Our proposals are based on the creation of a Budget for democratization which would be
debated and voted by a sovereign European Assembly. This will at last enable Europe to equip
itself with a public institution which is both capable of dealing with crises in Europe
immediately and of producing a set of fundamental public and social goods and services in the
framework of a lasting and solidarity-based economy. In this way, the promise made as far back
as the Treaty of Rome of 'improving living and working conditions' will finally become
meaningful.
This Budget, if the European Assembly so desires, will be financed by four major European
taxes, the tangible markers of this European solidarity. These will apply to the profits of
major firms, the top incomes (over 200,000 Euros per annum), the highest wealth owners (over 1
million Euros) and the carbon emissions (with a minimum price of 30 Euros per tonne). If it is
fixed at 4% of GDP, as we propose, this budget could finance research, training and the
European universities, an ambitious investment programme to transform our model of economic
growth, the financing of the reception and integration of migrants and the support of those
involved in operating the transformation. It could also give some budgetary leeway to member
States to reduce the regressive taxation which weighs on salaries or consumption.
The issue here is not one of creating a 'Transfer payments Europe' which would endeavour to
take money from the 'virtuous' countries to give it to those who are less so. The project for a
Treaty of Democratization ( www.tdem.eu )
states this explicitly by limiting the gap between expenditure deducted and income paid by a
country to a threshold of 0.1% of its GDP. This threshold can be raised in case there is a
consensus to do so, but the real issue is elsewhere: it is primarily a question of reducing the
inequality within the different countries and of investing in the future of
all Europeans, beginning of course with the youngest amongst them, with no
single country having preference. This computation does exclude spending that benefit
equally to all countries, such as policies to curb global warming. Because it will finance
European public goods benefiting all countries, the Budget for democratization will de facto
also foster convergence between countries.
Because we must act quickly but we must also get Europe out of the present technocratic
impasse, we propose the creation of a European Assembly. This will enable these new European
taxes to be debated and voted as also the budget for democratization. This European Assembly
can be created without changing the existing European treaties.
This European Assembly would of course have to communicate with the present decision-making
institutions (in particular the Eurogroup in which the Ministers for Finance in the Euro zone
meet informally every month). But, in cases of disagreement, the Assembly would have the
final word. If not, its capacity to be a locus for a new transnational, political
space where parties, social movements and NGOs would finally be able to express
themselves, would be compromised. Equally its actual effectiveness, since the issue is one of
finally extricating Europe from the eternal inertia of inter-governmental negotiations, would
be at stake. We should bear in mind that the rule of fiscal unanimity in force in the European
Union has for years blocked the adoption of any European tax and sustains the eternal evasion
into fiscal dumping by the rich and most mobile, a practice which continues to this day despite
all the speeches. This will go on if other decision-making rules are not set up.
"... What is neoliberalism? A programme for destroying collective structures which may impede the pure market logic. ..."
"... The movement toward the neoliberal utopia of a pure and perfect market is made possible by the politics of financial deregulation. And it is achieved through the transformative and, it must be said, destructive action of all of the political measures (of which the most recent is the Multilateral Agreement on Investment (MAI), designed to protect foreign corporations and their investments from national states) that aim to call into question any and all collective structures that could serve as an obstacle to the logic of the pure market: the nation, whose space to manoeuvre continually decreases; work groups, for example through the individualisation of salaries and of careers as a function of individual competences, with the consequent atomisation of workers; collectives for the defence of the rights of workers, unions, associations, cooperatives; even the family, which loses part of its control over consumption through the constitution of markets by age groups. ..."
"... The neoliberal programme draws its social power from the political and economic power of those whose interests it expresses: stockholders, financial operators, industrialists, conservative or social-democratic politicians who have been converted to the reassuring layoffs of laisser-faire, high-level financial officials eager to impose policies advocating their own extinction because, unlike the managers of firms, they run no risk of having eventually to pay the consequences. Neoliberalism tends on the whole to favour severing the economy from social realities and thereby constructing, in reality, an economic system conforming to its description in pure theory, that is a sort of logical machine that presents itself as a chain of constraints regulating economic agents. ..."
"... This structural violence also weighs on what is called the labour contract (wisely rationalised and rendered unreal by the "theory of contracts"). Organisational discourse has never talked as much of trust, co-operation, loyalty, and organisational culture as in an era when adherence to the organisation is obtained at each moment by eliminating all temporal guarantees of employment (three-quarters of hires are for fixed duration, the proportion of temporary employees keeps rising, employment "at will" and the right to fire an individual tend to be freed from any restriction). ..."
"... How could we not make a special place among these collectives, associations, unions, and parties for the state: the nation-state, or better yet the supranational state - a European state on the way toward a world state - capable of effectively controlling and taxing the profits earned in the financial markets and, above of all, of counteracting the destructive impact that the latter have on the labour market. This could be done with the aid of labour unions by organising the elaboration and defence of the public interest . Like it or not, the public interest will never emerge, even at the cost of a few mathematical errors, from the vision of accountants (in an earlier period one would have said of "shopkeepers") that the new belief system presents as the supreme form of human accomplishment. ..."
What is neoliberalism? A programme for destroying collective structures which may impede the pure market logic.
As the dominant discourse would have it, the economic world is a pure and perfect order, implacably unrolling the logic of its
predictable consequences, and prompt to repress all violations by the sanctions that it inflicts, either automatically or -- more
unusually -- through the intermediary of its armed extensions, the International Monetary Fund (IMF) and the Organization for Economic
Cooperation and Development (OECD) and the policies they impose: reducing labour costs, reducing public expenditures and making work
more flexible. Is the dominant discourse right? What if, in reality, this economic order were no more than the implementation of
a utopia - the utopia of neoliberalism - thus converted into a political problem ? One that, with the aid of the economic
theory that it proclaims, succeeds in conceiving of itself as the scientific description of reality?
This tutelary theory is a pure mathematical fiction. From the start it has been founded on a formidable abstraction. For, in the
name of a narrow and strict conception of rationality as individual rationality, it brackets the economic and social conditions of
rational orientations and the economic and social structures that are the condition of their application.
To give the measure of this omission, it is enough to think just of the educational system. Education is never taken account of
as such at a time when it plays a determining role in the production of goods and services as in the production of the producers
themselves. From this sort of original sin, inscribed in the Walrasian myth (
1 ) of "pure theory", flow all of the deficiencies and
faults of the discipline of economics and the fatal obstinacy with which it attaches itself to the arbitrary opposition which it
induces, through its mere existence, between a properly economic logic, based on competition and efficiency, and social logic, which
is subject to the rule of fairness.
That said, this "theory" that is desocialised and dehistoricised at its roots has, today more than ever, the means of making
itself true and empirically verifiable. In effect, neoliberal discourse is not just one discourse among many. Rather, it is a
"strong discourse" - the way psychiatric discourse is in an asylum, in Erving Goffman's analysis (
2 ) . It is so strong and so hard to combat only because
it has on its side all of the forces of a world of relations of forces, a world that it contributes to making what it is. It does
this most notably by orienting the economic choices of those who dominate economic relationships. It thus adds its own symbolic force
to these relations of forces. In the name of this scientific programme, converted into a plan of political action, an immense
political project is underway, although its status as such is denied because it appears to be purely negative. This project aims
to create the conditions under which the "theory" can be realised and can function: a programme of the methodical destruction
of collectives .
The movement toward the neoliberal utopia of a pure and perfect market is made possible by the politics of financial deregulation.
And it is achieved through the transformative and, it must be said, destructive action of all of the political measures (of
which the most recent is the Multilateral Agreement on Investment (MAI), designed to protect foreign corporations and their investments
from national states) that aim to call into question any and all collective structures that could serve as an obstacle to
the logic of the pure market: the nation, whose space to manoeuvre continually decreases; work groups, for example through the individualisation
of salaries and of careers as a function of individual competences, with the consequent atomisation of workers; collectives for the
defence of the rights of workers, unions, associations, cooperatives; even the family, which loses part of its control over consumption
through the constitution of markets by age groups.
The neoliberal programme draws its social power from the political and economic power of those whose interests it expresses:
stockholders, financial operators, industrialists, conservative or social-democratic politicians who have been converted to the reassuring
layoffs of laisser-faire, high-level financial officials eager to impose policies advocating their own extinction because, unlike
the managers of firms, they run no risk of having eventually to pay the consequences. Neoliberalism tends on the whole to favour
severing the economy from social realities and thereby constructing, in reality, an economic system conforming to its description
in pure theory, that is a sort of logical machine that presents itself as a chain of constraints regulating economic agents.
The globalisation of financial markets, when joined with the progress of information technology, ensures an unprecedented mobility
of capital. It gives investors concerned with the short-term profitability of their investments the possibility of permanently comparing
the profitability of the largest corporations and, in consequence, penalising these firms' relative setbacks. Subjected to this permanent
threat, the corporations themselves have to adjust more and more rapidly to the exigencies of the markets, under penalty of "losing
the market's confidence", as they say, as well as the support of their stockholders. The latter, anxious to obtain short-term profits,
are more and more able to impose their will on managers, using financial directorates to establish the rules under which managers
operate and to shape their policies regarding hiring, employment, and wages.
Thus the absolute reign of flexibility is established, with employees being hiring on fixed-term contracts or on a temporary basis
and repeated corporate restructurings and, within the firm itself, competition among autonomous divisions as well as among teams
forced to perform multiple functions. Finally, this competition is extended to individuals themselves, through the individualisation
of the wage relationship: establishment of individual performance objectives, individual performance evaluations, permanent evaluation,
individual salary increases or granting of bonuses as a function of competence and of individual merit; individualised career paths;
strategies of "delegating responsibility" tending to ensure the self-exploitation of staff who, simple wage labourers in relations
of strong hierarchical dependence, are at the same time held responsible for their sales, their products, their branch, their store,
etc. as though they were independent contractors. This pressure toward "self-control" extends workers' "involvement" according to
the techniques of "participative management" considerably beyond management level. All of these are techniques of rational domination
that impose over-involvement in work (and not only among management) and work under emergency or high-stress conditions. And they
converge to weaken or abolish collective standards or solidarities (
3 ) .
In this way, a Darwinian world emerges - it is the struggle of all against all at all levels of the hierarchy, which finds support
through everyone clinging to their job and organisation under conditions of insecurity, suffering, and stress. Without a doubt, the
practical establishment of this world of struggle would not succeed so completely without the complicity of all of the precarious
arrangements that produce insecurity and of the existence of a reserve army of employees rendered docile by these social processes
that make their situations precarious, as well as by the permanent threat of unemployment. This reserve army exists at all levels
of the hierarchy, even at the higher levels, especially among managers. The ultimate foundation of this entire economic order placed
under the sign of freedom is in effect the structural violence of unemployment, of the insecurity of job tenure and the menace
of layoff that it implies. The condition of the "harmonious" functioning of the individualist micro-economic model is a mass phenomenon,
the existence of a reserve army of the unemployed.
This structural violence also weighs on what is called the labour contract (wisely rationalised and rendered unreal by the
"theory of contracts"). Organisational discourse has never talked as much of trust, co-operation, loyalty, and organisational culture
as in an era when adherence to the organisation is obtained at each moment by eliminating all temporal guarantees of employment (three-quarters
of hires are for fixed duration, the proportion of temporary employees keeps rising, employment "at will" and the right to fire an
individual tend to be freed from any restriction).
Thus we see how the neoliberal utopia tends to embody itself in the reality of a kind of infernal machine, whose necessity imposes
itself even upon the rulers. Like the Marxism of an earlier time, with which, in this regard, it has much in common, this utopia
evokes powerful belief - the free trade faith - not only among those who live off it, such as financiers, the owners and managers
of large corporations, etc., but also among those, such as high-level government officials and politicians, who derive their justification
for existing from it. For they sanctify the power of markets in the name of economic efficiency, which requires the elimination of
administrative or political barriers capable of inconveniencing the owners of capital in their individual quest for the maximisation
of individual profit, which has been turned into a model of rationality. They want independent central banks. And they preach the
subordination of nation-states to the requirements of economic freedom for the masters of the economy, with the suppression of any
regulation of any market, beginning with the labour market, the prohibition of deficits and inflation, the general privatisation
of public services, and the reduction of public and social expenses.
Economists may not necessarily share the economic and social interests of the true believers and may have a variety of individual
psychic states regarding the economic and social effects of the utopia which they cloak with mathematical reason. Nevertheless, they
have enough specific interests in the field of economic science to contribute decisively to the production and reproduction of belief
in the neoliberal utopia. Separated from the realities of the economic and social world by their existence and above all by their
intellectual formation, which is most frequently purely abstract, bookish, and theoretical, they are particularly inclined to confuse
the things of logic with the logic of things.
These economists trust models that they almost never have occasion to submit to the test of experimental verification and are
led to look down upon the results of the other historical sciences, in which they do not recognise the purity and crystalline transparency
of their mathematical games, whose true necessity and profound complexity they are often incapable of understanding. They participate
and collaborate in a formidable economic and social change. Even if some of its consequences horrify them (they can join the socialist
party and give learned counsel to its representatives in the power structure), it cannot displease them because, at the risk of a
few failures, imputable to what they sometimes call "speculative bubbles", it tends to give reality to the ultra-logical utopia (ultra-logical
like certain forms of insanity) to which they consecrate their lives.
And yet the world is there, with the immediately visible effects of the implementation of the great neoliberal utopia: not only
the poverty of an increasingly large segment of the most economically advanced societies, the extraordinary growth in income differences,
the progressive disappearance of autonomous universes of cultural production, such as film, publishing, etc. through the intrusive
imposition of commercial values, but also and above all two major trends. First is the destruction of all the collective institutions
capable of counteracting the effects of the infernal machine, primarily those of the state, repository of all of the universal values
associated with the idea of the public realm . Second is the imposition everywhere, in the upper spheres of the economy and
the state as at the heart of corporations, of that sort of moral Darwinism that, with the cult of the winner, schooled in higher
mathematics and bungee jumping, institutes the struggle of all against all and cynicism as the norm of all action and behaviour.
Can it be expected that the extraordinary mass of suffering produced by this sort of political-economic regime will one day serve
as the starting point of a movement capable of stopping the race to the abyss? Indeed, we are faced here with an extraordinary paradox.
The obstacles encountered on the way to realising the new order of the lone, but free individual are held today to be imputable to
rigidities and vestiges. All direct and conscious intervention of whatever kind, at least when it comes from the state, is discredited
in advance and thus condemned to efface itself for the benefit of a pure and anonymous mechanism, the market, whose nature as a site
where interests are exercised is forgotten. But in reality, what keeps the social order from dissolving into chaos, despite the growing
volume of the endangered population, is the continuity or survival of those very institutions and representatives of the old order
that is in the process of being dismantled, and all the work of all of the categories of social workers, as well as all the forms
of social solidarity, familial or otherwise.
The transition to "liberalism" takes place in an imperceptible manner, like continental drift, thus hiding its effects from view.
Its most terrible consequences are those of the long term. These effects themselves are concealed, paradoxically, by the resistance
to which this transition is currently giving rise among those who defend the old order by drawing on the resources it contained,
on old solidarities, on reserves of social capital that protect an entire portion of the present social order from falling into anomie.
This social capital is fated to wither away - although not in the short run - if it is not renewed and reproduced.
But these same forces of "conservation", which it is too easy to treat as conservative, are also, from another point of view,
forces of resistance to the establishment of the new order and can become subversive forces. If there is still cause for some
hope, it is that forces still exist, both in state institutions and in the orientations of social actors (notably individuals and
groups most attached to these institutions, those with a tradition of civil and public service) that, under the appearance of simply
defending an order that has disappeared and its corresponding "privileges" (which is what they will immediately be accused of), will
be able to resist the challenge only by working to invent and construct a new social order. One that will not have as its only law
the pursuit of egoistic interests and the individual passion for profit and that will make room for collectives oriented toward the
rational pursuit of ends collectively arrived at and collectively ratified .
How could we not make a special place among these collectives, associations, unions, and parties for the state: the nation-state,
or better yet the supranational state - a European state on the way toward a world state - capable of effectively controlling and
taxing the profits earned in the financial markets and, above of all, of counteracting the destructive impact that the latter have
on the labour market. This could be done with the aid of labour unions by organising the elaboration and defence of the public
interest . Like it or not, the public interest will never emerge, even at the cost of a few mathematical errors, from the vision
of accountants (in an earlier period one would have said of "shopkeepers") that the new belief system presents as the supreme form
of human accomplishment.
Pierre Bourdieu. Professor at the Collčge de France Translated by Jeremy J. Shapiro
( 1 ) Auguste Walras (1800-66), French economist,
author of De la nature de la richesse et de l'origine de la valeur ("On the Nature of Wealth and on the Origin of Value")(1848).
He was one of the first to attempt to apply mathematics to economic inquiry.
( 2 ) Erving Goffman. 1961. Asylums: Essays on
the Social Situation of Mental Patients and Other Inmates . New York: Aldine de Gruyter.
( 3 ) See the two journal issues devoted to "Nouvelles
formes de domination dans le travail" ("New forms of domination in work"), Actes de la recherche en sciences sociales , nos.
114, September 1996, and 115, December 1996, especially the introduction by Gabrielle Balazs and Michel Pialoux, "Crise du travail
et crise du politique" & Work crisis and political crisis, no. 114: p.3-4.
After the US government elicited outrage from the Chinese due to its attempts to convince
its allies to bar the use of equipment made by telecoms supplier Huawei, President Trump is
apparently weighing whether to take another dramatic antagonistic step that could further
complicate trade negotiations less than two weeks before a US delegation is slated to head to
Beijing.
According to
Reuters , the White House is reportedly considering an executive order that would ban US
companies from using equipment made by Huawei and ZTE, claiming that both companies work "at
the behest of the US government" and that their equipment could be used to spy on US citizens.
The order would invoke the International Emergency Economic Powers Act to order the Department
of Commerce to prohibit the purchase of equipment from telecoms manufacturers that could
threaten national security. Though it wouldn't explicitly name Huawei or ZTE, the ban would
arise from Commerce's interpretation. The IEEA allows the president the authority to regulate
commerce in the face of a national emergency. Back in August, Congress passed and Trump signed
a bill banning the use of ZTE and Huawei equipment by the US government and government
contractors. The executive order has reportedly been under consideration for eight months,
since around the time that the US nearly blocked US companies from selling parts to ZTE, which
sparked a mini-diplomatic crisis, which
ended with a deal allowing ZTE to survive, but pay a large fine.
The feud between the US and Huawei has obviously been escalating in recent months as the US
has embarked on an
"extraordinary influence campaign" to convince its allies to ban equipment made by both
companies, and the arrest of Huawei CFO Meng Wanzhou in Canada has also blossomed into a
diplomatic crisis of sorts.
But the real reason issuing a ban on both companies' equipment is seen as a priority is
because Huawei's lead in the race to build 5G technology is making its products more appealing
to global telecoms providers. Rural telecoms providers in the US - those with fewer than
100,000 subscribers - are particularly reliant on equipment made by both companies. They've
expressed concerns that a ban would require them to rip out and scrap their equipment at an
immense cost.
Rural operators in the United States are among the biggest customers of Huawei and ZTE,
and fear the executive order would also require them to rip out existing Chinese-made
equipment without compensation. Industry officials are divided on whether the administration
could legally compel operators to do that.
While the big U.S. wireless companies have cut ties with Huawei in particular, small rural
carriers have relied on Huawei and ZTE switches and other equipment because they tend to be
less expensive.
The company is so central to small carriers that William Levy, vice president for sales of
Huawei Tech USA, is on the board of directors of the Rural Wireless Association.
The RWA represents carriers with fewer than 100,000 subscribers. It estimates that 25
percent of its members had Huawei or ZTE equipment in their networks, it said in a filing to
the Federal Communications Commission earlier this month.
As Sputnik
pointed out, the news of the possible ban followed questions from Defense Secretary Gavin
Williamson, who expressed serious concerns over the involvement of Huawei in Britain's 5G
network, suggesting that Beijing sometimes acted "in a malign way." But even if it loses access
to the US market, Huawei's global expansion and its leadership in the 5G space are expected to
continue to bolster profits and growth. Currently, Huawei sells equipment in 170 countries.
According to a statement from the company's rotating chairman, the company's full-year sales
are expected to increase 21% to $108.5 billion this year. The company has signed 26 contracts
globally to supply 5G equipment for commercial use, leaving it well ahead of its US rivals.
"... Her targets range from pharmaceutical companies, which uphold a heartless version of market rationality, to internet companies with monopoly power such as Google and Facebook. Her most compelling example, however, is the workings of the financial sector, and its Friedman-style obsession with "shareholder value maximization," which has infected the corporate sector as a whole. ..."
"... Reading Mazzucato's book, it is hard not to wonder just how "neoliberal" ideas and values, which uphold the rationality of the market and exclude notions of the common good, came to shape the conduct of individuals and institutions. ..."
"... In these narratives, neoliberalism appears indistinguishable from laissez-faire. In " Globalists : The End of Empire and the Birth of Neoliberalism," Quinn Slobodian briskly overturns this commonplace view. Neoliberals, he argues, are people who believe that "the market does not and cannot take care of itself," and indeed neoliberalism is a form of regulation -- one that insulates the markets from vagaries of mass democracy and economic nationalism. ..."
Ideas once dismissed as the ravings of the loony left are breaking into the mainstream of economic and intellectual debate. We live
in an age of political earthquakes: That much, at least, seemed clear from newspaper headlines nearly every day of 2018. But intellectual
tectonic plates were also shifting throughout the year, with ideas once dismissed as the ravings of the loony left breaking into
the mainstream.
A Western consensus quickly formed after the collapse of communist regimes in 1989. It was widely believed by newspaper editorialists
as well as politicians and businessmen that there was no alternative to free markets, which alone could create prosperity.
The government's traditional attempts to regulate corporations and banks and redistribute wealth through taxes were deemed a problem.
As the economist Milton Friedman
put it , "The
world runs on individuals pursuing their separate interests."
Neither individuals nor companies needed to worry much about inequality or social justice. In Friedman's influential view, "There
is one and only one social responsibility of business -- to use its resources and engage in activities designed to increase its profits."
Political fiascos in the West, following its largest financial crisis -- events accompanied by the emergence of China, a Communist-run
nation-state, as a major economic power, as well as an unfolding environmental calamity -- have utterly devastated these post-1989
assumptions about free markets and the role of governments.
Confessions to this effect come routinely from disenchanted believers. Take, for instance, Olivier Blanchard, former chief economist
of the International Monetary Fund, who recently posed the once-blasphemous question: "What comes after capitalism?"
Blanchard was commenting on the recent demonstrations in France against President Emmanuel Macron. He
rightly described a global impasse: "Given
the political constraints on redistribution and the constraints from capital mobility, we may just not be able to alleviate inequality
and insecurity enough to prevent populism and revolutions."
Nor, for that matter, can we work towards a greener economy. In any case, Blanchard's admission confirms that we inhabit, intellectually
and culturally, a radical new reality -- one in which "neoliberalism," a word previously confined to academic seminars, has entered
rap lyrics , and stalwarts of the establishment
sound like activists of Occupy Wall Street.
Thus, Martin Wolf, respected columnist for the Financial Times, recently
concluded , if "reluctantly," that
"capitalism is substantially broken." This year, many books with titles such as "The Myth of Capitalism: Monopolies and the Death
of Competition" and "Winners Take All: The Elite Charade of Changing the World" blamed an unjust economic system and its beneficiaries
for the rise of demagogues.
It is becoming clear that the perennial conflict between democracy, which promises equality, and capitalism, which generates inequality,
has been aggravated by a systemic neglect of some fundamental issues.
In " The Value of
Everything : Making and Taking in the Global Economy," Mariana Mazzucato bracingly focuses our attention on them. Mazzucato
has previously written about the innovative role of governments in the modern economy. In her new book, she asks us to distinguish
between people who create value and those who merely extract it, often destroying it in the process.
Her targets range from pharmaceutical companies, which uphold a heartless version of market rationality, to internet companies
with monopoly power such as Google and Facebook. Her most compelling example, however, is the workings of the financial sector, and
its Friedman-style obsession with "shareholder value maximization," which has infected the corporate sector as a whole.
Reading Mazzucato's book, it is hard not to wonder just how "neoliberal" ideas and values, which uphold the rationality of the
market and exclude notions of the common good, came to shape the conduct of individuals and institutions.
In the conventional account of neoliberalism, Friedman looms large, along with his disciple Ronald Reagan, and Britain's Margaret
Thatcher. Much has been written about how the IMF's structural adjustment programs in Asia and Africa, and "shock-therapy" for post-Communist
states, entrenched orthodoxies about deregulation and privatization.
In these narratives, neoliberalism appears indistinguishable from laissez-faire. In "
Globalists : The
End of Empire and the Birth of Neoliberalism," Quinn Slobodian briskly overturns this commonplace view. Neoliberals, he argues, are
people who believe that "the market does not and cannot take care of itself," and indeed neoliberalism is a form of regulation --
one that insulates the markets from vagaries of mass democracy and economic nationalism.
Beginning with the breakup of the Hapsburg Empire, Slobodian's lucidly written intellectual history traces the ideas of a group
of Western thinkers who sought to create, against a backdrop of anarchy, globally applicable economic rules.
Their attempt, it turns out, succeeded all too well in our own time. We stand in the ruins of their project, confronting political,
economic and environmental crises of unprecedented scale and size.
It is imperative to chart our way out of them, steering clear of the diversions offered by political demagogues. One can only
hope that the new year will bring more intellectual heresies of the kind Mazzucato's and Slobodian's books embody. We need them urgently
to figure out what comes after neoliberalism.
"... The political strategy behind these contradictions is simple: it is difficult to criticise government spending on health and education, or popular regulations like consumer protection and limits on executive pay. So why not just criticise all government spending and all ..."
After the mining boom and decades of economic growth, how can Australia be broke?
Gina Rinehart was becoming the world's richest woman those on the minimum wage were falling further and
further behind
Australia just experienced one of the biggest mining booms in
world history. But even at the peak of that boom, there was no talk of the wonderful opportunity we finally had to invest in world-class
mental health or domestic violence crisis services.
Nor was there much talk from either major party about how the wealth of the
mining boom gave us a once-in-a-generation opportunity to invest in remote Indigenous communities. Nope, the peak of the mining boom
was not the time to help those who had missed out in decades past, but the Howard government thought it was a great time to introduce
permanent tax cuts for high-income earners. These, of course, are the tax cuts that caused the budget deficits we have today.
Millions of tonnes of explosives were used during the mining boom to build more than 100 new mines, but it wasn't just prime farmland
that was blasted away in the boom, it was access to the middle class. At the same time that Gina Rinehart was becoming the world's
richest woman on the back of rising iron ore prices, those on the minimum wage were falling further and further behind their fellow
Australians.
Like Joe Hockey, Rinehart saw the problem of inequality as having more to do with the character of the poor than
with the rules of the game: "If you're jealous of those with more money, don't just sit there and complain. Do something
to make more money yourself – spend less time drinking or smoking and socialising, and more time working."
Privatisation is deeply unpopular with voters. Here's how to end it | John Quiggin
Australia isn't poor; it is rich beyond the imagining of anyone living in the 1970s or 80s. But so much of that
new wealth has been vacuumed up by a few, and so little of that new wealth has been paid in tax, that the public has
been convinced that ours is a country struggling to pay its bills.
Convincing Australians that our nation is poor and that our governments "can't afford" to provide the level of services they provided
in the past has not just helped to lower our expectations of our public services and infrastructure, it has helped to lower our expectations
of democracy itself. A public school in Sydney has had to ban kids from running in the playground because it was so overcrowded.
Trains have become so crowded at peak hours that many people, especially the frail and the disabled, are reluctant to use them. And
those who have lost their jobs now wait for hours on the phone when they reach out to Centrelink for help.
Although people with low expectations are easier to con, fomenting cynicism about democracy comes at a long-term cost. Indeed,
as the current crop of politicians is beginning to discover, people with low expectations feel they have nothing to lose.
As more and more people live with the poverty and job insecurity that flow directly from neoliberal welfare and industrial relations
policies, the scare campaigns run so successfully by the likes of the Business Council of Australia have lost their sting. Scary
stories about the economy become like car alarms: once they attracted attention, but now they simply annoy those forced to listen.
'If governments can't make a difference and all politicians are corrupt, why not vote for outsiders?
After decades of hearing conservative politicians say that government is the problem, a growing number of conservative
voters no longer care which major party forms government. If governments can't make a difference and all politicians
are corrupt, why not vote for outsiders like Jacqui Lambie or Clive Palmer? There is perhaps no clearer evidence of
the short-termism of the Liberal and National parties today than their willingness to fan the flames of anti-politician
rhetoric without considering that it is their own voters who are most likely to heed the message.
Back when he was leading the campaign against Australia becoming a republic, Tony Abbott famously argued that you couldn't trust
politicians to choose our head of state. And more recently, in campaigning against marriage equality, Minister Matt Canavan was featured
in a television advertisement laughing at the thought that we could trust politicians.
Neoliberalism: the idea that swallowed the world
Convincing Australians that the country was broke also helped convince us that we have no choice but to sell the
family silver. But of course we have a choice. Just as there is no right answer as to whether it's better to rent
a home or buy one, there is no right answer to whether it's better for governments to own the electricity supply,
the postal service or the water supply, or none of these things.
Different governments in different countries make different decisions at different points in time. While much of neoliberalism's
rhetorical power comes from the assertion that "there is no alternative," the simple fact is that the world is full of alternatives.
Indeed, even the so-called free marketeers in Australia can see alternatives.
Consider stadiums, for example. The NSW Liberal government has a long track record of being pro-privatisation. It has sold off
billions of dollars' worth of electricity, water and health infrastructure. But when it comes to football stadiums, it has no ideological
problem with public ownership, nor any fiscal inhibition about spending billions of taxpayers' dollars.
In 2016 the NSW Liberal government spent $220m buying back ANZ Stadium, built in the 1990s with taxpayer funds at a cost of $690m
and subsequently sold to Stadium Australia Group. Having bought back the stadium, the NSW government plans to spend hundreds of millions
of dollars refurbishing it. That same money could build a lot of school science labs, domestic violence crisis centres or skate parks
for the bored kids the shopping malls don't want scratching up their marble stairs. For the past 30 years, Australians have been
told that we can't afford high-quality public services, that public ownership of assets is inefficient, and that the pursuit of free
markets through deregulation would create wealth and prosperity for all. But none of this is true.
While the policy agenda
of neoliberalism has never been broadly applied in Australia, for 30 years the language
of neoliberalism has been applied to everything from environmental protection to care of the disabled. The result of the partial
application of policy and the broad application of language is not just a yawning gap between those with the greatest wealth and
those with the greatest need, but a country that is now riven by demographic, geographic and racial divides.
Cutting the budget deficit is very important – except when it isn't
Australian politics
isn't about ideology, it's about interests. The clearest proof of that claim is that neoliberal ideas such
as deregulation were never aimed at powerful interest groups like the pharmacists or the gambling industry. And savage spending cuts
were never aimed at subsidies for the fossil-fuel industry or private health insurers.
Tony Abbott, who claimed to have a philosophical problem with carbon taxing, once proposed a 20% increase in the tobacco excise
Just as conservative Christian theology provides an excuse for sexism and homophobia, neoliberal language allows
powerful groups to package their personal preferences as national interests – systematically cutting spending on their
enemies and giving money to their friends. Here are some examples:
John Howard said he was obsessed with deregulating the labour market, but introduced 762 pages of labour-market regulation,
which he entitled WorkChoices. He didn't deregulate the labour market; he re-regulated it in his preferred form. He knew that
government decisions matter. Similarly, the Abbott government declared it was waging a war on red tape, yet the Turnbull government
is determined to pass new laws restricting unions and NGOs.
If there is one thing that neoliberals really seem to believe, it is that reducing the budget deficit is very, very important.
Except when it isn't. The political and business leaders who said we needed to slash welfare spending because we had a "budget
emergency" are currently advocating a $65bn tax cut for business – even though the deficit is bigger now than it was at the
time of the alleged emergency.
The Productivity Commission and state treasuries spent years advocating the deregulation and privatisation of the electricity
industry – and succeeded in creating a "free market" system governed by 5,000 pages of electricity market rules. Electricity
is too dangerous and too important to be deregulated, and those pushing for deregulation always knew that. They didn't want
a free market; they simply wanted a market, one in which the government played a smaller role and the private sector made large
profits selling an essential service for much higher prices than the government ever charged.
The NSW government requires NGOs and disability service providers to compete with each other but, when it sold Port Botany
and the Port of Newcastle, it structured the sales to ensure that Newcastle could not compete with Port Botany for the landing
of the millions of containers that arrive by ship each year. While "competition policy" is applied to the vulnerable, those
buying billion-dollar assets are protected from those same forces of competition.
To be clear, there has been no obsession among the political elite with the neoliberal goals of reducing government spending,
regulation or tax collection in Australia over the past three decades. None. They didn't mean a word of it. While there may have
been economists, commentators and even business leaders who sincerely believed in those goals, it is clear from their actions, as
distinct from their words, that John Howard, Tony Abbott and even the former head of the Business Council of Australia Tony Shepherd,
the man tasked with running Abbott's National Commission of Audit, had no principled objection to spending large amounts of public
money on things they liked spending large amounts of public money on. Indeed, in his speakers' agency profile, Tony Shepherd brags
about his ability to get public money for private ventures:
It is no mean feat to convince governments to support private sector proposals, but as former prime minister, the honourable
Paul Keating, said, "Tony managed to get more money out of my government than any other person I can recall."
Hundreds of new pages of regulation now govern the conduct of charities. Billions of taxpayers' dollars have been spent by "small
government" politicians on everything from television ads for innovation to subsidies for marriage counselling. And Tony Abbott,
who claimed to have a philosophical problem with carbon taxing, once proposed a 20% increase in the tobacco excise.
The political strategy behind these contradictions is simple: it is difficult to criticise government spending on health and education,
or popular regulations like consumer protection and limits on executive pay. So why not just criticise all government spending and
all
red tape in general? Once you have convinced the public that all government spending is inefficient, you can set about
cutting spending on your enemies and retaining it for your friends. And once you convince people that all regulation is bad, you
can set about removing consumer protections while retaining the laws that protect the TV industry, the gambling industry, the pharmaceutical
industry and all your other friends.
Cover of Dead Right by Richard Denniss, Quarterly Essay.
When powerful groups want subsidies, we are told they will create jobs. When powerless groups want better funding
for domestic violence shelters or after-school reading groups, they are told of the need to reduce the budget deficit.
When powerful groups demand new regulations, we are told it will provide business with certainty, but when powerless
groups demand new regulations, they are told it will create sovereign risk.
Ideology has a bad name these days, but it simply means a "system of ideas and ideals." By that definition, it is possible to
think of neoliberalism as an ideology focused on the idea that market forces are superior to government decision-making. But while
large segments of Australian politics and business have draped themselves, and their policy preferences, in the cloak of neoliberal
ideas and ideals, in reality to call them "ideologues" is to flatter them. They lack the consistency and strength of principle to
warrant the title.
Tue 16 Oct 2018
13.00 EDT
Last modified on Tue 16 Oct 2018
19.11 EDT
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Australian economic growth has been a 'standout' says Bernie Fraser, but too many have missed the benefits.
Photograph: Tracey Nearmy/EPA
Neoliberalism has caused "misery and social polarisation" yet remains in vogue with the Coalition government,
according to the economist Bernie Fraser.
The former Treasury secretary and Reserve Bank governor has made the
comments in a presentation circulated to participants of the Australia Institute's revenue summit to be held in
Canberra on Wednesday.
Michael Keating, a former secretary to the Department of the Prime Minister and Cabinet, will also use the summit
to raise doubts about the Morrison government's budget forecasts.
Australia's housing boom is not heading for a soft landing. How did we get
here? | Greg Jericho
Read more
In the background notes for Fraser's speech, seen by Guardian Australia, he says that Australia's 27 consecutive
years of economic growth is a "standout", "Winx-like" performance.
But the record deserves only "qualified applause" because "too many Australians remain unemployed, under-employed,
underskilled, underpaid and lack job security".
Fraser warns that society has become "less fair, less compassionate and more divided" and "more devoid of trust in
almost every field of human activity" in the past 20 years.
"As a disinterested player in climate change negotiations and a miserable foreign aid donor, we have slipped well
down the list of good global citizens."
Political ideologies appear to have contributed to inequality and disadvantage in Australia in that time, he
argues.
Fraser in large part blames "neoliberalism" and its influence on policymaking for the "disconnect between
Australia's impressive economic growth story and its failure on so many markers to show progress towards a better,
fairer society".
"Favouring the market system ahead of the state system, and individual interests ahead of community interests, can
lead to profoundly unfair social outcomes.
More than three million Australians living in poverty, Acoss report reveals
Read more
"Those unable to afford access to decent standards of housing, healthcare, and other essential services have to
settle for inferior arrangements, or go without."
Fraser says charitable organisations see the effects of "real poverty" that result in "misery, anxiety and loss of
self-esteem of mothers unable to put food on the table for their kids, of old and young homeless people, and the
victims of domestic violence and drug overdoses".
Fraser summarises the key thrusts of neoliberalism as "the pursuit of the lowest possible rates of income and most
other taxes and the maximum restraint on government interventions and spending programs".
Evidence in Australia and overseas shows the influence of neoliberalism on fiscal policy "and the misery and
social polarisation that has come with it", he says.
The global financial crisis "should have" marked a tipping point, when the "idealised view of financial markets
being self-regulating" was shattered. While Australia "avoided the worst traumas of the GFC" with prompt fiscal and
monetary policy responses, in Europe "taxes were increased and spending programs slashed", resulting in a further
five or six years of severe recession.
Fraser says that all political ideologies – taken to extremes – can be divisive and cause damage, including an
ideology "based on a state system".
But the former Reserve Bank governor focuses on neoliberalism because it "remains in vogue". The Morrison
government "continues to reaffirm its over-riding commitment to lower taxation, and to assert that this is the best
way to increase investment, jobs and economic growth" -
despite the lack of evidence to support the theory
.
Although Fraser recognises that politics never can or should be taken out of policymaking, he suggests the best
course is to "hammer away" at flaws of particular approaches.
In a separate presentation Keating – who headed PM&C from 1991 to 1996 – warns the government's promise to cap
expenditure while simultaneously cutting taxes and returning the budget to surplus is based on overly optimistic
assumptions of growth in GDP, wages and productivity.
Why are stock markets falling and how far will they go?
Read more
According to Keating, the government must stop assuming there have been no structural changes in the relationship
between unemployment and the rate of wage increases.
He notes that predictions of a tightening labour market leading to higher wages are predicated on assumptions of
growth averaging 3% or as much as 3.5%.
He will also say a sustained return to past rates of economic growth will be impossible unless we can ensure a
reasonably equitable distribution of income, involving a faster rate of wage increases, especially for the low-paid.
The hypothesis is that due to emergence of mutual funds and other financial instruments the capitalist class became more
homogeneous in its interests and more united with financial oligarchy.
Notable quotes:
"... In such a situation there were significant divisions within the capitalist class that attenuated its overall political clout. Industries divided according to policy preferences, and political parties, which were essentially interest group coalitions, attracted different segments of this class. (In the US the Republicans were just as much an interest group coalition as the Democrats, just different interests like small retail business, domestic mining, nonunion manufacturing, etc.) Public policy in this dispensation, whatever its ostensible justification, reflected sectoral influence. ..."
"... Since the early 1970s capital ownership has become substantially more fungible in every respect. Equity funds of various sorts established themselves as institutional players, allowing individual capitalists to diversify via investment in these funds. Regulatory restrictions on capital movements were dismantled or bypassed. New information technology dramatically reduced (but not eliminated!) the fog of all financial markets. ..."
"... The other side of the coin was political influence over ideas. Intellectuals who advanced the positions we now call neoliberal were rewarded with research funding, jobs and influence over government policy. ..."
"... Lending conditionality reproduced in developing countries the same incentives that had shifted the intellectual environment in the core capitalist world. ..."
"... This hypothesis -- and it's important to be clear that's what it is -- also gives us an explanation for why the 2008 crisis, while it did provoke a lot of reconsideration by intellectuals -- did not result in meaningful institutional or policy change: the underlying political economic factors were unaltered . And it implies that further intellectual work, necessary as it is, will not be enough to extricate us from the shackles of neoliberal political constraints. For that we need to contest the power that undergirds them. ..."
"... The alliance (in the US, the focus of my comments) of the monied interests, providing the financial resources and seeking the repeal of the social and fiscal policies of the New Deal, and the heavily Southern-based evangelical/religious right, providing the voting bloc and seeking to turn back the progress of minorities and women in achieving more equal social and political rights -- created the powerful political base from which the revisionist onslaught was mounted. Reagan then provided the smiling face to sell the proposition that "government isn't the solution to your problems; government IS the problem" that effectively neutered the one institution capable of regulating the monied interests. ..."
"... Neoliberalism is a dialectic between them more than it has been a fixed doctrine. The remarkable power and resistance to outside critique is attributable to the insular nature of that dialectic. ..."
"... Where we are -- neoliberalism triumphant albeit spent ..."
A standard narrative is that the Keynesian postwar order cracked up over the crisis of inflation during the mid-1970s. A conservative
alternative that trusted markets more and government less was vindicated by events and established its intellectual dominance. After
a lag of a few years, policy followed along. One can critique this on matters of detail: economic growth remained stronger during
the 70s than it would be thereafter, anti-Keynesians did not have a superior understanding of economic developments, and no intellectual
revolution was complete within the space of just a few years. But the deeper problem, it seems to me, is that this attributes vastly
exaggerated agency to coteries of intellectuals. Do we really think that the elections of Reagan and Thatcher, for instance, were
attributable to a shift in grad school syllabi in economics and related fields?
I propose an alternative hypothesis. From the end of WWII to the collapse of the Bretton Woods monetary system, a large portion
of capital was illiquid, its value tied to its existing use. The rich sought to diversify their portfolios, of course, but there
were limits. Stock market transactions were beclouded by large information costs, and share ownership tended to be more stable and
concentrated. Fortunes were rooted in specific firms and industries. In such a situation there were significant divisions within
the capitalist class that attenuated its overall political clout. Industries divided according to policy preferences, and political
parties, which were essentially interest group coalitions, attracted different segments of this class. (In the US the Republicans
were just as much an interest group coalition as the Democrats, just different interests like small retail business, domestic mining,
nonunion manufacturing, etc.) Public policy in this dispensation, whatever its ostensible justification, reflected sectoral influence.
Since the early 1970s capital ownership has become substantially more fungible in every respect. Equity funds of various sorts
established themselves as institutional players, allowing individual capitalists to diversify via investment in these funds. Regulatory
restrictions on capital movements were dismantled or bypassed. New information technology dramatically reduced (but not eliminated!)
the fog of all financial markets. And firms themselves became separable bundles of assets as new technology and business methods
allowed for more integrated production across ownership lines. The combined result is a capitalist class with more uniform interests
-- an interest in a higher profit share of income and greater freedom for capital in every respect.
The crisis in real returns to
capital during the 1970s, the true economic instigator, galvanized this reorganization of the political economy. (In the US the S&P
peaked in 1972 and then lost almost half its inflation-adjusted value by the end of the decade. This is not an artifact of business
cycle timing.)
Of course, all understanding of the world is mediated by the way we think about it. The wealthy didn't say to themselves, "Gee,
my assets are taking a hit, so the government needs to change course." They turned to dissident, conservative thinkers who explained
the "failures" of the 70s as the result of too little concern for the engine of growth, which (of course) was understood to be private
investment. Market-friendly policy would, it was said, reinvigorate investment and spur economic growth. Keynesianism was seen as
having failed because it took investors for granted, taxing and regulating them and competing with them for finance; politicians
needed to show respect. It's understandable why capitalists would interpret their problems in this way.
The other side of the coin was political influence over ideas. Intellectuals who advanced the positions we now call neoliberal
were rewarded with research funding, jobs and influence over government policy. When the World Bank and the IMF were remade in the
wake of the 1982 debt crisis, this influence was extended internationally. Lending conditionality reproduced in developing countries
the same incentives that had shifted the intellectual environment in the core capitalist world.
This hypothesis -- and it's important to be clear that's what it is -- also gives us an explanation for why the 2008 crisis,
while it did provoke a lot of reconsideration by intellectuals -- did not result in meaningful institutional or policy change:
the underlying political economic
factors were unaltered . And it implies that further intellectual work, necessary as it is, will not be enough to extricate us
from the shackles of neoliberal political constraints. For that we need to contest the power that undergirds them.
The alliance (in the US, the focus of my comments) of the monied interests, providing the financial resources and seeking
the repeal of the social and fiscal policies of the New Deal, and the heavily Southern-based evangelical/religious right, providing
the voting bloc and seeking to turn back the progress of minorities and women in achieving more equal social and political rights
-- created the powerful political base from which the revisionist onslaught was mounted. Reagan then provided the smiling face
to sell the proposition that "government isn't the solution to your problems; government IS the problem" that effectively neutered
the one institution capable of regulating the monied interests.
An interesting discussion of the roots, differences and similarities between neoliberalism and ordoliberalism. And believe it
or not, the many comments raise some interesting points. Only one real gaslighting comment.
One thing Barkley said should be repeated: neoliberalism has opposing poles quite a distance apart. Neoliberalism is a dialectic
between them more than it has been a fixed doctrine. The remarkable power and resistance to outside critique is attributable to
the insular nature of that dialectic. The neoliberal right has chosen its interlocutors, the centrist "left" very well, which
is an important reason that the non-neoliberal real Left is emerging now from the sojurn in the politics of cultural critique
where it went in the 1960's with no knowledge or interest in economics.
It does not take a genius to see that human civilization and the natural ecology can only survive if people somehow manage
to produce a rational architecture for political economy deliberately and on an unprecedented scale and level of sophistication.
Where we are -- neoliberalism triumphant albeit spent and a Left at peak consciousness -- is exactly the wrong place to be in
the political cycle.
Michael Greenwood , Geoff Naylor and David Murray on the failures of economic policy
While agreeing with the thrust of Paul Mason's article (
A new politics of emotion is needed to beat the far right , Journal, 26 November), it is
surely necessary to employ economics if we are to defeat neoliberalism. We have lived under
this regime, with increasing severity, for 25 years or so. The result has been the stagnation
of real incomes for the large majority, with the benefits of GDP growth accruing to those at
the top of income and wealth distributions. This has suppressed growth, as those with less
money tend to spend it and those with more hide it and avoid tax. Lower UK growth is clearly
shown in comparative data.
So if neoliberalism is a school of economics, it is a failure if the aim of economic policy
is to encourage growth and the reinvestment of the benefits. Of course, neoliberalism is not
economics, it is political dogma, supported by its beneficiaries. We need economics
undergraduates to demand to be taught real economics and not the propaganda of power that is
neoliberalism.
Michael Greenwood Manchester
• In his search for a political narrative of economic hope to counteract the rise of
rightwing populism, Paul Mason overlooks the sense of belonging that exists in faith
communities. Here, a selfless collaboration for the inclusive good of one another has never
required disruption of the free-market economy. It is just that this ethos has not been
introduced at the national economic and political levels.
Geoff Naylor Winchester, Hampshire
• All suffered the same 2007-08 financial crash, but the "UK has weakest wage growth of
wealthy nations" ( Report
, 27 November). Anything to do with Tory-led government economic policy?
David Murray Wallington, Surrey
For 40 years, the ideology popularly known as "neoliberalism" has dominated political decision-making in the English-speaking
west.
People hate
it . Neoliberalism's sale of state assets, offshored jobs, stripped services, poorly-invested infrastructure and armies of the
forcibly unemployed have delivered, not promised "efficiency" and "flexibility" to communities, but discomfort and misery. The wealth
of a few has now swelled to a level of conspicuousness that must politely be considered
vulgar
yet the philosophy's entrenched itself so deeply in how governments make decisions and allocate resources that one of its megaphones
once declared its triumph "the end of history".
... ... ...
Paul Keating's rejection
It was a year ago that a third sign first appeared, when the dark horse of Australian prime ministers, Paul Keating, made public
an on-balance rejection of neoliberal economics. Although Liberal PM Malcolm Fraser instigated Australia's first neoliberal policies,
it was Keating's architecture of privatisation and deregulation as a Labor treasurer and prime minister that's most well remembered.
Now, "we have a comatose world economy held together by debt and central bank money," Keating has said, "Liberal economics has run
into a dead end and has had no answer to the contemporary malaise." What does the disavowal mean? In terms of his Labor heir Bill Shorten's growing appetite for redistributive taxation and close relationship to the union movement, it means "if Bill Shorten becomes
PM, the rule of engagement between labour and capital will be rewritten," according to The Australian this week. Can't wait!
Tony
Abbott becomes a fan of nationalising assets
Or maybe's Sukkar's right about the socialists termiting his beloved Liberal party. How else to explain the earthquake-like paradigm
shift represented by the sixth sign? Since when do neoliberal conservatives argue for the renationalisation of infrastructure, as
is the push of Tony Abbott's gang to nationalise the coal-fired Liddell power station? It may be a cynical stunt to take an unscientific
stand against climate action, but seizing the means of production remains seizing the means of production, um, comrade. "You know,
nationalising assets is what the Liberal party was founded to stop governments doing," said Turnbull, even as he hid in the dens
and in the rocks of the mountains to weather – strange coincidence –
yet another Newspoll
loss.
"new introduction to a re-released Marx and Engels' Communist Manifesto.
Collective, democratic political action is our only chance for freedom and enjoyment."
Might be true. But frightening that people should naively still think that democracy is to be found in the 'Dictatorship of
the Proletariat' [ ie those who know what's good for you even if you don't like it ] of the Communist Manifesto after the revelations
of what that leads to in the Gulag Archipelago , Mao's China , Pol Pot , Kim John - un .
How quickly the world forgets. - you
might just as well advocate Mein Kampf it's the same thing in the end !
That's what you claim and it might be so but I'm not interested in keeping a score on the matter. The point you failed to get
is that the people you mentioned where totalitarian thugs. They used the banner of communism to achieve their ends. They would
have used what ever ideology that was in fashion to achieve the same results.
Does present day neo-liberalism actually qualify as a political movement?
Vested interests and the dollar seem to have all the power. Lies and deception are so common the truth is seen as the enemy.
The voting public are merely fools for manipulation. Nah, neo-liberalism is not government, it is something far nastier, and clearly
not what the public vote for, presuming a vote actually counts for anything anymore.
Right now neo-fascism is the most probably scenario of the social system after the decline of
neoliberalism.
Notable quotes:
"... But, in Europe, there has always been a deep distrust of the Anglo-American celebration of "possessive individualism" and its repudiation of community and society. Remember Margaret Thatcher's contempt for the idea of "society"? So, it is unsurprising that neoliberalism's advocates dismiss recent European analyses of local, regional and global economies as the nostalgia of "old Europe", even as neoliberalism's failures stack up unrelentingly. ..."
"... The consequences of these failures are largely unseen or avoided by policymakers in the US and their camp followers in the UK and Australia. They are in denial of the fact that not only has neoliberalism failed to meet its claimed goals, but it has worked devastatingly to undermine the very foundations of late-modern capitalism. The result is that the whole shambolic structure is tottering on the edge of an economic abyss. ..."
"... If Streeck is correct, then we need to anticipate what a post-capitalist world may look like. He thinks it will be terrible. He fears the emergence of a neocorporatist state and close crony-like collaboration between big capital, union leaders, government and the military as the consequence of the next major global financial crisis ..."
"... Jobs will disappear, Streeck believes. Capital will be intensely concentrated in very few hands. The privileged rich will retreat into security enclaves dripping with every luxury imaginable ..."
"... Meanwhile, the masses will be cast adrift in a polluted and miserable world where life – as Hobbes put it – will be solitary, poor, nasty, brutish and short. ..."
"... As Piketty and Streeck are pointing out to us, the post-neoliberal era has started to self-destruct. Either a post-capitalist, grimly neo-fascist world awaits us, or one shaped by a new and highly creative version of communitarian democracy. It's time for some great imagining. ..."
It is unfashionable, or just embarrassing, to suggest the
taken-for-granted late-modern economic order – neoliberal capitalism – may be in a
terminal decline. At least that's the case in what former Australian prime minister Tony Abbott
likes to call the "Anglosphere" .
What was once known as the Chicago school of economics
– the neoclassical celebration of the "free market" and "small government" – still
closes the minds of economic policymakers in the US and its satellite economies (although
perhaps less so in contemporary Canada).
But, in Europe, there has always been a deep distrust of the Anglo-American celebration
of "possessive individualism" and its repudiation of community and society. Remember Margaret
Thatcher's
contempt for the idea of "society"? So, it is unsurprising that neoliberalism's advocates
dismiss recent European analyses of local, regional and global economies as the nostalgia of
"old Europe", even as neoliberalism's failures stack up unrelentingly.
The consequences of these failures are largely unseen or avoided by policymakers in the
US and their camp followers in the UK and Australia. They are in denial of the fact that not
only has neoliberalism failed to meet its claimed goals, but it has worked devastatingly to
undermine the very foundations of late-modern capitalism. The result is that the whole
shambolic structure is tottering on the edge of an economic abyss.
What the
consequences might be
Two outstanding European scholars who are well aware of the consequences of the neoliberal
catastrophe are French economist Thomas Piketty and German economist Wolfgang Streeck.
Piketty's 2013 book, Capital in the
Twenty-First Century , charts the dangers of socioeconomic inequality in capitalism's
history. He demonstrates how this inequality can be – and has been over time –
fundamentally destructive of sustained economic growth.
Most compellingly, Piketty documented in meticulous detail how contemporary neoliberal
policies have constructed the worst forms of socioeconomic inequalities in history. His
analysis has been underlined by the recent Oxfam report that showed a mere eight
multi-billionaires own the equivalent amount of capital of half of the global population.
Despite Piketty's scrupulous scholarship, Western neoliberal economies continue merrily down
the road to nowhere. The foundations of that road were laid by the egregiously ideological
policies of Thatcher and Ronald Reagan – and slavishly followed by Australian politicians
on all sides ever since.
Streeck's equally detailed scholarship has demonstrated how destructive of capitalism itself
neoliberal policymaking has been. His latest book, How Will Capitalism
End? , demonstrates how this neoliberal capitalism triumphed over its opponents (especially
communism) by devouring its critics and opponents, obviating all possible alternatives to its
predatory ways.
If Streeck is correct, then we need to anticipate what a post-capitalist world may look
like. He thinks it will be terrible. He fears the emergence of a neocorporatist state and close
crony-like collaboration between big capital, union leaders, government and the military as the
consequence of the next major global financial crisis .
Jobs will disappear, Streeck believes. Capital will be intensely concentrated in very
few hands. The privileged rich will retreat into security enclaves dripping with every luxury
imaginable .
Meanwhile, the masses will be cast adrift in a polluted and miserable world where life
– as Hobbes put it – will be solitary,
poor, nasty, brutish and short.
What comes next is up to us
The extraordinary thing is how little is known or understood of the work of thinkers like
Piketty and Streeck in Australia today.
There have been very fine local scholars, precursors of the Europeans, who have warned about
the hollow promises of "economic rationalism" in Australia.
But, like the Europeans, their wisdom has been sidelined, even as inequality has been
deepening exponentially and its populist consequences have begun to poison our politics,
tearing down the last shreds of our ramshackle democracy.
The time is ripe for some creative imagining of a new post-neoliberal world that will repair
neoliberalism's vast and catastrophic failures while laying the groundwork for an Australia
that can play a leading role in the making of a cosmopolitan and co-operative world.
Three immediate steps can be taken to start on this great journey.
First, we need to see the revival of what American scholar Richard Falk called "globalisation
from below" . This is the enlivening of international civil society to balance the power of
the self-serving elites (multinational managers and their political and military puppets) now
in power.
Second, we need to come up with new forms of democratic governance that reject the fiction
that the current politics of representative government constitute the highest form of
democracy. There is nothing about representative government that is democratic. All it amounts
to is what Vilfredo Pareto described as
"the circulation of elites" who have become remote from – and haughtily contemptuous
of – the people they rule.
Third, we need to see states intervening comprehensively in the so-called "free market".
Apart from re-regulating economic activity, this means positioning public enterprises in
strategic parts of the economy, to compete with the private sector, not on their terms but
exclusively in the interests of all citizens.
As Piketty and Streeck are pointing out to us, the post-neoliberal era has started to
self-destruct. Either a post-capitalist, grimly neo-fascist world awaits us, or one shaped by a
new and highly creative version of communitarian democracy. It's time for some great
imagining.
This article is based on an earlier piece published in John Menadue's blog Pearls
and Irritations.
At the same time, however, it seems fair to point out that Trump and López Obrador both represent what
the Times described as "a global repudiation of the establishment." Indeed, this fact could actually help to distinguish
between the two leaders (along with other populist leaders) and their competing worldviews. While they stand on opposite sides
of the political spectrum, both Trump and López Obrador are part of the global revolt against what critics call neoliberalism,
and this is important for understanding our current era.
The past 30-plus years has been defined by the
political
project
of neoliberalism, spearheaded by the U.S. government and international financial institutions like the
International Monetary Fund and the World Bank, with the utopian aim of creating a global capitalist economy perfectly guided
by the invisible hand of the market (for neoliberals and free-market fundamentalists, the invisible hand is an almost divine
concept, worshipped in economics departments around the country). The neoliberal era peaked in the 1990s, and in America it
was Democratic President Bill Clinton who accomplished neoliberal "reforms" that right-wingers had long dreamed of, including
financial deregulation, NAFTA and "ending welfare as we knew it" (he would probably have
privatized
Social Security too
had it not been for Monica Lewinsky).
Though the 1990s is often remembered as the beginning of our hyper-partisan age (demonstrated by the Clinton impeachment
scandal), the irony is that Democrats and Republicans became closer than ever before on economic issues during this decade.
The "Washington consensus" dominated this period, and it took a Democrat to pass a Republican trade deal and other
conservative economic policies. (Not surprisingly, the Democratic Party's shift to the right simply resulted in the GOP
shifting even further to the right.)
Neoliberalism was a global project advanced by economic elites. Not surprisingly, then, the neoliberal policies of the past
few decades have benefited those who pushed for them, creating enormous wealth for the richest individuals while leaving the
world grossly unequal. According to Oxfam, 82 percent of the wealth created in 2017
went
to the top one percent
, while the poorest half got nothing. In America alone, inequality is at historic levels and more
than 40 million people live in poverty; a
UN report
from
last month notes that the U.S. "now has one of the lowest rates of intergenerational social mobility of any of the rich
countries," and zip codes "are tragically reliable predictors of a child's future employment and income prospects."
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In Europe, Latin America, Asia and the United States, the status quo is no longer acceptable to a populace that has been
betrayed time and again throughout the neoliberal era. Leaders who represent this status quo are being thrown out of office
left and right. Those who have challenged the "establishment" have been labeled "populists" by the press, of course, and
thus are categorized more for what they stand
against
than what they stand
for
(this would be like
identifying the Soviet Union and the U.S. for their anti-fascism, rather than their communism or capitalism).
Some dispute the characterization of right-wing populists as anti-neoliberal, and correctly point out that most of the
Trump administration's economic policies have actually been neoliberalism on steroids (e.g., the GOP tax bill, deregulation,
etc.). Right-wing populism is purely about racism and xenophobia, these critics insist, and to make it about economics is to
ignore these ugly realities. But as Thomas Frank
pointed
out
in The Guardian back in 2016, "trade may be [Trump's] single biggest concern -- not white supremacy."
"It seems to obsess him," wrote Frank, who watched several hours of Trump's speeches. "The destructive free-trade deals our
leaders have made, the many companies that have moved their production facilities to other lands, the phone calls he will make
to those companies' CEOs in order to threaten them with steep tariffs unless they move back to the US."
Say what you will about Trump's tendency to lie and spew falsehoods, but on the issue of trade he has actually been pretty
consistent since entering the White House, and free trade is one of the staples of the neoliberal project. On the left, free
trade deals like NAFTA and TPP have also been major talking points, as we saw with Bernie Sanders' presidential campaign in
2016. There are other economic issues where some agreement exists, and right-wing populist parties in Europe are even more
likely to be anti-neoliberal on economic issues. Marine Le Pen's National Front, for example,
opposed
austerity cuts and promised to increase welfare for the working class
(at least for French citizens), while lowering the
retirement age and increasing tariffs to benefit French companies (and, the claim goes, workers too).
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Still, the left- and right-wing alternatives to neoliberalism are poles apart, and the differences between left-populists
like López Obrador and Sanders and right-populists like Trump and Le Pen are hard to overstate. To appreciate just how
different their worldviews are, it is worth considering how the left and right have historically understood themselves in
relation to the Enlightenment and modernity.
Throughout the modern era progressives and reactionaries have more or less rejected the status quo, with thinkers from both
sides offering critiques of the modern world. The fundamental difference was that the left considered itself a part of the
Enlightenment tradition, while the right was part of the "counter-Enlightenment" (this goes back to the French Revolution,
when revolutionaries sat on the left side of the Estates General and royalists sat on the right).
The left criticized modernity not because it rejected the modern world, but because it saw the Enlightenment project as
incomplete. Karl Marx praised the bourgeoisie and called capitalism a "great civilizing influence," considering it to be a
positive development in history. He also wrote the most influential critique of capitalism to date, and while he acknowledged
that capitalism was progress over feudalism, he also believed that it must eventually be replaced with socialism to
realize the goals of the Enlightenment. Put simply, Marx and other leftists believed in the idea of progress, long associated
with the Enlightenment.
On the right, criticisms of modernity came from a very different perspective. Reactionaries did not see the modern world as
progress over the pre-modern world; rather, they saw it as a decline. Driven by nostalgia and resentment, reactionaries
romanticized the past and believed that the ills of modernity could be cured by simply turning back the clock and restoring
the status quo ante.
In his classic book "
Escape from Freedom
," the psychiatrist and
social philosopher Erich Fromm attempted to make sense of the rise of fascism in the early 20th century, and in doing so
offered a penetrating analysis of modernity. While the modern world had liberated men and women from social conventions of the
past and various restrictions on the individual (i.e., "freedom from"), it had also severed what Fromm called "primary bonds,"
which gave security to the individual and provided meaning. Forced from their communities into urban and industrial
environments, modern men and women were left alienated and rootless, feeling powerless and purposeless in the new world.
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There were two ways that people could respond to this situation, Fromm argued; either they could reject freedom
altogether and embrace counter-Enlightenment movements like fascism, or they could progress to a "positive freedom," where one
can relate oneself "spontaneously to the world in love and work."
"If the economic, social and political conditions on which the whole process of human individuation depends, do not offer a
basis for the realization of individuality," wrote Fromm, "while at the same time people have lost those ties which gave them
security, this lag makes freedom an unbearable burden." Freedom, he continued, "becomes identical with doubt, with a kind of
life which lacks meaning and direction. Powerful tendencies arise to escape from this kind of freedom into submission or some
kind of relationship to man and the world which promises relief from uncertainty, even if it deprives the individual of his
freedom."
The reactionary impulse would be to "escape from freedom" and restore the conventions and "primary bonds" of the past,
while the progressive impulse would be to progress to a more complete and dynamic kind of freedom.
The reader may be wondering where all of this fits in with the current revolt against neoliberalism. Put simply, the
neoliberal age has left many people with the same kind of doubts and anxieties that Fromm discussed in his book almost 80
years ago. Numerous articles have been written in recent years about how the policies of neoliberalism have
worsened stress and loneliness
, exacerbated
mental
health problems
,
driven
rising rates of suicide
and the opioid crisis, and left people feeling desperate and hopeless in general. Globalization,
deindustrialization, consumerism and "financialization"; all these economic trends are contributing to the breakdown of our
democratic society, leading some to embrace authoritarian alternatives, as many did in Fromm's day.
From this point of view, the global rise of populism that continued with López Obrador isn't much of a surprise. The
popular rejection of neoliberalism around the world is undeniable at this point, but it is still unclear whether this
rejection of the status quo will lead to reactionary or progressive change in the long run. López Obrador represents
progressive change, as does Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez's surprise primary victory in New York's 14th congressional district.
Trump and other far-right populists like Le Pen represent something very different.
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It will ultimately come down to which side can offer the more appealing alternative, and the left should recognize that the
more realistic and "pragmatic" approach isn't always the most politically persuasive. One of the most common criticisms of
populists has been that they are selling a pipe dream, which to an extent is true -- especially for right-wing populists who
base their entire worldview on falsehoods. If the left wants to stop reactionary populism, however, it will have to adopt an
unapologetically populist approach of its own, and reject the dogma of neoliberalism once and for all.
Captain
Nonobvious
Leader
21 Jul
Neoliberalism is nothing more than a set of excuses and fables for giving more wealth, power
and income to the rich and well off than they have at any given moment, and for distributing
the assets of ownership and governance across borders, out of reach and jurisdiction of the
people.
Which brings us to today.
But what next? Neoliberalism is ending because enough of society now is owned and run by the top end --completely in Russia,
and mostly, here in the US-- that the people no longer have enough to work with to compete
against oligarchy.
In the US there's no more need for the pretense, so we get the blatant language and behavior of a Trump, and public display
of the aggression against the people and the nation that neoliberalism has been practicing
out of view all along. (It's not actually been so much hidden as willfully ignored by
moderates and commentators since the Administration of the previous lying, delusional
national media star.)
What's next is rapid consolidation of oligarchy. The Supreme Court will be held by oligarchy
fanatics for the coming 40 years, and will be ruling every imaginable practice of liberal or
progressive governance to be unconstitutional. Even an economic collapse like the Great
Depression can't unseat a Court, and no voting majorities can legislate against their
Constitution.
Basho
Leader
21 Jul
No matter how much you pretty up neoliberalism with racial diversity, women' empowerment, and
homosexual rights, it still stinks. Neoliberalism has turned the Democratic Party into a
political-correct Republican Party. All the great accomplishments that came from the1930s to
the mid-70s are gone. Democrats have become the party of the oligarchs and the professional
elites who serve them. They have - as Thomas Frank has suggested - ceased to be the party of
the people. The whole point of neoliberalism is to please big money donors by dismantling all
that Democrats did to help and ordinary working Americans before the1980s. This had been what
Noam Chomsky called Amerca's Golden Age. America had become the finest country to live in in
the entire history of the world. That's gone. Today Democrats join with Republicans in
supporting a corporate oligarchy. If the Democratic Party is to have a future (and if I am to
be a part of it) they must turn to new voices like Tulsi Gabbard and Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez.
They need to make Bernie Sanders the Chair of the Democratic Party. And they need to quit
warmongering. The Democratic Party must model itself after Jeremy Corbyn in the UK and Andrés
Manuel López Obrador in Mexico. Neoliberalism is a plague. It is anti-democratic. It must
end. The Democratic Party must once again be a moral force for economic justice.
Mike Calcagno
Leader
Basho
23 Jul
Edited
nYes, things were great in American cities in the 60s and 70s. Those riots - how
wonderful? Almost 1000 murders a year in Chicago in the early 70s, more than 2000 a year
in New York. Major American cities looked like Dresden after WWII in many neighborhoods.
LBJ was a warmonger who got 57000 Americans and millions of Vietnamese and Cambodians
killed, and Kennedy won by running to the right of Nixon. You continue to peddle this
nonsense that there was this golden age of liberalism. There was a brief period where the
White working class did well as a result of unions, and because wealthier white men who
served with them during the war felt an obligation to their fellow servicemen. As usual,
you ignore the plight of non-White Americans. I'm not calling you a racist; I'm
challenging you on your myopia. n
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Basho
Leader
Mike Calcagno
23 Jul
Edited
Today we have police armed with military equipment harassing and killing people of color
in American cities. Driving while Black has become a crime. Our Golden Age (which ended in
the 1970s) saw the least economic inequality of any industrialized nation. FDR created an
excellent economic safety net. He essentially created our middle class. Today we have
greatest wealth inequality of any industrialized nation. In the Golden Age we had the
nonviolent Civil Rights Movement (in which I participated.) There was a major peace
movement in the Democratic Party (in which I participated.) We had the War on Poverty.
Unions were strong. Working people had a decent standard of living. The Democratic Party
was actually liberal (The word liberal today has been drained of all meaning.) Kennedy
ran, not to the right of NIxon but as a hawk like Nixon, but at the time of his death he
was working to get out of Vietnam. And he started pushing the Democratic Party towards
civil rights.Kennedy got rid of the evil Alan Dulles as head of the CIA. Today's Dulles's
techniques are a clear part of the Democratic Party's foreign policy. Our CIA is Murder
Incorporated. The Democratic Party that I once loved has gone to hell.
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FreeQuark
Leader
22 Jul
The social agenda of the left is entirely compatible with neoliberalism, and in fact certain
aspects of that social agenda - unrestricted immigration, for example - are fundamental
components of neoliberal economic ideology. Neoliberal politicians who are members of
center/left political parties thus run on a far left social platform and thereby win election
after election over economic progressives. The left has consequently neutered itself on
economics through its overemphasis on social issues. Most people on the left are totally
unwilling to acknowledge that reality, and that is why neoliberals will continue to dominate
center/left politics around the world. Even though "progressives" may manage to win an
election here or there, neoliberals will always be able to maintain overall control of
center/left parties by associating left-wing economics with opposition to immigration and
other alleged "right-wing" causes. For people on the left primarily concerned about
economics, alternative right politicians on the order of Trump or Le Pen are likely to remain
the only viable political options in most elections for a long time to come.
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Darren
Tomlyn
Leader
21 Jul
Edited
Humanity now stands at a crossroads, for there's a difference between reacting against the
corruption of civilization, and reacting against civilization itself... The latter is
unfortunately what Trump (and Brexit) truly represents. If the latter is what people vote
for, then they vote for DEATH... Unfortunately, as has been proven throughout the past few
thousand years, this usually ultimately results in their very own death at the same time.
Although neoliberalism has been about the corruption of capitalism - using economic power to
get one part of humanity to essentially wage war on the rest to further their own goals -
this particular underlying economic conflict (the rich and powerful vs everyone else) is
inherent to civilization, and is what government exists to manage. So again, the main problem
stems from people not learning from history and repeating many of the same mistakes, even it
the context and outcomes merely rhyme...
Todd
Dunning
Leader
22 Jul
Can someone here help me out to properly define "Neoliberalism"?
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FreeQuark
Leader
Todd Dunning
22 Jul
Neoliberalism is the idea that the removal of protectionist trade policies, government
regulations, immigration quotas, and other barriers to international commerce is the key
to economic growth and prosperity. It's safe to say I think that the adoption of the
neoliberal policy agenda by many governments around the world has not produced the outcome
that economists and globalist think tanks claimed it would produce. The problem now is
that mainstream political parties in Western countries have bought, hook, line, and sinker
into neoliberalism and are refusing to let it go regardless of its failings. The reason
they won't let it go of course is that most of those parties are controlled by wealthy
people who haven't been harmed by neoliberal policies. I'm guessing Justin Trudeau,
Emmanuel Macron, Angela Merkel, and the Clintons have never lost a night's sleep worrying
that the factory they work in may move overseas or that they will lose a job to some
upwardly-mobile immigrant.
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RobertSF
Leader
Todd Dunning
22 Jul
Is there no wiki in your internet? Or are you looking for an argument?
jak123
Leader
21 Jul
Excellent article. Trump and AMLO are similar in that both are insurgents. The question for
both is whether they can make real progress within their respective political systems. The
Russia issue is a test of that. On one side is Trump, who represents a break from the
neoliberal policies of the past (even if many of his policies are neoliberal, as Lynch says),
such as hostility toward Russia, and on the other hand are elements of his government, such
as the intelligence agencies, that backed Clinton and are part of the effort to undermine
Trump because they want to topple Putin to allow the US to plunder Russia. The hysterical
overreaction to the summit. Strzok's shocking testimony to Congress and Mueller's pretend
indictments of Russians who will never stand trial represent an escalation by the elements of
Trump's government who oppose him.
Craig Murray is right that "As the Establishment feels its grip slipping, as people wake up to the appalling economic exploitation by the few that underlies
the very foundations of modern western society, expect the methods used by the security services to become even dirtier."
Collapse of neoliberal ideology and rise of tentions in neoliberal sociarties resulted in unprecedented increase of covert and false
flag operations by British intelligence services, especially against Russia, which had been chosen as a convenient scapegoat.
With Steele dossier and Skripal affair as two most well known.
New Lady Macbeth (Theresa May) Russophobia is so extreme that her cabinet derailed the election of a Russian to head
Interpol.
Looks like neoliberalism cannot be defeated by and faction of the existing elite. Only when shepp oil end mant people will
have a chance. The US , GB and EU are part of the wider hegemonic neoliberal system. In fact rejection of neoliberal
globalization probably will lead to "national neoliberals" regime which would be a flavor of neo-fascism, no more no less.
Notable quotes:
"... The British state can maintain its spies' cover stories for centuries. ..."
"... I learnt how highly improbable left wing firebrand Simon Bracey-Lane just happened to be on holiday in the United States with available cash to fund himself, when he stumbled into the Bernie Sanders campaign. ..."
"... It is, to say the least, very interesting indeed that just a year later the left wing, "Corbyn and Sanders supporting" Bracey-Lane is hosting a very right wing event, "Cold War Then and Now", for the shadowy neo-con Institute for Statecraft, at which an entirely unbalanced panel of British military, NATO and Ukrainian nationalists extolled the virtues of re-arming against Russia. ..."
"... the MOD-sponsored Institute for Statecraft has been given millions of pounds of taxpayers' money by the FCO to spread covert disinformation and propaganda, particularly against Russia and the anti-war movement. Activities include twitter and facebook trolling and secretly paying journalists in "clusters of influence" around Europe. Anonymous helpfully leaked the Institute's internal documents. Some of the Integrity Initiative's thus exposed alleged covert agents, like David Aaronovitch, have denied any involvement despite their appearance in the documents, and others like Dan Kaszeta the US "novichok expert", have cheerfully admitted it. ..."
"... By sleuthing the company records of this "Scottish charity", and a couple of phone calls, I discovered that the actual location of the Institute for Statecraft is the basement of 2 Temple Place, London. This is not just any basement – it is the basement of the former London mansion of William Waldorf Astor, an astonishing building . It is, in short, possibly the most expensive basement in London. ..."
"... Which is interesting because the accounts of the Institute for Statecraft claim it has no permanent staff and show nothing for rent, utilities or office expenses. In fact, I understand the rent is paid by the Ministry of Defence. ..."
"... I have a great deal more to tell you about Mr Edney and his organisation next week, and the extraordinary covert disinformation war the British government wages online, attacking British citizens using British taxpayers' money. Please note in the interim I am not even a smidgeon suicidal, and going to be very, very careful crossing the road and am not intending any walks in the hills. ..."
"... I am not alleging Mr Bracey-Lane is an intelligence service operative who previously infiltrated the Labour Party and the Sanders campaign. He may just be a young man of unusually heterodox and vacillating political opinions. He may be an undercover reporter for the Canary infiltrating the Institute for Statecraft. All these things are possible, and I have no firm information. ..."
"... one of the activities the Integrity Initiative sponsors happens to be the use of online trolls to ridicule the idea that the British security services ever carry out any kind of infiltration, false flag or agent provocateur operations, despite the fact that we even have repeated court judgements against undercover infiltration officers getting female activists pregnant. The Integrity Initiative offers us a glimpse into the very dirty world of surveillance and official disinformation. If we actually had a free media, it would be the biggest story of the day ..."
"... As the Establishment feels its grip slipping, as people wake up to the appalling economic exploitation by the few that underlies the very foundations of modern western society, expect the methods used by the security services to become even dirtier. ..."
"... You can bank on continued ramping up of Russophobia to supply "the enemy". ..."
The British state can maintain its spies' cover stories for centuries. Look up Eldred Pottinger, who for 180 years appears
in scores of British history books – right up to and including William Dalrymple's Return of the King – as a British officer who
chanced to be passing Herat on holiday when it came under siege from a partly Russian-officered Persian army, and helped to organise
the defences. In researching
Sikunder Burnes, I discovered and published from the British Library incontrovertible and detailed documentary evidence that
Pottinger's entire journey was under the direct instructions of, and reporting to, British spymaster Alexander Burnes. The first
historian to publish the untrue "holiday" cover story, Sir John Kaye, knew both Burnes and Pottinger and undoubtedly knew he was
publishing lying propaganda. Every other British historian of the First Afghan War (except me and latterly
Farrukh Husain) has just followed Kaye's official propaganda.
Some things don't change. I was irresistibly reminded of Eldred Pottinger just passing Herat on holiday, when I learnt how
highly improbable left wing firebrand Simon Bracey-Lane
just happened to be on holiday in the
United States with available cash to fund himself, when he stumbled into the Bernie Sanders campaign.
Recent university graduate Simon Bracey-Lane took it even further. Originally from Wimbledon in London, he was inspired to
rejoin the Labour party in September when Corbyn was elected leader. But by that point, he was already in the US on holiday. So
he joined the Sanders campaign, and never left.
"I had two weeks left and some money left, so I thought, Fuck it, I'll make some calls for Bernie Sanders," he explains. "I just
sort of knew Des Moines was the place, so I just turned up at their HQ, started making phone calls, and then became a fully fledged
field organiser."
It is, to say the least, very interesting indeed that just a year later the left wing, "Corbyn and Sanders supporting" Bracey-Lane
is hosting a very right wing event, "Cold War Then and Now", for the shadowy neo-con Institute for Statecraft, at which an entirely
unbalanced panel of British
military, NATO and Ukrainian nationalists extolled the virtues of re-arming against Russia.
Nor would it seem likely that Bracey-Lane would be involved with the Integrity Initiative. Even the mainstream media has been
forced to give a few paragraphs to the outrageous Integrity Initiative, under which the MOD-sponsored Institute for Statecraft
has been given millions of pounds of taxpayers' money by the FCO to spread covert disinformation and propaganda, particularly against
Russia and the anti-war movement. Activities include twitter and facebook trolling and secretly paying journalists in "clusters of
influence" around Europe. Anonymous helpfully leaked the Institute's internal documents. Some of the Integrity Initiative's thus
exposed alleged covert agents, like David Aaronovitch, have denied any involvement despite their appearance in the documents, and
others like Dan Kaszeta the US "novichok expert", have cheerfully admitted it.
The mainstream media have
tracked down
the HQ of the "Institute for Statecraft" to a derelict mill near Auchtermuchty. It is owned by one of the company directors, Daniel
Lafayeedney, formerly of D Squadron 23rd SAS Regiment and later of Military Intelligence (and incidentally born the rather more prosaic
Daniel Edney).
By sleuthing the company records of this "Scottish charity", and a couple of phone calls, I discovered that the actual location
of the Institute for Statecraft is the basement of 2 Temple Place, London. This is not just any basement – it is the basement of
the former London mansion of William Waldorf Astor, an astonishing building.
It is, in short, possibly the most expensive basement in London.
Which is interesting because the accounts of the Institute for Statecraft claim it has no permanent staff and show nothing
for rent, utilities or office expenses. In fact, I understand the rent is paid by the Ministry of Defence.
Having been told where the Institute for Statecraft skulk, I tipped off journalist Kit Klarenberg of Sputnik Radio to go and physically
check it out. Kit did so and was
aggressively
ejected by that well-known Corbyn and Sanders supporter, Simon Bracey-Lane. It does seem somewhat strange that our left wing
hero is deeply embedded in an organisation that
launches troll attacks on Jeremy Corbyn.
I have a great deal more to tell you about Mr Edney and his organisation next week, and the extraordinary covert disinformation
war the British government wages online, attacking British citizens using British taxpayers' money. Please note in the interim I
am not even a smidgeon suicidal, and going to be very, very careful crossing the road and am not intending any walks in the hills.
I am not alleging Mr Bracey-Lane is an intelligence service operative who previously infiltrated the Labour Party and the
Sanders campaign. He may just be a young man of unusually heterodox and vacillating political opinions. He may be an undercover reporter
for the Canary infiltrating the Institute for Statecraft. All these things are possible, and I have no firm information.
But one of the activities the Integrity Initiative sponsors happens to be the use of online trolls to ridicule the idea that the
British security services ever carry out any kind of infiltration, false flag or agent provocateur operations, despite the fact that
we even have repeated court judgements against undercover infiltration officers getting female activists pregnant. The Integrity
Initiative offers us a glimpse into the very dirty world of surveillance and official disinformation. If we actually had a free media,
it would be the biggest story of the day.
As the Establishment feels its grip slipping, as people wake up to the appalling economic exploitation by the few that underlies
the very foundations of modern western society, expect the methods used by the security services to become even dirtier.
You can
bank on continued ramping up of Russophobia to supply "the enemy".
As both Scottish Independence and Jeremy Corbyn are viewed as
real threats by the British Establishment, you can anticipate every possible kind of dirty trick in the next couple of years, with
increasing frequency and audacity
Many threads to tug on at the close of this tumultuous work-week before the supreme holiday
of white privilege rolls through, all silver bells and hovering angels.
It took hours of rumination and prayer to arrive at a coherent notion about the strange
doings in Gen. Mike Flynn's sentencing hearing, but here goes: Judge Emmet Sullivan sent Gen
Flynn to the doghouse for three months to reconsider his guilty plea. The judge may believe
that Gen. Flynn needs to contest the charge in open court, where all the Special Prosecutor's
janky evidence will be subject to discovery and review. Mr. Mueller tried to toss a wrecking
bar into the proceedings the day before by pressing charges against two of Gen. Flynn's
colleagues in the Turkish lobbying gambit, which was meant to terrify Gen. Flynn as a hint that
separate charges would be dumped on him if he doesn't play ball. A lot can happen in three
months, including the arrival of a new Attorney General, and we'll leave it there for the
moment.
The stopgap spending bill before congress -- to avert a government shut-down -- is based on
the comical idea that the money is actually there to spend. Everyone with half a brain knows
that it's not money but " money ," a hypothetical abstraction composed of hopes and wishes. The
USA is worse than broke. It's down to liquidating its rehypothecated hypotheticals. After all,
financialization added up to money with its value removed . The global credit markets seem to
be sensing this as the tide of borrowings retreats , exposing all the wretched, slimy creatures
wheezing in the exposed mudflats who have no idea how to service their old loans or generate
credible new ones. But, no matter. We'll continue pretending until the US$ flies up its own
cloacal aperture and vanishes.
Contingent on that exercise is "money" for Mr. Trump's promised-and-requested border wall.
The wall is really a symbol for the nation's unwillingness to set a firm policy on immigration.
Half of the political spectrum refuses to even make a basic distinction between people who came
here legally and those who snuck in and broke the law. They've super-glued themselves to that
position not on any plausible principle, but because they're desperate to corral Hispanic votes
-- and notice how eager they are to get non-citizens on the voting rolls. Their mouthpiece, The
New York Times , even ran an op-ed today,
None of Us Deserve Citizenship , (is that even grammatical?) arguing that we should let
everybody and anybody into the country because of our longstanding wickedness.
The simple resolve to firmly and politely send interlopers back across the border would go a
long way to providing border security, but we've allowed this process to be litigated into
incoherence so that it is increasingly impossible to enforce the existing rules. Mr. Trump's
wall is an acknowledgement of that failure to agree on lawful action to defend the border. It
evokes the works of past empires, like the wall built across Britain by the Roman emperor
Hadrian to keep out the warlike, filthy, blue-faced Scots, or the Great Wall of China built to
block marauding Mongols. Of course, these societies didn't have closed circuit TV, drones,
laser sensors, four-wheel-drive landcruisers, and night-vision goggles. I'm not persuaded that
the US really requires Mr. Trump's wall, but it does require a functioning consensus that
national borders mean something, and the president's argument is a lever to produce that
consensus.
In the meantime, the condition of the US economy, which Mr. Trump has boasted is roaring on
his account, wobbles badly. It has been based for two decades on a three-card-monte trade
set-up in which China sends us amazingly cheap products and we send them IOUs (dollars, i.e.
Federal Reserve promissory notes). It was not an arrangement bound to last. And it entailed a
lot of mischief around the theft of complex intellectual property. The damage there appears to
be already done. China may have enough computer mojo now to make all kinds of trouble in the
world. Of course, China will have enough political and economic trouble when its Molto-Ponzi
banking system flies apart, so I would not assume that they are capable of attaining the kind
of world domination that scenario-gamers in the US Intel-and-Military offices dream up.
To me, these disturbances and machinations suggest the unravelling of the arrangements we've
called "globalism." That's what we face most acutely in 2019, along with the fragile conditions
in banking, markets, and currencies that can put the schnitz on supply lines as everybody and
his uncle around the world fear that they will never get paid. It all makes for a suspenseful
holiday. Bake as many cookies as you can while the fixings are still there and stuff a few in
your ammunition box for the fretful days ahed.
In his recent article "Averting
World Conflict with China" Ron Unz has come up with an intriguing suggestion for the Chinese
government to turn the tables on the December 1 st arrest of Meng Wanzhou in Canada.
Canada detained Mrs. Meng, CFO of the world's largest telecoms equipment manufacturer Huawei,
at the request of the United States so she could be extradited to New York to face charges that
she and her company had violated U.S. sanctions on Iran. The sanctions in question had been
imposed unilaterally by Washington and it is widely believed that the Trump Administration is
sending a signal that when the ban on purchasing oil from Iran comes into full effect in May
there will be no excuses accepted from any country that is unwilling to comply with the U.S.
government's demands. Washington will exercise universal jurisdiction over those who violate
its sanctions, meaning that foreign officials and heads of corporations that continue to deal
with Iran can be arrested when traveling internationally and will be extradited to be tried in
American courts.
There is, of course, a considerable downside to arresting a top executive of a leading
foreign corporation from a country that is a major U.S. trading partner and which also, inter
alia, holds a considerable portion of the U.S. national debt. Ron Unz has correctly noted the "
extraordinary gravity of this international incident and its potential for altering the course
of world history." One might add that Washington's demands that other nations adhere to its
sanctions on third countries opens up a Pandora's box whereby no traveling executives will be
considered safe from legal consequences when they do not adhere to policies being promoted by
the United States. Unz cites Columbia's Jeffrey Sachs as
describing it as "almost a U.S. declaration of war on China's business community." If
seizing and extraditing businessmen becomes the new normal those countries most affected will
inevitably retaliate in kind. China has already detained two traveling Canadians to pressure
Ottawa to release Mrs. Meng. Beijing is also contemplating some immediate retaliatory steps
against Washington to include American companies operating in China if she is extradited to the
U.S.
Ron Unz has suggested that Beijing might just want to execute a quid pro quo by pulling the
licenses of Sheldon Adelson's casinos operating in Macau, China and shutting them down, thereby
eliminating a major source of his revenue. Why go after an Israeli-American casino operator
rather than taking steps directly against the U.S. government? The answer is simple. Pressuring
Washington is complicated as there are many players involved and unlikely to produce any
positive results while Adelson
is the prime mover on much of the Trump foreign policy, though one hesitates to refer to it
as a policy at all.
Adelson is the world's leading diaspora Israel-firster and he has the ear of the president
of the United States, who reportedly speaks and meets with him regularly. And Adelson uses his
considerable financial resources to back up his words of wisdom. He is the fifteenth wealthiest man in America
with a reported fortune of $33 billion. He is the number one contributor to the GOP having
given $81 million in the last cycle. Admittedly that is chump change to him, but it is more
than enough to buy the money hungry and easily corruptible Republicans.
In a certain sense, Adelson has obtained control of the foreign policy of the political
party that now controls both the White House and the Senate, and his mission in life is to
advance Israeli interests. Among those interests is the continuous punishment of Iran, which
does not threaten the United States in any way, through employment of increasingly savage
sanctions and threats of violence, which brings us around to the arrest of Meng and the
complicity of Adelson in that process. Adelson's wholly owned talking head National Security
Adviser John Bolton reportedly had prior knowledge of the Canadian plans and may have actually
been complicit in their formulation. Adelson has also been the major force behind moving the
U.S. Embassy to Jerusalem, has also convinced the Administration to stop its criticism of the
illegal Israeli settlements on Arab land and has been instrumental in cutting off all
humanitarian aid to the Palestinians. He prefers tough love when dealing with the Iranians,
advocating dropping
a nuclear bomb on Iran as a warning to the Mullahs of what more might be coming if they don't
comply with all the American and Israeli demands.
Wall Street, Banks, and Angry Citizens
The Inequality Gap on a Planet Growing More Extreme
Nomi Prins
December 13, 2018
2,400 Words
16 Comments
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As we head into 2019, leaving the chaos
of this year behind, a major question remains unanswered when it comes to the state of Main Street, not just
here but across the planet. If the global economy really is booming, as many politicians claim, why are
leaders and their parties around the world continuing to get booted out of office in such a sweeping
fashion?
One obvious answer: the post-Great
Recession economic "recovery" was largely reserved for the few who could participate in the rising financial
markets of those years, not the majority who continued to work longer hours, sometimes at multiple jobs, to
stay afloat. In other words, the good times have left out so many people, like those struggling to keep even
a
few hundred dollars
in their bank accounts to cover an emergency or the
80%
of American workers who live paycheck to paycheck.
In today's global economy, financial
security is increasingly the property of the 1%. No surprise, then, that, as a sense of economic instability
continued to grow over the past decade, angst turned to anger, a transition that -- from the U.S. to the
Philippines, Hungary to Brazil, Poland to Mexico -- has provoked a plethora of voter upheavals. In the
process, a 1930s-style brew of rising nationalism and blaming the "other" -- whether that other was an
immigrant, a religious group, a country, or the rest of the world -- emerged.
This phenomenon offered a series of
Trumpian figures, including of course The Donald himself, an opening to ride a wave of "populism" to the
heights of the political system. That the backgrounds and records of none of them -- whether you're talking
about Donald Trump, Viktor Orbán, Rodrigo Duterte, or Jair Bolsonaro (among others) -- reflected the daily
concerns of the "common people," as the
classic definition
of populism might have it, hardly mattered. Even a billionaire could, it turned out,
exploit economic insecurity effectively and use it to rise to ultimate power.
Ironically, as that American master at
evoking the fears of apprentices everywhere showed, to assume the highest office in the land was only to
begin a process of creating yet more fear and insecurity. Trump's trade wars, for instance, have typically
infused the world with increased
anxiety
and distrust toward the U.S., even as they thwarted the ability of domestic
business
leaders and ordinary
people
to plan for the future. Meanwhile, just under the surface of the reputed good times, the
damage
to that future only intensified. In other words, the groundwork has already been laid for what
could be a frightening transformation, both domestically and globally.
That Old Financial Crisis
To understand how we got here, let's take
a step back. Only a decade ago, the world experienced a genuine global financial crisis, a meltdown of the
first order. Economic growth ended; shrinking economies threatened to collapse; countless jobs were cut;
homes were foreclosed upon and lives wrecked. For regular people, access to credit suddenly disappeared. No
wonder fears rose. No wonder for so many a brighter tomorrow ceased to exist.
The details of just why the Great
Recession happened have since been glossed over by time and partisan spin. This September, when the 10th
anniversary of the collapse of the global financial services firm Lehman Brothers came around, major
business news channels considered whether the world might be at risk of another such crisis. However,
coverage of such fears, like so many other topics, was quickly tossed aside in favor of paying yet more
attention to Donald Trump's latest tweets, complaints, insults, and lies. Why? Because such a crisis was so
2008 in a year in which, it was
claimed,
we were enjoying a first class economic high and edging toward the
longest
bull-market in Wall Street history. When it came to "boom versus gloom," boom won hands down.
None of that changed one thing, though: most people still feel
left behind
both in the U.S. and
globally
. Thanks to the massive accumulation of wealth by a 1% skilled at gaming the system, the roots
of a crisis that didn't end with the end of the Great Recession have spread
across the planet
, while the dividing line between the "have-nots" and the "have-a-lots" only sharpened
and widened.
Though the media hasn't been paying
much attention to the resulting inequality, the statistics (when you see them) on that ever-widening wealth
gap are mind-boggling. According to Inequality.org, for instance, those with at least $30 million in wealth
globally had the fastest growth rate of any group between 2016 and 2017. The size of that club rose by 25.5%
during those years, to 174,800 members. Or if you really want to grasp what's been happening, consider that,
between 2009 and 2017, the number of billionaires whose combined wealth was greater than that of the world's
poorest 50% fell from
380
to just
eight
. And by the way, despite claims by the president that every other country is screwing America, the
U.S. leads the pack when it comes to the growth of inequality. As Inequality.org
notes
, it has "much greater shares of national wealth and income going to the richest 1% than any other
country."
That, in part, is due to an institution
many in the U.S. normally pay little attention to: the U.S. central bank, the Federal Reserve. It helped
spark that increase in wealth disparity domestically and globally by adopting a post-crisis monetary policy
in which electronically fabricated money (via a program called quantitative easing, or QE) was offered to
banks and corporations at significantly cheaper rates than to ordinary Americans.
Pumped into financial markets, that
money sent stock prices soaring, which naturally ballooned the wealth of the small percentage of the
population that actually owned stocks.
According to
economist Stephen Roach, considering the Fed's Survey of Consumer Finances, "It is hardly a
stretch to conclude that QE exacerbated America's already severe income disparities."
Wall Street, Central Banks, and
Everyday People
What has since taken place around the
world seems right out of the 1930s. At that time, as the world was emerging from the Great Depression, a
sense of broad economic security was slow to return. Instead, fascism and other forms of nationalism only
gained steam as people turned on the usual cast of politicians, on other countries, and on each other. (If
that sounds faintly Trumpian to you, it should.)
In our post-2008 era, people have
witnessed
trillions
of dollars flowing into bank bailouts and other financial subsidies, not just from governments
but from the world's major central banks. Theoretically, private banks, as a result, would have more money
and pay less interest to get it. They would then lend that money to Main Street. Businesses, big and small,
would tap into those funds and, in turn, produce real economic growth through expansion, hiring sprees, and
wage increases. People would then have more dollars in their pockets and, feeling more financially secure,
would spend that money driving the economy to new heights -- and all, of course, would then be well.
That fairy tale was pitched around the
globe. In fact, cheap money also pushed debt to epic levels, while the share prices of banks rose, as did
those of all sorts of other firms, to record-shattering heights.
Even in the U.S., however, where a
magnificent recovery was supposed to have been in place for years, actual economic growth simply didn't
materialize at the levels promised. At
2% per year
, the average growth of the American gross domestic product over the past decade, for
instance, has been half the average of 4% before the 2008 crisis. Similar numbers were repeated throughout
the developed world and most emerging markets. In the meantime, total global debt hit
$247 trillion
in the first quarter of 2018. As the
Institute of International Finance
found, countries were, on average, borrowing about three dollars for
every dollar of goods or services created.
Global Consequences
What the Fed (along with central banks
from Europe to Japan) ignited, in fact, was a disproportionate rise in the stock and bond markets with the
money they created. That capital sought higher and faster returns than could be achieved in crucial
infrastructure or social strengthening projects like building roads, high-speed railways, hospitals, or
schools.
What followed was anything but fair. As
former Federal Reserve Chair Janet Yellen
noted
four years ago, "It is no secret that the past few decades of widening inequality can be summed up
as significant income and wealth gains for those at the very top and stagnant living standards for the
majority." And, of course, continuing to pour money into the highest levels of the private banking system
was anything but a formula for walking that back.
Instead, as more citizens fell behind, a
sense of disenfranchisement and bitterness with existing governments only grew. In the U.S., that meant
Donald Trump. In the United Kingdom, similar discontent was reflected in the June 2016 Brexit vote to leave
the European Union (EU), which those who felt economically squeezed to death clearly meant as a
slap at
both the establishment domestically and EU leaders abroad.
Since then, multiple governments in the
European Union, too, have shifted toward the populist right. In Germany, recent elections swung both
right
and
left
just six years after, in July 2012, European Central Bank (ECB) head Mario Draghi
exuded optimism
over the ability of such banks to protect the financial system, the Euro, and generally
hold things together.
Like the Fed in the U.S., the ECB went
on to manufacture money, adding another
$3 trillion
to its books that would be deployed to buy bonds from favored countries and companies. That
artificial stimulus, too, only increased inequality within and between countries in Europe. Meanwhile,
Brexit negotiations remain ruinously divisive,
threatening
to rip Great Britain apart.
Nor was such a story the captive of the
North Atlantic. In Brazil, where left-wing president Dilma Rouseff was ousted from power in 2016, her
successor Michel Temer oversaw plummeting economic growth and escalating unemployment. That, in turn, led to
the election of that country's own Donald Trump, nationalistic far-right candidate Jair Bolsonaro who won a
striking
55.2%
of the vote against a backdrop of popular discontent. In true Trumpian style, he is disposed
against both the very idea of climate change and multilateral trade agreements.
In Mexico, dissatisfied voters similarly
rejected the political known, but by swinging left for the
first time
in 70 years. New president Andrés Manuel López Obrador, popularly known by his initials AMLO,
promised to put the needs of ordinary Mexicans first. However, he has the U.S. -- and the whims of Donald
Trump and his "great wall" -- to contend with, which could hamper those efforts.
As AMLO took office on
December 1st
, the G20 summit of world leaders was unfolding in Argentina. There, amid a glittering
backdrop of power and influence, the trade war between the U.S. and the world's rising superpower, China,
came even more clearly into focus. While its president, Xi Jinping, having fully consolidated power amid a
wave of Chinese nationalism, could become his country's
longest serving
leader, he faces an international landscape that would have amazed and befuddled Mao
Zedong.
Though Trump declared his meeting with
Xi a success because the two sides agreed on a
90-day tariff truce
, his prompt
appointment
of an anti-Chinese hardliner, Robert Lighthizer, to head negotiations, a tweet in which he
referred to himself in superhero fashion as a "
Tariff
Man
," and news that the U.S. had requested that Canada arrest and extradite an executive of a key
Chinese tech company, caused the Dow to take its
fourth largest plunge
in history and then
fluctuate wildly
as economic fears of a future "Great Something" rose. More uncertainty and distrust
were the true product of that meeting.
In fact, we are now in a world whose
key leaders, especially the president of the United States, remain willfully oblivious to its long-term
problems, putting policies like deregulation, fake nationalist solutions, and profits for the already
grotesquely wealthy ahead of the future lives of the mass of citizens. Consider the
yellow-vest protests
that have broken out in France, where protestors identifying with left and right
political parties are calling for the resignation of neoliberal French President Emmanuel Macron. Many of
them, from financially starved provincial towns, are angry that their purchasing power has dropped so low
they can barely
make ends meet
.
Ultimately, what transcends geography
and geopolitics is an underlying level of economic discontent sparked by twenty-first-century economics and
a resulting Grand Canyon-sized global inequality gap that is still
widening
. Whether the protests go left or right, what continues to lie at the heart of the matter is the
way failed policies and stop-gap measures put in place around the world are no longer working, not when it
comes to the non-1% anyway. People from
Washington
to
Paris
,
London
to
Beijing
, increasingly grasp that their economic circumstances are not getting better and are not likely
to in any presently imaginable future, given those now in power.
A Dangerous Recipe
The financial crisis of 2008 initially
fostered a policy of bailing out banks with cheap money that went not into Main Street economies but into
markets enriching the few. As a result, large numbers of people increasingly felt that they were being left
behind and so turned against their leaders and sometimes each other as well.
This situation was then exploited by a
set of self-appointed politicians of the people, including a billionaire TV personality who capitalized on
an increasingly widespread fear of a future at risk. Their promises of economic prosperity were wrapped in
populist platitudes, normally (but not always) of a right-wing sort. Lost in this shift away from previously
dominant political parties and the systems that went with them was a true form of populism, which would
genuinely put the needs of the majority of people over the elite few, build real things including
infrastructure, foster organic wealth distribution, and stabilize economies above financial markets.
In the meantime, what we have is, of
course, a recipe for an increasingly unstable and vicious world.
However, coverage of such fears, like so many other topics, was quickly tossed aside in favor of
paying yet more attention to Donald Trump's latest tweets, complaints, insults, and lies.
Tossed aside by whom? The corporate media of course. Fake news. Their ONLY agenda is the ongoing
demonetization of Donald Trump.
Minus the obligatory Trump bashing this is a good piece. The beating heart of Neo Feudalism (against
which we populists/nationalists/deplorables rebel) is debt money aka the FED. So what would you have us
actually do about the banking cartel? Vote BETO? Check our privilege?
I suggest stepping back further than the GFC, to the halcyon days of Thatcher and Reagan and TINA.
That's
when we stopped investing in ourselves, which is why R&D has a 50% lower share of GDP today than then.
Encouraged by the success of this non-investment, we then stopped keeping up the infrastructure we had
built–including the great corporate labs that created our recent prosperity–and now the maintenance bill is
coming due.
Needless to say, the Chinese did the opposite and the current "China!" noise is designed to distract us
from the dreadful destiny our faux democracy created for us.
But a country deserves the government it gets and we've always liked Elmer Gantry's style of
self-confident bullshit.
I miss Mike Whitney. Where did he go? He hasn't posted anything here at Unz since June. He was just as good
as Nomi on the finance/economic topics, but we didn't have to endure the constant anti-Trump
virtue-signalling. It's a bit like being served castor oil along with your beef bourguignon: it spoils the
whole effect.
Another thing I don't like about Nomi is how she fails to make the connection between
hyper-financialization and falling median incomes in the West on the one hand, and open borders and 'free'
trade on the other. Neoliberalism could succinctly be defined as the free movement of goods, capital and
people across borders. Hence, there is nothing left-wing about hating borders–not if you by 'left-wing' you
mean
pro-workingclass
.
Remember, the Tea Party was a grassroots anti-banker movement. The media successfully convinced the rest of
America that they were all racist fascist deplorables.
Post-housing collapse, maybe, the Fed should have provided loans to Main Street merchants, unleashing more
small-business energy, especially since so few Americans are starting businesses these days. But those
loans, too, always need to be allocated to people with a reasonable chance to pay them back. The Fed gave
the dough to the banks and the zombies, but in different ways, the small-business climate in the USA is
almost as bad as the zombie-business climate.
Back in 2008, any small-business stimulus would have been
complicated by the need for small fish to compete with the Goliath of big-box chains and on-every-corner
franchise mills spawned by big corporations, which, in neither case, generate many quality, rent-covering
jobs beyond a few management positions. In many cases, the owners of franchise businesses do not make
much -- they can't pay much. And the recent attempt to stimulate small businesses via the LLC tax cut might be
diluted by the undermining of small retail by volume sellers, like Amazon & Walmart -- behemoths that sell
everything under the sun at cut rates, now speedily delivering to customers' doors.
Infrastructure spending would create long-term value and some quality, if temporary, jobs mostly for
underemployed males, one of the groups unable to just work part-time or temp jobs at low wage levels, making
up the difference between living expenses and inadequate pay with spousal income, child support checks or
multiple monthly welfare streams from .gov and a refundable child tax credit up to $6,431. Rather than
working multiple jobs, that is what many single-breadwinner parents do. They stay below the income limits
for the .gov handouts, strategically, thereby keeping wages and job quality low for many women who lack
access to unearned income streams unrelated to their employment.
College-educated Americans (and others) also face the problem of the many dual-earner parents, keeping
two of the few decent-paying jobs with benefits under one roof. These are often not two rocket-scientist
jobs, but jobs that many educated people could perform. They maintain those jobs despite tons of time off to
accommodate their personal lives, letting $10-per-hour daycare workers, NannyCam-surveilled babysitters and
never-retiring grandparents do the work of raising their kids. The middle-class job pool would expand
dramatically if they were just more interested in raising the kids they produce, but they put house size and
multiple vacations first, with the liberals among them insincerely bemoaning the fact that 30 million
Americans lack health insurance, while they are double-covered in their above-firing, family-friendly jobs.
Still, if infrastructure spending is used to build The Wall, everyone will at least be safer, welfare
expenditures will go down and fewer welfare-assisted noncitizens will chase jobs, driving wages down for
underemployed US citizens. Bridges require repair -- something that affects the safety of everyone in the
country. The electrical grid and nuclear plants need to be fortified. Something needs to be done about
cybersecurity, a type of invisible infrastructure that is more and more important.
We need US citizens to get these jobs, including the record number of working-aged US citizens out of the
laborforce. Infrastructure spending should not be used to employ the citizens of other countries, like the
1.5 to 1.7 new legal immigrants admitted into the country each year, many of whom qualify for welfare and
tax credits for US-born kids and boatloads of illegal immigrants.
The Western propaganda continues unabated. In the latest episode of #FakeNews France3 TV got caught
broadcasting a fake Yellow Vests image–photoshoped by its disinformation division–to their viewers, and then
blatantly lied about afterwards:
I fear for the Jews, both universalist Tikkun Olas like Nomi and the Zio-nationalists,
when the (((Great Ponzi))) collapses.
Haxo has to be hasbara of some sort trying to discredit Prins' article. That aside, I hope for major
correction before we see a complete collapse of the U.S. and global economy which will result in complete
social collapse. For no other reason than I live in a major East Coast city and am not prepared to forage
for food.
That's when we stopped investing in ourselves, which is why R&D has a 50% lower share of GDP today
than then.
Encouraged by the success of this non-investment, we then stopped keeping up the infrastructure we had
built–including the great corporate labs that created our recent prosperity–and now the maintenance bill
is coming due.
Is this the result of Ivy League schools pumping out more degrees in finance rather than science and
engineering, or the cause?
Including Hungary and Viktor Orban in your piece demonstrates a lack of research and a definite lack of
perspective. I discount the rest of what you babble on about as a result. Try doing some on-the-spot
research. You might learn what really is going on. Start with the hundreds of YouTube tourist blogs. Then
visit. Stop blindly regurgitating the narrow, usually distorted crap you find in the press. You may have a
point but it appears to be a house of cards. To me at least. An expat enjoying my freedoms in Hungary.l
Yeah, and what 'tomdispatch regular' Prins does is increase the sense of rage and helplessness by pointing
out the degenerative process without offering any avenue to lance the boil and treat the infection. This
only contributes to the resultant social problems she describes. Not necessarily smart.
Better had she
pointed to some means of holding those responsible accountable, example given:
I'm old, mid seventies, studied economics in the sixties.
Among the many stupid things I did or thought in my life is that economics is what is expressed by
'economics is common sense made difficult'.
Maybe I had also the completely wrong idea about common sense, looking back, and looking around me now, it
hardly seems to exist.
The figures about CO2 ppm can be explained in one sentence, yet mankind seems to be embarking on the most
expensive experiment ever, the outcome of which will, my conviction, be that the only effect is back to
barbarism, civilisation depends on cheap energy.
About financial crises, around 1880 there was a crash in
Germany, Wild West around emission of shares was ended.
In 1929 USA financial regulations were way behind German, the great crash.
The USA, with GB, is the only country in the world where the central bank is not state owned.
Therefore derivatives were not regulated, the fairy tales about absolute minimum value were believed, as
were before 1880 in Germany emission fairy tales.
We have one more problem central bank, ECB, in theory owned by the euro countries, in practice Draghi can do
what he wants, as long as he stays within his statutes.
Anyone with some insight in the world economy sees that w're heading towards a gigantic crash, who is
unable to see this can read Varoufakis.
Now how did we get into this mess ?
In my opinion quite simple: globalisation, that made the political power of the nation states disappear, EU
of course also is globalisation.
Central bankers of the world monthly meet at BIS Basle, financially, economically, in my opinion, there the
world is ruled.
What these central bankers think, I've no idea.
But that Dutch central bank director Klaas Knot does not care for Dutch interests, is more than clear.
There is one important and interesting thing about economies, economy defined as the finances of a
country, the euro zone, the USA, politicians, and bankers, even central bankers, do not control economies.
A few aspects can be controlled, but not all of them at the same time.
So inconsistent decisions lead to unwanted, and/or unforeseen consequences.
The euro is a political experiment, the object was to force euro countries to become more or less
economically the same.
It failed, southern euro countries differ economically as much now from northern as when the euro was
introduced.
The only way out for France economically now I can see is the old devaluation recipe.
Alas, 'thanks' to the euro this is no longer possible.
So that, what is erronuously called elite, has maneuvred itself into a lose lose situation, do nothing, and
France will have a second 1791, or remove the euro flag from the sinking EU ship.
In both cases, as far as I can see, end of EU.
@tac
Quite simple, more and more French are running into financial difficulties.
Most of them of course do not understand why, but they're not interested in why, as the immigrants 'we want
a better life'.
Since over ten years now, I'm retired, we live many months yearly in France.
Great country, compared to the Netherlands, more and more resembling LA.
We do not pay French income taxes, just property tax.
But the steady increase over the years of the cost of living in France we noticed quite well.
For the last two or three years it is clear to us that even our French neighbours are less affluent, our
neighbouring houses all are second homes, owned by upper middle class, of course.
Complaints about the cost of the gardener, no parties with traiteurs any more.
A traiteur is someone who prepares expensive dishes for parties etc.
French complain, even in casual conversations, a restaurant owner 'Macron is right, nobody wants to work in
France any more', someone else 'France is ill, we pay to much for social security'.
Nomi doesn't even mention the impact a million and a half legal immigrants coming in each year has had on
our supposed recovery. How can we trust what she says when she leaves out such pertinent information? In
fact we could argue the only way we were able to recover after the Great Depression is because immigration
had been cut.
Mike was possibly the
only
journalist who gave Trump a modicum of good advice when he mentioned
bumping retirees pay instead of pretending corporate tax cuts will ever "trickle down" to the workers still
on the job. Bullseye! I could use a raise.
Mike said $150 more per month would go directly for stuff retirees need, especially the ones right on the
edge. Young plumbers, roofers, electricians and so on would have tons of work to do.
Cut corporate tax, on the other hand. and the buggers only send more work to China, sluice money to
anti-worker NGOs, or sit on it all like Bill Gates.
I'd go one step further: Put a cork in the billions for Israel program and pay off all American student
loans. Further still: Tax corporations that outsource work to pay every young worker $2500 monthly till
America learns how to pay "middle class wages" again. Bezos at Amazon can get a special bill for the
millions of worker-years he's stiffed and pay them US Marshall rates, backdated to their start date with
interest.
I know, I know. Fascist economics is
so
boring. But we're near the centennial of the days when
Benito Mussolini was the most respected and successful politician in Europe if not the world.
So in 2018 chickens hatched in 2008 come home to roost.
The financial meltdown of 2008 is no longer fresh in our minds. In the wake of the 2008
crisis, to save itself from bankruptcy, the US paid leading banks in excess of $16 trillion - the
biggest bailout ever! This itself had a huge impact on the overall debt burden.
Was 2017 a bond bubble that was deflated in 2018 or it was "everything bubble" and stocks are
the next in line. The lowest S&P500 went during22008 crisis was 670 I think.
Notable quotes:
"... financial crisis poses a fundamental challenge to globalization and to the finance capitalism of the Anglo-American neoliberal model of the free market. ..."
Reinhart and Rogoff (2008) suggest that 'the present U.S. financial crisis is severe by any
metric.' Many have pointed to the systemic nature of the crisis. Gokay (2009) suggests an
analysis in terms of' the explosive growth of the financial system during the last three
decades relative to manufacturing and the economy as a whole' with the huge growth of finance
capitalism and 'the proliferation of speculative and destabilizing financial institutional
arrangements and instruments of wealth accumulation.' This has meant 'the rise of new centers
and the loss of relative weight of the U.S. as a global hegemonic power' with increasing
resource depletion and ecological crisis. He goes on to argue:
The current financial crisis (and economic downturn) has not come out of blue. It is the
outcome of deep-seated contradictions within the structure of global economic system. It is
not a 'failure' of the system, but it is central to the mode of functioning of the system
itself. It is not the result of some 'mistakes' or 'deviations,' but rather it is inherent to
the logic of the system. ( http://www.globalresearch.ca/index.php?contexr=va&and=123
)
... ... ...
The question is the nature of the systemic crisis: does it mean the end of U.S. style
capitalism? Does it mean the end of neoliberalism? Does it mean the end of capitalism
itself?
Undoubtedly, the financial and economic crisis of 2008 is a major geopolitical setback for
the United States and Europe.
Altman (2009) argues hat governments in the U.S. and Europe will turn inward to focus on
domestic recovery especially as their citizens begin to make demands, such as the 'tea-party' )
phenomenon in the U.S.
The international fiscal deficits will discourage the U.S. and Western nations from
embarking on any international initiatives in foreign policy and Western capital markets will
take several years to recover as the banks insulate themselves by becoming risk-averse.
Perhaps, most importantly 'the economic credibility of the West has been undermined by the
crisis' (p. 10)...
... ... ...
Whatever the economic advantages of progress toward the 'knowledge economy,' the 'creative
economy' and, even the 'green economy the fact is that the cur- rent financial crisis poses
a fundamental challenge to globalization and to the finance capitalism of the Anglo-American
neoliberal model of the free market. As Harold James (2009: 168) reminds us
'The response to the Asian crisis of 1997-98 was the reinforcement of the American model
of financial capitalism, the so-called Washington consensus'
and he goes on to argue
'The response to the contagion caused by the U.S. subprime crisis of 2007-8 will be the
elaboration of the Chinese model.' ...
The key problem of the USA is that neoliberalism ideology is now discredited (since 2008) and
neoliberalism as the social system clearly entered the stage of decline. Trump and Brexit
were the first Robin (as in "One robin doesn't make a spring" )
The key problem that probably will prolong the period of neoliberalism past its Shelf LIfe
Expiration Date is that the alternative to it is still unclear. and probably will not emerge
until the end of the age of "cheap oil" which might mean another 40-50 years. But the rise of
far-right nationalism is a clear indication of people in various countries started reject
neoliberal globalization (including the USA, GB and most of Europe.) Trump's "national
neoliberalism" and Brexit are just another side of the same coin.
Economic rape of Russia and post Soviet republic in 1991-2000 as well as the communication
revolution postponed the crisis of neoliberalism for a decade or so. Otherwise, it might well
start around 2000 instead of 2008. Now G7 countries that adopted neoliberalism entered the
phase of "secular stagnation" (as Summers called it) and probably will not be able to escape
for it without some war-style mobilization or military coup d'état and introduction of
command economics.
IMHO military remains one of the few realistic hopes to play the role of countervailing
force for the financial oligarchy -- which owns that state under neoliberalism, So when we
talk about the Depp State that created anti-Trump witch hunt it is not just intelligence
agencies (although they assume active political role now and strive to be the kingmakers).
This Wall street, military-industrial complex and intelligence agencies.
It will be interesting if establishment neoliberals will try to take revenge in 2020, as
they clearly do not have any viable candidate right now (Biden is a sad joke). But they
definitely can put Trump on the ropes in 2019 and sign of their intention to do so already
emerged.
BTW the key problem of Trump survival is that Trump abandoned (or was forced to abandon)
most of his key election promises to the electorate (with the only exception of tariffs for
China, I think).
In this sense Trump behaved much like Obama did with his "Change and hope" bait and switch
trick, and Nobel Peace Price. Nobel Peace Prize for the butcher of Libya and Syria, the
godfather of ISIS, is rich.
During election campaign, his message was straightforwardly anti-globalization. He
believes that the interests of the working class have been sacrificed in favor of the big
corporations that have been encouraged to invest around the world and thereby deprive
American workers of their jobs. Further, he argues that large-scale immigration has
weakened the bargaining power of American workers and served to lower their wages.
He proposes that US corporations should be required to invest their cash reserves in the
US. He believes that the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA) has had the effect of
exporting American jobs to Mexico. On similar grounds, he is opposed to the TPP and the
TTIP. And he also accuses China of stealing American jobs, threatening to impose a 45%
tariff on Chinese imports.
To globalization, Trump counterposes economic nationalism: "Put America first". His
appeal, above all, is to the white working class who, until Trump's (and Bernie Sander's)
arrival on the political scene, had been ignored and largely unrepresented since the 1980s.
Given that their wages have been falling for most of the last 40 years, it is extraordinary
how their interests have been neglected by the political class. Increasingly, they have
voted Republican, but the Republicans have long been captured by the super-rich and Wall
Street, whose interests, as hyper-globalisers, have run directly counter to those of the
white working class. With the arrival of Trump they finally found a representative: they
won Trump the Republican nomination.
Trump believes that America's pursuit of great power status has squandered the nation's
resources
The economic nationalist argument has also been vigorously pursued by Bernie Sanders , who
ran Hillary Clinton extremely close for the Democratic nomination and would probably have
won but for more than 700 so-called super-delegates, who were effectively chosen by the
Democratic machine and overwhelmingly supported Clinton. As in the case of the Republicans,
the Democrats have long supported a neoliberal, pro-globalization strategy, notwithstanding
the concerns of its trade union base. Both the Republicans and the Democrats now find
themselves deeply polarized between the pro- and anti-globalizers, an entirely new
development not witnessed since the shift towards neoliberalism under Reagan almost 40
years ago.
Another plank of Trump's nationalist appeal – "Make America great again" –
is his position on foreign policy. He believes that America's pursuit of great power status
has squandered the nation's resources. He argues that the country's alliance system is
unfair, with America bearing most of the cost and its allies contributing far too little.
He points to Japan and South Korea, and NATO's European members as prime examples. He seeks
to rebalance these relationships and, failing that, to exit from them.
As a country in decline, he argues that America can no longer afford to carry this kind
of financial burden. Rather than putting the world to rights, he believes the money should
be invested at home, pointing to the dilapidated state of America's infrastructure. Trump's
position represents a major critique of America as the world's hegemon. His arguments mark
a radical break with the neoliberal, hyper-globalization ideology that has reigned since
the early 1980s and with the foreign policy orthodoxy of most of the postwar period. These
arguments must be taken seriously. They should not be lightly dismissed just because of
their authorship.
Roughly two-thirds of Americans agree that "we should not think so much in international
terms but concentrate more on our own national problems". And, above all else, what will
continue to drive opposition to the hyper-globalizers is inequality.
Jana Bacevic
59
2 years ago
PhD researcher at the University of Cambridge, Department of Sociology; sociology of
knowledge, social theory, political economy of knowledge production.
This is an extremely interesting and important question. In the past years, critics are
increasingly proclaiming that neoliberalism has
come to an end
, or at least become too broad or
too vague
to be used as an explanatory term.
Yet, neoliberalism has proven to be remarkably resilient. This, as
Jamie Peck
has argued, may be due to its propensity to 'fail forward', that is, perpetuate
rather than correct or reverse the mechanisms that led to its failures in the first place – the
economic/fiscal policies following the
2008 economic crisis
are a good example. Or it may have to do with what
Boltanski and Chiapello
have dubbed 'the new spirit of capitalism', meaning its capacity to
absorb political and societal challenges and subsume them under the dominant economic paradigm –
as reflected, for instance, in the way neoliberalism has managed to coopt politics of identity.
But the success of neoliberalism has arguably less to do with its performance as an economic
philosophy (at least after 2008, that is patently not the case – even IMF
has admitted
that neoliberal policies may be exacerbating inequality), and more to do with
what seems to be the consensus of political and economic elites over its application.
Neoliberalism allows for the convergence of financial, governmental, military, industrial and
technological networks of power in ways that not only make sustained resistance difficult, but
also increasingly constrain possibilities for thinking about alternatives.
This is not to say that
heterodox economic
ideas are lacking. Alternatives to mainstream (or neo-classical)
economics range from Marxist and Keynesian approaches, to post-Keynesian, participatory, or
'sharing' economies, and the philosophy of
degrowth.
Yet, in the framework of existing system of political and economic relations,
successfully implementing any of these would require a strong political initiative and at least
some level of consensus beyond the level of any single nation-state.
In this sense, the economic philosophy to succeed neoliberalism will be the one that manages
to capture the 'hearts and minds' of those in power. While the Left needs to start developing
sustainable economic alternatives, it seems that, in the short term, economic policies will be
driven either by some sort of
authoritarian populism,
(as for instance in Trump's pre-election speeches), or a new version
of neoliberalism (what
Will Davies
has called "punitive" neoliberalism). Hopefully, even from such a shrunk space,
alternatives can emerge; however, if we are to draw lessons from the
intellectual history of neoliberalism
, they will require long-term political action to
seriously challenge the prevailing economic order.
This isn very important question that i try to answer in my books. I think
regulation and taxation are key, as well as moving toward a more local circular
economy. You can download the books for free at
It is very interesting and educational to read this pre-election article two years later and see where the author is
right and where he is wrong. The death of neoliberalism was greatly exaggerated. It simply mutated in the USA into "national
neoliberalism" under Trump. As no clear alternative exists it remain the dominant ideology and universities still
brainwash students with neoclassical economics. And in way catchy slogan "Make America great again" under Trump
means "Make American working and lower middle class great again"
It is also clear that Trump betrayed or was forced to betray most of his election promises. Standrd of living of common
americans did not improve under his watch. most of hi benefits of his tax cuts went to large corporations and financial
oligarch. He continued the policy of financial deregulation, which is tantamount of playing with open fire trying to
warm up the house
What we see under Trump is tremendous growth of political role of intelligence agencies which now are real kingmakers and can
sink any candidate which does not support their agenda. And USA intelligence agencies operated in 2016 in close cooperation
with the UK intelligence agencies to the extent that it is not clear who has the lead in creating Steele dossier. They are
definitely out of control of executive branch and play their own game. We also see a rise of CIA democrats as a desperate
attempt to preserve the power of Clinton wing of the Democratic Party ('soft neoliberals" turned under Hillary into into warmongers
and neocons) . Hillary and Bill themselves clearly belong to CIA democrats too, not only to Wall Street democrats, despite the fact
that they sold Democratic Party to Wall Street in the past. New Labor in UK did the same.
But if it is more or less clear now what happened in the USa in 2016-2018, it is completely unclear what will happen next.
I think in no way neoliberalism will start to be dismantled. there is no social forces powerful enough to start this job, We
probably need another financial crisi of the scale of 2008 for this work to be reluctantly started by ruling
elite. And we better not to have this repetition of 2008 as it will be really devastating for common people.
Notable quotes:
"... the causes of this political crisis, glaringly evident on both sides of the Atlantic, are much deeper than simply the financial crisis and the virtually stillborn recovery of the last decade. They go to the heart of the neoliberal project that dates from the late 70s and the political rise of Reagan and Thatcher, and embraced at its core the idea of a global free market in goods, services and capital. The depression-era system of bank regulation was dismantled, in the US in the 1990s and in Britain in 1986, thereby creating the conditions for the 2008 crisis. Equality was scorned, the idea of trickle-down economics lauded, government condemned as a fetter on the market and duly downsized, immigration encouraged, regulation cut to a minimum, taxes reduced and a blind eye turned to corporate evasion. ..."
"... It should be noted that, by historical standards, the neoliberal era has not had a particularly good track record. The most dynamic period of postwar western growth was that between the end of the war and the early 70s, the era of welfare capitalism and Keynesianism, when the growth rate was double that of the neoliberal period from 1980 to the present. ..."
"... In the period 1948-1972, every section of the American population experienced very similar and sizable increases in their standard of living; between 1972-2013, the bottom 10% experienced falling real income while the top 10% did far better than everyone else. In the US, the median real income for full-time male workers is now lower than it was four decades ago: the income of the bottom 90% of the population has stagnated for over 30 years . ..."
"... On average, between 65-70% of households in 25 high-income economies experienced stagnant or falling real incomes between 2005 and 2014. ..."
"... As Thomas Piketty has shown, in the absence of countervailing pressures, capitalism naturally gravitates towards increasing inequality. In the period between 1945 and the late 70s, Cold War competition was arguably the biggest such constraint. Since the collapse of the Soviet Union, there have been none. As the popular backlash grows increasingly irresistible, however, such a winner-takes-all regime becomes politically unsustainable. ..."
"... Foreign Affairs ..."
"... "'Populism' is the label that political elites attach to policies supported by ordinary citizens that they don't like." Populism is a movement against the status quo. It represents the beginnings of something new, though it is generally much clearer about what it is against than what it is for. It can be progressive or reactionary, but more usually both. ..."
"... According to a Gallup poll, in 2000 only 33% of Americans called themselves working class; by 2015 the figure was 48%, almost half the population. ..."
"... The re-emergence of the working class as a political voice in Britain, most notably in the Brexit vote, can best be described as an inchoate expression of resentment and protest, with only a very weak sense of belonging to the labour movement. ..."
"... Economists such as Larry Summers believe that the prospect for the future is most likely one of secular stagnation . ..."
"... those who have lost out in the neoliberal era are no longer prepared to acquiesce in their fate – they are increasingly in open revolt. We are witnessing the end of the neoliberal era. It is not dead, but it is in its early death throes, just as the social-democratic era was during the 1970s. ..."
In the early 1980s the author was one of the first to herald the emerging dominance of neoliberalism in the west. Here he argues
that this doctrine is now faltering. But what happens next?
The western financial crisis of 2007-8 was the worst since 1931, yet its immediate repercussions were surprisingly modest. The
crisis challenged the foundation stones of the long-dominant neoliberal ideology but it seemed to emerge largely unscathed. The banks
were bailed out; hardly any bankers on either side of the Atlantic were prosecuted for their crimes; and the price of their behaviour
was duly paid by the taxpayer. Subsequent economic policy, especially in the Anglo-Saxon world, has relied overwhelmingly on monetary
policy, especially quantitative easing. It has failed. The western economy has stagnated and is now approaching its lost decade,
with no end in sight.
After almost nine years, we are finally beginning to reap the political whirlwind of the financial crisis. But how did neoliberalism
manage to survive virtually unscathed for so long? Although it failed the test of the real world, bequeathing the worst economic
disaster for seven decades, politically and intellectually it remained the only show in town. Parties of the right, centre and left
had all bought into its philosophy, New Labour a classic
in point. They knew no other way of thinking or doing: it had become the common sense. It was, as Antonio Gramsci put it, hegemonic.
But that hegemony cannot and will not survive the test of the real world.
The first inkling of the wider political consequences was evident in the turn in public opinion against the banks, bankers and
business leaders. For decades, they could do no wrong: they were feted as the role models of our age, the default troubleshooters
of choice in education, health and seemingly everything else. Now, though, their star was in steep descent, along with that of the
political class. The effect of the financial crisis was to undermine faith and trust in the competence of the governing elites. It
marked the beginnings of a wider political crisis.
But the causes of this political crisis, glaringly evident on both sides of the Atlantic, are much deeper than simply the financial
crisis and the virtually stillborn recovery of the last decade. They go to the heart of the neoliberal project that dates from the
late 70s and the political rise of Reagan and Thatcher, and embraced at its core the idea of a global free market in goods, services
and capital. The depression-era system of bank regulation was dismantled, in the US in the 1990s and in Britain in 1986, thereby
creating the conditions for the 2008 crisis. Equality was scorned, the idea of trickle-down economics lauded, government condemned
as a fetter on the market and duly downsized, immigration encouraged, regulation cut to a minimum, taxes reduced and a blind eye
turned to corporate evasion.
It should be noted that, by historical standards, the neoliberal era has not had a particularly good track record. The most dynamic
period of postwar western growth was that between the end of the war and the early 70s, the era of welfare capitalism and Keynesianism,
when the growth rate was double that of the neoliberal period from 1980 to the present.
But by far the most disastrous feature of the neoliberal period has been the huge growth in inequality. Until very recently, this
had been virtually ignored. With extraordinary speed, however, it has emerged as one of, if not the most important political issue
on both sides of the Atlantic, most dramatically in the US. It is, bar none, the issue that is driving the political discontent that
is now engulfing the west. Given the statistical evidence, it is puzzling, shocking even, that it has been disregarded for so long;
the explanation can only lie in the sheer extent of the hegemony of neoliberalism and its values.
But now reality has upset the doctrinal apple cart. In the period 1948-1972, every section of the American population experienced
very similar and sizable increases in their standard of living; between 1972-2013, the bottom 10% experienced falling real income
while the top 10% did far better than everyone else. In the US, the median real income for full-time male workers is now lower than
it was four decades ago: the income of the bottom 90% of the population has
stagnated for over 30 years .
A not so dissimilar picture is true of the UK. And the problem has grown more serious since the financial crisis. On average,
between 65-70% of households in 25 high-income economies experienced stagnant or falling real
incomes between 2005 and 2014.
Large sections of the population in both the US and the UK are now in revolt against their lot
The reasons are not difficult to explain. The hyper-globalisation era has been systematically stacked in favour of capital against
labour: international trading agreements, drawn up in great secrecy, with business on the inside and the unions and citizens excluded,
the Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP) and the
Transatlantic
Trade and Investment Partnership (TTIP) being but the latest examples; the politico-legal attack on the unions;
the encouragement of large-scale immigration in both the US and Europe that helped to undermine
the bargaining power of the domestic workforce; and the failure to retrain displaced workers in any meaningful way.
As Thomas Piketty has shown, in the absence of
countervailing pressures, capitalism naturally gravitates towards increasing inequality. In the period between 1945 and the late
70s, Cold War competition was arguably the biggest such constraint. Since the collapse of the Soviet Union, there have been none.
As the popular backlash grows increasingly irresistible, however, such a winner-takes-all regime becomes politically unsustainable.
Large sections of the population in both the US and the UK are now in revolt against their lot, as graphically illustrated by
the support for Trump and Sanders in the US and the Brexit vote in the UK. This popular revolt is often described, in a somewhat
denigratory and dismissive fashion, as populism. Or, as Francis Fukuyama writes in a recent excellent
essay
in Foreign Affairs : "'Populism' is the label that political elites attach to policies supported by ordinary citizens
that they don't like." Populism is a movement against the status quo. It represents the beginnings of something new, though it is
generally much clearer about what it is against than what it is for. It can be progressive or reactionary, but more usually both.
Brexit is a classic example of such populism. It has overturned a fundamental cornerstone of UK policy since the early 1970s.
Though ostensibly about Europe, it was in fact about much more: a cri de coeur from those who feel they have lost out and been left
behind, whose living standards have stagnated or worse since the 1980s, who feel dislocated by large-scale immigration over which
they have no control and who face an increasingly insecure and casualised labour market. Their revolt has paralysed the governing
elite, already claimed one prime minister, and left the latest one fumbling around in the dark looking for divine inspiration.
The wave of populism marks the return of class as a central agency in politics, both in the UK and the US. This is particularly
remarkable in the US. For many decades, the idea of the "working class" was marginal to American political discourse. Most Americans
described themselves as middle class, a reflection of the aspirational pulse at the heart of American society. According to a Gallup
poll, in 2000 only 33% of Americans called themselves working class; by 2015 the figure was 48%, almost half the population.
Brexit, too, was primarily a working-class revolt. Hitherto, on both sides of the Atlantic, the agency of class has been in retreat
in the face of the emergence of a new range of identities and issues from gender and race to sexual orientation and the environment.
The return of class, because of its sheer reach, has the potential, like no other issue, to redefine the political landscape.
The working class belongs to no one: its orientation, far from predetermined, is a function of politics
The re-emergence of class should not be confused with the labor movement. They are not synonymous: this is obvious in the US
and increasingly the case in the UK. Indeed, over the last half-century, there has been a growing separation between the two in Britain.
The re-emergence of the working class as a political voice in Britain, most notably in the Brexit vote, can best be described as
an inchoate expression of resentment and protest, with only a very weak sense of belonging to the labour movement.
Indeed, Ukip has been as important – in the form of immigration and Europe – in shaping its current attitudes as the Labour party.
In the United States, both Trump and Sanders have given expression to the working-class revolt, the latter almost as much as the
former. The working class belongs to no one: its orientation, far from predetermined, as the left liked to think, is a function of
politics.
The neoliberal era is being undermined from two directions. First, if its record of economic growth has never been particularly
strong, it is now dismal. Europe is barely larger than it was on the eve of the financial crisis in 2007; the United States has done
better but even its growth has been anaemic. Economists such as Larry Summers believe that the prospect for the future is most likely
one of secular stagnation .
Worse, because the recovery has been so weak and fragile, there is a widespread belief that another financial crisis may well
beckon. In other words, the neoliberal era has delivered the west back into the kind of crisis-ridden world that we last experienced
in the 1930s. With this background, it is hardly surprising that a majority in the west now believe their children will be worse
off than they were. Second, those who have lost out in the neoliberal era are no longer prepared to acquiesce in their fate – they
are increasingly in open revolt. We are witnessing the end of the neoliberal era. It is not dead, but it is in its early death throes,
just as the social-democratic era was during the 1970s.
A sure sign of the declining influence of neoliberalism is the rising chorus of intellectual voices raised against it. From the
mid-70s through the 80s, the economic debate was increasingly dominated by monetarists and free marketeers. But since the western
financial crisis, the centre of gravity of the intellectual debate has shifted profoundly. This is most obvious in the United States,
with economists such as Joseph Stiglitz, Paul Krugman, Dani Rodrik and Jeffrey Sachs becoming increasingly influential. Thomas Piketty's
Capital in the Twenty-First Century has been a massive seller. His work and that of
Tony Atkinson
and Angus Deaton have pushed the question of the inequality to the top of the political agenda. In the UK,
Ha-Joon Chang , for long isolated within the economics
profession, has gained a following far greater than those who think economics is a branch of mathematics.
Meanwhile, some of those who were previously strong advocates of a neoliberal approach, such as Larry Summers and the Financial
Times 's Martin Wolf, have become extremely critical. The wind is in the sails of the critics of neoliberalism; the neoliberals
and monetarists are in retreat. In the UK, the media and political worlds are well behind the curve. Few recognize that we are at
the end of an era. Old attitudes and assumptions still predominate, whether on the BBC's Today programme, in the rightwing
press or the parliamentary Labor party.
Following Ed Miliband's resignation as Labour leader, virtually no one foresaw the triumph of
Jeremy Corbyn in the subsequent leadership election.
The assumption had been more of the same, a Blairite or a halfway house like Miliband, certainly not anyone like Corbyn. But the
zeitgeist had changed. The membership, especially the young who had joined the party on an unprecedented scale, wanted a complete
break with New Labour. One of the reasons why the left has failed to emerge as the leader of the new mood of working-class disillusionment
is that most social democratic parties became, in varying degrees, disciples of neoliberalism and uber-globalisation. The most extreme
forms of this phenomenon were New Labour and the Democrats, who in the late 90s and 00s became its advance guard, personified by
Tony Blair and Bill Clinton, triangulation and the third way.
But as David Marquand observed in a review for the New Statesman , what is the point of a social democratic party if
it doesn't represent the less fortunate, the underprivileged and the losers? New Labour deserted those who needed them, who historically
they were supposed to represent. Is it surprising that large sections have now deserted the party who deserted them? Blair, in his
reincarnation as a money-obsessed consultant to a shady bunch of presidents and dictators, is a fitting testament to the demise of
New Labour.
The rival contenders – Burnham, Cooper and Kendall – represented continuity. They were swept away by Corbyn, who won nearly 60%
of the votes. New Labour was over, as dead as Monty Python's parrot. Few grasped the meaning of what had happened. A Guardian
leader welcomed the surge in membership and then, lo and behold, urged support for Yvette Cooper, the very antithesis of the
reason for the enthusiasm. The PLP refused to accept the result and ever since has tried with might and main to remove Corbyn.
Just as the Labour party took far too long to come to terms with the rise of Thatcherism and the birth of a new era at the end
of the 70s, now it could not grasp that the Thatcherite paradigm, which they eventually came to embrace in the form of New Labour,
had finally run its course. Labour, like everyone else, is obliged to think anew. The membership in their antipathy to New Labour
turned to someone who had never accepted the latter, who was the polar opposite in almost every respect of Blair, and embodying an
authenticity and decency which Blair patently did not.
Labour may be in intensive care, but the condition of the Conservatives is not a great deal better
Corbyn is not a product of the new times, he is a throwback to the late 70s and early 80s. That is both his strength and also
his weakness. He is uncontaminated by the New Labour legacy because he has never accepted it. But nor, it would seem, does he understand
the nature of the new era. The danger is that he is possessed of feet of clay in what is a highly fluid and unpredictable political
environment, devoid of any certainties of almost any kind, in which Labour finds itself dangerously divided and weakened.
Labour may be in intensive care, but the condition of the Conservatives is not a great deal better. David Cameron was guilty of
a huge and irresponsible miscalculation over Brexit. He was forced to resign in the most ignominious of circumstances. The party
is hopelessly divided. It has no idea in which direction to move after Brexit. The Brexiters painted an optimistic picture of turning
away from the declining European market and embracing the expanding markets of the world, albeit barely mentioning by name which
countries it had in mind. It looks as if the new prime minister may have an anachronistic hostility towards China and a willingness
to undo the good work of George Osborne. If the government turns its back on China, by far the fastest growing market in the world,
where are they going to turn?
Brexit has left the country fragmented and deeply divided, with the very real prospect that Scotland might choose independence.
Meanwhile, the Conservatives seem to have little understanding that the neoliberal era is in its death throes.
Dramatic as events have been in the UK, they cannot compare with those in the United States. Almost from nowhere,
Donald Trump rose to capture the Republican nomination
and confound virtually all the pundits and not least his own party. His message was straightforwardly anti-globalisation. He believes
that the interests of the working class have been sacrificed in favour of the big corporations that have been encouraged to invest
around the world and thereby deprive American workers of their jobs. Further, he argues that large-scale immigration has weakened
the bargaining power of American workers and served to lower their wages.
He proposes that US corporations should be required to invest their cash reserves in the US. He believes that the North American
Free Trade Agreement (Nafta) has had the effect of exporting American jobs to Mexico. On similar grounds, he is opposed to the TPP
and the TTIP. And he also accuses China of stealing American jobs, threatening to impose a 45% tariff on Chinese imports.
To globalisation Trump counterposes economic nationalism: "Put America first". His appeal, above all, is to the white working
class who, until Trump's (and Bernie Sander's) arrival on the political scene, had been ignored and largely unrepresented since the
1980s. Given that their wages have been falling for most of the last 40 years, it is extraordinary how their interests have been
neglected by the political class. Increasingly, they have voted Republican, but the Republicans have long been captured by the super-rich
and Wall Street, whose interests, as hyper-globalisers, have run directly counter to those of the white working class. With the arrival
of Trump they finally found a representative: they won Trump the Republican nomination.
Trump believes that America's pursuit of great power status has squandered the nation's resources
The economic nationalist argument has also been vigorously pursued by
Bernie Sanders , who ran Hillary Clinton extremely
close for the Democratic nomination and would probably have won but for more than 700 so-called super-delegates, who were effectively
chosen by the Democratic machine and overwhelmingly supported Clinton. As in the case of the Republicans, the Democrats have long
supported a neoliberal, pro-globalisation strategy, notwithstanding the concerns of its trade union base. Both the Republicans and
the Democrats now find themselves deeply polarised between the pro- and anti-globalisers, an entirely new development not witnessed
since the shift towards neoliberalism under Reagan almost 40 years ago.
Another plank of Trump's nationalist appeal – "Make America great again" – is his position on foreign policy. He believes that
America's pursuit of great power status has squandered the nation's resources. He argues that the country's alliance system is unfair,
with America bearing most of the cost and its allies contributing far too little. He points to Japan and South Korea, and NATO's
European members as prime examples. He seeks to rebalance these relationships and, failing that, to exit from them.
As a country in decline, he argues that America can no longer afford to carry this kind of financial burden. Rather than putting
the world to rights, he believes the money should be invested at home, pointing to the dilapidated state of America's infrastructure.
Trump's position
represents a major critique of America as the world's hegemon. His arguments mark a radical break with the neoliberal, hyper-globalisation
ideology that has reigned since the early 1980s and with the foreign policy orthodoxy of most of the postwar period. These arguments
must be taken seriously. They should not be lightly dismissed just because of their authorship. But Trump is no man of the left.
He is a populist of the right. He has launched a racist and xenophobic attack on Muslims and on Mexicans. Trump's appeal is to a
white working class that feels it has been cheated by the big corporations, undermined by Hispanic immigration, and often resentful
towards African-Americans who for long too many have viewed as their inferior.
A Trump America would mark a descent into authoritarianism characterised by abuse, scapegoating, discrimination, racism, arbitrariness
and violence; America would become a deeply polarised and divided society. His threat to impose
45%
tariffs on China , if implemented, would certainly provoke retaliation by the Chinese and herald the beginnings of a new era
of protectionism.
Trump may well lose the presidential election just as Sanders failed in his bid for the Democrat nomination. But this does not
mean that the forces opposed to hyper-globalisation – unrestricted immigration, TPP and TTIP, the free movement of capital and much
else – will have lost the argument and are set to decline. In little more than 12 months, Trump and Sanders have transformed the
nature and terms of the argument. Far from being on the wane, the arguments of the critics of hyper-globalisation are steadily gaining
ground. Roughly two-thirds of Americans agree that "we should not think so much in international terms but concentrate more on our
own national problems". And, above all else, what will continue to drive opposition to the hyper-globalisers is inequality.
End of cheap oil is the next milestone in the development of neoliberalism. It remain to be seen if it can survive the end of
cheap oil.
Notable quotes:
"... According to a Gallup poll, in 2000 only 33% of Americans called themselves working class; by 2015 the figure was 48%, almost half the population. ..."
"... American politicians, Obama in particular, constantly talk about "the middle class" when they want to refer to the bulk of the working population, as if almost everybody were doctors, lawyers, teachers and managers. ..."
"... This situation in the USA remind me of Australia where we have a choice between two right wing parties ..."
"... austerity for the working class while the rich go untouched even to pay a fair share of taxation. It's world wide the servants of the 1% who own 50% of the world's economy. ..."
"... There is no country in the world that doesn't have a mixture of both. The mix is probably a bit strained in north Korea but those countries where private capital is supreme all have intolerable conditions for workers. The Nordic countries probably have the most enlightened approach and best living standards for the majority. Remember well the old adage: With communism man exploits man. With capitalism it's the other way round. ..."
"... one can only hope neoliberalism is dead and/or dying.... ..."
"... Trump does not truly represent the labor or economically frustrated class. He is saying things that they'd like to hear. He is a rich and pompous man who belongs to the class which benefited tremendously from neoliberalistic policies. People are so fed up with inequality, their emotions can be directed in any direction and manipulated. Anger needs a target - Mexicans, Blacks, women, Muslims, immigrants and the list expands. Trump is misleading them by speaking in their voices while enjoying the comfort of luxury that he built by exploiting those very people. ..."
Quote: According to a Gallup poll, in 2000 only 33% of Americans called themselves working
class; by 2015 the figure was 48%, almost half the population.
How strange. American politicians, Obama in particular, constantly talk about "the middle
class" when they want to refer to the bulk of the working population, as if almost everybody
were doctors, lawyers, teachers and managers. It's good therefore to know that the American
people know better than their politicians how to classify themselves.
This situation in the USA remind me of Australia where we have a choice between two right
wing parties. The LNP is extreme/ultra right wing and our Labor Party is right wing
controlled. At least in Britain you have a choice, from afar it seems that your Conservative
Party is equal to our LNP but your Labour Party seems to be a little more Left wing than our
Labor Party which is a good thing for Britain.
willpodmore your next target must be your tory government, they are doing to you what our
tory government in Australia is doing to us and if Trump gets elected the USA tory government
will do to them, austerity for the working class while the rich go untouched even to pay a
fair share of taxation. It's world wide the servants of the 1% who own 50% of the world's
economy. If you don't believe me type the 1% own 50% of Earth's economy into Dr Goggle and
see what come up.
The one thing all Left leaning people do agree on is 'fairness' and equity for all, in
economic terms it means that huge corporations pay a fair share of tax, as working people do.
Sadly Tory govts ignore the profits of corporations and fail to force them to pay a fair
share of tax. The basic problem that the neo-cons suffer from is insatiable greed where
enough is never enough, selfishness is also a trait along with lack of empathy or compassion
for their fellow mankind.
"neoliberalism" is simply unregulated capitalism as practiced by Tory governments around the
world. Labour governments usually regulate and force these huge corporations to pay a fair
share of taxation from their huge incomes. The corporations are owned by the 1% who own 50%
of the world economy and continuing to grow on a daily basis.
Yes, nothing has changed in my lifetime except the 1% now own 50% of Earth's economy. Working
people have always struggled while the rich build their mansions, both Bernie Sanders and
Jeremy Corbyn have the right idea of a fair distribution of wealth. This means these huge
corporations paying their fair share of their income in taxes to the host country so "all"
the people receive some benefit, apart from the 1%.
blaster1, the joke of the century, globalisation -- which will only increase to the benefit of
everyone eventually. You obviously have little knowledge apart from what the Tories feed you.
1% of the global population own 50% of Earth's economy and through their corporations who the
tories allow to avoid paying tax will build on that 50% how long will it eventually take the
other 99% to receive any benefit? 200,000 years?
Exploitation is high on the priority list of any Tory government, wealth should be
distributed much more fairly than it currently is. The tories only serve the rich, they have
no time or empathy for the poor. Empathy and compassion are vacant in the tory philosophy of
the world. These two components make up a psychopathic personality.
pantomimetorie yes, and England could also be if you had a government who were not merely
servants of the rich. A government interested in the fair distribution of wealth. Not a tory
government, obviously!
There's no such thing as neoliberalism, it's just capitalism and capitalism actually works,
unlike socialism.
Yes it works alright, it works for the 1% of the global population who own 50% of the global
economy, sadly it leaves in its wake an underclass of people living below the poverty line
struggling to survive. It works for the rich, but there is no mechanism in the system that
the conservative will use to force the rich to pay their fair share of taxation to the
country included in that are the multibillion pound multinational corporations who pay little
to naught in taxes also which leaves a huge swathe of the population on Struggle Street and
the sooner that democratic socialism is instituted the better off the other 99% will be.
Keep up! There is no country in the world that doesn't have a mixture of both. The mix is
probably a bit strained in north Korea but those countries where private capital is supreme
all have intolerable conditions for workers. The Nordic countries probably have the most
enlightened approach and best living standards for the majority. Remember well the old
adage:
With communism man exploits man.
With capitalism it's the other way round.
Think they call it lobbying. Companies pay professional lobby firms staffed with ex MPs or
whatever to ' meet' ministers. The PR companies make 'donations' to party funds and push for
government contracts, changes in legislation, favorable to their industry tax breaks. You
can do it of course. Write to your mp to get your local roads, parks, libraries, improved.
Don't hold your breath.
That has to be the joke of the year if not the century!!!!!!!!!!!!
The most dynamic period of postwar western growth was that between the end of the war and
the early 70s, the era of welfare capitalism and Keynesianism, when the growth rate was
double that of the neoliberal period from 1980 to the present.
It would be interesting to see those growth figures with inflation taken into account or
to average them out across the whole world and not just the West. I suspect that if the
massive growth in India, China and the rest of Asia was taken into account the growth figures
wouldn't be so bad.
Excuse me? You're the one claiming rural inhabitants "have no idea" what city life entails.
That may have been the case centuries ago, but not now. Offshoring is small potatoes in the shift of global production. It may have been big news
a decade ago. We aren't a decade ago.
"Poverty = no kids" is your myth. Human history proves otherwise. Nobody's "decimating western/westernized population for profit". Is what you're about
really more white people, fewer brown people? Just say it, this is the Guardian, we've heard
it all before.
So run your country then. But intelligently, not on the basis of twisted myth-making and
dodgy race myths that we had enough of in 1945.
The left, at least as far as I know, have not been able to build up a solid set of
ideas on which to build a political agenda nor have they sought to gain traction for their
ideas in sites of knowledge production. The neoliberals were organised and waiting when
their turn came. For me, the left have fragmented and have turned to cultural critiques and
identity politics, forgoing any kind of realistic transformative agenda.
Apologies for not answering earlier.
i) Traction in sites of knowledge production is happening certainly. Again I can point to the
article for support - Stiglitz, Ha-Joon Chang, Piketty etc did not arise to such prominence
due to an organised left-wing agenda but because events in the real world demanded an
explanation for why neoliberalism wasn't delivering its universal benison as promised, and
indeed was showing empirical signs that it might be poisonous to economic activity in certain
fundamental ways.
ii) In my view it is quite possible to support identity politics (social liberalism if you
like) and a more left wing view of economics. At present the more enthusiastic placard wavers
are seeing identity politics as more likely to produce a beneficial change, but many are
recognising that the former hegemony of neoliberalism is breaking, and the best way to really
enhance the welfare of vulnerable groups is to promote universal economic justice in some
form.
iii) You appear to want to replace one hegemonic system of thought with another. But these
are the wrong tactics for me, since we have things to do in the real world.
By all means explain some of the properties your new left hegemonic theory should have, I'd
be very interested to hear them.
But in the end the practical steps are obvious and consist of applying left wing principles
to the modern economy. An example would be privatising the natural monopoly of the
railways.
If that sounds retro, it isn't, because we've never had to deal with an economy in this
condition before. We must proceed step by step in my view. The hegemony of neoliberalism was
damaging and lasted 40 years and counting. We must be pragmatic to be successful, given what
we know about the modern economy, and proceed by finding successful strategies rather than an
abstruse new theory that ignores the messy present in favour of some pure, simple conception
of the world backed up by the PR department. As I said above, one of the critical faults of
neoliberalism is its insistence that it is the answer to everyone's prayers. That certainty
is also the seed of its destruction, because to avoid doubts it eventually has to answer
those unrealistic prayers.
Trump does not truly represent the labor or economically frustrated class. He is saying
things that they'd like to hear. He is a rich and pompous man who belongs to the class which
benefited tremendously from neoliberalistic policies. People are so fed up with inequality,
their emotions can be directed in any direction and manipulated. Anger needs a target -
Mexicans, Blacks, women, Muslims, immigrants and the list expands. Trump is misleading them
by speaking in their voices while enjoying the comfort of luxury that he built by exploiting
those very people.
Billions of Chinese and Indian have never seen a toilet in their life, so yes, they really
don't know what life in a city is. And that doesn't make them "dumb". In their domain,
farming, you don't look like a brain storm either.
Offshoring isn't a "tiny element". We are no longer self sustaining and if China slammed the
door (as they did for a brief instant on Japan), there'd be serious heartburn in the US
before transitioning.
The official western tautology is fail/fail for the public. Not enough jobs to consider
having kids? Too bad. Not enough money to raise your kids? Too bad. Due to natural events?
No, due to political gaming.
Decimating western/westernized population for profit. It's not complicated. It is you who
claim immigration is needed to leave it as it is. "Ending our ability to pay pensions by
ending immigration isn't improvement either. "
The west has no business meddling with the rest of the planet if it can't run their own
countries.
People aren't so dumb as you imagine. They really didn't know about life in the city? Every
village had its emigrant. I've no such disdain for those who made that move.
Offshoring's now a tiny element in western deindustrialisation. Your costs are too high,
you can't compete: don't blame those worse off than yourself, put your own house in order and
educate your workforce to do better than flip burgers.
"Birth control brings down reproduction rates" is a meaningless tautology. People have
been practising birth control for centuries, mainly by delaying marriage. The PRB peddles
malthusian nonsense that the past half-century has clearly discredited. I thought you were
for population growth anyway: "economies so economically unstable that population declines"?
Make your mind up.
The ridiculous boom did crash, in 2008. Maybe you missed it. I want to know how we go
forward. But people need to pay attention to what's going on outside our head too.
I correct misrepresentations of the truth such as yours.
And the problem with communism is that it suspends peoples right in favour of central
control.
Communism and socialism is a post -capitalist society, means exactly the same thing to
me as they did to Marx also.
The common ownership and democratic control by us all, of all the means and instruments
for creating and distributing wealth. 'Common' and 'social' mean the same.
Nothing to do with state ownership or corporate or private ownership.
Nothing to do with central control either . It is a post-capitalist system
which utilises the technological advances of capitalism to produce for use to satisfy human
needs, using self feeding loopback informational tools for stock measurements and control
with direct inputs at local regional and global levels to allow calculation in kind, as
opposed to the economic calculation of capitalism, only necessary to satisfy profit
taking.
The reality is that we can all choose to be rich or poor. We are free to do as we wish
(within the law).
Nonsense. If you are born poor you will most likely die poor. Poverty is both absolute
and relative.
All wealth comes from the exploited abour of the working class which creates a surplus value
above its rationed access (wages). A commonly owned society, would not have rich or poor, we
would all have free access to the commonly produced wealth, with no elite classes creaming it
off and storing it.
Other than that, mind your own damn business, if you can't deal with the arguments.
One of the biggest downsides of the rise of Corbyn and Sanders, interesting though it is, is
the oxygen it seems to be giving to several old Marxist hacks who have made a good living for
decades banging on about their discredited and blood soaked ideology, ie Jacques et al.
Recently joined by that newly hatched Marxist harpie on the block, the hipster bearded and
thoroughly poisonous Richard Seymour.
The fact is there is not and never was any such thing as "neoliberalism". What they are
really referring to is globalisation- which will only increase to the benefit of everyone
eventually. The world is shrinking ever faster and that is no bad thing. Progress, evolution,
the future, call it what you want. To try and make out that it is halting or in reverse is
plainly nonsense.
???
What I remember of Reagan,
- spent like a drunken sailor, "defense" spending, til it broke US economy
- unbounded "adjustable rate" and "balloon" mortgages, first bank bailout, bill kicked down
the road to Bush Sr., $125 billion, when it blew up
- "trickle down", wealth transfer, via having taxed public pick up the tab for not just his
defense binge spending, but also corporate welfare programs (patent office, Import/Export
bank, infrastructure, etc.)
- first soup kitchens, adults panhandling/will work for food signs that I'd ever seen
- illegal immigrant amnesty, millions
- "War On Drugs" and right after that black neighborhoods flooded with crack
Reagan and Thatcher kicking off their "gut the public of wealth" agenda.
Their story is "you're a failure". Because a) you don't work hard enough/long enough, b) hold
your household together (if you were at work all waking hours), c) don't know how to raise
decent, independent kids (whilst being at work every waking hour), d) aren't motivated to
improve your lot in life if you need to work every waking hour and e) probably need to take
stress management classes if this gets on your nerves because you personally are driving up
"our" health care costs with your irresponsible neglect of your health.
Or, as the economists tout in the papers, "Productivity is up!" Or as the oligarchical put
it, "we need immigrant work force", who'll do it for cheaper and not complain or
burden us with their need for an actual life outside of work.
Clinton is, was, and still is. despite her recent fake reversal, a staunch supporter of TPP
and other trade agreements that will further impoverish the working class. She is the
furthest thing from a populist. Case closed.
Neoliberal economic policies, with their emphasis on market-led development and individual
rationality, have been exposed as bankrupt not only by the global economic crisis but also by
increasing social opposition and resistance. Social movements and critical scholars in Latin
America, East Asia, Europe and the United States, alongside the Arab uprisings, have triggered
renewed debate on possible different futures. While for some years any discussion of
substantive alternatives has been marginalized, the global crisis since 2008 has opened up new
spaces to debate, and indeed to radically rethink, the meaning of development. Debates on
developmental change are no longer tethered to the pole of 'reform and reproduce': a new pole
of 'critique and strategy beyond' neoliberal capitalism has emerged.
Despite being forcefully challenged, neoliberalism has proven remarkably resilient. In the
first years since the crisis erupted, the bulk of the alternative literature pointed to
continued growth in the BRICS (Brazil, Russia, India, China and South Africa) and in other big
emerging market countries to affirm the necessary role for the state in sustaining capitalist
development. New developmental economists have consequently reasserted themselves. Their
proposals converged into a broader demand for global Keynesianism (Patomaki, 2012) -- a demand
that is proving to be less and less realistic in the face of a deepening global economic
crisis.
Interpreting and Resisting Neoliberalism
Neoliberalism is a historical phenomenon. In the early 1970s firms began to feel acutely the
impact of falling profitability. Many managers and owners believed the mounting power of
organized labor was responsible. Indeed, this emerging structural crisis of capitalism was
amplified by increasing labor militancy and social opposition, and by the rising challenge of
socialism and nationalism from the Global South - the greatest wave of decolonization in world
history (Arrighi, 2007: 136). The power of the United States reached its nadir with its defeat
in Vietnam (1975), with the Iranian Revolution in the late 1970s, and with the spread of
revolutionary struggles, notably in Latin America. It is against this backdrop that the rise of
neoliberalism becomes understandable.
Neoliberalism's set of pro-market and anti-labor policies were first implemented by the
brutal US-backed Pinochet dictatorship in Chile (1973). The monetarist economic principles of
the infamous 'Chicago Boys' guided the process. At this time, however, many other governments
in the South resisted initial demands by the Northern-dominated international financial
institutions (IFIs), notably the World Bank and International Monetary Fund (IMF), to implement
rapid 'shock therapy' structural adjustment programmes.
The 1979 to 1982 Volcker Shock changed matters dramatically. Paul Volcker, then head of the
US Federal Reserve, allowed US interest rates to skyrocket from around 5 per cent to over 20
per cent, ostensibly to halt persistent inflation and to shock the US economy out of
stagnation. This move sparked a global rise in interest rates and a wave of profound economic
crises in Africa, Asia, Latin America and the Soviet bloc. Governments in these countries lost
the ability to service their debts because of the dramatic falls in the prices received for and
the quantity of their primary goods exported. This triggered the 1980s debt crisis, which
opened an opportunity for governments North and South to press more systematically for
neoliberal transformation.
Instead of mobilizing workers and peasants against this new form of economic imperialism,
governments in the South began to reorient their economies toward intensified export production
in order to earn the foreign currency needed to repay their loans. With the fall of the Soviet
Union, neoliberal shock therapy was also extended to Russia and other Eastern European
countries. In the former Yugoslavia, Iraq and Afghanistan, Western governments mobilized their
military power to facilitate the entrenchment of neoliberal policies at a terrible human
cost.
Neoliberalism has entailed processes of contested socio-economic transformation. Amidst
great popular resistance and economic instability, post-war state-led strategies of development
gave way to market-oriented neoliberal ones, or the so-called 'Washington consensus'. The
economist John Williamson identified ten policies characteristic of the consensus: fiscal
discipline, reduction in public expenditure, tax reform, financial liberalization,
market-determined exchange rates, trade liberalization, an open door to foreign direct
investment, privatization of public service and state-owned enterprises, deregulation, and
secure property rights. These policies have led to higher unemployment, worsening social
inequalities, widespread impoverishment, peasant land dispossessions, unsustainable
urbanization and increased worker exploitation.
Contributors to this book describe many of the specific developmental transformations in the
Global South, and how neoliberal processes have led to an expansion of the global reserve army
of workers and accelerated international migration. At the same time, financial and trade
deregulation have enhanced the power of finance capital and multinational corporations, which
they have used to pursue the outsourcing and offshoring of many industrial and service
activities. This globalization of production has brought with it intensified processes of
ecological destruction.
Women and the poor are the most negatively impacted by the neoliberal privatization of
public services. As women increasingly enter into the workforce, the privatization of public
services magnifies their 'double burden'. Such transformations have been global, having
negative impacts on workers in the South and, increasingly, in the North.
The neoliberal policies shaping these transformative processes are derived from neoclassical
economic theory. Neoclassical theory obscures and naturalizes the exploitative foundations of
capitalism because it reduces labor to just another factor of production, not unlike other
'technical inputs' like land and capital. The social reproduction of workers is further assumed
to be a private, genderless process restricted to the household, when it is in fact vital to
overall capital accumulation processes. In not dissimilar ways, neoclassical economics tends to
treat the environment as an externality. Further embedded in this kind of approach is a
tendency towards methodological nationalism. Certain models presuppose that capital and labor
do not move internationally and that international trade represents merely exchange of
commodities between national units. It follows, in theory, that by promoting domestic
specialization according to a given country's comparative advantage, free trade would
spontaneously stabilize participating 'national' economies at an equilibrium level, maintaining
employment and growth in all of them.
With its emphasis on liberal, market-based notions of individual equality and freedom,
neoclassical economics conceals underlying social polarizations and exploitative relationships
characteristic of capitalism. In reality, neoliberal transformation favors the interests of the
strongest capitals internationally (see Shaikh, 2005). Despite the proclaimed spontaneity of
the market, moreover, neoliberalism does not lead to a retreat of the state. Rather,
neoliberalism is marked by the class-based restructuring of the state apparatus in ways that
have responded to the evolving needs of capital accumulation (for example, around new financial
imperatives). What is more, as today's capitalism is dominated by Northern powerhouses like the
United States and Western European countries, the extension of capitalist relations globally
embodies these imperialist powers' aspirations to retain supremacy in the hierarchy of
states.
Neoliberalism, in fact, has always occurred through and within states, never in the absence
of states. Actually existing neoliberal transformations are mediated by the hierarchical
position of a given state within the world market and by specific social struggles.
Consequently, neoliberal transition in the United States is not the same as neoliberalism
transition in India or Iraq, and each entails specific national, class, racial and gendered
dimensions. Yet contributors to this book recognize that neoliberalism is a class-based
political and economic project, defined by the attack of capital and neoliberal state
authorities on the collective capacity of organized labor, the peasantry and popular classes to
resist the subordination of all social, political, economic and ecological processes to
accumulation imperatives. The subsequent consolidation of neoliberalism globally has thus been
to the benefit of global capital, and has come at the expense of workers, women and the poor.
Relations of imperialist domination, environmental exploitation, racial and gender oppression
are constitutive dimensions of this class struggle.
Neoliberal consolidations nonetheless generate new social resistances. Many contributors to
this book identify continuing processes involving the decomposition of working classes and the
formation of important social movements. With the 1999 demonstrations in Seattle, these
struggles assumed an inter-American character. Various indigenous groups, trade unionists,
faith-based and women's organizations marched alongside environmentalists and farmers in a
collective bid to shut down the World Trade Organization (WTO) talks (Burbach, Fox and Fuentes,
2013: 2). In the new millennium, the 'alter-globalisation' movement has attained a truly global
scale. Yet the movement has not been without problems. Notably, the activists and organizations
have failed to produce precise sets of collective demands or a coherent international political
programme. Pre-existing antagonisms among workers and peoples across lines of national and
social oppression were not overcome. The movement, as a result, failed to articulate collective
resistance across national, regional and international levels (Prashad, 2013: 235). After the
huge demonstrations against the war on Iraq (2003), it gradually faded away.
Still, resistances to neoliberalism grew thereafter, especially in the Global South. In some
cases these made significant advances. For example, while the United States and other Western
states were bogged down with military aggressions in the Middle East, US control over Latin
America eased. Social mobilizations there enjoyed new spaces for action, which helped give rise
to a variety of progressive governments less subservient to imperialist interests and the
competitive imperatives of neoliberal development. In this book, Abelardo Marifta-Flores
suggests that progressive income redistribution and the reinforcement of regional integration
processes are among the most significant achievements. Susan Spronk and Sarah Miraglia
highlight the progressive, albeit imperfect, gendered dimensions of the Bolivarian
transformative movement in Venezuela. Neoliberal transformations also create new socio-economic
conditions that may undermine US and Western hegemony. As several authors attest, for example,
the relocation of industrial production towards East Asia has generated new centers of
accumulation. Consequently, Western imperial powers now face a major challenge with the rise of
China and India. So too have other big emerging capitalisms, like Brazil, Russia, South Africa,
Indonesia and the Gulf States, become ever more important centers of accumulation. This has
lent support to arguments suggesting global hegemony has started to shift from the West to the
East.
To be sure, these emerging capitalisms, China in particular, offer alternative sources of
foreign direct investment, international aid, developmental loans and technological know-how to
countries in Asia, Africa and Latin America. Leaders of the BRICS have, for example, called for
a 'multipolar' reform of the financial system and of the IFIs, which includes the establishment
of a new multilateral Development Bank, the 'BRICS Bank'. Yet the extent to which these changes
offer an alternative at all has everything to do with the extent to which South -- South
relations and flows of know-how do not serve to extend and reproduce exploitative class
relations of domination, even be they under novel forms of sub/ Southern imperialism. This
remains to be seen, and indeed the global crisis is affecting the terms of this debate.
The Global Crisis and the Resilience of Neoliberalism
The global crisis that emerged in the United States in 2007 was rooted in the preceding
decades of neoliberal restructuring. Its immediate trigger, however, was the subprime mortgage
lending debacle. The US subprime crisis then took a global turn in late September 2008 with the
collapse of the US investment bank Lehman Brothers. As investors scrambled to preserve their
wealth and dump any toxic assets they had bought into, otherwise liquid US credit markets
seized up, bringing the global financial system to the edge of ruin. Only massive and sustained
state intervention prevented the system's implosion. Many Western governments rolled out
financial Keynesianism. This entailed nationalizing failed private banks and industries and
adding trillions of dollars to the public debt. The governments thus staved off global economic
collapse but only by incurring massive increases in new public debts. This gave rise to the
sovereign debt crises in the 'peripheral' EU countries. A number of developing countries also
incurred new public debts as governments rolled out economic stimulus packages to help sustain
domestic investment, maintain employment and buttress internal demand.
On the one hand, the privileges and powers gained by global capital under neoliberal
transformation remain largely intact. Indeed, imperialist governments have done everything in
their power to reinforce the current system. Such is the aim of the quantitative easing and
zero interest rate policies being pursued by the US Federal Reserve, the Banks of England and
Japan, and increasingly the European Central Bank. These actions are intended to prop up the
financial markets, support the prices of financial assets and make these countries' exports
more competitive. Throughout it all neoliberal technocrats remain unwavering in their
ideological commitments to market-oriented development. For example, the World Bank's Global
Financial Development Report 2013 attempts to reframe the global crisis not as a fundamental
problem of 'market failure' and capitalism, but instead as essentially about 'state failure'
and flawed human nature. The solution? More of the same neoliberal policies implemented since
the 1980s, but now guided and sustained by a more robust state apparatus that ensures better
market discipline...
So much for peace that neoliberal globalization should supposedly bring...
Notable quotes:
"... We face a world of multiple wars some leading to direct global conflagrations and others that begin as regional conflicts but quickly spread to big power confrontations. ..."
"... In our times the US is the principal power in search of world domination through force and violence. Washington has targeted top level targets, namely China, Russia, Iran; secondary objectives Afghanistan, North and Central Africa, Caucuses and Latin America ..."
"... China is the prime enemy of the US for several economic, political and military reasons: China is the second largest economy in the world; its technology has challenged US supremacy it has built global economic networks reaching across three continents. China has replaced the US in overseas markets, investments and infrastructures. ..."
"... In response the US has resorted to a closed protectionist economy at home and an aggressive military led imperial economy abroad. ..."
"... The first line of attack are Chinese exports to the US and its vassals. Secondly, is the expansion of overseas bases in Asia. Thirdly, is the promotion of separatist clients in Hong Kong, Tibet and among the Uighurs. Fourthly, is the use of sanctions to bludgeon EU and Asian allies into joining the economic war against China. China has responded by expanding its military security, expanding its economic networks and increasing economic tariffs on US exports ..."
"... The US economic war has moved to a higher level by arresting and seizing a top executive of China's foremost technological company, Huawei. ..."
"... Each of the three strategic targets of the US are central to its drive for global dominance; dominating China leads to controlling Asia; regime change in Russia facilitates the total submission of Europe; and the demise of Iran facilitates the takeover of its oil market and US influence of Islamic world. As the US escalates its aggression and provocations we face the threat of a global nuclear war or at best a world economic breakdown. ..."
We face a world of multiple wars some
leading to direct global conflagrations and others that begin as regional conflicts but quickly spread to
big power confrontations.
We will proceed to identify 'great power'
confrontations and then proceed to discuss the stages of 'proxy' wars with world war consequences.
In our times the US is the principal
power in search of world domination through force and violence. Washington has targeted top level targets,
namely China, Russia, Iran; secondary objectives Afghanistan, North and Central Africa, Caucuses and Latin
America.
China is the prime enemy of the US for
several economic, political and military reasons: China is the second largest economy in the world; its
technology has challenged US supremacy it has built global economic networks reaching across three
continents. China has replaced the US in overseas markets, investments and infrastructures. China has built
an alternative socio-economic model which links state banks and planning to private sector priorities. On
all these counts the US has fallen behind and its future prospects are declining.
In response the US has resorted to a
closed protectionist economy at home and an aggressive military led imperial economy abroad. President Trump
has declared a
tariff
war on China; and multiple separatist and propaganda war; and aerial
and maritime encirclement of China's mainland
The first line of attack are Chinese
exports to the US and its vassals. Secondly, is the expansion of overseas bases in Asia. Thirdly, is the
promotion of separatist clients in Hong Kong, Tibet and among the Uighurs. Fourthly, is the use of sanctions
to bludgeon EU and Asian allies into joining the economic war against China. China has responded by
expanding its military security, expanding its economic networks and increasing economic tariffs on US
exports.
The US economic war has moved to a higher
level by arresting and seizing a top executive of China's foremost technological company, Huawei.
The White House has moved up the ladder
of aggression from sanctions to extortion to kidnapping. Provocation, is one step up from military
intimidation. The nuclear fuse has been lit.
Russia faces similar threats to its
domestic economy, its overseas allies, especially China and Iran as well as the US renunciation of
intermediate nuclear missile agreement
Iran faces oil sanctions, military
encirclement and attacks on proxy allies including in Yemen, Syria and the Gulf region Washington relies on
Saudi Arabia, Israel and paramilitary terrorist groups to apply military and economic pressure to undermine
Iran's economy and to impose a 'regime change'.
Each of the three strategic targets of
the US are central to its drive for global dominance; dominating China leads to controlling Asia; regime
change in Russia facilitates the total submission of Europe; and the demise of Iran facilitates the takeover
of its oil market and US influence of Islamic world. As the US escalates its aggression and provocations we
face the threat of a global nuclear war or at best a world economic breakdown.
Wars by Proxy
The US has targeted a second tier of
enemies, in Latin America, Asia and Africa.
In Latin America the US has waged
economic warfare against Venezuela, Cuba and Nicaragua. More recently it has applied political and economic
pressure on Bolivia. To expand its dominance Washington has relied on its vassal allies, including Brazil,
Peru, Chile, Ecuador, Argentina and Paraguay as well as right-wing elites throughout the region
As in numerous other cases of regime
change Washington relies on corrupt judges to rule against President Morales, as well as US foundation
funded NGO's; dissident indigenous leaders and retired military officials. The US relies on local political
proxies to further US imperial goals is to give the appearance of a 'civil war' rather than gross US
intervention.
In fact, once the so-called 'dissidents'
or 'rebels' establish a foot hole, they 'invite' US military advisers, secure military aid and serve as
propaganda weapons against Russia, China or Iran – 'first tier' adversaries.
In recent years US proxy conflicts have
been a weapon of choice in the Kosovo separatist war against Serbia; the Ukraine coup of 2014 and war
against Eastern Ukraine; the Kurd take over of Northern Iraq and Syria; the US backed separatist Uighurs
attack in the Chinese province of Xinjiang.
The US has established 32 military bases
in Africa, to coordinate activities with local warlords and plutocrats. Their proxy wars are discarded as
local conflict between 'legitimate' regimes and Islamic terrorists, tribality and tyrants.
The objective of proxy wars are
threefold. They serve as 'feeders' into larger territorial wars
encircling
China, Russia
and Iran.
Secondly, proxy wars are 'testing
grounds' to measure the vulnerability and responsive capacity of the targeted strategic adversary, i.e.
Russia, China and Iran.
Thirdly, the proxy wars are 'low cost'
and 'low risk' attacks on strategic enemies. The lead up to a major confrontation by stealth.
Equally important 'proxy wars' serve as
propaganda tools, associating strategic adversaries as 'expansionist authoritarian' enemies of 'western
values'.
Conclusion
US empire builders engage in multiple
types of aggression directed at imposing a unipolar world. At the center are trade wars against China;
regional military conflicts with Russia and economic sanctions against Iran.
These large scale, long-term strategic
weapons are complemented by proxy wars, involving regional vassal states which are designed to erode the
economic bases of counting allies of anti-imperialist powers.
Hence, the US attacks China directly via
tariff wars and tries to sabotage its global "Belt and Road' infrastructure projects linking China with 82
counties.
Likewise, the US attacks Russian allies
in Syria via proxy wars, as it did with Iraq, Libya and the Ukraine.
Isolating strategic anti-imperial power
via regional wars, sets the stage for the 'final assault' – regime change by cop or nuclear war.
However, the US quest for world
domination has so far taken steps which have failed to isolate or weaken its strategic adversaries.
China moves forward with its global
infrastructure programs: the trade war has had little impact in isolating it from its principal markets.
Moreover, the US policy has increased China's role as a leading advocate of 'open trade' against President
Trump's protectionism.
ORDER IT NOW
Likewise, the tactics of encircling and
sanctioning Russia has deepened ties between Moscow and Beijing. The US has increased its nominal 'proxies'
in Latin America and Africa but they all depend on trade and investments from China. This is especially true
of agro-mineral exports to China.
Notwithstanding the limits of US power
and its failure to topple regimes, Washington has taken moves to compensate for its failures by escalating
the threats of a global war. It kidnaps Chinese economic leaders; it moves war ships off China's coast; it
allies with neo-fascist elites in the Ukraine. It threatens to bomb Iran. In other words the US political
leaders have embarked on adventurous policies always on the verge of igniting one, too, many nuclear fuses.
It is easy to imagine how a failed trade
war can lead to a nuclear war; a regional conflict can entail a greater war.
Can we prevent World War 3? I believe it
will happen. The US economy is built on fragile foundations; its elites are deeply divided. Its main allies
in France and the UK are in deep crises. The war mongers and war makers lack popular support. There are
reasons to hope!
I disagree. The parasitic terror regime that runs washington believe they can win a nuclear war, i have no
hope left for peace. They need a culling of the "useless eaters", we are stealing the food out of their poor
frightened children`s mouths by existing.
Eric Zuesse wrote a decent article yesterday at the Saker blog about the US nuclear forces and its owners
wet dream.
"The U.S. Government's Plan Is to Conquer Russia by a Surprise Invasion"
The actions of nato/EU/UK/ISR/KSA etc certainly supports his article, at least in my opinion.
The US, and the West, by instigating wars elsewhere, and selling weapons to
those, destroy countries and prosperity abroad. Those living in target countries find themselves miserable,
with loss of everything. It is only natural that they may try to escape a living hell by emigrating to the
West.
People in the US and the West in general will not want mass immigration, and with good reason; but if you
were in a war torn country or an impoverished country (as a result of western "help") you would also attempt
to move away from the bombs, etc.
If the West left the rest of the world alone (in terms of their regimes and in terms of their weapons),
they might prosper and no longer need to run away from their home countries.
The sanctions and embargoes have failed in the past, when China was much weaker, so we can be quite
confident that they will fail again, and quickly, as this timeline suggests:
September 3, 2018
:
Huawei unveils Kirin 980 CPU, the world's first commercial 7nm system-on-chip (SoC) and the first to use
Cortex-A76 cores, dual neural processing units, Mali G76 GPU, a 1.4 Gbps LTE modem and supports faster RAM.
With 20 percent faster performance and 40 percent less power consumption compared to 10nm systems, it has
twice the performance of Qualcomm's Snapdragon 845 and Apple's A11 while delivering noticeable battery life
improvement. Its Huawei-patented modem has the world's fastest Wi-Fi and its GPS receiver taps L5 frequency
to deliver 10cm. positioning.
September 5, 2018
. China's front-end fab capacity will account for 16 percent of the world's
semiconductor capacity this year, increasing to 20 percent by 2020.
September 15, 2018.
China controls one third of 5G patents and has twice as many installations
operating as the rest of the world combined.
September 21, 2018
. China has reached global technological parity and now has twelve of the
world's top fifty IC design houses (China's SMIC is fourth, Huawei's HiSilicon is seventh), and twenty-one
percent of global IC design revenues. Roger Luo, TSMC.
October 2, 2018
. Chinese research makes up 18.6 percent of global STEM peer-reviewed papers, ahead
of the US at 18 percent. "The fact that China's article output is now the largest is very significant. It's
been predicted for a while, but there was a view this was not likely to happen until 2025," said Michael
Mabe, head of STM.
October 14, 2018
. Huawei announces 7 nm Ascend 910 chipset for data centers, twice as powerful as
Nvidia's v100 and the first AI IP chip series to natively provide optimal TeraOPS per watt in all scenarios.
Available 2Q19.
October 7, 2018
: China becomes largest recipient of FDI in H1, attracting an estimated 70 billion
U.S. dollars, according to UNCTAD.
October 8, 2018:
Taiwan's Foxconn moves its major semiconductor maker and five integrated circuit
design companies to Jinan, China.
October 22, 2018
. China becomes world leader in venture capital, ahead of the US and almost twice
the rest of the world's $53.4 billion YTD. The Crunchbase report says the entrepreneurial ecosystem in the
world is undergoing a major transformation: it is now driven by China instead of the US.
Isolating strategic anti-imperial power via regional wars, sets the stage for the 'final assault' –
regime change by cop or nuclear war
good article.
Only idiot can believe that nuclear war can be won, IMHO. Elites aren't suicidal, oh no. On the contrary.
Can they make a mistake and cause that war, definitely.
Which brings us to the important part:
Can we prevent World War 3? I believe it will happen. The US economy is built on fragile foundations;
its elites are deeply divided. Its main allies in France and the UK are in deep crises. The war mongers
and war makers lack popular support.
Agree, but, that's
exactly
the reason I disagree with:
There are reasons to hope!
No need to be pedantic, of course there is always a reason for hope.
But, I see it as
so
fertile ground for making
The MISTAKE
.
Can we prevent World War 3? I believe it will happen. The US economy is built on fragile foundations;
its elites are deeply divided. Its main allies in France and the UK are in deep crises. The war mongers
and war makers lack popular support. There are reasons to hope!
It's when the elite war mongers' backs are up against the wall that they come up with a cleverly designed
false flag attack to rally public support for war. They are more dangerous now than ever.
Agree about Russia and China, however Iran needs to be viewed not as a play for oil or the Islamic crowd but
driven wholly and solely by Israel. Iran is not a threat to US in any context, only Israel.
question:
If the relatively small tariffs on Chinese goods amount to 'direct attacks on China', then what are the
massive tariffs by China on US goods?
The "Chess men" behind "The Wall Street Economy" have stated a few times that the only way to remain the
dominant economy is to first: convince rivals that resistance is futile, and second:
to atomize any
potential rival
(Ghaddaffi is a clear example).
Breaking up Russia has been on the to-do list for
decades, and I believe that the Chess Men have no idea what to do about containing China, and are clearly
flat-footed, and
desperate
kidnapping a Chinese business executive.
The Wall Street Economy depended on cheap Chinese labor it's own profits, and that was Ok until .?
Until the writing on the Wall became ledgible .
The smell of genuine fear is in the air.
" The war mongers and war makers lack popular support. There are reasons to hope! "
Is popular support
needed to get a people in a war mood ?
Both Pearl Harbour and Sept 11 demonstrate, in my opinion, that it is not very difficult to create a war
mood.
Yet, if another Sept 11 would do the trick, I wonder.
Sept 11 has been debated without without interruption since Sept 11.
After the 1946 USA Senate investigation into Pearl Harbour the USA government succeeded in preventing a
similar discussion.
Until now the west, Deep State, NATO, EU did not succeed in provoking Russia or China.
Each time they tried something, in my opinion they did this several times, Russia showed its military
superiority, at the same time taking care not to hurt public opinion in the west.
Is not it amazing that the morally miserable US, a "power in search of world domination through force and
violence," is officially governed by self-avowed pious X-tians. What kind of corruption among the high-level
clergy protects the satanists Pompeo, Bush, Rice, Clinton, Obama, Blair and such from excommunication?
"Washington does little to nothing to restore peace and help the devastated region to recover from the
long war, while its [US] airstrikes
continue to rack up civilian deaths
At the same time, the US
military presence at the Al-Tanf airbase and the "armed gangs" around it prevent refugees from returning
home."
– Nothing new. The multi-denominational Syria has been pounded by the US-supported "moderate" terrorists
(armed with US-provided arms and with UK-provided chemical weaponry) to satisfy the desires of
Israel-firsters, arm-dealers and the multitude of war-profiteers that have been fattening their pockets at
the US/UK taxpayers' expense.
"Timber Sycamore" [initiated by Obama] is the most important arms trafficking operation in History. It
involves at least 17 governments. The transfer of weapons, meant for jihadist organizations, is carried out
by Silk Way Airlines, a Azerbaďdjan public company of cargo planes."
@Godfree Roberts
Huawei can announce whatever, there are much more experienced adversaries(IBM, intel and ARM) who can`t beat
nV in computation, and especially in integration of silicon. Guess who`s running inference and computer
vision in all these car autopilots.
I think we could have an economic collapse like the Soviet Union had , or like Argentina had in 2001 with
the " corralito "
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Corralito
.
Being the complex and global society that we are , it would be a disaster , it would produce hunger ,
misery and all types of local wars .
"Notwithstanding the limits of US power and its failure to topple regimes "
Have to agree with that
statement. Seriously, wherein is this vaunted "superpower" that our American politicians always yap about?
All I've seen in my lifetime is our military getting its butt kicked in Cuba, Vietnam, Somalia, Iraq,
Afghanistan. What, besides insanity and hubris, makes them think they could win anything much less a war
against Iran, China or Russia?
Mostly accurate, but 'closed protectionist society' ! Hardly. It's still very difficult to buy any
manufactured goods made in this country. Of course this is part of the World economic circle countries use
the US Dollar for all trade. They need dollars. We can print them and receive real goods in return. This has
been going around and around for decades. It may come to an end in the not-too-distant future, but it has a
lot of inertia.
@jilles dykstra
"Naturally the common people don't want war: Neither in Russia, nor in England, nor for that matter in
Germany. That is understood. But, after all, IT IS THE LEADERS of the country who determine the policy and
it is always a simple matter to drag the people along, whether it is a democracy, or a fascist dictatorship,
or a parliament, or a communist dictatorship. Voice or no voice, the people can always be brought to the
bidding of the leaders. That is easy. All you have to do is TELL THEM THEY ARE BEING ATTACKED, and denounce
the peacemakers for lack of patriotism and exposing the country to danger. IT WORKS THE SAME IN ANY
COUNTRY."
The only threat to patriotic Americans is Zionism which has ruled the U.S. since it took control over the
money supply and the taxes via the privately owned Zionist FED and IRS and has given America nothing to wars
and economic destruction since the FED and IRS were put in place by the Zionist banking kabal in 1913 and
both are UNCONSTITUTIONAL!
The threat is not from China or Russia or Iran etc., the threat is from within
the U.S. government which is controlled in every facet by the Zionists and dual citizens and is as foreign
to the American people as if it were from MARS!
Until the American people wake up to the fact that we are slaves on a Zionist plantation and are used as
pawns in the Zionist goal of a satanic Zionist NWO and abolish the FED and IRS and break the chains of
slavery that the FED and IRS have place upon us, until then nothing will change and the wars and economic
destruction by the Zionist kabal will continue!
Read The Controversy of Zion by Douglas Reed and The Committee of 300 by Dr. John Coleman and The
Protocols of Zion, to see the Zionist satanic NWO plan.
Lost me at Kurd takeover of northern Iraq/Syria. The Kurds have defacto owned those areas since 1991, and
earlier. Saddam gassing the Kurds didn't accomplish anything except for making himself a target, no Arab
lived in those areas, the Kurds would kill them.
Nov 28, 2018 Belt & Road Billionaire in Massive Bribery Scandal
The bribery trial of Dr. Patrick Ho, a
pitchman for a Chinese energy company, lifts the lid on how the Chinese regime relies on graft to cut Belt
and Road deals in its global push for economic and geopolitical dominance.
I agree with Bob Sykes' commentary over on Instapundit:
Well, our "anti-ISIS" model in eastern Syria consists of defending ISIS against attacks by the Syrian
government, allowing them to pump and export Syrian oil for their profit, arming them and allowing them
to recruit new fighters. I suppose that means we should be arming the Taliban.
ISIS was created by the CIA to fight against Assad. But they slipped the leash and became the fighting
force for the dissident Sunni Arabs all along the Euphrates Valley. We only began to oppose them when
their rebellion reached the outskirts of Baghdad, and even then the bulk of the fighting was done by
Iraq's Shias and Iran. Now we are transferring them, or many of them, into secure (for ISIS) areas of
Iraq.
The three U.S. presidents, six secretaries of defense and five chairmen of the Joint Chiefs of
Staff are, in fact, war criminals, in exactly the same sense that Hitler, Goebels, Goering, Himmler et
al. were war criminals.
Those presidents, secretaries and generals launched wars of aggression
against Sudan, Somalia, Afghanistan, Iraq, Syria, Ukraine, Libya, Yemen not one of which threatened us
in any way. They engineered coups d'état against two friendly governments, Egypt and Turkey.
Now the
fake American, anti-American neocons want to attack Iran, Venezuela, North Korea and even Russia and
China.
Green needs to get his head out of his arse. We, the US, are the great rogue terrorist state. We are
the evil empire. We are the chief source of death and destruction in the world. How many hundreds of
thousands of civilians have we murdered in the Middle East, Africa and Central Asia? How many cities have
we bombed flat like Raqqa and Mosel. Putin is a saint compared to any US President.
Iran has always been at the center of the Great Game, the key square on the board to block
Eurasia.You must either control Afghanistan AND Pakistan or Iran.
With Pakistan now in the SCO, Iran is a US imperative.
Israels antipathy is secondary and a useful foil, not the primary motive.
Read MacKinder, the imperial power has changed, not the strategy.
How is it possible for anyone to write an article titled:
A World of Multiple Detonators of Global Wars
without mentioning the Principal Detonator of Global Wars?? The Elephant!
The United States of America is no longer a Sovereign Nation.
The Local Political Power Elite (C. Wright Mills term), serve, are Minions, of the Zionist Jewish
Financial Terrorist Initiators and Controllers of the Global New World Order.
I would express this point in stronger terms, but I have not yet finished my coffee. The "Mulitiple
Detonators" Petras discusses are useless unless Triggered by the Global Controllers.
A Slight Digression: maybe:
Petras may have written his exposé this way, understanding that he might safely avoid mention of the
anti-Semitic (they hate Palestinians and other Arabs – actual Semites), Zionist Land Thieves, because a
clueless Anarchist would appear and complete his article for him. If that is the case, I want half of the $
Unz is paying Petras for this article.
In Conclusion: and by the number###:
1. The American Power Elite and servile Politicians in America's Knesset in Washington DC, do not go to the
Bathroom, without permission from their Zionist Oligarch masters.
2. The American Gauleters, Quislings, (better known as Traitors), serve the Rothschild and other Foreign
Oligarchs. Recently, only 1, of 100 'Senators' demanded that there be a discussion of the Bill to send
another $35 Billion gift to the Zionist occupiers of Palestine. Poor
Senator Rand Paul
. How many ribs
of his remain to be broken?
We the American people, have one Senator. And he has a great father.
3. Textbooks, Entertainment from Hollywood (key to all mind control), even Dictionaries, have been
ruthlessly censored.
4.
Our elected Zionist slaves in Congress, and all State and local governing bodies, live in fear
of saying (accidentally), some truth, and ending up working at Walmart or 7-11, (if they are lucky).
5. Our young are effectively brainwashed in their schools; they have already been removed from their
parents.
6. Our politicians are bribed with our own tax money (re-routed by the Zionists AIPAC, etc.).
7.
The Zionist Entity has huge Financial Resources
. They should be giving us 'Financial $$ Aid,
not the other way around. Since NAFTA, we have entire cities & tons of infrastructure to rebuild.
Excuse me
: Girlfriend thinks I should go to work.
Petras, I just fleshed out your, otherwise, promising article. You must understand – that
the ethnic
cleansing – genocide, against the Palestinian Nation, by the Terrorist Zionist Oligarchs, is the greatest
single crime being committed on our Planet.
All other crimes stem from this one.
We Americans must Restore Our Republic!
John F. Kennedy, Robert Kennedy, M L King, Malcolm X. John Lennon; we are late, but we are coming.
The threat is not from China or Russia or Iran etc., the threat is from within the U.S. government
which is controlled in every facet by the Zionists and dual citizens and is as foreign to the American
people as if it were from MARS!
One comment:
Until the American people wake up to the fact that we are slaves on a Zionist plantation and are used
as pawns in the Zionist goal of a satanic Zionist NWO and abolish the FED and IRS and break the chains of
slavery that the FED and IRS have place upon us, until then nothing will change and the wars and economic
destruction by the Zionist kabal will continue!
In order to accomplish the above
, we American Citizen Patriots – must Restore Our Republic – that,
with our Last Constitutional President,
John F. Kennedy,
was destroyed by the Zionist Oligarchs and
their American underling traitors, in a hail of bullets, on November 22, 1963.
@Miro23
" same sense that Hitler, Goebels, Goering, Himmler et al. were war criminals. "
Why were they war criminals ?
Because of the Neurenberg farce ?; farce according to the chairman of the USA Supreme Court in 1945:
Bruce Allen Murphy, 'The Brandeis/Frankfurter Connection, The Secret Political Activities of Two Supreme
Court Justices', New York, 1983
Churchill and Lindemann in fact murdered some two million German civilians, women, children, old men. Not a
crime ?
Churchill refused the May 1941 Rudolf Hess peace proposal, not a crime ?
FDR deliberately provoked Pearl Harbour, some 2700 casualties, his pretcxt for war, not a crime ?
900.000 German hunger deaths between the 1918 cease fire and Versailles, the British food blockade, not a
crime ?
Will these wild accusations ever stop ?
I am all for the mother of all wars; however, it isn't going to come anytime soon, nay, not in our lifetime
but when it does appear on the next century's horizon, it would be cathartic to all concerned. Rejoice!
Europe is realigning. England leaving Euro. French population is in upheaval. Eventually France will leave
the Euro also.Most of German tourists now are going to Croatia. Italy is loosing tourists.
Italy living standard is declining. Germany is being pushed inevitably toward cooperation with Russia. Only
supporter of Ukraine will remain USA. Ukraine will be only burden.
Brussels power will evaporate. NATO will remain only on paper and will cease to be reality.
.
This will be great step toward peace in the world.
US is treating its allies as used toilet paper.
Obviously Kashogi was sentenced to death for high treason in absence. The sentence was carried out on Saudi
Arabia's territory. So in reality it is nobody's business.
All hula-buu did happen because he was a reporter working for warmongering Zionist New york times.
@Durruti
I agree with you partly, especially when it comes to the US regarding Zionism and the power of the Israel
lobby to influence US foreign policy and even domestic policy.
But when it comes to Global governance, you have a somewhat narrow minded approach.
Most of the ills today that happen in the world, is driven by the NEW WORLD ORDER OF NEOLIBERAL
GLOBALIZATION.
Unrelated phenomena, such as the destruction in the Middle East (Iraq, Afghanistan, Libya, and Syria), the
destruction of Yugoslavia, the coup in Ukraine and the Greek economic catastrophe are a consequence of this
NWO expansion. NWO expansion is the phasing out of national sovereignty (through economic and/or military
violence) and its replacement by a kind of transnational sovereignty administered by a Transnational Elite.
This is the network of the elites mainly based in the G7 countries, which control the world economic and
political/ military institutions (WTO, IMF, World Bank, EU, European Central Bank, NATO, UN and so on), as
well as the global media that set the agenda of the 'world community'.
The US is an important part of this since it provides the Military Means to integrate countries that do not
"comply" with the NWO dictates.
The Zionists carry a lot of blame and are part of that drive for this NWO, but there are others, most of
them in the US and Europe.
Here's a good link to an article if you have time, with good info about NWO & Trasnational corporations
that are mainly to blame about all the worlds and misery in our world today.
@WHAT
back door Intel
,
embedded ARM
Open source Red Hat-IBM
Hummm?.
I am not so sure, Mr. What. Experience may not mean much to abused IAI consumers. even if IAI catches up
to the exponential fundamentals achieved by Huawei consumers might prefer back-door-free equipment and
Operating Systems.
Russian times reported a few weeks ago that Russia has a quite different new processor and an OS that
does not use any IAI stuff and is developing a backup Internet for Russians which it expects to expand
regionally,
"What we have then, are criminal syndicates masquerading as philanthropic enterprises
Norman Dodd, director of research for the (U.S.) REECE COMMITTEE in its attempt to investigate tax exempt
foundations, stated:
"The Foundation world is a coordinated, well-directed system, the purpose of which is to ensure that the
wealth of our country shall be used to divorce it from the ideas which brought it into being."
The Rothschilds rule the U.S. through the foundations, the Council on foreign Relations, and the Federal
Reserve System, with no serious challenges to their power. Expensive 'political campaigns' are routinely
conducted, with carefully screened candidates who are pledged to the program of the WORLD ORDER. Should they
deviate from the program, they would have an 'accident', be framed on a sex charge, or indicted on some
financial irregularity.
Senator Moynihan stated in his book, "Loyalties", "A British friend, wise in the ways of the world, put
it thus: "They are now on page 16 of the Plan." Moynihan prudently did not ask what page 17 would bring.
"Tavistock's pioneer work in behavioural science along Freudian lines of 'controlling' humans established
it as the world center of FOUNDATION ideology.
[MORE]
Its network extends from the University of Sussex to the U.S. through the Standford Research
Institute, Esalen, MIT, Hudson Institute, HERITAGE FOUNDATION, Centre of Strategic and International
Studies at Georgetown, where State Dept personnel are trained, US Air Force Intelligence, and the Rand
and Mitre corporations.
(at the time of writing, 1992) Today the Tavistock Institute operates a $6 billion a year network
of foundations in the U.S., all of it funded by U.S. taxpayers' money. Ten major institutions are
under its direct control, with 400 subsidiaries, and 3000 other study groups and think tanks which
originate many types of programs to increase the control of the WORLD ORDER over the American people.
The personnel of the FOUNDATIONS are required to undergo indoctrination at one or more of these
Tavistock controlled institutions.
A network of secret groups – the MONT PELERIN SOCIETY, TRILATERAL COMMISSION, DITCHLEY FOUNDATION,
and CLUB OF ROME is the conduit for instructions to the Tavistock network.
Tavistock Institute developed the mass brain-washing techniques which were first used
experimentally on AMERICAN prisoners of war in KOREA.
Its experiments in crowd control methods have been widely used on the American public, a
surreptitious but nevertheless outrageous assault on human freedom by modifying individual behaviour
through topical psychology.
A German refugee, Kurt Lewin, became director of Tavistock in 1932. He came to the U.S. in 1933 as
a 'refugee', the first of many infiltrators, and set up the Harvard Psychology Clinic, which
originated the propaganda campaign to turn the American public against Germany and involve the U.S. in
WWII.
In 1938, Roosevelt executed a secret agreement with Churchill which in effect ceded U.S.
sovereignty to England, because it agreed to let Special Operations Executive control U.S. policies.
To implement this agreement, Roosevelt sent General Donovan to London for indoctrination before
setting up the OSS (now the CIA) under the aegis of SOE-SIS. The entire OSS program, as well as the
CIA has always worked on guidelines set up by the Tavistock Institute.
Tavistock Institute originated the mass civilian bombing raids [against the German people] carried
out by [the ALL LIES] Roosevelt and Churchill as a clinical experiment in mass terror, keeping records
of the results as they watched the "guinea pigs" reacting under "controlled laboratory conditions".
All Tavistock and American foundation techniques have a single goal – to break down the
psychological strength of the individual and render him helpless to oppose the dictators of the WORLD
ORDER.
Any technique which helps to break down the family unit, and family inculcated principles of
religion, honor, patriotism and sexual behaviour, is used by the Tavistock scientists as weapons of
crowd control.
The methods of Freudian psychotherapy induce permanent mental illness in those who undergo this
treatment by destabilizing their character. The victim is then advised to 'establish new rituals of
personal interactions', that is, to indulge in brief sexual encounters which actually set the
participants adrift with no stable personal relationships in their lives – destroying their ability to
establish or maintain a family.
Tavistock Institute has developed such power in the U.S. that no one achieves prominence in any
field unless he has been trained in behavioural science at Tavistock or one of its subsidiaries.
Tavistock maintains 2 schools at Frankfort, birthplace of the Rothschilds, the FRANKFURT SCHOOL, and
the Sigmund Freud Institute.
The 'experiment' in compulsory racial integration in the U.S. was organized by Ronald Lippert of
the OSS (forerunner of CIA) and the American Jewish Congress, and director of child training at the
Commission on Community Relations.
The program was designed to break down the individual's sense of personal knowledge in his
identity, his racial heritage. Through the Stanford Research Institute, Tavistock controls the
National Education Association.
The Institute of Social Research at the Natl Training Lab brain washes the leading executives of
business and government.
Another prominent Tavistock operation is the WHARTON SCHOOL OF FINANCE.
A single common denominator identifies the common Tavistock strategy – the use of drugs such as the
infamous MK Ultra program of the CIA, directed by Dr Sidney Gottlieb, in which unsuspecting CIA
officials were given LSD and their reactions studied like guinea pigs, resulting in several deaths –
no one was ever indicted.
(Source of info: author Eustace Mullins "The World Order: Our Secret Rulers" 2nd ed. 1992. He
dedicated his book "to American patriots and their passion for liberty". note: No copyright
restrictions)
@Agent76
Excellent video. More people need to see this to understand how corrupt the China Totalitarian state works
behind the scenes along with the US as part of the Globalization NWO movement to enrich the few and
impoverish the rest of the world population.
"... The US rarely arrests senior businesspeople, US or foreign, for alleged crimes committed by their companies. Corporate managers are usually arrested for their alleged personal crimes (such as embezzlement, bribery or violence) rather than their company's alleged malfeasance. ..."
"... Meng is charged with violating US sanctions on Iran. Yet consider her arrest in the context of the large number of companies, US and non-US, that have violated US sanctions against Iran and other countries. ..."
"... The Trump administration is preparing actions this week to call out Beijing for what it says are China's continued efforts to steal American trade secrets and advanced technologies and to compromise sensitive government and corporate computers, according to U.S. officials. ..."
"... Multiple government agencies are expected to condemn China, citing a documented campaign of economic espionage and the alleged violation of a landmark 2015 pact to refrain from hacking for commercial gain ..."
"... Taken together, the announcements represent a major broadside against China over its mounting aggression against the West and its attempts to displace the United States as the world's leader in technology, officials said. ..."
"... The actions come amid mounting intelligence showing a sustained Chinese hacking effort devoted to acquiring sophisticated American technologies of all stripes. A number of agencies -- including the Justice, State, Treasury and Homeland Security departments -- have pushed for a newly aggressive U.S. response. A National Security Council committee coordinated the actions ..."
"... After three centuries of anglo-american imperialism the economic center of the world is moving back to the east . ..."
"... The U.S. is way too late to prevent this move. Its best and most profitable chance is not to challenge, but to accommodate it. That again would require to respect international laws and treaty obligations. The U.S. is not willing to do either. ..."
"... Nothing except a large scale war that results in the destruction of the industrial centers of east Asia, while keeping the U.S. and Europe save, could reverse the trend. Nuclear weapons on all sides and the principal of mutual assured destruction have made such a war unthinkable. What we are likely to see instead will be proxy conflicts in various other countries. ..."
"... The current U.S. strategy is to restrict China's access to foreign markets, advanced technologies, global banking and higher education. While that may for a moment slow down China's rise it will in the long run strengthen China even more. Instead of integrating into the world economy it will develop its own capacities and international systems. ..."
"... dh posted a link on the last thread to China banning import and sale of all iPhones in China (strange, I thought they were made in China? Must be exported and re-imported?). ..."
"... This is interesting. China hits a top US company manufacturing in China by granting an injunction in a case of one US company against another US company, in which one accuses the other of intellectual property theft. China was not expected to find in Qualcomm's favour, according to the article (perhaps in part because Apple manufactures in China therefore is a client of China, so it was expected China might favour Apple). If this decision was influenced by the arrest, the US can hardly point the finger at China! ..."
"... In my opinion, China should make these criminal actions of the US extremely painful indeed, and as quickly as possible ..."
"... With Trump's utterance, he also exposed how he/his government has abused Canada's extradition law for political purposes. Officially in this extradition procedure, the US now has 60 days to submit a complete extradition request which requires far more detail. Meng's court date is set for February. In any case, Canada's rubberstamping of extradition requests (90% are by the US) was already successfully challenged once in the Diab case with France, was criticized by Canada's Superior Court (extraditions are processed at the provincial judicial level), so Trudeau's hiding behind 'judicial process' is two-faced cowardliness. ..."
"... What's even more damning for the collective absolute stupidity of capitalist bigwigs is that I could see this coming more than 20 years ago, yet these idiots blindly charged as if short-term profits were all they wanted and would be enough to ensure their eternal dominance. ..."
"... What an empire does not control they destroy. ..."
"... The "own goal" was not outsourcing manufacturing to China but in not isolating China by bringing Russia into the Western fold. Instead, they kicked Russia while it was down via capitalist "Shock Doctrine" - hoping for total capitulation. Kissinger admits(*) this when, in his typical roundabout way, he says that no one anticipated Russia's ability to absorb pain. ..."
"... Does that moron Kissinger know nothing about WW2? That Kissinger projects an inability to absorb pain onto the Russians suggests that Kissinger knows the Americans have no ability to absorb pain themselves ..."
"... Maybe now Shell executives will be arrested for crimes against humanity in Nigeria. ..."
"... After all, as you stated, these maneuvers wrt Meng are emanating from John (I am the Eggman) Bolton's office and clearly evidence his trademarked hard-boiled belligerence which of course is heartily endorsed by Trump (as an "Art of the Deal" negotiating ploy by the master debater himself) who selected The Walrus in the first place. Or second place if you count Bolton's earlier appointment by that other intellectual giant of the GOP, GW Bush. ..."
"... "Kissinger admits(*) this when, in his typical roundabout way, he says that no one anticipated Russia's ability to absorb pain." Then Kissinger is a bigger fool than I thought. He's old enough to know about WWII, and previous wars as well. I mean, he did study the Napoleonic wars... ..."
"... She's not being accused of trading with Iran. She's being accused of bank fraud (providing false information to obtain a loan). ..."
"... The charges against Meng were brought by Richard P. Donoghue, the United States Attorney for the Eastern District of New York. Donoghue was appointed as Interim United States Attorney for the Eastern District by Attorney General Jeff Sessions on January 3, 2018, and as Attorney on May 3, 2018. ..."
"... The bottom line is that the bar for extradition from Canada is extremely low, which should worry Ms Meng. ..."
"... The historical West is still violently opposed to the objective rise of a fairer and more democratic polycentric world order. Clinging to the principles of unipolarity, Washington and some other Western capitals appear unable to constructively interact with the new global centres of economic and political influence. A wide range of restrictions are applied to the dissenters, ranging from military force and unilateral economic sanctions to demonisation and mud-slinging in the spirit of the notorious "highly likely." There are many examples of this dirty game...This has seriously debased international law. Moreover, attempts have been made to replace the notion of law with a "rules-based order" the parameters of which will be determined by a select few. ..."
"... We are especially concerned about the activities of the US administration aimed at destroying the key international agreements. These include withdrawal from the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action known as the Iran nuclear deal, the declared intention to withdraw from the Intermediate-Range Nuclear Forces Treaty (INF Treaty), an open line for revising the settlement principles in the Middle East, as well as sabotaging the Minsk Agreements on overcoming the internal Ukrainian crisis. The trade wars that have been launched contrary to the WTO principles are rocking the global economic architecture, free trade and competition standards. The US establishment, blindly believing in the idea of their exceptionalism, continues to appoint rivals and adversaries, primarily among the countries that pursue an independent foreign policy. Everyone can see that Washington is a loose cannon, liable to act incongruously, including regarding Russia where any steps taken by US President Donald Trump to develop stable and normal channels of communication with Moscow on the biggest current problems are promptly blocked by those who want to continue or even strengthen the destructive approach to relations with Russia, which developed during the previous US administration. ..."
"... Overall, it looks as if the Americans and some of our other Western colleagues have forgotten the basics of diplomacy and the art of dialogue and consensus over the past 25 years. One result of this is the dangerous militarisation of the foreign policy thinking. As RIAC Director General Andrey Kortunov recently pointed out at a Valdai Discussion Club meeting, the Clausewitz formula can be changed to a mirror image, "Politics is a continuation of war by other means. ..."
"... Unfortunately, the U.S. ruling class cares more about the psychic gratification it derives from dominating the world. ..."
"... The prosecutor's case against Meng is fundamentally weak. For instance, there is no identification of a "co-conspirator", necessary to a charge of conspiracy. It does not seem to have been developed much beyond the information developed in the 2013 Reuters investigation. At least half of that relies on unnamed "former employees" and unnamed persons who claimed to have dealt with Skycom in Iran. ..."
The United States issued an arrest warrant against the chief financial officer and heir apparent of Huawei, Meng Wanzhou. At issue
is a six years old
alleged violation of sanctions against Iran. Mrs. Meng was arrested in Canada. She has been set free under a
stringent $10 million bail agreement . An extradition trial will follow in February or March.
It is unprecedented
that an officer of a large company is personally indicted for the alleged sanction violations by a subsidiary company:
The US rarely arrests senior businesspeople, US or foreign, for alleged crimes committed by their companies. Corporate managers
are usually arrested for their alleged personal crimes (such as embezzlement, bribery or violence) rather than their company's
alleged malfeasance.
... Meng is charged with violating US sanctions on Iran. Yet consider her arrest in the context of the large number of companies,
US and non-US, that have violated US sanctions against Iran and other countries. In 2011, for example, JPMorgan Chase paid
US$88.3 million in fines for violating US sanctions against Cuba, Iran and Sudan. Yet chief executive officer Jamie Dimon wasn't
grabbed off a plane and whisked into custody.
The U.S. indicted dozens of banks for violating its sanction regime. They had to pay
huge fines (pdf) but none of their officers were ever touched.
U.S. President Donald Trump told Reuters on Tuesday he would intervene in the U.S. Justice Department's case against Meng if it
would serve national security interests or help close a trade deal with China.
The arrest of Meng is but one part of a larger
political campaign against China directed out of the office of National Security Advisor John Bolton:
The Trump administration is preparing actions this week to call out Beijing for what it says are China's continued efforts
to steal American trade secrets and advanced technologies and to compromise sensitive government and corporate computers, according
to U.S. officials.
Multiple government agencies are expected to condemn China, citing a documented campaign of economic espionage and the
alleged violation of a landmark 2015 pact to refrain from hacking for commercial gain.
In typical propaganda style the U.S. media depict the Chinese as enemies:
Taken together, the announcements represent a major broadside against China over its mounting aggression against the West
and its attempts to displace the United States as the world's leader in technology, officials said.
...
The actions come amid mounting intelligence showing a sustained Chinese hacking effort devoted to acquiring sophisticated
American technologies of all stripes. A number of agencies -- including the Justice, State, Treasury and Homeland Security departments
-- have pushed for a newly aggressive U.S. response. A National Security Council committee coordinated the actions.
One wonders what those "mounting aggressions" are supposed to be. Is the U.S. not constantly spying and hacking for economic or
political gain?
Other reports today of alleged
Chinese hacking are
obviously part of the concerted anti-China campaign. As usual no evidence is presented for the vague allegations:
U.S. government investigators increasingly believe that Chinese state hackers were most likely responsible for the massive intrusion
reported last month into Marriott's Starwood chain hotel reservation system, a breach that exposed the private information and
travel details of as many as 500 million people, according to two people briefed on the government investigation.
These people cautioned that the investigation has not been completed, so definitive conclusions cannot be drawn. But the sweep
and tactics of the hack, which took place over four years before being discovered, prompted immediate speculation that it was
carried out by a national government.
The new anti-China campaign follows a
similar push of anti-Russian propaganda three month ago.
China has taken first countermeasures against Canada's hostage taking on behalf of the United States. It
detained Michael
Kovrig, a former Canadian diplomat who now
works for the International Crisis
Group. Beijing suggest that the ICG is
operating illegally in China :
"The relevant organization has violated Chinese laws because the relevant organization is not registered in China," Foreign Ministry
spokesman Lu Kang said at a press briefing Wednesday.
China sharply tightened its rules on NGOs operating in the country last year, ..
This will not be the sole Chinese measure against Canada for its role in enforcing extraterritorial U.S. sanctions.
The string of U.S. accusations and measures against China are partly to protect the market share of U.S. companies against better
and cheaper Chinese products and partly geopolitical. Neither has anything to do with protecting the international rule of law.
After three centuries of anglo-american imperialism the economic center of the world
is moving back
to the east .
The U.S. is way too late to prevent this move. Its best and most profitable chance is not to challenge, but to accommodate
it. That again would require to respect international laws and treaty obligations. The U.S. is not willing to do either.
Nothing except a large scale war that results in the destruction of the industrial centers of east Asia, while keeping the
U.S. and Europe save, could reverse the trend. Nuclear weapons on all sides and the principal of mutual assured destruction have
made such a war unthinkable. What we are likely to see instead will be proxy conflicts in various other countries.
The current U.S. strategy is to restrict China's access to foreign markets, advanced technologies, global banking and higher
education. While that may for a moment slow down China's rise it will in the long run strengthen China even more. Instead of integrating
into the world economy it will develop its own capacities and international systems.
The U.S. can temporarily hinder the telecommunication equipment provider Huawei by denying it access to U.S. designed chips. It
will probably do so. But that will only incentivize Huawei to start its own chip production. With a few years delay it will be back
and out-compete U.S. companies with even better and cheaper products.
It is typical for the current U.S. to seek short term advantage while disregarding the long term negative effects of its doing.
It is a major reason for China's rise and its future supremacy.
Posted by b on December 12, 2018 at 07:07 AM |
Permalink
Comments
next page " The reason she is violating trade sanctions against Iran is because Trump suspended the Iran Nuclear treaty.
How short-sighted is that?
Well, all these sanctions are pushing target countries to be self sufficient. That's wonderful. Us are pushing countries for a
better production and decrease itself. Smart.
the King Liar has spoken...the boss of the mafia group U$A... The Chinese will interpret this as a kidnapping for blackmail and
act accordingly...this can only get much worse...
dh posted a link on the last thread to China banning import and sale of all iPhones in China (strange, I thought they were
made in China? Must be exported and re-imported?). This concerns a patent dispute between US company Qualcomm and Apple,
over which Qualcomm sued Apple in Chinese courts. The existence of the action in the courts must predate the Meng arrest, but
the court decision to support Qualcomm could be influenced by the arrest.
This is interesting. China hits a top US company manufacturing in China by granting an injunction in a case of one US company
against another US company, in which one accuses the other of intellectual property theft. China was not expected to find in Qualcomm's
favour, according to the article (perhaps in part because Apple manufactures in China therefore is a client of China, so it was
expected China might favour Apple). If this decision was influenced by the arrest, the US can hardly point the finger at China!
It gets better: The Apple executive states in the article that they have stocks of all models in China and sales will not stop.
How can this be, if sales are banned? Surely China can then arrest several Apple executives in China for breaking the injunction?
Would depend of course on the terms of the injunction, of which the article gave no details.
In my opinion, China should make these criminal actions of the US extremely painful indeed, and as quickly as possible.
One person arrested in China is not enough - it should be 10 Americans arrested for 1 Chinese, plus 5 Canadians. China should
make sure the US and Canada understand that the ratio will stay constant if the US/Canada respond to the arrests in China. China
should also take extremely painful action against US telecomms companies in China to compensate for the campaign against Huawei
- it could include denying access to comms links, forcing US telcom communications to go through very expensive route, ceasing
negotiations for investment consortia in favour of non-US companies, etc. The difficulty to navigate, of course, is the risk of
inciting escalating actions against Huawei; but the Chinese will find excellent startegies I am sure.
It may be the case that the Huawei equipment is very, very secure, has much better performance. Soon, China will be the tech leader,
hence the panic. I have a snippet below, but peruse the article in full on the 5G landscape.
"Huawei has been pouring money into research on 5G wireless networks and patenting key technologies. The company has hired
many experts from abroad as well to decide the technical standards for the next generation of wireless communication technology.
As of early 2017, 10% of 1450 patents essential for 5G networks were in Chinese hands in which majority belongs to Huawei and
ZTE.
Huawei spent around $12 Billion on R&D in 2017, which was threefold of Ericsson's spending of $4.1 Billion. This year, according
to estimates, it will spend $800 million in 5G research and development alone.
The company wants to involve AI in 5G which according to them is a much more integral element of Huawei's 5G strategy. The
company also plans to launch a full range of Huawei commercial equipment including wireless access networks, core networks, and
devices.
Huawei has also revealed its hopes to launch smartphones ready for supporting 5G networks by 2019 and starting selling in the
mid-2019. The company is also said to be working on developing a brand-new chipset for 5G services.
Huawei and Vodafone made the 5G call using non-standalone 3GPP 5G-NR standard and sub 6 GHz spectrum. The two companies built
a 5G NR end-to-end test network for the trial and used 3.7GHz spectrum. They also used Huawei Radio Access Network and core network
equipment to support the test with microservice-centric architecture, control plane/user plane separation, and unified access
and network slicing technology.
Huawei also started manufacturing products that provide 5G services. In Mobile World Congress, Huawei launched its 5G customer-premises
equipment (CPE), the world's first commercial terminal device supporting 3GPP standard for 5G. Huawei used its self-developed
chipset Balong 5G01 – world's first commercial chipset supporting the 3GPP standard for 5G, with downlink speed up to 2.3 Gbps."
With Trump's utterance, he also exposed how he/his government has abused Canada's extradition law for political purposes.
Officially in this extradition procedure, the US now has 60 days to submit a complete extradition request which requires far more
detail. Meng's court date is set for February. In any case, Canada's rubberstamping of extradition requests (90% are by the US)
was already successfully challenged once in the Diab case with France, was criticized by Canada's Superior Court (extraditions
are processed at the provincial judicial level), so Trudeau's hiding behind 'judicial process' is two-faced cowardliness.
Canada needs to amend its extradition law, become much more stringent, and arm this law against the bullying and abusive southern
neighbor who prefers to lord its own laws over others than abide by any kind of international law.
We've been at war with Eurasia long enough. Time for Eastasia! The main question is whether Putin will remain Emmanuel Goldstein
or if someone Chinese will get the honor.
China is set to introduce maximum residue limits (MRLs) of 200 parts per billion (ppb) or lower for glyphosate in all imported
final food products and raw materials including grains, soybeans and other legumes before the end of 2019, according to Sustainable
Pulse sources.....
It is expected that China will now import more grains from Russia, where glyphosate is not widely used as a desiccant. This
also enables China to use glyphosate as a political tool in the current U.S. / China trade war, as food and raw material imports
from the U.S., which often contain high levels of the weedkiller, will be put under major pressure.
That'll hit Monsanto's Roundup pretty hard. Of course China doesn't really have any problem with glyphosate - it's long been
a major producer and exporter itself. So this is obviously a trade war action.
"It is typical for the current U.S. to seek short term advantage while disregarding the long term negative effects of its doing.
It is a major reason for China's rise and its future supremacy."
Well, the economic and industrial rise of China is the ultimate
proof of this. Instead of making sure China would have a limited and purely internal development and would never become such a
fearsome rival, Western (specially US) capitalist fools decided to outsource their production there, creating the monster they
feared and fear even more nowadays.
I've never seen such a ridiculous and brilliant own goal in any World Cup. What's even more damning for the collective
absolute stupidity of capitalist bigwigs is that I could see this coming more than 20 years ago, yet these idiots blindly charged
as if short-term profits were all they wanted and would be enough to ensure their eternal dominance.
I think it's pretty clear to China, Russia, India, and many others, that trading in dollars is a losing strategy. Thus the dollar
is very fast losing its position as the world reserve currency. The EU is not using dollars for Iran's oil. India is not using
dollars for its purchase of Russia's S-400.
It's not only US anti-China strategy; but the US insistence to be the hegemon; the
rest of the planet will not have it, period. The US is done dictating what the rest of the planet will do/follow... Bye, bye,
American pie............
BM @4 I'm not sure where Qualcomm stands in relation to China. It could be a bargaining chip...excuse the pun. The Apple ban applies
to the older iPhone 8 & 7 not the new Xs & Xr......but that may change. Apple is already having trouble selling phones in China
and the Huawei dispute won't help.
What is the legal basis for Meng's arrest? What Canadian law is she alleged to have violated? Or is American wish fulfillment
now part of Canadian jurisprudence?
As a non-American I've got half a mind to find a way to purchase some Iranian products and then send the US State Department an
e-mail telling them to suck it.
Fernando Martinez , Dec 12, 2018 10:11:44 AM |
link
Posted by: Clueless Joe | Dec 12, 2018 9:14:45 AM | 10
The "own goal" was not outsourcing manufacturing to China but in not isolating China by bringing Russia into the Western
fold. Instead, they kicked Russia while it was down via capitalist "Shock Doctrine" - hoping for total capitulation. Kissinger
admits(*) this when, in his typical roundabout way, he says that no one anticipated Russia's ability to absorb pain.
* In his lunch interview with the Financial Times this past summer.
"What is the legal basis for Meng's arrest? What Canadian law is she alleged to have violated? Or is American wish fulfillment
now part of Canadian jurisprudence?"
As I understand it, the USA and Canada have an extradition agreement, and corporate fraud is also a crime in Canada.
This idiocy seems certain to increase curiosity in Huawei products by telcos worldwide. Business managers use technical experts
to evaluate available technologies when contemplating upgrades to their systems. They're certainly not swayed by MSM spin doctors.
This issue could soon be overtaken by a brand new reality. China is planning to launch a worldwide free wifi internet service
based on more than 100 satellites, which could be interpreted as a Commie scheme to undermine the profitability of telcos.
Not clear exactly which officials said, "Taken together, the announcements represent a major broadside against China over its
mounting aggression against the West... The actions come amid mounting intelligence showing a sustained Chinese hacking effort..."
but do know it's very unusual to repeat a verb in consecutive sentences. Mantra alert! Mounting... mounting... mounting... hear
the drums of war.
he says that no one anticipated Russia's ability to absorb pain
Does that moron Kissinger know nothing about WW2? That Kissinger projects an inability to absorb pain onto the Russians
suggests that Kissinger knows the Americans have no ability to absorb pain themselves
China is planning to launch a worldwide free wifi internet service based on more than 100 satellites, which could be interpreted
as a Commie scheme to undermine the profitability of telcos
cool. digital nomadism
and growing your own food will be the ticket.
The story I heard was that it was a screw up. Mira Ricardel was fired because she pissed off Melania about airplane seats. She
was fired before inter-agency coordination for the arrest but after the warrant for the arrest was issued - the warrant was issued
back in August. That and the fact that Trudeau hates Trump explains this idiocy. Trudeau was left to weigh up the US request against
the poor timing of the US request from the US point of view. No one from the WH got back to the Canadians to ask them to wait.
So Justin decided to go ahead to screw Trump. Fun, no?
ralphieboy | Dec 12, 2018 10:52:25 AM | 18: corporate fraud is also a crime in Canada.
More specifically, she's accused of inducing banks to provide financing that was illegal due to US sanctions. It appears that
as Huawei CFO, she certified that her company doesn't trade with Iran despite the fact that Huawei has an Iran-based subsidiary
(SkyCom Tech).
Is this an example of "US short term strategical thinking" or "Trump's-as-per-usual (non) thinking?"
After all, as you stated, these maneuvers wrt Meng are emanating from John (I am the Eggman) Bolton's office and clearly
evidence his trademarked hard-boiled belligerence which of course is heartily endorsed by Trump (as an "Art of the Deal" negotiating
ploy by the master debater himself) who selected The Walrus in the first place. Or second place if you count Bolton's earlier
appointment by that other intellectual giant of the GOP, GW Bush.
Please, the US voted less for Trump to be our trade representative then even the British voted for their own ridiculous "alt-right"
trade adventure wildride, AKA "Brexit."
And we now have another pretty solid election behind us illustrating even further that Trump's worldview doesn't represent
most of the US. He represents only a dwindling "base" of mostly old white male reactionary racist very scared supporters whose
presence within the GOP has terrified the GOP toadies into supporting most everything Trump wants because he delivers judges and
tax cuts to the rich.
But again,
the majourity
of the toadies don't support Trump on China. He has them by their shriveled up balls is all.
That Kissinger projects an inability to absorb pain onto the Russians ...
This is a misreading. Kissinger is not projecting but explaining. Look at the Financial Times interview for more clarity. Also,
they didn't fail to consider WWII. They miscalculated. And then they doubled down (as the neocons always do).
Jackrabbit 17 "Kissinger admits(*) this when, in his typical roundabout way, he says that no one anticipated Russia's ability to absorb
pain." Then Kissinger is a bigger fool than I thought. He's old enough to know about WWII, and previous wars as well. I mean,
he did study the Napoleonic wars...
You have to remember, this was economic warfare, not military. And the USA/West were pretending to be helpful. IIRC, Yeltsin
was happy for this "help" too.
"The government and us are cut from the same cloth." Sam Giancana, former Mob boss from Chicago. Deep State, you say? No way,
Jose. More like the Gambino (Democrat's) and the Genovese (Republicans). You don't need "colors" to identify yourself as a gang
member. You can wear double breasted suits and have the same bad intentions as any member of the Crips, Bloods, Mafia or Mexican
Cartels. The US government is one great big Tammany Hall. Nothing has changed since the days of Boss Tweed. Instead of being centered
in New York, it's now in our nation's capital. Mah Rohn! Forget about it!
Fidelios Automata , Dec 12, 2018 12:22:34 PM |
link
This is beyond outrageous. US law is not the law of the world. The Chinese may trade with whomever they choose.
According to the above article, American firms set up foreign subsidiaries to do business with sanctioned countries. So if
SkyCom is an Iranian subsidiary, what can be Sabrina Meng Wanzhou's crime? Or even if SkyCom is a Hong Kong-based subsidiary?
The city-state effectively maintains its own laws and financial architecture, as part of one country, two systems.
It's a bit OT but this thing of Russia absorbing pain - to be fair, I always thought that producing Putin at the last moment was
really stretching survival to a fine thread. The neocons almost won there. The country was almost done for. It took a man whose
father nursed life back into his wife when medics figured she was done for...
Russia's ultimate salvation was way too close to the edge of the cliff for my taste.
Ya'll know how the Chinese finger trap works, yes? Instead of his fingers, Trump's got his whole head inside, and he's stuck real
good. There're only two ways out: Trump admits China can't be beaten so its better to join them or he cuts off his head to free
his body--both are essentially suicide, although the former is merely political instead of actual.
There is zero chance she gets deported to the US because doing so would mean a Canadian court blessing the idea that the US is
the sole legal authority of every thing on planet earth. There isn't a a judge in Canada that is goin g to sign off on the idea
that US law trumps Canadian law and international law in Canada.
There is a strange ambiguous nature to the post. It seems there is a reluctance to address the issues. It has long been
claimed that China has a tendency to copy or steal intellectual property. Most "I/P" is horse shit anyway - e.g. Apple and the
rounded corners. Apparently there has been some actual espionage, but that is probably pretty common its just that China has used
it to good advantage (if we accept that they have used it - as I do).
It is quite odd to to make such a fuss in the absence
of smoking gun - maybe Mueller is in need of something to investigate?
I am baffeled by the whole Iran thing and the nations in terror of U.S. sanctions. What is this "international law" of which
we speak? The implication is that because Mr Trump (Bolton) does not approve of a treaty that now Iran and RoW has violated a
law and are subject to sanction by the U.S.? I find it hard to comprehend.
This first paragraph from a today's Global Times op-ed nicely summarizes the 21st Century:
For a long time in the future, the international situation will evolve around the rise of China, the decline of the US and
the uncertain development level of Russia.
No arrests among the Israelis. None. The loyalty to Israel by Israel-firsters (and their corrupting influence on the US Congress)
overpowers any loyalty to the US.
But to arrest a woman because of the illegal economic sanctions against Iran (on Israelis' prodding) is fine for US "deciders"
Thanks for assembling those links. That is a good compilation. I was vaguely aware of those stories but had forgotten most
of the details. It is so true. And you didn't even get to the Jonathan Pollard betrayal!
thanks b! and thanks to the many informative comments.. i encourage others to read the jeffery sachs article in b's article near
the top under the word 'unprecedented"...
@23 john.. thanks.. i will take a look..
@24 harry.. thanks.. that is an interesting conjecture..
@38 jared.. larvov made some comments on the use of the term 'rule of law' which is different from 'international law'.. i
can't find the article from yesterday that i read on this, but essentially he is saying the usa wants to toss international law
and replace it with 'rule of law', or 'law based rules' and do away with international law, as international law is not working
in the usa's favour at this point..'rule of law' or 'law based rules' is something that a country can make up as it goes along..
the usa wants to drop international law essentially.. if i find larvov's comments, i will post them...
Here's the
legal mumbo-jumbo from B.C. which includes details on the charges against Meng. The poor banks were "victim banking institutions."
The investigation by U.S. authorities has revealed a conspiracy between and among Meng and other Huawei representatives to
misrepresent to numerous financial institutions. . . .The motivation for these misrepresentations stemmed from Huawei's need
to move money out of countries that are subject to U.S. or E.U. sanctions--such as Iran, Syria, or Sudan--through the international
banking system. At various times, both the U.S. and E.U. legal regimes have imposed sanctions that prohibit the provision of
U.S. or E.U. services to Iran, such as banking services....
Because Meng and other Huawei representatives misrepresented
to Financial Institution 1 and the other financial institutions about Huawei's relationship with Skycom, these victim banking
institutions were induced into carrying out transactions that they otherwise would not have completed. As a result, they violated
the banks' internal policies, potentially violated U.S. sanctions laws, and exposed the banks to the risk of fines and forfeiture.
.
Very accurate. Yes of course the smart move would have been to welcome China into a multi-polar world, but it is too late now,
and I doubt the US could ever have managed that. Trade war and probable actual war has been inevitable for some time. An alien
visiting earth would want to view every event through the prism of imminent US-China war.
Right now we see a US circling of
the wagons, with threats against outsiders. In particular Iran, NK and Russia are villified because the message is "look what
happens if you don't come in on our side". We think the casual slanders about these countries are just vulgar Americans, but they
are really calculated warnings to other countries.
The charges against Meng were brought by Richard P. Donoghue, the United States Attorney for the Eastern District of New
York. Donoghue was appointed as Interim United States Attorney for the Eastern District by Attorney General Jeff Sessions on January
3, 2018, and as Attorney on May 3, 2018.
Donoghue is one of five U.S. attorneys serving in a "working group" under the Justice Department's recently announced China
Initiative. Launched by then-Attorney General Jeff Sessions, the China Initiative is a broad-based strategy designed to counter
Chinese economic espionage and a range of other national security threats. Donoghue has been leading an investigation of Huawei
since 2016 for possible violations of U.S. sanctions against Iran.
The Eastern District serves over eight million residents through its Criminal Division, with approximately 115 Assistant U.S.
Attorneys, and its Civil Division, with approximately 60 U.S.Attorneys. But what the heck, forget New Yorkers, Donoghue has bigger
fish to fry.
If one has an interest on seeing how the war-mongers visualize the US-China standoff, check out this
blog where I
regularly get roasted. (roasted bacon?)
Hmmm... following the downfall of the drunkard Yeltsin (the first miscalculation of the Empire, hubris strikes again), they
put their money on Medvedev, the 'Atanticist'. Bad move! Putin was the response. Nationalism bad? I don't think so, it's what
enabled Stalin to win WW2 and it enabled Putin to pull the country, but as said, only just! Phew.
70 years of isolating the Soviet Union meant that they really didn't have a handle on the Western propaganda machine. In the
80s the North Koreans made the same mistake.
A slight aside: I and a bunch of other journos, activists were invited to a wonderful slap up meal held at the N.Korean UN
delegation HQ in Manhattan. Food great but the video they showed horrendous! Imagine 1 1/2hrs of the Great Leader and endless
displays in stadiums waving flags in unison. They then asked us what we thought of it (that was the purpose of 12 course meal).
When they were told it would go down like a lead balloon, they just didn't get it. They lived in a different world, ditto the
Soviets.
BTW, the video was made for US consumption.
On the other hand, Verso brought out a book (I have it somewhere) on the aesthetics of East European cityscapes during the
Soviet period and lamented on the loss of individuality, following the fall of socialism and the rise of McDonaldism. How ironic.
And we though (were taught) that E. European design and architecture was drab!
MBA ideology, which is narrowly focused on the next quarter results, bottom line, and bonuses for executives has devastated /
destroyed industrial base of the 5 eyes!
I saw the discussion thread at that BreakingDefense.com post you linked to, and I must say you should seek help for that masochistic
tendency that drives you to post there and risk being savaged by armchair generals whose idea of military strategy comes from
playing wall-2-wall computer games.
I should think a better example from Ancient Greek history that we should heed, rather than Thucydides' Trap (discussions of
which use very selective examples to "prove" its premise) is Athens' military expedition to Syracuse to conquer the city and all
of Sicily in 415 BCE. How did that turn out for Athens?
September 3, 2018: Huawei unveils Kirin 980 CPU, the world's first commercial 7nm system-on-chip (SoC) and the first to
use Cortex-A76 cores, dual neural processing units, Mali G76 GPU, a 1.4 Gbps LTE modem and supports faster RAM. With 20 percent
faster performance and 40 percent less power consumption compared to 10nm systems, it has twice the performance of Qualcomm's
Snapdragon 845 and Apple's A11 while delivering noticeable battery life improvement. Its Huawei-patented modem has the world's
fastest Wi-Fi and its GPS receiver taps L5 frequency to deliver 10cm. positioning.
September 5, 2018. China's front-end fab capacity will account for 16 percent of the world's semiconductor capacity this
year, increasing to 20 percent by 2020.
September 15, 2018. China controls one third of 5G patents and has twice as many installations operating as the rest of
the world combined.
I should add that the US put China under total embargoes on food, ag equipment, finance, technology for 25 years during Maos'
tenure. Yet he grew the economy by 7.25% annually, doubled the population, its life expectancy and literacy during that time.
[email protected] there is any question whether Canadian courts will side with American laws you only need to google Qmar
Khadr to answer the question.
@46 don bacon.. thanks for the link.. in it admiral Davidson says "I see a fundamental divergence of values that leads to two
incomparable visions of the future. I think those two incomparable visions are between China and the rules-based international
order."
there is that ''rules-based international order'' quote again - which i was mentioning to @38 jared in my post @42..
what the fuck is ''rules-based international order'' supposed to mean? you mean like - ignore international law and replace it
with ''rule-basd international order''??
i agree with jen... don, you must be a bit of a masochist!
I definitely second Jen's remark about BreakingDefense. Reading that post was very distressing and I can imagine they would
roast you and many who follow and admire b. But, as the saying goes, it is also good to know "how the enemy" thinks. Or in this
case how our gov + thinks.
Canada's rubberstamping of extradition requests (90% are by the US)was already successfully challenged once in the Diab
case with France
Not exactly. Diab was arrested in 2008 and, after a long series of legal proceedings (ending with the refusal of the Canadian
Supreme Court to hear his appeal), finally extradited to France in 2014. The case against Diab was flimsy to nonexistent to begin
with, but "good enough" to meet Canadian standards. In spite of the continued insistence by French prosecutors that they had a
legitimate case, multiple judges disagreed and Diab was finally released earlier this year and allowed to return to Canada.
The bottom line is that the bar for extradition from Canada is extremely low, which should worry Ms Meng.
The way the U.S. seems intent on punishing Australian Assange for exposing U.S. secrets exhibits the same determination to apply
U.S. law to everyone all over the world.
20 November 201815:24
Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov's remarks at the general meeting of the Russian International Affairs Council, Moscow, November
20, 2018
"The historical West is still violently opposed to the objective rise of a fairer and more democratic polycentric world
order. Clinging to the principles of unipolarity, Washington and some other Western capitals appear unable to constructively interact
with the new global centres of economic and political influence. A wide range of restrictions are applied to the dissenters, ranging
from military force and unilateral economic sanctions to demonisation and mud-slinging in the spirit of the notorious "highly
likely." There are many examples of this dirty game...This has seriously debased international law. Moreover, attempts have been
made to replace the notion of law with a "rules-based order" the parameters of which will be determined by a select few.
We are especially concerned about the activities of the US administration aimed at destroying the key international agreements.
These include withdrawal from the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action known as the Iran nuclear deal, the declared intention to
withdraw from the Intermediate-Range Nuclear Forces Treaty (INF Treaty), an open line for revising the settlement principles in
the Middle East, as well as sabotaging the Minsk Agreements on overcoming the internal Ukrainian crisis. The trade wars that have
been launched contrary to the WTO principles are rocking the global economic architecture, free trade and competition standards.
The US establishment, blindly believing in the idea of their exceptionalism, continues to appoint rivals and adversaries, primarily
among the countries that pursue an independent foreign policy. Everyone can see that Washington is a loose cannon, liable to act
incongruously, including regarding Russia where any steps taken by US President Donald Trump to develop stable and normal channels
of communication with Moscow on the biggest current problems are promptly blocked by those who want to continue or even strengthen
the destructive approach to relations with Russia, which developed during the previous US administration.
Overall, it looks as if the Americans and some of our other Western colleagues have forgotten the basics of diplomacy and
the art of dialogue and consensus over the past 25 years. One result of this is the dangerous militarisation of the foreign policy
thinking. As RIAC Director General Andrey Kortunov recently pointed out at a Valdai Discussion Club meeting, the Clausewitz formula
can be changed to a mirror image, "Politics is a continuation of war by other means."
Russia is a consistent supporter of the development of international life based on the principles of the UN Charter. We are
a serious obstacle in the way of different destructive undertakings." etc
Considering the eventual results of the Peloponnesian War for all combatants, Thucydides' Trap turned out to be a trap for everyone.
They all would have been better off peacefully settling their differences. Same goes for World War One. And the same goes for
a declining U.S. facing a rising China.
What the U.S. should do is to negotiate with China a deal which recognizes the status of China as a superpower in return for
an economic relationship that preserves the U.S. standard of living.
Unfortunately, the U.S. ruling class cares more about the psychic gratification it derives from dominating the world.
@ 52 james
re: "rules-based international order"
This is widely and repeatedly used by the Pentagon; I've also seen it used by the Australia government (no surprise there from
a US puppet). Of course we know that it's a code-phrase for. . .let's not change the current US-dominated world disorder with
its US-led wars, assassinations and torture.
Other pet phrases, taken from my blog link above:
... revisionist great powers like China and Russia
... China's state-led, market-distorting economic model
... democratic, liberal values that draws us together with our allies and differentiates us from China."
@ 57 Loz
Russia's Lavrov is a smart guy and gets it right, as a realist, but I prefer Iran's Khamenei who always looks on the bright side.
. . .from a
speech
delivered on November 3, 2018, by Ayatollah Khamenei
. . . the US waged military wars and military actions,
. . .There has also been an economic war in this 40-year challenge
. . .They have waged a media war as well.
Well, there is an important truth which is sometimes not seen by some people: its dazzling clarity makes it go unnoticed. This
truth is a bright and shining one, which is the fact that in this 40-year challenge, the side which has been defeated represents
the US and the side which has achieved victory represents the Islamic Republic. --This is a very important truth. What is the
reason behind America's defeat? The reason for their defeat was that it was they who began the attack. It was they who initiated
corrupt actions. It was they who imposed sanctions, and it was they who launched a military attack, but they have not achieved
their goals. --This is the reason why the US has been defeated.
And he's right, Iran has defeated the US, which is why Washington is so down on Iran. The defeats have come in Iraq, and Syria,
and next in Afghanistan . . .plus in Iran itself, which has stood up to the greatest world power for forty years full of sanctions
and assaults, and thereby served as a model and inspiration for other countries large and small.
The prosecutor's case against Meng is fundamentally weak. For instance, there is no identification of a "co-conspirator",
necessary to a charge of conspiracy. It does not seem to have been developed much beyond the information developed in the 2013
Reuters investigation. At least half of that relies on unnamed "former employees" and unnamed persons who claimed to have dealt
with Skycom in Iran.
If these persons cannot be produced then all that evidence cannot rise above hearsay. The coincidences left to the prosecutors
to suggest a shell corporation should be then overwhelmed by the perfectly legal offshore documentation, which represents common
corporate practice worldwide. If the US courts still nail Huawei, the precedent could put all large businesses and business persons
everywhere at criminal risk for currently accepted practices.
The exit door could be a finding by the Canadian court, tacitly ok'ed by the Americans, that the case lacks merit and Meng
is freed sometime in the spring to a chorus of self-congratulatory hurrahs over "rule of law". If the intent was to damage the
Huawei brand in the West, then mission already accomplished.
here is our canuck foreign affairs minister Freeland using the term as well.. "It, I think, is quite obvious that it ought to
be incumbent on parties seeking an extradition from Canada, recognizing that Canada is a rule-of-law country, to ensure that any
extradition request is about ensuring that justice is done, is about ensuring that the rule of law is respected and is not politicized
or used for any other purpose," she said." https://www.cbc.ca/news/politics/china-missing-person-questioned-1.4943591
last paragraph in that link is even better - here.. ""I think in the world today, where the rule of law is under threat in some
parts of the world, being a rule-of-law country is more important now than ever," Freeland said. "And what I can commit to for
Canadians, and for our partners around the world, is that Canada will very faithfully follow the rule of law."
My suggestion in the previous comments thread was noticed only by one (James) but I'm sure it still holds up well.
Huawei could undertake to pay Sabrina Meng's bail or at least her security detail when she has to leave her house. Huawei then
sends the amount paid to Beijing and Beijing charges Ottawa for the amount paid ... and includes interest payment for each and
every day that Ottawa declines to pay the principal.
Tit-4-tat actions against US companies, however desirable, might have unfortunate long-term consequences especially if elements
in the US Deep State are expecting them and are prepared for them.
Thanks for reposting Lavrov's acute observations, thus revealing that Russia and China already know the what and why of the
Outlaw US Empire's doings. Frankly, I was surprised nobody commented about my Monopoly Game analogy from yesterday which illustrates
the situation the Outlaw US Empire finds itself in thanks to its unilateral and exceptionalisms. Indeed, for its opponents, moves
made by the Outlaw US Empire can fairly well be anticipated and thus quickly countered. And thanks to the desire by most nations
for multilateralism, Russia and China find receptive audiences and ready allies in their campaign to neuter the international
outlaw bully.
A Must Remember: The USA has never wanted to subordinate itself to any rules other than its own that it can change whenever
it suits itself. The key evidence of this is that while the Senate was ratifying the UN Charter in late July of 1945, the Executive
branch was embarking on its terroristic Anti-Communist Crusade by arming and facilitating the infiltration of former Nazi SS and
Gestapo agents into the Soviet-held regions of Eastern Europe thereby violating the newly negotiated international system of law
and its own Constitution, and making itself THE primary International Outlaw Nation, which it proudly continues to be to this
day.
Great article and I would say that you are getting the political implications, the hypocrisy and the rest of it pretty much spot
on.
I'll add this just for the heck of it.
This case started a while back when ZTE narked out Huawei for using third party cutouts to avoid the sanctions. The ZTE case
was in England. Because Hauwei is not the legal owner of these chips or code it makes it "theft by conversion". Using banks to
launder the money is bank fraud as well.
What a lot of people are missing, legally, is that this is not the same at all as violating sanctions by selling your own products.
They do not own the chips or proprietary software in any legal sense. The chips and code are still owned by the parent company
that developed them, China has what amounts to a licensing agreement with the parent companies. If Weng had violated the sanctions
by transferring her own code and her own chips then it would be out of our jurisdiction. However, once they violated the terms
and conditions of the contract they not only have committed fraud they have committed theft by conversion of a US owned product
and they used US banks to launder the money. This is why she is actually being charged with fraud and not sanctions violations.
I'd bet that if they go full hardball she would be charged with Bank Fraud as well. That's the one that comes with the most prison
time.
In short, violating sanctions doesn't usually get you arrested because it doesn't also include theft, fraud although money
laundering gets them sometimes. But of course we also know that the rest of the article is pretty much correct. She was actually
arrested as part of the entire back and forth over trade and all the rest. Our government normally would not pick a top dog to
do jail time, so why now and why her? 5G and access to markets are a big part but so is a real concern over the constant pirating,
malware, spyware, backdoor access to the Chinese government to all the encryption they use, etc. etc.
I'm only adding my comments to remind people that the US actually does have a rock solid case against her company, so don't
be at all surprised if she isn't eventually charged unless Trump does something to stop it. They were caught red handed committing
fraud by using third party cut outs and lying to the banks involved as well. If the US really wants to push it they are within
their legal rights under our laws to do it. She essentially stole US property and laundered the proceeds with US banks. Go ahead
and try that yourself and see if you get away with it.
Transferring a product you do not own to a third party in violation of a contract is theft by conversion. It's the same as
if I recorded a football game and then sold it against their wishes and then laundered the money. It's not the violation of the
sanctions per se that will get her in trouble, it's transferring stolen property, fraud and money laundering that they are actually
holding over her head. If they want to, they can send her away for a long time and they know it. This could get really ugly.
Don That breakingdefence seems as broken as other neo-lib sites such as Lawyers, Guns and Money.
BTW, we are coming up for the sixtieth anniversary of the the Cuban revolutionaries kicking out the dictator Batista. Cuba,
which then went on to impose massive defeats on Reagan and Thatcher by bringing down their beloved (Reagan and Thatcher's, that
is) apartheid in South Africa. We are repeatedly told that it was Russian MiGs which it did but they were operated and flown by
Cubans, and if Castro hadn't sent them to defeat the apartheid state in Angola, it's doubtful the conservatives in the Soviet
Union would have done so. So, Cuba has been in the trenches for twenty years more than Iran and still appears to be undefeated.
Sorry, but the readers here seem to have no clue whatsoever about Putin's past.
Putin was part of the group under the St. Petersburg mayor - it was because of this that he was put in power as Yeltsin's 2nd
in command. And equally it was because of Putin's position under Yeltsin which made him acceptable to foreign powers as Russia's
new head.
Medvedev has always been an Atlanticist; much like the 1% in the US, his background is global technocracy which naturally gravitates
him toward the US. Having a close relative on Gazprom doesn't hurt either.
Point is, Putin didn't come out of nowhere nor was he a nobody.
That he is a very articulate and thoughtful leader - that was the only surprise.
China just ordered a boatload or more of soybeans and says they wont let this interfere with trade talks.
Just the way Trump likes to deal. Meng will work out of her expensive Vancouver home as hostage until a trade deal is done.
Then she gets released w/o extradition
How many US corporations are guilty of doing the same do ya think? As for industrial espionage, I have just one word--ECHELON.
There's an excellent reason why the Outlaw US Empire wants to change the rules of the game that it initially designed: It can
no longer win using them; indeed, it can be defeated by what it emplaced. Reminds me of an old Sting hit
Fortress Around Your Heart ; in fact, it's quite
apt.
"The pretext for her arrest is that Huawei has violated US sanctions against Iran. But the "sanctions" imposed on Iran by the
US recently are illegal under international law, that is under the UN Charter that stipulates that only the Security Council can
impose economic sanctions on a nation..... There is, therefore, no law that she or Huawei is violating. ....
(Trudeau stated) that this arbitrary arrest was not politically motivated ...... Article 2 of the Treaty (with the US) requires
that Canada can only act on such a request if, and only if, the offence alleged is also an offence by the laws of both contracting
parties. But the unilaterally imposed and illegal sanctions placed against Iran by the USA, are not punishable acts in Canada
and even in the USA the "sanctions" are illegal as the are in violation of the UN Charter.
Article 4 (1) of the Treaty states:
"Extradition shall not be granted in any of the following circumstances:
(iii) When the offense in respect of which extradition is requested is of a political character, or the person whose extradition
is requested proves that the extradition request has been made for the purpose of trying to punish him (or her) for an offense
of the above-mentioned character.....
So, Prime Minister Trudeau cannot evade responsibility for this hostage taking, this arbitrary arrest and detention since his
government had to consider the US request and consider whether it was politically motivated. ....... It was a political arrest.
The rule of law in Canada has been suspended, at least in her case, and so can be in any case.
Trudeau's insinuation that extradition is a purely judicial process in Canada is simply wrong. The "International Assistance Group"
in the Department of Justice works actively with the requesting state against the person sought for extradition, and this can
be a hugely political process involved outright lies to the court, as the Diab case revealed. Extradition law in Canada is so
politicized that even when a judge commits someone for extradition, the matter is then referred to the Minister of Justice, who
has the ultimate say. All of this is to maintain Canadian political alliances at the expense of the rights of the accused. Extradition,
kidnapping and extraordinary rendition are almost indistinguishable in Canada.
@75 "Canadians should be angry about their nation being led by people whose loyalty is to Washington instead of to the Canadian
people whose interests they care nothing for."
So is Christopher Black suggesting Canada put Meng on a plane back to China and give Trump the finger? How would that be good
for the Canadian people?
Brad #69
She is being charged with bank fraud. That is why she is being threatened with up to 60 years in prison. But the attribution of
the cut out or shell company, Skycom, with Huawei is based on anecdotal evidence which can be effectively challengd. Alleging
that Meng herself knowingly conspired to make false representation is a huge stretch, and none of the evidence assembled comes
close to that. Also, the sanction violation involved less than $2 million of Hewlett Packard "gear", not high-end proprietary
tech.
Your opinion on this? How could China win a trade war since it is relying on its large trade surplus with the US? As Trump said,
trade-surplus countries suffer more in trade wars, as it is they who get hit with tariffs.
In Giant Trade War Concession, China Prepares To Replace "Made In China 2025"
Karlof1 I agree, it's damage control at this point in time.
And yeah they have wanted "total information awareness" for a while. I think that was the term they used in the "Project for
a new American Century" talking points wasn't it? They wanted to grab every bit of data produced in the entire world and store
it. TOTAL information awareness. And they published that plan right out in the open for everyone to read. Then they went right
ahead and built the facilities, infrastructure, hired all the people to man it and nobody did jack nothing to stop em either.
(dem terrorsts might get us if we complain too much)
Why we didn't run those neo-con fools out of town on a rail is beyond me but the reality is that people will put up with damn
near anything before they really demand change.
By the way which would you prefer, a phone with a backdoor by China or a backdoor by the US? Pretty lousy choice either way
if you ask me. I bet if Heuwei would give our "intel" agencies the backdoor key to their devices they would be just fine with
that as a "settlement".
"The US has increasingly been wielding its legal definitions and measures as if it is the world's judge and jury.
"In recent years, American lawmakers have created a slew of legal weapons, including the Magnitsky Act, the Global Magnitsky
Act, the Countering America's Adversaries Through Sanctions Act, which give Washington the supposed power to penalize any country
it deems to be in breach of its national laws.
"The arbitrariness of US "justice" has got to the febrile point where Washington is threatening all nations, including its
supposed European allies, with legal punishment if they don't toe the line on its designated policy."
His conclusion:
"Washington's lawless pursuit of its nationalistic interests is turning the globe into a seething jungle of distrust and resentment.
The political chaos in Washington – where even the president is accused by domestic opponents of abusing democratic norms – is
fanning out to engulf the rest of the world.
"America's erstwhile claim of being the world's sheriff has taken on a macabre twist. Increasingly in the eyes of the world,
it is a renegade state which absurdly justifies its criminality with lofty claims of rule of law."
IMO, the world can do very well without the English-speaking nations of the Western Hemisphere. Containing them would be far
easier than Eurasia, even with bases strewn globally, for they must trade with the rest of the world to keep their current
standard of living whereas the rest of the world doesn't need to reciprocate. Yes, there's a very good reason why the USA called
its late 19th Century trade policy the Open Door--a policy that continues today. Trump seems to want autarky, so give it to him
by calling his massive bluff. Leave Uncle Scam sitting alone at his Monopoly Board masturbating while the rest of the world plays
Diplomacy and Go! Send an unmistakable message that he's the Bullying Misfit and shatter his exceptional ego. Hopefully if the
correct psychological approach is used, a planet devastating war can be avoided; but the latter cannot be feared when dealing
with the International Bully as it must be taught a lesson it will never forget.
@79 I'm not sure anybody will come out a clear winner....though Trump will claim victory for sure. A large order of soy beans
makes a nice gesture, so would buying a few airplanes from Boeing, but the Chinese still have a few red lines they won't cross.
All depends how hard Trump wants to push.
"Moreover, attempts have been made to replace the notion of law with a "rules-based order"
About time this was voiced publicly and Lavrov is the man to do it. It has been very noticeable over the last few years that
our western or five eyes "rule of law" narrative has been replaced by "rules based order" or so called "international norms".
@ james, in a snarky response to a warmonger at Breaking Defense, who misunderstood a previous james comment: --
. . ."thanks for yours as well.. usually the american trolls are always reminding others of how they abide by law, when in fact,
it is quite the opposite..."
...a classic put-down. kudos.
Thanks for your reply! I own the most fundamental of cell phones used for rudimentary texting and emergencies as I have no
need for further sophistication, and I had to be talked into buying that one! So, I'd prefer to have no backdoors anywhere near
my person at anytime and strive to establish that condition.
Indeed, this entire situation ought to bring governmental interference in citizen privacy to the fore so it can finally have
the debate it deserves--Constitutionally, the government is in violation, it knows it, but tries to circumvent Primary Law by
using the National Security canard. Should the citizen have an expectation of privacy within his/her own space or not? If not,
then the entire Bill of Rights is null and void.
@ 79 T
In Giant Trade War Concession, China Prepares To Replace "Made In China 2025"
The revised plan would play down China's bid to dominate manufacturing and be more open to participation by foreign companies,
these people said.
That's what the US has been complaining about, isn't it? The American manufacturers are invited in and then have to give up
all their trade secrets to be allowed to manufacture in China, until the locals take over with their newly acquired knowledge.
Regarding soybeans, China needs it to feed their hogs. Apparently Brazil didn't work out in the long term.
@Don, Thank you for the great brave job of posting on the out of realty redneck' site. A daily dose of reality comments should
really F*s the warmonger bastard' day.
I fail to see how exercising their sovereign right is giving Trump the finger, or bad for the Canadian people. However Canada
has basically become the US 51st state since NAFTA and the first Gulf War, so they follow orders
The new NAFTA will push up drug prices even more so they may soon join their brothers south of the border and enjoy declining
life expectancy due to unaffordable Drug prices
From ZeroHedge "Below we present some pertinent thoughts on the arrest of Huawei CFO Meng Wanzhou from former Fed Governor Larry
Lindsey and current head of the Lindsay Group."
.. Then along comes a story in the South China Morning Post about an October meeting with employees in which Meng said that
there are cases where, "the external rules are clear-cut and there's no contention, but the company is totally unable to comply
with in actual operations. In such cases, after a reasonable decision-making process, one may accept the risk of temporary non-compliance."
That statement is full of euphemisms, but it makes putting the corporate interest ahead of complying with the law the official
position of management. Put that in the context of a four-year anti-corruption campaign by Xi and a purge of top-level tech executives
who have gotten too big for their britches. In Xi's new world it may be one thing to have said that it was ok to put China's interests
first, but she is putting the corporate interests ahead of China's interests.
Also note that these comments were in quotes from an internal (and closed) Huawei meeting. How did the SCMP acquire these direct
quotes? The SCMP is one of the world's truly great papers, publishing candid news and commentary focused on getting to the truth
in a way that is only a distant memory in American newspapers. That said, it is also like Hong Kong – one nation, two systems.
If Beijing really wanted a story out, it would provide the sources and the reporters would do the rest. And if they really wanted
a story spiked it probably would be spiked. Those direct quotes obviously came from Chinese authorities and the story was printed
at a very inconvenient time for Meng – when she was protesting her innocence. Somebody in Beijing thinks Meng is a loose cannon.
Let's be a little conspiratorial or, more precisely, try and create a narrative that fits the facts. It arguably serves everyone's
interests for Ms. Meng to be taught a lesson. It is in Bolton's and the DoJ's interest to send a message that access to power
and connections does not buy you a get out of jail free card. It is in Xi's interest, or at least in the interests of major portions
of the Chinese government, to send a signal that even the extremely well-connected still have to toe the party line.
...The detention did not involve any surprises. The charges against Meng were leveled three months before her arrest. The market
reaction seemed to be based on the notion that this was a last-minute surprise. As for the Chinese, Xi and Company knows where
everyone is going and when. They certainly knew that Meng was traveling to Vancouver, that she had a warrant for her arrest outstanding,
and that Canada extradites to the U.S. They did nothing to warn her.
... Our conspiracy theory holds that she will be released when everyone thinks the lesson has been learned. America scores
a win in terms of signal value about enforcing Iran sanctions whether Meng spends two weeks, two months, or the rest of her life
behind bars. Xi will have signaled what he thinks about prioritizing corporate interests over national interests and bending regulations.
... One does not have to buy this conspiracy theory in all its detail to get at the essential truth that markets need to digest.
Meng's arrest is not going to affect the outcome of the trade talks. Xi (and China) have too much of a stake in this to let the
antics of a close friend's naughty daughter stand in the way of him getting what he wants. And once an example is made, America
also has too much to lose.
@88 "I fail to see how exercising their sovereign right is giving Trump the finger..."
ReallY? Then you haven't been watching Trump. He would go ballistic. He would probably renegotiate NAFTA ....again. He could
put thousands of Canadians out of work overnight if he felt like it.
@ 69 BS
". . .the US actually does have a rock solid case against her company,"
. . .to repeat from 43:
The investigation by U.S. authorities has revealed a conspiracy between and among Meng and other Huawei representatives to
misrepresent to numerous financial institutions. . . .The motivation for these misrepresentations stemmed from Huawei's need
to move money out of countries that are subject to U.S. or E.U. sanctions--such as Iran, Syria, or Sudan--through the international
banking system. At various times, both the U.S. and E.U. legal regimes have imposed sanctions that prohibit the provision of
U.S. or E.U. services to Iran, such as banking services....
Because Meng and other Huawei representatives misrepresented to Financial Institution 1 and the other financial institutions
about Huawei's relationship with Skycom, these victim banking institutions were induced into carrying out transactions that
they otherwise would not have completed. As a result, they violated the banks' internal policies, potentially violated U.S.
sanctions laws, and exposed the banks to the risk of fines and forfeiture.
So if Skycom belonged to Huawei, and the banks were "induced," there were problems --
1. violation of banks' internal policies
2. potentially violated US sanctions
3. exposed banks to US punishment
But if Skycom was an independent corporation the sanctions violations would have been okay? What am I missing. And why would the
US punish banks when they were knowingly duped.
" How could China win a trade war since it is relying on its large trade surplus with the US? As Trump said, trade-surplus
countries suffer more in trade wars, as it is they who get hit with tariffs."
Well, you do know tarrifs on imports are paid by the US importer and on to the consumer. China pays not a dime of US tarrifs
Now it could be hurt if US buyers could order from other countries. However, this is not an option for every import as there
are production capacity, quality and price constraints. In the short term orders to China would not be affected much since there
are not many good alternatives
China has some weapons of their own. US military required certain rate metals from China for weapons, China basically clothes
America and of course many electronics , furniture, tools and toys come from China. Witholding or taxing these exports is a weapon
they have yet to use.
Furthermore, much of the profits of US companies come from manufacturing or buying from China. Prices get marked up as much
as 10 times what China receives
18% of its exports go to US. With 20% of GDP based on exports that means US is responsible for 3.6% of Chinas GDP. Tarrifs
might affect 20% of exports meaning the hit on GDP would be 0.7%. With GDP growth over 6% they wont feel too much pain.
"hey do not own the chips or proprietary software in any legal sense. The chips and code are still owned by the parent company
that developed them, China has what amounts to a licensing agreement with the parent companies. If Weng had violated the sanctions
by transferring her own code and her own chips then it would be out of our jurisdiction. However, once they violated the terms
and conditions of the contract they not only have committed fraud they have committed theft by conversion of a US owned product
and they used US banks to launder the money. This is why she is actually being charged with fraud and not sanctions violations."
-
I've heard US government make this argument in courts before and historically US courts have generally agreed with it. However,
this legal argument ignores the huge practical consideration of this rule within the current international economic system (i.e.
the real world). Namely, for the last 70 years (post-WW2) the US has encouraged and promoted Liberal free market world economic
integration, that each country should focus on the specialization of their economies to produce a small number of goods at a low
production cost and then purchase all other goods they needed from other countries that specialized in that good (i.e. internal
economic self-sufficiency is bad). Generally people hear this and immediately think of how Germany specializes in mechanical engineering,
Japan specializes in high-tech computer and so on. However the realty in the world today is that is specialization goes much further
in that a single circuit board in a computer WILL contain transistors made in Korea, Inductors made in Japan, Capacitators made
in Taiwan, Transistors made in the US and then assembled in China. At each stage of the manufacturing / assembly process costs
are carefully analyzed to minimize costs based on the provider, transportation costs, etc... to produce the goods at the lowest
possible cost and maximize profits. This is what people call the Global Supply chain that has for the last 30 years underpinned
the entire world manufacturing economy. N(OTE: I'm not saying this is good or bad from a moral stance, merely that this is what
it is and the motive for it)
What the US is doing, by asserting that US law indefinitely applies to any component (including intellectual or financial)
that is made in or travels through the US and is then subsequently assembled or sold in a 3rd (or 4th or 5th or 6th....) country
that is subject to US sanctions is a direct attack on the Global Supply Chain economy and is extremely dangerous to standard of
living we've become accustom to in the Western world. Historically, when the US used sanctions like this against Cuba, North Korea,
Iran, China and the Soviet Union, these countries were relatively much weaker than the US and not integrated into the Western
World economy (nor were they well integrated with each other economically speaking), so the US was able to retard their economic
development. However after more than 40 years of increasing integration the Western world (US, Canada, Mexico, Europe) is totally
dependant on the Global Supply Chain, so now that the US is expanding their sanctions to everyone they are effectively sabotaging
their own economy and the economies of their allies/vassals. Conversely, the US rivals (Particularity Russia, China & Iran) are
become more economically integrated with each other and are already experienced with economic independence from the Western Market.
The two most likely outcomes from the US actions are 1) The non-western world becomes more integrated with each other and independent
of the Western market, effectively re-dividing the world like we saw during the Cold War, only now instead of Capitalist vs Socialist,
it will be Neo-Liberal Fascism vs National independence (i.e. a return to the pre-1914 concept of the state) 2) The Western World
will become more divided with their economies weakened as the US asserts more direct control over their vassals, impoverishing
their vassals' economies in order to consolidated wealth & power into their preferred elites who will ensure their control over
their vassal countries. As the quality of life of the average citizen declines and Western countries become more politically unstable
and economically stagnate, we may even see a "Prague Spring" type of event, where a Western government moves away from the US/NATO/EU
alliance only to suffer a US/NATO backed invasion similar to the Soviet invasion of Czechoslovakia in 1968.
>> Well, you do know tarrifs on imports
>> are paid by the US importer and on to
>> the consumer. China pays not a dime of
>> US tarrifs
No, I don't know that. It depends.
If China's exporters have tiny margins and the consumer can afford to pay more, then yes.
If China's exporters have big margins and fear losing market share (not necessarily to domestic American manufacturers but
to other foreign manufacturers), they might choose to sell at a "lower but still profitable" price in order for the POS price
to remain nearly the same and for them to retain their market share.
>> With GDP growth over 6% they
>> wont feel too much pain.
Pft, I agree bigly there. (And thanks for doing the math.) Despite my prior post, I doubt China cares about "maintaining market
share" to ship real product to a nation that provides almost nothing but threats in payment.
>> we may even see a "Prague Spring" type
>> of event, where a Western government moves
>> away from the US/NATO/EU alliance only to
>> suffer a US/NATO backed invasion similar
>> to the Soviet invasion of Czechoslovakia
>> in 1968.
As a small step in that direction, someone mentioned a few French "police" vehicles bore EU insignia.
"18% of its exports go to US. With 20% of GDP based on exports that means US is responsible for 3.6% of Chinas GDP. Tarrifs
might affect 20% of exports meaning the hit on GDP would be 0.7%. With GDP growth over 6% they wont feel too much pain."
This 18 - 19 percent export number is not true, as in does not take into account exports to the US via Hong Kong. This is only
mainland exports. But China also "exports" a lot to HK, and then these goods are exported to the rest of the world. So exports
to the US are more than 18 percent.
And the US is waging the trade war via other means, for example it is urging allies to drop China's IT companies. New Zealand
and Japan are dropping Huawei and ZTE. EU is warning too. No doubt there will be other US allies following. So costs for China
will be substantial.
Japan sets policy that will block Huawei and ZTE from public procurement as of April
China's trillion dollar Belt & Road Initiative will change everything, so why get hung up on the past. The BRI provides China
with an opportunity to use its considerable economic means to finance infrastructure projects around the world.
"... The structures of the global economy present challenges to any country or political party that wants to try to break out of U.S. hegemony. Even for countries as big and with as much potential as Brazil or Egypt, countries that have experienced waves of relative independence, the inertia of these economic structures helps send them back into old patterns of extraction and debt. In this moment of right-wing resurgence it is hard to imagine political movements arising with plans to push off the weight of the economic past. But that weight cannot be ignored. ..."
"... I'm guessing the short answer is credit. The amazing genius of the US reserve currency policies have given them such massive leverage over the world, it is nearly impossible to recreate elsewhere. This is why China is trying to get loans flowing from their belt/road relationships. ..."
"... Without the ability to simply declare into existence wealth, the US would have to compete fairly for their global relationships. What is amazing about this system, is that the right to owe money to the US is something countries will beg for, because there is no alternate trust system that could be used to stimulate economic activity. ..."
"... The global economy is truly in an unusual situation and the completely financialized creation of credit is less than 50 years old as a human experiment. (before it was linked to precious metals, and I think returning to that would squash liquidity). ..."
"... The same forces that are being applied to Brazil and Venezuela have been, and will continue to be applied to American workers. America is not busy spreading democracy, it's busy extending the reach of Wall $treet's steely fingers. ..."
"... The author does mention the problems with an extraction state. I think that that is at the root of the problem. It also is a result of the general trade pattern set up by the Western Europeans, with others brought in over time. Industrialization-Colonialism I think can fairly be described as root causes. It is also a lot more plausible than claiming the relatively recent introduction of the US $ as a reserve currency as a root versus aggravating cause. ..."
Why is it so difficult even for huge countries with large, diversified economies to maintain
independence from the West?
If anyone could have done it, it was Brazil. In the 19th century it was imagined that Brazil
could be a Colossus of the South to match the U.S., the Colossus of the North. It never panned
out that way.
And 100 years later, it still hasn't happened. With a $2 trillion GDP (a respectable $9,800
per capita), nearly 200 million people, and a strong manufacturing base (the second largest in
the Americas and 28.5 percent of its GDP), Brazil is far from a tiny, weak island or peninsula
dependent on a patron state to keep it afloat.
When Luiz Inacio "Lula" da Silva won a historic election to become president of Brazil in
2003, it seemed like an irreversible change in the country's politics. Even though Lula's
Workers' Party was accused of being communists who wanted to redistribute all of the country's
concentrated wealth, the party's redistributive politics were in fact modest -- a program to
eradicate hunger in Brazil called Zero Hunger, a family-based welfare program called the Family
Allowance, and an infrastructure spending program to try to create jobs. But its politics of
national sovereignty were ambitious.
It was under Workers' Party rule (under Lula and his successor, president Dilma Rousseff,
who won the 2010 election to become president at the beginning of 2011) that the idea surged of
a powerful BRICS (Brazil, Russia, India, China, South Africa) alliance that could challenge the
ambitions of the U.S.-led West. Brazil took steps to strengthen its manufacturing, and held its
ground on preventing pharmaceutical patent monopolies. Lula's Brazil accused Western countries
of hypocrisy for insisting both on "free trade" with poor countries and farm subsidies for
themselves. Brazil even moved in the direction of building an independent arms industry.
Contradictions remained: The Workers' Party government sent Brazilian troops to command the
UN force that enacted the U.S.-impelled occupation of Haiti -- treating the world to the
spectacle of the biggest, wealthiest country in the region helping the U.S. destroy the
sovereignty of the poorest as part of its foreign policy. But in those years Brazil refused to
renounce its alliance with Venezuela's even more independent-minded government under Hugo
Chavez; it defended ideas of South-South cooperation, especially within Latin America, and it
made space for movements like the Landless Peasants' Movement (MST).
But after more than a decade of Workers' Party rule, what happened? President Rousseff was
overthrown in a coup in 2016. When polls showed that Lula would have won the post-coup
election, he was imprisoned to prevent him from running. And so with the Workers' Party
neutralized, Brazil elected Jair Bolsonaro, a man who famously saluted the American flag and
chanted "USA" while on campaign (imagine an American leader saluting the Brazilian flag during
a presidential campaign). No doubt the coup and the imprisonment of Lula were the key to
Bolsonaro's rise, and failings like supporting the coup in Haiti played a role in weakening the
pro-independence coalition.
But what about the economy? Or Brazil's leaders now dragging the economy into the U.S. fold?
Or did the Brazilian economy drag the country back into the fold?
Brazil's economic history and geography have made independence a challenge. Colonial-era
elites were interested in using slave labor to produce sugar and export as much of it as
possible: The infrastructure of the country was built for commodity extraction. Internal
connections, including roads between Brazil's major cities, have been built only slowly and
recently. The various schemes of the left-wing governments of the last decade for South-South
economic integration were attempting to turn this huge ship around (not for the first time --
there have been previous attempts and previous U.S.-backed coups in Brazil), and to develop the
internal market and nurture domestic industries (and those of Brazil's Latin neighbors).
Yesterday's dependent economy was based on sugar export -- today's is based on mining
extraction. When Bolsonaro was elected, the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation quickly posted a
story speculating on how the new government would be good for Canadian mining companies. The
new Brazilian president plans to cut down huge swaths of the Amazon rainforest. Brazil is to
return to its traditional role of providing natural resources to the U.S. and to the other rich
countries.
A smaller country with a stronger pro-independence leadership, Venezuela faced similar
structural economic problems that have imperiled and nearly derailed the independent-minded
late president Hugo Chavez's dream that Venezuelans would learn to eat arepas instead of
hamburgers and play with Simon Bolivar dolls instead of Superman ones. There, too, the
pro-independence project had a long-term goal of overcoming the country's dependence on a
single finite commodity (oil), diversifying its agricultural base and internal markets. And
there, too, the challenge of doing so proved too great for the moment, especially in the face
of an elite at least as ruthless as Brazil's and nearly two decades of vindictive, pro
regime-change U.S. policy. Today Venezuela's "Bolivarian project" is in crisis, along with its
economy and political system.
There are other sleeping giants that remain asleep, perhaps for economic reasons. In the
face of relentless insults by Trump, the Mexican electorate chose a left-wing government
(Mexicans have elected left-wing governments many times in the past few decades, but elections
have been stolen). But locked into NAFTA, dependent on the U.S. market, Mexico also would seem
to have little option but to swallow Trump's malevolence.
Egypt is the Brazil of the Middle East. With 100 million people and a GDP of $1.4 trillion,
the country that was for a few thousand years the center of civilization attempted in the 20th
century to claim what is arguably its rightful place at the center of the Arab world. But
today, this giant and former leader of the nonaligned movement is helping Israel and the U.S.
starve and besiege the Palestinians in Gaza and helping Saudi Arabia and the U.S. starve and
blockade the people of Yemen.
Egypt stopped challenging the U.S. in the 1970s after a peace deal brought it into the fold
for good. Exhaustion from two wars with Israel were cited as the main cause -- though a proxy
war with Saudi Arabia in Yemen and several domestic factors also played a role. But here, too,
is there a hidden economic story?
Egypt has oil, but its production is small -- on the order of 650,000 barrels a day compared
to Saudi Arabia's 10 million barrels, or the UAE's 2.9 million. It has a big tourist industry
that brings in important foreign exchange. But for those who might dream of an independent
Egypt, the country's biggest problem is its agricultural sector: It produces millions of tons
of wheat and corn, but less than half of what it needs. As told in the classic book
Merchants of Grain , the politics of U.S. grain companies have quietly helped feed its
power politics all over the world. Most of Egypt's imported grain comes from the U.S. As
climate change and desertification wreak havoc on the dry agricultural ecosystems of the
planet, Egypt's grain dependence is likely to get worse.
The structures of the global economy present challenges to any country or political
party that wants to try to break out of U.S. hegemony. Even for countries as big and with as
much potential as Brazil or Egypt, countries that have experienced waves of relative
independence, the inertia of these economic structures helps send them back into old patterns
of extraction and debt. In this moment of right-wing resurgence it is hard to imagine political
movements arising with plans to push off the weight of the economic past. But that weight
cannot be ignored.
Justin Podur, a
Toronto-based writer who teaches at York University in the Faculty of Environmental Studies.
His site is podur.org . Follow him on Twitter:
@justinpodur . Produced by by
Globetrotter
, a project of the Independent Media Institute.
So Egypt has a massive and rapidly growing population, but relatively little arable land,
and so is dependent on food imports.
Duh. Perhaps the problem is not Western grain merchants. Perhaps the problem is when a country
that could comfortably feed 20 million people boosts its population to 100 million and
beyond, that more people do NOT automatically create more wealth. I mean, that is an
established fact: more Egyptians are certainly creating more demand for food, but they are
not automatically and without delay creating more fresh water, or new industries, etc.
I'd always wondered why in the aftermath of WW2, when most of the developed world was in
tatters, why South America didn't arise to become more than the continual basket case of a
place that it is? Every country there has had hyperinflation (Brazil had a decade long+ stretch of it)
episodes-post WW2, but surprisingly none before the war
I think the answer for South America is structural to its politics and society. Both were
settled by Europeans from feudal societies and incorporated all the worst aspects of a
decaying Spain and Portugal into their systems. They are not just dependent on resource
extraction, they are dominated by elites who's sole source of power is that resource
extraction. In Classical economics terms, they are dominated by rentiers, not industrial
capitalists. In modern development economics, you would say their structural issues prevent
them escaping the middle income trap. When you look at
reactionary movements in Brazil or Argentina, its usually big ranchers and mining interests
who are behind them. The urban middle classes are usually not strong enough to form a buffer
– as historically has happened in Europe and the US and most other countries that have
achieved high development status.
Some might argue that a major contributor to the problem is simple geography. South
American has a largely impenetrable interior, encouraging an urban and infrastructural system
based on connecting agricultural and mining areas to big coastal cities, who's wealth is then
dependent on trading those goods across the ocean. When you compare North American or Europe
or even China to South America, you can see the former countries have dense internal networks
of rail/road and many similar sized cities. South American has a few mega cities and very
undeveloped internal networks. Of course, there is a chicken and egg argument here –
did geography lead to a rentier dominated society, or did a rentier society result in an
undeveloped urban structure and infrastructure?
Good start but article doesn't really give explicit answer to its rhetorical question. I'm
guessing the short answer is credit. The amazing genius of the US reserve currency policies
have given them such massive leverage over the world, it is nearly impossible to recreate
elsewhere. This is why China is trying to get loans flowing from their belt/road
relationships.
Without the ability to simply declare into existence wealth, the US would have to compete
fairly for their global relationships. What is amazing about this system, is that the right
to owe money to the US is something countries will beg for, because there is no alternate
trust system that could be used to stimulate economic activity.
The global economy is truly
in an unusual situation and the completely financialized creation of credit is less than 50
years old as a human experiment. (before it was linked to precious metals, and I think
returning to that would squash liquidity).
I think in the future a different currency will be needed that is anchored to energy in a
more direct way than the petrodollar. I think we should trade in kWh.
It might be also worth focusing on those countries which have succeeded in keeping some
independence, whether small or large. Bhutan is an example of a very small country which has
to some extent succeeded in keeping western and other foreign interests at arms length. Of
course, its protected from western domination by being landlocked by two regional
superpowers. But it has resisted the temptation to play off one against the other. The price
has been relative poverty, although its proud of having a very happy (by their own measure)
populace. It has though accepted its military dependence on India, in effect ceding its
military independence to that country (as was proven in the recent Chinese incursion, the
Bhutanese depended on the Indian military to chase the Chinese off).
Plenty of countries have tried some level of autarky. Ireland tried it after independence
– both military neutrality and economic independence. The latter was a disaster, it
proved completely impractical and left the country entirely impoverished by the 1950's.
Larger states including of course Russia, India and China have had their experiments.
Russia
at the moment seems the most successful, something nobody I think would have predicted 10
years ago.
India has been largely proud to be apart for decades, but seems determined under Modi to abandon that. In South America, Uruguay is arguably the most successful example of a
country that has kept to some degree its own independence. Costa Rica has been successful
too, although you can't really say its kept US influence at bay.
In Africa, Botswana is a
country which has had some degree of success. In Asia, Laos has tried to keep all influences
out, but its pretty much being swallowed up by the Chinese now. This, of course leads us to
the other conclusion – if you are small, and you resist Western influence, you may just
end up getting swallowed up by another imperial power, be it the Saudi's (Yemen) or
Laos/Tibet/Myanmar (China), etc.
The New World Order (GHW Bush) has only a couple of rules, and one is you will do
'business' only with the western finance Borg.
And what they mostly mean by 'business' , is everything you do should be financed
by the Borg, the Borg gets a cut of everything you do, or you don't get to do it.
It's not only bad for other countries, it's bad for the American people because those same
finance institutions that screw over other countries, screw Americans over by
leading/prompting the rush to off-shore American jobs.
The same forces that are being applied to Brazil and Venezuela have been, and will
continue to be applied to American workers. America is not busy spreading democracy, it's busy extending the reach of Wall $treet's
steely fingers.
It is taken for granted here that there was a coup. But the charges of corruption against
Lulu stemming from the Operation Car Wash investigations seem pretty real and plausible. The
Clintons have their foundation, and Trump has his "all-sorts-of-stuff" . They are still
walking free. Is it a coup because somebody in a high office actually got convicted of
something?
The author does mention the problems with an extraction state. I think that that is at
the root of the problem. It also is a result of the general trade pattern set up by the
Western Europeans, with others brought in over time. Industrialization-Colonialism I think
can fairly be described as root causes. It is also a lot more plausible than claiming the
relatively recent introduction of the US $ as a reserve currency as a root versus aggravating
cause.
Since a huge number of countries seem to have had this problem (half of the issue is
referred to as the Dutch disease after all), it would be more interesting to compare
experience to countries that escaped the problem. My guess is that a close look at the
history, and current trends, would show that the problem is actually much deeper rooted and
far more problematic than just some hand-wringing over the United States replacing nice
guy/gal governments and the US$ reserve currency.
"... "In this case, it is clear the Chinese government wants to put maximum pressure on the Canadian government," Guy Saint-Jacques, the former Canadian ambassador to Beijing , said. Canadian Foreign Minister Chrystia Freeland went on to criticize statements by US President Donald Trump, who said in an interview on Tuesday that he was ready to intervene in the Meng affair if it helped seal a trade deal with the world's second-largest economy. ..."
Her case has angered Beijing and shaken Canada's relations with China, which is embroiled in
a trade war with Washington.
"In this case, it is clear the Chinese government wants to put maximum pressure on the
Canadian government," Guy Saint-Jacques, the former
Canadian ambassador to Beijing , said. Canadian Foreign Minister Chrystia Freeland went on to criticize statements by US President
Donald Trump, who said in an interview on Tuesday that he was ready to intervene in the Meng
affair if it helped seal a trade deal with the world's second-largest economy.
"Our extradition partners should not seek to politicize the extradition process or use it
for ends other than the pursuit of justice and following the rule of law," she said at a press
conference.
"... this is a clear sign that Canada no longer exists as an independent nation, but is a colony of the USA/Israeli empire. ..."
"... This story is not about an ultra-wealthy Chinese heiress enduring an odd adventure in Canada. This story is about a complete loss of Canadian sovereignty, because detaining this lady is outright insane. Canada was conquered without firing a shot! Welcome back to the royal empire run as a dictatorship. ..."
"... If only America focused its attention inward, on growth and stability, instead of transcendent American Imperialism then the world may stand a chance. ..."
"... Western positions on climate, neoliberalism, migration, in my opinion point into the same direction: critical thinking, almost gone. ..."
"... Defrauding the nation into "war of aggression" is the supreme crime one can commit against the American People. The "SUPREME CRIME"! ..."
"... Every "penny" belonging to each and every Neocon Oligarch who CONSPIRED TO DEFRAUD US INTO ILLEGAL WAR should be forfeit until the debt from those wars is paid down .. IN FULL ! ..."
"... Canada may be the obvious criminal. But on consideration, isn't it rather like the low-level thug who carries out a criminal assignment on the orders of a gang boss? And isn't it the gang boss who is the real problem for society? ..."
"... and Ms. Meng was seized on the same day that he was personally meeting on trade issues with Chinese President Xi. Some have even suggested that the incident was a deliberate slap in Trump's face. ..."
As most readers know, I'm not a casual political blogger and I prefer producing lengthy research articles rather than chasing
the headlines of current events. But there are exceptions to every rule, and the looming danger of a direct worldwide clash with
China is one of them.
Consider the arrest last week of Meng Wanzhou, the CFO of Huawei, the world's largest telecom equipment manufacturer. While flying
from Hong Kong to Mexico, Ms. Meng was changing planes in the Vancouver International Airport airport when she was suddenly detained
by the Canadian government on an August US warrant. Although now released on $10 million bail, she still faces extradition to a New
York City courtroom, where she could receive up to thirty years in federal prison for allegedly having conspired in 2010 to violate
America's unilateral economic trade sanctions against Iran.
Although our mainstream media outlets have certainly covered this important story, including front page articles in the New
York Times and the Wall Street Journal , I doubt most American readers fully recognize the extraordinary gravity of
this international incident and its potential for altering the course of world history. As one scholar noted, no event since America's
deliberate 1999 bombing of China's
embassy in Belgrade , which killed several Chinese diplomats, has so outraged both the Chinese government and its population.
Columbia's Jeffrey Sachs correctly
described it as "almost a US declaration of war on China's business community."
Such a reaction is hardly surprising. With annual revenue of $100 billion, Huawei ranks as the world's largest and most advanced
telecommunications equipment manufacturer as well as China's most internationally successful and prestigious company. Ms. Meng is
not only a longtime top executive there, but also the daughter of the company's founder, Ren Zhengfei, whose enormous entrepreneurial
success has established him as a Chinese national hero.
Her seizure on obscure American sanction violation charges while changing planes in a Canadian airport almost amounts to a kidnapping.
One journalist asked how Americans would react if China had seized Sheryl Sandberg of Facebook for violating Chinese law especially
if Sandberg were also the daughter of Steve Jobs.
Indeed, the closest analogy that comes to my mind is when Prince Mohammed bin Salman of Saudi Arabia kidnapped the Prime Minister
of Lebanon earlier this year and held him hostage. Later he more successfully did the same with hundreds of his wealthiest Saudi
subjects, extorting something like $100 billion in ransom from their families before finally releasing them. Then he may have finally
over-reached himself when Washington Post columnist Jamal Khashoggi, a Saudi dissident, was killed and dismembered by a
bone-saw at the Saudi embassy in Turkey.
We should actually be a bit grateful to Prince Mohammed since without him America would clearly have the most insane government
anywhere in the world. As it stands, we're merely tied for first.
Since the end of the Cold War, the American government has become increasingly delusional, regarding itself as the Supreme World
Hegemon. As a result, local American courts have begun enforcing gigantic financial penalties against foreign countries and their
leading corporations, and I suspect that the rest of the world is tiring of this misbehavior. Perhaps such actions can still be taken
against the subservient vassal states of Europe, but by most objective measures, the size of China's real economy surpassed that
of the US several years ago and is now substantially
larger , while also still having a far higher rate of growth. Our totally dishonest mainstream media regularly obscures this
reality, but it remains true nonetheless.
Provoking a disastrous worldwide confrontation with mighty China by seizing and imprisoning one of its leading technology executives
reminds me of
a comment
I made several years ago about America's behavior under the rule of its current political elites:
Or to apply a far harsher biological metaphor, consider a poor canine infected with the rabies virus. The virus may have no
brain and its body-weight is probably less than one-millionth that of the host, but once it has seized control of the central
nervous system, the animal, big brain and all, becomes a helpless puppet.
Once friendly Fido runs around foaming at the mouth, barking at the sky, and trying to bite all the other animals it can reach.
Its friends and relatives are saddened by its plight but stay well clear, hoping to avoid infection before the inevitable happens,
and poor Fido finally collapses dead in a heap.
Normal countries like China naturally assume that other countries like the US will also behave in normal ways, and their dumbfounded
shock at Ms. Meng's seizure has surely delayed their effective response. In 1959, Vice President Richard Nixon visited Moscow and
famously engaged in a heated
"kitchen debate"
with Premier Nikita Khrushchev over the relative merits of Communism and Capitalism. What would have been the American reaction
if Nixon had been immediately arrested and given a ten year Gulag sentence for "anti-Soviet agitation"?
Since a natural reaction to international hostage-taking is retaliatory international hostage-taking, the newspapers have reported
that top American executives have decided to forego visits to China until the crisis is resolved. These days, General Motors sells
more cars in China than in the US, and China is also the manufacturing source of nearly all our iPhones, but Tim Cook, Mary Barra,
and their higher-ranking subordinates are unlikely to visit that country in the immediate future, nor would the top executives of
Google, Facebook, Goldman Sachs, and the leading Hollywood studios be willing to risk indefinite imprisonment.
Canada had arrested Ms. Meng on American orders, and this morning's newspapers reported that
a former Canadian diplomat
had suddenly been detained in China , presumably as a small bargaining-chip to encourage Ms. Meng's release. But I very much
doubt such measures will have much effect. Once we forgo traditional international practices and adopt the Law of the Jungle, it
becomes very important to recognize the true lines of power and control, and Canada is merely acting as an American political puppet
in this matter. Would threatening the puppet rather than the puppet-master be likely to have much effect?
Similarly, nearly all of America's leading technology executives are already quite hostile to the Trump Administration, and even
if it were possible, seizing one of them would hardly be likely to sway our political leadership. To a lesser extent, the same thing
is true about the overwhelming majority of America's top corporate leaders. They are not the individuals who call the shots in the
current White House.
Indeed, is President Trump himself anything more than a higher-level puppet in this very dangerous affair? World peace and American
national security interests are being sacrificed in order to harshly enforce the Israel Lobby's international sanctions campaign
against Iran, and we should hardly be surprised that the National Security Adviser John Bolton, one of America's most extreme pro-Israel
zealots,
had personally given the green light to the arrest. Meanwhile, there are credible reports that Trump himself remained entirely
unaware of these plans, and Ms. Meng was seized on the same day that he was personally meeting on trade issues with Chinese President
Xi. Some have even suggested that the incident was a deliberate slap in Trump's face.
But Bolton's apparent involvement underscores the central role of his longtime patron, multi-billionaire casino-magnate Sheldon
Adelson, whose enormous financial influence within Republican political circles has been overwhelmingly focused on pro-Israel policy
and hostility towards Iran, Israel's regional rival.
Although it is far from clear whether the very elderly Adelson played any direct personal role in Ms. Meng's arrest, he surely
must be viewed as the central figure in fostering the political climate that produced the current situation. Perhaps he should not
be described as the ultimate puppet-master behind our current clash with China, but any such political puppet-masters who do exist
are certainly operating at his immediate beck and call. In very literal terms, I suspect that if Adelson placed a single phone call
to the White House, the Trump Administration would order Canada to release Ms. Meng that same day.
Adelson's fortune of $33 billion ranks him as the
15th wealthiest man in America, and the bulk of his fortune is based on his ownership of extremely lucrative gambling casinos in
Macau, China . In effect, the Chinese government currently has its hands around the financial windpipe of the man ultimately responsible
for Ms. Meng's arrest and whose pro-Israel minions largely control American foreign policy. I very much doubt that they are fully
aware of this enormous, untapped source of political leverage.
Over the years, Adelson's Chinese Macau casinos have been involved
in all sorts of political bribery scandals
, and I suspect it would be very easy for the Chinese government to find reasonable grounds for immediately shutting them down, at
least on a temporary basis, with such an action having almost no negative repercussions to Chinese society or the bulk of the Chinese
population. How could the international community possibly complain about the Chinese government shutting down some of their own
local gambling casinos with a long public record of official bribery and other criminal activity? At worst, other gambling casino
magnates would become reluctant to invest future sums in establishing additional Chinese casinos, hardly a desperate threat to President
Xi's anti-corruption government.
I don't have a background in finance and I haven't bothered trying to guess the precise impact of a temporary shutdown of Adelson's
Chinese casinos, but it wouldn't surprise me if the resulting drop in the stock price of
Las Vegas Sands Corp would reduce Adelson's personal
net worth were by $5-10 billion within 24 hours, surely enough to get his immediate personal attention. Meanwhile, threats of a permanent
shutdown, perhaps extending to Chinese-influenced Singapore, might lead to the near-total destruction of Adelson's personal fortune,
and similar measures could also be applied as well to the casinos of all the other fanatically pro-Israel American billionaires,
who dominate the remainder of gambling in Chinese Macau.
The chain of political puppets responsible for Ms. Meng's sudden detention is certainly a complex and murky one. But the Chinese
government already possesses the absolute power of financial life-or-death over Sheldon Adelson, the man located at the very top
of that chain. If the Chinese leadership recognizes that power and takes effective steps, Ms. Meng will immediately be put on a plane
back home, carrying the deepest sort of international political apology. And future attacks against Huawei, ZTE, and other Chinese
technology companies would not be repeated.
China actually holds a Royal Flush in this international political poker game. The only question is whether they will recognize
the value of their hand. I hope they do for the sake of America and the entire world.
This is no surprise. Anyone who follows political events knows that John Bolton is insane, so no surprise that he devised this
insane idea. The problem will be corrected within a week, and hopefully Bolton sent to an asylum.
However, this is a clear sign that Canada no longer exists as an independent nation, but is a colony of the USA/Israeli empire.
Canada provides soldiers for this empire in Afghanistan even today, and in Latvia. Most Canadians can't find that nation on a
map, but it's a tiny unimportant nation in the Baltic that NATO adsorbed as part of its plan for a new Cold War.
This story is not about an ultra-wealthy Chinese heiress enduring an odd adventure in Canada. This story is about a complete
loss of Canadian sovereignty, because detaining this lady is outright insane. Canada was conquered without firing a shot! Welcome
back to the royal empire run as a dictatorship.
I hope someone in China is reading this article. I would love to see Adelson and his cohorts go down in flames. This would fit
right in with China's current anti-corruption foray. Xi has a reputation for hanging corrupt officials. Shutting down Adelson's
casinos would be consistent with what Xi has been doing and increase his popularity, not least of all, right here in the US.
If only America focused its attention inward, on growth and stability, instead of transcendent American Imperialism then the world
may stand a chance. The future will suffer once China's debt traps collapse and like America it begins placing military globally.
America would be the one country who could work towards a Western future but this will never be the case. Better start learning
Mandarin lest we end up like the Uyghurs.
@Anonymous Use your
brain. The Chinese elite want to use the political clout that Adelson and the other big casino Jews have with the US government.
To gain lobby power from a proven expert, Shelly Adelson, they are willing to allow him to make the big bucks in Macao. They expect
quid pro quo.
The Chinese are pussies and will always back down. The U.S. laughed in their face after they bombed and killed them in Belgrade
and got crickets from the Chinamen. China can't project much power beyond its borders. They can't punch back. The Chinese (and
East Asians) are only part of the global business racket because they are efficient worker bees facilitating the global financial
system. They have no real control over the global market. And if they start to think they do they'll get a quick lesson. Like
they're getting with Meng, who is being treated like coolie prostitute. LMAO.
I always enjoy fresh writing from Mr. Unz. Clarity of thought is a fine thing to witness in language. It should be stated, America
is not in any danger.the empire is and is in terminal decline. As Asia's economic might grows in leaps ad bound, so does the empire
scramble to thwart losing its global grip.
As Fred Reed once pointed out, declining empires rarely go quietly. Will America's leadership gamble on a new war to prevent asia's
ascendancy?
I think it's possible.
But what do I know. As my father once said, "I'm just a pawn in a game."
To his credit he had the wherewithal to see that. Alas, most Americans are asleep.
The call for Ms. Meng's arrest had to come from the US Treasury's Office of Foreign Assets Control. They enforce every thing related
to sanctions, which they claim is what Meng was arrested for– sale of phones and software to Iran.
But they also say they had been on her company's case since 2013 so their timing is rather suspect.
What else I don't understand is her company has research and offices in Germany, Sweden, the U.S., France, Italy, Russia, India,
China and Canada ..So if what they sold or attempted to sell to Iran wasn't outright 'stolen' intellectual property from the US
or even if it was why not transfer it to and or have it made in China or some country not signed onto the Iran sanctions and then
sell it to Iran. I haven't boned up on exactly what kinds of phone software they were selling but I think it has something to
do with being able to bypass NSA and others intercepts.
You are assuming Meng is not a sacrificial pawn in some larger game.
It would be priceless for Xi to shut down Adelson's operations in Macau for a few days or weeks, but I'm afraid Xi is very
much akin to Capitain Louis Renault in Casablanca , and after walking into a Macau casino and uttering the phrase, "I am
shocked- shocked- to find that gambling is going on in here!" might admit in the next breath, "I blow with the wind, and the prevailing
wind happens to be from Jerusalem."
Half a century or so propaganda like 'the USA policing the world' of course had effect.
Not realised is that in normal circumstances police is not an autonomous force, but has to act within a legal framework.
The illusion of this framework of course exists, human rights, democracy, whatever
She's out on bail. Agree that Bolton blindsided Trump. Trump is going to try to turn this into some sort of PR gesture when he
pardons her. No way he will let this mess up his trade deal. Which is beached until she exonerated.
What is true
of these stories of course cannot be known with certainty, but it is asserted that USA military technology is way behind China
and Russia.
Several examples exist, but of course, if these examples tell the truth, not sure.
PISA comparisons of levels of education world wide show how the west is intellectually behind the east.
Western positions on climate, neoliberalism, migration, in my opinion point into the same direction: critical thinking, almost
gone.
"I very much doubt that they are fully aware of this enormous, untapped source of political leverage".
I very much doubt whether that is the case. As far as I know, most Chinese people are distinguished by their intelligence,
thoroughness and diligence. What do the thousands of people employed by China's foreign ministry and its intelligence services
do all day, if they are unaware of such important facts?
However I also doubt if China's leaders are inclined to see matters in nearly such a black and white way as many Westerners.
Jewish people seem to get along very well in China and with the Chinese, which could be because both have high levels of intelligence,
culture, and subtlety. As well as being interested in money and enterprise.
It's certainly an interesting situation, and I too am waiting expectantly for the other shoe to drop.
Yes, whatever your bias is, China is a "normal" country. In the sense of being closer to the ideal than most countries – not of
being average.
You may bewail some of the "human rights" issues in China, although I believe they may be somewhat magnified for PR purposes.
But when did China last attack another country without provocation and murder hundreds of thousands of its citizens, level its
cities, or destroy the rule of law? (Like Afghanistan, Iraq, Libya )
The Chinese seem to be law-abiding, sensible, and strongly disposed to peace. Which is something the world needs a lot more
of right now.
@Dan Hayes "why hasn't
anyone before thought of it.. "
" WHY HASN'T ANYONE BEFORE THOUGHT OF IT !!"
You must be kidding me.
For over three years I have been issuing comment after comment after comment .Like a crazed wolf howling in a barren forest
.That the "number one" priority of the American people should be demanding the seizure of ALL the assets of Neocon oligarchic
class.
Why ?
Not because they are "oligarchs." ..or some might own "casinos" but because they "deliberately" Conspired to Defraud the American
People into illegal Wars of Aggression and have nearly bankrupted the nation in the process.
That's why.
And it is the worlds BEST REASON to seize the assets a thousand times better than "bribery charges." I have issued statement after statement to that affect ,on Unz Review, in the hope that at some point it might, at least subliminally,
catch on.
What I have witnessed over the past six years, is a lot of intelligent, thoughtful people "correctly diagnosing" the issues
which plague the nation But no one had any idea of what to do about it. I have been pointing out, that if people really want to do something about it then do whats RIGHT: Seize the assets of the defrauders.!
Of course we can. Of course we can Its the LAW! Defrauding the nation into "war of aggression" is the supreme crime one can commit against the American People. The "SUPREME CRIME"!
(If you don't think so, go ask your local Police Officer. He will tell you FLAT OUT ..it is the Worst crime "Conspiracy to Defraud
into Mass Murder! .Not good ! You can even ask him if there is a statute of limitations. He will probably say something like "
Yeah .When the Sun collapses!")
And they are GUILTY as charged There is no doubt , .. not anymore. We all know it and can "prove" it ! Every "penny" belonging to each and every Neocon Oligarch who CONSPIRED TO DEFRAUD US INTO ILLEGAL WAR should be forfeit until
the debt from those wars is paid down .. IN FULL !
The keys to the kingdom are right there, right in front of your noses. If you want to change things ."take action" the law is on YOUR side. We don't need China to do a damn thing ..We just need the American People to rise up,"apply the law" and take back their country
and its solvency.
Canada may be
the obvious criminal. But on consideration, isn't it rather like the low-level thug who carries out a criminal assignment on the
orders of a gang boss? And isn't it the gang boss who is the real problem for society?
An article with the identical take as Ron Unz, including the idea that China has its key lever via Sheldon Adelson's casinos,
was published on the Canadian
website of Henry Makow also noting that USA political king-maker Adelson, is a major force behind the anti-Iran obsessions
that partly grounded the arrest of Ms Meng, and so well-deserves consequences here...
In the Jeffrey Sachs article linked above, Sachs lists no less than 25 other companies which have been 'violating US sanctions'
and admitted guilt via paying of fines, but never suffered any executive arrests, including banks including JP Morgan Chase, Bank
of America, PayPal, Toronto-Dominion Bank, and Wells Fargo.
The principle against 'selective, arbitrary, and political prosecutions'
The principle that one state cannot take measures on the territory of another state by means of enforcement of national laws
- 'proportionality of law', which demands that penalty for any said 'crime' needs to be proportionate to the offence, and not
draconian, 'cruel and unusual' Ms Meng is threatened with decades in prison
This is also a significant humiliation of President Trump personally, his own advisors apparently colluding to render him powerless
and uninformed
The Meng case brings to mind the story of another sanctions-violating 'target' arrested at USA request, the great USA chess
master and non-Zionist Jew, Bobby Fischer (1943-2008).
Born in Chicago, Illinois, USA, Fischer impressed the world with his genius, but, like Ms Meng became criminally indicted by
the USA regime, for the 'crime' of playing chess in Yugoslavia when the Serb government was under USA 'sanctions'. Harassed across
the globe, Fischer was jailed in Japan in 2004-05 by embarrassed Japanese leaders, for this fake 'crime' which few people in the
world thought was wrong. Fischer had been using his celebrity voice to strongly criticise the USA & Israeli governments, making
him also a political target, much as Ms Meng is a political target due to her being a prominent citizen and quasi-princess of
China.
The Japanese, loath to be the instrument of Fischer's USA imprisonment, finally allowed Bobby to transit to Iceland where he
was given asylum and residency. Living not far from Iceland's NATO military base, Fischer became quickly and mysteriously struck
with disease, and Fischer died in Reykjavik, perhaps a victim of a CIA-Mossad-Nato assassination squad.
The Chinese government, I am told, directly understands the power and role of Sheldon Adelson here, and Chinese inspectors
are perhaps inside Adelson's Macau properties as you read this. Perhaps Chinese officials may show up soon in Adelson's casinos,
and repeat the line of actor Claude Rains' character in the 1942 film 'Casablanca' -
"I'm shocked, shocked, to find that gambling is going on in here!"
What we have to realize is that just as there is no real difference between Democrats and Republicans because they are both
owned by the same people, so must we realize that in reality there is little difference between the leaders of the worlds countries
because they are all owned by the same central banks. This is why Nate Rothschild famously stated "give me control of a countries
money supply, and I care not who makes its laws" . All the world's central banks are tied together by BIS, WB and IMF and
the US marines. This is the reason Syria, Libya, NK and Venezuela have been taken down: Rothchild central bank control.
So this Huaiwei arrest almost certainly has nothing to do with the "trade war", and is with certainly a hit by one side of
the Kabal against the other. Zionist Nationalists versus Chabad Lubbovitz perhaps?
Jared Kushner has been lying pretty low lately and recently was stripped of his security clearance. He was linked to Kissilev
the Russian ambassador, plus he was pushing Trump to help protect MBS in SA. I would bet that he is at the center of this storm.
I'm honestly shocked no one has stated the obvious: very, very few Americans would be likely to care if Sheryl Sandberg were arrested
on dubious charges in China. I cant say I would be one of those few people.
I also should note that the crown prince of KSA is Mohammad bin Salman. Salman is his father, the king. The crown prince is
Mohammad, son of (aka "bin") Salman.
@TheMediumIsTheMassage
In many ways China does deviate from international norms, but of course so does the United States. As Tom Welsh pointed out, Chinese
foreign policy is downright angelic compared to the US, even if you consider Tibet and Xinjiang to be illegitimately occupied
territories (an argument I'm sympathetic to). Perhaps China would act as belligerently as the US does if China were the sole global
superpower, but it's not, so it's fair to judge China favorably compared to the US.
@Craig Nelsen Trump
deserves it for hiring Bolton at all. Perhaps one might argue Trump was blackmailed into doing so but he doesn't seem to be acting
like a blackmailed man.
Mr. Unz, at no time since Ms. Wanzhou's arrest have I felt myself in a position to judge that this was a strategically unwise
or incautious act. It might be, but apparently I'm to be contrasted from so many of your readers, and you, simply for understanding
myself to have an inadequate handle on the facts to make the call. That would be true, that my handle on the facts would be inadequate,
even if I didn't have personal knowledge of Huawei's suspicious practices or their scale.
I worry that you don't seem to evidence the presence of someone trusted who will go toe to toe with you as Devil's Advocate.
Too often, on affairs of too great a consequence, you come across too strongly, when the data doesn't justify the confidence.
A confident error is still an error and Maimonides' advice on indecision notwithstanding, a confident error is a candidate for
hubris, the worst kind of error. All of this, of course, assumes you make these arguments in good faith because if not the calculus
changes mightily.
Too many of your readers evidence that they interpret this event and form an opinion of it based on nothing but this higher order
syllogism:
Because I distrust the US government
[or because I distrust those I believe to control the US government]
It follows that this was an unjustified act or else a dangerous strategic error
After this higher order syllogism is accepted without due critique, evidence is sought to justify it and no further consideration
of the possibilities is tallied.
At minimum you need to have run a permutation where you seriously consider that : it is well know to US operatives, if not
to US citizens, you, and your readers, that Huawei is actively, constantly and maliciously waging covert war on the USA. You should
at least consider this possibility. If true, this act may merely be a shot across the bow that notifies China of a readiness to
expose things China may not wished exposed, and might stop endangering US citizens, if it were made aware such things stand to
be exposed.
If that's true, not only are you a fishing trawler captain causing distraction with a loudspeaker yelling at the captain of
the destroyer that just fired the warning shot across the bow of a Chinese vessel that is likely covert PLA/N, but now you may
be positioning your trawler to block the destroyer.
Do you really have enough information to know this is wise? Do you really know as much as the destroyer captain?
I will be away today, in the off chance you reply and I don't immediately answer it is because I can't.
Superb, as always, Ron Unz!
For someone who says he has no background in economics you you put your finger dead center on the money nexus of this "puppet
run by another puppet controlled by another puppet dangling from the strings of a still bigger puppet" chain from hell.
I wish someone would read out the entire article, may be with photos of the culprits, on Youtube with subtitles in Chinese.
@Craig Nelsen Nobody
is suggesting that "the order" came from Bolton or that he could indeed give any such order. True his not telling Trump about
what was about to happen bears a sinister interpretation.
@TheMediumIsTheMassage
I think what he means by normal are countries whose leaders are interested in the well being of their nation and the people they
rule. No divided or corrupted loyalties to another nation.
By this standard the United States is clearly not a normal country.
One angle you did not mention, Cisco (U.S. company) of course until not too many years ago had a near-monopoly on the kind
of network systems Huawei is selling as number one now (actually, I did not know of Huawei's success there, thought of it as a
handset maker), that may be a factor here.
There are a few Chinese or U.S. people of that descent on this site, mainly PRC-sympathetic, it would be very amusing if they
were able to ignite a big discussion of your hypothetical reprisals
During the bombing of Belgrade a missile fell on the Chinese Embassy. A local tv reporter approached a Chinese Embassy official
and asked him. What are you going to do now? The answer was.
The Meng case brings to mind the story of another sanctions-violating 'target' arrested at USA request, the great USA chess
master and non-Zionist Jew, Bobby Fischer (1943-2008).
Fischer was another victim of Zionist controlled American imperialism. Yugoslavia, the child of Woodrow Wilson, became the
victim of the Imperialist war Against Russia. Russia's brother, and ally, Yugoslavia, was destroyed by the kind democrat gang
administration of Wm (that was not sex), Clinton.
Excellent article, and an ingenious suggestion regarding the Adelson casinos. But I wouldn't hold my breath waiting for a casino
shutdown. Having worked in the marketing end of the casino industry myself, I can tell you the most coveted demographic lists
were always the Chinese players, words like fanatical and obsessive don't even come close to describing their penchant for gambling.
I could literally see casino shutdowns in China causing a national Gilet Jaune moment followed by the overthrow of the Communist
Party LOL.
I would definitely welcome seeing more Ron Unz articles on current topics.
@Carlton Meyer Any chance
this is Democrat, Deep State types at State and Justice manufacturing this cluster-f in order to make Trump look unaware? This
is a President that respects casinos. And business. If Bolton and Company pulled this from behind the scenes without Executive
knowledge or authorization, is that even legal? More treason? But given the circumstances, how does all this even GET to Iran,
hurt Iran at all? What was supposedly illegal was done in 2010. Are we certain bags of cash from the Chinese and Russians and
Iran weren't traveling about Democrat-ruled DC back then? Grabbing this chick helps the case against Iran? I'm at a loss as to
how.
And so the thought of a more local political benefit/purpose, stirring a diplomatic shit-storm on Trump's watch, something
he'd have to take responsibility for. To start a near war, sort of like the Bay of Pigs. Operatives, pulling tricks, writing checks
the President then has to cover, looking like an unelectable mook throughout.
I'm happy to give the AIPAC kiddies full credit, I just don't see the damage to Iran in all this. For crying out loud, we carted
$500 billion cash over to Iran under Obama's watch, what, 2013 or 2014ish? I don't know how we skip over THAT, to get to trade
shenanigans in 2010, also taking place under Obama's watch. What was Holder doing when he was AG after all, why no action then?
If it's Israeli-driven today, why wasn't Israel pushing Holder to take action against Huawei back in 2010?
@TheMediumIsTheMassage
How is the USA a "normal" country in any sense of the word? It once was truly great among the nations of the world but that ship
sailed looooong back.
We invade for fake "freedom", inject the poison of homo mania into nations that do not do the bidding of the homos and/or bend
to the will of the chosen ones, pretend it's all for some good cause then invite the survivors to displace the founding stock
of this country. You call that "normal"??
We are nothing more than a vehicle for every kind of degenerate (((loser))) with cash to use our men and women as their private
mercenaries. We spread filth around the place, destroy nations and proclaim ourselves as the peace-makers with the shrill voice
of a worn out street prostitute on kensingtion ave (philly).
We are like that hoe, living out the last days of her aids infested body, with a grudge on the world for something that was
completely of our (((own))) making. Philly might have been the birthplace of this country but camden is where we are all headed.
And looking at China, we are dysfunctional beyond repair. Of course we still have quite a few things the Chinese might want to
emulate (no the SJW versions but the read deal) but looking at our other maladies, they probably won't who'll blame them?
@Anon Yes it was s Portuguese
colony. Interesting that Persian traders including Jews were in Macau going back st least to 500 AD probably more.
Ron, have you sent this article to the Chinese ambassador in DC yet?
Strange that the Chinese let Adelson in. The Macau casinos have thrived for a long time. The Portuguese left valuable casinos
and the Chinese let the Jews in soon after the Portuguese left.
It makes sense that foreign casino operators would want to move into Macau, but why would China let foreigners in?
Could it be that one of the largest investors in China since the mid 1970s Richard Blum husband of Dianne Feinstein has something
to do with it??
She's as much the Senator representing China as a Senator representing California.
Another interesting aspect of all this is the "suicide" of Physics Professor Zhang Shoucheng at Stanford just a few hours after
Meng was arrested on Dec 1. According to reliable Chinese sources and widespread reporting on social media Zhang was the conduit
to China from Silicone Valley. He was richly rewarded by Chinese investment in his US companies. IMHO the Chinese understand the
role of Israel and Adelson in US politics but are cautious in going this far. The Chinese are taking the light touch approach
with Trump and his Adelson selected neocons. A Chinese businessman Guo WenGui with the highest connections to the Chinese elites
and security services has sought political asylum in the USA. On the internet he daily speaks to the Chinese diaspora (in Mandarin)
on the complex developments in Chinese official corruption. The NY Times has now started to take him seriously (good idea ) and
reports that he and Steve Bannon have formed an alliance to expose Chinese government activities. You can read all this in the
NY Times. Unz should translate Guo Wengui into English and publish his commentaries. In my analysis he is usually right about
China and has shown remarkable predictive powers. He knows how and what the Chinese think, where the bones are buried and what
comes next. He and Bannon plan to reveal the facts about the recent suicide in France of another prominent Chinese businessman
Wang Jian who was Chairman of Hainan Airlines parent company.
This article by Mr. Unz is a good example of why people should read and support the Unz Review. No one is better equipped to shed
light on otherwise unmentioned interests behind mainstream news events like this one.
Kudos for making a smart suggestion that no doubt will be heard by people who could carry it out.
Good article, but it is only scratching the surface.
Many things would be explained if somebody would find out what is the volume of US investment in China, and what percentage of
it is Jewish.
That would shed light why the rabid Jewish press in US so bestially attacking Trump, after Trump started to impose tariffs on
Chinese goods.
I do not know, but I could guess that Trump reached deep into Jewish profits.
We have no choice than wait what will happen to tariffs after Trump will be replaced.
@Carlton Meyer Canada
declared an end to participating in combat operations in Afghanistan in July 2011 and withdrew its combat forces, leaving a dwindling
number of advisors to Afghan forces. The last Canadian soldier departed Afghanistan in March 2014. You are spot on regarding Bolton's
certifiability.
Trump has been totally phagocyted by the Neo-Cons in the foreign policy. The two pillars of the neocons foreign policy are now
Saudi Arabia and Israel. Trump is benefitting from the neo-cons intelligence and their powerful financial network that he is convinced
would help in his reelection.
Once he is re-elected then he may decrease his reliance on them but for the next few years the jewish lobby will prevail in Trump's
foreign policy. Unless they are not able to protect Trump from falling under the democrats assaults or been eliminated from power,
they are on for more wars, more troubles and more deaths. History will place Trump near Bush junior as neo-cons puppets responsible
for the largest destruction of countries since WWII.
@Brabantian Interesting
that she was arrested in the Chinese colony of Vancouver BC. Maybe the Canadian government is asserting sovereignty over Vancouver
at long last.
That must have been frightening. There she was sitting in the VIP lounge surrounded by deferential airline clerks as usual
and suddenly she's under arrest.
Since the end of the Cold War, the American government has become increasingly delusional, regarding itself as the Supreme
World Hegemon.
More delusional than when in 1957 the US government gave Iran a nuclear reactor and weapons grade uranium? In his latter years
Khashoggi 's relative, the weapons dealer Adnan Khashoggi, much later mused on what the US was trying to achieve by giving Iran
vast amounts of armaments, when all it did was set off an arms race in the region. America then switched to Iraq as its cop on
the beat and gave them anything they asked for, and were placatory of Saddam when he started talking crazy. This was under the
US government least attentive to Israel. Yes things should be more balanced as Steven Walt suggests
Averting World Conflict with China, by Ron Unz - The Unz Review If it wants to create the conditions for a final settlement
of the Palestinian problem, then America should be more even handed but it must also be very cautious about Iran. We don't know
who will be in power there in the future and history shows that once those ME counties are given an inch they take a mile.
Saudi Arabia seems quite sensible, its liking for US gov bonds that even Americans think offer too low a rate of interest is
easily explained as payment for US protection. Killing Khashoggi that way was a dreadful moral and foreign policy mistake from
someone who is too young for the amount of authority he has been given, but the victim did not beg for death like more than a
few Uygurs are doing right now. The CIA agent China rounded up with the help of it's network of double agents in the US were doubtless
glad to have their interrogation terminated.
Some sweeteners from Adelson are likely in the Tsunami of dirty Chinese money, which are amusingly being laundered in Canadian
casinos. As Walt points out the Chinese elite want bolt holes and bank accounts in north America. By the way most of the ill gotten
gains are from sale of opiates such as fentanyl.
Targeting Sheldon Adelson's Chinese Casinos
Yes that will work, especially when added to what China is already doing in targeting farmers who supported Trump, so he is
definitely not going to be reelected now you have explained all this to them, and you are also opening up Harvard to their children,
which can only redound to the detriment of white gentiles. Deliberate pouring of the vials of wrath or just accidentally spilling
them? I am begining to wonder.
Thank you, Ron, for a clear-headed and insightful article.
There are however, two tiny infelicities, which I would not want for them to distract from the article's merit.
First, I think the Saudi Arabian Prince you are referring to is Prince Mohammed bin Salman, not "Prince Salman". "Prince
Mohammed" would be the abbreviated form of his name. "Bin" is of course the Arabic equivalent of the Hebrew "ben" indicating paternity,
rather than a middle name, so "Salman" is not his surname. "Prince Salman" would refer to the current Saudi King before he was
King, rather than to the current Prince.
Second, maybe the hypothetical of China seizing Sheryl Sandberg of Facebook is not the best analogy since I, and I suspect
others who are aware of her key role in empowering and enriching a deceptive and parasitical industry, would not be terribly troubled
if China seized her. Indeed, we might consider it a public service. Admittedly, it is hard to find a good analogy for a prominent
female executive of a US national champion company since so many of our prominent companies are predatory rather than productive
and scorn their native country rather than serve it.
and Ms. Meng was seized on the same day that he was personally meeting on trade issues with Chinese President Xi. Some
have even suggested that the incident was a deliberate slap in Trump's face.
@Baxter"America
is not in any danger." America is in very great danger, but only from within.
Almost half of all millenials believe that Capitalism is evil and that the Socialism should be the guiding economic principle
of this nation. When you point out that it has failed for every nation in history that has tried it, notably the Soviet Union
and more recently Venezuela, they retort that it is because those countries "did it wrong" and that "we will do it right."
When you ask for specifics as what they "did wrong" that we will "do right" they stare at you wordlessly as if you
are the one who is an idiot.
It should also be pointed out that a vast majority of Democrats think that Ocasio-Cortez is brilliant and that we need more
legislators like her.
What if Ms. Meng, was giving Iranian dissidents phones and other equipment to undermine the Government of Iran, starting another
color revolution, that sucks in America and Israel? What if the Trump administration asked that this not be done in order to end
the endless "revolutions" that have been happening and bankrupting our country and threatening Israel? What if the sanctions are
benefiting Iran's government too? China was allowed to become so large at our expense when we opened up trade and moved businesses
over there, but this was to keep them from being too cozy with Soviet Russia, just ask Nixon.
Part of the Zionist plan for a Zionist NWO was laid by David Rockefeller when he sent Kissinger to China to open up Chinas slave
labor to the NWO types like Rockefeller and the Zionist controlled companies in the U.S. and part of the plan was the deindustrialization
of America thus bringing down the American standard of living while raising the standard of living in China.
I will never believe the fake disagreement between the Zionist controlled U.S. and the Chinese government as long as G.M and
Google and the other companies that have shut down their operations in the U.S. and opened operations in China, it is all a NWO
plan to bring down we Americans to third world status and then meld all of us into a Zionist satanic NWO.
The enemy is not at the gates, the enemy is in the government and its name is Zionism and the Zionist NWO!
"... Brexit can be considered as the rebuilding of the old nation state wall between England and the Continent. To an extent, this is a repudiation of the Globalist Movement, a wholly owned subsidiary of the Neo-Liberal Experiment. In it's essence, Trumps Wall is a repudiation of the NAFTA Consensus. The American 'deplorables' support it because they see it as a means of defending their livelihoods from those hordes of 'foreign' low wage workers. In both cases, it is a looking inwards. ..."
Brexit can be considered as the rebuilding of the old nation state wall between
England and the Continent. To an extent, this is a repudiation of the Globalist Movement, a
wholly owned subsidiary of the Neo-Liberal Experiment. In it's essence, Trumps Wall is a
repudiation of the NAFTA Consensus. The American 'deplorables' support it because they see it
as a means of defending their livelihoods from those hordes of 'foreign' low wage workers. In
both cases, it is a looking inwards.
Arguably, May is one of a generation of politicos in decline. Macron, (perhaps Merkel's
hope of having a posterity,) has caved. Merkel has seen the face of her political mortality
recently. May has her Pyrrhic victory.
The Clintons cannot even give tickets to their road show away. In all of these examples,
the replacements waiting in the wings are, to be charitable about it, underwhelming. Brexit
is but the opening act of a grand, worldwide crisis of governance.
How England muddles through this will be an object lesson for us all. We had better take
notes, because there will be a great testing later.
While the UK has rightly been the focus, I can't help wondering what the deeper feelings
are across Europe. It's very hard to gauge how much thought the rest of Europe is giving to
Brexit at this stage. The average punter seems very uninterested at this point, while a
growing number (from what I'm reading from other sources) just wish they'd get it over with
so the rest of Europe could be allowed to get on with its own internal concerns. I suspect
the rest of the EU economies most affected must be putting their 'crash-out' plans into
over-drive after this week's continuing escapades.
(Re: Sinn Féin. I was wondering if there was the remotest possibility that they
would cross their biggest line just to help a Tory government, and a particularly vile Tory
government from their standpoint. When speaking to veteran Belfast Republican during
negotiations on the GFA (Good Friday Agreement), their viewpoint was that nearly everything
could be negotiated but one thing was impossible: entering into a foreign London parliament.
Symbolically and practically, it was a step beyond the pale. I also noticed lately that a
couple of older Sinn Féin Republicans, who had to be persuaded into the negotiation
camp all those years ago, are again contemplating running for local government positions in
the North.)
Everything I've read indicates that the rest of Europe has simply given up on Brexit
– they are unwilling to expend any more energy or political capital on it. The leaders
have much bigger things on their plates than Brexit, and the general population have lost
interest – I'm told it rarely features much in reporting on the major media. I think
they'll grant an extension purely to facilitate another couple of months preparation for a
crash out, and thats it.
As for Sinn Fein, I get the feeling that after been caught on the hop by Brexit, they now
see a crash out as an opportunity. NI looks likely to suffer more than anywhere else if there
is a no-deal – there is hardly a business there that won't be devastated. But they are
caught between trying to show their soft face in the south and their hardliner face in the
North, and I think they are having difficulty deciding how to play it.
The British circus attracts interest and there is coverage on the motions and so on
treated as UK internal politics. May and the ultra-brexiteers get almost all the attention.
The only options mentioned are no deal and May's agreement.
" European diplomats in London watching the government's Brexit agony have conveyed a
mixture of despair, and almost ghoulish fascination, at the state of British politics, with
one saying it is as melodramatic as a telenovela, full of subplots, intrigue, tragedy and
betrayal
Although privately many diplomats would love Brexit to be reversed, and believe it could
mark a turning point against populism, there was also a wariness about the disruption of a
second referendum. One ambassador suggested the French realised that European parliamentary
election campaign of the French president, Emmanuel Macron, would be damaged by the sight of
furious British leave campaigners claiming they had been cheated of their democratic rights
by an arrogant elite who refused to listen: "What is happening in France is potentially
momentous. The social fabric is under threat, and this anger could spread across the
continent," the ambassador said, referring to the gilets jaunes protests ."
During the last decades of Soviet power, the importance of Communist ideology' was
frequently
overrated abroad. Only after the downfall of the regime did it become clear that
Marxism-Leninism
was no longer taken seriously; lip service was still paid to it, but it became the subject of
ridicule
among those at the very' top.
Is there a danger that a similar misapprehension may prevail now that political views once
found only' at the periphery' of the political system have moved to its center?
... ... ....
... In the 1980s, a strange situation had arisen: The KGB spent much of its time harassing
and persecuting the dissidents, but they believed as little in communism and the Soviet system
as their victims. They did what they did because they had been given orders from above. What is
known about their real convictions? Deep down many of them were probably cynics, willing
apparently' to serve any' system as long as it preserved their privileged positions. What of
the current situation? How important is ideology', and what is the specific weight of power and
money'?
... ... ...
In its cultural history, Russia went through a golden and a silver age, but now there are
few prospects even for a bronze age. One feels reminded of Pushkin's reaction having finished
listening to Nikolai Gogol reading to him Dead Souls: "God, what a sad country, our
Russia."
As with the USSR if promised of better life are not fulfulled, ideology is bankruppt and
nationalism is on the rise.
Notable quotes:
"... The Party of Davos is yet unwilling to make the fundamental changes that would reduce the huge advantages they have accumulated over the past 40 years. We should therefore expect an intensification of this conflict with the natural ups and downs but a general trend towards increasing angst and frustration manifesting in unpredictable ways ..."
The main fault of the EU is that the biggest party at the table always in the end, when
things get serious, gets its way. The 80 million or so people of Germany de facto rule the 500
million of the Union, or you know, the three handfuls that rule Germany. No important decision
can or will ever be taken that Berlin does not agree with. Angela Merkel has been the CEO of
Europe Inc. since November 22 2005, gathering more power as time went by . That was never going
to work unless she made everyone richer. Ask the Greeks about that one.
Merkel was the leader of both Germany and of Europe, and when things got precarious, she
chose to let German interests prevail above Italian or Greek ones. That's the fundamental flaw
and failure of the Union in a nutshell. All other things, the Greek crisis, Salvini, Macron,
Brexit, are mere consequences of that flaw. In absence of a forever economic boom, there is
nothing left to fall back on. SF
-----------
A persuasive article, the Europeans here can now explain to us all how much better and more
virtuous Europe is than the United States.
What was it that Macron was saying about a European army? The CRS and the Gendarmerie Mobile
will get this under control but Macron may well be neutered by the unrest.
FWIW, the disparate power exercised by the great and the small states under present EU
conditions is exactly what the US Framers successfully avoided by the Great Compromises in the
US Constitution. pl
The main breaking point of the EU is the Euro. The rules agreed in the Maastricht Treaty
are not suitable for the participating countries but are written by the northern european
countries such as Germany and my country The Netherlands.
The rules each Euro-country are:
* maximum of 60% debt to GDP
* maximum deficit of 3% of GDP
* maximum inflation of 1.5%
These rules made national politicians toothless. A lot of monetary policy they could use
were taken away from them and delegated to the non-democratic, non-chosen technocratic
institute of the European Central Bank.
They are not allowed to print money battle a recession which would increase inflation.
This strategy makes a country cheap. So when there is a lot of inflation in Italy, Greece,
Portugal or Greece a lot of people from northern Europe go there on holiday.
In your discussion of the Eurozone you do not mention the Target 2 balances. This is almost a
non subject in Germany and not referred to that often elsewhere. I believe they amount to an
unacknowledged form of fiscal transfer.
Even if I'm correct, I don't think it's enough.
All unified countries, from the US to Iceland, recognise the duty of the richer areas to
transfer funds to poorer areas if needed. So, in the UK, HMG sends large sums of money over
to Northern Ireland as subsidy.
The other side of the coin to this is that the central government may supervise the
expenditure of that subsidy. That entails overall control over the entire expenditure of the
recipient area.
This system of fiscal transfer is seldom adequate and seldom well supervised.
It is, however, essential in any country.
As the EU becomes more unified this question of fiscal transfer becomes more important.
There are two obstacles.
1. The richer countries are reluctant to pay the subsidy. Since the EU is not yet a
unified state there are no means of coercing the richer countries into paying the subsidy. To
be part of a superstate, and to benefit from being part of it, is one thing. To face a
reduced standard of living in order to subsidise other parts of it is quite another.
2. Even if the richer parts of the EU are willing to pay, there are no effective means of
supervising the spending of the subsidy.
This is I think the greatest problem the EU faces and it faces it because it is in
transition from a collection of countries to a unified state under unified control. As a
collection of countries there is no onus on any one country to subsidise another. As a
unified state the process would happen automatically. But the in-between stage the EU's
currently at allows for neither one nor the other.
This is why we hear so often the calls for "ever greater unity" for the EU. That is no
mere expression of an ideological or millenarian dream. It is a precondition that must be met
if the EU is to hold together. Given the other stresses to which the EU is subjected I do not
believe it will arrive quickly enough or at all at the degree of unification that will allow
that precondition to be satisfied.
"The Union appears fatally wounded, and that's even before the next financial crisis has
materialized. Speaking of which, the Fed has been hiking rates and can lower them again a
little if it wants, but much of Europe 'works' on negative rates already. That next crisis
could be a doozy."
Sir
IMO, the Southfront article has a lot of merits. The problem that much of Europe faces is
similar to what we face here. Extreme wealth inequality caused by the concentration of
political and economic power in the hands of a few. The divide between the working class and
the urban upper class. The "Deplorables" are expressing their frustration at the ballot box
now by voting for Brexit, Trump, Bolsonaro, AMLO, Salvini & Five Star and what would have
been considered fringe parties not too long ago. The social contract has fallen apart.
The Party of Davos is yet unwilling to make the fundamental changes that would reduce
the huge advantages they have accumulated over the past 40 years. We should therefore expect
an intensification of this conflict with the natural ups and downs but a general trend
towards increasing angst and frustration manifesting in unpredictable ways
Russian articles are about as close to the truth as we are going to get on the internet
since it serves their interests to weaken the sanctions placed on them by the West. Facts do
not serve western Media Moguls. The last thing they want published is that the news is
manipulated to make them richer and more powerful. The closest I ever got to the White House
was standing on the lawn when Jimmy Carter welcomed Pierre Trudeau. Still, there is a video
of Huma Abedin hugging Lindsey Graham with the Generals looking on at John McCain's
funeral.
The fundamental problem of the EU is that the Euro is an unfinished project. Unfinished
because it lacks the internal transfer payments required to make it fully functional. Every
single currency essentially subsidizes to some degree it's poorer regions at the expense or
the richer. This is true or the US, all European countries prior to the euro etc The reason
for this is that under normal circumstances a poorer region (or under the current EURO
scenario, a poorer country) would be able to benefit from a weaker currency, in its
relationship with a better off country enjoying a stronger currency. By agreeing to a common
currency it gives up this essential compensating mechanism, but (normally) only in exchange
for meaningful fiscal transfers as compensation.
Today euro zone fiscal transfer amount to a fraction of comparative rates in the us or
other countries. Practically, it's non existent.
And the main reason for the current situation is Merkel/Germany. It takes all the benefits
(a lower weaker currency then it would otherwise have and unfettered access for is products
across Europe) without any costs. Of course, in the long run it's undermining the golden
goose, but it's difficult to focus even Germans on the long term...
The topic can be expanded at length but I've tried to keep it simple. Nothing is more
important than this.
The article is over the top. Brussels has very limited economic power and less political
power. The EU budget is only around 1% of Gross National Income. What is the Federal Budget
in the USA in comparison? Just your defence spending is around 3% of GDP. Fx. Hungary
receives around 4 billion Euros in 2017 from the EU and paid ca 800 million Euros to the EU.
How vital is 3.2 billion Euros for Hungary in a existential question? It's ca 2.7 % of GDP.
As for the commission it is only able to administrate existing rules.
New rules required the Council of Europe (the governments) and the EU parliament to pass
them.
The Council's voting rules require a majority to pass and sometimes unanimity. Which is
why the is no agreement on the distribution of refugees/immigrants. Member countries can
refuse to take part. Germany has limited
" .. if the more national-minded parties of the EU get a majority in the EU parliament
..."
They are a most disparate group of parties and it's unlikely in any case that they'd end
up having the say in the European Parliament. If they got near to it, we would see the same
mechanism operating as can operate in the parliaments of the constituent countries - the
status quo parties would join together to keep them from power.
But that's speculation. Here we are on firmer ground -
"The article is over the top. Brussels has very limited economic power and less
political power. The EU budget is only around 1% of Gross National Income."
There are two points relevant here.
1. "Brussels" or "the EU" are very imprecise terms. It is safer to talk in terms of the
Berlin/Paris/Brussels axis, with the two first components having the ultimate say and the
third being mainly the means through which that say is expressed.
2. The size and expenditure of Brussels itself is remarkably small. Compare it to the
massive size and expenditure of the governing apparatus in Washington and it's almost
invisible. But through regulation and law it has at its disposal increasing control over the
much larger establishments and budgets of the constituent nation states.
It is important not to exaggerate the reach of EU regulation. Many regulations we think of
as "EU regulations" are made elsewhere at international level and the EU only transmits these
regulations to its member states. For this and other reasons the Berlin/Paris/Brussels axis,
or whatever term one may wish to use, cannot be directly compared with the central power in
the US. But the EU does have very much more power than is indicated in the sentence quoted
above.
Good day Colonel. We can only hope so. The EU was conceived as an idea that would prevent
another European Conflict. Its initial organisation the European Coal and Steel
Community was designed to bring the sinews of war under centralised control. This was a
practical measure which was quite separate from the founder's beliefs about the origins of
the war; this was that it was the people who by their nationalism and subordination to
demagoguery that had enabled that power to be harnessed by the forces of Fascism. They thus
determined to create a political system in parallel that would neutralise the people as a
factor in political decisions within what would eventually become the EU. This involved
rendering their choices at the ballot box ineffective puppets who can initiate no legislation
and by virtue of their large constituencies are so distant from the people that no real
representation can take place. I doubt that there is one person in twenty in the UK who could
tell you the name of their MEP. What this means in effect is that there is no demos, no
people in the original Greek political sense and since there is no demos there can be no
democracy. The European Commission, which is the executive arm of the EU is voted for by the
Parliament, there is no input from the people which is why you see strange anomalies like
Prime Minister May negotiating with Michael Barnier or President Donald Trump talking to
Jean-Claude Juncker, two men who wield enormous power and yet have never received a single
vote from a citizen of the EU.
The truly frightening thing about this state of affairs is not the present EU even with
its lack of accountability, malice and incompetence but the opportunities it offers for
future tyranny and oppression. Human beings being what they are, no system that leaves the
people out of its decision making process will endure long as a force for good in the
world.
A currency is both an instrument and a product of a nation's monetary, fiscal and budgetary
policies.
Multiple nations with separate, and often contrary policies, cannot realistically share a
currency.
on one hand the dream of the internationalist eurocrats is the United States of Europe,
that is a USA on steroids from the aspect of govt powers. They are after it with 'all
possible despatch' as the old british navy slang goes. For them nation states are a thing of
the past and they see a rainbow society stretching from Gibraltar to Tallinn, and from Faroer
islands to Rhodes, with all possible colours, and other liberal nightmares of 'families', as
well as as a refuge open to everybody, who is not christian/and or conservative. Political
and economical control is absolute in their hands, and a police state is chasing 'family
values', but not petty crime. Drugs are legalized and stuff.
That dream is falling apart. Thank God.
On the other hand everything a semi-official russian source says must be taken with a huge
spoon of salt, since those 'pesky rooshans' are always up to something. A united and strong
EU not to mention a strong european army is not in their interest, since they fear a
Barbarossa 2.0. But what they want less is the version of Mr. Trump's NATO, an enlarged and
obeying military AND political arm of the US.
Yes the current EU is weak and will be weaker when in April 2019 more eu-sceptical parties
will join the EU parliament, I would even go as far as they will the majority. The neoliberal
top down, forced 'gleichschaltung' has failed and the Yellow Vests are only one aspect. A
thorough reform is needed, and as always I promote the way the austro-hungarian empire
worked, and worked reliably. That is a common foreign and defence politics, financed commonly
BUT this budget was to be suported by BOTH parliaments. The rest is voluntary. Standards,
education, police and intelligence services obligatorily share data etc. but NOTHING ELSE is
mandatory.
As of anti US sentiments. The late G. Bush with his visit in 1989 has left a deep and very
positive mark on hungarian public opinion. Some 30 years later the new ambassador appointed
by the running Pres himself says, that although Mr. Trump and Mr. Orban see the world very,
very similarly, a gesture from the hungarian govt is needed to facilitate a personnal
meeting. It could be a defence cooperation, a step to increase energy independence, or
helping to resolve the ukrainian situation.
Let me translate.
Buy US weapons for billions of dollars, buy US LNG for 50-70% higher price, or let 150 000
hungarians be forcefully assimilated into ukrainians becuase that is in-line with US
interests.
If you would like Sir, I would be more than honoured to write you a piece on the growing
disillusionment about the „West" in the Visegrad 4 countries, and the impossibility of
US geopolitical plans with this region.
"The 80 million or so people of Germany de facto rule the 500 million of the Union, or you
know, the three handfuls that rule Germany. No important decision can or will ever be taken
that Berlin does not agree with. "
Stupid lie, in the past I was used to better quality Rusian propaganda. :-)
"A persuasive article, the Europeans here can now explain to us all how much better and
more virtuous Europe is than the United States."
Sir;
It may be a stretch, but I can see the present state of the European Union as analogous to
America under the Articles of Confederation. That experiment wasn't working out as expected,
so, America went back to the drawing board and developed the Constitution. This set in train
events that, arguably, culminated in the War Between the States. Out of that crucible came a
strong central government, with some allowances for differences between states and regions,
but a general and enforceable national system. Where is the District of Columbia for Europe?
Berlin? Hardly. German civil law does not run in France, or Spain. Brussels? Conrad was right
in describing it in the opening of his book "The Heart of Darkness" as full of whited
sepulchers. Until some true Capitol is established for Europe, apart from and distinct from
the state capitols, and given effective power, Europe will just limp along.
The real value of the European Union lies in its function as a brake on inter-european
disputes. Preventing round three of the Great War might be it's biggest achievement.
As for Merkel being CFO of Germany, well, a nation is not just it's financial and economic
systems. If she concentrated her energies only on the financial aspects of her country, then
she deserves to go. Not enough of the 'vision' thing.
"The real value of the European Union lies in its function as a brake on inter-european
disputes."
I've seen that statement so often that I might eventually have to agree with it out of
weariness. But I don't think it'll do.
The reason we've had seventy years of peace, more or less, is that the European powers,
possibly excepting Germany, are no longer Great Powers.
In such disputes as have seriously escalated the EU has not been a brake. It has if
anything been a promoter of conflict, though its contribution to conflict so far has
necessarily been less than the contribution of its constituent nation states.
The reaction of the western media to these protests in France is quite different compared to
how they reported (aka propagandized) the Arab Spring and the Color Revolutions in Eastern
Europe. There they created the mythology of the liberty loving people vs the authoritarian
state. And the hysteria to gin up support for regime change.
In this instance on the protests in France, on most days there is no reporting. And when
there is any analysis these protesters are deemed as anarchists and troublemakers. I can't
wait for the subversive Russian hand to show up in the NY Times and WaPo. I for one would be
very interested to learn more about the Yellow Vests and the sentiments among the broad
public they are mining. It seems their demands are the demands of the disenfranchised. Those
who have paid the price for the enormous wealth of the Davos globalist elites. It also seems
that 70% of the French public support the protests.
The poll ratings of Macron the favorite of the globalist elites has plummeted that makes
Trump a very popular leader relatively. Will the "regime changers" in the west demand that
Macron go as they would if these protests were taking place in Russia for example?
IMO, the biggest problem in Europe is that an unelected bureaucracy in Brussels has
essentially stripped EU countries of their sovereignty and make classic bureaucratic
decisions that make ordinary lives more challenging, like the well known example of the pages
of directive about the shape and color of bananas that can be sold in the EU, which is an
example of a bureaucracy that is so big that they have to invent knew ways to remain
relevant.
We've seen many countries in Europe starting to take independent stances and pushing back
against the Brussels bureaucracy. Hungary, Czech Republic, Italy are examples of countries in
some conflict with Brussels. Even in Germany what would have been considered fringe political
parties are gaining substantial ground in national, state and local elections. All signs that
the average person is getting more frustrated.
this article from SF is provocative, not so persuasive. The mantra that some German Kamarilla
is ruling the EU, that German "deep state" if you will, exists in order to conquer the
European continent by peaceful, economic, financial means is IMO total BS. Germany is not
sovereign country, that is no. 1; secondly - the important decisions like the Greece bailouts
were made by France (Sarkozy) and others by "pulling Merkel over the table", by ramming these
decisions through the Bundestag without proper deliberations. Thirdly, the ECB boss and the
Board are totally out of German hands. Merkel saw to it that Mario Draghi became the boss,
and not Weidmann. The issue of Greece´s debts and the role of Goldman Sachs in getting
Greece into the Euro zone is well known, and I will not spend any more time digesting it
again here. Facts are that Greece´s billions of Euro´s received from printing
presses, ended up in the pockets of oligarchs, who purchased real estate in Geneva, Lausanne,
Paris, Berlin, Munich, London, New York. The famous 2000 names on Lagarde´ list never
materialized in public.
Now, the state of infrastructure in Germany is bad, people´s savings disappeared,
poverty in old age is a big issue for average German worker. Tell me, how did Germany profit?
There is no disparate power of Germany in the EU. France does not know "wo ihr der Schwanz
steht" - and talking about european military force is of course excluding the control over
the French nuclear arsenal.
I am not linking to sources but I can provide these if so desired, the SF article did not
provide any for their claims.
Fanto - I am so glad that you distinguish between "Germany" - still one of the finest
countries in Europe - and the German ruling apparatus.
The elites tend to drag us along with them when it comes to conflict. So because the
Western power structures are at present opposed to, say, Russia, we must all line up
dutifully and uncritically behind the anti-Russian line. And many of us do just that.
I've seen this mechanism at work in my own country. Our government, Brussels, and the
Irish government are involved in a complex dispute. This is now spilling over into antagonism
on our part against "the Irish" and antagonism on their part against "the Brits" - not
unexpected in the latter case because the Irish do have a fair few reasons for hostility to
"the Brits" in any case. What a mess!
The same mechanism operated internally in the Ukraine. A generalised sense of resentment
against a corrupt and greedy elite was diverted to the quite different channel of conflict
between pro-Russian and anti-Russian sectors of the population.
They got the conflict, all right, but the corrupt and greedy elite is still there.
I believe this will happen to us in Europe if we don't look out. The crony corporatist
club we term "the EU", and the crony corporatist governments of its constituent nations, are
the common burden of the many peoples of Europe. If we allow them to become our leaders in a
fight against each other they will remain our common burden.
The Greek bailout was simply EU self preservation and not in their interests. The IMF was
more lenient that Germany in those bailouts.. Seriously. =)
Germany did not mind the wealth transfer from the southern states, nor the lower euro due
to their economic inefficiencies (see Pres. Trumps comments), Goldman or no Goldman. If the
Chinese do it they are currency manipulators but when Germany does it...
And Germany not spending on infrastructure restrained consumption, imposing their short
sighted austerity on the rest of Europe. This exacerbated the crazy trade surpluses that
Europe had with the rest of the world, basically starving the European consumers and screwing
the USA further.
hah. I would hope no one is suggesting that Merkel's 'refugees for cheap labour' imposed on
Europe was due to American pressure. It is basically an extension of the German predatory
economic polices.
The financial sovereignty of the Eurozone countries, Germany included, is constrained by the
terms of the Maastricht Treaty, by which they are restricted from running budget deficits in
excess of 3%. The north/south divide that has been unfolding since it went into effect early
in this century was uncannily predicted by the late Wynne Godley in the London Review of
Books a few months the treaty's ratification. Godley was a senior analyst in the British
Finance Ministry and his analyses were said by some to be the primary influence in the
government's decision not to forsake the pound for the common currency.
As for Germany having minimal influence on Eurozone financial policy, try telling that to
Yanis Varoufakis, who was the Finance Minister of Greece during the 2015 negotiations that
led to the draconian austerity program under which the country's economy has all but
collapsed and its infrastructure looted at bargain basement prices. There was little question
in his mind that it was Wolfgang Schäuble, the German Finance Minister at the time,
running the show.
exSpec4Chuck, I see that you are full on board of emotional German bashing tour; I can
recommend the book by H.W.Sinn, "Der Euro", Hanser Verlag, 2015. quote (p.27) "....Italiens
große Tageszeitung iL Giornale sieht in Deutschland das Bestreben am Werk, das Vierte
Reich zu errichten... Das linke englische Wochenmagazin New Statesman nannte Angela Merkel
gar das ´gefährlichste deutsche Staatsoberhaupt seit Hitler´ " (if you are
not proficient in German, you can try Google translate).
and what Varoufakis claims are concerned - he was refuted by the research of H.W. Sinn, who
calculated that only 1/3 of money which was going to Greece - benefited the French, German,
American banks, and not 90% as Varoufakis claims. The 2/3rds of it benefited Greeks, who were
buying foreign assets because they did not trust their own economy.
BTW, the introduction of the Euro was a political decision to weaken to Deutsche Mark,
against the Franc, it was promoted by Mitterrand as "better than Versaille", meaning better
than the reparations after WW1. -also called "Versaille without war". So, tell me -who is
right, give me some other points of view, please.
Related to the question ( rethorical? ) you pose, it was really very timely that these
protests in France started just a week after Macron supported the creation of an European
Army....They were organized by social networks ( not workers assemblies, as it is the usual
way amongst French working class movements... )... like the last so succesful electoral
campaign of Bolsonaro.... There is a significant extrem right component and claims for only
low taxes..... In fact it seems that people from the "Yellow Vests" who are willing to
negotiate are receiving death threats from the far-righters, who, at the same time, claim for
the rise to power of a general whom Macron dismissed in the past, once taking over....Then...
it is the presence of strange strong fitted masked people wearing sunglasses and dressed in
military fatigues with backpacks....wearing strange white brazelets.... amongst the first
line in the front of the riots...Believe me, I have seen many working class movements through
these years in Europe and this one resembles more the "Ukrainian Maidan" than any other
else...by its extrem violence, even attacking representative signs of French nation as
Marianne statue, Arc du Triumphe , or even burning of French flags...and calls
to storm L´ Elysée ...
Macron, like it or not, is the legitimate president of France elected in democratic
elections....There is an excellent opportunity to fight him in the next European elections,
since the real fish ( we all seem to agree in that ) is cut in Brussels.... Why it is that
this people can not wait till May..., or is it that the real organizers of these riots do not
expect any good result in those elections, be it because they are fringe organizations with
scarce support amongst the French people, or because they can not concur as subjects to these
elections because they are... well, foreigners...?
There are a lot of people who live far worst that the French today, including people in
the US ( only you would wish to have the still remaining French welfare state...to which the
globalist want to take a dent in...) and then, would you be happy seeing this happening in
the US?
Anyway, am I detecting some schadenfreude here by this South Front people?
Who they are, btw?
I use to read them when at first The Saker was publishing their "analyses"...It seemed to me
they were military people then....
Nobody in the US disputes Macron's legitimacy. His fantastical effort to prevent global
warming by raising the already sky high taxes on consumer energy products are a French
problem and worthy of an Enarch. The US has far fewer bases in Europe that it used to have,
especially in Germany. The remaining ones are there because of a mistaken policy of
containing Russia post USSR.
You Europeans and your governments are fully complicit in that
policy although as Trump observes you are unwilling to fund your own defense adequately under
NATO agreements. As I have said, I personally, think NATO should be dissolved and that
whatever security arrangements should exist between the US and European countries should be
on a bi-lateral basis, but it appears that your governments do not want NATO dissolved.
Pompeo is pretty simplistic guy from the "Coalition for the peace from the position of strength". A neocon hell bent on US hegemony.
And it not true that Mike Pompeo is doing his best to demolish the global neoliberal world order. It just point to US vassals its real
place in the neoliberal pecking order.
Notable quotes:
"... "Multilateralism has too often become viewed as an end unto itself," said Pompeo. "The more treaties we sign, the safer we supposedly are. The more bureaucrats we have, the better the job gets done." Maybe I ran in strange circles during my eight years in the State Department, but few of my colleagues were in thrall to such simplistic thinking. ..."
"... For its part, the Trump administration hasn't been shy about trespassing on other countries' sovereignty. Trump has threatened to invade Venezuela and to punish South Africa for its land-reform policies. By the end of 2017, he had also sanctioned nearly 1,000 individuals and entities. Apparently, there are limits to how much other countries can "exert their sovereignty" within their own borders if doing so goes against the interests of the U.S. ..."
"... The liberal international order actually provides a legal basis for such interventions -- if, that is, you're willing to uphold it and play by its rules. The UN Security Council has passed hundreds of Chapter VII resolutions authorizing action to "restore international peace and security." Many investigations and prosecutions by the ICC, to which all NATO members except Turkey and the U.S. belong, have advanced many U.S. policy interests. Multilateral bodies also provide a forum for resolving lesser disputes. Trump's animus toward the World Trade Organization, for instance, ignores the better than average (and better than China) U.S. winning streak in trade cases. ..."
"... Do multilateral institutions need review, reform and renewal? Well, what institution doesn't? And as the largest funder from 2014 to 2016 for 24 out of 53 leading UN and non-UN multilateral institutions (compared with nine each for Japan and the U.K.), the U.S. has a strong interest in making sure they work effectively and advance the interests of member states. ..."
If a diplomat truly is, as the old saying goes, "an honest man sent abroad to lie for his country," then Secretary of State Mike
Pompeo has earned his pay. His speech in
Brussels on "Restoring the Role of the Nation-State in the Liberal International Order" deserves a State Department Distinguished
Honor Award for Intellectual Dishonesty.
"Multilateralism has too often become viewed as an end unto itself," said Pompeo. "The more treaties we sign, the safer we supposedly
are. The more bureaucrats we have, the better the job gets done." Maybe I ran in strange circles during my eight years in the State
Department, but few of my colleagues were in thrall to such simplistic thinking.
Pompeo then hurled rhetorical grenades at a row of multilateral bunkers: United Nations peacekeeping missions don't work; the
Organization of American States hasn't brought freedom to Cuba; the African Union doesn't advance the mutual interest of its members;
the World Bank and International Monetary Fund just make things worse; the European Union puts the interests of its bureaucrats before
those of its countries and citizens. Admittedly, each of those institutions is imperfect. But none lives down to the caricatures
Pompeo made of them.
Finally, in his own Mount Suribachi moment
, Pompeo brazenly planted the flag of American leadership on an international liberal order that this administration has worked
harder to blow up than to build. Wisely, he beat a retreat after his speech, taking no questions.
So, let's look at his points one by one. In attacking multilateralism, Pompeo claimed that the Trump administration's mission
is "to reassert our sovereignty and we want our friends to help us and exert their sovereignty as well." Trump himself played up
this same theme at the United Nations General Assembly in September.
But it's not clear that multilateral agreements and institutions have actually done much to abuse U.S. sovereignty. The UN
charter , for instance, clearly excludes intervention in
any state's domestic affairs. The U.S. veto on the Security Council gives it an unassailable backstop. America has unrivaled
voting power in the International Monetary
Fund and the World Bank. Many of the supposed threats to U.S. sovereignty that the Trump administration has cited have been either
illusory -- such as a hortatory compact on migration the U.S. pulled out of last year -- or could be easily
countered
, such as a possible investigation by the International Criminal Court into U.S. actions in Afghanistan.
For its part, the Trump administration hasn't been shy about trespassing on other countries' sovereignty. Trump has threatened
to invade Venezuela and to punish South Africa for its land-reform policies. By the end of 2017, he had also sanctioned
nearly 1,000 individuals and entities. Apparently,
there are limits to how much other countries can "exert their sovereignty" within their own borders if doing so goes against the
interests of the U.S.
The liberal international order actually provides a legal basis for such interventions -- if, that is, you're willing to uphold
it and play by its rules. The UN Security Council has passed hundreds of Chapter VII resolutions authorizing action to "restore international
peace and security." Many investigations and prosecutions by the ICC, to which all NATO members except Turkey and the U.S. belong,
have advanced many U.S. policy interests. Multilateral bodies also provide a forum for resolving lesser disputes. Trump's animus
toward the World Trade Organization, for instance, ignores the
better than average (and better than China) U.S. winning streak in trade cases.
Even in those situations where international rules may constrain future U.S. behavior, they reflect trade-offs that negotiators
have weighed and accepted. As Secretary of State Dean Rusk said to Congress in 1965 about the thousands of treaties and agreements
that the U.S. had inked in the previous two decades, "We are constantly enlarging our own freedom by being able to predict what others
are going to do."
At their best, multilateral institutions allow their member states to leverage national power. Twice in the last decade, the U.S.
Government Accountability Office has compared the cost of UN peacekeeping missions to U.S. boots on the ground and found them to
be a much more cost-effective
alternative . Fittingly, two days after Pompeo blasted his hosts at the EU for shortchanging the interests of its members' citizens,
news broke of a massive, multi-nation EU-coordinated
raid on the 'Ndrangheta crime syndicate in
Italy -- the kind of bust that no country can mount on its own.
Do multilateral institutions need review, reform and renewal? Well, what institution doesn't? And as the
largest funder
from 2014 to 2016 for 24 out of 53 leading UN and non-UN multilateral institutions (compared with nine each for Japan and the
U.K.), the U.S. has a strong interest in making sure they work effectively and advance the interests of member states.
But the way to do that isn't to browbeat them, or to take your ball and go home when things don't go your way. For all the weaknesses
of the UN Human Rights Council, the U.S. withdrawal (Iceland
took its place) won't make it better, and makes it even less likely that offenders will be held to account. Moreover, China and Russia
are busy building their own multilateral bodies or suborning existing ones like
Interpol .
Pompeo claimed that the U.S. wants to create international organizations "that deliver on their stated missions, and that create
value for the liberal order and for the world." But the administration's drastic budget cuts to the State Department and international
organizations (which a more multilaterally-minded Congress
has blunted) and its preference for bilateral over multilateral deals suggest it would rather they withered on the vine. Equally
toxic has been Trump's disdain for the work of experts and seasoned public servants -- witness his recent repudiation of a searing
U.S. government
report on climate change's economic impact.
One of my wonkiest jobs as a Foreign Service Officer at the U.S. Embassy in Tokyo was to cover Japan's conduct in commodities
groups such as the International Tropical Timber Organization, the International Coffee Organization and the now-defunct International
Natural Rubber Organization. I never became an expert, though I did come to understand why Japan has such good coffee. I did, however,
develop a healthy respect for the wonks, nerds and gnomes who inhabit the multilateral garden, tending to their countries' national
interests while advancing the greater common good. They need and deserve your support, Mr. Secretary, not your contempt.
"... The unquenchable quest for high income on the part of the upper classes must be halted. ..."
"... They maintain it is a mistake to isolate it merely in the context of the financial innovation and deregulation occurring from the late 1990s. Instead, capitalism has particular historical tendencies and specific class relations. ..."
"... However, because politics and social class alliances can change, so can the profitability. The current crisis was not caused by falling rates of profits, but by financial innovation, credit overextension, and the particular social class alliances facilitating these activities. ..."
Neoliberalism is a new stage of capitalism that emerged in the wake of the
structural crisis of the 1970s. It expresses the strategy of the capitalist classes
in alliance with upper management, specifically financial managers, in-
tending to strengthen their hegemony and to expand it globally. As of 2004,
when our book Capital Resurgent: Roots of the Neoliberal Revolution was
published by Harvard University Press, this strategy appeared successful,
based on its own objectives, the income and wealth of a privileged minority,
and the dominance of a country. The contemporary crisis is an outcome
of the contradictions inherent in that strategy. The crisis revealed the
strategy's unsustainable character, leading to what can be denoted as the
"crisis of neoliberalism." Neoliberal trends ultimately unsettled the foundations
of the economy of the "secure base" of the upper classes -- the capability of the United States
to grow, maintain the leadership of its financial institutions worldwide, and ensure the dominance of its currency
-- a class and imperial strategy that resulted in a stalemate.
A New Social Order-A Multipolar World
The crisis of neoliberalism is the fourth structural crisis in capitalism since
the late nineteenth century. Each of these earthquakes introduced the establishment
of a new social order and deeply altered international relations. The
contemporary crisis marks the beginning of a similar process of transition.
Not only is financial regulation involved, but a new corporate governance,
the rebuilding of the financial sector, and new policies are now required. The
basic tenets and practices of neoliberal globalization will be questioned, and
production has to be "re-territorialized" in the United States to a significant
extent. Accordingly, countries such as China, India, or Brazil will become
gradually less dependent on their relationship to the United States. It will be,
in particular, quite difficult to correct for the macro trajectory of declining
trends of accumulation and cumulative disequilibria of the U.S. economy
once the present Great Contraction is stopped.
In any event, the new world order will be more multipolar than at present. Further, if such changes are not realized successfully in
the United States, the decline of U.S. international hegemony could be sharp. None of the urgently required tasks in the coming
decades to slow down the comparative decline of the U.S. economy can be realized under the same class leadership and unchecked
globalizing trends. The unquenchable quest for high income on the part of the upper classes must be halted. Much will
depend on the pressure exerted by the popular classes and the peoples of the world, but the "national factor," that is, the national
commitment in favor of the preservation of U.S. preeminence worldwide, could play a crucial role. The necessary adjustment can be realized in the context of a new
social arrangement to the Right or to the Left, although, as of the last months
of 2009, the chances of a Left alternative appear slim.
It is important to understand that the contemporary crisis is only the
initial step in a longer process of rectification. How long this process will
last depends on the severity of the crisis, and national and international
political strife. The capability of the U.S. upper classes to perform the much
needed adjustment and the willingness of China to соllaborate will be
crucial factors. A crisis of the dollar could precipitate a sequence of events
that would alter the basic features of the process.
Two very distinct categories of phenomena are involved in the analysis of the contemporary crisis: the historical dynamics of
capitalism, on the one hand, and financial and macro mechanisms, on the other hand. The interpretation of the crisis lies at the
intersection of these two sets of processes, and the difficulty is to do justice to both and account for their reciprocal
relationships.
Neoliberalism should be understood as a new phase in the evolution of capitalism. As such, it can be described
intrinsically-its basic mechanisms and contradictions. The reference to a m ost recent phase raises, however, the issue of
previous phases. The comparison with earlier periods reveals the traits proper to the new period. The analysis of the social,
political, and economic trends that led to the establishment of neoliberalism is also telling of the nature and fate of this
social order. Symmetrically, the notion of a crisis of neoliberalism implies a possible transition to a new phase, and the
nature of the society that will prevail in the wake of the contemporary crisis is a major component of the investigation here.
... ... ...
A central thesis in Capital Resurgent: Roots of the Neoliberal Revolution
is that the overall dynamics of capitalism under neoliberalism,
both nationally and internationally, were determined by new class
objectives that worked to the benefit of the highest income brackets,
capitalist owners, and the upper fractions of management. The greater
concentration of income in favor of a privileged minority was a crucial
achievement of the new social order. Income statement data make this
apparent. In this respect, a social order is also a power configuration,
and implicit in this latter notion is "class" power. National accounting
frameworks add to this observation that a large and increasing fraction
of U.S. capital income comes from outside of the United States. Not only
class relations are involved, but also imperial hierarchies, a permanent
feature of capitalism.
The new configuration of income distribution was the outcome of
various converging trends. Strong pressure was placed on the mass of
salaried workers, which helped restore profit rates from their low levels
of the 1970s or, at least, to put an end to their downward trend. The opening
of trade and capital frontiers paved the way to large investments in
the regions of the world where prevailing social conditions allowed for
high returns, thus generating income flows in favor of the U.S. upper
classes (and broader groups that benefit to some extent by capital income).
Free trade increased the pressure on workers, the effect of the
competition emanating from countries where labor costs are low. Large
capital income flows also derived from the growing indebtedness of households
and the government. Extreme degrees of sophistication and expansion
of financial mechanisms were reached after 2000, allowing for
tremendous incomes in the financial sector and in rich households. The
crisis, finally, revealed that a significant fraction of these flows of income
were based on dubious profits, due to a n increasing overvaluation of
securities.
Besides the comparative interests of social classes, the leading position
of the United States, economically, politically, and militarily, must also
be considered. The political conditions underlying the dominance of the
United States in the decades preceding the crisis are well known. Two
major factors are the fall of the Soviet Union and the weakness of Europe
as a political entity. Neoliberalism corrected for the earlier decline of
the leadership of the United States in the 1970s, at least vis-a-vis Europe
and Japan. The U.S. economy is still the largest in the world in terms of
gross domestic product (GDP), with a leadership in fields as important
as research and innovation, both in production and financial mecha-
nisms. As a consequence, the dollar is acknowledged as the international
currency.
The international neoliberal order -- known as neoliberal globalization --
was imposed throughout the world, from the main capitalist countries of
the center to the less developed countries of the periphery, often at the cost
of severe crises as in Asia and Latin America during the 1990s and after
2000. As in any stage of imperialism, the major instruments of these international
power relations, beyond straightforward economic violence, are
corruption, subversion, and war. The main political tool is always the establishment
of a local imperial-friendly government. The collaboration of the
elites of the dominated country is crucial, as well as, in contemporary capitalism,
the action of international institutions such as the North Atlantic
Treaty Organization (NATO), the International Monetary Fund (IMF), the
World Bank (WB), and the World Trade Organization (WTO). Economically, the purpose
of this domination is the extraction of a "surplus" through
the imposition of low prices of natural resources and investment abroad, be
it portfolio or foreign direct investment. That countries of the periphery
want to sell their natural resources and are eager to receive foreign invest-
ment does not change the nature of the relations of domination, just as
when, within a given country, workers want to sell their labor power, the
ultimate source of profit.
The same notion, hegemony, is used here to refer to both class hierarchi-
cal relationships, as in neoliberalism, and imperialism internationally. No
distinction is made between hegemony and domination as in approaches of
Gramscian inspiration. The notion emphasizes a common aspect within
class and international mechanisms. In each instance, a class or country
leads a process of domination in which various agents are involved. In
neoliberalism, the upper fractions of capitalist classes, supported by finan-
cial institutions, act as leaders within the broader group of upper classes in
the exercise of their common domination. Similarly, the United States acts
as leader within the broader group of imperialist countries.
... ... ..
..the upper classes, to the Right. A shift would occur within the compara-
tive interests of these classes.
b. It is hard to imagine that such a far-reaching transformation would
be accomplished without significant support from the popular classes. A
degree of concession to the popular classes might be necessary. Consequently,
a political orientation to the Center Right could be expected.
3. Diversification in the rest of the world. Such a new strategy of strengthening
of the U.S. domestic economy would have important consequences for countries
of the periphery profoundly engaged in the neoliberal international
division of labor. But, in the long run, such trends open opportunities
toward the establishment of national development models as was the case
after the Great Depression (as in import-substitution industrialization in
Latin America), the much needed alternative to neoliberal globalization.
Independent of the path followed by the United States, the situation will
differ significantly around the globe. An increased diversity will be observed
in the establishment of new social orders more or less to the Right
or to the Left. Europe is not committed to international hegemony as is the
United States, and the European Union is politically unable to pursue such
an ambitious strategy. Europe might-paradoxically, given its history -- become the traditional
neoliberal stronghold in the coming decades.
It is still unclear whether social democratic trends in a few countries of Latin America
will open new avenues to social progress. The crucial factor
will be the impact of the contemporary crisis on China. Either, having suecessfully
superseded the consequences of the crisis, China will experience
strengthened neoliberal trends as if nothing had happened, or the experience
of the crisis, in China itself or in the rest of the world, will work in
favor of a "third way" along the contemporary pattern of the mixed economy
that prevails in China.
Even if new social arrangements are successfully established in the
United States, it is hard to imagine that U.S. hegemony will be preserved.
There will be no clear substitute to an impaired U.S. dominance, and a
multipolar configuration, around regional leaders, will gradually prevail
in the coming decades. A bipolar world, Atlantic and Asian, is a possible
outcome. Abstracting from rising international confrontation if conflicting
interests cannot be superseded, the optimistic scenario is that new international
hierarchies will be expressed within international institutions
to which the task of global governance would be slowly transferred.
This
new environment would be favorable to the international diversification of
social orders around the globe. This would mean a sharp break with the
logic of neoliberal globalization, with a potential for developing countries
depending, as in the case of the popular classes concerning domestic social
orders, on what these countries would be able to impose.
This book can be highly recommended as a book on the Great Financial
Crisis of 2008, and a book of politics, political economy, class analysis,
sociology, and history. Very impressive accomplishment.
The strength of this book on the Great Financial Crisis of 2008 is that
Dumenil and Levy place the crisis in a larger historical perspective.
They maintain it is a mistake to isolate it merely in the context of
the financial innovation and deregulation occurring from the late 1990s.
Instead, capitalism has particular historical tendencies and specific class
relations.
This is a very impressive volume published by Harvard University Press.
It offers a play by play of the Great Financial Recession of 2008, beginning
from 2000 in chapters 12 - 17, the political response and the continued
stagnation in domestic economies and instability within the international
economic order in chapters 18 - 20, along with very interesting historical
policy observations and recommendations for this current crisis in chapters
21 - 25. Nonetheless the real power of this book occurs in its historical
analysis of capitalist development since 1970s described in great detail
in chapters 1 - 11.
According to Dumenil and Levy the historical
tendencies of capitalism are radically mediated by politics and social class
configurations (i.e. alliances). They argue capitalistic
development, since 1880s, has gone through four primary stages and corresponding
crises. They emphasize these developments are not historically necessary,
but contingent on politics and social class configurations. Moreover, their
analysis is particular to the capitalistic development in the United States
and Western Europe, they are able to generalize or internationalize their
analysis because of the U.S. global hegemony (although they certainly accept
there are modes of resisting this hegemony (e.g. Iran, Venezuela, Cuba,
China, etc.).
Dumenil and Levy have demonstrated in previous work the tendency of the
rate of profit to fall in capitalistic economies. However, because politics
and social class alliances can change, so can the profitability. The current
crisis was not caused by falling rates of profits, but by financial innovation,
credit overextension, and the particular social class alliances facilitating
these activities. There is no single cause of the crisis, but broader
social political mechanisms at work and in the process of transformation.
The basic story goes like this: following the Great Depression of 1930
a strong social political alliance emerged between
the management class and "popular classes" (this popular
class includes blue and white collar workers, including quasi-management,
clerical, and professional, which cannot be reduced to the traditional "working-class").
In the 1970s there was a severe profitability crisis, the legislative and
institutional response to this crisis caused a fracture between management
and popular classes, and a re-alliance between
management and capitalist classes (which includes ownership and financial
classes).
Once the alliance between capitalist classes and management had been
forged in late 1970s and 1980s, profitability returned and financial incentives
and financial innovation reconfigured personal incentives and corporate
motivations. Most important according to Dumenil and Levy is that these
historical transformations manifested a "divorce" between ownership/finance
and the domestic economy and its actual production process. The political
system did nothing to reconcile this disconnect, indeed expedited the divorce
via deregulation and financial innovation, what the economic literature
calls "financialization" (although, to repeat in several countries the response
was radically different and in specific opposition to U.S. hegemony and
the neo-liberalism which the U.S. Treasury, IMF, World Bank, and WTO exported
to the rest of the world).
Nationalisation of essential services is required to put this country back on an even keel.
It was a stupid idea by governments (of all persuasions) to sell off monopoly essential
service assets. The neoliberal experiment has failed.
Beware: Just build a HUGE worker owned, democratically run (by workers) sector to compete
against privately owned concerns. If workers are (democratically) involved in running and
managing their own workplaces that will give plenty of competition for private concerns.
Workers will be involved in the 'politics' and economics of their local area as part of work.
They'll have more control over the technologies they want to use, how much profit they want
to make or not, wages, investment, working conditions and all aspects of their concern.
Workers would 'participate' more and be more involved in thinking about larger concerns. This
would make a nation/region more democratic on the 'ground'. Not just reliant on
'representative' democracy/voting. You'd still need over-arching government(s) but people
would have more direct control over their livelihoods and work conditions. Such a BIG sector
would give (I'm talking about Health, Education, manufacturing etc - not 'bread shop',
basket-weaving coops/social enterprises) private enterprise some REAL competition on prices
and services. It would deliver democracy to masses of people, some control over wealth
generation/economy and on a large enough scale CHANGE society in terms of social justice and
politics.
You don't need to go to State control or Private control of 'the economy'. Just the right
kinds of structures.
Neoliberalism is like a cancer on a health democracy. If we'd treated it in its early
magnifications (when the Librerals and far right old version of Labor), first started selling
off public assets (that are then charged back to citizens to use at increasing price rates
etc), we would have been fine.
But now the cancer is deep in democracy's lymph glads ( in many of our public services)
and so needs radical prolonged treatment and some surgery to assure the country's thriving
democracy survives.
First surgically remove the source: cease (vote out always) all right wing conservative
nutters from ever gaining power, or media mogul influence of government. Most but not all
hide in the Coalition.
Then, begin the reconstruction surgery to re-assert public assets and services. This is a
temporary but life saving cost.
Then, monitor and manage, (educate) the citizens about this scourge on democracy.
The death of neoliberalism means we can finally have a national debate about the size
and role of government, and the shape of the economy and society we want to build.
Neoliberalism is far from dead Richard - neoliberalism is deeply entrenched in mainstream
thinking its corporate enriching magic works insidiously - mostly subliminally under cover of
'sensible' free market self clearing 'orthodox' economics.
You and many others from 'progressive' TAI almost daily, unwittingly play a role in
reinforcing and entrenching neoliberal ideology in the community by framing macroeconomic
analysis/commentary in neoliberal terms.
Your oft repeated call for 'budget balance' over the business cycle is such an example. Only
fiscal deficits can build a prosperous productive nation in the absence of consistent
external surpluses - no government can ever build and expand a nation without permanently
injecting more funds into the non government sector than (through taxation etc) it
withdraws.
Both our major parties of government espouse neoliberal economic orthodoxy as if there is
no alternative - and no one calls them out - not even the quasi progressive TAI.
DSGE based 'orthodox' economics provides the lifeblood to neoliberalism - the myth of tax
collections funding expenditure provides plausible cover to constrain spending on
citizen/social services - but when it comes to war/corporate subsidy spending, such
constraints are immediately abandoned.
Hetereodox MMT exposes the lie of such DSGE myths - but faithful Ptolemaic 'progressives'
refuse to investigate or debate such Copernican macroeconomic sacrilege.
The recent TAI 'outlook' economic conference (proudly sponsored by 'The Australian'!! )
was a classic progressive 'fail'; loaded with orthodox 'experts' like Bowen and Keating
spouting austerity inducing neoliberal orthodoxy - not one heterodox economist was invited to
present the unwelcome, uncomfortable truth of sovereign nation macroeconomic reality.
Prof Bill Mitchell is Australia's most widely & internationally respected REAL
progressive heterodox academic - yet the TAI ignores him.
Neoliberalism won't die until it extracts the last breath of available wealth from
Australia's citizenry. It will die a savage death with the onset of the impending depression
'to end all depressions' when the collapsing housing bubble leaves citizens with a 'decades
long' bubble of unpayable private debt.
Only then will people realise they have been elaborately 'conned' - too late.
P.S. For all TRUE progressives:
Some brilliant short videos here
and here by Parody Project.
That's really the point, much as you might expect government like the Howard and Abbott ones
to have stuck to their claimed neo-liberal principles, neither substantially altered the
compulsory nature of the scheme, despite the fact that it ran more or less completely
contrary to Chicago School principles. Howard might have been fond of shouting "socialism" or
"nanny state" when he felt the need to criticise something, but deeds speak stronger than
words, and for all his p!ssing and moaning he was never going to do anything that stopped all
those truckloads of money finding their way to his friends in the banking industry.
Yes historically high mass immigration in Australia has been used as a trojan horse by the
adherents of neo-liberalism - to break down the pay and conditions of Australian workers and
their rights and entitlements.
By importing "ready made" skilled workers, neither the Government or the private sector have
had to go to the trouble of training their workforce nor bear any of the costs of educating
and training them.
As to the lower skilled imported workers, in the main, this is a crude device to cut out the
locals so that accepted or legislated pay and conditions can be lowered. Most of those
imported workers don't know their rights and are ripe for exploitation.
The shonks, rip off and quick buck merchants love neo-liberalism for the what it has done to
the Australian labour market.
And the Labor party has been complicit in all this - when it should have been protecting
Australians and Australian workers present and future from the ravaging impacts of
neo-liberalism.
For something that's supposedly dead, it still looks like neoliberalism is in charge to me.
The relentless commodification of every aspect of life continues apace. Money is still the
measure of everything and takes precedence over the environment, ethics, community,
creativity, discovery, and virtually everything else you care to name. When water thiefs, big
bankers, corrupt politicians, environmental despoilers, and those that start pointless wars
are IN GAOL, then I'll start to believe things are changing.
Neoliberalism is not simply an economic agenda. From the beginning it was conceived as and
then constructed to be much more than that - it was in fact as much a pedagogical cum
psychological operation to change minds across generations with regard to free-market
capitalism and thus to orient all thinking to that, than it was a matter of simple monetary
or trade policy. Of course, this had to be done with a good deal of repression and oppression
backing it up, here and there - Chile e.g. Thus electing neoliberalism is an effect of this
pedagogy over time - we are all schooled in its 'normality - and not a reflection of either
some natural desire for it or an educated choice.
I agree that we should be discussing fiscal policy but I suspect that Richard Denniss is
using a false frame for this topic. He probably adheres to the claim made by the
macroeconomic equivalent of pre-Copernican physics that a government that issues its own
currency, enforces taxes in that currency, and allows the currency to float in foreign
exchange markets can run out of its currency.
The fiscal policy of the federal government should be to employ all available labour in
socially useful and environmental sustainable productive activity, maintain price stability,
minimize inequality of income and wealth, and fund public services and infrastructure to the
maximum extent permitted by the resources that are available for sale in the government's
currency.
If you think that the government's fiscal policy should be to reduce a fiscal deficit or
deliver a fiscal surplus, you are a dill.
It makes no sense to target a particular fiscal balance because the outcome is driven
largely by the aggregated spending and saving decisions of the domestic non-government sector
and the external sector. The federal government does not control those variables.
The federal government needs to target economically, socially, and environmentally
desirable goals and allow the fiscal balance to reach whatever level is needed at any given
time to achieve those goals.
'Democracy' needs to be structural as well as a moral idea. Workers have been disempowered
and impoverished and disenfranchished by neoliberalism. An answer to structurally improve the
wealth AND democratic power of the workers is to build a HUGE co operative sector in each
economy: worker owned workplaces/businesses/concerns AND democratically run. THAT will
improve the situation for workers/punters: democracy where they live and work. Democracy
rooted not in fine ideas only about rights but bedded down in economic livelihoods. People
will take an interest in their local 'politics' and also understand more of the politics of
the nation. You don't have to get rid of 'capitalism' just give it a 'good run' for it's
money - some real COMPETITION. Cooperatively run Hospitals, owned by doctors and nurses and
other stakeholders - not for profit - that'll soon see the 'private' for profit' health
providers/rorters wind their prices and necks in. Socially owned, worker-owned,
government/taxpayer supported enterprise, work places, democratically run will boot up the
level of 'democracy' in our societies. We can still have voter style over-arching national
government of course. If you don't root democracy where people actually can participate and
which gives them a lot of control over their workplaces/livelihood, then it can all be
hijacked by the greedy and cunning (see neoliberalism). OH, a large cooperative sector in the
economy democratically run by workers won't deliver 'heaven on earth' - it'll still be run by
people!
It is also a tool of the neoliberals along with the whole neoliberal trend in macroeconomic
policy. The essential thing underlying this, is to try to reduce the power of government and
social forces that might exercise some power within the political economy -- workers and
others -- and put the power primarily in the hands of those dominating in the markets. That's
often the financial system, the banks, but also other elites. The idea of neoliberal
economists and policymakers being that you don't want the government getting too involved in
macroeconomic policy. You don't want them promoting too much employment because that might
lead to a raise in wages and, in turn, to a reduction in the profit share of the national
income.
Austerity fits into the mix very well Keeping wages low, or debt pressure high, means
workers will be less likely to complain or make demands. As workers struggle to provide their
families with all the temptations that a capitalist society offers, they become far less
likely to risk their employment, and less able to improve their situation.
At bottom, conservatives believe in a social hierarchy of "haves" and "have nots". They
have taken this corrosive social vision and dressed it up with a "respectable" sounding
ideology which all boils down to the cheap labour they depend on to make their fortunes.
It shows a great sense of inferiority and knowing our "proper"place, that the populace
apparently accepted the colloquial term for neo-liberalism or economic rationalism, as being
"trickle down economics" and that all that the populace deserved and was going to get was a
trickle of the alleged wealth and benefits created.
Why were most people so compliant and accepting of something that as a concept, from the
outset, was clearly signalling it would economically completely discriminate against the 99%
and was intended to provide such a meager share of the wealth and economic benefits
generated?
A quick look around the world provides clear evidence that there really are a lot of
alternatives.
That's the crux: many (western, developed) countries before us have
proven over and over again that the best type of democratic government is one in which
consensus is the basis for long-term decisions to the benefit of all. Is it tedious? Yes.
Frustrating at times? You bet. Slow? Indeed, quite often so. But the point is,
consensus-based decision making works and eventually is in everyone's interest (left,
right and centre), resulting in better long-term outcomes. With the added benefit that new
"majority" Governments won't throw out the children with the bathwater all the time.
I'd add one aspect to the article though, and that is to combine a form of proportional
representation with longer terms of Government. You won't get much meaningful done in
3 years, whatever form of representation you choose. 4 years, 5 years... whatever strikes the
best balance between governments getting some runs on the board and voters feeling empowered
to change government coalitions in the ballot box when they stuff up.
But what economic system worked in the interests of majority of population. There was only
one such system -- USA in 1935-1970th and it was the result of WWII and record profits of the US
corporation after the war, when both Europe and Japan were devastated.
In no way the USSR was social system that worked for the majority of population. It worked
for the Nomenklatura -- a pretty narrow caste, similar to current top 1% under
neoliberalism.
Neoliberalism clearly works for the interests of the minority and against the interests of
the majority. Households are now worse off than they were 6 years ago and large businesses
are enjoying record profits. It feels as if the australian economy is being run for the
benefit of a small percentage of wealthy shareholders.
While a purported devotion to the principles and precepts of neo-liberalism has been claimed
by decades of right-wing politicians, businesses and bankers, drilling down deeper often reveals
that what is really happening in favoring the economic interests of the few at the expense of the
many, and very often involving compulsorily actions like switch to 401K accounts. Which was stoke
of genius for neoliberals to fleeces common people. acquired
Speaking as no fan of neo-liberalism, but there is a risk that the term gets overused. Things
that the right have embraced with open arms, like compulsory retirement savings (which have
enriched the private sector, especially banks and their shareholders), would have caused
sharp intakes of breath from the steely-eyed theorists who came up with the concept. While a
purported devotion to the principles and precepts of neo-liberalism has been claimed by
decades of right-wing politicians, businesses and bankers, drilling down deeper often reveals
that what is really happening in favouring the economic interests of the few at the expense
of the many, and very often involving compulsorily acquired public resources being
re-directed to business, with barely even the thinnest veneer of genuine theoretical
observance to the neo-liberal model. Both neo-liberalism itself, and bogus claims of its
practical use and benefits, need to be dead and buried.
I really would love the rich and powerful who basically prey on the average
person/worker/mums and dads, to be held accountable and penalised properly in relation to
their deeds. These bastards destroy families in their grab for greed, and almost every time
they are excused by their cohorts, and even go on to bigger and better opportunities to keep
feeding their voracious greedy appetites. Basically they steal, so why isn't their proceeds
of crime taken back by government; and why do they not do any jail time?
Natural monopolies like water and power, roads and public transport should be in public
hands. All call centres dealing with government issues should be done by public servants, not
outsourced to foreign corporations.
I'd start with a bank. Give people a non-greed infested alternative.
Under neo-liberalism we have gone from 1 person, 1 vote to $1, one vote. The con job that
is 'small government and little or no regulations' is bad for society and the environment.
Greed over need.
Dr. T. J. Coles is director of the Plymouth Institute for Peace Research and the author of
several books, including Voices for Peace (with Noam Chomsky and others) and the forthcoming
Fire and Fury: How the US Isolates North Korea, Encircles China and Risks Nuclear War in Asia
(both Clairview Books).
The current economic model being used by capitalist countries across the world is failing
most of the people in these countries while enriching tiny elites. Unfortunately, politicians
in these countries are often in the pockets of the elite or are themselves members of the
elite.
We need a new economic narrative which better reconciles the needs of the population with
the directives of the market.
Why not? Profits to the nation, not greedy corporates and their shareholders.
I think you will find there were no profits made that could be put "to the nation." When
the wall came down, the USSR and the entire eastern bloc were completely bankrupt.
As was Mao's China prior to the emergence of Deng and his "to get rich is glorious"
mantra, that set China on its current path. Of course his generally market-oriented approach
has since been bastardised to one of One Party State-capitalism dominated by cronyism,
corruption, and a perverted justice system.
Yes it has generated vast wealth, but it is an empire built on sand. As any analysis of
its shadow banking system will show.
And while the legions of newly minted millionaires of party benevolence celebrate, the
hundreds of millions stuck in poverty are left to fend for themselves.
Neoliberalism is a secular religion, so it doe need to be rational, to remains influential or even dominant, much like
Bolshevism or Trotskyism (actually neoliberalism should be viewed as a perverted mutation of Trotskyism -- Trotskyism for irch) .
It took 70 years for Bolshevism to became discredited and collapse (under the attack from neoliberalism).
In the absence of alternatives neoliberalism might continues to exist in zombie state for a very long time.
Notable quotes:
"... Poverty rate in the USA has been increasing since about the year 2000. ..."
"... Why do you think that all around the world voters are going hard against Neoliberalism and why do you think that Neoliberals are desperately trying to save their bankrupt philosophy by hiding behind Nationalism and Racism? ..."
"... While I would very much like to agree with the notion that neo-liberalism is dead, there's rather too much evidence that its pernicious influence lingers ghost-like and ghastly, having suffused far too many politicians of an ultra-conservative ilk ..."
"... The true believers in the neo-liberal faith, as it was never other than a creed espoused by Thatcher and Pinochet among others, are like those in the catholic church who continued to advocate an earth centric universe long after science proved them wrong. ..."
"... It will be a long wait until these myopic adherents to the gospel of Hayek, Friedman and Buchanan, are consigned to the waste bin of history where they belong. Until then, it will remain a struggle to right the many wrongs of this mis-guided and shallow populism. ..."
"... The neocons have had their day, though it'll no doubt take one hell of an effort to drag them out of their crony-capitalist, snouts-in-the-trough ways. The profit motive in the provision of essential services should be confined to covering costs, maintenance and associated investment. ..."
The death of neoliberalism means we can finally have a national debate about the size and
role of government, and the shape of the economy and society we want to build.
Unfortunately, I see lots of deaths but none of them is neoliberalism. I can see death of
a decent safety net in Australia. Death of biodiversity. Death of ecosystems. Death of
intelligent debate. Death of science.
Poverty rate in the USA has been increasing since about the year 2000. The international
poverty trend has been decreasing over time only because the definition of poverty is to earn
less than $1.25 per day..... So, if you earn $10/day you are well above the poverty line:
Good luck living on that income in any OECD country!
Standards of living are decreasing in Australia... ever heard of the housing crisis? The
household debt crisis?.... Paying for hospital and medicines, education, electricity and
other services.... should I go on?.... ACOSS found that "there are just over 3 million people
(13.2%) living below the poverty line of 50% of median income – including 739,000
children (17.3%)".
"The evil neo-liberalism" has delivered poverty, massive inequality, dissatisfaction,
unemployment/sub-employment and casualization, collapse of public services, high costs of
living.... and deterioration of the environment...
Why do you think that all around the world
voters are going hard against Neoliberalism and why do you think that Neoliberals are
desperately trying to save their bankrupt philosophy by hiding behind Nationalism and
Racism?
While I would very much like to agree with the notion that neo-liberalism is dead, there's
rather too much evidence that its pernicious influence lingers ghost-like and ghastly, having
suffused far too many politicians of an ultra-conservative ilk.
The true believers in the neo-liberal faith, as it was never other than a creed espoused
by Thatcher and Pinochet among others, are like those in the catholic church who continued to
advocate an earth centric universe long after science proved them wrong.
It will be a long wait until these myopic adherents to the gospel of Hayek, Friedman and
Buchanan, are consigned to the waste bin of history where they belong. Until then, it will
remain a struggle to right the many wrongs of this mis-guided and shallow populism.
Abso-bloody-lutely! The neocons have had their day, though it'll no doubt take one hell of an
effort to drag them out of their crony-capitalist, snouts-in-the-trough ways. The profit
motive in the provision of essential services should be confined to covering costs,
maintenance and associated investment. It's so painfully obvious that the market has not met
the needs of the average citizen without absurd cost. Bring on the revolution!
What made anyone think neo-liberalism was going to work? Why was this even tried or got past
a focus group?
Only the Murdoch press ever dreamed this could have any merit and a few totally selfish and
controlling wealthy people. 2008 and the GFC should have killed this idea instead it gained
traction as the perpetrators not only were not prosecuted but were subsidised to create more
havoc. Find the culprits and jail them ... it is not too late.
"... What about "competition", the God of Neoliberals?.... Competition can have some positive role in society only in an environment of Regulation. That's why the future is neither Neoliberal nor Socialist, but a Mixed Economy Social Democracy. ..."
"... Bring back a Commonwealth Bank! In fact bring back State run Electricity, Gas and Water utilities... ..."
"... The Coalition these days proudly subsidise their friends and regulate their enemies in order to reshape Australia in their preferred form. ..."
All essential infrastructure should be Nationalised. Water electricity supply and generation,
ports and railways, educational facilities, one major bank, one country wide telco and mail
delivery. Remove the for profit aspect, and they become assets. In at least a few of these
they also provide training opportunities across a wide spectrum of careers
Nationalise the banks and the Mining Industry .
Take back control of outrageous wages in both these sectors and return profits to the
taxpayer .
Nationalise the State Governments in other words get rid of them and appoint federal
controlled administrators same with local councils, sack the lot of them and appoint
administrators.
Just like the AFP is "nationalised", or education is also to a big extent "nationalised",
alongside a big chunk of the health system.... so we can nationalise other things, such as
the modes of production and distribution of energy, major mineral resources, etc.
What about "competition", the God of Neoliberals?.... Competition can have some positive
role in society only in an environment of Regulation. That's why the future is neither
Neoliberal nor Socialist, but a Mixed Economy Social Democracy.
Which party is for a Mixed Economy Social Democracy?.... Labor and to some extent the
Greens. A bunch of independents are also happy with the concept.... Together they are
currently a majority, only waiting for a Federal election.
"... I don't like using the term "neo-liberalism" that much because there is nothing "new" or "liberal" about it, the term itself just helps hide the fact that it's a political project more about power than profit and the end result is more like modern feudalism - an authoritarian system where the lords (bankers, energy companies and their large and inefficient attendant bureaucracies), keep us peasants in thrall through life long debt-slavery simply to buy a house or exploit us as a captured market in the case of the energy sector. ..."
"... Since the word "privatisation" is clearly no longer popular, the latest buzzword from this project is "outsourcing". ..."
"... As far as I can see "neo-liberalism", or what I prefer to call managerial and financialised feudalism is not dead, it's still out and about looking around for the next rent-seeking opportunity. ..."
"... In the political arena, is enabling porkies facilitate each other in every lunatic pronouncement about "Budget repair" and "on track for a surplus". And its spotty, textbook-spouting clones ("all debt is debt! Shriek, gasp, hyperventilate!") fall off the conveyor belts of tertiary education Australia-wide, then turn up on The Drum as IPA 'Research Fellows' to spout their evidence-free assertions. ..."
"... And don't forget the handmaiden of neoliberalism is their macroeconomic mythology about government "debt and borrowing" which will condemn our grandchildren to poverty - inter-generational theft! It also allows them to continue dismantling government social programs by giving tax-cuts to reduce "revenue" and then claiming there is no money to fund those programs. ..."
"... "Competition" as the cornerstone of neoliberal economics was always a lie. Corporations do their best to get rid of competitors by unfair pricing tactics or by takeovers. And even where some competitors hang in there by some means (banks, petrol companies) the competition that occurs is not for price but for profit. ..."
"... We find a shift away from democratic processes and the rise of the "all new adulation of the so-called tough leader" factor, aka Nazism/Fascism. From Trump to Turkey, Netanyahu to Putin, Brazil to China, the rise of the "right" in Europe, the South Americas, where the leader is "our great and "good" Teacher", knows best, and thus infantalises the knowledge and awareness of the rest of the population. Who needs scientists, when the "leader" knows everything? ..."
"... There are indeed alternatives to neoliberalism, most of which have been shown to lead back to neoliberalism. Appeals for fiscal and monetary relief/stimulus can only ever paper over the worst aspects of it's relentless 'progress', between wars, it seems. ..."
"... Neoliberalism seems vastly, catastrophically misunderstood. Widely perceived as the latest abomination to spring from the eternal battle 'twixt Labour and Capital, it's actual origins are somewhat more recent. Neoliberalism really, really is not just "Capitalism gone wrong". It goes much deeper, to a fundamental flaw buried( more accurately 'planted') deep in the heart of economics. ..."
"... In 1879 an obscure journalist from then-remote San Francisco, Henry George, took the world by storm with his extraordinary bestseller Progress and Poverty . Still the only published work to outsell the Bible in a single year, it did so for over twenty years, yet few social justice advocates have heard of it. ..."
"... George gravely threatened privileged global power-elites , so they erased him from academic history. A mind compared, in his time with Plato, Copernicus and Adam Smith wiped from living memory, by the modern aristocracy. ..."
"... In the process of doing so, they emasculated the discipline of economics, stripped dignity from labour, and set in motion a world-destroying doctrine. Neo-Classical Economics(aka neoliberalism) was born , to the detriment of the working-citizen and the living world on which s/he depends. ..."
I don't like using the term "neo-liberalism" that much because there is nothing "new" or
"liberal" about it, the term itself just helps hide the fact that it's a political project
more about power than profit and the end result is more like modern feudalism - an
authoritarian system where the lords (bankers, energy companies and their large and
inefficient attendant bureaucracies), keep us peasants in thrall through life long
debt-slavery simply to buy a house or exploit us as a captured market in the case of the
energy sector.
Since the word "privatisation" is clearly no longer popular, the latest buzzword from this
project is "outsourcing". If you've had a look at The Canberra Times over the last couple of
weeks there have been quite a few articles about outsourcing parts of Medicare and Centrelink, using labour hire companies and so on – is this part of a current LNP plan
to "sell off" parts of the government before Labour takes the reins in May?
As far as I can see "neo-liberalism", or what I prefer to call managerial and
financialised feudalism is not dead, it's still out and about looking around for the next
rent-seeking opportunity.
Neoliberalism "dead"?
I think not.
It is riveted on the country like a straitjacket.
Which is exactly what it was always intended to be, a system gamed and rigged to ensure the
wage-earning scum obtain progressively less and less of the country's productive wealth,
however much they contributed to it.
The wage theft and exploitation Neoliberalism fosters has become the new norm.
Neoliberal idealogues thickly infest Federal and State Treasuries.
In the political arena, is enabling porkies facilitate each other in every lunatic
pronouncement about "Budget repair" and "on track for a surplus".
And its spotty, textbook-spouting clones ("all debt is debt! Shriek, gasp, hyperventilate!")
fall off the conveyor belts of tertiary education Australia-wide, then turn up on The Drum as
IPA 'Research Fellows' to spout their evidence-free assertions.
The IPA itself has moles in govt at every level--even in your local Council.
Certainly in ours.
Neoliberalism is "dead"?
Correction.
Neoliberalism is alive, thriving---and quick to ensure its glaring deficiencies and
inequities are solely attributable to its opponents. Now THERE'S a surprise.....
Agree! And don't forget the handmaiden of neoliberalism is their macroeconomic mythology
about government "debt and borrowing" which will condemn our grandchildren to poverty -
inter-generational theft! It also allows them to continue dismantling government social programs by giving tax-cuts
to reduce "revenue" and then claiming there is no money to fund those programs.
Neoliberalism will not be dead until the underpinning of neoliberalism is abandoned by ALP
and Greens. That underpinning is their mindless attachment to "budget repair" and "return to
surplus". The federal government's "budget" is nothing like a currency user's budget.
Currency users collect in order to spend whereas every dollar spent by the federal government
is a new dollar and every dollar taxed by the federal government is an ex-dollar. A currency
cannot sensibly have "debt" in the currency that it issues and no amount of surplus or
deficit now will enhance or impair its capacity to spend in future. A currency issuer does
not need an electronic piggybank, or a Future Fund, or a Drought Relief Fund. It can't max
out an imaginary credit card. It's "borrowing" is just an exchange of its termless no-coupon
liabilities (currency) for term-limited coupon-bearing liabilities (bonds). The federal
budget balance is no rational indicator of any need for austerity or for stimulus. The
rational indicators are unemployment (too small a "deficit"/too large a surplus) and
inflation (too large a "deficit"/too small a "surplus"). Federal taxation is where dollars go
to die. It doesn't "fund" a currency issuer's spending - it is there to stop the dollars it
issues from piling up and causing inflation and to make room for spending by democratically
elected federal parliament. The name of the game is to balance the economy, not the entirely
notional and fundamentally irrelevant "budget".
"Competition" as the cornerstone of neoliberal economics was always a lie. Corporations do
their best to get rid of competitors by unfair pricing tactics or by takeovers. And even
where some competitors hang in there by some means (banks, petrol companies) the competition
that occurs is not for price but for profit.
And changing the electoral system? Yes indeed. After years of observation it seems to me
that the problem with our politics is not individual politicians (although there are notable
exceptions) but political parties. Rigid control of policies and voting on party instruction
(even by the Greens) makes the proceedings of parliament a complete waste of time. If every
policy had to run the gauntlet of 150 people all voting by their conscience we would have
better policy. The executive functions could be carried out by a cabinet also elected from
those members. But not going to happen - too many vested interests in the parties and their
corporate sponsors.
With the election of Bolsonaro in Brazil (even though nearly 30% of electors refused to vote)
it may be a little presumptuous to dissect the dead corpse of neoliberalism, as Richard
Denniss' hopes that we can.
What is absolutely gob-smacking is that Brazilians voted for him; a man that Glenn Greenwald
describes as "far more dangerous than Trump" , that Bolsonaro envisages military
dictatorships as "being a far more superior form of government" advocating a civil war
in order to dispose of the left.
Furthermore, the election of this far-right neoliberal extremist also threatens the Amazon
forest and its indigenous people; with a global impact that will render combatting climate
change even more difficult.
Locally, recent Liberal Party battles over leadership have included the neolib factor, as the
lunatic right in that party - who I suspect would all love to be a Bolsonaro themselves -
aggressively activate their grumblings and dissension.
Oh, Richard how I wish you were right; but in the Victorian election campaign - currently
underway - I have seen Socialist candidates behaving in a manner that doesn't garner hope in
a different way of doing politics.
The fact that 'our' democracy is based on an adversarial, partisan system leaves me with
little hope.
Alain Badiou wrote that "ours is not a world of democracy but a world of imperial
conservatism using democratic phraseology" ; and until that imposition is discarded 'our'
democracy will remain whatever we are told it is, and neolibs will continue to shove their
bullshit down our throats as much as they can.
We find a shift away from democratic processes and the rise of the "all new
adulation of the so-called tough leader" factor, aka Nazism/Fascism. From Trump to
Turkey, Netanyahu to Putin, Brazil to China, the rise of the "right" in Europe, the South
Americas, where the leader is "our great and "good" Teacher", knows best, and thus
infantalises the knowledge and awareness of the rest of the population. Who needs scientists,
when the "leader" knows everything?
Have the people of the world abrogated their democratic responsibility?
Or is it the gerrymandering chicanery of US Republican backers/politicians( so long as you
control the voting machines ) that have sent the ugly message to the world, Power is yours
for the making and taking by any means that ignores the public's rights in the decision
making process. Has the "neo-liberal" world delivered a corrupted system of democracy that
has deliberately alienated the world's population from actively participating fully in the
full awareness that their vote counts and will be counted?
Do we need to take back the controls of democracy to ensure that it is the will of the
people and not a manipulation by vested interest groups/individuals? You're darn
tootin'!!!
A thoughtful piece. Thanks. There are indeed alternatives to neoliberalism, most of which
have been shown to lead back to neoliberalism. Appeals for fiscal and monetary
relief/stimulus can only ever paper over the worst aspects of it's relentless 'progress',
between wars, it seems.
Neoliberalism seems vastly, catastrophically misunderstood. Widely perceived as the
latest abomination to spring from the eternal battle 'twixt Labour and Capital, it's actual
origins are somewhat more recent. Neoliberalism really, really is not just "Capitalism gone
wrong". It goes much deeper, to a fundamental flaw buried( more accurately 'planted')
deep in the heart of economics.
Instead of trying to understand Neo-Classical Economics it is perhaps more instructive to
understand what it was built, layer by layer, to obscure. First the Land system, then the
Wealth system, and finally the Money system (hived off into a compartment - 'macroeconomics').
Importantly, three entirely different categories of "thing" .
In 1879 an obscure journalist from then-remote San Francisco, Henry George, took the world
by storm with his extraordinary bestseller Progress and Poverty . Still the only
published work to outsell the Bible in a single year, it did so for over twenty years, yet
few social justice advocates have heard of it.
George set out to discover why the worst poverty always seemed to accompany the most
progress. By chasing down the production process to its ends, and tracing where the proceeds
were going, he succeeded spectacularly. From Progress and Poverty , Chapter 17 - "The Problem Explained"
:
Three things unite in production: land, labor, and capital. Three parties divide the
output: landowner, laborer, and capitalist. If the laborer and capitalist get no more as
production increases, it is a necessary inference that the landowner takes the gain.
George
gravely threatened privileged global power-elites , so they erased him from academic
history. A mind compared, in his time with Plato, Copernicus and Adam Smith wiped from living
memory, by the modern aristocracy.
In the process of doing so, they emasculated the discipline of economics, stripped dignity
from labour, and set in motion a world-destroying doctrine. Neo-Classical
Economics(aka neoliberalism) was born , to the detriment of the working-citizen and the
living world on which s/he depends.
Einstein was a fan of George, and used his methods of thought-experiment and powerful
inductive reasoning to discover Relativity, twenty years later. Henry Georges brilliant
insights into Land (aka nature), Wealth (what you want, need), and Money
(sharing mechanism) are as relevant as ever, and until they are rediscovered, we are likely
to re-run the 1900's over and over, with fewer and fewer resources.
"... Apologies, but Neoliberalism is far from 'dead'. But of course it should never have given 'life'. However, if it were 'dead' why did Labor vote with the Coalition to ratify the ultra-Neoliberal TPP??? The TPP is the penultimate wet dream of all neoliberal multinational vulture corporations. Why???? Investor-state dispute settlement (ISDS) Under these rules, foreign investors can legally challenge host state regulations outside that country's courts. A wide range of policies can be challenged. ..."
Apologies, but Neoliberalism is far from 'dead'. But of course it should never have given
'life'. However, if it were 'dead' why did Labor vote with the Coalition to ratify the
ultra-Neoliberal TPP??? The TPP is the penultimate wet dream of all neoliberal multinational
vulture corporations. Why???? Investor-state dispute settlement (ISDS) Under these rules,
foreign investors can legally challenge host state regulations outside that country's courts.
A wide range of policies can be challenged.
Yeah! Philip Morris comes to mind. "The cost to taxpayers of the Australian government's
six-year legal battle with the tobacco giant Philip Morris over plain packaging laws can
finally be revealed, despite the government's efforts to keep the cost secret.
The commonwealth government spent nearly $40m defending its world-first plain packaging
laws against Philip Morris Asia, a tobacco multinational, according to freedom of information
documents.
Documents say the total figure is $38,984,942.97."
"... The incident shows that the US and some other countries that follow the US didn't abide by the bottom line of international law at all. From now on, we should reduce or cancel important people's visits to the US, Canada and some other countries like the UK, Australia and New Zealand. The warning applies to not only Chinese citizens, but also citizens of any other country. ..."
"... Given the extreme risks of the political struggle in the US, Chinese scientists and technological experts in the West, particularly in the UKUSA countries (the US, UK, Canada, Australia and New Zealand) are advised to make some risk prevention arrangements for their own sake and the sake of their children. ..."
"... Unlike China's State-owned enterprises, Huawei is a genuine private firm. But the severe political discrimination and repulsion from the US reflect an undeniable fact - the political gap between China and the US and a few other Western nations is too wide to bridge. ..."
Avoided a knee-jerk response, did some chores, read some other items, then went looking for
English language Chinese reactions, like this one provided by Global
Times , which said several different things to different audiences, although toward its
bottom we find this:
" The incident shows that the US and some other countries that follow the US didn't
abide by the bottom line of international law at all. From now on, we should reduce or cancel
important people's visits to the US, Canada and some other countries like the UK, Australia
and New Zealand. The warning applies to not only Chinese citizens, but also citizens of any
other country.
" Given the extreme risks of the political struggle in the US, Chinese scientists and
technological experts in the West, particularly in the UKUSA countries (the US, UK, Canada,
Australia and New Zealand) are advised to make some risk prevention arrangements for their
own sake and the sake of their children. "
Global Times also published this editorial with its emphasis on the
entire affair being an attack on Huawei's competitiveness, although suddenly in the middle it
says this:
" Unlike China's State-owned enterprises, Huawei is a genuine private firm. But the
severe political discrimination and repulsion from the US reflect an undeniable fact - the
political gap between China and the US and a few other Western nations is too wide to
bridge. "
A bit of a bombshell that seems to contradict what came before and after, which is an
exploration of how "the political gap" can be narrowed. This line says:
"Meanwhile, China needs to ease its geopolitical and ideological tensions with the US and
the West through expanding its opening-up to the world."
Unfortunately, the Outlaw US Empire has no interest in "eas[ing] its geopolitical and
ideological tensions" with China, Russia or any other nation as its unelected helmsmen want
everything for themselves a la Monopoly winners, thus rendering Chinese attempts at
appeasement vacuous--Real Men want it all; sharing--Win-Win--is for wussies.
This is 'eight nations alliance' [1] mark2 no less. The military encirclement of China is
in place, to be sprung if necessary. The trade war targets the entire Chinese high tech
industry, especially the Made in China 2030 proj. Huawei is the crown jewel of emerging
Chinese high tech, its rise is nothing less than astounding. In less than 30 years it has
displaced CISCO as the world's no 1 network supplier, presently gunning Samsung for top spot
in mobile phone preeminence.
It makes lots of people scare. [2]
They use false pretext to wage wars OF terror, now they use false pretext to launch a
trade war, hyping up Huawei's 'security risk'. But nsa has been 'monitoring' Huawei since
2007, even hacked into its Shenzhen HQ, to look for incriminating evidence of CCP
collaboration, it turned out naught. There'r absolutely No Evidence Huawei Spies on
Americans, [3]
Just like the lack of evidence didn't prevent fukus attack on 'terrorist' countries, it
sure doesn't stop Washington from mounting a frontal assault on Huawei. Huawei is currently
shut out of the 5lies markets plus SK, JP, courtesy of Washington. The 'battle' has extended
to the Pacifics isles,
where Washington/Oz joint force to arm twist Solomon isle to drop a undersea cable contract
with Huawei.
They tried that again with PNG, asking them to renege on their contract with Huawei, but
the PNG PM is made of sterner stuff, lecturing fukus on the importance of integrity and law,
no less.
hhhhh
When the Meng kidnap news broke, my jaw dropped in amazement, ....They'r really getting
really desperate now.
[2]
Huawei's U.S. competitors among those pushing for scrutiny of Chinese tech firm
It was long thought that we were the number-one economy and China just supplied cheap
labor,"
Guthrie said. "Now it is clear that China has lot to offer in terms of innovation and
Industrial policy and state investment, and now people are scared
I agree Jilles, and with many other of the commenters.
Read enough to see that the article has many errors of fact and perception. It is bad
enough to suspect *propaganda* , but Brett is clearly not at that level.
An important point that you hint at is that the Brits were violently and manipulatively
forced to accept mass immigration for many years.
Yet strangely, to say anything about it only became acceptable when some numbers of the
immigrants were fellow Europeans from within the EU, and most having some compatibility with
existing ethnicity and previous culture.
Even people living far away notice such forced false consciousness.
As for Corbyn, he is nothing like the old left of old Labour. He tries to convey that
image, it is a lie.
He may not be Blairite-Zio New Labour, and received some influence from the more heavily
Marxist old Labour figures, but he is very much a creature of the post-worst-of-1968 and
dirty hippy new left, Frankfurt School and all that crap, doubt that he has actually read
much of it, but he has internalised it through his formal and political education.
By the way, the best translation of the name of North Korea's ruling party is 'Labour
Party'. While it is a true fact, I intend nothing from it but a small laugh.
"... Another reason for the instability of the Western system is that two of the main areas of sovereignty are not included in the state structure: control of credit/banking and corporations. These two elements are therefore free of political controls and responsibility. They have largely monopolized power in Western Civilization and in American society. They are ruthlessly going forward to eliminate land, labour, entrepreneur-management skills and everything else the economists once told us were the chief elements of production. ..."
Summary of Prof. Carroll Quigley's
Last Public Lecture Given Months Before He Died:
"The 3rd. Oscar Iden Lecture 1978"
By Christopher M. Quigley B.Sc., M.M.I.I., M.A.
"This shift from customary conformity to decision making by some other power, in its
final stages, results in the dualism of almost totalitarian imperialism and an
amorphous mass culture of atomised individuals.
The fundamental, all pervasive cause of World instability today is the destruction of
communities by the commercialization of all human relationships and the resulting
neurosis and psychosis.
Another reason for the instability of the Western system is that two of the main areas
of sovereignty are not included in the state structure: control of credit/banking and
corporations. These two elements are therefore free of political controls and
responsibility.
They have largely monopolized power in Western Civilization and in American society.
They are ruthlessly going forward to eliminate land, labour, entrepreneur-management
skills and everything else the economists once told us were the chief elements of
production.
The only element of production they are concerned with is the one they control:
capital. Thus capital intensification has destroyed food, manufacturing, farming and
communities. All these processes create frustrations on every level of modern human
experience and result in the instability and disorder we see around everyday."
Carroll Quigley
In 1978 Professor Carroll Quigley, a few months before he died, gave three lectures at
Georgetown University, Washington. The lecture series was sponsored by a grant from the
Oscar Iden endowment.
The genius of Carroll Quigley shone through his three presentations because, as always, he
forced his audience to think. His essays covered the thousand years of the growth of the
State in the Western tradition from 976 – 1976. His approach went against the grain of
most academics who only taught history in short sound bites.
Quigley believed that you could not understand anything unless you saw the whole, and the
essence of his philosophy was that history is logical, i.e. things happen for a reason.
For him the core of all that occurs throughout the ages is the underlying force of
fundamental human values.
Leaders, rulers and executives who miss this point are prone to make erroneous decisions
because their actions will be based on flawed analysis and understanding. The professor
saw that American society and Western Civilization were in serious trouble in the late
70's. In hindsight his final essay
The State of Individuals
was particularly
prophetic and events during the subsequent 32 years have exonerated his controversial
conclusions.
In summary this essay stated the following:
Society is an organization of persons and artifacts to satisfy human needs.
Currently our desires are remote from our true needs. Societies are built on needs and
they are ultimately destroyed through desires.
Power between the state and the society rests on the ability of the state to satisfy human
needs. The state is a good state if it is sovereign and responsible.
There are seven level of culture or aspects of society: military, political, economic,
social, emotional, religious and intellectual.
Military
: men cannot live outside of groups. They can satisfy their needs only by
co-operating within community. The group needs to be defended.
Political:
If men operate within groups you must have a method to settle disputes.
Economic:
The group must have organizational patterns for satisfying material
needs.
Social:
Man and women are social beings. They have a need for other people. They
have a need to love and be loved.
Emotional:
Men and women must have emotional experiences. Moment to moment with
other people and moment to moment with nature.
Religious:
Human beings have a need for a feeling of certitude in their minds about
things they cannot control and do not fully understand.
Intellectual:
Men and women have a need to comprehend and discuss.
Power is the ability in society to meet these eight fore-mentioned human needs.
Community is group of people with close inter-personal relationships. Without community no
infant will be sufficiently socialized. Most of our internal controls which make society
function have historically been learnt in community. Prior to 976 most controls in society
were internal. In the West after 976 due to specialization and commercial expansion
controls began to be externalized.
Sovereignty has eight aspects: defence, judicial, administrative, taxation, legislation,
executive, monetary and incorporating power.
Expansion in society brings growing commercialization with the result that all values, in
time, become monetized. As expansion continues it slows with the result that society
becomes politicized and eventually militarized. This shift from customary conformity to
decision making by some other power in its final stages results in the dualism of almost
totalitarian imperialism and an amorphous mass culture of atomised individuals.
The main theme in our society today is [ruthless] competition, and no truly stable society
can possibly be built on such a premise. In the long term society must be based on
association and co-operation.
From 1855 Western Civilization has shown signs of becoming increasingly unstable due to:
technology and the displacement of labour: increased use of propaganda to brainwash people
into thinking society was good and true; an increased emphasis on material desires; the
increased emphasis on individualism over conformity; growing focus on quantity rather than
quality; increased demand for vicarious satisfactions.
As a result more and more people began to comprehend that the state was not a society with
community values. This realisation brought increasing instability.
Another element of the trend towards instability in Western Civilization was the growth in
weapon
systems that if actually used would ensure total destruction of the planet. This in effect
meant that they were effectively redundant.
In addition the expansion of the last 150 years has in essence been based on fossil fuels.
The energy which gave us the industrial revolution, coal – oil – natural gas – represented
the combined savings of four weeks of sunlight that managed to be accumulated on earth out
of the previous three billion years of sunshine.
This resource instead of being saved has been lost. Gone forever never to return. The
fundamental all pervasive cause of World instability today is the destruction of
communities by the commercialization of all human relationships and the resulting neurosis
and psychosis.
Medical science and all the population explosions have continued to produce more and more
people while the food supply and the supply of jobs are becoming increasingly precarious,
not only in the United States, but everywhere, because the whole purpose of using fossil
fuels in the corporate structure is the elimination of jobs.
Another reason for the instability of the Western system is that two of the main areas of
sovereignty are not included in the state structure: control of credit/banking and
corporations. These two elements are therefore free of political controls and
responsibility. They have largely monopolized power in Western Civilization and in
American society. They are ruthlessly going forward to eliminate land, labour,
entrepreneur-management skills and everything else the economists once told us were the
chief elements of production.
The only element of production they are concerned with is the one they control: capital.
Thus capital intensification has destroyed food, manufacturing, farming and communities.
All these processes create frustrations on every level of modern human experience and
result in the instability and disorder we see around everyday.
Today in America there is a developing constitutional crisis. The three branches of
government set up in 1789 do not contain the eight aspects of sovereignty. As a result
each has tried to go outside the sphere in which it should be restrained. The constitution
completely ignores, for example, the administrative power.
As a result the courts, in particular the Supreme court, is making decisions it should not
be making. In addition the President, who by the constitution should be easily impeached,
has become all powerful to such an extent that the office is now as basically Imperial.
However, to me the most obvious flaw in our constitutional set-up is the fact that the
federal government does not have control over money and credit and does not have control
over corporations. It is therefore not really sovereign and is not really responsible.
The final result is that the American people will unfortunately prefer communities. They
will cop or opt out of the system. Today everything is a bureaucratic structure, and
brainwashed people who are not personalities are trained to fit into it and say it is a
great life but I think otherwise.
Do not be pessimistic. Life goes on; life is fun. And if a civilization crashed it
deserves to. When Rome fell the Christian answer was. "Create your own communities."
Source: The Oscar Iden Lecture Series Georgetown University Library: Prof. Carroll
Quigley
"Beijing is likely to react angrily to this latest arrest of a Chinese citizen in a third
country for violating U.S. law," Eurasia analysts wrote.
In fact, Global Times -- a hyper-nationalistic tabloid tied to the Chinese Communist Party
-- responded to the arrest by posting on Twitter a statement about trade war escalation it
attributed to an expert "close to the Chinese Ministry of Commerce."
"China should be fully prepared for an escalation in the #tradewar with the US, as the US
will not ease its stance on China, and the recent arrest of the senior executive of #Huawei is
a vivid example," said the statement, paired with a photo of opposing fists with Chinese and
American flags superimposed upon them.
U.S. President Donald Trump
and Chinese President Xi Jinping
met over a dinner during the G-20 summit in Argentina after months of increasing trade tensions
between the two countries. The U.S. has imposed tariffs on $250 billion worth of Chinese goods,
while Beijing has retaliated with duties on $110 billion of U.S. goods.
The White House's latest round of tariffs on $200 billion goods was set to rise to 25
percent from 10 percent on Jan. 1, 2019, but Trump agreed at the G-20 meeting not to do so.
The catch is, however, that Xi and Trump must find resolution on "forced technology
transfer, intellectual property protection, non-tariff barriers, cyber intrusions and cyber
theft, services and agriculture" within 90 days, according to the White House press secretary's
statement.
That gives the leaders until early March -- past Christmas, New Year's and Chinese New Year
-- to find a way to keep tariffs from rising.
However, official online statements about Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi's briefing on the
meeting did not discuss the technology transfers or the 90-day condition.
The timeframe and details on areas of disagreement also did not appear in online reports
from China's state news agency Xinhua , People's
Daily -- the official Communist Party paper -- and CGTN -- the
English-language version of state broadcaster CCTV.
The articles did note the U.S. and China agreed to work towards mutual benefits, and
generally indicated Beijing would increase purchases of U.S. goods. The state media also said
the two parties discussed North Korea denuclearization. The Chinese press also said Trump
upheld a "One-China Policy" regarding Taiwan -- something not mentioned in the White House
statement.
On top of that, Trump tweeted late Sunday evening that "China has agreed to reduce and
remove tariffs on cars coming into China from the U.S. Currently the tariff is 40%."
Prior to that Twitter post, there had not been any mention of such an agreement in Chinese
sources.
The arrest is related to violations of U.S. sanctions, a person familiar with the matter
said. Reuters was unable to determine the precise nature of the violations. Meng Wanzhou, who
is one of the vice chairs on the Chinese technology company's board and the daughter of company
founder Ren Zhengfei, was arrested on Dec. 1 and a court hearing has been set for Friday, a
Canadian Justice Department spokesman said.
The U.K.'s spy chief said that decisions still had to be made on China's role in building
Britain's 5G network.
... ... ...
Last week, New Zealand
banned Huawei from providing tech for its 5G rollout -- the third member of the Five Eyes
security alliance to do so. At the time, New Zealand's government said it had identified a
"significant network security risk."
Fellow members Australia and the U.S. have also excluded Chinese telecoms firms from
providing 5G equipment for their domestic networks, leaving Canada and the U.K. as the only
members not to rule out using the telecoms giant.
All three nations cited national security fears as the reason for excluding Chinese
companies from their 5G rollouts, with Younger's Australian counterpart
referring to them as "high-risk vendors."
... ... ...
Huawei and ZTE – another Chinese firm blocked from the U.S. 5G market – have
repeatedly denied that their involvement in the rollouts would give China's government access
to international networks. Warning to Russia China wasn't the only country raising
security questions for MI6. Younger told his audience the U.K. faced many adversaries who
regarded themselves as being in a state of "perpetual confrontation" with the nation --
including Russia.
"I urge Russia or any other state intent on subverting our way of life not to underestimate
our determination and our capabilities, or those of our allies," he said.
"I should emphasize that even as the Russian state seeks to destabilize us, we do not seek
to destabilize Russia. We do not seek an escalation. If we see a change in Russian behavior, we
will respond positively. But we will be implacable in defense of our people and our vital
interests."
"... The IMF exists to lend money to governments, so it's comic that it wags its finger at governments that run up debt. And, of course, its loans famously come with strings attached: adopt a free-market economy, or strengthen the one you have, kissing goodbye to the Big State. ..."
"... Yet, the irony is painful. Neoliberal ideology insists that states are too big and cumbersome, too centralized and faceless, to be efficient and responsive ..."
"... The problem is that the ruthless sentimentalists of neoliberalism like to tell themselves – and anyone else who will listen – that removing the dead hand of state control frees the individual citizen to be entrepreneurial and productive. Instead, it places the financially powerful beyond any state, in an international elite that makes its own rules, and holds governments to ransom. That's what the financial crisis was all about ..."
"... Markets cannot be free. Markets have to be nurtured. They have to be invested in. Markets have to be grown. Google, Amazon and Apple haven't taught anyone in this country to read. But even though an illiterate market wouldn't be so great for them, they avoid their taxes, because they can, because they are more powerful than governments. ..."
"... The neoliberalism that the IMF still preaches pays no account to any of this. It insists that the provision of work alone is enough of an invisible hand to sustain a market. Yet even Adam Smith, the economist who came up with that theory , did not agree that economic activity alone was enough to keep humans decent and civilised. ..."
The crash was a write-off, not a repair job. The response should be a wholesale reevaluation of the way in which wealth
is created and distributed around the globe
he IMF's limited admission of guilt over the Greek bailout is a start, but they still can't see the global financial system's
fundamental flaws, writes Deborah Orr.
The International Monetary Fund has admitted that some of the decisions it made in the wake of the 2007-2008 financial crisis
were wrong, and that the €130bn first bailout of Greece was "bungled". Well, yes. If it hadn't been a mistake, then it would have
been the only bailout and everyone in Greece would have lived happily ever after.
Actually, the IMF hasn't quite admitted that it messed things up. It has said instead that it went along with its partners in
"the Troika" – the European Commission and the European Central Bank – when it shouldn't have. The EC and the ECB, says the IMF,
put the interests of the Eurozone before the interests of Greece. The EC and the ECB, in turn, clutch their pearls and splutter with
horror that they could be accused of something so petty as self-preservation.
The IMF also admits that it "underestimated" the effect austerity would have on Greece. Obviously, the rest of the Troika takes
no issue with that. Even those who substitute "kick up the arse to all the lazy scroungers" whenever they encounter the word "austerity",
have cottoned on to the fact that the word can only be intoned with facial features locked into a suitably tragic mask.
Yet, mealy-mouthed and hotly contested as this minor mea culpa is, it's still a sign that financial institutions may slowly be
coming round to the idea that they are the problem. They know the crash was a debt-bubble that burst. What they don't seem to acknowledge
is that the merry days of reckless lending are never going to return; even if they do, the same thing will happen again, but more
quickly and more savagely. The thing is this: the crash was a write-off, not a repair job. The response from the start should have
been a wholesale reevaluation of the way in which wealth is created and distributed around the globe, a "structural adjustment",
as the philosopher
John Gray has said all along.
The IMF exists to lend money to governments, so it's comic that it wags its finger at governments that run up debt. And, of
course, its loans famously come with strings attached: adopt a free-market economy, or strengthen the one you have, kissing goodbye
to the Big State.
Yet, the irony is painful. Neoliberal ideology insists that states are too big and cumbersome, too centralized and faceless,
to be efficient and responsive. I agree.
The problem is that the ruthless sentimentalists of neoliberalism like to tell themselves – and anyone else who will listen
– that removing the dead hand of state control frees the individual citizen to be entrepreneurial and productive. Instead, it places
the financially powerful beyond any state, in an international elite that makes its own rules, and holds governments to ransom. That's
what the financial crisis was all about. The ransom was paid, and as a result, governments have been obliged to limit their
activities yet further – some setting about the task with greater relish than others. Now the task, supposedly, is to get the free
market up and running again.
But the basic problem is this: it costs a lot of money to cultivate a market – a group of consumers – and the more sophisticated
the market is, the more expensive it is to cultivate them. A developed market needs to be populated with educated, healthy, cultured,
law-abiding and financially secure people – people who expect to be well paid themselves, having been brought up believing in material
aspiration, as consumers need to be.
So why, exactly, given the huge amount of investment needed to create such a market, should access to it then be "free"? The neoliberal
idea is that the cultivation itself should be conducted privately as well. They see "austerity" as a way of forcing that agenda.
But how can the privatization of societal welfare possibly happen when unemployment is already high, working people are turning to
food banks to survive and the debt industry, far from being sorry that it brought the global economy to its knees, is snapping up
bargains in the form of busted high-street businesses to establish shops with nothing to sell but high-interest debt? Why, you have
to ask yourself, is this vast implausibility, this sheer un-sustainability, not blindingly obvious to all?
Markets cannot be free. Markets have to be nurtured. They have to be invested in. Markets have to be grown. Google, Amazon
and Apple haven't taught anyone in this country to read. But even though an illiterate market wouldn't be so great for them, they
avoid their taxes, because they can, because they are more powerful than governments.
And further, those who invest in these companies, and insist that taxes should be low to encourage private profit and shareholder
value, then lend governments the money they need to create these populations of sophisticated producers and consumers, berating them
for their profligacy as they do so. It's all utterly, completely, crazy.
The other day a health minister,
Anna Soubry
, suggested that female GPs who worked part-time so that they could bring up families were putting the NHS under strain. The
compartmentalised thinking is quite breathtaking. What on earth does she imagine? That it would be better for the economy if they
all left school at 16? On the contrary, the more people who are earning good money while working part-time – thus having the leisure
to consume – the better. No doubt these female GPs are sustaining both the pharmaceutical industry and the arts and media, both sectors
that Britain does well in.
As for their prioritising of family life over career – that's just another of the myriad ways in which Conservative neoliberalism
is entirely without logic. Its prophets and its disciples will happily – ecstatically – tell you that there's nothing more important
than family, unless you're a family doctor spending some of your time caring for your own. You couldn't make these characters up.
It is certainly true that women with children find it more easy to find part-time employment in the public sector. But that's a prima
facie example of how unresponsive the private sector is to human and societal need, not – as it is so often presented – evidence
that the public sector is congenitally disabled.
Much of the healthy economic growth – as opposed to the smoke and mirrors of many aspects of financial services – that Britain
enjoyed during the second half of the 20th century was due to women swelling the educated workforce. Soubry and her ilk, above all
else, forget that people have multiple roles, as consumers, as producers, as citizens and as family members. All of those things
have to be nurtured and invested in to make a market.
The neoliberalism that the IMF still preaches pays no account to any of this. It insists that the provision of work alone
is enough of an invisible hand to sustain a market. Yet even Adam Smith, the economist who
came up with that theory , did not agree
that economic activity alone was enough to keep humans decent and civilised.
Governments are left with the bill when neoliberals demand access to markets that they refuse to invest in making. Their refusal
allows them to rail against the Big State while producing the conditions that make it necessary. And even as the results of their
folly become ever more plain to see, they are grudging in their admittance of the slightest blame, bickering with their allies instead
of waking up, smelling the coffee and realising that far too much of it is sold through Starbucks.
"... power in our societies resides in structure, ideology and narratives – supporting what we might loosely term our current "neoliberal order" – rather than in individuals. Significantly, our political and media classes, who are of course deeply embedded in this neoliberal structure, are key promoters of the very opposite idea: that individuals or like-minded groups of people hold power; that they should, at least in theory, be held accountable for the use and misuse of that power; and that meaningful change involves replacing these individuals rather than fundamentally altering the power-structure they operate within. ..."
"... The [neoliberal] focus on individuals happens for a reason. It is designed to ensure that the structure and ideological foundations of our societies remain invisible to us, the public. The neoliberal order goes unquestioned – presumed, against the evidence of history, to be permanent, fixed, unchallengeable. ..."
"... These minor narratives conceal the fact that such individuals are groomed before they ever gain access to power. Business leaders, senior politicians and agenda-setting journalists reach their positions after proving themselves over and over again – not consciously but through their unthinking compliance to the power-structure of our societies. ..."
"... They rise to the top because they are the most talented examples of those who are blind or submissive to power, those who can think most cleverly without thinking critically. Those who reliably deploy their skills where they are directed to do so. ..."
"... Were the neoliberal order laid bare – were the emperor to allow himself to be stripped of his clothes – no one apart from a small psychopathic elite would vote for neoliberalism's maintenance. ..."
"... elections become an illusory contest between more transparent and more opaque iterations of neoliberal power ..."
"... Despite its best efforts, neoliberalism is increasingly discredited in the eyes of large sections of the electorate in the US and UK. Its attempts at concealment have grown jaded, its strategy exhausted. It has reached the end-game, and that is why politics now looks so unstable. "Insurgency" candidates in different guises are prospering. ..."
"... Neoliberal power is distinctive because it seeks absolute power, and can achieve that end only through global domination. Globalisation, the world as a plaything for a tiny elite to asset-strip, is both its means and its end. Insurgents are therefore those who seek to reverse the trend towards globalisation – or at least claim to. There are insurgents on both the left and right. ..."
"... A Trump figure can usefully serve power too, because he dons the clothes of an insurgent while doing little to actually change the structure. ..."
"... Nonetheless, Trump is a potential problem for the neoliberal order for two reasons. First, unlike an Obama or a Clinton, he too clearly illuminates what is really at stake for power – wealth maximisation at any cost – and thereby risks unmasking the deception. And second, he is a retrograde step for the globalising power-structure. ..."
"... The neoliberal order prefers a Trump to a Bernie Sanders because the nativist insurgents are so much easier to tame. A Trump can be allowed to strut on his Twitter stage while the global power-structure constrains and undermines any promised moves that might threaten it. Trump the candidate was indifferent to Israel and wanted the US out of Syria. Trump the president has become Israel's biggest cheerleader and has launched US missiles at Syria. ..."
"... Neoliberalism is now so entrenched, so rapacious that even a moderate socialist like Corbyn is seen as a major threat. And unlike a Blair, Obama or Trump, Corbyn is much harder to tame because he has a grassroots movement behind him and to which he is ultimately accountable ..."
"... In the US, the neoliberal wing of the Democratic party prevented the left-insurgent candidate, Bernie Sanders, from contesting the presidency by rigging the system to keep him off the ballot paper ..."
"... How anti-semitism is being weaponised, not to protect Jews but to protect the neoliberal order, was made starkly clear this week when Corbyn criticised the financial elite that brought the west to the brink of economic ruin a decade ago, and will soon do so again unless stringent new regulations are introduced. Useful idiots like Stephen Pollard, editor of the rightwing Jewish Chronicle, saw a chance to revive the anti-semitism canard once again, accusing Corbyn of secretly meaning "Jews" when he actually spoke of bankers. It is a logic intended to make the neoliberal elite untouchable, cloaking them in a security blanket relying on the anti-semitism taboo. ..."
"... The weaponising of anti-semitism by the neoliberal order to protect its power risks turning Jews into collateral damage. It makes them another small or bigger drama in the increasingly desperate attempt to create a narrative that deflects attention from the real power-structure. ..."
"... And second, the effort to stitch together a narrative of Corbyn's anti-semitism out of non-existent cloth is likely to encourage more and more people to take a step back from the screen so that those unintelligible pixels can more easily be discerned as a smoking gun. The very preposterousness of the allegations, and the fact that they are taken so seriously by a political and media class selected for their submissiveness to the neoliberal order, accelerates the process by which these opinion-formers discredit themselves. Their authority wanes by the day, and as a result their usefulness to the power-structure rapidly diminishes. ..."
"... No one pays me to write these blog posts. If you appreciated it, or any of the others, please consider hitting the donate button in the right-hand margin (computer) or below (phone). ..."
In
my last
blog post I argued that power in our societies resides in structure, ideology and
narratives – supporting what we might loosely term our current "neoliberal order" –
rather than in individuals. Significantly, our political and media classes, who are of course
deeply embedded in this neoliberal structure, are key promoters of the very opposite idea: that
individuals or like-minded groups of people hold power; that they should, at least in theory,
be held accountable for the use and misuse of that power; and that meaningful change involves
replacing these individuals rather than fundamentally altering the power-structure they operate
within.
In other words, our political and media debates reduce to who should be held to
account for problems in the economy, the health and education systems, or the conduct of a war.
What is never discussed is whether flawed policies are really the fleeting responsibility of
individuals and political parties or symptoms of the current neoliberal malaise –
manifestations of an ideology that necessarily has goals, such as the pursuit of maximised
profit and endless economic growth, that are indifferent to other considerations, such as the
damage being done to life on our planet.
The [neoliberal] focus on individuals happens for a reason. It is designed to ensure
that the structure and ideological foundations of our societies remain invisible to us, the
public. The neoliberal order goes unquestioned – presumed, against the evidence of
history, to be permanent, fixed, unchallengeable.
So deep is this misdirection that even efforts to talk about real power become treacherous.
My words above might suggest that power is rather like a person, that it has intention and
will, that maybe it likes to deceive or play tricks. But none of that is true either.
Big
and little power
My difficulty conveying precisely what I mean, my need to resort to metaphor, reveals the
limitations of language and the necessarily narrow ideological horizons it imposes on anyone
who uses it. Intelligible language is not designed adequately to describe structure or power.
It prefers to particularise, to humanise, to specify, to individualise in ways that make
thinking in bigger, more critical ways near-impossible.
Language is on the side of those, like politicians and corporate journalists, who conceal
structure, who deal in narratives of the small-power of individuals rather than of the
big-power of structure and ideology. In what passes for news, the media offer a large stage for
powerful individuals to fight elections, pass legislation, take over businesses, start wars,
and a small stage for these same individuals to get their come-uppance, caught committing
crimes, lying, having affairs, getting drunk, and more generally embarrassing themselves.
These minor narratives conceal the fact that such individuals are groomed before they
ever gain access to power. Business leaders, senior politicians and agenda-setting journalists
reach their positions after proving themselves over and over again – not consciously but
through their unthinking compliance to the power-structure of our societies. They are
selected through their performances in exams at school and university, through training
programmes and indentures. They rise to the top because they are the most talented examples
of those who are blind or submissive to power, those who can think most cleverly without
thinking critically. Those who reliably deploy their skills where they are directed to do
so.
Their large and small dramas constitute what we call public life, whether politics, world
affairs or entertainment. To suggest that there are deeper processes at work, that the largest
of these dramas is not really large enough for us to gain insight into how power operates, is
to instantly be dismissed as paranoid, a fantasist, and – most damningly of all – a
conspiracy theorist.
These terms also serve the deception. They are intended to stop all thought about real
power. They are scare words used to prevent us, in a metaphor used in my previous post, from
stepping back from the screen. They are there to force us to stand so close we see only the
pixels, not the bigger picture.
Media makeover
The story of Britain's Labour party is a case in point, and was illustrated even before
Jeremy Corbyn became leader. Back in the 1990s Tony Blair reinvented the party as New Labour,
jettisoning ideas of socialism and class war, and inventing instead a "Third Way".
The idea that gained him access to power – personified in the media narrative of the
time as his meeting
with Rupert Murdoch on the mogul's Hayman Island – was that New Labour would
triangulate, find a middle way between the 1 per cent and the 99 per cent. The fact that the
meeting took place with Murdoch rather than anyone else signaled something significant: that
the power-structure needed a media makeover. It needed to be dressed in new garb.
In reality, Blair made Labour useful to power by re-styling the turbo-charged neoliberalism
Margaret Thatcher's Conservative party of the rich had unleashed. He made it look compatible
with social democracy. Blair put a gentler, kinder mask on neoliberalism's aggressive pursuit
of planet-destroying power – much as Barack Obama would do in the United States a decade
later, after the horrors of the Iraq invasion. Neither Blair nor Obama changed the substance of
our economic and political systems, but they did make them look deceptively attractive by
tinkering with social policy.
Were the neoliberal order laid bare – were the emperor to allow himself to be
stripped of his clothes – no one apart from a small psychopathic elite would vote for
neoliberalism's maintenance. So power is forced to repeatedly reinvent itself. It is like
the shape-shifting Mystique of the X-Men films, constantly altering its appearance to lull us
into a false sense of security. Power's goal is to keep looking like it has become something
new, something innovative. Because the power-structure does not want change, it has to find
front-men and women who can personify a transformation that is, in truth, entirely hollow.
Power can perform this stunt, as Blair did, by repackaging the same product –
neoliberalism – in prettier ideological wrapping. Or it can, as has happened in the US of
late, try a baser approach by adding a dash of identity politics. A black presidential
candidate (Obama) can offer hope, and a woman candidate (Hillary Clinton) can cast herself as
mother-saviour.
With this model in place, elections become an illusory contest between more transparent
and more opaque iterations of neoliberal power . In failing the 99 per cent, Obama so
woefully voided this strategy that large sections of voters turned their back on his intended
successor, the new makeover candidate Hillary Clinton. They saw through the role-playing. They
preferred, even if only reluctantly, the honest vulgarity of naked power represented by Trump
over the pretensions of Clinton's fakely compassionate politics.
Unstable politics
Despite its best efforts, neoliberalism is increasingly discredited in the eyes of large
sections of the electorate in the US and UK. Its attempts at concealment have grown jaded, its
strategy exhausted. It has reached the end-game, and that is why politics now looks so
unstable. "Insurgency" candidates in different guises are prospering.
Neoliberal power is distinctive because it seeks absolute power, and can achieve that
end only through global domination. Globalisation, the world as a plaything for a tiny elite to
asset-strip, is both its means and its end. Insurgents are therefore those who seek to reverse
the trend towards globalisation – or at least claim to. There are insurgents on both the
left and right.
If neoliberalism has to choose, it typically prefers an insurgent on the right to the left.
A Trump figure can usefully serve power too, because he dons the clothes of an insurgent
while doing little to actually change the structure.
Nonetheless, Trump is a potential problem for the neoliberal order for two reasons.
First, unlike an Obama or a Clinton, he too clearly illuminates what is really at stake for
power – wealth maximisation at any cost – and thereby risks unmasking the
deception. And second, he is a retrograde step for the globalising power-structure.
Neoliberalism has dragged capitalism out its nineteenth-century dependency on nation-states
into a twenty-first ideology that demands a global reach. Trump and other nativist leaders seek
a return to a supposed golden era of state-based capitalism, one that prefers to send our
children up chimneys if it prevents children from far-off lands arriving on our shores to do
the same.
The neoliberal order prefers a Trump to a Bernie Sanders because the nativist insurgents
are so much easier to tame. A Trump can be allowed to strut on his Twitter stage while the
global power-structure constrains and undermines any promised moves that might threaten it.
Trump the candidate was indifferent to Israel and wanted the US out of Syria. Trump the
president has become Israel's biggest cheerleader and has launched US missiles at
Syria.
Faustian pacts
The current power-structure is much more frightened of a left insurgency of the kind
represented by Corbyn in the UK. He and his supporters are trying to reverse the accommodations
with power made by Blair. And that is why he finds himself relentlessly assaulted from every
direction – from his political opponents; from his supposed political allies, including
most of his own parliamentary party; and most especially from the state-corporate media,
including its bogus left-liberal elements like the Guardian and the BBC.
The past three years of attacks on Corbyn are how power manifests itself, shows its hand,
when it is losing. It is a strategy of last resort. A Blair or an Obama arrive in power having
already made so many compromises behind the scenes that their original policies are largely
toothless. They have made Faustian pacts as a condition for being granted access to power. This
is variously described as pragmatism, moderation, realism. More accurately, it should be
characterised as betrayal.
It does not stop when they reach high office. Obama made a series of early errors, thinking
he would have room to maneuver in the Middle East. He made a speech in Cairo about a "New
Beginning" for the region. A short time later he would help to snuff out the Egyptian Arab
Spring that erupted close by, in Tahrir Square. Egypt's military, long subsidized by
Washington, were allowed to take back power.
Obama won the 2009 Nobel peace prize, before he had time to do anything, for his
international diplomacy. And yet he stepped up the war on terror, oversaw the rapid expansion
of a policy of extrajudicial assassinations by drone, and presided over the extension of the
Iraq regime-change operation to Libya and Syria.
And he threatened penalties for Israel over its illegal settlements policy – a
five-decade war crime that has gone completely unpunished by the international community. But
in practice his inaction allowed Israel to entrench its settlements to the point where
annexation of parts of the West Bank is now imminent.
Tame or destroy
Neoliberalism is now so entrenched, so rapacious that even a moderate socialist like
Corbyn is seen as a major threat. And unlike a Blair, Obama or Trump, Corbyn is much harder to
tame because he has a grassroots movement behind him and to which he is ultimately
accountable .
In the US, the neoliberal wing of the Democratic party prevented the left-insurgent
candidate, Bernie Sanders, from contesting the presidency by rigging the system to keep him off
the ballot paper . In the UK, Corbyn got past those structural defences by accident. He
scraped into the leadership race as the token "loony-left" candidate, indulged by the Labour
party bureaucracy as a way to demonstrate that the election was inclusive and fair. He was
never expected to win.
Once he was installed as leader, the power-structure had two choices: to tame him like
Blair, or destroy him before he stood a chance of reaching high office. For those with short
memories, it is worth recalling how those alternatives were weighed in Corbyn's first
months.
On the one hand, he was derided across the media for being shabbily dressed, for being
unpatriotic, for threatening national security, for being sexist. This was the campaign to tame
him. On the other, the Murdoch-owned Times newspaper, the house journal of the neoliberal
elite, gave a platform to an anonymous army general to warn that the British military would
never allow Corbyn to reach office. There would be an army-led
coup before he ever got near 10 Downing Street.
In a sign of how ineffectual these power-structures now are, none of this made much
difference to Corbyn's fortunes with the public. A truly insurgent candidate cannot be damaged
by attacks from the power-elite. That's why he is where he is, after all.
So those wedded to the power-structure among his own MPs tried to wage a second leadership
contest to unseat him. As a wave of new members signed up to bolster his ranks of supporters,
and thereby turned the party into the largest in Europe, Labour party bureaucrats stripped as
many as possible of their right to vote in the hope Corbyn could be made to lose. They failed
again. He won with an even bigger majority.
Redefining words
It was in this context that the neoliberal order has had to play its most high-stakes card
of all. It has accused Corbyn, a lifelong anti-racism activist, of being an anti-semite for
supporting the Palestinian cause, for preferring Palestinian rights over brutal Israeli
occupation. To make this charge plausible, words have had to be redefined: "anti-semitism" no
longer means simply a hatred of Jews, but includes criticism of Israel; "Zionist" no longer
refers to a political movement that prioritises the rights of Jews over the native Palestinian
population, but supposedly stands as sinister code for all Jews. Corbyn's own party has been
forced under relentless pressure to adopt these malicious reformulations of meaning.
How anti-semitism is being weaponised, not to protect Jews but to protect the neoliberal
order, was made starkly clear this week when Corbyn criticised the financial elite that brought
the west to the brink of economic ruin a decade ago, and will soon do so again unless stringent
new regulations are introduced. Useful idiots like Stephen Pollard, editor of the rightwing
Jewish Chronicle, saw a chance to revive the anti-semitism canard once again, accusing Corbyn of
secretly meaning "Jews" when he actually spoke of bankers. It is a logic intended to make the
neoliberal elite untouchable, cloaking them in a security blanket relying on the anti-semitism
taboo.
Almost the entire Westminister political class and the entire corporate media class,
including the most prominent journalists in the left-liberal media, have reached the same
preposterous conclusion about Corbyn. Whatever the evidence in front of their and our eyes, he
is now roundly declared an
anti-semite . Up is now down, and day is night.
High-stakes strategy
This strategy is high stakes and dangerous for two reasons.
First, it risks creating the very problem it claims to be defending against. By crying wolf
continuously about Corbyn's supposed anti-semitism without any tangible evidence for it, and by
making an unfounded charge of anti-semitism the yardstick for judging Corbyn's competence for
office rather than any of his stated policies, the real anti-semite's argument begins to sound
more plausible.
In what could become self-fulfilling prophecy, the anti-semitic right's long-standing ideas
about Jewish cabals controlling the media and pulling levers behind the scenes could start to
resonate with an increasingly disillusioned and frustrated public. The weaponising of
anti-semitism by the neoliberal order to protect its power risks turning Jews into collateral
damage. It makes them another small or bigger drama in the increasingly desperate attempt to
create a narrative that deflects attention from the real power-structure.
And second, the effort to stitch together a narrative of Corbyn's anti-semitism out of
non-existent cloth is likely to encourage more and more people to take a step back from the
screen so that those unintelligible pixels can more easily be discerned as a smoking gun. The
very preposterousness of the allegations, and the fact that they are taken so seriously by a
political and media class selected for their submissiveness to the neoliberal order,
accelerates the process by which these opinion-formers discredit themselves. Their authority
wanes by the day, and as a result their usefulness to the power-structure rapidly
diminishes.
This is where we are now: in the final stages of a busted system that is clinging on to
credibility by its fingernails. Sooner or later, its grip will be lost and it will plunge into
the abyss. We will wonder how we ever fell for any of its deceptions.
In the meantime, we must get on with the urgent task of liberating our minds, of undoing the
toxic mental and emotional training we were subjected to, of critiquing and deriding those
whose job is to enforce the corrupt orthodoxy, and of replotting a course towards a future that
saves the human species from impending extinction.
No one pays me to write these blog posts. If you appreciated it, or any of the others,
please consider hitting the donate button in the right-hand margin (computer) or below
(phone).capitalism , corporations , Jeremy Corbyn
Famous song of Vladimir Vysotsky about Soviet system. Sound now as if it was written about the current crisis of neoliberalism
I found several translation of it at Vysotsky Translations Of
course, original is better, but it is assessable only for Russian-speaking readers
Notable quotes:
"... Yes, something wrong along the road But at the end nightmare Neither church nor even pub Non of them is right way Nor my friends, oh nor my friends All are wrong, friends, I can say ..."
"... At the end of that long road Nothing but the gallows. ..."
"... Nothing's holy anymore, Neither drink nor prayer. ..."
Dreaming I see yellow lights
Hoarsely scream while dreaming
Give me time, oh give me time
Morning will be easy
But the morning was also hard
My party have been over
So I am smoking on empty gut
Or drinking in hangover
I saw the pub-a lot of fun
And many sexy women
This place is heaven for drunkard
But for me it's prison
In holy church was dusk and stunk
Priest burned incensed honey
No, even church was wrong, I think
Nothing there was holy
I saw wild field along the stream
That God forgot forever
Blue bells were only in clear field
And road that led somewhere
Dark ancient forest by this road
With evil witches orgies
And at the end of that scary road
Were guillotine and axes
So loosing breath I climbed on hill
To save myself from horror
I saw red alder on the top of hill
But at the foot-black cherry
If even ivy twined hills slope
I might be happy see it
Or, if there was only something else
But nothing pleased my spirit
So, I am dreaming on empty gut
Or drinking in hangover
Yes, something wrong along the road
But at the end nightmare
Neither church nor even pub
Non of them is right way
Nor my friends, oh nor my friends
All are wrong, friends, I can say
Hey one, another one,
And many, many, many, many ones
Another one and other ones
All are wrong, I can say.
In my dream burn yellow lights,
And I spill my sorrow:
"Do not go - please, stay the night!
Wait! Fresh for the morrow!"
But the morning seems all wrong,
No joy - more's the pity -
Ugh - the hair of the dog,
Of the dog that bit you!
In the bars, red, bloodshot eyes,
All that sparkling poison -
Clowns' and beggars' paradise
And my gilded prison.
In the church, stench, Evensong,
Even gold looks shabby...
No, the church, it feels all wrong,
Not the way it should be!
In a hurry, I climb up,
Why? I do not know.
There's an alder-tree on top,
A cherry-tree below.
Wish there was plush on the slope -
It would look less scrubby.
There is not a bloody hope,
Nothing's as it should be.
I keep searching high and low:
Oh my God, where are you?
By the roadside, bluebells grow,
And the road climbs higher.
All along the road, a wood
Full of witches, fellows.
At the end of that long road
Nothing but the gallows.
Horses dancing all along,
Smoothly dance the horses.
On the road it seems all wrong,
At the end, much worser.
Nothing's holy anymore,
Neither drink nor prayer.
It's all wrong, boys, by the Lord,
No, boys, it's not fair...
Into my dream creep yellow lights,
And I shout myself hoarse in my sleep:
"Wait a bit, wait a bit -
It'll get better in the morning."
But in the morning nothing is right,
It's no fun anymore:
You either smoke on empty stomach,
Or drink from a hangover.
In the drinking-house there is a familiar sight
Of a green shot, white napkins, -
It's a heaven for beggars and buffoons,
I feel like a caged bird in it.
The church dissolves in stench and darkness ,
The deacons are smoking the incense...
No, nothing is right in here, either,
Nothing is the way it's supposed to be!
I hurry off onto the hill,
So nothing would come before me, -
There grows an alder on the hill
And under the hill - a cherry tree.
If only the ivy twined the slope, -
It would bring me a slight consolation,
If there only was something else...
But no, nothing is the way it should be!
I go off onto the field, along the river.
Tons of light, no God.
Corn-flowers in the clear field
And a road leading far away.
Along the road - a deep forest
With evil witches.
And at the end of that road -
A guillotine and axes.
Somewhere horses are dancing to the beat,
Half-heartedly and smoothly..
Nothing is right along the road,
And it's no better at the end of it.
And not the church or the drinking-house -
Nothing is holy!
No, folks, nothing is right!
Nothing is right, folks...
Like bolshevism this secular regions is to a large extent is a denial of Christianity. While Bolshevism is closer to the Islam,
Neoliberalism is closer to Judaism.
The idea of " Homo economicus " -- a person who in all
his decisions is governed by self-interest and greed is bunk.
Notable quotes:
"... There is not a shred of logical sense in neoliberalism. You're doing what the fundamentalists do... they talk about what neoliberalism is in theory whilst completely ignoring what it is in practice. ..."
"... In theory the banks should have been allowed to go bust, but the consequences where deemed too high (as they inevitable are). The result is socialism for the rich using the poor as the excuse, which is the reality of neoliberalism. ..."
"... Neoliberalism is based on the thought that you get as much freedom as you can pay for, otherwise you can just pay... like everyone else. In Asia and South America it has been the economic preference of dictators that pushes profit upwards and responsibility down, just like it does here. ..."
"... We all probably know the answer to this. In order to maintain the consent necessary to create inequality in their own interests the neoliberals have to tell big lies, and keep repeating them until they appear to be the truth. They've gotten so damn good at it. ..."
"... Neoliberalism is a modern curse. Everything about it is bad and until we're free of it, it will only ever keep trying to turn us into indentured labourers. ..."
"... It's acolytes are required to blind themselves to logic and reason to such a degree they resemble Scientologists or Jehovah's Witnesses more than people with any sort of coherent political ideology, because that's what neoliberalism actually is... a cult of the rich, for the rich, by the rich... and it's followers in the general population are nothing but moron familiars hoping one day to be made a fully fledged bastard ..."
"... Who could look at the way markets function and conclude there's any freedom? Only a neoliberal cult member. They cannot be reasoned with. They cannot be dissuaded. They cannot be persuaded. Only the market knows best, and the fact that the market is a corrupt, self serving whore is completely ignored by the ideology of their Church. ..."
Unless you are completely confused by what neoliberalism is there is not a shred of logical sense in this.
There is not a shred of logical sense in neoliberalism. You're doing what the fundamentalists do... they talk about what neoliberalism
is in theory whilst completely ignoring what it is in practice.
In theory the banks should have been allowed to go bust, but the consequences where deemed too high (as they inevitable
are). The result is socialism for the rich using the poor as the excuse, which is the reality of neoliberalism.
Savers in a neoliberal society are lambs to the slaughter. Thatcher "revitalised" banking, while everything else withered and
died.
Neoliberalism is based on the thought of personal freedom, communism is definitely not. Neoliberalist policies have lifted
millions of people out of poverty in Asia and South America.
Neoliberalism is based on the thought that you get as much freedom as you can pay for, otherwise you can just pay... like
everyone else. In Asia and South America it has been the economic preference of dictators that pushes profit upwards and responsibility
down, just like it does here.
I find it ironic that it now has 5 year plans that absolutely must not be deviated from, massive state intervention in markets
(QE, housing policy, tax credits... insert where applicable), and advocates large scale central planning even as it denies reality,
and makes the announcement from a tractor factory.
Neoliberalism is a blight... a cancer on humanity... a massive lie told by rich people and believed only by peasants happy
to be thrown a turnip. In theory it's one thing, the reality is entirely different. Until we're rid of it, we're all it's slaves.
It's an abhorrent cult that comes up with purest bilge like expansionary fiscal contraction to keep all the money in the hands
of the rich.
Why, you have to ask yourself, is this vast implausibility, this sheer unsustainability, not blindingly obvious to all?
We all probably know the answer to this. In order to maintain the consent necessary to create inequality in their own interests
the neoliberals have to tell big lies, and keep repeating them until they appear to be the truth. They've gotten so damn good
at it.
Neoliberalism is a modern curse. Everything about it is bad and until we're free of it, it
will only ever keep trying to turn us into indentured labourers.
It's acolytes are required
to blind themselves to logic and reason to such a degree they resemble Scientologists or
Jehovah's Witnesses more than people with any sort of coherent political ideology, because
that's what neoliberalism actually is... a cult of the rich, for the rich, by the rich... and
it's followers in the general population are nothing but moron familiars hoping one day to be
made a fully fledged bastard.
Who could look at the way markets function and conclude there's any freedom? Only a
neoliberal cult member. They cannot be reasoned with. They cannot be dissuaded. They cannot
be persuaded. Only the market knows best, and the fact that the market is a corrupt, self
serving whore is completely ignored by the ideology of their Church.
It's subsumed the entire planet, and waiting for them to see sense is a hopeless cause. In
the end it'll probably take violence to rid us of the Neoliberal parasite... the turn of the
century plague.
How many alternative economic systems would you say have been given a fair trial under
reasonably favorable circumstances?
A good question. Answer: admittedly, not a huge number - but not none either. Feudalism
held sway in the middle ages and mercantilism in the 18th century, before both fell out of
fashion. In the 20th century Russia stuck with communism for 74 years, and many other
countries tried it for a while. At one time (around 1949-89) there were enough countries in
the communist block for us to be able to say that they at least had a fair chance to make it
work - that is, if it didn't work, they can't really blame it on the rest of the world
ganging up on them.
Lately, serious challengers to the global economic order have been more isolated
(Venzuela, Cuba, North Korea?) - so maybe you could argue that, if they are struggling, it is
because they have been unfairly ganged up on. But then again, aren't they pursuing a
version of socialism that has close affinities to that tried in the Soviet Union?
The problem with giving any novel political idea a really extended trial is that you have
to try it out on live human beings. This means that, once a critical mass of data has built
up that indicates a political idea doesn't work out as hoped, then people inevitably lose the
will to try that idea again.
So my question is: are critics of the current world economic order able to spell out
exactly how their proposed alternative would differ from Soviet-style socialism?
The evidence of social decay in America is becoming more visible. As other countries
continue to show increases in life expectancy, the US continues its deterioration.
Life expectancy in the US fell to 78.6 years in 2017, a o.1 year fall from 2016 and a 0.3
year decline from the peak.
Overdose deaths reached a new high in 2017, topping 70,000, while the suicide rate
increased by 3.7%, the CDC's National Center for Health Statistics reports.
Dr. Robert Redfield, CDC director, called the trend tragic and troubling. "Life expectancy
gives us a snapshot of the Nation's overall health and these sobering statistics are a wakeup
call that we are losing too many Americans, too early and too often, to conditions that are
preventable," he wrote in a statement.
While this assessment is technically correct, it is too superficial in seeing the rising
rate of what Angus Deaton and Ann Case called "deaths of despair" as a health problem, rather
than symptoms of much deeper societal ills. Americans take antidepressants at a higher rate
than any country in the world. The average job tenure is a mere 4.4 years. In my youth, if you
changed jobs in less than seven or eight years, you were seen as an opportunist or probably
poor performer. The near impossibility of getting a new job if you are over 40 and the fact
that outside hot fields, young people can also find it hard to get work commensurate with their
education and experience, means that those who do have jobs can be and are exploited by their
employers. Amazon is the most visible symbol of that, working warehouse workers at a deadly
pace, and regularly reducing even white collar males regularly to tears.
On top of that, nuclear families, weakened communities, plus the neoliberal expectation that
individuals be willing to move to find work means that many Americans have shallow personal
networks, and that means less support if one suffers career or financial setbacks.
But the big driver, which the mainstream press is unwilling to acknowledge, is that highly
unequal societies are unhealthy societies. We published this section from a Financial Times
comment by Michael Prowse in 2007, and it can't be
repeated often enough :
Those who would deny a link between health and inequality must first grapple with the
following paradox. There is a strong relationship between income and health within countries.
In any nation you will find that people on high incomes tend to live longer and have fewer
chronic illnesses than people on low incomes.
Yet, if you look for differences between countries, the relationship between income and
health largely disintegrates. Rich Americans, for instance, are healthier on average than
poor Americans, as measured by life expectancy. But, although the US is a much richer country
than, say, Greece, Americans on average have a lower life expectancy than Greeks. More
income, it seems, gives you a health advantage with respect to your fellow citizens, but not
with respect to people living in other countries .
Once a floor standard of living is attained, people tend to be healthier when three
conditions hold: they are valued and respected by others; they feel 'in control' in their
work and home lives; and they enjoy a dense network of social contacts. Economically unequal
societies tend to do poorly in all three respects: they tend to be characterised by big
status differences, by big differences in people's sense of control and by low levels of
civic participation .
Unequal societies, in other words, will remain unhealthy societies – and also
unhappy societies – no matter how wealthy they become. Their advocates – those
who see no reason whatever to curb ever-widening income differentials – have a lot of
explaining to do.
The stats first. They tell a clear story: Americans now live shorter lives than men and
women in most of the rest of the developed world. And that gap is growing.
Back in 1990, shouts
a new study published last week in the prestigious Journal of the American Medical
Association, the United States ranked just 20th on life expectancy among the world's 34
industrial nations. The United States now ranks 27th -- despite spending much more on health
care than any other nation.
Americans, notes an editorial the
journal ran to accompany the study, are losing ground globally "by every" health measure.
Why such poor performance? Media reports on last week's new
State of U.S. Health study hit all the usual suspects: poor diet, poor access to
affordable health care, poor personal health habits, and just plain poverty.
In the Wall Street Journal, for instance, a chief wellness officer in Ohio opined
that if Americans exercised more and ate and smoked less, the United States would surely
start moving up in the global health rankings.
But many epidemiologists -- scientists who study health outcomes -- have their doubts.
They point out that the United States ranked as one of the world's healthiest nations in the
1950s, a time when Americans smoked heavily, ate a diet that would horrify any 21st-century
nutritionist, and hardly ever exercised.
Poor Americans, then as now, had chronic problems accessing health care. But poverty,
epidemiologists note, can't explain why fully insured middle-income Americans today have
significantly worse health outcomes than middle-income people in other rich nations.
The University of Washington's Dr. Stephen Bezruchka
has been tracking these outcomes since the 1990s. The new research published in the
Journal of the American Medical Association, Bezruchka told Too Much last week, should worry
Americans at all income levels.
"Even if we are rich, college-educated, white-skinned, and practice all the right health
behaviors," he notes, "similar people in other rich nations will live longer."
A dozen years ago, Bezruchka
published in Newsweek the first mass-media commentary, at least in the United States, to
challenge the conventional take on poor U.S. global health rankings.
To really understand America's poor health standing globally, epidemiologists like
Bezruchka posit, we need to look at "the social determinants of health," those social and
economic realities that define our daily lives.
None of these determinants matter more, these researchers contend, than the level of a
society's economic inequality, the divide between the affluent and everyone else. Over 170
studies worldwide have so far linked income inequality to health outcomes. The more
unequal a society, the studies show, the more unhealthy most everyone in it -- and not the
poor alone.
Just how does inequality translate into unhealthy outcomes? Growing numbers of researchers
place the blame on stress. The more inequality in a society, the more stress on a daily
level. Chronic stress, over time, wears down our immune systems and leaves us more vulnerable
to disease.
Data the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention released on Thursday show life
expectancy fell by one-tenth of a year, to 78.6 years, pushed down by the sharpest annual
increase in suicides in nearly a decade and a continued rise in deaths from powerful opioid
drugs like fentanyl. Influenza, pneumonia and diabetes also factored into last year's
increase.
Economists and public-health experts consider life expectancy to be an important measure
of a nation's prosperity. The 2017 data paint a dark picture of health and well-being in the
U.S., reflecting the effects of addiction and despair, particularly among young and
middle-aged adults, as well as diseases plaguing an aging population and people with lower
access to health care
Life expectancy is 84.1 years in Japan and 83.7 years in Switzerland, first and second in
the most-recent ranking by the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development. The
U.S. ranks 29th..
White men and women fared the worst, along with black men, all of whom experienced
increases in death rates. Death rates rose in particular for adults ages 25 to 44, and
suicide rates are highest among people in the nation's most rural areas. On the other hand,
deaths declined for black and Hispanic women, and remained the same for Hispanic men .
Earlier this century, the steady and robust decline in heart-disease deaths more than
offset the rising number from drugs and suicide, Dr. Anderson said. Now, "those declines
aren't there anymore," he said, and the drug and suicide deaths account for many years of
life lost because they occur mostly in young to middle-aged adults.
While progress against deaths from heart disease has stalled, cancer deaths -- the
nation's No. 2 killer -- are continuing a steady decline that began in the 1990s, Dr.
Anderson said. "That's kind of our saving grace," he said. "Without those declines, we'd see
a much bigger drop in life expectancy."
Suicides rose 3.7% in 2017, accelerating an increase in rates since 1999, the CDC said.
The gap in deaths by suicide widened starkly between cities and the most rural areas between
1999 and 2017, the data show. The rate is now far higher in rural areas. "There's a much
wider spread," Dr. Hedegaard said.
"This is extremely discouraging," Christine Moutier, chief medical officer of the American
Foundation for Suicide Prevention, said of the suicide-rate increase. Studies show that
traumas such as economic difficulties or natural disasters, along with access to lethal means
including guns and opioid drugs, and lack of access to care can affect suicide rates, she
said. More accurate recording of deaths may also have added to the numbers, she said.
Japan leads the pack in life expectancy and pretty much every other measure of social well
being. Yet when its financial bubbles were bigger than the ones in the US pre our crisis, and
it's on its way to having a lost three decades of growth. On top of that, Japan has one of the
worst demographic crunches in the world, in terms of the aging of its population. So how it is
that Japan is coping well with decline, while the US is getting sicker in many ways (mental
health, obesity, falling expectancy)?
It's easy to hand-wave by saying "Japanese culture," but I see the causes as more specific.
The Japanese have always given high employment top priority in their economic planning.
Entrepreneurs are revered for creating jobs, not for getting rich. Similarly, Japan was long
criticized by international economist types for having an inefficient retail sector (lots of
small local shops), when they missed the point: that was one way of increasing employment, plus
Japanese like having tight local communities.
After their crisis, Japanese companies went to considerable lengths to preserve jobs, such
as by having senior people taking pay cuts and longer term, lowering the already not that large
gap between entry and top level compensation. The adoption of second-class workers (long-term
temps called "freeters") was seen as less than ideal, since these workers would never become
true members of the company community, but it was better than further reducing employment.
Contrast that to our crisis response. We reported in 2013 that
the top 1% got 121% of the income gains after the crisis. The very top echelon did better
at the expense of everyone else. Longer term, lower-income earners have fallen behind. From a
2017 MarketWatch story, quoting a World Economic Forum report: "America has experienced 'a
complete collapse of the bottom 50 percent income share in the U.S. between 1978 to 2015.'"
There is a lot of other data that supports the same point: inequality continues to widen in
America. The areas that are taking the worst hits are states like West Virginia and Ohio that
have been hit hard by deindustrialization. But the elites are removed in their glamorous cities
and manage not to notice the conditions when they transit through the rest of America. They
should consider themselves lucky that America's downtrodden are taking out their misery more on
themselves than on their betters.
God, this is so depressing to read. The worse aspect of it is that it never had to be this
way but that these deaths were simply 'collateral damage' to the social and economic changes
in America since the 1970s – changes by choice. This seems to be a slow motion move to
replicate what Russia went through back in the 1990s which led to the unnecessary, premature
deaths of millions of its people. Dmitry Orlov has a lot to say about the subject of collapse
and there is a long page in which Orlov talks about how Russia got through these bad times
while comparing it with America as he lives there now. For those interested, it is at-
What gets me most is how these deaths are basically anonymous and are not really
remembered. When AIDS was ravishing the gay community decades ago, one way they got people to
appreciate the numbers of deaths was the AIDS Memorial Quilt which ended up weighing over 50
tons. It is a shame that there can not be an equivalent project for all these deaths of
despair.
There were pictures in the Wall Street Journal article I didn't pull over due to copyright
issues, but it did show people commemorating these deaths Captions:
People in Largo, Fla., hold candles at a vigil on Oct. 17 to remember the thousands who
succumbed to opioid abuse in their community.
More than 1,000 backpacks containing belongings of suicide victims and letters with
information about them are scattered across a lawn during a demonstration at the University
of Tennessee at Chattanooga on March 22.
But to your point, these seem isolated and are not getting press coverage at anywhere near
the level of the AIDS crisis.
It focuses too much on peak oil. As if the social collapse of the United States (and the
Soviet Union) was some kind of natural consequence of resources dryinf out instead of a
premeditated looting.
Orlov's posts on how Russians survived the collapse is a small masterpiece. I read it a
couple of years back and it affected me greatly. I just reread it, thanks, Rev Kev, and it
seems even more relevant now.
Small gems: Money becomes useless: items or services that can be swapped are paramount.
Bottles of alcohol, fresh homegrown veggies (and pot), I re-fashion your old suit and you fix
my broken window.
Social networks keep you alive. Know and be on good terms with your neighbors. Communal
gardens keep you fed.
War-hardened men (and the women who love them), who thrive on violence abound. They will
either be hired as security or rove about as free-lancers. A community is better able either
to hire them, or defend against them.
Our ancestors lived and thrived without: central heating, electric lights, hot and cold
running water, flush toilets, garbage collection, the Internet. We can too; it just takes
forethought and planning. Densely packed cities without these amenities are hell.
Cultivate an attitude of disdain for the 'normal' things that society values, especially
if you are a middle-aged male; career, large house and SUV, foreign vacations, a regular
salary. Enjoy contemplating nature. When the former disappear, you have the latter to fall
back upon. And consider a second career as a recycler of abandoned buildings, or a distiller
of potatoes. (Think of all the Medieval structures built from crumbling Roman edifices.)
Russians, in many ways, had more resilience built in to their system: housing was
State-owned, so there was less homelessness. Private automobiles were relatively rare, but
public transportation was wide-spread and remained in good-running order. Minimal universal
health care existed.
Cease from trying, futilely, to change the System. Ain't gonna happen. Instead, prepare to
survive, if only just, the coming dismantling.
> Once a floor standard of living is attained, people tend to be healthier when three
conditions hold: they are valued and respected by others; they feel 'in control' in their
work and home lives; and they enjoy a dense network of social contacts.
"Sapolsky: We belong to multiple hierarchies, and you may have the worst job in your
corporation and no autonomy and control and predictability, but you're the captain of the
company softball team that year and you'd better bet you are going to have all sorts of
psychological means to decide it's just a job, nine to five, that's not what the world is
about. What the world's about is softball. I'm the head of my team, people look up to me, and
you come out of that deciding you are on top of the hierarchy that matters to you."
iirc, there was a perspective of some economists that infinite groaf could be carried by
the creative, emergent, and infinite wants of homo sapiens. But that creates compounding
deprivations, never enough time, money, resources. With the 2:1 ratio of loss aversion, what
is compounded are bad affects.
That 'dense network of social contacts' means smaller groups with symmetric interactions. The multiple
dominance heirarchies is the healthy version of creative emergence, but supplying needs, not
creating wants.
I think that one of the most valuable tools used by government in the Great Depression was
the CCC, WPA, and TVA set of programs that provided jobs to people while they created
valuable infrastructure and art. How many of those people could go back to the dams or state
parks and tell their spouses and kids that "I helped build that." During a time of despair,
it was a way of making people believe they had value.
Today, it would be viewed as a waste of money that could be better spent on the military
or another tax cut for the wealthy.
I'd mentioned some wrongheaded policies of Sequoia NP of 90 years ago yesterday, and they
seem ridiculous in retrospect, and we no longer treat natural places as ad hoc zoos, where
everybody gets to see the dancing bears @ a given hour.
Our methodology as far as our rapport with fire was just as stupid, but we've really done
nothing to repair our relationship with trees and the forests they hang out in.
There's an abundance of physical labor needed to clear out the duff, the deadfalls and
assorted debris from huge swaths of guaranteed employment until the job is done, which could
take awhile.
There's really few graft possibilities though, we're talking chainsaws, Pulaskis, never
ending burn pile action and lots of sweat equity. If KBR wanted to be in charge of
backcountry camps housing crews, that'd be ok, they'd be doing something useful for a
change.
Yes, why do you think video games appeal so much to young males? Because of the pixels?
What these gamers are really after is the ability to excel in a niche hierarchy. It doesn't
(usually) appeal to females as much as more traditional kinds of success but it serves a
psychological need.
A traitorous ruling class that has sold out its workers in favor of foreign workers.
And it's very lucrative – the Walton's fortune was made by being an agent of
communist Chinese manufacturers. In direct competition with US manufacturers. Does this not
seem like treason to you?
The word 'communist' in relation to the Chinese government and party is void of content.
'Communist' in the current Chinese context is legacy branding, nothing more. Its use in this
comment is inflammatory, as is the too-loose bandying of 'treason'. The Waltons are loyal to
their class (however fierce their disputes may be with rival oligarch factions), and since
the state exists to serve the interests of their class, how can they be traitors to the
state?
"Communist" is what they call themselves. They're totalitarians. Which is what most people
think "communist" means – because all countries that called themselves communist used
authoritarian rule. Methinks you might be a marxist idealist. Offended by the misuse of your
ideal State word by totalitarians.
Similarly, I used "treason" in the sense of acting against the interests of the citizens,
not in the sense of a crime against the state. You clearly believe the state to be
representative of only the ruling class. And I don't disagree wrt the USA and its imperial
machine. Which would make the State treasonous, according to the sense of the word I
used.
One could always say communism is an end point developed through a process preceded by
socialism and before that capitalism which replaces feudalism. The idea being Chinese
Communists, the rich Chinese have bug out spots for a reason, believe Mao and the Soviets
moved too quickly skipping a Marxist historical epoch.
The Communist Party officially is always a vanguard for the future society not the
Communist society. Phrases such as "under communism" aren't Soviet features as much as they
are propaganda from the West.
When the Reds were the only game in town, the greedy class joined the CCP, but since 1991,
they skipped signing up, leaving believers in control. What the party congress believes is
probably important.
As far as branding goes, all Communists are branded because the are all vanguard parties,
not parties of blocs or even current populations. Star Trek is the only communist society.
The Soviet thinkers definitely wrote about what an Ideal society would look like, the nature
of work, and self and societal improvement.
Overthrowing a long established government shouldn't be done for light and transient
reasons, and Xi has seemed to be concerned with the demands of the party congress. The party
at large doesn't have a single voice to rally behind which makes it difficult to overthrow a
government.
the word is "communist". The gov't isn't anything of the sort these days. Isn't the
chinese gov't of today "fascist". just like the national socialists of the german stripe?
They are the state that may be lord over controller of private institutions, and ruler of
other state institutions, all intermixed into what is "the chinese economy". They allow the
private wealth creation in a controlled sense. that is state function serving private wealth.
and if you are a party loyal, private wealth may come to you some day too.
It is just another part of the world trend "everyone is turning into full fledged
fascists"
No wonder people in the states are dying earlier.. to get back on topic
Last night, my wife and I took our boys to meet Santa at my older son's school. Elementary
school in Mississippi. The town is an outer suburb of Memphis. A mile east of the town you
are in rural Mississippi. I noticed 2 or 3 parents with visible drug addiction issues. These
folks were still people. Want their kids to see Santa and have a better life. The country
doesn't care.
I'll guess that you're near Byhalia. Happy memories of visiting family there from late
forties through sixties. Wonder what its like now – how the economic changes have
affected it.
Byhalia is a little further down highway 78. Kids from Byhalia drive up to Olive Branch to
go to a McDonald's and other fast food. Things may be changing because they just completed an
outer interstate loop that passes close by Byhalia. Byhalia was just in news a couple months
ago because a kid died during a football game. People were up in arms about no doctor at game
and a 30 to 40 minute drive to closest hospital. There aren't any doctors offices in Byhalia.
Then toxicology report came back. Kid had cocaine in his system. Holly Springs and Byhalia
area are big drug smuggling area. Close to Memphis and it's distribution network, but across
state line in poor rural Mississippi. NBA players linked to this area and smuggling
networks.
I'm always amazed @ the suicide by gun numbers, as it strikes me as a not so fool proof
way of checking out, exacerbated by perhaps dying slowly in a painful way?
Oh, and bloody, very much so.
Fentanyl seems an easier way out, you just drift into the ether and leave a presentable
corpse for everybody you knew, who all wonder if they could have done something to stop it
from happening, posthaste.
It's cheap and fairly efficient, and the drug way out can be tricky. Silent film legend,
Lupe Valez, is the famed example of suicide by drugs gone wrong. She still died but not on
her own terms because the sleeping pills she took didn't react well with her last meal.
How many people have tried to check out and had it not work is something to consider.
The level of denial people are capable of can be daunting.
1). My dentist who I think is Republican told me when I brought up Medicare for all said
"I don't think we can afford Medicare for all." This was not an immediate response to my
raising the topic, but something he told me after several visits and having thought about
what I had said and around the time Sanders got media coverage introducing a Medicare for all
bill (I was getting a crown and required many visits). Talking to your dentist can be a one
sided conversation for obvious reasons, but I thought "don't you mean we can't afford NOT to
have Medicare for all?"
2). A co-worker of mine who is African American. When I said U.S. life expectancy is
falling, this is a sign of extreme policy failure and should affect how we rate the ACA (read
that here, of course!) replied "You're assuming health has an impact on life expectancy." I
was stunned and didn't know what to say for a second and finally said "yes, absolutely."
These are the types that are more than happy to hand the place over to the next Bolsonaro
if only to protect the status gap between themselves and those beneath them.
They also "hand the place over" when the Bolsonaro types tell everyone they have the
solution and the opposition party is tainted by austerity and corruption.
"You're assuming health has an impact on life expectancy"
I have absolutely no idea how I would respond to this either. Was this comment by this
person some kind of built in knee-jerk response to criticism of the ACA/Obama?
actually you are assuming health coverage, even if it was real coverage for what one
needed, has that much of an impact on life expectancy and from what I've read it probably
doesn't compared to things like poverty *regardless* of health coverage. Because the greatest
link to say heart attacks is with poverty (not diet etc.)
At this point though it doesn't even make sense to talk about the ACA circa now and say
it's Obama's ACA, it wasn't that great to begin with. But Trump has made it worse.
My dentist who I think is Republican told me when I brought up Medicare for all said
"I don't think we can afford Medicare for all."
When I brought up Medicare for All to my dentist, after listening to him describe some of
his ER work where he claims to routinely see people who have intentionally damaged their
teeth in order to obtain painkillers (which he is not allowed to proscribe to them
regardless), he said he would never want to have the kind of inferior health care they have
"in Europe." He seemed genuinely surprised when I reported that my wife had done most of a
pregnancy in Italy in the mid-90s and got pre-natal care that was better than anything she
ever got in this country.
My dentist is definitely a Repub. And he socializes with other medical professionals,
which I presume gives him a very distorted image of the health care system. I often hear him
railing against the idiotic dictates of insurance companies and he seems genuinely proud
that, unlike the inscrutable and BS pricing of hospitals, dentists have to have
straightforward pricing because many people do pay 100% out of pocket (so he says).
This is a part of the 10% that is going to be very hard to reach. But I tell him
socialists need dental care too and so he will always have work even after we take over.
Suicide can be a rational and sensible choice.
Bluntly, if the quality of your life is shitty and not going to improve why stick around?
That the reason so many people's lives are bad enough that they decide death is preferable to
life is societal doesn't change their circumstances.
If you are old and sick, barely surviving financially or in poor health and unable to afford
care suicide might look like your best alternative.
The "Hemlock Society" has been around for quite a while, that its membership is growing in
the short term says a great deal about America.
Suicide is never rational. It is arrogance that one could weigh the pros and cons of
suicide like they think the have all the pertinent information. The only truth is that we
have no idea what happens when we die or if there is some kind of experience that continues
in a form that might not be a personal consciousness. Also, why don't you see the decision to
die is made under duress and therefor invalid like signing a contract with a gun pointed at
your head? There were several times in my life that I determined "the quality of [my] life is
shitty and not going to improve [so] why stick around", but yet, I became better off going
through the struggle. As a result I have made others lives better with the understanding I
have gained going through the Shaman's journey.
By considering suicide you are considering trading a known (suffering) for an unknown
(Death). In what way can that be considered rational?
The sad fact is that we spend our whole lives avoiding suffering and never take the time
to understand it. Opioids, all drugs, are a route to avoid suffering, to avoid looking at our
trauma. Materialism is about avoiding our suffering. Suicide is materialistic because it
supposes there is a mind that we can stop.
But even in the Buddhist centers I visit it has turned away from the spiritual and people
go there not to understand their suffering, but rather only to escape it.
American society does not have an economic problem, it has a spiritual problem.
I respect your view that suicide is an arrogant act and that suffering is an unavoidable
part of life. I totally agree with the latter philosophy. You suffer, and you wade through it
and come out on the other side as a better person. Forged in fire, so to speak.
Plus, I am, by nature, an optimist. There is always something to look forward to, every
morning.
But, a few years ago, I suffered a cascade of bodily failures, whose symptoms were at
first ignored, then misdiagnosed, resulting in my taking medications that made me worse off.
At one point, for two months, I had constant nerve pain (comparable to having teeny barbed
wire wrapped around my torso and and being zapped by an electric charge every few seconds.)
Plus back pain. I could not eat, and when I did, I vomited. I lost 20 pounds. I could not
sleep for more than hour at a time, and that hour happened only once a day. I walked only
with the aid of two walking sticks. I was totally constipated for a month (gross, but this
condition just adds to one's misery.) There was no end in sight and my condition just kept
worsening with each round of new medication.
I did not seriously contemplate suicide. But I did give some thought to what I would do if
I had to face life without sleep, without food, without the ability to walk, and death came
up as one of the better solutions. Fortunately, I changed doctors.
I empathize with your struggles, and I have contemplated suicide myself, but contemplating
death is part of the shaman's journey. I do not think that suicide is arrogant, I think it is
a misunderstanding.
IMHO, medical doctors will disrupt this journey. They should be consulted but with the
understanding that they know very little about the balance of the body and what is needed to
heal.
Truth is, we will die. The greater the suffering the easier to find out "who" that is
suffering.
I get in fights with my therapist all the time about this. She is always advocating for ME
to change when I feel if she wants to help us all she should be helping us change the
system.
Well roles like therapist are part of what props up the system and they get paid for
precisely that.
I mean if we are just living our lives we see that things are both individual and
systematic. And some things are strongly systematic (economic problems), and others probably
have a significantly personal component (phobias etc.). And so we have to exist with both
being true, but if we are drowning in economic problems the rest doesn't matter. But
therapists have a specific role to individualize all problems. But if people are just doing
therapy to get stuff off their chest, who can blame them. Enough people are, although it's
not how therapists like to see their role.
The train goes right by Chester, Pa, and you can see decay along the tracks all along
BosWash. Except for Biden, a corrupt tool who hasn't figured out how to cash in, the elites
don't take the train.
Remember the Kingsman movie where the president was going to let all the dopers die? Think
Trump.
Not only is the WH response to the opioid problem merely cosmetic, they (and NIH) refuse
to link it to the economics of human obsolescence. How convenient. As jobs die, the workers
do too – less welfare burden. That is fascist thinking, and it is evident today.
Finally, let us recall that all public health leaders are Trump appointees – i.e.,
incompetent. CDC too refuses to link suicide to the economy. It's bad politics. They can do
this because there are no national standards for reporting deaths as suicides or even drug
overdoses. It is entirely up to the elected coroner. Thus 10s of thousands of suicides are
reported as natural or accidental either intentionally to ease the grief of family members or
because they lack the manpower to investigate suspicious deaths. Note the bump in accidental
deaths. Driving your car into a concrete abutment or over a cliff might be an accident, but
more often than not, the driver was pickled (Irish courage) and the death was
intentional.
So, until we do a better job of measuring the causes of death, the administration can
continue to blame the deaths on moral weakness rather than its cruel economic policies.
Sadly, I believe if suicide attempts were taken into account, the picture would even look
far bleaker, and likely include far more Metro areas. In those Metro areas there are likely
far less gun/rifle owners (reportedly the most successful method), far quicker ambulance
response times, and significant expenditures have been made, and actions taken, to thwart
attempts on transit lines and bridges, along with committing suicidal persons to locked down
psychiatric facilities (which then adds further financial burden, significant employment
issues, and possibly ugly, forced medication side effects); while doing absolutely nothing
whatsoever to address the causes.
What a sickening blotch on the US , with such wealth and power – sovereign in
its own currency – that it's citizens are increasingly attempting and committing
suicide because they can no longer afford to live in any manner that's considered humane.
That, while its Fourth Estate deliberately obscures the deadly problem – which
cannot be cured by forcing Pharma™, Therapy™, and Psychiatric Confinement™
at it, when a predatory crippling of economic stability is the entire cause – and
refuses to hold the Government and Elites accountable.
I would commend to all Beth Macy's riveting book "
Dopesick : Dealers, Doctors, and the Drug Company that Addicted America ."
Equal parts nicely written investigative reporting and painful personal stories. I'd
thought that the "opioid epidemic" meme was hyperbolic. I was wrong.
BUENOS AIRES (Reuters) - China and the United States have agreed to halt new tariffs as
both nations engage in trade talks with the goal of reaching an agreement within 90 days, the
White House said on Saturday after U.S. President Donald Trump and Chinese President Xi
Jinping held high-stakes talks in Argentina.
Trump agreed not to boost tariffs on $200 billion of Chinese goods to 25 percent on Jan. 1
as previously announced, as China agreed to buy an unspecified but "very substantial" amount
of agricultural, energy, industrial and other products, the White House said. The White House
also said China "is open to approving the previously unapproved Qualcomm Inc <QCOM.O>
NXP <NXPI.O> deal should it again be presented."
The White House said that if agreement on trade issues including technology transfer,
intellectual property, non-tariff barriers, cyber theft and agriculture have not been reached
with China in 90 days that both parties agree that the 10 percent tariffs will be raised to
25 percent.
China does not have its own technological base and is depended on the USA for many technologies. So while China
isdefinitly in assendance, Washington still have capability to stick to "total global dominance" agenda for some time.
Attempt to crush China by Tariffs might provoke the economic crisi in China and possible a "regime change", like Washington
santions to the USSR in the past. And that's probably the calculation.
Notable quotes:
"... President Trump has taken long-simmering US complaints about China to boiling point, castigating Beijing for unfair trade, currency manipulation, and theft of intellectual property rights. China rejects this pejorative American characterization of its economic practices. ..."
"... The problem is that Washington is demanding the impossible. It's like as if the US wants China to turn the clock back to some imagined former era of robust American capitalism. But it is not in China's power to do that. The global economy has shifted structurally away from US dominance. The wheels of production and growth are in China's domain of Eurasia. ..."
"... Combined with its military power, the postwar global order was defined and shaped by Washington. Sometimes misleading called Pax Americana, there was nothing peaceful about the US-led global order. It was more often an order of relative stability purchased by massive acts of violence and repressive regimes under Washington's tutelage. ..."
"... In American mythology, it does not have an empire. The US was supposed to be different from the old European colonial powers, leading the rest of the world through its "exceptional" virtues of freedom, democracy and rule of law . In truth, US global dominance relied on the application of ruthless imperial power. ..."
"... Washington likes to huff and puff about alleged Chinese expansionism "threatening" US allies in Asia-Pacific. But the reality is that Washington is living in the past of former glory. Trading blocs like the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC) realize their bread is buttered by China, no longer America. ..."
"... Washington's rhetoric about "standing up to China" is just that – empty rhetoric. It doesn't mean much to countries led by their interests of economic development and the benefits of Chinese investment. ..."
"... China's strategic economic plans – the One Belt One Road initiative – of integrating regional development under its leadership and finance have already created a world order analogous to what American capital achieved in the postwar decades. ..."
"... American pundits and politicians like Vice President Mike Pence may disparage China's economic policies as creating "debt traps" for other countries . But the reality is that other countries are gravitating to China's dynamic leadership ..."
The G20 summits are nominally about how the world's biggest national economies can cooperate
to boost global growth. This year's gathering – more than ever – shows, however,
that rivalry between the US and China is center stage.
Zeroing in further still, the rivalry is an expression of a washed-up American empire
desperately trying to reclaim its former power. There is much sound, fury and pretense from the
outgoing hegemon – the US – but the ineluctable reality is an empire whose halcyon
days are a bygone era.
Ahead of the summit taking place this weekend in Argentina, the Trump administration has
been issuing furious ultimatums to China to "change its behavior". Washington is threatening an
escalating trade war if Beijing does not conform to American demands over economic
policies.
President Trump has taken long-simmering US complaints about China to boiling point,
castigating Beijing for unfair trade, currency manipulation, and theft of intellectual property
rights. China rejects this pejorative American characterization of its economic practices.
Nevertheless, if Beijing does not comply with US diktats then the Trump administration says
it will slap increasing tariffs on Chinese exports.
The gravity of the situation was highlighted by the comments this week of China's
ambassador to the US, Cui Tiankai, who warned that the "lessons of history" show trade wars can
lead to catastrophic shooting wars. He urged the Trump administration to be reasonable and to
seek a negotiated settlement of disputes.
The problem is that Washington is demanding the impossible. It's like as if the US wants
China to turn the clock back to some imagined former era of robust American capitalism. But it
is not in China's power to do that. The global economy has shifted structurally away from US
dominance. The wheels of production and growth are in China's domain of Eurasia.
For decades, China functioned as a giant market for cheap production of basic consumer
goods. Now under President Xi Jinping, the nation is moving to a new phase of development
involving sophisticated technologies, high-quality manufacture, and investment.
It's an economic evolution that the world has seen before, in Europe, the US and now
Eurasia. In the decades after the Second World War, up to the 1970s, it was US capitalism that
was the undisputed world leader. Combined with its military power, the postwar global order was
defined and shaped by Washington. Sometimes misleading called Pax Americana, there was nothing
peaceful about the US-led global order. It was more often an order of relative stability
purchased by massive acts of violence and repressive regimes under Washington's tutelage.
In American mythology, it does not have an empire. The US was supposed to be different from
the old European colonial powers, leading the rest of the world through its "exceptional"
virtues of freedom, democracy and rule of law . In truth, US global dominance relied on the
application of ruthless imperial power.
The curious thing about capitalism is it always outgrows its national base. Markets
eventually become too small and the search for profits is insatiable. American capital soon
found more lucrative opportunities in the emerging market of China. From the 1980s on, US
corporations bailed out of America and set up shop in China, exploiting cheap labor and
exporting their goods back to increasingly underemployed America consumers. The arrangement was
propped up partly because of seemingly endless consumer debt.
That's not the whole picture of course. China has innovated and developed independently from
American capital. It is debatable whether China is an example of state-led capitalism or
socialism. The Chinese authorities would claim to subscribe to the latter. In any case, China's
economic development has transformed the entire Eurasian hemisphere. Whether you like it or
not, Beijing is the dynamo for the global economy. One indicator is how nations across
Asia-Pacific are deferring to China for their future growth.
Washington likes to huff and puff about alleged Chinese expansionism "threatening" US allies
in Asia-Pacific. But the reality is that Washington is living in the past of former glory.
Trading blocs like the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC) realize their bread is buttered
by China, no longer America.
Washington's rhetoric about "standing up to China" is just that
– empty rhetoric. It doesn't mean much to countries led by their interests of economic
development and the benefits of Chinese investment.
One example is Taiwan. In contrast to Washington's shibboleths about "free Taiwan", more and
more Asian countries are dialing down their bilateral links with Taiwan in deference to China's
position, which views the island as a renegade province. The US position is one of rhetoric,
whereas the relations of other countries are based on material economic exigencies. And
respecting Beijing's sensibilities is for them a prudent option.
A recent
report by the New York Times starkly illustrated the changing contours of the global
economic order. It confirmed what many others have observed, that China is on the way to
surpass the US as the world's top economy. During the 1980s, some 75 per cent of China's
population were living in "extreme poverty", according to the NY Times. Today, less than 1 per
cent of the population is in that dire category. For the US, the trajectory has been in reverse
with greater numbers of its people subject to deprivation.
China's strategic economic plans – the One Belt One Road initiative – of
integrating regional development under its leadership and finance have already created a world
order analogous to what American capital achieved in the postwar decades.
American pundits and politicians like Vice President Mike Pence may disparage China's
economic policies as creating "debt traps" for other countries . But the reality is that other
countries are gravitating to China's dynamic leadership.
Arguably, Beijing's vision for economic development is more enlightened and sustainable than
what was provided by the Americans and Europeans before. The leitmotif for China, along with
Russia, is very much one of multipolar development and mutual partnership. The global economy
is not simply moving from one hegemon – the US – to another imperial taskmaster
– China.
One thing seems inescapable. The days of American empire are over. Its capitalist vigor has
dissipated decades ago. What the upheaval and rancor in relations between Washington and
Beijing is all about is the American ruling class trying to recreate some fantasy of former
vitality. Washington wants China to sacrifice its own development in order to somehow
rejuvenate American society. It's not going to happen.
That's not to say that American society can never be rejuvenated . It could, as it could
also in Europe. But that would entail a restructuring of the economic system involving
democratic regeneration. The "good old days" of capitalism are gone. The American empire, as
with the European empires, is obsolete.
That's the unspoken Number One agenda item at the G20 summit. Bye-bye US empire.
What America needs to do is regenerate through a reinvented social economic order, one that
is driven by democratic development and not the capitalist private profit of an elite few.
If not, the futile alternative is US failing political leaders trying to coerce China, and
others, to pay for their future. That way leads to war.
"... Everyone knows it's the US presence in the Middle East which creates terrorists, both as proxies of and in resistance to the US imperial presence (and often one and then the other). So reading Orwellian language, Pompeo is saying the US wants to maximize Islamic terrorism in order to provide a pretext for creeping totalitarianism at home and abroad. ..."
"... The real reason is to maintain the petrodollar system, but there seems to be a conspiracy of silence never to mention it among both supporters and opponents of Trump. ..."
"... everyone knows why the usa is in the middle east.. to support the war industry, which is heavily tied to the financial industry.. up is down and down is up.. that is why the usa is great friends with ksa and israel and a sworn enemy of iran... what they don't say is they are a sworn enemy of humanity and the thought that the world can continue with their ongoing madness... ..."
"... The importance of oil is not to supply US markets its to deny it to enemies and control oil prices in order to feed international finance/IMF ..."
Trump also floated the idea of removing U.S. troops from the Middle East, citing the lower price of oil as a reason to withdraw.
"Now, are we going to stay in that part of the world? One reason to is Israel ," Trump said. "Oil is becoming less and less
of a reason because we're producing more oil now than we've ever produced. So, you know, all of a sudden it gets to a point
where you don't have to stay there."
It is only Israel, it is no longer the oil, says Trump. But the nuclear armed Israel does not need U.S. troops for its protection.
And if it is no longer the oil, why is the U.S. defending the Saudis?
Trump's Secretary of State Mike Pompeo disagrees with his boss. In a Wall Street journal op-ed today he claims that
The U.S.-Saudi Partnership
Is Vital because it includes much more then oil:
[D]egrading U.S.-Saudi ties would be a grave mistake for the national security of the U.S. and its allies.
The kingdom is a powerful force for stability in the Middle East. Saudi Arabia is working to secure Iraq's fragile democracy
and keep Baghdad tethered to the West's interests, not Tehran's. Riyadh is helping manage the flood of refugees fleeing Syria's
civil war by working with host countries, cooperating closely with Egypt, and establishing stronger ties with Israel. Saudi
Arabia has also contributed millions of dollars to the U.S.-led effort to fight Islamic State and other terrorist organizations.
Saudi oil production and economic stability are keys to regional prosperity and global energy security.
Where and when please has Saudi Arabia "managed the flood of refugees fleeing Syria's civil war". Was that when it
emptied its jails of violent criminals and sent them to wage jihad against the Syrian people? That indeed 'managed' to push
millions to flee from their homes.
Saudi Arabia might be many things but "a powerful force for stability" it is not. Just ask 18 million Yemenis who, after years
of Saudi bombardment, are near to death for lack of
food .
Pompeo's work for the Saudi dictator continued today with a Senate briefing on Yemen. The Senators will soon vote on a resolution
to end the U.S. support for the war. In his prepared remarks Pompeo wrote:
The suffering in Yemen grieves me, but if the United States of America was not involved in Yemen, it would be a hell of a lot
worse.
What could be worse than a famine that threatens two third of the population?
If the U.S. and Britain would not support the Saudis and Emirates the war would end within a day or two. The Saudi and UAE
planes are maintained by U.S. and British specialists. The Saudis still
seek 102 more U.S. military personal to
take care of their planes. It would be easy for the U.S. to stop such recruiting of its veterans.
It is the U.S. that
holds up an already
watered down UN Security Council resolution that calls for a ceasefire in Yemen:
The reason for the delay continues to be a White House worry about angering Saudi Arabia, which strongly opposes the resolution,
multiple sources say. CNN reported earlier this month that the Saudi crown prince, Mohammed bin Salman, "threw a fit" when
presented with an early draft of the document, leading to a delay and further discussions among Western allies on the matter.
There is really nothing in Trump's list on which the Saudis consistently followed through. His alliance with MbS brought him
no gain and a lot of trouble.
Trump protected MbS from the consequences of murdering Jamal Khashoggi. He hoped to gain leverage with that. But that is not
how MbS sees it. He now knows that Trump will not confront him no matter what he does. If MbS "threws a fit" over a UN Security
Council resolution, the U.S. will drop it. When he launches his next 'adventure', the U.S. will again cover his back. Is this
the way a super power is supposed to handle a client state?
If Trump's instincts really tell him that U.S. troops should be removed from the Middle East and Afghanistan, something I doubt,
he should follow them. Support for the Saudi war on Yemen will not help to achieve that. Pandering to MbS is not MAGA.
Posted by b on November 28, 2018 at 03:12 PM |
Permalink
Comments Pompeo: "Saudi Arabia has also contributed millions of dollars to the U.S.-led effort to fight Islamic State and other
terrorist organizations."
Everyone knows it's the US presence in the Middle East which creates terrorists, both as proxies of and in resistance to
the US imperial presence (and often one and then the other). So reading Orwellian language, Pompeo is saying the US wants to maximize
Islamic terrorism in order to provide a pretext for creeping totalitarianism at home and abroad.
The real reason is to maintain the petrodollar system, but there seems to be a conspiracy of silence never to mention it among
both supporters and opponents of Trump.
There is really nothing in Trump's list on which the Saudis consistently followed through. His alliance with MbS brought him
no gain and a lot of trouble.
He did get to fondle the orb - although fuck knows what weirdness was really going on there.
thanks b... pompeo is a very bad liar... in fact - everything he says is about exactly the opposite, but bottom line is he is
a bad liar as he is thoroughly unconvincing..
everyone knows why the usa is in the middle east.. to support the war industry, which is heavily tied to the financial
industry.. up is down and down is up.. that is why the usa is great friends with ksa and israel and a sworn enemy of iran... what
they don't say is they are a sworn enemy of humanity and the thought that the world can continue with their ongoing madness...
oh, but don't forget to vote, LOLOL.... no wonder so many are strung out on drugs, and the pharma industry... opening up to
the msm is opening oneself up to the world george orwell described many years ago...
Take a wafer or two of silicon and just add water. The oil obsession has been eclipsed and within 20 years will be in absolute
disarray. The warmongers will invent new excuses.
A hypothetical: No extraordinary amounts of hydrocarbons exist under Southwest Asian ground; just an essential amount for domestic
consumption; in that case, would Zionistan exist where it's currently located and would either Saudi Arabia, Iraq and/or Iran
have any significance aside from being consumers of Outlaw US Empire goods? Would the Balfour Declaration and the Sykes/Picot
Secret Treaty have been made? If the Orinoco Oil Belt didn't exist, would Venezuela's government be continually targeted for Imperial
control? If there was no Brazilian offshore oil, would the Regime Change effort have been made there? Here the hypotheticals end
and a few basic yet important questions follow.
Previous to the 20th Century, why were Hawaii and Samoa wrested from their native residents and annexed to Empire? In what
way did the lowly family farmers spread across 19th Century United States further the growth of its Empire and contribute to the
above named annexations? What was the unspoken message sent to US elites contained within Frederic Jackson Turner's 1893 Frontier
Thesis ? Why is the dominant language of North America English, not French or Spanish?
None of these are rhetorical. All second paragraph questions I asked of my history students. And all have a bearing on b's
fundamental question.
b says, "And it its no longer the oil, why is the U.S. defending the Saudis?"
The US has a vital interest in protecting the narrative of 9/11. The Saudis supplied the patsies. Mossad and dual-citizen neocons
were the architects of the event. Hence, the US must avoid a nasty divorce from the Saudis. The Saudis are in a perfect blackmailing
position.
Of course, most Americans have no idea that the U.S. Shale Oil Industry is nothing more than a Ponzi Scheme because of the
mainstream media's inability to report FACT from FICTION. However, they don't deserve all of the blame as the shale energy
industry has done an excellent job hiding the financial distress from the public and investors by the use of highly technical
jargon and BS.
S.A. is a thinly disguised US military base, hence the "strategic importance" and the relevance of the new Viceroy's previous
experience as a Four Star General. It's doubtful that any of the skilled personnel in the SA Air Force are other than former US/Nato.
A few princes might fancy themselves to be daring fighter pilots. In case of a Anglo-Zio war with Iran SA would be the most forward
US aircraft carrier. The Empire is sustained by its presumed military might and prizes nothing more than its strategically situated
bases. Saud would like to capture Yemen's oil fields, but the primary purpose of the air war is probably training. That of course
is more despicably cynical than mere conquest and genocide.
Trump is the ultimate deceiver/liar. Great actor reading from a script. The heel in the Fake wrestling otherwise known as US politics.
It almost sounds as if he is calling for an end of anymore significant price drops now that he has got Powell on board to limit
interest rate hikes. After all if you are the worlds biggest producer you dont want prices too low. These markets are all manipulated.
I cant imagine how much insider trading is going on. If you look at the oil prices, they started dropping in October with Iran
sanctions looming (before it was announced irans shipments to its 8 biggest buyers would be exempt) and at the height of the Khashoggi
event where sanctions were threatened and Saudi was making threats of their own. In a real free market prices increase amidst
supply uncertainty.
Regardless of what he says he wants and gets now, he is already planning a reversal. Thats how the big boys win, they know
whats coming and when the con the smaller fish to swim one way they are lined up with a big mouth wide open. Controlled chaos
and confusion. For every winner there must be a loser and the losers assets/money are food for the Gods of Money and War
As for pulling out of the Middle East Bibi must have had a good laugh. My money is on the US to be in Yemen to protect them
from the Saudis (humanitarian) and Iranian backed Houthis while in reality we will be there to secure the enormous oil fields
in the North. Perhaps this was what the Khashoggi trap was all about. The importance of oil is not to supply US markets its to
deny it to enemies and control oil prices in order to feed international finance/IMF
@ Pft who wrote: "The importance of oil is not to supply US markets its to deny it to enemies and control oil prices in order
to feed international finance/IMF"
BINGO!!! Those that control finance control most/all of everything else.
Saudi Arabia literally owns close to 8% of the United States economy through various financial instruments. Their public investment
funds and dark pools own large chunks from various strategic firms resting at the apex of western power such as Blackstone. Trump
and Pompeo would be stupid to cut off their nose to spite their face... It's all about the petrodollar, uncle sam will ride and
die with saudi barbaria. If push comes to shove and the saudis decide to untether themselves from the Empire, their sand kingdom
will probably be partitioned.
The oil certainly still plays an important role, the u.s. cannot maintain the current frack oil output for long. For Tronald's
term in office it will suffice, but hardly longer. (The frack gas supplies are much more substantial.)
Personal interests certainly also play a role, and finally one should not make u.s. foreign policy more rational than it is.
Much is also done because of traditions and personal convictions. Often they got it completely wrong and the result was a complete
failure.
Let us watch what Trump does with this or if the resolution makes it to daylight:
Senate advances Yemen resolution in rebuke to Trump
The Senate issued a sharp rebuke Wednesday to President Trump, easily advancing a resolution that would end U.S. military support
for the Saudi-led campaign in Yemen's civil war despite a White House effort to quash the bill.
The administration launched an eleventh-hour lobbying frenzy to try to head off momentum for the resolution, dispatching
Defense Secretary James Mattis and Secretary of State Mike Pompeo to Capitol Hill in the morning and issuing a veto threat
less than an hour before the vote started.
But lawmakers advanced the resolution, 63-37, even as the administration vowed to stand by Saudi Arabia following outcry
over the killing of journalist Jamal Khashoggi.
"There's been a lot of rhetoric that's come from the White House and from the State Department on this issue," said Sen.
Bob Corker (R-Tenn.), chairman of the Foreign Relations Committee. "The rhetoric that I've heard and the broadcasts that we've
made around the world as to who we are have been way out of balance as it relates to American interests and American values."
[/] LINK
TheHill
But Mattis says there is no smoking gun to tie the Clown Thug-Prince to Kashoggi's killing.
TheHill
And Lyias @ 2 is a bingo. Always follow the fiat.
Soon, without any announcements, if they wish to maintain selling oil to China, KSA will follow Qatar. It will be priced in
Yuan...especially given the escalating U.S. trade war with China.
2019 holds interesting times. Order a truckload of popcorn.
Midwest For Truth , Nov 28, 2018 7:29:46 PM |
link
You would have to have your head buried in the sand to not see that the Saudi "Kings" are crypto-Zionistas. Carl Sagan once said,
"One of the saddest lessons of history is this: If we've been bamboozled long enough, we tend to reject any evidence of the bamboozle.
We're no longer interested in finding out the truth. The bamboozle has captured us. It's simply too painful to acknowledge, even
to ourselves, that we've been taken. Once you give a charlatan power over you, you almost never get it back." And Mark Twain also
wrote "It's easier to fool people than to convince them that they have been fooled."
Gee, not one taker amongst all these intelligent folk. From last to first: 1588's Protestant Wind allowed Elizabeth and her cronies
to literally keep their heads as Nature helped Drake defeat the Spanish Armada; otherwise, there would be no British Empire root
to the USA, thus no USA and no future Outlaw US Empire, the British Isles becoming a Hapsburg Imperial Property, and a completely
different historical lineage, perhaps sans World Wars and atomic weapons.
Turner's message was with the Frontier closed the "safety valve" of continental expansion defusing political tensions based
on economic inequalities had ceased to be of benefit and future policy would need to deal with that issue thus removing the Fear
Factor from the natives to immigrants, and from wide-open spaces to the inner cities. Whipsawing business cycles driving urban
labor's unrest, populist People's Party politics, and McKinley's 1901 assassination further drove his points home.
Nationwide, family farmers demanded Federal government help to create additional markets for their produce to generate price
inflation so they could remain solvent and keep their homesteads, which translated into the need to conduct international commerce
via the seas which required coaling stations--Hawaii and Samoa, amongst others--and a Blue Water Navy that eventually led to Alfred
T. Mahan's doctrine of Imperial Control of the Oceans still in use today.
As with Gengis Khan's death in 1227 that stopped the Mongol expansion to the English Channel that changed the course of European
history, and what was seen as the Protestant Wind being Divine Intervention, global history has several similar inflection points
turning the tide from one path to another. We don't know yet if the Outlaw US Empire's reliance on Saudi is such, but we can see
it turning from being a great positive to an equally potential great negative for the Empire--humanity as a whole, IMO, will benefit
greatly from an implosion and the relationship becoming a Great Negative helping to strip what remains of the Emperor's Clothing
from his torso so that nations and their citizens can deter the oncoming financialized economic suicide caused by massive debt
and climate chaos.
Vico's circle is about to intersect with Hegel's dialectic and generate a new temporal phase in human history. Although many
will find it hard to tell, the current direction points to a difficult change to a more positive course for humanity as a whole,
but it's also possible that disaster could strike with humanity's total or near extinction being the outcome--good arguments can
be made for either outcome, which ought to unsettle everyone: Yes, the times are that tenuous. But then, I'm merely a lonely historian
aware of a great many things, including the pitfall inherent in trying to predict future events.
"The suffering in Yemen grieves me, but if the United States of America was not involved in Yemen, it would be a hell of a lot
worse." And I'll bet Pompeo said that with a straight face, too. lmfao
And as for "...keep[ing] Baghdad tethered to the West's interests and not Tehran's," I'm guessing the "secretary" would have
us all agree "yeah, fk Iraqi sovereignty anyway. Besides, it's not like they share a border with Iran, or anything. Oh,
wait..."
p.s. Many thanks for all you have contributed to collective knowledge, b; I will be contacting you about making a contribution
by snail mail (I hate PayPal, too).
"... a powerful force for stability in the Middle East."
"Instability" more like it.
Paid for military coup in Egypt. Funding anti-Syrian terrorists. Ongoing tensions with Iran. Zip-all for the Palestinians.
WTF in Yemen. Wahhabi crazy sh_t (via Mosque building) across Asia. Head and hand chopping Friday specials the norm -- especially
of their South-Asian slave classes. Ok, so females can now drive cars -- woohoo. A family run business venture manipulating the
global oil trade and supporting US-petro-$ hegemony recently out of goat herding and each new generation 'initiated' in some Houston
secret society toe-touching shower and soap ceremonies before placement in the ruling hierarchy back home. But enough; they being
Semites makes it an offence to criticize in some 'free' democratic world domains.
Instead of the "rebuke to Trump" meme circulating around, I found
this statement to be more accurate:
"'Cutting off military aid to Saudi Arabia is the right choice for Yemen, the right choice for our national security, and the
right choice for upholding the Constitution,' Paul Kawika Martin, senior director for policy and political affairs at Peace Action,
declared in a statement. ' Three years ago, the notion of Congress voting to cut off military support for Saudi Arabia would
have been politically laughable .'" [My Emphasis]
In other words, advancing Peace with Obama as POTUS wasn't going to happen, so this vote ought to be seen as an attack on Obama's
legacy as it's his policy that's being reconsidered and hopefully discontinued.
Trump, Israel and the Sawdi's. US no longer needs middle east oil for strategic supply. Trump is doing away with the petro-dollar
as that scam has run its course and maintenance is higher than returns. Saudi and other middle east oil is required for global
energy dominance.
Energy dominance, lebensraum for Israel and destroying the current Iran are all objectives that fit into one neat package.
Those plans look to be coming apart at the moment so it remains to be seen how fanatical Trump is on Israel and MAGA. MAGA
as US was at the collapse of the Soviet Union.
As for pulling out of the Middle East Bibi must have had a good laugh. Remember when he said he wanted out of Syria. My money
is on the US to be in Yemen before too long to protect them from the Saudis (humanitarian) and Iranian backed Houthis, while in
reality it will be to secure the enormous oil fields in the North. Perhaps this was what the Khashoggi trap was all about.
The importance of oil is not to supply US markets its to deny it to enemies and control oil prices in order to feed international
finance/IMF .
@16 karlof1.. thanks for a broader historical perspective which you are able to bring to moa.. i enjoy reading your comments..
i don't have answers to ALL your questions earlier.. i have answers for some of them... you want to make it easy on us uneducated
folks and give us less questions, like b did in his post here, lol.... cheers james
The US Senate has advanced a measure to withdraw American support for a Saudi-led coalition fighting in Yemen.
In a blow to President Donald Trump, senators voted 63-37 to take forward a motion on ending US support.
Secretary of State Mike Pompeo and Defence Secretary Jim Mattis had urged Senators not to back the motion, saying it would
worsen the situation in Yemen.
...
The vote in the Senate means further debate on US support for Saudi Arabia is expected next week.
However, correspondents say that even if the Senate ultimately passes the bipartisan resolution it has little chance of
being approved by the outgoing House of Representatives.
That is quite a slap for the Trump administration. It will have little consequences in the short term (or for Yemen) but it sets
a new direction in foreign polices towards the Saudis.
Pompeo is a Deep State Israel-firster with a nasty neocon agenda. It is to Trump's disgrace that he chose Pompeo and the abominable
Bolton. At least Trump admits the ME invasions are really about Israel.
Take a look at some of the - informed - comments below the vid to which you linked. Then think again about an 'all electric
civilisation within a few years'. Yes, and Father Christmas will be providing everything that everyone in the world needs for
a NAmerican/European standard of living within the same time frame. Er - not.
'Renewables' are not going to save hitech industrial 'civilisation' from The Long Descent/Catabolic Collapse (qv). Apart from
any other consideration - and there are some other equally intractable ones - there is no - repeat NO - 'renewable' energy system
which doesn't rely crucially on energy subsidies from the fossil-hydrocarbon fuels, both to build it and to maintain it. They're
not stand-alone, self-bootstrapping technologies. Nor is there any realistic prospect that they ever will be. Fully renewable-power
hitech industrial civilisation is a non-deliverable mirage which is just drawing us ever further into the desert of irreversible
peak-energy/peak-everythig-else.
@16 karlof1. I also find your historical references very interesting. We do indeed seem to be at a very low point in the material
cycle, it will reverse in due course as is its want, hopefully we will live to see a positive change in humanity.
For example we know Tesla didn't succeed in splitting the planet in half, the way techno-psychotics fantasize. As for that
silly link, how typical of techno-wingnuts to respond to prosaic physical facts with fantasies. Anything to prop up faith in the
technocratic-fundamentalist religion. Meanwhile "electrical civilization" has always meant and will always mean fracking and coal,
until the whole fossil-fueled extreme energy nightmare is over.
Given the proven fact that the extreme energy civilization has done nothing but embark upon a campaign to completely destroy
humanity and the Earth (like in your Tesla fantasy), why would a non-psychopath want to prop it up anyway?
It is still the oil, even for the US. The Persian Gulf supplies 20% of world consumption, and Western Europe gets 40% of its oil
from OPEC countries, most of that from the Gulf. Even the US still imports 10% of its total consumption.
Peter AU 1 | Nov 28, 2018 9:44:50 PM | 20
b | Nov 29, 2018 2:33:04 AM | 23
USD as a world reserve currency could be one factor between the important ones. With non US support the saud land could crash
under neighbours pressure, that caos may be not welcomed.
Humble people around where I live have mentioned that time is speeding up its velocity; there seems to be a spiritual (evolutionary)/physical
interface effect or something...
Tolstoy, in the long theory-of-history exposition at the end of War and Peace, challenges 'the great man' of History idea,
spreading in his time, at the dawning of the so-called: European Romantic period of Beethoven, Goerte and Wagner, when
the unique person was glorified in the name of art, truth, whatever (eventually this bubble burst too, in the 20th C. and IMO
because of too much fervent worship in the Cult of the Temple of the Money God. Dostoyevki's great Crime and Punishment is all
about this issue.)
Tolstoy tries to describe a scientifically-determined historical process, dissing the 'great man of History' thesis. He was
thinking of Napoleon Bonaparte of course, the run-away upstart repulican, anathema to the established order. Tolstoy describes
it in the opening scene of the novel: a fascinating parlor-room conversation between a "liberal" woman of good-birth in the elite
circles of society and a military captain at the party.
...only tenuously relevant to karlofi1's great post touching upon the Theory of History as such; thanks.
Now as to the question: żWhy is Trump supporting Saudi Arabia? Let me think about that...
After Democratic party was co-opted by neoliberals there is no way back. And since Obama the trend of Democratic Party is
toward strengthening the wing of CIA-democratic notthe wing of the party friendly to workers. Bought by Wall Street leadership is
uncable of intruting any change that undermine thier current neoliberal platform. that's why they criminally derailed Sanders.
Notable quotes:
"... When you think about the issue of how exactly a clean-energy jobs program would address the elephant in the room of private accumulation and how such a program, under capitalism, would be able to pay living wages to the people put to work under it, it exposes how non threatening these Green New Deals actually are to capitalism. ..."
"... To quote Trotsky, "These people are capable of and ready for anything!" ..."
"... "Any serious measures to stop global warming, let alone assure a job and livable wage to everyone, would require a massive redistribution of wealth and the reallocation of trillions currently spent on US imperialism's neo-colonial wars abroad." ..."
"... "It includes various left-sounding rhetoric, but is entirely directed to and dependent upon the Democratic Party." ..."
"... "And again and again, in the name of "practicality," the most unrealistic and impractical policy is promoted -- supporting a party that represents the class that is oppressing and exploiting you! The result is precisely the disastrous situation working people and youth face today -- falling wages, no job security, growing repression and the mounting threat of world war." - New York Times tries to shame "disillusioned young voters" into supporting the Democrats ..."
"... It is an illusion that technical innovation within the capitalist system will magically fundamentally resolve the material problems produced by capitalism. But the inconvenient facts are entirely ignored by the corporate shills in the DSA and the whole lot of establishment politicians, who prefer to indulge their addiction to wealth and power with delusions of grandeur, technological utopianism, and other figments that serve the needs of their class. ..."
"... First it was Obama with his phoney "hope and change" that lured young voters to the Dumbicrats and now it's Ocacia Cortez promising a "green deal" in order to herd them back into the Democratic party--a total fraud of course--totally obvious! ..."
"... from Greenwald: The Democratic Party's deceitful game https://www.salon.com/2010/... ..."
they literally ripped this out of the 2016 Green Party platform. Jill Stein spoke repeatedly
about the same exact kind of Green New Deal, a full-employment, transition-to-100%-renewables
program that would supposedly solve all the world's problems.
When you think about the issue of how exactly a clean-energy jobs program would address
the elephant in the room of private accumulation and how such a program, under capitalism,
would be able to pay living wages to the people put to work under it, it exposes how non
threatening these Green New Deals actually are to capitalism.
In 2016, when the Greens made
this their central economic policy proposal, the Democrats responded by calling that platform
irresponsible and dangerous ("even if it's a good idea, you can't actually vote for a
non-two-party candidate!"). Why would they suddenly find a green new deal appealing now
except for its true purpose: left cover for the very system destroying the planet.
To quote
Trotsky, "These people are capable of and ready for anything!"
"Any serious measures to stop global warming, let alone assure a job and livable wage to
everyone, would require a massive redistribution of wealth and the reallocation of trillions
currently spent on US imperialism's neo-colonial wars abroad."
Their political position not only lacks seriousness, unserious is their political
position.
"It includes various left-sounding rhetoric, but is entirely directed to and dependent
upon the Democratic Party."
For subjective-idealists, what you want to believe, think and feel is just so much more
convincing than objective reality. Especially when it covers over single-minded class
interests at play.
"And again and again, in the name of "practicality," the most unrealistic and impractical
policy is promoted -- supporting a party that represents the class that is oppressing and
exploiting you! The result is precisely the disastrous situation working people and youth
face today -- falling wages, no job security, growing repression and the mounting threat of
world war." - New York Times tries to shame "disillusioned young voters" into supporting
the Democrats
It is an illusion that technical innovation within the capitalist system will magically
fundamentally resolve the material problems produced by capitalism. But the inconvenient
facts are entirely ignored by the corporate shills in the DSA and the whole lot of
establishment politicians, who prefer to indulge their addiction to wealth and power with
delusions of grandeur, technological utopianism, and other figments that serve the needs of
their class.
First it was Obama with his phoney "hope and change" that lured young voters to the
Dumbicrats and now it's Ocacia Cortez promising a "green deal" in order to herd them back
into the Democratic party--a total fraud of course--totally obvious!
Only an International Socialist program led by Workers can truly lead a "green revolution" by
expropriating the billionaire oil barons of their capital and redirecting that wealth into
the socialist reconstruction of the entire economy.
Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez's "Green New Deal" is a nice laugh. Really, it sure is funny hearing
these lies given any credence at all. This showmanship belongs in a fantasy book, not in real
life. The Democratic Party as a force for good social change Now that's a laugh!
Lies, empty promises, meaningless tautologies and morality plays, qualified and conditional
declarations to be backpedalled pending appropriate political expediencies, devoid any
practical content that is what AOC, card carrying member of DSA, and in fact young energetic
political apparatchik of calcified political body of Dems establishment, duty engulfs. And
working for socialist revolution is no one of them.
What kind of socialist would reject socialist revolution, class struggle and class
emancipation and choose, as a suppose socialist path, accommodation with oligarchic ruling
elite via political, not revolutionary process that would have necessarily overthrown ruling
elite.
What socialist would acquiesce to legalized exploitation of people for profit, legalized
greed and inequality and would negotiate away fundamental principle of egalitarianism and
working people self rule?
Only National Socialist would; and that is exactly what AOC campaign turned out to be all
about.
National Socialism with imperial flavor is her affiliation and what her praises for
Pelosi, wife of a billionaire and dead warmonger McCain proved.
Now she is peddling magical thinking about global change and plunge herself into falacy of
entrepreneurship, Market solution to the very problem that the market solutions were designed
to create and aggravate namely horrific inequality that is robbing people from their own
opportunities to mitigate devastating effects of global change.
The insidiousness of phony socialists expresses itself in the fact that they lie that any
social problem can be fixed by current of future technical means, namely via so called
technological revolution instead by socialist revolution they deem unnecessary or
detrimental.
The technical means for achieving socialism has existed since the late 19th century, with the
telegraph, the coal-powered factory, and modern fertilizer. The improvements since then have
only made socialism even more streamlined and efficient, if such technologies could only be
liberated from capital! The idea that "we need a new technological revolution just to achieve
socialism" reflects the indoctrination in capitalism by many "socialist" theorists because it
is only in capitalism where "technological growth" is essential simply to maintain the
system. It is only in capitalism (especially America, the most advanced capitalist nation,
and thus, the one where capitalism is actually closest towards total crisis) where the dogma
of a technological savior is most entrenched because America cannot offer any other kind of
palliative to the more literate and productive sections of its population. Religion will not
convince most and any attempt at a sociological or economic understanding would inevitably
prove the truth of socialism.
"... The original "New Deal," which included massive public works infrastructure projects, was introduced by Democratic President Franklin Roosevelt in the 1930s amid the Great Depression. Its purpose was to stave off a socialist revolution in America. It was a response to a militant upsurge of strikes and violent class battles, led by socialists who were inspired by the 1917 Russian Revolution ..."
"... Since the 2008 crash, first under Bush and Obama, and now Trump, the ruling elites have pursued a single-minded policy of enriching the wealthy, through free credit, corporate bailouts and tax cuts, while slashing spending on social services. ..."
"... To claim as does Ocasio-Cortez that American capitalism can provide a new "New Deal," of a green or any other variety, is to pfile:///F:/Private_html/Skeptics/Political_skeptic/Neoliberalism/Historyromote an obvious political fiction." ..."
"The original "New Deal," which included massive public works infrastructure projects,
was introduced by Democratic President Franklin Roosevelt in the 1930s amid the Great
Depression. Its purpose was to stave off a socialist revolution in America. It was a response
to a militant upsurge of strikes and violent class battles, led by socialists who were
inspired by the 1917 Russian Revolution that had occurred less than two decades before.
American capitalism could afford to make such concessions because of its economic
dominance. The past forty years have been characterized by the continued decline of American
capitalism on a world stage relative to its major rivals. The ruling class has responded to
this crisis with a social counterrevolution to claw back all gains won by workers. This has
been carried out under both Democratic and Republican administrations and with the assistance
of the trade unions.
Since the 2008 crash, first under Bush and Obama, and now Trump, the ruling elites have
pursued a single-minded policy of enriching the wealthy, through free credit, corporate
bailouts and tax cuts, while slashing spending on social services.
To claim as does Ocasio-Cortez that American capitalism can provide a new "New Deal," of a
green or any other variety, is to pfile:///F:/Private_html/Skeptics/Political_skeptic/Neoliberalism/Historyromote an obvious political fiction."
US allies in Europe and Asia did not expect to be treated like vassal states, at least not
openly. Succumbing to Trump's demands is an admission of being a lapdog.
US allies in Europe and Asia have no choice but to push back against Trump's bullying and
condescending stances. They are elected by their citizens to protect the countries' sovereignty
and interests, after all. Too, these leaders must save face and protect their legacies.
One of the first European leaders having the courage to defy Trump is French President
Emmanuel Macron, calling for the establishment of a European Union army independent of the US
to defend itself against Russia, China and possibly America itself. His proposal is supported
by German Chancellor Angela Merkel.
Asian allies, particularly India, also seem to have pushed back , buying Iranian oil whether
the US likes it or not.
Washington's attempt to revive the Quadrilateral Security Dialogue comprising itself and
soulmates Australia, India and Japan may be losing support. Instead of joining with the US to
contain China, India and Japan are seeking rapprochement with the Asian giant. Even "deputy
sheriff" Australia is apparently having second thoughts, as one of its states is
officially joining China's Belt and and Road Initiative.
In short, these three allies might finally realize that joining the US in containing China
is harmful to their national interests. Fighting that nuclear power on their own soil might not
be a good idea.
No country treats the US 'unfairly'
The fact of the matter is no country treats the US "unfairly" or is "eating its lunch." On
the contrary, it could be argued that it is the other way around.
Having emerged as the world's strongest nation during and after World War II, US foreign
policies have one goal: Shape the world to its image. That process began at the 1944 Bretton
Woods Conference, insisting on using the US dollar as the world reserve currency and writing
the trade rules. In this way, the US has accumulated a very powerful tool, printing as much
money as it wants without repercussions to itself. For example, when a country wants to cash
its US Treasury holdings, all America has to do is print more greenbacks.
To that end, the US is clearly "eating other countries' lunch." Indeed, a major reason the
US can afford to build so many weapons is that other countries are paying for them.
US
trade practices
On trade, the US in 1950 rejected the UK's proposal of forming an International Trade
Organization (ITO) modeled after the International Monetary Fund and World Bank because it
feared the ITO might have harmed American manufacturing. In its place, the US proposed and
succeeded in forming the General Agreement on
Tariffs and Trade (GATT) framework to negotiate tariff rates on goods.
Being the world's most powerful economy and biggest trading nation at that time, the US
dominated the world trading system and wrote its rules. For example, it was the US that
invented and implemented non-tariff trade barriers such as anti-dumping duties and
national-security concerns to block imports. For example, the US imposed tariffs on Canadian,
EU, Mexican and other countries' steel and aluminum from entering its market for security
reasons.
It is laughable for the US to accuse Canada, the EU and Mexico of posing a national-security
threat. They are, in fact, America's most staunch allies.
US foreign direct investment
abroad
US companies bring with them ideas and technology (for which they charge exorbitant prices)
when investing in a foreign market such as China and elsewhere. The capital needed to build
factories is largely funded by the host country or other partners. For example, it is Taiwanese
and Japanese investors that built Foxconn factories in China to assemble American electronic
gadgets such as the iPad.
What's more, US companies charge huge prices for the products they make in China. According
to the Asian Development Bank and other research organizations, Chinese labor, for example,
receives a small percentage of the profits Apple takes in from gadgets it produces in China.
This lopsided profit distribution raises the question: Who is "eating whose
lunch?"
America has itself to blame
The US cannot blame China or any other country for its declining global influence and
dominance – America, particularly under Donald Trump, did that to itself. Chinese
President Xi Jinping, indeed, has advocated cooperation and dialogue as ways to defuse
conflicts and attain a better world.
No country has ever even hinted at attacking the US; it is after all the world's most
powerful nation, armed with enough conventional and nuclear weapons to blow up the world. The
"threats" are exaggerated or invented by US neoconservatives and vested interests to scare
Americans into supporting huge defense spending.
'Fake news' can only go so far
Using "fake news" to pressure countries into submission might work with those unable to
fight back, but could be extremely costly against powers such as China and Russia. For example,
Trump's escalating trade tensions with China are already adversely affecting the US economy, as
seen in falling GDP growth, decreasing stock prices, a huge agricultural inventory, and rising
poverty.
According to United Nations, the impoverished American population is being hit the hardest
under the Trump administration. The US Federal Reserve and others are projecting significant
economic decline in the foreseeable future if the trade war does not end.
One can only imagine what a nuclear war would bring.
Donald Trump is probably no less bullying than his predecessors (perhaps with the exception
of George W Bush), but he is more open about it. Bush's outburst, "You are either with us or
against us," earned America a bad reputation when he demanded that allies join him to invade
Iraq.
Trump has bullied or offended everyone, friends and foes alike. Unless he shifts gear, he
could alienate friends as well as foes, which could erode US geopolitical influence and
economic growth or might even bring the country down. He cannot threaten sovereign nations
without incurring huge costs to America.
TheRealNews
Published on 14 Nov 2018
The latest revelation about Brazil's slow motion coup, designed to ensure that the
center-left remains out of power and the far-right takes control, involves a general who
admitted that he threatened the Supreme Court so it would imprison presidential front-runner
Lula da Silva. We discuss the development with Brian Mier
I personally don't understand the French electorate on these matters. Macron in particular
did not promise anything other than to deliver more of the same policies, albeit with
more youth and more vigor, as a frank globalist. Who, exactly, was excited at his election but
is disappointed now? People with a short attention span or susceptibility to marketing
gimmicks, I assume.
It is hard to talk about the French media without getting a bit conspiratorial, at least, I
speak of "structural conspiracies." Macron's unabashed, "modernizing" globalism certainly
corresponds to the id of the French media-corporate elites and to top 20% of the
electorate, let us say, the talented fifth. He was able to break through the old French
two-party system, annihilating the Socialist Party and sidelining the conservatives. The media
certainly helped in this, preferring him to either the conservative François Fillon or
the civic nationalist Marine Le Pen.
However, the media have to a certain extent turned on Macron, perhaps because he
believes his "complex thoughts" cannot be grasped by
journalists with their admittedly limited cognitive abilities . Turn on the French radio
and you'll hear stories of how the so-called "Youth With Macron," whose twenty- and
thirty-somethings were invited onto all the talk shows just before Macron became a leading
candidate, were actually former Socialist party hacks with no grass roots. Astroturf. I could
have told you that.
Macron has made a number of what the media call "gaffes." When an old lady voiced concern
about the future of her pension,
he answered : "you don't have a right to complain." He has also done many things that
anyone with just a little sense of decorum will be disgusted by. The 40-year-old Macron, who
has a 65-year-old wife and claims not to be a homosexual, loves being photographed with sweaty
black bodies.
... ... ...
So there's that. But, in terms of policies, I cannot say that the people who supported
Macron have any right to complain. He is doing what he promised, that is to say, steaming full
straight ahead on the globalist course with, a bit more forthrightness and, he hopes,
competence than his Socialist or conservative predecessors.
Link
Bookmark In truth there are no solutions. There is nothing he can do to make the elitist and
gridlocked European Union more effective, nothing he can do to improve the "human capital" in
the Afro-Islamic banlieues , and not much he can do to improve the economy which the
French people would find acceptable. A bit more of labor flexibility here, a bit of a tax break
there, oh wait deficit's too big, a tax hike in some other area too, then. Six of one, half a
dozen in the other. Oh, and they've also passed
more censorship legislation to fight "fake news" and "election meddling" and other pathetic
excuses the media-political class across the West have come up with for their loss of control
over the Narrative.
Since the European Central Bank has been printing lending hundreds of billions of euros to
stimulate the Eurozone economy, France's economic performance has been decidedly mediocre, with
low growth, slowly declining unemployment, and no reduction in debt (currently at 98.7% of
GDP). Performance will presumably worsen if the ECB, as planned, phases out stimulus at the end
of this year.
There is a rather weird situation in terms of immigration and diversity. Everyone seems to
be aware of the hellscape of ethno-religious conflict which will thrive in the emerging
Afro-Islamic France of the future. Just recently at the commemoration of the Battle of Verdun,
an elderly French soldier asked Macron : "When will you kick out the illegal immigrants? .
. . Aren't we bringing in a Trojan Horse?"
More significant was the resignation of Gérard Collomb from his position as interior
minister last month to return to his old job as mayor of Lyon, which he apparently finds more
interesting. Collomb is a 71-year-old Socialist politician who has apparently awakened to the
problems of ethnic segregation and conflict. He said in his
farewell address :
I have been in all the neighborhoods, the neighborhoods of Marseille-North to Mirail in
Toulous, to the Parisian periphery, Corbeil, Aulnay, Sevran, the situation has deteriorated
greatly. We cannot continue to work on towns individually, there needs to be an overarching
vision to recreate social mixing. Because today we are living side by side, and I still say,
me, I fear that tomorrow we will live face-to-face [i.e. across a battle lines].
It is not clear how much Collomb tried to act upon these concerns as interior minister and
was frustrated. In any case, he dared to voice the same concerns to
the far-right magazine Valeurs Actuelles last February. He told them: "The relations
between people are very difficult, people don't want to live together" (using the term
vivre-ensemble , a common diversitarian slogan). He said immigration's responsibility
for this was "enormous" and agreed with the journalist that "France no longer needs
immigration." Collomb then virtually predicted civil war:
Communities in France are coming into conflict more and more and it is becoming very
violent . . . I would say that, within five years, the situation could become irreversible.
Yes, we have five or six years to avoid the worst. After that . . .
It's unclear why "the next five or six years" should be so critical. From one point of view,
the old France is already lost as about
a third of births are non-European and in particular
one fifth are Islamic . The patterns of life in much of France will therefore likely come
to reflect those of Africa and the Middle-East, including random violence and religious
fanaticism. Collomb seems to think "social mixing" would prevent this, but in fact, there has
been plenty of social and even genetic "mixing" in Brazil and Mexico, without this preventing
ethno-racial stratification and extreme levels of violence.
I'm afraid it's all more of the same in douce France , sweet France. On the current
path, Macron will be a one-termer like Sarkozy and Hollande were. Then again, the next
elections will be in three-and-a-half years, an eternity in democratic politics. In all
likelihood, this would be the Right's election to win, with a conservative anti-immigration
candidate. A few people of the mainstream Right are open to working with Le Pen's National
Rally and some have even defended the Identitarians. Then again, I could even imagine
Macron posing as a heroic opponent of (illegal . . .) immigration if he thought it could
help get him reelected. Watch this space . . .
How many immigrants from Africa come to Europe depends only on political will of Europeans. The
demography of African has nothing to do with it. Europe has means to stop immigration legal and
illegal. Macron talking about how many children are born in Africa is just another cop out.
A few months ago I claimed that Emmanuel Macron has/holds an ""Alt Right" worldview" due
to him having had interactions with an influential member of the French Protestant Huguenot
minority in France: http://www.unz.com/article/collateral-damage/#comment-1955020
[...] Macron : Germany is different from France. You are more Protestant, which results
in a significant difference. Through the church, through Catholicism, French society was
structured vertically, from top to bottom. I am convinced that it has remained so until
today. That might sound shocking to some – and don't worry, I don't see myself as a
king. But whether you like it or not, France's history is unique in Europe. Not to put too
fine a point on it, France is a country of regicidal monarchists. It is a paradox: The
French want to elect a king, but they would like to be able to overthrow him whenever they
want. The office of president is not a normal office – that is something one should
understand when one occupies it. You have to be prepared to be disparaged, insulted and
mocked – that is in the French nature. And: As president, you cannot have a desire to
be loved. Which is, of course, difficult because everybody wants to be loved. But in the end,
that's not important. What is important is serving the country and moving it forward.
Who, exactly, was excited at his election but is disappointed now? People with a short
attention span or susceptibility to marketing gimmicks, I assume.
Gold age of the USA (say 40 years from 1946 to approximately 1986 ) were an in some way an aberration caused by WWII. As soon
as Germany and Japan rebuilt themselves this era was over. And the collapse of the USSR in 1991 (or more correct Soviet
nomenklatura switching sides and adopting neoliberalism) only make the decline more gradual but did not reversed it. After
200 it was clear that neoliberalism is in trouble and in 2008 it was clear that ideology of neoliberalism is dead, much like
Bolshevism after 1945.
As the US ruling neoliberal elite adopted this ideology ad its flag, the USA faces the situation somewhat similar the USSR
faced in 70th. It needs its "Perestroika" but with weak leader at the helm like Gorbachov it can lead to the dissolution of
the state. Dismantling neoliberalism is not less dangerous then dismantling of Bolshevism. The level of brainwashing of both
population and the elite (and it looks like the USA elite is brainwashed to an amazing level, probably far exceed the level of
brainwashing of Soviet nomenklatura) prevents any constructive moves.
In a way, Neoliberalism probably acts as a mousetrap for the country, similar to the role of Bolshevism in the
USSR. Ideology of neoliberalism is dead, so what' next. Another war to patch the internal divisions ? That's probably
why Trump is so adamant about attacking Iran. Iran does not have nuclear weapons so this is in a way an ideal target.
Unlike, say, Russia. And such a war can serve the same political purpose. That's why many emigrants from the USSR view the current
level of divisions with the USA is a direct analog of divisions within the USSR in late 70th and 80th. Similarities are
clearly visible with naked eye.
Notable quotes:
"... t is well known that legendary American gangster Al Capone once said that 'Capitalism is the legitimate racket of the ruling class', - and I have commented on the links between organised crime and capitalist accumulation before on this blog, but I recently came across the following story from Claud Cockburn's autobiography, and decided to put it up on Histomat for you all. ..."
"... "Listen," he said, "don't get the idea I'm one of those goddam radicals. Don't get the idea I'm knocking the American system. The American system..." As though an invisible chairman had called upon him for a few words, he broke into an oration upon the theme. He praised freedom, enterprise and the pioneers. He spoke of "our heritage". He referred with contempuous disgust to Socialism and Anarchism. "My rackets," he repeated several times, "are run on strictly American lines and they're going to stay that way"...his vision of the American system began to excite him profoundly and now he was on his feet again, leaning across the desk like the chairman of a board meeting, his fingers plunged in the rose bowls. ..."
"... A month later in New York I was telling this story to Mr John Walter, minority owner of The Times . He asked me why I had not written the Capone interview for the paper. I explained that when I had come to put my notes together I saw that most of what Capone had said was in essence identical with what was being said in the leading articles of The Times itself, and I doubted whether the paper would be best pleased to find itself seeing eye to eye with the most notorious gangster in Chicago. Mr Walter, after a moment's wry reflection, admitted that probably my idea had been correct.' ..."
"... The biggest lie ever told is that American hegemony relies on American imperialism and warmongering. The opposite is true. America is weak precisely because it is trying so hard to project strength, because anyone with half a brain knows that it is projecting strength to enrich oligarhcs, not to protect or favor the American people. ..."
"... please mr. author don't give us more globalist dribble. We want our wealth back ..."
"... America the empire is just another oligarchic regime that other countries' populations rightly see as an example of what doesn't work ..."
"... It's the ruling capitalist Predator Class that has been demanding empire since McKinley was assassinated. That's the problem. ..."
"... And who do you suppose are the forces which are funding US politicians and thus getting to call their shots in foreign policy? Can you bring yourself to name them? ..."
"... The US physical plant and equipment as well as infrastructure is in advanced stages of decay. Ditto for the labor force which has been pauperized and abused for decades by the Predator Class... ..."
"The only wealth you keep is wealth you have given away," said Marcus Aurelius (121-180 AD),
last of the great Roman emperors. US President Donald Trump might know of another Italian,
Mario Puzo's Don Vito Corleone, and his memorable mumble : "I'm going to make him
an offer he can't refuse."
Forgetting such Aurelian and godfather codes is propelling the decline and fall of the
American empire.
Trump is making offers the world can refuse – by reshaping trade deals, dispensing
with American sops and forcing powerful corporations to return home, the US is regaining
economic wealth but relinquishing global power.
As the last leader of the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics (USSR), Mikhail Gorbachev's
perestroika (restructuring) led to the breakup of its vast territory(22 million square
kilometers). Gorbachev's failed policies led to the dissolution of the USSR into Russia and
independent countries, and the end of a superpower.
Ironically, the success of Trump's policies will hasten the demise of the American empire:
the US regaining economic health but losing its insidious hold over the world.
This diminishing influence was highlighted when India and seven other countries geared up to
defy Washington's re-imposition of its unilateral, illegal sanctions against Iran, starting
Monday.
The US State Department granting "permission" on the weekend to the eight countries to buy
Iranian oil was akin to waving the green flag at a train that has already left the
station
The US State Department granting "permission" on the weekend to the eight countries to buy
Iranian oil was akin to waving the green flag at a train that has already left the station.
The law of cause and effect unavoidably delivers. The Roman Empire fell after wars of greed
and orgies of consumption. A similar nemesis, the genie of Gorbachev, stalks Pennsylvania
Avenue, with Trump unwittingly writing the last chapter of World War II: the epilogue of the
two rival superpowers that emerged from humanity's most terrible conflict.
The maverick 45th president of the United States may succeed at being an economic messiah to
his country, which has racked up a $21.6 trillion debt, but the fallout is the death of
American hegemony. These are the declining days of the last empire standing.
Emperors and mafia godfathers knew that wielding great influence means making payoffs.
Trump, however, is doing away with the sops, the glue that holds the American empire together,
and is making offers that he considers "fair" but instead is alienating the international
community– from badgering NATO and other countries to pay more for hosting the US legions
(800 military bases in 80 countries) to reducing US aid.
US aid to countries fell from $50 billion in fiscal year 2016, $37 billion in 2017 to $7.7
billion so far in 2018. A world less tied to American largesse and generous trade tarrifs can
more easily reject the "you are with us or against us" bullying doctrine of US presidents. In
the carrot and stick approach that largely passes as American foreign policy, the stick loses
power as the carrot vanishes.
Don Vito Corleone (Marlon Brando) in The Godfather. Big payoffs needed for big influence. A
presidential lesson for Don Trump
More self-respecting leaders will have less tolerance for American hypocrisy, such as
sanctioning other countries for nuclear weapons while having the biggest nuclear arsenal on the
planet.
They will sneer more openly at the hysteria surrounding alleged interference in the 2016 US
presidential elections, pointing to Washington's violent record of global meddling. They will
cite examples of American hypocrisy such as its sponsorship of coups against elected leaders in
Latin America, the US Army's Project Camelot in 1964 targeting 22 countries for intervention
(including Iran, Turkey, Thailand, Malaysia), its support for bloodthirsty dictators, and its
destabilization of the Middle East with the destruction of Iraq and Libya.
Immigrant
cannon fodder
Trump's focus on the economy reduces the likelihood of him starting wars. By ending the
flood of illegal immigrants to save jobs for US citizens, he is also inadvertently reducing the
manpower for illegal wars. Non-citizen immigrants comprise about 5% of the US Army. For its
Iraq and Afghanistan wars, US army recruiters offered citizenship to lure illegal immigrants,
mostly Latinos.
Among the first US soldiers to die in the Iraq War was 22-year old illegal immigrant
Corporal Jose Antonio Gutierrez, an orphan from the streets of Guatemala City. He sneaked
across the Mexican border into the US six years before enlisting in exchange for American
citizenship.
On March 21, 2003, Gutierrez was killed by friendly fire near Umm Qasr, southern Iraq. The
coffin of this illegal immigrant was draped in the US flag, and he received American
citizenship – posthumously.
Trump policies targeting illegal immigration simultaneously reduces the availability of
cannon fodder for the illegal wars needed to maintain American hegemony.
Everything comes to an end, and so too will the last empire of our era.
The imperial American eagle flying into the sunset will see the dawn of an economically
healthier US that minds its own business, and increase hopes for a more equal, happier world
– thanks to the unintentional Gorbachev-2 in the White House.
I am sure that many of us are OK with ending American Empire. Both US citizens and other
countries don't want to fight un-necessary and un-ending wars. If Trump can do that, then he
is blessed.
See a pattern here? Raja Murthy, you sound like a pro-American Empire shill. 1964 Project
Camelot has nothing to do with the current administration. Raja, you forgot to wear your
satirical pants.
The idea and catchy hook of 2016 was Make America Great Again, not wasting lives and
resources on the American Empire. You point out the good things. Who might have a problem
with the end of the American Empire are Globalists. What is wrong with relinquishing global
power and not wasting lives and money?
"The only lives you keep is lives you've given away" That does not ring true. The only
lies you keep are the lies you've given away. What? You're not making any sense, dude. How
much American Empire are you vested in? Does it bother you if the Empire shrinks its death
grip on Asia or the rest of the world? Why don't you just say it: This is good! Hopefully
Trump's policies will prevent you from getting writers' cramp and being confusing--along with
the canon fodder. Or maybe you're worried about job security.
America is a super power, just like Russia. Just like England. However, whom the US
carries water for might change. Hope that's ok.
Trump is an empirial president, just like every other US president. In fact, that's what
the article is describing. MAGA depends upon imperialist domination. Trump and all of US
capitalism know that even if the brain-dead MAGA chumps don't.
Capitalism can't help but seek to rule the world. It is the result of pursuing
capitalism's all-important growth. If it's not US capitalism, it will be Chinese capitalism,
or Russian capitalism, or European capitalism that will rule the world.
The battle over global markets doesn't stop just because the US might decide not to play
anymore. Capitalism means that you're either the global power who is ******* the royal ****
out of everyone else, or you're the victim of being fucked up the *** by an imperialist
power.
The only thing which makes the US different from the rest of the world is its super
concentration of power, which in effect is a super concentration of corruption.
Another day and another ZeroHedge indictment of American capitalism.
And how refreshing that the article compares US capitalism to gangsterism. It's a most
appropriate comparison.
--------------------
Al Capone on Capitalism
It is well known that legendary American gangster Al Capone once said that 'Capitalism is the
legitimate racket of the ruling class', - and I have commented on the links between organised
crime and capitalist accumulation before
on this blog, but I recently came across the following story from Claud Cockburn's autobiography, and decided
to put it up on Histomat for you all.
In 1930, Cockburn, then a correspondent in America for the Times newspaper,
interviewed Al Capone at the Lexington Hotel in Chicago, when Capone was at the height of his
power. He recalls that except for 'the sub-machine gun...poking through the transom of a door
behind the desk, Capone's own room was nearly indistinguishable from that of, say, a "newly
arrived" Texan oil millionaire. Apart from the jowly young murderer on the far side of the
desk, what took the eye were a number of large, flattish, solid silver bowls upon the desk,
each filled with roses. They were nice to look at, and they had another purpose too, for
Capone when agitated stood up and dipped the tips of his fingers in the water in which
floated the roses.
I had been a little embarrassed as to how the interview was to be launched. Naturally the
nub of all such interviews is somehow to get round to the question "What makes you tick?" but
in the case of this millionaire killer the approach to this central question seemed mined
with dangerous impediments. However, on the way down to the Lexington Hotel I had had the
good fortune to see, I think in the Chicago Daily News , some statistics offered by an
insurance company which dealt with the average expectation of life of gangsters in Chicago. I
forget exactly what the average was, and also what the exact age of Capone at that time - I
think he was in his early thirties. The point was, however, that in any case he was four
years older than the upper limit considered by the insurance company to be the proper average
expectation of life for a Chicago gangster. This seemed to offer a more or less neutral and
academic line of approach, and after the ordinary greetings I asked Capone whether he had
read this piece of statistics in the paper. He said that he had. I asked him whether he
considered the estimate reasonably accurate. He said that he thought that the insurance
companies and the newspaper boys probably knew their stuff. "In that case", I asked him, "how
does it feel to be, say, four years over the age?"
He took the question quite seriously and spoke of the matter with neither more nor less
excitement or agitation than a man would who, let us say, had been asked whether he, as the
rear machine-gunner of a bomber, was aware of the average incidence of casualties in that
occupation. He apparently assumed that sooner or later he would be shot despite the elaborate
precautions which he regularly took. The idea that - as afterwards turned out to be the case
- he would be arrested by the Federal authorities for income-tax evasion had not, I think, at
that time so much as crossed his mind. And, after all, he said with a little bit of
corn-and-ham somewhere at the back of his throat, supposing he had not gone into this racket?
What would be have been doing? He would, he said, "have been selling newspapers barefoot on
the street in Brooklyn".
He stood as he spoke, cooling his finger-tips in the rose bowl in front of him. He sat
down again, brooding and sighing. Despite the ham-and-corn, what he said was probably true
and I said so, sympathetically. A little bit too sympathetically, as immediately emerged, for
as I spoke I saw him looking at me suspiciously, not to say censoriously. My remarks about
the harsh way the world treats barefoot boys in Brooklyn were interrupted by an urgent angry
waggle of his podgy hand.
"Listen," he said, "don't get the idea I'm one of those goddam radicals. Don't get the
idea I'm knocking the American system. The American system..." As though an invisible
chairman had called upon him for a few words, he broke into an oration upon the theme. He
praised freedom, enterprise and the pioneers. He spoke of "our heritage". He referred with
contempuous disgust to Socialism and Anarchism. "My rackets," he repeated several times, "are
run on strictly American lines and they're going to stay that way"...his vision of the
American system began to excite him profoundly and now he was on his feet again, leaning
across the desk like the chairman of a board meeting, his fingers plunged in the rose
bowls.
"This American system of ours," he shouted, "call it Americanism, call it Capitalism, call
it what you like, gives to each and every one of us a great opportunity if we only seize it
with both hands and make the most of it." He held out his hand towards me, the fingers
dripping a little, and stared at me sternly for a few seconds before reseating himself.
A month later in New York I was telling this story to Mr John Walter, minority owner of
The Times . He asked me why I had not written the Capone interview for the paper. I
explained that when I had come to put my notes together I saw that most of what Capone had
said was in essence identical with what was being said in the leading articles of The
Times itself, and I doubted whether the paper would be best pleased to find itself seeing
eye to eye with the most notorious gangster in Chicago. Mr Walter, after a moment's wry
reflection, admitted that probably my idea had been correct.'
This article was obviously written by someone who wants to maintain the status quo.
America would be much stronger if it were not trying to be an empire. The biggest lie ever
told is that American hegemony relies on American imperialism and warmongering. The opposite
is true. America is weak precisely because it is trying so hard to project strength, because
anyone with half a brain knows that it is projecting strength to enrich oligarhcs, not to
protect or favor the American people.
I truly believe that "America First" is not selfish. America before it went full ******
was the beacon of freedom and success that other countries tried to emulate and that changed
the world for the better.
America the empire is just another oligarchic regime that other
countries' populations rightly see as an example of what doesn't work.
Empire is a contrivance, a vehicle for psychopathic powerlust. America was founded by
people who stood adamantly opposed to this. Here's hoping Trump holds their true spirit in
his heart.
If he doesn't, there's hundreds of millions of us who still do. We don't all live in
America...
America is weak precisely because it is trying so hard to project strength, because
anyone with half a brain knows that it is projecting strength to enrich oligarhcs [sic],
not to protect or favor the American people.
And who do you suppose are the forces which are funding US politicians and thus getting to
call their shots in foreign policy? Can you bring yourself to name them? Oligarchs...you're
FULL of ****. Who exactly pools all (((their))) money, makes sure the [s]elected officials
know (((who))) to not question and, instead, just bow down to them, who makes sure these
(((officials))) sign pledges for absolute commitment towards Israel--or in no uncertain
terms-- and know who will either sponsor them/or opposes them next time around?
JSBach1 called you a 'coward', for being EXACTLY LIKE THESE TRAITOROUS SPINELESS
VERMIN who simply just step outside just 'enough' the comfort zone to APPEAR 'real'. IMHO, I
concur with JSBach1 ...your're a coward indeed, when you should know better .....
shame you you indeed!
There is little evidence, Trump's propaganda aside (that he previously called Obama
dishonest for) that the US economy is improving. If anything, the exploding budget and trade
deficits indicate that the economy continues to weaken.
Correct. The US physical plant and equipment as well as infrastructure is in advanced
stages of decay. Ditto for the labor force which has been pauperized and abused for decades
by the Predator Class...
the US can't even raise an army... even if enough young (men) were
dumb enough to volunteer there just aren't enough fit, healthy and mentally acute recruits
out there.
"... As of today, the US is embargoing all Iranian energy exports and freezing Iran out of the US-dominated world financial system, so as to cripple the remainder of its trade and deny it access to machinery, spare parts and even basic foodstuffs and medicine. ..."
"... In doing so, American imperialism is once again acting as a law unto itself. The sanctions are patently illegal and under international law tantamount to a declaration of war. They violate the UN Security Council-backed 2015 Iran nuclear accord, or Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA) ..."
"... Financial Times ..."
"... Those developing the SPV are acutely conscious of this and have publicly declared that it is not Iran-specific. ..."
"... The strategists of US imperialism are also aware that the SPV is a challenge to more than the Trump administration's Iran policy. Writing in Foreign Affairs ..."
"... With its drive to crash Iran's economy and further impoverish its people, the Trump administration has let loose the dogs of war. Whatever the sanctions' impact, Washington has committed its prestige and power to bringing Tehran to heel and making the rest of the world complicit in its crimes. ..."
"... The danger of another catastrophic Mideast war thus looms ever larger, while the growing antagonism between Europe and America and descent of global inter-state relations into a madhouse of one against all is setting the stage ..."
Washington's imposition of sweeping new sanctions on Iran -- aimed at strangling its economy and precipitating regime change in
Tehran -- is roiling world geopolitics.
As of today, the US is embargoing all Iranian energy exports and freezing Iran out of the US-dominated world financial system,
so as to cripple the remainder of its trade and deny it access to machinery, spare parts and even basic foodstuffs and medicine.
In doing so, American imperialism is once again acting as a law unto itself. The sanctions are patently illegal and under
international law tantamount to a declaration of war. They violate the UN Security Council-backed 2015 Iran nuclear accord, or Joint
Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA), an agreement that was negotiated at the behest of Washington and under its duress, including
war threats.
All the other parties to the JCPOA (Russia, China, Britain, France, Germany and the EU) and the International Atomic Energy Agency,
which is charged with verifying Iranian compliance, are adamant that Iran has fulfilled its obligations under the accord to the letter.
This includes dismantling much of its civil nuclear program and curtailing the rest.
Yet, having reneged on its support for the JCPOA, Washington is now wielding the club of secondary sanctions to compel the rest
of the world into joining its illegal embargo and abetting its regime-change offensive. Companies and countries that trade with Iran
or even trade with those that do will be excluded from the US market and subject to massive fines and other penalties. Similarly,
banks and shipping insurers that have any dealings with companies that trade with Iran or even with other financial institutions
that facilitate trade with Iran will be subject to punishing US secondary sanctions.
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, who like US President Donald Trump has repeatedly threatened to attack Iran and ordered
military strikes on Iranian Islamic Revolutionary Guard forces in Syria, has hailed the US sanctions as "historic." Saudi Arabia
and the United Arab Emirates, two other US client states, are pledging to ramp up oil production to make up for the shortfalls caused
by Washington's embargoing of Iranian oil exports.
But America's economic war against Iran is not just exacerbating tensions in the Middle East. It is also roiling relations between
the US and the other great powers, especially Europe.
On Friday, the foreign ministers of Britain, France and Germany and European Union Foreign Policy Chief Frederica Mogherini issued
a statement reaffirming their support for the JCPOA and vowing to circumvent and defy the US sanctions. "It is our aim," they declared,
"to protect European economic operators engaged in legitimate business with Iran, in accordance with EU law and with UN Security
Council resolution 2231."
They declared their commitment to preserving "financial channels with" Iran, enabling it to continue exporting oil and gas, and
working with Russia, China and other countries "interested in supporting the JCPOA" to do so.
The statement emphasized the European powers' "unwavering collective resolve" to assert their right to "pursue legitimate trade"
and, toward that end, to proceed with the establishment of a Special Purpose Vehicle (SPV) that will enable European businesses and
those of other countries, including potentially Russia and China, to conduct trade with Iran using the euro or some other non-US
dollar medium of exchange, outside the US-dominated world financial system.
Friday's statement was in response to a series of menacing pronouncements from Trump, Secretary of State Mike Pompeo and other
top administration officials earlier the same day. These fleshed out the new US sanctions and reiterated Washington's resolve to
crash Iran's economy and aggressively sanction any company or country that fails to fall into line with the US sanctions.
In reply to a question about the European SPV, US Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin, said he had "no expectation" it will prove
to be a conduit for "significant" trade. "But if there are transactions that have the intent of evading our sanctions, we will aggressively
pursue our remedies."
Trump officials also served notice that they will sanction SWIFT, the Brussels-based network that facilitates secure inter-bank
communications, and the European bankers who comprise the majority of its directors if they do not expeditiously expel all Iranian
financial institutions from the network.
And in a step intended to demonstratively underscore Washington's disdain for the Europeans, the Trump administration included
no EU state among the eight countries that will be granted temporary waivers on the full application of the US embargo on oil imports.
Germany, Britain, France and the EU are no less rapacious than Washington. Europe's great powers are frantically rearming, have
helped spearhead NATO's war build-up against Russia. Over the past three decades they have waged numerous wars and neocolonial interventions
in the Middle East and North Africa, from Afghanistan and Libya to Mali.
But they resent and fear the consequences of the Trump administration's reckless and provocative offensive against Iran. They
resent it because Washington's scuttling of the nuclear deal has pulled the rug out from under European capital's plans to capture
a leading position in Iran's domestic market and exploit Iranian offers of massive oil and natural gas concessions. They fear it,
because the US confrontation with Iran threatens to ignite a war that would invariably set the entire Mideast ablaze, triggering
a new refugee crisis, a massive spike in oil prices and, last but not least, a repartition of the region under conditions where the
European powers as of yet lack the military means to independently determine the outcome.
To date, the Trump administration has taken a haughty, even cavalier, attitude to the European avowals of opposition to the US
sanctions. Trump and the other Iran war-hawks like Pompeo and National Security Adviser John Bolton who lead the administration are
buoyed by the fact that numerous European businesses have voted with their feet and cut off ties with Iran, for fear of running afoul
of the US sanctions.
The Financial Times reported last week that due to fear of US reprisals, no European state has agreed to house the SPV,
which, according to the latest EU statements, will not even be operational until the new year.
The European difficulties and hesitations are real. But they also speak to the enormity and explosiveness of the geopolitical
shifts that are now underway.
Whilst European corporate leaders, whose focus is on maximizing market share and investor profit in the next few business quarters,
have bowed to the US sanctions threat, the political leaders, those charged with developing and implementing imperialist strategy,
have concluded that they must push back against Washington.
This is about Iran, but also about developing the means to prevent the US using unilateral sanctions to dictate Europe's foreign
policy, including potentially trying to thwart Nord Stream 2 (the pipeline project that will transport Russian natural gas to Germany
under the Baltic Sea and which Trump has repeatedly denounced.)
As Washington's ability to impose unilateral sanctions is bound up with the role of the US dollar as the world's reserve currency
and US domination of the world banking system, the European challenge to America's sanctions weapon necessarily involves a challenge
to these key elements of US global power.
The European imperialist powers are taking this road because they, like all the great powers, are locked in a frenzied struggle
for markets, profits and strategic advantage under conditions of a systemic breakdown of world capitalism. Finding themselves squeezed
between the rise of new powers and an America that is ever more reliant on war to counter the erosion of its economic might and that
is ruthlessly pursing its own interests at the expense of foe and ostensible friend alike, the Europeans, led by German imperialism,
are seeking to develop the economic and military means to assert their own predatory interests independently of, and when necessary
against, the United States.
Those developing the SPV are acutely conscious of this and have publicly declared that it is not Iran-specific.
Speaking last month, only a few weeks after European Commission President Jean-Claude Juncker used his State of the EU address
to called for measures to ensure that the euro plays a greater global role, French Finance Minister Bruno Le Maire declared the "crisis
with Iran" to be "a chance for Europe to have its own independent financial institutions, so we can trade with whomever we want."
The SPV, adds French Foreign Ministry spokesperson Agnes Von der Muhl, "aims to create an economic sovereignty tool for the European
Union that will protect European companies in the future from the effect of illegal extraterritorial sanctions."
The strategists of US imperialism are also aware that the SPV is a challenge to more than the Trump administration's Iran
policy. Writing in Foreign Affairs last month, former Obama administration official Elizabeth Rosenberg expressed grave
concerns that the Trump administration's unilateral sanctions are causing the EU to collaborate with Russia and China in defying
Washington, and are inciting a European challenge to US financial dominance. Under conditions where Russia and China are already
seeking to develop payments systems that bypass Western banks, and the future promises further challenges to dollar-supremacy and
the US-led global financial system, "it is worrying," laments Rosenberg, "that the United States is accelerating this trend."
With its drive to crash Iran's economy and further impoverish its people, the Trump administration has let loose the dogs
of war. Whatever the sanctions' impact, Washington has committed its prestige and power to bringing Tehran to heel and making the
rest of the world complicit in its crimes.
The danger of another catastrophic Mideast war thus looms ever larger, while the growing antagonism between Europe and America
and descent of global inter-state relations into a madhouse of one against all is setting the stage...
Each year I choose a book to be the Globalization Book of the Year, i.e., the "Globie". The prize is strictly honorific and does
not come with a check. But I do like to single out books that are particularly insightful about some aspect of globalization. Previous
winners are listed at the bottom.
This year's choice is
Crashed: How a Decade of Financial Crises Changed the Worldby
Adam Tooze of Yale University . Tooze, an historian, traces the events leading up to the crisis and the subsequent ten years.
He points out in the introduction that this account is different from one he may have written several years ago. At that time Barak
Obama had won re-election in 2012 on the basis of a slow but steady recovery in the U.S. Europe was further behind, but the emerging
markets were growing rapidly, due to the demand for their commodities from a steadily-growing China as well as capital inflows searching
for higher returns than those available in the advanced economies.
But the economic recovery has brought new challenges, which have swept aside established politicians and parties. Obama was succeeded
by Donald Trump, who promised to restore America to some form of past greatness. His policy agenda includes trade disputes with a
broad range of countries, and he is particularly eager to impose trade tariffs on China. The current meltdown in stock prices follows
a rise in interest rates normal at this stage of the business cycle but also is based on fears of the consequences of the trade measures.
Europe has its own discontents. In the United Kingdom, voters have approved leaving the European Union. The European Commission
has expressed its disapproval of the Italian government's fiscal plans. Several east European governments have voiced opposition
to the governance norms of the West European nations. Angela Merkel's decision to step down as head of her party leaves Europe without
its most respected leader.
All these events are outcomes of the crisis, which Tooze emphasizes was a trans-Atlantic event. European banks had purchased held
large amounts of U.S. mortgage-backed securities that they financed with borrowed dollars. When liquidity in the markets disappeared,
the European banks faced the challenge of financing their obligations. Tooze explains how the Federal Reserve supported the European
banks using swap lines with the European Central Bank and other central banks, as well as including the domestic subsidiaries of
the foreign banks in their liquidity support operations in the U.S. As a result, Tooze claims:
"What happened in the fall of 2008 was not the relativization of the dollar, but the reverse, a dramatic reassertion of the pivotal
role of America's central bank. Far from withering away, the Fed's response gave an entirely new dimension to the global dollar"
(Tooze, p. 219)
The focused policies of U.S. policymakers stood in sharp contrast to those of their European counterparts. Ireland and Spain had
to deal with their own banking crises following the collapse of their housing bubbles, and Portugal suffered from anemic growth.
But Greece's sovereign debt posed the largest challenge, and exposed the fault line in the Eurozone between those who believed that
such crises required a national response and those who looked for a broader European resolution. As a result, Greece lurched from
one lending program to another. The IMF was treated as a junior partner by the European governments that sought to evade facing the
consequences of Greek insolvency, and the Fund's reputation suffered new blows due to its involvement with the various rescue operations.The
ECB only demonstrated a firm commitment to its stabilizing role in July 2012, when its President Mario Draghi announced that "Within
our mandate, the ECB is ready to do whatever it takes to preserve the euro."
China followed another route. The government there engaged in a surge of stimulus spending combined with expansionary monetary
policies. The result was continued growth that allowed the Chinese government to demonstrate its leadership capabilities at a time
when the U.S. was abandoning its obligations. But the ensuing credit boom was accompanied by a rise in private (mainly corporate)
lending that has left China with a total debt to GDP ratio of over 250%, a level usually followed by some form of financial collapse.
Chinese officials are well aware of the domestic challenge they face at the same time as their dispute with the U.S. intensifies.
Tooze demonstrates that the crisis has let loose a range of responses that continue to play out. He ends the book by pointing
to a similarity of recent events and those of 1914. He raises several questions: "How does a great moderation end? How do huge risks
build up that are little understood and barely controllable? How do great tectonic shifts in the global world order unload in sudden
earthquakes?" Ten years after a truly global crisis, we are still seeking answers to these questions.
"... Her announcement on Monday that she will vacate the leadership of Germany's ruling center-right Christian Democrats marks the culmination of what has been a slow denouement of Merkelism. ..."
"... Long the emblematic figure of "Europe," hailed by the neoliberal Economist as the continent's moral voice, long the dominant decider of its collective foreign and economic policies, Merkel will leave office with border fences being erected and disdain for European political institutions at their highest pitch ever. In this sense, she failed as dramatically as her most famous predecessors, Konrad Adenauer, Willy Brandt, Helmut Schmidt, and Helmut Kohl, succeeded in their efforts to make Germany both important and normal in the postwar world. ..."
"... "We can do this!" she famously declared. Europe, she said, must "show flexibility" over refugees. Then, a few days later, she said there was "no limit" to the number of migrants Germany could accept. At first, the burgeoning flood of mostly young male asylum claimants produced an orgy of self-congratulatory good feeling, celebrity posturing of welcome, Merkel greeting migrants at the train station, Merkel taking selfies with migrants, Merkel touted in The Economist as "Merkel the Bold." ..."
"... The euphoria, of course, did not last. Several of the Merkel migrants carried out terror attacks in France that fall. (France's socialist prime minister Manuel Valls remarked pointedly after meeting with Merkel, "It was not us who said, 'Come!'") Reports of sexual assaults and murders by migrants proved impossible to suppress, though Merkel did ask Mark Zuckerberg to squelch European criticism of her migration policies on Facebook. Intelligent as she undoubtedly is (she was a research chemist before entering politics), she seemed to lack any intellectual foundation to comprehend why the integration of hundreds of thousands of people from the Muslim world might prove difficult. ..."
"... Merkel reportedly telephoned Benjamin Netanyahu to ask how Israel had been so successful in integrating so many immigrants during its brief history. There is no record of what Netanyahu thought of the wisdom of the woman posing this question. ..."
"... In any case, within a year, the Merkel initiative was acknowledged as a failure by most everyone except the chancellor herself. ..."
Drop of Light/Shutterstock Whatever her accomplishments
as pathbreaking female politician and respected leader of Europe's dominant economic power, Angela Merkel will go down in history
for her outburst of naivete over the issue of migration into Europe during the summer of 2015.
Her announcement on Monday that she will vacate the leadership of Germany's ruling center-right Christian Democrats marks
the culmination of what has been a slow denouement of Merkelism.
She had seen the vote share of her long dominant party shrink in one regional election after another. The rebuke given to her
last weekend in Hesse, containing the Frankfurt region with its booming economy, where she had campaigned extensively, was the final
straw. Her CDU's vote had declined 10 points since the previous election, their voters moving toward the further right (Alternative
fur Deutschland or AfD). Meanwhile, the further left Greens have made dramatic gains at the expense of Merkel's Social Democrat coalition
partners.
Long the emblematic figure of "Europe," hailed by the neoliberal Economist as the continent's moral voice, long the
dominant decider of its collective foreign and economic policies, Merkel will leave office with border fences being erected and disdain
for European political institutions at their highest pitch ever. In this sense, she failed as dramatically as her most famous predecessors,
Konrad Adenauer, Willy Brandt, Helmut Schmidt, and Helmut Kohl, succeeded in their efforts to make Germany both important and normal
in the postwar world.
One can acknowledge that while Merkel never admitted error for her multiculti summer fling (beyond wishing she had communicated
her goals better), she did manage to adjust her policies. By 2016, Germany under her watch was paying a healthy ransom to Turkey
to keep would-be migrants in camps and preventing them from sailing to Greece. Merkel's departure will make the battle to succeed
her one of the most watched political contests in Europe. She has turned migration into a central and quite divisive issue within
the CDU and Germany, and the party may decide that it has no choice but to accommodate, in one way or another, the voters who have
left them for the AfD.
Related to the issue of who should reside in Europe (objectively the current answer remains anyone who can get there) is the question
of how are such questions decided. In July 2015, five years after asserting in a speech that multiculturalism has
"utterly failed" in Germany (without addressing what policies should be pursued in an increasingly ethnically diverse society)
and several weeks after reducing a young Arab girl to tears at a televised forum by telling her that those whose asylum claims were
rejected would "have to go back" and that "politics is hard," Merkel changed course.
For those interested in psychological studies of leadership and decision making, it would be hard to imagine a richer subject.
Merkel's government first announced it would no longer enforce the rule (the Dublin agreement) that required asylum claimants to
be processed in the first country they passed through. Then she doubled down. The migrants fleeing the Syrian civil war, along with
those who pretended to be Syrian, and then basically just anyone, could come to Germany.
"We can do this!" she famously declared. Europe, she said, must "show flexibility" over refugees. Then, a few days later,
she said there was "no limit" to the number of migrants Germany could accept. At first, the burgeoning flood of mostly young male
asylum claimants produced an orgy of self-congratulatory good feeling, celebrity posturing of welcome, Merkel greeting migrants at
the train station, Merkel taking selfies with migrants, Merkel touted in The Economist as
"Merkel the Bold."
Her words traveled far beyond those fleeing Syria. Within 48 hours of the "no limit" remark, TheNew York Times
reported a sudden stirring of migrants from Nigeria. Naturally Merkel boasted in a quiet way about how her decision had revealed
that Germany had put its Nazi past behind it. "The world sees Germany as a land of hope and chances," she said. "That wasn't always
the case." In making this decision personally, Merkel was making it for all of Europe. It was one of the ironies of a European arrangement
whose institutions were developed in part to transcend nationalism and constrain future German power that 70 years after the end
of the war, the privately arrived-at decision of a German chancellor could instantly transform societies all over Europe.
The euphoria, of course, did not last. Several of the Merkel migrants carried out terror attacks in France that fall. (France's
socialist prime minister Manuel Valls remarked pointedly after meeting with Merkel, "It was not us who said, 'Come!'") Reports of
sexual assaults and murders by migrants proved impossible to suppress, though Merkel did ask Mark Zuckerberg to squelch European
criticism of her migration policies on Facebook. Intelligent as she undoubtedly is (she was a research chemist before entering politics),
she seemed to lack any intellectual foundation to comprehend why the integration of hundreds of thousands of people from the Muslim
world might prove difficult.
Merkel reportedly telephoned Benjamin Netanyahu to ask how Israel had been so successful in integrating so many immigrants
during its brief history. There is no record of what Netanyahu thought of the wisdom of the woman posing this question.
In any case, within a year, the Merkel initiative was acknowledged as a failure by most everyone except the chancellor herself.
Her public approval rating plunged from 75 percent in April 2015 to 47 percent the following summer. The first electoral rebuke came
in September 2016, when the brand new anti-immigration party, the Alternative fur Deutschland, beat Merkel's CDU in Pomerania.
In every election since, Merkel's party has lost further ground. Challenges to her authority from within her own party have become
more pointed and powerful. But the mass migration accelerated by her decision continues, albeit at a slightly lower pace.
Angela Merkel altered not only Germany but the entire European continent, in irreversible ways, for decades to come.
Scott McConnell is a founding editor ofand the author of Ex-Neocon: Dispatches From the Post-9/11 Ideological Wars
.
"... On the other hand, President Trump is pushing Merkel on policy on Russia and Ukraine that furthers the image that she is simply a stooge of U.S. geopolitical ambitions. Don't ever forget that Germany is, for all intents and purposes, an occupied country. So, what the U.S. military establishment wants, Merkel must provide. ..."
"... But Merkel, further weakened by another disastrous state election, isn't strong enough to fend off her emboldened Italian and British opposition (and I'm not talking about The Gypsum Lady, Theresa May here). ..."
"... Merkel is a lame-duck now. Merkelism is over. Absentee governing from the center standing for nothing but the international concerns has been thoroughly rebuked by the European electorate from Spain to the shores of the Black Sea. ..."
"... Germany will stand for something other than globalism by the time this is all over. There will be a renaissance of culture and tradition there that is similar to the one occurring at a staggering pace in Russia. ..."
German Chancellor Angela Merkel has stepped down as the leader of the Christian Democratic
Union, the party she has led for nearly two decades. Yesterday's election in Hesse, normally a
CDU/SPD stronghold was abysmal for them.
She had to do something to quell the revolt brewing against her.
Merkel knew going in what the polls were showing. Unlike American and British polls, it
seems the German ones are mostly accurate with pre-election polls coming close to matching the
final results.
So, knowing what was coming for her and in the spirit of trying to maintain power for as
long as possible Merkel has been moving away from her staunch positions on unlimited
immigration and being in lock-step with the U.S. on Russia.
She's having to walk a tightrope on these two issues as the turmoil in U.S. political
circles is pulling her in, effectively, opposite directions.
The globalist Davos Crowd she works for wants the destruction of European culture and
individual national sovereignty ground into a paste and power consolidated under the rubric of
the European Union.
They also want Russia brought to heel.
On the other hand, President Trump is pushing Merkel on policy on Russia and Ukraine that
furthers the image that she is simply a stooge of U.S. geopolitical ambitions. Don't ever
forget that Germany is, for all intents and purposes, an occupied country. So, what the U.S.
military establishment wants, Merkel must provide.
So, if she rejects that role and the chaos U.S. policy engenders, particularly Syria, she's
undermining the flow of migrants into Europe.
This is why it was so significant that she and French President Emmanuel Macron joined this
weekend's summit with Russian President Vladimir Putin and Turkish President Recep Tayyip
Erdogan in Istanbul.
It ended with an agreement on Syria's future that lies in direct conflict with the U.S.'s
goals of the past seven years.
It was an admission that Assad has prevailed in Syria and the plan to atomize it into yet
another failed state has itself failed. Merkel has traded 'Assad must go' for 'no more
refugees.'
To President Trump's credit he then piggy-backed on that statement announcing that the U.S.
would be pulling out of Syria very soon now. And that tells me that he is still coordinating in
some way with Putin and other world leaders on the direction of his foreign policy in spite of
his opposition.
But the key point from the Istanbul statement was that Syria's rebuilding be prioritized to
reverse the flow of migrants so Syrians can go home. While
Gilbert Doctorow is unconvinced by France's position here , I think Merkel has to be
focused on assisting Putin in achieving his goal of returning Syria to Syrians.
Because, this is both a political necessity for Merkel as well as her trying to burnish her
crumbling political throne to maintain power.
The question is will Germans believe and/or forgive her enough for her to stay in power
through her now stated 'retirement' from politics in 2021?
I don't think so and it's obvious Davos Crowd boy-toy Macron is working overtime to salvage
what he can for them as Merkel continues to face up to the political realities across Europe,
which is that populism is a natural reaction to these insane policies.
Merkel's job of consolidating power under the EU is unfinished. They don't have financial
integration. The Grand Army of the EU is still not a popular idea. The euro-zone is a disaster
waiting to happen and its internal inconsistencies are adding fuel to an already pretty hot
political fire.
On this front, EU integration, she and Macron are on the same page. Because 'domestically'
from an EU perspective, Brexit still has to be dealt with and the showdown with the Italians is
only just beginning.
But Merkel, further weakened by another disastrous state election, isn't strong enough to
fend off her emboldened Italian and British opposition (and I'm not talking about The Gypsum
Lady, Theresa May here).
And Macron should stop looking in the mirror long enough to see he's standing on a quicksand
made of blasting powder.
This points to the next major election for Europe, that of the European Parliament in May
where all of Merkel's opposition are focused on wresting control of that body and removing
Jean-Claude Juncker or his hand-picked replacement (Merkel herself?) from power.
The obvious transition for Merkel is from German Chancellor to European Commission
President. She steps down as Chancellor in May after the EPP wins a majority then to take
Juncker's job. I'm sure that's been the plan all along. This way she can continue the work she started
without having to face the political backlash at home.
But, again, how close is Germany to snap elections if there is another migrant attack and
Chemnitz-like demonstrations. You can only go to the 'Nazi' well so many times, even in
Germany.
There comes a point where people will have simply had enough and their anger isn't born of
being intolerant but angry at having been betrayed by political leadership which doesn't speak
for them and imported crime, chaos and violence to their homes.
And the puppet German media will not be able to contain the story. The EU's speech rules
will not contain people who want to speak. The clamp down on hate speech, pioneered by Merkel
herself is a reaction to the growing tide against her.
And guess what? She can't stop it.
The problem is that Commies like Merkel and Soros don't believe in anything. They are
vampires and nihilists as I said over the
weekend suffused with a toxic view of humanity.
Oh sure, they give lip service to being inclusive and nice about it while they have
control over the levers of power, the State apparatus. But, the minute they lose control of
those levers, the sun goes down, the fangs come out and the bloodletting begins.
These people are vampires, sucking the life out of a society for their own ends. They are
evil in a way that proves John Barth's observation that "man can do no wrong." For they never
see themselves as the villain.
No. They see themselves as the savior of a fallen people. Nihilists to their very core
they only believe in power. And, since power is their religion, all activities are justified
in pursuit of their goals.
Their messianic view of themselves is indistinguishable to the Salafist head-chopping
animals people like Hillary empowered to sow chaos and death across the Middle East and North
Africa over the past decade.
Add to this Merkel herself who took Hillary's empowerment of these animals and gave them a
home across Europe. At least now Merkel has the good sense to see that this has cost her nearly
everything.
Even if she has little to no shame.
Hillary seems to think she can run for president again and win with the same schtick she
failed with twice before. Frankly, I welcome it like I welcome the sun in the morning, safe in
the knowledge that all is right with the world and she will go down in humiliating defeat yet
again.
Merkel is a lame-duck now. Merkelism is over. Absentee governing from the center standing
for nothing but the international concerns has been thoroughly rebuked by the European
electorate from Spain to the shores of the Black Sea.
Germany will stand for something other than globalism by the time this is all over. There
will be a renaissance of culture and tradition there that is similar to the one occurring
at a staggering pace in Russia.
Not to worry. Brexit is rather a textbook example of the political/economic dichotomy to
which I speak @ 5.
There will be no Brexit in economic or political reality. It isn't even remotely possible,
even in the unlikely event the EU collapses in the short term. There may be a pseudo "Brexit"
for political face-saving purposes, true, which will consist of a similar sales effort as
Trump is making to hold onto his own age-depressed plebes in flyover USArya.
"Brexit is coming! Brexit is coming! Tariffs are easy! Tariffs are easy! Hold on a bit
longer, we are just trying to get it right for you little people not to suffer anymore."
Lol.
@6 "Sadly many left wing ppl prefer EU neoliberal anti democratic, corrupt rule over their
own sovereign democratic institutions."
I see it more as a neoliberal desire to belong to some vague bigger global entity. Plus
the fact that since WW2 nationalism has become equated with fascism.
Britain has never been totally part of Europe....geographically or politically.
DontBelieveEitherPropaganda , Oct 21, 2018 10:16:20 AM |
link
@dh-mtl: True that. Sadly many left wing ppl prefer EU neoliberal anti democratic, corrupt
rule over their own souvereign democratic institutions. It was the national state (with its
additional regional democratic institutions) that brought us democracy, not the neolibs EU.
But that truth hurts, and many prefer empty slogans against the evil national state over a
honest analysis.
@B: Inoreader cant find new feeds for some days, something is broken!
With Brexit, the U.K. is trying to save itself before it collapses to a state similar to
Greece.
The E.U., because it is essentially a financially based dictatorship, and is fatally
flawed, will break apart. And, in this sense, I agree with you that the U.K. is ahead of the
curve.
Abandoning nuclear treaty is just a diversion to steer away eyes off Khashoggi case, latter
being even more important as it wedges in the very depth of an internal US political
demise.
UK barks there on Russia to steer its own downfall into spotlight of an importance on a world
stage that is close to null. UK didn't even sign anything with Russia as basically nobody
else did from within NATO, so one can render that INF as outdated and stale.
Will they come up with a new one that suits all or we will just let it go and slip into
unilateral single polarity downfall of West? Answers are coming along real soon.
Right now US and a few vasal allies left are getting into dirty set of strategic games
opposing far more skilled opponents and it will come around at a really high price. EU has
lost many contracts lately in mid east due to America First, so a lots of sticks in US wheels
are coming up. It is going to be a real fun watching all that and reading b. and others on
MoA..
The UK will most likely crash out of the EU. Of course, one can't exclude that some
last minute holding action, temp. solution, or reversal can be found - but I doubt it.
Northern Ireland will break away. The analysis of the vote has been very poor, and based
on an 'identity politics' and slice-n-dice views. Pensioners afraid to lose their pension,
deplorables, victims of austerity, lack of young voter turnout, etc.
NI and Scotland are ruled by a tri-partite scheme: 'home rule', 'devolution' - Westminster
- and the EU. The two peripheral entities prefer belonging to and participating in the larger
group (see also! reasons historical and of enmity etc.) which has on the whole been good for
them. England prefers a return to some mythical sovereignity / nationalism, getting rid of
the super-ordinate power, a last desperate stab at Britannia (hm?) rules the waves or at
least some bloody thing like traffic on the Thames, labor law, etc. The UK had no business
running that referendum - by that I mean that in the UK pol. system Parliament rules supreme,
which is antithetical to the referendum approach (in any case the result is only advisory)
and running it was a signal of crack-up. By now, it is clear that the UK political / Gvmt.
system is not fit for handling problems in the years 2000.
Why NI and not Scotland (which might split as well ..)? From a geo-political pov, because
geography bats last - yes. And also because NI is the much weaker entity. EU has stated (Idk
about texts etc.): if and when a EU member conquers, annexes, brings into the fold some
'other' territory, it then in turn becomes part of the EU. Ex. If Andorra chose to join Spain
it would meld into Eurolandia, with time to adjust to all the rules. Perhaps Macron would no
longer be a Prince!
However, Catalonia *cannot* be allowed to split from Spain (affecting Spanish integrity
and the EU) and if it did it would crash out of the EU, loosing all, so that doesn't work.
Scotland is not Catalonia. NI has had a special status in many ways for a long time so it is
easier to tolerate and imagine alternatives. The EU will pay for NI...
The UK is losing power rapidly and indulging in its own form of 're-trenchment' (different
from the Trumpian desired one) - both are nostalgic, but the British one is more
suicidal.
The only alternative interpretation I can see (suggested by John Michael Greer) is that
the UK is ahead of the curve: a pre-emptive collapse (rather semi-collapse) now would put it
in a better position than others 20 years or so hence. That would also include a break-up
into parts.
New Tucker book condemns both neoliberalism and neocon foreign policy
Notable quotes:
"... Tucker states that the USA's neoliberal elite acquired control of a massive chunk of the country's wealth. And then successfully insulated themselves from the hoi polloi. They send their children to the Ivy League universities, live in enclosed compounds with security guards, travel in helicopters, etc. Kind of like French aristocracy on a new level ("Let them eat cakes"). "There's nothing more infuriating to a ruling class than contrary opinions. They're inconvenient and annoying. They're evidence of an ungrateful population... Above all, they constitute a threat to your authority." (insert sarcasm) ..."
I think the US society is entering a deep, sustained political crisis and it is unclear
what can bring us back from it other then the collapse, USSR-style. The USA slide into
corporate socialism (which might be viewed as a flavor of neofascism) can't be disputed.
Looks like all democracies are unstable and prone to self-destruction. In modern America,
the elite do not care about lower 80% of the population, and is over-engaged in cynical
identity politics, race and gender-mongering. Anything to win votes.
MSM is still cheering on military misadventures that kill thousands of Americans,
impoverish millions, and cost trillions. Congress looks even worse. Republican House leader
Paul Ryan looks like 100% pure bought-and-paid-for tool of multinational corporations...
The scary thing for me is that the USA national problems are somewhat similar to the ones
that the USSR experienced before the collapse. At least the level of degeneration of
political elite of both parties (which in reality is a single party) is.
The only positive things is that there is viable alternative to neoliberalism on the
horizon. But that does not mean that we can't experience 1930th on a new level again. Now
several European countries such as Poland and Ukraine are already ruled by far right
nationalist parties. Brazil is probably the next. So this or military rule in the USA is not
out of question.
Ship of Fools is what the US empire and the US society looks like now. And that's not
funny. Look at <a
href="https://www.amazon.com/Ship-Fools-Selfish-Bringing-Revolution-ebook/dp/B071FFRJ48">"Ship
of Fools: How a Selfish Ruling Class Is Bringing America to the Brink of
Revolution"</a> by Tucker Carlson hits the mark when he says that the career
politicians and other elites in this country have put the USA on a path of
self-destruction.
Some other factors are also in play: one is that a country with 320 million population
can't be governed by the same methods as a country of 76 million (1900). End of cheap oil is
near and probably will occur within the next 50 years or so. Which means the end of
neoliberalism as we know it.
Tucker states that the USA's neoliberal elite acquired control of a massive chunk of the
country's wealth. And then successfully insulated themselves from the hoi polloi. They send
their children to the Ivy League universities, live in enclosed compounds with security
guards, travel in helicopters, etc. Kind of like French aristocracy on a new level ("Let them
eat cakes"). "There's nothing more infuriating to a ruling class than contrary opinions.
They're inconvenient and annoying. They're evidence of an ungrateful population... Above all,
they constitute a threat to your authority." (insert sarcasm)
Donald Trump was in many ways an unappealing figure. He never hid that. Voters knew it.
They just concluded that the options were worse -- and not just Hillary Clinton and the
Democratic Party, but the Bush family and their donors and the entire Republican
leadership, along with the hedge fund managers and media luminaries and corporate
executives and Hollywood tastemakers and think tank geniuses and everyone else who created
the world as it was in the fall of 2016: the people in charge. Trump might be vulgar and
ignorant, but he wasn't responsible for the many disasters America's leaders created .
There was also the possibility that Trump might listen. At times he seemed interested in
what voters thought. The people in charge demonstrably weren't. Virtually none of their
core beliefs had majority support from the population they governed .Beginning on election
night, they explained away their loss with theories as pat and implausible as a summer
action movie: Trump won because fake news tricked simple minded voters. Trump won because
Russian agents "hacked" the election. Trump won because mouth-breathers in the provinces
were mesmerized by his gold jet and shiny cuff links.
From a reader review:
The New [Neoliberal] Elite speaks: "The Middle Class are losers and they have made bad
choices, they haven't worked as hard as the New Elite have, they haven't gone to SAT Prep
or LSAT prep so they lose, we win. We are the Elite and we know better than you because we
got high SAT scores.
Do we have experience? Uh....well...no, few of us have been in the military, pulled KP,
shot an M-16.... because we are better than that. Like they say only the losers go in the
military. We in the New Elite have little empirical knowledge but we can recognize patterns
very quickly."
Just look at Haley behavior in the UN and Trump trade wars and many things became more
clear. the bet is on destruction of existing international institutions in order to save the
USA elite. A the same time Trump trade wars threaten the neoliberal order so this might well
be a path to the USA self-destruction.
On Capital hill rancor, a lack of civility and derisive descriptions are everywhere.
Respect has gone out the window. Left and right wings of a single neoliberal party (much like
CPSU was in the USSR) behave like drunk schoolchildren. Level of pettiness is simply
amazing.
"... The vote for Brexit and the election of protectionist Donald Trump to the US presidency – two momentous markers of the ongoing pushback against globalization – led some to question the rationality of voters. This column presents a framework that demonstrates how the populist backlash against globalisation is actually a rational voter response when the economy is strong and inequality is high. It highlights the fragility of globalization in a democratic society that values equality. ..."
"... See original post for references ..."
"... Aversion to inequality thus reflects envy of the economic elites rather than compassion for the poor. ..."
Posted on September 28,
2018 by Yves
Smith Yves here. Haha, Lambert's volatility voters thesis confirmed! They are voting
against inequality and globalization. This important post also explains how financialization
drives populist rebellions.
By Lubos Pastor, Charles P. McQuaid Professor of Finance, University of Chicago Booth
School of Business and Pietro Veronesi, Roman Family Professor of Finance, University of
Chicago Booth School of Business. Originally published at VoxEU
The vote for Brexit and the election of protectionist Donald Trump to the US presidency
– two momentous markers of the ongoing pushback against globalization – led some to
question the rationality of voters. This column presents a framework that demonstrates how the
populist backlash against globalisation is actually a rational voter response when the economy
is strong and inequality is high. It highlights the fragility of globalization in a democratic
society that values equality.
The ongoing pushback against globalization in the West is a defining phenomenon of this
decade. This pushback is best exemplified by two momentous 2016 votes: the British vote to
leave the EU ('Brexit') and the election of a protectionist, Donald Trump, to the US
presidency. In both cases, rich-country electorates voted to take a step back from the
long-standing process of global integration. "Today, globalization is going through a major
crisis" (Macron 2018).
Some commentators question the wisdom of the voters responsible for this pushback. They
suggest Brexit and Trump supporters have been confused by misleading campaigns and foreign
hackers. They joke about turkeys voting for Christmas. They call for another Brexit referendum,
which would allow the Leavers to correct their mistakes.
Rational Voters
We take a different perspective. In a recent paper, we develop a theory in which a backlash
against globalization happens while all voters are perfectly rational (Pastor and Veronesi
2018). We do not, of course, claim that all voters are rational; we simply argue that
explaining the backlash does not require irrationality. Not only can the backlash happen in our
theory; it is inevitable.
We build a heterogeneous-agent equilibrium model in which a backlash against globalization
emerges as the optimal response of rational voters to rising inequality. A rise in inequality
has been observed throughout the West in recent decades (e.g. Atkinson et al. 2011). In our
model, rising inequality is a natural consequence of economic growth. Over time, global growth
exacerbates inequality, which eventually leads to a pushback against globalization.
Who Dislike Inequality
Agents in our model like consumption but dislike inequality. Individuals may prefer equality
for various reasons. Equality helps prevent crime and preserve social stability. Inequality
causes status anxiety at all income levels, which leads to health and social problems
(Wilkinson and Pickett 2009, 2018). In surveys, people facing less inequality report being
happier (e.g. Morawetz et al. 1977, Alesina et al. 2004, Ferrer-i-Carbonell and Ramos 2014).
Experimental results also point to egalitarian preferences (e.g. Dawes et al. 2007).
We measure inequality by the variance of consumption shares across agents. Given our other
modelling assumptions, equilibrium consumption develops a right-skewed distribution across
agents. As a result, inequality is driven by the high consumption of the rich rather than the
low consumption of the poor. Aversion to inequality thus reflects envy of the economic elites
rather than compassion for the poor.
Besides inequality aversion, our model features heterogeneity in risk aversion. This
heterogeneity generates rising inequality in a growing economy because less risk-averse agents
consume a growing share of total output. We employ individual-level differences in risk
aversion to capture the fact that some individuals benefit more from global growth than others.
In addition, we interpret country-level differences in risk aversion as differences in
financial development. We consider two 'countries': the US and the rest of the world. We assume
that US agents are less risk-averse than rest-of-the-world agents, capturing the idea that the
US is more financially developed than the rest of the world.
At the outset, the two countries are financially integrated – there are no barriers to
trade and risk is shared globally. At a given time, both countries hold elections featuring two
candidates. The 'mainstream' candidate promises to preserve globalization, whereas the
'populist' candidate promises to end it. If either country elects a populist, a move to autarky
takes place and cross-border trading stops. Elections are decided by the median voter.
Global risk sharing exacerbates US inequality. Given their low risk aversion, US agents
insure the agents of the rest of the world by holding aggressive and disperse portfolio
positions. The agents holding the most aggressive positions benefit disproportionately from
global growth. The resulting inequality leads some US voters, those who feel left behind by
globalization, to vote populist.
Why Vote Populist?
When deciding whether to vote mainstream or populist, US agents face a
consumption-inequality trade-off. If elected, the populist delivers lower consumption but also
lower inequality to US agents. After a move to autarky, US agents can no longer borrow from the
rest of the world to finance their excess consumption. But their inequality drops too, because
the absence of cross-border leverage makes their portfolio positions less disperse.
As output grows, the marginal utility of consumption declines, and US agents become
increasingly willing to sacrifice consumption in exchange for more equality. When output grows
large enough -- see the vertical line in the figure below -- more than half of US agents prefer
autarky and the populist wins the US election. This is our main result: in a growing economy,
the populist eventually gets elected. In a democratic society that values equality,
globalization cannot survive in the long run.
Figure 1 Vote share of the populist candidate
Equality Is a Luxury Good
Equality can be interpreted as a luxury good in that society demands more of it as it
becomes wealthier. Voters might also treat culture, traditions, and other nonpecuniary values
as luxury goods. Consistent with this argument, the recent rise in populism appears
predominantly in rich countries. In poor countries, agents are not willing to sacrifice
consumption in exchange for nonpecuniary values.
Globalization would survive under a social planner. Our competitive market solution differs
from the social planner solution due to the negative externality that the elites impose on
others through their high consumption. To see if globalization can be saved by redistribution,
we analyse redistributive policies that transfer wealth from low risk-aversion agents, who
benefit the most from globalization, to high risk-aversion agents, who benefit the least. We
show that such policies can delay the populist's victory, but cannot prevent it from happening
eventually.
Which Countries Are Populist?
Our model predicts that support for populism should be stronger in countries that are more
financially developed, more unequal, and running current account deficits. Looking across 29
developed countries, we find evidence supporting these predictions.
Figure 2 Vote share of populist parties in recent elections
The US and the UK are good examples. Both have high financial development, large inequality,
and current account deficits. It is thus no coincidence, in the context of our model, that
these countries led the populist wave in 2016. In contrast, Germany is less financially
developed, less unequal, and it runs a sizable current account surplus. Populism has been
relatively subdued in Germany, as our model predicts. The model emphasises the dark side of
financial development – it spurs the growth of inequality, which eventually leads to a
populist backlash.
Who are the Populist Voters?
The model also makes predictions about the characteristics of populist voters. Compared to
mainstream voters, populist voters should be more inequality-averse (i.e. more anti-elite) and
more risk-averse (i.e. better insured against consumption fluctuations). Like highly
risk-averse agents, poorer and less-educated agents have less to lose from the end of
globalization. The model thus predicts that these agents are more likely to vote populist. That
is indeed what we find when we examine the characteristics of the voters who supported Brexit
in the 2016 EU referendum and Trump in the 2016 presidential election.
The model's predictions for asset prices are also interesting. The global market share of US
stocks should rise in anticipation of the populist's victory. Indeed, the US share of the
global stock market rose steadily before the 2016 Trump election. The US bond yields should be
unusually low before the populist's victory. Indeed, bond yields in the West were low when the
populist wave began.
Backlash in a booming economy
In our model, a populist backlash occurs when the economy is strong because that is when
inequality is high. The model helps us understand why the backlash is occurring now, as the US
economy is booming. The economy is going through one of its longest macroeconomic expansions
ever, having been growing steadily for almost a decade since the 2008 crisis.
This study relates to our prior work at the intersection of finance and political economy.
Here, we exploit the cross-sectional variation in risk aversion, whereas in our 2017 paper, we
analyse its time variation (Pastor and Veronesi 2017). In the latter model, time-varying risk
aversion generates political cycles in which Democrats and Republicans alternate in power, with
higher stock returns under Democrats. Our previous work also explores links between risk
aversion and inequality (Pastor and Veronesi 2016).
Conclusions
We highlight the fragility of globalization in a democratic society that values equality. In
our model, a pushback against globalization arises as a rational voter response. When a country
grows rich enough, it becomes willing to sacrifice consumption in exchange for a more equal
society. Redistribution is of limited value in our frictionless, complete-markets model. Our
formal model supports the narrative of Rodrik (1997, 2000), who argues that we cannot have all
three of global economic integration, the nation state, and democratic politics.
If policymakers want to save globalization, they need to make the world look different from
our model. One attractive policy option is to improve the financial systems of less-developed
countries. Smaller cross-country differences in financial development would mitigate the uneven
effects of cross-border risk sharing. More balanced global risk sharing would result in lower
current account deficits and, eventually, lower inequality in the rich world.
"rising inequality is a natural consequence of economic growth. " For which definition of
growth? Or maybe, observing that cancer is the very model of growth, for any definition?
Nice model and graphs, though.
What kind of political economy is to be discerned, and how is one to effectuate it with
systems that would have to be so very different to have a prayer of providing lasting
homeostatic functions?
The global overclass can hardly wait too. They think they are in position to guide the
change to their desired outcome. Targeted applied Jackpot Engineering, you know.
At some point if the majority dont think they get any benefit from the economy, they will
put a stake through it, and replace it with some thing that works?now that could be some
thing very different, but it will happen
I had the same thought – growth as defined in the current, neoliberal model. There
is nothing inevitable about inequality – it is caused by political choices.
It is painful to find these assumptions accepted at NC.
"the economy is strong"
Not from my perspective. Or from the perspectives of the work force or the industrial base
replacing themselves. Or the perspective of a 4 to 5 trillion dollar shortfall in
infrastructure funding.
"In our model, rising inequality is a natural consequence of economic growth."
Well, that simply did not happen 1946 to 1971.
"populist delivers lower consumption but also lower inequality to US agents."
REALLY? Consumption of WHAT? Designer handbags and jeans? What about consumption of mass
public transit and health care services? I'm very confident that a populist government that
found a way to put a muzzle on Wall Street and the banksters would increase consumption of
things I prefer while also lessening inequality.
Reading through this summary of modeling, it occurred to me that the operative variable
was not inequality so much as "high financial development."
Yes and also, let's not throw the baby out with the bath water. These days, just saying
that globalisation leads to inequality and people act rationally, when they push back –
even though choices are limited – is pretty revolutionary. We need other analyses along
those lines, maybe with a few corrections. Thanks for posting!
" In our model, a populist backlash occurs when the economy is strong because that is when
inequality is high. "
Yes to the above comments. This sentence really stuck in my throat. A strong economy to me
is one that achieves balanced equality. Somehow this article avoids the manner in which the
current economy became "strong". Perhaps a better word is "corrupt". (No 'perhaps' really;
I'm just being polite.)
I also didn't like that the anti-neoliberalists are being portrayed as not having sympathy
for the poor. Gosh, we are a hard-hearted lot, only interested in our own come-uppance and
risk-adversity.
A "strong" economy is one that is growing as measured by GDP – full stop. Inequality
looks to me like a feature of our global economic value system, not a bug.
I only read these articles to see what the enemy is thinking. The vast majority of
economists are nothing more than cheerleaders for capitalism. I imagine anybody who strays
too far from neoliberal orthodoxy is ignored.
the Trump/Brexit populist thinking has nothing to do with equality. it has do do with who
should get preferential treatment and why -- it's about drawing a tight circle on who get's
to be considered "equal".
not sure how you can pull a desire for equality from this (except through statistics,
which can be used to "prove" anything).
I'm confused – so the evidence of statistics should be discounted, in favor of more
persuasive evidence? Consisting of your own authoritative statements about the motives of
other people?
In the future, please try to think about what sorts of arguments are likely to be
persuasive to people who don't already agree with you.
If you consider yourself an "environmentalist," then you have to be against
globalization.
(From the easiest to universally agree upon) the multi-continental supply chain for
everything from tube socks to cobalt to frozen fish is unsustainable, barring Star Trek-type
transport tech breakthroughs.
(to the less easily to universally agree upon) the population of the entire developed
(even in the US) would be stablized/falling/barely rising, but for migration.
mass migration-fueled population growth/higher fertility rates of migrants in the
developed world and increased resource footprint is bad for both the developed world and
developing world.
The long, narrow, and manifold supply lines which characterize our present systems of
globalization make the world much more fragile. The supply chains are fraught with single
points of systemic failure. At the same time Climate Disruption increases the risk that a
disaster can affect these single points of failure. I fear that the level of instability in
the world systems is approaching the point where multiple local disasters could have
catastrophic effects at a scale orders of magnitude greater than the scale of the triggering
events -- like the Mr. Science demonstration of a chain-reaction where he tosses a single
ping pong ball into a room full of mousetraps set with ping pong balls. You have to be
against globalization if you're against instability.
The entire system of globalization is completely dependent on a continuous supply of cheap
fuel to power the ships, trains, and trucks moving goods around the world. That supply of
cheap fuel has its own fragile supply lines upon which the very life of our great cities
depends. Little food is grown where the most food is eaten -- this reflects the distributed
nature of our supply chains greatly fostered by globalization.
Globalization increases the power and control Corporate Cartels have over their workers.
It further increases the power large firms have over smaller firms as the costs and
complexities of globalized trade constitute a relatively larger overhead for smaller firms.
Small producers of goods find themselves flooded with cheaper foreign knock-offs and
counterfeits of any of their designs that find a place in the market. It adds uncertainty and
risk to employment and small ventures. Globalization magnifies the power of the very large
and very rich over producers and consumers.
I believe the so-called populist voters and their backlash in a "booming" economy are
small indications of a broad unrest growing much faster than our "booming" economies. That
unrest is one more risk to add to the growing list of risks to an increasingly fragile
system. The world is configured for a collapse that will be unprecedented in its speed and
scope.
Actually, the way I see it – if one considers oneself an environmentalist, one has
to be against capitalism, not just globalization. Capitalism is built on constant growth
– but on a planet, with limited resources, that simply cannot work. Not long term
unless we're prepared to dig up and/or pave over everything. Only very limited-scale,
mom-and-pop kind of capitalism can try to work long term – but the problem is, it would
not stay that way because greed gets in the way every time and there's no limiting greed.
(Greed as a concept was limited in the socialist system – but some folks did not like
that.)
" Given their low risk aversion, US agents insure the agents of the rest of the world by
holding aggressive and disperse portfolio positions."
That low risk aversion could be driven by the willingness of the US government to provide
military/diplomatic/trade assistance to US businesses around the word. The risk inherent in
moving factories, doing resource extraction and conducting business overseas is always there,
but if one's government lessens the risk via force projection and control of local
governments, a US agent could appear to be "less risk averse" because the US taxpayer has
"got their back".
This paper closes with
"If policymakers want to save globalization, they need to make the world look different
from our model. One attractive policy option is to improve the financial systems of
less-developed countries. Smaller cross-country differences in financial development would
mitigate the uneven effects of cross-border risk sharing. More balanced global risk sharing
would result in lower current account deficits and, eventually, lower inequality in the rich
world."
Ah yes, to EVENTUALLY lower inequality, the USA needs to "improve the financial systems of
less-well developed countries"
Perhaps the USA needs to improve its OWN financial system first?
Paul Woolley has suggested, the US and UK financial systems are 2 to 3 times they should
be.
And the USA's various financial industry driven bubbles, the ZIRP rescue of the financial
industry, and mortgage security fraud seem all connected back to the USA financial
industry.
Inequality did not improve in the aftermath of these events as the USA helped preserve the
elite class.
Maybe the authors have overlooked a massive home field opportunity?
That being that the USA should consider "improving" its own financial system to help
inequality.
I'm glad to see that issues and views discussed pretty regularly here in more or less
understandable English have been translated into Academese. Being a high risk averse plebe,
who will not starve for lack of trade with China, but may have to pay a bit more for
strawberries for lack of cheap immigrant labor, I count myself among the redistributionist
economic nationalists.
Right now I'm making raisins from the grapes harvested here at home .. enough to last for
a year, or maybe two. Sure, it's laborous to some extent, but the supply chain is very short
.. the cost, compared to buying the same amount at retait rates, is minuscule, and they're as
'organic' as can be. The point I'm trying to make is that wth some personal effort, we can
all live lighter, live slower, and be, for the most part, contented.
Might as well step into collapse, gracefully, and avoid the rush, as per J. M. Greer's
mantra.
The UK had become somewhat dependent on Switzerland for wristwatches prior to WW2, and all
of the sudden France falls and that's all she wrote for imports.
Must've been a mad scramble to resurrect the business, or outsource elsewhere.
My wife and I were talking about what would happen if say the reign of error pushes us
into war with China, and thanks to our just in time way of life, the goods on the shelves of
most every retailer, would be plundered by consumers, and maybe they could be restocked a few
times, but that's it.
I recently purchased a cabinet/shelf for 20 tubmans, from a repurposing/recycling
business, and, after putting a couple of hundred moar tubmans into it .. some of which
included recycled latex paints and hardware .. transformed it into a fabulous stand-alone
kitchen storage unit. If I were to purchase such at retail, it would most likely go for close
to $800- $1000.00 easy !!
With care, this 'renewed' polecat heirloom will certainly outlive it's recreator, and pass on
for generations henceforth.
Yes, thank goodness there was no mention of Canada's failure to negotiate a trade treaty
with our best friend. All of a sudden, Canadians seem to be the target of a lot of ill will
in other articles.
I think it's just ill- informed jealousy. Us US mopes think Canadians are much better off
than we Yanks, health care and such. You who live there have your own insights, of course.
Trudeau and the Ford family and tar sands and other bits.
And some of us are peeved that you don't want us migrating to take advantage of your more
beneficent milieu.
It's a different vibe up over, their housing bubble crested and is sinking, as the road to
HELOC was played with the best intentions even more furiously than here in the heat of the
bubble.
Can Canada bail itself out as we did in the aftermath, and keep the charade going?
Feel free to fill out that 8 inch high pile of Canadian immigration documentation, so
ya'all can come on up and join the party. Or just jump on your pony and ride North into the
Land of the Grandmother. Trudeau wants more people and has failed to offer proper sacrifice
to the god Terminus, the god of borders, so .
Just don't move to "Van" unless you have a few million to drop on a "reno'ed" crack shack.
When the god Pluto crawls back into the earth, the housing bubble will burst, and it's not
going to be pretty.
That's funny as our dam here is called the Terminus Reservoir, if the name fits
I'm just looking for an ancestral way out of what might prove to be a messy scene down
under, i'd gladly shack up in one of many of my relatives basements if Max Mad breaks out
here.
Great article, interesting data points, but besides placing tariffs on Chinese imports
there is nothing populist about Trump, just empty rhetoric. Highly regressive tax cuts for
the wealthy, further deregulation, wanton environmental destruction, extremist right-wing
ideologues as judges, a cabinet full of Wall Street finance guys, more boiler-plate Neo-Lib
policies as far as I can tell.
I fear Trump and the Brexiters are giving populism a bad name. A functioning democracy
should always elect populists. A government of elected officials who do not represent the
public will is not really a democracy.
Aversion to inequality thus reflects envy of the economic elites rather than
compassion for the poor.
That's ridiculous. Indeed, the Brexit campaign was all about othering the poor and
powerless immigrants, as well as the cultural, artistic, urban and academic elites, never the
the moneyed elites, not the 1%. The campaign involved no dicussion what's so ever of the
actual numbers of wealth inequality.
When deciding whether to vote mainstream or populist, US agents face a
consumption-inequality trade-off. If elected, the populist delivers lower consumption but
also lower inequality to US agents.
How can anyone possibly write such a thing? The multi-trillion tax cut from Donald Trump
represents a massive long time rise in inequality. Vis-à-vis Brexit, the entire
campaign support for that mad endeavor came from free-trader fundamentalists who want to be
free to compete with both hands in the global race-to-the-bottom while the EU is (barely)
restraining them.
Trump and Brexit voters truly are irrational turkeys (that's saying a lot for anyone who's
met an actual turkey) voting for Christmas.
Some of us mopes who voted for Trump did so as a least-bad alternative to HER, just to try
to kick the hornet's nest and get something to fly out: So your judgment is that those folks
are "irrational turkeys," bearing in mind how mindless the Christmas and Thansgiving turkeys
have been bred to be?
Better to arm up, get out in the street, and start marching and chanting and ready to
confront the militarized police? I'd say, face it: as people here have noted there is a
system in place, the "choices" are frauds to distract us every couple of years, and the
vectors all point down into some pretty ugly terrain.
Bless those who have stepped off the conveyor, found little places where they can live
"autarkically," more or less, and are waiting out the Ragnarok/Gotterdammerung/Mad Max
anomie, hoping not to be spotted by the warbands that will form up and roam the terrain
looking for bits of food and fuel and slaves and such. Like one survivalist I spotted
recently says as his tag-line, "If you have stuff, you're a target. If you have knowledge.
you have a chance–" this in a youtube video on how to revive a defunct nickel-cadmium
drill battery by zapping it with a stick welder. (It works, by the way.)He's a chain smoker
and his BMI must be close to 100, but he's got knowledge
The papers's framing of the issues is curious: the populace has 'envy' of the well-off;
and populism (read envy) rises when the economy is strong and inequality rises (read where's
my yaht?).
The paper lacks acknowledgement of the corruption, fraud, and rigging of policy that rises
when an overly financialized economy is 'good.' This contributes to inequality. Inequality is
not just unequal, but extremely disproportionate distributions which cause real suffering and
impoverishment of the producers. It follows (but not to the writer of this paper) that the
citizens take offense at and objection to the disproprtionate takings of some and the meager
receipts of the many. It's this that contributes to populism.
And the kicker: to save globalization, let's financialize the less developed economies to
mitigate cross-border inequalities. Huh? Was not the discussion about developed nations'
voters to rising inequality in face of globalization? The problem is not cross-border 'envy.'
It's globalization instrinsically and how it is gamed.
I'm with Olga. It's good to see that voting "wrong" taken seriously, and seen as
economically rational. Opposing globalization makes sense, even in the idiosyncratic usage of
economics.
The trouble, of course, is that the world of economics is not the world we live in.
Why does the immigrant cross the border? Is it only for "pecuniary interests," only for
the money? Then why do so many send most of it back across the border, in remittances?
If people in poor countries aren't willing to sacrifice for "luxuries," like a dignified
human life, who was Simon Bolivar, Che Guevara, or more recently, Berta Cáceres?
Seems to be a weakness of economic models in general: it's inconceivable that people do
things for other than pecuniary interests. In the reductionist terms of natural science,
we're social primates, not mechanical information engines.
If this model were a back patio cart, like the one I'm building right now, I wouldn't set
my beer on it. Looks like a cart from a distance, though, esp when you're looking for
one.
To the extent that the backlash has irrational aspects in the way it manifests, I would
suspect that it relates to the refusal of the self-styled responsible people to participate
in opening more rational paths to solutions, or even to acknowledge the existence of a
problem. When the allegedly responsible and knowledgeable actors refuse to act, or even see a
need to act, it's hardly surprising that the snake oil vendors grow in influence.
I'm always leery of t-test values being cited without the requisite sample size being
noted. You need that to determine effect size. While the slope looks ominously valid for the
regression model, effects could be weak and fail to show whether current account deficits are
the true source. Financialization seems purposely left out of the model.
In my own words then. According to Cook the power elites goal is to change its
appearance to look like something new and innovative to stay ahead of an electorate who are
increasingly skeptical of the neoliberalism and globalism that enrich the elite at their
expense.
Since they do not actually want change they find actors who pretend to represent change
, which is in essence fake change. These then are their insurgent candidates
Trump serves the power elite , because while he appears as an insurgent against the
power elite he does little to change anything
Trump promotes his fake insurgency on Twitter stage knowing the power elite will counter
any of his promises that might threaten them
As an insurgent candidate Trump was indifferent to Israel and wanted the US out of
Syria. He wanted good relations with Russia. He wanted to fix the health care system,
rebuild infrastructure, scrap NAFTA and TTIPS, bring back good paying jobs, fight the
establishment and Wall Street executives and drain the swamp. America First he said.
Trump the insurgent president , has become Israel's biggest cheerleader and has launched
US missiles at Syria, relations with Russia are at Cold War lows, infrastructure is still
failing, the percentage of people working is now at an all time low in the post housewife
era, he has passed tax cuts for the rich that will endanger medicare, medicaid and social
security and prohibit infrastructure spending, relaxed regulations on Wall Street, enhanced
NAFTA to include TTIPS provisions and make US automobiles more expensive, and the swamp has
been refilled with the rich, neocons , Koch associates, and Goldman Sachs that make up the
power elites and Deep State Americas rich and Israel First
@34 pft... regarding the 2 cook articles.. i found they overly wordy myself...
however, for anyone paying attention - corbyn seems like the person to vote for given how
relentless he is being attacked in the media... i am not so sure about trump, but felt cook
summed it up well with these 2 lines.. "Trump the candidate was indifferent to Israel and
wanted the US out of Syria. Trump the president has become Israel's biggest cheerleader and
has launched US missiles at Syria." i get the impression corbyn is legit which is why the
anti-semitism keeps on being mentioned... craig murrary is a good source for staying on top
of uk dynamics..
(a) talk coherently
(b) have some kind of movement consisting of people that agree with what is says -- that
necessitates (a)
Then he could staff his Administration with his supporters rather than a gamut of
conventional plutocrats, neocons, and hacks from the Deep State (intelligence, FBI and
crazies culled from Pentagon). As it is easy to see, I am describing an alternate reality.
Who is a Trumpian member of the Administration? His son-in-law?
The swamps been filled with all kinds of vile creatures since the Carter administration.
This is when the US/UK went full steam ahead with neoliberal globalism with Israel directing
the war on terror for the Trilateral Empire (following Bibis Jerusalem conference so as to
fulfill the Yinon plan). 40 years of terror and financial mayhem following the coup that took
place from 1963-1974. After Nixons ouster they were ready to go once TLC Carter/Zbig kicked
off the Trilateral era. Reagan then ran promising to oust the TLC swamp but broke his
promise, as every President has done since .
"UK Prime Minister Theresa May suffered political humiliation in Salzburg, when European
Union (EU) leaders rebuffed her appeal to give at least conditional support to her Chequers
proposal for a "soft Brexit."
May was given only 10 minutes to address EU heads of state Wednesday, after dinner at the
informal summit, during which she appealed to her audience, "You are participants in our
debate, not just observers."
She said she had counted on at least supportive noises for her "serious and workable"
plan, given that she was seeking to head off a potential challenge from the
"hard-Brexit"/Eurosceptic wing of the Conservative Party. She warned that the UK could be
torn apart -- with respect to Northern Ireland and Scotland, as well as by social tensions;
that if her government fell, Jeremy Corbyn's Labour Party could win a general election; and
cited the potential damage to the EU itself of lost trade, investment and military support
from the UK.
Instead, her address was met with silence and her implied threats were stonewalled, as the
main players within the EU combined the next day to declare her proposals to be
"unworkable.
No matter how these conflicts play out, Britain and the whole of Europe face a worsening
crisis that threatens to tear the EU apart. The growth of both inter-imperialist and social
antagonisms found dramatic form in Brexit, which the dominant sections of the City of London,
big business, all the major parties and Britain's allies in the US and Europe all opposed.
Yet two years later, May is fighting a desperate struggle against her anti-EU "hard-Brexit"
faction, the US is led by a president who has declared his support for the breakup of the EU,
and numerous far-right governments have taken power in part by exploiting popular hostility
to EU-dictated austerity."
"worsening crisis that threatens to tear the EU-(and hence NATO)- apart. " .
"... Popularity of National Socialism in capitalist country like Germany was exactly due to that process of corruption of working class who embassy stoped to question system as long as provided them with goods. ..."
"... Henceforth, most goods manufactured for US consumption were to be produced abroad, from Mexico to China. Once US based multinationals started down this road, European and even Japanese ones followed. This did not mean an increase in productive forces but a substitution of one labour force for another. ..."
"... Thus the rise of Chinese industry was as much a part of this process as the deindustrialisation of formerly prosperous parts of the US and the UK. This has nothing to do with the evolution of our species and everything to do with the evolution of capitalism. This is what I mean by globalisation. ..."
"... It has not eradicated national borders but is a major factor in the recent development of far right nationalism in Europe. It is a strong contributor to the restructuring of western economies so that only a minority of British workers have full time permanent jobs. It is also used as leverage to drive down wages in western economies. ..."
"... I do not believe what I mean by globalisation is progressive at all. It has been pushed by the most reactionary political forces in western societies as an integral part of what the WSWS calls a social counter revolution. As the WSWS again points out it makes the preservation of national welfare states or a decent standard of living for working class people impossible. I am not calling for this to be reversed under capitalism. ..."
"... "...globalised production is the exploitation of lower wage rates in developing countries." ..."
"... As if domestic production were not the same thing. The author is essentially arguing for "lesser evil" exploitation in the interests of society as a whole. Reformists always do. ..."
"... "The crisis also exposed in full glare another of the central myths of the capitalist order -- that the state is somehow a neutral or independent organisation committed to regulating social and economic affairs in the interests of society as a whole." - Ten years since the collapse of Lehman Brothers ..."
"... "Keynes was a reformist and capable of formulating policies which, if followed, would make capitalism more amenable to the interests of the majority of people." ..."
"... The most important theoretical source of his thinking is his own work "The General Theory of Employment, Money and Interest" which is available to read or download free online. ..."
"... The US wants to reinforce it's declining global hegemonic position at any cost. Now they started with economic war against countries they see as not cooperating to their demands, but under current conditions this could easily transform into Global war at some point in future. ..."
In the aftermath of the global financial crisis ten years ago, the leaders of the world's
major powers pledged that never again would they go down the road of protectionism which had
such disastrous consequences in the 1930s -- deepening the Great Depression and contributing
to the outbreak of world war in 1939.
Yesterday US President Donald Trump announced tariffs on $200 billion worth of Chinese
goods in what the Washington Post described as "one of the most severe economic
restrictions ever imposed by a US president."
A levy of 10 percent will be imposed starting from September 24 and will be escalated to
25 percent in 2019 if the US does not receive what it considers to be a satisfactory
agreement. The new tariffs, which will cover more than 1,000 goods, come on top of the 25
percent tariff already imposed on $50 billion worth of industrial products. Trump has
threatened further measures on the remaining Chinese exports to the US totalling more than
$250 billion.
China has threatened retaliatory action including tariffs and other, as yet unspecified
measures, against the US, meaning that the world's number one and number two economies are
locked into a rapidly escalating trade war that will have global consequences.
Announcing the decision, Trump called on China to take "swift action" to end what he
called its "unfair trade practices" and expressed the hope that the trade conflict would be
resolved.
But there is little prospect of such an outcome because, while the US is demanding that
the trade deficit with China be reduced, the conflict does not merely centre on that issue.
China has made offers to increase its imports from the US, all of which have been rejected.
The key US demand is that the Chinese government completely abandon its program of economic
development and remain subservient to the US in high-tech economic sectors.
As the position paper issued by Washington in May put it: "China will cease providing
market-distorting subsidies and other types of government support that can contribute to the
creation or maintenance of excess capacity in industries targeted by the Made in China 2025
industrial plan."
In other words, China must completely scrap the foundational structures of its economy so
that it presents no threat to the economic dominance of US capitalism, a dominance which the
US intends to maintain, if it considers necessary, by military means. This was made clear
earlier this year when Washington designated China as a "strategic competitor," that is, a
potential military enemy. This is the inherent, objective, logic of the latest trade war
measures.
Their full significance can only be grasped when viewed with the framework of the
historical development of the global capitalist economy.
After the disastrous decade of the 1930s, and as the world plunged into war, leading
figures within the Roosevelt administration recognised that this situation was due in no
small measure to the division of the world into rival trade and economic blocs which tariff
and other trade restrictions had played a major role in creating.
Post-war planning centred on trying to overcome this contradiction between the global
economy and its division into rival great powers and blocs through the development of a
mechanism that ensured the expansion of world trade. This was the basis of the series of
measures set in place in the immediate aftermath of the war: the Bretton Woods monetary
system which tied major currencies to the dollar in fixed exchange rates, the General
Agreement on Tariffs and Trade that sought to bring down tariff barriers and the
establishment of the International Monetary Fund and the World Bank to ensure international
economic collaboration.
These measures, however, did not overcome the inherent contradictions of capitalism, above
all between the global economy and the nation-state system. Rather, they sought to contain
and mitigate them within a system based on the overwhelming economic dominance of the US.
But the growth of the world capitalist economy and the strengthening of the other major
powers undermined the very foundations on which they were based -- the absolute dominance of
the US. Within the space of a generation, the weakening of the US position was revealed in
August 1971 when it scrapped the Bretton Woods monetary system declaring that the dollar
would no longer be redeemable for gold.
The period since then has seen the ongoing weakening of the position of the US, which was
graphically revealed in the financial meltdown ten years ago when the US financial system was
shown to be a house of cards based on rampant speculation and outright criminal activity.
This situation has continued in the subsequent decade, threatening, another, even more
disastrous, financial crisis.
The US is now not only confronted with the economic power of its European rivals but a
major new one in the form of China. It is striving to reverse this situation. As Leon Trotsky
explained some eighty years ago, the hegemony of the US would assert itself most powerfully
not in conditions of boom but above all in a crisis when it would use every means -- economic
and military -- against all rivals to maintain its position.
The trade war measures against China are only one expression of this process. The US has
already carried out protectionist measures against Europe and Japan through the imposition of
tariffs on steel and aluminium and has threatened tariffs on cars and auto parts, which will
be invoked unless they join its push on China.
And as the China tariffs are imposed, top officials of the European Union are meeting to
discuss how they might overcome the financial sanctions the US will impose against European
companies if they maintain economic ties with Iran after November 4 following the unilateral
abrogation of the Iran nuclear deal.
The deal was not overturned because Iran had breached the agreement -- international
agencies found that it had fully complied. Rather, the United States unilaterally abrogated
the treaty in order to strengthen the strategic position of the US in the Middle East by
countering the influence of Iran, and because European corporations stood to benefit from the
opening up of new economic opportunities in that country at the expense of their US
rivals.
Now the State Department has warned that European companies are "on the railroad tracks"
if they defy US sanctions and firms that deal with the "enemy" will be barred from access to
the US financial system.
Writing in the 1930s, Leon Trotsky explained that the interdependence of every country in
the global economy meant that the program of economic nationalism, of the kind now being
practised by the Trump administration, was a reactionary "utopia" insofar as it set itself
the task of harmonious national economic development on the basis of private property.
"But it is a menacing reality insofar as it is a question of concentrating all the
economic forces of the nation for the preparation of a new war," he wrote five years before
the outbreak of World War II.
This "menacing reality" is now once again expressed in the fact that the trade war
measures against China, as well as those against Europe and Japan, have all been invoked on
"national security" grounds. Just as the US prepares for war, so too do all the other major
powers. This drive does not arise from the heads of the capitalist politicians -- their
actions are only the translation into politics of the objective logic and irresolvable
contradictions of the capitalist system over which they preside.
But there is another more powerful logic at work. The very development of globalised
production, which has raised the contradiction of the outmoded nation-state system with its
rival great powers to a new peak of intensity, has laid the foundations for a planned world
socialist economy. And it has created in the international working class, unified at an
unprecedented level, the social force to carry it out.
The latest Trump trade war measures underscore the urgency for the political and
theoretical arming of the working class with the program of world socialist revolution,
fought for by the International Committee of the Fourth International, if civilisation is to
go forward and the plunge into barbarism averted.
Beams excellent piece included:
"As the position paper issued by Washington in May put it: "China will
cease providing market-distorting subsidies and other types of government support that can
contribute to the creation or maintenance of excess capacity in industries targeted by the
Made in China 2025 industrial plan."
This issue of "government support" in China is reflected in the U.S. but in a different
way. Nashville and Tennessee governments alone have given hundreds of millions of dollars
in "tax incentives," payment for worker training and outright "grants" to corporations in
"government support."
Hospital Corporation of America (HCA) got millions for, of all things, furniture for new
offices which included thousands of dollars for a guitar-shaped table.
Gaylord's Opryland Resort got almost $14 million from the city to build a $90 million hotel
Waterpark that would only be open to hotel guests!
The state and its capitol are prepared to give Amazon more than $1.5 billion to have the
corporation move is second U.S. headquarters here.
Like the Chinese government and oligarchs, neither state nor city will reveal the details
or total amount.
As the WSWS has so correctly observed before, "the hypocrisy is breathtaking."
I should say I do not agree that globalised production is a beneficial or positive economic
development. I accept that as a by product there is a positive political result namely the
creation and expansion of the international working class. But the only reason for
globalised production is the exploitation of lower wage rates in developing countries. If
the cost of labour, taking into account currency exchange rates as well as wage levels,
were the same in every country and region, there would be no advantage in producing most
commodities in Asia for sale in North America or Europe (or vice versa). Also, I do not
accept that free trade is in everyone's interest. The only argument ever advanced in it's
favour by economists, the comparative advantage argument, is spurious. Even its
originators, Adam Smith and David Ricardo, accepted that the benefits would only apply if
capital was immobile across national boundaries, which hardly applies today. The US
economy's industrial growth, though the result of several factors, was only possible
because the US rejected free trade in favour of protective tariffs which protected its
infant industries from foreign competition. What is the central fallacy in the comparative
advantage argument is that the prosperity of the majority of a country's citizens under
capitalism depends on a strong, capital intensive, manufacturing sector, but which also
requires a large labour input. Only those jobs can pay a sufficiently high wage to workers.
Their spending power also invigorates the whole economy.
Thy major point about this issue global or local is often completely missed namely that
this dispute have nothing to do with Workers Socialist Revolution but to perhaps see ways
how to save capitalism in a way of sharing more wealth with working class, how to suppress
class struggle with Bread and Games or War, an old Roman method of divide and conquer.
Hence, capital controls, tarrifs , barriers, subsidies are instruments of having any
possibility of real social policies in capitalism system making it more livable and longer
lasting than in case of intensified pressure on working class and class struggle of
globalism versus nationalism.
Popularity of National Socialism in capitalist country like Germany was exactly due
to that process of corruption of working class who embassy stoped to question system as
long as provided them with goods.
Little did they know, that they were in 1930 confronted with no permanent political
solution to their class issues via improvement of standard of living and importance of
their labor on the propaganda spectrum,but with dead end politics of submission to one
political sellouts or another since their forced unity was just subordinated to capitalist
imperative of ufettered economic and military growth via extreme exploitation.
And that is what's wrong with nationalism namely it is shutting down paths of class
struggle toward class liberation, as it neuters this struggle.
There is a difference between the growth of global productive capacity and globalisation.
Prior to the latter process, manufacturing capacity was increased including by western
investment in developing countries, especially in Latin America. But production in those
countries was for local regional and national markets.
The US accepted competition from the German economy as a price to be paid for avoiding
the postwar threat of socialism. But the Japanese export driven model of growth was
eventually unacceptable. The US demanded the Japanese destroy this model by raising their
own currency to a level which made their exports much less competitive. The Japanese rich
were given financial opportunities in the US as compensation.
However, when the South Koreans and other nations copied the Japanese model, the US
government and US multinationals radically changed their economic policy. A conscious
choice was made by the Reagon administration to export manufacturing jobs en masse to
developing countries as well as attacking the incomes of US workers who had jobs.
Henceforth, most goods manufactured for US consumption were to be produced abroad,
from Mexico to China. Once US based multinationals started down this road, European and
even Japanese ones followed. This did not mean an increase in productive forces but a
substitution of one labour force for another.
Thus the rise of Chinese industry was as much a part of this process as the
deindustrialisation of formerly prosperous parts of the US and the UK. This has nothing to
do with the evolution of our species and everything to do with the evolution of capitalism.
This is what I mean by globalisation.
It has not eradicated national borders but is a major factor in the recent
development of far right nationalism in Europe. It is a strong contributor to the
restructuring of western economies so that only a minority of British workers have full
time permanent jobs. It is also used as leverage to drive down wages in western
economies.
Of course in recent years the Chinese and Indian economies have grown under these
policies so that there is now an increase of global capacity. Nor do I believe this process
has led to a genuinely more efficient system of production and distribution. To produce
products in one part of the world for distribution to another part half way around the
world is very inefficient, if the product could be made nearer to the point where it would
be used. It however becomes profitable if the labour used to produce it is much cheaper
than that available where the the object is to be sold.
I do not believe what I mean by globalisation is progressive at all. It has been
pushed by the most reactionary political forces in western societies as an integral part of
what the WSWS calls a social counter revolution. As the WSWS again points out it makes the
preservation of national welfare states or a decent standard of living for working class
people impossible. I am not calling for this to be reversed under capitalism.
That seems impossible. Only the overthrow of capitalism offers the possibility of
positive change. But under international socialism, globalised production chains will
finally be seen for what they are, an unnecessary and inefficient encumbrance on
humanity.
I think you are largely confusing globalisation with imperialism. I think you are also
misunderstanding the wsws position. The wsws does not call for xenophobic or nationalist
policies to close borders and keep workers imprisoned in their home countries to be used as
a captive labor force by the domestic bourgeoisie. The wsws calls for an internationalist
and proletarian socialist movement in conformity with that advocated by the workers
movement ever since the publication of the communist manifesto.
I really could not care less what you call it. I just want people to start treating each
other better. What makes those with sticky fingers think that they are so G.D. better than
everyone else that they can condemn whole segments to poverty and even death, all for the
sake of their bits of imaginary ego-boosts?
ALL of the "isms" in the world have never worked out a justification for greed and the
lust for power. No matter what the system, crooked people always try to exploit others, and
blamejustify it all on their "good genes". (edited)
Capitalism is no better or worse because it just doesn't matter what the system is, the
crooks will always cheat that system to get more than everyone else.
An interesting theory to describe what is essentially creation of a world customs union
based on the model that created Germany in 1871, the Zollverein. Spreading the customs
union (Zollverein) worldwide was the reason for the two world wars--instead of maintaining
a world federation politically and economically. The United Nations was designed to be a
federation, but under post-1945 changes in the USA and subsequent pressures on the UN and
its member states, it began developing into a union, not a federation. This was accompanied
with creation of a global Zollverein, tariff free borders and free trade.
The difference politically between a union and a federation is that in a federation the
member states award limited operating powers to a central coordinating body which does what
the members want; in a union the central body holds all the powers and tells the members
what to do.
The United Nations "holds all the powers and tells the members what to do" ? That's news to
me. As far as I can tell, the members do what they damn well please. The UN is more like a
fractured federation with a nearly impotent central body - the so-called "Security Council"
- which issues edicts but has no enforcement power. Same with the World Court.
The UN was designed by the victors of WWII to be "crippled", mere window-dressing as a
calming salve for the developing nations. From the start, it was meant to be largely
ineffective as the world's policeman and justice system .
All the nation states with any significant power are still more interested in preserving
as much their own power and hegemonic control as possible.
"...globalised production is the exploitation of lower wage rates in developing
countries."
As if domestic production were not the same thing. The author is essentially arguing
for "lesser evil" exploitation in the interests of society as a whole. Reformists always
do.
"The crisis also exposed in full glare another of the central myths of the
capitalist order -- that the state is somehow a neutral or independent organisation
committed to regulating social and economic affairs in the interests of society as a
whole." - Ten years since the collapse of Lehman Brothers
"However my fundamental advocacy of policy would be that of international socialism the
result of which would be the handing of power to the working class to be exercised
democratically ."
The "handing of power" from whom exactly?
As it is now, the minority holds the power. So it's reasonable to think you mean they
would hand the power over to the majority.
Which would be silly. But whether or not that was your meaning, "the handing of power to
the working class to be exercised democratically" besides being exactly backwards, is an
opportunist "understanding" of Marxism. It implies a perspective where the state does not
need to be destroyed.
"The crucial question for Marx was what was the social material force -- the class --
created by capitalist society itself, which would be the agency, the driving force, of this
transformation." - A promotion of the "life-style" politics of the pseudo-left
It's a version of the frequently and historically repeated goal of replacing one petty
bourgeoisie minority with another, betraying the material interests of the working class
and the revolution every time.
It seems like you might have just mentioned that phrase as an aside but it might
indicate the deeper problem.
Before you start analyzing which policies might be recommended (which seems to be mainly
what interests you) you have to understand the class nature of the problem. That doesn't
come down only to understanding that there are two classes in struggle in society
and then applying your everyday petty bourgeois thinking to it.
Have you read David North's Lenin, Trotsky and the Marxism of the October
Revolution ? It was written back in March yet it's still posted on the wsws main
page--for a reason.
It provides a concise explanation of some of the fundamental ideas and way of thinking
you have to understand if you want to have any kind of intelligent conversation
about socialism.
Nick Beams did not say that "globalised production chains employed represent a genuinely
beneficial development in some deep sense." He said that such an outcome is impossible
under capitalism and the system of competing nation-states.
The only "deep sense" is that he said it would be possible for globalization to
have a positive effect for humanity if the international working class were able to abolish
capitalism, the pursuit of private profit, warring nation-states, and institute
socialism.
Thank you comrade Nick Beams. US's century is 20th and a bygone one. You finely point out
on the basis of Trotskysm the mortal danger that humanity faces resulting from the
inter-imperialist rivalry that is escalating by the day.
Besides, the US's taking up of its rival China, the second biggest economy, in trade war
pose a military confrontation to which Russia could be attracted on to China side.
Also Russia has been taken up by American imperialism independently as a target. Brexit
hard or soft would also confound economic nationalism that is gathering momentum hugely. US
sanctions on Iran is bound to sharpen the conflict between European imperialists. Also
India appears to be in crisis on whether to abide by US dictats as per its Iranian economic
connection especially on oil purchase. US's increasing protectionism has already gone out
of control as per its implications to global polity and military activity. In view of this
critical situation the role of the working class, national and international, should
determine the future of humanity. Role of the revolutionary triumvirate, ICFI/SEP/IYSSE, is
of paramount importance. I appeal to national working classes to build SEP as your national
party of the socialist revolution. I appeal to youth and students to build your national
chapters of the IYSSE in schools, universities etc. as quickly as possible. World war is
haunting. Very existannce of the humanity on this palnet is uncertain, if we unitedly as
workers, youth and students fail to empower the party of the world revolution, ICFI.
Victory to international socialist revolution. Death to protectionism whose major advocate
is US capitalism/imperialism. Down with the psudo left and the trade unions.
Keynes, who designed the Bretton Woods system, also proposed an international banking
system and currency (called the Bancor). The purpose was to prevent the kind of unbalanced
world trade which now dominates the global economy. Under his proposed system, countries
with chronic trade surpluses would be penalised, thus preventing a situation like the
present with some nations being massive exporters and others massive importers. Instead,
all countries would hover around balanced trade where their imports equaled their exports
in value. The US government told Keynes to shut up about this plan or they would cancel
their promised postwar loans to the UK. The reason was that at the time the US planned to
be a net exporter. Incidentally, Keynes warned that if the system of managed currency
exchange rates were abandoned, the financial markets would become a "virtual senate" which
would have the power to dictate economic policies to nation states.
"Keynes, who designed the Bretton Woods system, also proposed an international banking
system and currency (called the Bancor). The purpose was to prevent the kind of
unbalanced world trade which now dominates the global economy."
Perpetually caught in a "lesser evil" loop of some variety or another from which the
reformist never escapes, applying the same failed (ruling class) logic over, and over and
over and over...
"But this solves nothing because, as Marx's analysis showed, the crises of capitalism
cannot be overcome by reforms to the monetary system because, while they necessarily
express themselves there, they were rooted in the very foundations of the capitalist
economy, in its DNA so to speak -- that is, in the social relations based on profit and the
market system." -Ten years after Lehman: New financial crises in the making
Keynes' suggestion would have "solved" or rather prevented one problem, but not every
problem of capitalism. Keynes was a reformist and capable of formulating policies which, if
followed, would make capitalism more amenable to the interests of the majority of people.
He was consciously trying to save capitalism from itself and said so. But you rightly
point out there is a major problem with this thinking, namely that it ignores the self
interest of governments and capitalists alike, who ignore such concepts of "enlightened"
self interest in favour of short term advantage.
Political reality intruded in Keynes' well-intentioned designs immediately as I've
mentioned and the whole Bretton Woods edifice was knocked down as soon as it proved
inconvenient for US interests.
Similarly, I strongly suspect Keynes would have disapproved of financial deregulation,
but the underlying development of US capitalism led to unstoppable political pressure for
its implementation.
"Keynes was a reformist and capable of formulating policies which, if followed, would
make capitalism more amenable to the interests of the majority of people."
For the life of me I can't figure why you'd praise a policy that more effectively
persuades or controls the masses to their own detriment and to the economic benefit of a
minority--other than to conclude that like Keynes and the rest of the petty bourgeoisie,
you're a reformist.
The most important theoretical source of his thinking is his own work "The General
Theory of Employment, Money and Interest" which is available to read or download free
online.
I only recently learned of his Bancor proposal in an article by George Monbiot
originally published in the Guardian. I read it on the Znet website, but I can't remember
when.
As for his quote about the financial markets becoming a virtual senate, I read that in
some article about finance but don't remember the source. Sorry I can't be more helpful.
There could be other books on his theories but he is somewhat unfashionable as mainstream
economics has mostly reverted to a more ideologically driven right wing position.
"In January, while Trump was requesting Congress to allocate funds for the US-Mexico border
wall, China sent delegates to Chile, inviting Latin American leaders to participate in the
Belt and Road Initiative. Months later, as Trump bullied US allies at the NATO summit,
China was wrapping up the "16+1 summit" in Bulgaria, where Chinese investment and
diplomatic relations were marketed to Central and Eastern European leaders. And most
recently, Chinese President Xi Jinping wrapped up his travels throughout Africa, where he
was visiting with heads of state and deepening China's relationships with the continent of
the future, while America picks a one-sided trade fight with Rwanda."
The US "makes war" while China makes business deals. Pick your poison--two capitalists
countries controlled by oligarchs which can only offer the working-class continued
exploitation.
An Excellent piece of article that explains clearly the trajectory that got us into
US-China trade war, and what this means for the Global Capitalist System going forward. If
we remember when trade war topic was first brought into picture Trump administration
officials were saying imposing tariffs on China and Europe were the only way to correct the
unfair trade balances. However, as the months progressed it quickly became known that US
officials were using unfair trade practices of China as a scapegoat to demand further
concessions from the Chinese authorities. These concessions include complete dismantlement
of Made in China 2025 program and put a hold to their Silk Road initiative. In other words,
Donald Trump and the entire American ruling circles see China as an existential long term
threat and they are using trade war as a weapon to contain China's rising political and
economical ambitions.
For now Trump is increasing the tariffs so as to force the Chinese leadership to
acquiesce to his conditions. Of course, I would expect in the coming days Chinese
authorities to rebuff this latest round of sanctions and that they would retaliate their
own tariffs.
On the other hand, the Trump administration has put Iran under severe sanctions, and
they also warned all big European Multinational corporations like Total and others to stop
doing business with Iran after November. So as we can see we are in a very precarious
Global situation right now due to rising contradictions between the needs of Global economy
and nation states.
The US wants to reinforce it's declining global hegemonic position at any cost. Now
they started with economic war against countries they see as not cooperating to their
demands, but under current conditions this could easily transform into Global war at some
point in future.
A confidential report by Belgian investigators confirms that British intelligence services
hacked state-owned Belgian telecom giant Belgacom on behalf of Washington, it was revealed on
Thursday (20 September).
The report, which summarises a five-year judicial inquiry, is almost complete and was
submitted to the office of Justice Minister Koen Geens, a source close to the case told AFP,
confirming Belgian press reports
The matter will now be discussed within Belgium's National Security Council, which
includes the Belgian Prime Minister with top security ministers and officials.
Contacted by AFP, the Belgian Federal Prosecutor's Office and the cabinet of Minister
Geens refused to comment .
####
NO. Shit. Sherlock.
So the real question is that if this has known since 2013, why now? BREXIT?
"... The EU is not perfect and has costs, but measured against what it has achieved, it is a great success. ..."
"... The EU has brought peace to Europe for the longest period since Pax Romana (and that was not entirely peaceful). ..."
"... You're funny. The EU makes war by other means. The burden of disease in Greece, health loss, risk factors, and health financing, 2000–16: an analysis of the Global Burden of Disease Study 2016 https://www.thelancet.com/pdfs/journals/lanpub/PIIS2468-2667(18)30130-0.pdf ..."
"... The mortality rate for Greece is up approximately 50,000. All so Merkel in Germany, and Sarkozy and Hollande didn't have to go before their electorates and admit they were bailing out French and German banks through the backdoor. ..."
"... I guess all those little Balkan unpleasantnesses, the former Czechoslovakia and Bosnia and such, are not wars -- but then those are layable at the feet of NATO (that collection, as I recall it, of what, now, 29 member countries including all the Great Powers of the West) and the US imperium. ..."
"... The NATO establishment is about "making war," ..."
"... All of which is linked in significant ways to the economic "health" of the EU, from which lots of weapons flow in exchange for favors and money from the Destabilizers. ..."
"... In the meantime, the various stages are set, the players in the game of statism and nationalism and authoritarianism and neoliberalism are on their marks, the house lights are going out, and the long slow rise of the curtain is under way ..."
"... The period from the end of WWII to the Balkan Wars is still the longest period of peace since the Romans. I doubt you have ever lived through a war so I can't expect you to appreciate the difference between the Horrors of the Brussels Bureaucracy and the Horrors of Shelling and Bombing. ..."
"... I am not defending poor governance per se for the sake of defending the EU. But it is facile and fun to criticize it because one can make up all kinds of counter fantasies about how wonderful life would be without it. ..."
"... in the real world ..."
"... in the real world ..."
"... Ultimately, it's that simple. Merkel, Sarkozy, Hollande, and whoever else among the EU elites who chose to be complicit in killing substantial numbers of people so they could maintain themselves in power are scum. They are scum. They are scum. ..."
"... Fine, our elected leaders are all scum, but why does this mean that the EU is evil specifically. Why single it out? Why not advocate the overthrow of all centralized or unifying government? Move out to Montana to a cult and buy lots of guns or something. ..."
"... Ons should be very aware that EU directives comes mainly from the member states and that especially bad things that would never fly past an election could – and often is – spun by local government as "Big Bad Bruxelles is forcing poor little us to do this terrible thing to you poor people". Ala the British on trade deal with India and immigration of east-european workers. ..."
"... The EU does not have that much in the way of enforcement powers, that part is down-sourced to the individual member states. When a member state doesn't give a toss, it takes forever for some measure of sanctioning to spin up and usually it daily fines unto a misbehaving government, at the taxpayers expense (which of course those politicians who don't give a toss, are fine with since most of their cronies are not great taxpayers anyway). ..."
"... The solution is, patently, Tories out of power. Which I think will happen, certainly between now and 31 March 2019. Now would be better. Anyone thinking strategically in other parties in the UK (an oxymoron of a formulation, to be sure) would call for a no confidence vote the instant May's feet are on British soil. ..."
"... I doubt that this is personal, but what do I know. May is a nincompoop. The other heads of state patently, and quite rightly, don't respect her. Her presence has been useful to them only insofar as she could deliver a deal. ..."
"... I'd agree with your analysis of what happened – just glancing through the news today it seems that Macron in particular just lost patience, and the other leaders were happy to help him put the boot in. The EU has been trying to shore May up for a long time – the December agreement was little more than an attempt to protect her from an internal heave. This is a common dynamic in the EU – however much the leaders may dislike each other, they will usually prefer the person at the seat than the potential newcomer. ..."
"... But I think the EU has collectively decided that May is simply incapable of delivering any type of agreement, so there is no point in mincing words. They simply don't care any more if the Tory government collapses, or if they put Rees Mogg or Johnson in power. It makes absolutely zero difference to them. In fact, it might make it easier for the EU if the UK goes politically insane as they can then wash their hands of the problem. ..."
"... A colleague told me today he knows of several Northern Irish Republicans who voted leave, precisely because they thought this would create constitutional havoc and lead to a united Ireland. It seems at least some people were thinking strategically . ..."
"... British politicians apparently were supposed to negotiate Brexit among themselves. And once they had reached a (tentative) consensus the foreigners (the EU) were apparently supposed to bow down and accept the British proposal. ..."
"... Which means I never understood why the British media was treating the Chequers proposal as a serious proposal? And spending lots of time and articles discussing on how to convince the EU / the member states. ..."
"... As a Scot can I point out that it is English politicians who are responsible for this mess? ..."
Posted on
September 20, 2018 by Yves Smith Yves here. While the
specific observations in this post will be very familiar to readers (you've said the same
things in comments!), I beg to differ with calling the Government's Brexit negotiating stance a
strategy. It's bad habit plus lack of preparation and analysis.
And the UK's lack of calculation and self-awareness about how it is operating means it will
be unable to change course.
By Benjamin Martill, a Post-Doctoral Fellow at the Dahrendorf Forum where he focuses on
Europe after Brexit. He is based at LSE IDEAS, the London School of Economics's foreign policy
think tank. The Dahrendorf Forum is a joint research venture between LSE and the Hertie School
of Governance in Berlin. Originally published at
openDemocracy
But is this the best strategy for advancing British interests? Here is the argument based on
the findings of a recent Dahrendorf
Forum working paper .
All eyes in British politics are on the negotiations between the UK and the EU over the
terms of the forthcoming British withdrawal from the Union, or Brexit. Surprisingly, questions
of bargaining strategy – once the preserve of diplomats and niche academic journals
– have become some of the most defining issues in contemporary British politics.
The New Politics of Bargaining
Cabinet disagreements over the conduct of the negotiations led to the resignation of David
Davis and Boris Johnson in early July 2018 and the issue continues to divide the ruling
Conservative party. Theresa May's most recent statements have all addressed the question of how
hard she has pushed Brussels in the talks.
But is the hard bargaining strategy appropriate, or will it ultimately harm the UK? The
salience of this question should occasion deeper analysis of the fundamentals of international
bargaining, given the extent to which the course of British politics will be determined by the
government's performance (or perceived performance) in the Brexit talks.
Driving a Hard Bargain
A hard-bargaining strategy isn't necessarily a poor one. To the extent it is workable, it
may even represent the sensible option for the UK.
Hard bargaining is characterised by negative representations of negotiating partners,
unwillingness to make concessions, issuance of unrealistic demands, threats to damage the
partner or exit the negotiations, representations of the talks in zero-sum terms, failure to
provide argumentation and evidence, and withholding of information. From diplomats' portrayal
of the EU as an uncooperative and bullying negotiating partner to a set of demands recognised
as unrealistic in Brussels and Britain alike, the UK's approach to the Brexit negotiations
scores highly on each of these measures.
The consensus in the academic literature is generally that hard bargaining works only
where a given party has a relative advantage . Powerful states have an incentive to engage
in hard bargaining, since by doing so they will be able to extract greater concessions from
weaker partners and maximise the chance of achieving an agreement on beneficial terms.
But weaker actors have less incentive to engage in hard bargaining, since they stand to lose
more materially if talks break down and reputationally if they're seen as not being backed by
sufficient power,
So which is Britain?
Power Distribution
The success of hard bargaining depends on the balance of power. But even a cursory
examination would seem to confirm that the UK does not hold the upper hand in the negotiations.
Consider three standard measures of
bargaining power: a country's economic and military capabilities, the available alternatives to
making a deal, and the degree of constraint emanating from the public.
When it comes to capabilities, the UK is a powerful state with considerable economic clout
and greater military resources than its size would typically warrant. It is the second-largest
economy in the EU (behind Germany) and its GDP is equal to that of the smallest 19 member
states. And yet in relative terms, the combined economic and military power of the EU27 dwarves
that of the UK: the EU economy is five times the size of the UK's.
Next, consider the alternatives. A 'no deal' scenario would be damaging for both the UK and
the EU, but the impact would be more diffuse for the EU member states. They would each lose one
trading partner, whereas the UK would lose all of its regional trading partners. Moreover, the
other powers and regional blocs often cited as alternative trading partners (the US, China, the
Commonwealth, ASEAN) are not as open as the EU economy to participation by external parties,
nor are they geographically proximate (the greatest determinant of trade flows), nor will any
deal be able to replicate the common regulatory structure in place in the EU. This asymmetric
interdependence strongly suggests that the UK is in greater need of a deal than the EU.
Finally, consider the extent of domestic constraints. Constraint enhances power by
credibly preventing a leader from offering too generous a deal to the other side. On the EU
side the constraints are clear: Barnier receives his mandate from the European Council (i.e.
the member states) to whom he reports frequently. When asked to go off-piste in the
negotiations, he has replied that he does not have the mandate to do so. On the UK side, by
contrast, there is no such mandate. British negotiators continually cite Eurosceptic opposition
to the EU's proposals in the cabinet, the Conservative party, and the public, but they are
unable to guarantee any agreement will receive legislative assent, and cannot cite any unified
position.
Perceptions of Power
But the real power distribution is not the only thing that matters. While the EU is the more
powerful actor on objective criteria, a number of key assumptions and claims made by the
Brexiteers have served to reinforce the perception that Britain has the upper hand.
First, on the question of capabilities, the discourse of British greatness (often based on
past notions of power and prestige) belies the UK's status as a middle power (at best) and
raises unrealistic expectations of what Britain's economic and military resources amount to.
Second, on the question of alternatives, the oft-repeated emphasis on 'global Britain' and the
UK's stated aim to build bridges with its friends and allies around the globe understates the
UK's reliance on Europe, the (low) demand for relations with an independent Britain abroad, and
the value of free trade agreements or other such arrangements with third countries for the UK.
Third, on the question of domestic constraint, the post-referendum discourse of an indivisible
people whose wishes will be fulfilled only through the implementation of the Brexit mandate
belies the lack of consensus in British politics and the absence of a stable majority for
either of the potential Brexit options, including the 'no deal', 'hard', or 'soft' variants of
Brexit. Invoking 'the people' as a constraint on international action, in such circumstances,
is simply not credible.
Conclusion
Assumptions about Britain's status as a global power, the myriad alternatives in the wider
world, and the unity of the public mandate for Brexit, have contributed to the overstatement of
the UK's bargaining power and the (false) belief that hard bargaining will prove a winning
strategy.
Britain desperately needs to have an honest conversation about the limits of the UK's
bargaining power. This is not 'treasonous', as ardent Brexiteers have labelled similar nods to
reality, but is rather the only way to ensure that strategies designed to protect the national
interest actually serve this purpose. Power is a finite resource that cannot be talked into
existence. Like a deflating puffer fish, the UK's weakness will eventually become plain to see.
The risk is that before this occurs, all bridges will be burned, all avenues exhausted, and all
feathers ruffled.
The opinions expressed in this blog contribution are entirely those of the author and do
not represent the positions of the Dahrendorf Forum or its hosts Hertie School of Governance
and London School of Economics and Political Science or its funder Stiftung Mercator.
I tend to agree that there is no real strategy on the UK's part. May resembles a broken
record, where she says much the same thing over and over again, seemingly expecting a
different response each time. Although Einstein said that he probably never made the claim
about what insanity consists of, it is often attributed to him -- doing the same thing over
and over expecting different results is the very definition of insanity. How the government
expects that this sort of behavior will bring desirable results is beyond me.
Both UK and EU politicians are talking past each other. Neither side understands there are
two key issues. Firstly, not understanding the economic effects stemming from the failure to
understand how money is created and how it can be manipulated for global trading advantage.
Secondly, that the UK is high up the list for "cultural tightness" and the reasons for
this.
The other element of course of a negotiation is getting potential allies to roll up behind
you. At the start of this the UK had a series of potential 'friends' it could call on –
eurosceptics governments in Eastern Europe, close historic friends and political like minded
governments in Spain, the Netherlands, Denmark and Ireland. And of course non-EU countries
like India or the US with historic links.
They somehow managed to anger or frustrate nearly all of those though its heavy handed
negotiations or laughable lack of political empathy.
It must be emphasised that the current Irish government is ideologically and instinctively
very pro-London. And yet, today RTE is
reporting about the latest meeting between May and Varadkar:
The source said there was "an open exchange of views" between both sides, with the Irish
delegation emphasising that the time was short and "we need to get to the stage where we
can consider a legal text" on the backstop.
The source described British proposals so far as "only an outline, and we haven't seen
specific proposals from the British side."
This can only be translated as 'what the hell are they playing at?'
The Indians of course were amusedly baffled by the British assumption that they would
welcome open trade (without lots of new visas for Indian immigrants). Trump just smelt the
blood of a wounded animal. The Russians are well
The British cited the EU's inability to conclude a free-trade agreement with India as one
example of the EU's failings a revitalized Global Britain would no longer be shackled by.
That's quite rich considering the FTA was torpedoed when the British Home Secretary vetoed
increased visas for the Indians. Her name was Theresa May.
They somehow managed to anger or frustrate nearly all of those
Somehow?
The brits basically said: We are special people, much, much better, richer and stronger
than you sorry lot of Peons to Brussels(tm), so now you shall see sense and give us what we
want this week; you can call it your tribute if you like (because we don't care what you like
:)
Half the Danes are fed up with the whole thing and the other half would be egging on a
hard Brexit if only they could – knowing it will likely take out at least some of the
worst and most overleveraged (and gorged with tax-paid subsidies) Anti-Environmentalist
Danish industrial farmers, their bankers too. And diminish the power of their lobbyists:
"Landbrug & Fødevarer"!
The good part is that: the British and the Danish governments have managed to make "being
ruled by faceless bureaucrats in Brussels" look like a pretty much OK & decent deal,
considering the alternative options: Being ruled by our local crazies, straight-up nutters
and odious nincompoops (a word i like), half of whom, to top it up, are probably mere
soulless proxies for those ghouls that are running Washington DC.
It seems more and more to me, that never ending class warfare, and its current emphasis on
austerity, leaves us unable to envision alternate routes to economic health.
The neo-liberal consensus mandates that our ruling class never questions its own tactics,
ie dog-whistle racism to distract and divide the lower classes to enable all the looting.
So on both sides of the Atlantic, the rulers of English speakers stir up resentment
amongst those at the bottom in order to secure votes, and maintain power, while never
intending to follow through on promises to provide tangible material benefits to their
constituents.
The looting goes on, the trail of broken promises grows longer, and the misery
deepens.
The issue being ignored is that the folks at the bottom have reached the limit of their
ability to maintain life and limb in the face of downward economic pressure.
We've finally reached the end game, we in America have been driven to Trumpism, and in
Britain they've been driven to Brexit by the clueless efforts of pols to maintain power in
the face of electorates who have decided they have had enough, and will absolutely not take
the SOS anymore.
So we have the nonsensical situation of pols on both sides of the Atlantic flirting with
economic collapse, and even civil war rather than moderate their irrational fixation on
making the insanely rich even richer.
In both cases we have a cast of alternating villains robbing and beating us while waving
flags and loudly complaining that we aren't showing the proper level of enthusiasm.
Which leaves me with one question for those villains;
Why no one, especially the punditocracy seems to realize this, is astonishing.
I also cannot believe the Old Gray Lady killing millions of trees in its shrill efforts to
prove the Russians cost Hilary the election and nary a word about how totally fed up and
voiceless (with the exception of a single presidential vote) are those in the Great
Flyover.
Also find it amazing that the Beeb with rudimentary linguistic forensic analysis
identified Mike Pence as almost certainly the author of the scathing anti-Trump memo the NYT
published anonymously, without a single mention of this now widely-known fact.
On a related note, while this was about the tactics of leaving, there has been some
movement on the end state front, though not by the UK. Rather it seems that the EU has made
up it's mind, and in my mind definitively scrapped the EEA option.
Several EU leaders (Pms of Malta and the Czech republic) have clearly stated that they wish
to see a new referendum, and Macron said the following:
"Brexit is the choice of the British people pushed by those who predicted easy solutions.
Those people are liars. They left the next day so they didn't have to manage it," Macron said
on Thursday, vowing to "never" accept any Brexit deal, which would put the EU's integrity at
risk.
I think the bridges have been burned, now it's surrender or revocation that's left to the
UK, or stepping off the cliff edge.
It is astonishing to see that the UK still does not accept that the EU doesn't want it to
go on principle more than for practical reasons. May and the others cling to the notion that
without Great Britain, the EU will collapse or something. This is the same nation that has
been foot-dragging on everything about Europe and slagging off the continent at every turn
while pretending they are a Great Power and the BFF of the US. Trump does not care about
Great Britain unless he needs some sort of zoning permission for his gold course, in which
case he will cut a deal on trade or arms with May.
The Irish Border, assuming it remains open, is a massive concession and likely to lead to
future problems as other EU nations try to have open borders or trade with their pet
countries.
Brits on the Continent are worried about many things ranging from driver's licenses to
residency visas! Not every Brit wants to live on that damp little island! Some like the sun
and Continental cuisine.
Is the EU a Great Idea to be Protected and Advanced, one that will inexorably result in
ever greater benefits for the common people of the fainting nations that have been cat-herded
into submitting to the "political union" that many very personally interested parties are
always working toward? Like NATO is a Great Idea, not just a mechanism for global mischief
and chaos? NATO gives "warfighters" a place to sit and play their games. Brussels gives
"rules," at least some of which are sort of for public benefit, until the regulatory
capturers work their magic. Profit and impunity, always for the few.
What is the organizing principle in all this? Likely can't be stated. Just a lot of
interested parties squabbling over gobbets from the carcass torn from the planet
Maybe the 14th Century was not so very horrible after all? If one looks in "A Distant
Mirror" at it, given where humanity seems to be, on the increasingly fleshed-out timeline of
collapse?
OF course, one can always summon up the demoness TINA, to trump any efforts to take
different paths
NATO was created to make war. The EU was created to make peace and prosperity. Comparing
one to the other is unjust.
The EU is not some sacrosanct construct that must be worshiped, but it has brought peace
to Europe for the longest period since Pax Romana (and that was not entirely peaceful). It
has also promoted trade and prosperity. Europe has been even farther ahead of economic and
regulatory integration than the US (phones and credit cards come to mind). Free movement of
labor and travel have dropped costs for businesses and individuals immensely.
Now, whether or not human foibles enter into it is really another discussion. Is Brussels
at times a giant Interest Machine and Bureaucratic Nightmare? Yes, but that is the negative
face we see portrayed by anti-Europeans like the Brexiteers. The EU does a terrible job of
self-promotion; citizens rarely know just how much the EU contributes to their lives. Perhaps
the EU is afraid of drawing attention to itself. But the people making up the EU are not
extraterrestrials; they are Europeans who make the same mistakes and commit the same fraud on
a national level.
Many Americans criticize Europe while vaunting their own Federation. Why should California
and Alabama share a currency, a passport and a Congress? There are more differences between
those states than between France and Belgium or Italy and Spain.
The EU is not perfect and has costs, but measured against what it has achieved, it is a
great success.
The mortality rate for Greece is up approximately 50,000. All so Merkel in Germany, and
Sarkozy and Hollande didn't have to go before their electorates and admit they were bailing
out French and German banks through the backdoor.
If you want to start accounting for economic death by economic war, we can look at the US
as recently as the financial crisis, though I doubt there are studies on the Homeland of this
sort. Or US embargoes of vital medication and food in Iraq which led to hundreds of thousands
of deaths. And so on.
My point is not that the EU is perfect, but there has not been a war in Western Europe since
1945. You are welcome to spin and fiddle and search for anything you like (Gosh, all that
free travel led to increases in traffic deaths! Ban the EU!). Of course, we would also need
to examine what the EU has done for Europe and how many lives have been saved by improved
infrastructure and exchange of information.
I am not defending poor governance per se for the sake of defending the EU. But it is facile
and fun to criticize it because one can make up all kinds of counter fantasies about how
wonderful life would be without it. Let's see how Great Britain does and then we can discuss
this in a few years.
I guess all those little Balkan unpleasantnesses, the former Czechoslovakia and Bosnia and
such, are not wars -- but then those are layable at the feet of NATO (that collection, as I
recall it, of what, now, 29 member countries including all the Great Powers of the West) and
the US imperium.
The NATO establishment is about "making war," largely now displaced to other Woggish and Hajji places where the huge number of refugees that are moving into Eurospace are
coming from (as a result of the largely economically driven (oil and other extraction
interests) and Israeli and Saudi-enhanced large scale destabilizing war prosecution.
All of
which is linked in significant ways to the economic "health" of the EU, from which lots of
weapons flow in exchange for favors and money from the Destabilizers.
Yes, the EU notion of reducing the conflict generators of the past seems to be a good one.
But surprise! In practice, you got your German hegemon and your French strutters and now of
course the British bomb throwers pointing out, along with the renascent nationalism triggered
in part by the hegemon's bleeding of other nations via Brussels and EU institutions, like
Greece and Spain and Italy and so forth.
And of course the warring that the seamless
economies of the EU (that includes their particpation in NATO) foster and participate in that
drives the exodus of mopes from the Mideast and Africa. And how about the fun and games, with
possible nuclear war consequences, that are playing out with EU and NATO and of course US
Imperial Interests activity in Ukraine? And I see that the Krupp Werks has delivered a bunch
of warships to various places (hasn't that happened a couple of times in the past? Thinking
how particularly of Dolphin-class submarines paid for by Uncle Sucker, as in the US, and
delivered to the Israel -ites who have equipped them with many nuclear-warhead cruise
missiles? And thanks to the French, of course, and other Great Nations, the Israelis have
nuclear weapons in the first place.
It's nice that the science parts of the EU structure are sort of working to keep US-made
toxins and genetically modified crap and other bad stuff out of the Holy EU Empire. But hey,
how many VW diesel vehicles on the road (thanks to some combination of corruption and
incompetence on the part of the EU?) equals how much glyphosate and stacked-GM organisms
barred by EU regulations? Lots of argument possible around the margins and into the core of
the political economy/ies that make up the EU/NATO, and the Dead Empire across the Channel,
and of course the wonderful inputs from the empire I was born into.
I guess the best bet
would be to program some AI device to create a value structure (to be democratically studied
and voted on, somehow?) and measure all the goods and bads of the EU, according to some kind
of standard of Goodness to Mope-kind? Naw, power trumps all that of course, and "interests"
now very largely denominated and dominated by supranational corporations that piss on the EU
when not using its institutions as a means to legitimize their looting behaviors that sure
look to me like an expression of a death wish from the human species.
There are always winners and losers in any human game, because at anything larger than the
smallest scale, we do not appear wired to work from comity and commensalism. You sound from
the little one can see of you from your comment as a person among the winners. Which is fine,
all well and good, because of that "winners and losers" thing. Until either the mass vectors
of human behavior strip the livability out of the biosphere, or some provocation or mischance
leads to a more compendious and quicker, maybe nuclear, endpoint. Or maybe, despite the
activities of the Panopticon and the various powers with forces in the polity to tamp it
down, maybe there will be a Versailles moment, and "Aux Armes, Citoyens" will eventuate.
In the meantime, the various stages are set, the players in the game of statism and
nationalism and authoritarianism and neoliberalism are on their marks, the house lights are
going out, and the long slow rise of the curtain is under way
I suggest you read up on your recent European history. Czechoslovakia split entirely
peacefully and it had exactly zero to do with either NATO or USA.
Yugoslavia had its problems ever since it was Yugoslavia in early 20th century – all
Tito managed was to postpone it, and once he was gone, it was just a question of when, and
how violent it would be. Serbian apologistas like to blame NATO, conveniently ignoring any
pre-existing tensions between Croats and Serbs (not to mention ex-Yugoslavian muslims). Did
NATO help? No. But saying it was the cause of the Serbo-Croat war and all the Yugoslavian
fallout is ignorance.
What gets my goat is when someone blames everything on CIA, USA, NATO (or Russia and China
for the matter), denying the small peoples any agency. Especially when that someone tends to
have about zilch understanding of the regions in question, except from a selective
reading.
Yep, CIA and NATO and the Illuminati (and Putin, to put it on both sides) are the
all-powerful, all seeing, all-capable forces. Everyone else is a puppet. Right.
The period from the end of WWII to the Balkan Wars is still the longest period of peace
since the Romans. I doubt you have ever lived through a war so I can't expect you to
appreciate the difference between the Horrors of the Brussels Bureaucracy and the Horrors of
Shelling and Bombing. From your lofty armchair, they might be the same but then again,
perhaps you blame the socialists when your caramel latte is cold.
Lofty armchair? I actually volunteered and got the opportunity to go be a soldier in an
actual war, the Vietnam one. So I have a darn good idea what War is in actuality and from
unpleasant personal experience. And I don't have either the taste or the wealth for lattes.
And forgive my aging failure of typing Czech instead of Yugo -- my point, too, is that the
nations and sets of "peoples" living and involved in United Europe do in fact have "agency,"
and that is part of the fractiousness that the proponents of a federated Europe (seemingly
under mostly German lead) are working steadily at suppressing. Not as effectively as a
Federalist might want, of course.
TheScream wrote: I am not defending poor governance per se for the sake of defending
the EU. But it is facile and fun to criticize it because one can make up all kinds of counter
fantasies about how wonderful life would be without it.
Wake up. I'm talking about what the European elite in the real world deliberately
chose to do.
They chose to do a backdoor bailout of German and French banks specifically so
Merkel, Sarkozy and Hollande and the governments they led didn't have to go to their
electorates and tell them the truth. Thereby, they maintained themselves in power, and German
and French wealth structures -- the frickin', frackin banks -- as they were. And they did
this in the real world knowing that innocent people in Greece would die in
substantial numbers consequently.
This is not a counterfactual. This happened.
There's a technical term for people who plan and execute policies where many thousands of
people die so they themselves can benefit. That term is 'scum.'
Ultimately, it's that simple. Merkel, Sarkozy, Hollande, and whoever else among the EU
elites who chose to be complicit in killing substantial numbers of people so they could
maintain themselves in power are scum. They are scum. They are scum.
Don't get me started on people who defend such scum with threadbare waffle about 'I am not
defending poor governance per blah blah it is facile and fun to criticize blah blah.' Nor
interested in whataboutery about US elites, who as the main instigators of this 21st century
model of finance as warfare are also scum.
Fine, our elected leaders are all scum, but why does this mean that the EU is evil
specifically. Why single it out? Why not advocate the overthrow of all centralized or
unifying government? Move out to Montana to a cult and buy lots of guns or something.
My point is not that EU leaders are charming people working exclusively for the good of the
people. My point is that the EU is not as bad as most of you believe and no worse than most
other governments. It is simply an easy target because it is extra or supra-national. We can
get all frothy at the mouth blaming Nazis and Frogs for our woes and ignore our personal
failures.
I would love to insult you personally as you have insulted me, but I sense you are just
ranting out of frustration. You hate the EU (are you even European or just some right-wing
nutcase from America involving yourself in other's business?) and take it out on me. Go for
it. Your arguments are irrelevant and completely miss the point of my comments.
The EU does a terrible job of self-promotion; citizens rarely know just how much the EU
contributes to their live
The EU is, very simplistically, set up like a shared Civil Service. Civil Services are to
be seen rarely and never heard, less they take shine and glamour from the Government they
serve.
What "Bruxelles" can do is to advise and create Directives, which are instructions to
local government to create and enforce local legislation. The idea is that the legislation
and enforcement will be similar in all EU member states.
Ons should be very aware that EU directives comes mainly from the member states and that
especially bad things that would never fly past an election could – and often is
– spun by local government as "Big Bad Bruxelles is forcing poor little us to do this
terrible thing to you poor people". Ala the British on trade deal with India and immigration
of east-european workers.
The EU does not have that much in the way of enforcement powers, that part is down-sourced
to the individual member states. When a member state doesn't give a toss, it takes forever
for some measure of sanctioning to spin up and usually it daily fines unto a misbehaving
government, at the taxpayers expense (which of course those politicians who don't give a
toss, are fine with since most of their cronies are not great taxpayers anyway).
"Maybe the 14th Century was not so very horrible after all?"
Hopefully sarcastic?
Dude -- black plague! 75 to 200 million dead! At a tie with a world population of 400
million, and 40 million of those may as well have been on Mars! China, ME, North Africa and
Europe depopulated!
Time to really reconsider one's assumptions when one wonders whether the 14th century was
"that bad".
Dude, yes, sarcastic. And ironic. Doesn't change the horribleness of the present, does it
now? Or the coming horrors (say some of us) that may have been inevitably priced in to the
Great Global Market, does it
Donald Tusk, the European council president, has ratcheted up the pressure on Theresa
May by rejecting the Chequers plan and warning of a breakdown in the Brexit talks unless
she delivers a solution for the Irish border by October – a deadline the British
prime minister had already said she will not be able to meet.
The stark threat to unravel the talks came as the French president, Emmanuel Macron,
broke with diplomatic niceties and accused those of backing Brexit of being liars. "Those
who explain that we can easily live without Europe, that everything is going to be all
right, and that it's going to bring a lot of money home are liars," he said.
"It's even more true since they left the day after so as not to have to deal with it."
The comments came at the end of a leaders' summit in Salzburg, where May had appealed
for the EU to compromise to avoid a no-deal scenario. She had been hoping to take warm
words over Chequers into Conservative party conference.
Tusk, who moments before his comments had a short meeting with the prime minister, told
reporters that he also wanted to wrap up successful talks in a special summit in
mid-November.
But, in a step designed to pile pressure on the prime minister, he said this would not
happen unless the British government came through on its commitment to finding a "precise
and clear" so-called backstop solution that would under any future circumstances avoid a
hard border on the island of Ireland.
"Without an October grand finale, in a positive sense of this word, there is no reason
to organise a special meeting in November," Tusk said. "This is the only condition when it
comes to this possible November summit."
It seems the EU leaders aren't even pretending anymore. Its pretty clear they have run out
of patience, and May has run out of options. I wonder if they'll even bother with having the
November summit.
If there's no November summit (which would make no-deal Brexit almost certainty), then the
game becomes fast a and furious, as sterling will drop like a stone – with all sorts of
repercussions. TBH, that can already be clear after the Tory party conference, it's entirely
possible that that one will make any October Brexit discussions entirely irrelevant.
I think that EU overestimated May in terms of sensibility, and now accept that there's no
difference between May and Johnson (in fact, with Johnson or someone like that, they will get
certainy, so more time to get all ducks in row. Entirely cynically, clear no-deal Brexit
Johnson would be better for EU than May where one has no idea what's going to happen).
Either way, this crop of politicians will make history books. Not sure in the way they
would like to though.
Announced post-summit in Salzburg: no November summit absent a binding exit deal on the
table by the end of October. So no: no November dealing.
I don't know that EU politicos overestimated May. She is what they had, and all they had,
so they did their absolute best to prop up Rag Sack Terry as a negotiating partner, hoping
that they could coax her to toddle over their red lines with enough willingness to listen to
her hopeless twaddle first. She just shuffled and circled in place. So they've given up on
her ability to deliver anything of value to them. One could see this coming in June, when she
couldn't even get the sound of one hand clapping to her chipper nonsense over dinner.
I think that deciding heads in Europe have accepted the probability that crashout is
coming. That was clear also in June. If something better happens, I suppose that they would
leap at it. Nothing in the last two years engenders any hope in that regard, so hard heads
are readying the winches to hoist the drawbridge on We're Dead to You Day.
If the Tories fall, which I think and have long thought is probable, it would be up to a
'unity government' to either initial a settlement surrender and keep the sham going, or
flinch. My bet has been on pulling together some kind of flinch mechanism on aborting exit.
It's the kind of year, as I model these, where wild swings of such kind are possible, but I
couldn't predict the outcome anymore than anyone else.
My feeling for a while is that the government would never fall, whatever happened, simply
because the Tories (and DUP) fear a Corbyn government too much, so would never, ever pull the
trigger, no matter how bad things got. But if May falls at the Party Conference and is
replaced with a hard Brexiter, I don't think its impossible that there may be a temptation
that to see if they could whip up a nationalistic mood for a snap election. Some of them are
gamblers by instinct. Anything could happen then.
I think Tory Remainers bolt, choosing keeping their own wallets rather than handing those
over to the worst of their lot with everything else. But they would find a unity coalition
more palatable than passing the microphone to Jerry the Red, yeah, so that's a bit sticky. A
snap election is the worst kind of crazy town, and wolldn't improve negotiating or decision
outcomes in the slightest -- so of course that may be the likeliest near term course! Won't
get settled in a few weeks. Probably not until 20 March 2019.
This is just wowsers. Tusk, Macron, and Merkel baldly state that Chequers is mated --
"unacceptable" -- and furthermore gave the Tories a drop-dead date of 31 October to initial
the divorce settlement. The process is a flat abandonment of Theresa May, concluding the
obvious, that she and her government are incapable of negotiating exit. Going over her head
to Parliament and public, in fact if not in pre-consisdered intent. -- And about time. I was
worried that the EU would eat fudge in November with the Brits again on another
pretend-to-agree accord like that of December 2017, which, as we have seen did nothing to
induce the Tories to negotiate a viable outcome.
What was May's reaction? That she's perfectly prepared to lead Britain over the crashout
cliff if the EU doesn't see fit to capitulate. I'd roll on the floor laughing but I can't
catch my breath.
The next two weeks are going to be lively times in Britain indeed. I can't see how
'Suicide Terry's' government can survive this situation. -- And about high time. Put the poor
brute out of her misery; she's delusional, can't they see how she's suffering? Push has come,
so it's time to shove. Crashout or Flinch, those are the outcomes, now plainer than ever. All
May can do is thrash and fabulate, so time to bag the body and swear in another fool; lesser
or greater, we shall see.
Yes, I wonder was that planned, or (as is suggested in the
latest Guardian articl e), motivated by anger at Mays criticism of Barnier?
EU sources said the move had been made on the bidding of Macron, who urged taking a hard
line over lunch. The French president had been infuriated by May's warning earlier in the
day to Varadkar that she believed a solution on the issue could not be found by October,
despite previous promises to the contrary.
The tone of the prime minister's address to the EU leaders on Wednesday night, during
which she attacked Michel Barnier, is also said by sources to have been the cause of
irritation.
This obviously makes her very vulnerable at the party conference. Its hard to see what she
can do now. She is toast I think.
I can only think of two reasons that they've closed the door firmly in her face. Either
they have simply lost patience and now accept there is nothing can be salvaged, or they have
lost patience with May personally, and hope that a new leader might do a deal out of
desperation. The latter seems highly unlikely – a sudden Tory challenge is more likely
to bring a hardliner into power.
Whichever way you look at it, things look certain to come to a head very soon now. The EU
may have a hope that the UK will blink when staring into the abyss and agree to the backstop,
but I don't see how politically this a capitulation is possible, at least with the Tories in
power.
The solution is, patently, Tories out of power. Which I think will happen, certainly
between now and 31 March 2019. Now would be better. Anyone thinking strategically in other
parties in the UK (an oxymoron of a formulation, to be sure) would call for a no confidence
vote the instant May's feet are on British soil.
I doubt that this is personal, but what do I know. May is a nincompoop. The other heads of
state patently, and quite rightly, don't respect her. Her presence has been useful to them
only insofar as she could deliver a deal. Macron looked at his watch and the date said, non on that. Just looking at his ambitions and how he operates, I would think he
wanted to go this route quite some time ago, but the 'softly, softly' set such as the Dutch
and Merkel wouldn't back that, and he was too smart to break ranks alone. That the Germans
have given up on May is all one really needs to know. This was May's no confidence vote by
the European Council, and she lost it over lunch.
I'd agree with your analysis of what happened – just glancing through the news today
it seems that Macron in particular just lost patience, and the other leaders were happy to
help him put the boot in. The EU has been trying to shore May up for a long time – the
December agreement was little more than an attempt to protect her from an internal heave.
This is a common dynamic in the EU – however much the leaders may dislike each other,
they will usually prefer the person at the seat than the potential newcomer.
But I think the EU has collectively decided that May is simply incapable of delivering any
type of agreement, so there is no point in mincing words. They simply don't care any more if
the Tory government collapses, or if they put Rees Mogg or Johnson in power. It makes
absolutely zero difference to them. In fact, it might make it easier for the EU if the UK
goes politically insane as they can then wash their hands of the problem.
At this point it might actually be a blessing if that happened. There is likely to be a
great deal of practical difference between a no-deal Brexit with six months of planning and
preparation and a no-deal Brexit that takes everyone by surprise at the very last minute.
(Yes, they will both be a nightmare, but some nightmares are worse than others). All this
pretense that the other side is bluffing and will roll over at the 11th hour is starting to
look like a convenient excuse for not facing reality. I don't think either side is
bluffing.
Comments like "Britain desperately needs to have an honest conversation about the limits
of the UK's bargaining power" might very well be true, but they're also irrelevant at this
point. Certainly it would have been very useful if it had happened two years ago. Right now
it's time to break out the life jackets.
Most Brits don't seem capable of mentally accepting how irrelevant they actually are
internationally. They are NOT a 'power' in any other respect than that they have nuclear
weapons under their launch authority (which they are never going to use). They have no
weight. The City is, really other people's money that predominantly foreign nationals at
trading desks play with, loose, steal, hide, and occasionally pay out. The UK economy isn't
of any international consequence. Brits are embedded in the international diplomatic
process, in a dead language speakers kind of way, which makes them seem important. But they
are not.
So there was never going to be a reassessment of the weaknesses of Britain's negotiating
position, nor will there be now exactly, because most in Britain cannot get their heads
around the essential premise to such a discussion, the Britain is now essentially trivial on
the power scale rather than of any real consequence. The Kingdom of Saud has more real power.
Turkey is a more consequential actor. Mexico has more people. &etc.
If one is to accept the convictions of master bloviator Niall Ferguson and other
Brexiteers, the issue is issue. Brexit is about immigration, period. The EU claims it will
not bend on free movement of people, Brexiteers will not accept anything less. There was such
a huge outcry when May mentioned the possibility of 'preferential' treatment for EU citizens
back in July she threatened any further public dissent in the party would result in sackings.
The EU insists there can be no trade deals, no freed movement of goods without free movement
of people, for good reasons. Hard to imagine them climbing down.
There's about as many reasons why people voted Brexit as there's different Brexits they
wanted. Immigration is just one of the convenient scapegoats peddled by both sides, although
for different reasons.
If you want a better (but still not complete) reason, try decreasing real income.
I'd like to know what those "many different reasons" are. Sovereignty? Well, that rolls
off the tongue more easily than "immigration" which, leavers know, sounds a bit racist.
"Control of borders" works for leavers like Nigell, although he went on at great length about
how it's all about immigration, after talking to all the 'real' folks in the provinces.
My Irish/Brit family's Own Private Brexit: the grandparents are entitled to naturalisation
and voted Leave, the children are subjects/citizens and voted Remain (and almost all vote
Tory), the grandchildren are compromised subjects/citizens and didn't have a vote. Everyone's
happy to be entitled to an EU passport. The Pakistan offshoot has a less complex variation
(fewer rights), but I believe their family voted Leave on balance. Life.
A colleague told me today he knows of several Northern Irish Republicans who voted leave,
precisely because they thought this would create constitutional havoc and lead to a united
Ireland. It seems at least some people were thinking strategically .
Majority of the drop in real income is NOT driven by immigration. You may find it
surprising, but there were times with large (relatively speaking) immigration and the real
incomes going up.
I don't believe it is either, you seem to think these views are my own. I am speculating,
with some basis, that a majority of leavers think so. Anti-immigration attitudes are
entrenched and growing. Just the other day a teacher, no less, spouted off about how
immigrants were causing crime and stealing jobs. This is in a blue city in a blue state. I
was shocked.
People come up with fantasy explanations when they've been reduced from realistic
assessments to fantastic ideologies. If there's a clear answer but you are ideologically
constrained from considering it, you need to invent some answer, the nuttier the better.
I think a major part of the problem is that British politicians and media seem to believe
that Brexit is mainly (or exclusively) a British topic.
One British politician publishes one proposal, another British politician shoots it down.
With the British media reporting about it gleefully for days. Newspaper articles, opinion
pieces. Without even mentioning what the EU might think about it. The EU seems to not exist
in this bubble.
Just remember the more than 60 "notices to stakeholders" published by the EU months ago.
And freely available for reading on the Internet. I´ve read British media online for a
long time now but somehow these notices never made any impact. It was only when the first
British impact assessments were published (not that long ago) that British media started to
report about possible problems after a no-deal Brexit. Problems / consequences that were
mentioned in the EU notices months ago.
It´s almost unbelievable. It looks like if something isn´t coming from London (or
Westminster) then it doesn´t exist in the British media.
And it´s the same with British politicians.
David Davis and the back-stop deal in late 2017?. He agreed with it during the negotiations,
returned home and then said that it wasn´t binding, just a letter of intent. Or Michael
Gove a few days ago? Regardless of what agreement PM T. May negotiates now with the EU, a new
PM can simply scrap it and negotiate a new deal? Or send government members to the EU member
states to try and undermine Barnier as reported in British media? How exactly is that
building trust?
Have they never heard about the Internet? And that today even foreigners might read British
media?
Brexit supporter Jacob Rees-Mogg might be the MP for the 18th century but surely they know
that today there are faster methods for messages than using pigeons?
What about foreign investment in the UK? The gateway to the EU? Japanese car
companies?
The drop in foreign investment was reported, to be sure. But after a few days it was
immediately forgotten.
T. May according to British media articles apparently developed her Brexit strategy (and
her red lines) together with her two closest political advisers back in late 2016 / early
2017. No cabinet meeting to discuss the strategy, no ordering of impact assessments which
might have influenced the strategy (and the goals). And apparently – in my opinion
– no detailed briefing on how the EU actually works. What might be realistically
possible and what not.
The resignation of Ivan Rogers seems to support my speculations. Plus the newspaper
articles in early 2017 which mentioned that visitors to certain British government ministries
were warned not to criticize Brexit or warn about negative consequences. Such warnings would
result in no longer being invited to visit said ministry and minister.
If they actually went through with that policy they created an echo chamber with no
dissenting voices allowed.
Which might explain why they had no plan to deal with the EU.
British politicians apparently were supposed to negotiate Brexit among themselves. And once
they had reached a (tentative) consensus the foreigners (the EU) were apparently supposed to
bow down and accept the British proposal.
And now when the EU hasn´t followed the script they don´t know what to do?
I´m not an expert but it was pretty clear to me that the Chequers deal would never
work. It was pretty obvious even when EU politicians were somewhat polite about it when T.
May proposed it.
It might have been a good starting point for negotiations if she had introduced it in 2017.
But in July 2018? Just a few months before negotiations were supposed to be concluded? And
then claiming it´s the only realistic proposal? It´s my way or the highway?
It was obvious.
Which means I never understood why the British media was treating the Chequers proposal as a
serious proposal? And spending lots of time and articles discussing on how to convince the EU
/ the member states.
I really think the EU member states have finally concluded that T. May is incapable of
producing (and getting a majority in the House of Commons) for any realistic solution.
Therefore helping her with statements to keep her politically alive doesn´t make sense
any longer. The EU would probably really, really like a solution that gives them at least the
transition period. Another 21 months to prepare for Brexit. But fudging things only get you
that far .
The UK apparently never understood that it´s one thing to bend rules or fudge things to
get the agreement of a member state. It´s quite another thing with a soon -to-be
ex-member state.
I am a German citizen, living in Germany.
The (German weekly printed newspaper) Zeit Online website did have three articles about
Brexit in the last few days. Which is noteworthy since they normally have 1-2 articles per
month.
And the comments were noteworthy too.
Almost all of them now favor a hard-line approach by the EU.
The UK lost a lot of sympathy and support in the last two years. Not because of the
referendum result itself but because of the actions and speeches of British politicians
afterwards.
The UK had a rebate, opt-outs and excemptions. All because successive British governments
pointed to their EU-sceptic opposition. Now the population voted for Brexit the British want
a deal that gives them all (or most) of the advantages of EU membership without any of the
obligations. To reduce the economic consequences of their decision.
No longer.
Actions have consequences.
And if it means we´ll have to support Ireland, we´ll do it.
The German commentators quite obviously have lost their patience with the UK.
This is the first article that I have seen that talks about power. The ability to
influence or outright control the behavior of people. Money has power. It is needed to eat,
heal and shelter in the West. But, it is never talked about. This is because it would raise
inconvenient truths. The wealthy are accumulating it and everyone else in the West is losing
it. The neo-liberal/neo-conservative ideologies are the foundation of this exploitation. It
is the belief that markets balance and there is no society. "Greed is good. Might is right."
Plutocrats rule the west. Democracy died. There are two versions of similar corporate
political parties in the USA. The little people matter not. Politicians are servants of the
oligarchs. Global trade is intertwined and not redundant. What will happen will be to the
benefit of the very few in power. Donald Trump is raising the price of all Chinese goods
shipped into the USA and sold at Walmart and Amazon. A Brexit crash seems inevitable.
Amen! It is ALWAYS about power. And the only way to deal with the elites is "Lord of the
Rings" style:
their money must be cast into a financial version of Mount Doom, breaking their power once
and for all. You folks in the UK need to make douchebag Brexiteers like Nigel Farrage suffer
total loss of power for forcing this disaster on you.
There is a huge source of wealth that UK monopolises from Treasure Islands that operate
the City's tax havens. That money goes straight back to City banks and flows into the market
economy, independently of trade and commerce. It underwrites the derivatives biz that keeps
the market economy afloat, paying pensions and profits and Directors' options.
Leaving the EU might have an effect but not a big one. Is that why UK seems so blithely
unconcerned?
The offshore wealth is certainly why the core hard Brexiters are unconcerned, because
thats where they store their cash. They don't care if the UK goes down.
But in the longer term, they are under threat – within the EU the UK consistently
vetoed any attempts to crack down on internal tax havens. The internal political balance of
the EU is now much more firmly anti tax avoidance with the UK gone, so there would be little
to stop a series of Directives choking off the Channel Island/Isle of Man option for money
flows.
Split Brain Syndrome: They seem think that the EU is Lucifer's Army Incarnate and then
they apparently also think at the same time, that "The Army of Darkness" once unleashed from
the responsible British leadership into the hands of those per-definition also demonic French
and Germans will still "play cricket" and not come after their tax-havens ASAP, like in 2020
or so.
May now demanding that the EU respect Great Britain. We are back to the beginning again.
May has no leverage beyond the EU wanting Britain to stay in . But if Britain goes out, then
it's out. The only way for May to get any concessions would be to offer to stay in! And even
then I am not sure the EU would accept since it would simply open the way for any member to
have a tantrum and demand better terms.
GB should leave, wallow in their loneliness a while and then ask to come back. I suspect
that the EU would reinstate them fully without the usual processes. Check back here in 24-36
months.
the obligatory four freedoms of the EU are free movement of goods, services, persons and
capital throughout the Union. Open borders. That is the essence of the European Union, the
dogma of the Free Market.
The problem with the Open Border doctrine is that it doesn't know where to stop. Or it
doesn't stop anywhere. When Angela Merkel announced that hundreds of thousands of refugees were
welcome in Germany, the announcement was interpreted as an open invitation by immigrants of all
sorts, who began to stream into Europe. This unilateral German decision automatically applied
to the whole of the EU, with its lack of internal borders. Given German clout, Open Borders
became the essential "European common value", and welcoming immigrants the essence of human
rights.
Very contrasting ideological and practical considerations contribute to the idealization of
Open Borders. To name a few:
This combination of contrasting, even opposing motivations does not add up to a majority in
every country. Notably not in Hungary.
It should be noted that Hungary is a small Central European country of less than ten million
inhabitants, which never had a colonial empire and thus has no historic relationship with
peoples in Africa and Asia as do Britain, France, the Netherlands, and Belgium. As one of the
losers in World War I, Hungary lost a large amount of territory to its neighbors, notably to
Romania. The rare and difficult Hungarian language would be seriously challenged by mass
immigration. It is probably safe to say that the majority of people in Hungary tend to be
attached to their national identity and feel it would be threatened by massive immigration from
radically different cultures. It may not be nice of them, and like everyone they can change.
But for now, that is how they vote.
In particular, they recently voted massively to re
Like the Soviet Union, the European Union is not merely an undemocratic institutional
framework promoting a specific economic system; it is also the vehicle of an ideology and a
planetary project. Both are based on a dogma as to what is good for the world: communism for
the first, "openness" for the second. Both in varying ways demand of people virtues they may
not share: a forced equality, a forced generosity. All this can sound good, but such ideals
become methods of manipulation. Forcing ideals on people eventually runs up against stubborn
resistance.
There are differing reasons to be against immigration just as to be for it. The idea of
democracy was to sort out and choose between ideals and practical interests by free discussion
and in the end a show of hands: an informed vote. The liberal Authoritarian Center represented
by Verhofstadt seeks to impose its values, aspirations, even its version of the facts on
citizens who are denounced as "populists" if they disagree. Under communism, dissidents were
called "enemies of the people". For the liberal globalists, they are "populists" – that
is, the people. If people are told constantly that the choice is between a left that advocates
mass immigration and a right that rejects it, the swing to the right is unstoppable.
Orban's reputation in the West as dictator is unquestionably linked to his intense
conflict with Hungarian-born financier George Soros
And not only Soros, of course:
'I know that this battle is difficult for everyone. I understand if some of us are also
afraid. This is understandable, because we must fight against an opponent which is different
from us. Their faces are not visible, but are hidden from view; they do not fight directly,
but by stealth; they are not honourable, but unprincipled; they are not national, but
international; they do not believe in work, but speculate with money; they have no homeland,
but feel that the whole world is theirs.' --
Viktor Orbán
Watch the great Hungarian foreign minister repel attacks by the BBCs arrogant open borders
propagandist, rudely treating him like an ignorant child and calling him a racist for
defending his nation.
Economic liberals maintain that because Europe is aging, it needs young immigrant
workers to pay for the pensions of retired workers.
Not gonna happen. Their 80 IQ skills are uncompetitive and useless in Europe even before
Automation erases those low-skilled positions in the coming decade or two. Meanwhile, (real)
European youth unemployment rate is 20%. Young Europeans are not making babies because they
don't have a stable future. This can only get worse as the hostile invaders get preferential,
Affirmative Action treatment, in schools and workplaces. None of this is accidental.
There are, in my opinion, two reasons for letting the mass immigration happen:
- the Brussels belief, expressed in a 2009 official document, not secret, that the EU needs
60 million immigrants.
- a Merkel belief dat the Germans are bad, they caused two world wars and perpetrated the
holocaust, so the German people must be changed through mass immigration.
The Brussels belief seems to be based mainly on the increasing average age in the EU.
It is incomprehensible to me, at the same time fear that robots slowly will do all simple
jobs.
The Merkel belief, on the other side of the Atlantic, where few understand German, and
cannot or do not watch German tv, I wonder how many understand that the 20th century
propaganda of the victors still is decisive in German daily life and politics.
The danger of neonazi's and fascism is everywhere.
Nationalism, the equivalent of building gas chambers.
The EU also is based on the 20th century fairy tales, only the EU prevented wars in Europe
after WWII.
The idea that Germans were victims in two world wars, and, until Hitler became power in 1933,
also between the world wars, in unthinkable.
The idea that Endlösung meant deportation to Madagaskar, even more unthinkable.
That jews, as one Rothschild wrote to another around 1890, have and had but one enemy,
themselves, the world unthinkable is too weak.
Yet
'From prejudice to destruction', Jacob Katz, 1980, Cambridge MA
explains it, things as 'close economic cooperation, intermarriage, ostentious behaviour'.
In this respect
'Christianity and the Holocaust of the Hungarian Jewry', Moshe Y Herclz, 1993 New York
University press
also is a very interesting book, after jews in the thirties had been banned from many
intellectual professions not a single Hungarian newspaper could be published any more.
Soros trying to force Muslim immigrants on deeply catholic Hungary, he was born in
Hungary, experienced anti semitism, revenge ?
I was recently in Budapest on business and will likely be returning soon: It is the most
beautiful city I have ever seen, with stunning architectural restoration projects, almost
non-existent police and military presence, food and wines that rival those of Paris, and a
very friendly, non-bureaucratic and non-obsese (as opposed to the USA) population. I would
like to hear from others who have recently visited and have knowledge of the country.
Viszlát! -- John
When the fort of folly that Globalism is finally falls, Diana Johnstone's article will be
cited as exemplary in exposing its hidden grammar. That fall cannot be far off now given that
psy-ops can only work if people are ignorant of the manipulation afoot.
Great opening, Diana. For forty years the presstitude media have leaned on the use of
implication as argument to have the ninety-nine percent buy what they are selling. What was
not pointed out very well until now, is that their implications are all false. Now, only a
dummy among the dumbed-down cannot see it.
For those who have the patience to read the English subtitles, here is an excellent speech
given by Orbán in July. Here he outlines his thinking on the issues facing Hungary and
the world.
Viktor Orbán is a very intelligent leader, and he has the vast majority of the
Hungarian people behind him. History has taught those people many things, and they have had
enough. They are not fools. Look to them as an example for all of us.
@John Siman I was recently in Budapest on business and will likely be returning soon: It
is the most beautiful city I have ever seen, with stunning architectural restoration
projects, almost non-existent police and military presence, food and wines that rival those
of Paris, and a very friendly, non-bureaucratic and non-obsese (as opposed to the USA)
population. I would like to hear from others who have recently visited and have knowledge of
the country. Viszlát! -- John Wherever US influence is not yet overwhelming (and such
places are becoming fewer every day, unfortunately), you will still find "old-fashioned" ways
of interaction, few fatties, and decent food and drink.
People may become fat for many reasons, but most fatties these days in the Anglosphere
belong to the underclass. These wretches get fat from eating expensive trash at McDonald's
and other fast food outlets, and drinking Coca Cola and similar sugar-saturated garbage.
Their behavior may seem strange because their brains have largely withered away through
endless TV watching (mainly US or US-inspired visual trash), their hearing impaired by ear-
and mind numbing noise passing for music.
I am afraid the way out of that prison is long and tortuous for all victims of US
neoliberalism.
The usual anti-EU propaganda that Ms Johnstone has been peddling for at least a dozen years,
although she has recently moved from claiming to be a far-leftist to claiming to be a
far-rightest. Whatever pretext "proves" the EU to be evil is trotted out! However, she points
out very clearly Viktor Orban's dilemma. The choice for Hungary is between the EU and Putin's
tanks. After 40 years of occupation by a Soviet Union in which the ethnic Russians acted as
colonial overlords and the general contempt which Hungarians have for Slavs, choosing the
latter option would be political suicide for any Hungarian leader. Thus, Orban is stuck with
the EU whether he likes it or not and the other Member States are stuck with Orban whether
they like it or not. In addition, two of Ms Johnstone's factual claims need to be corrected.
The "EU" is taking no step whatsoever to strip Hungary of its political rights. The
(according to Ms Johnstone, "largely rubber stamp") European Parliament has adopted a
resolution calling on the Member States to sanction Hungary. The EP always does something
attention-grabbing in the run up to elections and since Ms Johnstone once worked for the
European Parliament (as a far-leftist!), I'm sure she knows that. Imposing sanctions, as
always in the EU, is a matter for the sovereign Member States and the decision has to be
unanimous. Poland has already said it will not vote for sanctions, so the whole thing is a
dead letter. Secondly, the claim that Hungary "never had a colonial empire" is untrue. It
never had a colonial empire outside Europe but before 1918, it ruled over Slovakia, most of
Croatia, Transylvania, now part of Romania, and the Vojvodina, now part of Serbia (so much
for Ms Johnstone's supposed "expertise" on ex-Yugoslavia!). In general, the frantic, almost
hysterical, tone of the article suggests that Ms Johnstone doesn't believe that Viktor Orban
is going to be the cause of the imminent and inevitable demise of the hated EU that she has
been predicting for as long as I have been reading her articles (and that goes back at least
14 years!).
@Michael Kenny The usual anti-EU propaganda that Ms Johnstone has been peddling for at
least a dozen years, although she has recently moved from claiming to be a far-leftist to
claiming to be a far-rightest. Whatever pretext "proves" the EU to be evil is trotted out!
However, she points out very clearly Viktor Orban's dilemma. The choice for Hungary is
between the EU and Putin's tanks. After 40 years of occupation by a Soviet Union in which the
ethnic Russians acted as colonial overlords and the general contempt which Hungarians have
for Slavs, choosing the latter option would be political suicide for any Hungarian leader.
Thus, Orban is stuck with the EU whether he likes it or not and the other Member States are
stuck with Orban whether they like it or not. In addition, two of Ms Johnstone's factual
claims need to be corrected. The "EU" is taking no step whatsoever to strip Hungary of its
political rights. The (according to Ms Johnstone, "largely rubber stamp") European Parliament
has adopted a resolution calling on the Member States to sanction Hungary. The EP always does
something attention-grabbing in the run up to elections and since Ms Johnstone once worked
for the European Parliament (as a far-leftist!), I'm sure she knows that. Imposing sanctions,
as always in the EU, is a matter for the sovereign Member States and the decision has to be
unanimous. Poland has already said it will not vote for sanctions, so the whole thing is a
dead letter. Secondly, the claim that Hungary "never had a colonial empire" is untrue. It
never had a colonial empire outside Europe but before 1918, it ruled over Slovakia, most of
Croatia, Transylvania, now part of Romania, and the Vojvodina, now part of Serbia (so much
for Ms Johnstone's supposed "expertise" on ex-Yugoslavia!). In general, the frantic, almost
hysterical, tone of the article suggests that Ms Johnstone doesn't believe that Viktor Orban
is going to be the cause of the imminent and inevitable demise of the hated EU that she has
been predicting for as long as I have been reading her articles (and that goes back at least
14 years!). Judging by your name, you are not a European, but an Englishman, or from
somewhere else in the Anglosphere. It is a good thing for England and especially the English
to be leaving the EuSSR, which is more of a prison than commonly realized. Ruled by a greedy
class of corrupt and, to make it worse, utterly mediocre, politicians, incompetent and stupid
bureaucrats (yes, I know this is an oxymoron) in the exclusive interest of ruthless big
corporations, human rights do not exist in the EuSSR.
Since the fall of the Berlin Wall, Europe has seen a wave of privatizations on a scale
only comparable to what happened in the former USSR. Nevertheless, taxation has increased to
a point where today, the average EuSSR "citizen" pays between 75% and 80% taxes on every Euro
he earns. The middle class is on its way to extinction. The judiciary is a joke, education
has been dismantled or stupidified, health care is a disaster, save in Southern Europe where
many doctors and nurses still have a sense of humanity.
The piece by Mrs. Johnstone may not be flawless, but it says what needs to be said.
70 years ago the Democrat party in the American South was the party of regular working
class White Southerners and promoted Southern heritage and Southern history including
Confederate history.
Then things change.
Now the national Democrat party and the Democrat party in the South hates Whites
Southerners, hates Southern heritage and Southern history and are promoting the desecration
of Confederate monuments and confederate graves.
60 years ago Hungarian was under Soviet Communist domination and Hungarian patriots looked
to the West – especially American and Great Britain to help them achieve some personal
freedom from Communism.
Now things have completely changed. It's the Wester (EU) UK BBC, American mass media that
restricts freedom and National Christianity in Hungary and pretty much everywhere else.
Russia is once again a health European Christian nation. Nobody in Hungary, Eastern Europe or
Russia wants to allow their countries to be invaded by millions of 3rd world Muslim
rapists.
So I living in Chicago IL (Obama was my neighbor) look to Hungary, Poland, Russia and
Eastern Europe for any small dose of freedom.
The economic model that the word "neoliberalism" was coined to describe was developed by
Chicago school economists in the 1960s and 1970s based upon Austrian neoclassical
economic theories, but heavily influenced by Ayn
Rand's barmy pseudo-philosophy of Übermenschen and greed-worship .
The first experiment in applied neoliberal theory began on September 11th 1973 in
Chile , when a US backed military coup resulted in the death of social-democratic leader
Salvador Allende and his replacement with the brutal military dictator General Pinochet
(Margaret Thatcher's friend and idol). Thousands of people were murdered by the Pinochet regime
for political reasons and tens of thousands more were tortured as Pinochet and the "Chicago
boys" set about implementing neoliberal economic reforms and brutally reppressing anyone that
stood in their way. The US financially doped the Chilean economy in order to create the
impression that these rabid-right wing reforms were successful. After the "success" of the
Chilean neoliberal experiment, the instillation and economic support of right-wing military
dictatorships to impose neoliberal economic reforms became unofficial US foreign policy.
The first of the democratically elected neoliberals were Margaret
Thatcher in the UK and Ronald Reagan in the US. They both set about introducing
ideologically driven neoliberal reforms, such as the complete withdrawal of capital controls by
Tory Chancellor Geoffrey Howe and the deregulation of the US financial markets that led to vast
corruption scandals like Enron and the global
financial sector insolvency crisis of 2007-08 .
By 1989 the ideology of neoliberalism was enshrined as the economic orthodoxy of the world
as undemocratic Washington based institutions such as the International Monetary Fund (IMF),
the World Bank and the US Treasury Department signed up to a ten point economic plan which was
riddled with neoliberal ideology such as trade liberalisation, privatisation, financial sector
deregulation and tax cuts for the wealthy. This agreement between anti-democratic organisations
is misleadingly referred to as "The Washington Consensus".
These days, the IMF is one of the most high profile pushers of neoliberal economic policies.
Their strategy involves applying strict "structural adjustment" conditions on their loans.
These conditions are invariably neoliberal reforms such as privatisation of utilities, services
and government owned industries, tax cuts for corporations and the wealthy, the abandonment of
capital controls, the removal of democratic controls over central banks and monetary policy and
the deregulation of financial industries.
"... Serious border enforcement, demanding our wealthy allies do more for their own security, infrastructure investment, the (campaign's) refutation of Reaganomics, acknowledging the costs of globalism, calling BS on all of the dominant left PC pieties and lies, were themes of Trump's campaign that were of value. ..."
Serious border enforcement, demanding our wealthy allies do more for their own security,
infrastructure investment, the (campaign's) refutation of Reaganomics, acknowledging the
costs of globalism, calling BS on all of the dominant left PC pieties and lies, were themes
of Trump's campaign that were of value.
Trump was able to harness and give voice to some very important energies. But being Trump,
he's poisoned these issues for a couple of generations. No serious leader will be able to
touch these things.
Add this to all the institutional and political ruin he has created.
"... Tucker Carlson went off last week on how the US welfare system is gamed by major corporations like Amazon and Walmart to keep workers' wages below a basic level of being able to support one's self and family. ..."
"... How about reducing these companies' tax deductions for wages by an estimate of the welfare benefits, e.g. "Food Stamps," etc., their workers use to stay afloat? ..."
You missed the pithiest soundbite that succinctly sums it all up:
We privatised profits and we socialised risk and losses.
We continue to do so in a major way to prop up our oligarch class.
Capitalism died a long time ago in the US, and its death is not just evident in the way
banks are coddled.
Tucker Carlson went off last week on how the US welfare system is gamed by major
corporations like Amazon and Walmart to keep workers' wages below a basic level of being able
to support one's self and family.
How about reducing these companies' tax deductions for wages by an estimate of the welfare
benefits, e.g. "Food Stamps," etc., their workers use to stay afloat?
"We can look to Iceland for an example of how to handle the next crisis."
No, we should follow the example of Vietnam and execute a few bankers and other
oligarchs.
The Asian country that best overcame the 1997 crisis was Malaysia.
Under then PM Mahathir, the country defied the IMF and refused to take loans from it.
Instead of obeying the Washington Consensus rules, Malaysia applied completely unorthodox
measures: fixing the peg of the ringgit to the dollar, selective foreign exchange controls,
de- internationalisation of the ringgit. As a consequence, Malaysia preserved all her
assets.
Ironically, such unorthodox crisis measures are now recognised as innovative and efficient
by the same vulture IMF.
The 1997 crisis followed the trademark asset rip off script set up by the financial
industry loan sharks. The same script has repeated time and again over decades.
On a slightly related topic, "Let's put forward a People's Agenda."
India just created one of the worlds largest Public Banks.
The mother of all banks is coming today
. . .
A banking behemoth will take birth at Delhi's Talkatora Stadium today when Prime
Minister Narendra Modi inaugurates the India Post Payments Bank (IPPB).
Not Pepe's best sauce, but always worth a read. He's best when he's reporting from the
field. His armchair geopolitics aren't that much better than anyone else's.
That said, Eurasian integration, Western Hemispheric energy independence, the populist
revolt against forced globalization/sovereignty elimination/kleptocracy and the outbreak of
global peace are all changing the chessboard profoundly. Most of the premises of traditional
imperialist power politics are simply blown away. Instead, a new 'Chinese Peace with Russian
Muscle' is the de facto hegemony in the vast bulk of the world, including parts of South
American and most of Africa. With the Brits and French too slow and stupid to react, the
Germans as weaselly and venal as ever, and the Japanese comatose, the hulk known as the G7 is
heeling over into full capsize mode. And, good riddance.
Now the G20 has to either stand up or collapse. Much depends on which outcome
develops.
However it works out, we can all stand and cheer that it is not a US dependent historical
course any more. We've ceded our moral and military leadership. Perhaps we can reform, even
if by bloody revolution, and re-emerge with something to give the rest of the world. Free
markets, liberty, democracy, freedom of thought......the future is now really a question of
whether any of these ideas will have a chance in a remade global order dominated, so far, by
dictatorship, corruption, and moral crime.
So, we tend to our own house now. Anyone got a pack of matches?
** We've ceded our moral and military leadership **
Kosovo, Iraq, Afghanistan, Benghazi, Libya, Syria, Ukraine, Georgia, NATO expansion, the
Clintoons, the Bush dynasty of mediocrity, our open border, offshoring, Muslim ass kissing,
free-ranging Antifa filth, media monopoly and lies, foreigners taking university slots,
sexual confusion, ass kissing homosexuals, groveling before bat shit crazy feminists,
destruction of our basic legal document through judicial usurpation, diseased leftists
spouting lies and delusion, excusing black dysfunction, fiscal incontinence, unaddressd
monopolies, attacks on free speech, criminal immunity for elites, a president who won't
exercise his authority and tolerates insubordination, an unaccountable bureaucracy, a loose
cannon prosecutor, Jewish political domination, slobbering over Israel as though Jerusalem is
our capitol not Washington, denigration of the white majority culture, celebration of
miscegenation, degradation of marriage, our diseased educational establishment, rampant vote
fraud, illegal and unconstitutional wars, chest beating about "exceptionalism," and a
generally crap culture all say you're right.
There will be no sudden and dramatic collapse. There will only be a slow, painful,
never-ending, degrading decay into nothingness, a death from one million pundits, a process
readily apparent (literally) all around us. Tune in to CNN, see for yourself.
I see your point, but I am not convinced bankers work independently. Bankers do not have a
monopoly on psychotics. The psychotics in gov have as much greed and craving for power as the
bankers and I believe they work around, with, and against each other for various reasons just
like everything else in the world works. Thus a one dimensional theory will not be complete -
and maybe that is what you are arguing: to include bankers in geopolitics. I agree the
bankers are a big part of the rotten problem but like when I am overseas - I watch the guys
with the guns.
Most of the planet has put up with a lot of shit from America It's good that it's finally
coming to an end.
"We have about 50% of the world's wealth but only 6.3% of its population... Our real task
in the coming period is to devise a pattern of relationships which will permit us to maintain
this position of disparity without positive detriment to our national security. To do so, we
will have to dispense with all sentimentality and daydreaming, and our attention will have to
be concentrated everywhere on our immediate national objectives. We need not deceive
ourselves that we can afford today the luxury of altruism and world benefaction... We should
cease to talk about vague and unreal objectives such as human rights, the raising of the
living standards, and democratization. The day is not far off when we are going to have to
deal in straight power concepts. The less we are then hampered by idealistic slogans, the
better."
George Kennan, State Department memo, 1948
America never gave up on the idealistic slogans -- the figleaf for the Empire of Chaos.
Finally shutting the fuck up after the game is over will be welcome.
"... No wonder one of the side effects of progressive Eurasia integration will be not only a death blow to Bretton Woods but also to "democratic" neoliberalism. ..."
Alastair Crooke took a great
shot at deconstructing why Western global elites are terrified of the Russian
conceptualization of Eurasia.
It's because "they 'scent' a stealth reversion to the old, pre-Socratic values: for the
Ancients the very notion of 'man', in that way, did not exist. There were only men: Greeks,
Romans, barbarians, Syrians, and so on. This stands in obvious opposition to universal,
cosmopolitan 'man'."
So it's Heraclitus versus Voltaire – even as "humanism" as we inherited it from the
Enlightenment, is de facto over.
Whatever is left roaming our wilderness of mirrors depends on
the irascible mood swings of the Goddess of the Market.
No wonder one of the side effects of
progressive Eurasia integration will be not only a death blow to Bretton Woods but also to
"democratic" neoliberalism.
What we have now is also a remastered version of sea power versus land powers. Relentless
Russophobia is paired with supreme fear of a Russia-Germany rapprochement – as Bismarck
wanted, and as Putin
and Merkel recently hinted at. The supreme nightmare for the U.S. is in fact a truly
Eurasian Beijing-Berlin-Moscow partnership.
The Belt and Road Initiative (BRI) has not even begun; according to the official Beijing
timetable, we're still in the planning phase. Implementation starts next year. The horizon is
2039.
"... " One of the worst things that can happen to our country, is when Russia ever gets driven to China. We have driven them together – with the big oil deals that are being made. We have driven them together. That's a horrible thing for this country. We have made them friends because of incompetent leadership. I believe I would get along very nicely with Putin – okay? And, I mean [that] where we [the US] have the strength. I don't think we need the sanctions. I think that we would get along very, very well." ..."
"... Art of the Deal ..."
"... Identify a big goal (tax cuts, balanced trade, the wall, etc.). ..."
"... Identify your leverage points versus anyone who stands in your way (elections, tariffs, jobs, etc.). ..."
"... Announce some extreme threat against your opponent that uses your leverage. ..."
"... If the opponent backs down, mitigate the threat, declare victory and go home with a win. ..."
"... If the opponent fires back, double down. If Trump declares tariffs on $50 billion of good from China,and China shoots back with tariffs on $50 billion of goods from the U.S., Trump doubles down with tariffs on $100 billion of goods, etc. Trump will keep escalating until he wins." ..."
"... Eventually, the escalation process can lead to negotiations with at least the perception of a victory for Trump (North Korea) -- even if the victory is more visual than real. ..."
"... "The position of Europe is clear. It isn't a coincidence that Trump, while enumerating the enemies of the US (the EU, China, and Russia), made it clear that he considers Russia to be a smaller problem [than the EU], because there are practically no economic contradictions ("Nord Stream-2" doesn't count) with it. It's not China, with which the US has the biggest negative trade balance, but the EU, which Trump fairly defined as the main trade competitor, receiving unjustified economic benefits from political agreements with the US, and which is the main 'foe' of the US. ..."
"... "[Thus Trump] resolves his military-political contradictions with Russia, [and consequently] reduces the value of the EU as an ally for Washington, to zero Europe was accustomed to (and hoped to continue to use) its role of a springboard for the fight against Russia as [the primordial] argument that was supposed to keep Trump away from making the last step (complete separation with the EU). ..."
"... In recent days, Merkel, after the NATO summit, started talking literally [that Trump's hostility towards Europe is unjustified], because Europe battles with Russia for the interests of the US. ..."
"... "For the EU it was crucial that this argument continued to work. Otherwise, Washington indeed, would have more common ground with Moscow than with Brussels. And Europe isn't ready for a sharp confrontation with the US. Having rested on its laurels [i.e. on its conviction that it occupied, as it were, some 'moral high ground of values']. Europe wasn't engaged (in difference, for example, from China), in the diversification of economic ties and appeared to be strongly dependent on access to the American market. ..."
"... "Without having risked to be ahead of Trump in the question of normalising relations with Russia, EU leaders were fatally afraid that Trump and Putin, despite all difficulties, will do the impossible and reach an agreement, especially as both proved to be people who are ready to instantly make decisions that change the destiny of the world. ..."
"... "The position taken by the EU raised the value of the summit for Russia too. Moscow can wait until Washington is ready for reconciliation. But, taking into account the obvious intention of Europe to manoeuvre between Russia and the US, trying to preserve the geopolitical configuration that is profitable for itself, but doesn't suit either Trump nor Putin, Russia was also interested in showing to the whole world the success of the summit and good prospects for achieving definitive and comprehensive agreements." ..."
"... The latent hatred for Russia is unmistakeably revealed. This animosity will not be a surprise to Putin – though the extremity of the elite language used towards Trump will make Russians aware of their ..."
"... What does such language portend? The roots of American Russo-phobia go deep. It starts with American Trotskyist activists' on ground participation in the initial Trotskyist Bolshevik revolution – largely financed, and orchestrated by Wall Street. ..."
"... Of course, what rankles most in America, and amongst European liberal elites, is the apparent according of moral equivalence of Putin to America, and to America's intelligence capabilities. America believes it WON – it won the Cold War culturally, and in terms of its systems of government and economics. ..."
"... The western Establishment anger stems ultimately from Russia's refusal to acquiesce to their merited 'defeatism' (in this view): Putin rejected to merge Russia into the American-led global order, preferring Russia to remain somehow 'Russian', in its own Russian cultural way. ..."
"... And for Trump? The 'smart money' says that he will be indicted, or impeached, after the midterms. I doubt it. For all John Brennan's talk of "High Crimes and Misdemeanors" (the precise legal language of impeachment), there is no crime. If any, crimes per se ..."
Maybe we are misreading things. Not a small number of commentaries have suggested
that President Trump intended for Helsinki to re-set the Kissinger-esque triangulation
between the US, Russia and China. And there are good grounds for making such
a hypothesis. At a 2015 press conference, Trump, himself, took the Kissinger
line -- that the US should always try to keep Russia and China divided, and
never allied together against America):
" One of the worst things that can happen to our country, is when
Russia ever gets driven to China. We have driven them together – with the
big oil deals that are being made. We have driven them together. That's
a horrible thing for this country. We have made them friends because of
incompetent leadership. I believe I would get along very nicely with Putin
– okay? And, I mean [that] where we [the US] have the strength. I don't
think we need the sanctions. I think that we would get along very, very
well."
This makes a lot of sense, but maybe in Helsinki Trump was doing something
a little less strategic and more down-to-earth – something more in line with
his Art of the Deal philosophy.
We have, over the decades, developed a fairly precise mental model of how
"Presidents are supposed to behave; and how the policymaking process is supposed
to be carried out. Obviously, Trump does not fit their model", Jim Rickards
writes . "[GW] Bush and Obama were totally process-driven. You could see
events coming a mile away as they wound their way through the West Wing and
Capitol Hill deliberative processes." With Trump, Rickards continues, "there
is a process, but it does not adhere to a timeline or existing template. Trump
seems to be the only process participant most of the time. No one else in Washington
thinks this way. Washington insiders try to avoid confrontation, avoid escalation,
compromise from the beginning, and finesse their way through any policy process."
"Here's the Trump process:
Identify a big goal (tax cuts, balanced trade, the wall, etc.).
Identify your leverage points versus anyone who stands in your way
(elections, tariffs, jobs, etc.).
Announce some extreme threat against your opponent that uses your
leverage.
If the opponent backs down, mitigate the threat, declare victory
and go home with a win.
If the opponent fires back, double down. If Trump declares tariffs
on $50 billion of good from China,and China shoots back with tariffs on
$50 billion of goods from the U.S., Trump doubles down with tariffs on $100
billion of goods, etc. Trump will keep escalating until he wins."
Eventually, the escalation process can lead to negotiations with at least
the perception of a victory for Trump (North Korea) -- even if the victory is
more visual than real.
So, if we reframe the Helsinki meeting through this Art of the Deal lens,
what do we get? Seeing that thedivergencies of vision between Russia and the
US are so substantial, and the common ground is so small, there is very little
prospect for a 'strategic global deal'. In fact, President Trump has little
that he can offer Russia: sanctions relief is not in his gift (it is in the
maw of Congress), and he could not – at this stage – relinquish Ukraine, even
if Trump understands that the US and Europe bought a 'pig in a poke' with its
Maidan coup in Kiev.
"So", as Russian commentator, Rostislav Ishchenko, writes (in Russian, translation
here ): "We have a situation where both parties even prior to negotiations,
knew that they wouldn't be able to come to some arrangement, and they didn't
even prepare for such a thing (it wasn't planned to sign anything following
the results of negotiations). At the same time, both parties needed the event
to be successful". Ishchenko continues: "Trump obviously blackmails the European
Union with a possible agreement with Russia. But Putin also needs to show Europe
that there are other fish in the sea besides them."
"The position of Europe is clear. It isn't a coincidence that Trump,
while enumerating the enemies of the US (the EU, China, and Russia), made
it clear that he considers Russia to be a smaller problem [than the EU],
because there are practically no economic contradictions ("Nord Stream-2"
doesn't count) with it. It's not China, with which the US has the biggest
negative trade balance, but the EU, which Trump fairly defined as the main
trade competitor, receiving unjustified economic benefits from political
agreements with the US, and which is the main 'foe' of the US.
"[Thus Trump] resolves his military-political contradictions with
Russia, [and consequently] reduces the value of the EU as an ally for Washington,
to zero Europe was accustomed to (and hoped to continue to use) its role
of a springboard for the fight against Russia as [the primordial] argument
that was supposed to keep Trump away from making the last step (complete
separation with the EU).
In recent days, Merkel, after the NATO summit, started talking literally
[that Trump's hostility towards Europe is unjustified], because Europe battles
with Russia for the interests of the US.
"For the EU it was crucial that this argument continued to work.
Otherwise, Washington indeed, would have more common ground with Moscow
than with Brussels. And Europe isn't ready for a sharp confrontation with
the US. Having rested on its laurels [i.e. on its conviction that it occupied,
as it were, some 'moral high ground of values']. Europe wasn't engaged (in
difference, for example, from China), in the diversification of economic
ties and appeared to be strongly dependent on access to the American market.
"Without having risked to be ahead of Trump in the question of normalising
relations with Russia, EU leaders were fatally afraid that Trump and Putin,
despite all difficulties, will do the impossible and reach an agreement,
especially as both proved to be people who are ready to instantly make decisions
that change the destiny of the world.
"The position taken by the EU raised the value of the summit for
Russia too. Moscow can wait until Washington is ready for reconciliation.
But, taking into account the obvious intention of Europe to manoeuvre between
Russia and the US, trying to preserve the geopolitical configuration that
is profitable for itself, but doesn't suit either Trump nor Putin, Russia
was also interested in showing to the whole world the success of the summit
and good prospects for achieving definitive and comprehensive agreements."
In short, Trump was using Helsinki to leverage "an extreme threat against
your opponent" (Europe), by voiding the European 'card' of its 'usefulness'
to America through its constant battling against Russia. Indeed the recent
NATO final comunique, reads almost precisely as an legal indictment of Russia
and its behavior.
Both Trump and Putin took a big political risk by staging this 'end
to Cold War – coup de théâtre'. Trump has unleashed extraordinary hysteria in
parts of the US, provoking numerous Washington Post op-eds to language such
as characterising Trump's words (at the press conference) as 'apostasy' and
'a cancer amongst us'. (Apostasy is the language used by violent jihadists against
non-believers.)
The latent hatred for Russia is unmistakeably revealed. This animosity will
not be a surprise to Putin – though the extremity of the elite language used
towards Trump will make Russians aware of their risks – what
might ensue were Trump somehow be removed from office?
What does such language portend? The roots of American Russo-phobia go deep.
It starts with American Trotskyist activists' on ground participation in the
initial Trotskyist Bolshevik revolution –
largely financed, and orchestrated by Wall Street.
Not only did New York
bankers provide money, they also facilitated safe passage to Russia for revolutionaries
such as Trotsky and others. Stalin's ultimate killing of the Trotskyist killers
in the 1930s (and many others) is at the root of the Russian 'thuggery' language
still circulating in US (even if some have forgotten its origins). Stalin's
cleansing has never been forgiven by certain circles in the US.
Of course, what rankles most in America, and amongst European liberal elites,
is the apparent according of moral equivalence of Putin to America, and to America's
intelligence capabilities. America believes it WON – it won the Cold War culturally,
and in terms of its systems of government and economics. This 'End to History'
hubris voided – in this ecstatic state – the need to treat Russia as other than
a psychologically 'defeated people', (which they were not).
The western Establishment anger stems ultimately from Russia's refusal
to acquiesce to their merited 'defeatism' (in this view): Putin rejected to
merge Russia into the American-led global order, preferring Russia to remain
somehow 'Russian', in its own Russian cultural way.
What are the implications for Europe? For Europe this is a catastrophe. It
means that US dialogue with Putin will continue. Where to run for the EU – to
Washington or to Moscow? To remain loyal to an old suzerain or to try to adhere
to a new one, before others get there first?
Moreover, unlike Russia, Europe can't wait. By meeting Putin, Trump brought
the US out of zugzwang, having handed over to the European Union the right to
make this same move, which only risks complicating Euro politics – beyond its
existing challenges.
And for Trump? The 'smart money' says that he will be indicted, or impeached,
after the midterms. I doubt it. For all John Brennan's talk of "High Crimes
and Misdemeanors" (the precise legal language of impeachment), there is no crime.
If any, crimes per se may emerge out from a very different quarter.
And Trump likely will survive the current hysterics.
"... I was not sure whether Trump was controlled opposition or simply a useful scapegoat for the economic crisis that globalists are clearly engineering. Now it appears that he is both. ..."
"... Many businessmen end up dealing with elitist controlled banks at some point in their careers. But when Trump entered office and proceeded to load his cabinet with ghouls from Goldman Sachs, JP Morgan, the Council on Foreign Relations and give Wilber Ross the position of Commerce Secretary, it became obvious that Trump is in fact a puppet for the banks. ..."
"... If one examines the history of fake coups, there is ALWAYS an element of orchestrated division, sometimes between the globalists and their own puppets. This is called 4th Generation warfare, in which almost all divisions are an illusion and the real target is the public psyche. ..."
"... the overall picture is not as simple as "Left vs. Right." Instead, we need to look at the situation more like a chess board, and above that chess board looms the globalists, attempting to control all the necessary pieces on BOTH sides. Every provocation by leftists is designed to elicit a predictable response from conservatives to the point that we become whatever the globalists want us to become. ..."
"... Therefore it is not leftists that present the greatest threat to individual liberty, but the globalist influenced Trump administration. A failed coup on the part of the left could be used as a rationale for incremental and unconstitutional "safeguards." And conservatives may be fooled into supporting these measures as the threat is overblown. ..."
At that time I was certain that the globalists would find great use for a Trump presidency,
more so in fact than a Clinton presidency. However, I was not sure whether Trump was controlled
opposition or simply a useful scapegoat for the economic crisis that globalists are clearly
engineering. Now it appears that he is both.
Trump's history was already suspicious. He was bailed out of his considerable debts
surrounding his Taj Mahal casino in Atlantic City in the early 1990s by
Rothschild banking agent Wilber Ross , which saved him from embarrassment and
possibly saved his entire fortune . This alone was not necessarily enough to deny Trump the
benefit of the doubt in my view.
Many businessmen end up dealing with elitist controlled banks at some point in their
careers. But when Trump entered office and proceeded to load his cabinet with ghouls from
Goldman Sachs, JP Morgan, the Council on Foreign Relations and give Wilber Ross the position of
Commerce Secretary, it became obvious that Trump is in fact a puppet for the banks.
Some liberty movement activists ignore this reality and attempt to argue around the facts of
Trump's associations. "What about all the media opposition to Trump? Doesn't this indicate he's
not controlled?" they say. I say, not really.
If one examines the history of fake coups, there is ALWAYS an element of orchestrated
division, sometimes between the globalists and their own puppets. This is called 4th Generation
warfare, in which almost all divisions are an illusion and the real target is the public
psyche.
This is not to say that leftist opposition to Trump and conservatives is not real. It
absolutely is. The left has gone off the ideological deep end into an abyss of rabid frothing
insanity, but the overall picture is not as simple as "Left vs. Right." Instead, we need to
look at the situation more like a chess board, and above that chess board looms the globalists,
attempting to control all the necessary pieces on BOTH sides. Every provocation by leftists is
designed to elicit a predictable response from conservatives to the point that we become
whatever the globalists want us to become.
... ... ...
As this is taking place, conservatives are growing more sensitive to the notion of a leftist
coup, from silencing of conservative voices to an impeachment of Trump based on fraudulent
ideas of "Russian collusion."
To be clear, the extreme left has no regard for individual liberties or constitutional law.
They use the Constitution when it suits them, then try to tear it down when it doesn't suit
them. However, the far-left is also a paper tiger; it is not a true threat to conservative
values because its membership marginal, it is weak, immature and irrational. Their only power
resides in their influence within the mainstream media, but with the MSM fading in the face of
the alternative media, their social influence is limited. It is perhaps enough to organize a
"coup," but it would inevitably be a failed coup.
Therefore it is not leftists that present the greatest threat to individual liberty, but the
globalist influenced Trump administration. A failed coup on the part of the left could be used
as a rationale for incremental and unconstitutional "safeguards." And conservatives may be
fooled into supporting these measures as the threat is overblown.
I have always said that the only people that can destroy conservative principles are
conservatives. Conservatives diminish their own principles every time they abandon their
conscience and become exactly like the monsters they hope to defeat. And make no mistake, the
globalists are well aware of this strategy.
Carroll Quigley, a pro-globalist professor and the author of Tragedy and Hope, a book
published decades ago which outlined the plan for a one world economic and political system, is
quoted in his address ' Dissent: Do We Need It
':
"They say, "The Congress is corrupt." I ask them, "What do you know about the Congress? Do
you know your own Congressman's name?" Usually they don't. It's almost a reflex with them,
like seeing a fascist pig in a policeman. To them, all Congressmen are crooks. I tell them
they must spend a lot of time learning the American political system and how it functions,
and then work within the system. But most of them just won't buy that. They insist the system
is totally corrupt. I insist that the system, the establishment, whatever you call it, is so
balanced by diverse forces that very slight pressures can produce perceptible results.
For example, I've talked about the lower middle class as the backbone of fascism in the
future. I think this may happen. The party members of the Nazi Party in Germany were
consistently lower middle class. I think that the right-wing movements in this country are
pretty generally in this group."
Is a "failed coup" being staged in order to influence conservatives to become the very
"fascists" the left accuses us of being? The continuing narrative certainly suggests that this
is the game plan.
* * *
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"... For dessert today, I offer Russia's Grand Strategy Revisited published on the 24th. The Outlaw US Empire is in the midst of a Seldon Crisis but lacks the means to even recognize the spectacular mess its made for itself, much of which is quite visibly articulated in its NDS I linked to above. ..."
"... By every metric I've observed, the USA's citizenry from all political POVs wants a return to Reality for that's the only basis from which to address and solve the many domestic problems. ..."
Too Funny!
Trump whines, threatens pullout from WTO again! After decades of bullying
nations and impoverishing their people, other nations are using the Outlaw
US Empire's WTO as a weapon against it, so Trump cries Unfair! As I wrote
above, Big Money's trapped within its own web.
The "Softies" are yet another entity in the Smoke & Mirrors Fun House
designed to fool and gain citizenry's consent to be robbed blind.
Russians already went through that and are very wary as illustrated by
the very sensitive nature of the recent
Pension System Reform Debate and legislation that Putin had to solve
using his political capital.
As with all politicians, you won't know what you elected until you learn
how your rep votes issues, although some can be anticipated by examining
their past behavior as with our pseudo Democrat-Socialist.
For dessert today, I offer Russia's
Grand Strategy Revisited published on the 24th. The Outlaw US
Empire is in the midst of a Seldon Crisis but lacks the means to even recognize
the spectacular mess its made for itself, much of which is quite visibly
articulated in its NDS I linked to above.
By every metric I've observed, the USA's citizenry from all political
POVs wants a return to Reality for that's the only basis from which to address
and solve the many domestic problems.
Big Money refuses as its addicted to Smoke & Mirrors since that's what
was used to gain its power and will now double-down.
The powerful always want more power.
-- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- –
June 26, 2016
"Brexit: Are The Serfs Finally Rebelling"?
The establishment are shocked that the ordinary people want out of the European Union
(EU). They just don't realize that people are fed up being used, abused, dictated to, lied
to, manipulated, and forced into an EU dictatorship by treacherous politicians.
These are some of the same politicians who scurry to the meetings of the so-called elites
in Davos, and also attend Bilderberg meetings. And many of them, when they leave politics,
finish up on the boards of banks and multi-national corporations with the rest of the
money-manipulating bandits that got bailed out with taxpayers' dollars, some of whom, I
believe, should be in jail .
"... But to an extent hardly imaginable in 2008, all the world's leading economies are locked in a perpetually escalating cycle of economic warfare. This global trade war is spearheaded by the Trump White House, which sees trade sanctions and tariffs, such as the onslaught it launched against Turkey, as an integral component of its drive to secure the United States' geopolitical and economic interests at the expense of friend and foe alike. ..."
"... But while they are deeply divided as to their economic and geo-political objectives, the capitalist ruling classes are united on one essential question. However the next stage of the ongoing breakdown of world capitalism proceeds, they will all strive by whatever means considered necessary to make the working class the world over pay for it. ..."
"... In 2008, capitalist governments around the world, above all in the US, derived enormous benefit from the decades-long suppression of the class struggle by the trade unions and the parties of the political establishment. The rescue operation they carried out on behalf of parasitic and criminal finance capital would not have been possible without it ..."
"But to an extent hardly imaginable in 2008, all the world's leading economies are locked
in a perpetually escalating cycle of economic warfare. This global trade war is spearheaded
by the Trump White House, which sees trade sanctions and tariffs, such as the onslaught it
launched against Turkey, as an integral component of its drive to secure the United States'
geopolitical and economic interests at the expense of friend and foe alike.
The character of world economy has undergone a major transformation in the past decade in
which economic growth, to the extent it that it occurs, is not driven by the development of
production and new investments but by the flow of money from one source of speculative and
parasitic activity to the next."
"But while they are deeply divided as to their economic and geo-political objectives, the
capitalist ruling classes are united on one essential question. However the next stage of the
ongoing breakdown of world capitalism proceeds, they will all strive by whatever means
considered necessary to make the working class the world over pay for it.
This is the lesson from the past decade which, in every country, has seen a deepening
attack on wages, social conditions and living standards as wealth is redistributed up the
income scale, raising social inequality to unprecedented heights.
In 2008, capitalist governments around the world, above all in the US, derived enormous
benefit from the decades-long suppression of the class struggle by the trade unions and the
parties of the political establishment. The rescue operation they carried out on behalf of
parasitic and criminal finance capital would not have been possible without it."
"... So why should you care? Why does that matter to you or me? Well, like most emerging market financial crisis there is the danger of contagion . ..."
"... Turkey's economy is four times the size of Greece, and roughly equal in size to Lehman Brothers circa 2008. ..."
"... Turkey's other borders face six nations: Georgia, Iran, Iraq, Syria, Armenia, and Nakhchivan, a territory affiliated with Azerbaijan. Five of those are involved in ongoing armed conflicts or outright war. ..."
"... NATO has long outlived its' usefulness. Cancel its' stipend and bring our soldiers, marines, sailors and airmen and women home! Put them to work here. Fighting fires. ..."
"... NATO only seems to be useful to the hegemony that supports it. Peace is not it's mission. ..."
By now you've probably heard that Turkey is having a financial crisis, and Trump appears to be pouring gasoline on it.
But you may not understand what is happening, or you may not know why it's important.
So let's do a quick recap
.
Turkey's currency fell to a new record low today. Year to date it's lost almost half its value, leading some investors and
lenders inside and outside of Turkey to lose confidence in the Turkish economy.
...
"Ninety percent of external public and private sector debt is denominated in foreign currencies," he said.
Here's the problem. Because of the country's falling currency, that debt just got a lot more expensive.
A Turkish business now effectively owes twice as much as it did at the beginning of the year. "You are indebted in the U.S.
dollar or euro, but your revenue is in your local currency," explained Lale Akoner, a market strategist with Bank of New York
Mellon's Asset Management business. She said Turkey's private sector currently owes around $240 billion in foreign debt.
This is all about hot money that has been washing around in a world of artificially low interest rates, and now, finally, an
external shock happened. As it
always happens .
The bid-ask spread, or the difference between the price dealers are willing to buy and sell the lira at, has widened beyond
the gap seen at the depth of the global financial crisis in 2008, following Lehman Brothers Holdings Inc.'s collapse.
So why should you care? Why does that matter to you or me? Well, like most emerging market financial crisis there is the
danger of contagion
.
The turmoil follows a similar currency crash in Argentina that led to a rescue by the International Monetary Fund. In recent
days, the Russian ruble, Indian rupee and South African rand have also tumbled dramatically.
Investors are waiting for the next domino to fall. They're on the lookout for signs of a repeat of the 1997-1998 Asian financial
crisis that began when the Thai baht imploded.
A minor currency devaluation of the Thai baht in 1997 eventually led to 20% of the world's population being thrust into poverty.
It led to Russia defaulting in 1998, LTCM requiring a Federal Reserve bailout, and eventually Argentina defaulting in 2001.
Turkey's economy is four times the size of Greece, and roughly equal in size to Lehman Brothers circa 2008.
The markets want Turkey to run to the IMF for a loan, but that would require a huge interest rate hike and austerity measures
that would thrust Turkey into a long depression. However, that isn't the
biggest obstacle .
The second is that Erdogan would have to bury his hatchet with the United States, which remains the IMF's largest shareholder.
Without U.S. support, Turkey has no chance of securing an IMF bailout program.
There is another danger, a political one and not so much an economic one, that could have dramatic implications.
If Erdogan isn't overthrown, or humbled, then there is an ironclad certainty that Turkey will
leave NATO and
the West.
Turkey, unlike Argentina, does not seem poised to turn to the International Monetary Fund in order to stave off financial collapse,
nor to mend relations with Washington.
If anything, the Turkish President looks to be doubling down in challenging the US and the global financial markets -- two
formidable opponents.
...
Turkey would probably no longer view the US as a reliable partner and strategic ally.
Whoever ends up leading the country, a wounded Turkey would most likely seek to shift the center of gravity away from the West
and toward Russia, Iran and Eurasia.
It would make Turkey less in tune with US and European objectives in the Middle East, meaning Turkey would seek to assert a
more independent security and defense policy.
Erdogan has warned Trump that Turkey would
"seek new friends" , although Russia and China haven't yet stepped up to the plate to bat for him.
Russia, Iran and China do have a common interest when in comes to undermining the
petrodollar . Pulling Turkey into their sphere of influence would be a coup.
Turkey lies at a historic, strategic crossroad. The
bridge between the peaceful West and the war-ridden dictatorships of the East that the West likes to bomb.
On its Western flank, Turkey borders Greece and Bulgaria, Western-facing members of the European Union. A few years ago, Turkey
-- a member of NATO -- was preparing the join Europe as a full member.
Turkey's other borders face six nations: Georgia, Iran, Iraq, Syria, Armenia, and Nakhchivan, a territory affiliated with
Azerbaijan. Five of those are involved in ongoing armed conflicts or outright war.
Losing Turkey would be a huge setback for NATO, the MIC, and the permanent war machine.
more struggling economies are starting to get it. Trade wealth for the rulers (IMF supporters) to be paid by the rest of us.
Fight back. Squeeze the bankers balls. Can't have our resources, now way, no how, without a fight.
in a flailing Turkey? Weren't there some outside potential takers encouraging China when it floated its currency proposal?
Nastarana on Tue, 08/14/2018 - 8:41pm
NATO has long outlived its' usefulness. Cancel its' stipend and bring our soldiers, marines, sailors and airmen and women home! Put them to work here. Fighting fires.
Patrolling our shores for drug running and toxic dumping. Teaching school, 10 kids per class maximum. Refurbishing buildings and
housing stock. Post Cold War, an military alliance with Turkey makes no sense.
Meanwhile going back to the ongoing escalation in political tensions between the US and
Turkey, one day after Erdogan vowed to boycott US electronics products, including the iPhone,
Ankara slapped an additional tax on imports of a broad range of American goods. Turkey
announced it would impose an additional 50% tax on U.S. rice, 140% on spirits and 120% on cars.
There are also additional charges on U.S. cosmetics, tobacco and some food products. The was Erdogan's latest retaliation for the Trump administration's punitive actions over the past few
weeks to pressure Turkey into releasing an American pastor.
Bloomberg
calculated that the items listed in the decree accounted for $1 billion of imports last
year, similar to the amount of Turkish steel and aluminum exports that were subjected to higher
tariffs by President Donald Trump last week.
The decision shows Turkey giving a proportionate
response to American "attacks" on the Turkish economy, Vice President Fuat Oktay said in tweets
this morning.
"... not all forms of economic liberalization are equally good: some reforms can be so inadequately designed as to harm the interests of the poor, especially in the short term. ..."
"... This raises the questions: Are the poor better off under a market economy? Is the invisible hand conducive to giving people a hand? Pope Francis's assessment is often negative. "[U]nbridled capitalism," he has claimed, "has taught the logic of profit at any cost, of giving in order to receive, of exploitation without looking at the person." ..."
Societies marked by oligarchy, that is, rigged to help the privileged elites at the expense of everyone else, require more than
merely the removal of anti-competitive rules and regulations. The reason, according to Martinez, is that not all forms of economic
liberalization are equally good: some reforms can be so inadequately designed as to harm the interests of the poor, especially in
the short term.
This raises the questions: Are the poor better off under a market economy? Is the invisible hand conducive to giving people a
hand? Pope Francis's assessment is often negative. "[U]nbridled capitalism," he has claimed, "has taught the logic of profit at any
cost, of giving in order to receive, of exploitation without looking at the person."
...Although the pope is on target in his admonition against worshipping the false god of a "deified market," according to Waterman,
his encyclical Laudato si' is flawed, due in no small measure to its failure to acknowledge the good that markets do by
channeling self-interest to serve the common good.
No matter how globalism is repackaged, it always smells the same way in the end.
For decades, the globalists have subtly (or sometimes not so subtly) been moving us toward a
world in which national borders have essentially been made meaningless . The ultimate goal, of
course, is to merge all the nations of the world into a "one world socialist utopia" with a
global government, a global economic system and even a global religion.
The European Union is a model for what the elite hope to achieve eventually on a global
scale . The individual nations still exist, but once inside the European Union you can travel
wherever you want, economic rules have been standardized across the Union, and European
institutions now have far more power than the national governments.
Liberty and freedom have been greatly restricted for the "common good", and a giant horde of
nameless, faceless bureaucrats constantly micromanages the details of daily life down to the
finest details.
With each passing day the EU becomes more Orwellian in nature, and that is why so many in
Europe are completely fed up with it.
"... Trump in fact was not the consensus candidate of the American capitalist class back to the 2016 election. So with respect to these economic policies, especially about his trade protectionist measures, these new tariffs imposed on the Chinese goods, let's put it this way: These are not, certainly not the traditional kind of neoliberal economic policy as we know it. So some sections of the American manufacturing sector [capitalists] may be happy about this. But I would say the majority of the American capitalists probably would not approve this kind of trade war against China. ..."
"... So on the Chinese part, ironically, China very much depends on these overall what Martin Wolf called liberal global order, which might better be called the model of global neoliberal capitalism. So China actually much more depends on that. ..."
"... despite whatever happened to the U.S., China would still be committed to the model of openness, committed to privatization and the financial liberalization. The Chinese government has declared new measures to open up a few economic sectors to foreign investment. ..."
"... for China to rearrange towards this kind of domestic consumption-led model of economic development, the necessary condition is that you have income, wealth redistribution towards the workers, towards poor people. And that is something that the Chinese capitalists will resist. And so that is why and so far China has not succeeded in transforming itself away from this export-led model based on exploitation of cheap labor. ..."
"... first of all, China is not socialist at all today. So income of economic sector, the [space] sector accounts for a small number, a small fraction of the overall economy, by various measurements. ..."
"... And so it's expected China will also become the world's largest importer of natural gas by the year 2019. So you are going to have China to be simultaneously the largest importer of oil, natural gas, and coal. ..."
"... let's say the Chinese government right now, even though is led by the so-called Communist Party, is actually much more committed to the neoliberal global order that the Trump administration in the U.S. ..."
"... The Trump administration of this trade protectionist policy, although not justified, it reflects fundamental social conflicts within the U.S. itself, and that probably cannot be sorted out by the Americans' current political system. ..."
"... So the overall neoliberal regime has become much more unstable. ..."
PAUL JAY: Welcome to The Real News Network. I'm Paul Jay.
The Financial Times chief economic columnist Martin Wolf has called Trump's trade wars with
Europe and Canada, but obviously the big target is China, he's called this a war on the liberal
world order. Well, what does this mean for China? China's strategy, the distinct road to
socialism which seems to take a course through various forms of state hypercapitalism. What
does this mean for China? The Chinese strategy was developed in what they thought would be a
liberal world order. Now it may not be that at all.
Now joining us to discuss what the trade war means for China, and to have a broader
conversation on just what is the Chinese model of state capitalism is Minqi Li, who now joins
us from Utah. Minqi is the professor, is a professor of economics at the University of Utah.
He's the author of The Rise of China and the Demise of the Capitalist World Economy, and the
editor of Red China website. Thanks for joining us again, Minqi.
MINQI LI: Thank you, Paul.
PAUL JAY: So I don't think anyone, including the Chinese, was expecting President Trump to
be president Trump. But once he was elected, it was pretty clear that Trump and Bannon and the
various cabal around Trump, the plan was twofold. One, regime change in Iran, which also has
consequences for China. And trade war with China. It was declared that they were going to take
on China and change in a fundamental way the economic relationship with China and the United
States. And aimed, to a large extent, trying to deal with the rise of China as an equal, or
becoming equal, economy, and perhaps someday in the not-too-distant future an equal global
power, certainly as seen through the eyes of not just Trumpians in Washington, but much of the
Washington political and economic elites.
So what does this mean for China's strategy now? Xi Jinping is now the leader of the party,
leader of the government, put at a level virtually equal to Mao Tse-tung. But his plan for
development of the Chinese economy did not, I don't think, factor in a serious trade war with
the United States.
MINQI LI: OK. As you said, Trump was not expected. Which meant that Trump in fact was not
the consensus candidate of the American capitalist class back to the 2016 election. So with
respect to these economic policies, especially about his trade protectionist measures, these
new tariffs imposed on the Chinese goods, let's put it this way: These are not, certainly not
the traditional kind of neoliberal economic policy as we know it. So some sections of the
American manufacturing sector [capitalists] may be happy about this. But I would say the
majority of the American capitalists probably would not approve this kind of trade war against
China.
Now, on the Chinese part, and we know that China has been on these parts, there was
capitalist development, and moreover it has been based on export-led economic growth model and
with exploitation of cheap labor. So on the Chinese part, ironically, China very much depends
on these overall what Martin Wolf called liberal global order, which might better be called the
model of global neoliberal capitalism. So China actually much more depends on that.
And so you have, indeed there are serious trade conflicts between China and U.S. that will,
of course, undermine China's economic model. And so far China has responded to these new
threats of trade war by promising that China, despite whatever happened to the U.S., China
would still be committed to the model of openness, committed to privatization and the financial
liberalization. The Chinese government has declared new measures to open up a few economic
sectors to foreign investment.
Now, with respect to the trade itself, at the moment the U.S. has imposed tariffs on, 25
percent tariffs on the worth of $34 billion of Chinese goods. And then Trump has threatened to
impose new tariffs on the additional $200 billion worth of Chinese goods. But this amount at
the moment is still a small part of China's economy, about 3 percent of the Chinese GDP. So the
impact at the moment is limited, but certainly has created a lot of uncertainty for the global
and the Chinese business community.
PAUL JAY: So given that this trade war could, one, get a lot bigger and a lot more serious,
and/or even if they kind of patch it up for now, there's a lot of forces within the United
States, both for economic and geopolitical reasons. Economic being the discussion about China
taking American intellectual property rights, becoming the new tech sector hub of the world,
even overpassing the American tech sector, which then has geopolitical implications; especially
when it comes to the military. If China becomes more advanced the United States in artificial
intelligence as applied to the military, that starts to, at least in American geopolitical
eyes, threaten American hegemony around the world.
There are a lot of reasons building up, and it's certainly not new, and it's not just Trump.
For various ways, the Americans want to restrain China. Does this start to make the Chinese
think that they need to speed up the process of becoming more dependent on their own domestic
market and less interested in exporting cheap labor? But for that to happen Chinese wages have
to go up a lot more significantly, which butts into the interests of the Chinese billionaire
class.
MINQI LI: I think you are right. And so for China to rearrange towards this kind of domestic
consumption-led model of economic development, the necessary condition is that you have income,
wealth redistribution towards the workers, towards poor people. And that is something that the
Chinese capitalists will resist. And so that is why and so far China has not succeeded in
transforming itself away from this export-led model based on exploitation of cheap labor.
PAUL JAY: You know, there's some sections of the left in various parts of the world that do
see the Chinese model as a more rational version of capitalism, and do see this because they've
maintained the control of the Chinese Communist Party over the politics, and over economic
planning, that do see this idea that this is somehow leading China towards a kind of socialism.
If nothing else, a more rational planned kind of capitalism. Is that, is there truth to
this?
MINQI LI: Well, first of all, China is not socialist at all today. So income of economic
sector, the [space] sector accounts for a small number, a small fraction of the overall
economy, by various measurements.
And then regarding the rationality of China's economic model, you might put it this way: The
Chinese capitalists might be more rational than the American capitalists in the sense that they
still use most of their profits for investment, instead of just financial speculation. So that
might be rational from the capitalist perspective. But on the other hand, regarding the
exploitation of workers- and the Chinese workers still have to work under sweatshop conditions-
and regarding the damage to the environment, the Chinese model is not rational at all.
PAUL JAY: My understanding of people that think this model works better, at least, than some
of the other capitalist models is that there's a need to go through this phase of Chinese
workers, yes, working in sweatshop conditions, and yes, wages relatively low. But overall, the
Chinese economy has grown by leaps and bounds, and China's position in the world is more and
more powerful. And this creates the situation, as more wealth accumulates, China is better
positioned to address some of the critical issues facing China and the world. And then, as bad
as pollution is, and such, China does appear to be out front in terms of developing green
technologies, solar, sustainable technology.
MINQI LI: OK. Now, Chinese economy has indeed been growing rapidly. It used to grow like
double-digit growth rate before 2010. But now China's growth rate has slowed down just under 7
percent in recent years, according to the official statistics. And moreover, a significant part
of China's growth these days derives rom the real estate sector development. And so there has
been this discussion about this growing housing market bubble. And it used to be that this
housing price inflation was limited to a few big cities. But for the first half of 2018,
according to the latest data, the national average housing price has grown by 11 percent
compared to the same period last year. And that translates into a pace of doubling every six
years.
And so that has generated lots of social resentment. And so not only the working class these
days are priced out of the housing market. Moreover, even the middle class is increasingly
priced out of the housing market. So that is the major concern. And in the long run, I think
that China's current model of accumulation will also face the challenge of growing social
conflicts. Worker protests. As well as resources constrained and environmental damage. And
regarding the issue of China's investment in renewable energy, it is true. China is the largest
investor in renewable energy development, in the solar panels. And although China is of all the
largest investor in about everything.
And so China is still the largest emitter of greenhouse gases in the world, accounting for
almost 30 percent of the total carbon dioxide emissions in the world every year. And then
China's own oil production in decline, but China's oil consumption is still rising. So as a
result, China has become the world's largest oil importer. That could make the Chinese economy
vulnerable to the next major oil price shock.
PAUL JAY: And how seriously is climate change science taken in China? If one takes the
science seriously, one sees the need for urgent transformation to green technology. An urgent
reduction of carbon emission. Not gradual, not incremental, but urgent. Did the Chinese- I
mean, it's not, it's so not taken seriously in the United States that a climate denier can get
elected president. But did the Chinese take this more seriously? Because you don't get the
same, any sense of urgency about their policy, either.
MINQI LI: Well, yeah. So like many other governments, the Chinese government also pays lip
service to the obligation of climate stabilization. But unfortunately, with respect to policy,
with respect to mainstream media, it's not taken very seriously within China. And so although
China's carbon dioxide emissions actually stabilized somewhat over the past few years, but is
starting to grow again in 2017, and I expect it will continue to grow in the coming year.
PAUL JAY: I mean, I can understand why, for example, Russia is not in any hurry to buy into
climate change science. Its whole economy depends on oil. Canada also mostly pays lip service
because the Alberta tar sands is so important to the Canadian economy. Shale oil is so
important to the American economy, as well as the American oil companies own oil under the
ground all over the world. But China is not an oil country. You know, they're not dependent on
oil income. You'd think it'd be in China's interest to be far more aggressive, not only in
terms of how good it looks to the world that China would be the real leader in mitigating,
reducing, eliminating the use of carbon-based fuels, but still they're not. I mean, not at the
rate scientists say needs to be done.
MINQI LI: Not at all. Although China does not depend on all on oil for income, but China
depends on coal a lot. And the coal is still something like 60 percent of China's overall
energy consumption. And so it's still very important for China's energy.
PAUL JAY: What- Minqi, where does the coal mostly come from? Don't they import a lot of that
coal?
MINQI LI: Mostly from China itself. Even though, you know, China is the world's largest coal
producer, on top of that China is either the largest or the second-largest coal importer in the
world market as well. And then on top of that, China is also consuming an increasing amount of
oil and natural gas, especially natural gas. And so although natural gas is not as polluting as
coal, it's still polluting. And so it's expected China will also become the world's largest
importer of natural gas by the year 2019. So you are going to have China to be simultaneously
the largest importer of oil, natural gas, and coal.
PAUL JAY: The Chinese party, just to get back to the trade war issue and to end up with, the
idea of this Chinese nation standing up, Chinese sovereignty, Chinese nationalism, it's a
powerful theme within this new Chinese discourse. I'm not saying Chinese nationalism is new,
but it's got a whole new burst of energy. How does China, if necessary to reach some kind of
compromise with the United States on the trade war, how does China do that without looking like
it's backing down to Trump?
MINQI LI: Well, yes, difficult task for the Chinese party to balance. What they have been
right now is that on the one hand they promise to the domestic audience they are not going to
make concessions towards the U.S., while in fact they are probably making concessions. And then
on the other hand the outside world, and they make announcement that they will not change from
the reform and openness policy, which in practice means that they will not change from the
neoliberal direction of China's development, and they will continue down the path towards
financial liberalization. And so that is what they are trying to balance right now.
PAUL JAY: I said finally, but this is finally. Do the Americans have a case? Does the Trump
argument have a legitimate case that the Chinese, on the one hand, want a liberal world order
in terms of trade, and open markets, and such? On the other hand are not following intellectual
property law, property rights and law, the way other advanced capitalist countries supposedly
do. Is there something to that case?
MINQI LI: Well, you know, let's say the Chinese government right now, even though is led
by the so-called Communist Party, is actually much more committed to the neoliberal global
order that the Trump administration in the U.S. - but I don't want to make justifications
for the neoliberal global order. But let's put it this way: The Trump administration of
this trade protectionist policy, although not justified, it reflects fundamental social
conflicts within the U.S. itself, and that probably cannot be sorted out by the Americans'
current political system.
PAUL JAY: So the crisis- you know, when you look at the American side and the Chinese side,
including the deep debt bomb people talk about in China, there really is no sorting out of this
crisis.
MINQI LI: So the overall neoliberal regime has become much more unstable.
PAUL JAY: All right. Thanks for joining us, Minqi. I hope we can pick this up again
soon.
MINQI LI: OK. Thank you.
PAUL JAY: Thank you for joining us on The Real News Network.
"... In 2004, the historian Walter McDougall concluded that as early as the Civil War, America was a "nation of hustlers." During Reconstruction, Walt Whitman wrote that "genuine belief" seemed to have left America. "The underlying principles of the States," Whitman said, "are not honestly believed in, nor is humanity itself believed in." ..."
"... Accumulation of capital is the dominant, even definitional, American idea, which is why Calvin Coolidge famously remarked, "The chief business of the American people is business." ..."
"... Christopher Lasch had a slightly more prosaic way of measuring the pain of progress. "The triumph of corporate capitalism," he wrote, "has created a society characterized by a high degree of uniformity, which nevertheless lacks the cohesiveness and sense of shared experience that distinguish a truly integrated community from an atomistic society." ..."
"... Rather than a "marketplace of ideas," the United States is a mere marketplace, and just like at any store in the shopping mall, whatever fails to sell is removed from the shelves. Today's trend is tomorrow's garbage. ..."
"... We focus on immigration because it is a clear threat to the American tradition with clear and obvious solutions. ..."
"... While I appreciate that the writer is trying to link immigration with big business and culture, the argument as a whole doesn't come together. He needs to define what he means by "corporate capitalism," "identity," and "culture"; otherwise, this is nothing more than a incoherent rant. Is he talking about popular entertainment, the arts, academic institutions, civil society, religion? How exactly is the existence of a Walmart or the popularity of smartphones to blame? Quoting Walt Whitman and Calvin Coolidge doesn't really get us anywhere. ..."
"... Yes of course a commercial culture is prosperous, dynamic, cosmopolitan, rootless, greedy, materialistic, cynical, plebian and vulgar. And yes, of course in a market-dominated culture, all other systems of indoctrination (i.e. church and state) are constantly on the defensive. ..."
"... That is not 'no' culture; it is a highly distinctive culture. It tends to neglect the high arts and excel at the low arts; it favors novelty over tradition, spectacle over reflection, passion over balance. Again, 'twas ever thus; as is the inevitable cooling of these innovations to new formalisms for the next generation to rebel against, and enrich. ..."
"... So, what should replace corporate capitalism -- socialism, distributism, non-corporate capitalism, what? ..."
Donald Trump, during a recent stop on his "Anarchy in the UK" tour, argued that the mass influx of immigrants into Europe is causing
Great Britain and other nations to "lose their culture." The fear of cultural dilution and transformation as a consequence of shifting
demographics is widespread, and it resonates in the United States, too, especially among those who support the current president.
Stephen Bannon, Tucker Carlson, and other popular right-wing figures have warned of threats to national identity in an American
context, contending that Mexicans will not assimilate and that Islam is incompatible with liberal democracy and secular governance.
Liberals and libertarians often respond by recalling the long tradition of assimilation in American history, along with the outrage
that often accompanies new arrivals. Nearly every ethnic group, from the Italians to the Chinese, has been the target of political
and social hostility. It is an old story, but one worth telling, and it is an old debate, but one worth having. Border sovereignty,
even to someone like me who probably favors more liberal immigration laws than most TAC readers, is a legitimate issue and
not to be easily dismissed.
The current conversation about traditionalism, national identity, and cultural preservation, however, is so narrow to render it
counterproductive and oblivious. For those truly worried about the conservation of traditional culture, to focus solely, or even
primarily, on immigration is the equivalent of a gunshot victim rushing to the barber for a haircut.
Rather than asking whether American culture is at risk of ruination, it is more salient to inquire, after decades of commercialization,
Madison Avenue advertising onslaughts, the erasure of regional differences, and the "Bowling Alone" collapse of community, whether
America even has a culture.
In 2004, the historian Walter McDougall concluded that as early as the Civil War, America was a "nation of hustlers." During
Reconstruction, Walt Whitman wrote that "genuine belief" seemed to have left America. "The underlying principles of the States,"
Whitman said, "are not honestly believed in, nor is humanity itself believed in."
Prophesizing with his pen that democratic structures and procedures would prove insufficient to cultivate a truly democratic culture,
Whitman likened the American obsession with commercial conquest and pecuniary gain to a "magician's serpent that ate up all the other
serpents." Americans, Whitman warned, were dedicating themselves to creating a "thoroughly-appointed body with no soul."
When Whitman wrote the essay in question -- "Democratic Vistas" -- the United States had open borders and immigrants freely entered
the "new world" for reasons of freedom and financial ambition. Even if they attended churches in their native languages and lived
in ethnic enclaves, they often found that they could matriculate into the mainstream of Americana through pursuit of the "American
dream," that is, hope for monetary triumph. Accumulation of capital is the dominant, even definitional, American idea, which
is why Calvin Coolidge famously remarked, "The chief business of the American people is business."
Capitalism is a formidable engine, enabling society to advance and allowing for high standards of living. But to construct an
entire culture around what Coolidge identified as "buying, selling, investing, and prospering," especially when capitalism becomes
corporate and cronyist, is to steadily empty a culture of its meaning and purpose.
Few were as celebratory over the potential for meaning and purpose in American culture as Whitman, who drew profound inspiration
from America's natural beauty and regional diversity. So what force was most responsible for the widespread desecration of America's
own Garden of Eden? All arguments about immigration aside, changing demographics did not transform the country into the planetary
capital of asphalt and replace its rich terrain with the endless suburban sprawl of office complexes, strip malls, and parking lots.
The reduction of the American character to a giant Walmart and the mutation of the American landscape, outside of metropolitan areas,
to the same cloned big box stores and corporate chains is not a consequence of immigration.
The degradation of the American arts and the assault on history and civics in public school and even higher education curricula
is not the result of immigrants flooding American streets. Amy Chua has argued quite the opposite when it comes to America's increasingly
imbecilic and obscene pop culture. Many immigrant families try to keep their children away from the influence of reality television,
the anti-intellectual reverence for celebrities, and the vigilant commercialization of every aspect of life.
The same cultural killer is responsible for all the assaults on American identity visible as daily routine, from environmental
destruction to the endangerment of independent retailers and "mom and pop" shops. That culprit is corporate capitalism. It is a large
entity that, like any killer, justifies its death toll with dogmatic claims of ideology. "Progress," everyone from the owner of the
local diner to the out-of-work art teacher is told, has no room for you.
In his song "The West End," John Mellencamp gives an angry account of the disappearance of a small town:
For my whole life
I've lived down in the West End
But it sure has changed here
Since I was a kid
It's worse now
Look what progress did
Someone lined their pockets
I don't know who that is
Progress, as Mellencamp succinctly captures in song, often comes at someone else's expense, and translates to enrichment for the
few who benefit.
Christopher Lasch had a slightly more prosaic way of measuring the pain of progress. "The triumph of corporate capitalism,"
he wrote, "has created a society characterized by a high degree of uniformity, which nevertheless lacks the cohesiveness and sense
of shared experience that distinguish a truly integrated community from an atomistic society."
The irony Lasch describes is tragic. A culture of corporate capitalism demands conformity, and most people cooperate. But because
its center is hollow, few people feel any sense of connection to each other, even as they parrot the same values. It is no wonder
that most forms of rebellion in the United States are exhibitions of stylized individualism -- inspiring theater and often enlivening
to observe, but politically fruitless.
Rather than a "marketplace of ideas," the United States is a mere marketplace, and just like at any store in the shopping
mall, whatever fails to sell is removed from the shelves. Today's trend is tomorrow's garbage.
Those concerned about tradition and cultural longevity can lament immigration and condemn "open borders." But if they are serious
about American identity, they should begin and end with the villainous corporate enterprise that has waged war on it since the late
19th century.
Whatever culture remains in this country can often be found in the places where people still maintain at least a symbolic link
with their immigrant roots.
Many of the immigrants came to the dream of America believing the myth. That they could be anything hard work would bring them,
regardless of rank or class of birth, title, family name, or religious prejudice. For the most part, this was sufficiently true
that they prospered. They became "us". This [perhaps naive] belief in the dream made most of them, and their children, our most
loyal and law-abiding citizens.
It was indeed the robber barons of the 19th century that pushed us down the path of self-destruction.
I feel vindicated. Some years ago, Rod Dreher pilloried me for being obsessed with how destructive corporate capitalism had become
to American culture, values and social cohesion. I think his epiphany came, when supposedly "conservative" big business turned
out to be on the other side in the culture wars.
I hear you, Mr. Masciotra. I'm not especially fond of large for-profit corporations. But they wouldn't occupy monopolistic positions
and enjoy rapacious profits and latitude for enormous misdeeds if the public were firmly opposed to that sort of thing. Americans
generally love a winner, even if the "winning" is fraudulent or coerced, as long as they personally aren't coerced or defrauded.
It's all about the money, or at least the belief that the money might come.
Thank you for this refreshing piece which points the finger to a place where those on the left and right can actually make a difference.
Of course, making any changes will require dismantling some the mythology of the American prosperity gospel, but it starts with
great articles like these.
The system didn't become corrupt in the 80s, it's been that way for much longer. And there have been hustlers and " well meaning
" Corporate yes men making dishonest money off of their compatriots for centuries (everywhere, I might add).
So the question is, do we want to continue to encourage this behavior or do we dare to dream of another reality ?
Well crafted and thoughtful. Years ago, Walker Percy observed that America was unique among nations in that it was simultaneously
the most religious country and the most materialistic country in the world. Fast forward to 2018 and while religion appears to
be in decline "getting and spending" continues apace.
Agreed but lets be honest with ourselves. We have to go where the kindling is dry and abundant to start a proverbial fire. America
does have a culture. To see that all one need do is visit Nashville, the Ozarks or farm country in nebraska. Where there are still
people the culture survives. That is a stoical dispensation. The culture does go back to Hellenism but Americana does have it's
own ways. Go visit Europe for any amount of time or dare I say it Asia and American culture becomes obvious.
Thanksgiving is a uniquely American holiday that, in my opinion, best represents American culture and how it is different from
all else.
Corporate Capitalism has always been American culture and life. Basic Taylorism on the assembly line was over 100 years in which
men spent 50 -- 60 hours a week performing a single task very quickly.
What is American art? Would we consider Chuck Berry and Elvis Presley great American art and music? I do but the original reaction
of older Americans was 1950s R&R was complete degradation of music. (Some of the racial language was very colorful by good citizens.)
Or what Star Wars or Godfather. Or maybe the modern Marvel 'universe' has a degree of great pop art.
Certainly well argued but for one important element that has been omitted; one ingredient which bundles everything together into
one integrated picture. That necessary item can be summed with these two words, "buy in." Corporate capitalism would never hold
sway except for the acquiescence of the populace which wanting the quantity of commodities had gathered in the shopping malls
but now remain isolated in the front of their computer screens or cell phones.
Rather than there being the tyranny of the marketplace bringing forth this dominance of goods over people and the legerdemain
of monetized value displacing our organic relationship to the land, it is this anonymous accommodation to the denigration of the
high arts and the erosion to our culture which is the ultimate culprit.
In a word, it is the tyranny of the masses which pulls apart any endeavor at creating and sustaining a hierarchy of value rewarding
all enterprise which appeases public taste by appealing to the lowest common denominator. Fore it is through this tyranny that
capitalism has built its avaricious edifice.
Suffice it to say that the target "corporate capitalism" remains the straw man, that ethereal and empty concept devoid of blood
and sinews. Where then does one find the source to this dilemma but in that which is of both flesh and blood namely humanity.
The problem lies with the populace.
What is called for here is an awakening but not through a reckoning as that would only cause humanity to roll over and return
to its slumber. And if crisis and collapse serves not the catalyst for such an awakening what then will provide such an arousal?
Until such a time, we remain asleep and the institutions of our dream life will rule us.
Corporate capitalism is not the source. It is not even at the source. We are the source until such a time as we awaken.
excellent points. oh, and ironically (or not), from the Middle Ages (Europe) through the 19th century (American West), it was
not uncommon for a barber to also perform ad hoc surgery/medical procedures, or to share space with the town's 'doctor', so in
some instances it was prudent to go to the barbershop if shot
"Liberals and libertarians often respond by recalling the long tradition of assimilation in American history, along with
the outrage that often accompanies new arrivals."
Apples and oranges. The welfare state didn't exist then, so it was assimilate or fail. 1/3 of all culturally similar to existing
US culture Europeans returned to Europe.
Today, "Press 2 for Spanish", the welfare state (give birth on US soil to a US citizen for family access to benefits [or steal
an ID], then chain migrate the rest of your family), the Internet, and identity politics discourage assimilation and allow extremely
large cultural enclaves which are politically divisive as pointed out MANY years ago by the not exactly "right wing" former WH
press secretary for LBJ, Bill Moyers, in one of his many excellent documentaries.
We focus on immigration because it is a clear threat to the American tradition with clear and obvious solutions. The
author paints this focus of the Trumpian and dissident right as exclusionary, but it is not; at the same time arguing for his
own exclusionary anti-capitalist platform. Quite frankly, I don't know what it's doing on TAC, but I will take the time to respond.
The criticism of anti-immigration on the right is a straw man argument. The dissident right is not merely anti-immigration,
it is more broadly anti-multiracialist. Many understand and agree with the author on the problems of capitalism, but also see
racial and cultural integration as an additional threat to the American tradition. His point about how the immigration (into America)
didn't cause the hellspace of suburbia is true, since only up until 1965 did we make sure immigrants were white and could integrate
well into society. However, he ignores the history of black empancipation and subsequent desegregation that led to massive internal
migration from the South into cities like Detroit, Chicago, and Baltimore. There weren't always majority black, my friend. The
very real problems that this internal migration presented to ethnically homogenous, culturally rich, urban white neighborhoods
in the 20th century were the driving force behind the suburban sprawl. We colloquially refer to this phenomenon as "white flight,"
and many on the left and the right see it as unjustified "racism."
The curious reader would do well to investigate this claim to see if maybe white flight might have actually been very justified,
maybe a gross historical injustice was done to those now ethnically cleansed communities, and maybe racial desegregation is partly
to blame for the author's perceived lack of (white) culture in America.
Thank you for reading.
"Capitalism" is cronyist by nature. "Capitalism" itself requires an extensive set of laws that benefit some economic arrangements
over others. Now the reason for this is because nations need development, and that means they need capital, and that means they
need to create laws that ensure that the people who have capital feel willing and confident enough to invest it in that country.
But once you've opened the pandora's box of bankruptcy laws, limit liability, and other "terms and conditions" of investment
and capital, you're going to have a system that lends itself to cronyism when you have no other counter-balancing power from labor.
My brilliant iPad just deleted my response. So, quickly, capitalism is partly curable by antitrust and protectionism, but proto-amnesty
mass immigration is not curable, and it more quickly distorts national identity than does capitalism, which takes a very long
time to alter society's frame. Mass immigration does that relatively quickly. Also, immigration has as many rackets as capitalism
does -- for the one, capital gains tax cuts, and for the other, H1-B visas.
only up until 1965 did we make sure immigrants were white and could integrate well into society
The immigration act of 1924 which choked off most immigration was about reducing white immigration. It didn't actually affect
Mexican immigration. The largest beneficiaries the post-1965 immigration laws have been Asian immigrants who everyone argues integrate
perfectly well.
ethnically homogenous, culturally rich, urban white neighborhoods
Any of the residents of those neighborhoods in Chicago would have been quick to deny they were "ethnically homogeneous" because
they would have pointed out how they were mixed neighborhoods of Greeks, Poles, Slovenes, etc.
Its about time someone on this site placed at least 50% of the blame when it comes to demise of the American Middle Class as well
as ' culture ' -- ( such as it is seeing we have no well defined codified ' culture ' because we are and have been since the beginning
so diverse ) -- on the American Corpocracy .
But the fact is the other 50% of the blame must fall firmly upon the shoulders of the greedy speculators and investors convinced
every year should be a profitable year and they should of received next year's profits yesterday
Along with the American Consumer addicted to cheap goods 60% of which they have no need for nor ever use .
So what is the answer ? First we need to move towards a Responsible Capitalism rather than the Ayn Rand addled narcissist Hyper-
Capitalism rapidly approaching Anarcho -- Capitalism we're currently immersed in from the Oval Office on down
Second the American Consumer needs to accept paying what something is worth .. be it service , goods or food .. rather than
thinking the entire world is a discounted oyster at their beck and call
And Third .. with the onus once again falling firmly upon the shoulders of the discount addled American consumer . We need
to get over the theater of convenience shopping ( online ) and get back to supporting local businesses who pay taxes to our local
community and are in fact our neighbors
Problem is all of the above solutions require both compromise , authentic thought as well as discernment
None of which ( for the most part ) currently exists in this over polarized ' Collective Stupidity of America ' zeitgeist we're
firmly entrenched in
Lecture over . Donuts , bagels and coffee in the virtual break room .
English colonials brought to the American continent both English Law -- based on private property -- which has turned into Corporate
Market Capitalism (Citizens United, eh?), and the Enlightenment idea of the centrality of Individual Freedom, which has turned
into the rank Individualism of our current Me-Myself-and-I cultural ethos.
Democracy and a healthy culture, in my view, depend upon holding in balance the needs/desires/rights of both the Individual
and the broader Common Good. There now seems to be little left of a Social Covenant that includes all Americans, which is central
to a viable culture.
I'll say this when it comes it integration: people in the past weren't forced to integrate in the least. A friend of mine has
a grandmother that speaks Russian, only Russian, and no English. As long as she remained in her little enclave in the US, why
need to speak English? In my native Cincinnati the "Over the Rhine" neighborhood had beer gardens, German schools, German newspapers,
and German street signs. Only a fire and I am sure some Progressive 'encouragement' broke the neighborhood up.
White in America use to mean Anglo-Saxon and Protestant. To be Wet was to be Catholic and to be Catholic was to be an immigrant.
Dry was honest, hard working, and true. Wet was disorderly, murderous, and poor. Irish weren't white, Poles weren't white, and
the Italians most certainly weren't white.
My question is why are we poo pooing Latina values? Family centric, conservative, Catholic/Christian, and hard working (come
on, either immigrants are stealing our jobs or they are welfare leeches, pick one!). Their food is delicious and the music is
fun.
The latina vote should be the Republican vote if they would just get over themselves. Spanish is just as much a Romance language
as French or Italian. Get with the program, declare them white, and let's enjoy a super majority with taco Tuesday.
@BradD
Nothing is necessarily wrong with "Latin" values per se . The problem is with massive amounts of Illigeal immigration coming all
from one area. I'm sorry but integration and assimilation is extremely important, just look at Europe for an idea of what happens
to countries that don't integrate immigrants well.
Also, if "Latin" values are great and desirable then why would such a massive amount of people be bum rushing our southern
borders?
Can you please tell me one example of a country in Latin America that has been successful for an extended period of time? I
cannot even think of one. When people come in small waves they can integrate and learn the value of our institutions, laws, freedom,
liberty ect They basically become American w/ Latin heritage. When they come en mass, they keep their societies values a lot longer
and stay in enclaves a lot longer as well. As an example not too long ago I was in the southern part of Houston Texas and the
Galveston area and I cannot tell you the number of cars, houses and business that have the Mexican flag up instead of the USA
flag! That is all kinds of wrong to me. If Mexico is so great, than they should just move on back and set up shop there.
Ding, ding, ding
We have a winner here. America is promoted as merchant culture, bread or bombs. The peoole termed colonists were largely corporate
sponsored. So when people continue to arrive, they figure starting their store or buying the "right" things is American culture.
And for everything else, they just say, "We have our own, thank you."
While I appreciate that the writer is trying to link immigration with big business and culture, the argument as a whole doesn't
come together. He needs to define what he means by "corporate capitalism," "identity," and "culture"; otherwise, this is nothing
more than a incoherent rant. Is he talking about popular entertainment, the arts, academic institutions, civil society, religion?
How exactly is the existence of a Walmart or the popularity of smartphones to blame? Quoting Walt Whitman and Calvin Coolidge
doesn't really get us anywhere.
I would be happy to defend free enterprise in America and would even credit the business and marketing practices in America
for inculcating customer service as a uniquely American trait. You can tell you're in America when people act politely and aim
to serve you -- even illiterate young people know this. Go to any country in Europe, and you'll find a whole staff of people from
the airport, to the stores, to the hotel frowning at you for having the nerve to have want of their services. And that's just
a side benefit. The main thing business does is finance the creation of culture at all levels. Any civilization's golden age followed
from societal prosperity, not from a more democratic and tasteful distribution of wealth.
If we're talking about the arts and influence, America is still the most dynamic in the world, being a great producer of movies,
music, books, and all the rest. Even the existence of a site like TAC should cause one to reflect on just how nice it is to live
in a country that permits open discourse and values quality writing and ideas -- and for no cost at all to the reader. We can
despair all we like of the decline of the Oscars, or the stupidity of modern art, or the pointlessness of postmodernist ideology,
but it says something that we can even have this conversation. I'm not sure other cultures, outside those in elite circles, even
think about this stuff.
Wow, something Fran Macadam and I agree on! Surely there is enough there for some bright politician to make a central platform
plank out of?
A number of commenters point out that this isn't just imposed on us, we also embrace it (or just succumbed to the propaganda/advertising).
Fixing the problem will require efforts to curb corporate power as well cultural change from the ground up to embrace real values
beyond just capitalism.
Re: Today, "Press 2 for Spanish", the welfare state (give birth on US soil to a US citizen for family access to benefits [or steal
an ID], then chain migrate the rest of your family), the Internet, and identity politics discourage assimilation
The evidence, notably from language learning, shows that today's immigrants assimilate at about the same rate others did in
the past. And yes, you could hear other languages in the US in the past also. There were places in Detroit I remember in childhood
where all the signs were in Polish. Going farther back 19th century nativists were horrified that entire communities in the Midwest
spoke German. Early on, our eighth president, Martin Van Buren, grew up speaking Dutch in the Hudson Valley.
As for the welfare state, well, there were lots of mutual aid societies which provided help -- we were not a social Darwinist
nation. And don't forget the Civil War pensions to which a significant fraction of the population was entitled.
Mr. Mascriota tells us: "Border sovereignty, even to someone like me who probably favors more liberal immigration laws than most
TAC readers, is a legitimate issue and not to be easily dismissed."
And yet, Mr. Mascriotra, last Sept 9th (2017) at "Salon" you wrote an article entitled "The case for open borders: Stop defending
DACA recipients while condemning the 'sins' of their parents":
"As an English instructor and tutor, I've met young men and women from Ethiopia, China and Nigeria, and I have taught students
whose parents emigrated from Mexico to the United States 'illegally.' If I were an insecure coward afraid to compete in a multicultural
society, and convinced my future children would become deadbeats without the full force of white privilege to catapult them into
success, I would advocate for the deportation of immigrant families similar to those of my students, and I would repeat mindless
bromides like 'America First' and 'Build that Wall.' One of the costs of racism, xenophobia, or any form of pathetic provincialism
is that freezes the prejudicial person in a permanent state of mediocrity President Donald Trump's decision to end DACA, and his
demand that Congress 'fix the' nonexistent 'immigration problem,' demonstrates a stunning streak of sadism, projecting yet another
signal to his rabid and anti-American base of closed-minded losers If the 'real Americans' are afraid to compete with immigrants
for jobs, prestige, or cultural authority, they only indict themselves as weak, self-entitled and easy to panic. In a word, 'snowflakes'.
A bureaucratic permission slip is trivial compared to the imperative of human freedom -- freedom that should transcend what are
largely artificial borders."
@Mr. Soprano: I think Baltimore was a special case as a Southern city (which it historically was up to maybe WW1, maybe WW2.)
Don't know its demographics pre-WW2 but I'd bet dollars to donuts it was substantially more black pre-WW1 than Chicago, which
was nearly all white up to about 1915 even though it was founded by a Francophone Black man Jean Baptiste Pont du Sable.
David Masciotra: Not sure what I think about the ironmongery in your left ear, but this piece is excellent. My only criticism
-- mild at that -- concerns the analogy in your third paragraph:
" to focus [our worries] on immigration is the equivalent of a gunshot victim rushing to the barber for a haircut."
This article is timely, but only because its complaints are perennial. 'Twas ever thus.
Yes of course a commercial culture is prosperous, dynamic, cosmopolitan, rootless, greedy, materialistic, cynical, plebian
and vulgar. And yes, of course in a market-dominated culture, all other systems of indoctrination (i.e. church and state) are
constantly on the defensive.
That is not 'no' culture; it is a highly distinctive culture. It tends to neglect the high arts and excel at the low arts;
it favors novelty over tradition, spectacle over reflection, passion over balance. Again, 'twas ever thus; as is the inevitable
cooling of these innovations to new formalisms for the next generation to rebel against, and enrich.
A similar cycle applies to demographics. Today's scary outsider becomes tomorrow's stodgy insider, after they buy their way
in. I therefore second BradD's motion to declare Hispanics to be white; and Asians too.
All those disturbed by demographic transitions should contemplate this truism: that by the middle of next century every man,
woman and child now alive shall be dead, and replaced by people not born yet.
This includes you, which makes it personal. What a way to run a world! But if you can put up with 100% population turnover
by 2150, then language and skin tint seems (to me at least) a trivial detail.
***
Self-critique: The preceding analysis has a flaw, namely that this is not simply a 'commercial' culture; it is a 'capitalistic'
culture, which is the least free form of commercial culture.
Go to any country in Europe, and you'll find a whole staff of people from the airport, to the stores, to the hotel frowning
at you for having the nerve to have want of their services.
Americans, in my experience, mistake lack of slavish over-friendliness as rudeness. I have realized this because I am a fairly
reserved kind of person, and "reserved" gets coded as "aloof" or "snobbish."
European retail still follows the "sole proprietor" model of service -- it's assumed that by shopping there you're effectively
entering someone else's home, and you must act accordingly. In the US, lacking a formal class system, the retail experience is
one coded towards allowing the customer to feel as though he is a noble with servants to attend on him that he can order around.
The store is selling that experience.
Related to this is why middle class and upper middle Americans are so upset by the DMV and the Post Office. It's the only place
where money does not buy them any better service, and they cannot use the threat of talking to the manager to have the service
personnel fired in order to get what they want.
America's customer service culture is probably one of our most culturally dysfunctional aspects, all rooted in middle class
insecurity.
If this were actually, a Conservative website, that valued Western ideals? Do you really believe such excuses or something outside
of myself like the "devil made me do it" will pass mustard with "God" or "St. Peter?"
I strongly endorse Jon's (much earlier comment). It is not corporations that ruin culture but we who demand what they give. Corporations
are just a convenient funding vehicle to produce goods. Yes they often mass market them. But it is we who like the marketing.
If we were appalled, or turned away and it ignored it, they would change. In the end, when the spiritual life is subordinate to
the material, our appetites and the corporations that serve them are a guaranteed outcome.
late to this thread but what is American identity? How is it different from let's say a Danish identity? I have a good number
of coworkers from other countries: Asians, South Americans, some Germans or Swedes. When I visit them, do you think I find their
homes, their families (or their priorities for that matter) different from that of born-here American? If so, I must have missed
it
Auguste Mayrat hit the nail on the head. This article is garbage. It's sad that so many commentators agree with it. America is
full of culture: pro and college sports, movies, TV shows, technology, books, music of all kinds all consumed throughout the world,
as people from all countries love and admire American culture. Find a country that produces more culture than America. You can't.
Churches and schools proliferate here. What's so bad about corporations? If you own an iPhone or a television or a car or shop
at the mall, or ride a plane or go on a cruise, you're a hypocrite to be against corporations. Corporations provide goods and
services that people want, not to mention jobs. The author of this piece is an intellectual lightweight, and those who agree with
his views are the type of blind sheep that communists find useful. The author neither specified what's bad about corporations,
nor provides any solutions. Can believe TAC publishes such drivel.
The key problem is technological dependence on the West and the fact thet there no viable alternative to neoliberalism yet. Resotration
of New Deal is impossible as management and professional classes are now allied with capital owners. So while those Philippics are entertaining,
in reality Russian needs to suffer and try to grow its economics and raise the standard of living of people without rocking the boat
too much. China too.
Notable quotes:
"... The Russian and Chinese governments are puzzling. They hold all the cards in the sanction wars and sit there with no wits whatsoever as to how to play them. ..."
"... The Russians are also convinced that they should freely trade their currency, thereby subjecting the ruble to manipulation on foreign exchange markets. If Washington wants to bring a currency crisis to Russia, all the Federal Reserve, its vassal Japanese, EU, and UK central banks have to do is to short the ruble. Hedge funds and speculators join in for the profits. ..."
"... Why don't the Russian and Chinese play their winning hands? The reason is that neither government has any advisers who are not brainwashed by neoliberalism. The brainwashing that Americans gave Russia during the Yeltsin years has been institutionalized in Russian institutions. Trapped in this box, Russia is a sitting duck for Washington. ..."
The Russian and Chinese governments are puzzling. They hold all the cards in the sanction wars and sit there with no wits
whatsoever as to how to play them.
The Russians won't get any help from the Western media which obscures the issue by stressing that the Russian government doesn't
want to deprive its citizens of consumer goods from the West, which is precisely what Washington's sanctions intend to do.
The Russian and Chinese governments are in Washington's hands because Russia and China, thinking that capitalism had won, quickly
adopted American neoliberal economics, which is a propaganda device that serves only American interests. For years NASA has been
unable to function without Russian rocket engines. Despite all the sanctions, insults, military provocations, the Russian government
still sends NASA the engines. Why? Because the Russian economists tell the government that foreign exchange is essential to Russia's
development.
Europe is dependent on Russian energy to run its factories and to keep warm in winter. But Russia does not turn off the energy
in response to Europe's participation in Washington's sanctions, because the Russian economists tell the government that foreign
exchange is essential to Russia's development.
As Michael Hudson and I explained on a number of occasions, this is nonsense. Russia's development is dependent in no way on the
acquisition of foreign currencies.
The Russians are also convinced that they need foreign investment, which serves only to drain profits out of their economy.
The Russians are also convinced that they should freely trade their currency, thereby subjecting the ruble to manipulation
on foreign exchange markets. If Washington wants to bring a currency crisis to Russia, all the Federal Reserve, its vassal Japanese,
EU, and UK central banks have to do is to short the ruble. Hedge funds and speculators join in for the profits.
Neoliberal economics is a hoax, and the Russians have fallen for it.
So have the Chinese.
Suppose that when all these accusations against Russia began -- take the alleged attack on the Skirpals for example -- Putin had
stood up and said:
"The British government is lying through its teeth and so is every government including that of Washington that echoes this
lie. Russia regards this lie as highly provocative and as a part of a propaganda campaign to prepare Western peoples for military
attack on Russia. The constant stream of gratuitous lies and military exercises on our border have convinced Russia that the West
intends war. The consequence will be the total destruction of the United States and its puppets."
That would have been the end of the gratuitous provocations, military exercises, and sanctions.
Instead, we heard about "misunderstandings" with out "American partners," which encouraged more lies and more provocations.
Or, for a more mild response, Putin could have announced:
"As Washington and its servile European puppets have sanctioned us, we are turning off the rocket engines, all energy to Europe,
titanium to US aircraft companies, banning overflights of US cargo and passenger aircraft, and putting in place punitive measures
against all US firms operating in Russia."
One reason, perhaps, that Russia does not do this in addition to Russia's mistaken belief that it needs Western money and good
will is that Russia mistakenly thinks that Washington will steal their European energy market and ship natural gas to Europe. No
such infrastructure exists. It would take several years to develop the infrastructure. By then Europe would have mass unemployment
and would have frozen in several winters.
What about China? China hosts a large number of major US corporations, including Apple, the largest capitalized corporation in
the world. China can simply nationalize without compensation, as South Africa is doing to white South African farmers without any
Western protest, all global corporations operating in China. Washington would be overwhelmed with global corporations demanding removal
of every sanction on China and complete subservience of Washington to the Chinese government.
Or, or in addition, China could dump all $1.2 trillion of its US Treasuries. The Federal Reserve would quickly print the money
to buy the bonds so that the price did not collapse. China could then dump the dollars that the Fed printed in order to redeem the
bonds. The Fed cannot print the foreign currencies with which to purchase the dollars. The dollar would plummet and not be worth
a Venezuelan bolivar unless Washington could order its pupper foreign central banks in Japan, UK, and EU to print their currencies
in order to purchase the dollars. This, even if complied with, would cause a great deal of stress in what is called "the Western
alliance," but what is really Washington's Empire.
Why don't the Russian and Chinese play their winning hands? The reason is that neither government has any advisers who are not
brainwashed by neoliberalism. The brainwashing that Americans gave Russia during the Yeltsin years has been institutionalized in
Russian institutions. Trapped in this box, Russia is a sitting duck for Washington.
Turkey is a perfect opportunity for Russia and China to step forward and remove Turkey from NATO. The two countries could offer
Turkey membership in BRICS, trade deals, and mutual security treaties. China could easily buy up the Turkish currency off foreign
exchange markets. The same could be done for Iran. Yet neither Russia nor China appear capable of decisive action. The two countries,
both under attack as Turkey is from Washington, sit there sucking their thumbs. (See
this )
This article was originally published on the author's blog site: Paul Craig Roberts Institute for Political Economy.Paul Craig Roberts is a frequent contributor to Global Research.
trump has wrecked environmental policy, trade policy and domestic social policy....the
upshots will be: 1- a much more toxic environment & much higher level of respiratory
disease and cancerous related ailments; overall poorer health & health care for the
average citizen 2- higher prices for imported goods, lower level of trade exports, fewer US
based jobs and more off-shoring of US jobs 3- a substantial increase in the homeless
population in the urban areas of this country; increased rates of poverty for the poor, lower
economic prosperity for the lower and lower middle class income brackets; wage stagnation for
the middle & upper middle income brackets; less advanced education & lower worker
productivity and innovation to name just a few of the impacts created by this idiot....in
simple in English, Trump and his so-called initiatives are shafting this country in almost
every way possible
What part of international law is not just pissed on toiler paper strewn over the floors of a
urinal? Which post WWII president respected this law?
None.
International law, since WWII failed. It failed in '47 when no referendum was held in
Palestine - against Chapter 1, Article 1 paragraph 2 of the UN Charter. It failed in Crimea,
when the results of such a referendum was spat on by the previous war criminal to sit in the
Oval Office. It fails now as sanctions are used unilaterally - being equivalent to the use of
force in result, they should be
But then let's not stop at after the war. The US is the only country to nuke civilians.
6/7 US four star generals at the time said the action had no strategic or tactical purpose
whatsoever.
The US is what ISIS dreams to be, the sooner it falls into obscurity the better.
Pure nonsense. The Great Depression began on October 29, 1929. FDR was inaugurated on March
4, 1933 nearly 4 years after it began. Hoover had actually only been in office for just over
6 months before Black Tuesday. GDP began growing and unemployment began falling in 1933
shortly after FDR took office. The Depression officially came to an end in 1939 when GDP
returned to pre-Depression levels.
There is no long term US growth. There is a debt default after people realize the fact that
the top of the whole US government is incompetent. That it has chained itself to such
astronomic liabilities for useless wars (as the Empire has not succeeded in world hegemony),
is even sadder. It coould have spent the $5tn of Iraq and Afghanistan on building shit, but
instead it bombed shit.
Trump doesn't matter for US long run - in 5-10 years time the country will be only found
in history books.
Remember Kruschev's (sp?) last words on leaving office, and I'm paraphrasing: "Don't worry
about America, they'll spend themselves to death (just like we have)". Continued economic
growth is a wet dream of Wall Street origin. We are massively overpopulated and rapidly using
up earth's natural resources at an increasingly unsustainable rate. We must begin to reduce
our growth, not keep increasing it. Population density stress is killing us now and only
increasing every day along with the 220,000 new mouths to feed that we are turning out into a
world that has no room for 28,000,000 homeless migrants already. Just how crazy are we
really. If this article is to be believed, we are nuts. E.F. Schumacher is rolling in his
grave! Stress R Us
The contribution of a president to the national debt depends a bit on how you calculate it.
You could simply look at rhe dates of inauguration or go a step further and look at the
fiscal years. For the latter see :
In absolute terms Obama is indeed at the top of the list, percentagewise his predecessor
played a larger part. No matter how you look at it or what the causes were, under Bush and
Obama the U.S. debt seems to have spiralled out of of control and Trump is doing bugger all
to stop that trend.
For consider the fruits of free trade policy during the last 25 years : the frozen wages of
U.S. workers, $12 trillion in U.S. trade deficits, 55,000 factories lost, 6 million
manufacturing jobs gone, China surpassing the U.S in manufacturing, all causing a backlash that
pushed a political novice to the Republican nomination and into the presidency.
To maintain a belief in the superiority of free trade to economic patriotism, in the face of
such results, is to recognize that this belief system is impervious to contradictory proof.
The sad reality that I see all around is that Western civilization has been hijacked by
degenerate hyenas like Rome was sacked from within first before being sacked externally. The
institutions that once made the West a leader and a model, have been corrupted, tainted and
filled with anti-humanists and crony corporatists. Greed is out of control and "popular
culture" is spreading decay. The hollowing out will continue until these parasites find
another host to leech off. Will it be China? Will it be a global government? Will it be
another planet? Who knows.
Once upon a time figures like Rosenstein, Mueller, Brennan, Browder, Clapper, Clinton etc
would be just fucking taken out or punished. Instead of that, they get to wander their toxic
asses around like protected peacocks, all on tax payers dime, with their shitty agendas, and
their shitty handlers cheering on the degeneracy and assault on the truth and the people.
If this is what "civilization" has boiled down to, count me the fuck out of it. The 5000
year old human farming experiment is merely switching straight jackets. Its the same old
story that ever was, ever since we gave up the nomadic lifestyle. In a way, its probably an
inevitability, given our flawed human nature, and the size of the population....and average
intellect. The desire to be 'lead' by some ruling class, no matter what flavour of 'ism' it
is, eventually all turns to the same end result....shit. Unless this global awakening can
muster into a force to be reckoned with, and not be swayed by divide and conquer tactics,
nothing will change. So far with the toxic Left vs Right divide, and countless other divides,
the only beneficiaries of this are the ones at the top of the pyramid.
Pat Buchanan: Are Globalists Plotting A Counter-Revolution?
HopefulCynical : Is the sky blue? Is water wet? Is fire hot?
FFS, look at the goddamn purge on (((Social media))). Of COURSE the (((globalists))) are
attempting a counter-revolution.
We all need to move to alt-tech: Minds , Gab , Bitchute . Even if you don't have a
(((social media))) presence, consider getting an alt-media presence. We've been wondering
when the next phase would begin, whewn it would be time to take further action. Well, it's
here.
First step in this next phase is to set up multiple lines of communication not under
(((establishment))) control. Even if you seldom use them, set up accounts; advise those you
know to do likewise. Wanna see the establishment panic? If they see the subscriber count for
the alt-tech sites suddenly quadruple (or more) in response to their purge, they'll shit
themselves. They'll probably attempt to pull domain registrars and financial processing
services from those sites.
Then - the motherfucking games begin, bitchez.
[EDIT:] According to Styx, the alt-tech sites are already seeing a surge in membership.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hZP1fwkdupg
Let the (((establishment))) diaper-filling begin!
But will "negotiations" and regulatory loosening on issues like the environment and worker
safety, which have gotten out of hand in the US to the disadvantage of underemployed
citizens, offset the extremely low wages offered to Asian and Latin American workers in the
countries where American-owned companies shipped over 6 million jobs, canceling out the
SS-retirement fund contributions that would have been made by American workers [and]
employers if the jobs had been kept here?
Cheap labor seems to TRUMP everything with US employers.
Running from the SS trust fund might be another reason for their abandonment of
America.
Cheap labor Trumps everything here in the USA, too, and the cheap-labor pool is aided and
abetted by the welfare system. That is why US employers prefer an often extremely absentee
welfare and progressive-tax-code-subsidized labor market, receiving .gov-financed monthly
bills and up to $6,431 in refundable child-tax-credit cash for US-born instant-citizen
kids.
Contrary to myth, hard work, daily and all-day attendance and even work productivity, like
every-month quota meeting, is NOT preferred by American employers for most of the jobs left
here in the USA.
The welfare-eligible 42 million are (on the books) not hard workers, but part-time
workers, staying under the income limits for welfare programs. I KNOW that from working at
the Department of Human Services, where single moms and the womb-productive girlfriends of
illegal and legal immigrants MUST submit proof of a single-breadwinner's part-time, traceable
earnings to get the free stuff.
The earnings must fall below the income limits for welfare programs that ALWAYS reward
part-time work in womb-productive single-breadwinner households of citizens and noncitizens.
You cannot work full time in a minimum-wage job while meeting the income limits. When I
worked at DHS, both the EBT and monthly cash assistance income limits were BELOW $900 per
month......
Even if Trump eventually lures US corporations back here with looser regulations and tax
cuts, rather than just unleashing a stock buy-back spree, it will not matter to the 101
million American citizens of working age who are out of the labor force and the 78 million
gig pieceworkers, not if this welfare-rigged labor market of citizens and noncitizens
continues to be the norm.
You cannot compete with a bigly labor market full of welfare-fetching citizens &
noncitizens who do not need pay sufficient to cover rent due to their womb production.
Only a Deplorables First immigration reform would address that issue, including a big
reduction in the number of welfare-eligible legal immigrants let in each year. The number 1.5
million is too many. This -- no more and no less than illegal immigration -- keeps wages
down, but the illegal immigration has the added bonus of making America more dangerous.
The impasse on the immigration issue is the reason why I am skeptical of the value of
current trade-war maneuvering, even though I am glad that Trump is addressing that general
issue.
The other thing that complicates this trade war is the way that globalist elites have sold
America out over the years, not just destroying the middle class with all of this offshoring
and welfare-supported illegal labor, but also getting the US economy 1) waist-deep in debt,
2) dependent on foreign investment and 3) subject to getting jerked around by Machiavellian
currency manipulation that non-math people, like me, really don't understand.
It sounds kind of dangerous, though, even just the argument that Stockman makes about
China being a house of cards that, if it came down, could have unintended consequences for
the US.
I have no idea. But I do know that many of the people who voted for Trump are pretty
adamant about the immigration issue, first and foremost, regarding it as an easier and less
risky thing to get done as well.
Maybe, the children-at-the-border Movie of the Week has convinced most Trump voters to
stay on the train, thinking something permanent has been done to contain the flow of
welfare-rewarded illegal immigration.
I think many of the teenagers, released into the country to live with extended family or
in foster care, will, in a few years, be entering the labor force as part-time workers,
producing instant-citizen kids and getting free monthly bills and refundable child-tax-credit
cash from .gov, while citizens like me will still face rent that eats up over half of our
monthly, earned-only income from low-wage churn jobs.
As much of an enthusiastic Trump voter as I have been, going back a long way, I am not
sure that I am going to vote in the mid-term general election. I am not going to vote for
this Tammany Hall II Democratic Party, but I may just stay home.
There are many populists out there, not just on the right either, who are disgruntled for
very real reasons, like this interesting article explains, so there will likely be wave after
wave of non-centrist populism until globalism's shoreline has been redefined.
Hmmm, weird, when I loaded the other link, it conformed to the format of this text box,
but then when I loaded the link above this last paragraph, it reverted to cutting off the
text on the side. Until I post it, I cannot see the full text after links are added.
"The few who understand the system, will either be so interested in its profits, or so
dependent on it favors that there will be no opposition from that class, while on the other
hand, the great body of people mentally incapable of comprehending the tremendous
advantages...will bear its burden without complaint and perhaps without suspecting that the
system is inimical to their best interests."
-Rothschild Brothers of London communique' to associates in New York June 25th, 1863.
The Difference.
J. Speer-Willams
June 16, 2010.
New-Cons. Love War & torture, increased regulations, tyranny and taxes; with our taxes
going to the plutocrats of the private banking community. They support governmental
destruction of our environment, under the pretender of protecting it. They, also, overtly
support corporatism (Fascism for Oligarchs) and any measures supported by the Republican
Party that enrich the private International Monetary / Banking Cartel at the expensive of
the. American People.
New- Libs. Love War & torture, increased regulations, tyranny and taxes; with our
taxes going to the plutocrats of the private banking community. They support governmental
destruction of our environment, under the pretender of protecting it. They, also, overtly
support corporatism (Socialism for Oligarchs) and any measures supported by the Democratic
Party that enrich the private International Monetary / Banking Cartel at the expensive of
the. American People.
The economics of the neoliberal era had a fundamental flaw.
The 1920s roared with debt based consumption and speculation until it all tipped over into
the debt deflation of the Great Depression. No one realised the problems that were building
up in the economy as they used an economics that doesn't look at private debt, neoclassical
economics.
I think Pat also gets this sentence wrong and if so I say he misses details we would like
to see
This is truly economics uber alles, economy before country.
The University Economist programs/studies were more oriented toward people in the old
days. Economics today is used to justify Wall Street type finance and ideology. Economic
study was hijacked to serve only those looking to get rich any way they can. CFR agenda comes
to mind. Globalism comes to mind also and is an attack on all nations constitutions.
The Americans have been discovering the problems of running an economy with bad
economics.
Economics was always far too dangerous to be allowed to reveal the truth about the
economy.
The Classical economist, Adam Smith, observed the world of small state, unregulated
capitalism around him.
"The labour and time of the poor is in civilised countries sacrificed to the maintaining
of the rich in ease and luxury. The Landlord is maintained in idleness and luxury by the
labour of his tenants. The moneyed man is supported by his extractions from the industrious
merchant and the needy who are obliged to support him in ease by a return for the use of his
money. But every savage has the full fruits of his own labours; there are no landlords, no
usurers and no tax gatherers."
How does this tie in with the trickledown view we have today?
Somehow everything has been turned upside down.
The workers that did the work to produce the surplus lived a bare subsistence
existence.
Those with land and money used it to live a life of luxury and leisure.
The bankers (usurers) created money out of nothing and charged interest on it. The bankers
got rich, and everyone else got into debt and over time lost what they had through defaults
on loans, and repossession of assets.
Capitalism had two sides, the productive side where people earned their income and the
parasitic side where the rentiers lived off unearned income. The Classical Economists had
shown that most at the top of society were just parasites feeding off the productive activity
of everyone else.
Economics was always far too dangerous to be allowed to reveal the truth about the
economy.
How can we protect those powerful vested interests at the top of society?
The early neoclassical economists hid the problems of rentier activity in the economy by
removing the difference between "earned" and "unearned" income and they conflated "land" with
"capital". They took the focus off the cost of living that had been so important to the
Classical Economists to hide the effects of rentier activity in the economy.
The landowners, landlords and usurers were now just productive members of society
again.
It they left banks and debt out of economics no one would know the bankers created the
money supply out of nothing. Otherwise, everyone would see how dangerous it was to let
bankers do what they wanted if they knew the bankers created the money supply through their
loans.
The powerful vested interests held sway and economics was corrupted.
Now we know what's wrong with neoclassical economics we can put the cost of living back
in.
Disposable income = wages – (taxes + the cost of living)
Employees want more disposable income (discretionary spending)
Employers want to pay lower wages for higher profits
The cost of living = housing costs + healthcare costs + student loan costs + food + other
costs of living
The neoliberals obsessed about reducing taxes, but let the cost of living soar.
The economists also ignore the debt that is papering over the cracks and maintaining
demand in the economy. This can never work in the longer term as you max. out on debt.
The problem is the US has lost citizenry-control. A shadow-government along with media
operatives work unseen to manipulate sentiment and events in-line with an overall globalist,
world-government objective (Neo-Marxism). The so-called elites behind the curtain are after
total control which is why we will continue toward totalitarian dictatorship. It will not be
a one-man show nor will it be readily recognizable as such, rather there will be a secretive
Cabal of select ultra-wealthy liberals who will negotiate with each other as to which levers
to pull and valves to turn in order to "guide" culture and civilization. But the tightknit
Cabal has more work to do to infiltrate deeper into US (and world) government. The EU's
Parliament is a proto-type test to tweak how they must proceed. As the Cabal coalesces their
power, more draconian rulership will become apparent. The noose will tighten slowly so as to
be un-noticeable and unstoppable. Certain events are planned that will cause citizenry to
demand totalitarianism (for safety reasons). For the Cabal, it'll be like taking candy from a
baby. This, in a nutshell, is the outline of how the US (and Western civilization) loses its
democracy.
Understanding how trillions of trade dollars influence geopolitical policy we begin to
understand the three-decade global financial construct they seek to protect.
That is, global financial exploitation of national markets. FOUR BASIC ELEMENTS :
♦Multinational corporations purchase controlling interests in various national
outputs and industries of developed industrial western nations.
♦The Multinational Corporations making the purchases are underwritten by massive
global financial institutions, multinational banks.
♦The Multinational Banks and the Multinational Corporations then utilize lobbying
interests to manipulate the internal political policy of the targeted nation state(s).
♦With control over the targeted national industry or interest, the multinationals
then leverage export of the national asset (exfiltration) through trade agreements structured
to the benefit of lesser developed nation states – where they have previously
established a proactive financial footprint.
Pat must suffer from some kind of cognitive dissonance. There is no free trade, nor there
was before Trump. In a world of flexible exchange rates and central banking
backed-inflationary credit trade wars are the status quo. He willfully ignores all the
effects of credit inflation, unsound money, tax structures, subsidies, regulatory burdens
created internally and by those "trade deals" and last but not least the reserve status of
the fiat dollar which basically turned the US in a huge nothing-for-something economy
relative to its imports.
The crisis consists precisely in the fact that the old is dying and the new cannot be born; in this interregnum a great variety
of morbid symptoms appear. ANTONIO GRAMSCI (1891-1937). ITALIAN MARXIST THEORIST & POLITICIAN
In the first episode of 'On Contact', host Chris Hedges discusses the global revolt against corporate capitalism with radical
intellectual and author Tariq Ali. Ali talks about how the world banking system got Greece and other European countries in trouble,
and how big capital may be behind the impeachment of Brazilian president Dilma Rousseff. RT Correspondent Anya Parampil joins the
show with a report on global inequality.
So, Chris, "open markets" which USA has not seen a trace of for over 100 years are a "failure" and we are "doomed" unless we
have a politburo of corruptible socialist elites determining "policy" for industries and enterprises they know nothing about?
I believe that any great thinker or genius can become fixated on a false prize and all of the genius is diverted, perverted to
a futile cyclical cry for "justice" based on an unsupported ideological dream, not any pragmatic vision.
"Corporate Capitalism" ? Why do people refuse to see that this is a Natural progression of Capitalism. Whether it's Corporations,
Governments, Banks or Elites, the inner workings & outline of this type of System creates Inevitable Stratification of Power &
Wealth. The Incentives have Always been there for this to eventually to take place. NLRBE!
Capitalism in and of itself fosters overwhelming greed. We need a new model for the whole planet that evens the playing field
for every human being in existence. We need a fusion of the best for what is next.
Chris, the system we now have is a Corporatist State which is a fascist system. The radical left can't distinguish between
Nationalist and Fascist. The radical Left are not nationalists they are globalist and peddle cultural Marxism!
I very much understand the need to fight against the international banking system that has been making a mess of things,but
I don't understand the continuing blaming of the philosophical worldviews of fascism and national socialism which have not been
put into political practice since the middle of the 20th century. Both the political practices of capitalism and communism are
the ideas that have had a major influence on the whole entire world since the end of World War II that have been making a mess
of the world on so many levels. It's so completely ridiculous for these people to think that communism will work out so great
for them and can't realize that it works against them. As Jewish philosopher Karl Marx had said "What is the real basis of the
Jewish religion ? Practice need,egoism. The God of practice need and egoism is money. Money is the jealous God of Israel before
whom no other God may endure. Money debases all gods of men and transforms them into commodities. The God of the Jews has become
the God of the universe. The real God of the Jews is money. Their God is only an illusory bill of exchange". This is what the
founder of communism himself had said and these people have admireration for the worldview of communism and they have major attitudes
and problems with the ideas of fascism,national socialism and other true nationalist worldviews who's main concerns is to be in
the service of the nation and people and by fighting against the power of the international banking system.
There is no capitalism in this world. There is no such thing as too big to fail in a capitalist system. There is no such thing
as bank bailouts. There is no such thing as bailing out auto companies or any big corporation. In a capitalist system the market
determines interest rates not a privately owned central bank. In a capitalist system all those bank's that took on unrealistic
risk would have failed, instead they got to keep all their profit and we the taxpayer got to cover their losses. In a capitalist
system the bank's that only took on manageable risk would have greatly benefited from the greed and failure of the others. Our
system is fascist pure and simple, the merger of state and corporate powers.
With the American left, I don't know what's going on with Bernie Sanders anymore. I don't think he knows. I think he's getting
pulled in separate directions -- one, by his campaign insiders who have their own careers in the Democratic Party to consider,
and the other by his supporters in the general public who don't care about "Democratic Party" or necessarily any other party.
There's now a Huffington Post story of Bernie Sanders scheduled to meet with Hillary next week -- meet with the war-hungry corporate
interventionist, the war goddess herself. And if Bernie lets himself get assimilated into Hillary's campaign, that's it -- his
credibility is shot. Meanwhile, the corporate press is having a field-day with all of this. You know, if you were some bigwig
of ABC or CBS, this would have to be your "day in the sun" -- you couldn't hope for a better chain of events than those of the
past 2 months. And throughout the American public there's complacency and acquiescence -- even though now were left with 2 Wall
Street representatives to choose from for our nation's highest office. And what's our avg household debt, mortgages included --
something like $140,000 per household? You have an American public that cannot even think without Wall Street telling them what
to think about, care about and believe in. I don't see this ending well for us.
Capitalism IS fascism and indeed diametrically opposed to any form of democracy. Additionally, calling current nationalist
movements in Europe fascist, especially those in Germany, France and Spain, is completely off base. There are brown skinned Europeans
who proudly support the Front National in France for example. It is not a racist platform.
85% of the profits are going to the top 1%. 50% of the workforce are paycheck to paycheck or Worse. Then The payday Lenders
finish off the working Class.
I find Tariq Ali a great thinker and eloquent speaker and author. However, as an example of just how 'tight a grip' corrupt
capitalism has 'on all the global institutions' - in this case, education - I find it interesting how a man, who simply offers
us contemporary examples of the never - ending struggle between the 'Haves' and the 'Have Nots,' is now referred to as a, "Radical
Intellectual." This struggle has only been going on since the Bronze Age. It would seem humankind would've found a solution to
it by now.
In recent decades throughout Latin America, rulers have spoken and demanded 'reforms' as
essential to stimulate and sustain growth and foster equity and sustainability. The 'reforms'
involve implementing 'structural changes' which require large scale privatization to encourage
entrepreneurship and end state corruption; deregulation of the economy to stimulate foreign and
domestic investment; labor flexibility to 'free' labor markets and increase employment; and
lower business taxes. According to the reformers all this will lead to free markets and promote
democratic values.
Over the past thirty years, ruling elites in Latin America have carried out IMF and World
Bank structural reforms in two cyclical periods: between 1989-1999 and more recently between
2015-2018. In both cases the reforms have led to a series of major economic, political and
social deformations .
During the first cycle of 'reforms', privatization concentrated wealth by transferring
public means of production to oligarchs, and increased private monopolies, which deepened
inequalities and sharpened class divisions.
Deregulation led to financial speculation, tax evasion, capital flight and public- private
corruption.
'Reforms' deformed the existing class structure provoking social upheavals, which
precipitated the collapse of the elite led 'reforms' and the advent of a decade of nationalist
populist governments.
The populists restored and expanded social reforms but did not change the political and
economic 'deformations', embedded in the state.
A decade later (2015) the 'reformers' returned to power and restored the regressive free
market policies of the previous neo-liberal ruling elite. By 2018 a new cycle of class
conflicts flared throughout Brazil and Argentina, threatening to overturn the existing US
center free market order.
China is willing to resolve differences with the United States
on an equal footing, the Chinese government's top diplomat said on Friday after meeting U.S.
Secretary of State Mike Pompeo, but added they did not address their trade war too
specifically.
U.S. President Donald Trump on Wednesday instructed his trade officials to look at
increasing tariffs to 25 percent from 10 percent on $200 billion in Chinese imports into the
United States.
Trump, who has accused China and others of exploiting the United States in global trade, has
demanded that Beijing make a host of concessions to avoid the new duties, which could be
imposed in the weeks after a comment period closes on Sept. 5.
China, however, shows no sign of bending to Washington's pressure.
Speaking to reporters after meeting Pompeo on the sidelines of a regional summit in
Singapore, Chinese State Councillor Wang Yi said Pompeo told him he was "was willing to
maintain constructive contact".
"As two members of the U.N. Security Council and the world's largest two economies, we
should of course maintain talks at all times," Wang said.
"Cooperation is the only correct choice for the United States and China. It's the universal
expectation of the international community. Opposition can only bring dual loss and will hurt
the peaceful and stable development of the world," he added.
"We are willing to resolve the concerns of both sides via talks on the basis of an equal
footing and mutual respect. He (Pompeo) was accommodating on this as a direction, and said that
he does not want current frictions to continue," Wang said.
Answering a question about what was specifically said on trade, Wang said: "We did not speak
in such details. But actually, as journalists have noted, how can talks take place under this
pressure?"
Wang, who is also China's foreign minister, urged the United States on Thursday to calm down
and "carefully listen to the voices of U.S. consumers".
So far, the United States has imposed duties on $34 billion of imports from China as part of
a first tranche of sanctions on $50 billion of goods.
It wants China to stop stealing U.S. corporate secrets, abandon plans to boost its high-tech
industries at America's expense and stop subsidising Chinese companies with cheap loans that
enable them to compete unfairly.
China says the United States is trying to stop the rise of a competitor and it has imposed
its own tariffs on U.S. goods. The rising tensions have weighed on stock and currency markets,
with the Chinese yuan falling against the dollar.
The two countries have not had formal talks on their trade dispute since early June.
The views and opinions expressed herein are the views and opinions of the author and do
not necessarily reflect those of NASDAQ, Inc.
American citizens were asleep and did nothing and took it, and took it and took it.
You guys did not understand that The President and Congress work for you, you treat
them like Gods and they behave the way you treat them. So take some of the blame,
Evil thrives where Good men do nothing, and you did nothing.
Capitalism was allowed to become unfettered via the corruption of government. So
called, Democracy has an enabling role here. We the People are the only ones who can
stop this.
Except now the U.S. Government/Big Pharma has 2/3 of the population on
antidepressants and antipsychotic dope. I hope all of the Big Pharma executives
children end up on their parents dope.
What Mr. Wolff characterizes as "Capitalism" is in fact Fascism (merger of Private
and State interests; PRIVATE companies/corporations subsisting SOLELY
upon GOVERNMENT contracts. The Federal Reserve, for instance.). Why Wolff
continues to stop just short of this correct designation in his otherwise competent
Economic critique remains a mystery. He certainly KNOWS the difference, so I can
only assume that he wishes to remain employed......................... -Cheers!
We are in the point when capitalist system (which presented itself as asocial system that created a large middle class)
converted into it opposite: it is social system that could not deliver that it promised and now want to distract people from this
sad fact.
The Trump adopted tax code is a huge excess: we have 40 year when corporation paid less taxes. This is last moment when they
need another gift. To give them tax is crazy excess that reminding
Louis XV of France. Those gains are going in buying of socks. And real growth is happening elsewhere in the world.
After WW2 there were a couple of decades of "golden age" of US capitalism when in the USA middle class increased considerably.
That was result of pressure of working class devastated by Great Depression. Roosevelt decided that risk is too great and he
introduced social security net. But capitalist class was so enraged that they started fighting it almost immediately after the
New Deal was introduced. Business class was enrages with the level of taxes and counterattacked. Tarp act and McCarthyism were
two successful counterattacks. McCarthyism converting communists and socialists into agents of foreign power.
The quality of jobs are going down. That's why Trump was elected... Which is sad. Giving your finger to the
neoliberal elite does not solve their problem
Notable quotes:
"... Finally, if everybody tries to save themselves (protection), we have a historical example: after the Great Depression that happened in Europe. And most people believe that it was a large part of what led to WWII after WWI, rather than a much saner collective effort. But capitalism doesn't go for collective efforts, it tends to destroy itself by its own mechanisms. There has to be a movement from below. Otherwise, there is no counter force that can take us in another direction. ..."
"... When Trump announced his big tariffs on China, we saw the stock market dropped 700 points in a day. That's a sign of the anxiety, the danger, even in the minds of capitalists, about where this is going. ..."
"... Everything is done to avoid asking the question to what degree the system we have in place - capitalism is its name - is the problem. It's the Russians, it's the immigrants, it's the tariffs, it's anything else, even the pornstar, to distract us from the debate we need to have had that we haven't had for a half a century, which puts us in a very bad place. We've given a free pass to a capitalist system because we've been afraid to debate it. And when you give a free pass to any institution you create the conditions for it to rot, right behind the facade. ..."
"... The Trump presidency is the last gasp, it's letting it all hang out. A [neoliberal] system that's gonna do whatever it can, take advantage of this moment, grab it all before it disappears. ..."
In another interesting interview with Chris Hedges, Richard Wolff explains why the Trump presidency is the last resort of a system
that is about to collapse:
Finally, if everybody tries to save themselves (protection), we have a historical example: after the Great Depression that happened
in Europe. And most people believe that it was a large part of what led to WWII after WWI, rather than a much saner collective effort.
But capitalism doesn't go for collective efforts, it tends to destroy itself by its own mechanisms. There has to be a movement from
below. Otherwise, there is no counter force that can take us in another direction.
So, absent that counter force we are going to see this system spinning out of control and destroying itself in the very way its
critics have for so long foreseen it well might.
When Trump announced his big tariffs on China, we saw the stock market dropped 700 points in a day. That's a sign of the anxiety,
the danger, even in the minds of capitalists, about where this is going. If we hadn't been a country with two or three decades of
a middle class - working class paid really well - maybe we could have gotten away with this. But in a society that has celebrated
its capacity to do what it now fails to do, you have an explosive situation.
Everything is done to avoid asking the question to what degree the system we have in place - capitalism is its name - is the problem.
It's the Russians, it's the immigrants, it's the tariffs, it's anything else, even the pornstar, to distract us from the debate we
need to have had that we haven't had for a half a century, which puts us in a very bad place. We've given a free pass to a capitalist
system because we've been afraid to debate it. And when you give a free pass to any institution you create the conditions for it
to rot, right behind the facade.
The Trump presidency is the last gasp, it's letting it all hang out. A [neoliberal] system that's gonna do whatever it can, take advantage
of this moment, grab it all before it disappears.
In France, it was said
'Aprčs moi, le déluge' (after me the
catastrophe). The storm will break.
Putin needs to get himself a good monetary economist not affiliated or influenced by the
Chicago School. The "pension reforms" are an Atlanticist trojan horse to erode the legitimacy
of the government and not a necessary "reform".
Putin has made his reputation "allocating real resources to the common people of Russia,
he should continue to do that.
"... According to Dumenil and Levy the historical tendencies of capitalism are radically mediated by politics and social class configurations (i.e. alliances). They argue capitalistic development, since 1880s, has gone through four primary stages and corresponding crises. They emphasize these developments are not historically necessary, but contingent on politics and social class configurations. Moreover, their analysis is particular to the capitalistic development in the United States and Western Europe, they are able to generalize or internationalize their analysis because of the U.S. global hegemony (although they certainly accept there are modes of resisting this hegemony (e.g. Iran, Venezuela, Cuba, China, etc.)). ..."
"... The current crisis was not caused by falling rates of profits, but by financial innovation, credit overextension, and the particular social class alliances facilitating these activities. There is no single cause of the crisis, but broader social political mechanisms at work and in the process of transformation. ..."
"... The basic story goes like this: following the Great Depression of 1930 a strong social political alliance emerged between the management class and "popular classes" (this popular class includes blue and white collar workers, including quasi-management, clerical, and professional, which cannot be reduced to the traditional "working-class"). In the 1970s there was a severe profitability crisis, the legislative and institutional response to this crisis caused a fracture between management and popular classes, and a re-alliance between management and capitalist classes (which includes ownership and financial classes). ..."
"... Most important according to Dumenil and Levy is that these historical transformations manifested a "divorce" between ownership/finance and the domestic economy and its actual production process ..."
"... Dumenil and Levy maintain the current system, especially the "divorce" between the ownership/financial and the domestic economy, is not economically sustainable. Hence is also not political sustainable. Thus, they suggest several political possibilities that could manifest. However, they advocate an alliance between the "popular classes" and management (reminiscent of the New Deal/Fair Deal alliances). Nonetheless, it does not yet appear management has the political incentives to agree to forge such an alliance. ..."
Unique and Stimulating Account of the Great Financial Recession of 2008
This book can be highly recommended as a book on the Great Financial Crisis of 2008, and a book of politics, political economy,
class analysis, sociology, and history. Very impressive accomplishment.
The strength of this book on the Great Financial Crisis of 2008 is that Dumenil and Levy place the crisis in a larger historical
perspective. They maintain it is a mistake to isolate it merely in the context of the financial innovation and deregulation occurring
from the late 1990s. Instead, capitalism has particular historical tendencies and specific class relations.
This is a very impressive volume published by Harvard University Press. It offers a play by play of the Great Financial Recession
of 2008, beginning from 2000 in chapters 12 - 17, the political response and the continued stagnation in domestic economies and
instability within the international economic order in chapters 18 - 20, along with very interesting historical policy observations
and recommendations for this current crisis in chapters 21 - 25. Nonetheless the real power of this book occurs in its historical
analysis of capitalist development since 1970s described in great detail in chapters 1 - 11.
According to Dumenil and Levy the historical tendencies of capitalism are radically mediated by politics and social class
configurations (i.e. alliances). They argue capitalistic development, since 1880s, has gone through four primary stages and corresponding
crises. They emphasize these developments are not historically necessary, but contingent on politics and social class configurations.
Moreover, their analysis is particular to the capitalistic development in the United States and Western Europe, they are able
to generalize or internationalize their analysis because of the U.S. global hegemony (although they certainly accept there are
modes of resisting this hegemony (e.g. Iran, Venezuela, Cuba, China, etc.)).
Dumenil and Levy have demonstrated in previous work the tendency of the rate of profit to fall in capitalistic economies. However,
because politics and social class alliances can change, so can the profitability. The current crisis was not caused by falling
rates of profits, but by financial innovation, credit overextension, and the particular social class alliances facilitating these
activities. There is no single cause of the crisis, but broader social political mechanisms at work and in the process of transformation.
The basic story goes like this: following the Great Depression of 1930 a strong social political alliance emerged between
the management class and "popular classes" (this popular class includes blue and white collar workers, including quasi-management,
clerical, and professional, which cannot be reduced to the traditional "working-class"). In the 1970s there was a severe profitability
crisis, the legislative and institutional response to this crisis caused a fracture between management and popular classes, and
a re-alliance between management and capitalist classes (which includes ownership and financial classes).
Once the alliance between capitalist classes and management had been forged in late 1970s and 1980s, profitability returned
and financial incentives and financial innovation reconfigured personal incentives and corporate motivations. Most important
according to Dumenil and Levy is that these historical transformations manifested a "divorce" between ownership/finance and the
domestic economy and its actual production process. The political system did nothing to reconcile this disconnect, indeed
expedited the divorce via deregulation and financial innovation, what the economic literature calls "financialization" (although,
to repeat in several countries the response was radically different and in specific opposition to U.S. hegemony and the neo-liberalism
which the U.S. Treasury, IMF, World Bank, and WTO exported to the rest of the world).
This is a very tightly and elegantly argued book. It has a huge advantage over other books on the Great Financial Crisis of
neoliberalism in that it places the crisis in both an historical and socio-political perspective. Further they provide the political
implications, or what is to be done.
Dumenil and Levy maintain the current system, especially the "divorce" between the ownership/financial and the domestic
economy, is not economically sustainable. Hence is also not political sustainable. Thus, they suggest several political possibilities
that could manifest. However, they advocate an alliance between the "popular classes" and management (reminiscent of the New Deal/Fair
Deal alliances). Nonetheless, it does not yet appear management has the political incentives to agree to forge such an alliance.
This book will have a hard time finding its audience. Mainstream audiences will charge Dumenil and Levy with being overly Marxist,
while Marxists will complain they deviate too far from classical Marxism. Nonetheless this is political economy at its best. This
book deserves a wide audience and Dumenil and Levy deserve credit for the construction of a unique and stimulating account of
the Great Financial Recession of 2008.
"... Unfortunately, if we scan the regions of our planet, we immediately see that humanity has disappointed God's expectations. Man, especially in our time, has without hesitation devastated wooded plains and valleys, polluted waters, disfigured the earth's habitat, made the air unbreathable, disturbed the hydrogeological and atmospheric systems, turned luxuriant areas into deserts and undertaken forms of unrestrained industrialization, degrading that "flowerbed" – to use an image from Dante Alighieri (Paradiso, XXII, 151) – which is the earth, our dwelling-place. ..."
Unfortunately, if we scan the regions of our planet, we immediately see that humanity has
disappointed God's expectations. Man, especially in our time, has without hesitation devastated
wooded plains and valleys, polluted waters, disfigured the earth's habitat, made the air
unbreathable, disturbed the hydrogeological and atmospheric systems, turned luxuriant areas
into deserts and undertaken forms of unrestrained industrialization, degrading that "flowerbed"
– to use an image from Dante Alighieri (Paradiso, XXII, 151) – which is the earth,
our dwelling-place.
"... As Bishop Athanasius Schneider recently opined in an interview , "the powerful of our world, the Western states" support groups like ISIS "indirectly." As a result, civilians get killed, and a prolonged bloodbath between warring religious factions ensues, thus ruining thousands, if not millions, of lives. ..."
"... Persons who espouse this warped ideology are what political scientists refer to as neoconservatives. To put it in Catholic terms, neoconservatives seek to once and for all obliterate the Social Kingship of Christ by constructing a world order rooted in the Freemasonic Social Kingship of Man. For decades neocons have preyed on the patriotism of ordinary Americans to get them to fight unjust wars on behalf of Arab theocrats and Jewish Zionists, the real behind-the-scenes power brokers. ..."
Super Tuesday and Super Saturday came and went. As expected, Donald Trump dominated the competition.
Sort of.
While Trump did exceptionally well in states like New Hampshire, South Carolina and elsewhere in the South, The Donald has stumbled
as of late, coming in second to Ted Cruz in a number of recent contests.
Trump will likely expand his delegate lead in the coming weeks. However, he won't arrive at the Republican convention with enough
of them to secure the nomination outright.
If that happens, the oligarchs in the Republican Party will do everything they can at the convention to deny Trump that which
would rightfully be his.
It's been rumored that Mitt Romney will be called upon by the establishment to save the Party of Lincoln from being "torn asunder."
Some Republicans say they simply won't vote for Mr. Trump. Others suggest running a third party "conservative" candidate.
However it shakes out, if reaction to Romney's anti-Trump press conference held earlier this month indicates anything, it's that
refusing the billionaire from New York the nomination if he has the majority of delegates would literally break the GOP in two.
Before discussing what a Trump victory would mean for the Republican Party, let's backtrack a bit and try to put this man's candidacy
into context. If possible, a Catholic context.
American "exceptionalism"
Since the Second World War but most especially since the early 1990s, a cabal of intellectuals desirous of global empire have
hubristically argued that it is America's duty to advance "freedom" and "democracy" to "the people" of the world, all in the name
of bringing about a lasting "peace."
Of course, when these men speak of "freedom" what they really mean is massive economic inequality and social hedonism. And when
these men speak of "democracy" what they truly mean is rigged elections with candidates that they and not "the people" get to pick.
(See the U.S.-backed coup that took place in Ukraine in February 2014 for evidence of this.)
Despite the lofty language used to trick Americans into supporting this political pyramid scheme, the reality is that bringing
about this so-called "peace" is a dirty business.
For one, the U.S. essentially bribes countries into joining NATO. Economically sanctioning those who refuse to do so.
Two, when leaders from sovereign Middle Eastern nations are no longer viewed as politically useful, they're assassinated. Of course,
the more diplomatic way to put it is "so and so has to go! "
And three, sustaining American imperialism oversees requires the funneling of billions of taxpayer dollars to Islamic states like
Saudi Arabia and providing firearms to "moderate rebels" in countries most people can't locate on a map.
As Bishop Athanasius Schneider recently opined
in an interview , "the powerful of our world, the Western states" support groups like ISIS "indirectly." As a result, civilians get killed, and a prolonged bloodbath between warring religious factions ensues, thus ruining thousands,
if not millions, of lives.
The end game, of course, is to pick off Eastern European countries one by one in order to expand NATO (something the U.S. promised
decades ago they wouldn't do) so that "liberal democracy" can be established not only there but also in North Africa and, most importantly,
in Russia.
Globalism
Persons who espouse this warped ideology are what political scientists refer to as neoconservatives. To put it in Catholic terms, neoconservatives seek to once and for all obliterate the Social Kingship of Christ by constructing
a world order rooted in the Freemasonic Social Kingship of Man. For decades neocons have preyed on the patriotism of ordinary Americans to get them to fight unjust wars on behalf of Arab theocrats
and Jewish Zionists, the real behind-the-scenes power brokers.
While paying lip service to social conservatism, limited government, constitutionalism and state's rights these war hawks hijacked
the Republican Party and surgically transformed it into a weak-kneed, open borders, bloodthirsty Frankenstein in the service of international
elites.
Though insurgent candidates like Pat Buchanan in the 1990s reminded folks about the direction this clandestine group of war criminals
was leading the country, the monied class acted quickly and decisively. Buchanan's warnings about 1) the looming culture wars 2)
the harm cheap labor abroad would have on the American middle class 3) the problems associated with not securing the border and 4)
the debt and death required with being the policeman of the world were easily tamped down, thanks in no small part to the help of
the corporate media.
Since that time Americans have had to choose between presidential candidates who, at the end of the day, were nothing more than
cogs in the globalist's wheel.
Enter Trump
Donald J. Trump has the temperament of an eight year old child. He mocks. He condescends. He can't give specifics to half the
things he talks about. And I don't trust him on social issues. Put another way, I have the same concerns about Mr. Trump as American
Conservative contributor Rod Dreher does
.
For good reason, these facts and many others, have a large number of folks, including many Catholics, deeply disturbed.
At the same time, much of his public image is an act, and he has turned out be a shrewder political operator than I expected.
No one, and I mean no one, predicted he would have this much success.
People support Trump not necessarily because of his policies but because of what he represents. And what he represents is the
frustration ordinary, mostly white, Americans have towards politics in general. More specifically, the antipathy they have towards
the feckless politicians the Republican Party has nominated over the past thirty years who have largely failed to halt the social
and economic decay of the United States.
Against the neocons
Despite his inconsistency, immaturity and, at times, imbecility, Trump has been clear on several important policies. Policies
that can be appreciated from a Catholic viewpoint.
In
an article for the Ron Paul Institute for Peace and Prosperity, Daniel Mcadams outlines where Trump differentiates himself from
the war hawks in his party.
First, according to Mcadams Trump states "the obvious" when he says "the Iraq war was brought to us by the liars of the neoconservative
movement" and that it was a "total disaster" for the rest of us who "are forced to pay for their fantasies of world domination."
Second, Trump wants to "actually speak with Russian President Vladimir Putin to see if US/Russia differences can be worked out
without a potentially world-ending nuclear war."
Third, although Trump is "arguing that he is hugely pro-Israel" he is "nevertheless suggesting that if the US is to play a role
in the Israel/Palestine issue the US side should take a neutral role in the process."
Fourth, Trump is also calling out the "idiotic neocon advice" that resulted in the overthrowing of Gaddafi in Libya that has led
to "the red carpet" being "laid down for ISIS" in that failed state.
And lastly, Trump is "suggesting that it may be a good thing that Russia be bombing ISIS into oblivion and that we might want
to just sit back and let that happen for once."
Push back
The ruling class disdains each and every one of these positions. And for good reason.
By talking about the Iraq War and claiming Bush lied about it, Trump reminds us about the back room dealings and costs, both human
and monetary, spreading "freedom" and "democracy" necessarily entails. And by drawing attention to the disastrous situation in Libya,
Trump shines light on the foolishness of nation building abroad and the need to nation build at home. Obviously, all of this causes
voters to have a less favorable view of foreign intervention in the future.
By painting Putin as a potential ally instead of a "thug," Trump de-programs Americans from thinking of the Russian President
as Josef Stalin re-incarnated. It also disabuses ordinary citizens from seeing everything through an us-versus-them prism. Having
a villain to point at evokes patriotism at home and affirms Americans in the moral right-ness of the pursuit of spreading "liberty."
Neocons have long understood this. And Trump could potentially reverse that paradigm.
Furthermore, by taking a "neutral" stance towards Israel, Trump is indicating that he may put American interests ahead of Zionist
interests. In other words, Trump would likely approach the Middle East in a way that holds Israel to the same moral standards as
others. Realizing that this may result in an American president who refuses to be silent about the terrorist attacks Israelis commit
against Palestinians on an almost daily basis, the globalists and their cronies in the media have been quick to compare Trump with,
you guessed it, Adolf Hitler.
Going forward
Neoconservatives, in short, are apoplectic over a possible Trump presidency. His success could mean their demise, if only for
a short while.
To be sure, it is difficult to know who Trump would surround himself with if he were to win the presidency. Would he call up Henry
Kissinger? Would he seek the advice of the Council on Foreign Relations? I don't know.
But what I do know is that as of right now Trump appears to have all the right enemies. Enemies that include the neo-Catholic
neocon community. Read
here .
Now, don't expect the elites to go silently into the night. The attacks in the coming days and weeks will only get more vicious.
We've already seen how quickly they brought up "the 1930s." Additionally, more than 100 self-identified "members of the Republican
national security community" have signed an
open letter
excoriating Trump for his foreign policy views, adding that they are "united in our opposition to a Donald Trump presidency."
Unsurprisingly, some of them have said
they would support Hillary Clinton, a Democratic neocon, instead of Trump in the general election.
So much for party loyalty.
In brief, a Trump nomination means the internationalists would no longer dictate the terms of America's economic and foreign policy.
Moreover, if Trump arrives at the Republican convention with the majority of delegates and is denied the nomination, it will be clear
to all that we live in country that is anything but a democracy.
Indeed, far from being a "breaking" of the GOP in two, wouldn't a Trump victory be nothing more than a re-calibration of the party
to what it stood for historically? A party that serves the will of the American people instead of global elites?
I utterly despise Neocons, whether in Politics & Government or as Catholic Church Commentators.
This is why I come to akacatholic.com, The Remnant Newspaper & Catholic Family News.
In Politics, Conservatives would use The Bomb, while Neocons would engage in "Protective Reaction", whatever that means.
In The Case of Louie, Mike Matt, Chris Ferrara, John Vennari, Dr John Rao & Ann Barnhardt, one is told the truth as it occurred.
There are no "Sweeps Week Specials" by People who are financed by Fat Cats & sound like Shills for said Fat Cats, while broadcasting
from a Miniaturized Version of The CBS Broadcast Center on West 57th Street, from a Suburb of The Motor City, who tells everyone
that what The Pope Said was a Mistranslation, while making Hay of Cardinal Dolan, passing wind on the Uptown Platform of the IND
6th Avenue Subway, all while the Polemicist is telling the World that The SSPX is in Schism. No, THAT Guy, despite the Bells &
Whistles, is a Neo Catholic, who in many cases, cannot get his facts straight.
The NeoCatholics are the ones telling people that Girl Altar Servers are OK because the Pope says so. Ditto, Sancte Communion
A Mano & Altar Tables facing the Congregation.You know WHO They Are.
But something I have noticed is that when it comes to Intelligent Conversation on the message boards, the Neo Catholics will
not tolerate dissent vis a vis their position. The one with his broadcast centre is a classic example, with commenters practically
forced to pay homage to The Fearless Leader's Position, even when not well researched.
Those who hold the Traditional Catholic Position, allow True Discussion on matters Catholic.
Traditional Catholic is true Freedom, without being patronizing. I cannot say that for a certain site, which charges $10 per
month for Premium Membership.
You've reminded me of how the totally neocon and cuckservative National Review now rigorously–with all the fanaticism of the Stasi–polices
its comments section. It's unreal.
In the long run, the US has two distinct advantages that offset some of the vulnerabilities in the US economy, brought about
by 40 years of outsourcing. The US is energy independent to a very large extent, where China is greatly dependent on energy
imports, largely priced in dollars. The US has a global military advantage that will persist for the next decade or more.
Hard to say where this will lead. Best option is for the US and China to resume the trade talks that broke off months ago.
Economic mutually assured destruction is not a pleasant outcome, particularly at a moment when even the IMF is worrying about
emerging market debt, corporate debt defaults and other signs of another global financial crisis.
My sense is that the whole issue of trade disputes is not so much about trade and economics as much
as politics and sovereignty. Not a whole lot will have changed in economic terms when the dust
clears, but the underlying politics will have been altered unrecognizably. The whole idea of
creating international bureaucratic bodies to oversee and regulate international trade (e.g. WTO)
was to bypass the "normal" politics in the states involved. Long ago, the weaker countries cried
"modern day imperialism" over these because they felt (not entirely without justification) that
these arrangements took trade policy out of the hands of their domestic politics and unresponsive
to their needs, interests, and demands--and, in a sense, this was exactly the point, since
protectionism, even economically undesirable varieties, are product of "good" domestic politics.
But since 1980s and 90s, the pendulum seems to have swung in the opposite direction where
reclaiming a share of sovereignty over trade policy is preferred by many over trusting
international bureaucracy. While not exactly "trade" policy (but it is economic), the experiences
of the less well off countries in EU (as well as segments of the publics even in better off
countries) has to be a fairly widespread worldview in many countries these days--certainly enough
that it should make good politics to try to address them in some fashion, not try to override them
by fiat (the latter seeming to be the preferred approach of the cosmopolitan elite)
"My sense is that the whole issue of trade disputes is not so much about trade and economics as
much as politics and sovereignty."
That has to be right, and it certainly applies to small
countries. Small countries must always be aware that there is a loss of sovereignty implicit in
the very act of trading with larger ones. The greater weight of the large country can enable it
to impose trading terms that are sometimes disadvantageous to the smaller.
Tough. That's how it is. But the smaller country must always be on its guard against the very
real danger of allowing that to extend to loss of political sovereignty.
What I don't see is how this applies to the US. The US is not a small country and need not
fear any loss of political sovereignty attendant upon any lack of size or power. Therefore one
could perhaps see the current US trade negotiations in a different light.
That is, that Trump is not defending his country against any such threat. He is merely
attempting to level the playing field. For far too long that playing field has been tilted
against the US worker and, ultimately, the US economy. He was elected to rectify that and will,
I believe, be judged by his success in doing so.
If, in attempting that, he ruffles a few feathers - well, if he went the asking nicely route
they'd walk all over him.
That quibble aside, I couldn't agree more with your note.
I don't think the size of the country is the decisive factor.
International trade always
produces winners and losers. Depending on the particulars, the gains might be more widely
spread than losses, or vice versa. Both sides want to play the political game to shape the
terms of the trade in their favor. Generally, those who are in favor of more protection tend
to do well in domestic politics, while those who tend to gain more by opening up trade don't.
This is why international bureaucracy regulating trade winds up being set up, to bypass the
domestic political process in favor of the free traders.
I don't think there is a fundamental relationship between the size of the country and the
political conflict over free trade. It may be that smaller countries tend to be predisposed
more towards protectionist policies, but counterexamples are found easily (e.g. Singapore).
The real issue is that creation of and deference to international bureaucracy is a mechanism
through which the winners from free trade shift the venue of politics from the domestic to
the international and, in a sense, unfairly disadvantage their political enemies by depriving
them of the means to affect trade policy easily. Or, in other words, international trade
bureaucracy is NOT just a solution for trade conflict between nations, but a political weapon
directed at the skeptics at home. If the winners of free trade were willing to share their
gains with the losers, the conflict would not need to be so sharp. This has not been the case
in US: more than in most other developed countries, the winners of free trade kept the gains
only to themselves, claiming moral absolute of the free trade and their Mammon-given right to
hold on to everything. Those who lose from the free trade are not only aggrieved, but find
themselves at the wrong end of the political game specifically rigged to deprive them of
influence. They don't want to play by its rules if they can--and Trump is providing them this
option.
In this sense, Trump's actions are re-domesticalizing the politics of free trade, making
trade policy responsive to domestic interests that were shunted side formerly. The
internationalists have only their own short-sightedness to blame: if they were willing to
build up a broader coalition, or at least, appease their domestic opponents better, the
opposition to free trade detached from domestic politics would not have become so
acrimonious.
Personally, I think it's not a good development: walking back from free trade is not easy,
if at all possible--too many linkages have been built, too many sectors are dependent on
access to foreign inputs or markets, that actual protectionism will be near impossible to
bring back without major costs. Still, if you are creating international bureaucracy to
bypass domestic politics, you'd better not piss off folks back home enough that they'd start
with pitchforks, and this is among the many mistakes internationalists have made.
This interview of Sir James Goldsmith by Charlie Rose frames his debate with Laura Tyson, Clinton's
trade representative. Well worth watching to understand the trade debate.
Play
Hide
The analyst in the link below explained the myth US energy independence. Although it is not as
severe as china's need for foreign energy supply , but she got russian energy export via landline
as opposed as sealane gulf imports.
There also this constant propaganda of better unemployment
statistic , because of the way the data was processed to make it looks better (cooked)
-- -- -- -- --
From Srsroccoreport :
While the Mainstream media and the Whitehouse continue with the energy independent mantra, the
U.S. is still highly reliant upon a great deal of foreign oil.
Ahttps://d3hxt1wz4sk0za.clo...
, why would the U.S. import 8 million barrels of oil per day if
its shale oil production has surged over the past decade?
Well, it's quite simple. The U.S. Shale Oil Industry is producing way too much light tight oil,
with a high API Gravity, for our refineries that are designed for a lower grade. So, as U.S. shale
oil production exploded , the industry was forced to export a great deal more of this light oil
overseas.
Thanks for your exposition.
Some observations:
China's import of oil in US funds is about equal to USA's net import in US$ - the rest is in ruble/yuan.
The armed force imbalance is of no value, as attack on China is certain to get A-bombs into play
[aside form danger to US ships both naval and other due to Chinese/Russian made anti ship missiles]
The USA can not maintain 25% duties on consumer goods for the simple reason that 75% of population
can not afford to be consumer -debt levels are too high.
The USA can not maintain high tariffs as such would greatly increase the inflation rate applicable
to the "deplorables" who are already on ropes [homelessness, welfare, food subsidies etc.] Notably
the Fed would have to raise rates if inflation increases with dire result for the bond market and
the federal deficit due to increased interest costs.
That the European satraps have bowed under US pressure is nothing new... there will be more changes
in governments in the next cycle - the present bunch is too ripe [or rotten].
I do not imply by the above that China will not suffer, however they have a trillion dollar kitty
to balance the external trade problems.
"75% of population can not afford to be consumer..."
They are in debt because they are consuming beyond thier income. "the Fed would have to raise
rates if inflation increases" The Fed has already raised rates twice this year. It was less than
ten days ago that Trump based the Fed for raising rates. The losers in that have always been
Americans at the bottom.
http://thehill.com/policy/f...
"... If it wasn't so disturbing to witness mainstream American [neo]liberalism's recent descent into a prolonged fit of vintage Cold War jingoistic paranoia, it'd be pretty satisfying to see such clear corroborating evidence right here in this thread of the deep ideological kinship to which I was just alluding, between mainstream anti-leftist liberalism and the far-right reactionary fringe. ..."
"... Somebody joked that Obama married the neocons to the humanitarian bombers and to the SJWs. It s a powerful alliance... ..."
I hope it's clear to any thoughtful reader that the scenario Robert Zannelli lays out above
-- from high US political officials like Donald Trump as tightly controlled assets of the
Russian state, to squishy soft-left social democratic commentators like Chris Hedges as
secret committed Marxist-Leninists, to respected intellectuals like Cornel West as hapless
dupes of this aforementioned Russian/Marxist conspiracy -- might as well come straight out of
a badly photocopied John Birch Society pamphlet of the 1950s or 1960s.
If it wasn't so disturbing to witness mainstream American liberalism's recent descent into
a prolonged fit of vintage Cold War jingoistic paranoia, it'd be pretty satisfying to see
such clear corroborating evidence right here in this thread of the deep ideological kinship
to which I was just alluding, between mainstream anti-leftist liberalism and the far-right
reactionary fringe. As is, I can only hope that enough people searching for ways to
understand the rise of the far right in the US and elsewhere are able to weigh the frenzied
ideological fever dreams of Russiagate-obsessed US liberals (citing the influence of shadowy
foreign conspiracies against an otherwise pristine liberal political order) against the sober
analysis of leftists like Losurdo (citing the influence of the liberal political order's own
immanent tensions and contradictions) and have the presence of mind to opt for the
latter.
Likbez,
@WLGR 07.23.18 at 7:13 pm
If it wasn't so disturbing to witness mainstream American [neo]liberalism's recent descent into a prolonged fit of
vintage Cold War jingoistic paranoia, it'd be pretty satisfying to see such clear corroborating evidence right here in
this thread of the deep ideological kinship to which I was just alluding, between mainstream anti-leftist liberalism and
the far-right reactionary fringe.
Somebody joked that Obama married the neocons to the humanitarian bombers and to the SJWs. It s a
powerful alliance...
Reaction to the crisis of neoliberalism and loss of confidence in ruling elite generate many different
attempts to restore the status quo, some of them grotesque.
In this sense, we can view Anti-Russian paranoia as a desperate attempt to the ruling neoliberal elite
to restore the control of the narrative and cement the cracks in the neoliberal society on the basis of uniting the society
via neo-McCarthyism hysteria. Because regular propaganda and neoliberal myths lost their persuading power and no longer work
they resort to classic forms of war propaganda in the center of which is the demonization of the "enemy of the people."
Moreover, the carpet bombing of Trump in neoliberal MSM is really a sign of paranoid reaction of
neoliberals (both hard and soft) on the possibility of losing grip on the US electorate and the beginning of the process of
dismantling/downsizing the global neoliberal empire led by the USA.
Trump rejection of existing forms of neoliberal globalization is one sign that this process already
started and some politicians already are trying to catch the wind.
"Enrightenment" probably should be understood as the dramatic rise of nationalism including some forms
of far right nationalism as a reaction on the crisis on the neoliberal society.
"... The borg, financed and sworn to the agenda of globalists and the military-industrial-media complex, has its orders and is acting on them. The globalists want more free trade agreements, no tariffs and more immigration to prevent higher wages. Capital does not have a national attachment. It does not care about the 'deplorables' who support Trump and his policies: ..."
"... Nearly three-fourths, or 73 percent, of Republicans and Republican-leaning independents who responded to a Pew Research survey out this week said they felt increased tariffs would benefit the country. ..."
"... Donald Trump is, indeed, a kind of traitor to the Washington Consensus, a hyper-militarized capitalist utopia of corporate dominated global supply chains that doubled the international wage-slave workforce in the last two decades of the 20th century and herded these desperate billions into a race to the bottom. The leadership of both corporate parties conspired to force U.S. workers into the global meat-grinder. ..."
"... The weapon industry and the military recognize that the 'war of terror' is nearing its end. To sell more they need to create an new 'enemy' that looks big enough to justify large and long-term spending. Russia, the most capable opponent the U.S. could have, is the designated target. A new Cold War will give justification for all kinds of fantastic and useless weapons. ..."
"... Trump grand foreign policy is following a realist assessment . He sees that previous administrations pushed Russia into the Chinese camp by aggressive anti-Russian policies in Europe and the Middle East. He wants to pull Russia out of the alliance with China, neutralize it in a political sense, to then be able to better tackle China which is the real thread to the American (economic) supremacy. ..."
President's Trump successful summit with President Putin was used by the 'resistance' and
the deep state to launch a coup-attempt against Trump. Their minimum aim is to put Trump into a
(virtual) political cage where he can no longer pursue his foreign policy agenda.
One does not have to be a fan of Trump's policies and still see the potential danger. A
situation where he can no longer act freely will likely be worse. What Trump has done so far
still does not add up to the
disastrous policies and crimes his predecessor committed.
The borg, financed and sworn to the agenda of globalists and the
military-industrial-media complex, has its orders and is acting on them. The globalists want
more free trade agreements, no tariffs and more immigration to prevent higher wages. Capital
does not have a national attachment. It does not care about the 'deplorables' who support
Trump and his policies:
[P]olls show that Trump appears to still have the support of the bulk of Republican voters
when it comes to tariffs. Nearly three-fourths, or 73 percent, of Republicans and
Republican-leaning independents who responded to a Pew Research survey out this week said
they felt increased tariffs would benefit the country.
Donald Trump is, indeed, a kind of traitor to the Washington Consensus, a
hyper-militarized capitalist utopia of corporate dominated global supply chains that doubled
the international wage-slave workforce in the last two decades of the 20th century and herded
these desperate billions into a race to the bottom. The leadership of both corporate parties
conspired to force U.S. workers into the global meat-grinder.
The weapon industry and the military recognize that the 'war of terror' is nearing its
end. To sell more they need to create an new 'enemy' that looks big enough to justify large and
long-term spending. Russia, the most capable opponent the U.S. could have, is the designated
target. A new Cold War will give justification for all kinds of fantastic and useless
weapons.
Trump does not buy the
nonsense claims of 'Russian meddling' in the U.S. elections and openly says so. He does not
believe that Russia wants to attack anyone. To him Russia is not an enemy.
Trump grand foreign policy is following a
realist assessment . He sees that previous administrations pushed Russia into the Chinese
camp by aggressive anti-Russian policies in Europe and the Middle East. He wants to pull Russia
out of the alliance with China, neutralize it in a political sense, to then be able to better
tackle China which is the real thread to the American (economic) supremacy.
Former CIA chief John Brennan denounced Trump as a "traitor" who had "committed high crimes"
in holding a friendly summit with Putin.
It can't get more seditious than that. Trump is being denigrated by almost the entire
political and media establishment in the US as a "treasonous" enemy of the state.
Following this logic, there is only one thing for it: the US establishment is calling for
a coup to depose the 45th president. One Washington Post oped out of a total of five
assailing the president gave the following stark ultimatum: "If you work for Trump, quit
now".
Some high ranking people working for Trump followed that advice. His chief of staff John
Kelly rallied
others against him:
According to three sources familiar with the situation, Kelly called around to Republicans on
Capitol Hill and gave them the go-ahead to speak out against Trump. (The White House did not
respond to a request for comment.) Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell and House Speaker
Paul Ryan held televised press conferences to assert that Russia did meddle in the election.
Others who attacked Trump over his diplomatic efforts with Russia
included the Director of National Intelligence Daniel Coats who used an widely distributed
interview for that:
The White House had little visibility into what Coats might say. The intelligence director's
team had turned down at least one offer from a senior White House official to help prepare
him for the long-scheduled interview, pointing out that he had known Mitchell for years and
was comfortable talking with her.
Coats was extraordinarily candid in the interview, at times questioning Trump's judgment
-- such as the president's decision to meet with Putin for two hours without any aides
present beyond interpreters -- and revealing the rift between the president and the
intelligence community.
FBI Director Wray also
undermined his boss' position:
FBI Director Christopher Wray on Wednesday defended Special Counsel Robert Mueller as a
"straight shooter," and said the Russia investigation is no "witch hunt."
Speaking at the Aspen Security Forum in Colorado, Wray said he stood by his view that
Russia meddled in the 2016 presidential election in some capacity and that the threat
remained active.
A day latter Secretary of Defense Mattis also issued a statement that contradicted his
president's policy:
Secretary of Defense James Mattis took his turn doing the implicit disavowing in a statement
about new military aid to Ukraine:
"Russia should suffer consequences for its aggressive, destabilizing behavior and its
illegal occupation of Ukraine. The fundamental question we must ask ourselves is do we wish
to strengthen our partners in key regions or leave them with no other options than to turn to
Russia, thereby undermining a once in a generation opportunity to more closely align nations
with the U.S. vision for global security and stability."
Pat Lang
thinks that Trump should fire Coats, Wary and Rosenstein, the Deputy Attorney General who
is overseeing the Mueller investigation.
My advice is to spare Rosenstein, for now, as firing him would lead to a great uproar in
Congress. The Mueller investigation has not brought up anything which is dangerous to Trump and
is unlikely to do so in the immediate future. He and Rosenstein can be fired at a latter
stage.
But Wray and Coats do deserve a pink slip and so do Kelly and Mattis. They are political
appointees who work 'at the pleasure of the President'.
The U.S. has the legislative and the judicative as a counterweight to the president who
leads the executive. The 'deep state' and its moles within the executive should have no role in
that balance. The elected president can and must demand loyalty from those who work for
him.
Those who sabotage him should be fired, not in a Saturday night massacre but
publicly, with a given reason and all at the same time. They do not deserve any warning. Their
rolling heads will get the attention of others who are tempted by the borg to act against the
lawful policy directives of their higher up.
All this is not a defense of Trump. I for one despise his antics and most of his policies.
But having a bad president of the United States implementing the policies he campaigned on, and
doing so within the proper process, is way better than having unaccountable forces dictating
their policies to him.
It will be impossible for Trump to get anything done if his direct subordinates, who work
'at his pleasure', publicly sabotage the implementation of his policies. Either he fires these
people or the borg will have won.
"... By Enrico Verga, a writer, consultant, and entrepreneur based in Milan. As a consultant, he concentrates on firms interested in opportunities in international and digital markets. His articles have appeared in Il Sole 24 Ore, Capo Horn, Longitude, Il Fatto Quotidiano, and many other publications. You can follow him on Twitter @enricoverga . ..."
"... Continuing flows of low-cost labor can be useful for cutting costs. West Germany successfully absorbed East Germany after the fall of the Berlin Wall, but the dirty secret of this achievement is the exploitation of workers from the former East, as Reuters reports . ..."
"... The expansion of the EU to Poland (and the failed attempt to incorporate the Ukraine) has allowed many European businesses to shift local production to nations where the average cost of a blue or white collar worker is much lower ( by 60-70% on average ) than in Western European countries. ..."
"... The middle class is a silent mass that for many years has painfully digested globalization, while believing in the promises of globalist politicians," explains Luciano Ghelfi, a journalist of international affairs who has followed Lega from its beginnings. Ghelfi continues: ..."
"... I think unrestrained globalization has taken a hit. In Italy as well, as we have seen recently, businesses are relocating abroad. And the impoverished middle class finds itself forced to compete for state resources (subsidies) and jobs which can be threatened by an influx of economic migrants towards which enormous resources have been dedicated – just think of the 4.3 billion Euros that the last government allocated toward economic migrants. ..."
"... In all of this, migrants are more victims than willing actors, and they become an object on which the fatigue, fear, and in the most extreme cases, hatred of the middle class can easily focus. ..."
"... If for the last twenty years, with only occasional oscillation, the pro-globalization side has been dominant in the West, elections are starting to swing the balance in a new direction. ..."
"... "Klein analyzes a future (already here to some degree) in which multinational corporations freely fish from one market or another in an effort to find the most suitable (i.e. cheapest) labor force." ..."
"... never export their way out of poverty and misery ..."
By Enrico Verga,
a writer, consultant, and entrepreneur based in Milan. As a consultant, he
concentrates on firms interested in opportunities in international and digital markets. His
articles have appeared in Il Sole 24 Ore, Capo Horn, Longitude, Il Fatto Quotidiano, and many
other publications. You can follow him on Twitter @enricoverga .
International commerce, jobs, and economic migrants are propelled by a common force:
profit.
In recent times, the Western middle class (by which I mean in particular industrial workers
and office employees) has lost a large number of jobs and has seen its buying power fall. It
isn't true that migrants are the source of all evil in the world. However, under current
conditions, they become a locus for the exasperation of the population at twenty years of
pro-globalization politics. They are tragically placed in the role of the straw that breaks the
camel's back.
Western businesses have slipped jobs overseas to countries with low labor costs, while the
middle class has been pushed into debt in order to try to keep up. The Glass-Steagall law and
other brakes on American banks were abolished by a cheerleader for globalization, Bill Clinton,
and these banks subsequently lost all restraints in their enthusiasm to lend. The cherry on top
of the sundae was the real estate bubble and ensuing crash of 2008.
A damning picture of the results of 20 years of globalization is provided by
Forbes , capitalism's magazine par excellence. Already in 2016, the surprise victory of
Trump led to questions about whether the blond candidate's win was due in part to the straits
of the American middle class, impoverished as a result of the pro-globalization politics of
figures like Clinton and Obama.
Further support for this thesis is furnished by the
New York Times , describing the collapse of the stars-and-stripes middle class. Its
analysis is buttressed by lengthy research from the very mainstream
Pew Center , which agrees that the American middle class is vanishing.
And Europe? Although the European middle class has been squeezed less than its American
counterpart, for us as well the picture doesn't look good. See for example the
analysis of the Brookings Institute , which discusses not only the flagging economic
fortunes of the European middle class, but also the fear of prosperity collapsing that
currently grips Europe.
Migrants and the Shock Doctrine
What do economic migrants have to do with any of this?
Far be it from me to criticize large corporations, but clearly they – and their
managers and stockholders – benefit from higher margins. Profits (revenue minus costs and
expenses) can be maximized by reducing expenses. To this end, the costs of acquiring goods
(metals, agricultural products, energy, etc.) and services (labor) need to fall steadily.
In the quest to lower the cost of labor, the most desirable scenario is a sort of blank
slate: to erase ongoing arrangements with workers and start over from zero, building a new
"happy and productive" economy. This operation can be understood as a sort of "shock
doctrine."
The term "economic shock therapy" is based on an analogy with electroshock therapy for
mental patients. One important analysis of it comes from Naomi Klein , who became
famous explaining in 2000 the system of fashion production through subsidiaries that don't
adhere to the safety rules taken so seriously in Western countries (some of you may recall the
scandal of
Benetton and Rana Plaza , where more than a thousand workers at a Bangladesh factory
producing Benetton (and other) clothes were crushed under a collapsing building).
Klein analyzes a future (already here to some degree) in which multinational corporations
freely fish from one market or another in an effort to find the most suitable (i.e. cheapest)
labor force. Sometimes relocating from one nation to another is not possible, but if you can
bring the job market of other countries here in the form of a low-cost mass of people competing
for employment, then why bother?
The Doctrine in Practice
Continuing flows of low-cost labor can be useful for cutting costs. West Germany
successfully absorbed East Germany after the fall of the Berlin Wall, but the dirty secret of
this achievement is the exploitation of workers
from the former East, as Reuters reports .
The expansion of the EU to Poland (and the failed attempt to incorporate the Ukraine) has
allowed many European businesses to
shift local production to nations where the average cost of a blue or white collar worker
is much lower (
by 60-70% on average ) than in Western European countries.
The migrant phenomenon is a perfect counterpoint to a threadbare middle class, given its
role as a success story within the narrative of globalization.
Economic migrants are eager to obtain wealth on the level of the Western middle class
– and this is of course a legitimate desire. However, to climb the social ladder, they
are willing to do anything: from accepting low albeit legal salaries to picking tomatoes
illegally (
as Alessandro Gassman, son of the famous actor, reminded us ).
The middle class is a silent mass that for many years has painfully digested globalization,
while believing in the promises of globalist politicians," explains Luciano Ghelfi, a
journalist of international affairs who has followed Lega from its beginnings. Ghelfi
continues:
This mirage has fallen under the blows it has received from the most serious economic
crisis since the Second World War. Foreign trade, easy credit (with the American real estate
bubble of 2008 as a direct consequence), peace missions in Libya (carried out by
pro-globalization French and English actors, with one motive being in my opinion the
diversion of energy resources away from [the Italian] ENI) were supposed to have created a
miracle; they have in reality created a climate of global instability.
Italy is of course not untouched by this phenomenon. It's easy enough to give an
explanation for the Five Stars getting votes from part of the southern electorate that is
financially in trouble and might hope for some sort of subsidy, but the North? The choice of
voting center right (with a majority leaning toward Lega) can be explained in only one way
– the herd (the middle class) has tried to rise up.
I asked him, "So in your opinion, is globalization in stasis? Or is it radically
changing?" He replied:
I think unrestrained globalization has taken a hit. In Italy as well, as we have seen
recently, businesses are relocating abroad. And the impoverished middle class finds itself
forced to compete for state resources (subsidies) and jobs which can be threatened by an
influx of economic migrants towards which enormous resources have been dedicated – just
think of the 4.3 billion Euros that the last government allocated toward economic
migrants.
This is an important element in the success of Lega: it is a force that has managed to
understand clearly the exhaustion of the impoverished middle class, and that has proposed a
way out, or has at least elaborated a vision opposing the rose-colored glasses of
globalization.
In all of this, migrants are more victims than willing actors, and they become an object on
which the fatigue, fear, and in the most extreme cases, hatred of the middle class can easily
focus.
What Conflicts Are Most Relevant Today?
At the same time, if we observe, for example in Italy, the positions taken by the
(pro-globalization?) Left, it becomes easier to understand why the middle class and also many
blue collar workers are abandoning it. Examples range from the unfortunate declarations of
deputy Lia Quartapelle on
the need to support the Muslim Brotherhood to the explanations of the former president of
the Chamber of Deputies, Laura Boldrini, on how the status of economic migrant should be seen as a model for the
lifestyle of all Italians . These remarks were perhaps uttered lightly (Quartapelle
subsequently took her post down and explained that she had made a mistake), but they are
symptomatic of a certain sort of pro-globalization cultural "Left" that finds talking to
potential voters less interesting than other matters.
From Italy to America (where
Hillary Clinton was rejected after promoting major international trade arrangements that
she claimed would benefit middle-class American workers) to the UK (where Brexit has been taken as a sort of
exhaust valve), the middle class no longer seems to be snoring.
We are currently seeing a political conflict between globalist and nationalist forces.
Globalists want more open borders and freer international trade. Nationalists want protection
for work and workers, a clamping down on economic migrants, and rules with teeth aimed at
controlling international trade.
If for the last twenty years, with only occasional oscillation, the pro-globalization side
has been dominant in the West, elections are starting to swing the balance in a new
direction.
Meanwhile, many who self-identify as on the Left seem utterly uninterested in the concerns
of ordinary people, at least in cases where these would conflict with the commitment to
globalization.
If the distinction between globalism and nationalism is in practice trumping other
differences, then we should not let ourselves be distracted by bright and shiny objects, and
keep our focus on what really matters.
From the Forbes link:
"The first downside of international trade that even proponents of freer trade must
acknowledge is that while the country as a whole gains some people do lose."
More accurate to say a tiny, tiny, TINY percentage gain.
Nice how they use the euphemism "country as a whole" for GDP. Yes, GDP goes up – but
that word that can never be uttered by American corporate media – DISTRIBUTION –
that essentially ALL gains in GDP have gone to the very top. AND THAT THIS IS A POLITICAL
DECISION, not like the waves of the ocean or natural selection. There is plenty that could be
done about it – BUT it STARTS with WANTING to do something effective about it .
Nice how they use the euphemism "country as a whole" for GDP.
Fresno Dan,
You have identified one of my pet peeves about economists and their fellow traveler
politicians. They hide behind platitudes, and the former are more obnoxious about that.
Economists will tell people that they just don't understand all that complexity, and that in
the name of efficiency, etc, free trade and the long slide toward neo-liberal hell must
continue.
I think the assertion that all economic gains have gone to the very top is not accurate.
According to 'Unintended Consequences' by Ed Conard, the 'composition of the work force has
shifted to demographics with lower incomes' between 1980 and 2005. If you held the workforce
of 1980 steady through 2005, wages would be up 30% in real terms, not including benefits.
I think the author has highlighted some home truths in the article. I once remember
several years ago just trying to raise the issue of immigration* and its impact on workers on
an Irish so-called socialist forum. Either I met silence or received a reply along the lines:
'that when socialists rule the EU we'll establish continental wide standards that will ensure
fairness for everyone'. Fairy dust stuff. I'm not anti immigrant in any degree but it seems
unwise not to understand and mitigate the negative aspects of policies on all workers. Those
chickens are coming home to roost by creating the type of political parties (new or
established) that now control the EU and many world economies.
During the same period many younger middle and upper middle class Irish extolled the
virtues, quite openly, of immigration as way of lowering the power and wages of existing
Irish workers so that the costs of building homes, labour intensive services and the like
would be concretely reduced; and that was supposed to be a good thing for the material well
being of these middle and upper middle classes. Sod manual labour.
One part of the working class was quite happy to thrown another part of the working class
under the bus and the Left**, such as it was and is, was content to let it happen. Then
established Leftist parties often facilitated the rightward economic process via a host of
policies, often against their own stated policies in election manifestos. The Left appeared
deceitful. The Irish Labour party is barely alive and subsisting on die-hard traditionalists
for their support by those who can somehow ignore the deceit of their party. Surreaslist
stuff from so-called working class parties,
And now the middle-middle classes are ailing and we're supposed to take notice. Hmmm. Yet,
as a Leftist, myself, it is incumbent upon us to address the situation and assist all
workers, whatever their own perceived status.
*I'm an immigrant in the UK currently, though that is about to change next year.
** Whether the "Left", such as the Irish Labour Party, was just confused or bamboozled
matters not a jot. After the financial crises that became an economic crisis, they zealously
implemented austerity policies that predominantly cleared the way for a right wing political
landscape to dominate throughout Europe. One could be forgiven for thinking that those who
called themselves Leftists secretly believed that only right wing, neo-liberal economic
policies were correct. And I suppose, being a bit cynical, that a few politicos were paid
handsomely for their services.
I think its easy to see why the more middle class elements of the left wing parties never
saw immigration as a problem – but harder to see why the Trade Unions also bought into
this. Partly I think it was a laudable and genuine attempt to ensure they didn't buy into
racism – when you look at much trade union history, its not always pleasant reading
when you see how nakedly racist some early trade union activists were, especially in the US.
But I think there was also a process whereby Unions increasingly represented relatively
protected trades and professions, while they lost ground in more vulnerable sectors, such as
in construction.
I think there was also an underestimation of the 'balancing' effect within Europe. I think
a lot of activists understimated the poverty in parts of Europe, and so didn't see the
expansion of the EU into eastern Europe as resulting in the same sort of labour arbitrage
thats occurred between the west and Asia. I remember the discussions over the enlargement of
the EU to cover eastern Europe and I recall that there seemed to be an inbuilt assumption
(certainly in the left), that rising general prosperity would ensure there would be no real
migration impact on local jobs. This proved to be entirely untrue.
Incidentally, in my constituency (Dublin Central) in past elections the local Labour party
was as guilty as any of pandering to the frequent racism encountered on the doorsteps in
working class areas. But it didn't do them much good. Interestingly, SF was the only party
who would consistently refuse to pander (At least in Dublin), making the distinction between
nationalist and internationalist minded left wingers even more confusing.
Yes, one has to praise the fact that the Unions didn't pander to racism – but that's
about all the (insert expletive of choice) did correctly.
Your other points, as ever, are relevant and valid but (and I must but) I tend to think
that parties like Labour were too far "breezy" about the repercussions about labour
arbitrage. But that's water under the bridge now.
Speaking about SF and the North West in general, they have aggressively canvassed recent
immigrants and have not tolerated racism among their ranks. Their simple reasoning was that
is unthinkable that SF could tolerate such behaviour amongst themselves when they has waged a
campaign against such attitudes and practices in the six counties. (SF are no saints, often
fumble the ball badly, and are certainly not the end-all-be-all, but this is something they
get right).
It has to be understood that much of immigration is occurring because of war, famine,
collapsing societies (mostly due to massive wealth inequality and corrupt governments).
Immigration is not the cause of the economic issues in the EU, it's a symptom (or a feature
if you're on top). If you don't correct the causes – neo-liberalism, kleptocracy,
rigged game – what ever you want to call it, then you too will become an immigrant in
your own country (and it will be a third world country by the time the crooks on top are
done).
Don't get caught up in the blame the other poor people game. It's a means to get the
powerless to fight among themselves. They are not in charge, they are victims just like
you.
Having spent a lot of time in the Indian subcontinent and Afghanistan and Iraq I have to
say that rampant overpopulation plays a big part. Anyone who can get out is getting out. It
makes sense. And with modern communications they all know how life is in Europe or the US in
contrast to the grinding horror that surrounds them.
But Conan tells me that Haiti is a tropical paradise! (my brother too spent a lot of time
in Afghanistan and Iraq working with the locals during his deployments)
"Twitter liberalism" is doing itself by not recognizing that much of the developing world
IS a corrupt cesspool.
Instead of railing against Trump, the Twitter-sphere needs to rail against the bipartisan
policies that drive corruption, and economic dislocations and political dislocations. and
rail against religious fundamentalism that hinders family planning.
But if you actually do that, rail against bipartisan neoliberal policies on social media
and IRL, the conservatives are far less hostile than the die-hard Dems. This is especially
true now, with all the frothing at the mouth and bloodlust about Russia. Its raised their
"it's ALL *YOUR* FAULT"-ism by at least an order of magnitude.
Actually, that's been true since the 18th C., at least for the US. TV may make it more
vivid, and Europe has changed places, but most Americans have immigrant ancestors, most often
from Europe.
However, it does seem that the policy of the EU, especially under the influence of Mutti
Merkel, signalled a free-for-all immigration stance over the last several years, completely
ignoring the plight of existing workers (many of whom would be recent immigrants themselves
and the children of immigrants). That the so-called Left either sat idly by or jumped on
Mutti's band wagon didn't do them any favours with working people. Every country or customs
union has and needs to regulate its borders. It also makes some sense to monitor labour
markets when unfavourable conditions appear.
It appears that only the wealthy are largely reaping the rewards of the globalist
direction trade has taken. These issues need to be addressed by the emerging Left political
parties in the West. Failure to address these issues must, I would contend, play into the
hands of the more right wing parties whose job is to often enrich the local rich.
But, bottom line, your are correct workers do not come out well when blaming other workers
for economies that have been intentionally created to produce favourable conditions for the
few over the many.
It's a blade with two sides.
There are push factors like the wars and poor countries. However neither of these causes can
be fixed. Not possible. Europe can gnash their teeth all they want, not even when they did
the unthinkable and put the US under sanctions for their warcrimes would the US ever stop.
First there would be color revolutions in western europe.
As important as the push factors are the pull ones. 90% or so of all refugees 2015 went to
Germany. Some were sent to other countries by the EU, these too immediately moved to Germany
and didn't stay where they were assigned. So the EU has to clean up their act and would need
to put the last 10 or so US presidents and administrations before a judge in Den Haag for
continued war crimes and crimes against humanity (please let me my dreams). The EU would also
need to clean up their one sided trade treaties with Africa and generally reign in their own
corporations. All that is however not enough by far and at most only half the battle. Even
when the EU itself all did these things, the poverty would remain and therefore the biggest
push factor. Humans always migrate to the place where the economy is better.
The pull factors is however at least as big. The first thing to do is for Germany to fix
their laws to be in sync with the other EU countries. At this point, Germany is utterly
alone, at most some countries simply don't speak out against german policy since they want
concessions in other areas. Main one here is France with their proposed EU and Euro reforms
but not alone by far.
Nationalists want protection for work and workers, a clamping down on economic
migrants, and rules with teeth aimed at controlling international trade.
Socialism in one country is a Stalinist theory, and falling back upon it in fear of
international capital is not only regressive but (assuming we aren't intentionally ignoring
history) relective of a defensive mentality.
In other words, this kind of thinking is the thinking of the whipped dog cringing before
the next blow.
Or perhaps they want to regulate and control the power of capital in their country. Which
is an entirely impossible proposition considering that capital can flee any jurisdiction and
cross any border. After all, transnational capital flows which were leveraged to the hilt in
speculative assets played an oversized role in generating the financial crisis and subsequent
crash.
It wouldn't be the first time I've been called a Stalinist though.
And why would we care whether it's a "Stalinist" theory? For that matter, although worker
ownership would solve some of these problems, we needn't be talking about socialism, but
rather about more functional capitalism.
Quite a leap in that last sentence; you haven't actually established anything of the
sort.
Personally, I believe capitalism needs to go away, but for it, or any other economic
system, to work, we would need a fair, equal, just, enforced rule of law that
everyone would be under, wouldn't we?
Right now the blessed of our various nations do not want this, so they make so that one
set is unfair, unequal, unjust, harshly enforced on most of their country's population while
they get the gentle rules.
For a society to function long term, it needs to have a fair and just set of rules that
everyone understands and follow, although the rules don't have to equal; people will tolerate
different levels of punishments and strictness of the rules. The less that is the case the
more dysfunctional, and usually the more repressive it is. See the Western Roman Empire, the
fall of just about every Chinese dynasty, the Russian Empire, heck even the American War of
Independence, and the American Civil War. In example, people either actively worked to
destroy the system or did not care to support it.
Thank you for the article, a pretty lucid analysis of the recent electoral results in
Italy and trends elsewhere. Although I would have liked to read something about people voting
the way they do because they are xenophobe fascist baby-eating pedophile racist Putin
friends. Just for fun.
Funny how the author's company promotes "Daily international job vacancies in UNDP, FAO,
UN, UNCTAD, UNIDO and the other Governative Organization, Non Governative Organization,
Multinationals Corporations. Public Relations, Marketing, Business Development."
Precisely the sort of jobs that infuriates the impoverishing middle classes.
As recently as 2015, Bernie Sanders defended not only border security, but also national
sovereignty. Asked about expanded immigration, Sanders flipped the question into a critique
of open-borders libertarianism: "That's a Koch brothers proposal which says essentially there
is no United States."
Unfortunately the ethnic division of the campaign and Hillary's attack seems to have led him
to change his mind.
That's probably due to the fact that just about everybody can't seem to differentiate
between immigration and mass migration. The latter issue is a matter of distributing the pain
of a collapsing order. state failure, and climate change while the former is simply engaging
in the comfortable rhetoric of politics dominated by the American middle class.
1 people vote they like. im not updated if the voters eat babies but i'll check and let u
know.
2 My company is not dream job. It is a for free ( and not making a penny) daily bulleting
that using a fre soft (paper.li) collect international qualified job offers for whoever is
willing to work in these sector.
i'm not pro or contro migrants. i actually only reported simple fact collating differents
point :)
Economic migrants seek prosperity and are justified in doing so, yet they can also be
seen as pawns in an international strategy that destroys the negotiating leverage of
workers. The resulting contradictions potentially render conventional political
classifications obsolete.
This appears on the homepage, but not here.
In any case, the 10% also seek prosperity. They are said to be the enablers of the 1%.
Until the left alters its thinking to reflect the crucial information presented in this
video, information more clearly and comprehensively spelled out in "Reclaiming the State" by
Mitchell and Fazi, resurgent rightwing nationalism will be the only outlet for those who
reject global neoliberalism's race to the bottom. It's that simple and sad.
To paint this as two pro-globalisation (within which you place the left) and
pro-nationalism is simplistic and repositions the false dichotomy of left vs right with
something just as useless. We should instead seek to speak to the complexities of the modern
political spectrum. This is an example of poor journalism and analysis and shouldn't have
been posted here, sorry Yves.
Thanks for your opinion. Check the format of this place: articles selected for information
or provoking thoughts, in support of a general position of driving toward betterment of the
general welfare, writ large.
The political economy is at least as complex as the Krebs or citric acid cycle that
biology students and scientists try to master. There are so many moving parts and
intersecting and competing interests that in the few words that the format can accommodate,
regarding each link, it's a little unkind to expect some master work of explication and
rhetorical closure every time.
The Krebs cycle is basically driven by the homeostatic thrust, bred of billions of years
of refinement, to maintain the healthy functioning and prolong life of the organism. There's
a perceivable axis to all the many parts of respiration, digestion, energy flows and such,
all inter-related with a clear organizing principle at the level of the organism. On the
record, it's hardly clear that at the level of the political economy, and all the many parts
that make it up, there is sufficient cohesion around a set of organizing principles that
parallel the drive, at the society and species level, to regulate and promote the energy
flows and interactions that would keep things healthy and prolong the life of the larger
entity. Or that their is not maybe a death wish built into the "cultural DNA" of most of the
human population.
Looks a lot to me that we actually have been invested (in both the financial and military
senses of the word) by a bunch of different cancer processes, wild and unregulated
proliferation of ecnomic and political tumor tissues that have invaded and undermined the
healthy organs of the body politic. Not so clear what the treatments might be, or the
prognosis. It is a little hopeful, continuing the biological analogy, that the equivalents of
inflammation and immune system processes appear to be overcoming the sneaky tricks that
cancer genes and cells employ to evade being identified and rendered innocuous.
Yes, "invested in a bunch of cancer processes" is a good description of allowing excessive
levels of predatory wealth. Thus you end up with a bunch of Jay Gould hyper capitalists whose
guiding principle is: I can always pay one half of the working class to kill the other half.
Divide and conquer rules.
It's mostly simply wrong. This doesn't describe the political views of almost anyone near
power anywhere as far as I can tell:
"Globalists want more open borders and freer international trade. Nationalists want
protection for work and workers, "
Most of the nationalist forces are on the right and give @#$# all for workers rights.
Really they may be anti-immigrant but they are absolutely anti-worker.
The middle class does not really exist, it was a concept invented by capitalists to
distract the workers from their essential unity as fellow wage slaves. Some make more wages,
some make less wages but they all have their surplus value, the money left over after they
have enough to take care of themselves, taken by the capitalist and used for his ends even
though he may not have worked in the value creation process at all.
Economic migrants are members of the working class who have been driven from their home
country to somewhere else by the capitalist system. While the article does mention capitalist
shock doctrine methods for establishing imperialism and correctly notes that economic
migrants are victims, it then goes on to try to lay a weak and insidious argument against
them. The author goes on citing multiple different cases of worker wages being driven lower
or stagnating, many of these cases have differing and sometimes complex reasons for why this
happened. But migrants and globalization are to blame he says and that our struggle is
nationalism vs globalism. He refuses to see what is staring him in the face, workers produce
surplus value for society, more workers produce more surplus value. If society finds itself
wealthier with more workers then why do workers wage fall or stagnate? He does note correctly
that this is due to the workers now having a weaker bargaining position with the capitalist,
but he seems to conclude from this without stating outrightly that we should then reject the
economic migrants because of this.
However, we could instead conclude that if more workers produce more surplus value but yet
their wages fall because the capitalist takes a larger share of the overall pot, that the
problem is not more workers but instead the capitalist system itself which was rigged to
exploit workers everywhere. Plus the workers bargaining position only weakens with a greater
number of them if they are all just bargaining for themselves, but if they were to bargain
togather collectively then there bargaining position has actually only grown even
stronger.
Also he falsly equates democratic party policies with leftists, instead of correctly
noting that the democratic party represents capitalist interests from a centrist position and
not the left. The strength of global capitalism can only be fought by a global coalition of
the working class. The struggle of Mexican and American workers are interrelated to each
other and the same goes for that of European and Middle Eastern workers. The time has come
for the left to raise the rallying cry of its great and glorious past.
You claim, as if it were obvious, that "economic migrants are members of the working class
who have been driven from their home country to somewhere else by the capitalist system."
Are all economic migrants therefore bereft of agency?
If the borders of the US were abruptly left completely open, a huge number of people would
enter the country tomorrow, for economic reasons. Would they all have been "driven" here, or
would they have some choice in the matter?
When you say, "he refuses to say what is staring him in the face, that [ ] more workers
produce more surplus value," you are not only taking a gratuitously pedantic tone, you are
actually not making a coherent critique. If economic migrants move from one country to
another, the total pool of workers in the world has not increased; while according to your
logic, if all the workers in the world were to move to Rhode Island, Rhode Island would
suddenly be swimming in the richness of surplus value.
When you say, "we could instead conclude that [..] the problem is not more workers but
instead the capitalist system itself which was rigged to exploit workers everywhere," you are
straw-manning the author but also making a purely rhetorical argument. If you think the
capitalist system can be replaced with a better one within the near future, then you can work
toward that; but in the meanwhile, nations, assuming that they will continue to exist, will
either have open borders or something short of that, and these decisions do affect
the lives of workers.
When you say he "falsly equates democratic party policies with leftists," the false
equivalence is coming from you. The article barely touches on the Democratic Party, and
instead draws most of its examples from Europe, especially Italy. In Italy, the public
figures he mentions call themselves part of the sinistra and are generally referred
to that way. You might perhaps feel that they are not entitled to that name (and in fact, the
article sometimes places "left" in quotation marks), but you should at least read the article
and look them up before discussing the matter.
From the article: "Meanwhile, many who self-identify as on the Left seem utterly
uninterested in the concerns of ordinary people, at least in cases where these would conflict
with the commitment to globalization."
To Be Fair, Verga clearly is skeptical about those claims to be "on the Left," as he
should be. Nonetheless, his initial mention of Democratic exemplars of globalization triggers
American reflexes.
Something before this failed to post; was rejected as a double post.
In brief: corporate globalization is a conservative, Republican policy that Bill Clinton
imposed on the Dems, where it has since become doctrine, since it pays. It's ultimately the
reason I'm a Green, not a Democrat, and in a sense the reason there IS a Green Party in the
US.
The author points to stagnant middle class income in USA and Western Europe but fail to
look the big picture. Middle class income has increased sharply in the past decades in Asia
and Eastern Europe. Overall the gain huge, even though life is tougher in richer
countries.
Overall the gain huge, even thought life is tougher in richer countries.
Please accept my apologies for saying this. I don't mean to offend. I just have to point
out something.
Many in the Democratic Party, as well as the left, are pointing to other countries and
peoples as well as the American 9.9% and saying things are great, why are you complaining?
With the not so hidden implications, sometimes openly stated that those who do are losers and
deplorables.
Saying that middle class incomes are merely stagnant is a sick, sick joke as well as an
untruth. As an American, I do not really care about the middle classes in Asia and Eastern
Europe. Bleep the big picture. The huge gains comes with a commensurate increase in homeless
in the United States, and a falling standard of living for most the of the population,
especially in the "wealthy" states, like my state of California. Most of us are using
fingernails to stay alive and homed. If those gains had not been caused by the losses, I
would be very please to see them. As it is, I have to live under President Trump and worry
about surviving. Heck, worry about the rest of my family doing so.
"Saying that middle class incomes are merely stagnant is a sick, sick joke as well as an
untruth."
+10,000
I mean I actually do care somewhat about the people of the world, but we here in "rich
countries" are being driven to homelessness at this point and told the goddamn lie that we
live in a rich country, rather than the truth that we live in a plutocracy with levels of
inequality approaching truly 3rd world. We are literally killing ourselves because we have to
live in this plutocracy and our one existence itself is not even worth it anymore in this
economic system (and we are lacking even a few of the positives of many other 3rd world
countries). And those that aren't killing ourselves still can't find work, and even if we do,
it doesn't pay enough to meet the most basic necessities.
1. It is unfortunate that Verga raises the rising cost of material inputs but fails to
meaningfully address the issue. One of the drivers of migration, as mentioned in Comments
above, is the population volcano currently erupting. Labor is cheap and globalization
possible in large part because the world population has grown from 2 Billion to over 7
Billion in the past 60-odd years. This slow-growing mountain of human beings has created
stresses on material inputs which are having a negative impact on the benefits derived from
declining labor costs. This becomes a death-spiral as capital seeks to balance the rising
cost of raw materials and agricultural products by driving down the cost of labor ever
further.
2. Verga touches on the interplay of Nationalism and Racism in the responses of political
parties and institutions in Italy and elsewhere. Voters appear to be abandoning Left and
left-ish parties because the Left have been unable to come up with a definintion of national
sovereignty that protects worker rights largely due to the importance of anti-racism in
current Left-wing thought. Working people were briefly bought-off with cheap consumer goods
and easy credit, but they now realize that low-wage migrant and off-shore workers mean that
even these goodies are now out of reach. The only political alternative currently on offer is
a brand of Nationalism defined by Racism -- which becomes acceptable to voters when the
alternative is Third-World levels of poverty for those outside the 1% and their 9%
enablers.
I don't see any simple solutions. Things may get very ugly.
I certainly see that policies tampering down free trade, both of capital and labor, can
benefit workers within a particular country. However, especially in the context of said
policies in "Western" countries, this can tend towards a, protect the working class within
the borders, leave those outside of it in impoverished squalor. Which doesn't mesh well with
the leftist goal of global class consciousness. Much like the racially segregated labor
policies of yesteryear, it's playing a zero-sum game with the working class while the
ownership class gets the "rising tide lifts all boats" treatment.
So how do we protect workers within the sovereign, while not doing so at the cost of the
workers outside of it? Schwieckart has an interesting idea, that tariffs on imports are used
to fund non-profits/higher education/cooperatives in the country of export. However, I think
we'd need something a bit more fine-tuned than that.
It has always baffled me that governments enable this global musical chairs game with the
labor market. Nearly all Western governments allow tax dodging by those who benefit the most
from their Navies, Armies, Patents, and Customs enforcement systems. However, it is the
working class that carries the brunt of that cost while corporations off-shore their
profits.
A simple-minded fix might be to start taxing foreign profits commensurate with the cost of
enabling those overseas profits.
Interesting that a corporation is a person just like us mortals when it is to their
advantage, but unlike us humans, they can legally escape taxation on much of their income
whereas a human being who is a US citizen cannot. A human citizen is generally taxed by the
US on all income regardless of its source. OTOH, corporations (among other means) routinely
transfer intellectual property to a non tax jurisdiction and then pay artificial payments to
that entity for the rights to use such property. It is a scam akin to a human creating a tax
deduction by transferring money from one pocket to another. Yes, proper taxation of
corporations is a simple-minded fix which is absolutely not simple to legislate. Nice try
though. Something else to ponder: Taxation without representation was said to be a major
factor in our war of independence from Britain. Today no one seems to be concerned that we
have evolved into representation without taxation. Doesn't see right to me.
"Klein analyzes a future (already here to some degree) in which multinational
corporations freely fish from one market or another in an effort to find the most suitable
(i.e. cheapest) labor force."
FWIW I don't think it's productive to talk about things like immigration in (or to) the US
in terms of just the here – as in what should/could we be doing here
to fix the problem. It's just as much if not more about the there . If we
view the global economic order as an enriched center feeding off a developing periphery, then
fixing the periphery should be first aim. #Wall or #NoBorders are largely incendiary
extremes. Ending Original Sin and creating some
sort of supranational
IOU/credit system (not controlled by World Bank or IMF!) will end the economic imbalance
and allow countries who will never export their way out of poverty and misery a way
to become equal first world nation states. With this equality, there will be less economic
migration, less peripheral poverty and potentially less political unrest. It's a gargantuan
task to be sure, but with rising Socialist sentiment here and abroad, I'd like to think we
are at least moving in the right direction.
If the rich were properly taxed then social tensions would be greatly reduced and if the
revenue raised were used to help the poorest in society much distress could be
alleviated.
I worry that debate on migration/globalisation is being encouraged to distract attention
from this issue.
I may indeed have taken a gratuitously pedantic tone and could have chosen a better one,
for that i apologise. I do however believe that much of my critique still stands, I will try
to go through your points one by one.
"Are all economic migrants therefore bereft of agency?"
Not all but many are, especially the ones that most people are complaining about. Many of
them are being driven from their home countries not simply for a better life but so they can
have something approaching a life at all. While to fully prove this point would require an
analysis of all the different migrants and their home country conditions, I do feel that if
we are talking about Syrian refugees, migrants from Africa risking their lives crossing the
Mediteranian sea, or CentralAmerican refugees than yes i do think these people to an extent
have had their agency taken from them by global events. For Syrians, by being caught in an
imperialist power struggle which while the civil war may not have been caused by it, it
certainly has been prolonged because of it. Not too mention America played a very significant
role in creating the conditions for ISIS, and western European powers don't have completely
clean hands either due to their long history of brutal imperialism in the mideast. Africa of
course also has an extensive past of colonization and suffers from a present of colonization
and exploitation as well. For Central Americans there is of course the voracious american
drug market as well as our politicians consistent appetite for its criminalisation to blame.
There is also of course global climate change. Many of these contributing conditions are not
being dealt with and so i believe that the migrations we have witnessed these last few years
are only the first ining of perhaps even greater migrations to come. How we deal with it now,
could determine whether our era is defined by mass deaths or something better. So to the
extent that i believe many of these migrants have agency is similiar to how a person climbing
onto the roof of there house to escape a flood does.
If the borders of the US were left completely open then, yes, there would most likely be a
rush of people at first but over time they would migrate back and forth according to their
needs, through the opening of the border they would gain agency. People often think that a
country not permitting its citizens to leave is wrong and immoral, but if most countries
close their borders to the people of a country going through great suffering, then it seems
to me that is essentially the same even if the rhetoric may be different. The likeliness of
this is high if the rich countries close there borders, since if the rich countries like the
US and Italy feel they can not take them in, then its doubtful countries on the way that are
much poorer will be able to either.
At the begining of your article you stated that "International commerce, jobs, and
economic migrants are propelled by a common force: profit." This is the capitalist system,
which is a system built upon the accumulation of capital, which are profits invested in
instruments of labor, aka machines and various labor enhancements. Now Rhode island is quite
small so there are geographical limitations of course, but if that was not an issue then yes.
Wage workers in the capitalist system produce more value than they consume, if this was not
the case they would not be hired or be hired for long. So if Rhode Island did not have the
geographical limitations that it does, then with more workers the overall pot of valuable
products and services would increase per capita in relation to the population. If the workers
are divided and not unified into cohesive and responsive institutions to fight for there
right share of the overall pie, which I believe should be all of it, then most of the gain to
society will go to the capitalist as increased profits. So it is not the migrant workers who
take from the native but instead actually the capitalist who exploits and trys to magnify
there difference. So if the capitalist system through imperialism helped to contribute to the
underlying conditions driving mass migration, and then it exploits there gratitude and
willingness to work for less than native workers, than I believe it follows that they will
wish to drive native anger towards the migrants with the ultimate goal of allowing them to
exploit the migrant workers at an even more severe level. This could be true within the
country, such as the US right now where the overarching result of anti-immigrant policies has
been to not get rid of them but to drive there exploitation more into the shadows, or through
mass deportations back to their home country followed by investments to exploit their
desperation at super low wages that will then compete with the rich country workers, it is
also possible they will all just die and everyone will look away. Either way the result will
still be lower wages for rich country workers, it seems to me the only way out of the impass
is for the native workers to realize their unity with migrant workers as exploited workers
and instead of directing that energy of hostility at each other instead focus it upon the
real root which is the capitalists themselves. Without the capitalists, more workers, held
withing certain geographic limitations of course, would in fact only enrich each other.
So while nations may indeed continue to exist for awhile, the long term benefit of native
workers is better served by making common cause with migrants against their mutual oppressors
then allowing themselves to be stirred up against them. Making this argument to workers is
much harder, but its the most beneficial if it can be made successfully.
This last point i do agree i may have been unfair to you, historically I believe the left
generally referred to anarchists, socialists and communists. So I often dislike the way
modern commentators use the left to refer to anything from a center right democrat like
Hillary Clinton all the way to the most hard core communist, it can make understanding
political subtleties difficult since anarchists, socialists and communists have radically
different politics than liberals, much more so than can be expressed along a linear line. But
as you point out you used quotes which i admit i did not notice, and of course one must
generally use the jargon of the times in order to be understood.
Overall i think my main critique was that it seemed that throughout your article you were
referencing different negative symptoms of capitalism but was instead taking that evidence
for the negatives of globalism. I may come from a more radical tradition than you may be used
to, but i would consider globalism to be an inherent aspect of capitalism. Capitalism in its
algorithmic quest for ever increasing profits generally will not allow its self to be bound
for long by people, nations, or even the physical and environmental limitations of the earth.
While one country may be able to restrict it for a time unless it is overcome completely it
will eventually reach out globally again. The only way to stop it is a prolonged struggle of
the international working class cooperating with each other against capitalism in all its
exploitive forms. I would also say that what we are seeing is not so much globalism vs
nationalism but instead a rearrangement of the competing imperial powers, Russia, China, US,
Germany and perhaps the evolution of multiple competing imperialisms similiar in nature to
pre- world war times but that may have to wait for later.
A great deal of your article did indeed deal with Italy which I did not address but I felt
that your arguments surrounding migrants was essentially of a subtle right wing nature and it
needed to be balanced by a socialist counter narrative. I am very glad that you took the time
to respond to my critique I know that putting analysis out there can be very difficult and i
am thankful for your response which has allowed me to better express and understand my
viewpoint. Once again I apoligise if I used some overly aggressive language and i hope your
able to get something out of my response as well.
I appreciate the more reflective tone of this reply. I believe there are still some
misreadings of the article, which I will try to clarify.
For one thing, I am not the author of the article! Enrico Verga is the author. I merely
translated the article. Enrico is Italian, however, and so for time zone reasons will be
unable to respond to your comments for a while. I am happy to write a bit on this in the
meantime.
You make two arguments.
The first is that many or most migrants are fleeing desperate circumstances. The article
speaks however consistently of "economic migrants" – there are some overlapping issues
with refugees, but also significant differences. Clearly there are many people who are
economically comfortable in their home countries and who would still jump at a chance to get
US citizenship if they could (look up EB-5 fraud for one example). Saying this does not imply
some sort of subtle critique of such people, but they are not a myth.
I actually found your second argument more thought-provoking. As I understand you, you are
suggesting something like the following. You support completely open borders. You acknowledge
that this would lead at first to massive shifts in population, but in the long run you say
things would stabilize. You acknowledge that this will lead to "lower wages for rich country
workers," but say that we should focus on the fact that it is only within the capitalist
system that this causality holds. You also suggest that it would probably lead, under current
conditions, to workers having their anger misdirected at migrants and therefore supporting
more reactionary policies.
Given that the shift to immediate open borders would, by this analysis, be highly
detrimental to causes you support, why do you favor it? Your reasons appear to be (1) it's
the right thing to do and we should just do it, (2) yes, workers might react in the way
described, but they should not feel that way, and maybe we can convince them not to feel that
way, (3) things will work themselves out in the long run.
I am a bit surprised at the straightforwardly idealistic tone of (1) and (2). As for (3),
as Keynes said, in the long run we are all dead. He meant by this that phenomena that might
in theory equilibrate over a very long time can lead to significant chaos in the short run;
this chaos can meanwhile disrupt calculations about the "long term" and spawn other
significant negative consequences.
Anyone who is open to the idea of radically new economic arrangements faces the question
of how best to get there. You are perhaps suggesting that letting global capital
reign supreme, unhindered by the rules and restrictions of nation-states, will in the long
run allow workers to understand their oppression more clearly and so increase their openness
to uniting against it. If so, I am skeptical.
I will finally point out that a part of the tone of your response seems directed at the
impression that Enrico dislikes migrants, or wants other people to resent them. I see nothing
in the article that would suggest this, and there are on the other hand several passages in
which Enrico encourages the reader to empathize with migrants. When you suggest that his
arguments are "essentially of a subtle right wing nature," you are maybe reacting to this
misreading; in any case, I'm not really sure what you are getting at, since this phrase is so
analytically imprecise that it could mean all sorts of things. Please try to engage with the
article with arguments, not with vague epithets.
There is a bit of a dissonance here. Human rights has been persistently used by
neoliberals to destabilize other regions for their own ends for decades now with little
protest. And when the standard playbook of coups and stirring up trouble does not work its
war and total destruction as we have seen recently in Iraq, Libya and Syria for completely
fabricated reasons.
Since increased migration is the obvious first consequence when entire countries are
decimated and in disarray one would expect the countries doing the destruction to accept the
consequences of their actions but instead we have the same political forces who advocate
intervention on 'human rights grounds' now demonizing migrants and advocating openly racist
policies.
One can understand one mistake but 3 mistakes in a row! And apparently we are not capable
of learning. The bloodlust continues unabated for Iran. This will destabilize an already
destabilized region and cause even more migration to Europe. There seems to be a fundamental
contradiction here, that the citizens of countries that execute these actions and who who
protest about migrants must confront.
Maybe they should pay trillions of dollars of reparations for these intervention so these
countries can be rebuilt and made secure again so migrants can return to their homes. Maybe
the UN can introduce a new fund with any country considering destabilizing another country,
for instance Iran, to first deposit a trillion dollars upfront to deal with the human
fallout. Or maybe casually destabilizing and devastating entire countries, killing millions
of people and putting millions more in disarray should be considered crimes against humanity
and prosecuted so they are not repeated.
Globalization is not a one-dimensional phenomenon, and some of its aspects are still intact.
Hollywood dominance, Internet, English language dominance, West technological dominance, will
not reverse any time soon.
What is under attack by Trump, Brexit, etc. is neoliberal globalization, and, especially
financial globalization, free movement of labor and outsourcing of manufacturing and services
(offshoring).
Neoliberal globalization was also based on the dollar as world reserve currency (and oil
trading in dollars exclusively). But this role of dollar recently is under attack due to the
rise of China. Several "anti-dollar" blocks emerged.
Trump tariffs are also anathema for "classic neoliberalism" and essentially convert
"classic neoliberalism" into "national neoliberalism" on the state level. BTW it looks like
Russia switched to "national neoliberalism" earlier than the USA. No surprise that Trump
feels some affinity to Putin ;-)
Attacks against free labor movement also on the rise and this is another nail in the
coffin of classic neoliberalism. In several countries, including the USA the neoliberal elite
(especially financial elite after 2008, despite that no banksters were killed by crowds) does
not feel safe given animosity caused by the promotion of immigration and resorts of
conversion of the state into national security state and neo-McCarthyism to suppress
dissent.
I think those attacks will continue, immigration will be curtailed, and "classic
neoliberalism" will be transformed into something different. Not necessarily better.
Several trends are also connected with the gradual slipping of the power of the USA as the
chief enforcer of the neoliberal globalization. Which is partially happened due to the
stupidity and arrogance of the USA neoliberal elite and neocons.
Another factor in play is the total, catastrophic loss of power of neoliberal propaganda
-- people started asking questions, and neoliberal myths no longer hold any spell on
population (or at least much less spell). The success of Bernie Sanders during the last
election (DNC was forced to resort to dirty tricks to derail him) is one indication of this
trend. This "collapse of ideology" spells great troubles for the USA, as previously it spells
great troubles for the USSR.
"Trumpism" as I understand it tried to patch the situation by two major strategies:
(1) splitting Russia from China
(2) Attempt to acquire dominant position in regions rick in hydrocarbons (Iraq, Iran,
Libya, Venezuela, etc)
But so far the decline of neoliberalism looks like Irreversible. It never fully recovered
from the deep crisis of 2008 and there is no light at the end of the tunnel.
Another powerful factor that works against neoliberal globalization is the end of cheap
oil. How it will play out is unclear, Much depends whether we will have a Seneca cliff in oil
production or not. And if yes, how soon.
This is the end of classic neoliberalism, no question about it, and the collapse of
neoliberal globalization is just one aspect of it
There's a longstanding joke in the USA regarding military intelligence in that it's always
lacking in said intelligence. What happens is raw intel gets politicized and thus what was
once neutral becomes dumb or false as one prefers.
What dooms the Outlaw US Empire and its vassals is its Zerosumism and related
neoliberal/neocon policies that are driven by same philosophy. Zerosumism precludes any sort
of equal dealing with others, even one's own citizenry--all is to go to the .01% as in
Feudalism. To jump ship to the If you can't beat 'em join 'em path, a wholesale rejection of
Zerosumism must occur and WinWinism must be embraced wholeheartedly in its place. Indeed, if
Trump really wants to accomplish his MAGA project, he only has one choice: He must dump
Zerosumism, which is destroying the USA and its allies, and embrace WinWinism. But to
accomplish that, Trump would need far more support from US citizenry and institutions than he
has at present. And unfortunately, his actions to date show he's still an acolyte of
Zerosumism as it benefits him and his class.
As with the supposedly ideologically driven Cold War1 (the Anti-Communist Crusade was used
as cover for neocolonialism), there is certainly an ideological divide driving Cold War2: The
West's Zerosumism versus Eurasia's WinWinism. The former is anti-people and planet while the
latter seeks to boost people while tackling a multiplicity of problems of which Climate
Change and its Ocean Acidification is but one. Corruption thrives in the former while its
anathema in the latter and subject to the death penalty in China--I'd also call that an
ideological divide as the latter embraces the Rule of Law while the former ignores or
tramples it (democracy versus totalitarianism).
What's really crazy is Zerosumism works against the tenets the West spelled out for itself
and the world in 1945's UN Charter--the West is actually engaged in killing its own ideals!
The Twitter link I posted @72 illustrates quite well the delusion of Zerosumism and the
ideological divide that's quickly becoming a chasm. What the Twitteridioti don't realize is
just how far their minds have been warped by Big Lie Media along with their lack of
initiative to determine the facts--particularly in 2016 when this all began. Even if Assange
or Murray were to name those who generated the DNC leak , I don't think that would
stop the massive recrimination and ongoing Big Lies--as Murray tells us, the FBI has yet to
ask him anything despite his very public admission that he knows the leakers!!!!! Launching
Cold War2 is more important than discovering the truth of the matter can be the only logical
conclusion.
"... Two U.S. 'realists', Henry Kissinger and Zbigniew Brzezinski, had always warned that the 'west' must keep China and Russia apart if it wants to keep its leading global position. Nixon went to China to achieve that. ..."
"... Years later the U.S. fell for the myth that it had 'won' the Cold War. It felt invincible, the 'sole superpower' and sought to 'rule them all'. It woke up from that dream after it invaded Iraq. The mighty U.S. military was beaten to pulp by the 'sand niggers' it despised. A few years later U.S. financial markets were in shambles. ..."
"... Crude attempts to further encircle Russia led to the Chinese-Russian alliance that now leads the SCO and soon, one might argue, the world. There will be no photo like the above from the SCO summit. The Chinese President Xi calls Russia's President Putin 'my best friend'. ..."
"... Agreed! But what will the US psychopaths do to maintain their grip when they realize they are really losing it? Nuclear war? ..."
"... Watching the two meetings play out has really been interesting, that the West is dead is not in question. And once it started it seems to be gaining momentum. I don't know how many readers here watch CGTN but it is amazing. My IQ goes up every time I watch. Astonishing how much more valuable information you get from a "heavily censored" Chinese news compared to MSM. The website is a little slow at times but it is well worth the wait. ..."
G-7 summits are supposed to symbolize "the west", its unity and its power. The summits pretended to set policy directions for
the world. We are happy to see that they are dead.
Trump was obviously not inclined to compromise.
Before attending the summit Trump trolled his colleagues by inviting Russia to rejoin the G-7/G-8 format without conditions. Russia
had been kicked out after Crimea voted to join its motherland. Merkel, who had negotiated the Minsk agreement with Russia, was furious.
She wants to use such an invitation as an element of future negotiations. (It is stupid talk. Russia is not interested in rejoining
the G-7/G-8 format.)
There are now many fields where the U.S. and its allies disagree: climate change, the Iran deal, trade are only the major ones.
Before leaving the summit Trump again
used
Mafia language against everyone else:
As he prepared to depart early from the G-7 summit in Charlevoix, Canada, to head to Singapore ahead of his planned meeting with
North Korean leader Kim Jong Un, Trump delivered an ultimatum to foreign leaders, demanding that their countries reduce trade
barriers for the U.S. or risk losing market access to the world's largest economy.
"They have no choice. I'll be honest with you, they have no choice," Trump told reporters at a news conference, adding that
companies and jobs had left the U.S. to escape trade barriers abroad. "We're going to fix that situation. And if it's not fixed,
then we're not going to deal with these countries. "
The row at the G-7 meeting was in stark contrast to the more important other meeting that happened today, the 18th Shanghai Cooperation
Organization (SCO) summit in Qingdao, China:
Dazzling against the city skyline of Qingdao, fireworks lit up the faces of guests who traveled across the vast Eurasian continent
to the coast of the Yellow Sea for the 18th Shanghai Cooperation Organization (SCO) summit, on Saturday night.
It is the first such summit since the organization's expansion in June 2017 when India and Pakistan joined as full members.
...
The Shanghai Spirit of mutual trust, mutual benefit, equality, consultation, respect for diverse civilizations and pursuit
of common development , was stated in the Charter of the SCO, a comprehensive regional organization founded in 2001 by China,
Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Russia, Tajikistan and Uzbekistan and later expanded to eight member states.
This weekend Xi will chair the summit for the first time as Chinese president, which is attended by leaders of other SCO member
states and four observer states, as well as chiefs of various international organizations.
...
The SCO has grown to be an organization covering over 60 percent of the Eurasian landmass, nearly half the world's population
and over 20 percent of global GDP.
Two U.S. 'realists', Henry Kissinger and Zbigniew Brzezinski, had always warned that the 'west' must keep China and Russia
apart if it wants to keep its leading global position. Nixon went to China to achieve that.
Years later the U.S. fell for the myth that it had 'won' the Cold War. It felt invincible, the 'sole superpower' and sought
to 'rule them all'. It woke up from that dream after it invaded Iraq. The mighty U.S. military was beaten to pulp by the 'sand niggers'
it despised. A few years later U.S. financial markets were in shambles.
Crude attempts to further encircle Russia led to the Chinese-Russian alliance that now leads the SCO and soon, one might argue,
the world. There will be no photo like the above from the SCO summit. The Chinese President Xi calls Russia's President Putin 'my
best friend'.
The 'west' has lost in Eurasia.
The U.S. is reduced to a schoolyard bully who beats up his gang members because their former victims have grown too big. Trump is off to Singapore to meet Kim Yong-un. Unlike Trump North Korea's supreme leader will be well prepared. It is likely that
he will run rings around Trump during the negotiations. If Trump tries to bully him like he bullies his 'allies', Kim will pack up
and leave. Unlike the U.S. 'allies' he has no need to bow to Trump. China and Russia have his back. They are now the powers that
can lead the world.
The 'west' is past. The future is in the east.
Posted by b on June 9, 2018 at 03:14 PM |
Permalink
Yeah, I was just thinking that. Trump is running full-speed into isolation. It's an ancient policy, which recalls the 1920s. What
does America need of the outside world? Good question.
I would think we will hear in the not too distant future of a European replacement of the US exchange systems, such as VISA.
The Americans have become too unreliable. Obviously the Russians and Chinese do have their own systems, but that won't do for
the EU.
Independence is going to be forced, and the consequences will be permanent.
Watching the two meetings play out has really been interesting, that the West is dead is not in question. And once it started
it seems to be gaining momentum. I don't know how many readers here watch CGTN but it is amazing. My IQ goes up every time I watch. Astonishing how much more
valuable information you get from a "heavily censored" Chinese news compared to MSM. The website is a little slow at times but
it is well worth the wait.
Last year during the border standoff with India they had on strident Indian voices arguing the Indian position every day. Imagine
if CNN had on Mexican reps regarding the wall - never happen.
Because Iran was under sanctions levied by the United Nations earlier, it was blocked from admission as a new member of the Shanghai
Cooperation Council [SCO]. The SCO stated that any country under UN sanctions could not be admitted. After the UN sanctions were
lifted, Chinese president Xi Jinping announced its support for Iran's full membership in SCO during a state visit to Iran in January
2016.Iran must join the SCO ASAP it is also a military alliance and should prepare itself for a big effort at regime change by
the US and lackeys. The moral of the story unless they hang together, the US will hang them separately.
Well, China as the text books say was always ' half the human story' - only eclipsed by Western connivance in the 1860's .I remember
my father argueing with high ranking Australian government and commercial figures in 1970.
My father argued Australia needed
to find its own voice with China and Chinese policy . They replied sneeringly '' Ralph , their just red communists and will never
amount to anything ' . Shortly thereafter Nixon flew to Beijing and my father sat back in his living room with a sardonic look
on his face !
You may like Freedland's article yesterday, which unusually I agreed with, that in fact Trump is a poor negotiator, and gives
away tricks he doesn't have to. Why no concession from Israel, over the move of the US embassy to Jerusalem? Why give away the
honour to NK of a one-to-one with the US president? I'd be surprised if NK surrenders, when they know what will happen if they
do.
"President Putin is the leader of a great country who is influential around the world," Xi said. "He is my best, most intimate
friend." Xi promised Russia and China would increase their coordination in the international arena.
Putin expressed his thanks for the honor and said he saw it as an "evaluation" of his nation's efforts to strengthen its relationship
with its southern neighbor.
"This is an indication of the special attention and respect on which our mutual national interests are based, the interests
of our peoples and, of course, our personal friendship," Putin said.
Interesting that Trump has said Russia should be invited back into the west's G7/G8 at this time. In cold war 1.0, Soviet Union
was the main enemy of the US and China was split away from the Soviet Union. In this war, Trump sees China's economy as the main
threat to the US and is trying but failing to pull Russia away from China.
They did win the Cold War. That's how they became the'sole superpower'.
If winning the Cold War is about vanquishing communism, they flat out lost. Because, while they were concentrating on the end
of the USSR and celebrating, China was going up and up and up. They never saw her coming, yet to this day and for the foreseeable
future, China is a socialist, Marxist country.
So the new, desperate Western spin is to try to argue that China has "succumbed" to capitalism. Yeah, right, a country where
all the private companies have to have members of the CPC on their board and hand over enough shares to the state to grant it
veto powers, not to mention the Central bank and all its major companies are state-owned... Lol.
After the collapse of the USSR the consensus - even of the alt-media (what little of it existed) was that a new American century
was on the way and the whole world would be better off for it. A decade later in 2003 the consensus (post 'shock & awe' Gulf War
2) was that America had the ability to re-structure the Asian /African world and that it would all be for good.
15 years later we are all sick of the fruit of that delusion. So we look to another power to save us... Do we understand nothing?
Without the accountability of multi-polarity, Western supreme power all became security-obsessed privilege, self-aggrandizement,
blatant plunder and total disregard for moral value and life. Power corrupts - it knows no exceptions.
If the West is truly dead, the East will be no different.
Interesting that Trump has said Russia should be invited back into the west's G7/G8 at this time.
Thought of a moment to annoy the Europeans. It is obvious that Trump was pissed off about having to attend, and left at the earliest
opportunity. The Europeans heard that, and will draw the inevitable conclusions.
Lea @ 13 Socialist, Marxist, Capitalist, what does it matter: it seems to work for China, at least for the time being. It's success
makes me think that a bit more government control of corporations might not be such a bad thing.
The summit with Kim will be fascinating to observe. In my view, NK has finessed the US and the Trump administration to a degree
I would not have thought possible, even from native US insiders. To do it long range from the other side of the world speaks to
me a lot about the power of Asia, and the clarity of view from there.
I agree with Laguerre @9 that Trump is a terrible negotiator (forgive that I didn't read the Guardian piece). I would take
this much further and say that all the US institutions themselves are culturally crippled in terms of understanding what's happening
in the ascendancy of Asia. All of their negotiation is feeble, because their grasp on their own true position is based on yesterday's
view of their power. You cannot go into negotiation without knowing what you hold.
Every day, I become more confident in the ability of the elder nations to put the young western empires to rest without their
being triggered into death spasms.
Red Ryder @11 - I see China's full-on drive for the one Road as its way of waging total war, its strategic masterstroke to
render the enemy powerless without the enemy's realizing that it is being attacked. Russia as the other half of the Double Helix
mesmerizes the west with weaponry while China undercuts the ground. Both countries are fully at war, and winning, while unseeing
commenters complain that it's time for them to "do something." How superb the silk rope drawn so softly around the throat.
It's a beautiful play. I very much hope - and truly expect - that we can all survive to be able to sit back and admire it as
the years unfold.
I have a small quibble with b's wording but thank him for following and reporting on our evolving world.
b's words:"
The U.S. is reduced to a schoolyard bully who beats up his gang members because their former victims have grown too big.
"
My rewording:
The global elite have their US puppet acting like a schoolyard bully who beat up his gang members because their former victims
have grown too big.
The West is trying to consolidate power and control while they still have some ghost of a chance. How they hold countries after
this global divorce will be interesting.
At his time the West has little to offer humanistically except its vice grip on most economic interaction and the tools including
banking underpinning the "system". The elite have deluded the public in the West for centuries about private finance behind the
scenes of all/most conflict......pointing to other religions but never their own.
It sure is getting interesting. IMO, the two Koreas are going to announce a reconciliation that requires the removal of America
military forces/bases et al, which fits in with the fake nationalism efforts of Trump.
That the US and the EU and their respective camps are at loggerheads over trade and perhaps other economic issues should not (I
hope) lead readers to assume that one side has the interests of the public it represents uppermost in mind. As the US and the
Anglosphere is dominated by one set of neoliberals, so Germany and the lackey EU nations following Berlin are dominated by another
set of neoliberals in thrall to an export-led mercantilist ideology. Just as the elites in charge of US power structures are only
interested in enriching themselves, the same can be said for those in charge of power structures in Europe. Whether under the
US or the EU, the public suffers.
Notice that Germany benefits from being the major economic power in the EU while its fellow EU nations around the Atlantic
and Mediterranean rim flail under a huge debt (and Greece is being punished back into the impoverished colonial status it held
under Nazi German occupation) and eastern European EU members are following suit running their economies into the ground and having
to beg NATO into setting up bases in their territories to attract money. At the same time German workers are becoming poorer,
they are not benefiting from Berlin's economic policies, they are not reproducing fast enough so Berlin needs to bring in more
foreign workers in the guise of "refugees" to prop up factories and keep wages low.
@ Madderhatter67: The US did not win the Cold War because the Cold War was only ever a propaganda front for the secret war
waged by US / UK elites against Russia and China to dominate and rob these nations and their neighbours of their natural resources.
thanks b - and for the laugh with the marjorie and homer pic for comparison!
i think this parallel you draw is a good one.. the west is certainly floundering... i am not sure how global finance responds
here... i can't imagine the 1% being on the wrong side of a bet on the direction of things here either..
@6 harry law.. did iran make it into the sco? it sounds like it did.. good!
@14 les7.. regarding your last line - i tend to agree with that viewpoint..
@19 jen... do you think it will be somehow different if the power shifts to russia/china? i guess i am not so sanguine over
power, regardless of who holds it.
Very well put, only issue that as to be dealt with is all those Stan Countries, they are a hibernating and breeding ground for
Terrorists and Arms dealers , who don't care who they sell arms to and how they get them to rogue regimes.
I see China's full-on drive for the one Road as its way of waging total war, its strategic masterstroke to render the enemy
powerless without the enemy's realizing that it is being attacked.
I do think you're exaggerating there.
China's past history has been one of a country very contented with itself, much like the US, because defended geographically
by vast deserts. A longer history, so some foreigners did traverse the deserts.
The Chinese exported their products by foreign ships (Arabo-Persian) arriving at Canton, and buying cargoes, or camel caravans
arriving in the north and buying silk. The Chinese themselves did not travel abroad very much, and so didn't know very much about
surrounding countries, or the rest of the world. There was a fleet of Chinese junks which arrived in the Gulf in the 14th century,
but it was the only one.
Today's situation is not so different. There are Chinese interventions in Africa, but their diplomacy is pretty ham-fisted.
The Belt-and-Road initiative is in fact intended to bring up to speed Central Asian countries like Tajikistan. Fine, Tajikistan
needs it, but it's not world-changing.
The rail freight from Beijing to Frankfurt works better as an intermediate between sea and air freight, but essentially it
is what has always happened - foreigners export Chinese products. The Chinese don't know how to run a foreign policy.
from their body language, I would say that Japan is surely 'with' Trump and the US, but that's only because that arch-reactionary
Abe is in power.....and when he goes, and go he will, there will be a big period of adjustment...some day.
The scambastic Trump could be inclined to make a slightly more fair deal in Singapore just to make a deal, but he is going extra
early (no jet lag) and will be controlled by Pompeo with his 'Grim Reaper' CIA-dog/warhawk/translator/born & raised S. Korean
with multiple relations in their South KCIA (NIS) and cabinet leadership, Andrew Kim (born Kim Sung-hyun). Kim's purpose will
be to control Trump's spontaneaous decision making, inform him on what he reads as N. Korea's intent, and give baseline hawkish
color to the translations for his own hawkish viewpoint.
bjd, bolton is trump's overseer, making sure he doesn't step out of line.
Trump is a poor negotiator, and gives away tricks he doesn't have to. Why no concession from Israel, over the move of the
US embassy to Jerusalem?
Laguerre, you have it backwards. the embassy move, the iran deal, and the appointment of bolton are all concessions trump made,
as payback for adelson's millions to both the gop and his campaign. possibly also has a little something to do cambridge analytica,
honey traps or whatever.
The imprint of the 84-year-old's political passions is seen in an array of Donald Trump's more controversial decisions, including
violating the Iran nuclear deal, moving the American embassy in Israel to Jerusalem, and appointing the ultra-hawkish John
Bolton as national security adviser.
......The New York Times reported that Adelson is a member of a "shadow National Security Council" advising Bolton
James @ 21: I think one should always be a bit suspicious of those who hold power, especially those who find themselves holding
the uppermost hand in power as a result of victory in war (whether in the form of actual military combat, trade war or other wars
in soft power).
Russia under Vladimir Putin and China under Xi Jinping may be fine but will their successors know not to abuse the power they
may gain from the New Silk Road projects encompassing Eurasia and Africa?
Of course, it is about Iran. It's the Iranian deal that the EU needs to continue. They benefit as the biggest vendors to Iran.
They want to get inside that developing 70 million person market, also.
Bolton wants regime change. The EU knows that will be worse than Iraq. And economically, the EU will be in the dumps for 2
decades if there's another war they are forced to join. And they will be forced to join. They cannot say No to the Hegemon.
The EU 2, Germany and France, are at a historic moment of truth.
They could have a great future with Russia, China, Iran, the BRICS, SCO, OBOR and EAEU or they could be crippled by the Empire.
"...But Canada, which pushed for Russia to get the boot in 2014, is not onside. 'Russia was invited to be part of this club
and I think that was a very wise initiation, and an invitation full of goodwill,'[FM Chrystia Freeland] she told reporters at
the summit. 'Russia, however, made clear that it had no interest in behaving according to the rules of Western democracies..."
it's kind of wonderful to see all these imperialist and former neo-colonial powers fighting among themselves.
unfortunately, like the old African proverb goes, when the elephants fight it's the grass and small animals that suffer.
I see no reason for optimism for the peoples of europe at this point, as the stranglehold of the Trioka is perhaps as strong
as ever, and hundreds of millions of people are suffering; the people simply have to get organized at all levels and take back
their sovereignty at least as a start
The US still has the power of the dollar in its arsenal. The UK and EU, and any nation that deals with Wall Street, are addicted
to US investment in dollars. Since the EU is run by the banks, and western banks can't function with the dollar, any statements
by the EU that they're going to avoid US sanctions over Iran are meaningless.
The equation is essentially this: you can have your sovereignty or you can have the benefits of the dollar that make your 1%
very rich. You can't have both. Since the EU is ruled by the 1% banker/investor class they will forestall any attempts to regain
sovereignty by the people. In a sense, Europe is like Russia 10-15 years ago, thinking that the US is the key to the golden calf.
Russia learned the hard way they needed to establish some independence (although to this day Russia doesn't have nearly the financial
independence one might hope), and China saw from Russia's example they needed to do so as well. This led them to team up on many
economic initiatives while seeking to reduce the dominance of the dollar.
Perhaps someday Europe will learn this lesson. But as long as the EU exists, I kind of doubt it. The EU-crats will cry and
criticize Trump but the bankers love US money too much to let them actually do anything serious.
If the West is dead and the East is the future, then why are so many Chinese buying houses and living part time in Canada, Australia,
and the USA? Why is there so much emphasis put on Western education facilities by Asians?
Most Americans don't no matter how much explanation I go into.
They insist its a tariff or duty,which its not.
I've given up trying to explain its a sales tax on all,paying at customs is merely a cash flow issue for the importer.A reclaimable
input on his VAT return,did it many times myself.
there is only a bunch of paid of administrators running the countries and the corporations that pay them.
Trumps quid pro quo is deals that benefit his family. I don't thinks he cares one bit about the GOP and how the party fundraises.
He cares about advancing his family and keeping the loot.
maybe we should realize that the concepts of east and west, as much as neo liberalism or neo conservatism or any other moniker
that we could apply to loot and steal - legally and without shame under the guise of trade - are concepts of the past.
the future is for the strongest, irrespective of their origins or philosophy. we are burning this planet down with a vengeance
and we - the people - are to numerous and too expensive to keep.
while we debate and some even chuckle with delight as to how the west is treated by trump, or how much the west deserves to
be made redundant and all hail the Russians and the Chinese - the king is dead, long live the king - it is us who dies in the
wars, it is our children that are being kidnapped and locked up in prison when arriving on the border seeking asylum, it is us
who will watch the women in our live die in childbirth because of lack of medical care, it is us who will die of black lung, hunger,
thirst and general malice.
and while we gossip, they laugh all the way to the bank.
b, we have no doubt that the North Korean leadership is ready for the Americans and know the score with a rising Eurasia and a
sinking NATO. However, your last assumption of Kim being more than ready to go toe-to-toe with DJT smacks of some of the worst
tendencies of many posters here who are ready to venerate Kim without him ever even making formal address of more than a few words
to a) his people, 2) his allies, or D) even the world. This is a laughable assumption from you and it would be like having the
most beautifully-made garment handy for a long while, desperate for anyone to come along so you could fling it on them to prove
they were the most amazing supreme leader in all the world!
This is not to say I do not want the NoKos to succeed in their endeavors of getting a fair deal...hardly: I think they will
succeed eventually because they are shrewd. But this is an attempt to squash the unbelievably propagandistic (or naive) attempts
to place the mantle of imperviousness, all-knowingness, utterly-innocentness, and insurmountably-cleverousness onto the boy that
would be king. DJT could eat a boy like Kim for breakfast if left alone from their advisors.
Trump is very dependent on his base. He knows them well. At risk of hitting a discordant note I suspect a lot of his fans are
happy seeing him sock it to the goddamn ch*nks and euro faggots.
It's a big weekend. G7, SCO, Bilderberg, NATO Defence Ministers meeting in Brussels and the huge NATO "Drills" including the Baltic
States and for the first time, Israel.
Oh, and the US called on NATO to add 30 land battalions, 30 air fighter squadrons, and 30 naval ships to "counter Russian aggression."
I predicted it would become the G6+1 and so it has. Trump told his staffers NOT to sign the Joint Communique, which I believe
is a first.
On the issue of power
and the BRI , the linked item is a trove of info as it focuses on perhaps the most problematic region of the SCO/BRI.
If Europe is to break free from the Outlaw US Empire, Merkel must be jettisoned and independent-minded leaders must take control
of Germany and EU. I'm not at all surprised with how events went in Canada. However, I see the Policy as the Bully, not Trump,
the policy still being the attempt to gain Full Spectrum Domination. What's most important, IMO, is this spectacle will not go
unnoticed by the rest of the world. The Outlaw US Empire cannot make it any plainer that it's the primary enemy state of all except
the Zionist Abomination. I think Abe wonders why he's there and not in Qingdao.
Although this item focuses on Kashmir , it should be read after the longer article linked above. There's little news as of
yet coming from Qingdao other than who's cooking what and sideline meets. I expect more coming out beginning Monday. Of course,
Kim-Trump begins now, it being the 10th in Singapore already.
The difference between the two projects- the western Empire and the Eurasian schemes exemplified by OBOR- is that the former,
as 500 years of experience teaches us, relies on ethnic divisions, wars and competition while the latter requires peace and co-operation.
In a sense that answers Jen @ 32. It really doesn't matter who runs the governments of China and Russia, provided that they
can prevent the imperialists from distracting them into rivalry. It was that which, thanks to plenty of stupidity on both sides,
gave rise to the tensions of which Nixon and Kissinger took advantage.
Had the USSR and China ironed out their small differences on the sixties- and Vietnam gave them a perfect excuse to do so,
history would have been very different and probably much less bloody.
The truth is that, as b asserts, the SCO is already much more important than the G7- America and the Six Dwarfs. How much more
important is shown by the role of Freeland (the neo-Nazi Ukrainian apologist) in insisting on holding the line against Russia's
re-admission to a club that it almost certainly does not want to rejoin.
Trump may not be a 'good negotiator' but he has a position of relative strength vis a vis the rest of the G7 who cannot negotiate
because they do as they are told. If they won't do what Trump tells them to do they will be on the lookout for someone else to
give them orders-they have no idea of independence or sovereignty. Just watch most of them scuttle back to Brussels for ideas,
or set up back channels to Moscow- once a puppet always a puppet.
The Sino-Soviet Split occurred while Stalin was still alive--he refused to allow the Chinese to develop "Communism with Chinese
Characteristics" just like any other European Orientalist. And as the Monthly Review article I linked, the Chinese must
beware of becoming/being seen as Imperialistic in their zeal to push BRI--Imperialist behavior will kill the Win-Win concept as
it will revert to just another Zero-sum Game.
One of the factors which has been killing the 'Democratic' West is that its bribed & blackmailed leaders have alienated themselves
from The People whose views they were elected to represent.
No-one living in a so-called democracy is prepared to tolerate a leader who spends too much time praising, and making excuses
for, the crimes of the racist-supremacist Zionist Abomination (h/t karlof1) and its Piece Process in Palestine. It can be persuasively
argued that embrace of and fealty to the Z.A. is the only factor which Western Leaders have in common. And it's neither a coincidence
nor happenstance.
Grrr! I still don't get why so many humans believe anything good comes from chucking aside one greedy oppressive arsehole then
replacing it with another. Sure the SCO has a founding document laden with flowery words and seemingly wonderful concepts but
I say "So what" check out the UN charter or the amerikan constitution and you'll find the same.
These issues of justice & equity
cannot be fixed by swapping bosses because every society has its share of pathologically fucked up greedies who have the means
and lack of empathy to destroy anything and everyone in their lust for whatever it is they imagine they need.
We have to accept that will never change and that trying to purge the planet of those types just creates more of them from
within the structure most successful in effecting the swap.
I know I sound like a scratched disc but the only fix that could hope to work is one that smashes the conglomerations into
tiny shards, reducing the world to thousands of small self governing entities; sure some places will still end up being taken
over by low self esteem motivated arseholes, but not only will they not be able to do as much damage, arseholes stand out in a
small society where more 'normal' humans interact with them - currently all the pr1cks coagulate in spots such as the G7 and few
non-pr1cks ever get close enough to see them for what they are. A low count on the old degrees of seperation register makes it
much more difficult for the scum to rise. Making sure that no chunk is sufficiently big to force its will on another would also
be vital.
That won't fix everything, but who outside some totally screwed up anal regressive would want that anyway? I just want to live
in a world where no one cops it like the entire Yemeni population currently is. I see no benefit in moving the horror from Yemen
to Uigar-land or whatever place the new bosses decide should be their fun palace of hate, murder and misery.
The Congo and/or Nigeria another coupla sites of misery for money. Timor Leste aka East Timor, now that the Portuguese expats
in the form of the man with the Nobel stamp of obeisance to the monied
Jose Ramos Horta have done over the
locals, something Xanana Gusmăo always said could happen. Horta's arseholeness made the wealthiest nation in the world (divide
resources by population) riven by poverty, lack of health and education services plus of course old favourite, racist oppression.
Check out these kids here untroubled
by issues like getting a decent phone signal or their ranking on Twitch - wondering where their next decent feed is coming from
is prolly their most pressing issue.
Swapping SCO for G7 will do SFA for them or anyone else unlucky enough to be living on top of whatever the current 'must have'
is deemed to be.
Humanity either learns how to live with itself on an equal basis or it will perish; it's really that simple. The likes of the
Outlaw US Empire, its NATO vassals and the Zionist Abomination are shining examples of what MUST be exorcised for ever more.
EDITOR'S NOTE: This article originally appeared at TomDispatch.com
.
Leaders are routinely confronted with philosophical dilemmas. Here's a classic one for our Trumptopian times: If you make enemies
out of your friends and friends out of your enemies, where does that leave you? What does winning (or losing) really look like? Is
a world in which walls of every sort encircle America's borders a goal worth seeking? And what would be left in a future fragmented
international economic system marked by tit-for-tat tariffs, travel restrictions, and hyper-nationalism? Ultimately, how will such
a world affect regular people? Let's cut through all of this for the moment and ask one crucial question about our present cult-of-personality
era in American politics: Other than accumulating more wealth and influence for himself,
his children
, and the
Trump family empire , what's Donald J. Trump's end game as president? If his goal is to keep this country from being, as he likes
to complain, " the world's
piggy bank ," then his words, threats, and actions are concerning. However bombastic and disdainful of a history he appears to
know little about, he is already making the world a less stable, less affordable, and more fear-driven place. In the end, it's even
possible that, despite the upbeat economic news of the moment, he could almost single-handedly smash that piggy bank himself, as
he has many of his own
business
ventures . Still, give him credit for one thing: Donald Trump has lent remarkable new meaning to the old phrase "the imperial
presidency." The members of his administration, largely a set of aging white men, either conform to his erratic wishes or get fired.
In other words, he's running domestic politics in much the same fashion as he oversaw the boardroom on his reality-TV show The
Apprentice . Now, he's begun running the country's foreign policy in the same personalized, take-no-prisoners, you're-fired
style. From the moment he hit the Oval Office, he's made it clear at home and abroad that it's his way or the highway. If only,
of course, it really was that simple. What he will learn, if "learning process" and "President Trump" can even occupy the same sentence,
is that "firing" Canada, the European Union (EU), or for that matter China has a cost. What the American working and the middle classes
will see (sooner than anyone imagines) is that actions of his sort have unexpected global consequences. They could cost the United
States and the rest of the world big-time. If he were indeed emperor and his subjects (that would be us) grasped where his policies
might be leading, they would be preparing a revolt. In the end, they -- again, that's us -- will be the ones paying the price in
this global chess match.
The Art of Trump's Deals
So far, President Trump has only taken America out of trade deals or threatened to do so if other countries don't behave
in a way that satisfies him. On his
third day in the White House, he honored his campaign promise to remove the United States from the Trans-Pacific Partnership,
a decision that opened space for our allies and competitors, China in particular, to negotiate deals without us. Since that grand
exit, there has, in fact, been a boom in side deals involving China and other Pacific Rim countries that has weakened, not strengthened,
Washington's global bargaining position. Meanwhile, closer to home, the Trump administration has engaged in a barrage of NAFTA-baiting
that is isolating us from our regional partners, Canada and Mexico.
Conversely, the art-of-the-deal aficionado has yet to sign a single new bilateral trade deal. Despite steadfast claims that he
would serve up the best deals ever, we have been left with little so far but various tariffs and an onslaught against American trading
partners. His one claim to bilateral-trade-deal fame was the
renegotiation of a six-year-old
deal with South Korea in March that doubled the number of cars each US manufacturer could export to South Korea (without having to
pass as many safety standards).
As White House Press Secretary Sarah Sanders
put
it , when speaking of Kim Jong-un's North Korea, "The President is, I think, the ultimate negotiator and dealmaker when it comes
to any type of conversation." She left out the obvious footnote, however: any type that doesn't involve international trade.
In the past four months, Trump has imposed tariffs, exempting certain countries, only to reimpose them at his whim. If trust were
a coveted commodity, when it came to the present White House, it would now be trading at zero. His supporters undoubtedly see this
approach as the fulfillment of his many campaign promises and part of his
classic method of keeping both friends and enemies guessing until he's ready to go in for the kill. At the heart of this approach,
however, lies a certain global madness, for he now is sparking a set of trade wars that could, in the end,
cost millions of American jobs.
The Allies
On May 31st, Commerce Secretary Wilbur Ross
confirmed that Canada, Mexico, and the EU would all be hit with 10 percent aluminum and 25 percent steel tariffs that had first
made headlines in March. When it came to those two products, at least, the new tariffs bore no relation to the previous average 3
percent tariff on US-EU traded goods.
In that way, Trump's tariffs, initially supposed to be
aimed at
China (a country whose president he's praised to the skies and whose trade policies he's lashed out at endlessly), went global.
And not surprisingly, America's closest allies weren't taking his maneuver lightly. As the verbal-abuse level rose and what looked
like a possible race to the bottom of international etiquette intensified, they threatened to strike back.
In June, President Trump ordered
that a promised 25 percent tariff on
$50 billion worth of imported
goods from China also be imposed. In response, the Chinese, like the Europeans, the Canadians, and the Mexicans, immediately
promised a massive response in kind. Trump countered by threatening another
$200 billion in tariffs against China. In the meantime, the White House is targeting its initial moves largely against products
related to that country's "
Made in China 2025 " initiative, the Chinese government's strategic plan aimed at making the country a major competitor in advanced
industries and manufacturing.
Meanwhile, Mexico began adopting retaliatory tariffs on American imports. Although it has a far smaller economy than the United
States, it's still the second-largest importer of US products, buying a whopping
$277 billion of them last year. Only Canada buys
more. In a mood of defiance stoked by the president's
hostility to its people, Mexico
executed its own trade gambit, imposing
$3 billion in 15
percent–25 percent tariffs against US exports, including pork, apples, potatoes, bourbon, and cheese.
While those Mexican revenge tariffs still remain limited, covering
just 1 percent
of all exports from north of the border, they do target particular industries hard, especially ones that seem connected to President
Trump's voting "base." Mexico, for instance, is by far the largest buyer of US pork exports, 25 percent of which were sold there
last year. What its 20 percent tariff on pork means, then, is that many US producers will now find themselves unable to compete in
the Mexican market. Other countries may follow suit. The result: a possible loss of up to 110,000 jobs in the pork industry.
Our second North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA) partner (for whose prime minister, Justin Trudeau, there is "
a special place in hell ," according to a key Trumpian trade negotiator) plans to invoke tariffs of up to 25 percent on about
$13 billion in US products beginning on July 1st. Items impacted
range "from ballpoint
pens and dishwasher detergent to toilet paper and playing cards sailboats, washing machines, dish washers, and lawn mowers." Across
the Atlantic, the EU has similarly announced retaliatory tariffs of 25 percent on 200 US products, including such American-made classics
as Harley-Davidson motorcycles, blue jeans, and bourbon.
Trump Disses the Former G7
As the explosive Group of Seven, or G7, summit in Quebec showed, the Trump administration is increasingly isolating itself from
its allies in palpable ways and, in the process, significantly impairing the country's negotiating power. If you combine the economies
of what might now be thought of as the G6 and add in the rest of the EU, its economic power is collectively larger than that of the
United States. Under the circumstances, even a small diversion of trade thanks to Trump-induced tariff wars could have costly consequences.
President Trump did try one "all-in" poker move at that summit. With his game face on, he first suggested the possibility of wiping
out all tariffs and trade restrictions between the United States and the rest of the G7, a bluff met with a healthy dose of skepticism.
Before he left for his meeting with North Korean leader Kim Jong-un in Singapore, he even suggested that the G7 leaders "consider
removing every single tariff or trade barrier on American goods." In return, he claimed he would do the same "for products from their
countries." As it turned out, however, that wasn't actually a venture into economic diplomacy, just the carrot before the stick,
and even it was tied to lingering
threats of severe penalties.
The current incipient trade war was actually launched by the Trump administration in March in the name of American "
national security
." What should have been highlighted, however, was the possible "national insecurity" in which it placed the country's (and the
world's) future. After all, a similar isolationist stance in the 1920s and the subsequent market crash of 1929 sparked the global
Great Depression,
opening the way for the utter devastation of World War II.
European Union countries were
incredulous when Trump insisted, as he had many times before, that the "U.S. is a victim of unfair trade practices," citing the
country's trade deficits, especially with
Germany and China. At the G7 summit, European leaders did their best to explain to him that his country isn't actually being
treated unfairly. As French President Emmanuel Macron
explained , "France runs trade
deficits with Germany and the United Kingdom on manufactured goods, even though all three countries are part of the EU single market
and have zero tariffs between them."
Does neoliberalism in crisis has a tendency to slide into neofascism?
Notable quotes:
"... Massive global inequality underlies our era of economic and political unrest. The rise of nationalist, populist movements, and the faltering influence of the Davos class of free-trade advocates, have rendered neoliberalism an ideology without committed ideologues. So what will bring about the end of neoliberalism -- the left? the right? the incompetence of the professional political class? -- and, when it's gone, what will replace it? We asked five of our favorite minds for their views on the direction we urgently need to go next. ..."
"... Take the State ..."
"... Postcapitalism: A Guide to Our Future ..."
"... The Crisis of Care ..."
"... A Revolution of Managers ..."
"... Who Needs the Negro? ..."
"... Universal Base Income ..."
"... The Guardian ..."
"... The Nation ..."
"... The New York Times ..."
"... With Liberty and Dividends for All: How to Save Our Middle Class When Jobs Don't Pay Enough ..."
"... All economic problems, in the neoliberal view, are attributable to sluggish growth, which is in turn the result of insufficient competition. The neoliberal agenda seeks to stimulate competition, suggesting that if countries are allowed to run deficits, the people's work ethic will suffer as a result. ..."
"... Given the neoliberal experiment we've been engaged in since the seventies, we see economic growth is still sluggish and further, global economic inequality continues to increase. Yet if I consider what's likely to prove to be the undoing of moral universe theory, it's the reality that it's very sloppy theology. ..."
"... he doesn't recognize that it is the Oligarchy that is in control and has a stranglehold on both the RNC and DNC to maintain its power. ..."
"... The Right is desperate for change but has really no place to go. Our society has been pulled so far right that there is little to nothing for them to grasp on to display possibilities of improvement for the populous. ..."
"... The Left are the ones who are poised to "Kill Neoliberalism." Joelle Gamble hides the fact that the establishment DNC is almost totally controlled by the Oligarchy and that there are already multiple organizations that are aggressively challenging them. ..."
"... The Progressive Left will be the ones to take down Neoliberalism, what comes next is the real question. Will the Oligarchy be able to implement a fascist regime to maintain its control or will they be cut off at the knees by a socialist government? ..."
Massive global inequality underlies our era of
economic and political unrest. The rise of nationalist, populist movements, and the faltering influence of the Davos class of free-trade
advocates, have rendered neoliberalism an ideology without committed ideologues. So what will bring about the end of neoliberalism
-- the left? the right? the incompetence of the professional political class? -- and, when it's gone, what will replace it? We asked
five of our favorite minds for their views on the direction we urgently need to go next.;
Joelle Gamble
The dramatic effects of deindustrialization, automation,
globalization, and the growing disparities of wealth and income --
including by race and region -- are undermining political norms in much of the West. 4
Activists and academics alike have linked these trends to the neoliberal ideology that has guided policy-making over the past
several decades. This ideology has resulted in pushing the widespread deregulation of key industries, attempting to solve most
social and economic problems through market competition, and privatizing public functions like the operation of prisons and institutions
of higher education. Neoliberal ideas were considered such common sense during the 1980s and '90s that they were simply never
acknowledged as an ideology. Now, even economists at the International Monetary Fund are willing to poke holes in the ideology
of neoliberalism. Jonathan Ostry, Prakash Loungani, and Davide Furceri wrote in 2016: "The costs in terms of increased inequality
are prominent. Such costs epitomize the trade-off between the growth and equity effects of some aspects of the neoliberal agenda."
5
We know that neoliberalism has now provoked populist responses on the left and the right. But are either of them sufficient
to end its rule? 6
The left needs to stop playing defense. This means enacting policies like universal health care, free college, and ending the
private-prison industry.
Left populism, if organized, could end the neoliberal order: As espoused by leaders like Pramila Jayapal and Keith Ellison,
left populism demands public control as well as redistribution; it is pro-regulation, pro-state, and anti-privatization. These
values are inherently at odds with the small-government, anti-regulatory tenets of neoliberalism. If an aggressive left-populist
agenda is successfully implemented, neoliberalism would be defeated. The barrier to implementation is the left's inability to
be consistent and organized. 7
Populism on both the left and right has proved difficult to organize and suffers from a lack of leadership. On the left, the
struggle for organization has been playing out in the Democratic Party's leadership fights. Politicians and activists are attempting
to close the ideological gap between the party's base and its leaders. Without enough trust to allow leaders to set and execute
a well-resourced strategy -- to say nothing of the resources themselves -- the left faces huge obstacles to actually implementing
an agenda that spells the end of neoliberal dominance, despite having an ideology that could usher in a post-neoliberal world.
8
Left populism can technically end neoliberalism. But can right-wing populism? 9
One should hope that right-wing populism doesn't become organized enough to end the neoliberal order. Public control is not
a cogent ideology on the right. That leaves room for privatization -- a main pillar of neoliberalism -- to continue to grow. Only
if right-wing nationalism turns into radical authoritarian nationalism (read: fascism) will its relationship with corporate power
turn into an end to the neoliberal order. In the United States, this would mean: 1) the delegitimization of Congress and the judicial
branch, 2) the increased criminalization of activists and political opponents, and 3) the nationalization of major industries.
10
Right-wing nationalism seems to be crafted to win electoral victories at the intersection of protectionist and xenophobic sentiments.
Its current manifestation, designed to win over rural nativist voters, appears to be at odds with the pro-free-trade policies
of neoliberalism. However, the lines between far-right nationalism and the mainstream right are blurring, especially when it comes
to privatization and the role of government. In the United States, Trump's agenda looks more like crony capitalism than a consistent
turn from neoliberal norms. His administration seems either unwilling or incapable of taking a heavy-handed approach to industry.
11
As with many of his business ventures, we've already seen Trump-style nationalism fail in his nascent administration. The White
House caved to elite Republican interests with the attempt to repeal and replace the Affordable Care Act and with Trump's decision
to stack high-level economic-policy roles with members of the financial elite. Trump's proclaimed nationalist ideology seems to
be a rhetorical device rather than a consistent governing principle. It's possible that the same might be true for other right-wing
nationalists. France's Marine Le Pen has cozied up, though admittedly inconsistently, to business interests; she has also toned
down her rhetoric, especially on immigration, over the years in order to win centrist voters. Meanwhile, Dutch nationalist Geert
Wilders notably lost to a more mainstream candidate in March's general elections. Yet the radical right is more organized in Europe
than in the United States. We may not see the same level of compromise and incompetence as in the Trump administration. Moves
toward moderation may only be anomalous and strategic rather than a sign of a failing movement. 12
So what does all of this mean for the future of neoliberalism, particularly in the American context? I believe there are two
futures in which neoliberalism's end is possible. In the first, the left decides to stop playing defense and organizes with the
resources needed to build sustained power, breaking down the policies that perpetuate American neoliberalism. This means enacting
policies like universal health care and free college, and ousting the private-prison industry from the justice system. In the
second future, a set of political leaders who have been emboldened by Trump's campaign strategy gain office through mostly republican
means. They could concentrate power in the executive in an organized manner, nationalize industries, and criminalize communities
who don't support their jingoistic vision. We should hope for the first future, as unlikely as it seems in this political moment.
We've already seen the second in 20th-century Europe and Latin America. We cannot live that context again. 13
Paul Mason
Take the State 14
I wrote in Postcapitalism: A Guide to Our Future that if we
didn't ditch neoliberalism, globalization would fall
apart -- but I had no idea that it would happen so quickly. In hindsight, the problem is that you can put an economy on life support,
but not an ideology. 15
After the 2008 financial crisis, quantitative easing and state support for banks kept the patient alive. As the Bank of England
governor Mark Carney said last year at the G20 summit in Shanghai, central banks have even more ammunition to draw on should they
need it -- for example, the extreme option of "helicopter money," in which they credit every bank account with, say, $20,000.
So they can stave off complete stagnation for a long time. But patchwork measures cannot kick-start a new era of dynamism for
capitalism, much less faith in its goodness. 16
The human brain demands coherence -- and a certain amount of optimism. The neoliberal story became incoherent the moment the
state had to take dramatic steps to support a failing financial market. The form of recovery stimulated by quantitative easing
boosted the asset wealth of the rich but not the income of the average worker -- and rising costs for health care, education,
and pension provision across the developed world meant that many people experienced the "recovery" as a household recession. 17
The one big cause that needs to animate us in the future is a systemic project of transition beyond capitalism.
So they began looking for answers, and the right had an easy one: Ditch globalization, free trade, and relatively free migration
rules, as well as acceptance of the undocumented migrants who keep the economy working. That's how we get to Donald Trump, Marine
Le Pen, Geert Wilders, Viktor Orbán, the Law and Justice party in Poland, and UKIP in Britain. Each of them has promised to make
their country "great again" -- by diverting growth toward it and migrants and refugees away. 18
For 30 years, neoliberalism taught national elites that they were better off collaborating in the creation of a positive-sum
game: Everybody wins, ultimately, even if your factory moves to China. That was the rationale. 19
Economic nationalism is logical if you believe that stagnation will last a long time, creating a zero-sum or even a negative-sum
game. But the projects of economic nationalism will fail. This is not because economic nationalism has always been a losing strategy:
Adolf Hitler practically abolished German unemployment within five years, and Franklin Roosevelt triggered a spectacular recovery
and reindustrialization with the New Deal. But these were programs of another era, in which business models were primarily national
and monopolies operated in the sphere of one big nation and its colonies; where the state was heavily enmeshed in the national
economy; and where global trade was puny and economic migration low compared to now. 20
To try a repeat of autarky in the 21st century will trigger dislocation on a large scale. Some countries will win: It's even
feasible that, although led by an imbecile, the United States could win. However, "winning" in this context means bankrupting
other countries. Given the complexity and fragility of the globalized system, the cities of the losing nations would resemble
New Orleans after Hurricane Katrina. 21
In the long term, for the left, the transition to a system beyond capitalism must be based on the possibility of a low-work,
high-abundance society. This is the essence of the postcapitalism project that I proposed: automate work, replace wages with a
basic income and heavy state provision of services, and enforce competition among the rent-seeking monopolies in order to force
the price of their goods so low that people can survive scarce and precarious work. 22
As Manuel Castells's research group in Barcelona has found, as the market staggers, more and more people actually begin to
adopt nonmarket survival tactics, mechanisms, and institutions like informal lending, co-ops, time banks, and alternative currencies.
And that's the basis for an economic counterpower to big capital and high finance. 23
But in the short term, a whole generation of the left that reveled in aimlessness and horizontality needs to split the difference
between that and effective, organized politics. Call it "diagonality," if you want: Without ceasing to care about the 100 small
causes that have animated us in the past, the one big cause that needs to animate us in the future is a systemic project of transition
beyond capitalism. For now, that project has to be pursued at the level of big cities, regions, states, and alliances of states
-- that is, at scale. 24
The hardest thing for the old left to accept will be that this means using the existing, oppressive, imperfect state while
simultaneously trying to democratize it. Street protests, mass resistance, strikes, and the occupation of squares are great ways
to assemble the forces. But the arc of the story from 2011 to 2015 -- Occupy, the Indignados, and the Arab Spring -- shows that
we have to do more than simply create a counterpower: We need to take power and diffuse it at the same time. 25
Bryce Covert
The Crisis of Care 26
American parents are being crushed between
trying to care for their families and working enough hours to survive financially.
This problem plagues parents of both genders, up and down the income scale, and it is upending the way Americans view the capitalist
system. This crisis of care is fostering solidarity among the millions of Americans who share this challenge, as well as support
for solutions that will end the reign of neoliberalism. 27
Among low-income Americans, especially people of color, both parents have often worked outside the home to make ends meet.
Nonetheless, the ideal has been, until very recently, a stay-at-home mother and a father working for pay outside the home. World
War II undermined this idyll, pushing women into factories as men went to fight abroad. The gauzy 1950s dream of single-earner
families masked the reality that women continued to pour into the workforce. 28
Today, women make up about half of the paid labor force in the United States, including more than 70 percent of women with
children. This means that in about half of married heterosexual couples, both the husband and wife work. This has given women
far more access to the public sphere and, with it, greater status and equality both inside and outside the home. 29
But it's also meant a crunch for families. There is no longer a designated parent to stay home with the kids or care for aging
relatives, and the workplace isn't designed to help with that predicament. Instead, work is devouring people's lives. 30
You can see this problem in the rising number of Americans who worry about their work/life balance. About half of parents of
both genders say they struggle to reconcile these competing demands. Fathers are particularly freaked out: More than 45 percent
feel they don't spend enough time with their children, compared with less than a quarter of mothers (probably because more women
reduce their paid work to care for children). As the baby-boomer generation ages, a growing elderly population threatens to trap
even more working people in the predicament of caring for aging parents, raising young kids, and trying to make a living. 31
The result has been that more and more people are being forced to reckon with the fact that capitalism's unquenchable thirst
for labor makes a balanced life impossible. This, in turn, is fostering a greater sense of solidarity among them as workers struggling
against the demands of corporate bosses. This growing crisis has already led to some policy-making. The expansion of overtime
coverage by the Obama administration means that workers will either be better compensated for putting in long hours or have their
schedules pared back to a more humane 40-hour work week (though it remains to be seen what will happen to the overtime expansion
under President Trump). Legislation guaranteeing paid time off has swept city and state governments. These are policies that challenge
the idea that we should give everything of ourselves to our jobs. 32
The crisis of care has also revived the notion that the public should deal with these shared problems collectively. While other
developed countries have spent money to create government-funded solutions for child care over the past half-century, Americans
have insisted child care remain a private crisis that each family has to solve alone. The United States provides all children
age 6 to 18 with a public education, but for children under the age of 6, it offers basically nothing. Head Start is available
to some low-income parents, and a smattering of places have started experimenting with universal preschool for children ages 3
and 4. Outside of that, parents are left to a pitiful private system that often doesn't even offer them enough slots, let alone
quality affordable care. 33
Americans have increasingly come to recognize that this situation is ridiculous and are throwing their support behind a government
solution. Huge majorities support
spending more money on early-childhood programs. American parents haven't yet gone on strike
against capitalism's endless demands on their time or the government's failure to provide public support. But the crisis is reaching
a boiling point, and it's transforming our relationship to America's neoliberal system. 34
William Darity Jr.
A Revolution of Managers 35
Marx's classic law of motion for bourgeois
society -- the tendency of the rate of profit to fall -- was the foundation for
his prediction that capitalism would die under the stress of its own contradictions. But even Marx's left-wing sympathizers, who
see the dominant presence of corporate capital in all aspects of their lives, have argued that Marx's prediction was wrong. It
has become virtually a reflex to assert that modern societies all fall under the sway of "global capitalism," and that a binary
operates with two great social classes standing in fundamental opposition to each other: capital and labor. 36
Suppose, however, that Marx was correct in his expectation that capitalism, like other social modes of production before it,
will wind down gradually, but wrong in his expectation that it would be succeeded by a "dictatorship of the proletariat," a civilization
without class stratification. Suppose, indeed, that the age of capitalism is actually reaching its conclusion -- but one that
doesn't involve the ascension of the working class. Suppose, instead, that we consider the existence of a third great social class
vying with the other two for social dominance: what was seen in the work of such disparate thinkers as James Burnham, Alvin Gouldner,
Barbara Ehrenreich, and John Ehrenreich as the managerial class. 37
Suppose, indeed, that the age of capitalism is reaching its conclusion -- but one that doesn't involve the ascension of the working
class.
The managerial class comprises the intelligentsia and intellectuals, artists and artisans, as well as state bureaucrats --
a credentialed or portfolio-rich cultural aristocracy. While the human agents of global capital are the corporate magnates, and
the working class is the productive labor -- labor that is directly utilized to generate profit -- the managerial class engages
comprehensively in a social-management function. The rise of the managerial class is the rise to dominance of unproductive labor
-- labor that can be socially valuable but is not a direct source of profit. 38
A surplus population under capitalism has a purpose: It exists as a reserve army of the unemployed, which can be mobilized
rapidly in periods of economic expansion and as a source of downward pressure on the demands for compensation and safe work conditions
made by the employed. Therefore, capital has little incentive to eliminate this surplus population. In contrast, the managerial
class will view those identified as surplus people as truly superfluous. The social managers consider population generally as
an object of control, reduction, and demographic administration, and whoever is assigned to the "surplus" category bears the weight
of the arbitrary. 39
To the extent that identification of the surplus population is racialized, particular groups will be targets for social warehousing
and extermination. The disproportionate overincarceration of black people in the United States -- a form of social warehousing
-- is a direct expression of the managerial class's preferences regarding who should be deemed of low necessity. The exterminative
impulse is evident in the comparative devaluation of black lives that prompted resistance efforts like the Black Lives Matter
movement. The potential for black superfluity in the managerial age is evident in prescient works like Sidney Willhelm's
Who
Needs the Negro? (1970) and Samuel Yette's The Choice (1971), both published almost 50 years ago. 40
The assault on "big" and invasive government constitutes an attack on the managerial class by both capital and the working
class. Despite endorsing military spending, receiving lucrative government contracts, and enjoying the benefits of publicly provided
infrastructure like roads, highways, and railways, corporate capital calls for small government. This is a strategic route to
slashing social-welfare expenditures, with the goal of reducing the wage standard and eliminating all regulations on corporate
predations. Despite benefiting from social-welfare expenditures, the working class gravitates to a new brand of populism that
blends anticorporatism with anti-elitism (and anti-intellectualism), xenophobia, and a demand for a smaller and less intrusive
state. Since "big" government constitutes the avenue for independent action on the part of the managerial class, an offensive
of this type directly undermines the "new" class's base of power. 41
Calls for smaller government are a strategic route to slashing social-welfare expenditures, wage standards, and regulations on
corporate predation.
But the managerial class also possesses another attribute that is both a strength and a weakness. Unlike capital and labor,
whose agendas are driven to a large degree by the struggle over the character of a society structured for the pursuit of profit,
the managerial class has no anchor for its ideological stance. In fact, it's a social class that is wholly fluid ideologically.
Some of its members align fully with the corporate establishment; indeed, the corporate magnates -- especially investment bankers
-- look much the same as members of the managerial class in terms of educational credentials, cultural interests, and style. Other
social managers take a more centrist posture harking back to their origins in the "middle class," while still others position
themselves as allies of the working class. And there are many variations on these themes. 42
Depending on where the ideological weight centers most heavily, the managerial class can take many directions. During the wars
in southern Africa against Portuguese rule, Amílcar Cabral once observed that for the anticolonial revolution to succeed, "the
petty bourgeoisie" would need to commit suicide as a social class, ceasing their efforts to pursue their particular interests
and positioning themselves fully at the service of the working class. One might anticipate that the global managerial class will
one day be confronted with the choice of committing suicide, in Cabral's sense, as a class. But the question is: If such a step
is taken, will they place themselves fully at the service of labor or capital? 43
Peter Barnes
Universal Base Income 44
There is no single solution to economic
inequality and insecurity in America, but there's one that could go further than any
other. It's a universal base income, as distinct from a universal basic income. 45
A universal base income of a few hundred dollars a month is not the same as a universal basic income of, say, $1,000 a month.
The latter, at least in some places, is enough to survive on; the former decidedly is not. And while the latter is the dream of
many, it is far too expensive -- and threatening to America's work ethic -- to be enacted anytime soon. If a universal basic income
ever happens here, it will be because it was preceded for many years by a universal base income, gradually nudged upward like
Social Security and the minimum wage. So let's take a look at that. 46
A universal base income is both a springboard and a cushion for every participant in our fast-changing market economy -- like
giving everyone $200 for passing "Go" in a game of Monopoly. It supplements, but does not replace, labor income (which for the
last 30 years has stagnated or declined), and it does so without judgment or stigma. It is grounded on the principle that, in
a prosperous albeit volatile and increasingly unequal economy, everyone has a right to some cash flow they can count on. 47
In practical terms, a universal base income would be simple to administer. Eligible recipients (anyone with a valid Social
Security number, which can include legal immigrants) would receive an equal amount of money every month, wired to their bank accounts
or debit cards. The system would look and feel like Social Security, or a monthly version of the dividends that all Alaskans receive.
People who don't need the extra income would be enabled by a check-off option to donate it to any IRS-approved charity. 48
A universal base income, I should note, has nothing to do with automation, robots, or artificial intelligence. It has a lot
to do with enhancing every American's security, reducing their stress, and giving our poor and middle classes a leg to stand on
-- the very opposite of what our economy does now. 49
A universal base income would have other benefits as well. It is an answer -- perhaps the answer -- to long-term economic
stagnation, a trickle-up form of Keynesianism that would stimulate our economy through increased household spending. Moreover,
if funded by fees on unproductive activities like pollution and speculation, it would help solve two other deep problems of 21st-century
capitalism: climate change and financial instability. And it wouldn't need to replace or reduce spending on current programs that
benefit the poor, a regressive trade-off that conservatives favor but most progressives oppose. 50
There are six large demographic groups (with some overlap) that could form the core of a movement for a universal base income:
millennials (the first generation of Americans destined to earn less than their parents), low-wage and on-demand workers (the
so-called precariat), women (who still earn less than men and aren't paid at all for much of the work they do), African Americans
(who suffer from past and present injustices), retired and near-retired workers (who can't live on Social Security alone), and
poor people of all colors. Environmentalists might also link arms with the cause if one of the revenue sources is a tax on pollution.
It will, of course, be no simple feat to persuade these diverse groups that what they can't achieve separately they may be able
to achieve together. But it has happened before, and, in the post-Sanders era, it could happen again. 51
In the political realm, a universal base income would bring our nation together by affirming that we are all in the same economic
boat. It would unite our desperate poor and our anxious middle class, young and old, women and men, white people and people of
color. It would make millions of Americans less stressed, healthier, and perhaps even happier. And it could make many of us proud
to be American. 52
Ready to Fight Back? Sign Up For Take Action Now
Fourscore and two years ago, Franklin Roosevelt's Committee on Economic Security produced the classic report that led to passage
of the first Social Security Act. The report itself went beyond security for the aged. It proclaimed: "The one almost all-embracing
measure of security is an assured income. A program of economic security, as we vision it, must have as its primary aim the assurance
of an adequate income to each human being in childhood, youth, middle age, or old age -- in sickness or in health." 53
The committee added that, for reasons of political expediency, it was proposing only an assured income for the elderly, but
it hoped that the rest of its vision would be implemented in the not-too-distant future. Much of it has been, but not all. A lifelong
base income, along with health insurance for all, are the next pieces. 54
Joelle Gamble Joelle Gamble is a graduate
student in public affairs at Princeton University.
All good articles. Darity in particular on "managerial class" who I would say are oligarch wannabees not recognizing their
true allegiance. Credit and leases allow this group to live the lifestyle, sold and pushed upon them 401Ks, and stock ownership
completes the charade.
Walter Pewen says: May 6, 2017 at 3:22 pm
I appreciate Bryce Cover's analysis. What is happening, in the United States, is life at home is ceasing to exist. In large
part due to the dual income requirement. Also a BIG issue on the coasts at least, is people building families (and everyone)
simply cannot afford housing. How long can this go on? Here in California capitalism is working people to death on all levels.
We used to have enviable lifestyles for the middle and working class both. Not now. It's truly evil.
Wesley Decker says: May 5, 2017 at 12:09 pm
Neoliberalism is Weber's Protestant Work Ethic dressed up by Milton Friedman to do battle with seventies Limits to Growth
science. It argues that we inhabit a moral universe where rich and poor deserve what they have and don't have. The challenge
posed by Limits to Growth, which has it that outcomes exhibit sensitive dependence to initial conditions, is a seen as a direct
affront to such moral ordering.
All economic problems, in the neoliberal view, are attributable to sluggish growth, which is in turn the result of insufficient
competition. The neoliberal agenda seeks to stimulate competition, suggesting that if countries are allowed to run deficits,
the people's work ethic will suffer as a result.
The science instead considers what's necessary for populations of living organisms to survive and grow. It recognizes that
shortages of necessary resources the result of excessive competition. In this view unconstrained competition is naturally at
odds with a finite supply of resources, resulting in the economic problems we see.
Given the neoliberal experiment we've been engaged in since the seventies, we see economic growth is still sluggish
and further, global economic inequality continues to increase. Yet if I consider what's likely to prove to be the undoing of
moral universe theory, it's the reality that it's very sloppy theology.
I can see Joelle Gamble's assessment with either the left or the right taking over Neoliberalism. But he doesn't recognize
that it is the Oligarchy that is in control and has a stranglehold on both the RNC and DNC to maintain its power.
The Right is desperate for change but has really no place to go. Our society has been pulled so far right that there
is little to nothing for them to grasp on to display possibilities of improvement for the populous.
The Left are the ones who are poised to "Kill Neoliberalism." Joelle Gamble hides the fact that the establishment DNC
is almost totally controlled by the Oligarchy and that there are already multiple organizations that are aggressively challenging
them.
He also doesn't say a word about the most popular leader in country by far, Senator Sanders. Bernie Sanders' presidential
primary election has provided a laser for the populous to see who the DNC really serves, by forcing them to reveal its ugly
face behind their mask to maintain their power. Sanders has also provided the platform for issues that the populous has been
rallying behind and has shown how the establishment squelches their needs with platitudes and deflection.
The Progressive Left will be the ones to take down Neoliberalism, what comes next is the real question. Will the Oligarchy
be able to implement a fascist regime to maintain its control or will they be cut off at the knees by a socialist government?
"... The official who described this to me said Trump believes that keeping allies and adversaries alike perpetually off-balance necessarily benefits the United States, which is still the most powerful country on Earth. ..."
"... "No," the official said. "There's definitely a Trump Doctrine." "What is it?" I asked. Here is the answer I received: "The Trump Doctrine is 'We're America, Bitch.' That's the Trump Doctrine." ..."
In an interview with "CBS Evening News" anchor Jeff Glor in Scotland on Saturday, President
Trump named the European Union -- comprising some of America's oldest allies -- when asked to
identify his "biggest foe globally right now."
"Well, I think we have a lot of foes. I think the European Union is a foe, what they do to us
in trade. Now, you wouldn't think of the European Union, but they're a foe. ..."
Bashing allies is an essential component of the
Trump doctrine :
The second-best self-description of the Trump Doctrine I heard was this, from a senior
national-security official: "Permanent destabilization creates American advantage." The
official who described this to me said Trump believes that keeping allies and adversaries
alike perpetually off-balance necessarily benefits the United States, which is still the most
powerful country on Earth.
...
The best distillation of the Trump Doctrine I heard, though, came from a senior White
House official with direct access to the president and his thinking. I was talking to this
person several weeks ago, and I said, by way of introduction, that I thought it might perhaps
be too early to discern a definitive Trump Doctrine. "No," the official said. "There's
definitely a Trump Doctrine." "What is it?" I asked. Here is the answer I received: "The
Trump Doctrine is 'We're America, Bitch.' That's the Trump Doctrine."
I think Trump simply has a very prosaic, very sincere even, view about the world: he treats
his equals equally (e.g. Putin, Xi, Kim) and his unequals unequally (NATO countries'
leaders, Abe etc.).
That is, he simply views his allies for what they really are: clients. And when you go
visit clients, you expect them to stop, lower their heads, listen and obey you: that's why
he probably found strange the fact that the Europeans were insulted by his behavior during
the NATO summit and the individual countries official visits. He must have been
particularly thunderstruck over the popular protests in Scotland: from his point of view,
Scotland owes everything they have now to the USA (NATO), so he, as chief of State of the
USA, has every right to go there and play golf whenever he pleases to do so. And the fact
is he's right to think so: the European peninsula is an American protectorate, a
"subState", inhabited by second-class citizens (like the peoples of Latin status of the
Roman Republic).
As for the destabilization doctrine (Trump Doctrine), it's absolutely correct: peace,
right now, is nocive to the USA. That's why Russia and China are trying to descalate: peace
(and time) is on their side. If the USA doesn't manage to trigger WWIII soon, it will start
to eat itself up, because the world didn't recover from the 2008 meltdown. The clock is
ticking for the Americans (and, by extension, for the Europeans and the Japanese).
Last, I agree completely with the theory that May is a remainer who's trying to implode
brexit without appearing to do so. She was a remainer during the camapaign, that's the
reason she was elected as Cameron's successor (it was she or Leadsom or Johnson, both
hardcore brexiters). The British elite is holding her while it can, and she is only in
office right now because she has the elite's full weight behind her: if it was a Labour MP,
he/she would've already fallen.
There is one significant weakness to Putin's patient, restrained and reasonable response
to US/NATO aggression and intimidation...
...
Posted by: les7 | Jul 15, 2018 12:17:17 PM | 2
Huh?!
If you watch the last 8 minutes of Episode 3 of Oliver Stone's Putin Interviews it'll cure
you of the habit of confusing Putin's "Our Partners" diplo-speak with the hair-raising
reality experienced by the crew of the Donald Cook in the Black Sea a couple of years ago.
It'll also dissuade you from imagining that Putin/Russia has a 'weak' or 'reasonable'
attitude toward NATO military provocations.
Imo Trump would have either watched them himself or been briefed on their contents by
someone who has.
Trump is acting out the good cop bad cop role all in one. He comes in with slashing attacks
and praise. The media only prints the slashing attacks. By placing his adversaries off
balance he seeks to gain something. I would say that he is operating like a corporate
raider. The weak kneed euro leaders just do not know how to handle this stuff.
He will not try that with Putin because he respects him. Putin is operating with a weak
hand and he cannot and will not take on the Europe on his borders conventionally when he
can possibly get what he wants in time with no bloodshed. Libya is his next target.
Putin and his family are from Stalingrad and Putin will cut off the head of the Snake
(US) before he lets that happen again. How? Think bright glowing mushroom clouds. It is
that serious.
Trump wants to bring Russia back into Europe. The Anglo Europeans want more control over
Russia's vast resources and companies that control them. Offering then a role in NATO would
be genius.
Putin is being conflated into an enemy of the world by a mass propaganda campaign.
Crimea and Ukraine was NATO pushing to hard to make Putin act with aggression. Crimea fell
without a shot being fired. As an independent republic full of Russians it can choose who
it wants to affiliate with.
All in all this can be solved diplomatically but not by the current crop of deep state
diplomats.
"... No doubt that the globalized elite want Friedman's "World is Flat" concept – profit maximizing world markets, world production, stateless corporations, free movement of labour and capital (without troublesome national identities) represented by an exclusive and vastly wealthy rootless elite ruling over a global worker hive. The "Empire" is only the military/enforcement side of this, with sanctions/wars against dissidents. ..."
"... Trump is in the strange situation of having been elected to fight the Empire while needing elite Imperial support to stay in his job. ..."
If history is any precedent, empires without economic foundations, sooner or later
crumble, especially when rising regional powers are capable of replacing them.
This is worth repeating. Empire and wars are expensive. For example the British world
trade network was doing fine until the "Imperial" idea came along with wars and economic
failure. The US is doing even worse in trying to fight its Imperial wars on credit.
The result is that Trump faces the real prospects of a decline in exports and popular
electoral support – especially from those adversely affected by declining markets and
deep cuts in health, education and the environment.
He may well be blindsided by a candidate who actually implements Trump's own election
platform 1) no more wars 2) domestic infrastructure spending 3) stopping mass immigration 4)
draining the swamp. Trumps electoral weakness is that didn't follow through on his
promises.
The electoral oligarchy and the mass media will force him to retreat from the trade wars
and surrender to the globalizing elites.
No doubt that the globalized elite want Friedman's "World is Flat" concept –
profit maximizing world markets, world production, stateless corporations, free movement of
labour and capital (without troublesome national identities) represented by an exclusive and
vastly wealthy rootless elite ruling over a global worker hive. The "Empire" is only the
military/enforcement side of this, with sanctions/wars against dissidents.
Trump is in the strange situation of having been elected to fight the Empire while
needing elite Imperial support to stay in his job.
THERESA May's new soft Brexit blueprint would "kill" any future trade deal with the United
States, Donald Trump warns today.
Mounting an extraordinary attack on the PM's exit negotiation, the President also reveals
she has ignored his advice on how to toughen up the troubled talks.
Instead he believes Mrs May has gone "the opposite way", and he thinks the results have been
"very unfortunate".
His fiercest criticism came over the centrepiece of the PM's new Brexit plan -- which was
unveiled in full yesterday.
It would stick to a common rulebook with Brussels on goods and agricultural produce in
a bid to keep customs borders open with the EU.
But Mr Trump told The Sun: "If they do a deal like that, we would be dealing with the
European Union instead of dealing with the UK, so it will probably kill the deal.
Trump's declaration that "trade wars are good, and easy to win" is an instant classic, right up there with Herbert Hoover's "prosperity
is just around the corner."
Trump obviously believes that trade is a game in which he who runs the biggest surplus wins, and that America, which imports more
than it exports, therefore has the upper hand in any conflict. That's also why Peter Navarro predicted that
nobody would retaliate against Trump's
tariffs. Since that's actually not how trade works, we're already facing plenty of retaliation and the strong prospect of escalation.
But here's the thing: Trump's tariffs are badly designed even from the point of view of someone who shares his crude mercantilist
view of trade. In fact, the structure of his tariffs so far is designed to inflict maximum damage on the U.S. economy, for minimal
gain. Foreign retaliation, by contrast, is far more sophisticated: unlike Trump, the Chinese and other targets of his trade wrath
seem to have a clear idea of what they're trying to accomplish.
The key point is that the Navarro/Trump view, aside from its fixation on trade balances, also seems to imagine that the world
still looks the way it did in the 1960s, when trade was overwhelmingly in final goods like wheat and cars. In that world, putting
a tariff on imported cars would cause consumers to switch to domestic cars, adding auto industry jobs, end of story (except for the
foreign retaliation.)
In the modern world economy, however, a large part of trade is in intermediate goods – not cars but car parts. Put a tariff on
car parts, and even the first-round effect on jobs is uncertain: maybe domestic parts producers will add workers, but you've raised
costs and reduced competitiveness for downstream producers, who will shrink their operations.
So in today's world, smart trade warriors – if such people exist – would focus their tariffs on final goods, so as to avoid raising
costs for downstream producers of domestic goods. True, this would amount to a more or less direct tax on consumers; but if you're
afraid to impose any burden on consumers, you really shouldn't be getting into a trade war in the first place.
But almost none of the Trump tariffs are on consumer goods.
Chad Bown and colleagues
have a remarkable chart showing the distribution of the Trump China tariffs: an amazing 95 percent are either on intermediate goods
or on capital goods like machinery that are also used in domestic production: KS
Is there a strategy here? It's hard to see one. There's certainly no hint that the tariffs were designed to pressure China into
accepting U.S. demands, since nobody can even figure out what, exactly, Trump wants from China in the first place.
China's retaliation
looks very different. It doesn't completely eschew tariffs on intermediate goods, but it's mostly on final goods. And it's also
driven by a clear political strategy of hurting Trump voters; the Chinese, unlike the Trumpies, know what they're trying to accomplish:
Image
What about others?
Canada's picture
is complicated by its direct response to aluminum and steel tariffs, but those industries aside it, too, is following a far more
sophisticated strategy than the U.S.:
Except for steel and aluminum, Canada's retaliation seemingly attempts to avoid messing up its engagement in North American
supply chains. In broad terms, Canada is not targeting imports of American capital equipment or intermediate inputs, focusing
instead on final goods.
And like China, Canada is clearly trying to inflict maximum political damage.
Trade wars aren't good or easy to win even if you know what you're trying to accomplish and have a clear strategy for getting
there. What's notable about the Trump tariffs, however, is that they're so self-destructive.
And we can already see hints of the economic fallout. From the Fed's
most recent minutes :
[M]any District contacts expressed concern about the possible adverse effects of tariffs and other proposed trade restrictions,
both domestically and abroad, on future investment activity; contacts in some Districts indicated that plans for capital spending
had been scaled back or postponed as a result of uncertainty over trade policy. Contacts in the steel and aluminum industries
expected higher prices as a result of the tariffs on these products but had not planned any new investments to increase capacity.
So Trump and company don't actually have a plan to win this trade war. They may, however, have stumbled onto a strategy that will
lose it even more decisively than one might have expected.
Note to readers: please click the share buttons above
On Tuesday, his trade representative Robert Lighthizer released a list of $10% tariffs
to be imposed on $200 billion worth of Chinese goods.
A senior Trump regime official falsely said it's "roughly equal to their exports to" the
US. It's around 40% of the 2017 total.
Newly announced tariffs won't take effect before completion of a two-month review process,
concluding at end of August. Trump warned he may order tariffs on $500 billion worth of Chinese
goods.
In 2017, imports from China were $506 billion, US exports to the country $130 billion. The
trade deficit was $375 billion last year.
It's because so much of industrial America was offshored to China and other low-wage
countries, millions of US jobs lost, Washington under Republicans and undemocratic Dems
permitting what demands opposition.
The Investment-State Dispute Settlement (ISDS) system incorporated into US trade deals like
NAFTA and others, letting a corporate controlled extrajudicial tribunal resolve disputes,
promotes offshoring of US jobs.
China called the latest announced tariffs "totally unacceptable" bullying, urging other
countries to unite against Trump's trade policy, promising to retaliate in kind.
Along with earlier duties on $50 billion worth of Chinese goods, newly announced ones raise
the total to half of Chinese imports – maybe all of them to be targeted ahead if China
retaliates in kind as expected.
China Association of International Trade senior fellow Li Yong believes one Beijing
retaliatory measure may be a greater push to attract foreign investment other than from the US,
adding:
Trump "closed the door for negotiations. It's up to (him) to open the door again."
Trade policy expert Eswar Prasad believes
"(t)he internal political dynamics in both countries make it unlikely that either side
will stand down and offer conciliatory measures that could deescalate tensions and lead to a
resumption of negotiations."
Economist Stephen Roach called trade wars "not easy to win easy to lose, and the US is on
track to lose (its) trade war" with China, adding:
"This is live ammunition. This is not just rhetorical discussion anymore. We're in the
early stages of fighting skirmishes in a real, live trade war."
"The question is, how far does it go? And how significant will the ammunition be in the
future?"
Roach believe China has lots of ammunition to hold firm and fight back with.
"The US is hugely dependent on China as a source for low-cost goods to make ends meet for
American consumers. We're hugely dependent on China to buy our Treasuries to fund our budget
deficits," he explained.
Beijing has lots of ways to retaliate against Washington besides imposing duties on US
goods.
On Thursday, China's People's Daily slammed the Trump
regime, saying
Beijing "will never back down when faced with threats and blackmail, neither will it waver
its resolution in safeguarding the global free trade and multilateral trade system,"
adding:
"The US is undermining global trade rules and causing problems for the global economy.
(Its) mentality not only brings negative impacts to both parties directly involved, but also
to every country on the global industrial chain."
China's Global Times called Trump's trade policy "extortion," stressing "countermeasures"
will be taken.
Markets believe both sides eventually will show restraint. There's no sign of it so far
– just the opposite.
*
Stephen Lendman is a Research Associate of the CRG, Correspondent of Global Research
based in Chicago.
"... Obama was a Manchurian Candidate for the globalist banks and corporations and their war-mongering Deep State that would like to rule the world in perpetuity. Brad, the Democratic Party committed suicide with the Clintons. Obama was a rerun of Bush Jr. Trump is actually trying to put the Deep State down, and you should be supporting that. How many Stupid Wars till you see the light? How many more countries do you want to bomb in the name of Democracy? Syria has been stabilized, Brad. Hillary would not have done that. ..."
"... Perhaps the date should mark the end of neo-classical economics. You have widespread poverty and a populace who want change. Hardly the result of success. ..."
America the Loser Jul 4, 2018 J. Bradford DeLong
Donald Trump's unhinged recent attacks on the iconic motorcycle maker Harley-Davidson distill his larger assault
on American democracy. Even if Democrats do manage to retake one or both houses of Congress this November, the damage that Trump
and Republican leaders have done to the country's global standing cannot be repaired.
BERKELEY – The Washington Post's Catherine Rampell recently
recalled
that when US President Donald Trump held a session for Harley-Davidson executives and union representatives at the White
House in February 2017, he thanked them "for building things in America." Trump went on to predict that the iconic American motorcycle
company would expand under his watch. "I know your business is now doing very well," he observed, "and there's a lot of spirit right
now in the country that you weren't having so much in the last number of months that you have right now."
What a difference a year makes. Harley-Davidson recently announced that it would move some of its operations to jurisdictions
not subject to the European Union's retaliatory measures adopted in response to Trump's tariffs on imported steel and aluminum. Trump
then took to Twitter to say that he
was, "Surprised that Harley-Davidson, of all companies, would be the first to wave the White Flag." He then made a promise that he
cannot keep: " ultimately they will not pay tariffs selling into the EU."
Then, in a later tweet, Trump
falsely stated
that, "Early this year Harley-Davidson said they would move much of their plant operations in Kansas City to Thailand," and that
"they were just using Tariffs/Trade War as an excuse." In fact, when the company announced the closure of its plant in Kansas City,
Missouri, it said that it would move those operations to York, Pennsylvania. At any rate, Trump's point is nonsensical. If companies
are acting in anticipation of his own announcement that he is launching a trade war, then his trade war is not just an excuse.
In yet another tweet, Trump turned to threats,
warning
that, "Harley must know that they won't be able to sell back into U.S. without paying a big tax!" But, again, this is
nonsensical: the entire point of Harley-Davidson shifting some of its production to countries not subject to EU tariffs is to sell
tariff-free motorcycles to Europeans.
In a final tweet, Trump
decreed
that, "A Harley-Davidson should never be built in another country – never!" He then went on to promise the destruction
of the company, and thus the jobs of its workers: "If they move, watch, it will be the beginning of the end – they surrendered, they
quit! The Aura will be gone and they will be taxed like never before!"
1
Needless to say, none of this is normal. Trump's statements are dripping with contempt for the rule of law. And none of them rises
to the level of anything that could be called trade policy, let alone governance. It is as if we have returned to the days of Henry
VIII, an impulsive, deranged monarch who was surrounded by a gaggle of plutocrats, lickspittles, and flatterers, all trying to advance
their careers while keeping the ship of state afloat.
Trump is clearly incapable of executing the duties of his office in good faith. The US House of Representatives and Senate should
have impeached him and removed him from office already – for violations of the US Constitution's
emoluments clause , if nothing else. Barring that, Vice President Mike
Pence should have long ago invoked the 25th Amendment, which provides for the removal of a president whom a majority of the cabinet
has deemed "unable to discharge the powers and duties of his office."
And yet, neither Speaker of the House Paul Ryan nor Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell nor Pence has dared to do anything
about Trump's assault on American democracy. Republicans are paralyzed by the fear that if they turn on Trump, who is now
supported by roughly
90% of their party's base, they will all suffer at the polls in the midterm congressional election this November.
It is nice to think that the election will fix everything. But, at a minimum, the Democratic Party needs a
six-percentage-point edge
to retake the House of Representatives, owing to Republican gerrymandering of congressional districts. Democrats also have to
overcome a
gerrymandering effect
in the Senate. Right now, the 49 senators who caucus with the Democrats represent 181 million people, whereas
the 51 who caucus with the Republicans represent just 142 million people.
3
Moreover, the US is notorious for its
low
voter turnout during midterm elections, which tends to hurt Democratic candidates' prospects. And Trump and congressional Republicans
have been presiding over a relatively strong economy, which they inherited from former President Barack Obama, but are happy to claim
as their own.
Finally, one must not discount the fear factor. Countless Americans routinely fall victim to social- and cable-media advertising
campaigns that play to their worst instincts. You can rest assured that in this election cycle, as in the past, elderly white voters
will be fed a steady diet of bombast about the threat posed by immigrants, people of color, Muslims, and other Trump-voter bugaboos
(that is, when they aren't being sold fake diabetes cures and overpriced gold funds).
Regardless of what happens this November, it is already clear that the American century ended on November 8, 2016. On that day,
the United States ceased to be the world's leading superpower – the flawed but ultimately well-meaning guarantor of peace, prosperity,
and human rights around the world. America's days of
Kindlebergian
hegemony are now behind it. The credibility that has been lost to the Trumpists – abetted by Russia and the US Electoral College
– can never be regained.
See also
J. Bradford DeLong is Professor of Economics at the University of California at Berkeley and a research associate at
the National Bureau of Economic Research. He was Deputy Assistant US Treasury Secretary during the Clinton Administration, where
he was heavily involved in budget and trade negotiations. His role in designing the bailout of Mexico during the 1994 peso crisis
placed him at the forefront of Latin America's transformation into a region of open economies, and cemented his stature as a leading
voice in economic-policy debates.
Obama
was a Manchurian Candidate for the globalist banks and corporations and their war-mongering Deep State that would like to rule
the world in perpetuity. Brad, the Democratic Party committed suicide with the Clintons. Obama was a rerun of Bush Jr. Trump is
actually trying to put the Deep State down, and you should be supporting that. How many Stupid Wars till you see the light? How
many more countries do you want to bomb in the name of Democracy? Syria has been stabilized, Brad. Hillary would not have done
that.
" It is as if we have returned to the days of Henry VIII, an impulsive, deranged monarch who was surrounded by a
gaggle of plutocrats, lickspittles, etc."
Henry V111th - very popular - in fact achieved a revolutionary transformation of England into a nation state, strengthened
its navy and political existence - a process continued by the Queen Elizabeh 1. In this process foreign-dominated institutions
of the Church were destroyed; and indeed many people were executed as necessary to achieve great social transformation, for such
change cannot be made without the use of terror, as Robespierre rightly argued.
So for Trump let's wait and see, eh? Perhaps he is up to it.
Rather
that praise Obama and GDP growth surely the current President is simply an outcome of failures previously unrecognised by the
author?
Perhaps the date should mark the end of neo-classical economics. You have widespread poverty and a populace who want change. Hardly
the result of success.
Trump's declaration that "trade wars are good, and easy to win" is an instant classic, right up there with Herbert Hoover's "prosperity
is just around the corner."
Trump obviously believes that trade is a game in which he who runs the biggest surplus wins, and that America, which imports more
than it exports, therefore has the upper hand in any conflict. That's also why Peter Navarro predicted that
nobody would retaliate against Trump's
tariffs. Since that's actually not how trade works, we're already facing plenty of retaliation and the strong prospect of escalation.
But here's the thing: Trump's tariffs are badly designed even from the point of view of someone who shares his crude mercantilist
view of trade. In fact, the structure of his tariffs so far is designed to inflict maximum damage on the U.S. economy, for minimal
gain. Foreign retaliation, by contrast, is far more sophisticated: unlike Trump, the Chinese and other targets of his trade wrath
seem to have a clear idea of what they're trying to accomplish.
The key point is that the Navarro/Trump view, aside from its fixation on trade balances, also seems to imagine that the world
still looks the way it did in the 1960s, when trade was overwhelmingly in final goods like wheat and cars. In that world, putting
a tariff on imported cars would cause consumers to switch to domestic cars, adding auto industry jobs, end of story (except for the
foreign retaliation.)
In the modern world economy, however, a large part of trade is in intermediate goods – not cars but car parts. Put a tariff on
car parts, and even the first-round effect on jobs is uncertain: maybe domestic parts producers will add workers, but you've raised
costs and reduced competitiveness for downstream producers, who will shrink their operations.
So in today's world, smart trade warriors – if such people exist – would focus their tariffs on final goods, so as to avoid raising
costs for downstream producers of domestic goods. True, this would amount to a more or less direct tax on consumers; but if you're
afraid to impose any burden on consumers, you really shouldn't be getting into a trade war in the first place.
But almost none of the Trump tariffs are on consumer goods.
Chad Bown and colleagues
have a remarkable chart showing the distribution of the Trump China tariffs: an amazing 95 percent are either on intermediate goods
or on capital goods like machinery that are also used in domestic production:
Image
Is there a strategy here? It's hard to see one. There's certainly no hint that the tariffs were designed to pressure China into
accepting U.S. demands, since nobody can even figure out what, exactly, Trump wants from China in the first place.
Advertisement
China's retaliation
looks very different. It doesn't completely eschew tariffs on intermediate goods, but it's mostly on final goods. And it's also
driven by a clear political strategy of hurting Trump voters; the Chinese, unlike the Trumpies, know what they're trying to accomplish:
Image
What about others?
Canada's picture
is complicated by its direct response to aluminum and steel tariffs, but those industries aside it, too, is following a far more
sophisticated strategy than the U.S.:
Except for steel and aluminum, Canada's retaliation seemingly attempts to avoid messing up its engagement in North American
supply chains. In broad terms, Canada is not targeting imports of American capital equipment or intermediate inputs, focusing
instead on final goods.
And like China, Canada is clearly trying to inflict maximum political damage.
Trade wars aren't good or easy to win even if you know what you're trying to accomplish and have a clear strategy for getting
there. What's notable about the Trump tariffs, however, is that they're so self-destructive.
And we can already see hints of the economic fallout. From the Fed's
most recent minutes :
[M]any District contacts expressed concern about the possible adverse effects of tariffs and other proposed trade restrictions,
both domestically and abroad, on future investment activity; contacts in some Districts indicated that plans for capital spending
had been scaled back or postponed as a result of uncertainty over trade policy. Contacts in the steel and aluminum industries
expected higher prices as a result of the tariffs on these products but had not planned any new investments to increase capacity.
So Trump and company don't actually have a plan to win this trade war. They may, however, have stumbled onto a strategy that will
lose it even more decisively than one might have expected.
The trend is definitely against EU. But Britain may be crushed, like Brazil and Argentina into accepting neoliberal world order
for longer.
Notable quotes:
"... Maybe Johnson the Brexiter can now launch an inner party coup and push Theresa May out. According to a YouGov poll she lost significant support within her conservative party. Besides the Brexit row she botched a snap election, lost her party's majority in parliament and seems to have no clear concept for anything. It would not be a loss for mankind to see her go. ..."
"... Boris the clown, who wins within his party on 'likability' and 'shares my political outlook', would then run the UK. A quite amusing thought. Johnson is a man of no principles. While he is currently pretending to hold a pro-Brexit position he would probably run the same plan that May seems to execute: Delay as long as possible, then panic the people into a re-vote, then stay within the EU. ..."
"... There is an excellent piece in the Boston Review on the EU- https://bostonreview.net/class-inequality/j-w-mason-market-police ..."
"... Iy makes the point that "The European Union offers the fullest realization of the neoliberal political vision. Its incomplete integration -- with its confusing mix of powers -- is precisely the goal." ..."
"... It traces the neo-liberal project, designed to prevent democracy from controlling economic policy, back to von Mises and Hayek. Nothing is more mistaken for critics of imperialism than to buy the line that the EU represents internationalism in any sense. The fact that some racists oppose the EU-just as others support it as a 'white" bastion -- is no reason to give an institution which is profoundly and purposefully undemocratic the benefit of the doubt. ..."
"... It is a wondrous sight to see Western [neo]Liberal Democracy crumbling before our eyes. Have a look at the very founders and protectors of "freedom" corrupt to the very marrow of their bones. ..."
"... Anything bad that can happen to the UK is well-deserved. The home, the womb of Russophobia, lies and illegal wars, as well as the hub of spying against American citizens, is exposed as thoroughly bankrupt politically. ..."
"... EU is bound to collapse but Britain might be tempted to wait it out, and maybe it is the game in London: not to be the first. The most dynamic destructive work in progress is the Euro that benefit to none of its 18 members (the euro-zones) but Geramny and Nederland. Italy has understood it but is using the refugees crisis to enlarge the contestation to non-euro zone countries (Visegrad group and more). ..."
"... As Nato is the real and only cement in this enlarged un-united Europe, in an epoch of accelerating change (collapse maybe) the famous Wait and see of the Brits has just muted in a slow fox-trot. ..."
"... But the puffed up Brits do not even see this danger and would blithely fall into the arms of the mafiosi from across the pond. ..."
"... Brexit is rebellion against the US imposed world order. London money has gone along and profited from the US imposed order, but the ordinary Brits may not have. They may not know where they are going, but they do know where they do not want to be. ..."
"... ditto... status of colony... isn't that what the globalists, corporations, neo liberals and etc want? get rid of any national identity as it gets in the way of corporations having the freedom to rape and pillage as needed.. ..."
"... Trump has reversed some 70 years of US strategy to gain nothing. It is quite remarkable. Strategic vandalism is a good description. ..."
"... The thing about UK and the EU is the UK is basically the US 51st state and the US is a defacto commonwealth nation. The colonization of Europe by the US was never meant to encompass the UK and the City. As they are basically one and the same. ..."
"... EU could not possibly have been a US/CIA idea as it actually works. Yes it is undemocratic, usurps national aspirations, perverts local economies, coddles oligarchs, and all that. But that does not mean it is a US idea. ..."
"... Single union political aspirations have been around for centuries and in many countries. Dare I suggest that it is actually based on the Soviet Union of peoples and most likely a Leninist or Trotskyist plot!! :)))) ..."
"... What do the City of London, the Vatican and Washington DC have in common? Actually, Jerusalem shares many of the same traits. Bonus points for the most creative euphemism for "usurious bank." ..."
"... From my perspective, Nation-States have not been the loci of power for some time (if they ever really were). The US, with its awesome military might and (former) industrial capabilities has served as the enforcement arm of that usurious supra-national cabal throughout "the American Century." ..."
"... Obtainimg strong mandate Cameron went to Brussels to supposedly negotiate better deal with EU ESPECIALLY for security while in fact he went there trying to bully the shape future EU integration especially in political realm and even more in realm of banking Union and integration and coordination of banking rules, laws and unified controlling authorities, via threatening Brexit which would be a deadly blow to EU propaganda glue that holds together this melting pot of divided as never before nations and never since medieval times united national elites integrated in EU ruling bureaucracy. ..."
"... First it was devastating impact of further EU integration on UK banking as London has become legal under U.K. law illegal in EU, money laundering capital of the world and criminal income is huge part of the revenue of the City , US is second. ..."
"... At the passage of Brexit I believed the purpose to be to allow the City of London (the bankers) unlimited financial freedom, perhaps especially in their entering into agreements with the Chinese. This could not be the case under the original EU rules. It will be interesting to see how this works out. ..."
"... The reality of the brexit which the Tory government is determined to raiload through has been designed by elites to better oppress the hoi polloi and to sell it to the masses it has been marketed as a means of restoring 'white power'. ..."
"... That is really saying something because the current version of the UK is one of the sickest, greed is good and devil take the hindmost societies I have ever experienced -- up there with contemporary israel and the US, 1980's South Africa and by the sound of it (didn't experience it firsthand like the other examples, all down to not existing at the time) 1940's Germany. ..."
"... Brexit is nether the problem or the solution, it was just another distraction to keep the mass occupied, whilst they assist stripped the uk and a large part of the world! ..."
"... Every brexiteer I've asked why they voted for out, begins by saying "For once they had to listen to us" and that's usually followed by "there's too many people here" or "it's the E.Europeans". (My response to the europhiles is that you knew the EU was finished a dozen years ago, when all the Big Issue sellers turned into Romanian women.) UK cities are thick with destitute E.Europeans. ..."
...Hours before Boris Johnson quit his position, Brexit Secretary David Davis resigned from Prime Minister May's cabinet.
On July 6 the British government held a cabinet meeting at Chequers, the private seat of the prime minister. Following the meeting
it published
a paper (pdf) that took a weird position towards exiting the European Union. If it would be followed, Britain would practically
end up with staying in the EU, accepting nearly all its regulations and court decisions, but without any say over what the EU decides.
The paper was clearly written by the 'Remain' side. The two top Brexiters in May's cabinet felt cheated and resigned. More are likely
to follow.
The majority of the British people who voted to leave the EU must feel duped.
My hunch is that Prime Minister Theresa May was tasked with 'running out the clock' in negotiations with the EU. Then, shortly
before the March 2019 date of a 'hard Brexit' would arrive without any agreement with the EU, the powers that be would launch a panic
campaign to push the population into a new vote. That vote would end with a victory for the 'Remain' side. The UK would continue
to be a member of the European Union.
No matter how the Brexit vote will go, the powers that are will not allow Britain to exit the European Union.
Is that claim still justified?
Maybe Johnson the Brexiter can now launch an inner party coup and push Theresa May out. According to a YouGov poll she
lost significant
support within her conservative party. Besides the Brexit row she botched a snap election, lost her party's majority in parliament
and seems to have no clear concept for anything. It would not be a loss for mankind to see her go.
Boris the clown, who wins within his party on 'likability' and 'shares my political outlook', would then run the UK. A quite
amusing thought. Johnson is a man of no principles. While he is currently pretending to hold a pro-Brexit position he would probably
run the same plan that May seems to execute: Delay as long as possible, then panic the people into a re-vote, then stay within the
EU.
Then again - Boris may do the unexpected.
How do the British people feel about this?
Posted by b on July 9, 2018 at 11:43 AM |
Permalink
Did you notice how quickly th E U sided with the U K over Salisbury ? That was the deal.
Remain in EU and we're back you!
Then again could have been we'l create a false flag you back us and we'll stay , a suttle nuonce.
The likelihood is that the blairite faction in the Parliamentary Labour Party-which has no real political differences with the
Tories and is fanatically pro EU, as all neo-liberals are- will prop up the May government. Or a Tory government headed by another
Remainer, with Blairites in the Cabinet.
This will prevent the General Election which Tories of all parties fear.
Iy makes the point that "The European Union offers the fullest realization of the neoliberal political vision. Its incomplete
integration -- with its confusing mix of powers -- is precisely the goal."
It traces the neo-liberal project, designed to prevent democracy from controlling economic policy, back to von Mises and
Hayek. Nothing is more mistaken for critics of imperialism than to buy the line that the EU represents internationalism in any
sense. The fact that some racists oppose the EU-just as others support it as a 'white" bastion -- is no reason to give an institution
which is profoundly and purposefully undemocratic the benefit of the doubt.
@Jeff - #1 - You are correct. There will not be another referendum.
I would add that there is some chance, however small, that on March 29th the British government will tell the EU that they
just have no way to meet the requirements of Article 50 and would the EU please allow them to continue as a member of the EU and
forget about all the shenanigans of the past 2 years. The EU has said previously that they will accept such a result and allow
the UK to continue as a member. The Brexiteers will have a total meltdown, and May will most likely be thrown out of office, but
most businesses and many individuals will be quite happy for this whole thing to just go away.
It is a wondrous sight to see Western [neo]Liberal Democracy crumbling before our eyes. Have a look at the very founders
and protectors of "freedom" corrupt to the very marrow of their bones.
In the US Trump, in the UK the Torys the democracies are now openly imperial and openly corrupt. Rule of law - ask the Skripals.
Brexit, Russia, Skripals, Russia, junkies and poisons Russians - minority government - ministers resigning right and left deadlines
looming no solutions in sight.
Western civilization is based on the Enlightenment and the Enlightenment and all its ideas of "democracy" are failing. Democracy
is not a religion, it is not the end of history, it is not sacred and immutable - checks and balances have failed utterly. This
sweetly written little essay says it all.
Look for countries to unilaterally bail from the EU with little or no advance notice. They will simply abrogate and that will
trigger an avalanche of others joining in. There are various good economic reasons why they would do that, but I think the groundswell
of populism fueled by anger over the open borders cataclysm will be the prime driver.
Anything bad that can happen to the UK is well-deserved. The home, the womb of Russophobia, lies and illegal wars, as well
as the hub of spying against American citizens, is exposed as thoroughly bankrupt politically.
The current path to chaos
is well-trod. Now, we can expect national attention is on the team in Russia in the semi-finals, while the government crumbles
and tumbles. But afterward, especially if Kane fails to bring the Cup home? Oh, the chaos. Of course, it will all be Putin and
Russia's fault.
UK. Despicable. How long it has taken for folks to realize Theresa May always has been a stalking horse. Highly Likely the
UK will stew in its own piss. Put that in their White Hall dossiers, and stamp it "Kremlin Plot".
Britain won't be staying in the EU and nor will the EU be accepting May's fantasy ideas for a future relationship giving the UK
free trade on everything it needs. There's a remote possibility that a new UK government could begin working on re-joining the
EU (Article 49), but there are plenty in Europe who would not let the UK re-join, at least not in the near future.
Friday the
13th is coming soon, scary stuff ?
The "Don't take No for an answer" is rather misleading. Made to vote again ..only after changes to the Treaty. France's vote
against the EU Constitution was accepted and when the Dutch also rejected it, it didn't happen.
EU is bound to collapse but Britain might be tempted to wait it out, and maybe it is the game in London: not to be the first.
The most dynamic destructive work in progress is the Euro that benefit to none of its 18 members (the euro-zones) but Geramny
and Nederland. Italy has understood it but is using the refugees crisis to enlarge the contestation to non-euro zone countries
(Visegrad group and more).
Now we have this Nato meeting coming and the abomination of Donald meeting Vlad that scares the whole neo-lberals, borgists,
russian haters, warmongers.
As Nato is the real and only cement in this enlarged un-united Europe, in an epoch of accelerating change (collapse maybe)
the famous Wait and see of the Brits has just muted in a slow fox-trot.
Brits, especially the Leave voters, have no real idea what the consequences of leaving the EU are, nor do they care that much.
What is uppermost in their minds is they do not want is to be in a union with "losers". Every single country on the Continent
is a loser and thus the object of contempt. The only country in Europe that is not a loser (meaning they have never lost a war)
is the United Kingdom of Roast Beef and God Save The Queen.
This British loser-phobia also explains the island nation's guttural hatred of Russia, which has bailed out Europe, and so
by definition the Brits as well, twice, thereby taking away some of the British luster. (OK the last time around they got a bit
of help from their old colonies, the Yanks, but its all the same. Yanks and Brits are the same stock.) As far as EU goes the Brits
can leave, no problem. Except that what the Continent would then be faced with was an American armed camp a few miles off shore,
not an appealing prospect to say the least. But the puffed up Brits do not even see this danger and would blithely fall into
the arms of the mafiosi from across the pond.
Boris Johnson's resignation letter. Well written.
Makes the same argument over the Checkers paper that I made above. If Johnson gets 48 back benchers on his side he could launch
a vote on no-confidence against May and possibly become PM. The Conservatives in Parliament seem quite upset over all of this.
Brexit is rebellion against the US imposed world order. London money has gone along and profited from the US imposed
order, but the ordinary Brits may not have. They may not know where they are going, but they do know where they do not want to
be.
@20 Not sure who qualifies as an 'ordinary Brit' these days. They come in all shapes and colours. I think the ones who moved to
Spain are fairly happy with the EU status quo.
Dominic Raab is the new UK Brexit point-man. The previous guy, Davies, just resigned. But Raab's appointment, I think, points
to what Brexit has been about all along -- namely, labour market reform beyond the rest of Europe, and to do this the UK must
be free of the European Human Rights council and other protections it provides for workers in the member states.
@23 psychohistorian... ditto... status of colony... isn't that what the globalists, corporations, neo liberals and etc want?
get rid of any national identity as it gets in the way of corporations having the freedom to rape and pillage as needed..
it was interesting reading near the end of bjs comments "Over the last few months they have shown how many friends this country
has around the world, as 28 governments expelled Russian spies in an unprecedented protest at the attempted assassination of the
Skripals." Guilty first - we will prove it later... maybe he really ought to consider rule from Brussels or where ever, if he
can't fathom the concept of innocent until proven guilty...
The French populace rejected the EU Constitution in 2005 during the Chirac years, and you are correct that after some changes
it was accepted under the Sarkozy government.But that happened because it was the Assembly (the parliament, i.e., the political
class) that voted on it, not the people. Can't have those deplorable citizens deciding important matters like that, now can we?
@51 pft... in so far as the cia work for the financial complex - yeah, probably.. how to create a currency - the eu - that no
one has any real control over, to compete with the us$ and yen... makes sense on that level..
Western civilization is based on the Enlightenment and the Enlightenment and all its ideas ...
When we discuss ALL ideas of the Enlightenment, we must remember this:
Wikipedia: "Enlightened absolutism is the theme of an essay by Frederick the Great, who ruled Prussia from 1740 to 1786, defending
this system of government.[1]
When the prominent French Enlightenment philosopher Voltaire fell out of favor in France, he eagerly accepted Frederick's invitation
to live at his palace. He believed that an enlightened monarchy was the only real way for society to advance.
Frederick the Great was an enthusiast of French ideas. Frederick explained: "My principal occupation is to combat ignorance
and prejudice ..."
In relatively short time, the List of enlightened despots included almost all absolute monarchs in Europe.
The awful truth for the Leave campaign is that the governing establishment of the entire Western world views Brexit as strategic
vandalism. Whether fair or not, Brexiteers must answer this reproach. A few such as Lord Owen grasp the scale of the problem.
Most seemed blithely unaware until Mr Obama blew into town last week.
Donald Trump, the presumptive Republican nominee for president, has come out in support of Brexit, saying the UK would be "better
off" outside of the European Union and lamenting the consequences of migration in the continent.
The billionaire, who secured the backing of Republican voters on a staunchly anti-immigration platform, said that his support
for the UK leaving the EU was a personal belief and not a "recommendation".
"I think the migration has been a horrible thing for Europe," Trump told Fox News late on Thursday. "A lot of that was pushed
by the EU. I would say that they're better off without it, personally, but I'm not making that as a recommendation. Just my
feeling."
Donald Trump accuses Angela Merkel of making 'catastrophic mistake' on refugees. President-elect tells The Times and Bild that
EU has become 'a vehicle for Germany'.
US President-elect Donald Trump said in a newspaper interview published on Sunday that German Chancellor Angela Merkel had
made a "catastrophic mistake" with a policy that let a wave of more than one million migrants into her country.
In a joint interview with The Times and the German newspaper Bild, Trump also said the European Union had become "a vehicle
for Germany" and predicted that more EU member states would vote to leave the bloc as Britain did last June.
"I think she made one very catastrophic mistake, and that was taking all of these illegals," Trump said of Merkel, who in
August 2015 decided to keep Germany's borders open for refugees, mostly Muslims, fleeing war zones in the Middle East.
Trump has reversed some 70 years of US strategy to gain nothing. It is quite remarkable. Strategic vandalism is a good
description.
Even when the 'light' (read truth about Brexit) is revealed, many here choose to ignore it out of sheer ignorance. For a good
description of the MOA comment section, one should consult Plato's Allegory of the Cave. And the 'left' blames external elements
for its inaptitude and demise when many it has only itself to blame.
The thing about UK and the EU is the UK is basically the US 51st state and the US is a defacto commonwealth nation. The
colonization of Europe by the US was never meant to encompass the UK and the City. As they are basically one and the same.
Its presence in the EU was never really a problem though and was useful in terms of providing a guiding hand, so long as it remained
free of the Eurozone. So I am not really sure its a change in strategy. Just another fork in the road.
It remains to be seen how it all works out. Perhaps the UK Brexit is meant to send a message to the other EU states as to the
consequences of leaving. One benefit to the US neoliberals might be that UK scraps or at least scales back its NHS due to the
economic consequences of a hard Brexit. The 0.1% will be fine at the end of the day and they are the only group that matters .
The rest are just pawns on the board.
As for Germany. Immigration in the EU was all about divide and rule and leaving fewer Euros for social programs. All part of
the neoliberal blueprint. Divide and rule is an age old tactic perfected by the British to rule the colonies. The EU and Germany
being controlled by the Anglo-American ruling elite , and basically occipied by US controlled NATO opened the doors. Reversing
this immigration can provide a plausible reason for more terrorism in Europe to empower the EU to become more of a security-police
state like US and UK.
On a side note its interesting the head of the ECB and BOE are both former Goldman Sachs employees.
Another related link suggesting the EU also serves a purpose of isolating Russia economically.
EU could not possibly have been a US/CIA idea as it actually works. Yes it is undemocratic, usurps national aspirations,
perverts local economies, coddles oligarchs, and all that. But that does not mean it is a US idea.
Zero Hedge is polishing turds now it seems.
Single union political aspirations have been around for centuries and in many countries. Dare I suggest that it is actually
based on the Soviet Union of peoples and most likely a Leninist or Trotskyist plot!! :))))
"The Marshall Plan also established the creation of the Organization for European economic cooperation. It did this in a
number of ways:
promote co-operation between participating countries and their national production programmes for the reconstruction
of Europe,
develop intra-European trade by reducing tariffs and other barriers to the expansion of trade,
study the feasibility of creating a customs union or free trade area,
study multi-lateralisation of payments, and
Achieve conditions for better utilisation of labour.
It was arguably through this persistent interlinking of many European countries economic affairs that to not cooperate would
simply be too risky.
This provided the basis for European cooperation and this was favoured by many people because cooperation was seen as a
fundamental building block in the establishment of long term European Peace."
"In relatively short time, the List of enlightened despots included almost all absolute monarchs in Europe."
You are right, and that included Catherine the Great for whom Samuel Bentham worked for some years. His brother Jeremy spent
some time with him there and was a great admirer of Catherine and Potemkin. He was a key figure in the development of liberal
ideology and political economy.
'The Enlightenment' is an historical concept which obscures more than it explains. To suggest that representative democracy's
origins lie in this nebulous thing is completely misleading -- the truth is that democracy is as old as community. If anything
'The Enlightenment' movements are the beginning of the current system whereby the trappings of popular government are hung on
the reality of a kleptocrats' oligarchy.
Just in time for Emperor Trump's arrival in Britain! I do not understand Great Britain's "democracy," (the very concept
of an aristocratic House of Lords Peerage makes my head explode... and what's this about the Monarch having the authority to appoint
a Prime Minister if he/she doesn't like the one selected?). But doesn't the party with the majority get to anoint the Prime Minister?
Wouldn't that be Labour right now if Missy May is shown the door?
Furthermore, the assertion that the UK will stay in the EU is entirely plausible. I heard, early in the days after the vote, that
the govt had not expected it to go the way it did. Plans were made for a show of Brexit but that 'the idea is that everything
stays the same' , i.e., no change. Sadly for the UK, the EU will not allow that to happen. In all probability, another vote
will indeed be called. Otherwise, it's going to be a disaster for an already divided UK for many, many years to come!
The main problem with Brexit is that it is so complex that neither the officials who were set the task of drafting it knew
little more than the Ministers themselves! NOBODY knew what the fuck to do! And they still don't!
There is every chance a Vote of No Confidence is going to be called on May's government and she will finally fall, as she must
as she is the most inept PM there has probably ever been!
What do the City of London, the Vatican and Washington DC have in common? Actually, Jerusalem shares many of the same traits.
Bonus points for the most creative euphemism for "usurious bank."
Are terms such as "The Five Eyes" and "The AZ Empire"
'trumped' by all this nationalistic furor?
From my perspective, Nation-States have not been the loci of power for some time (if they ever really were). The US, with
its awesome military might and (former) industrial capabilities has served as the enforcement arm of that usurious supra-national
cabal throughout "the American Century."
But really, does anyone here really believe that a New York City conman or the latest British "mophead" is more powerful than
the dynastic power of the Rothschilds, Warburgs or Morgans... or even the nouveau riche like the Rockefellers or Carnegies?
These are dynasties so wealthy and powerful that they don't even appear on Forbes lists of "The Richest" and no one dare mention
their names when plotting the next global conflagration.
Since David Cameron used Jimmy Cliff's " You Can Get It
If You Really Want " for his campaign,
Afshin Rattansi's interview
with that truly revolutionary artist is not so off topic. And it's well worth 12 minutes to enter a worldview we Westerners rarely
live.
I and I say "Ja Mon!"
OK. I can't post Jimmy without " The Harder They Come,
" especially as that seems to be the root of most of the comments here.
@33 -- "...and Western Australia were separate British colonies that all began as penal settlement."
Not entirely correct. Western Australia started as a capitalist investment venture (c. 1828) but suffered chronic labor shortages
as slavery was closed down (c. 1833). The colony then resorted to convict imports for a time. Much of the myth about 'criminal'
can be re-framed as political prisoners such as the Welsh Chartists (see Chartism in Wales).
One can only be confused if one ignores public and secret reasons while Cameron threatened Brexit vote already in 2015 and went
through it in 2016. Officially it was about antiterrorism, security and hence controlling immigration flagship of Tory political
campaign that brought them overwhelming electoral win as well as some noises that EU rules and laws stifle economic development
and the British lose more in EU payments than they gain.
Obtainimg strong mandate Cameron went to Brussels to supposedly
negotiate better deal with EU ESPECIALLY for security while in fact he went there trying to bully the shape future EU integration
especially in political realm and even more in realm of banking Union and integration and coordination of banking rules, laws
and unified controlling authorities, via threatening Brexit which would be a deadly blow to EU propaganda glue that holds together
this melting pot of divided as never before nations and never since medieval times united national elites integrated in EU ruling
bureaucracy.
What Cameron was scared of as far as direction of future of EU?
First it was devastating impact of further EU integration on UK banking as London has become legal under U.K. law illegal
in EU, money laundering capital of the world and criminal income is huge part of the revenue of the City , US is second.
And second point is future of British monarchy which further integration of EU into superstate would require to be abandoned
in UK as elsewhere as states were to loose all even symbolic sovereignty and turn into regions and provinces as in Roman Empire
. Needles to say that UK still powerful landed aristocracy want nothing of that sort.
Hence Cameron went to Brussels make special deal for UK and was essentially, with some meaningless cosmetic changes, rebuked
into binary decision in EU or out of it no special deal and hence he escalated with calling Brexit vote as a negotiating tool
only to increase political pressure to rig elections toward remain if deal reached . In fact as latest scandal revealed results
of exit polls were released to stock market betting hedge funds just minutes before polls were closed concluding guess what, that
remain campaign won while electoral data in hours showed Brexiters wining simply because to the last moment before closing polls
they expected EU to cave in, they did not so they continued pressure by closing openly pro Brexit win.
The pressure continues now while Cameron had to pay political price as he openly advocated staying in EU under phony deal even
Tory did not buy, and hence this seeming chaos now fooling people that there is other way but hard Brexit to keep monarchy sovereignty
and profits from global money laundering or surrender and humiliation degradation U.K. into EU colony as BJ just said.
Of course which way it goes ordinary Brits will pay but also big crack will widen in EU as national movements will have impact
of shattering dreams of quit ascending to EU superstate.
At the passage of Brexit I believed the purpose to be to allow the City of London (the bankers) unlimited financial freedom,
perhaps especially in their entering into agreements with the Chinese. This could not be the case under the original EU rules.
It will be interesting to see how this works out.
The Chinese, as they are intended to be the regional governor of Asia under the evolving global governance are key to the entire
tyrannical plan. The AGW hoax, paid for by Western oligarchs, is the public relations for the UN's Agenda 21, currently being
enforced at the local level in many parts of the US.
The Chinese oligarchs are so delighted with its tyrannical land-use provisions that they are actually calling their projects
"China's Agenda 21". You may search for it.
@ 62: Thanks for the Pilger article, a good read. There are many today, who would return us all to those days.
Herman J Kweeblefezer , Jul 10, 2018 1:05:09 AM |
72
The reality of the brexit which the Tory government is determined to raiload through has been designed by elites to better
oppress the hoi polloi and to sell it to the masses it has been marketed as a means of restoring 'white power'. Bevin
& co can whine on about the injustices of the eu for as long as their theoretical view of the world sustains them, but the brexit
which will be delivered is based on 'pragmatic realism' developed by a really nasty gang of avaricious lying c**tfaces and will
create a society far more unjust, divided and impoverished than the one that currently exists.
That is really saying something
because the current version of the UK is one of the sickest, greed is good and devil take the hindmost societies I have ever experienced
-- up there with contemporary israel and the US, 1980's South Africa and by the sound of it (didn't experience it firsthand like
the other examples, all down to not existing at the time) 1940's Germany.
Jezza was great in the house last night but he didn't
call for an immediate general election which would be pretty much SOP for any opposition facing as tattered a government (Seven
cabinet 'resignations') as bereft of ideas as the Maybot machine.
The reason he didn't - couldn't in fact, is that the UK left is as divided and dug into their positions as that tory bunch
of bastards. Far too many opposition politicians insist that a 'deal' on brexit comes first ahead of sorting out poverty and homelessness,
woeful education outcomes (unless you believe wildly juked stats) and the horror show that has been created by three decades of
relentless attacks on the health service.
We see it here from the brexiters so convinced of the rightness of their cause they ignore the institutionalised racism that
will certainly follow a tory brexit. Or the remoaners who also ignore the unsavory aspects of eu policy to try and render the
labour left impotent. Those latter types simply don't give a damn about anything which flows from this debate and division other
than killing momentum, they consider even losing the next 5 elections to tories an agreeable sacrifice for ridding the party of
Corbyn and co.
Corbyn has recognized the destructive divisiveness of Brexit and tries to ignore it because he holds with fixing the mess so
many people are in as being much more important than theoretical arguments which will change nothing for the better regardless
of impassioned exhortations by ninnies on both sides of the argument.
The thing which really pisses me off about the lefty brexiters, is that they behave as if it is a now or never situation, when
it is anything but. There is nothing to prevent a more united Labour Party who have got their mandate by actually delivering a
better life for people rather than irrelevant concepts, returning to sorting out the UK's position in the EU at a later date,
ideally at a time when the EU's intransigent support for corporate welfare has run bang smack into a leftist UK Labour government's
determination to restore public ownership of natural monopolies (rail, water, power, mail delivery etc).
The lefty brexiters claim the lefty remainers won't allow it, while the lefty remainers claim it is the lefty brexiters clogging
the works. In fact it is both gangs of selfish egotistical assholes.
NotBob @ 35.
The EU Constitution never happened. The Lisbon Treaty came along a couple of years later and this time round the Irish people
voted against it. It got amended and the Irish people accepted it. The French and Dutch (and every other EU) country chose not
to "ask the people" and left the decision to the peoples' chosen represtentatives.
The Irish Constitution has a bit in it making
it necessary to ask the people before any changes can be made to that Constitution, so every time the EU adds some bits to the
EU Treaty that require the Irish to change their own Constitution there's trouble, as those 3 million or so Irish people have
the power to scupper anything and everything for the other 500 million EU citizens. Holding a national referendum to make decisions
affecting the entire Union doesn't seem to be either fair or democratic. A single EU-wide referendum could be held when there's
a major change to the Treaties.
Political correctness is a social disease very similar to syphilis - it fucks with the brain. You really should take precautions
if socializing in those circles. Precautionary measures are available at all chemists and most public toilets.
I click on MoA now and see a pic of Boris the clown hanging from a rope. If the Brits were smart, they would connect that rope
to a weather balloon and allow Boris to ascend to the stratosphere and cruise the jet stream.
The EU is first and foremost a massive attack on democracy. At the same time it attempts to establish technocracy as the mode
of government of the future. But right only racists and overly idealistic assholes oppose the EU...
"Democracy" only being possible locally? Numbers I posted on another thread:
Members of the Shanghai Cooperation Organisation - population of 3 Billion+
EU Members - population of 500 million.
United States - population of 326 million
GDP of United States - 18.57 trillion USD
GDP of European Union - 17.1 trillion USD
GDP China, India, Russia combined (Shanghai Cooperation Organisation) -
- close to 15 trillion
You think EU countries have got a competitive chance if on their own? Or - democracy in Switzerland enables them to decide
on their relations with the outside world? Like not being part of the "single market" - they are -including free movement of people
- yes you can live and work in Switzerland if you are a EU citizen.
But right only racists and overly idealistic assholes oppose the EU
Brexit is nether the problem or the solution, it was just another distraction to keep the mass occupied, whilst they assist
stripped the uk and a large part of the world! The people we are scared to mention are the true people killing and oppressing
us. I thank Daniel@66 for naming them ! Rothchild family ect ect I would add the Rothermere family and Murdoch ! Politics are
debated, but history is made on the streets. We need to regain our sense of moral outrage (where did that go ?) there are 70 million
displaced people in the world ! It could be. You or I next !
Peter AU 1 @ 83: I agree with ADKC and IMO. There were convicts transported to the Australian colonies whose crimes can be considered
political crimes. The Tolpuddle Martyrs who came to the Sydney colony in the 1830s are one example: they were transported for
the crime of demanding an extension of voting rights to all men, among other demands. Such convicts were a small minority though.
As for Germany. Immigration in the EU was all about divide and rule and leaving fewer Euros for social programs.
"The demonization of Muslim immigration to the EU ...." - fixed it for you.
The stuff about leaving fewer euros for social programmes is propaganda. Social programmes are designed to force people to
work - they are pegged below the minimum wage.
In the case of Germany costs for refugees were accounted to the 0.7 percent of GDP Germany is supposed to spend for development
aid by the UN, thereby effectively developing Germany instead.
Alan @ 88
I am in total agreement with you on your comment regarding Boris Johnson ! His childish buffoonery, is a commen system / tactic
of a psychopath . It hides a callous disregard for human life , wins gullible friends which the psychopath manipulates to exploit
there power and influence! They are very good at scheming there own self interested plan. But (and here's the crunch ) are totally
useless at for seeing the consequences of there actions . And no regard for the victim of there actions!!! Do we want that in
charge of the nuclear button ?
There is nothing wrong/inconsistent with the idea of an interconnected world of sovereign (independent) states. The idea that
a treaty or a trade agreement means that a state is no-longer independent is ridiculous. As ridiculous as believing that an individual
who purchases a pack of polo mints is no longer free because of the need of a local shop and a manufacturer.
You are basically pushing the idea that there should be no nation states, no borders and all trade free and therefore no need
for treaties. From this comes no regulation, a poisoned environment, uncontrolled and rapacious capitalism, no rights for people,
no benefits, no protection, just work til' you die and polished off sharpish if you are no longer productive.
I don't object to an EU as a grouping of independent states acting collectively. I do object to an EU that erodes and undermines
the nation state, that seeks to remove state leaders and interfere in state elections/policies. The EU that we have is the latter
and there is no practical way to reform it to the former.
@ B. You have too high an opinion of the competence of the main political figures in the UK Governing Party.
Boris Johnson has
never been a serious contender for PM. He's good at giving a rousing speech to the Party faithful but that's it. The blue rinses
enjoy the titillation of his infidelities but they don't want someone so amoral coming anywhere near their daughters, or representing
their principles.
You knew Theresa May had no judgment the first day of her premiership, when she made BoJo her Foreign Secretary. A selection
that could kindly be described as risible. He indicated no suitability for the role before his appointment nor has since. Quite
the opposite. It was at that decision you knew all was hopeless. Brexit was going to be hopeless. Everything she was going to
be involved in was hopeless.
And so it has proved.
The vox pop that I encounter ..... the Remainers are reconciled to Brexit and just want to get on with it. The Brexiteers are
sick to death with hearing about it but not seeing anything done. Everyone had made their minds up before the election in 2015.
The Referendum campaign was a few weeks of premium entertainment watching the most reviled political figures in the land trying
to tear each others' throats out.
Every brexiteer I've asked why they voted for out, begins by saying "For once they had to listen to us" and that's usually
followed by "there's too many people here" or "it's the E.Europeans". (My response to the europhiles is that you knew the EU was
finished a dozen years ago, when all the Big Issue sellers turned into Romanian women.) UK cities are thick with destitute E.Europeans.
There's a huge disconnect between Parliament (+ media) and the people. A further example of this is the official narrative
on the Salisbury poisonings. Ask people in the street and they say "yeah, it was Vlad with the doorknob" and then they crease
up laughing. The Govt has no credibility with its "only plausible explanation".
My prediction, since the day BoJo was appointed minister for the exterior, is that the situation is so catastrophic the EU
will have to lead us by the hand through the process of brexit. The EU's priority will be the stability of the Euro. They won't
want us beggared on their doorstep and as they export 15% of their stuff to us they'll want to keep on doing that. We'll have
to have what we're given and be grateful.
The political situation in the UK is so far beyond surreal that a man dragging a piano with a dead horse on it would appear
mundane.
- It doesn't matter who the prime minister is. The UK has already adopted A LOT OF EU regulations/laws and that will make it nearly
impossible to perform a "Hard Brexit". The UK still exports A LOT OF stuff to the Eurozone and then it simply has to follow EU
regulations, no matter what the opinion of the government is. In that regard, the current EU regulation simply provides a good
framework, even for the UK. No matter what one Mrs. May or Mr. Johnson.
- As time goes by the UK can change parts of the EU
regulations to what the UK thinks those regulations should be.
- And do I think that Mrs. May and her ministers have drawn that same conclusion.
The much anticipated resignation letter penned by the former UK Foreign Minister Boris
Johnson has been released, and in as expected, he does not mince his words in unleashing a
brutal attack on Thersa May, warning that "we have postponed crucial decisions -- including the
preparations for no deal, as I argued in my letter to you of last November -- with the result
that we appear to be heading for a semi-Brexit, with large parts of the economy still locked in
the EU system, but with no UK control over that system ."
He then adds that while "Brexit should be about opportunity and hope" and "a chance to do
things differently, to be more nimble and dynamic, and to maximise the particular advantages of
the UK as an open, outward-looking global economy", he warns that the " dream is dying,
suffocated by needless self-doubt. "
He then compares May's proposal to a submission even before it has been received by the EU,
noting that "what is even more disturbing is that this is our opening bid. This is already how
we see the end state for the UK -- before the other side has made its counter-offer . It is as
though we are sending our vanguard into battle with the white flags fluttering above them."
And his punchline: the UK is headed for the status of a colony:
In that respect we are truly headed for the status of colony -- and many will struggle to
see the economic or political advantages of that particular arrangement
Explaining his decision to resing, he then says that "we must have collective
responsibility. Since I cannot in all conscience champion these proposals, I have sadly
concluded that I must go."
It remains to be seen if his passionate defense of Brexit will stir enough MPs to indicate
they are willing to back a vote of no confidence, and overthrow Theresa May in what would be
effectively a coup, resulting in new elections and chaos for the Brexit process going
forward.
Meanwhile, as Bloomberg adds, the fact that Boris Johnson, or those around him, made sure
his resignation statement came out in time for the evening news - before it was formally issued
in the traditional way by May's office, hints at his continued interest in leading the
Conservative Party.
His full letter is below (highlights ours):
Dear Theresa,
It is more than two years since the British people voted to leave the European Union on an
unambiguous and categorical promise that if they did so they would be taking back control of
their democracy.
They were told that they would be able to manage their own immigration policy, repatriate
the sums of UK cash currently spent by the EU, and, above all, that they would be able to
pass laws independently and in the interests of the people of this country.
Brexit should be about opportunity and hope. It should be a chance to do things
differently, to be more nimble and dynamic, and to maximise the particular advantages of the
UK as an open, outward-looking global economy.
That dream is dying, suffocated by needless self-doubt.
We have postponed crucial decisions -- including the preparations for no deal, as I argued
in my letter to you of last November -- with the result that we appear to be heading for a
semi-Brexit, with large parts of the economy still locked in the EU system, but with no UK
control over that system.
It now seems that the opening bid of our negotiations involves accepting that we are not
actually going to be able to make our own laws. Indeed we seem to have gone backwards since
the last Chequers meeting in February, when I described my frustrations, as Mayor of London,
in trying to protect cyclists from juggernauts. We had wanted to lower the cabin windows to
improve visibility; and even though such designs were already on the market, and even though
there had been a horrific spate of deaths, mainly of female cyclists, we were told that we
had to wait for the EU to legislate on the matter.
So at the previous Chequers session we thrashed out an elaborate procedure for divergence
from EU rules. But even that now seems to have been taken off the table, and there is in fact
no easy UK right of initiative. Yet if Brexit is to mean anything, it must surely give
Ministers and Parliament the chance to do things differently to protect the public. If a
country cannot pass a law to save the lives of female cyclists -- when that proposal is
supported at every level of UK Government -- then I don't see how that country can truly be
called independent.
Conversely, the British Government has spent decades arguing against this or that EU
directive, on the grounds that it was too burdensome or ill-thought out. We are now in the
ludicrous position of asserting that we must accept huge amounts of precisely such EU law,
without changing an iota, because it is essential for our economic health -- and when we no
longer have any ability to influence these laws as they are made.
In that respect we are truly headed for the status of colony -- and many will struggle to
see the economic or political advantages of that particular arrangement.
It is also clear that by surrendering control over our rulebook for goods and agrifoods
(and much else besides) we will make it much more difficult to do free trade deals. And then
there is the further impediment of having to argue for an impractical and undeliverable
customs arrangement unlike any other in existence.
What is even more disturbing is that this is our opening bid. This is already how we see
the end state for the UK -- before the other side has made its counter-offer. It is as though
we are sending our vanguard into battle with the white flags fluttering above them. Indeed, I
was concerned, looking at Friday's document, that there might be further concessions on
immigration, or that we might end up effectively paying for access to the single market.
On Friday I acknowledged that my side of the argument were too few to prevail, and
congratulated you on at least reaching a Cabinet decision on the way forward. As I said then,
the Government now has a song to sing. The trouble is that I have practised the words over
the weekend and find that they stick in the throat.
We must have collective responsibility. Since I cannot in all conscience champion these
proposals, I have sadly concluded that I must go.
I am proud to have served as Foreign Secretary in your Government. As I step down, I would
like first to thank the patient officers of the Metropolitan Police who have looked after me
and my family, at times in demanding circumstances.
I am proud too of the extraordinary men and women of our diplomatic service. Over the last
few months they have shown how many friends this country has around the world, as 28
governments expelled Russian spies in an unprecedented protest at the attempted assassination
of the Skripals. They have organised a highly successful Commonwealth summit and secured
record international support for this Government's campaign for 12 years of quality education
for every girl, and much more besides. As I leave office, the FCO now has the largest and by
far the most effective diplomatic network of any country in Europe -- a continent which we
will never leave.
The fact that the US is facing a profound crisis, possibly the worst one in its history, is
accepted by most observers, except maybe the most delusional ones. Most Americans definitely
know that. In fact, if there is one thing upon which both those who supported Trump and those
who hate him with a passion can agree on, it would be that his election is a clear proof of a
profound crisis (I would argue that the election of Obama before also had, as one of its main
causes, the very same systemic crisis). When speaking of this crisis, most people will mention
the deindustrialization, the drop in real income, the lack of well-paid jobs, healthcare,
crime, immigration, pollution, education, and a myriad of other contributing factors. But of
all the aspects of the "American dream", the single most resilient one has been the myth of the
US military as "the finest fighting force in history".
For Americans warfare is killing the other guy in his own country, preferably from afar
or above, while making a ton of money in the process.
This is why I don't think there'll be any head-on clash between the US and Russia. It
would violate the above principle. American wars are ones of predation, attacking weaker
countries when the opportunity presents itself. It's a form of banditry, roving the world in
search of the next victim. Parts of Asia, Africa and Latin America are all weak and subject
to US whims. That there's a huge mythology attached to US military prowess is just part of
the brainwashing that goes on. It's been a winning formula for the US which has avoided the
massive casualty rates suffered by other countries. There's always the risk of miscalculation
of course but US politics is mostly show biz so it's hard to assess what part of it's warhawk
talk is real and what's showboating.
"... By David Llewellyn-Smith, founding publisher and former editor-in-chief of The Diplomat magazine, now the Asia Pacific's leading geo-politics website. Cross posted from MacroBusiness ..."
"... Captains of the German auto industry kowtowing to US ambassador Grenell make a remarkable scene, not unlike the Chinese capitulating to the British and handing over Hong Kong in the opium wars. ..."
Europe
Isolates China Trade Cheat Posted on July 7,
2018 by Yves
Smith Yves here. I'm faithfully replicating the MacroBusiness headline as an indicator of
unhappiness in some circles in Australia about the degree to which the government has opened
the floodgates since I was there to investment from China, particularly in real estate. When I
lived in Sydney in 2002 to 2004, property struck me as awfully fully priced by global
standards, and it's been on a moon shot trajectory since then, in part due to Australia also
liberalizing immigration. When I was there, the intent of policy was to have immigration in
certain skilled categories, and then with an eye to maintaining population levels, not goosing
them. Since then, the population in Australia has grown from 20 million to over 24 million.
But in addition, even though imposing tariffs on cars and car parts would hurt quite a few
US employers, it would also hurt European multinationals (many of whom happen to be US
employers), to the degree that they've pushed the European officialdom to see if they can cut a
deal with Trump. If that happens, Trump gets a win he can brandish for the midterms and the
tariff brinksmanship presumably eases off a bit, potentially a lot.
By David Llewellyn-Smith, founding publisher and former editor-in-chief of The Diplomat
magazine, now the Asia Pacific's leading geo-politics website. Cross posted from MacroBusiness
Recall that China has tried to play Europe for the chump, via
Reuters :
China is putting pressure on the European Union to issue a strong joint statement against
President Donald Trump's trade policies at a summit later this month but is facing
resistance, European officials said.
In meetings in Brussels, Berlin and Beijing, senior Chinese officials, including Vice
Premier Liu He and the Chinese government's top diplomat, State Councillor Wang Yi, have
proposed an alliance between the two economic powers and offered to open more of the Chinese
market in a gesture of goodwill.
One proposal has been for China and the European Union to launch joint action against the
United States at the World Trade Organization.
But the European Union, the world's largest trading bloc, has rejected the idea of allying
with Beijing against Washington, five EU officials and diplomats told Reuters, ahead of a
Sino-European summit in Beijing on July 16-17.
Instead, the summit is expected to produce a modest communique, which affirms the
commitment of both sides to the multilateral trading system and promises to set up a working
group on modernizing the WTO, EU officials said.
"China wants the European Union to stand with Beijing against Washington, to take sides,"
said one European diplomat. "We won't do it and we have told them that."
Despite Trump's tariffs on European metals exports and threats to hit the EU's automobile
industry, Brussels shares Washington's concern about China's closed markets and what Western
governments say is Beijing's manipulation of trade to dominate global markets.
"We agree with almost all the complaints the U.S. has against China, it's just we don't
agree with how the United States is handling it," another diplomat said.
But it's China that looking more isolated today, via
Quartz :
The US may have been accused by China of "opening fire on the world" with its punitive
trade tariffs, but it looks like officials may be making more progress in Europe's largest
economy Germany.
Richard Grenell, the US ambassador to Germany, has caused quite a stir since he arrived in
Berlin in May, lecturing German companies to stop trading with Iran, and saying he planned to
"empower" anti-establishment conservatives in Europe. However, with the threat of punitive US
tariffs on its cars looming, Grenell certainly has the attention of Germany's powerful car
bosses.
German business daily Handelsblatt reports (link in German) that Grenell met Daimler CEO
Dieter Zetsche, BMW CEO Harald Krüger, and VW CEO Herbert Diess on Wednesday evening to
discuss both sides abolishing all tariffs on each others car imports. Right now, the European
Union adds a 10% tax on imported US cars, and the US puts 2.5% on EU car imports, and is
threatening to ramp that up to 25%. As part of the deal, president Donald Trump would
reportedly want German carmakers to invest more in the US.
Last night's meeting was not the first time the carmakers and Grenell have talked about
abolishing two-way tariffs. The Wall Street Journal (paywall) reported on June 20 that the
ambassador had been meeting with all Germany's most important car companies, and that they
were already behind the idea.
Chancellor Angela Merkel is worried about the damage a car trade war could do to one of
Germany's core industries. "We now have tariffs on aluminum and steel and we have a
discussion that is far more serious," she told parliament, referring to auto tariffs. "It's
worth every effort to try to defuse this conflict so it doesn't turn into a war."
German Chancellor Angela Merkel said Thursday she would back opening talks with trading
partners on lowering automobile tariffs, in what appeared to be an olive branch to US
President Donald Trump as the EU battles to dissuade him from imposing hefty levies on
European cars.
But Merkel said that any negotiations on lowering tariffs in one area could only be
conducted with "all the countries with which we have trade in cars," rather than just with
the United States.
A deal with the US alone "would not conform with WTO" rules, she said.
"We can either have negotiations about a wide range of tariffs, for 90 percent of goods,"
Merkel said in a reference to the stalled talks for a transatlantic free-trade deal known as
TTIP.
"Or we can talk about one type of goods, but then we must accord the same treatment to all
trading partners of the world. That's an option I could imagine," she added.
Interestingly, Nomura sees it all as deflationary:
US pursuit of beggar thy neighbor policies: is it leading to a whole new world for global
automakers?
Automakers have set up an intricate web of suppliers and assembly plants globally to
leverage the benefits of trade agreements, while keeping FX risks at acceptable levels. The
pursuit of beggar thy neighbour policies by a large, connected, and heretofore open Now 3
mths 12 mths US Europe Japan Korea Brazil Russia India China Thailand Indonesia Nomura |
Global Autos Outlook 4 June 2018 4 economy such as the US threatens to upend this
structure.
In this edition of the Global Autos Outlook, we therefore look at trade-related challenges
(and opportunities) facing global automakers, possible strategies they could adopt to cope,
and potential winners and losers over the near-to-medium term. Risk of "No NAFTA" has risen,
although our base case remains NAFTA 2.0 Trump's openly protectionist policies have increased
the risk of a "No NAFTA" outcome, although our base case still remains that NAFTA will be
renegotiated.
Nearly 25 years of NAFTA have integrated the North American auto industry very tightly. If
NAFTA is dissolved, it will impact all automakers operating in North America. In particular,
we think GM and FCA could be hit the hardest (higher import tariffs cut 40% of GM's FY2018E
EBIT, 23% of that for FCA). In our opinion, it increasingly appears that the US President's
decision-making is centered on autoworkers, even if that is to the detriment of the
automakers. Thus, US automakers getting hurt might not hold back Trump from making such a
move.
Auto industry staring at global excess capacity, no matter what the outcome of the Section
232 drama
The US Department of Commerce has started a Section 232 investigation into US imports of
autos and auto parts. Under the worst case scenario, this may result in broadbased import
tariffs slapped on US automotive imports after the investigation concludes and reports back
to the President in several months. US imports of new passenger vehicles and auto parts
totaled $333bn in 2017. Import duties on such a large volume of goods would be highly
disruptive and impact all the major car exporting countries/regions such as Mexico, Canada,
Japan, the EU, and South Korea.
While we think that the threat of tariffs is largely Trump's negotiation tactic to get a
better NAFTA deal, we caution investors to pay attention, as the tail risk (of import tariffs
materializing) is not negligible. Furthermore, no matter whether new auto tariffs are imposed
or not, global carmakers, irrespective of nationality, are feeling pressured to build plants
and increase employment in the US. This is likely to lead to increased capacity in the US,
where car demand is no longer growing.
On the other hand, non-US carmakers are unlikely to cut capacity at home or elsewhere,
leading to excess capacity globally. This will impact most markets except for relatively
closed ones such as China, India, and Southeast Asia, due to their existing high import
tariffs. For global automakers, we therefore see a binary outcome from a growing list of
protectionist measures being deployed by the US. Neither outcome is good news, with
automakers staring at excess global capacity in either case:
If Section 232 tariffs are imposed, it (largely) cuts off imports into the
domestic US market. However, that would mean that there is excess capacity outside the US, as
existing foreign plants supplying to the US (7.88mn/$192bn new PVs, 8.2% of global volume,
and $141bn auto parts in 2017) have to find markets elsewhere.
If new tariffs are not imposed, we still have additional capacity coming up in
the US as automakers are goaded into doing so to avoid political pressure. This also leads to
a global supply-demand imbalance in the auto industry.
Although US protectionism is a real threat, we see a couple of silver linings. China
announced an import tariff cut for autos, from 25% currently to 15% beginning 1st July 2018.
The Japan-EU Economic Partnership Agreement (JEEPA) was agreed upon last December and is
likely to become effective in spring 2019, benefiting Japanese car exporters. One of the
biggest beneficiaries from both China and the EU's tariff cuts would be Toyota Motor.
"US lure carmakers with tariff offer – but the proposal is illegal"
That's the title in WirtschaftsWoche. A premier german language trade and economics
magazine. It had an interview(in German) with Ewald Pum attorney at internal law firm
Wirtschaftskanzlei Rödl & Partner.
He states that what Ambassador Grenell proposed is illegal under international WTO law,
and the EU could therefore not support it. Also, the EU had historically supported rules
based free trade, and this could only be accomplished via an bilateral trade deal in goods,
what he called TTIP on a diet.
' Nomura sees it all as deflationary: the pursuit of beggar thy neighbour policies by a
large, connected, and heretofore open economy such as the US threatens to upend this
structure. '
So does UK-based Russell Napier, who sees the US obsession with shrinking its trade
deficit provoking a seismic shift in China:
Investors need to prepare for a formal widening of the trading bands for the RMB
relative to its basket and the problems such a move will create for all emerging markets.
That first move in the RMB is inherently deflationary. This is no counter-punch in a trade
war; it is the beginning of the creation of a new global monetary system.
The ability of China to extend the cycle has come to an end as its current account
surplus has all but evaporated. It has also come to an end because Jay Powell has warned
China, and other emerging markets, that he will not alter the course of US monetary policy
to assist with any credit disturbances outside his own jurisdiction.
Who can run the current account deficits necessary to make their currency an attractive
anchor for smaller countries seeking to run current account surpluses?
It seems well nigh impossible to believe, following almost 40 years of mercantilism,
that China would opt to become a country running large current account deficits. Such a
change in mindset may seem revolutionary, but it is just another necessary shift in the
long game in the attempt to make China the pre-eminent global economy.
The initial shift to a more flexible Chinese exchange rate is deflationary and
dangerous. The USD selling price of Chinese exports will likely fall, putting pressure on
all those who compete with China – EMs [Emerging Markets] but also Japan. The USD
will rise, putting pressure on all those, particularly EMs, who have borrowed USD without
having USD cash flows to service those debts. With world debt-to-GDP at a record high, such
a major deflationary dislocation can easily trigger another credit crisis.
Following the great dislocation, China will be free to reflate the world.
' Free to reflate the world ' much as the US did post-WW II with its Great
Inflation that flooded the world with dollars.
But getting from here to there is the tricky bit. As Napier insists, a deflationary ditch
lies between. Combine Llewellyn-Smith's comments on the auto industry's overcapacity and
supply-chain disruption with a deflationary break in the global economy, and you've got the
recipe for a nasty little crisis and perhaps a second bankruptcy in GM, whose long-term debt
is rising rapidly.
Flake-o-nomics may be creative destruction, but folks are not going to like the interim
results. The purblind Hoover-Trump will be blamed, rightly.
This whole tariff fight really seems to be about derailing China's plans to be a world
leader with its 'Made in China 2025' plan. Maybe Trump and his advisers reckon that if this
fight is not carried to the Chinese soon, then it will be too late. Europe, though under
attack by Trump, is also seeing the dangers where the EU will be eclipsed by a single
country.
It may be that Europe is giving Trump a message that if he plays nice with Europe's
tariffs, then the EU will cooperate with the US against China. I hope that the calculation is
not to push China into financial chaos as serving Europe's and Trump's interests. Supply
chains are far too meshed to make that a good option and I can easily see a recession in the
making which will hit the world hard.
China may have a long term advantage in that it has invested in infrastructure, transport,
education and training whereas the west has been devaluing these things due to neoliberal
policies for decades now. They may start pulling their money back which will hit places like
Australia, Canada and the US hard as to my eye Chinese money keeps things like property
values high in those places. We'll find out soon enough.
I've been following CGTN on the tariff war, and it looks like China is going to go the
'proportional reciprocity' route, just as Russia has with sanctions.
The latter has benefited from sanctions, while Europe has lost billions in trade.
As for the 'five EU officials' – all anonymous – cited in Reuters' report, I
would take their statements with a large dose of salt.
EU is in ferment, and Merkel is not doing well in the polls.
There is strong anti-US sentiment in Germany, albeit not reported in the media. A
combination of Trump's policies and the perpetual wars – now implicated in the greatest
mass migrantion crisis since WWII – has led to a disenchantment with US.
Then there is OBOR, with various interest groups – particularly in European industry
– beginning to look East rather than West.
Thus there is no real unified resolve at EU level to warrant such claims.
Dedollarization is continuing apace too, and new alliances are emerging like the SCO and
the reported deals between the major oil producing countries like Russia and Saudi.
China plays a much longer game than the US, so it is hard to estimate what the consequence
will be within the short – tern assessment models used by the Western powers.
I've gotten into the habit of rolling my eyes whenever an establishment media outlet
quotes "anonymous sources". Looking at the prospects in the global automotive sector, surely
the smart money is on the east (and other emerging markets) being where the long term growth
is going to emerge, so why the EU would bet on a jockey riding a horse that's falling behind
the pace would be rather difficult to fathom. One assumes that CEOs of the big three German
automakers play as long a game as anyone, so being brow beaten into an anti-china stance by a
US ambassador would be incredibly shortsighted, to say nothing of raising investor ire
Captains of the German auto industry kowtowing to US ambassador Grenell make a
remarkable scene, not unlike the Chinese capitulating to the British and handing over Hong
Kong in the opium wars.
But Germany is an occupied and humbled nation, with tens of thousands of US troops
garrisoned on its soil for three generations now. And Grenell, a product of the John F
Kennedy School of Gubmint at Hahhhhhvid, was born to rule.
It's good to be king ambassador.
*summons his liveried steward to fetch oysters and mimosas for brunch*
I agree that this is looking like creative destruction -- but more like intentional
creative destruction. Bringing down the dinosaur auto industry – now that's definitely
a step in the right direction, imo. So it's curious that Trump has such a strategic focus,
no? And he just started Space Force.
So clearly that is where the technology is. I do not agree that this is hyper-nationalism
(that's just the cover) and it seems absurd for anyone to suggest that Trump is actually
doing anything to benefit domestic auto workers he's just not that dumb. And of course Merkel
is in a tizzy. She's going to do everything she can to soften the impact of the
inevitable.
Ha! As discussed and promised 'round the table at D4 last night ;-) #ChicagoNCMeetup
Thanks again Yves!
Part of me wants to believe that the capitalist nations were always destined to circle
the wagons against communist China, despite all the hand wringing about Trump. The
political aspect of this is more interesting to me at the moment. Given all we know about the
loyalty Trump still enjoys from those who put him in office, a yuge trade "win" this
year will play to the theme of tempered expectations of a "Blue Wave".
The rant of a coddled establishment chickenhawk, who is quite overrated, relative to the
positions accorded to him (Nasty people don't deserve kindness.)
Notable quotes:
"... When Tucker Carlson on his prime time program last July 11, 2017, demanded that Peters provide facts and figures for his accusations, Peters immediately exploded and implied that program host Carlson was a "Hitler apologist." It was a classic argument and instance of reductio ad Hitlerum. ..."
"... Ralph Peters is one of the nuttiest neocons around, and Fox was smart to dump him. I recall an article long ago where he suggested that the US Govt. should address the drug addition problem in the USA by assassinating drug dealers on the streets in the USA ..."
"... He lives off scraps from neocons by selling his soul for BS talking points and collects a monthly check from Uncle Sam after 20 years of sitting at a desk doing BS intel work, as I once did for a year. It seems he missed his chance at killing commies in Nam by touring Europe, as Fred Reed explained ..."
"... Last week, Fox News host Tucker Carlson, received well deserved praise for taking to task the permeating anti-Russian biases. The highlight of Carlson's exchanges was his encounter with Ralph Peters, who for years has spouted grossly inaccurate propaganda against Russia. Antiwar.com and Russia Insider, are among the counter-establishment English language venues commenting on the Carlson-Peters discussion. The US foreign policy establishment realist leaning National Interest carried a lengthy piece on Carlson's challenge to the neocon/neolib foreign policy perceptions. For the record, more can and should be said in reply to Peter's comments. ..."
"... Peters' characterization of Russia targeting civilian areas is disingenuous. Over the years, the matter of collateral damage is something periodically brought up in response to those killed by US and Israeli military actions. ..."
"... Some Kiev regime elements positively reference the 1995 Croat ethnic cleansing of Krajina Serbs (known as Operation Storm) as a solution for ending the rebel position in Donbass. Russia doesn't seek a massive refugee problem in Donbass and some other parts of the former Ukrainian SSR. As is, a sizeable number of Ukrainian residents have fled to Russia. ..."
Or, recall those on-camera Fox News Russia experts -- think here of General Jack Keane or
the unhinged Colonel Ralph Peters who literally foamed at the mouth when talking about Putin,
calling him "the new Hitler," and who asserted that Putin had committed "worse crimes" than the
German dictator. (Peters is so anti-Russian that he finally
left the Fox News network in March 2018 )
When Tucker Carlson on his prime time program last July 11, 2017, demanded that Peters
provide facts and figures for his accusations, Peters
immediately exploded and implied that program host Carlson was a "Hitler apologist." It was
a classic argument and instance of reductio ad Hitlerum.
Ralph Peters is one of the nuttiest neocons around, and Fox was smart to dump him. I recall
an article long ago where he suggested that the US Govt. should address the drug addition
problem in the USA by assassinating drug dealers on the streets in the USA.
He lives off scraps from neocons by selling his soul for BS talking points and collects a
monthly check from Uncle Sam after 20 years of sitting at a desk doing BS intel work, as I
once did for a year. It seems he missed his chance at killing commies in Nam by touring
Europe, as Fred Reed explained:
Last week, Fox News host Tucker Carlson, received well deserved praise for taking to
task the permeating anti-Russian biases. The highlight of Carlson's exchanges was his
encounter with Ralph Peters, who for years has spouted grossly inaccurate propaganda
against Russia. Antiwar.com and Russia Insider, are among the counter-establishment English
language venues commenting on the Carlson-Peters discussion. The US foreign policy
establishment realist leaning National Interest carried a lengthy piece on Carlson's
challenge to the neocon/neolib foreign policy perceptions. For the record, more can and
should be said in reply to Peter's comments.
Peters falsely claims that Russia hasn't made a concerted effort in confronting ISIS. In
one of his more accurate moments, CNN's Wolf Blitzer said that the ISIS claimed shoot down
of a Russian civilian airliner over Egypt, was in response to Russia's war against ISIS.
You've to be either a liar or clueless to not recognize why Russia has actively opposed
ISIS. The latter sees Russia as an enemy, while having a good number of individuals with
roots in Russia and some other parts of the former USSR.
Peters' characterization of Russia targeting civilian areas is disingenuous. Over the
years, the matter of collateral damage is something periodically brought up in response to
those killed by US and Israeli military actions.
Peters offers no proof to his suspect claim that Russian President Vladimir Putin kills
journalists. There're numerous anti-Putin advocates alive and well in Russia. That country
does have a violence problem. Recall what the US was like in the 1960s thru early
1970′s. For that matter, Bernie Sanders isn't blamed for the pro-Sanders person who
attempted to kill Republican lawmakers.
Given the situations concerning Kosovo and northern Cyprus, Peters is being a flat out
hypocrite regarding Crimea. Donbass is a civil conflict involving some Russian support for
the rebels, who're overwhelmingly from the territory of the former Ukrainian SSR. These
individuals have a realistic basis to oppose the Kiev based regimes that came after the
overthrow of a democratically elected Ukrainian president.
During the American Revolution, most of the pro-British fighters were said to be
colonists already based in America. Furthermore, the American revolutionaries received
significant support from France. With these factors in mind, the Donbass rebels don't seem
less legit than the American revolutionaries.
Some Kiev regime elements positively reference the 1995 Croat ethnic cleansing of
Krajina Serbs (known as Operation Storm) as a solution for ending the rebel position in
Donbass. Russia doesn't seek a massive refugee problem in Donbass and some other parts of
the former Ukrainian SSR. As is, a sizeable number of Ukrainian residents have fled to
Russia.
Putin isn't anti-US in the manner claimed by Peters. Moreover, Peters is clearly more
anti-Russian (in a narrow minded way at that) than what can be reasonably said of how Putin
views the US. Putin's obvious differences with neocons, neolibs and flat out Russia haters
isn't by default anti-US. He was the first foreign leader to console the US following 9/11.
The Russian president has been consistently on record for favoring better US-Russian ties
(even inquiring about Russia joining NATO at one point), thereby explaining why he has
appeared to have preferred Trump over Clinton.
Some (including Trump) disagree with that view, which includes the notion that the
Russians (by and large) prefer predictability. As a general rule this is otherwise true.
However, Clinton's neocon/neolib stated views on Russia have been to the point where many
Russians felt willing to take a chance with Trump, whose campaign included a comparatively
more sympathetic take of their country. At the same time, a good number of Russians
questioned whether Trump would maintain that stance.
Many historians have suggested that the 1929 stock market crash
was not the cause of the Great Depression. If anything, the 1929 crash was
the technical reflection of the inevitable fate of an overblown bubble
economy. Yet, stock market crashes can recover within a relatively short time
with the help of effective government monetary measures, as demonstrated by
the crashes of 1987 (23% drop, recovered in 9 months), 1998 (36% drop,
recovered in 3 months) and 2000-2 (37% drop, recovered in 2 months).
Structurally, the real cause of the Great Depression, which lasted more than
a decade, from 1929 till the beginning of the Second World War in 1941, was
the 1930 Smoot-Hawley tariffs that put world trade into a tailspin from which
it did not recover until World War II began. While the US economy finally
recovered from war mobilization after the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor on
December 7, 1940, most of the world's market economies sunk deeper into
war-torn distress and never fully recovered until the Korea War boom in
1951.
Barely five years into the 21st century, with
a globlaized neo-liberal trade regime firmly in place in a world where market
economy has become the norm, trade protectionism appears to be fast
re-emerging and developing into a new global trade war of complex dimensions.
The irony is that this new trade war is being launched not by the poor
economies that have been receiving the short end of the trade stick, but by
the US which has been winning more than it has been losing on all counts from
globalized neo-liberal trade, with the EU following suit in locked steps.
Japan of course has never let up on protectionism and never taken competition
policy seriously. The rich nations needs to recognize that in their effort to
squeeze every last drop of advantage out of already unfair trade will only
plunge the world into deep depression. History has shown that while the poor
suffer more in economic depressions, the rich, even as they are fianancially
cushioned by their wealth, are hurt by political repercussions in the form of
either war or revolution or both.
During the Cold War, there was no international free trade. The
economies of the two contending ideology blocks were completely disconnected.
Within each block, economies interact through foreign aid and memorandum
trade from their respective superpowers. The competition was not for profit
but for the hearts and minds of the people in the two opposing blocks as well
as those in the non-aligned nations in the Third World. The competition
between the two superpowers was to give rather than to take from their
separate fraternal economies.
The population of the superpowers worked hard to help the poorer
people within their separate blocks and convergence toward equality was the
policy aim even if not always the practice. The Cold War era of foreign aid
and memorandum trade had a better record of poverty reduction in either camps
than post-Cold War globalized neo-liberal trade dominated by one single
superpower. The aim was not only to raise income and increase wealth, but
also to close income and wealth disparity between and within economies.
Today, income and wealth disparity is rationalized as a necessity for capital
formation. The New York Time reports that from 1980 to 2002, the total income
earned by the top 0.1% of earners in the US more than doubled, while the
share earned by everyone else in the top 10% rose far less and the share of
the bottom 90% declined.
For all its ill effects, the Cold War achieved two formidable ends:
it prevented nuclear war and it introduced development as a moral imperative
into superpower geo-political competition with rising economic equality
within each block. In the years since the end of the Cold War, nuclear
terrorism has emerged as a serious threat and domestic development is
pre-empted by global trade even in the rich economies while income and wealth
disparity has widened everywhere.
Since the end of the Cold War some fifteen years ago, world economic
growth has shifted to rely exclusively on globalized neo-liberal trade
engineered and led by the US as the sole remaining superpower, financed with
the US dollar as the main reserve currency for trade and anchored by the huge
US consumer market made possible by the high wages of US workers. This growth
has been sustained by knocking down national tariffs everywhere around the
world through supranational institutions such as the World Trade Organization
(WTO), and financed by a deregulated foreign exchange market working in
concert with a global central banking regime independent of local political
pressure, lorded over by the supranational Bank of International Settlement
(BIS) and the International Monetary Fund (IMF).
Redefining humanist morality, the US asserts that world trade is a
moral imperative and as such trade promotes democracy, political freedom and
respect for human rights in trade participating nations. Unfortunately,
income and wealth equality are not among the benefits promoted by trade. Even
if the validity of this twisted ideological assertion is not questioned, it
clearly contradicts US practice of trade embargo against countries the US
deems undemocratic, lacking in political freedom and deficient in respect for
human rights. If trade promotes such desirable conditions, such practice of
linking trade to freedom is tantamount to denying medicine to the
sick.
President George W Bush defended his free trade agenda in moralistic
terms. "Open trade is not just an economic opportunity, it is a moral
imperative," he declared in a May 7, 2001 speech. "Trade creates jobs for the
unemployed. When we negotiate for open markets, we're providing new hope for
the world's poor. And when we promote open trade, we are promoting political
freedom." Such claims remain highly controversial when tested by actual
data.
Phyllis Schlafly, syndicated conservative columnist, responded
three weeks later in an article: Free Trade is an Economic Issue, Not a
Moral One . In it, she notes while conservatives should be happy to
finally have a president who adds a moral dimension to his actions, "the
Bible does not instruct us on free trade and it's not one of the Ten
Commandments. Jesus did not tell us to follow Him along the road to free
trade. Nor is there anything in the U.S. Constitution that requires us to
support free trade and to abhor protectionism. In fact, protectionism was the
economic system believed in and practiced by the framers of our Constitution.
Protective tariffs were the principal source of revenue for our federal
government from its beginning in 1789 until the passage of the 16th
Amendment, which created the federal income tax, in 1913. Were all those
public officials during those hundred-plus years remiss in not adhering to a
"moral obligation" of free trade?" Hardly, argues Schlafly whose views are
noteworthy because US politics is currently enmeshed in a struggle between
strict-constructionist paleo-conservatives and moral-imperialist
neo-conservatives. Despite the ascendance of neo-imperialism in US foreign
policy, protectionism remains strong in US political culture, particularly
among conservatives and in the labor movement.
Bush also said China, which reached a trade agreement with the
US at the close of the Clinton administration, and became a member of the WTO
in late 2001, would benefit from political changes as a result of liberalized
trade policies. This pronouncement gives clear evidence to those in China who
see foreign trade as part of an anti-China "peaceful evolution" strategy
first envisioned by John Forster Dulles, US Secretary of State under
Eisenhower in the 1950s. It is a strategy of inducing through peaceful trade
the Communist Party of China (CPC) to reform itself out of power and to
eliminate the dictatorship of the proletariat in favor of bourgeois
liberalization. Almost four decades later, Deng Xiaoping criticized CPC
Chairman Hu Yaobang and Premier Zhao Ziyang for having failed to contain
bourgeois liberalization in their implementation of China's modernization
policy. Deng warned in November 1989, five months after the Tiananmen
incident: "The Western imperialist countries are staging a third world war
without guns. They want to bring about the peaceful evolution of socialist
countries towards capitalism." Deng's handling of the Tiananmen incident
prevented China from going the catastrophic route of the USSR which dissolved
in 1991.
Yet it is clear that political freedom is often the first
casualty of a garrison state mentality and such mentality inevitably results
from hostile US economic and security policy toward any country the US deems
as not free. Whenever the US pronounces a nation to be not free, that nation
will become less free as a result of US policy. This has been repeatedly
evident in China and elsewhere in the Third World. Whenever US policy toward
China turns hostile, as it currently appears to be heading, political and
press freedom inevitably face stricter curbs. For trade to mutually and truly
benefit the trading economies, three conditions are necessary: 1) the
de-linking of trade from ideological/political objectives, 2) equality must
be maintained in the terms of trade and 3) recognition that global full
employment at rising, living wages is the prerequisite for true comparative
advantage in global trade.
The developing rupture between the sole superpower and its
traditionally deferential allies lies in mounting trade conflicts. The US has
benefited from an international financial architecture that gives the US
economy a structural monetary advantage over those of the EU and Japan, not
to mention the rest of the world. Trade issues range from government
subsidies disputes between Airbus and Boeing, banana, sugar, beef, oranges,
steel, as well as disputes over fair competition associated with mergers and
acquisition and financial services. If either government is found to be in
breach of WTO rules when these disputes wind through long processes of
judgment, the other will be authorized to retaliate. The US could put tariffs
on other European goods if the WTO rules against Airbus and vice versa. So if
both governments are found in breach, both could retaliate, leading to a
cycle of offensive protectionism. When the US was ruled to have unfairly
supported its steel industry, tariffs were slapped by the EU on Florida
oranges to make a political point in a politically important state in US
politics.
Trade competition between the EU and the US is spilling over
into security areas, allowing economic interests to conflict with ideological
sympathy. Both of these production engines, saddled with serious
overcapacity, are desperately seeking new markets, which inevitably leads
them to Asia in general and China in particular, with its phenomenal growth
rate and its 1.2 billion eager consumers bulging with rapidly rising
disposable income. The growth of the Chinese economy will lift all other
economies in Asia, including Australia which has only recently begun to
understand that its future cannot be separated from its geographic location
and that its prosperity is interdependent with those of other Asian
economies. Australian iron ores, beef and dairy products are destined for
China, not the British Isles. The EU is eager to lift its 15-year-old arms
embargo on China, much to the displeasure of the US. Israel faces similar
dilemma in its close relations with the US on military sales to China. Even
the US defense establishment has largely come around to the view that US arms
industry must export, even to China, to remain on top. The Bangkok Post
reported on June 7 that Rumsfeld tried to sell to Thailand F-16 warplanes
capable of firing advanced medium-range air-to-air missiles (AMRAAMs) two
days after he lashed out in Singapore at China for upgrading its own military
when no neighboring nations are threatening it. The sales pitch was in
competition with Russian-made Sukhoi SU-30s and Swedish JAS-39s. The open
competition in arms export had been spelled out for Congress years earlier by
Donald Hicks, a leading Pentagon technologist in the Reagan administration.
"Globalization is not a policy option, but a fact to which policymakers must
adapt," he said. "The emerging reality is that all nations' militaries are
sharing essentially the same global commercial-defense industrial base." The
boots and uniforms worn by US soldiers in Afghanistan and Iraq were made in
China.
The WTO is the only global international organization dealing
with the rules of trade between its 148 member nations. At its heart are the
WTO agreements, known as the multilateral trading system, negotiated and
signed by the majority of the world's trading nations and ratified in their
parliaments. The stated goal is to help producers of goods and services,
exporters, and importers conduct their business, with the dubious assumption
that trade automatically brings equal benefits to all participants. The
welfare of the people is viewed only as a collateral aim based on the
doctrinal fantasy that "balanced" trade inevitably brings prosperity equally
to all, a claim that has been contradicted by facts produced by the very
terms of trade promoted by the WTO itself.
Two decades of neo-liberal globalized trade have widened income
and wealth disparity within and between nations. Free trade has turned out
not to be the win-win game promised by neo-liberals. It is very much a
win-lose game, with heads, the rich economies win, and tails, the poor
economies lose. Domestic development has been marginalized as a hapless
victim of foreign trade, dependent on trade surplus for capital. Foreign
trade and foreign investment have become the prerequisite engines for
domestic development. This trade model condemns those economies with trade
deficits to perpetual underdevelopment. Because of dollar hegemony, all
foreign investment goes only to the export sector where dollars can be
earned. Even the economies with trade surpluses cannot use their dollar trade
earnings for domestic development, as they are forced to hold huge dollar
reserves to support the exchange rate of their
currencies.
In the fifth WTO Ministerial Conference held in Cancun in
September 2003, the richer countries rejected the demands of poorer nations
for radical reform of agricultural subsidies that have decimated Third World
agriculture. Failure to get the Doha round back on track after the collapse
of Cancun runs the danger of a global resurgence of protectionism, with the
US leading the way. Larry Elliott reported on October 13, 2003 in The
Guardian on the failed 2003 Cancun Ministerial meeting: "The language of
globalization is all about democracy, free trade and sharing the benefits of
technological advance. The reality is about rule by elites, mercantilism and
selfishness." Elliot noted that the process is full of paradoxes: why is it
that in a world where human capital is supposed to be the new wealth of
nations, labor is treated with such contempt?
Sam Mpasu, Malawi's commerce and industry minister, asked at
Cancun for his comments about the benefits of trade liberalization, replied
dryly: "We have opened our economy. That's why we are flat on our back."
Mpasu's comments summarize the wide chasm that divides the perspectives of
those who write the rules of globalization and those who are powerless to
resist them.
Exports of manufactures by low-wage developing countries have
increased rapidly over the last 3 decades due in part to falling tariffs and
declining transport costs that enable outsourcing based on wage arbitrage. It
grew from 25% in 1965 to nearly 75% over three decades, while agriculture's
share of developing country exports has fallen from 50% to under 10%. Many
developing countries have gained relatively little from increased
manufactures trade, with most of the profit going to foreign capital. Market
access for their most competitive manufactured export, such as textile and
apparel, remains highly restricted and recent trade disputes threaten further
restrictions. Still, the key cause of unemployment in all developing
economies is the trade-related collapse of agriculture, exacerbated by the
massive government subsidies provided to farmers in rich economies. Many poor
economies are predominantly agriculturally based and a collapse of
agriculture means a general collapse of the whole
economy.
The Doha Development Agenda (DDA) negotiations, sponsored by the
WTO, collapsed in Cancun, Mexico over the question of government support for
agriculture in rich economies and its potential impacts on causing more
poverty in developing countries. The Doha negotiations since Cancun are
focused on the need to better understand the linkages between trade policies,
particularly those of the rich economies, and poverty in the developing
world. While poverty reduction is now more widely accepted by establishment
economists as a necessary central focus for development efforts and has
become the main mission of the World Bank and other development institutions,
very little effective measures have been forthcoming. The UN Millennium
Development Goals (UNMDG) commits the international community to halve world
poverty by 2015, a decade from now. With current trends, that goal is likely
to be achievable only through death of half of the poor by starvation,
disease and local conflicts. The UN Development
Program warns that 3 million children will die in sub-Saharan Africa alone by
2015 if the world continues on its current path of failing to meet the UNMDG
agreed to in 2000 . Several key venues to this goal are located in
international trade where the record of poverty reduction has been
exceedingly poor, if not outright negative. The fundamental question whether
trade can replace or even augment socio-economic development remains unasked,
let alone answered. Until such issues are earnestly addressed, protectionism
will re-emerge in the poor countries. Under such conditions, if democracy
expresses the will of the people, democracy will demand protectionism more
than government by elite.
While tariffs in the past decade have been coming down like
leaves in autumn, flexible exchange rates have become a form of virtual
countervailing tariff. In the current globalized neo-liberal trade regime
operating in a deregulated global foreign exchange market, the exchanged
value of a currency is regularly used to balance trade through government
intervention in currency market fluctuations against the world's main reserve
currency – the dollar, as the head of the international monetary
snake.
Purchasing power parity (PPP) measures the disconnection between
exchange rates and local prices. PPP contrasts with the interest rate parity
(IRP) theory which assumes that the actions of investors, whose transactions
are recorded on the capital account, induces changes in the exchange rate.
For a dollar investor to earn the same interest rate in a foreign economy
with a PPP of four times, such as the purchasing power parity between the US
dollar and the Chinese yuan, local wages would have to be at least 4 time
lower than US wages.
<>PPP theory is based
on an extension and variation of the "law of one price" as applied to the
aggregate economy. The law of one price says that identical goods should sell
for the same price in two separate markets when there are no transportation
costs and no differential taxes applied in the two markets. But the law of
one price does not apply to the price of labor. Price arbitrage is the
opposite of wage arbitrage in that producers seek to make their goods in the
lowest wage locations and to sell their goods in the highest price markets.
This is the incentive for outsourcing which never seeks to sell products
locally at prices that reflect PPP differentials.
What is not generally noticed is that price deflation in an economy
increases its PPP, in that the same local currency buys more. But the
cross-border one price phenomenon applies only to certain products, such as
oil, thus for a PPP of 4 times, a rise in oil prices will cost the Chinese
economy 4 times the equivalent in other goods, or wages than in the US. The
larger the purchasing power parity between a local currency and the dollar,
the more severe is the tyranny of dollar hegemony on forcing down wage
differentials.
Ever since 1971, when US president Richard Nixon, under pressure from
persistent fiscal and trade deficits that drained US gold reserves, took the
dollar off the gold standard (at $35 per ounce), the dollar has been a fiat
currency of a country of little fiscal or monetary discipline. The Bretton
Woods Conference at the end of World War II established the dollar, a solid
currency backed by gold, as a benchmark currency for financing international
trade, with all other currencies pegged to it at fixed rates that changed
only infrequently. The fixed exchange rate regime was designed to keep
trading nations honest and prevent them from running perpetual trade
deficits. It was not expected to dictate the living standards of trading
economies, which were measured by many other factors besides exchange
rates.
Bretton Woods was conceived when conventional wisdom in international
economics did not consider cross-border flow of funds necessary or desirable
for financing world trade precise for this reason. Since 1971, the dollar has
changed from a gold-back currency to a global reserve monetary instrument
that the US, and only the US, can produce by fiat. At the same time, the US
continued to incur both current account and fiscal deficits. That was the
beginning of dollar hegemony.
With deregulation of foreign exchange and financial markets, many
currencies began to free float against the dollar not in response to market
forces but to maintain export competitiveness. Government interventions in
foreign exchange markets became a regular last resort option for many trading
economies for their preserving export competitiveness and for resisting the
effect of dollar hegemony on domestic living standards.
World trade under dollar hegemony is a game in which the US produces
paper dollars and the rest of the world produce real things that paper
dollars can buy. The world's interlinked economies no longer trade to capture
comparative advantage; they compete in exports to capture needed dollars to
service dollar-denominated foreign debts and to accumulate dollar reserves to
sustain the exchange value of their domestic currencies in foreign exchange
markets. To prevent speculative and manipulative attacks on their currencies
in deregulated markets, the world's central banks must acquire and hold
dollar reserves in corresponding amounts to market pressure on their
currencies in circulation. The higher the market pressure to devalue a
particular currency, the more dollar reserves its central bank must hold.
This creates a built-in support for a strong dollar that in turn forces all
central banks to acquire and hold more dollar reserves, making it stronger.
This anomalous phenomenon is known as dollar hegemony, which is created by
the geopolitically constructed peculiarity that critical commodities, most
notably oil, are denominated in dollars. Everyone accepts dollars because
dollars can buy oil. The denomination of oil in dollars and the recycling of
petro-dollars is the price the US has extracted from oil-producing countries
for US tolerance of the oil-exporting cartel since 1973.
By definition, dollar reserves must be invested in dollar-denominated
assets, creating a capital-accounts surplus for the US economy. A
strong-dollar policy is in the US national interest because it keeps US
inflation low through low-cost imports and it makes US assets denominated in
dollars expensive for foreign investors. This arrangement, which Federal
Reserve Board chairman Alan Greenspan proudly calls US financial hegemony in
congressional testimony, has kept the US economy booming in the face of
recurrent financial crises in the rest of the world. It has distorted
globalization into a "race to the bottom" process of exploiting the lowest
labor costs and the highest environmental abuse worldwide to produce items
and produce for export to US markets in a quest for the almighty dollar,
which has not been backed by gold since 1971, nor by economic fundamentals
for more than a decade. The adverse effects of this type of globalization on
the developing economies are obvious. It robs them of the meager fruits of
their exports and keeps their domestic economies starved for capital, as all
surplus dollars must be reinvested in US treasuries to prevent the collapse
of their own domestic currencies.
The adverse effect of this type of globalization on the US economy is
also becoming clear. In order to act as consumer of last resort for the whole
world, the US economy has been pushed into a debt bubble that thrives on
conspicuous consumption and fraudulent accounting. The unsustainable and
irrational rise of US equity and real estate prices, unsupported by revenue
or profit, had merely been a de facto devaluation of the dollar. Ironically,
the recent fall in US equity prices from its 2004 peak and the anticipated
fall in real estate prices reflect a trend to an even stronger dollar, as it
can buy more deflated shares and properties for the same amount of dollars.
The rise in the purchasing power of the dollar inside the US impacts its
purchasing power disparity with other currencies unevenly, causing sharp
price instability in the economies with freely exchangeable currencies and
fixed exchange rates, such as Hong Kong and until recently Argentina. For the
US, falling exchange rate of the dollar actually causes asset prices to rise.
Thus with a debt bubble in the US economy, a strong dollar is not in the US
national interest. Debt has turned US policy on the dollar on its
head.
The setting of exchange values of currencies is practiced not only by
sovereign governments on their own currencies as a sovereign right. The US,
exploiting dollar hegemony, usurps the privilege of dictating the exchange
value of all foreign currencies to support its own economic nationalism in
the name of global free trade. And US position on exchange rates has not been
consistent. When the dollar was rising, as it did in the 1980s, the US, to
protect its export trade, hailed the stabilizing wisdom of fixed exchange
rates. When the dollar falls as it has been in recent years, the US, to
deflect the blame of its trade deficit, attacks fixed exchange rates as
currency manipulation, as it targets China's currency now which has been
pegged to the dollar for over a decade, since the dollar was lower. How can a
nation manipulate the exchange value of its currency when it is pegged to the
dollar at the same rate over long periods? Any manipulation came from the
dollar, not the yuan.
The recent rise of the euro against the dollar, the first
appreciation wave since its introduction on January 1, 2002, is the result of
an EU version of the 1985 Plaza Accord on the Japanese yen, albeit without a
formal accord. The strategic purpose is more than merely moderating the US
trade deficit. The record shows that even with the 30% drop of the dollar
against the euro, the US trade deficit has continued to climb. The strategic
purpose of driving up the euro is to reduce the euro to the status of the
yen, as a subordinated currency to dollar hegemony. The real effect of the
Plaza Accord was to shift the cost of support for the dollar-denominated US
trade deficit, and the socio-economic pain associated with that support, from
the US to Japan.
What is happening to the euro now is far from being the beginning of
the demise of the dollar. Rather, it is the beginning of the reduction of the
euro into a subservient currency to the dollar to support the US debt bubble.
Six and a half years since the launch of European Monetary Union, the
eurozone is trapped in an environment in which monetary policy of sound money
has in effect become destructive and supply-side fiscal policy unsustainable.
National economies are beginning to refuse to bear the pain needed for
adjustment to globalization or the EU's ambitious enlargement. The European
nations are beginning to resist the US strategy to make the euro economy a
captive supporter of a rising or falling dollar as such movements fit the
shifting needs of US economic nationalism.
It is the modern-day monetary equivalent of the brilliant Roman
strategy of making a dissident Jew a Christian god, to pre-empt Judaism's
rising cultural domination over Roman civilization. Roman law, the foundation
of the Roman Empire, gained in sophistication from being influenced by if not
directly derived from Jewish Talmudic law, particularly on the concept of
equity - an eye for an eye. The Jews had devised a legal system based on the
dignity of the individual and equality before the law four century before
Christ. There was no written Roman law until two centuries B.C. The Roman law
of obligatio was not conducive to finance as it held that all
indebtedness was personal, without institutional status. A creditor could not
sell a note of indebtedness to another party and a debtor did not have to pay
anyone except the original creditor. Talmudic law, on the other hand,
recognized impersonal credit and a debt had to be paid to whoever presented
the demand note. This was a key development of modern finance. With the
Talmud, the Jews under the Diaspora had an international law that spans three
continents and many cultures.<>
The Romans were faced with a dilemma. Secular Jewish ideas and values
were permeating Roman society, but Judaism was an exclusive religion that the
Romans were not permitted to join. The Romans could not assimilate the Jews
as they did the more civilized Greeks. Early Christianity also kept its
exclusionary trait until Paul who opened Christianity to all. Historian
Edward Gibbon (1737-94) noted that the Rome recognized the Jews as a nation
and as such were entitled to religious peculiarities. The Christians on the
other hand were a sect, and being without a nation, subverted other nations.
The Roman Jews were active in government and when not resisting Rome against
social injustice, fought side by side with Roman legionnaires to preserve the
empire. Roman Jews were good Roman citizens. By contrast, the early
Christians were social dropouts, refused responsibility in government and
civic affairs and were conscientious objectors and pacifists in a militant
culture. Gibbon noted that Rome felt that the crime of a Christian was not in
what he did, but in being who he was. Christianity gained control of Roman
culture and society long before Constantine who in 324 A.D. sanctioned it
with political legitimacy and power after recognizing its power in helping to
win wars against pagans, the way Pope Urban II in 1095 used the crusade to
keep Papal temporal power longer. When early Christianity, a secular Jewish
dissident sect, began to move up from the lower strata of Roman society and
began to find converts in the upper echelons, the Roman polity adopted
Christianity, the least objectionable of all Jewish sects, as a state
religion. Gibbons estimated that Christians killed more of their own members
over religious disputes in the three centuries after coming to secular power
than did the Romans in three previous centuries. Persecution of the Jews
began in Christianized Rome. The disdain held by early Christianity on
centralized government gave rise to monasticism and contributed to the fall
of the Roman Empire.
By allowing a trade surplus denominated in dollars to be accumulated
by non-dollar economies, such as yen, euro, or now the Chinese yuan, the cost
of supporting the appropriate value of the dollar to sustain perpetual
economic growth in the dollar economy is then shifted to these non-dollar
economies, which manifests themselves in perpetual relative low wages and
weak domestic consumption. For already high-wage EU and Japan, the penalty is
the reduction of social welfare benefits and job security traditional to
these economies. For China, now the world's second largest creditor nation,
it is reduced to having to ask the US, the world's largest debtor nation, for
capital denominated in dollars the US can print at will to finance its export
trade to a US running recurring trade deficits.<>
The IMF, which has been ferocious in imposing draconian fiscal and
monetary "conditionalities" on all debtor nations everywhere in the decade
after the Cold War, is nowhere to be seen on the scene in the world's most
fragrantly irresponsible debtor nation. This is because the US can print
dollars at will and with immunity. The dollar is a fiat currency not backed
by gold, not backed by US productivity, not back by US export prowess, but by
US military power. The US military budget request for Fiscal Year 2005 is
$420.7 billion. For Fiscal Year 2004, it was $399.1 billion; for 2003, $396.1
billion; for 2002, $343.2 billion and for 2001, $310 billion. In the first
term of the Bush presidency, the US spent $1.5 trillion on its military. That
is bigger than the entire GDP of China in 2004. The US trade deficit is
around 6% of its GDP while it military budget is around 4%. In other words,
the trading partners of the US are paying for one and a half times of the
cost of a military that can someday be used against any one of them for any
number of reasons, including trade disputes. The anti-dollar crowd has
nothing to celebrate about the recurring US trade deficit.
It is pathetic that US Secretary of Defense Donald H Rumsfeld tries
to persuade the world that China's military budget, which is less that one
tenth of that of the US, is a threat to Asia, even when he is forced to
acknowledge that Chinese military modernization is mostly focused on
defending its coastal territories, not on force projection for distant
conflicts, as is US military doctrine. While Rumsfeld urges more political
freedom in China, his militant posture toward China is directly
counterproductive towards that goal. Ironically, Rumsfeld chose to make his
case about political freedom in Singapore, the bastion of Confucian
authoritarianism.
Normally, according to free trade theory, trade can only stay
unbalanced temporarily before equilibrium is re-established or free trade
would simply stop. When bilateral trade is temporarily unbalanced, it is
generally because one trade partner has become temporarily uncompetitive,
inefficient or unproductive. The partner with the trade deficit receives more
goods and services from the partner with the trade surplus than it can offer
in return and thus pays the difference with its currency that someday can buy
foods produced by the deficit trade partner to re-established balance of
payments. This temporary trade imbalance is due to a number of socio-economic
factors, such as terms of trade, wage levels, return on investment,
regulatory regimes, shortages in labor or material or energy,
trade-supporting infrastructure adequacy, purchasing power disparity, etc. A
trading partner that runs a recurring trade deficit earns the reputation of
being what banks call a habitual borrower, i.e. a bad credit risk, one who
habitually lives beyond his/her means. If the trade deficit is paid with its
currency, a downward pressure results in the exchange rate. A flexible
exchange rate seeks to remove or moderate a temporary trade imbalance while
the productivity disparities between trading partners are being addressed
fundamentally.
Dollar hegemony prevents US trade imbalance from returning to
equilibrium through market forces. It allows a US trade deficit to persist
based on monetary prowess. This translates over time into a falling exchange
rate for the dollar even as dollar hegemony keeps the fall at a slow pace.
But a below-par exchange rate over a long period can run the risk of turning
the temporary imbalance in productivity into a permanent one. A continuously
weakening currency condemns the issuing economy into a downward economic
spiral. This has happened to the US in the last decade. To make matters
worse, with globalization of deregulated markets, the recurring US trade
deficit is accompanied by an escalating loss of jobs in sectors sensitive to
cross-border wage arbitrage, with the job-loss escalation climbing up the
skill ladder. Discriminatory US immigration policies also prevent the
retention of low-paying jobs within the US and exacerbate the illegal
immigration problem.
Regional wage arbitrage within the US in past decades kept the US
economy lean and productive internationally. Labor-intensive US industries
relocated to the low-wage South through regional wage arbitrage and despite
temporary adjustment pains from the loss of textile mills, the Northern
economies managed to upgrade their productivity, technology level, financial
sophistication and output quality. The Southern economies in the US also
managed to upgrade these factors of production and in time managed to narrow
the wage disparity within the national economy. This happened because the
jobs stay within the nation. With globalization, it is another story. Jobs
are leaving the nation mercilessly. According to free trade theory, the US
trade deficit is supposed to cause the dollar to fall temporarily against the
currencies of its trading partners, causing export competitiveness to
rebalance to remove or reduce the US trade deficit or face the collapse of
its currency. Either case, jobs that have been lost temporarily are then
supposed to return to the US.
But the persistent US trade deficit defies trade theory because of
dollar hegemony. The current international finance architecture is based on
dollar hegemony which is the peculiar arrangement in which the US dollar, a
fiat currency, remains as the dominant reserve currency for international
trade. The broad trade-weighted dollar index stays in an upward trend,
despite selective appreciation of some strong currencies, as highly-indebted
emerging market economies attempt to extricate themselves from
dollar-denominated debt through the devaluation of their currencies. While
the aim is to subsidize exports, it ironically makes dollar debts more
expensive in local currency terms. The moderating impact on US price
inflation also amplifies the upward trend of the trade-weighted dollar index
despite persistent US expansion of monetary aggregates, also known as
monetary easing or money printing.
Adjusting for this debt-driven increase in the exchange value of
dollars, the import volume into the US can be estimated in relationship to
expanding monetary aggregates. The annual growth of the volume of goods
shipped to the US has remained around 15% for most of the 1990s, more than 5
times the average annual GDP growth. The US enjoyed a booming economy when
the dollar was gaining ground, and this occurred at a time when interest
rates in the US were higher than those in its creditor nations. This led to
the odd effect that raising US interest rates actually prolonged the boom in
the US rather than threatened it, because it caused massive inflows of
liquidity into the US financial system, lowered import price inflation,
increased apparent productivity and prompted further spending by US consumers
enriched by the wealth effect despite a slowing of wage increases. Returns on
dollar assets stayed high in foreign currency terms.
This was precisely what Federal Reserve Board chairman Alan Greenspan
did in the 1990s in the name of pre-emptive measures against inflation.
Dollar hegemony enabled the US to print money to fight inflation, causing a
debt bubble of asset appreciation. This data substantiated the view of the US
as Rome in a New Roman Empire with an unending stream of imports as the free
tribune from conquered lands. This was what Greenspan meant by US "financial
hegemony."
The Fed Funds rate (ffr) target has been lifted eight times in steps
of 25 basis points from 1% in mid 2004 to 3% on May 3, 2005. If the same
pattern of "measured pace" continues, the ffr target would be at 4.25% by the
end of 2005. Despite Fed rhetoric, the lifting of dollar interest rate has
more to do with preventing foreign central banks from selling
dollar-denominated assets, such as US Treasuries, than with fighting
inflation. In a debt-driven economy, high interest rates are themselves
inflationary. Rising interest rate to fight inflation could become the
monetary dog chasing its own interest rate tail, with rising rate adding to
rising inflation which then requires more interest rate hikes. Still,
interest rate policy is a double edged sword: it keeps funds from leaving the
debt bubble, but it can also puncture the debt bubble by making the servicing
of debt prohibitively expensive.
To prevent this last adverse effect, the Fed adds to the money
supply, creating an unnatural condition of abundant liquidity with rising
short-term interest rate, resulting in a narrowing of interest spread between
short-term and long-term debts, a leading indication for inevitable recession
down the road. The problem of adding to the money supply is what Keynes
called the liquidity trap, that is, an absolute preference for liquidity even
at near zero interest-rate levels. Keynes argued that either a liquidity trap
or interest-insensitive investment draught could render monetary expansion
ineffective in a recession. It is what is popularly called pushing on a
credit string, where ample money cannot find credit-worthy willing borrowers.
Much of the new low cost money tends to go to refinancing of existing debt
take out at previously higher interest rates. Rising short-term interest
rates, particularly at a measured pace, would not remove the liquidity trap
when long term rates stay flat because of excess liguidity.
The debt bubble in the US is clearly having problems, as evident in
the bond market. With just 14 deals worth $2.9 billion, May 2005 was the
slowest month for high-yield bond issuance since October 2002. The late-April
downgrades of the debt of General Motors and Ford Motor to junk status roiled
the bond markets. The number of high-yield, or junk bond deals fell 55% in
the March-to-May 2005 period, compared with the same three months in 2004.
They were also down 45% from the December-through-February period. In dollar
value, junk bond deals totaled $17.6 billion in the March-to-May 2005 period,
compared with $39.5 billion during the same three months in 2004 and $36
billion from December through February 2005. There were 407 deals of
investment-grade bond underwriting during the March-to-May 2005 period,
compared with 522 in the same period 2004 - a decline of 22%. In dollar
volume, some $153.9 billion of high-grade bonds were underwritten from March
to May 2005, compared with $165.5 billion in the same period in 2004 - a 7%
decline. Oil at $50, along with astronomical asset price appreciation,
particularly in real estate, is giving the debt bubble additional borrowed
time. But this game cannot go on forever and the end will likely be triggered
by a new trade war's effect on reduced trade volume. The price of a reduced
US trade deficit is the bursting of the US debt bubble which can plunge the
world economy into a new depression. Given such options, the US has no choice
except to ride the trade deficit train for as long as the traffic will bear,
which may not be too long, particularly if protectionism begins to gather
force.
The transition to offshore outsourced production has been the source
of the productivity boom of the "New Economy" in the US in the last decade.
The productivity increase not attributable to the importing of other nations'
productivity is much less impressive. While published government figures of
the productivity index show a rise of nearly 70% since 1974, the actual rise
is between zero and 10% in many sectors if the effect of imports is removed
from the equation. The lower productivity values are consistent with the
real-life experience of members of the blue-collar working class and the
white collar middle class who have been spending the equity cash-outs from
the appreciated market value of their homes. World trade has become a network
of cross-border arbitrage on differentials in labor availability, wages,
interest rates, exchange rates, prices, saving rates, productive capacities,
liquidity conditions and debt levels. In some of these areas, the US is
becoming an underdeveloped economy.
The Bush Administration continues to assure the public that the state
of the economy is sound while in reality the US has been losing entire
sectors of its economy, such as manufacturing and information technology, to
foreign producers, while at the same time selling off the part of the nation
to finance its rising and unending trade deficit. Usually, when unjustified
confidence crosses over to fantasized hubris on the part of policymakers,
disaster is not far ahead.
To be fair, the problems of the US economy started before the second
Bush Administration. The Clinton Administration's annual economic report for
2000 claimed that the longest economic expansion in US history could continue
"indefinitely" as long as "we stick to sound policy", according to Chairman
Martin Baily of the Council of Economic Advisors (CEA) as reported in the
Wall Street Journal . The New York Times report differed
somewhat by quoting Baily as saying: "stick to fiscal policy." Putting the
two newspaper reports together, one got the sense that the Clinton
Administration thought that its fiscal policy was the sound policy needed to
put an end to the business cycle. Economics high priests in government,
unlike the rest of us mortals who are unfortunate enough to have to float in
the daily turbulence of the market, can afford to aloofly focus on long-term
trends and their structural congruence to macro-economic theories. Yet,
outside of macro-economics, long-term is increasingly being re-defined in the
real world. In the technology and communication sectors, long-term evokes
periods lasting less than 5 years. For hedge funds and quant shops, long-term
can mean a matter of weeks.
Two factors were identified by the Clinton CEA Year 2000 economic
report as contributing to the "good" news: technology-driven productivity and
neo-liberal trade globalization. Even with somewhat slower productivity and
spending growth, the CEA believed the economy could continue to expand
perpetually. As for the huge and growing trade deficit, the CEA expected
global recovery to boost demand for US exports, not withstanding the fact
that most US exports are increasingly composed of imported parts. Yet the US
has long officially pursued a strong dollar policy which weakens world demand
for US exports. The high expectation on e-commerce was a big part of
optimism, which had yet to be substantiated by data. In 2000, the CEA
expected the business to business (B2B) portion of e-commerce to rise to $1.3
trillion by 2003 from $43 billion in 1998. Goldman Sachs claimed in 1999 that
B2B e-commerce would reach $1.5 trillion by 2004, twice the size of the
combined 1998 revenues of the US auto industry and the US telecom sector.
Others were more cautious. Jupiter Research projected that companies around
the globe would increase their spending on B2B e-marketplaces from US$2.6
billion in 2000 to only $137.2 billion by 2005 and spending in North America
alone would grow from $2.1 billion to only $80.9 billion. North American
companies accounted for 81% of the total spending in 1998, but by 2005, that
figure was expected to drop to 60% of the total. The fact of the matter is
that Asia and Europe are now faster growth market for communication and
technology.
Reality proved disappointing. A 2004 UN Conference on Trade and
Development (UNCTAD) report said: In the United States, e-commerce between
enterprises (B2B), which in 2002 represented almost 93% of all e-commerce,
accounted for 16.28% of all commercial transactions between enterprises.
While overall transactions between enterprises (e-commerce and non
e-commerce) fell in 2002, e-commerce B2B grew at an annual rate of 6.1%. As
for business-to-consumer (B2C) e-commerce, UNCTAD reported that sales in the
first quarter of 2004 amounted to 1.9 per cent of total retail sales, a
proportion that is nearly twice as large as that recorded in 2001. The annual
rate of growth of retail e-commerce in the US in the year to the end of the
first quarter of 2004 was 28.1%, while the growth of total retail in the same
period was only 8.8%. Dow Jones reported on May 20, 2005 that first-quarter
retail e-commerce sales in the U.S. rose 23.8% compared with the year-ago
period to $19.8 billion from $16 billion, according to preliminary numbers
released by the Department of Commerce. E-commerce sales during the first
quarter rose 6.4% from the fourth quarter, when they were $18.6 billion.
Sales for all periods are on an adjusted basis, meaning the Commerce
Department adjusts them for seasonal variations and holiday and trading-day
differences but not for price changes.
E-commerce sales accounted for 2.2% of total retail sales in the
first quarter of 2005, when those sales were an estimated $916.9 billion,
according to the Commerce Department. Walmart, the low-priced retailer that
imports outsourced goods from overseas, grew only 2%, indicating spending
fatigue on the part of low-income US consumers, while Target Stores, the
upscale retailer that also imports outsourced goods, continues to grow at 7%,
indicating the effects of rising income disparity.
The CEA 2000 report did not address the question whether e-commerce
was merely a shift of commerce or a real growth. The possibility exists for
the new technology to generate negative growth. It happened to IBM –
the increased efficiency (lower unit cost of calculation power) of IBM big
frames actually reduced overall IBM sales, and most of the profit and growth
in personal computers went to Microsoft, the software company that grew on
business that IBM, a self-professed hardware manufacturer, did not consider
worthy of keeping for itself. The same thing happened to Intel where Moore's
Law declared in 1965 an exponential growth in the number of transistors per
integrated circuit and predicted that this trend would continue the doubling
of transistors every couple of years. But what Moore's Law did not predict
was that this growth of computing power per dollar would cut into company
profitability. As the market price of computer power continues to fall, the
cost to producers to achieve Moore's Law has followed the opposite trend:
R&D, manufacturing, and test costs have increased steadily with each new
generation of chips. As the fixed cost of semiconductor production continues
to increase, manufacturers must sell larger and larger quantities of chips to
remain profitable. In recent years, analysts have observed a decline in the
number of "design starts" at advanced process nodes. While these observations
were made in the period after the year 2000 economic downturn, the decline
may be evidence that the long-term global market cannot economically sustain
Moore's Law. Is the Google Bubble a replay of the AOL fiasco?
Schumpeter's creative destruction theory, while revitalizing the
macro-economy with technological obsolescence in the long run, leaves real
corporate bodies in its path, not just obsolete theoretical concepts.
Financial intermediaries and stock exchanges face challenges from Electronic
Communication Networks (ECNs) which may well turn the likes of NYSE into
sunset industries. ECNs are electronic marketplaces which bring buy/sell
orders together and match them in virtual space. Today, ECNs handle roughly
25% of the volume in NASDAQ stocks. The NYSE and the Archipelago Exchange
(ArcaEx) announced on April 20, 2005 that they have entered a definitive
merger agreement that will lead to a combined entity, NYSE Group, Inc.,
becoming a publicly-held company. If approved by regulators, NYSE members and
Archipelago shareholders, the merger will represent the largest-ever among
securities exchanges and combine the world's leading equities market with the
most successful totally open, fully electronic exchange. Through Archipelago,
the NYSE will compete for the first time in the trading of NASDAQ-listed
stocks; it will be able to indirectly capture listings business that
otherwise would not qualify to list on the NYSE. Archipelago lists stocks of
companies that do not meet the NYSE's listing standards.
On fiscal policy, US government spending, including social programs
and defense, declined as a share of the economy during the eight years of the
Clinton watch. This in no small way contributed to a polarization of both
income and wealth, with visible distortions in both the demand and supply
sides of the economy. This was the opposite of the FDR record of increasing
income and wealth equality by policy. The wealth effect tied to bloated
equity and real estate markets could reverse suddenly and did in 2000, bailed
out only by the Bush tax cut and the deficit spending on the War on Terrorism
after 2001. Private debt kept making all time highs throughout the 1990s and
was celebrated by neo-liberal economists as a positive factor. Household
spending was heavily based on expected rising future earnings or paper
profits, both of which might and did vanished on short notice. By election
time in November 1999, the Clinton economic miracle was fizzling. The
business cycle had not ended after all, and certainly not by
self-aggrandizing government policies. It merely got postponed for a more
severe crash later. The idea of ending the business cycle in a market economy
was as much a fantasy as Vice President Cheney's assertion in a speech before
the Veterans of Foreign Wars in August 26, 2002 that "the Middle East expert
Professor Fouad Ajami predicts that after liberation, the streets in Basra
and Baghdad are sure to erupt in joy ."
In their 1991 populist campaign for the White House, Bill Clinton and
Al Gore repeatedly pointed out the obscenity of the top 1% of Americans
owning 40% of the country's wealth. They also said that if you eliminated
home ownership and only counted businesses, factories and offices, then the
top 1% owned 90% of all commercial wealth. And the top 10%, they said, owned
99%. It was a situation they pledged to change if elected. But once in
office, Clinton and Gore did nothing to redistribute wealth more equally -
despite the fact that their two terms in office spanned the economic joyride
of the 1990s that would eventually hurt the poor much more severely than the
rich. On the contrary, economic inequality only continued to grow under the
Democrats. Reagan spread the national debt equally among the people while
Clinton gave all the wealth to the rich.
Geopolitically, trade globalization was beginning to face complex
resistance worldwide by the second term of the Clinton presidency. The
momentum of resistance after Clinton would either slow further globalization
or force the terms of trade to be revised. The Asian financial crises of 1997
revived economic nationalism around the world against US-led neo-liberal
globalization, while the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) attack on
Yugoslavia in 1999 revived militarism in the EU. Market fundamentalism as
espoused by the US, far from being a valid science universally, was
increasingly viewed by the rest of the world as merely US national ideology,
unsupported even by US historical conditions. Just as anti-Napoleonic
internationalism was essentially anti-French, anti-globalization and
anti-moral-imperialism are essentially anti-US. US unilateralism and
exceptionism became the midwife for a new revival of political and economic
nationalism everywhere. The Bush Doctrine of monopolistic nuclear posture,
pre-emptive wars, "either with us or against us" extremism, and no compromise
with states that allegedly support terrorism, pours gasoline on the
smoldering fire of defensive nationalism everywhere.
Alan Greenspan in his October 29, 1997 Congressional testimony on
Turbulence in World Financial Markets before the Joint Economic
Committee said that "it is quite conceivable that a few years hence we will
look back at this episode [Asian financial crisis of 1997] . as a salutary
event in terms of its implications for the macro-economy." When one is
focused only on the big picture, details do not make much of a difference:
the earth always appears more or less round from space, despite that some
people on it spend their whole lives starving and cities get destroyed by war
or natural disasters. That is the problem with macroeconomics. As Greenspan
spoke, many around the world were waking up to the realization that the
turbulence in their own financial markets was viewed by the US central banker
as having a "salutary effect" on the US macro-economy. Greenspan gave anti-US
sentiments and monetary trade protectionism held by participants in these
financial markets a solid basis and they were no longer accused of being mere
paranoia.
Ironically, after the end of the Cold War, market capitalism has
emerged as the most fervent force for revolutionary change. Finance
capitalism became inherently democratic once the bulk of capital began to
come from the pension assets of workers, despite widening income and wealth
disparity. The monetary value of US pension funds is over $15 trillion, the
bulk of which belong to average workers. A new form of social capitalism has
emerged which would gladly eliminate the worker's job in order to give
him/her a higher return on his/her pension account. The capitalist in the
individual is exploiting the worker in same individual. A conflict of
interest arises between a worker's savings and his/her earnings. As Pogo used
to say: "The enemy: they are us." This social capitalism, by favoring return
on capital over compensation for labor, produces overinvestment, resulting in
overcapacity. But the problem of overcapacity can only be solved by high
income consumers. Unemployment and underemployment in an economy of
overcapacity decrease demand, leading to financial collapse. The world
economy needs low wages the way the cattle business need foot and mouth
disease.
The nomenclature of neo-classical economics reflects, and in turn
dictates, the warped logic of the economic system it produces. Terms such as
money, capital, labor, debt, interest, profits, employment, market, etc, have
been conceptualized to describe synthetic components of an artificial
material system created by the power politics of greed. It is the capitalist
greed in the worker that causes the loss of his/her job to lower wage earners
overseas. The concept of the economic man who presumably always acts in his
self-interest is a gross abstraction based on the flawed assumption of market
participants acting with perfect and equal information and clear
understanding of the implication of his actions. The pervasive use of these
terms over time disguises the artificial system as the logical product of
natural laws, rather than the conceptual components of the power politics of
greed.
Just as monarchism first emerged as a progressive force against
feudalism by rationalizing itself as a natural law of politics and eventually
brought about its own demise by betraying its progressive mandate, social
capitalism today places return on capital above not only the worker but also
the welfare of the owner of capital. The class struggle has been internalized
within each worker. As people facing the hard choice of survival in the
present versus wellbeing in the future, they will always choose survival,
social capitalism will inevitably go the way of absolute monarchism, and make
way for humanist socialism.
Global trade has forced all countries to adopt market economy. Yet the market
is not the economy. It is only one aspect of the economy. A market economy
can be viewed as an aberration of human civilization, as economist Karl
Polanyi (1886-1964) pointed out. The principal theme of Polanyi's Origins
of Our Time: The Great Transformation (1945) was that market economy was
of very recent origin and had emerged fully formed only as recently as the
19th century, in conjunction with capitalistic industrialization. The current
globalization of markets following the fall of the Soviet bloc is also of
recent post-Cold War origin, in conjunction with the advent of the electronic
information age and deregulated finance capitalism. A severe and prolonged
depression can trigger the end of the market economy, when intelligent human
beings are finally faced with the realization that the business cycle
inherent in the market economy cannot be regulated sufficiently to prevent
its innate destructiveness to human welfare and are forced to seek new
economic arrangements for human development. The principle of diminishing
returns will lead people to reject the market economy, however
sophisticatedly regulated.
Prior to the coming of capitalistic industrialization, the market played only
a minor part in the economic life of societies. Even where market places
could be seen to be operating, they were peripheral to the main economic
organization and activities of society. In many pre-industrial economies,
markets met only twice a month. Polanyi argued that in modern market
economies, the needs of the market determined social behavior, whereas in
pre-industrial and primitive economies the needs of society determined market
behavior. Polanyi reintroduced to economics the concepts of reciprocity and
redistribution in human interaction, which were the original aims of trade.
Reciprocity implies that people produce the goods and services they are
best at and enjoy most in producing, and share them with others with joy.
This is reciprocated by others who are good at and enjoy producing other
goods and services. There is an unspoken agreement that all would produce
that which they could do best and mutually share and share alike, not just
sold to the highest bidder, or worse to produce what they despise to meet the
demands of the market. The idea of sweatshops is totally unnatural to human
dignity and uneconomic to human welfare. With reciprocity, there is no need
for layers of management, because workers happily practice their livelihoods
and need no coercive supervision. Labor is not forced and workers do not
merely sell their time in jobs they hate, unrelated to their inner callings.
Prices are not fixed but vary according to what different buyers with
different circumstances can afford or what the seller needs in return from
different buyers. The law of one price is inhumane, unnatural, inflexible and
unfair. All workers find their separate personal fulfillment in different
productive livelihoods of their choosing, without distortion by the need for
money. The motivation to produce and share is not personal profit, but
personal fulfillment, and avoidance of public contempt, communal ostracism,
and loss of social prestige and moral standing.
This motivation, albeit distorted today by the dominance of money, is
still fundamental in societies operating under finance capitalism. But in a
money society, the emphasis is on accumulating the most financial wealth,
which is accorded the highest social prestige. The annual report on the
world's richest 100 as celebrities by Forbes is a clear evidence of this
anomaly. The opinion of figures such as Bill Gates and Warren Buffet are
regularly sought by the media on matters beyond finance, as if the possession
of money itself represents a diploma of wisdom. In the 1960s, wealth was an
embarrassment among the flower children in the US. It was only in the 1980s
that the age of greed emerged to embrace commercialism. In a speech on June 3
at the Take Back America conference in Washington, D.C, Bill Moyers drew
attention to the conclusion by the editors of The Economist , all
friends of business and advocates of capitalism and free markets, that "the
United States risks calcifying into a European-style class-based society." A
front-page leader in the May 13, 2005 Wall Street Journal concluded that "as
the gap between rich and poor has widened since 1970, the odds that a child
born in poverty will climb to wealth - or that a rich child will fall into
middle class - remain stuck....Despite the widespread belief that the U.S.
remains a more mobile society than Europe, economists and sociologists say
that in recent decades the typical child starting out in poverty in
continental Europe (or in Canada) has had a better chance at prosperity."
The New York Times ran a 12-day series in June 2005 under the heading
of "Class Matters" which observed that class is closely tied to money
in the US and that " the movement of families up and down the economic ladder
is the promise that lies at the heart of the American dream. But it does not
seem to be happening quite as often as it used to." The myth that free
markets spread equality seems to be facing challenge in the heart of market
fundamentalism.
People trade to compensate for deficiencies in their current state of
development. Free trade is not a license for exploitation. Exploitation is
slavery, not trade. Imperialism is exploitation by systemic coercion on an
international level. Neo-imperialism after the end of the Cold War takes the
form of neo-liberal globalization of systemic coercion. Free trade is
hampered by systemic coercion. Resistance to systemic coercion is not to be
confused with protectionism. To participate in free trade, a trader must have
something with which to trade voluntarily in a market free of systemic
coercion. All free trade participants need to have basic pricing power which
requires that no one else commands monopolistic pricing power. That tradable
something comes from development, which is a process of self-betterment. Just
as equality before the law is a prerequisite for justice, equality in pricing
power in the market is a prerequisite for free trade. Traders need basic
pricing power for trade to be free. Workers need pricing power for the value
of their labor to participate in free trade.
Yet trade in a market economy by definition is a game to acquire
overwhelming pricing power over one's trading partners. Wal-Mart for example
has enormous pricing power both as a bulk buyer and a mass retailer. But it
uses its overwhelming pricing power not to pay the highest wages to workers
in factories and in its store, but to deliver the lowest price to its
customers. The business model of Wal-Mart, whose sales volume is greater than
the GDP and trade volume of many small countries, is anti-development. The
trade off between low income and low retail price follows a downward spiral.
This downward spiral has been the main defect of trade de-regulation when low
prices are achieved through the lowering of wages. The economic purpose of
development is to raise income, not merely to lower wages to reduce expenses
by lowering quality. International trade cannot be a substitute for domestic
development, or even international development, although it can contribute to
both domestic and international development if it is conducted on an equal
basis for the mutual benefit of both trading partners. And the chief benefit
is higher income.
The terms of international trade needs to take into consideration local
conditions not as a reluctant tolerance but with respect for diversity.
Former Japanese Vice Finance Minister for International Affairs, Eisuke
Sakakibara, in a speech "The End of Market Fundamentalism" before the
Foreign Correspondent's Club, Tokyo, Jan. 22, 1999, presented a coherent and
wide ranging critique of global macro orthodoxy. His view, that each national
economic system must conform to agreed international trade rules and
regulations but needs not assimilate the domestic rules and regulations of
another country, is heresy to US-led one-size-fits-all globalization. In a
computerized world where output standardization has become unnecessary, where
the mass production of customized one-of-a-kind products is routine,
one-size-fit all hegemony is nothing more than cultural imperialism. In a
world of sovereign states, domestic development must take precedence over
international trade, which is a system of external transactions made
supposedly to augment domestic development. And domestic development means
every nation is free to choose its own development path most appropriate to
its historical conditions and is not required to adopt the US development
model. But neo-liberal international trade since the end of the Cold War has
increasingly preempted domestic development in both the center and the
periphery of the world system. Quality of life is regularly compromised in
the name of efficiency.
This is the reason the French and the Dutch voted against the EU
constitution, as a resistance to the US model of globalization. Britain has
suspended its own vote on the constitution to avoid a likely voter rejection.
In Italy, cabinet ministers suggested abandoning the euro to return to an
independent currency in order to regain monetary sovereignty. Bitter battles
have erupted between member nations in the EU over national government
budgets and subsidies. In that sense, neo-liberal trade is being increasingly
identified as an obstacle, even a threat, to diversified domestic development
and national culture. Global trade has become a vehicle for exploitation of
the weak to strengthen the strong both domestically and internationally.
Culturally, US-style globalization is turning the world into a dull market
for unhealthy MacDonald fast food, dreary Walt-Mart stores, and automated
Coca Cola and ATM machines. Every airport around the world is a replica of a
giant US department store with familiar brand names, making it hard to know
which city one is in. Aside from being unjust and culturally destructive,
neo-liberal global trade as it currently exists is unsustainable, because the
perpetual transfer of wealth from the poor to the rich is unsustainable
anymore than drawing from a dry well is sustainable in a drought, nor can a
stagnant consumer income sustain a consumer economy. Neo-liberal claims of
fair benefits of free trade to the poor of the world, both in the center and
the periphery, are simply not supported by facts. Everywhere, people who
produce the goods cannot afford to buy the same goods for themselves and the
profit is siphoned off to invisible investors continents away.
Trade and Money
Trade is facilitated by money. Mainstream monetary economists view
government-issued money as a sovereign debt instrument with zero maturity,
historically derived from the bill of exchange in free banking. This view is
valid only for specie money, which is a debt certificate that entitles the
holder to claim on demand a prescribed amount of gold or other specie of
value. Government-issued fiat money, on the other hand, is not a sovereign
debt but a sovereign credit instrument, backed by government acceptance of it
for payment of taxes. This view of money is known as the State Theory of
Money, or Chartalism. The dollar, a fiat currency, entitles the holder to
exchange for another dollar at any Federal Reserve Bank, no more, no less.
Sovereign government bonds are sovereign debts denominated in money.
Sovereign bonds denominated in fiat money need never default since sovereign
government can print fiat money at will. Local government bonds are not
sovereign debt and are subject to default because local governments do not
have the authority to print money. When fiat money buys bonds, the
transaction represents credit canceling debt. The relationship is rather
straightforward, but of fundamental importance.
Credit drives the economy, not debt. Debt is the mirror reflection of
credit. Even the most accurate mirror does violence to the symmetry of its
reflection. Why does a mirror turn an image right to left and not upside down
as the lens of a camera does? The scientific answer is that a mirror image
transforms front to back rather than left to right as commonly assumed. Yet
we often accept this aberrant mirror distortion as uncolored truth and we
unthinkingly consider the distorted reflection in the mirror as a perfect
representation. Mirror, mirror on the wall, who is the fairest of them all?
The answer is: your backside.
In the language of monetary economics, credit and debt are opposites but
not identical. In fact, credit and debt operate in reverse relations. Credit
requires a positive net worth and debt does not. One can have good credit and
no debt. High debt lowers credit rating. When one understands credit, one
understands the main force behind the modern finance economy, which is driven
by credit and stalled by debt. Behaviorally, debt distorts marginal utility
calculations and rearranges disposable income. Debt turns corporate shares
into Giffen goods, demand for which increases when their prices go up, and
creates what Federal Reserve Board Chairman Alan Greenspan calls "irrational
exuberance", the economic man gone mad. <> If fiat money is not
sovereign debt, then the entire financial architecture of fiat money
capitalism is subject to reordering, just as physics was subject to
reordering when man's world view changed with the realization that the earth
is not stationary nor is it the center of the universe. For one thing, the
need for capital formation to finance socially useful development will be
exposed as a cruel hoax. With sovereign credit, there is no need for capital
formation for socially useful development in a sovereign nation. For another,
savings are not necessary to finance domestic development, since savings are
not required for the supply of sovereign credit. And since capital formation
through savings is the key systemic rationale for income inequality, the
proper use of sovereign credit will lead to economic democracy.
Sovereign Credit and Unemployment
In an economy financed by sovereign credit, labor should be in perpetual
shortage, and the price of labor should constantly rise. A vibrant economy is
one in which there is a persistent labor shortage and labor enjoys basic,
though not monopolistic, pricing power. An economy should expand until a
labor shortage emerges and keep expanding through productivity rise to
maintain a slight labor shortage. Unemployment is an indisputable sign that
the economy is underperforming and should be avoid as an economic
plague.
The Phillips curve, formulated in 1958, describes the systemic
relationship between unemployment and wage-pushed inflation in the business
cycle. It represented a milestone in the development of macroeconomics .
British economist A. W. H. Phillips observed that there was a consistent
inverse relationship between the rate of wage inflation and the rate of
unemployment in the United Kingdom from 1861 to 1957. Whenever unemployment
was low, inflation tended to be high. Whenever unemployment was high,
inflation tended to be low. What Phillips did was to accept a defective labor
market in a typical business cycle as natural law and to use the tautological
data of the flawed regime to prove its validity, and made unemployment
respectable in macroeconomic policymaking, in order to obscure the
irrationality of the business cycle. That is like observing that the sick are
found in hospitals and concluding that hospitals cause sickness and that a
reduction in the number of hospitals will reduce the number of the sick. This
theory will be validated by data if only hospital patients are counted as
being sick and the sick outside of hospitals are viewed as "externalities" to
the system. This is precisely what has happened in the US where an oversupply
of hospital beds has resulted from changes in the economics of medical
insurance, rather than a reduction of people needing hospital care. Part of
the economic argument against illegal immigration is based on the overload of
non-paying patients in a health care system plagued with overcapacity.
Nevertheless, Nobel laureates Paul Samuelson and Robert Solow led an army
of government economists in the 1960s in using the Phillips curve as a guide
for macro-policy trade-offs between inflation and unemployment in market
economies. Later, Edmund Phelps and Milton Friedman independently challenged
the theoretical underpinnings by pointing out separate effects between the
"short-run" and "long-run" Phillips curves, arguing that the
inflation-adjusted purchasing power of money wages, or real wages, would
adjust to make the supply of labor equal to the demand for labor, and the
unemployment rate would rest at the real wage level to moderate the business
cycle. This level of unemployment they called the "natural rate" of
unemployment. The definitions of the natural rate of unemployment and its
associated rate of inflation are circularly self-validating. The natural rate
of unemployment is that at which inflation is equal to its associated
inflation. The associated rate of inflation rate is that which prevails when
unemployment is equal to its natural rate.
A monetary purist, Friedman correctly concluded that money is all
important, but as a social conservative, he left the path to truth half
traveled, by not having much to say about the importance of the fair
distribution of money in the market economy, the flow of which is largely
determined by the terms of trade. Contrary to the theoretical relationship
described by Phillips curve, higher inflation was associated with higher, not
lower, unemployment in the US in the 1970s and contrary to Friedman's claim,
deflation was associated also with high unemployment in Japan in the 1990s.
The fact that both inflation and deflation accompanied high unemployment
ought to discredit the Phillips curve and Friedman's notion of a natural
unemployment rate. Yet most mainstream economists continue to accept a
central tenet of the Friedman-Phelps analysis that there is some rate of
unemployment that, if maintained, would be compatible with a constant rate of
inflation. This they call the "non-accelerating inflation rate of
unemployment" (NAIRU), which over the years has crept up from 4% to 6%.
It is hard to see how sound money can ever lead to full employment when
unemployment is necessary to keep money sound. Within limits and within
reason, unemployment hurts people and inflation hurts money. And if money
exists to serve people, then the choice between inflation and unemployment
becomes obvious. The theory of comparative advantage in world trade is merely
Say's Law internationalized. It requires full employment to be operative.
Wages and Profit
And neoclassical economics does not allow the prospect of employers having
an objective of raising wages, as Henry Ford did, instead of minimizing wages
as current corporate management, such as General Motors, routinely practices.
Henry Ford raised wages to increase profits by selling more cars to workers,
while Ford Motors today cuts wages to maximize profit while adding to
overcapacity. Therein resides the cancer of market capitalism: falling wages
will lead to the collapse of an overcapacity economy. This is why global wage
arbitrage is economically destructive unless and until it is structured to
raise wages everywhere rather than to keep prices low in the developed
economies. That is done by not chasing after the lowest price made possible
by the lowest wages, but by chasing after a bigger market made possible by
rising wages. The terms of global trade need to be restructured to reward
companies that aim at raising wages and benefits globally through
internationally coordinated transitional government subsidies, rather than
the regressive approach of protective tariffs to cut off trade that exploits
wage arbitrage. This will enable the low-wage economies to begin to be able
to afford the products they produce and to import more products from the high
wage economies to move towards balanced trade. Eventually, certainly within a
decade, wage arbitrage would cease to be the driving force in global trade as
wage levels around the world equalize. When the population of the developing
economies achieves per capita income that matches that in developed
economies, the world economy will be rid of the modern curse of overcapacity
caused by the flawed neoclassical economics of scarcity. When top executives
are paid tens of million of dollars in bonuses to cut wages and worker
benefits, it is not fair reward for good management; it is legalized theft.
Executives should only receive bonuses if both profit and wages in their
companies rise as a result of their management strategies.
Sovereign Credit and Dollar Hegemony
In an economy that can operate on sovereign credit, free from dollar
hegemony, private savings are needed only for private investment that has no
clear socially redeeming purpose or value. Savings are deflationary without
full employment, as savings reduces current consumption to provide investment
to increase future supply. Savings for capital formation serve only the
purpose of bridging the gap between new investment and new revenue from
rising productivity and increased capacity from the new investment. With
sovereign credit, private savings are not needed for this bridge financing.
Private savings are also not needed for rainy days or future retirement in an
economy that has freed itself from the tyranny of the business cycle through
planning. Say's Law of supply creating its own demand is a very special
situation that is operative only under full employment, as eminent
post-Keynesian economist Paul Davidson has pointed out. Say's Law ignores a
critical time lag between supply and demand that can be fatal to a
fast-moving modern economy without demand management. Savings require
interest payments, the compounding of which will regressively make any
financial system unsustainable by tilting it toward overcapacity caused by
overinvestment. The religions forbade usury also for very practical reasons.
Yet interest on money is the very foundation of finance capitalism, held up
by the neoclassical economic notion that money is more valuable when it is
scarce. Aggregate poverty then is necessary for sound money. This was what
President Reagan meant when he said that there is always going to be poor
people.
The Bank of International Finance (BIS) estimated that as of the end of
2004, the notional value of global OTC interest rate derivatives is around
$185 trillion, with a market risk exposure of over $5 trillion, which is
almost half of US 2004 GDP. Interest rate derivatives are by far the largest
category of structured finance contracts, taking up $185 trillion of the
total $250 trillion of notional values. The $185 trillion notional value of
interest rate derivatives is 41 times the outstanding value of US Treasury
bonds. This means that interest rate volatility will have a disproportioned
impact of the global financial system in ways that historical data cannot
project.
Fiat money issued by government is now legal tender in all
modern national economies since the 1971 collapse of the Bretton Woods regime
of fixed exchange rates linked to a gold-backed dollar. The State Theory of
Money (Chartalism) holds that the general acceptance of government-issued
fiat currency rests fundamentally on government's authority to tax.
Government's willingness to accept the currency it issues for payment of
taxes gives the issuance currency within a national economy. That currency is
sovereign credit for tax liabilities, which are dischargeable by credit
instruments issued by government, known as fiat money. When issuing fiat
money, the government owes no one anything except to make good a promise to
accept its money for tax payment.
A central banking regime operates on the notion of government-issued fiat
money as sovereign credit. That is the essential difference between central
banking with government-issued fiat money, which is a sovereign credit
instrument, and free banking with privately issued specie money, which is a
bank IOU that allows the holder to claim the gold behind it.
With the fall of the USSR, US attitude toward the rest of the world
changed. It no longer needs to compete for the hearts and minds of the masses
of the Third /Fourth Worlds. So trade has replaced aid. The US has embarked
on a strategy to use Third/Fourth-World cheap labor and non-existent
environmental regulation to compete with its former Cold War Allies, now
industrialized rivals in trade, taking advantage of traditional US anti-labor
ideology to outsource low-pay jobs, playing against the strong pro-labor
tradition of social welfare in Europe and Japan. In the meantime, the US
pushed for global financial deregulation based on dollar hegemony and emerged
as a 500-lb gorilla in the globalized financial market that left the Japanese
and Europeans in the dust, playing catch up in an un-winnable game. In the
game of finance capitalism, those with capital in the form of fiat money they
can print freely will win hands down.
The tool of this US strategy is the privileged role of the dollar as the
key reserve currency for world trade, otherwise known as dollar hegemony. Out
of this emerges an international financial architecture that does real damage
to the actual producer economies for the benefit of the financier economies.
The dollar, instead of being a neutral agent of exchange, has become a weapon
of massive economic destruction (WMED) more lethal than nuclear bombs and
with more blackmail power, which is exercised ruthlessly by the IMF on behalf
of the Washington Consensus. Trade wars are fought through volatile currency
valuations. Dollar hegemony enables the US to use its trade deficits as the
bait for its capital account surplus.
Foreign direct investment (FDI) under dollar hegemony has changed the face
of the international economy. Since the early 1970s, FDI has grown along with
global merchandise trade and is the single most important source of capital
for developing countries, not net savings or sovereign credit. FDI is mostly
denominated in dollars, a fiat currency that the US can produce at will since
1971, or in dollar derivatives such as the yen or the euro, which are not
really independent currencies. Thus FDI is by necessity concentrated in
exports related development, mainly destined for US markets or markets that
also sell to US markets for dollars with which to provide the return on
dollar-denominated FDI. US economic policy is shifting from trade promotion
to FDI promotion. The US trade deficit is financed by the US capital account
surplus which in turn provides the dollars for FDI in the exporting
economies. A trade spat with the EU over beef and bananas, for example, risks
large US investment stakes in Europe. And the suggestion to devalue the
dollar to promote US exports is misleading for it would only make it more
expensive for US affiliates to do business abroad while making it cheaper for
foreign companies to buy dollar assets. An attempt to improve the trade
balance, then, would actually end up hurting the FDI balance. This is the
rationale behind the slogan: a strong dollar is in the US national
interest.
Between 1996 and 2003, the monetary value of US equities rose around 80%
compared with 60% for European and a decline of 30% for Japanese. The 1997
Asian financial crisis cut Asia equities values by more than half, some as
much as 80% in dollar terms even after drastic devaluation of local
currencies. Even though the US has been a net debtor since 1986, its net
income on the international investment position has remained positive, as the
rate of return on US investments abroad continues to exceed that on foreign
investments in the US. This reflects the overall strength of the US economy,
and that strength is derived from the US being the only nation that can enjoy
the benefits of sovereign credit utilization while amassing external debt,
largely due to dollar hegemony.
In the US, and now also increasingly so in Europe and Asia, capital
markets are rapidly displacing banks as both savings venues and sources of
funds for corporate finance. This shift, along with the growing global
integration of financial markets, is supposed to create promising new
opportunities for investors around the globe. Neo-liberals even claim that
these changes could help head off the looming pension crises facing many
nations. But so far it has only created sudden and recurring financial crises
like those that started in Mexico in 1982, then in the UK in 1992, again in
Mexico in 1994, in Asia in 1997, and Russia, Brazil, Argentina and Turkey
subsequently.
The introduction of the euro has accelerated the growth of the EU
financial markets. For the current 25 members of the European Union, the
common currency nullified national requirements for pension and insurance
assets to be invested in the same currencies as their local liabilities, a
restriction that had long locked the bulk of Europe's long-term savings into
domestic assets. Freed from foreign-exchange transaction costs and risks of
currency fluctuations, these savings fueled the rise of larger, more liquid
European stock and bond markets, including the recent emergence of a
substantial euro junk bond market. These more dynamic capital markets, in
turn, have placed increased competitive pressure on banks by giving
corporations new financing options and thus lowering the cost of capital
within euroland. How this will interact with the euro-dollar market is still
indeterminate. Euro-dollars are dollars outside of US borders everywhere and
not necessarily Europe, generally pre-taxed and subject to US taxes if they
return to US soil or accounts. The term also applies to euro-yens and
euro-euros. But the idea of French retirement accounts investing in
non-French assets is both distasteful and irrational for the average French
worker, particularly if such investment leads to decreased job security in
France and jeopardizes the jealously guarded 35-hour work-week with 30 days
of paid annual vacation which has been part of French life.
Take the Japanese economy as an example, the world's largest creditor
economy. It holds over $800 billion in dollar reserves in 2005. The Bank of
Japan (BoJ), the central bank, has bought over 300 billion dollars with yen
from currency markets in the last two years in an effort to stabilize the
exchange value of the yen, which continued to appreciate against the dollar.
Now, BoJ is faced with a dilemma: continue buying dollars in a futile effort
to keep the yen from rising, or sell dollars to try to recoup yen losses on
its dollar reserves. Japan has officially pledged not to diversify its dollar
reserves into other currencies, so as not to roil currency markets, but many
hedge funds expect Japan to soon run out of options.
Now if the BoJ sells dollars at the rate of $4 billion a day, it will take
some 200 trading days to get out of its dollar reserves. After the initial 2
days of sale, the remaining unsold $792 billion reserves would have a market
value of 20% less than before the sales program began. So the BoJ will suffer
a substantial net yen paper loss of $160 billion. If the BoJ continues its
sell-dollar program, everyday Y400 billion will leave the yen money supply to
return to the BoJ if it sells dollars for yen, or the equivalent in euro if
it sells dollars for euro. This will push the dollar further down against the
yen or euro, in which case the value of its remaining dollar reserves will
fall even further, not to mention a sharp contraction in the yen money supply
which will push the Japanese economy into a deeper recession.
If the BoJ sells dollars for gold, two things may happen. There would be
not enough sellers because no one has enough gold to sell to absorb the
dollars at current gold prices. Instead, while price of gold will rise, the
gold market may simply freezes with no transactions. Gold holders will not
have to sell their gold; they can profit from gold derivatives on notional
values. Also, the reverse market effect that faces the dollar would hit gold.
After two days of Japanese gold buying, everyone would hold on to their gold
in anticipation for still higher gold prices. There would be no market
makers. Part of the reason central banks have been leasing out their gold in
recent years is to provide liquidity to the gold market. The second thing
that may happen is that price of gold will sky rocket in currency terms,
causing a great deflation in gold terms. The US national debt as of June 1,
2005 was $7.787 trillion. US government gold holding is about 261,000,000
ounces. Price of gold required to pay back the national debt with US-held
gold is $29,835 per ounce. At that price, an ounce of gold will buy a car.
Meanwhile, market price of gold as of June 4, 2005 was $423.50 per ounce.
Gold peaked at $850 per ounce in 1980 and bottom at $252 in 1999 when oil was
below $10 a barrel. At $30,000 per ounce, governments then will have to made
gold trading illegal, as FDR did in 1930 and we are back to square one. It is
much easier for a government to outlaw the trading of gold within its borders
than it is for it to outlaw the trading of its currency in world markets. It
does not take much to conclude that anyone who advices any strategy of
long-term holding of gold will not get to the top of the class.
Heavily indebted poor countries need debt relief to get out of virtual
financial slavery. Some African governments spend three times as much on debt
service as they do on health care. Britain has proposed a half measure that
would have the IMF sell about $12 billion worth of its gold reserves, which
have a total current market value of about $43 billion to finance debt
relief. The US has veto power over gold decisions in the IMF. Thus Congress
holds the key. However, the mining industry lobby has blocked a vote. In
January, a letter opposing the sale of IMF gold was signed by 12 US senators
from Western mining states, arguing that the sale could drive down the price
of gold. A similar letter was signed in March by 30 members of the House of
Representatives. Lobbyists from the National Mining Association and gold
mining companies, such as Newmont Mining and Barrick Gold Corp, persuaded the
Congressional leadership that the gold proposal would not pass in Congress,
even before it came up for debate. The BIS reports that gold derivatives took
up 26% of the world's commodity derivatives market yet gold only composes 1%
of the world's annual commodity production value, with 26 times more
derivatives structured against gold than against other commodities, including
oil. The Bush administration, at first apparently unwilling to take on a
congressional fight, began in April to oppose gold sales outright. But
President Bush and UK Prime Minister Tony Blair announced on June 7 that the
US and UK are "well on their way" to a deal which would provide 100% debt
cancellation for some poor nations to the World Bank and African Development
Fund as a sign of progress in the G-8 debate over debt cancellation.
Jude Wanniski, a former editor of the Wall Street Journal, commenting in
his Memo on the Margin on the Internet on June 15, 2005, on the headline of
Pat Buchanan's syndicated column of the same date: Reviving the Foreign-Aid
Racket, wrote: "This not a bailout of Africa's poor or Latin American
peasants. This is a bailout of the IMF, the World Bank and the African
Development Bank . The second part of the racket is that in exchange for
getting debt relief, the poor countries will have to spend the money they
save on debt service on "infrastructure projects," to directly help their
poor people with water and sewer line, etc., which will be constructed by
contractors from the wealthiest nations What comes next? One of the worst
economists in the world, Jeffrey Sachs, is in charge of the United Nations
scheme to raise mega-billions from western taxpayers for the second leg of
this scheme. He wants $25 billion A YEAR for the indefinite future, as I
recall, and he has the fervent backing of The New York Times , which
always weeps crocodile tears for the racketeers. It was Jeffrey Sachs, in
case you forgot, who, with the backing of the NYTimes persuaded Moscow
under Mikhail Gorbachev to engage in "shock therapy" to convert from
communism to capitalism. It produced the worst inflation in the history of
Russia, caused the collapse of the Soviet federation, and sank the Russian
people into a poverty they had never experienced under communism."
The dollar cannot go up or down more than 20% against any other major
currencies within a short time without causing a major global financial
crisis. Yet, against the US equity markets the dollar appreciated about 40%
in purchasing power in the 2000-02 market crash, so had gold. And against
real estate prices between 2002 and 2005, the dollar has depreciated 60% or
more. According to Greenspan's figures, the Fed can print $8 trillion more
fiat dollars without causing inflation. The problem is not the money
printing. The problem is where that $8 trillion is injected. If it is
injected into the banking system, then the Fed will have to print $3 trillion
every subsequent year just to keep running in place. If the $8 trillion is
injected into the real economy in the form of full employment and higher
wages, the US will have a very good economy, and much less need for paranoia
against Asia or the EU. But US wages cannot rise as long as global wage
arbitrage is operative. This is one of the arguments behind protectionism. It
led Federal Reserve Chairman Alan Greenspan to say on May 5 he feared what
appeared to be a growing move toward trade protectionism, saying it could
lessen the US and the world's economy ability to withstand shock. Yet if
democracy works in the US, protectionism will be unstoppable as long as free
trade benefits the elite at the expense of the voting masses.
Fiat Money is Sovereign Credit
Money is like power: use it or lose it. Money unused (not circulated) is
defunct wealth. Fiat money not circulated is not wealth but merely pieces of
printed paper sitting in a safe. Gold unused as money is merely a shiny metal
good only as ornamental gifts for weddings and birthdays. The usefulness of
money to the economy is dependent on its circulation, like the circulation of
blood to bring oxygen and nutrient to the living organism. The rate of money
circulation is called velocity by monetary economists. A vibrant economy
requires a high velocity of money. Money, like most representational
instruments, is subject to declaratory definition. In semantics, a
declaratory statement is self validating. For example: "I am King" is a
statement that makes the declarer king, albeit in a kingdom of one citizen.
What gives weight to the declaration is the number of others accepting that
declaration. When sufficient people within a jurisdiction accept the kingship
declaration, the declarer becomes king of that jurisdiction instead of just
his own house. When an issuer of money declares it to be credit it will be
credit, or when he declares it to be debt it will be debt. But the social
validity of the declaration depends on the acceptance of
others.
Anyone can issue money, but only sovereign government can
issue legal tender for all debts, public and private, universally accepted
with the force of law within the sovereign domain. The issuer of private
money must back that money with some substance of value, such as gold, or the
commitment for future service, etc. Others who accept that money have
provided something of value for that money, and have received that money
instead of something of similar value in return. So the issuer of that money
has given an instrument of credit to the holder in the form of that money,
redeemable with something of value on a later date.
When the state issues fiat money under the principle of Chartalism, the
something of value behind it is the fulfillment of tax obligations. Thus the
state issues a credit instrument, called (fiat) money, good for the
cancellation of tax liabilities. By issuing fiat money, the state is not
borrowing from anyone. It is issuing tax credit to the economy.
Even if money is declared as debt assumed by an issuer who is not a
sovereign who has the power to tax, anyone accepting that money expects to
collect what is owed him as a creditor. When that money is used in a
subsequent transaction, the spender is parting with his creditor right to buy
something of similar value from a third party, thus passing the "debt" of the
issuer to the third party. Thus no matter what money is declared to be, its
functions is a credit instrument in transactions. When one gives money to
another, the giver is giving credit and the receiver is incurring a debt
unless value is received immediately for that money. When debt is repaid with
money, money acts as a credit instrument. When government buys back
government bonds, which is sovereign debt, it cannot do so with fiat money it
issues unless fiat money is sovereign credit.
When money changes hands, there is always a creditor and a debtor.
Otherwise there is no need for money, which stands for value rather than
being value intrinsically. When a cow is exchanged for another cow, that is
bartering, but when a cow is bought with money, the buyer parts with money
(an instrument of value) while the seller parts with the cow (the substance
of value). The seller puts himself in the position of being a new creditor
for receiving the money in exchange for his cow. The buyer exchanges his
creditor position for possession of the cow. In this transaction, money is an
instrument of credit, not a debt.
When private money is issued, the only way it will be accepted generally
is that the money is redeemable for the substance of value behind it based on
the strong credit of the issuer. The issuer of private money is a custodian
of the substance of value, not a debtor. All that is logic, and it does not
matter how many mainstream monetary economists say money is debt.
Economist Hyman P Minsky (1919-1996) observed correctly that money is
created whenever credit is issued. He did not say money is created when debt
is incurred. Only entities with good credit can issue credit or create money.
Debtors cannot create money, or they would not have to borrow. However, a
creditor can only be created by the existence of a debtor. So both a creditor
and a debtor are needed to create money. But only the creditor can issue
money, the debtor accepts the money so created which puts him in debt.
The difference with the state is that its power to levy taxes exempts it
from having to back its creation of fiat money with any other assets of
value. The state when issuing fiat money is acting as a sovereign creditor.
Those who took the fiat money without exchanging it with things of value is
indebted to the state; and because taxes are not always based only on income,
a tax payer is a recurring debtor to the state by virtue of his citizenship,
even those with no income. When the state provides transfer payments in the
form of fiat money, it relieves the recipient of his tax liabilities or
transfers the exemption from others to the recipient to put the recipient in
a position of a creditor to the economy through the possession of fiat money.
The holder of fiat money is then entitled to claim goods and services from
the economy. For things that are not for sale, such as political office,
money is useless, at least in theory. The exercise of the fiat money's claim
on goods and services is known as buying something that is for sa <>
le.
There is a difference between buying a cow with fiat money and buying a
cow with private IOUs (notes). The transaction with fiat money is complete.
There is no further obligation on either side after the transaction. With
notes, the buyer must either eventually pay with money, which cancels the
notes (debt) or return the cow. The correct way to look at sovereign
government-issued fiat money is that it is not a sovereign debt, but a
sovereign credit good for canceling tax obligations. When the government
redeems sovereign bonds (debt) with fiat money (sovereign credit), it is not
paying off old debt with new debt, which would be a Ponzi scheme.
Government does not become a debtor by issuing fiat money, which in the US
is a Federal Reserve note, not an ordinary bank note. The word "bank" does
not appear on US dollars. Zero maturity money (ZMM), which grew from $550
billion in 1971 when Nixon took the dollar off gold, to $6.63 trillion as of
May 30, 2005 is not a Federal debt. It is a Federal credit to the economy
acceptable for payment of taxes and as legal tender for all debts, public and
private. Anyone refusing to accept dollars within US jurisdiction is in
violation of US law. One is free to set market prices that determine the
value, or purchasing power of the dollar, but it is illegal on US soil to
refuse to accept dollars for the settlement of debts. Instruments used for
settling debts are credit instruments. When fiat money is used to buy
sovereign bonds (debt), money cannot be anything but an instrument of
sovereign credit. If fiat money is sovereign debt, there is no need to sell
government bonds for fiat money. When a sovereign government sells a
sovereign bond for fiat money issues, it is withdrawing sovereign credit from
the economy. And if the government then spends the money, the money supply
remains unchanged. But if the government allows a fiscal surplus by spending
less than its tax revenue, the money supply shrinks and the economy slows.
That was the effect of the Clinton surplus which produce the recession of
2000. While run-away fiscal deficits are inflationary, fiscal surpluses lead
to recessions. Conservatives who are fixated on fiscal surpluses are simply
uninformed on monetary economics. <>
For euro-dollars, meaning fiat dollars outside of the US, the reason those
who are not required to pay US taxes accept them is because of dollar
hegemony, not because dollars are IOUs of the US government. Everyone accept
dollars because dollars can buy oil and all other key commodities. When the
Fed injects money into the US banking system, it is not issuing government
debt; it is expanding sovereign credit which would require higher government
tax revenue to redeem. But if expanding sovereign credit expands the economy,
tax revenue will increase without changing the tax rate. Dollar hegemony
exempts the dollar, and only the dollar, from foreign exchange implication on
the State Theory of Money. To issue sovereign debt, the Treasury issues
treasury bonds. Thus under dollar hegemony, the US is the only nation that
can practice and benefit from sovereign credit under the principle of
Chartalism .<>
Money and bonds are opposite instruments that cancel each other. That is
how the Fed Open Market Committee (FOMC) controls the money supply, by buying
or selling government securities with fiat dollars to set a fed funds rate
target. The fed funds rate is the interest rate at which banks lend to each
other overnight. As such, it is a market interest rate that influences market
interest rates throughout the world in all currencies through exchange rates.
Holders of a government bond can claim its face value in fiat money at
maturity, but holder of a fiat dollar can only claim a fiat dollar
replacement at the Fed. Holders of fiat dollars can buy new sovereign bonds
at the Treasury, or outstanding sovereign bond in the bond market, but not at
the Fed. The Fed does not issue debts, only credit in the form of fiat money.
When the Fed FOMC buys or sells government securities, it does on behalf of
the Treasury. When the Fed increases the money supply, it is not adding to
the national debt. It is increasing sovereign credit in the economy. That is
why monetary easing is not deficit financing.
Money and Inflation
It is sometimes said that war's legitimate child is revolution and war's
bastard child is inflation. World War I was no exception. The US national
debt multiplied 27 times to finance the nation's participation in that war,
from US$1 billion to $27 billion. Far from ruining the United States, the war
catapulted the country into the front ranks of the world's leading economic
and financial powers. The national debt turned out to be a blessing, for
government securities are indispensable as anchors for a vibrant credit
market. <>
Inflation was a different story. By the end of World War I, in 1919, US
prices were rising at the rate of 15% annually, but the economy roared ahead.
In response, the Federal Reserve Board raised the discount rate in quick
succession, from 4 to 7%, and kept it there for 18 months to try to rein in
inflation. The discount rate is the interest rate charged to commercial banks
and other depository institutions on loans they receive from their regional
Federal Reserve Bank's lending facility--the discount window. The result was
that in 1921, 506 banks failed. Deflation descended on the economy like a
perfect storm, with commodity prices falling 50% from their 1920 peak,
throwing farmers into mass bankruptcies. Business activity fell by one-third;
manufacturing output fell by 42%; unemployment rose fivefold to 11.9%, adding
4 million to the jobless count. The economy came to a screeching halt. From
the Fed's perspective, declining prices were the goal, not the problem;
unemployment was necessary to restore US industry to a sound footing, freeing
it from wage-pushed inflation. Potent medicine always came with a bitter
taste, the central bankers explained.
At this point, a technical process inadvertently gave the New York Federal
Reserve Bank, which was closely allied with internationalist banking
interest, preeminent influence over the Federal Reserve Board in Washington,
the composition of which represented a more balanced national interest. The
initial operation of the Fed did not use the open-market operation of
purchasing or selling government securities to set interest rate policy as a
method of managing the money supply. The Fed could not simply print money to
buy government securities to inject money into the money supply because the
dollar was based on gold and the amount of gold held by the government was
relatively fixed. Money in the banking system was created entirely through
the discount window at the regional Federal Reserve Banks. Instead of buying
or selling government bonds, the regional Feds accepted "real bills" of
trade, which when paid off would extinguish money in the banking system,
making the money supply self-regulating in accordance with the "real bills"
doctrine to maintain the gold standard. The regional Feds bought government
securities not to adjust money supply, but to enhance their separate
operating profit by parking idle funds in interest-bearing yet super-safe
government securities, the way institutional money managers do today.
Bank economists at that time did not understand that when the regional
Feds independently bought government securities, the aggregate effect would
result in macro-economic implications of injecting "high power" money into
the banking system, with which commercial banks could create more money in
multiple by lending recycles based on the partial reserve principle. When the
government sold bonds, the reverse would happen. When the Fed made open
market transactions, interest rates would rise or fall accordingly in
financial markets. And when the regional Feds did not act in unison, the
credit market could become confused or become disaggregated, as one regional
Fed might buy while another might sell government securities in its open
market operations.
Benjamin Strong, first president of the New York Federal Reserve Bank, saw
the problem and persuaded the other 11 regional Feds to let the New York Fed
handle all their transactions in a coordinated manner. The regional Feds
formed an Open Market Investment Committee, to be run by the New York Fed for
the purpose of maximizing overall profit for the whole system. This committee
became dominated by the New York Fed, which was closely linked to big-money
center bank interests which in turn were closely tied to international
financial markets. The Federal Reserve Board approved the arrangement without
full understanding of its full implication: that the Fed was falling under
the undue influence of the New York internationalist bankers. For the US,
this was the beginning of financial globalization. This fatal flaw would
reveal itself in the Fed's role in causing and its impotence in dealing with
the 1929 crash.
The deep 1920-21 depression eventually recovered by the lowering of the
Fed discount rate into the Roaring Twenties, which, like the New Economy
bubble of the 1990s, left some segments of economy and the population in them
lingering in a depressed state. Farmers remained victimized by depressed
commodity prices and factory workers shared in the prosperity only by working
longer hours and assuming debt with the easy money that the banks provided.
Unions lost 30% of their membership because of high unemployment in boom
time. The prosperity was entirely fueled by the wealth effect of a
speculative boom in the stock market that by the end of the decade would face
the 1929 crash and land the nation and the world in the Great Depression.
Historical data showed that when New York Fed president Strong leaned on the
regional Feds to ease the discount rate on an already overheated economy in
1927, the Fed lost its last window of opportunity to prevent the 1929 crash.
Some historians claimed that Strong did so to fulfill his internationalist
vision at the risk of endangering the national interest. It is an issue of
debate that continues in Congress today. Like Greenspan, Strong argued that
it was preferable to deal with post-crash crisis management by adding
liquidity than to pop a bubble prematurely with preventive measures of tight
money. It is a strategy that requires letting a bubble to pop only inside a
bigger bubble.
The speculative boom of easy credit in the 1920s attracted many to buy
stocks with borrowed money and used the rising price of stocks as new
collateral for borrowing more to buy more stocks. Broker's loans went from
under $5 million in mid 1928 to $850 million in September of 1929. The market
capitalization of the 846 listed companies of the New York Stock Exchange was
$89.7 billion, at 1.24 times 1929 GDP. By current standards, a case could be
built that stocks in 1929 were in fact technically undervalued. The 2,750
companies listed in the New York Stock Exchange had total global market
capitalization exceeding $18 trillion in 2004, 1.53 times 2004 GDP of $11.75
trillion. <>
On January 14, 2001, the DJIA reached its all time high to date at 11,723,
not withstanding Greenspan's warning of "irrational exuberance" on December
6, 1996 when the DJIA was at 6,381. From its August 12, 1982 low of 777, the
DJIA began its most spectacular bull market in history. It was interrupted
briefly only by the abrupt and frightening crash on October 19, 1987 when the
DJIA lost 22.6% on Black Monday, falling to 1,739. It represented a
1,020-point drop from its previous peak of 2,760 reached less than two months
earlier on August 21. But Greenspan's easy money policy lifted the DJIA to
11,723 in 13 years, a 674% increase. In 1929 the top came on September 4,
with the DJIA at 386. A headline in The New York Times on October 22,
1929, reported highly-respected economist Irving Fisher as saying: "Prices of
Stocks Are Low." Two days later, the stock market crashed, and by the end of
November, the New York Stock Exchange shares index was down 30%. The index
did not return to the 9/3/29 level until November, 1954. At its worst level,
the index dropped to 40.56 in July 1932, a drop of 89%. Fisher had based his
statement on strong earnings reports, few industrial disputes, and evidence
of high investment in research and development (R&D) and in other
intangible capital. Theory and supportive data not withstanding, the reality
was that the stock market boom was based on borrowed money and false
optimism. In hindsight, many economists have since concluded that stock
prices were overvalued by 30% in 1929. But when the crash came, the overshoot
dropped the index by 89% in less than three years <> .
Money and Gold
When money is not backed by gold, its exchange value must be managed by
government, more specifically by the monetary policies of the central bank.
No responsible government will voluntarily let the market set the exchange
value of its currency, market fundamentalism notwithstanding. Yet central
bankers tend to be attracted to the gold standard because it can relieve them
of the unpleasant and thankless responsibility of unpopular monetary policies
to sustain the value of money. Central bankers have been caricatured as party
spoilers who take away the punch bowl just when the party gets going.
Yet even a gold standard is based on a fixed value of money to gold, set
by someone to reflect the underlying economical conditions at the time of its
setting. Therein lies the inescapable need for human judgment. Instead of
focusing on the appropriateness of the level of money valuation under
changing economic conditions, central banks often become fixated on merely
maintaining a previously set exchange rate between money and gold, doing
serious damage in the process to any economy temporarily out of sync with
that fixed rate. It seldom occurs to central bankers that the fixed rate was
the problem, not the dynamic economy. When the exchange value of a currency
falls, central bankers often feel a personal sense of failure, while they
merely shrug their shoulders to refer to natural laws of finance when the
economy collapses from an overvalued currency.
The return to the gold standard in war-torn Europe in the 1920s was
engineered by a coalition of internationalist central bankers on both sides
of the Atlantic as a prerequisite for postwar economic reconstruction.
Lenders wanted to make sure that their loans would be repaid in money equally
valuable as the money they lent out, pretty much the way the IMF deals with
the debt problem today. President Strong of the New York Fed and his former
partners at the House of Morgan were closely associated with the Bank of
England, the Banque de France, the Reichsbank, and the central banks of
Austria, the Netherlands, Italy, and Belgium, as well as with leading
internationalist private bankers in those countries. Montagu Norman, governor
of the Bank of England from 1920-44, enjoyed a long and close personal
friendship with Strong as well as ideological alliance. Their joint
commitment to restore the gold standard in Europe and so to bring about a
return to the "international financial normalcy" of the prewar years was well
documented. Norman recognized that the impairment of British financial
hegemony meant that, to accomplish postwar economic reconstruction that would
preserve pre-war British interests, Europe would "need the active cooperation
of our friends in the United States."
Like other New York bankers, Strong perceived World War I as an
opportunity to expand US participation in international finance, allowing New
York to move toward coveted international-finance-center status to rival
London's historical preeminence, through the development of a commercial
paper market, or bankers' acceptances in British finance parlance, breaking
London's long monopoly. The Federal Reserve Act of 1913 permitted the Federal
Reserve Banks to buy, or rediscount, such paper. This allowed US banks in New
York to play an increasingly central role in international finance in
competition with the London market.
Herbert Hoover, after losing his second-term US presidential election to
Franklin D Roosevelt as a result of the 1929 crash, criticized Strong as "a
mental annex to Europe", and blamed Strong's internationalist commitment to
facilitating Europe's postwar economic recovery for the US stock-market crash
of 1929 and the subsequent Great Depression that robbed Hoover of a second
term. Europe's return to the gold standard, with Britain's insistence on what
Hoover termed a "fictitious rate" of US$4.86 to the pound sterling, required
Strong to expand US credit by keeping the discount rate unrealistically low
and to manipulate the Fed's open market operations to keep US interest rate
low to ease market pressures on the overvalued pound sterling. Hoover, with
justification, ascribed Strong's internationalist policies to what he viewed
as the malign persuasions of Norman and other European central bankers,
especially Hjalmar Schacht of the Reichsbank and Charles Rist of the Bank of
France. From the mid-1920s onward, the US experienced credit-pushed
inflation, which fueled the stock-market bubble that finally collapsed in
1929.
Within the Federal Reserve System, Strong's low-rate policies of the
mid-1920s also provoked substantial regional opposition, particularly from
Midwestern and agricultural elements, who generally endorsed Hoover's
subsequent critical analysis. Throughout the 1920s, two of the Federal
Reserve Board's directors, Adolph C Miller, a professional economist, and
Charles S Hamlin, perennially disapproved of the degree to which they
believed Strong subordinated domestic to international considerations.
The fairness of Hoover's allegation is subject to debate, but the fact
that there was a divergence of priority between the White House and the Fed
is beyond dispute, as is the fact that what is good for the international
financial system may not always be good for a national economy. This is
evidenced today by the collapse of one economy after another under the
current international finance architecture that all central banks support
instinctively out of a sense of institutional solidarity. The same issue has
surfaced in today's China where regional financial centers such as Hong Kong
and Shanghai are vying for the role of world financial center. To do this,
they must play by the rules of the international financial system which
imposes a cost on the national economy. The nationalist vs. internationalist
conflict, as exemplified by the Hoover vs. Strong conflict of the 1930s, is
also threatening the further integration of the European Union. Behind the
fundamental rationale of protectionism is the rejection of the claim that
internationalist finance places national development as its priority. The
Richardian theory of comparative advantage of free trade is not the
issue.
The issue of government control over foreign loans also brought the Fed,
dominated by Strong, into direct conflict with Hoover when the latter was
Secretary of Commerce. Hoover believed that the US government should have
right of approval on foreign loans based on national-interest considerations
and that the proceeds of US loans should be spent on US goods and services.
Strong opposed all such restrictions as undesirable government intervention
in free trade and international finance and counterproductively
protectionist. Businesses should be not only allowed, but encouraged to buy
when it is cheapest anywhere in the world, including shopping for funds to
borrow, a refrain that is heard tirelessly from free traders also today. Of
course, the expanding application of the law of one price to more and more
commodities, including the price of money, i.e. interest rates adjusted by
exchange rates, makes such dispute academic. The only commodity exempt from
the law of one price is labor. This exemption makes the trade theory of
comparative advantage a fantasy.
In July and August 1927, Strong, despite ominous data on mounting market
speculation and inflation, pushed the Fed to lower the discount rate from 4
to 3 percent to relieve market pressures again on the overvalued British
pound. In July 1927, the central bankers of Great Britain, the United States,
France, and Weimar Germany met on Long Island in the US to discuss means of
increasing Britain's gold reserves and stabilizing the European currency
situation. Strong's reduction of the discount rate and purchase of 12 million
pound sterling, for which he paid the Bank of England in gold, appeared to
come directly from that meeting. One of the French bankers in attendance,
Charles Rist, reported that Strong said that US authorities would reduce the
discount rate as "un petit coup de whisky for the stock exchange".
Strong pushed this reduction through the Fed despite strong opposition from
Miller and fellow board member James McDougal of the Chicago Fed, who
represented Midwestern bankers, who generally did not share New York's
internationalist preoccupation.
Frank Altschul, partner in the New York branch of the transnational
investment bank Lazard Freres, told Emile Moreau, the governor of the Bank of
France, that "the reasons given by Mr Strong as justification for the
reduction in the discount rate are being taken seriously by no one, and that
everyone in the United States is convinced that Mr Strong wanted to aid Mr
Norman by supporting the pound." Other correspondence in Strong's own files
suggests that he was giving priority to international monetary conditions
rather than to US export needs, contrary to his public arguments. Writing to
Norman, who praised his handling of the affair as "masterly", Strong
described the US discount rate reduction as "our year's contribution to
reconstruction." The Fed's ease in 1927 forced money to flow not into the
overheated real economy, which was unable to absorb further investment, but
into the speculative financial market, which led to the crash of 1929. Strong
died in October 1928, one year before the crash, and was spared the pain of
having to see the devastating results of his internationalist policies.
Scholarly debate still continues as to whether Strong's effort to
facilitate European economic reconstruction compromised the US domestic
economy and, in particular, led him to subordinate US monetary policies to
internationalist demands. In 1930, the US economy had yet to dominate the
world economy as it does now. There is, however, little disagreement that the
overall monetary strategy of European central banks had been misguided in its
reliance on the restoration of the gold standard. Critics suggest that the
ambitious but misguided commitment of Strong, Norman, and other
internationalist bankers to returning the pound, the mark, and other major
European currencies to the gold standard at overly-high parities to gold,
which they were then forced to maintain at all costs, including indifference
to deflation, had the effect of undercutting Europe's postwar economic
recovery. Not only did Strong and his fellow central bankers through their
monetary policies contribute to the Great Depression, but their continuing
fixation on gold also acted as a straitjacket that in effect precluded
expansionist counter-cyclical measures.
The inflexibility of the gold standard and the central bankers'
determination to defend their national currencies' convertibility into gold
at almost any cost drastically limited the policy options available to them
when responding to the global financial crisis. This picture fits the
situation of the fixed-exchange-rates regime based on the fiat dollar that
produced recurring financial crises in the 1990s and that has yet to run its
full course by 2005. In 1927, Strong's unconditional support of the gold
standard, with the objective of bringing about the rising financial
predominance of the US which had the largest holdings of gold in the world,
exacerbated nascent international financial problems. In similar ways, dollar
hegemony does the same damage to the global economy today. Just as the
international gold standard itself was one of the major factors underlying
and exacerbating the Great Depression that followed the 1929 crash, since the
conditions that had sustained it before the war no longer existed, the
breakdown of the fixed-exchange-rates system based on a gold-backed dollar
set up by the Bretton Woods regime after World War II, without the removal of
the fiat dollar as a key reserve currency for trade and finance, will cause a
total collapse of the current international financial architecture with
equally tragic outcomes. Stripped of its gold backing, the fiat dollar has to
rely on geopolitical factors for its value, which push US foreign policy
towards increasing militaristic and belligerent unilateralism. With dollar
hegemony today, as it was with the gold standard of 1930, the trade war is
fought through currencies valuations on top of traditional tariffs.
The nature of and constraints on US internationalism after World War I had
parallels in US internationalism after World War II and in US-led
globalization after the Cold War. Hoover bitterly charged Strong with
reckless placement of the interests of the international financial system
ahead of US national interest and domestic development needs. Strong
sincerely believed his support for European currency stabilization also
promoted the best interests of the United States, as post-Cold War
neo-liberal market fundamentalists sincerely believe its promotion enhances
the US national interest. Unfortunately, sincerity is not a vaccine against
falsehood.
Strong argued relentlessly that exchange rate volatility, especially when
the dollar was at a premium against other currencies, made it difficult for
US exporters to price their goods competitively. As he had done during the
war, on numerous later occasions, Strong also stressed the need to prevent an
influx of gold into the US and the consequent domestic inflation, by the US
making loans to Europe, pursuing lenient debt policies, and accepting
European imports on generous terms. Strong never questioned the gold parities
set for the mark and the pound sterling. He merely accepted that returning
the pound to gold at prewar exchange rates required British deflation and US
efforts to use lower dollar interest rates to alleviate market pressures on
sterling. Like Fed chairman Paul Volcker in the 1980s, but unlike Treasury
Secretary Robert Rubin in the 1990s, Strong mistook a cheap dollar as serving
the national interest, while Rubin understood correctly that a strong dollar
is in the national interest by sustaining dollar hegemony. In either case,
the price for either an over-valued or under-valued dollar is the same:
global depression. Dollar hegemony in the 1990s pushed Japan and Germany into
prolonged depression. <>
The US position in 2005 is that a strong dollar is still in the US
national interest, but a strong dollar requires an even stronger Chinese yuan
in the 21 st century. Just as Strong saw the need for a strong
British pound paid for by deflation in Britain in exchange for the carrot of
continuing British/European imports to the US, Bush and Greenspan now want a
stronger Chinese yuan, paid for with deflation in China in exchange for
curbing US protectionism against Chinese imports. The 1985 Plaza Accord to
force the appreciation of the Japanese yen marked the downward spiral of the
Japanese economy via currency-induced deflation. Another virtual Plaza Accord
forced the rise of the euro that left Europe with a stagnant economy. A new
virtual Plaza Accord against China will also condemn the Chinese economy into
a protracted period of deflation. Deflation in China at this time will cause
the collapse of the Chinese banking system which is weighted down by the BIS
regulatory regime that turned national banking subsidies to
state-own-enterprises into massive non-performing loans. A collapse of the
Chinese banking system will have dire consequences for the global financial
system since the robust Chinese economy is the only engine of growth in the
world economy at this time.
When Norman sent Strong a copy of John Maynard Keynes' Tract on
Monetary Reform (1923), Strong commented "that some of his [Keynes']
conclusions are thoroughly unwarranted and show a great lack of knowledge of
American affairs and of the Federal Reserve System." Within a decade, Keynes,
with his advocacy of demand management via deficit financing, became the most
influential economist in post-war history.
The major flaw in the European effort for post-World War I economic
reconstruction was its attempt to reconstruct the past through its attachment
to the gold standard, with little vision of a new future. The democratic
governments of the moneyed class that inherited power from the fall of
monarchies did not fully comprehend the implication of the disappearance of
the monarch as a ruler, whose financial architecture they tried to continue
for the benefit of their bourgeois class. The broadening of the political
franchise in most European countries after the war had made it far more
difficult for governments and central bankers to resist electoral pressures
for increased social spending and the demand for ample liquidity with low
interest rates, as well as high tolerance for moderate inflation to combat
unemployment, regardless of the impact of national policies on the
international financial architecture. The Fed, despite its claim of
independence from politics, has never been free of US presidential-election
politics since its founding. Shortly before his untimely death, Strong took
comfort in his belief that the reconstruction of Europe was virtually
completed and his internationalist policies had been successful in preserving
world peace. Within a decade of his death, the whole world was aflame with
World War II. <>
But in 1929, the dollar was still gold-backed. The government fixed the
dollar at 23.22 grains of gold, at $20.67 per troy ounce. When stock prices
rose faster than real economic growth, the dollar in effect depreciated. It
took more dollars to buy the same shares as prices rose. But the price of
gold remained fixed at $20.67 per ounce. Thus gold was cheap and the dollar
was overvalued and the trading public rushed to buy gold, injecting cash into
the economy which fueled more stock buying on margin. Price of gold mining
shares rose by 600%. But with a gold standard, the Fed could not print money
beyond its holding of gold without revaluing the dollar against gold. The
Quantity Theory of Money caught up with the financial bubble as prices for
equity rose but the quantity of money remained constant and it came into play
with a vengeance. Because of the gold standard, there reached a time when
there was no more money available to buy without someone first selling. When
the selling began, the debt bubble burst, and panic took over. When the stock
market collapsed, panic selling quickly wiped out most investors who bought
shares instead of gold. As gold price was fixed, it could not fall with the
general deflation and owners of gold did exceptionally well by comparison to
share owners.
What Strong did not figure was that when the Fed lowered the discount rate
to relieve market pressure on the overvalued British pound sterling after its
gold convertibility had been restored in 1925, the world economy could not
expand because money tied to gold was inelastic, leaving the US economy with
a financial bubble that was not supported by any rise in earnings. The
British-controlled gold standard proved to be a straightjacket for world
economic growth, not unlike the deflationary Maastricht "convergence
criteria" based on the strong German mark of the late 1990's. The speculation
of the Coolidge-Hoover era was encouraged by Norman and Strong to fight
gold-induced deflation. The accommodative monetary policy of the US Federal
Reserve led to a bubble economy in the US, similar to Greenspan's bubble
economy since 1987. There were two differences: the dollar was gold-backed in
1930 while in 1987 it was a fiat currency; and in 1930, the world monetary
system was based on sterling pound hegemony while today it is based on dollar
hegemony. When the Wall Street bubble was approaching unsustainable
proportions in the autumn of 1929, giving the false impression that the US
economy was booming, Norman sharply cut the British bank rate to try to
stimulate the British economy in unison. When short-term rates fell, it
created serious problems for British transnational banks which were stuck
with funds borrowed long-term at high interest rates that now could only be
lent out short-term at low rates. They had to repatriating British hot money
from New York to cover this ruinous interest rate gap, leaving New York
speculators up the creek without an interest rate paddle. This was the first
case of hot money contagion, albeit what hit the Asian banks in 1997 was the
opposite: they borrowed short-term at low interest rates to lend out
long-term at high rates. And when interest rates rose because of falling
exchange rate of local currencies, borrowers defaulted and the credit system
collapsed. <>
The contagion in the 1997 Asian financial crisis devastated all Asian
economies. The financial collapse in Thailand and Indonesia in July 1997
caused the strong markets of high liquidity such as Hong Kong and Singapore
to collapse when investors sold in these liquid markets to raise funds to
rescue their positions in illiquid markets that were wrongly diagnosed by the
IMF as mere passing storms that could be weathered with a temporary shift of
liquidity. Following badly flawed IMF advice, investors threw good money
after bad and brought down the whole regional economy while failing to
contain the problem within Thailand. <>
The financial crises that began in Thailand in July 1997 caused sell-downs
in other robust and liquid markets in the region such as Hong Kong and
Singapore that impacted even Wall Street in October. But prices fell in
Thailand not because domestic potential buyers had no money. The fact was
that equity prices in Thailand were holding in local currency terms but
falling fast in foreign exchange terms when the peg of the baht to the dollar
began to break. Then as the baht devalued in a free fall, stocks of Thai
companies with local currency revenue, including healthy export firms that
contracted local currency payments, logically collapsed while those with hard
currency revenue actually appreciated in local currency terms. The margin
calls were met as a result of investors trying not to sell, rather than
trying to liquidate at a loss. The incentive for holding on with additional
margin payments was based on IMF pronouncements that the crisis was only
temporary and imminent help was on the way and that the problem would
stabilize within months. But the promised help never come. What came was an
IMF program of imposed "conditionalities" that pushed the troubled Asian
economies off the cliff, designed only to save the foreign creditors. The
"temporary" financial crisis was pushed into a multi-year economic crisis.
<>
Geopolitics played a large role. US Treasury Secretary Robert Rubin
decided very early the Thai crisis was a minor Asian problem and told the IMF
to solve it with an Asian solution but not to let Japan take the lead. Hong
Kong contributed US$1 billion and China contributed US$1 billion on blind
faith on Rubin's assurance that the problem would be contained within Thai
borders (after all, Thailand was a faithful US ally in the Cold War). Then
Korea was hit in December 1997. Rubin again thought it was another temporary
Asian problem. The Korean Central Bank was bleeding dollar reserves trying to
support an overvalued won pegged to the dollar, and by late December had only
several days left before its dollar reserves would run dry. Rubin was holding
on to his moral hazard posture until his aides in the Department of Treasury
told him one Sunday morning that the Brazilians were holding a lot of Korean
bonds. If Korea were to default, Brazil would collapse and land the US banks
in big trouble. Only then did Rubin get Citibank to work out a restructuring
the following Tuesday in Korea by getting the Fed to allow the American banks
to roll over the short-term Korean debts into non-interest paying long-term
debts without having to register them as non-performing, thus exempting the
US banks from the adverse impacts of the required capital injection that
would drag down their profits. <>
The Great Depression that started in 1929 was made more severe and
protracted by the British default on gold payment in September, 1931 and
subsequent British competitive devaluations as a national strategy for a new
international trade war. British policy involved a deliberate use of pound
sterling hegemony, the only world monetary regime at that time, as a national
monetary weapon in an international trade war, causing an irreversible
collapse of world trade. In response to British monetary moves, alternative
currency blocs emerged in rising economies such as the German Third Reich and
Imperial Japan. It did not take these governments long to realize that they
had to go to war to obtain the oil and other natural resources needed to
sustain their growing economies that collapsed world trade could no longer
deliver in peace. For Britain and the US, a quick war was exactly what was
needed to bring their own economies out of depression. No one anticipated
that WWII would be so destructive. German invasion of Poland on September 1,
1939 caused Britain and France to declared war on Germany on September 3, but
the British and French stayed behind the Maginot Line all winter, content
with a blockade of Germany by sea. The inactive period of the "phony war"
lasted 7 months until April 9, 1940 when Germany invaded Demark and Norway.
On May 10, German forces overrun Luxemburg and invaded the Netherlands and
Belgium. On March 13, they outflanked the Maginot Line and German panzer
divisions raced towards the British Channel, cut off Flanders and trapped the
entire British Expeditionary Force of 220,000 and 120,000 French troops at
Dunkirk. The trapped Allied forces had to be evacuated by civilian small
crafts from May 26 to June 4. On June 22, France capitulated. If Britain had
failed to evacuate its troops from Dunkirk, it would have to sue for peace as
many had expected, the war would have been over with German control of
Europe. Unable to use Britain as a base, US forces would never be able to
land in Europe. Without a two-front war, Germany might have been able to
prevail over the USSR. Germany might have then emerged as the hegemon.
Franklin D. Roosevelt was inaugurated as president on March 4, 1933. In
his first fireside chat radio address, Roosevelt told a panicky public that
"the confidence of the people themselves" was "more important than gold." On
March 9, the Senate quickly passed the Emergency Banking Act giving the
Secretary of the Treasury the power to compel every person and business in
the country to relinquish their gold and accept paper currency in exchange.
The next day, Friday March 10, Roosevelt issued Executive Order No. 6073,
forbidding the public from sending gold overseas and forbidding banks from
paying out gold for dollar. On April 5, Roosevelt issued Executive Order No.
6102 to confiscate the public's gold, by commanding all to deliver their gold
and gold certificates to a Federal Reserve Bank, where they would be paid in
paper money. Citizens could keep up to $100 in gold, but anything above that
was illegal. Gold had become a controlled substance by law in the US.
Possession was punishable by a fine of up to $10,000 and imprisonment for up
to 10 years. On January 31, 1934, Roosevelt issued another Executive Order to
devalue the dollar by 59.06% of its former gold quantum of 23.22 grains,
pushing the dollar down to be worth only13.71 grains of gold, at $35 per
ounce, which lasted until 1971.
1929 Revisited and More
Shortsighted government monetary policies were the main factors that led
to the market collapse but the subsequent Great Depression was caused by the
collapse of world trade. US policymakers in the 1920s believed that business
was the purpose of society, just as policymakers today believe that free
trade is the purpose of civilization. Thus, the government took no action
against unconstructive speculation believing that the market knew best and
would be self-correcting. People who took risks should bear the consequences
of their own actions. The flaw in this view was that the consequences of
speculation were largely borne not by professional speculators, but by the
unsophisticated public who were unqualified to understand how they were being
manipulated to buy high and sell low. The economy had been based on
speculation but the risks were unevenly carried mostly by the innocent.
National wealth from speculation was not spread evenly. Instead, most money
was in the hands of a rich few who quickly passed on the risk and kept the
profit. They saved or invested rather than spent their money on goods and
services. Thus, supply soon became greater than demand. Some people profited,
but the majority did not. Prices went up faster than income and the public
could afford things only by going into debt while their disposable income
went into mindless speculation in hope of magically bailing borrowers out
from such debts. Farmers and factory/office workers did not profit at all.
Unevenness of prosperity made recovery difficult because income was
concentrated on those who did not have to spend it. The situation today is
very similar.
After the 1929 crash, Congress tried to solve the high unemployment
problem by passing high tariffs that protected US industries but hurt US
farmers. International trade came to a stand still both because of
protectionism and the freezing up of trade finance. <>
This time, world trade may also collapse, and high tariffs will again be the
effect rather than the cause. The pending collapse of world trade will again
come as a result of protracted US exploitation of the advantages of dollar
hegemony, as the British did in 1930 regarding sterling pound hegemony. The
dollar is undeservedly the main trade currency without either the backing of
gold or US fiscal and monetary discipline. Most of the things people want to
buy are no longer made in the US, so the dollar has become an unnatural trade
currency. The system will collapse because despite huge US trade deficits,
there is no global recycling of money outside of the dollar economy. All
money circulates only within the dollar money supply, overheating the US
economy, financing its domestic joyrides and globalization tentacles, not to
mention military adventurism, milking the rest of the global economy dry and
depriving the non-dollar economies of needed purchasing power independent of
the US trade deficit. World trade will collapse this time not because of
trade restricting tariffs, which are merely temporary distractions, but
because of a global mal-distribution of purchasing power created by dollar
hegemony.
Central banking was adopted in the US in 1913 to provide elasticity to the
money supply to accommodate the ebb and flow of the business cycle. Yet the
mortal enemy of elasticity is structural fatigue which is what makes the
rubber band snap. Today, dollar hegemony cuts off monetary recirculation to
all non-dollar economies, forcing all exporting nations with mounting trade
surpluses into the position of Samuel Taylor Coleridge's Ancient Mariner:
"Water, water, everywhere, nor any drop to drink."
The USA elite might now want abandoning of GATT and even WTO as it does not like the results. That single fraud on the west has
had catastrophically perverse consequences for the coterie of killer's future and all because the designers of GATT had never thought
outside the square of economics and failed utterly to grasp the gift of scientific and manufacturing politics.
Notable quotes:
"... The US still depends heavily on oil importation -- it is not "independent" in any manner whatsoever. Here's the most current data while this chart shows importation history since 1980. ..."
"... the only time a biological or economic entity can become energy independent is upon its death when it no longer requires energy for its existence. ..."
"... A big part of the US move into the middle east post WWII was that they needed a strategic reserve for time of war and also they could see US consumption growing far larger than US production. ..."
"... The USA of WAR may have oil independence, but it is temporary. The race is on for release from oil dependency and China intends to win in my view. It is setting ambitious targets to move to electric vehicles and mass transit. That will give it a technology dominance, and perhaps a resource dominance in the EV sphere. We are in the decade of major corporate struggles and defensive maneuverings around China investments in key EV sectors. ..."
"... In ten to twenty years' time the energy story could well be significantly different. The USA and its coterie of killers are still fighting yesterday's war, yesterday's hatred of all things Russian, yesterday's energy monopoly. ..."
"... I don't believe that the USA of WAR has changed or even intends to change the way they play their 'game'. The General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade set the trajectory for technology transfer, fabrication skills transfer, growth of academic and scientific achievement in 'other' countries (China, Russia etc). Their thoughts in the GATT deal were trade = economics = oligarchy = good. ..."
"... That single fraud on the west has had catastrophically perverse consequences for the coterie of killer's future and all because the designers of GATT had never thought outside the square of economics and failed utterly to grasp the gift of scientific and manufacturing politics. ..."
"... Canada and the gulf monarchies are the only countries with large reserves that are not hostile as yet to the US. As the US no longer is totally reliant on imports to meet its consumption, Saudi's, Bahrain and co are now expendable assets. ..."
The US still depends heavily on oil importation -- it is not "independent" in any manner whatsoever.
Here's the most current data
while this chart shows importation
history since 1980.
As I've said before, the only time a biological or economic entity can become energy independent is upon its death when
it no longer requires energy for its existence.
What I am looking at are strategic reserves, not how much oil is currently produced. With shale it now has those reserves and
shale oil I think is now at the point where production could quickly ramp up to full self sufficiency if required. Even if the
US were producing as much oil as they consumed, they would still be importing crude and exporting refined products.
A big part of the US move into the middle east post WWII was that they needed a strategic reserve for time of war and also
they could see US consumption growing far larger than US production.
@Peter AU 1 #28 Thank you for that stimulating post. I just have to respond. And thanks to b and all the commenters here, it is
my daily goto post.
The USA of WAR may have oil independence, but it is temporary. The race is on for release from oil dependency and China intends
to win in my view. It is setting ambitious targets to move to electric vehicles and mass transit. That will give it a technology
dominance, and perhaps a resource dominance in the EV sphere. We are in the decade of major corporate struggles and defensive
maneuverings around China investments in key EV sectors.
In ten to twenty years' time the energy story could well be significantly different. The USA and its coterie of killers
are still fighting yesterday's war, yesterday's hatred of all things Russian, yesterday's energy monopoly.
I don't believe that the USA of WAR has changed or even intends to change the way they play their 'game'. The General Agreement
on Tariffs and Trade set the trajectory for technology transfer, fabrication skills transfer, growth of academic and scientific
achievement in 'other' countries (China, Russia etc). Their thoughts in the GATT deal were trade = economics = oligarchy = good.
That single fraud on the west has had catastrophically perverse consequences for the coterie of killer's future and all
because the designers of GATT had never thought outside the square of economics and failed utterly to grasp the gift of scientific
and manufacturing politics.
By gross ignorance and foolish under-investment, the USA of WAR and its coterie of killers have eaten their future at their
people's expense.
Light sweet vs heavy sour. Light means it contains a lot of diesel/petrol. Sweet means low sulphur. Many oils are heavy sour.
Canada sand. the stuff they get from that is thick bitumen with high sulpher. The sulpher needs to be removed and the bitumen
broken down into light fuels like diesel and petrol.
Canada and the gulf monarchies are the only countries with large reserves that are not hostile as yet to the US. As the
US no longer is totally reliant on imports to meet its consumption, Saudi's, Bahrain and co are now expendable assets.
The great game for the US now is control or denial. Access to oil as a strategically critical resource is no longer a factor
for the US.
"We're an empire now, and when we act, we create our own reality. And while you're studying that reality – judiciously, as
you will – we'll act again, creating other new realities, which you can study too, and that's how things will sort out. We're
history's actors . . . and you, all of you, will be left to just study what we do." Karl Rove.
The squealing and consternation coming from the UK indicates that the empire has changed course and the UK is left sitting
on its own shit pile.
"... Since the start of Putin's tenure, Russia re-nationalized, that is returned to the state control or ownership, an enormous number of truly strategic companies. ..."
"... These are hardly signs of neoliberalism, not to mention that Russia, rightly so, is considered one of the most protectionist nations in the world. This is if to discount all this theoretical and metaphysical mambo-jumbo on the obvious fact that neoliberalism is dead, together with its founding Free Trade gospel, and stinks to heaven, poisoning surroundings. And, yes, I am sure Russian State has no control over Novatek (it is a bad joke). ..."
"... Kudrin's audit committee looks like being FAS Mark 2. He has been given the tools to take Sechin and other state moguls apart. Will he get to the Rotenbergs/Gazprom? ..."
The same "fifth column" that has over the past 18 years also forced Putin into adopting a
flat tax, liberalizing land sales, monetizing benefits, and now pensions reform.
If Putin still hasn't managed to get rid of them, then what the hell is he good for? ...
Reality is, all of those were great successes. Putin is an economic neoliberal and that
is a good thing .
Even if Bershidsky gets it, however in the field which doesn't require any serious skills,
except for good accounting. Now, you don't want me to refer to Russia's actual industries,
especially hi-tech, which are nationalized, do you? Does the title Rostec ring a bell? What
is remarkable, founding of Rostec somehow coincided with Putin's Munich Speech--both events
are hardly any evidence of neoliberalism. Is Putin a liberal? Yes, but to a degree and
political mostly--his progression from liberal economic model to a mixed model since 2014 is
visible to people with even rudimentary knowledge of Russia. This is not to mention that
Russia, quoting even Wiki:
Russia has an upper-middle income mixed economy with state ownership in strategic areas of
the economy.
Some private bank is not a "strategic" area, nor is "liberalization" of land
sales, resources and real hi-tech sector, however, together with agriculture, are. Since
the start of Putin's tenure, Russia re-nationalized, that is returned to the state control or
ownership, an enormous number of truly strategic companies. In fact, whole industries.
Putin recently himself clearly stated that, especially pointing out a bonanza Russian State
got from 2008 collapse and from sanctions.
These are hardly signs of neoliberalism, not to mention that Russia, rightly so, is
considered one of the most protectionist nations in the world. This is if to discount all
this theoretical and metaphysical mambo-jumbo on the obvious fact that neoliberalism is dead,
together with its founding Free Trade gospel, and stinks to heaven, poisoning surroundings.
And, yes, I am sure Russian State has no control over Novatek (it is a bad joke).
The picture is mixed. The Federal Antimonopoly Service has been given real teeth since its
humiliation by the Customs Service under Medvedev. It goes beyond antimonopoly. For example,
it reviews incoming foreign investment in the 42 strategic industries. This was originally a
protectionist committee. It gave Pepsico a hard time for buying Wimm-Bill-Dann, clearly a
military asset. These days its approach to foreigners is "How can I help you? Do you want
money?" It is frequently chaired by Putin.
Kudrin's audit committee looks like being FAS Mark 2. He has been given the tools to
take Sechin and other state moguls apart. Will he get to the Rotenbergs/Gazprom?
Their behaviour is outrageous. Certainly not the kind of corporate governance required for
a competitive market. e.g. Gazprom Bank has a Rotenberg son in charge of loans. Gazprom lent
another Rotenberg son the money to build Aviapark. No Rotenberg capital at risk during the
whole process. Now a $1 Bn asset. Kudrin has a target rich environment. Will he settle out of
court or make some high level examples?
Rostek, run by Chemezov, whose main qualification is being buddies with Putin in 1980s
East Germany, famous for passing off an
unsuccessful and outdated Taiwanese manufactured and American designed device as an example
of "Russian innovation" [at pilfering government money].
But you are of course correct. Russia is of course not neoliberal so far as Putin's
kleptocratic chums are concerned. Fortunately, overall domestic economic policy (with said
exceptions) is neoliberal, which rules out a Venezuelan scenario in Russia. That is a good
thing.
But you are of course correct. Russia is of course not neoliberal so far as Putin's
kleptocratic chums are concerned.
Exactly, nor do you have any qualifications nor skills to write about Russia since, and I
quote Margo Simonyan describing your kind.
Maybe you will finally understand that you do not believe us not because we lie, but
because you know horseradish (dick) about surrounding world, because you are badly
educated, do not read much and when do, do not read what is needed, you visit all the wrong
places and communicate with the same small bunch of prejudiced and/or mental people, who
only reinforce your condescending ignorance.
What is happening in Germany? Is "open borders" that Merkel has championed on its last
legs? It seems that the CSU is worried about the coming elections in Bavaria where AfD might
do much better than expected. Just as the outcome of the Italian elections was for a
government coalition opposed to illegal economic immigration under the guise of asylum for
political persecution.
Hungarian foreign minister in an interview with a snowflake BBC reporter. It seems that
the political trend in central Europe is away from multi-culturalism. Hungary wants to
maintain its culture.
"... The loss of middle class jobs has had a dire effect on the hopes and expectations of Americans, on the American economy, on the finances of cities and states and, thereby, on their ability to meet pension obligations and provide public services, and on the tax base for Social Security and Medicare, thus threatening these important elements of the American consensus. In short, the greedy corporate elite have benefitted themselves at enormous cost to the American people and to the economic and social stability of the United States. ..."
"... With the decline in income growth, the US economy stalled. The Federal Reserve under Alan Greenspan substituted an expansion in consumer credit for the missing growth in consumer income in order to maintain aggregate consumer demand. Instead of wage increases, Greenspan relied on an increase in consumer debt to fuel the economy. ..."
"... As a member of the Plunge Protection Team known officially as the Working Group on Financial Markets, the Federal Reserve has an open mandate to prevent another 1987 "Black Monday." In my opinion, the Federal Reserve would interpret this mandate as authority to directly intervene. ..."
"... As Washington's international power comes from the US dollar as world reserve currency, protecting the value of the dollar is essential to American power. Foreign inflows into US equities are part of the dollar's strength. Thus, the Plunge Protection Team seeks to prevent a market crash that would cause flight from US dollar assets. ..."
When are America's global corporations
and Wall Street going to sit down with President Trump and explain to him that his trade war is not
with China but with them?
The biggest chunk of America's trade deficit with China is
the offshored production of America's global corporations. When the corporations bring the products
that they produce in China to the US consumer market, the products are classified as imports from
China.
Six years ago when I was writing
The Failure of Laissez Faire Capitalism
, I concluded
on the evidence that
half of US imports from China consist of the offshored production of
US corporations.
Offshoring is a substantial benefit to US corporations because of much
lower labor and compliance costs.
Profits, executive bonuses, and shareholders' capital
gains receive a large boost from offshoring. The costs of these benefits for a few fall on the many
- the former American employees who formerly had a middle class income and expectations for their
children.
In my book, I cited evidence that during the first decade of the 21st century
"the US lost
54,621 factories, and manufacturing employment fell by 5 million employees. Over the decade, the
number of larger factories (those employing 1,000 or more employees) declined by 40 percent. US
factories employing 500-1,000 workers declined by 44 percent; those employing between 250-500
workers declined by 37 percent, and those employing between 100-250 workers shrunk by 30 percent.
These losses are net of new start-ups. Not all the losses are due to offshoring. Some are the
result of business failures"
(p. 100).
In other words, to put it in the most simple and clear terms,
millions of Americans lost
their middle class jobs not because China played unfairly, but because American corporations
betrayed the American people and exported their jobs.
"Making America great again"
means dealing with these corporations, not with China.
When Trump learns this, assuming anyone
will tell him, will he back off China and take on the American global corporations?
The loss of middle class jobs has had a dire effect
on the hopes and
expectations of Americans, on the American economy, on the finances of cities and states and,
thereby, on their ability to meet pension obligations and provide public services, and on the tax
base for Social Security and Medicare, thus threatening these important elements of the American
consensus. In short, the greedy corporate elite have benefitted themselves at enormous cost to the
American people and to the economic and social stability of the United States.
The job loss from offshoring also has had a huge and dire impact on Federal Reserve
policy.
With the decline in income growth, the US economy stalled. The Federal Reserve under Alan
Greenspan substituted an expansion in consumer credit for the missing growth in consumer income in
order to maintain aggregate consumer demand.
Instead of wage increases, Greenspan relied
on an increase in consumer debt to fuel the economy.
The credit expansion and consequent rise in real estate prices, together with the deregulation
of the banking system, especially the repeal of the Glass-Steagall Act, produced the real estate
bubble and the fraud and mortgage-backed derivatives that gave us the 2007-08 financial crash.
The Federal Reserve responded to the crash not by bailing out consumer debt but by
bailing out the debt of its only constituency -- the big banks.
The Federal Reserve let
little banks fail and be bought up by the big ones, thus further increasing financial
concentration. The multi-trillion dollar increase in the Federal Reserve's balance sheet was
entirely for the benefit of a handful of large banks. Never before in history had an agency of the
US government acted so decisively in behalf only of the ownership class.
The way the Federal Reserve saved the irresponsible large banks, which should have failed and
have been broken up, was to raise the prices of troubled assets on the banks' books by lowering
interest rates. To be clear, interest rates and bond prices move in opposite directions. When
interest rates are lowered by the Federal Reserve, which it achieves by purchasing debt
instruments, the prices of bonds rise. As the various debt risks move together, lower interest
rates raise the prices of all debt instruments, even troubled ones.
Raising the prices of
debt instruments produced solvent balance sheets for the big banks.
To achieve its aim, the Federal Reserve had to lower the interest rates to zero, which even the
low reported inflation reduced to negative interest rates. These low rates had disastrous
consequences. On the one hand low interest rates caused all sorts of speculations. On the other low
interest rates deprived retirees of interest income on their retirement savings, forcing them to
draw down capital, thus reducing accumulated wealth among the 90 percent.
The
under-reported inflation rate also denied retirees Social Security cost-of-living adjustments,
forcing them to spend retirement capital.
The low interest rates also encouraged corporate boards to borrow money in order to buy back the
corporation's stock, thus raising its price and, thereby, the bonuses and stock options of
executives and board members and the capital gains of shareholders. In other words, corporations
indebted themselves for the short-term benefit of executives and owners. Companies that refused to
participate in this scam were threatened by Wall Street with takeovers.
Consequently today the combination of offshoring and Federal Reserve policy has left us
a situation in which every aspect of the economy is indebted - consumers, government at all levels,
and businesses.
A recent Federal Reserve study concluded that Americans are so indebted
and so poor that 41 percent of the American population cannot raise $400 without borrowing from
family and friends or selling personal possessions.
A country whose population is this indebted has no consumer market. Without a consumer market
there is no economic growth, other than the false orchestrated figures produced by the US
government by under counting the inflation rate and the unemployment rate.
Without economic growth, consumers, businesses, state, local, and federal governments
cannot service their debts and meet their obligations.
The Federal Reserve has learned that it can keep afloat the Ponzi scheme that is the US economy
by printing money with which to support financial asset prices. The alleged rises in interest rates
by the Federal Reserve are not real interest rates rises. Even the under-reported inflation rate is
higher than the interest rate increases, with the result that the real interest rate falls.
It is no secret that the Federal Reserve controls the price of bonds by openly buying and
selling US Treasuries.
Since 1987 the Federal Reserve can also support the price of US
equities.
If the stock market tries to sell off, before much damage can be done the
Federal Reserve steps in and purchases S&P futures, thus driving up stock prices.
In recent
years, when corrections begin they are quickly interrupted and the fall is arrested.
As a member of the Plunge Protection Team known officially as the Working Group on
Financial Markets, the Federal Reserve has an open mandate to prevent another 1987 "Black Monday."
In my opinion, the Federal Reserve would interpret this mandate as authority to directly intervene.
However,
just as the Fed can use the big banks as agents for its control over the price
of gold, it can use the Wall Street banks dark pools to manipulate the equity markets.
In
this way the manipulation can be disguised as banks making trades for clients. The Plunge
Protection Team consists of the Federal Reserve, the Treasury, the SEC, and the Commodity Futures
Trading Corporation. As Washington's international power comes from the US dollar as world reserve
currency, protecting the value of the dollar is essential to American power. Foreign inflows into
US equities are part of the dollar's strength.
Thus, the Plunge Protection Team seeks to
prevent a market crash that would cause flight from US dollar assets.
Normally so much money creation by the Federal Reserve, especially in conjunction with such a
high debt level of the US government and also state and local governments, consumers, and
businesses, would cause a falling US dollar exchange rate.
Why hasn't this happened?
For three reasons.
One is that the central banks of the other three reserve currencies -- the Japanese central
bank, the European central bank, and the Bank of England -- also print money. Their Quantitative
Easing, which still continues, offsets the dollars created by the Federal Reserve and keeps the
US dollar from depreciating.
A second reason is that when suspicion of the dollar's worth sends up the gold price, the
Federal Reserve or its bullion banks short gold futures with naked contracts. This drives down
the gold price. There are numerous columns on my website by myself and Dave Kranzler proving
this to be the case. There is no doubt about it.
The third reason is that money managers, individuals, pension funds, everyone and all the
rest had rather make money than not. Therefore, they go along with the Ponzi scheme. The people
who did not benefit from the Ponzi scheme of the past decade are those who understood it was a
Ponzi scheme but did not realize the corruption that has beset the Federal Reserve and the
central bank's ability and willingness to continue to feed the Ponzi scheme.
As I have explained previously,
the Ponzi scheme falls apart when it becomes
impossible to continue to support the dollar as burdened as the dollar is by debt levels and
abundance of dollars that could be dumped on the exchange markets.
This is why Washington is determined to retain its hegemony.
It is Washington's hegemony
over Japan, Europe, and the UK that protects the American Ponzi scheme.
The moment one of
these central banks ceases to support the dollar, the others would follow, and the Ponzi scheme
would unravel. If the prices of US debt and stocks were reduced to their real values, the United
States would no longer have a place in the ranks of world powers.
The implication is that war, and not economic reform, is America's most likely future.
In a subsequent column I hope to explain why neither US political party has the awareness
and capability to deal with real problems.
Roberts is totally correct that Trump's trade war is with US
corporations and their offshoring. I think Trump knows this
and that's why he's cutting regulations and red tape at
home. We've gone too far left on regs. As for labor costs,
most factories are highly automated here but labor cost
includes disability, pensions, 'diversity' harassment
lawsuits, etc. This overhead doesn't exist in China or
Vietnam where my LL Bean t-shirts are made.
Trump's war is with the a corporate ideology that says
profit is primary to nationality or normal morality. He gave
the biggest corporations a huge tax cut. Now they need to
play ball with America's workers.
They need to acknowledge that we're all Americans and our
legal system, which protects their solvency, will not
survive if today's angry politics continues for two more
years.
The S&P500 needs to think about their future and getting
Bernie or worse in 2020. There's all these trade tirades
going on - good time to give Trump a win and then another to
let him feel some support. Then let the wise men of
government policy step in for a sit-down and determine the
best policy for America's survival. Is it either becoming
fascist or a pleading for a negotiated bankruptcy with all
the geopolitical implications? It can't be either extreme so
plan and do it. Otherwise, Mr. Roberts will be remembered as
a sage.
"To continue allowing these products into our country will
ultimately bring their standard of living here also."
This
is the most incisive comment I've seen on ZH in quite awhile. It's
like a balance beam scale that swings back and forth as weight is
added to or subtracted from one side or the other. Ultimately, the
scale will balance out as everyone attains the same standard of
living . Our government and economy has been surviving on borrowed
money (ie; paper fiat currency) since at least 1971, and now even
common people are living on borrowed paper fiat currency. Most of
the common people in China that I have known live in small rented
apartments and mostly eat the cheapest foods they can find; ie,
rice, vegetables, tofu, pumpkin, etc. At least the downward
trajectory of our economy will cure the obesity epidemic, but many
will likely starve. The big question is when? We are on the
downward slope already, but how steep it will be is a question no
one seems to be able to answer.
"when I was writing
The Failure of Laissez Faire Capitalism
,
I concluded on the evidence that
half of US imports from
China consist of the offshored production of US corporations"
Escaping government taxes and regulations has NOTHING to do with
Laissez Faire Capitalism, it's not even capitalism at that point!
Most of the people on this site already know what Roberts just
summarized. Other than referring to the Fed as a government agency
rather than a private corporation, he was mainly correct in what he
wrote. Most of the American sheeple do not. They do know that they
were sold out, but they don't know the details; how, why, by whom.
It's common knowledge that the people's gold was stolen by the Bush
and Clinton crime families along with Robert Rubin. There is a
persistent rumor out that Trump is in the process of successfully
recovering it. If China and Russia force the world back on a real
gold standard and Trump's recovery is unsuccessful, the USA will be
swimming naked when the tide goes out.
As to how long can the Fed
keep their Ponzi going. The answer would be a lot longer if they
still controlled the planet. But they no longer do and their bluff
is being called right now by Putin, Xi and others. As Göring wrote
at his Nuremberg trial, "Truth is the enemy of the State."
Roberts should be the one explaining. He makes sweeping assertions like:
" With the decline in income growth, the US economy stalled." When
exactly? What year are you talking about? And he seemingly leaves out
demographics completely in his analysis. He's just looking at everything
through the lens of central banking, and when all you have is a hammer,
everything tends to look like a nail. I'm thinking that, like Rudy
Giuliani, he lost his fastball a while back and maybe should just stick
to writing about 1987.
Finally, we have an
economist who reveals the ugly truth behind what the criminal corporate
class has done and is doing to America. See also Dr. Michael Hudson and
his work.
As for Trump, I suspect he understands what's really going on, but a
lot of his pals are billionaires involved in this corruption. Obviously,
he can't name names otherwise, the 1% elite would eliminate his
administration.
It may be that Trump is using the only "out" left in causing these
tariff wars. If you read other online reports in China, Russia, a seldom
few from the EU, you see enormous amounts of trade between China,
Russia, Iran, Germany, and other Asian nations. This American senses we
are being left in the dust by all this vitality.
It's recognized many multi-millionaire/billionaires in both the US &
other parts of the world are making lots of money from the system.
However, I'm beginning to sense that ALL these US elites recognize
the US financial system is deteriorating and there's no way to turn
back.
It happens to every "empire" throughout history, but, other than
about 10% of population who are informed, the real tragedy is about 80%
of the American public who haven't a clue.
"With the decline in income growth, the US economy stalled. The Federal
Reserve under Alan Greenspan substituted an expansion in consumer credit
for the missing growth in consumer income in order to maintain aggregate
consumer demand. Instead of wage increases, Greenspan relied on an increase
in consumer debt to fuel the economy."
"The credit expansion and
consequent rise in real estate prices, together with the deregulation of
the banking system, especially the repeal of the Glass-Steagall Act,
produced the real estate bubble and the fraud and mortgage-backed
derivatives that gave us the 2007-08 financial crash."
"The Federal Reserve responded to the crash not by bailing out consumer
debt but by bailing out the debt of its only constituency -- the big banks."
Yes, It is wash, rinse, repeat but Glass Steagal is irrelevant. The
criminaliy is the actual issue. Rules and regs are meaningless when the
bankers are also in charge of the regulation. Another layer is the
multinational corporations / banks that operate in between nations. What
may be illegal in one jurisdiction is protected in another. Without a
will to enforce, the crime is unstoppable.
The bankers did the end run round Glass Steagal long before
Clinton and his banking pals killed it officially. Killing it was
simply the formality, making things all legal like.
I had to laugh when I read it given all the irreversible mistakes that have
been made for decades in that city given how vital it once was to the U.S.
economy. But it makes you want to cry given the delusion on display of it's
leadership that could have made Ford embarrass itself like this with that
announcement so late in our "game"!
PCR of course does not explain how a nation of 320 million people with bountiful
natural resources and extensive industrial, services, and education
infrastructure would *not* be a world power, save for the fact that he really
really wishes America wasn't.
I bet what happened was these same multinationals stoked the fire about
China because they were concerned about the China 2030 plan. They wanted
China for production and a market, not for competition. They poured lots
of money into lobbying.
When Trump was elected instead of acting how they
predicted he's off script now and could hurt them. The nuisance of being a
democracy.
Barter. Happens all the time. There is NO alternative so long as we
are going to continue to believe in fantasy. Specifically, the
fantasy that economies can grow exponentially and forever in a
biosphere with finite resources. The only solution is a monetary
system that remains attached to reality, period. Keeping in mind
that no system will ever be perfect, but a system that insures bad
behavior and bad management
suffer real consequences
would be a good start! Remind me, how many bankers/financiers went to
prison for those MBS that almost destroyed the world?
A great deal of the BS is being hidden away in an explosion of large
Public-Private Partnerships projects.
Over the years we have been
hearing a lot of good things about "Public-Private Partnerships" and how they
can propel forward needed projects by adding an incentive for the private
sector to undertake projects they might choose not to do alone. Often this is
because the numbers often simply don't work. The truth is that history is
littered with these failed projects.
Often their announcements are
accompanied by promises and hype but sadly the synergy these projects are
intended to create never occurs. These so-called, "bridges to nowhere" and
boondoggles tend to be forgotten and brushed aside each time public servants
and their cronies get together. The article below delves into this tool often
used to line the pockets of those with influence.
You've well penned an Excellent Summation Piece of
not so well known behind the scenes economic conditions and factors.
As I've said many times:
UNFORESEEN WAR IS THE ONLY THING THAT DISRUPTS THE AMERICAN PONZI KNOWN AS
THE COLLUSIVE BIG BANKSTERS AKA THE FEDERAL RESERVE.
There is one point, however, where you are mistaken:
"The way the Federal Reserve saved the irresponsible large banks, which
should have failed and have been broken up, was to raise the prices of
troubled assets on the banks' books by lowering interest rates"
Wrong.
Instead, this was accomplished by the Banksters paying off the American
Congress to suspend the accounting rule called "mark to market". It was very
simple. The banks went to the government and said:
"you can print $2 trillion to bail us out, OR you can suspend mark to
market and we can show that we have NO losses on our books."
The FASB under pressure from Congress chose the prudent (at that time) but
dishonest approach and allowed the banks to suspend the mark to market
accounting rule, which is a basic rule of financial accounting. The sacrifice
was in banking transparency, which of course, is an oxymoron in 2018.
But that action essentially robbed an entire group of market speculators in
risky securities like FAZ (a 3x inverse ETF play on the banks, essentially
shorting the big banks) who bet that the US Government would not break the law
and suspend mark to market for the banks.
They were wrong and a lot of those honest speculators lost a lot of money
very quickly.
It was an "Aha!" Epiphanous moment on Thursday, April 2, 2009 for many
American equities speculators as they quickly realized that the American
government was indeed provably in the pocket of the Banksters Cartel and
likely had been for a very long time.
Interest rates way up or the dollar is toast if not for the Euro and Yen. I
have always felt the Euro was established as a shield for the USD and not so
much some European union of countries. The union of those countries will
always be difficult but controlling the currency of all those countries is
very important to the USA. Imagine all the dollar sellers today if the Euro
was not established.
Give me control of a nation's money and I care not who
makes it's laws" Roth
- more trade with Russia, and the railway connections with China, threaten to turn the USA
into an economic backwater
This is only a surmise I guess but Globalists are plum tired of American middle
class population, and their main purpose in the world is over, and the horses of manufacturing
and technology ''have got out of the barn'' and successfully transplanted to... greener
pastures so that, it's time to make fallow and put the stops to the further
exploitation of North American resources that are too much used up by the damned American
population on their gaddamed consumer needs, and time to put that back in store for a future
where there won't be so many hungry overfed mouths to worry about, so that is the possible
purpose to isolate and crush America at this time.
An induced torpor of complacency will make it seem impossible until the last moment, then
it's too late. (''Have you noticed the exsorbitance high cost of... Latties lately?.puffpuff...
// Hey! they ain't nuthin' on da shelves in da supermarket!!'')
Mean while there's time for the development of Russia and China to have their time in the
sun , for a while, then they get the axe later, and so it goes.
Well, I didn't want to say it but, part of the plan will be a pretty big reduction in pops
which isn't all bad... depends on how the cookie crumbles, (who's ox gets gored.) (Good for
biosphere mainly.)
But if your "In the Club'' and a member in standing which is a only a few you get a ticket
to ride.
The creeps are running America down every way, bread and circuses for a while then Austerity
for real.
Globalists are plum tired of American middle class population, and their main purpose in
the world is over
Bull's eye. That is an under-appreciated dynamic driving everything from economic policies
to the hatred of Trump and populists in general. The narcissistic Western elites cannot stand
their own people. One sees it in the culture, academia, economic policies, and the insane
attempt to dilute native population and replace them with new migrants. (It is amusing that
sophisticated Westerners often boringly allude to the evil 'commies' who 'wanted to elect new
people', and of course never did, but they are unwilling to see it happening at home.)
The purpose for creating the Western middle class after WWII was to prevent a revolution.
That is no longer a threat, so why coddle the deplorables?
- more trade with Russia, and the railway connections with China, threaten to turn the
USA into an economic backwater
This is only a surmise I guess but Globalists are plum tired of American middle class
population, and their main purpose in the world is over, and the horses of manufacturing and
technology "have got out of the barn" and successfully transplanted to greener
pastures so that, it's time to make fallow and put the stops to the further
exploitation of North American resources that are too much used up by the damned American
population on their gaddamed consumer needs, and time to put that back in store for a future
where there won't be so many hungry overfed mouths to worry about, so that is the possible
purpose to isolate and crush America at this time.
An induced torpor of complacency will make it seem impossible until the last moment, then
it's too late. ("Have you noticed the exsorbitance high cost of Latties lately?.puffpuff //
Hey! they ain't nuthin' on da shelves in da supermarket!!")
Mean while there's time for the development of Russia and China to have their time in
the sun , for a while, then they get the axe later, and so it goes.
Well, I didn't want to say it but, part of the plan will be a pretty big reduction in pops
which isn't all bad depends on how the cookie crumbles, (who's ox gets gored.) (Good for
biosphere mainly.)
But if your "In the Club" and a member in standing which is a only a few you get a ticket
to ride.
The creeps are running America down every way, bread and circuses for a while then
Austerity for real.
Much better articles in italian or spanish. They basically say that's because of 'recent'
events of P2 sect fraud in 1981. More sensible to think they don't want globalist with hidden
loyalties infiltrating a new inexperienced government, but I don't follow italian
developments closely. Any thoughts?
If Israel and Jewish Power killed JFK it matters very much. If by a magic wand I could
make people believe that Israel and Jewish Power were behind JFK assassination it would be
much easier to stop and undo all those things that you have listed:
This is simply wrong. Basically, it's the Joo (or any other) conspiracy, according to this
world-view.
The crucial mistake virtually all conspiracy- theories minded people make is that they try
to pin-point a clearly defined group (mostly religious, ethnic, racial,..) as the
source of major socio-cultural changes, and frequently it's Jews (sometimes masons or
something similar).
And this is a major misfire, because no such group exists. There is no causal
connection between any ethnicity/race/ & great upheavals in the West (and in the US) in
past 3-4 decades, especially re immigration debates, influx of culturally & racially
foreign and inimical masses, disintegration of family & denigration of national loyalties
etc. To think that a group (or groups), which is relatively easy to identify, can be the
source of such monumental upheavals bespeaks of historical illiteracy.
There was no ethnic nor ideological group of people behind such shattering revolutions
& world-view changes like transition from Roman republic to Imperial Rome, Protestant
Reformation, Crusades, formation of national monarchies, Enlightenment, collapse of "divine
rights" of kings, imperialist expansion of European powers, national awakening in the 19th C,
WW1 and WW2, Not Jews, not masons, not Illuminati, not Rosicrucians, not some occult
brotherhood residing in the Himalayas.
Simply, Western civilization has come to a dead end -as it was the continuity of the 18th C
Enlightenment- and we are witnessing the processes of further decay, encapsulated in famous
hypothetical question ascribed to Lenin: " Are the forces which propel us to greatness the
same that will, transformed by mutations of History, eventually lead to our collapse
?"
A man who, despite his shortcomings & delusions about the role of technology, various
national cultures and their dominant currents, understood this better than most was Oswald
Spengler. The Western civilizational matrix is old and tired. And this is the root of
the Western decline. That what plagues the West & the US the most (race replacement, PC
"liberal" ideological muzzle, hedonist emptiness & biological collapse manifested in
infertility, pathological altruism, lunatic ideological fashions like n-th wave of feminism,
media aggression promoting "diversity" & homosexualism- as different from homosexuality,
self-hatred of European & Western culture .)-this is as present, although a bit modified,
in Italy, Spain, Denmark, Norway, France, Germany, Switzerland,.. as in the US. And in these
countries Jewish presence in the media & the overall life is negligible or
non-existent.
Although ruling elites differ in these countries, they are a mixture of hereditary
aristocracy, established bourgeois families & plutocratic oligarchs. These groups have,
historically, served their countries. Now, they are morally & culturally bankrupt and
serve outmoded gods whose future is annihilation- similar situation that had befallen pompous
& deluded aristocrats in the 18th-19th C or imperialist jingoists in the 20th.
The failure of nerve that comes with exhausted & geriatric social-cultural matrix
is to blame, not some group conspiracy.
But, the societal-cultural matrix is exhausted, not the people. Our flaw is linear
extrapolation of current events which leads to paralyzing pessimist fatalism. We should know
from history this is a fatal mistake. Just compare Europe in 1930 (cars, planes, fascism,
communism, cubism, quantum mechanics, relativity, psychoanalysis, radio, tanks, films, ..)
and during 1900 (technologically, scientifically, ideologically and artistically more or less
the same as 1880).
So, we should not give up hope, and some of us who are obsessed with Jews, should give up
this tired old chestnut. If all of US Jewish ethno-nationalists were booted to Israel, life
would be somewhat easier for Euro-Americans in some respects, but not essentially different.
Blacks would remain blacks, PC muzzle would remain PC muzzle, dopeheads would remain
dopeheads, Pentagon would remain Pentagon,
There is still no countervailing force to oppose neoliberalism. Instead we observe internal development of neoliberalism toward
national neoliberalism and the rejection of neoliberal globalization.
Notable quotes:
"... Neoliberalism is the intensification of the influence and dominance of capital; it is the elevation of capitalism, as a mode
of production, into an ethic, a set of political imperatives, and a cultural logic. It is also a project: a project to strengthen, restore,
or, in some cases, constitute anew the power of economic elites. ..."
"... It should be recalled that, in his Grundrisse , Marx explicitly argued that capital is a process that puts into motion all
of the other dimensions of modern economic, political, social, and cultural life. It creates the wage system, influences values, goals,
and the ethics of individuals, transforms our relation to nature, to ourselves, and to our community, and constantly seeks to mold state
imperatives until they are in harmony with its own. ..."
"... Neoliberalism is therefore not a new turn in the history of capitalism. It is more simply, and more perniciously, its intensification,
and its resurgence after decades of opposition from the Keynesian welfare state and from experiments with social democratic and welfare
state politics. ..."
"... Neoliberalism, as Harvey tells us, quoting Paul Treanor in the process, 'valuesmarket exchange as "an ethic in itself, capable
of acting as a guide to all human action, and substituting for all previously held ethical beliefs," it emphasises the significance
of contractual relations in the marketplace. It holds that the social goodwill be maximised by maximising the reach and frequency of
market transactions, and it seeks to bring all human action into the domain of the market.' (p. 3) ..."
"... Neoliberalism is not simply an ethic in abstract, however. Rather, the locus for its influence has become the 'neoliberal state',
which collapses the notion of freedom into freedom for economic elites. ..."
"... 'neoliberalisation was from the very beginning a project to achieve the restoration of class power,' ..."
"... 'a political project to re-establish the conditions for capital accumulation and to restore the power of economic elites ..."
"... another crucial dimension of his argument, namely that neoliberalism is a liberalism for economic elites only; that liberal
aspects of the polity are decreased ..."
"... that neoliberal regimes will slowly erode institutions of political democracy since 'the freedom of the masses would be restricted
in favour of the freedoms of the few ..."
"... The focus on individual rights, the centrality of property rights, a culture of individualism, consumption, and a market-based
populism, all served as means by which the policies of neoliberalism – and the massive inequalities that have emerged over the past
two decades – were able to gain widespread support. Political liberalism becomes eroded by the much more powerful forces of economic
liberalism. ..."
"... The story of capitalism, for Harvey, always seems to play the same dire tune. But the global expansion of capital is premised
on what he terms 'accumulation by dispossession.' ..."
"... accumulation under globalisation continues to expand by dispossessing people of their economic rights and of various forms
of ownership and economic power. ..."
"... Neoliberalism's rhetoric of individual freedom, and equality, and its promise of prosperity and growth, are slowly being revealed
as falsities. ..."
"... Soon, Harvey believes, it will become evident that all of economic life and institutions are solely for the benefit of a single,
small social class. Therefore, theoretical insight – such as Harvey has proffered here – needs to constantly nourish the various opposition
movements that currently exist. ..."
"... While we can use Harvey's brilliant and deeply insightful analysis of the structural mechanisms of neoliberalism, it has to
be admitted that there are only rumblings of discontent in the United States or China, and no hint of a mass movement against the realities
of capitalism. ..."
...Marx, after all, according to Harvey, had shown that – unlike the liberal paradigm that was, and still is, predominant in the
social sciences – the split between fact and value had been overcome. No longerwas it sufficient to talk about social phenomena without
invoking political even practical evaluations of them.
Harvey's most recent book, A Brief History of Neoliberalism , dissects the inner workings of what has come to be one of
the most salient features of late 20thand early 21st century economic and social life: the gradual shift, throughout the nations
of the global economy, toward economic and social policies that have given an increased liberality and centrality to markets, market
processes, and to the interests of capital. If Harvey's enduring perspective – and one which admittedly| echoes orthodox Marxism
– has been to put the mechanics of the capitalist mode of production at the center of every aspect of modernity (and of postmodernity
as well), then his most recent contribution deviates little from that course.
<p>Harvey's contention is that we are witnessing, through this process of neoliberalisation, the deepening penetration of capitalism
into political and social institutions as well as cultural consciousness itself. Neoliberalism is the intensification of the
influence and dominance of capital; it is the elevation of capitalism, as a mode of production, into an ethic, a set of political
imperatives, and a cultural logic. It is also a project: a project to strengthen, restore, or, in some cases, constitute anew the
power of economic elites. The essence of neoliberalism, for Harvey, can be characterised as a rightward shift in Marxian class
struggle.
This analysis stems from Marx's insight about the nature of capital itself. Capitalis not simply money, property, or one economic
variable among others. Rather,capital is the organising principle of modern society. It should be recalled that, in his Grundrisse
, Marx explicitly argued that capital is a process that puts into motion all of the other dimensions of modern economic, political,
social, and cultural life. It creates the wage system, influences values, goals, and the ethics of individuals, transforms our relation
to nature, to ourselves, and to our community, and constantly seeks to mold state imperatives until they are in harmony with its
own.
Neoliberalism is therefore not a new turn in the history of capitalism. It is more simply, and more perniciously, its intensification,
and its resurgence after decades of opposition from the Keynesian welfare state and from experiments with social democratic and welfare
state politics.
Neoliberalism, as Harvey tells us, quoting Paul Treanor in the process, 'valuesmarket exchange as "an ethic in itself, capable
of acting as a guide to all human action, and substituting for all previously held ethical beliefs," it emphasises the significance
of contractual relations in the marketplace. It holds that the social goodwill be maximised by maximising the reach and frequency
of market transactions, and it seeks to bring all human action into the domain of the market.' (p. 3)
Neoliberalism is not simply an ethic in abstract, however. Rather, the locus for its influence has become the 'neoliberal
state', which collapses the notion of freedom into freedom for economic elites. 'The freedoms it embodies reflect the interests
of private property owners, businesses, multinational corporations and financial capital.' (p. 7) The neoliberal state defends the
new reach and depth ofcapital's interests and is defined against the 'embedded liberalism' of the several decades following World
War II when 'market processes and entrepreneurial andcorporate activities were surrounded by a web of social and political constraints
and a regulatory environment that sometimes restrained but in other instances led the way in economic and industrial strategy.' (p.
11)
Neoliberalism and the neoliberal state have been able to reverse the various political and economic gains made under welfare state
policies and institutions. This transformation of the state is an effect of the interests of capital and its reaction to the embedded
liberalism of the post war decades. Taking the empirical analysis – and the hypothesis – from the French economists Gérard Duménil
and Dominique Lévy, and their important book Capital Resurgent, Harvey argues that 'neoliberalisation was from the very beginning
a project to achieve the restoration of class power,' (p. 16) 'a political project to re-establish the conditions for capital
accumulation and to restore the power of economic elites .' (p. 19)
This notion of a revolution from above to restore class power is the basso ostinato of Harvey'sa nalysis, the bass line continuously
repeated throughout the book that grounds the argument.
He sees the first historical instance of this revolution from above in Pinochet's Chile. The violent coup against Salvador Allende,
which installed Pinochet to power, was followed by a massive neoliberalisation of the state. The move toward privatisation and the
stripping away of all forms of regulation on capital was one of the key aspects of the Pinochet regime. While the real grounding
of a neoliberal theory began much earlier with thinkers such as Friedrich von Hayek and Milton Friedman, among others, its first
real empirical manifestation was Pinochet's Chile.
Of course, this also allows Harvey to illustrate another crucial dimension of his argument, namely that neoliberalism is a
liberalism for economic elites only; that liberal aspects of the polity are decreased . It is Harvey's fear – along with Karl
Polanyi– that neoliberal regimes will slowly erode institutions of political democracy since 'the freedom of the masses would
be restricted in favour of the freedoms of the few .'(p. 70)
Insulating economic institutions such as central banks from majority rule is central, especially since neoliberalism – particularly
in developed economies –revolves around financial institutions. 'A strong preference,' Harvey argues, 'exists for government by executive
order and by judicial decision rather than democraticand parliamentary decision-making.' (p. 66)
America and England constitute Harvey's next two cases for his thesis. Thatcher in Britain and Reagan in the United States were
both pivotal figures, not so much because of their economic policies, but, more importantly, because of their success in the 'construction
of consent.' The political culture of both countries began to accept neoliberal policies. The focus on individual rights, the
centrality of property rights, a culture of individualism, consumption, and a market-based populism, all served as means by which
the policies of neoliberalism – and the massive inequalities that have emerged over the past two decades – were able to gain widespread
support. Political liberalism becomes eroded by the much more powerful forces of economic liberalism.
Another theme that Harvey explores – understandably, given his background inhuman geography – is the phenomenon of uneven spatial
development. In China, Harvey's fourth case, we see the rapid expansion of a neoliberal ethos. Markets were significantly liberalised
and an economic elite was reconstituted virtually overnight, in early 1980s, amid Deng Xiaoping's economic reforms. The result has
been extreme inequality between regions.
Coastal urban areas, where industry and finance are concentrated, have become massive epicenters of economic power and activity,
sucking in surplus labor from agrarian hinterlands which, as a result of the economic growth of these metro regions, have begun sinking
into poverty. Harvey sees this reality in China being mirrored throughout the globe, and the results are common: a pattern of rising
economic and social inequality which increases the marginalisation of large sectors of national populations and concentrates ever
more sectors of capital within certain regions and among certain groups.
Neoliberalisation, therefore, effects a return to some of the most entrenched forms of social inequality and injustice that characterised
the industrial expansion during the late 19th century in the West. The story of capitalism, for Harvey, always seems to play
the same dire tune. But the global expansion of capital is premised on what he terms 'accumulation by dispossession.'
This concept – developed more fully in Harvey's previous book, The New Imperialism (2003) – argues that accumulation
under globalisation continues to expand by dispossessing people of their economic rights and of various forms of ownership and economic
power.
Harvey defines it best:
By [accumulation by dispossession] I mean the continuation and proliferation of accumulation practices which Marx had treated
of as 'primitive' or 'original' during the rise of capitalism. These include the commodification and privatization of land and
the forceful expulsion of peasant populations ; conversion of various forms of property rights (common, collective, state, |etc.)
into exclusive private property rights (most spectacularly represented by China); suppression of rights to the commons; commodification
of labor power and the suppression of alternative (indigenous) forms of production and consumption; colonial, neocolonial, and
imperial processes of appropriation of assets (including natural resources); monetization of exchange and taxation, particularly
of land; the slave trade (which continues particularly in the sex industry); and usury, the national debt and, most devastating
of all the use of the credit system as a radical means of accumulation by dispossession. (p. 159)But it also includes – for working
people in developed nations – the 'extraction of rents from patents and intellectual property rights and the diminution or erasure
of various forms of common property rights (such as state pensions, paid vacations, and access to education and health care).'
(p. 160)
Neoliberalism, therefore, can only continue its process of accumulation by dispossessing people of what they own, or to what they
have always had rights. In the end, Harvey tells us, the way out of this situation – not surprisingly – is are connection of theory
and practice. But his analysis is, once again, subtle and takes stock of present political realities.
The plethora of social movements need to forma 'broad-based oppositional programme', which sees the activities of the economic
elites as fundamentally impinging on traditionally held beliefs about egalitarianism and fairness. Crisis, for Harvey as with any
orthodox Marxist, is always looming.
Neoliberalism's rhetoric of individual freedom, and equality, and its promise of prosperity and growth, are slowly being revealed
as falsities.
Soon, Harvey believes, it will become evident that all of economic life and institutions are solely for the benefit of a single,
small social class. Therefore, theoretical insight – such as Harvey has proffered here – needs to constantly nourish the various
opposition movements that currently exist. The dialogue between theory and practice is the only sure wayt o take advantage of
the moment when a new crisis – financial or otherwise –bursts forth onto the scene. The deepest hope is that such a moment will foster
a basis 'for a resurgence of mass movements voicing egalitarian political demandsand seeking economic justice, fair trade, and greater
economic security.' (p. 204)
Harvey's position is explicitly anti-capitalist, and his hope is that the rhetoric of neoliberalism will be unmasked by the various
realities – most specifically, massive economic inequalities – that it spawns. Only then will social movements be able to gain political
traction, and move society toward some form of social, economic and political transformation.
Harvey's logic is seductive, and his ruminations on 'freedom's prospect' are compelling. But political and cultural realities
cannot be simply reduced to the mechanisms of capital and accumulation. While we can use Harvey's brilliant and deeply insightful
analysis of the structural mechanisms of neoliberalism, it has to be admitted that there are only rumblings of discontent in the
United States or China, and no hint of a mass movement against the realities of capitalism.
There is too little attention paid – and here the deficits of the orthodox Marxist approach can be sensed – to the way that the
culture of consent has found a deep affinity with American liberalism. Louis Hartz, in his classic, The Liberal Tradition in America
, was perhaps most correct when he predicted that the contours of American liberalism would lead to the acceptance of quasi-authoritarian
political and social norms.
China – lacking any democratic tradition – has not seen a mass movement arise to combat the inequality that has swollen over the
last two decades, either.
But the question of social movements remains open. There is no guarantee what you get with a mass movement of the disaffected
– one can think of Venezuela's Hugo Chavez, in this regard. Harvey does not look into such issues, but they need to be considered
since history – even the history of capitalism – cannot be viewed as cyclical and politics does not spring mechanistically from economic
conditions.
But despite this, Harvey's book is deeply insightful, rewarding and stimulating. His ability to thematise the imperatives of the
most recent manifestation of capitalist accumulation – most specifically the recent trends in economic inequality, the shifts in
urban cultural and political life, and the economic logic that currently drives the process of globalization – is nothing short of
virtuosic and his ideas should become a central part of the current discourse on globalisation, economic inequality, and the erosion
of democratic politics throughout the globe. His history of neoliberalism may indeed be brief, but the richness and profundity of
this volume is without question.
Michael J. Thompson is an advisory editor of Democratiya and is also the founder and editor of Logos: A Journal of Modern
Society & Culture (www.logosjournal. com). He is Assistant Professor of Political Science at William Paterson University. His next
book, Confronting Neoconservatism: The Rise of the New Right in America, is forthcoming from NYU Press. a journal of politics and
ideas
Like a Dos Equis ad, Mexico is "keeping it interesante ." On July 1, Andres Manuel
Lopez Obrador, the veteran left-wing politician known as AMLO,
will likely win Mexico's presidential election , to the horror of policy analysts, U.S.
government officials, and the Mexican business community. As head of the upstart National
Regeneration Movement (MORENA, the Spanish acronym, also means "dark skin"), AMLO pledges to
make Mexico self-sufficient on food, halt foreign investment in the oil industry, and grant
amnesty to drug traffickers. AMLO hates the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA) --
although he's promised to stay in it for now -- and "the Wall" even more.
Washington's days of having a predictable and compliant partner in Mexico may be over.
This election is likely to radically transform Mexican politics. MORENA is
surging in the polls and may give AMLO a strong legislative bloc. Nationalist-minded
legislators from other parties could also defect to his agenda. That would cause a major
Mexican political realignment, under which for the next six years it could be governed by a
self-described "revolutionary nationalist" ruling coalition. It makes sense: Mexico's
neoliberal era had to end sooner or later. AMLO's longtime critique of an unfair economy and a
complacent and unresponsive political system has finally resonated.
What accounts for this sudden turnaround? Several factors have aligned in AMLO's favor.
Start with AMLO's opponents, who, in a time of change, represent continuity, splitting the
neoliberal vote in Mexico's "winner-take-all" system. The conservative National Action Party
(PAN), his strongest competitor, diluted its solid brand by running in coalition with two
leftist parties. The ruling Institutional Revolutionary Party (PRI) selected a well-qualified
former finance minister who is out of his depth as a campaigner. That's left the once-powerful
PRI mailing this campaign in, and AMLO siphoning up its traditional voters.
Insecurity and corruption,
according to polls , are the top issues for Mexican voters, and on these AMLO scores well.
Especially on managing corruption and crime, Mexico's political elite have appeared notoriously
inept. The former head of the state oil company PEMEX, a close ally of President Enrique
Peña Nieto, has been credibly accused of taking up to
$10 million in bribes to approve contracts from the corrupt Brazilian construction company
Odebrecht. Several governors have been indicted for racketeering and graft; one
even went on the lam and was arrested in Guatemala. Recently, Mexico's 12-year campaign to
corral drug trafficking organizations fell apart, and violence skyrocketed. Twenty-eight
thousand Mexicans were murdered last year, and political candidates are being physically
attacked. Meanwhile, drug trafficking gangs ("cartels") are placing parts of the country off
limits.
Then there's President Trump, who has treated Mexico as a problem and not as a partner by
insisting that it fund his humiliating border wall. When asked in 2015 by Wall Street
Journal editors if he thought the U.S. should promote stability and economic growth in
Mexico, he replied, "I don't care about Mexico honestly. I really don't care about Mexico."
Trump has bolstered AMLO's long-held view that Mexico has relied on the United States for too
long. On the campaign trail, AMLO has vowed to put Trump "in his place."
Still, these more immediate causes don't entirely explain AMLO's impending success. At a
deeper level, AMLO seems to be Mexico's answer to Samuel Huntington's key "who are we?"
question on national identity. AMLO's MORENA explicitly seeks to revive the abandoned ideals of
the Mexican Revolution (1910-1920): anti-imperialism, defense of national resources, equality,
and the protection of peasant rights. Tellingly, AMLO cites as his heroes two successful
presidents who propelled Mexico forward: Benito Juarez, the black-clad Zapotec Indian who
defeated the French-backed 19th-century "empire," and Lazaro Cardenas, the former revolutionary
general who nationalized the oil industry and built the modern Mexican state.
Despite his populism, AMLO hasn't always been an outsider. He started his political career
during the 1980s, when the PRI was still was Mexico's governing party. But he soon saw the
changes happening in his rural native state of Tabasco, when the oil boom pushed out the
farming and fishing industry. AMLO dissented from the PRI's decision to liberalize the economy
and joined the opposition in 1988.
Led by Carlos Salinas de Gortari, who was president from 1988 to 1994, the country embarked
on a strict neoliberal development path and internationalist agenda, reversing its program of
statist economics and authoritarian governance. Its ruling politicians sold state industries,
embraced market reforms, let the peso float, and joined the North American Free Trade
Agreement. Over the last several years, Mexico City has even permitted greater American
involvement in its war against drug traffickers. Under Peña Nieto, Mexico finally
allowed its oil industry to permit foreign investment.
In truth, these reforms worked well enough: Mexico democratized and developed into a solidly
middle-income country with steady economic growth. Net immigration into the United States has
come to a halt. Security issues were messy, but unlikely to destabilize the country.
These reforms represented a big win for Washington. If American intervention was needed for
the occasional peso crisis or drug trafficker menace, we were happy to oblige. Mexico made a
difficult partner at times, but on the policy side, it was where Washington wanted it to
be.
But the cost of these changes may have been Mexico's identity, its sense of self. Returning
to Huntington, his "The Clash of
Civilizations?" article described Mexico as a state "torn" between its economic future and
political and cultural past. After a top advisor to President Salinas described the sweeping
changes the government was making, Huntington remarked, "It seems to me that basically you want
to change Mexico from a Latin American country into a North American country." Salinas looked
at him with surprise and exclaimed: "Exactly! That's precisely what we are trying to do, but of
course we could never say so publicly."
AMLO and his followers have brooded about these radical changes for years. To this day, he
refers to the arch-neoliberal Salinas simply as El Innombrable -- he that cannot be
named. Neoliberalism launched AMLO not just on a political career but on a personal crusade to
bring the country back to its former ideals.
When AMLO won the Mexico City mayorship in 2000, he built up a national political base and
became a burr in the saddle of President Vicente Fox, who had embraced the liberal reforms of
the formerly ruling PRI. AMLO criticized Fox relentlessly, and in retaliation, Fox attempted to
have him legally prohibited from running for president in 2006.
This clumsy effort failed, giving AMLO a boost. But he narrowly lost the contest to the
PAN's Felipe Calderon, whose campaign linked AMLO with Venezuela's leftist President Hugo
Chavez. Embittered in defeat, AMLO immediately claimed the voting was rigged against him. AMLO
and his raucous followers held protests for months and even formed a parallel government. He
may have lost in 2006, but he solidified his position as the leader of Mexico's alternative
left.
AMLO's anti-system stance has given weight to the claim that he'd be another Chavez. The
comparison seems invidious, as the late comandante of Venezuela, an avowed Marxist and
coup plotter, crushed democratic institutions, set up a socialist economy, and in general drove
what had been a prosperous South American country into the ground. AMLO, an authentic democrat,
appears less megalomaniacal and more rules-focused, more the romantic reactionary than the
revolutionary radical.
Still, many of the same forces that propelled Chavez are driving AMLO now. Like Chavez, AMLO
is coming to power after a period of neoliberal reform and perceived intractable corruption.
Like Chavez, AMLO enjoys an almost mystical bond with his nation's poorer classes. And very
much like Chavez, AMLO is instinctively, but probably not irreversibly, anti-American in
outlook.
How these characteristics will play out with AMLO in power is hard to predict. The two main
parties won't be behind him, but many of their followers might. All of those alienated by
neoliberalism, the perceived kowtowing to Washington, the surrender of economic resources to
foreign companies and the free market, will flock to his banner. It is remarkable how some
former members of the right-of-center National Action Party and the PRI have backed his
campaign.
Some of AMLO's policy proposals seem less the stuff of hard leftism than nostalgic
nationalism. He focuses heavily on national development for industry and agriculture aimed at
self-reliance and reducing imports. He proposes holding referendums on the enacted legislation,
a move to broaden democracy, which would require constitutional reform. He seeks to raise the
minimum wage, but refreshingly pledges "no new taxes."
AMLO loves to wax nostalgic about Mexico's strong state traditions and will almost certainly
attempt to restore the waning power of the Mexican presidency as an anti-corruption pulpit. In
the tradition of newly inaugurated Mexican presidents, he'll probably look to prosecute a node
of corruption in Mexican society: a prominent businessman or politician, rather than a labor
union like his predecessors.
Much of the progress the United States has made with Mexico on security cooperation will
probably be jeopardized. It's hard to believe that AMLO will endorse the close relations that
the DEA, the Pentagon, and the intelligence community have forged with their Mexican
counterparts in the war on drugs. The extradition of the notorious drug kingpin Joaquin el
Chapo Guzman to the U.S. in 2017 will probably be the high watermark in the relationship. It is
doubtful that AMLO will permit more high-profile extraditions. President Trump's disdain for a
close relationship that has taken us decades to build may come back to haunt us.
But a poor relationship between Washington and Mexico City doesn't have
to be inevitable. Despite the rhetoric, the flamboyant American billionaire has much in
common with the austere Mexican populist. Both countries have too many common interests to go
down separate paths. The question is: does AMLO have to build the bomb to get Trump to care
about Mexico?
Michael J. Ard is a former deputy national intelligence officer for the Western
Hemisphere and the author of"An Eternal Struggle: The Role of the National Action
Party in Mexico's Democratic Transition." He teaches international relations at Rice
University's Master of Global Affairs program.
That's just the thing, AMLO isn't "an authentic democrat." He founded MORENA so he could keep
his presidential aspirations going; he's indistinguishable from the party. After losing in
2006, he notoriously said "to hell with institutions." His followers won't admit this, but
his platform is as diluted as the rest: he's taken in suspects of corruption and has allied
himself with both a very "conservative" party (the small, evangelical PES) and Mexico's hard
leftists.
Trump's "national neoliberalism" has some interesting side effects...
Notable quotes:
"... All it takes is for confidence to falter, and the whole house of cards comes tumbling down ..."
"... I have felt for a long time that our consumption based economy is a way to keep people so self absorbed that they don't ask too many questions . ..."
"... As tempting as it is to attribute this to personality failings, I don't believe that Mr. Trump's China tantrum is geopolitical one-upmanship. It is more likely a reaction to the annual Industrial Capabilities Report released on May 17 by the Pentagon's Office of Manufacturing and Industrial Base Policy, in parallel to a similar review being conducted internally by the White House. ..."
"... The Pentagon has concluded that two decades of financially-engineered corporate concentration and out-sourcing of skilled work to China has stripped the U.S. Military-Industrial Complex of its "organic industrial base." It appears evident that the White House has decided that tariff barriers on China are the only way to rebuild a population of of "qualified workers to meet current demands as well as needing to integrate a younger workforce with the 'right skills, aptitude, experience, and interest to step into the jobs vacated by senior-level engineers and skilled technicians' as they exit the workforce." ..."
"... I find myself confused and in a quandary. Is it not neoliberalism and global trade that over the past 25 years or so has led to corporate mega-wealth and the beginning of the end of the US middle class, and the further impoverishment of the working class? If so, then as a good progressive, should I not welcome a trade war or whatever economic change will end this global economic tyranny? Is the skepticism or outright opposition to a trade war of so many progressives simply based on the fact taht t's being initiated by the colossal idiot in the White House who may inadvertently be doing something beneficial? ..."
The White House's tough stance represents the ascendancy, for now, of trade hawks in the administration, particularly White
House senior trade adviser Peter Navarro and U.S. trade representative Robert Lighthizer
"It's clear that China has much more to lose" than the U.S. from a trade fight, said Mr. Navarro.
Mr. Lighthizer said additional tariffs wouldn't be imposed until the U.S. picked the products, and received industry comment,
a process that will take months and leaves open the possibility of additional negotiations. But so far there is no indication
that such talks are on the horizon, and the Trump administration is signaling that it is increasingly confident of achieving goals
through a dramatically more confrontational approach to China
Next up from the administration is a plan to halt Chinese investment in U.S. technology, due to be released by the Treasury
Department by June 30 .
Mr. Trump has backed away from threats before .In April, Mr. Trump threatened a dramatic increase in tariffs on Chinese goods,
but didn't follow through. Instead, he approved negotiations Mr. Mnuchin led to get China to buy more U.S. goods and make changes
to its tariffs and other trade barriers. That led to a temporary reprieve in the tensions as the two sides sought to negotiate
a truce.
The White House has since judged those efforts a failure, especially after Mr. Mnuchin and Mr. Trump were criticized by cable
TV hosts and some lawmakers of being weak on China. During a June trade mission to China by Commerce Secretary Wilbur Ross, Beijing
offered to buy nearly $70 billion in U.S. farm, manufacturing and energy products if the Trump administration abandoned tariff
threats. Mr. Trump rejected that offer as another empty promise.
Trump's negotiating strategy, if you can call it that, appears unlikely to work with China . If one were to try to ascribe logic
to Trump picking and then escalating a fight with China, it is presumably in the end to bring them to the negotiating table. But
China is not North Korea, where the US threatened the Hermit Kingdom with nuclear devastation and Kim Jong Un with being the next
Gaddafi and then dialed the bluster way down as China pushed and South Korea pulled North Korea to the negotiating table. And the
good luck of the Olympics being in South Korea facilitated the process.
One could argue that all of the theatrics was to enable Trump to talk with Kim Jong Un and not look like a wus.
With China, Trump's escalation to threatening another $200 billion of Chinese goods after his initial $50 billion shot is a reaction
to China going into tit for tat mode as opposed to negotiating. This should not be a surprise. The more detailed press reports were
making clear that China was initially not engaging with the US (as in making clear that they weren't receptive to US demands and
accordingly weren't deploying meaningful resources to talks).
Even if China incurs meaningful economic costs in hitting back at the US, politically it's a no brainer. China's sense of itself
as the power that will displace the US means it's unacceptable to be bullied. China has been bizarrely sensitive to slights, for
instance, lashing out during the 2007 IPCC negotiations and getting testy when the US put countervailing duties
on a mere $224 million
of goods . Recall that when the US put sanctions on Russia, its strategists seemed to genuinely believe that Russians would rise
up and turf Putin out. Instead, his popularity ratings rose and even the Moscow intelligentsia rallied to support him.
Oh, and while we are speaking about North Korea,
Kim Jong Un is in Beijing . It's not hard to get the message: there's no reason for China to play nicely in the face of US trade
brinksmanship.
Trump appears to be relying on the idea that since the US imports more than China exports, we can do more damage to them in a
tariff game of chicken . On the one hand, as Marshall Auerback has pointed out, in trade wars, the creditor nation, which would be
China, typically fares worse than the debtor nation. However, China can do a lot a damage to US companies in China. The US has long
had a policy of promoting the interests of US multinationals based on the claim that deeper trade relations would reduce the odds
of war and make countries more disposed towards democracy. And when "free trade" ideology got a life of its own, economists and pundits
regularly treated the idea of trying to protect domestic jobs as retrograde, even when many of our trade partners negotiated their
deals with that consideration in mind.
American businesses from Apple Inc. and Walmart Inc. to Boeing Co. and General Motors Co. all operate in China and are keen
to expand. That hands Xi room to impose penalties such as customs delays, tax audits and increased regulatory scrutiny if Trump
delivers on his threat of bigger duties on Chinese trade. U.S. shares slumped Tuesday as part of a broad sell-off in global markets
in response to Trump's threat.
The total amount of U.S. goods exports to China only amounted to $130 billion last year, meaning Trump's potential tariffs
on $250 billion or more of Chinese imports can't be matched, at least directly. But if you measure both exports and sales of U.S.
companies inside China, the U.S. has a surplus of $20 billion with China, according to Deutsche Bank AG .
One advantage of this tactic for Xi is that this time the numbers are on his side, as U.S. investment in China is far larger
than the reverse. American companies had $627 billion in assets and $482 billion in sales in China in 2015, compared to just $167
billion in U.S. assets and $26 billion in U.S. sales for Chinese companies .
A change in trade priorities to focus on domestic employment isn't nuts . It's hard to know what Trump is trying to achieve as
he calls for China to reduce its trade deficit by $200 billion. Given that the Administration said it will focus on the sectors depicted
as priorities in China's "Made-in-China 2025" plans in next round to tariff targets, China has good reason to think Trump's real
aim is to check its rise as a superpower.
Even though Trump is giving trade negotiations a bad name, there's every reason to give domestic employment higher priority in
trade negotiation. The reason Trump is so fond of tariffs is that they are a weapon he can deploy quickly and unilaterally, while
negotiations and WTO cases take time. And even though the pundit class likes to decry manufacturing as oh-so-20th century, Ford's
Rouge plant employed more people than Apple does in the entire US. Restoring infrastructure would create a lot of employment, as
would increasing domestic manufacturing.
But the US has eliminated the supervisor and middle managers that once ran operations like these. If we were to seek to build
some areas of manufacturing, the US would have to engage in industrial policy, which is something we do now, but only by default,
with the defense industry, financial services, health care, housing, and higher education among the favored sectors. So given our
political constraints, it's hard to see how we get there from here.
Mr. Market is anxious . Anxious is well short of panicked. Chinese stocks took the worst hit, but the latest round of threats
took 4% off the Shanghai composite, taking it back to its level of 20 months ago.
Chinese indexes were mixed today .
By contrast, the Dow was down 1.15% and the S&P 500, 0.4%.
Having said that, the Fed is in a tightening cycle and stock valuations already looked pretty attenuated. Trade tensions and the
uncertainty over how the threat to global supply chains will play out may lead investors to curb their enthusiasm, particularly if
the Trump initiative starts looking less like another fit of pique and more like a change in the rules of the game that looks unlikely
to work out well.
I think the Chinese response depends on the great unknown of the Chinese Communist Parties long term strategy. One line of
thought is that the 'Asian model' of trade surpluses is for them just the means to an end for China to reach 'high development'
status, from which point they would seek a much more balanced internal economy. The other, sees Chinas trade surplus – in particular
the deliberate over production of strategic products such as microprocessors and pharmaceuticals as an end itself – warfare by
means of trade. Both aspects are variations on the Japanese
Yoshida Doctrine , something the Chinese have studied
in detail.
If the former, then its entirely possible that the Chinese see Trump's threat not as a challenge, but an opportunity to carry
out the necessary deep structural changes to balance their economy. A populist trade war would be the cover the government needs
to dramatically cut over-production and focus instead on ensuring China has all the strategic products it needs (the most crucial
of course is food). The CCP's fear is always inflation in food prices – this is historically the trigger for urban unrest, as
in the 1980's. But if they have a foreign scapegoat for that, they may see it as a risk worth taking. Urban riots where people
attack CCP buildings terrifies the leadership. Urban riots where people burn Trump effigies, less so.
If the true strategy is the second, then Trumps attacks are an obvious threat. The Chinese are aware now of the growing awareness
in the US of just how vulnerable the US has become to shortages of products which are now almost entirely Chinese made or controlled
– many processed metals, pharmaceuticals, key electronic components, etc. If it is indeed Chinese strategy to use these for leverage
at some future date, then they won't want to risk undermining this in a tit for tat war. In this situation, they will tread much
more carefully and won't be worried about a minor loss of face if they stand down and give Trump the victory headlines he craves.
In a broader sense, Trump believes that the biggest stick always wins a war like this, and he and his advisor clearly believe
the US has the biggest stick. But in military terms, the winner in a war is not the country who has the biggest army, but the
country that can bring the biggest army to the right field of battle. The Chinese (along perhaps with the Europeans and Mexicans)
may believe that if they fight smart and focus on specific battles – such as US farm goods or key US aerospace and consumer electronics
companies – they can make Trump and the Republicans really hurt. They know the electoral cycle in the US, which gives them a big
advantage. It will be interesting to see if Trump forces all sorts of new and unlikely alliances in opposition.
Interesting analysis. Do you think Trump's aim could be to throw a spanner into their works, whatever the plan is, thereby
buying more time to re-industrialize and wean US industries off of China? Also, it strikes me that Trump is consciously disciplining
US-based businesses like Apple every bit as much as he is China.
It would also require companies like Apple to show some interest in U.S. manufacturing, which is not the case at this time.
I'm all for whatever barriers are necessary to re-invigorate and modernize U.S. manufacturing. But it will be impossible to
make progress if U.S. multi-nationals refuse to go along. Trump doesn't play the long game and there is really no evidence that
he is willing to challenge/threaten U.S. firms in substantive ways. Remember the campaign threats against Ford? Since then, Ford
has not upped its U.S. investment but instead chosen to get completely out of the small car business. And that is a company that
still has an extensive U.S. manufacturing presence, unlike, say, Apple.
I think this is what the Chinese understand (maybe Trump does too and this is all just theater for 2020). They can play hardball
with Trump as long as US MNC's are on the side of China against the U.S. In the last 6 months, have you heard a single large U.S.
manufacturer voice support for Trump's trade policies? I haven't.
If the Chinese focus on key areas that can 'make Trump and the Republicans really hurt. They know the electoral cycle in the
US ,' wouldn't that be outright election meddling?
There is the same logic, possibility, at work in Trump's thinking (and thinking may be too generous a term for it but we do
I suppose have to assign some sort of plan being pushed through here) to that of the U.K.'s Brexit Ultras.
For the Ultras, reestablishing political and sovereignty independence is conflated and intertwined with economic independence
which all -- through a mechanism which is never adequately explained -- will result in domestic economic revitalisation that doesn't
require government direct intervention.
No, it doesn't stack up or make a great deal of sense, but having been around many hard-core Brexit'eers in the Brexit heartland
(and the Conservative party's local association in a Brexit stronghold) the people who hold this worldview do make it work
within the confines of their own minds. It goes something like: if you neutralise or at least weaken the power blocks which are
winning out politically and you'll reap a reward economically. The fallacy assumes that you can give Johnny Foreigner a good kicking
at the sovereignty and international power-broker level and because you're a geopolitical shaker and mover, that'll pay off in
trade terms. All without consequences.
But of course there are always consequences. Other countries can decide to endure downsides (not least because the
various ruling elites don't end up on the receiving end of these, usually) -- this was the same gamble the U.K. government made,
unsuccessfully, with the EU ("we're in the unassailable position because we import from them more than we export"). And so also
with China. If Beijing is prepared to play a long game, it can tough it out with the US, potentially longer than the US is prepared
to tolerate.
This has always been the case with the US (and the U.K. too, for that matter) -- they never expect anyone else to tolerate
any downside which is imposed. They're astonished when Cuba, the DPRK, Iran, Russia, China and even to a lesser extent the EU
don't simply fall into line when they click their fingers.
There are different power centers operating in the Trump administration's trade policy. Trump himself may be motivated by no
more than a desire to appear tough -- and as Yves notes, tariffs are one of the few ways a US president can act swiftly and unilaterally
to do so.
His advisers are another matter. They would like to pressure China to have more open and fair policies, but are OK with the
consequences if China refuses -- i.e., an extremely large decrease in US trade volumes with China, and, indeed, the entire world.
They have probably performed a calculation similar to the one outlined by Paul Krugman
in his June
17 column on trade wars . Basically, a global trade war would not have a giant impact on global GDP -- perhaps 2-3 percent
assuming tariffs on everything in the neighborhood of 30 percent. There would be displacement of jobs and workers while everyone
readjusted, but that's a price the Trump administration would probably be willing to pay. And, what Krugman does not mention,
the United States as a very large economy would in fact do less badly in a trade war than most others countries. By losing less,
it would "win" in the zero-sum universe Trump seems to inhabit.
That's a difference between Trumpers and Brexiters. Britain is an island that has always depended on trade. The US has two
oceans around it, still the world's largest economy (more or less), adequate natural resources, and a whole hemisphere to pick
on.
I think you are right in suggesting that the calculation is that even an all out trade war would not be catastrophic, and the
US would come out best.
I think the problem with this thinking is that it assumes symmetric actions by all the major parties, but in this sort of trade
war it will be more targeted and asymmetric. By which I mean that the Chinese and Europeans in particular have immediately targetted
more obvious, vulnerable US sectors. At first, these are just rather obvious ones, like Harley Davidson bikes or Levi Jeans, but
its not hard to see that if it gets serious there might be co-operation to target what they see as Trumps heartlands. As I suggested
above, a targeted attempt to hit key US food exports at the strategically right time could be devastating for US farmers, and
domestically China and other countries may accept the 'hit' domestically as they have a convenient scapegoat.
I should say though that whatever the outcome, the uncertainty created by Trumps action is likely to make all investors much
more wary of businesses which depend on widespread global supply chain networks, which can only be a good thing for people trying
to keep jobs local and to reduce emissions. Its unfortunate that when these come about through trade wars the impacts (as usual)
will hit ordinary people first, at least in the initial stage
I do agree that the zenith of long, complex and ultimately not especially resilient global supply chains has passed. For at
least 20, possibly 30 years these have received and been able to rely on unstinting political aircover and hidden subsidies.
Not any more. There's some minor tremors already being felt with the distinct possibility of some bigger systemic shocks in
store.
I do agree that the zenith of long, complex and ultimately not especially resilient global supply chains has passed.
Indeed – anecdotally and slightly tangentially – the days of outsourcing call-centres etc are numbered. Whilst many knowledgable
people have shown that the cost savings have not turned out to be anything like as large as the corporations predicted, consumer
hatred cannot be understated. I have gone through several weeks of arguing with Three over their service, being bounced around
various call-centres offshore. Finally, an email to the CEO, pointing out (in a measured way) how my business calls and those
of other businesses who use them will very quickly be affected, it was amazing how quickly things progressed, with my complaint
being escalated to the CEO executive group. I phrased it in terms of the fact their business model now actively encouraged (and
in many cases only supported) people to use phones known to be vulnerable to hackers and companies are really not going to like
that, even if they're cheap. Furthermore Three are immensely vulnerable come the next 5G spectrum auction (they are significantly
in trouble spectrum-wise) and I was about to be escalated to the Ombudsman, and told the CEO I'd be highlighting their security
vulnerabilities – something they really don't want, even though they'd done it to save a bob or two in outsourcing.
Things were sorted ASAP; it was obvious that a UK programmer redid the whole Three app and web interface over a weekend (I
used to program in Fortran in my PhD and diagnosed their problem straightaway). Three used to be innovative in carving out a niche
segment regarding its roaming plans – but has not kept innovating, and EU laws on roaming now mean its advantage is largely gone
whilst Vodafone staff in stores gleefully tell customers that you'll talk to a British call-centre – they have calculated that
the price premium is worth it, if people don't have to go through what I did, particularly high-value customers.
The days of long supply chains are numbered, most definitely. Systemic breakdowns would simply kill a company that operated
as they did. Now rapid changes seem to be in motion to make supply chains more robust and acceptable .
I hope its true – the fascinating shipping stats that Lambert posts in WaterCooler most days shows that transport is still
a huge and growing business, and seems to have recovered from the changes made 5 years ago when the oil price peak made a lot
of companies think twice about long supply chains. But there do seem to be a converging set of factors which must surely make
companies think twice. If you combine energy price risks, political risks, increasing tarrifs, consumer resistence, etc., there
are more and more incentives for companies to tighten and simplify supply chains. But I think it will be quite a while before
we see the impacts (and I'd never underestimate the power of inertia behind globilisation either).
Its often forgotten of course – mostly by economists who never study history – that we've been here before, most notably in
the late 19th Century when the trade was highly globilised, thanks to the major empires. That unravelled with startling speed.
Indeed, I see his statistics and agree regarding interia. But, as you say, economists are rubbish at history – and coupled
with their fascination with models that are ergodic (when the climate models suggest we are entering new territory with complete
"breaks" in the relationships and possible sudden shifts to new equilibria with associated huge, fast, cyclical changes) I can't
help but wonder if the supply chain models simply must collapse if the climate scientists are right and the economists are wrong.
But only time will tell .
Speaking of 'bigger systemic shocks,' Doug Kass puts a finer point on it [lifted from the Z site this morning]:
[Trump's] policy and negotiating tactics hold the risk that business confidence could be jeopardized and supply chains
may be disrupted.
I have long argued that the "Orange Swan" would ultimately be market unfriendly – that an untethered Trump would "Make Uncertainty
and Volatility (in the markets) Great Again." (#MUVGA)
And, I have recently argued over the last few months that the president's behavior is now beginning to impact the capital
markets.
Acting upon his impulses, growing more isolated and becoming more unhinged -- the Supreme Tweeter is now an Orange Swan
headwind.
" Rex, eat your salad " – President Trump
What numerical analyses such as Kurgman's miss is confidence. Popular mood has propelled Bubble III to stratospheric
heights, with equities and property dear worldwide.
All it takes is for confidence to falter, and the whole house of cards comes tumbling down with a crash far out of proportion
to the minor changes in economic stats that will be visible at the time. ' No one could have foreseen ' etc
Bubbles, and their aftermaths, are self-reinforcing both on the way up and the way down. A manly square jaw and a glorious
orange helmet will take you only so far when you haven't a clue what you're doing. :-(
Since Kass mentioned 'negotiating tactics,' presumably many now also are aware that factor.
Judging by how the bubble is holding up, can we say that, so far, the key market players are receiving that message and remain
(again, so far the Nasdaq dropped just a bit yesterday after the additional $200 billion tariffs news) confident on this front
(but whose confidence can be shaken on other fronts for example, perhaps by others who worry openly and warn that the sky is,
at this moment, falling).
Who needs confidence when the Fed has proved it will just step in and buy whatever's necessary to prop up the market. Loot
on the way up, loot on the way down. Fearing volatility is for smallfolk.
All it takes is for confidence to falter, and the whole house of cards comes tumbling down
But U.S. MNCs have had no confidence in U.S. manufacturing for decades. Which is why we need to never anger the bubble-driven
"confidence fairy." On the fundamentals that affect most people, the house blew down long ago.
What's amazing, is that right at the time when being part of a large trading block would seem to be an imperative and not just
an advantage, Britain decides to leave the EU. Even the very timing is wrong.
Much as I would like one, I am quite confident there will not be a global trade war. Trump has no long game and in any event
no stomach for taking on the entire U.S. business class. There will negotiations, flip-flops, photo-ops, some marginal claimed
"wins," no real change, and on to 2020.
'Basically, a global trade war would not have a giant impact on global GDP -- perhaps 2-3 percent assuming tariffs on everything
in the neighborhood of 30 percent.'
Kurgman seems to assume that the radical adjustment to supply chains is nearly frictionless. But it's not. Vast capital investment
will be needed, at a time when corporations are already highly leveraged by piling up debt to buy back shares.
A trade war is just the pin we need to pop Bubble III and send it crashing to earth like the Hindenburg -- oh the humanity!
It's a heavy price to pay, just to turf out Herbert Hoover Trump after one term and highlight Peter Rabbit Navarro as the PhD
Econ know nothing who wrecked the global economy. Even the benighted Kurgman sees that Navarro is a total charlatan.
It has been interesting for the last few years watching the pigs cotillion that passes for a "western elite" pull pin after
pin after pin on what have been assumed to be grenades thus far without any detonation.
Though we'll never know for sure, the Fed's bond dumping is a financial pin, while trade wars are a confidence smasher.
Once a stampede starts, it acquires a momentum of its own: you're obliged to run, not because you were scared, but because
a thundering herd is coming at you.
I'd agree very much with this, Clive. I would add that this sort of delusion seems largely restricted to major powers who haven't
suffered a major loss (or at least not one that couldn't be quietly forgotten) in a century or so. Those of us who live in smaller
countries always know that true absolute 'sovereignty' in the real world is a chimera. What matters is what areas you maintain
control, and which ones you let go – and its always better to let some go than have them ripped from your hands. And those countries
who have suffered humiliations in the recent past (Germany, France, China, Japan) have fewer delusions about the dangers of arrogance
and powerplay, although the French in particular are prone to forget.
An overly dynamic situation is one thing so long as it does not end up in a 'kinetic' situation. I am going to go out on a
limb here and say that Trump's threats against China are a gamble but will have to explain it a bit. For about two decades after
the collapse of the USSR we lived in a unipolar world with the axis located in Washington DC. You had people like McCain, Rubio,
Navarro, Lighthizer and Graham working through their careers in this 'golden age' but those times are now definitely over. The
world is once more reverting to its normal state of a multipolar world and people like the aforementioned people cannot tolerate
this.
To push back against this reversion, they have been trying on a wide front to use American military and economic power to make
countries bend to their will. Threatening allies if they purchase Russian weapons, blackmailing the EU to abandon Iran in preparation
for a cruel embargo, threatening Turkey by withholding sales of the F35 fighter, etc. have all been tried. For several reasons,
this approach is not working so well anymore. So at this point, after wrestling some time with countries like Russia and Iran,
the US has decided that they need to attack the center of gravity in this new multipolar world and that means China.
The US demanded that China reconfigure their entire economy to enable US corporations to have more power and say in China while
demanding that China curtail their advancing their technological development program. China balked at this but did offer compromises
to no effect. With the lunatic policy of pushing China and Russia together, a massive political and economic federation is slowly
forming on the mass of lands from Vladivosok all the way through to Europe. If that happens, then the US definitely becomes a
second rate power. The clock is ticking on this development hence the attempt to cower China which is the linchpin for this.
Trump has been convinced that the US holds the upper hand and decided on a gamble, a doubling down if you will, so that a decisive
victory will be achieved on the cusp of the 2018 US midterm elections. The trouble with all this is that the US is hemorrhaging
both soft and hard power and is in a weaker position now. There is more and more countries seeking to bypass use of the US dollar
as being too dangerous to use for some countries and working with an American company and buying America products is also being
seen as risky. An example is when the US forbid Airbus selling its own aircraft to Iran due to the presence of US parts. I am
willing to bet that a lot of other companies sat up and took notice of this. So now for Trump he is going all in to try to overturn
these developments but as we say in Australia, he has two chances – his and Buckleys
They do seem to be caught in something of a chinese finger puzzle alright. Everything they do seems to make their opponents
stronger in some fashion or another. As per PK above, I wonder if Trump is not, unwittingly, doing the Chinese a favour?
There's a reason historical trade routes followed the Silk Road, a reason horsemen swept out of the Mongolian plains to conquer
the world time and again. The axis of human trade runs through Europe/Asia. It has never run through North America and never will.
The US can't be the axis of the world because it quite simply isn't located in the right place along the right population vectors.
This is a fact the US military is well aware of. If the US tries to maintain its position in the long run it will fail. That's
just the way it is, and the sooner US stops propagandizing its own citizens to the contrary, the better.
to throw out an unconventional thought: if you're an environmentalist/anti-climate change, you should want a trade war. I guess
per the media and Democratic pundits it's: Reduce, reuse, recycle–Unless your goals align with a Trump policy on a discrete issue.
you should want to stop the government-subsidized 5/10,000-mile supply chain. Government-subsidized as in: favorable taxation
for fuel oil, government subsidized port facilities/roads, lax emissions regulations, lax labor laws, etc.
to throw out an unconventional thought: if you're an environmentalist/anti-climate change, you should want a trade war
That thought occurred to me too. Of course this is one of those situations in which the supply conditions support this but
the demands of the population ? Nasty situation ..People are going to have to learn (maybe the hard way via the oft-quoted "war-like
BREXIT economy on here") that lots of foodstuffs currently grown between the Tropics of Cancer and Capricorn are simply going
to become unavailable. A 2-5 degree increase in average temperature in many of the countries there – particularly those with high
humidity – means that unless they have a LOT of energy to air condition people for large parts of the day, then human life will
be impossible – the body can't sweat enough to eliminate excess body heat if not cooled and death is inevitable. Nasty times ahead
for lots of countries in the "middle" of the planet ..and besides the (obviously) huge human cost to them, the days of producing
nice vegetables out of season for us at higher latitudes will soon be over.
But the US has eliminated the supervisor and middle managers that once ran operations like these. If we were to seek
to build some areas of manufacturing, the US would have to engage in industrial policy, which is something we do now, but only
by default, with the defense industry, financial services , health care, housing, and higher education among the favored
sectors. So given our political constraints, it's hard to see how we get there from here.
Perhaps, Trump is using the method of obliquity to get what is important to the powers that be, the fraudsters of Wall Street.
For instance, three nano seconds after the billionaire's tax cut was passed his top economic advisor, Gary Cohn
resigned , and the reason given was his opposition to the direction trade policy was going, but really,
who is dumb enough to believe that?
Quoting Trump:
"Gary has been my chief economic adviser and did a superb job in driving our agenda, helping to deliver historic tax
cuts and reforms and unleashing the American economy once again," Trump said in a statement to Times. "He is a rare talent,
and I thank him for his dedicated service to the American people."
Substitute "billionaire class" for "American people" to get closer to the truth. Gary is a venal mercenary that went to Washington
to get a jawb done.
Two of the "demands" by the US when it comes to "trade" is that intellectual property be respected and that US "companies"
operating in China be permitted to do so without the requirement to form partnerships with Chinese (CCP offshoots really) companies,
and to get there, my cynical self suspects that all peasants are nothing more than cannon fodder in this trade war so that the
fraudsters of Wall Street can go into China unfettered and loot the Chinese as much as they have looted Americans, and without
sharing a cut with Chinese "partners".
Sadly, the Europeans are key to preventing this. Only they have the purchasing power to offload China's current surplus, and
eventually proceed to an even trade relationship as the other terminus of the Belt.
I say sadly because they are the wimps of all time, and they will simply not let go of Mother America's apron strings. So at
least for my lifetime (another 20-30 years I'm expecting) things aren't going to change -- well, they will actually get worse
for the 90% in the US as well as everywhere else, but the overall state-level power dynamics will remain.
Funny also because the F35 sucks, you can barely tell where they detonated the MOAB, Elon Musk is building strange, badly-thought
out tunnels, our military is just tired, tired tired . yet still everybody cowers. What are they afraid of?
You make a good point in deriding Trump's vacillating positions as not a policy. (For comparison, Kirstjen Nielsen's consistent
behavior in having her dept. separate would be immigrant adults from children – without tracking who belongs to whom – is a policy.)
Trump's focus on domestic jobs would be an excellent, indeed, a necessary policy. Successful economic competitors in Asia and
Europe do exactly that. For Trump, however, it's not a policy, it's a talking point.
As you say, American mythology is that it has no industrial policy. The reality is that it has one, but it's written, implemented
and policed by the private sector. It does not want government to make a priority of domestic employment because it has largely
abandoned the idea as impossibly unprofitable.
In that, Elon Musk's reduction of at least 9% of his manufacturing workforce is the standard antediluvian response to management's
inability to meet its self-imposed objectives. He has decided, all evidence to the contrary, that his line workers and the processes
they are implementing are adequate to meet his objectives. They just need someone to crack the whip a tad harder.
But which jobs is Musk cutting? Largely middle management supervisors and technical staff. These are the people with manufacturing
know-how, the very people most likely to fix Musk's manufacturing-cum-quality process defects.
Musk is throwing out the people who could most help him meet his objectives. Adopting policies to which Detroit has long been
addicted will produce the consequences they always have before.
Krugman is not to be taken seriously on anything. He may actually know economic theory but he sold out so long ago that anything
he writes I dismiss out of hand as propaganda . I don't think he even has the potential to be stopped clock right about anything
. Every column is econo-babble designed to support whatever message his handlers need put out there. I think of him as the Baghdad
Bob of the economics bloggers.
As far as trade wars go I say bring it on. We have gotten so soft here in the US that everyone seems to walk around wringing
their hands and moaning all the time. My parents grew up during WW2 they had ration coupons and no passenger cars , no gasoline
, full on recycling of everything. I'd like to see some belt tightening of that sort in the here and now. I grew up in the 70's
I remember the energy crisis clearly, and people under 45 or 40 maybe literally have no clue what it means to have limitations
on basic necessities , not I can't afford the new Iphone but that it just can't be bought period.
Where ever one is in the golbal warming spectrum or the environmental spectrum personally , we just can not go on the way we
are . We need to put pressure on people to think about how they live and how they spend and what our government is doing in our
name.
many, many thing of which I do not approve, and wish to have no part of. However, in some manner I feel responsible as this
is a democracy, and I should have some influence (minuscule as it is).
The US is an oligarchy, even Princeton academics agree. Part of the way to end that problem, is seize control back from the
tyrants. My suggestion is to join the poor people's campaign, and do whatever you can do for them, whether it is protest, make
signs, or send small donations.
Don't let the oligarchs make you believe that what they do is in your name. It is not, and the only way to stop them is to
make them fear the population.
Elections won't do it – not as long as black-box voting machines and interstate cross-check ensure that the poor voice is as
quiet as possible.
I have felt for a long time that our consumption based economy is a way to keep people so self absorbed that they don't
ask too many questions .
WHEEE I got a new Iphone , instead of why are we bombing these people. Looking back I was a happier person when I had less
possessions. I don't know when the cut off point was though. I mean as a young man I did without and wanted things and then there
was a period of fuzziness and now my house is full of shit that I don't even care about.
I can remember waiting in line at a gas pump with my dad so we could go to nantasket beach. I didn't mind waiting in a hot
car for an hour because I was excited to go. Now you see a family out in a car everyone has their device and do they even care
where they are going?
In a world of plenty everything seems cheap and tawdry . Bring on the trade war , lets see people start to do without and then
realize the garbage they can't get isn't even important.
> One advantage of this tactic for Xi is that this time the numbers are on his side, as U.S. investment in China is far larger
than the reverse.
That's a really weird definition of the word "advantage". The factories and plants US companies built in China employ Chinese
workers and consist of infrastructure that exists in China. If China cracks down on those plants it's basically punching itself
in the face. Share prices for those US companies would fall, but as a working class American I honestly DGAF.
The American companies get far more revenue from their Chinese operations than their Chinese workers can get from their salaries.
So China's retaliation will disproportionately affect the revenue of these companies instead of the income of their Chinese workers.
As tempting as it is to attribute this to personality failings, I don't believe that Mr. Trump's China tantrum is geopolitical
one-upmanship. It is more likely a reaction to the annual Industrial Capabilities Report released on May 17 by the Pentagon's
Office of Manufacturing and Industrial Base Policy, in parallel to a similar review being conducted internally by the White House.
The Pentagon has concluded that two decades of financially-engineered corporate concentration and out-sourcing of skilled
work to China has stripped the U.S. Military-Industrial Complex of its "organic industrial base." It appears evident that the
White House has decided that tariff barriers on China are the only way to rebuild a population of of "qualified workers to meet
current demands as well as needing to integrate a younger workforce with the 'right skills, aptitude, experience, and interest
to step into the jobs vacated by senior-level engineers and skilled technicians' as they exit the workforce."
It's good to have an 'organic industrial base.' And Chins is well aware of the Japanese Judo, which advocates using someone's
energy to do the work for you. Here, workers in the US can take advantage of the energy of the MIC to achieve the goal of making
American manufacturing and employment great again.
Mr. Market is anxious. Anxious is well short of panicked.
When was "the market" not anxious? It appears to me that fear, anxiety, is paramount. They, the market participants, are anxious
where they are making money, they are anxious when not making money, they are anxious when they have money, and they are anxious
when they don't have money.
I find myself confused and in a quandary. Is it not neoliberalism and global trade that over the past 25 years or so has
led to corporate mega-wealth and the beginning of the end of the US middle class, and the further impoverishment of the working
class? If so, then as a good progressive, should I not welcome a trade war or whatever economic change will end this global economic
tyranny? Is the skepticism or outright opposition to a trade war of so many progressives simply based on the fact taht t's being
initiated by the colossal idiot in the White House who may inadvertently be doing something beneficial?
After dramatic neoliberal counterrevolutions in Brazil and Mexico, neoliberals might face a
defeat in Mexico
Notable quotes:
"... Business Insider ..."
"... Wall Street Journal, ..."
"... clase política. ..."
"... Dan La Botz' article in Jacobin succeeds masterfully in resolving relatively bland phrases like "coercive influence of the United States" that are part of left discourse into "a rational fear of murder by US-backed interests." ..."
"... Martin Luther King is said to have felt himself to be a "dead man walking" in the last months of his life; Amlo must feel much the same way. ..."
"... Mexico's predicament cannot be understood without the context of the war on drugs. I recommend a fun graphic novel: "Narcotráfico para inocentes: El narco en México y quien lo U.S.A." Mexico is in a similar situation as China during the Opium war or the US during prohibition. The book does an excellent job explaining how and why US interests created and foster the "war". ..."
"... The so-called 'pink tide' has been mostly, but certainly NOT completely, rolled back in the last few years. If AMLO's win is isolated, he probably won't change much. But, if this is the start of a new 'pink tide', then he might have more breathing space to get things done. ..."
"... I think Brazil is still the linchpin of the region. Prospects look quite dim there, but things can turn rather quickly. ..."
"... Neoliberalism somehow thought it could balance the budget and it would balance capitalism. So where do those ideologues go from here. It's a dead end. The only way to save the usefulness of capitalism at this point is to turn back to social spending. ..."
"... It avoids destructive over-banking and mirage profits by financialization because the money goes where it should go. But Obrador doesn't sound like he would dare suggest anything but austerity to rebalance spending priorities in Mexico. His priorities are fine, except he doesn't have a road map to get there. But interesting the political tide is turning. ..."
The US press has largely
ignored a potential sea change in our neighbor to the South. A self-styled radical, former
mayor of Mexico City, Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador, looks set to win Mexico's presidential
election on July 1. That possibility is giving heartburn to corporate interests in Mexico and
the US, as well the US officialdom.
His opponents depict him as a wild-eyed radical, but while Obrador, widely referred to as
Amlo, has called for agricultural self-sufficiency, infrastructure development, higher minimum
wages, improved public education. But he's also promised no new taxes, and as mayor of Mexico,
entered into a public-private partnership with billionaire Carlos Slim to redevelop the
downtown area.
Indeed, the website In
Defense of Marxism had to make quite a case for its readers to vote for Amlo. They depict
him as a type of Third Way figure:
AMLO does not propose a fundamental change of the system – replacing capitalism with
socialism – what he proposes is a return to a more humane form of capitalism . He does
not propose a programme of expropriations, nor the development of a large-scale nationalized
industry, as there was before neoliberalism. To the capitalists, he offers a country of
opportunity, without special privileges and without corruption.
For the poorest, he also offers a good list of proposals, particularly for the youth: he
is committed to providing education for all at all levels, universal healthcare – not
the so-called "seguro popular" ("people's insurance"), but healthcare systems like the IMSS
and the ISSSTE (the Mexican social security and the public employees' healthcare programmes)
that will be made available for everyone. He also speaks of scholarships for young people and
programmes where the state will employ millions of youths a year. He says he will raise
pensions for seniors and for single mothers and so on. All of this is a good start and we
support it.
He proposes that the funding for these reforms and a large-scale national infrastructure
plan will be drawn from eliminating corruption and cutting the high salaries of the
bureaucracy, as well as reducing the number of state workers, reducing unnecessary state
expenditure and so on. That is to say, he proposes that the interests of the big companies
and the banks are not to be touched, and that no more foreign loans are requested. We have
real doubts about the possibility that the money he saves with his proposed measures will
cover all his planned reforms.
"I will support banks. We won't confiscate assets. No expropriations, no nationalisations.
We'll have a country more focused on its main problem: the cancer of corruption. That's my
proposal, to end corruption," he said .
But he stuck to his guns on his main policy pledges, including austerity, an end to
fat-cat salaries, a president setting a moral example to fight graft, greater co-ordination
of security forces which Mr López Obrador said he would personally supervise with a
daily 6am security cabinet meeting .
He promised no rollback on structural reforms passed by the current government; a "very
few" reforms of his own around the middle of his term, including removing the ban on a
president being able to be tried for corruption. However he said there would be "no need to
increase taxes, no new taxes, no VAT on medicine and
food . . . no petrol price shocks". He also pledged to respect
the autonomy of the Bank of Mexico and to establish an "authentic rule of law".
So why are so many people in and outside Mexico in a tizzy about a probable Almo win?
Jacobin argues that if Amlo hasn't been convincing enough in his move to the right, he's likely
to assassinated. That's not a far-out idea, given Mexico's long-standing history of dirty
election, including past assassinations, which Jacobin recounts in gory detail.
I told him that many Mexicans wondered whether he had moderated his early radical beliefs.
"No," he said. "I've always thought the same way. But I act according to the circumstances.
We have proposed an orderly change, and our strategy seems to have worked. There is less fear
now. More middle-class people have come on board, not only the poor, and there are
businesspeople, too."
Even though Amlo has a strong left-wing economic agenda which makes him extremely popular in
the poor south, the election has come to be more and more about fighting corruption. Again from
the New Yorker:
With every major party implicated in corruption, López Obrador's supporters seem to
care less about the practicality of his ideas than about his promises to fix a broken
government. Emiliano Monge, a prominent novelist and essayist, said, "This election really
began to cease being political a few months ago and became emotional. It is more than
anything a referendum against corruption, in which, as much by right as by cleverness, amlo
has presented himself as the only alternative. And in reality he is."
"Implicated" is an understatement. "Knee deep" would be more accurate.
Even in his measured way, Amlo intends to turn Mexico away from neoliberalism, which is
enough to make heads explode. The US press either ignores or considerably downplays how poorly
Mexico has fared under its tender ministrations. Again from In
Defense of Marxism :
Mexico has been immersed in neoliberalism for 32 years and the results are overwhelming:
"Under Porfirio Diaz, 95 percent of the population was poor. In 1981 it had fallen to just
over 40 percent. Now it is actually 85 percent", said Dr. José Luis Calva
Téllez, a member of the Institute of Legal Research of the National Autonomous
University of Mexico (UNAM), in an interview with Contralínea. (Contralínea
2015)
In addition, the purchasing power of wages dropped by 71.5 percent. It is practically
impossible to live on the minimum wage
The driving priority was "macroeconomic management above everything else. More than 1,000
state-owned companies were privatized to stop state intervention in the economy. Foreign
trade was liberalized by drastically reducing all taxes or tariffs on foreign products; the
Mexican financial system was privatized." .
In the three neoliberal decades, GDP per capita has grown at a rate of 0.6 percent per
year; that is, an aggregate growth of 21 percent. That is not to mention the millions of
Mexicans who emigrated in search of jobs they do not find in our country. "Counting the
emigrants, the growth of GDP per inhabitant is scarcely 0.3 percent per year, or an aggregate
growth of 10 percent in 32 years." (José Luis Calva, Mexico Beyond Neoliberalism:
Options Within The Global Change)
Mexican immigration to the United States -- historically seen as a safety valve in a
country where about half the population lives in poverty -- has declined to the lowest level
in years. The unemployed and the underemployed are forced to stay home and can't live on
Mexican wages. With a population of 127 million, some 55 million live in poverty.
Violence remains a way of life and has not improved under the current administration.
There are over 200,000 dead in the drug wars since 2006 and another 32,000 disappeared.
Business
Insider wrote on April 23 :
The 104,583
homicide cases registered since [President Enrique Peña Nieto] took office in
December 2012 are more than the 102,859 officially recorded under his predecessor, Felipe
Calderon, who deployed
military personnel around the country to confront organized-crime and drug-related
violence.
The US is clearly not happy at the idea of an Amlo presidency. His instincts are
nationalistic but both the New Yorker and Michael Ard, a former deputy national intelligence
officer, see Amlo as willing to deal with America, just not on as one-sided terms as before.
As the New Yorker
notes :
In campaign events, López Obrador speaks often of mexicanismo -- a way of saying
"Mexico first." Observers of the region say that, when the two countries' interests compete,
he is likely to look inward. Mexico's armed forces and law enforcement have often had to be
persuaded to coöperate with the United States, and he will probably be less willing to
pressure them.
Much of the progress the United States has made with Mexico on security cooperation will
probably be jeopardized. It's hard to believe that AMLO will endorse the close relations that
the DEA, the Pentagon, and the intelligence community have forged with their Mexican
counterparts in the war on drugs. The extradition of the notorious drug kingpin Joaquin el
Chapo Guzman to the U.S. in 2017 will probably be the high watermark in the relationship. It
is doubtful that AMLO will permit more high-profile extraditions. President Trump's disdain
for a close relationship that has taken us decades to build may come back to haunt us.
But a poor relationship between Washington and Mexico City doesn't have to be inevitable.
Despite the rhetoric, the flamboyant American billionaire has much in common with the austere
Mexican populist. Both countries have too many common interests to go down separate paths.
The question is: does AMLO have to build the bomb to get Trump to care about Mexico?
But the US is already hostile. As Jacobin put it:
The business press is exceedingly gloomy about the future under a president who promises
to improve the lives of Mexico's working class. The New York Times
wrote on April 26 that:
In addition to threatening refinery profits in the United States, his proposals could slow
oil production in Texas and impede deepwater drilling in the Gulf of Mexico by international
oil giants like Exxon Mobil and Chevron. They would also jeopardize the United States'
energy trade
surplus with Mexico, which reached roughly $15 billion last year.
Mary Anastasia O'Grady, a columnist in the Wall Street Journal, writing on
López Obrador's "reinvention as a moderate," suggests
that her readers shouldn't believe it:
Morena's " declaration
of principles ," posted on its website, asserts that the liberalization of the economy is
part of a 'regime of oppression, corruption and privileges.' And that it is the work of "a
true Mafioso state built by a minority of concentrated political and economic power in
Mexico." If that's what Mr. López Obrador believes, fixing it would seem to require
more of a socialist revolution than he proposes.
She writes that, "Over the years he has earned a reputation as a populist demagogue who
uses the streets when democratic institutions block his path to power." And she warns her
readers against his "socialist party," Morena
.
The Council on Foreign Relations, the foreign relations think tank of the American ruling
class, writes:
Champions of civil society, transparency, and strong independent public institutions can
derive little comfort from some of [AMLO's]
recent pronouncements . On the stump, he offers a return to a time of business subsidies,
state ownership, and agricultural self-sufficiency. He repeatedly questions energy and
infrastructure contracts -- including those undergirding Mexico City's new
$13 billion airport -- and promises to roll back the educational shifts underway.
The reports in the business press and the warning from the Council on Foreign Relations
are intended to convince the American business class and the State Department that something
must be done to stop López Obrador.
The article concludes on a downbeat note:
I would be delighted if my speculations proved wrong and if AMLO could defend a
social-democratic program and avoid being pulled into the arms of the US State Department and
the Mexican clase política. But as they have for over a hundred years, the
prospects for democracy in Mexico look dim.
Mexico desperately needs and wants change and Amlo has long sought to be a catalyst. Let's
hope he can fulfill his ambitions.
Hopefully the third time is the charm for Obrador. He's contested the last two outcomes,
and I'm sure he had a case in at least one of them if not both.
An interesting historical 'what if', is what if AMLO had won in 2006 over Calderón?
Calderón unleashed the drug war that we know and see today, and was a faithful steward
of neoliberalism. México might be in a very different place today.
Dan La Botz' article in Jacobin succeeds masterfully in resolving relatively bland phrases
like "coercive influence of the United States" that are part of left discourse into "a
rational fear of murder by US-backed interests."
Martin Luther King is said to have felt
himself to be a "dead man walking" in the last months of his life; Amlo must feel much the
same way.
Mexico's predicament cannot be understood without the context of the war on drugs. I
recommend a fun graphic novel:
"Narcotráfico para inocentes: El narco en México y quien lo U.S.A." Mexico is in a similar situation as China during the Opium war or the US during
prohibition. The book does an excellent job explaining how and why US interests created and
foster the "war".
I suspect the outcome is going to be influenced, perhaps significantly, by how the
political context in the region unfolds in the next few years. The so-called 'pink tide' has
been mostly, but certainly NOT completely, rolled back in the last few years. If AMLO's win
is isolated, he probably won't change much. But, if this is the start of a new 'pink tide',
then he might have more breathing space to get things done.
I think Brazil is still the linchpin of the region. Prospects look quite dim there, but
things can turn rather quickly.
I've never understood why business interests fight so hard against the welfare of the
poor. If more poor people can get into the middle class, they then have more money to buy the
crap they sell. Would love to read the graphic novel that is mentioned, but there seems to be no English
edition of it.
Interesting politics in Mexico. But dangerous. Failed capitalism, or even failed
neoliberal freemarketism, is an existential threat to marxism. Neoliberalism somehow thought
it could balance the budget and it would balance capitalism. So where do those ideologues go
from here. It's a dead end. The only way to save the usefulness of capitalism at this point
is to turn back to social spending.
Varoufakis, yesterday, was logically fudging
neoliberalism – by going around the banking of surpluses and putting them directly into
EU-wide stimulation/projects. It is very MMT but he doesn't say so. It avoids destructive
over-banking and mirage profits by financialization because the money goes where it should
go. But Obrador doesn't sound like he would dare suggest anything but austerity to rebalance
spending priorities in Mexico. His priorities are fine, except he doesn't have a road map to
get there. But interesting the political tide is turning.
We destroy their indigenous agriculture by dumping cheap corn, then complain bitterly
about all the 'illegals' who seem perfectly willing to harvest our dinners since we won't do
the work. Then we try to make 'Agricultural Self-Sufficiency' sound like a bad thing.
Godd luck Senor Obrador, you're just what we need.
Decimation of anti-war forces and flourishing of Russophobia are two immanent features of the US neoliberalism. As long as
the maintinace fo the US global neoliberal empire depends of weakening and, possibly, dismembering Russia it is naive to expect any
change. Russian version of soft "national neoliberalism" is not that different, in principle form Trump version of hard
"netional neoliberalism" so those leaders might have something to talk about. In other words as soon as the USA denounce
neoliberal globalization that might be some openings.
Ten ways the new US-Russian Cold War is increasingly becoming more dangerous than the one we survived.
The political epicenter of the new Cold War is not in far-away Berlin, as it was from the late 1940s on, but directly on
Russia's borders, from the Baltic states and Ukraine to the former Soviet republic of Georgia. Each of these new Cold War fronts
is, or has recently been, fraught with the possibly of hot war. US-Russian military relations are especially tense today in the Baltic
region, where a large-scale NATO buildup is under way, and in Ukraine, where a US-Russian proxy war is intensifying. The "Soviet
Bloc" that once served as a buffer between NATO and Russia no longer exists. And many imaginable incidents on the West's new Eastern
Front, intentional or unintentional, could easily trigger actual war between the United States and Russia. What brought about this
unprecedented situation on Russia's borders -- at least since the Nazi German invasion in 1941 -- was, of course, the exceedingly
unwise decision, in the late 1990s, to expand NATO eastward. Done in the name of "security," it has made all the states involved
only more insecure.
Proxy wars were a feature of the old Cold War, but usually small ones in what was called the "Third World" -- in Africa,
for example -- and they rarely involved many, if any, Soviet or American personnel, mostly only money and weapons. Today's US-Russian
proxy wars are different, located in the center of geopolitics and accompanied by too many American and Russian trainers, minders,
and possibly fighters. Two have already erupted: in Georgia in 2008, where Russian forces fought a Georgian army financed, trained,
and minded by American funds and personnel; and in Syria, where in February
scores
of Russians were killed by US-backed anti-Assad forces . Moscow did not retaliate, but it has pledged to do so if there is "a
next time," as there very well may be. If so, this would in effect be war directly between Russia and America. Meanwhile, the risk
of such a direct conflict continues to grow in Ukraine, where the country's US-backed but politically failing President Petro Poroshenko
seems increasingly tempted to launch another all-out military assault on rebel-controlled Donbass, backed by Moscow. If he does so,
and the assault does not quickly fail as previous ones have, Russia will certainly intervene in eastern Ukraine with a truly tangible
"invasion." Washington will then have to make a fateful war-or-peace decision. Having already reneged on its commitments to the Minsk
Accords, which are the best hope for ending the four-year Ukrainian crisis peacefully, Kiev seems to have an unrelenting impulse
to be a tail wagging the dog of war. Certainly, its capacity for provocations and disinformation are second to none, as evidenced
again last week by the faked "assassination and resurrection" of the journalist Arkady Babchenko.
The Western, but especially American, years-long demonization of the Kremlin leader, Putin, is also unprecedented. Too
obvious to reiterate here, no Soviet leader, at least since Stalin, was ever subjected to such prolonged, baseless, crudely derogatory
personal vilification. Whereas Soviet leaders were generally regarded as acceptable negotiating partners for American presidents,
including at major summits, Putin has been made to seem to be an illegitimate national leader -- at best "a KGB thug," at worst a
murderous "mafia boss."
Still more, demonizing Putin has generated a
widespread Russophobic vilification
of Russia itself , or what The New York Times and other mainstream-media outlets have taken to calling "
Vladimir Putin's Russia ." Yesterday's enemy was Soviet Communism. Today it is increasingly Russia, thereby also delegitimizing
Russia as a great power with legitimate national interests. "The Parity Principle," as Cohen termed it during the preceding Cold
War -- the principle that both sides had legitimate interests at home and abroad, which was the basis for diplomacy and negotiations,
and symbolized by leadership summits -- no longer exists, at least on the American side. Nor does the acknowledgment that both sides
were to blame, at least to some extent, for that Cold War. Among influential American observers
who at least
recognize the reality of the new Cold War , "Putin's Russia" alone is to blame. When there is no recognized parity and shared
responsibility, there is little space for diplomacy -- only for increasingly militarized relations, as we are witnessing today.
Meanwhile, most of the Cold War safeguards -- cooperative mechanisms and mutually observed rules of conduct that evolved
over decades in order to prevent superpower hot war -- have been vaporized or badly frayed since the Ukrainian crisis in 2014,
as the
UN General Secretary António Guterres, almost alone, has recognized : "The Cold War is back -- with a vengeance but with a difference.
The mechanisms and the safeguards to manage the risks of escalation that existed in the past no longer seem to be present." Trump's
recent missile strike on Syria carefully avoided killing any Russians there, but here too Moscow has vowed to retaliate against US
launchers or other forces involved if there is a "next time," as, again, there may be. Even the decades-long process of arms control
may, we are told by an
expert , be coming to an "end." If so, it will mean an unfettered new nuclear-arms race but also the termination of an ongoing
diplomatic process that buffered US-Soviet relations during very bad political times. In short, if there are any new Cold War rules
of conduct, they are yet to be formulated and mutually accepted. Nor does this semi-anarchy take into account the new warfare technology
of cyber-attacks. What are its implications for the secure functioning of existential Russian and American nuclear command-and-control
and early-warning systems that guard against an accidental launching of missiles still on high alert?
Russiagate allegations that the American president has been compromised by -- or is even an agent of -- the Kremlin are
also without precedent. These allegations have had profoundly dangerous consequences, among them the nonsensical but mantra-like
warfare declaration that "Russia attacked America" during the 2016 presidential election; crippling assaults on President Trump every
time he speaks with Putin in person or by phone; and making both Trump and Putin so toxic that even most politicians, journalists,
and professors who understand the present-day dangers are reluctant to speak out against US contributions to the new Cold War.
Mainstream-media outlets have, of course, played a woeful role in all of this. Unlike in the past, when pro-détente
advocates had roughly equal access to mainstream media, today's new Cold War media enforce their orthodox narrative that Russia is
solely to blame. They practice not diversity of opinion and reporting but "confirmation bias." Alternative voices (with, yes, alternative
or opposing facts) rarely appear any longer in the most influential mainstream newspapers or on television or radio broadcasts. One
alarming result is that "disinformation" generated by or pleasing to Washington and its allies has consequences before it can be
corrected. The fake Babchenko assassination (allegedly ordered by Putin, of course) was quickly exposed, but not the alleged Skripal
assassination attempt in the UK, which led to the largest US expulsion of Russian diplomats in history before London's official version
of the story began to fall apart. This too is unprecedented: Cold War without debate, which in turn precludes the frequent rethinking
and revising of US policy that characterized the preceding 40-year Cold War -- in effect, an enforced dogmatization of US policy
that is both exceedingly dangerous and undemocratic.
Equally unsurprising, and also very much unlike during the 40-year Cold War, there is virtually no significant opposition
in the American mainstream to the US role in the new Cold War -- not in the media, not in Congress, not in the two major political
parties, not in the universities, not at grassroots levels. This too is unprecedented, dangerous, and contrary to real democracy.
Consider only the thunderous silence of scores of large US corporations that have been doing profitable business in post-Soviet Russia
for years, from fast-food chains and automobile manufacturers to pharmaceutical and energy giants. And contrast their behavior to
that of CEOs of PepsiCo, Control Data, IBM, and other major American corporations seeking entry to the Soviet market in the 1970s
and 1980s, when they publicly supported and even funded pro-détente organizations and politicians. How to explain the silence of
their counterparts today, who are usually so profit-motivated? Are they too fearful of being labeled "pro-Putin" or possibly "pro-Trump"?
If so, will this Cold War continue to unfold with only very rare profiles of courage in any high places? 9. And then there is the
widespread escalatory myth that today's Russia, unlike the Soviet Union, is too weak -- its economy too small and fragile, its leader
too "isolated in international affairs" -- to wage a sustained Cold War, and that eventually Putin, who is "punching above his weight,"
as the cliché has it, will capitulate. This too is a dangerous delusion.
As Cohen has shown previously ,
"Putin's Russia" is hardly isolated in world affairs, and is becoming even less so, even in Europe, where at least five governments
are tilting away from Washington and Brussels and perhaps from their economic sanctions on Russia. Indeed, despite the sanctions,
Russia's energy industry and agricultural exports are flourishing. Geopolitically, Moscow has many military and related advantages
in regions where the new Cold War has unfolded. And no state with Russia's modern nuclear and other weapons is "punching above its
weight." Above all, the great majority of Russian people have rallied behind Putin because t
hey believe
their country is under attack by the US-led West . Anyone with a rudimentary knowledge of Russia's history understands it is
highly unlikely to capitulate under any circumstances.
Finally (at least as of now), there is the growing war-like "hysteria" often commented on in both Washington and Moscow. It
is driven by various factors, but television talk/"news" broadcasts, which are as common in Russia as in the United States, play
a major role. Perhaps only an extensive quantitative study could discern which plays a more lamentable role in promoting this frenzy
-- MSNBC and CNN or their Russian counterparts. For Cohen, the Russian dark witticism seems apt: "Both are worst" ( Oba khuzhe
). Again, some of this American broadcast extremism existed during the preceding Cold War, but almost always balanced, even
offset, by truly informed, wiser opinions, which are now largely excluded.
Is this analysis of the dangers inherent in the new Cold War itself extremist or alarmist? Even SOME usually reticent specialists
would seem to agree with Cohen's general assessment. Experts gathered by a centrist Washington think tank
thought that on a scale of 1 to 10,
there is a 5 to 7 chance of actual war with Russia. A former head of British M16 is
reported as saying
that "for the first time in living memory, there's a realistic chance of a superpower conflict." And a respected retired Russian
general tells
the same think tank that any military confrontation "will end up with the use of nuclear weapons between the United States and
Russia."
In today's dire circumstances, one Trump-Putin summit cannot eliminate the new Cold War dangers. But US-Soviet summits traditionally
served three corollary purposes. They created a kind of security partnership -- not a conspiracy -- that involved each leader's limited
political capital at home, which the other should recognize and not heedlessly jeopardize. They sent a clear message to the two leaders'
respective national-security bureaucracies, which often did not favor détente-like cooperation, that the "boss" was determined and
that they must end their foot-dragging, even sabotage. And summits, with their exalted rituals and intense coverage, usually improved
the media-political environment needed to enhance cooperation amid Cold War conflicts. If a Trump-Putin summit achieves even some
of those purposes, it might result in a turning away from the precipice that now looms
"... It is not "misunderstood" -- it is a complete caricature which now blows into the faces of those who helped to create it. Western Russia "expertise" is pathetic and some exceptions merely confirm the rule. Generally, the term "Russia scholar" when applied to most, in our particular case American, experts should be treated as a bad joke. This is not to mention that most of those "scholars" (with the exception of predominantly Jewish Soviet emigres, such as moron Max Boot) can not even speak, forget a complete command, Russian language. ..."
"... Quite a few grant-eating "liberals" inside Russia speak the language, but this does not make them any more competent. Basically, they illustrate the saying that "he, who pays the musicians, calls the tune". The same applies to "Russia scholars" residing in the US, regardless of their language proficiency. ..."
The point is that Putin realizes that the Orthodox faith is the cultural framework of the
Russian nation; its development historically, socially and culturally rest in the hands
Orthodox Christianity.
No, it's not. No one can enter the same river twice. Russia will thankfully never
go back to its Orthodox roots completely, although Orthodoxy will co-exist peacefully within
the secular society. Putin's public insistence on rituals of the Orthodox faith is one of his
least attractive features.
Thankfully that chapter of history is over
It's not over until it's over. This sentence of yours simply shows how
misunderstood the Soviet period of the Russian history is in the West.
The Soviet Union has been gone for more than a quarter of a century and yet it is - to
borrow a phrase from a popular Soviet song - is more alive than the living. The Soviet period
has become a sort of a yardstick against which the modern Russia is compared in every area:
culture, economy, moral climate, everything.
It is a universal agreement that in many areas Russia doesn't measure up to the Soviet
standards - culture and education are the prime examples. Hardly anyone in Russia would
disagree that in 25 years Russia hasn't produced anything even remotely comparable with the
Soviet achievements in this spheres. Until it does - the Soviet Union will live one.
It's not over until it's over. This sentence of yours simply shows how misunderstood the
Soviet period of the Russian history is in the West.
It is not "misunderstood" -- it is a complete caricature which now blows into the
faces of those who helped to create it. Western Russia "expertise" is pathetic and some
exceptions merely confirm the rule. Generally, the term "Russia scholar" when applied to
most, in our particular case American, experts should be treated as a bad joke. This is not
to mention that most of those "scholars" (with the exception of predominantly Jewish Soviet
emigres, such as moron Max Boot) can not even speak, forget a complete command, Russian
language.
Quite a few grant-eating "liberals" inside Russia speak the language, but this does not
make them any more competent. Basically, they illustrate the saying that "he, who pays the
musicians, calls the tune". The same applies to "Russia scholars" residing in the US,
regardless of their language proficiency.
Quite a few grant-eating "liberals" inside Russia speak the language, but this does not
make them any more competent. Basically, they illustrate the saying that "he, who pays the
musicians, calls the tune". The same applies to "Russia scholars" residing in the US,
regardless of their language proficiency.
Here, I have to politely disagree since Russian "liberals" both grant-supported and ones
that are not is a separate animal altogether. First, most of them, grants or no grants, are
the real deal, they got grants because they are the real deal, not the other way around, and
causality in this case really matters.
I don't need even to know if Mr. Nekrasov or Gozman
are grant-eaters, their hatred of everything Russian is palpable. The only weaker feeling
than hatred they have is contempt. This cannot be hidden–it shines through. They do it
for the idea and grants are just a bonus. It all goes back to Russian "Westerners" and
liberals about whom Tyutchev (IIRC) left a profound paragraph.
Russia still is a neoliberal country. What do you expect ?
It is interesting that Russia which oppose neoliberal globalization in foreign policy, implements neoliberal reforms within
the country. The current pensoin reform is clienly neoliberal in spirit, even if it does not include privatization. there is
a big different between those who work at factories and those who work at offices.
Notable quotes:
"... I don't share your and some other commenters' fixation on Jews. I believe it's a red herring. Elites, Jewish and gentile, are equally repulsive and guilty of most ills that afflict our world. Despite its many failings, one of the redeeming qualities of communism was that it called for confiscation of the possessions of moneyed elites. In reality, they were mostly hanged or shot. Considering what they are doing to the US and other countries, this was amply justified. ..."
"... Basically there were real issues behind those color revolutions in Ukraine and elsewhere but without progressive force caring about people there were ulterior forces that led those eruption of real grievances and these grievances are caused by the system of capitalism you have just described. Yours and other former Soviet citizens excellent education is another testament to communism regime. ..."
"... Regarding new found religious feelings. it is obviously all fake. ..."
"... I can't say that today's Russia is all bad or all good. I think open borders is a huge achievement. People have a chance to see the reality with their own eyes: wherever you go in Europe or Asia now, you meet lots of people from Russia, which means that they have the money to travel and an interest in other cultures, as you meet them in museums and at historical sites all over Europe. ..."
"... I do resent what current authorities did to the education system: they degraded it, ostensibly in an attempt to reform and make it more Western-like. I think these "reforms" were extremely ill-conceived, the school is becoming much worse (in fact, American-like, although it must be degraded a lot more to sink all the way down to the US level). ..."
"... I resent than instead of improving Russian Academy of Sciences (it was pretty bad in the USSR) they essentially emasculated it. If you go by publications, there is less decent research in Russia now than there was in the USSR. ..."
"... Huge inequality is another negative, especially considering that most oligarchs got rich by looting state property, and now continue to enrich themselves the same way (heads of most Russian corporations, state-owned and private, are nothing but thieves). That made Russia more US-like, but I consider that regress rather than progress. ..."
"... On the other hand, I consider it a huge achievement that in international affairs Russia today is pursuing its own interests, rather than engaging in a thankless task of saving the world. I subscribe to the Protestant dictum that "God helps those who help themselves", so whoever is worth saving will save themselves, and the rest be damned. ..."
Maybe it is presumptuous to express my opinion about another person's faith, but let me
remind you that Putin was a KGB officer and a member of the communist party. As such, he was
(or pretended to be) a militant atheist. Now he publicly goes to church and remains there
throughout the service (mind you, Russian Orthodox Christmas and Easter services are
all-night affairs). Thus, he either lied then or is lying now about his faith. Take your
pick.
Yes, Orthodox Christianity was one of the pillars of Russian culture. But again, let me
remind you that one of the greatest Russian writers, Leo Tolstoy, was excommunicated by the
church. What's more, current patriarch Kirill, the head of the Russian Orthodox church, was
photographed with a watch worth hundreds of thousands of dollars, owns an apartment in the
center of Moscow, likely worth millions of $, and a collection or rare books in this
apartment with a huge value. If you are a Christian, you should know that "it is easier for a
camel to go through the eye of a needle, than for a rich man to enter into the kingdom of
God" (Matthew 19:24; also Mark 10:25).
I don't share your and some other commenters' fixation on Jews. I believe it's a red
herring. Elites, Jewish and gentile, are equally repulsive and guilty of most ills that
afflict our world. Despite its many failings, one of the redeeming qualities of communism was
that it called for confiscation of the possessions of moneyed elites. In reality, they were
mostly hanged or shot. Considering what they are doing to the US and other countries, this
was amply justified.
I frankly do not think that communism requires redemption. It was first attempt at moving
humanity towards next step in social evolution and it did not happen under the best
conditions. It happened in the country ridden with accumulated problems from previous regime
mishandling the country for a couple of centuries with those issues coming to a head and
after so much pressure it resulted in massive eruption of violence which would have been even
worse without Bolsheviks as it would lead to Russia disintegration and Russian state death.,
There would have happened something similar to modern Ukraine.
Basically there were real
issues behind those color revolutions in Ukraine and elsewhere but without progressive force
caring about people there were ulterior forces that led those eruption of real grievances and
these grievances are caused by the system of capitalism you have just described. Yours and
other former Soviet citizens excellent education is another testament to communism
regime.
Current Russian regime got bad roots and I do not believe anything good will come out of
these bad roots. The system is freakish and rotten at the core. It care s not for people.
Current increase of retirement age is another testament to this. Bolsheviks when they started
made their intentions rather obvious in destroyed and poor country. They assured real human
rights while current system removed those rights and there is no guarantees that we as a
soviet citizen used to enjoy. Obviously things were not perfect. They never are.
Regarding new found religious feelings. it is obviously all fake.
I also wonder what do you think of spontaneous life appearance? I read some books on this
issue including Dawkins' and Behe, but considering your experience and professional
background it would be very interesting to hear your thoughts.
I can't say that today's Russia is all bad or all good. I think open borders is a huge
achievement. People have a chance to see the reality with their own eyes: wherever you go in
Europe or Asia now, you meet lots of people from Russia, which means that they have the money
to travel and an interest in other cultures, as you meet them in museums and at historical
sites all over Europe.
I do resent what current authorities did to the education system: they
degraded it, ostensibly in an attempt to reform and make it more Western-like. I think these
"reforms" were extremely ill-conceived, the school is becoming much worse (in fact,
American-like, although it must be degraded a lot more to sink all the way down to the US
level).
I resent than instead of improving Russian Academy of Sciences (it was pretty bad in
the USSR) they essentially emasculated it. If you go by publications, there is less decent
research in Russia now than there was in the USSR.
Huge inequality is another negative,
especially considering that most oligarchs got rich by looting state property, and now
continue to enrich themselves the same way (heads of most Russian corporations, state-owned
and private, are nothing but thieves). That made Russia more US-like, but I consider that
regress rather than progress.
On the other hand, I consider it a huge achievement that in
international affairs Russia today is pursuing its own interests, rather than engaging in a
thankless task of saving the world. I subscribe to the Protestant dictum that "God helps
those who help themselves", so whoever is worth saving will save themselves, and the rest be
damned.
"... The United States, the EU and Canada are preparing tariffs impacting untold billions of dollars in goods and threatening tens of millions of jobs worldwide. As the remarks of Trudeau and Trump show, US tariff threats are setting into motion an escalatory spiral of tariffs and counter-tariffs with potentially devastating consequences. ..."
"... The collapse of the G7 talks cannot be explained by the personal peculiarities of Donald Trump. Rather, this historical milestone is an expression of US imperialism's desperate attempts to resolve insoluble contradictions of world capitalism. Not only Trump, but prominent Democrats and large sections of the European media and ruling elite are all recklessly calling for trade war measures against their rivals. ..."
"... Analyzing US imperialist policy in 1928, the year before the eruption of the Great Depression, Leon Trotsky warned: "In the period of crisis, the hegemony of the United States will operate more completely, more openly, and more ruthlessly than in the period of boom. The United States will seek to overcome and extricate herself from her difficulties and maladies primarily at the expense of Europe, regardless of whether this occurs in Asia, Canada, South America, Australia or Europe itself, whether this takes place peacefully or through war." ..."
"... After the Stalinist bureaucracy dissolved the Soviet Union in 1991, lifting the main obstacle to US-led neo-colonial wars, Washington tried to counterbalance its economic weakness by resort to its vast military superiority. ..."
"... Over decades of bloody neo-colonial wars that killed millions in Iraq, Afghanistan, Syria and beyond, the United States has sought to establish a powerful military position in the oil-rich Middle East. These wars placed its forces athwart key trade and energy supply routes of its main economic rivals. ..."
"... Amid growing tensions with the US, all of the European powers are rapidly rearming. ..."
The summit issued a final communiqué papering over the conflicts, as is usual in G7
summits, condemning protectionism but making a few criticisms of the World Trade Organization
in line with US complaints. The US was expected to sign, but Trump, after listening to Canadian
Prime Minister Justin Trudeau's post summit press conference while en route to Singapore for a
summit with North Korean President Kim Jong-un, fired off a volley of tweets that signaled a
comprehensive breakdown of the G7 talks.
After Trudeau said that the communiqué criticized protectionism and that Canada would
maintain its $16 billion retaliatory tariffs on US goods, the biggest Canadian tariffs since
World War II, Trump hurled invective at Trudeau, warning that he "will not allow other
countries" to impose tariffs. He accused what are nominally the closest US allies of having
targeted the US for "Trade Abuse for many decades -- and that is long enough."
In another tweet, the US president threatened a major escalation of trade war measures with
tariffs on auto imports and announced the breakdown of talks: "Based on Justin's false
statements at his news conference and the fact that Canada is charging massive Tariffs to our
US farmers, workers and companies, I have instructed our US Reps not to endorse the
Communiqué as we look at Tariffs on automobiles flooding the US market!"
This is the first time since G7 summits began in 1975 -- originally as the G5 with the
United States, Japan, Germany, Britain and France -- that all the heads of state could not
agree on a communiqué.
What is unfolding is a historic collapse of diplomatic and economic relations between the
major imperialist powers. For the three quarters of a century since World War II, a broad
consensus existed internationally in the ruling class that the trade wars of the 1930s Great
Depression played a major role in triggering that war, and that trade wars should be avoided at
all costs. This consensus has now broken down.
Explosive conflict and uncertainty dominate the world economy. The United States, the EU
and Canada are preparing tariffs impacting untold billions of dollars in goods and threatening
tens of millions of jobs worldwide. As the remarks of Trudeau and Trump show, US tariff threats
are setting into motion an escalatory spiral of tariffs and counter-tariffs with potentially
devastating consequences.
The collapse of the G7 talks cannot be explained by the personal peculiarities of Donald
Trump. Rather, this historical milestone is an expression of US imperialism's desperate
attempts to resolve insoluble contradictions of world capitalism. Not only Trump, but prominent
Democrats and large sections of the European media and ruling elite are all recklessly calling
for trade war measures against their rivals.
Analyzing US imperialist policy in 1928, the year before the eruption of the Great
Depression, Leon Trotsky warned: "In the period of crisis, the hegemony of the United States
will operate more completely, more openly, and more ruthlessly than in the period of boom. The
United States will seek to overcome and extricate herself from her difficulties and maladies
primarily at the expense of Europe, regardless of whether this occurs in Asia, Canada, South
America, Australia or Europe itself, whether this takes place peacefully or through
war."
The G7 summits were launched to manage conflicts between the major powers as the industrial
and economic dominance established by US imperialism in World War II rapidly eroded, and after
Washington ended dollar-gold convertibility in 1971. Still unable to catch up to its European
and international competitors, the United States has for decades posted ever-larger trade
deficits with rivals in Europe and Asia.
After the Stalinist bureaucracy dissolved the Soviet Union in 1991, lifting the main
obstacle to US-led neo-colonial wars, Washington tried to counterbalance its economic weakness
by resort to its vast military superiority.
Over decades of bloody neo-colonial wars that killed millions in Iraq, Afghanistan,
Syria and beyond, the United States has sought to establish a powerful military position in the
oil-rich Middle East. These wars placed its forces athwart key trade and energy supply routes
of its main economic rivals.
Trump's election and his denunciations of "trade abuse" of the United States by Europe,
Japan and Canada marks a new stage in the crisis of world capitalism. Bitter US-EU divisions
are growing not only over trade, but over EU opposition to the US policy of threatening Iran
with war by ending the Iranian nuclear deal. After decades of economic crisis and neo-colonial
war, the danger is rapidly emerging of a 1930s-style disintegration of the world economy into
rival trading blocs and, as in that decade, the eruption of military conflict between them.
... ... ...
The European powers have responded to Trump with stepped-up threats of retaliatory measures.
Following the summit, German Foreign Minister Heiko Maas called on the European powers to
respond "together" in order to defend their "interests even more offensively."
Historically, trade war has been a precursor to military conflict. Prior to the summit,
French President Emmanuel Macron responded angrily to Trump's threatened sanctions, declaring,
"This decision is not only unlawful but it is a mistake in many respects. Economic nationalism
leads to war. This is exactly what happened in the 1930s."
Amid growing tensions with the US, all of the European powers are rapidly rearming.
Just one week before the G7 summit, German Chancellor Angela Merkel signalled her support for
Macron's proposal to create a joint European defence force, open to British participation and
independent of NATO.
The term "national neoliberalism" should probably be adopted as the most succinct term for Trump economic policy
Notable quotes:
"... To paraphrase Ralph Nader, the U.S. corporate state is a two-headed beast. Sure, President Trump and the Republican Party are currently handing over public lands to oil and gas companies, eliminating net neutrality, introducing pro-corporate tax legislation, kowtowing to the military industrial complex, defunding the welfare state, and attempting to privatize education and deregulate finance. ..."
"... But let's not forget our recent Democratic presidents, for example, who are also guilty of empowering and enriching big business and disempowering and impoverishing ordinary Americans. ..."
"... In war the moral is to the material as 3 is to one, said Bonaparte. The neoliberal world order according the Bretton Woods and Washington cannot raise and apply enough material [bombings, drones, aircraft carrier intimidation THAAD in Korea are the ante] without destroying itself and in its throes the world. ..."
"... The U.S. trade deficit in goods, without services, was $810 billion. The United States exported $1.551 trillion in goods. It imported $2.361 trillion. The USA imports more than they export to: China, Japan, Canada, Germany and Mexico. USA top 5 Trade deficits: China $375 billion, Mexico $71, Japan $69, Germany $65, and Canada 18 billion. ..."
Trump behavior at Canadian G7 meeting was boorish, but it is logical and is consistent which his previous stance on globalization:
he rejects neoliberal globalization.
Sasha Breger Bush proposed the term "national neoliberalism" to depict the transition from "classic neoliberalism" which has
been started with the election of Trump.
I think the term really catches the essence of the election of Trump. and should probably be adopted as a succinct description
of Trump economic policy.
The nationalism, xenophobia, isolationism, and paranoia of Donald Trump are about to replace the significantly more cosmopolitan
outlook of his post-WWII predecessors. While Trump is decidedly pro-business and pro-market, he most certainly does not see
himself as a global citizen.
Nor does he intend to maintain the United States' extensive global footprint or its relatively open trading network. In
other words, while neoliberalism is not dead, it is being transformed into a geographically more fragmented and localized system
(this is not only about the US election, but also about rising levels of global protectionism and Brexit, among other anti-globalization
trends around the world).
I expect that the geographic extent of the US economy in the coming years will coincide with the new landscape of U.S. allies
and enemies, as defined by Donald Trump and his administration.
But if we take seriously the idea that Trump is a consequence of the disintegration of American democracy rather than the
cause of it, this "blame game" becomes especially problematic.
Partisan bickering, with one party constantly pointing to the other as responsible for the country's ills, covers up the
fact that Democrats and Republicans alike have presided over the consolidation of corporate power in the United States.
To paraphrase Ralph Nader, the U.S. corporate state is a two-headed beast. Sure, President Trump and the Republican
Party are currently handing over public lands to oil and gas companies, eliminating net neutrality, introducing pro-corporate
tax legislation, kowtowing to the military industrial complex, defunding the welfare state, and attempting to privatize education
and deregulate finance.
But let's not forget our recent Democratic presidents, for example, who are also guilty of empowering and enriching
big business and disempowering and impoverishing ordinary Americans.
JackD, June 10, 2018 9:58 am
@Likbez: "Sure, President Trump, etc" is your important sentence. It is the immediate need. First things, first.
ilsm, June 10, 2018 3:12 pm
In war the moral is to the material as 3 is to one, said Bonaparte. The neoliberal world order according the Bretton Woods
and Washington cannot raise and apply enough material [bombings, drones, aircraft carrier intimidation THAAD in Korea are the
ante] without destroying itself and in its throes the world.
Trump is not tearing apart NATO anyone not earning money is a PNAC think tanks knows NATO has become an aggression against
Russia with similar intent as Hitler.
Grabbing Sevastopol and aiding Russians in territory occupied by Kyiv are [bold] defensive moves. The threat of Chinese islands
in the South China Sea is the US Navy super carriers intimidations has no career raiding Hainan.
rps, June 10, 2018 7:42 pm
I was curious if Yglesias is a Canadian since his editorial sided with the G7 leaders stance against Trump's fair-trade often
labelled as 'protectionism' of USA industries. He's a New Yorker as I pondered what's his stake in this political tirade against
Trump's pro-America versus anti-globalist policies?
It appears that the media has glided over the fact Trump had suggested to the other G7 leaders that all trade barriers, including
tariffs and subsidies, be eliminated, ""You go tariff-free, you go barrier-free, you go subsidy free." Protectionist Canadian
PM Trudeau howled at a press conference after Trump had left on his way to Singapore. Why? Is it because Trudeau is committed
to the welfare of Canadians and their industries? How dare the president of the USA- in turn, advocate for citizenry and country
as does his G7 counterparts for their countries.
The U.S. trade deficit in goods, without services, was $810 billion. The United States exported $1.551 trillion in goods.
It imported $2.361 trillion. The USA imports more than they export to: China, Japan, Canada, Germany and Mexico. USA top 5 Trade
deficits: China $375 billion, Mexico $71, Japan $69, Germany $65, and Canada 18 billion.
US citizens and their jobs were swindled with cheaper foreign goods flooding American businesses and stores as good manufacturing
jobs headed overseas. Jobs that created the middle class and all their earned benefits and standard of living decreased/disappeared
quickly with NAFTA and the WTO.
Concisely, trade deficits destroyed the middle class, the working class, blue collar, and in turn, increased poverty and homelessness.
Destroyed small town anywhere in the USA with manufacturing and jobs fleeing overseas in search of cheap labor. Go travel across
the USA and see the boarded up towns, walk the streets of Flint Michigan, Detroit, Martinsville Virginia, Gary Indiana, Freeport
Il, etc. Throw a dart at a USA map and you'll hit a town devastated by 'free' to lose your job trade. In 2014, 2.3 million job
losses due to trade with China. Job losses in the millions have been slowly replaced with 'service' jobs and/or $8.00 an hour
part-time no benefits workers as the new norm.
Remember when Walmart's original slogan was "Buy American"? Sam Walton before he died, was big on "Buy American," and it appeared
in signs in the stores and on TV ads. His heirs quickly changed it to "Buy Chinese" destroying the american dream and small town
USA.
Yet Yglesias' preference is all for the unbalanced trade with our G7 frenemies and punishing a president who chooses fair trade
practices to ensure US jobs for American citizens. Makes me wonder who or what Yglesias truly advocates for, the NWO or the country
of origin on his passport?
"What we must do is this: revise our tariff on the basis of a reciprocal exchange of goods, allowing other Nations to buy and
to pay for our goods by sending us such of their goods as will not seriously throw any of our industries out of balance Such objectives
as these three, restoring farmers' buying power, relief to the small banks and home-owners and a reconstructed tariff policy,
are only a part of ten or a dozen vital factors. But they seem to be beyond the concern of a national administration which can
think in terms only of the top of the social and economic structure. It has sought temporary relief from the top down rather than
permanent relief from the bottom up. It has totally failed to plan ahead in a comprehensive way. It has waited until something
has cracked and then at the last moment has sought to prevent total collapse.
It is high time to get back to fundamentals. It is high time to admit with courage that we are in the midst of an emergency
at least equal to that of war. Let us mobilize to meet it." "The Forgotten Man" speech, 1937. Franklin Delano Roosevelt
Since Clinton signed NAFTA in 1994 and the WTO, American jobs and industry left our shores seeking the lowest common denominator-
cheap slave labor. To paraphrase FDR into the late 20th and early 21st century, "Clinton and his successors concern of their national
administrations thought in terms only of the top of the social and economic structure. It has sought temporary relief from the
top down rather than permanent relief from the bottom up.It has totally failed to plan ahead in a comprehensive way."
Bruce Webb, June 10, 2018 9:16 pm
Nothing personally Rps, but you do not get Triffin Dilemma and global reserve currency. Please no more NAFTA obsession when
no jobs left with that deal and exports excelerated. The global reserve currency and booming financial markets create a surplus
in services over goods. It also creates the need for a goods deficit to stabilize the financial system. You cannot wave a wand
and cure something that cannot be cured. You need a major depression to rebalance and drive capital from america.
Bruce Webb, June 10, 2018 9:19 pm
Likbez, Neoliberalism IS American. Trump is pro-East Asia
"... Gordon Duff is a Marine combat veteran of the Vietnam War that has worked on veterans and POW issues for decades and consulted with governments challenged by security issues. He's a senior editor and chairman of the board of Veterans Today , especially for the online magazine " New Eastern Outlook ." ..."
The Trump phenomenon, to paraphrase Lincoln, who may not have said this at all, "you can fool
some of the people all of the time," deeply parallels the elections of 1824 and 1828. This is when
consummate "outsider," a tough-as-nails backwoods "westerner" and war hero, Andrew Jackson, spouting
conspiracy theories about corruption and "elites" rose to the presidency.
Trump advisor Steve Bannon actually studied Jackson and his rise to prominence, followed by a checkered
presidency of broken treaties and violent retribution against his personal enemies.
Both Trump and Jackson brought first ladies to the White House with "deeply singed" reputations.
This is where the comparison ends. Jackson typically settled his personal grudges with a pistol or sword,
not his mouth or lawyers. He warred on the Rothschilds' agents and their national bank set up by Federalist
Alexander Hamilton.
Above all, Jackson was the "real deal," opposing elites who were then as they are today, utterly corrupt.
Trump is certainly not the "real deal," not with a cabinet of the "worst of the worst" of corrupt elites and
policies and appointments intended to stifle democratic institutions.
The Central Banks
The
Fed
Trump's court appointments
, rushed through congress, most
unvetted and unqualified, dark histories of personal bias and corruption, many young enough to serve for
decades, are intended to protect and serve the corrupt elites from public scrutiny and any legal process.
At the root of it all, in America as with America's NATO allies, are the central banks that date back
centuries.
Jackson, in 1833, shut down the bank run by Nicholas Biddle and backed by powerful "bought and paid for"
Senator Henry Clay. Jackson did so defending the constitution which clearly prohibited a central bank which
the founding fathers recognized as the root cause of Europe's continual wars.
A year later, in 1834, congress censured Jackson for abusing presidential power. His congress was "owned"
by Biddle and his European masters.
Today, we have a "dime store" Jackson, someone with the swagger and
none of the real muscle. Perhaps Trump saw another example of an American who stood against the central
bank, that being John Kennedy and his fate and that of his brother Robert.
Were one to follow this vein, as to who owns and controls the central banks, and how the restoration of
the central bank in 1913 re-empowered America's European masters under the Federal Reserve Act, a fuller
backdrop for understanding America's crippled political scene would entail. Our focus is elsewhere, and
America's own debt slavery is an important component for certain.
American Terrorism
How
does the world see the US?
Increasingly
, the world is terrified of
America. A single nation drowning in 21 trillion dollars of bankruptcy is blackmailing the world.
America clearly can't manage its own affairs at home, a nation with a third of its citizens living in or
near absolute poverty, a nation ruled by functional illiterates or faithless warmongers, yet America
continues its military crusade for what it calls "justice and freedom" that its own citizens seldom see.
Sanctions, trade wars and military bullying focused on rebuilding world divides, restoring world tensions
and finding adversaries where partners or friends may well have been, is the watchword of American policy.
Why?
America is breaking the rules. There was always "wiggle room" in the
hodge-podge of international law, room for "justified war" and a door opened for the "victor's justice" we
saw at the Nuremberg and Tokyo Tribunals after World War II.
Even that is gone today, and America's domestic political meltdown is largely responsible.
Were one to look to the roots, even before Machiavelli, one might turn to Sun Tzu. In his Art of War, Sun
Tzu advised a combatant to always build a golden bridge for a retreating enemy. In the world of nuclear
brinksmanship, this might be more aptly be expressed as a lesson most learned as children on the school
playing fields.
Never humiliate a potential adversary.
Background
Unrest
in US
At one time
, Americans themselves were politically astute, at
least an activist core, including up to 40 million union members when they held sway over politics.
At one time, the primary concern of Americans was economics, the day to day issues of job security,
rising prices and economic survival for the family.
Demagogues would drum beat about the dangers of communism or the threat of drugs. Hollywood would depict,
almost continually, a Soviet occupation of America, films like Red Dawn or even, jokingly, The Russians are
Coming, The Russians Are Coming. No sane person took it seriously
However, as most recognize, sanity isn't now nor may ever have been the strong suit for many Americans.
Why Things Are Different
Depiction
of Andrew Jackson at Battle of New Orleans
America was
always
strife with racial, religious and class differences. What few recognize is the regionalism that was
initially expressed in the political aspirations of Andrew Jackson, America's first populist "outsider."
From the Atlantic, November 2016:
"Newt Gingrich has compared Trump to Jackson for some time. Rudolph Giuliani
declared on election night that it was 'like Andrew Jackson's victory. This is the people beating the
establishment.' That may seem a comforting comparison, since it locates Donald Trump in the American
experience and makes his election seem less of a departure.
Is Trump's victory really like Jackson's? On the surface, yes: In 1828, an
'outsider' candidate appealed directly to the people against elites he called corrupt. A deeper look at
Jackson's victory complicates the comparison, but still says much about America then and now.
Jackson's road to victory began with a defeat. He was a Tennessee politician
and plantation owner turned soldier, a man who, unlike Trump, had deep experience in government. As a
general, he became the greatest hero of the War of 1812, and capitalized on his fame by running for
president in 1824. But the electoral votes were split between four candidates. The presidency was decided by
the House of Representatives, which chose John Quincy Adams, the highly qualified secretary of state.
1833
Democratic cartoon shows Jackson destroying the "Devil's Bank" (Photo credit, Wikipedia)
Jackson politely congratulated the winner but was seething. He soon declared the system was rigged. The
Jacksonians' phrase was 'bargain and corruption' -- they said the House speaker, Henry Clay, had thrown the
vote in exchange for being named secretary of state.
This conspiracy theory added an element of rage to Jackson's basic argument
that he was simply owed the presidency. Although the House had voted in accordance with the Constitution,
Jackson insisted that he should have automatically won because 'the majority' of the people supported him.
(He'd actually won a plurality of the popular vote, 40 percent, which was politically significant but had no
legal bearing.)
With an eye to the next election, he set out to upend the political system,
which had been running predictably for a generation. A party founded by Thomas Jefferson had installed four
consecutive presidents. Most elections were not even close. Relatively few people voted, and many lacked
voting rights. But the franchise was expanding to include all white men, and boisterous new political forces
were sweeping the growing nation.
Jackson and his allies spent four years building a popular movement in favor
of majority rule. They worked to delegitimize President Adams, promoting the "corrupt bargain" conspiracy
theory and blocking his programs in Congress. In their 1828 rematch, Jackson defeated Adams in a landslide.
His 1829 inauguration was recorded as a triumph of the people, who mobbed the White House in such numbers
that they trashed it. It's this moment to which Giuliani referred on election night 2016."
Defining the Problem
War
is a racket and a habit. (Four Horsemen of Apocalypse, by Viktor Vasnetsov, 1887)
In using "Jacksonesque" methods
without Jackson, the man, with his own experiences and
moral center as a balance, Bannon and Trump, now Trump with Bolton and Giuliani, personify not just
corruption. The world is seeing a darkness unleashed, an America wielded as a sword for globalist forces.
What is different today is that forces that reined in the "globalist cabal," for lack of another term
acceptable for publication, no longer exist.
The formula used to take America to war time and time again, 1898 with Spain or the two wars with
Germany, jingoism, black propaganda, false flag terrorism, seen again on 9/11, has its limitations. When the
US went to full scale war in Vietnam, justified by the Tonkin Gulf incident, reputedly a false flag attack
on the US Navy by imaginary North Vietnamese patrol boats, the public eventually rose in relative "unison,"
to stop the war.
Most
of these real men are now lost to the ages, prematurely dead from war toxin spray. How we miss their race.
Eventually, under the Clinton presidency, America had not only largely demilitarized, but had also entered
into a series of treaties limiting strategic nuclear capabilities. The end result was a pay down on the
national debt and an impeachment attempt against Clinton.
The
false flag event that drove the fragile, drugged American psyche over the cliff
This
was followed by the rigged election of 2000, then 9/11, then abrogated treaties, ten trillion in new debt,
police state legislation, near total military rule and a permanent war footing.
What was different, what separated America of 1965-1970 and America of 2000?
The unions were gone and with them the political leaders who answered to the working class that fought
the wars and paid the bills.
Campaign finance legislation was erased by a biased Supreme Court under Citizens United v. US in 2005.
Corporate control
of media was complete.
Ragtag extremist billionaires, the Koch's, Adelson, Scaife, DeVos, Coors and a series of offshore
"oligarchs" bought congress, as had been done during the Jackson presidency nearly two centuries before.
Then there is the internet. Where Jackson's electoral environment included limited suffrage, men only,
property owners only, voting only by the few, the larger electorate of the 21st century were subject to
advanced manipulation and thought control, real not imaginary, through social media.
In fact, two realities had been created, perhaps even more, separate
worlds for each recognized and identified "type," based on psychological triggers. Think tanks and major
military and intelligence contracting firms received and continue to receive billions to study and tune
capabilities, not just altering opinions but further, altering the ability to perceive and judge.
Thus, when Jackson stood against congress, he had the support of the people, the frontiersmen, the
farmers, the working classes, people now "chasing their own tails" at the behest of "fake everything."
Conclusion
What we are left with
is an America capable of targeting any nation, capable of
capriciousness unimagined by those who see it, who suffer it, those who assume rationality exists though not
evidenced.
It was Baudelaire (1864, Le Joueur Genereaux):
"la plus belle des ruses du diable est de vous persuader qu'il n'existe pas!"
(the most beautiful trick of the devil is to persuade you that he does not exist!)
Again we return to the issue of the unasked question of "why?" We know who, we know what, but as the
question of "why" is never asked, then we are then faced with another question, more basic, more telling.
Why are we afraid to ask a question? Why do we choose to turn away from what we know to be the presence of
pervasive evil itself as a prime motivator?
Gordon Duff is a Marine combat veteran of the Vietnam War that has
worked on veterans and POW issues for decades and consulted with governments challenged by security issues.
He's a senior editor and chairman of the board of
Veterans
Today
, especially for the online magazine "
New
Eastern Outlook
."
Then Trump demanded that the other G7 members remove their "ridiculous and unacceptable"
tariffs on U.S. goods – which would be hard for them to do, because their actual tariff
rates are very low. The European Union, for example, levies an average tariff of only three
percent on US goods. Who says so? The U.S. government's own guide to exporters
.
True, there are some particular sectors where each country imposes special barriers to
trade. Yes, Canada imposes high tariffs on certain dairy products. But it's hard to make the
case that these special cases are any worse than, say, the 25 percent tariff the U.S. still
imposes on light
trucks . The overall picture is that all of the G7 members have very open markets.
So what on earth was Trump even talking about? His trade advisers have repeatedly claimed
that value-added taxes, which play an important role in many countries, are a form of unfair trade
protection . But this is sheer ignorance: VATs don't convey any
competitive advantage – they're just a way of implementing a sales tax -- which is
why they're legal under the WTO. And the rest of the world isn't going to change its whole
fiscal system because the U.S. president chooses to listen to advisers who don't understand
anything.
Looks like Trump adopted Victoria Nuland "Fuck the EU" attitude ;-). There might be nasty
surprises down the road as this is uncharted territory: destruction of neoliberal
globalization.
Trump proved to be a really bad negotiator. he reduced the USA to a schoolyard bully who
beats up his gang members because their former victims have grown too big.
As the owner of world reserve currency the USA is able to tax US denominated transactions both via conversion fees and
inflation. As long as the USA has dollar as a reserve currency the USA has so called "exorbitant priviledge" : "In the
Bretton Woods system put in place in
1944, US dollars were convertible to gold. In France, it was called "America's
exorbitant privilege"[219]
as it resulted in an "asymmetric financial system" where foreigners "see themselves supporting American living standards and
subsidizing American multinationals"."... "De Gaulle openly criticised the
United States intervention in Vietnam and the "exorbitant
privilege" of the United States dollar. In his later years, his support for the slogan "Vive
le Québec libre" and his two vetoes of Britain's entry into the
European Economic
Community generated considerable controversy." Charles de Gaulle -
Wikipedia
Notable quotes:
"... Errrr, that so-called "piggy bank' just happens to; ..."
"... have the world's reserve currency ..."
"... dominates the entire planet militarily since the end of the Cold War ..."
"... dictates "regime change" around the world ..."
"... manipulates and controls the world's entire financial system, from the price of a barrel to every financial transaction in the SWIFT system. ..."
"... And Trump has the ignorance, the arrogance and the audacity to be pleading 'poverty?' ..."
"We had productive discussion on having fair and reciprocal" trade and market access.
"We're linked in the great effort to create a more just and prosperous world. And from the
standpoint of trade and creating more prosperous countries, I think they are starting to be
committed to more fair trade. We as a nation lost $870 billion on trade...I blame our leaders
and I congratulate leaders of other countries for taking advantage of our leaders."
"If they retaliate they're making a tremendous mistake because you see we have a
tremendous trade imbalance...the numbers are so much against them, we win that war 1000 times
out of a 1000."
"We're negotiating very hard, tariffs and barriers...the European Union is brutal to the
United States....the gig is up...there's nothing they can say."
"We're like the piggy bank that everybody's robbing."
"I would say the level of relationship is a ten - Angela, Emmanuel and Justin - we have a very good relationship. I won't
blame these people, unless they don't smarten up and make the trades fair."
Trump is now making the 20-hour flight to Singapore, where he will attend a historic summit with North Korea leader Kim Jong
Un. We'll now keep our eye out for the finalized communique from the group. The US is typically a leader in the crafting of the
statement. But this time, it's unclear if the US had any input at all into the statement, as only the leaders from Britain,
Canada, France, Germany, Italy and Japan as well as the presidents of the European Commission and European Council remain at the
meeting. But regardless of who writes it, the statement will probably be of little consequence, as UBS points out:
Several heads of state will be heading off on a taxpayer-financed "mini-break" in Canada today. In all of its incarnations
(over the past four years, we've gone from G-8 to G-6+1) the group hasn't really accomplished much since an initial burst of
enthusiasm with the Plaza Accords and Louvre Accords in the 1980s.
By the way, Trump is right on the tariffs in my view, Europeans should lower their tariffs
and not having the US raising it.
Trump: "We're The Piggy Bank That Everybody's Robbing"
Isn't Trump great in catch phrases? Trump's base will now regurgitate it to death.
Now reconcile Trump's remarks with reality:
Professor Werner: Germany is for instance not even allowed to receive delivery of US
Treasuries that it may have purchased as a result of the dollars earned through its current
account surplus: these Treasuries have to be held in custody by the Federal Reserve Bank of
New York, a privately owned bank: A promise on a promise. At the same time, German influence
over the pyramid structure of such promises has been declining rapidly since the abolition of
the German currency and introduction of the euro, controlled by an unaccountable
supranational international agency that cannot be influenced by any democratic assembly in
the eurozone. As a result, this structure of one-sided outflows of real goods and services
from Germany is likely to persist in the short and medium-term.
To add insult to injury:
Euro-federalists financed by US spy chiefs
The documents show that ACUE financed the European Movement, the most important federalist
organisation in the post-war years. In 1958, for example, it provided 53.5 per cent of the
movement's funds.
Okay, everyone set your "team" aside for a few minutes and let's look at the facts and
reality.
Do you really believe the rest of the world has trade advantages over the US? Well, let's
consider major industries.
Agriculture.....maybe, but only sightly. Our farmers are the richest in the workd....by
far.
Manufacturers.....probably so....because we gave it away to countries with slave labor.
Manufacturers jobs were jobs where people could earn a decent living...and that had to
go..can't be cutting into corporate profits with all that high cost labor.
Defense.....need I go here? We spend more than the next 11 countries combined! We sell
more as well.
Energy.....we rule thus space because we buy it with worthless printed fiat
debt...whenever we want to....and nd if you deny us, we will bomb the hell out of you and
take it.
Technology. ....Apple, Microsoft, Intel, Google, Amazon, Oracle, Dell, Cisco.....who can
touch that line up....not to mention all the on-line outfits like Facebook and Twitter.
Finance.....the best for last. We control the printing press that prints the dollar the
rest of the world needs. We control energy and foreign policy. Don't do what we like and we
will cut you off from SWIFT and devalue the hell out of your currency...and then move in for
the "regime" change to some one who plays ball the way we like it. 85% of all international
trade takes place in dollars everyday. We have the biggest banks, Wall Street, and infest the
world with our virus called the dollar so that we can Jeri their chain at will.
Now I ask you....just where the hell is the "trade imbalances"? Sure there are some
companies or job sectors that get a raw deal because our politicians give some foreigners
unfair trade advantages here and there, but as a whole, we dominate trade by far. The poor in
our country lives like kings compared to 5.5 billion of the world's population. Trump knows
this.....or he is stupid. He is pandering to his sheeple voting base that are easily duped
into believing someone is getting what is their's.
Hey, I am thankful to be an American and enjoy the advantages we have. But I am not going
to stick my head up Trump's ass and agree with this bullshit. It is misdirection (corporate
America and politicians are the problem here, not foreign countries) and a major distraction.
Because all the trade in the world isn't going to pull us out of this debt catastrophe that's
coming.
But, if we cut through all the verbiage, we will arrive at the elephant in the room.
American manufacturing jobs have been off-shored to low wage countries and the jobs which
have replaced them are, for the most part, minium wage service jobs. A man cannot buy a
house, marry and raise a family on a humburger-flippers wage. Even those minimum wage jobs
are often unavailable to Americans because millions of illegal aliens have been allowed into
the country and they are undercutting wages in the service sector. At the same time, the
better paid positions are being given to H-1B visa holders who undercut the American worker
(who is not infrequently forced to train his own replacement in order to access his
unemployment benefits.)
As the above paragraph demonstrates the oligarchs are being permitted to force down
American wages and the fact that we no longer make, but instead import, the things we need,
thus exporting our wealth and damaging our own workers is all the same to them. They grow
richer and they do not care about our country or our people. If they can make us all into
slaves it will suit them perfectly.
We need tariffs to enable our workers to compete against third world wages in countries
where the cost-of-living is less. (American wages may be stagnating or declining but our
cost-of-living is not declining.) We need to deport illegal aliens and to stop the flow of
them over our borders. (Build the wall.) We need to severely limit the H-1B visa programme
which is putting qualified Americans out of work. (When I came to the US in 1967 I was
permitted entry on the basis that I was coming to do a job for which there were not enough
American workers available. Why was that rule ever changed?)
You are making my point. China didn't "off shore" our jobs....our politicians and
corporations did. You can't fix that by going after other countries. You fix that by
penalizing companies for using slave labor workers from other countries. Tariffs are not
going to fix this. They will just raise prices on everyone.
I can't believe you Trumptards can't see this! Once again we will focus on a symptom and
ignore the real problem. Boy, Trump and his buddies from NYC and DC have really suffered
because of unfair trade practices, right? Why can't you people see that "government is the
problem" and misdirection your attention to China, Canada, Germany, Mexico, or whomever is
just that....misdirection.
I would tax the shit out of companies like Apple that make everything overseas with slave
labor and then ship it in here to sell to Americans at ridiculous prices.
Plenty of down votes but no one has proven that I am wrong on one point.
The EU countries have free college, health care, day care and just about everything else.
All paid for because they have no military spending.
It's all on the backs of the US tax payer. Or the fed, if you prefer.
Trump is working both angles. Forcing them to pay for their own defense. Forcing them to
allow US products with no trade disadvantages. Go MAGA and fuck the EU.
"... But if we take seriously the idea that Trump is a consequence of the disintegration of American democracy rather than the cause of it, this "blame game" becomes especially problematic. Partisan bickering, with one party constantly pointing to the other as responsible for the country's ills, covers up the fact that Democrats and Republicans alike have presided over the consolidation of corporate power in the United States. To paraphrase Ralph Nader, the U.S. corporate state is a two-headed beast. Sure, President Trump and the Republican Party are currently handing over public lands to oil and gas companies, eliminating net neutrality, introducing pro-corporate tax legislation, kowtowing to the military industrial complex, defunding the welfare state, and attempting to privatize education and deregulate finance. But let's not forget our recent Democratic presidents, for example, who are also guilty of empowering and enriching big business and disempowering and impoverishing ordinary Americans. ..."
"... All of this is to say that I'm considerably less excited about 2018 and 2020 than many others -- on what counts as the U.S. left -- appear to be. Democratic Party victories at the ballot box would certainly reduce some of the pressures on a variety of marginalized groups who are suffering mightily under President Trump. This is, of course, a good thing. But, Democratic victories will not "fix" the structural problems that underpin our current political crisis nor will they ensure a freer and more just future. ..."
This article is from Dollars & Sense : Real World Economics, available at
http://www.dollarsandsense.org
Last winter, in the wake of the 2016 Presidential election, I wrote an article for
Dollars & Sense in which I argued that Trump's election represented a transition
toward "national neoliberalism" in the United States ("Trump and National Neoliberalism:
Trump's ascendance means the end of globalism -- but not of neoliberalism," January/February
2017).
I argued that this emergent state of affairs would be marked by a completion of the takeover
of the U.S. government by corporate interests. I saw the election of Trump -- a top
one-percenter and real estate tycoon firmly rooted in the culture and logic of big business,
who has somehow convinced many Americans that he is an anti-establishment "outsider" -- as an
"unmasking" of the corporate state, a revelation of the ongoing merger between state and market
that has arguably been ongoing since the 1970s. In short, I envisioned a movement away from
"global neoliberalism," a state of affairs characterized by the increasing preeminence of
transnational corporate capital in a relatively open global political-economic system, and
towards "national neoliberalism," a state of affairs in which transnational corporate dominance
is cemented in the context of an ever more fragmented and dangerous global system.
About ten years ago, political theorist Sheldon Wolin published Democracy
Incorporated , diagnosing American democracy with a potentially fatal corporate disease.
Referring to the specter of "inverted totalitarianism," Wolin writes in his preface:
Primarily it represents the political coming of age of corporate power and the political
demobilization of the citizenry. Unlike the classic forms of totalitarianism [e.g. Germany,
Italy], which openly boasted of their intentions to force their societies into preconceived
totality, inverted totalitarianism is not expressly conceptualized as an ideology or
objectified in public policy. Typically it is furthered by power-holders and citizens who often
seem unaware of the deeper consequences of their actions or inactions. There is a certain
heedlessness, an inability to take seriously the extent to which a pattern of consequences may
take shape without having been preconceived. Wolin paints a picture of a gradual process of
change in which many different actors, some wealthy and powerful and others not, unwittingly
push the country's politics, bit by bit in piecemeal fashion, towards an undemocratic,
corporate-controlled end. Many of these actors may have good intentions. Many of them may see
themselves as champions of the people. Many of them may actually speak out against the very
interests that they in other ways empower.
This framework for thinking about the plight of the United States, which has for me been
legitimated over and over again during Trump's first year in office, conditions how I think
about President Trump and the Republican Party, and how I think about our opportunities for
nonviolent social transformation, freedom, and social justice. It's hard not to point to
President Trump and blame him for our problems. He is a bigot who has struck out at immigrants,
Muslims, Arabs, African-Americans, Mexicans, women, LGBT people, and disabled people. He lacks
the basic knowledge of politics and foreign policy that are a necessary condition for competent
leadership. He picked up a congratulatory call from the President of Taiwan in December 2016,
disrupting relations with China, and called North Korean dictator Kim Jong Un "short" and
"fat." He is a paranoid and narcissistic demagogue who has scorned and marginalized
journalists, and made the terms "fake news" and "alternative facts" household words. He is a
corrupt businessman who is using the levers of power that he controls to enrich Big Business,
as well as his cronies, his friends, and himself. I could go on.
It's also hard not to point to Republicans in Congress. After the election, there was hope
that the "never Trump" Republicans would win out and that Trump's agenda would be blocked. This
has not happened. While some in Congress, like Senators McCain (R-Ariz.), Corker (R-Tenn.),
Collins (R-Maine), Flake (R-Ariz.) and Murkowski (R-Alaska) have defied Trump in certain
contexts (e.g. on foreign policy), on many issues congressional Republicans have simply fallen
in line (e.g. with tax reform). Today, the Republican Party is often discussed by liberals in
the same breath as Trump, with everyone hoping for good news in 2018 and 2020.
But if we take seriously the idea that Trump is a consequence of the disintegration of
American democracy rather than the cause of it, this "blame game" becomes especially
problematic. Partisan bickering, with one party constantly pointing to the other as responsible
for the country's ills, covers up the fact that Democrats and Republicans alike have presided
over the consolidation of corporate power in the United States. To paraphrase Ralph Nader, the
U.S. corporate state is a two-headed beast. Sure, President Trump and the Republican Party are
currently handing over public lands to oil and gas companies, eliminating net neutrality,
introducing pro-corporate tax legislation, kowtowing to the military industrial complex,
defunding the welfare state, and attempting to privatize education and deregulate finance. But
let's not forget our recent Democratic presidents, for example, who are also guilty of
empowering and enriching big business and disempowering and impoverishing ordinary
Americans.
President Obama presided over the modernization of the U.S. nuclear arsenal, a process that
President Trump is continuing. As William Hartung recently reported in Mother Jones ,
"There is, in fact, a dirty little secret behind the massive U.S. arsenal: It has more to do
with the power and profits of weapons makers than it does with any imaginable strategic
considerations." President Obama also helped corporations get richer and more powerful in other
ways. He negotiated the Trans-Pacific Partnership, a multilateral trade deal that, if Trump had
not withdrawn us, would have expanded U.S. corporate access to overseas markets and given
multinational corporates new policy leverage over governments (via investor-state dispute
settlement mechanisms). (See Robin Brand, "Remembering the 'Tokyo No'," Dollars &
Sense , January/February 2015.) In 2012, as he was running for his second term, Obama
proposed a reduction in the corporate tax rate to 28%, not much different from the bill just
passed by Congress. He also lobbied Congress for the $700 billion Wall Street bailouts after
the Great Recession, continuing on the policy path set by his Republican predecessor, President
Bush. (Obama received huge campaign contributions from finance, insurance, and real estate.) In
terms of income inequality, CNBC had to reluctantly conclude that the gap widened under Obama,
in spite of all his powerful rhetoric about equity and equality.
President Clinton negotiated and signed NAFTA into law, a trade agreement that created
hardship for millions of American manufacturing workers and farmers, and generated large
profits for multinational industrial and agricultural corporations. Clinton also pushed for
welfare reform, signing into law a "workfare" system that required recipients to meet strict
job and employment related conditions. Millions of people became ineligible for payments under
the new system, and poverty increased especially among households in which members were
long-term unemployed. Clinton's 1997 tax proposal advocated cutting estate taxes and capital
gains taxes, and did not favor lower-income Americans. The Center on Budget and Policy
Priorities noted, "Analyses by the Treasury Department indicate that when fully in effect, the
Clinton plan would give the 20 percent of Americans with the highest incomes about the same
amount in tax cuts as the bottom 60 percent combined. This is an unusual characteristic for a
tax plan proposed by a Democratic President."
All of this is to say that I'm considerably less excited about 2018 and 2020 than many
others -- on what counts as the U.S. left -- appear to be. Democratic Party victories at the
ballot box would certainly reduce some of the pressures on a variety of marginalized groups who
are suffering mightily under President Trump. This is, of course, a good thing. But, Democratic
victories will not "fix" the structural problems that underpin our current political crisis nor
will they ensure a freer and more just future.
I plan to support third-party candidates at the ballot box in coming years, in the hopes of
contributing to the creation of a new kind of political infrastructure that can help us to
unmake the corporate state.
SASHA BREGER-BUSH is an assistant professor of political science at the University of
Colorado–Denver.
This article on almost a year old but thinks are developing as predicted. Which increases its
value.
"... Since when did Trump become an expert on political science and world history anyway? Who
does he think he is lecturing? Yet another US middle school classroom?! Does he not realize that
a good number of the countries represented at the UN consider themselves Socialist?! Furthermore,
while I don't necessarily disagree with the notion that Socialist and Communist ideas have often
been a disaster in the 20th century, Socialism in the 21st century is an entirely different beast
and the jury is still very much out on this issue, especially when considering the social,
political, economic, ecological, psychological and even spiritual disaster Capitalism is now
proving to be for much of the planet. Being the President of a country as dysfunctional as the
US, Trump would be well-advised to tone down his arrogant pontifications about Socialism and
maybe even open a book and read about it. ..."
"... My guess is that all they want is to send a clear messages to the Comprador elites
running most countries that this is the "official ideology of the AngloZionist Empire" and if
they want to remain in power they better toe the line even if nobody takes this stuff seriously.
Yup, back to a 1980s Soviet kind of attitude towards propaganda: nobody cares what everybody else
really thinks as long as everybody continues to pretend to believe the official propaganda.
..."
"... Ever since the Neocons overthrew Trump and made him what is colloquially referred to as
their "bitch" the US foreign policy has come to a virtual standstill. ..."
"... Because, and make no mistake here, if the US cannot get anything constructive done any
more, they retain a huge capability to disrupt, subvert, create chaos and the like. ..."
"... However, the US themselves are now the prime victim of a decapitated Presidency and a
vindictive and generally out of control Neocon effort to prevent true American patriots to "get
their country back" (as they say) and finally overthrow the regime in Washington DC. ..."
Notable quotes:
"... Since when did Trump become an expert on political science and world history anyway? Who does he think he is lecturing? Yet another US middle school classroom?! Does he not realize that a good number of the countries represented at the UN consider themselves Socialist?! Furthermore, while I don't necessarily disagree with the notion that Socialist and Communist ideas have often been a disaster in the 20th century, Socialism in the 21st century is an entirely different beast and the jury is still very much out on this issue, especially when considering the social, political, economic, ecological, psychological and even spiritual disaster Capitalism is now proving to be for much of the planet. Being the President of a country as dysfunctional as the US, Trump would be well-advised to tone down his arrogant pontifications about Socialism and maybe even open a book and read about it. ..."
"... we all know who Trump's puppet-masters are nowadays so we know what to expect ..."
"... Trump is now clearly fully endorsing that fairytale that "The West" (in which Trump now hilariously includes Poland!) has defeated Hitler and saved the world. The truth is that the Nazis were defeated by the Soviets and that all the efforts of the Poles, French, Brits and even Americans were but a minor (20% max) sideshow to the "real event" (Those who still might believe in this nonsense can simply read this ). Yet again, that the Americans would feel the need to appropriate for themselves somebody else's victory is, yet again, a clear sign of weakness. Do they expect the rest of the planet to buy into this nonsense? Probably not. ..."
"... My guess is that all they want is to send a clear messages to the Comprador elites running most countries that this is the "official ideology of the AngloZionist Empire" and if they want to remain in power they better toe the line even if nobody takes this stuff seriously. Yup, back to a 1980s Soviet kind of attitude towards propaganda: nobody cares what everybody else really thinks as long as everybody continues to pretend to believe the official propaganda. ..."
"... Ever since the Neocons overthrew Trump and made him what is colloquially referred to as their "bitch" the US foreign policy has come to a virtual standstill. ..."
"... Because, and make no mistake here, if the US cannot get anything constructive done any more, they retain a huge capability to disrupt, subvert, create chaos and the like. ..."
"... However, the US themselves are now the prime victim of a decapitated Presidency and a vindictive and generally out of control Neocon effort to prevent true American patriots to "get their country back" (as they say) and finally overthrow the regime in Washington DC. ..."
"... It appears that for the foreseeable future Trump will continue to focus his energy on beating Obama for the status of "worst President in US history" while the Neocons will continue to focus their energy on trying to impeach Trump ..."
"... I still maintain that the worst President in history (excluding possibly Woodrow Wilson) was Bill Clinton (strongly influenced, no doubt, by Hillary.) Sure, the 90′s were a great time in America, but Clinton's evil actions (signing NAFTA, the Crime Bill, ignoring Bin Laden, and repealing Glass-Steagall to name just a few) had not yet come to fruition. ..."
"... Consider that the scene he bought into is the product of 70 years of constant propaganda aimed at the American psyche and how successful that has been. ..."
"... Hillary would not have done anything different than Trump. Trump is a dumb shit sycophant of the Deep State just like Hillary. ..."
"... "Step by step the US is getting closer to a civil war" That pretty much says it all. All it will take is for US troops to get an unexpected butt kicking somewhere, sometime. ..."
Late this morning, outraged emails started pouring in. My correspondents reported "getting
sick" and having their "heart ache". The cause of all that? They had just watched Trump's
speech at the UN...
You can read the full (rush, not official) text
here or watch the video here .
Most of it is so vapid that I won't even bother posting the full thing. But there are a few
interesting moments including those:
"We will be spending almost $700 billion on our military and defense. Our military will
soon be the strongest it has ever been"
This short sentence contains the key to unlock the reason behind the fact that while the US
military is extremely good at killing people in large numbers, it is also extremely bad at
winning wars. Like most Americans, Trump is under the illusion that spending a lot of money
"buys" you a better military. This is completely false, of course. If spending money was the
key to a competent military force, the US armed forces would have already conquered the entire
planet many times over. In reality, they have not won anything meaningful since the war in the
Pacific.
...then he suddenly decided to share this outright bizarre insight of his:
The problem in Venezuela is not that socialism has been poorly implemented, but that
socialism has been faithfully implemented. From the Soviet Union to Cuba to Venezuela,
wherever true socialism or communism has been adopted, it has delivered anguish and
devastation and failure.
Since when did Trump become an expert on political science and world history anyway? Who
does he think he is lecturing? Yet another US middle school classroom?! Does he not realize
that a good number of the countries represented at the UN consider themselves Socialist?!
Furthermore, while I don't necessarily disagree with the notion that Socialist and Communist
ideas have often been a disaster in the 20th century, Socialism in the 21st century is an
entirely different beast and the jury is still very much out on this issue, especially when
considering the social, political, economic, ecological, psychological and even spiritual
disaster Capitalism is now proving to be for much of the planet. Being the President of a
country as dysfunctional as the US, Trump would be well-advised to tone down his arrogant
pontifications about Socialism and maybe even open a book and read about it.
I won't even bother discussing the comprehensively counter-factual nonsense Trump has spewed
about Iran and Hezbollah, we all know who Trump's puppet-masters are nowadays so we know
what to expect . Instead, I will conclude with this pearl from The Donald:
In remembering the great victory that led to this body's founding, we must never forget
that those heroes who fought against evil, also fought for the nations that they love.
Patriotism led the Poles to die to save Poland, the French to fight for a free France, and
the Brits to stand strong for Britain.
Echoing the nonsense he spoke while in Poland, Trump is now clearly fully endorsing that
fairytale that "The West" (in which Trump now hilariously includes Poland!) has defeated Hitler
and saved the world. The truth is that the Nazis were defeated by the Soviets and that all the
efforts of the Poles, French, Brits and even Americans were but a minor (20% max) sideshow to
the "real event" (Those who still might believe in this nonsense can simply read this ). Yet
again, that the Americans would feel the need to appropriate for themselves somebody else's
victory is, yet again, a clear sign of weakness. Do they expect the rest of the planet to buy
into this nonsense? Probably not.
My guess is that all they want is to send a clear messages to the Comprador elites
running most countries that this is the "official ideology of the AngloZionist Empire" and if
they want to remain in power they better toe the line even if nobody takes this stuff
seriously. Yup, back to a 1980s Soviet kind of attitude towards propaganda: nobody cares what
everybody else really thinks as long as everybody continues to pretend to believe the official
propaganda.
[Sidebar: When my wife and I watched this pathetic speech we starting laughing about the
fact that Trump was so obscenely bad that we (almost) begin to miss Obama. This is a standing
joke in our family because when Obama came to power we (almost) began to miss Dubya. The
reason why this is a joke is that when Dubya came to power we decided that there is no way
anybody could possibly be worse than him. Oh boy where we wrong! Right now I am still not at
the point were I would be missing Obama (that is asking for a lot from me!), but I will
unapologetically admit that I am missing Dubya. I do. I really do. Maybe not the people
around Dubya, he is the one who truly let the Neocon "crazies in the basement" creep out and
occupy the Situation Room, but at least Dubya seemed to realize how utterly incompetent he
was. Furthermore, Dubya was a heck of a lot dumber than Obama (in this context being stupid
is a mitigating factor) and he sure did not have the truly galactic arrogance of Trump
(intelligence-wise they are probably on par)].
In conclusion, what I take away from this speech is a sense of relief for the rest of the
planet and a sense of real worry for the US. Ever since the Neocons overthrew Trump and
made him what is colloquially referred to as their "bitch" the US foreign policy has come to a
virtual standstill. Sure, the Americans talk a lot, but at least they are doing nothing.
That paralysis, which is a direct consequence of the internal infighting, is a blessing for the
rest of the planet because it allows everybody else to get things done. Because, and make
no mistake here, if the US cannot get anything constructive done any more, they retain a huge
capability to disrupt, subvert, create chaos and the like.
But for as long as the US remains paralyzed this destructive potential remains mostly unused
(and no matter how bad things look now, Hillary President would have been infinitely worse!).
However, the US themselves are now the prime victim of a decapitated Presidency and a
vindictive and generally out of control Neocon effort to prevent true American patriots to "get
their country back" (as they say) and finally overthrow the regime in Washington DC.
Step by step the US is getting closer to a civil war and there is no hope in sight, at least
for the time being. It appears that for the foreseeable future Trump will continue to focus
his energy on beating Obama for the status of "worst President in US history" while the Neocons
will continue to focus their energy on trying to impeach Trump , and maybe even trigger a
civil war. The rest of us living here are in for some very tough times ahead. As they say in
Florida when a hurricane comes barreling down on you "hunker down!".
Netanyahu has spoken, stating that Trump has given the boldest, most courageous UN speech
that he has ever heard. Well that settles that with the prescient oracle rendering his
definitive and omnipotent judgment!
A lot of old friends didn't like President Trump's UN speech today because it didn't
break cleanly with UniParty foreign policy! E.g. Paul Craig Roberts' comments here. But
it did contain these revolutionary comments on immigration and refugee policy ! The
latter especially significant because Trump has to set the quota for U.S. quota for
refugees (actually expedited, subsidized, politically favored immigrants) in the next few
days. Who knows what Trump will do! But Hillary would never even have said it
[...] For the cost of resettling one refugee in the United States, we can assist more than 10
in their home region.
[...] For decades, the United States has dealt with migration challenges here in the Western
Hemisphere. We have learned that, over the long term, uncontrolled migration is deeply
unfair to both the sending and the receiving countries.
For the sending countries, it reduces domestic pressure to pursue needed political
and economic reform, and drains them of the human capital necessary to motivate and
implement those reforms.
For the receiving countries, the substantial costs of uncontrolled migration are
borne overwhelmingly by low-income citizens whose concerns are often ignored by both media
and government.
I still maintain that the worst President in history (excluding possibly Woodrow
Wilson) was Bill Clinton (strongly influenced, no doubt, by Hillary.) Sure, the 90′s
were a great time in America, but Clinton's evil actions (signing NAFTA, the Crime Bill,
ignoring Bin Laden, and repealing Glass-Steagall to name just a few) had not yet come to
fruition.
Assuming the keen political insight Trump exhibited to get himself the job he sought still
exists, perhaps all this insane blather is proof it continues. Consider that the scene he
bought into is the product of 70 years of constant propaganda aimed at the American psyche
and how successful that has been.
Then imagine Trump feeding the ravenous American mindset for the status quo while actually
working around it. Brilliant! Then again, if he truly means what he says, all is lost.
Thank you Stephen Miller! He must be reading Peter Singer:
International support for countries bearing the greatest refugee burden also makes economic
sense: it costs Jordan about €3,000 ($3,350) to support one refugee for a year; in
Germany, the cost is at least €12,000.
Another threat to the Church is the illegal immigration control movement. If this movement
succeeds, and what is perceived by Latin Americans and other governments as an escape valve
is shut off, these governments would logically say, "Our demographic course cannot
continue." These governments would have little choice but to confront the Church and say,
"If we are to survive as governments, then we must get serious about population growth
control. Otherwise, we in Latin America are destined to become a sea of chaos. We, as Latin
Americans, must make family planning and abortion services fully available and encourage
their use." Turning off the valve to illegal immigration is therefore a serious threat to
the power of the Church.
President Trump's Message: Make The United Nations Great
In fact, he's strengthened our alliances in meetings in Washington with key allies, by
going to foreign capitals - the trip to France and the Bastille Day with America's
oldest ally, with which the United States has in recent years had something of a rocky
relationship – was strengthened enormously by that visit to Paris this year. And
the president has, you know, both on a personal level and on an alliance level, really
strengthened the alliance with France and with President Macron. In fact, he met with
him yesterday and had a very, extremely positive and friendly meeting where they talked
substantive business, but they also talked about the history of the alliance and reminisced
a bit about the grandeur of that trip to Paris in July.
The French president's suggestion that African women are breeding like animals and must
be restrained by an enlightened elite awakens primordial terrors in the hearts of the
mainstream Left and Right.
[...]
If Europeans are replaced with Africans, Western Civilization will disappear. The choices
are simple: The West, yes or no? The white race, yes or no? Our rulers have exhausted all
other options.
Peter Singer on How Political Correctness Let African Population Growth Run Amok for a
Generation
The outrage evoked by Macron's remark, however, appears to have little to do with its
inaccuracy. Macron violated a taboo that has been in place since the International
Conference on Population and Development, held under the auspices of the UN in Cairo in
1994. The conference adopted a Programme of Action that rejected a demographically driven
approach to population policies, and instead focused on meeting the reproductive-health
needs of individuals, especially women. Population targets were out; rights were in.
Don't lose hope
[...]
I shared this video here at the Unz Review before, but I would like to share it again,
because it best encapsulates and captures what I personally associate with term "Alt
Right"
"Step by step the US is getting closer to a civil war" That pretty much says it all.
All it will take is for US troops to get an unexpected butt kicking somewhere,
sometime.
Churchill himself, one of a long list of Anglo-genocidal killers (according to The Saker's
last post) admitted that, "The Red Army tore the guts out of The Wehrmacht." Is this even in
dispute?
In Russian thinking therefore, with only 20% contribution by American/UK Commonwealth
forces, we subtract that, and this is the diplomatic question. Why would Stalin's T34s not
have rolled up to The English Channel and installed compliant Communist regimes in
France/Belgium/Holland as they did in Eastern Europe?
They did the same in North Korea by installing the grandfather (Kim Il-Sung) of this young
'Rocket Man' in 1945 at the conclusion of the fighting against Japan in the far-east.
Since the 1980s, free markets have been promoted as the best way to generate wealth (which
may be true) and the best way to help everyone in society since there will be more wealth to
go around. That has turned out not to work so well, since the wealth doesn't "trickle down",
but instead concentrates in fewer and fewer hands.
An excellent analysis. Neo-liberalism is a mechanism which transfers money from the poor to
the rich. Far from "trickle down" it is in fact "siphon up".
Therein lies the crux - to some folk (most, I would hesitate) money is a means of
survival.
To others, (those obsessed with it) it's the source of power. Ergo, of course you can have
too much money, since it is physically impossible to spend it. But at the same time, you
cannot, if so compelled, have too much power.
Put simply, it is unadulterated GREED. An addiction, if you like.
And for that, there is no cure.
B.J.
Privatization is one method of stealing the people's assessts and giving it to the wealthy
through ownership of shares. The Lieberals talk of mum & dad investors yet 98% of
Australian shares are owned by the wealthiest 1%
There are so many who believe they will benifit from these ideologies , that they reinforce
those who promote them . They simply don't realise they are not part of the equation , and
any benifit gained by them is simply incidental. The target recipients have always been the
Corporate bodies and those with their finger in the pie . Not once , to my recollection, has
the Australian people , in general terms , benifited from the sale of public companies ,
banks or infrastructure .
Brilliant article, hits the nail on the head! Australia really did go "off the tracks" with
the regime of John "Mugabe" Howard with a system of patronage, corruption, and systemic
bribery which gave us a third world government. Like other "mineral resource rich, failed
states" the nation's wealth has been mostly stolen.
It's not about money. Ultimately, it's not even about the financial system.
But it is about money and about the financial system.
Neo-liberals see things as a dollar value only nothing else is of value. The fact that Macro
economics is a social science is discarded and Micro-economics covers all that is of value.
The financial system is critical because it is based on lies publicly. This is one of the
reasons that power may indeed be defining. But the reason behind it is the lies of finance.
The key ones being tax does not fund government and banks create instant money when they give
a loan. The repayments cancel the money creation they do not get collected and put out as new
loans. Like wise when the federal government spends it also creates new money and drains ot
away by tax which destroys it. The federal government cannot save for a rainy day. Another
financial one that needs dumping is the lie that a surplus is good. It is not. So yes finance
is critical Power is a symptom of the lies. Not the cause.
As soon as they reality is accepted the whole driving force of neo-liberalism falls to bits.
It is exposed. Its reason to sell assets vanishes (federally) The passing of costs to the
states shows as political crap.
It's not about money. Ultimately, it's not even about the financial system. The real showdown
will start with the fight over energy and resources.
Tightening energy and resource supply, associated with environmental degradation to obtain
those resources and a still increasing world population will be the death of neo-liberalism.
But in my view, it is unlikely to be replaced by Communism.
We would have to look back to before the OPEC oil shocks of the early 1970s and the emergence
of the Asian Tigers to see a different model of capitalism dependent on the West having a
competitive industrial base with mass employment therein.
Hence, it is Varoufakis who is an old skool, radical chic of precisely this era and the
sub-concept of neoliberalism is only of use to neo-Marxists like himself. Perhaps he can go
and govern class relations (or foment their conflict) in apparently thriving Australian
industry however?
I believe fraud and corruption caused the great depression.
But this is a part of the myth of the free market. If a market is truly free, those with
enough money will always be able to influence the market for their own benefit. As soon as
this happens the market fails in its chief function of efficiently allocating scarce
resources. That's why there are regulators and anti-monopoly legislation, etc. etc. We pay
billions each year to keep capitalism from eating itself.
Self-serving behaviour is only corruption if it is illegal, otherwise it's called
business. It is regulation that makes it illegal, which is why we need strong, democratic
control.
So saying that the GD was caused by corruption is the same as saying that free-market
capitalism got out of control of democratic regulation. Same thing, different name.
The end of neoliberalism can't come soon enough for me. People and communities have been
destroyed for the benefit of a few who don't care about anything other than their own wealth
and power. Time to give the power to the people.
not to me; I think you have a conglomerate of ideas and policies, some of which I'd
categorize as neoliberal, but things like "extreme individualism" have nothing to do with neo
liberalism per se.
I think if you give too much power to the state, you'll wind up with authoritarianism.
maybe that doesn't concern you, maybe it does. I believe in the concept of labor unions.
However I also believe in freedom. It may not be in our long term interest to give up freedom
for the sake of a better economic prospect today.
It's not going to happen Van. Unfortunately, this is a globally integrated system, which
dwarfs the power of national politics and national economies, with maybe the exception of the
US, and look what's going on in the US. Donald Trump is the president. I mean, what does that
say about the United States, that they've elected a leader like Trump? How does the saying
go, "Cometh the hour, cometh the man?" I guess they must have a death wish, unfortunately,
they're going to take mos of the world's population with them. I'm not necessarily a
pessimist, but I think a rational analysis leads to the conclusion, that we're doomed.
The neoliberals in the West - unlike, disgustingly, those in South America - won hegemony
because they did as Gramsci and Dutschke advised the left; they made "a long march through
the institutions". Journalists, histoIran's, philosophers and academics were as necessary to
the movement as economists and politicians. It was what enabled them to win elections. As the
man said - "from the prophets, deserts come."
So, no point?
Marxism was a suggested response to rampant capitalism where only the very few at the top
benefited from the toil of all others.
I would have thought it was obvious. Or maybe you don't understand Marxism?
I would suggest you're not on the bottom of the pile either, if you are reading the Guardian
and commenting on a computer or an iPhone. The reality is, capitalism has seen the halving of
world poverty levels over the last 30 years, and poverty continues to fall. Are there serious
problems with inequality in the west, and the world generally? Yes. Capitalism needs to
evolve. Better tax regimes and systems for wealth redistribution are needed. Communism is not
the answer.
Every political party is a "collective" of sorts. But as far as I can scan the wasteland of
Australian politics, I can't find any that is shining a path towards "freedom and enjoyment."
We need to reconceive politics just as we must the banks, churches and other terminally
infected institutions of our time.
Neo liberal practices i.e. their 1% stranglehold on the economy, their ideology of winner
take all, etc are incompatible with a modern nation state, with civilised values, and with a
harmonious society.
They are destroying the state and society.
The simplest and most apposite critique of unbridled Capitalism is that is ideologically
bound to the notion that consuming is good, increased production and use of finite resources
is good, cheap labour is good, tax is bad, and sharing is bad...and that if Capitalism
continues apace in its present form it will lead to the total pollution of the earth, the
disappearance of all wild animals and plants, the end of bees and pollination, the rise of
rampant diseases uncontrolled by drugs that are not affordable to the world's poor, and the
eventual extinction of humans. Capitalism is not only dangerous, it is myopically
spectacularly insane. Psychology demonstrates that humans have 3 classic responses to a
crisis:
1.Denial
2.Fantasy
3.Acceptance of reality and action
1980's Denial phase: "It is exaggerated by mad greenies and ain't happening."
1990's Fantasy phase: "Recycling and prayer will fix it all."
2018 Reality and Action phase: "We are in deep shit....literally...and we need radical
immediate action by governments, corporations, educational institutions and individuals to
save the planet and us. Want your great grandkids to be alive in 2080? Then get out there
shouting....TODAY!!!!!
"People hate it". That kind of sentence which make you consider closing the tab. Your point
is sensible, neoliberalism has generated lot of bothering issues, but if it didn't exist, I
wouldn't have an affordable car and computer, and I wouldn't have a giant amount of choice
for goods to consider. It's time it ends, or rather rethink itself, but let's stop being full
anti elite, neo liberalism allowed several, unfortunately not all, of us, to feel a bit
special.
Fascism is the word that most interests me when looking a the present trajectory in
Australia
We're not there yet
And there's no one on the government benches who's a new Hitler or Stalin or Mussolini
But the next generation ..............
They make me uncomfortable. Some of the younger and as yet unheralded apparatchiks on the
conservative fringe worry me. They're smart. Know the advertising and selling the message
strategies. Have money and are well connected to the barons/oligarchs who pull the strings
and they're ambitious.
Paradoxically a collapse of the Liberal Party will help them. In spite of it all we need a
fiscally conservative, slightly socially conservative political movement in Australia but the
drift to extremism is quite pronounced and profoundly worrying, especially in a time where
climate change poses existential questions about our future.
This next election will not be a cakewalk. It'll be as bitterly fought as any in a
generation and the consequences of a loss will be, for progressive forces, catastrophic.
"Although people with low expectations are easier to con, fomenting cynicism about democracy
comes at a long-term cost. Indeed, as the current crop of politicians is beginning to
discover, people with low expectations feel they have nothing to lose."..... Yes, but that's
part of the Devilish Plan: Why do you think that the Neoliberals and Conservatives spend so
much time nurturing their relationship with both Police and the Army?.... They want to be
sure that if their Neoliberal-Conservative project goes truly belly up, they will be the ones
holding the guns.
Yes, it's sinister.... it's dangerous.... it's a time bomb, and we can only defuse it with
the help of a majority of Australians waking up, standing up and Democratically vote against
Fascism.
Despite the huge changes in communication in the last several decades
and the ever increasing levels of education in our society, politics have
failed to engage the vast majority and that cohort of the cynical, the alienated,
the disinterested, the lazy, the simply care less continues to grow.
In the last decade the only cause that evoked passion and engaged a larger
number, finally forcing our elected members to act was same sex marriage
.....a crescendo that took years to generate.
With the complicity of our media and the decline of that part of education
that teaches analysis, social psychology and political philosophy (let alone
teaches about basic political structures and mechanisms) our level of disengagement
from the political process appears to be at an all time high. The performance
of our legislators has become increasingly unaccountable and purely self interested
.... we have re-created the "political class" of pre-war times where alienation
was based on a lack of education and awareness and a sense of inferiority and
powerlessness DESPITE our vastly improved communication, access to information
and educational standards (not to mention affluence).
Basically, we have "dumbed down" to the extent where passion and ideology in
politics is now the preserve of fewer and fewer. In a democracy this trend is of
massive concern and a threat to its sustainability.... it also completely suits those
that are focused on concentrating power and wealth... the more that don't give
a toss the less likely you are to be encumbered by limitations, social considerations,
ethics and morality.
Until we re-engage far larger numbers into the political process, raise the levels
of awareness of political thought and choices, stop dumbing down and re-inject
some broader passion and participation into our political processes then vested
interests will continue to dominate.....and democracy will become increasingly
undemocratic !
We need a Nationalist government, which will automatically see itself as the mortal enemy of
the primary Internationalist (there used to be a song about that) force in the world today,
and which affects us greatly in terms of resource exploitation: Globalisation, or what we
used to call 'multi national corporations' or 'international capital'.
Nationalism is a decision-making tool as it always poses a question; what is good for
this country ?
When/if he mentions de-Globalisation, an Aus-Indonesian defence alliance, citizen
initiated referenda, and a Constitutional ban on donations and parties , then people
may listen, however he cannot be accused of being too imaginative or bright. He is
however advocating authoritarianism not fascism.
Fascism doesn't require a state sanctioned religion or suppression of religion
That said the Catholicism/fundamentalist Christian bent of the present cabinet and the
demonisation of any green beliefs is uncomfortably close to what you describe
And the nexus between big business and govern, the destruction of public institutions, the
reduction in the capacity of media to report truth and the vitriolic attacks on opponenents
are straws in an ill wind
You are right, it's not "fascismmmmmmmmmmmmmm".... it's Fascism. Which brings back to my
memory what Tom Elliott (the son of Liberal Party former president John Elliott) wrote in the
Herald Sun on 6 February 2015: "It's time we temporarily suspended the democratic process and
installed a benign dictatorship to make tough but necessary decisions."
The mystique of the European Union is anti-nationalism, based on the theory that "nations"
are bad because they caused the devastating wars of the twentieth century, while European
unification is the sole guarantee of "peace". Convinced of their mission, the Eurocentrists
have had no qualms in throwing out the baby of democratic choice along with the nationalist
bathwater.
The notion that "peace" depends on "Europe" persists despite the NATO bombing of Serbia and
European participation in U.S. wars in Afghanistan, Iraq, Libya and Syria, not to mention EU
participation in the current major military buildup in the Baltic States against "the Russian
enemy". Indeed, thanks to NATO, the EU is gearing for a war even worse than the previous
ones.
Since the "nation-state" is blamed for evil in the world, the Eurocentrists react with
horror at growing demands in Member States for a return to "national sovereignty". This,
however, is a natural reaction to the economic and social disasters resulting from policies
dictated by EU institutions in Brussels. The 1992 Maastricht Treaty legally bound member
countries to centralized neoliberal monetarist policies; not only "socialism" became illegal
– even Keynesianism was ruled out. Promised endless peace and prosperity, citizens of
European countries were cajoled into giving up their sovereignty to EU institutions, and many
now want it back.
Disillusioned Italy
Italian disillusion is particularly significant. Italy was an exceptionally enthusiastic
founding member of the unification begun with the 1957 Treaty of Rome. And yet, Italy's own
history illustrates what can go wrong with such unification, since the 19 th century
political creation of a unified Italy centered in Turin led to the enrichment of the industrial
north at the expense of southern Italy, where the splendor of Naples declined into chronic
poverty, crime and corruption. Now Italy is "the south", in the periphery of a European Union
centered around Germany.
Antagonism between North and South Italy has given way to a much stronger antagonism between
Italy and Germany – each blaming the other for the crisis.
It is only fair to recall that Germans were very attached to their Deutsche Mark and to
their own austere financial policies. Germany could only be lured into the common currency by
agreeing to let the euro follow German rules. France eagerly supported this concession based on
the notion that the common currency would unify Europe. It is doing quite the opposite.
Germany is a major exporting nation. Its trade with the rest of the EU is secondary. It uses
the EU as its hinterland as it competes and trades on the global scale with China, the United
States and the rest of the world. The proceeds of Germany's favorable EU trade balance is less
and less invested in those countries but in Germany itself or outside the EU. In the official
German view, the main function of the Southern EU members is to pay back their debts to
Germany.
Meanwhile, Italy's once flourishing industrial network has lost its competitive edge due to
the euro. It cannot save its exports by devaluation, as it was accustomed to doing. Italy's
debt is now 132% of its GNP, whereas the Maastricht Treaty governing the monetary union puts a
ceiling of 60% on national debt. And to continue paying the debt, public services are cut back,
the middle class is impoverished, the domestic market declines and the economy gets even
weaker.
This is precisely the situation that has plunged Greece into ever deepening poverty.
But Italy is not Greece. Greece is a small peripheral country, which can be pounded to death
by creditors as a warning of what can happen to others. Italy, on the contrary, is too big to
fail. Its collapse could bring the whole EU crashing down.
Italy's Potential Strength Through Weakness
The traditional Italian parties had no solution beyond those that have ruined Greece: cut
back social spending, impoverish workers and pensioners, and pay back the foreign banks, with
interest.
The odd coalition of the League and the M5S was obliged to try something different:
basically, to invest in the economy rather than abandon it to its creditors. Their program
combines lower taxes with Keynesian stimulation of investment. Since the leader of the League,
Matteo Salvini, and Luigi Di Maio of M5S do not like each other, they selected law professor
Giuseppe Conte to be Prime Minister in their coalition cabinet. The interesting choice was that
of Paolo Savona for the key post of Minister of Economy and Finance. Savona, whose long career
has taken him across the summits of Italian and international finance, was certainly the most
qualified choice imaginable. Savona knows everything there is to know about the Italian economy
and international currency creation.
And yet, it was the appointment of this 81-year-old expert that created outrage in the
Eurocenter.
The uproar was spurred by the fact that in one of his books Savona had described the euro as
"a German prison". Savona had also said it was necessary to prepare a Plan B, to leave the euro
if there is no other choice. "The alternative is to end up like Greece."
This hint of disloyalty to the euro was totally unacceptable to the European
establishment.
The Center struck back in the person of the largely figurehead President of Italy, Sergio
Mattarella, who used, or misused, his unique constitutional power by refusing to approve the
government. On May 28, he designated as Prime Minister Carlo Cottarelli of the International
Monetary Fund – a man who represented everything the Italians had just voted against.
Known in Italy as "Mr. Scissors" for his advocacy of drastic government spending cuts,
Cottarelli was supposed to run an apolitical "technical" government until new elections could
be held in the fall.
This coup against the Italian voters caused momentary rejoicing in the Authoritarian Center.
The European Budget Commissioner (a German of course), Günther Oettinger, was reported to
be gloating over the prospect that "the markets" (meaning the financial markets) would soon
teach Italians how to vote. Italy's economy "could be so drastically impacted", he said, as to
send a signal to voters "not to vote for populists on the right and left."
This simply intensified Italian indignation against "German arrogance".
Meanwhile Savona wrote a letter to President Mattarella which introduced a bit of cold
reason into an increasingly hysterical situation. He reminded the president that an important
meeting of EU heads of state was to be held at the end of June; without a political government,
Italy would be absent from negotiations which could seal the fate of the EU. Italy's plea for
economic change could expect French support. Savona denied having called for leaving the euro;
in the spirit of game strategy, he had mentioned the need for Plan B in order to strengthen
one's position before negotiations. He made it clear that his strategy was not to leave the
euro but to transform it into a genuine rival to the dollar.
"Germany prevents the euro from becoming 'an essential part of foreign policy', as the
dollar is for the United States", wrote Savona. But change becomes necessary, as the dollar is
less and less suitable for its role as world currency.
Indeed, the Italian crisis merges with a mounting trans-Atlantic crisis, the U.S. uses
sanctions as a weapon in competition with its European "partners". The paradox is that Italy
could use its very weakness to oblige Germany to reconsider its monetary policy in a moment
when the German economy is also facing problems due to U.S. sanctions on deals with Russia and
Iran, as well as protectionist measures. Savona's message was that clever diplomacy could work
to Italy's advantage. In its own interest, Germany may need to accept transformation of the
euro into a more proactive currency, able to defend European economies from U.S.
manipulation.
It was a matter of hours before Cottarella stepped back and a new M5S-League government was
formed, with Savona himself back as Minister of Relations with the European Union.
Italy's Double Jeopardy
The new Italian cabinet sworn in on June first is riven with contradictions. Despite all the
released anti-EU sentiment, it is definitely not an "anti-EU" government. Conte is back as
Prime Minister. The new foreign minister, Enzo Moavero Milnesi, is a staunch pro-European. As
Interior Minister, the northern Italy chauvinist Salvini – who doesn't even care
particularly for Southern Italians – will get tough with migrants. As Minister of
Economic Development, Di Maio will try to find ways improve conditions in the southern regions
that elected him. Since Salvini is the more experienced of the two, the League is likely to
profit from the experiment more than the M5S.
Some Italians warn that by leaving the "German prison" Italy would simply find itself even
more dependent on the United States.
One should never forget that ever since the end of World War II, Italy is an occupied
country, with dozens of U.S. military bases on its territory, including air bases with nuclear
weapons poised to strike the Middle East, Africa or even Russia. The Italian Constitution
outlaws participation in aggressive war, and yet Italian bases are freely used by the United
States to bomb whichever country it pleases, regardless of how Italians feel about it. Worst of
all, the U.S. used its Italian "NATO bases" to destroy Libya, a disaster for Italy which
thereby lost a valuable trade partner and found itself inundated with African refugees and
migrants. While international financial experts exhort Italy to cut government expenses, the
country is obliged by NATO to spend around 13 billion euros to buy 90 U.S. F-35 fighters and to
increase its military spending to around 100 million euros per day.
Italy's economic prospects have been badly hit by U.S.-enforced sanctions against trade with
Russia and Iran, important potential energy sources.
U.S. economic aggression, in particular Trump's rejection of the Iranian nuclear deal, is
the issue with the potential to bring European leaders together at a time when they were
drifting apart. But at present, the Europeans are unable to defy U.S. sanctions in punishment
for trade with those countries because their international dealings are in dollars. This has
already led to U.S. exacting billions of dollars in fines from the biggest French and German
banks, the BNP and Deutsche Bank, for trading that was perfectly legal under their own laws.
The French petroleum giant has been obliged to abandon contracts with Iran because 90% of its
trade is in dollars, and thus vulnerable to U.S. sanctions. And that is why the idea is growing
of building financial instruments around the euro that can protect European companies from U.S.
retaliation. [2] See Wolfgang
Münchau, "The euro must be made more robust to rival the dollar; US sanctions expose the
mistakes made by the founders of the single currency", The Financial Times, 27 May, 2018.
https://www.ft.com/content/ca8c6826-5f76-11e8-ad91-e...56df68
The Disappearance of the Left
The disappearance of left political forces has been almost total in Italy. There are many
reasons for this, but a curable part of the problem has been the inability of what remains of
the left to face up to the two main current issues: Europe and immigration.
The left has so thoroughly transformed its traditional internationalism into Europism that
it has been unable to recognize EU institutions and regulations as a major source of its
problems. The stigmatization of "the nation" as aggressively nationalistic has held back left
ability to envisage and advocate progressive policies at the national level, instead putting
its hopes forever in a future hypothetical "social Europe". Such a transformation would require
unanimity under EU rules – politically impossible with 28 widely differing Member
States.
Without such inhibitions, the far right capitalizes on growing discontent.
Another related handicap of the left is its inability to recognize that mass immigration is
indeed "a problem" – especially in a country like Italy, with a flagging economy and 20%
official unemployment (although this figure is probably too high, considering undeclared
labor). There is resentment that prosperous Germany issued a general invitation to refugees,
which for geographic reasons pile in Mediterranean countries unable to cope. The mass influx of
economic migrants from Africa is not even "taking jobs away from" Italians – the jobs are
not there to take. These migrants fled war and misery to come to Europe in order to earn money
to send back to their families, but how can they meet possibly meet these expectations?
It is all very well to extol the glorious hospitality of America entreating the world to "
Give me your tired, your poor, Your huddled masses yearning to breathe free, The wretched
refuse of your teeming shore. Send these, the homeless, tempest-tossed to me ". Such
generosity was suited to a new nation with huge empty spaces and rapidly growing industry in
need of a work force. The situation of a "full" nation in a time of economic downturn is quite
different. What is to become of the tens of thousands of vigorous young men arriving on Italian
shores where there is nothing for them to do except sell African trinkets on the sidewalks of
tourist centers? To make matters worse, the great contemporary thrust of technical innovation
aims at replacing more and more workers with robots. Leftist denial of the problem leaves its
exploitation and resolution to the extreme right.
Some leftist politicians in Italy, such as Stefano Fassina of the Sinistra Italiana
are waking up to this need. A left that dogmatically ignores the real concerns of the people is
doomed. A bold, honest, imaginative left is needed to champion Italians' independence from both
German-imposed austerity and the expensive military adventurism demanded by the United States.
But the interlaced problems created by unregulated globalization do not lend themselves to easy
solutions.
Notes
[1] David Adler,
"Centrists Are the Most Hostile to Democracy, Not Extremists", The New York Times, May 23,
2018.
Italy's primary problem is not the euro per se. It isn't even the much talked about
"proliferagacy". Italy has in fact run a primary surplus for most of the last 20 years
(primary surplus is the government budgetary balance sans interest payments). Italy's main
problem is the disastrous lack of productivity.
Its per capita productivity growth has actually declined by 0.1% the last 20 years,
versus around 0.7% positive growth for Germany and 0.6% for France. What explains this?
Supply side factors. Italy has many large-scale firms which are world-class. This leads a
naïve observer to conclude that the problem lies elsewhere.
Scratch the surface a little bit, and you'll find that the main problem for Italy is in
the SME sector. The comparison with the German Mittelstand is relevant here. Though many
German firms are still family-owned, they nevertheless have a significant amount of
meritocracy. Family scions frequently take on more ceremonial roles if they can find a
competent outsider to run large parts of the company. By contrast, Italian SMEs are much more
nepotistic. Italy also has far less labour mobility, meaning that the potential pool
of labour that a local company can draw from is quite limited.
There is therefore no easy solution. Devaluation is not a panacea. Italy is running a
current account surplus already. Their problem is lack of growth, which in turn is rooted in
supply-side factors.
There's a good paper by Luigi Zingales of University of Chicago (himself an Italian) as
you can surmise. He writes a lot of what I've outlined in greater detail if anyone is
interested in diving deeper:
The take-away is that there is no simple solution, Italy's problems are deep, structural
and tied to their social organisation. Devaluation, while tempting, would not fix these
issues and given that Italy is already running a current account surplus, it is hard to make
the case for one. Their exports is already competitive. Their debt problem stems from lack of
growth, not persistent budget deficits (mostly running a primary surplus for past few
decades).
Just to illustrate the point about the myth of 'profligate' Italy.
The problem is lack of growth, not lack of fiscal discpline. And the lack of growth is
rooted in deeply entrenched supply-side structural patterns, which changing the currency (or
letting it devalue) will do nothing to fix.
The interesting thing is that it is in Italy the same as in France, both what is called
extreme left, Mélenchon, and extreme right, Marine le Pen, are against the EU.
In the first round of the presidential elections Mélenchon and Le Pen together got 40%
of the votes.
In Italy now what is called extreme left and extreme right together formed a government.
Brussels fears for the euro.
They're quite right, the southern European countries, including France, have a long histories
of solving economic problems by devaluation, made impossible by the euro.
As the retired German sociologist Seeckt, retired men can speak their minds, says 'the big
mistake of the EU was (and is, my opinion) that the northern EU countries said to the
southern "become like us" '.
Cultures change very slowly, in France traces of the Louis XIV reign can still be found, a
love of bureaucracy.
In about 1973 an Italian consultant said to me 'there is only one way to solve our
problems, sell our civil servants for what they cost, and buy them back for what they're
worth'.
World Values Survey results indicate that in Europe and the United States, people who
describe themselves as "centrist" on the average have less attachment to democracy (e.g.
free and fair elections) that those on the left, and even those on the far right
I find this article sort of weird. And the above statement is based on this -- ->David
Adler, "Centrists Are the Most Hostile to Democracy, Not Extremists", The New York Times, May
23, 2018
Which is based on this -- -> http://www.worldvaluessurvey.org/WVSDocumentationWV6.jsp
And theses questions: ..which are totally sloppy. For instance question V138. 'People obey
their rulers. 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10.' is a ridiculous kindergarten question. A 'serious'
question on the value of democracy would have been "People obey the (rule of) law", not
'rulers'. Sorry, this is junk in which evidently those who didnt go for 1 or 2 or 9 or 10
were categorized as centrist and you and Adler somehow interpreted that as the problem.
Then you proceed to say .."Leftist denial of the problem leaves its exploitation and
resolution to the extreme right.'
And that .'A bold, honest, imaginative left is needed to champion Italians' independence from
both German-imposed austerity and the expensive military adventurism demanded by the United
States. '
So what is your point? .That 'centrist' should move to the left to solve your
problems?
The survey questions:
[MORE]
"I'm going to describe various types of political systems and ask what you think about
each as a way of
governing this country. For each one, would you say it is a very good, fairly good, fairly
bad or very bad
way of governing this country? (Read out and code one answer for each):
Very
good
Fairly
good
Fairly
bad
Very bad
V127. Having a strong leader who does not have to bother with parliament and elections
1
2
3
4
V128. Having experts, not government, make decisions
according to what they think is best for the country
1
2
3
4
V129. Having the army rule
1
2
3
4
V130. Having a democratic political system
1
2
3
4
(Show Card T)
Many things are desirable, but not all of them are essential characteristics of democracy.
Please tell me for
each of the following things how essential you think it is as a characteristic of
democracy. Use this scale
where 1 means "not at all an essential characteristic of democracy" and 10 means it
definitely is "an
essential characteristic of democracy" (read out and code one answer for each):
Not an essential An essential
characteristic characteristic
of democracy of democracy
V131. Governments tax the rich and subsidize the poor. 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10
V132. Religious authorities ultimately interpret the laws. 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10
V133. People choose their leaders in free elections. 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10
V134. People receive state aid for unemployment. 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10
V135. The army takes over when government is incompetent. 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10
V136. Civil rights protect people from state oppression. 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10
V137. The state makes people's incomes equal. 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10
V138. People obey their rulers. 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10
V139 Women have the same rights as men.
Good analysis of the reasons the left has declined. I do not see them changing course, but
rather doubling down. In Spain, Podemos wants to have universal basic income (or something
close to it) AND open borders
For a generation, acceptance of the neoliberal doctrine "there is no alternative" has
paralyzed politics in the West. If there is no alternative, what is politics to be
about?
What is politics to be about? Why, tranny bathrooms, of course!
Not being any kind of an economist and in general mistrusting economy as a wannabe science, I
would just take a compass, find the economic center point of EU and draw a circle. Whatever
is far from the center will face problems because in unification the center develops faster
than the outskirts. The traditional solution to this dilemma is to have borders (no
unification) since borders create a micro-economy that can function in its limits (better
than outskirts of an unified economy) just like animal species can survive if there are
natural barriers but removing them many species die out. Another alternative is to pack your
bags and move closer to the center.
I agree with much of this. But a quibble when you say that the EU was created out of a desire
to remove the evil of nationalism and create peace. That's the lipstick on the pig. The EU
was and is entirely devoted to boosting the profits of the super-rich, and putting big
finance in charge. The push against nationalism has nothing to do with peace, and only
because nationalism will tend to fight against the strip-mining of a society for profit. And
massive immigration was never a moral issue, neither today nor in the America of a century
ago. It was all about cheap labor and the massive profits that flow therefrom. Even with all
those resources, mass immigration in the United States at the end of the 19th and beginning
of the 20th centuries, created crushing poverty and a massive spike in crime. It was only
after the borders had been closed, after the shock of the Wall Street crash in 1929 (no, NOT
1924), and there was an immigration time-out, that America developed its prosperous middle
class. Which hurt profits for the rich, which is why it is being rolled back
LOL. Yes, there's a wedge issue a thinking man can sink his teeth into.
SCOTUS just reignited another one by surprisingly getting a case right, 7-2, in finding
for religious liberty and the baker who didn't want to do a wedding cake for poofters. I seem
to recall Tucker Carlson feeling the wrath and fury of all MSM for daring to suggest that the
baker had a legitimate constitutional issue.
Breyer and Kagan voted with the Republican/goy majority. Kagan, of course, regularly gets
offered up as the embodiment of in-your-face liberal-feminist-Jewish rule, but the couple of
opinions I've read by her suggested a pretty good legal mind, possibly tempered by some
common sense.
In any case, yes, identity politics provide the MSM with all the wedge issue substance
needed for the American public discourse. Europe, however, may have some remaining
expectations of adult content.
These "problems" are 100% within the context of the neoliberal consensus. The idea that we
have to have 2-3% annual growth – forever – or the world will somehow be
devastatingly awful is not a very sound foundation for a Good life.
That fiscal discipline you speak of is a significant factor in Italy's lack of growth.
Furthermore, it was designed and implemented for precisely that reason.
Their (Italy's) problem is lack of growth, which in turn is rooted in supply-side
factors
That is a fallacy that lies at the heart of the current European crisis. (I agree with the
other things you wrote.). It is not the 'supply', but lacking demand that is constraining
growth. All supply and higher productivity solutions are based on more 'flexible' labor,
removal of barriers, including borders, more 'competition' in everything. That translates in
practise into working more for less .
It had worked initially in the 70′s to 90′s when the entrenched inefficiency
was the main issue. It hasn't worked in the last 10-15 years. Suggesting more 'supply and
higher productivity' reforms simply means doubling down on policies that are failing. What is
needed is a huge shift in the labor markets toward more demand for workers so they can
improve their work lives, raise incomes, create more economic security. What Europe (and
West in general) need is a very tight labor market. By all means, cut and simplify taxes,
abandon austerity, promote some inflation, but the main reform that is needed is to restrict
outside labor migration and simultaneously restrict outflow of work. That is explicitly anti
neo-liberalism, it is also at the heart of the populist appeal.
Left has completely lost its way with its inability to distinguish between its local
voters and the feel-good charity towards the rest of the world. They are in effect being used
by the most anti-left business interests to keep labor as cheap as possible. Power to
negotiate doesn't come from institutions – it comes from having a strong hand in the
labor demand-supply equation.
Given the left collapse, the future is with the nationalist political forces. Trump
understands it, so does Salvini, La Pen, Orban, The names might change, but unless democracy
is completely abolished the 'selfish', restrict cheap labor politicians will eventually
prevail.
Please help me understand the implications of your comment.
Are you implying support for government debt fuelled expenditures as in Greece before the
GFC – or Argentina time and again?
Are you really saying the EU's (?EZ's) fiscal discipline rules were designed so that Italy
(and maybe some and what other country?) would have lower growth in economic activity? If so
why? And designed and intended by what persons?
Lot of people still think Keynes is wrong because its used as an excuse to tax and spend.
He wasn't wrong about the fact that fiance matters. Neither was Kalecki and neither was
Irving Fischer wrong that fiance matters after figuring out his disastrous mistake. Even
Thomas Mun understood money needs to circulate. Seems like Europe thinks the idea's of the
Spanish empire are best. Hoard coin.
It seems to me that the issue boils down to this:
- Capitalism seeks to concentrate capital and maximize profits;
- Communism seeks to concentrate capital, albeit in a different form than capitalism and
minimize profits.
- Efficiency means low cost and/or poorly made, and competition is no longer local, its
global.
- Free trade has replace fair trade.
The economic system in place today is not sustainable. In the not so distant past,
products exported had to have an internal market, or they were considered "dumped" into the
market at artificially low prices. tariffs were imposed for dumping. Today, electronic
products, such as alarm clocks, which are made in Asia, are dumped into the American market.
The electrical systems in Asia are incompatible with the 110v 60hz system in the US.
Ice hockey equipment is made in that global ice hockey powerhouse, Mauritius, as are winter
parkas and mitts. Cars produced in Japan include models for export that would not fit on the
roads in Japan. The list of these types of productions is endless. De-regulation has produced
20th and 21st century sweatshops in areas like call-centres, which are fast becoming
off-shored.
Local and national producers have been eliminated due to ending import duties to protect
internal companies. The set up has shifted taxation on imported goods to income taxes and
business taxes.
The narrative says competition is good, and higher production means lower cost to the
consumer. That only works when the competition is on a level playing field, and I'm employed
to be able to buy what is on offer. As for consumer products, how many TVs or refrigerators
do I really need? Korea has the capacity to supply all of the world's automobiles. Over
supply is rampant.
So, who really benefits? Those who seek to concentrate the wealth, and have the capability
to transfer out of the country, the value of a smaller (economic) country's GDP, with the
push of a button. When it all collapses they'll be off on their private islands or hiding in
their bastions.
On another note, yes, Italy is occupied, but so is Germany. The current German government,
according to a 1956 Constitutional Court ruling is not the legitimate government of Germany.
The "Old" Reich i.e. Wiemar Republic is. Therefore, it is an occupation government of the
Allies.
As if we didn't understand that.
A lot of bad assumptions and conclusions in this article.
Matteo Salvini has been supported by the southerners as well as the northerners because he is
defending Italy and Italians from the Globalists and their hordes invading Italy and DiMaio
and the MS5 agree with him and gave him the Interior ministry to handle it. But he still gets
a lot of resistance from the controlled globalist press. Go Salvini!
And the problem is, that Italy lacks competitiveness on a global scale. It's a puppet-home
perspective (and zero-sum-reasoning) to argue, that German exports are the reason, that
Italin exports declined. – Look at delivery cars, for example. something now even
Italian customers by more and more in Asia (once, this was a quasi monopoly, because it was
just something everybody did, to buy Italian Vans. – Even that is eroding now. And look
at -look at what you want in Italy consumer products, industrial products,
Meanwhile, Italy's once flourishing industrial network has lost its competitive edge due
to the euro.
So – this is a complete hoax, in the end. Especially since Italy is drowned in cheap
money – except that most of it is not invested, nowadays, but used to pay – for
the pensions, for social security, for univeristies the Police
Meanwhile in rome: The local authorities tell the public, that there are "missing busses"
at RomaTransporti or however th correct name of thsi fabulous enterprise is. Story is true
though: There are at least dozens 8some say:Hundreds!) of buses, which exist only in the
paperwork
"The idea that we have to have 2-3% annual growth – forever – or the world
will somehow be devastatingly awful is not a very sound foundation for a Good life."
Growth in GDP per capita is sustainable provided excess population is disposed of, which,
historically, it always has been via conflict. A world without war and the sanctity of human
life are the ideas in opposition here.
Centrist is a focus group tested term used to hide what a Centrist actually is. Neither
Center Right nor Center Left has ANY ideology. A Centrist seeks/holds office to receive money
from rent seekers. Nothing else.
Bottom line, IMHO:
A good idea (EU) failed because power corrupts.
A bad idea (nationalism) is coming up. Won't be pretty, especially there.
As
Growth in GDP per capita is sustainable provided excess population is disposed of,
which, historically, it always has been via conflict. A world without war and the sanctity
of human life are the ideas in opposition here.
Nobody is willing, apparently, to address the real issue:
Automation, overproduction, mass of people not needed as workers/employers anymore.
The nature of (modern/future) work, DISTRIBUTION of produced good and services, organization
of such society, etc.
Nationalism is regression into known.
We need a change of a full paradigm. Pass too hard.
Looking at the mix of "people" and "leaders" I go for a decent bloodshed as the most
likely option, hopefully not within next 10 years.
Hopefully.
From what other authors say, and what seems far more reasonable, demand has collapsed
because the corporate locust is doing the same thing they are doing in America, namely
destroying the entire industrial base and leaving a wasteland of debt and unemployment. Add
to that an inability to have a monetary policy and it's game over:
Luca Cordero di Montezemolo, a former chairman of Ferrari, Fiat and Alitalia, and now a
public enemy because of his dismissal of the "Made in Italy" label, acquired both companies
and moved them to Turkey, choosing profit over quality -- and Italian jobs. Montezemolo, of
aristocratic background, is a champion of Italian neoliberalism, having founded the
influential "free market" think tank Italia Futura (Future Italy) in 2009.
"Capital osmosis" is well known fact in economic science, and it means that, inside one
limited area, profit always runs from the "lower capitally equipped" sides to higher ones.
That is the reason why countries always take the money from rich sides and give it to poorer
ones. The truth isn't that poor part of nation works less, or that is stupid or unorganized;
no, the truth is in that "osmosis".
For 40 years, the ideology popularly known as "neoliberalism" has dominated political
decision-making in the English-speaking west.
People
hate it . Neoliberalism's sale of state assets, offshored jobs, stripped services,
poorly-invested infrastructure and armies of the forcibly unemployed have delivered, not
promised "efficiency" and "flexibility" to communities, but discomfort and misery. The wealth
of a few has now swelled to a level of conspicuousness that must politely be considered
vulgar
yet the philosophy's entrenched itself so deeply in how governments make decisions and allocate
resources that one of its megaphones once declared its triumph "the end of history".
ss="rich-link"> Australia needs tough cop to fight wage theft, Sally McManus says
Read more
It wasn't, as
even he admitted later . And given some of the events of the contemporary political moment,
it's possible to conclude from auguries like smoke rising from a garbage fire and patterns of
political blood upon the floor that history may be hastening neoliberalism towards an end that
its advocates did not forecast.
Three years ago,
I remarked that comedian Russell Brand may have stumbled onto a stirring spirit of the
times when his "capitalism sucks" contemplations drew stadium-sized crowds. Beyond Brand
– politically and materially – the crowds have only been growing.
Is the political zeitgeist an old
spectre up for some new haunting? Or are the times more like a strong angel proclaiming
with a loud voice, "the combination of inequality and low wage growth is fuelling discontent.
Time to sing a new song."
In days gone past, they used to slice open an animal's belly and study the shape of its
spilled entrails to find out. But we could just keep an eye on the news.
Here are my seven signs of the neoliberal apocalypse:
1. Girl crushes on Sally
McManus
The first sign appears with the noise of thunder – personalised in the form of ACTU
secretary, Sally McManus, and the trade union movement revival. No Australian of my own
generation or younger would likely possess any cultural memory of a trade union leader as hero
– let alone one whose packed-to-the-rafters appearance at Melbourne's Town Hall last week
brought with it chants and pennants, t-shirts and cheers a column of selfie-hunters. "We want
to see an end to neoliberalism!" she roared to wild applause in the barnstorming style that's
drawing similar crowds across the country. You had to feel sorry for conservative commentator
Janet Albrechtsen, who rode in to defend business-as-usual in a column entitled "I have to
admit a slight girl-crush on ACTU boss Sally McManus". "She's really not my type," McManus
retorted . Burnnnn.
2. Yanis Varoufakis praises the Communist Manifesto
The second bears a great sword – and that's the dashing former finance minister of
Greece, Yanis Varoufakis. As a scion of very modern political pedigree, he's an extraordinary
(brilliant) choice to
pen the new introduction to a re-released Marx and Engels' Communist Manifesto . A
revolutionary provocation considered so incendiary it was banned on its 1848 publication, the
book only achieved distribution when its entry into court documents as evidence of sedition
legally enabled it to be printed again. Varoufakis's praise of it in his introduction is no
less provocative; he sees the book as a work of prediction. "We cannot end this idiocy
individually," he writes of our present capitalist iteration, "because no market can ever
emerge that will provide an antidote to this stupidity. Collective, democratic political action
is our only chance for freedom and enjoyment."
It was a year ago that a third sign first appeared, when the dark horse of Australian prime
ministers, Paul Keating, made public an on-balance rejection of neoliberal economics. Although
Liberal PM Malcolm Fraser instigated Australia's first neoliberal policies, it was Keating's
architecture of privatisation and deregulation as a Labor treasurer and prime minister that's
most well remembered. Now, "we have a comatose world economy held together by debt and central
bank money," Keating has said, "Liberal economics has run into a dead end and has had no answer
to the contemporary malaise." What does the disavowal mean? In terms of his Labor heir Bill
Shorten's growing appetite for redistributive taxation and close relationship to the union
movement, it means "if Bill Shorten becomes PM, the rule of engagement between labour and
capital will be rewritten," according to The Australian this week. Can't wait!
4.
Hipsters picket trendy cafe
The fourth sign comes as the death of a certain kind of pale passivity and acceptance of the
status quo among the young. But much as
Kendall Jenner got the mood so wrong when she tried to retail Pepsi through the form of a
mock riot last year, this week the kids in Melbourne got the times very, very right. On
Tuesday, a flash mob of young people descended on no less than hipper-than-hip Northcote coffee
palace, Barry,
demanding the instant redress of alleged unfair dismissal and wage theft from staff pay
packets. Not so long ago, it was the Melbourne fashion for young people to sit at cafes and
joke about how exploited at work they were. The evolution to shouty pickets and cafe shut downs
indicate in a period of record low wage growth, the laughs have worn quite thin.
5. The
reds are back under the beds
There's always a bit of judgment and vengeance inherent to the factional shenanigans of
Australia's Liberal party, but its refreshed vocabulary warrants inclusion as the fifth sign.
Michael Sukkar, the member for Deakin, has been
recorded in a dazzling rant declaring war on a "socialist" incursion into a party whose
leader is a former merchant banker who pledged to rule for "freedom, the individual and the
market" the very day he was anointed. Sukkar's insistence is wonderful complement to the
performance art monologues of former Liberal MP Bronwyn Bishop on Sky, where she weekly
decries socialism is to blame for everything from alcoholism to energy prices. The reds may not
be under the beds quite yet, but if Sukkar's convinced some commie pinkos are already
gatecrashing cocktail events with the blue-tie set, they're certainly on his mind.
6.
Tony Abbott becomes a fan of nationalising assets
Or maybe's Sukkar's right about the socialists termiting his beloved Liberal party. How else
to explain the earthquake-like paradigm shift represented by the sixth sign? Since when do
neoliberal conservatives argue for the renationalisation of infrastructure, as is the push of
Tony Abbott's gang to nationalise the coal-fired Liddell power station? It may be a cynical
stunt to take an unscientific stand against climate action, but seizing the means of production
remains seizing the means of production, um, comrade. "You know, nationalising assets is what
the Liberal party was founded to stop governments doing," said Turnbull, even as he hid in the
dens and in the rocks of the mountains to weather – strange coincidence –
yet
another Newspoll loss.
ss="rich-link"> Yanis Varoufakis: Marx predicted our present crisis – and points
the way out Read more 7. Blue-collar billionaires
In the established canon, the final sign, the seventh, installs new saints on to golden
altars before praying supplicants. And I'd suggest some circumspection before the incense is
lit and venerations begin. A clear electoral yearning for a sincere leadership of politics
beyond the neoliberal frame has encouraged lying populists on the right, like the "blue-collar
billionaire" opportunistic falsity of Trump. For a left regaining momentum, there's also
danger; seizing at instant, available heroes propels into leadership politicians who are
polarising and
imperfect for the task.
The pressing need is not to pray for intercession; Varoufakis's call is right –
"collective, democratic political action" is the genuine alternative, and it's broader
democratic investment in the institutions of parties, movements, academies and media that
always builds the world to come. That is, after all, what the neoliberals did. And look –
just look – how far they got.
Neoliberalism so far and it's a rather interesting read if you follow global politics, yes
countries like people have ' charts' and Australia's is realtively tame:
This is absolutely true. Unintended consequences will always arise if the dim-witted tamper
with complex systems they do not understand.
Brexit is a classic case. It has blown up in the faces of its proponents and the rather
more level-headed among them are desperately trying to contain the spreading damage.
Ably assisted by Rupert's >75% control of print media... with his 'Get Bill' campaigns
(first Hayden, later Shorten) with 'Get Juliar' in between! The masses are swayed by big
media, enough to deliver the 1-3% needed to gain a parliamentary majority!
"new introduction to a re-released Marx and Engels' Communist Manifesto.
Collective, democratic political action is our only chance for freedom and enjoyment."
Might be true. But frightening that people should naively still think that democracy is to
be found in the 'Dictatorship of the Proletariate' [ ie those who know what's good for you
even if you don't like it ] of the Communist Manefesto after the revelations of what that
leads to in the Gulag Arichipeligo , Mao's China , Pol Pot , Kim John - un . How quickly the
world forgets. - you might just as well advocate Mein Kampf it's the same thing in the end
!
I don't think socialism can work without giving up too much freedom. Once you are in the
Leviathan's clutches, it is difficult to break free. In the USA, we have a great system. I
call it socialism for the rich and capitalism for the poor. It works great, but it only works
great for 1% of the people.
https://mises.org/wire/real-relationship-between-capitalism-and-environment
This idea of Capitalism fundamentally and completely undermining the environment is a myth.
You realise that the worst possible environmental degradation today occurs in extremely poor
countries which have neither the economic base, nor the surplus money to care for the
environment. Compound this with terrible legal systems in many of those countries and you get
the economic degradation you have today.
The fact that multinationals are happy to take Australian minerals from the land, make money
selling products to Australians, yet pay nil tax in Australia tells you everything you need
to know about how much they care for our 'state and society'.
Does present day neo-liberalism actually qualify as a political movement?
Vested interests and the dollar seem to have all the power. Lies and deception are so
common the truth is seen as the enemy. The voting public are merely fools for manipulation.
Nah, neo-liberalism is not government, it is something far nastier, and clearly not what the
public vote for, presuming a vote actually counts for anything anymore.
Plus, unlimited funding for elections has cemented capitalism's ability to 'buy' all the
elections, and hold-captive all the regulators it needs. Without the Citizens United decision
from right wing SCOTUS judges, US elections would be far more representative. Only in
capitalism can one believe that "money equals free speech". No such provision is in the US
constitution, so it is only these Bush-appointed judges who have determined that money can
rule the people. Even more stupid are the countries that have followed the USA down this
slippery slope. If you can fund politicians to undermine the ATO and ASIC, why not also allow
corporations to just pay bribes to judges to get decisions they would like?
Thanks curiouswes. Nice to engage in a polite discussion for a change.
I think you are right, in that all revolutions are susceptible to falling to their own
methods. Any mechanism for revolution legitimises the same mechanism for counter-revolution.
This is why violent revolution leads to militarism and authoritarianism. I don't think anyone
welcoming Lenin at the Finland Station did so because they wanted to live in a police state.
By the same token, I don't think that Socialism is inherently linked to giving the state
authoritarian power. In fact Socialism and democracy are perfectly compatible, because
democracy (one citizen one vote) is the counterweight to capitalism (one dollar one
vote).
As for globalism, it's the natural mode of capitalism and has been for centuries. Colonial
expansion and capitalism became synonymous with things like the Dutch East India Company.
Neoliberalism wants global reach for capital, but not for the regulators. They want keep
their tax-haven cake and eat it too. Typically, what they want is less about a free market
and more about freedom to game the market.
No, the current malaise is not 'due' to democracy, but despite it. America has
unlimited political funding by capitalism to sway elections to their desires. Australia is in
almost the same position, due to weak political funding reporting, and nil limits on what
'non-party' entities can spend on elections, or in the case of Rudd's removal, how just $45m
in advertising by the MCA managed to remove a sitting PM, because the handful of MCA members
did not want a resource tax. Our democracy has slipped into being a plutocracy (rule by the
wealthy).
Neoliberalism has inflicted a great deal of damage on western economies through the
off-shoring of industries and jobs by the wealthy elites who were aided by the donor addicted
political class. As a result, western democracies have weakened themselves in the eyes of the
world community who now see us as examples of dysfunctional economies and governing methods.
Who can blame them when the leading champion of the rules based order is so smitten with debt
it must withdraw into itself under the threat of debt default.
The way forward for us is not to look back at what is lost but too look at developing new
manufacturing industries and in particular, high technology manufacturing involving vehicles,
batteries, solar panels, biotechnology and other related areas.
What is always revealing about Vanessa and her obsession with neoliberalism, is her
intellectual dishonesty wrapped in a smattering of populist half-truths while ignoring any
fact that might get in the way of the emotional narrative.
How successful were the largely populist socialist governments in latin America: Argentina,
Brazil, Bolivia, Ecuador and, of course, the socialist paradise of Venezuela?
We don't have to go back 40 years Vanessa. A quick peek east across the Pacific to the last
decade of failed populist socialist ideology in South America tells enough.
PS: Delighted to see that you are back to full health after the 2 months of "absolute hell"
that you went through during the SSM postal survey - Q&A.
Neoliberalism, capitalism even, may well be dying. But the spectre of socialism is dead. What
you hear when kicking the cupboard is just the squeaking of the door, not the spectre
supposedly rumoring inside.
Worse, socialism did not just disappear but considerable fractions degenerated into all
kinds of zombies: you have the aggressive dreamers, who confound anecdotes about repair-cafes
or school meals with economic modeling and won't accept any response but flattery (yes, the
'senior' economic commentator is an example). You have the fascists supporting Assad because
he administrates the legacy of his Hitler-admiring father and people like the
Eichmann-assistant Alois Brunner, and a lot of them identify as 'anti-imperialist
left-wingers'. You have the naive nation-state nostalgics who believe the value of work can
be increased by blocking immigration, ignoring that the assembly of a car for the German
market can be done in the Netherlands or Slovakia just as well as in the UK.
To be sure: I know that persons like Varoufakis (or Badham) are neither fascists nor
morons. I wished it were these people who shaped the society after the downfall of
laissez-faire capitalism. But I fail to believe it. I believe that the end of laissez-faire
capitalism will coincide with the rise of fascism. Thus, I propose to extend capitalism's
life expectancy be shifting tax burdens from income and profit to wealth and to create a
favorable environment for tech-addicted turbo-capitalism.
Among EU countries, Ireland is still the most exposed but roughly 7.8% of aggregate domestic
value-added (i.e. GDP) ends up in final goods and services purchased in the US (Figure 2).
While arguably this is a lot, Ireland's exposure measured in value-added terms is about half of
that derived from gross bilateral exports (amounting to approximately 13.5% of GDP). The
value-added figures also show relatively large exposures to US demand for Germany, the
Netherlands and Belgium, to the tune of 3.5% of the GDP. On the other hand, Spain, Greece,
Cyprus, and Malta are the least vulnerable to US final consumption. Large countries such as
France and Italy sit in the middle of these extremes at around 2%.
The exposure of the EU as a whole to US demand in value-added terms is lower compared to
that suggested by gross exports to GDP . For individual countries other than Ireland, gross
flows overestimate exposure to US consumption most for Lithuania (+1.3 pp.) and Belgium (+1.2
pp.). The contrary is true especially for Luxembourg (-1.7 pp.), Slovenia (-0.8 pp.), and
Cyprus (-0.7 pp.).
Stuff they don't teach at Wharton to presidential trade warriors, courtesy of Dr
Hussman:
The inflow of foreign savings is the mirror image of our current account deficit,
because if we don't pay for our imports by sending foreigners goods and services, it turns
out that we pay for them by sending them securities.
Because the balance of payments always sums to zero, whenever we export securities to
foreigners, on balance, we also run a trade deficit.
Since real investment in factories, capital goods, and housing has to be financed by
savings, you'll also find that our trade deficit regularly "deteriorates" during
U.S. investment booms, and "improves" during recessions.
Our trade deficit represents vendor financing. Refuse foreigners' E-Z terms financing for
container loads of stuff, and pretty soon the US economy's gonna be wheezing like a
90-year-old with a two-pack-a-day habit.
This ain't rocket science -- except in the benighted precincts of Foggy Bottom.
Flake-o-nomics don't pay.
Another question is how much of these figures are really "trade" and how much is funny
accounting?
If I see the bizarre Ireland accounts, I can't help but think of Apple, Google and other
pharmaceuticals being incorporated in Ireland but not really producing much over there.
I'd love to see something like this done for Canada with its far more integrated economy
with that of the United States.
I also wonder if anyone has discussed Canada's/Mexico's refusal to consider the U.S.
Administration's proposed five year sunset clauses as indicative of their feared foreign
capital investment 'leveraging' that would, prima facie , clearly favor longer term
foreign investment in the U.S. facilities. In my view, even U.S. firms contemplating capital
investment in Canada would refrain from doing so if the longer term future of 'free trade'
was put into jeopardy every five years.
"... Back to Turkey. The largest net backstabbing of Turkish economy could be the slowdown of investments from the Gulf, where Erdogan bravely sided with Qatar. Erdogan engineered de facto confiscation of media assets owned by tycoons sympathetic to the opposition, to be purchased by Qataris, now Qatar is to Turkey what Adelson is to Israel. ..."
"... Add the effect of Iran sanctions -- it increased prices of oil and gas, but no associated increase the demand from the Gulf, on the northern shore there is a prospect of tightened belts, on the southern shore anti-Turkish policies, and Qatar alone is too small ..."
...Rusal,
the dominant aluminum maker in Russia recently was sanctioned by USA, while a while ago it
gained control of a large portion of alumina production -- aluminum ore, bauxite, has to be
processed into more pure feedstock for smelting factories, called alumina. Now aluminum
producers in many areas, notably, Europe, have a shortage of alumina that may lead to
mothballing of some smelters; the largest alumina facility in Europe is in Ireland and it is
owned by Rusal. Perhaps great for American smelter owners, but there has to be some teeth
gnashing in Europe.
Back to Turkey. The largest net backstabbing of Turkish economy could be the slowdown of
investments from the Gulf, where Erdogan bravely sided with Qatar. Erdogan engineered de facto
confiscation of media assets owned by tycoons sympathetic to the opposition, to be purchased by
Qataris, now Qatar is to Turkey what Adelson is to Israel.
Siding with Qatar would eliminate
investments from KSA and UAE, and draconian treatment of Saudi princes and other tycoons
probably led to their assets being under the control of the Crown Prince.
This is not
particularly recent, but financial markets tend to have delayed fuse. Add the effect of Iran
sanctions -- it increased prices of oil and gas, but no associated increase the demand from the
Gulf, on the northern shore there is a prospect of tightened belts, on the southern shore
anti-Turkish policies, and Qatar alone is too small.
Plus Erdogan himself promised to "pay more
attention to Turkish central bank", and justifiably or not, that is a very strong sell signal
for the currency.
21 November 2016
Ian Bremmer on the end of the Pax Americana, and what comes next
The following is an interview with Ian Bremmer by Peter Foster, Europe Editor at The
Telegraph. Find the original piece
here .
The so-called 'Pax Americana' that delivered 70 years of peace and rising prosperity after
the end of the Second World War has been fraying for over a decade as globalisation, the rise
of China and the emergence of a revanchist Russia forces a re-ordering of global institutions.
But 2016 has seen a dramatic acceleration in the unravelling of that old world order.
Here Ian Bremmer, the US political scientist who coined the phrase "G-Zero" to describe a
world without any clear global leadership, speaks exclusively to Peter Foster, our Europe
Editor, about the challenges ahead, and how the West can rise to meet them.
People feel that
with Brexit, and now the election of Donald Trump that the 'sky is falling in' – how
worried do we need to be?
From an international perspective, we should be very worried. It's the end of Pax Americana
– the G-Zero has been a long-time coming, and now it's officially here. One of the best
things about being a superpower is that no one can do as much injury to you as you can do to
yourself. That's also one of the worst things.
It's clear that the US doesn't have the international credibility it once had. Compounding
that is that American voters no longer want to be the global policeman, the architect of global
trade or the cheerleader of global values.
Problem is, no one else can play that role. So if Americans don't do it, no one will. The
great irony in all this is that the world is actually doing better than it ever has. Since
1990, we've lifted 1.3 billion people out of extreme poverty.
For the first time ever, less than 10 per cent of the global population lives in extreme
poverty. Think about that – it's the biggest accomplishment of humanity, ever.
Much of that has to do with technology, which provided us with the extraordinary and
unprecedented resources to fix these problems. But now the question has shifted from "do we
have the tools to make the world a better place" to "will our politics allow us to make the
world a better place?" It's not just a critical question; it's the critical question.
How much of Obama's legacy can survive – the Paris Agreement on Climate Change, the Iran
deal, the Russian sanctions, the strengthening of Nato in Europe? And which bits are the most
important to preserve?
I'll be honest -- from where I'm standing, Obama's foreign policy legacy was already in
shambles. He didn't get the Transpacific Partnership (TPP) trade deal done, which would have
made a big difference.
The Paris Agreement was already too late and too little by the time it arrived and now
Trump now gets to unwind it entirely. The "Russia Reset" was largely a failed policy (arguably
even his biggest), and now Trump gets to waltz in and show how great friends he is with the
Russians.
Under Obama's watch, the US-Europe relationship deteriorated to its weakest point in 70
years. And Nato hardly got any stronger during Obama's leadership.
Still, some things will stick.
The Iran deal is real , and if Trump tries to unravel it, he's going to be doing it alone
allies aren't following suit. That includes Russia, who helped negotiate the deal in the first
place.
Going forward, maintaining the Transatlantic alliance and the "pivot" to Asia are the most
important foreign policy objectives left to preserve. But they're both exceptionally weak at
the end of Obama's administration, and both look to deteriorate further under Trump.
If Marine Le Pen wins the French presidential election is that the "end of the EU" as one
official recently described it to me? Would Sarkozy be any better?
No, the EU could still serve an important role despite
a Le Pen victory this spring. But the grand ambition that comes from an overarching,
supranational identity that would bind values and rule of law together, that will be all but
over.
We've already begun to see it with the rise of populism across plenty of EU member states,
but a Le Pen victory would drive that stake in further.
How dangerous for global stability is the recent Russian cyber-intervention into the US
election?
By itself, not that dangerous given that Trump ended up winning the election.
Had Hillary Clinton won , it would be a lot more destabilizing since it would actively
deteriorate Washington-Moscow relations.
More broadly speaking, the precedent of forced transparency continues to grow and undermine
the central power of governments across the world, and is particularly dangerous for those
weaker and more brittle institutions around the world.
What is the risk that a Trump administration starts to remove the US from the global
architecture of economy and trade?
The US remains the largest global economy and has outsized weight accordingly. It's an
extremely attractive market for foreign investors, and that won't be changing anytime soon. But
the US won't be playing the role of trade architect anymore, that's for certain.
So we're going to continue to see the architecture of global trade fragment even further
under a Trump administration. We're also going to see American allies hedge faster away from
the US over the next 4-to-8 years. And not just towards allies far afield like in Asia –
Canada looks poised to be a particularly large beneficiary
What are the biggest centrifugal forces in world affairs at the moment, in your view?
1.
Populism empowered by technology. A global phenomenon, but with particular traction in the
US and Europe.
2. Erosion of the social safety net. Undermines the legitimacy of established institutions,
particularly for centralized state governments.
3. The continued rise of China, along with its alternative economic rule set, principles and
priorities.
4. The continued rise of Putin (and simultaneous decline of Russia), along with his
alternative security rule set, principles and priorities.
Russia has made the United Nations look utterly impotent over Syria. John Bolton, who
loathes the UN, is a key Trump adviser. What hope for António Guterres when he takes
over as UN Secretary-General?
It's going to get harder, no doubt about that. I sat down for dinner with Antonio literally
the night after the US election. Trump ran a campaign directly against globalism – and
given that the UN is the embodiment of globalism (albeit an imperfect one), the incoming UN
Secretary-General recognizes that this directly affects his agenda.
Budgets are likely to get slashed, and the climate agenda will get undermined at every turn.
We aren't heading for good times on the multilateralism front. China launched its own answer to
the World Bank, the Asia Infrastructure and Investment Bank (AIIB) which was welcomed by
Britain, but initially rebuffed by the Obama administration.
Should we welcome the AIIB, as part of the regionalising of global finance, which arguably
should make it more resilient, or are we witnessing the Balkanization of global financial
structures?
Given that wishing it away isn't going to work at this point, the West should welcome it.
There's a reason they coined the phrase "if you can't beat 'em, join 'em."
The West should want the AIIB to succeed, and should work with it to have influence over its
direction from within.
If TPP and TTIP are dead ducks in a 'Trumpiverse', then what next for world trade?
World trade will become much more fragmented and driven by alternative actors than the ones
we're accustomed to. We're already seeing that the real money and global strategy right now is
being driven by Beijing.
China is soon to be the world's largest economy, and will do so while being authoritarian
and state capitalist. That's unprecedented. It's also the end of the global free market and the
beginning of a hybrid global economy.
You've talked about the urgent need for the IMF to 'get political' and 'develop a political
mandate'? What does that mean? Where could it make a difference in practice?
I feel very strongly we are experiencing an unwinding of the geopolitical order that we have
all grown used to and critical organisations that are part of the fabric of that architecture
– like the IMF, the UN, the WTO – are going to be under a lot of pressure.
If they are going to get it right, not only are they going to have to engage with actors who
are not really aligned with them as much as they would like, but they are also going to have to
address the roots of the current problems which are not only economic, but political.
The IMF has historically not had that political mandate but they need it now because it will
determine whether or not they are successful. They need a voice, or they will suffer death by a
thousand cuts. The arrival of Trump in the White House the perfect moment to establish their
independence and credibility.
How much blame should Obama shoulder for the implosion of the Pax Americana – I'm
thinking particularly of his decision to essentially allow a sectarian controlled-burn in the
Middle East, sparking a refugee crisis and raising questions about US commitment to
underwriting global order?
To be honest, the end of Pax Americana has more to do with structural factors than anything
else. The energy revolution is undermining the Middle East; Europe is dealing with its own
succession of crises and teeters on the edge of fragmentation; China is rising as an
alternative economic force; Russia is rising as an alternative military force.
True, Obama didn't help stop these developments much, but they were coming either way. Trump
is simply the nail in the coffin of the Pax Americana era.
You've talked about the need to re-write the social contract, given the populist rejection
of the establishment. What does that mean in practice?
In practice, it means that the middle and working classes will have to feel like their
governments are legitimate and responding to their need. That means funding functioning
infrastructure, health care, and education; it means providing the feeling that there are
opportunities in the future.
So either we see serious redistribution and spending to make that happen or we have to
accept a permanent disenfranchised population that gets walled off and/or revolts.
How important is the rise of the robots and the so-called 'third' industrial revolution to
the current erosion of global order?
The rise of the robots is critical , and it's been driving a lot of the
populism/protectionism sentiment in the US and Europe. And it's going to hit emerging markets
next. And let's be honest; AI [Artificial Intelligence] and robotics have the potential to
upend society to a staggering degree, taking labor out of the capital equation for lots of
actors.
The only thing worse that having a job that doesn't pay you a decent wage is not having a
job at all.
Lastly, you have observed that "things/processes/technology tend to be globalising, it's the
people that aren't" - given that the march of technology cannot be stopped, what can be done
for the people?
As I wrote above, this is the social safety net question. If you are a defender of
globalisation, you also need to be a defender of the people globalisation is displacing.
Otherwise it will never work. If you didn't believe that before, 2016 should convince you
otherwise.
This interview was originally published by The Telegraph
here .
While it is stupid to argue that neoliberalism does not exist: it exits both as ideology, economic theory and politicl
pratice (much like Marxism before it; yet another "man-made" ideology -- actually a variation of Trotskyism, this discussion does
illuminate some interesting and subtle points.
Notable quotes:
"... Neoliberalism is a time-limited global system sustained by coercive imposition of competitive behaviour, parasitic finance & privatisation. ..."
"... But it's better to think of neoliberalism as a bunch of arrangements ("system" if you remove connotations of design) rather than as an ideology. Ed has a point when he says that almost nobody fully subscribes to "neoliberal ideology": free market supporters, for example, don't defend crony capitalism. ..."
"... Perhaps the texts of transnational trade treaties might be the best place to search for a de facto definition of neoliberalism. ..."
"... Whether or not the present neoliberal system is the result of a single coherent ideology, it emerged from the 70s on as a set of related (if not deliberately coordinated) responses to the structural crises of the older postwar Keynesian system. And there was definitely a cluster of policy-making elites in the early 70s making similar observations about the failure of consensus capitalism. ..."
"... It is possible to have 'hard' and 'soft' neoliberalism depending on whether the state employs 'carrots' or 'sticks', but essentially almost the entire UK political system agreed that 'There Is No Alternative' until Corbyn became Labour leader. ..."
"... I think Will Davies has hit the spot with his definition of neoliberalism as "the disenchantment of politics by economics". In other words, neoliberalism is first and foremost a political praxis, not an economic theory. It is about power, hence the continuing importance of the state. ..."
"... That is the Great Transformation and neoliberalism as its current phase are about turning institutions into businesses (including marriage), and part of this is "managerialism". This is not done because businesses are inherently better for every purpose than institutions, but because businesses are better vehicles than institutions for tunnelling (looting) by their managers. ..."
"... Neo-liberals are not opposed to all types of government intervention. But like neo-classical economists, they believe ultimately in the price mechanism to allocate resources - in the long run, if not the short. ..."
"... In terms of sincerity, Milton Friedman asserted in "Capitalism and Freedom" that the more a society was "free market," the more equal it was. Come the preface to 50th anniversary edition, he simply failed to mention that applying his own ideology had refuted his assertion (and it was an assertion). ..."
"... Neo-liberalism never been about reducing "the State" but rather strengthening it in terms of defending and supporting capital. Hence you see Tories proclaim they are "cutting back the state" while also increasing state regulation on trade unions -- and regulating strikes, and so the labour market. ..."
"... Somewhere along the line neo-liberalism got associated with austerity and small-government policies. The latter I think was because they are (correctly) associated with promoting privatisation and deregulation policy. ..."
"... But the market is the creation of man. It has no power, no judgement, other than that bestowed on it by us. My problem with neoliberalism is the belief that decisions can be made on the basis of a money metric whereas we know that money is not necessarily a good measure of value. ..."
"... Neoliberalism is real, but only describes background theoretical claims. It is wrong to apply the term to the broader political movement it supported. The political movement was dedicated to maximizing the power and freedom of action of large-scale capital accumulators. Lots of ideas from neoliberal intellectual argumentation were used to increase the power of capital accumulators, and neoliberal economists tended to ignore many aspects of the political movement they supported (strongr state power, crony capitalism, monopoly power) not strictly part of neoliberal theory ..."
"... usually the theory was just a weapon used in internal battles or as a PR tool to mask less savory political objectives. ..."
"... Repeating the message: "neoliberalism" has a pretty much official definition, the "Washington Consensus". And the core part of the "Washington Consensus" is "labour market reform", that is in practice whichever policies make labour more "competitive" and wages more "affordable". ..."
"... The "free markets" of neoliberalism are primarily "free" labour markets, that is free of unions. ..."
"... I would argue that, in terms of practical working definitions, Max Sawicky's definition of neo-liberalism seems to work well, at least in the U.S. context (second half of post): https://mikethemadbiologist.com/2017/04/28/remember-the-victims-of-the-nebraska-public-power-district/ ..."
Is neoliberalism even a thing? This is the question posed by Ed Conway, who
claims
it is "not an ideology but an insult." I half agree.
I agree that the economic system we have is "hardly the result of a guiding ideology" and more the result of "happenstance".
I say this because neoliberalism is NOT the same as the sort of free market ideology proposed by Friedman and Hayek. If this were
the case, it would have died on 13 October 2008 when the government bailed out
RBS .
In fact, though, as Will
Davies
and Adam Curtis
have said, neoliberalism entails the use of an active state. A big part of neoliberalism is the use of the state to increase the
power and profits of the 1% - capitalists and top managers. Increased managerialism, crony capitalism and tough benefit sanctions
are all features of neoliberalism. In this respect, the EU's treatment of Greece was neoliberal – ensuring that banks got paid at
the expense of ordinary people.
I suspect, though, that measures such as these were, as Ed says, not so much part of a single ideology as uncoordinated events.
Tax cuts for the rich, public sector outsourcing and target culture, for example, were mostly justified by appeals to efficiency,
and were not regarded even by their advocates as parts of a unified theory. To believe otherwise would be to subscribe to a conspiracy
theory which gives too much credit to Thatcher and her epigones.
Neoliberalism is a time-limited global system sustained by coercive imposition of competitive behaviour, parasitic finance
& privatisation.
I'm not sure about that word "system". Maybe it attributes too much systematization to neoliberals: perhaps unplanned order would
be a better phrase. But it's better to think of neoliberalism as a bunch of arrangements ("system" if you remove connotations
of design) rather than as an ideology. Ed has a point when he says that almost nobody fully subscribes to "neoliberal ideology":
free market supporters, for example, don't defend crony capitalism.
And it's useful to have words for economic systems. Just as we speak of "post-war Keynesianism" to mean a bundle of policies and
institutions of which Keynesian fiscal policy was only a small part, so we can speak of "neoliberalism" to describe our current arrangement.
It's a better description than the horribly question-begging "late capitalism".
This isn't to say that "neoliberalism" has a precise meaning. There are varieties of it, just as there were of post-war Keynesianism.
Think of the word as like "purple". There are shades of purple, we'll not agree when exactly purple turns into blue, and we'll struggle
to define the word (especially to someone who is colour-blind). But "purple" is nevertheless a useful word, and we know it when we
see it.
If neoliberalism is a system rather than an ideology, what role does ideology play?
I suspect it's that of post-fact justification.
Put it this way. In the mid-80s nobody argued that the share of GDP going to the top 1% should double. Of course, many advocated
policies which, it turns out, had this effect. Some of them intended this. But those policies were justified on other grounds, often
sincerely. Instead, the belief that the top 1% "deserve" 15% of total incomes rather than 7-8% has mostly followed them getting 15%,
not led it. A host of cognitive biases – the just world illusion,
anchoring
effect and status quo bias underpin
an ideology which defends inequality. John Jost calls this system
justification (pdf) . You can gather all these biases under the umbrella term "neoliberal ideology" if you want. But it follows
economic events rather than is the creator of them.
So, I half agree with Ed that neoliberalism isn't a guiding ideology. But I also agree with Paul, that it is a way of describing
a particular economic system.
I don't, however, want to get hung up on words: I'd rather leave such pedantry to the worst sort of academic. What's more important
than language is the brute fact that productivity and hence real incomes for most of us have
stagnated for years. In this sense, our existing economic system has
failed the majority of people. And this is true whatever name you give it.
Perhaps the texts of transnational trade treaties might be the best place to search for a de facto definition of neoliberalism.
There's not much room to blur, obfuscate (beyond the natural impenetrability of legalese) or wreath around with dubious ethicism
in these documents I'd imagine.
if it's a way of describing the prevailing economic system, does it make sense to describe people as neoliberals? Does that imply
that everyone who is not a radical revolutionary (i.e. anyone who if they got their way in government would still be within normal
variation in policies from a USA Republican administration to the Danish Labour party?). So the Koch brothers are neoliberals
and Brad De Long is a neoliberal despite them disagreeing vehemently about most things?
I know we have lots of other words that are used in wildly inconsistent ways (capitalism, socialism) but I can't help being
irked by the sheer incoherence of the things that neoliberals are accused of. Most recent example to come to mind, somebody in
conversation with Will Davies on Twitter claimed neoliberals oppose redistribution (and Will did not correct him). FFS.
'But, despite the fact that neoliberalism is frequently referred to as an ideology, it is oddly difficult to pin down. For
one thing, it is a word that tends to be used almost exclusively by those who are criticising it - not by its advocates, such
as they are (in stark contrast to almost every other ideology, nearly no-one self-describes as a neoliberal). In other words,
it is not an ideology but an insult.'
Well political science and history uses models too. What is the problem of say David Harvey's definition in, A Brief History
of ...that which doesn't exist (2007)?
Rather I think he means it upsets 'main stream' economics professors, to be called this term, and rather than opt for Wren
Lewis gambit (there is such a thing as 'Media Macro' or 'Tory Macro', or 'Econ 101', which I found interesting as it happens)
Conway has gone for pedantry and first year Politics student essentialism, ie what is Democracy? type stuff.
Neoliberalism, at least in the UK, was in part a reaction by Thatcher & Co to the excesses of previous Labour administrations:
excesses in the form of "if an industry looks like going bust, let's pour whatever amount of taxpayer's money into it needed to
save it". Thatcher & Co's reaction was: "s*d that for a lark – the rules of the free market are better than industrial subsidies
(especially industrial subsidies in cabinet ministers' constituencies)"
Whether or not the present neoliberal system is the result of a single coherent ideology, it emerged from the 70s on as a
set of related (if not deliberately coordinated) responses to the structural crises of the older postwar Keynesian system. And
there was definitely a cluster of policy-making elites in the early 70s making similar observations about the failure of consensus
capitalism.
"if it's a way of describing the prevailing economic system, does it make sense to describe people as neoliberals?"
Yes, these are largely people who reacted to the 'series of events' that occurred in the global economy in the 1970s by essentially
accepting a certain set of policies and responses, many of which involved seeking to insulate the state against collective popular
demands, intervening against organised labour, deregulating finance and targeting state intervention towards private business.
It is possible to have 'hard' and 'soft' neoliberalism depending on whether the state employs 'carrots' or 'sticks', but essentially
almost the entire UK political system agreed that 'There Is No Alternative' until Corbyn became Labour leader.
Many of these people were hardly hardcore ideologists but rather pragmatic
or unimaginative types that were unwilling to challenge the 'status quo' or the prevailing economic system, just as there were
very few classical liberals from WWI onwards.
I think Will Davies has hit the spot with his definition of neoliberalism as "the disenchantment of politics by economics". In
other words, neoliberalism is first and foremost a political praxis, not an economic theory. It is about power, hence the continuing
importance of the state.
This instrumentality echoes Thatcher's insistence that "Economics are the method; the object is to change the heart and soul",
which shows that there was more in play in the late-70s and early-80s than simply responding to the "structural crises of the
older postwar Keynesian system".
You should be reading Philip Mirowski instead. The economist and historian of science Philip Mirowski is considered the foremost expert on this subject, he has written many
books on this the latest is:
"The Knowledge We Have Lost in Information: The History of Information in Modern Economics":
Neoliberalism is a philosophy based on the metaphor/idea that the "market" is an information process ad it is quasi-omniscient,
that "knows" more than any and all of us could ever know. It makes certain claims about what "information" is and what a "market"
is. It's mostly started with the Mont Perelin Society think-tank.
"productivity and hence real incomes for most of us have stagnated for years."
But for many, usually people who vote more often or more opportunistically, they have been years of booming living standards.
The core of the electoral appeal of thatcherism is that thatcherites whether Conservative or New Labour have worked hard to
ensure that upper-middle (and many middle) class voters collectively cornered the southern property market, creating a massive
short squeeze on people short housing.
So many champagne leftists of some age talk about policies and concepts, but for the many the number one problem for decades
has been managing to pay rent.
"neoliberalism is first and foremost a political praxis, not an economic theory. It is about power, hence the continuing
importance of the state."
That's a very good point, but I would rather say that's a good description of New Right/thatcherite (and "third way" clintonian/mandelsonian)
politics, and neoliberalism is the economic policy aspect.
There is after all something called "The Washington consensus" that is a "standard" set of neoliberal economic policies.
"Neoliberalism is a philosophy based on the metaphor/idea that the "market" is an information process"
Written that wait it evokes Polanyi's "Great transformation" where markets mechanisms have displaced social mechanisms in many
areas.
But Just yesterday I realized that Polanyi was subtly off-target: it is not markets-vs-society (two fairly abstract concepts)
but instead institutions-vs-businesses.
That is the Great Transformation and neoliberalism as its current phase are about turning institutions into businesses
(including marriage), and part of this is "managerialism". This is not done because businesses are inherently better for every
purpose than institutions, but because businesses are better vehicles than institutions for tunnelling (looting) by their managers.
"the "market" is an information process ad it is quasi-omniscient, that "knows" more than any and all of us could ever know"
There have been a few books arguing that "the market", being omniscient, all powerful, and just in judging everybody and giving
them exactly what they deserve, has replaced God, and today's sell-side neoliberal Economists are its preachers:
Economists started using the term neo-liberalism a bit later, after it became a derogatory term - and after 2008 began to disassociate
from it (a few, and very few, did after the Asian Financial Crisis).
It is important to realise I think that it is a term that closely linked to political science -- and in particular a branch
of international relations. The person most associated with Neo-liberalism is Francis Fukuyama. What he did was link capitalism
and democracy; both he said had triumphed and because they respect the freedom of individual liberty and they allowed markets,
which are the most efficient way of allocating resources, to operate liberally. Its heyday was at the time of the collapse of
the Berlin Wall - "the end of history" as FF famously said.
Political scientists see neo-classical economics and neo-liberalism as very compatible, because of the formers basic construct
of individual optimisation, rational choice and market efficiency. Often they are grouped together and contrasted with radical
and realist (realpolitik) approaches. For neo-liberals and neo-classicists, markets get prices right, whether they do so with
a lag is a minor point.
Neo-liberals are not opposed to all types of government intervention. But like neo-classical economists, they believe ultimately
in the price mechanism to allocate resources - in the long run, if not the short.
They have no problem with welfare states. Like neo-classical economists they accept the second welfare theorem.
They are pro-globalisation: they don't like international trade, capital or immigration controls. Why? Because they impact
on individual liberty and distort market prices.
International relations were often guiding reasons behind economic policy that were pro-globalisation. By encouraging globalisation,
you were encouraging international capitalism and thereby the spread of democracy (a la Francis Fukuyama). International relations
policy was close to the PM, and run from the Cabinet Office.
I would argue that Blair and Jonathan Portes are prime examples of neo-liberals. And indeed the Clinton/Blair years were quintessentially
neo-liberal in the formerly correct use of the term. Thatcher, as a strong opponent of the welfare state, was not.
One further point. Neo-liberals are progressively and socially liberal, as well as economically liberal. They believe in cosmopolitanism
and diversity and put much emphasis on minority and women's rights.
"In fact, though, as Will Davies and Adam Curtis have said, neoliberalism entails the use of an active state."
It has always been like that -- Kropotkin was attacking Marxists for suggesting otherwise over a hundred years ago.
"In the mid-80s nobody argued that the share of GDP going to the top 1% should double. Of course, many advocated policies which,
it turns out, had this effect. Some of them intended this. But those policies were justified on other grounds, often sincerely."
Yes, different rhetoric was often used -- but the net effect was always obvious, and pointed out at the time. But you get better
results with honey than vinegar...
In terms of sincerity, Milton Friedman asserted in "Capitalism and Freedom" that the more a society was "free market," the
more equal it was. Come the preface to 50th anniversary edition, he simply failed to mention that applying his own ideology had
refuted his assertion (and it was an assertion).
Neo-liberalism never been about reducing "the State" but rather strengthening it in terms of defending and supporting capital.
Hence you see Tories proclaim they are "cutting back the state" while also increasing state regulation on trade unions -- and
regulating strikes, and so the labour market.
"intervening against organised labour" China bans unions, doesn't it? Are they in this tent too?
"targeting state intervention towards private business" not quite sure what that means but pre-1970 import substitution industrial
policy is what?
am I a neoliberal because I think markets do process dispersed information and that competition does some good things (I am
worried about monopolies, I would be worried about non-competitive government procurement) or am I not a neoliberal because I
am nowhere near thinking markets are omniscient and could write long essays on how markets fail?
am I a neoliberal because I think the Washington Consensus is broadly sensible (with some reservations) or not a neoliberal
because I'd like to see far more social housing?
Somewhere along the line neo-liberalism got associated with austerity and small-government policies. The latter I think was
because they are (correctly) associated with promoting privatisation and deregulation policy.
But neo-liberals have never been against welfare states in principle or counter-cyclical policy in principle.
Key-neo-liberals, however, were pro-austerity policy after the Asian Financial Crisis - but this included most of the mainstream
economics establishment (most crucially of all Stanley Fischer at the IMF). Their rational (naturally enough) related to consistency,
credibility, incentives and moral hazard arguments. There were a few who protested (eg Stiglitz). But they were exceptions.
@ Luis Enrique
I don't think you'd make the grade as a 'true' neo-liberal unless you'd be happy for your social housing to be less then optimal
and only for the destitute. Do you see moral hazard if the housing market is once again sidestepped in favour of decent homes
for average every-day heroes, or do you subscribe (explicitly) to the view that the state must sanction and hurt in order that
individuals strive?
"There have been a few books arguing that "the market", being omniscient, all powerful, and just in judging everybody and giving
them exactly what they deserve, has replaced God...."
But the market is the creation of man. It has no power, no judgement, other than that bestowed on it by us. My problem with neoliberalism is the belief that decisions can be made on the basis of a money metric whereas we know that
money is not necessarily a good measure of value.
'"intervening against organised labour"
China bans unions, doesn't it? Are they in this tent too?'
Well yes. They have taken it further than most countries, stripping back their welfare system while increasing state promotion
of capitalist development.
'"targeting state intervention towards private business" not quite sure what that means but pre-1970 import substitution industrial
policy is what?'
Import substitution industrial policy is protectionism, not neoliberalism. I'm referring to governments' privatisation and
outsourcing of public services and industries, taking them out of political responsibility and collective provision, while at
the same time providing them with subsidies and guaranteed markets.
Ben, ok protectionism is a different tactic than outsourcing but it's intervention towards private business so maybe that's not
a defining characteristic of neoliberalism?
And if the Chinese Communist party is neoliberal and also the Koch brothers I am not convinced this is a useful nomenclature
Is Productivity Growth like Evolution ?
Is it possible that productivity growth is like evolution: It can be a fortitous accident or it can happen due to competitive
pressure. The fortuitous accidents are the new technologies whose advantages are so obvious they are quickly adopted.
The competitive pressures can be constraints on profits or resources that force greater efficiency. Perhaps, now, in the UK, there is no shortage of reasonably priced personnel, infrastructure and goods. So, if productivity growth is low, you can be certain neither requirement has been met.
If neither requirement has been met, then, it may well be that there is excessive unused capacity and, if that is the case,
GDP growth has been suboptimal.
Which leads to the best question: Is greater GDP growth the result of greater efficiency or is greater efficiency the result
of greater GDP growth?
The conclusion is that it may be a mistake to guide policy under the assumption that GDP growth must he preceded by productivity
growth. Failing to realize this may be a cause of unnoticed suboptimal GDP growth.
.
1. Neoliberalism is real, but only describes background theoretical claims. It is wrong to apply the term to the broader political
movement it supported. The political movement was dedicated to maximizing the power and freedom of action of large-scale capital
accumulators. Lots of ideas from neoliberal intellectual argumentation were used to increase the power of capital accumulators,
and neoliberal economists tended to ignore many aspects of the political movement they supported (strongr state power, crony capitalism,
monopoly power) not strictly part of neoliberal theory
2. The overlap and confusion between neoliberal theory and the political movement for unfettered freedom for capital accumulator
is consistent with the broader history of movement conservatism. After WW2, conservatives (broadly defined) had a fixation with
developing an intellectual foundatation/justification for their policy preferences. Partly as a reaction to the perception that
FDR-LBJ era liberalism was based on theories published by Ivy League professors. The Mont Pelerin intellectual thread that Mirowski
and others describe was part of this process. But (even for the liberals) it was always a mistake to claim that intellectual/ideological
theorizing lead to political policy and action. It was sometimes the opposite; usually the theory was just a weapon used in internal
battles or as a PR tool to mask less savory political objectives.
3. Democratic neoliberalism (Brad DeLong) was always a totally different animal. It was a reaction to the economic crises of the
70s/80s--New Deal policies written in 1934 didn't seem to be working; maybe would should incorporate market forces a bit more.
At the same time Republican neoliberalism had abandoned all pretense of detached analysis and was now strictly a tool supporting
the pursuit of power.
"Put it this way. In the mid-80s nobody argued that the share of GDP going to the top 1% should double. Of course, many advocated
policies which, it turns out, had this effect. Some of them intended this. But those policies were justified on other grounds,
often sincerely. Instead, the belief that the top 1% "deserve" 15% of total incomes rather than 7-8% has mostly followed them
getting 15%, not led it. "
This is just not true. People did argue that, did announce the intent of these policies in public. Bill Mitchell's former student
Victor Quirk is great on such declarations of war on the poor from the rich throughout history. Mitchell himself wrote that he
was surprised how many and how blatant these declarations were.
"But the market is the creation of man. It has no power, no judgement, other than that bestowed on it by us."
But the neoliberal thesis is that it is all-knowing, all-powerful, all-judging. "vox populi vox dei" taken to an extreme.
"My problem with neoliberalism is the belief that decisions can be made on the basis of a money metric"
That to me seems a very poor argument, because then many will object that ignoring the money metric means that you want someone
else to pay. Consider the statement "everybody has a right to healthcare free at the point of use": it is mere handwaving unless you explain
who and how to pay for it.
The discussion in the money yes/no terms is for me fruitless, because there are two distinct issues in a project: the motivation
for there being the project, and the business of doing the project.
Claiming that the *only* motivation for a project should be money seems to me as bad a claiming that given a good motivation
how to pay for a project does not matter.
Projects don't reduce to their motivation any more than they reduce to the business of doing them.
An extreme example I make is marriage: for me it is (also) a business, as it requires a careful look at money and organization
issues, but hopefully the motivation to engage in that business is not economic, but personal feelings.
That's why I mentioned a better-than-Polanyi duality between businesses and institutions: institutions as a rule carry out
businesses but for non-business motivations, while "pure" businesses have merely economic motivations.
For example a university setup as a charity versus one setup a a business: both carry out business activities, but the motivation
of the former is not merely to do business.
Repeating the message: "neoliberalism" has a pretty much official definition, the "Washington Consensus". And the core part
of the "Washington Consensus" is "labour market reform", that is in practice whichever policies make labour more "competitive"
and wages more "affordable".
The "free markets" of neoliberalism are primarily "free" labour markets, that is free of unions.
@ Blissex "ignoring the money metric means that you want someone else to pay."
Not sure I follow. If payment is made via money then that is not ignoring the money metric, i.e. money as a measure of value.
Do we want someone to do the project and is someone willing and able to do it? If, yes, then money is not (or at least does not
need to be) the constraint. It is a mechanism to facilitate the project. If we want universal healthcare, money is not the constraint,
the constraint is the ability of society to train and sustain (feed and house) the required expertise.
Neo-liberalism is an economic idea based on the conjecture that by reverting the level of state spending and regulation of an
economy to that which existed at an earlier stage of its economic development will produce the same level of economic growth which
the economy experienced then.
But the level of output of an economy is a reflection of the level of the efficiency of that economy, the level of economic
growth therefore reflects the rate of increase in its efficiency in terms of increased economic output as the economy develops,
a measure which inevitably reduces in its order as an economy approaches its maximum level of efficiency and output. So the rate
of economic growth of an economy will inevitably be progressively reduced as an economy matures as the opportunities for efficiency
improvements are exploited and the number that remain diminish.
The level of state spending and regulation typical of economically developed societies are responses to the social change which
economic development itself has brought about. Abolishing those responses therefore is likely only to serve to reintroduce the
social problems which led to their introduction and to make the social consequences of economic development more arduous for the
lower social and economic groups disfavoured by that process of social change.
Neo-liberalism is, like other materialist ideology of the progressive left and right, a predominantly economic idea which is
a product of the affluent and intellectual classes who themselves, being a product of their elevated economic condition, being
dependent upon it and therefore having a vested interest in its continuance, are imbued with a bias which sees the improvement
in the general economic condition as a natural unmitigated good and are therefore oblivious or apathetic to its non-material consequences
as material progress causes a society and its population to diverge from its native and surviving character as it adapts to the
historically exceptional conditions of modernity and undermines its cultural foundation and ultimately threatens its long term
cultural future.
It seems clear from the above posts that there is no clear consensus about what neo-liberalism actually is.
I suggest the use of the term is little more than a cloak used to cover up an uncomfortable reality for those on the left.
Traditional left wing policies, such as nationalisation, state intervention in the economy such as rent controls, high marginal
tax rates, and strong trade unions systematically failed to deliver prosperity. States which moved to economic models involving
more reliance on markets to shift labour and capital to new activities seemed to prosper far better. Rather than say that conservatives
such as Friedman were proved right about the fundamental propositions about how an economy should be organised, the soft left
adopted conservative policies, and have dressed it up as 'neo-liberalism' to save face.
Indeed, some on the left, such as 'filthy rich' Mandelson, embraced the market economy with the zeal of converts, and have
ignored its faults and problems, and have failed to seek to mitigate or remedy these faults and problems.
The best thing to do is consult a first or second year undergraduate political science or international relations text. Burchill
"Theories of International Relations, Palgrave is a good one, and used in many UK universities. There will be a chapter on neo-liberalism
in them. These texts give you the standard blurb on what neo-liberalism really is (as well as what the other major schools of
thoughts are together with critiques of all of them).
Neo-liberalism is very much a coherent (but by no means flawless) theory.
Neo-liberalism comes from the subject of international relations. Fukuyama is the most representative neo-liberal. Important
is the notion of 'soft power': the spread of capitalism and western culture and other forms of globalisation spreads western notions
of democracy and human rights. It was important to integrate countries into the international capitalist (and engage them in the
multilateral) system. At the time of the fall of the Berlin Wall this seemed to be a convincing theory. It was very much adopted
as a key foreign policy strategy in the UK and the US. One of its biggest blows, however, is the lack of political reform we have
seen in China. What this showed was that democratisation does not necessarily follow capitalism and globalisation.
Just to qualify what I said above - the would not use the term "western notions". Ie they would not associate democracy or human
rights with being western. They are very cosmopolitan, and believe in the notion of universal, (not relative), values.
""ignoring the money metric means that you want someone else to pay."
... then money is not (or at least does not need to be) the constraint. It is a mechanism to facilitate the project. If we want
universal healthcare, money is not the constraint,"
Oh please, this is just two-bit nominalism: "money" then is just the mechanism by which "you want someone else to pay" and
indeed:
"the constraint is the ability of society to train and sustain (feed and house) the required expertise."
That is the *physical* aggregate constraint, regardless of whoever pays, the practical constraint, given that physical stuff
is purchased with money, creating or obtaining that money.
The question is then distributional, who is going to pay the money to "train and sustain (feed and house) the required expertise".
Unless there are ample unused resources, someone will have to pay.
What right-wingers object to is the idea that "universal health care" is paid for as a percent of income, so that someone on
Ł100,000 a year pays Ł8,000 a year for exactly the same level of service that someone on Ł10,000 a year pays Ł800 a year for.
@Luis Enrique: Correct - you are not a neoliberal as you'd like to see far more social housing? A neoliberal believes in more
economic freedom, so you achieve the aim of housing people who need state help for housing, food, energy etc by giving them the
money to buy a basic level of those things. The State should not be in the business of saying this house here is not a social
housing one, but this next that gets built is.
Blissex: "Oh please, this is just two-bit nominalism: "money" then is just the mechanism by which "you want someone else to pay""
Umm, no. In real terms, the someone else who is paying in health care is mainly the health care professional treating you.
"Unless there are ample unused resources, someone will have to pay."
But in all modern capitalist countries there are ample unused resources as far as the eye can see. Medicine is one way to use
them up, nearly cost-free, and all benefit. Most people value "not being dead" highly. As Paul Samuelson said responding to stupid
worries about the cost of the US health care system, so it's 15% (or whatever). It's the best 15% of the economy.
The real problem is that "socialized medicine" is too efficient in real terms, and doesn't create corrupt and powerful satrapies
to demand public money, as the US health system does. Since the UK has the most efficient health care system, it has the least
real resource "someone has to pay" problem, but it causes the biggest demand gap, the true longterm, macro problem. The opposite
for the USA. The real right wing concern is that the underpeople get health care at all, not some smokescreen triviality about
nominal taxation.
Most written about health care, as about war, follows the backwards, mainstream way. C Adams is following the correct, MMT/Keynesian
way. If that is two-bit nominalism, we need more of it.
"... By Christine Berry. Originally published at openDemocracy ..."
"... The really fascinating battles in intellectual history tend to occur when some group or movement goes on the offensive and asserts that Something Big really doesn't actually exist." ..."
"... "a new ideology must give high priority to real and efficient limitation of the state's ability to, in detail, intervene in the activities of the individual. At the same time, it is absolutely clear that there are positive functions allotted to the state. The doctrine that, one and off, has been called neoliberalism and that has developed, more or less simultaneously in many parts of the world is precisely such a doctrine But instead of the 19 th century understanding that laissez-faire is the means to achieve this goal, neoliberalism proposes that competition will lead the way". ..."
"... Wealth of Nations ..."
"... Neoliberalism is like a Caddis Fly larvae, that sticks random objects outside its cocoon to blend in. ..."
"... Neoliberalism did not just adopt neoclassical economics, nor did it simply infest political parties of the right. Neoliberalism re-invented neoclassical economics in ways that defined not just the "right" of academic economics, but also defined the "left". Keynesian economics was absorbed and transmogrified by first one neoclassical synthesis and then a second, leaving a New Keynesian macroeconomics to occupy the position of a nominal left within mainstream economics. If you are waiting for a Krugman or even a Stiglitz to oppose neoliberalism, you will be waiting a very long time, because they are effectively locked into the neoliberal dialectic. ..."
"... If neoliberalism can be broken down to "Because markets" perhaps it could also be referred to as "Market Darwinism". ..."
"... A fundamental difference between neoliberalism and classic economists like Ricardo & Smith is the latter's adamant opposition to rent seeking and insistence on fighting it by taxation. Neoliberalism on the other hand not only accepts rent-seeking, but actively encourages it. Thus we see not only the ascendancy of of the FIRE sector, but the effective destruction of markets as mechanisms of price discovery. ..."
"... Neoliberalism is just another damn thing that externalizes and socializes costs. It is a very costly thing. ..."
"... Much as I regard your past comments, I must disagree with your assertion "Neoliberalism is just another damn thing that externalizes and socializes costs". Neoliberalism does indeed externalize and socialize costs but it is more than just another damn thing. Just the scale and scope of the think tank network assembled and well funded to promote the concepts of the Neoliberal thought collective should be adequate to convince you that it is much more than "just another damn thing". ..."
"... Consider just the visible portion of the think tanks which are part of the Neoliberal thought collective. "Today, Atlas Network connects more than 450 think tanks in nearly 100 countries. Each is writing its own story of how principled work to affect public opinion, on behalf of the ideas of a free society, can better individuals' lives." ..."
"... Next consider the state of the economics profession. Neoliberalism has taken over many major schools of economics and a large number of the economics journals. In a publish or perish world there are few alternatives to an adherence to some flavor of Neoliberal ideology. This is not "just another damn thing." Consider how many national politicians are spouting things like there is 'no such thing as society'. This is not "just another damn thing" -- it is something much much more scary. ..."
"... "I am not well qualified to criticize those theories, because as a market participant, I considered them so unrealistic that I never bothered to study them" ..."
"... "Those, like Ed Conway, who persist in claiming neoliberalism doesn't even exist, may soon find themselves left behind by history." ..."
"... "One of the great achievements of neoliberalism has been to induce such a level of collective amnesia that it's now once again possible to claim that these tenets are simply "fundamental economic rules" handed down directly from Adam Smith on tablets of stone, unchallenged and unchallengeable in the history of economic thought." ..."
"... "The labour and time of the poor is in civilised countries sacrificed to the maintaining of the rich in ease and luxury. The Landlord is maintained in idleness and luxury by the labour of his tenants. The moneyed man is supported by his extractions from the industrious merchant and the needy who are obliged to support him in ease by a return for the use of his money. But every savage has the full fruits of his own labours; there are no landlords, no usurers and no tax gatherers." ..."
"... "The interest of the dealers, however, in any particular branch of trade or manufactures, is always in some respects different from, and even opposite to, that of the public. To widen the market and to narrow the competition, is always the interest of the dealers. To widen the market may frequently be agreeable enough to the interest of the public; but to narrow the competition must always be against it, and can serve only to enable the dealers, by raising their profits above what they naturally would be, to levy, for their own benefit, an absurd tax upon the rest of their fellow-citizens." ..."
"... "The proposal of any new law or regulation of commerce which comes from this order ought always to be listened to with great precaution, and ought never to be adopted till after having been long and carefully examined, not only with the most scrupulous, but with the most suspicious attention. It comes from an order of men whose interest is never exactly the same with that of the public, who have generally an interest to deceive and even to oppress the public, and who accordingly have, upon many occasions, both deceived and oppressed it." ..."
"... "All for ourselves, and nothing for other people seems, in every age of the world, to have been the vile maxim of the masters of mankind." ..."
"... "But the rate of profit does not, like rent and wages, rise with the prosperity and fall with the declension of the society. On the contrary, it is naturally low in rich and high in poor countries, and it is always highest in the countries which are going fastest to ruin." ..."
"... A reading of Smith's 'The Theory of Moral Sentiments' written before, but revised after, WoN is also worthwhile. As is, as ever, Karl Polyani's opening salvo against Smith's take on 'human market nature' (my term). Everyone should read 'The Great Transformation' at least once. ..."
"... Neoliberalism is the refinement of this basic human tendency for domination. It is a camouflaged form of oppression that is revealed through its ultimate effect, not what it does at the moment. A neoliberal is a disguised raider or conquerer. ..."
"... Neoliberals prefer a strong state that promotes their ends, not one that opposes them, or has the ability to oppose the means and methods of private capital . That leaves the playing field with a single team. ..."
"... Homo economicus ..."
"... Neoliberals argue that since members of H. economicus ..."
"... "Stocks have reached what looks like a permanently high plateau." ..."
"... "Doing the same thing again and again and expecting to get a different result" ..."
"... "[ ] Well, this one at least is half-true. Like literally every concept that has ever mattered, the concept of 'neoliberalism' is messy, it's deeply contested [ ]" ..."
"... Although it serves the purposes of the rich-and-powerful rather well, I think "neoliberalism" as a rhetorical engine and set of ideas is the ideology of the 9.9%, the chattering classes of professionals and bureaucrats who need a cover story for their own participation in running the world for the benefit of the 0.1% These are the people who need to rationalize what they do and cooperate and coordinate among themselves and that's a challenge because of their sheer numbers. ..."
"... Neoliberalism says it aims at freedom and social welfare and innovation and other good things. If neoliberalism said it aimed to make the richest 0.1% richer at the expense of everyone else, it would provoke political opposition from the 99% for obvious reasons. Including opposition from the 9.9% whom they need to run things, to run the state, run the corporations. ..."
"... The genius of neoliberalism is such that it is able to achieve a high degree of coordination in detail across large numbers of people, institutions, even countries while still professing [fake] aims and values to which few object. A high degree of coordination on implementing a political policy agenda that is variously parasitical or predatory on the 90%. ..."
"... You can say this is just hypocrisy of a type the rich have always engaged in, and that would be true. The predatory rich have always had to disguise their predatory or parasitical activity, and have often done so by embracing, for example, shows of piety or philanthropy. So, neoliberalism falls into a familiar albeit broad category. ..."
"... What distinguishes neoliberalism is how good it is at coordinating the activities of the 9.9% in delivering the goods for the 0.1%. For a post-industrial economy, neoliberalism is better for the mega-rich than Catholicism was for the feudalism of the High Middle Ages. I do not think most practicing neoliberals among the 9.9% even think of themselves as hypocrites. ..."
"... "Free markets" has been the key move, the fulcrum where anodyne aims and values to which no one can object meet the actual detailed policy implementation by the state. Creating a "market" removes power and authority from the state and transfers it to private actors able to apply financial wealth to managing things, and then, because an actual market cannot really do the job that's been assigned, a state bureaucracy has to be created to manage the administrative details and financial flows -- work for the 9.9% ..."
"... As a special bonus, the insistence on treating a political economy organized in fact by large public and private bureaucracies as if it is organized by and around "markets" introduces a high degree of economic agnatology into the conventional political rhetoric. ..."
"... Pierre Bourdieu, the great French sociologist, would say neoliberalism, like the devil, is one of those things that makes a priority of pretending it does not exist. (Bourdieu cited many others.) It makes it much harder for those whose interests it does not serve to fight it, like forcing someone to eat Jello with a single chopstick. ..."
By Christine Berry. Originally published at
openDemocracy
The really fascinating battles in intellectual history tend to occur when some group
or movement goes on the offensive and asserts that Something Big really doesn't actually
exist."
So says Philip Morowski in his book 'Never Let a Serious Crisis Go To Waste: How
Neoliberalism Survived the Financial Meltdown' . As Mirowski argues, neoliberalism is
a particularly fascinating case in point. Just as Thatcher asserted there was 'no such thing as
society', it's common to find economics commentators asserting that there is 'no such thing as
neoliberalism' – that it's simply a meaningless insult bandied about by the left, devoid
of analytical content.
But on the list of 'ten tell-tale signs you're a neoliberal', insisting that Neoliberalism
Is Not A Thing must surely be number one. The latest commentator to add his voice to the chorus
is Sky
Economics Editor Ed Conway . On the Sky blog, he gives four reasons why Neoliberalism Is
Not A Thing. Let's look at each of them in turn:
1. It's only used by its detractors, not by its supporters
This one is pretty easy to deal with, because it's flat-out not true. As Mirowski documents,
"the people associated with the doctrine did call themselves 'neo-liberals' for a
brief period lasting from the 1930s to the early 1950s, but then they abruptly stopped the
practice" – deciding it would serve their political project better if they claimed to be
the heirs of Adam Smith than if they consciously distanced themselves from classical
liberalism. Here's just one example, from Milton Friedman in 1951:
"a new ideology must give high priority to real and efficient limitation of the
state's ability to, in detail, intervene in the activities of the individual. At the same
time, it is absolutely clear that there are positive functions allotted to the state. The
doctrine that, one and off, has been called neoliberalism and that has developed, more or
less simultaneously in many parts of the world is precisely such a doctrine But instead of
the 19 th century understanding that laissez-faire is the means to achieve this
goal, neoliberalism proposes that competition will lead the way".
You might notice that as well as the word 'neoliberalism', this also includes the word
'ideology'. Remember that one for later.
It's true that the word 'neoliberalism' did go underground for a long time, with its
proponents preferring to position their politics simply as sound economics than to admit it was
a radical ideological programme. But that didn't stop them from knowing what they stood for, or
from acting collectively – through a well-funded network of think tanks and research
institutes – to spread those ideas.
It's worth noting that one of those think tanks, the Adam Smith Institute, has in the last
couple of years consciously reclaimed the mantle .
Affiliated intellectuals like Madsen Pirie and Sam
Bowman have explicitly sought to define and defend neoliberalism. It's no accident that
this happened around the time that neoliberalism began to be seriously challenged in the UK,
with the rise of Corbyn and the shock of the Brexit vote, after a post-crisis period where the
status quo seemed untouchable.
2. Nobody can agree on what it means
Well, this one at least is half-true. Like literally every concept that has ever mattered,
the concept of 'neoliberalism' is messy, it's deeply contested, it has evolved over time and it
differs in theory and practice. From the start, there has been debate within the neoliberal
movement itself about how it should define itself and what its programme should be. And, yes,
it's often used lazily on the left as a generic term for anything vaguely establishment. None
of this means that it is Not A Thing. This is something sociologists and historians
instinctively understand, but which many economists seem to have trouble with.
Having said this, it is possible to define some generally accepted core features of
neoliberalism. Essentially, it privileges markets as the best way to organise the economy and
society, but unlike classical liberalism, it sees a strong role for the state in creating and
maintaining these markets. Outside of this role, the state should do as little as possible, and
above all it must not interfere with the 'natural' operation of the market. But it has always
been part of the neoliberal project to take over the state and transform it for its own ends,
rather than to dismantle or disable it.
Of course, there's clearly a tension between neoliberals' professed ideals of freedom and
their need for a strong state to push through policies that often don't have democratic
consent. We see this in the actions of the Bretton Woods institutions in the era of 'structural
adjustment', or the Troika's behaviour towards Greece during the Eurozone crisis. We see it
most starkly in Pinochet's Chile, the original neoliberal experiment. This perhaps helps to
explain the fact that neoliberalism is sometimes equated with libertarianism and the 'small
state', while others reject this characterisation. I'll say it again: none of this means that
neoliberalism doesn't exist.
3. Neoliberalism is just good economics
Neoliberalism may not exist, says Conway, but what do exist are "conventional economic
models – the ones established by Adam Smith all those centuries ago", and the principles
they entail. That they may have been "overzealously implemented and sometimes misapplied" since
the end of the Cold War is "unfortunate", but "hardly equals an ideology". I'm sure he'll hate
me for saying this, but Ed – this is the oldest neoliberal trick in the book.
The way Conway defines these principles (fiscal conservatism, property rights and leaving
businesses to make their own decisions) is hardly a model of analytical rigour, but we'll let
that slide. Instead, let's note that the entire reason neoliberal ideology developed was that
the older classical "economic models" manifestly failed during the Great Depression of the
1930s, leading them to be replaced by Keynesian demand-management models as the dominant
framework for understanding the economy.
Neoliberals had to update these models in order to restore their credibility: this is why
they poured so much effort into the development of neoclassical economics and the capture of
academic economics by the Chicago School. One of the great achievements of neoliberalism has
been to induce such a level of collective amnesia that it's now once again possible to claim
that these tenets are simply "fundamental economic rules" handed down directly from Adam Smith
on tablets of stone, unchallenged and unchallengeable in the history of economic thought.
In any case, even some people that ascribe to neoclassical economics – like Joseph
Stiglitz – are well enough able to distinguish this intellectual framework from the
political application of it by neoliberals. It is perfectly possible to agree with the former
but not the latter.
4. Yes, 'neoliberal' policies have been implemented in recent decades, but this has been
largely a matter of accident rather than design
Privatisation, bank deregulation, the dismantling of capital and currency controls:
according to Conway, these are all developments that came about by happenstance. "Anyone who
has studied economic history" will tell you they are "hardly the result of a guiding ideology."
This will no doubt be news to the large number of eminent economic historians who have
documented the shift from Keynesianism to neoliberalism, from Mirowski and Daniel Stedman-Jones
to Robert Skidelsky and Robert Van Horn (for a good reading list, see this
bibliographic review by Will Davies .)
It would also be news to Margaret Thatcher, the woman who reportedly slammed down Hayek's
'Constitution of Liberty' on the table at one of her first cabinet meetings and declared
"Gentlemen, this is our programme"; and who famously said "Economics is the method; the object
is to change the soul". And it would be news to those around her who strategized for a
Conservative government with carefully laid-out battleplans for dismantling the key
institutions of the post-war settlement, such as the Ridley Report on privatising state-run
entities.
What Conway appears to be denying here is the whole idea that policymaking takes place
within a shared set of assumptions (or paradigm), that dominant paradigms tend to shift over
time, and that these shifts are usually accompanied by political crises and resulting transfers
of political power – making them at least partly a matter of ideology rather than simply
facts.
Whether it's even meaningful to claim that ideology-free facts exist on matters so
inherently political as how to run the economy is a whole debate in the sociology of knowledge
which we don't have time to go into here, and which Ed Conway doesn't seem to have much
awareness of.
But he shows his hand when he says that utilities were privatised because "governments
realised they were mostly a bit rubbish at running them". This is a strong – and highly
contentious – political claim disguised as a statement of fact – again, a classic
neoliberal gambit. It's a particularly bizarre one for an economist to make at a time when
70% of UK rail
routes are owned by foreign states who won the franchises through competitive tender. Just
this week, we learned that
the East Coast main line is to be temporarily renationalised because Virgin and Stagecoach
turned out to be, erm, a bit rubbish at running it.
* * *
It may be a terrible cliché, but the old adage "First they ignore you, then they
laugh at you, then they fight you, then you win" seems appropriate here. Neoliberalism
successfully hid in plain sight for decades, with highly ideological agendas being implemented
amidst claims we lived in a post-ideological world. Now that it is coming under ideological
challenge, it is all of a sudden stood naked in the middle of the room, having to explain why
it's there (to borrow a phrase from a very brilliant colleague).
There are a number of strategies neoliberals can adopt in response to this. The Adam Smith
Institute response is to go on the offensive and defend it. The Theresa May response is to pay
lip service to the need for systemic change whilst quietly continuing with the same old
policies. Those, like Ed Conway, who persist in claiming neoliberalism doesn't even exist, may
soon find themselves left behind by history. 95 comments
Neoliberalism may not exist, says Conway, but what do exist are "conventional economic
models – the ones established by Adam Smith all those centuries ago",
Um please name one "conventional economic model" established by Adam Smith. I mean,
really, who would actually write such nonsense?
In fairness, I expect Conway is referring to the "invisible hand" of market competition,
wherein the competitive market qua an institution supposedly transforms the private pursuit
of self-interest into a public benefit. From the OP, Milton Friedman saying, "instead of . .
. laissez-faire . . . neoliberalism proposes . . . competition".
A pedant can rightly claim that the actual Adam Smith had a more nuanced and realistic
view, but that does not help to understand, let alone defeat, the intellectual smoke and
mirrors of neoliberalism. And, in spirit, the neoliberals are more right than wrong in
claiming Adam Smith: on the economics, he was a champion of market competition against the
then degenerate corporate state and an advocate of a modified laissez faire against
mercantilism, not to mention feudalism.
My personal view is that you have lost the argument if you agree to the key element of
neoclassical economics: that the economy is organized around and by (metaphoric) markets and
policy is justified (sic!) by remedying market failure. If you concede "the market economy"
even as a mere convention of political speech, you are lost, because you have entered into
the Alice-in-Wonderland neoliberal model, and you can no longer base your arguments on
socially-constructed references to the real, institutional world.
Adam Smith was systematically interpreting his observed world, he kept himself honest by
being descriptively accurate. It was Ricardo who re-invented classical economics as an
abstract theory deductible from first principles and still later thinkers, who re-invented
that abstract, deductive theory as a neoclassical economics in open defiance of observed
reality. And, still later thinkers, many of them critics (Hayek being a prime example) of
neoclassical economics as it existed circa 1930, who founded neoliberalism as we know it. We
really should not blame Adam Smith.
You comment is confusing to me -- not quite sure what you are arguing. You close asserting
"We really should not blame Adam Smith." Was he blamed in this post?
I think it's the very selective reading, and quoting, of Adam Smith's writings to give
neoliberal economics more legitimacy; the parts where he mentions the supremacy of the common
good and the need to prevent too much accumulation of money in too few hands is ignored.
Restated, the free market with its invisible hand is best so long as the whole community
benefits. However, wealth and the power it brings tends to become monopolized into a very few
hands. That needs to be prevented and if needed by government.
I think I need to go back over the Wealth of Nations to be sure I am not being
too selective myself. That said, what the neoliberals are doing is like some people's very
selective reading of the New Testament to support their interests. (Like the vile
Prosperity Gospel)
There is so much claptrap in this article, on all sides of what is supposedly being
debated. Yet, the one underlying historical fact that is being completely overlooked is pure
Keynesian demand driven economics.
An economics that not only has a basis in fact, but also has an actual history of
success.
Keynesian economics did not fail. It was undermined by a movement back toward neo-liberal
Adam Smith "invisible hand of the free market" nonsense that has done nothing throughout
history except proven itself to be greed disguised as an economic theory to give the powerful
an opportunity to fleece the poor and the government treasury.
"Free markets" is incoherent, yet it is a very well accepted and unquestioned notion, to
the degree it is regularly depicted as virtuous and achieving it, a worthy policy goal.
I have written about how the East Germans were absorbed by Germany as neoliberalism was
ascendant in 1990, with such shibboleths as TINA and The End of History taken as cosmological
verities by the West German government. Now I'm doing research on Detroit, where
neoliberalism remains powerful and the source of a meretricious "renaissance" taking place
there even as it is increasingly found to be a generator of and rationalization for all
manner of class-based exploitation. Mirowski's checklist of the attributes of neoliberalism
is on display in state and local government there as they serve corporations, such as the
city "selling" the Little Ceasar's empire 39 acres of downtown land for $1 upon which was
built the new hockey arena. Detroit is a bellwether city, and despite the depredations of
corporations and government there is much organized opposition to neoliberal rule in the
city.
I believe there was an article here recently by Mirowski – The something or other
that dare not speak it's name ? I have spent quite a few hours in the past listening to his
podcasts & videos, which tend to repeat themselves, although something new slips in from
time to time, especially from Q & A's.
His assertion that economics is merely one part of a whole in the Neoliberal assault woke
me up, & indeed then appeared very obvious.
I believe I have seen an example of the Detroit devastation used as film sets in two
films: " Only Lovers Left alive " & " Don't Breathe ", which suit the darkness of them
very well.
Good to know that there is resistance & I wish you the very best outcome for your
& or their endeavours.
I too have watched many hours of Phillip Mirowski's videos, several of them more than
once. I have a little trouble with your assertion they "tend to repeat themselves, although
something new slips in from time to time". He does repeatedly emphasize points which are hard
to believe on first hearing but grow evident upon further reflection. For example his
emphasis on the concept of the Market as the Neoliberal epistemology -- an ultimate tool for
discovering Truth. A little recall of some recent and surprisingly commonplace constructs
like a "market of ideas", or various ways of suggesting we are each a commodity we need to
package, promote, and sell as exemplified by Facebook "likes" and "networking" as a way to
get ahead. Looking at the whole of the videos, and excluding obvious repetitions like
multiple versions of book promotion interviews at different venues I think the range of ideas
Mirowski explores is remarkable -- from the Neoliberal thought collective to climate change
to the Market applied to direct the truth science can discover.
[Where do you find podcasts of Mirowski? I recall collecting a few but most of what I find
are videos. He has numerous of his papers posted at academia.edu which can be downloaded for
free by signing up for the website.]
There are just a few. You may already have heard some of these: Search for Symptomatic
Redness, and search for This Is Hell. Search for [PPE Polanyi Hayek]. He talked to Doug
Henwood. He talked to Will Davies and that is audio only I believe. There's the Science Mart
talk that he gave in Australia. If you look in archive.org and soundcloud as well as youtube
and vimeo, you will find most of them. I think all four of those sites have a few recordings
that are exclusive from the others. Archive.org has a couple of his appearances on community
radio. A few are also linked from the media page for a given book on the publishers' sites,
like go to the links on the book page for Science Mart, for an appearance on I think Boston
radio.
I'm a nerd. Heh. But if you've come this far and listened to the videos (the one with
Homer's brain and markomata, the Boundary2 conference talk, the Leukana one, Prof Nik-Khah at
the Whitlam center, Sam Seder, the one on climate, talking about Cowles in Brazil), you will
enjoy the others. Hope these notes help you find a few.
I wrote a web page back in April of
2016 about the neoliberal forces in Detroit. Let me know at my twitter page what you think. Feel
free to use whatever you find helpful
I found then that the City of Detroit and the State of Michigan had been hornswaggled by
private enterprises nesting their own feathers.
Utilitarianism, expressed as the greatest aggregate well-being to humanity
(economic production and growth) and preference for economic efficiency (monopolies,
duopolies, cartels, etc.) over market competition, are two additional hallmarks of
neoliberalism.
Recognizing these two important values helps explain the growing economic and social
inequality we're witnessing around the western world.
I will checkout your recommendation and I hope that it will discuss, for instance, the
assumption that *economic* production and growth and preference for economic efficiency is
and should be the proper goal of human life.
The book is descriptive and critical, but not particularly prescriptive. But yes, one of
the real strengths of Davies' work is his documentation of the many economic, social, and
political assumptions that provide the foundations of neoliberal thought. I was impressed by
the many logical inconsistencies that advocates of neoliberalism are comfortable in
accepting. I don't believe that the bulk of neoliberal ideas could exist for long outside the
philosophical context of postmodernism as the cognitive dissonance they (should) generate
would find them quickly abandoned.
The intersection of postmodernism, neoliberalism , and neoconservatism defines our current
Western civilization, and I wish somebody would come up with a name for it. Whatever we have
now is the successor to Modernism, in its broadest sense.
I saw one of those political compass memes recently that had at the "center", "Everything
is rent seeking, except for literal rent seeking, which is okay."
Well, there is at least some labeling issue, as one of the first people to use term
"neoliberalism" (for his proposed policy) was Germany's Alexander Rustow, who hardlty anyone
knows about these days, so they don't know either that Rustow would likely sign off most of
Corbyn's proposed policies
IIRC Rustow was one of the more 'moderate' founder members of the Mont Pelerin Society.
His views did not prevail, though they initially adopted his term for their project. I wonder
if, when he saw which way the wind was blowing, he demanded it back.
The term was sometimes applied to the New Deal but didn't really catch on.
It was also used in the early '80s for a movement trying to resurrect the New Deal in the
face of Reagan but that didn't catch on either.
Hey, I just remembered something. When I was a kid growing up everybody knew all about the
mafia but all those in the know denied that there was any such thing when questioned in a
court of law. It got to be a running joke how these gang bosses and members were always
denying that the mafia was an actual thing. Could it be that the neoliberals took a page out
of their book and adopted the same tactic of denying the existence of neoliberalism while
actively pushing it at every opportunity?
And like the line from 'fight club', the first rule of neoliberalism is that you don't
talk about it.
To extend your analogy, much like the mafia, there's a handful of shadowy law breakers who
benefit from neoliberalism and a whole lot of people that suffer violence so that those
benefits can flow up to that few.
this is why I keep Mario Puzo next to Adam and Karl on the econ shelf in my library.
It's not so much Omerta, as gobbdeygook and wafer thin platitudes.
Like the concurrent and related "Conservative revolution"(1973-), they stole the Cell
Structure from the Comintern, and bought out the competition.
I am inclined to believe that the Libertarian Party was a vehicle for this counterrevolution,
too.
and finally, with the DLC, they were able to buy the "opposition party" outright and here we
are.
"Pay no attention to the man behind the curtain! He's only here to direct you to a very
robust curtain marketplace to suit all your needs, including our newest offering for
consumers without a desire to invest in (or a steady home for) full curtain infrastructure:
Curtains-as-a-Service! Ultimate mobility! Low(ish) monthly payments forever!"
"Neoliberalism" is indeed a thing, but it is not in any way an economic model.
"Neoliberalism" is simply the ethos of Sit Back and Let the Big Dog Eat, and it wraps itself
in whatever words or models is most effective at distracting and camouflaging its rotten
core. Neoliberalism is like a Caddis Fly larvae, that sticks random objects outside its
cocoon to blend in.
So the Neoliberals talk about free markets when it suits them – and when their
wealthy patrons want to be bailed out with public funds, they talk about government
responsibility. They harp about freedom – but demand that large corporations get to use
de-jure slave labor to peel shrimp. They talk about how wonderful free trade is – and
demand that private citizens not be able to import legal pharmaceuticals because this would
destroy the freedom of big pharma to maximize profits by restricting trade and without this
new drug development would stop and anyone who believes in free trade wants a free lunch. I
could go on. It's pointless to try and refute them, because there is nothing to refute, and
they have no shame. Only brute power, but this they have in abundance.
So of course they reject the label, because co-opting and corrupting and hiding behind
legitimate philosophies is part of their modus operandi. Using the terminology of the enemy
is always a mistake. Long may the vile practitioners of 'neoliberalism' be forced to be
referred to by an accurate label!
It is. I wish he had gone on. Might we build on it? I think such examples clarify
brilliantly exactly of whom we speak:
"Neoliberals want minimal government regulation because such regulation makes the market
inefficient. Except when making dubious student loans; then they want the government to
guarantee those loans and serve as their muscle in collecting."
Excellent comment.
"It's pointless to try and refute them, because there is nothing to refute, and they have no
shame. Only brute power, but this they have in abundance."
Absolutely.
Neoliberalism: an old fashioned expression of the seemingly eternal "all for me, none for
thee".
A million tonnes of economic speciousness, the thickness of a piece of plastic wrap, covering
the bloated & putrifying zombie body of a small "elite".
"Now that it is coming under ideological challenge, it is all of a sudden stood naked in
the middle of the room, having to explain why it's there (to borrow a phrase from a very
brilliant colleague)."
One gambit in denying neoliberalism is to pretend it must be a specific doctrine and then
dispute about which that doctrine that is. Or that neoliberalism must be a specific programme
and dispute whether that programme has been consistent thru time. But, the intellectual cum
ideological history cum policy history here is that neoliberalism has been a dialectic.
There's Thatcher and then there's Blair.
It is the back-and-forth of that dialectic that has locked in "the shared set of
assumptions" and paradigm of policy inventiveness that has given neoliberalism its remarkable
ability to survive its own manifest policy-induced crises.
Neoliberalism did not just adopt neoclassical economics, nor did it simply infest
political parties of the right. Neoliberalism re-invented neoclassical economics in ways that
defined not just the "right" of academic economics, but also defined the "left". Keynesian
economics was absorbed and transmogrified by first one neoclassical synthesis and then a
second, leaving a New Keynesian macroeconomics to occupy the position of a nominal left
within mainstream economics. If you are waiting for a Krugman or even a Stiglitz to oppose
neoliberalism, you will be waiting a very long time, because they are effectively locked into
the neoliberal dialectic.
Something almost analogous happened with the political parties of the centre-left, as in
the iconic cases of Blair vs Thatcher or Clinton vs Reagan (and then, of course, Obama vs
Reagan/Bush II). In western Europe, grand coalitions figured in the process of eliminating
the ability of centre-left parties to think outside the neoliberal policy frames or to
represent their electoral bases rather than their donor bases.
Sitting here nodding my head. All the same criticisms could be made of, oh, say,
Christianity. Wars have been fought, hundreds of thousands of Christians have been persecuted
by other Christians, over the definition, but that certainly does not make it Not A
Thing.
Neoliberal thought is very deliberately projected as a many-headed Hydra. The Neoliberal
thought collective presents manifold statements and refinements of its principles. The value
of agnotology is a belief of held in sufficient regard to be deemed a principle of belief.
Just try dealing with an opponent that shifts and evaporates but never loses substance in
working toward its goals.
A fundamental difference between neoliberalism and classic economists like Ricardo &
Smith is the latter's adamant opposition to rent seeking and insistence on fighting it by
taxation. Neoliberalism on the other hand not only accepts rent-seeking, but actively
encourages it. Thus we see not only the ascendancy of of the FIRE sector, but the effective
destruction of markets as mechanisms of price discovery.
Also, Yves, thanks a million for these enlightening neoliberalism articles. I've had quite
a bit of trouble in the past putting my political beliefs in the appropriate context; a
general feeling of malaise and overall mistrust of free-trade agreements and big corporations
without anything to really back it up is usually a one-way ticket to losing an argument and
being labelled an old crank. Being able to put a name on something you know doesn't smell
right, and finding a framework that allows others to spot it, is a hell of a leg up.
It always reminds me of the index (or aside, or supplementary reading, whatever it was)
that accompanied my copy of 1984. It basically said that controlling the common language and
not allowing for terminology to define certain things (in this case, pulling the 'first two
rules of Fight Club' thing – thanks, johnnygl!) was key to keeping those things
essentially invisible, and those afflicted by the maladies off-balance and unable to organize
against them. That bit of Orwell made sense then, but it has really been hitting home after
reading some of these articles.
For anyone who missed it, this
one was also particularly great.
Neoliberalism is just another damn thing that externalizes and socializes costs. It is a
very costly thing. But I'm more inclined to think that no isms exist anywhere in the real
world in any constructive way – they are all just mental reflexes useful for
rationalizing irresponsibility and procrastination. And self interest. We might as well just
say economicism.
Interesting comment by the author about the sociology of knowledge. No doubt
there is a sensible mantra somewhere chanting: Do what works. Because if evolution had been
evolutionism we'd all be extinct. The only thing sticking in my dottering old head these days
is Ann Pettifor's last question: Please, please can you just tell us how the economy actually
works?
Much as I regard your past comments, I must disagree with your assertion "Neoliberalism is
just another damn thing that externalizes and socializes costs". Neoliberalism does indeed
externalize and socialize costs but it is more than just another damn thing. Just the scale
and scope of the think tank network assembled and well funded to promote the concepts of the
Neoliberal thought collective should be adequate to convince you that it is much more than
"just another damn thing".
Consider just the visible portion of the think tanks which are part of the Neoliberal
thought collective. "Today, Atlas Network connects more than 450 think tanks in nearly 100
countries. Each is writing its own story of how principled work to affect public opinion, on
behalf of the ideas of a free society, can better individuals' lives."
Members of the network
include: AMERICAN ENTERPRISE INSTITUTE, AMERICAN LEGISLATIVE EXCHANGE COUNCIL (ALEC), AYN
RAND INSTITUTE, CATO INSTITUTE, GOLDWATER INSTITUTE, HEARTLAND INSTITUTE, HERITAGE FOUNDATION
selected members from the 177 think tanks in the U.S. which are a part of the 475 partners in
92 countries around the globe. [https://www.atlasnetwork.org/partners/global-directory]. This
is not "just another damn thing."
Next consider the state of the economics profession. Neoliberalism has taken over many
major schools of economics and a large number of the economics journals. In a publish or
perish world there are few alternatives to an adherence to some flavor of Neoliberal
ideology. This is not "just another damn thing." Consider how many national politicians are
spouting things like there is 'no such thing as society'. This is not "just another damn
thing" -- it is something much much more scary.
Thank you for this post. It is the methodical destruction of any possible alternatives to
this totalizing and dehumanizing system that is most frightening to me.
Basically the rich dismantled the New Deal and desperately are trying to hide it. The issue is that the decline in living standards for the middle class are so big that
they can no longer hide what they are. This was linked in NC a while ago:
Neoliberalism is quite fuzzy and difficult to attack. Neoliberalism intellectual framework comes from the underlying neoclassical economics that
can easily be attacked. Here's George Soros. George Soros realised the economics was wrong due to his experience with the markets. What the neoclassical economists said about markets and his experience just didn't
compare, and he knew it was so wrong he never even bothered to look into what the economics
said.
George Soros "I am not well qualified to criticize those theories, because as a market
participant, I considered them so unrealistic that I never bothered to study them"
Here is George Soros on the bad economics we have used for globalisation.
He had been complaining for years and at last in 2008 the bankruptcy of the economics
proved itself. With more widespread support, he set up INET (The Institute for New Economic
Thinking) to try and put things right. Globalisation's technocrats, trained in bad economics, never stood a chance.
"Those, like Ed Conway, who persist in claiming neoliberalism doesn't even exist, may
soon find themselves left behind by history."
During the last election, when leftist types were criticizing Hillary Clinton for her
neoliberal tendencies, the Ed Conway approach was favored by the online Dem Party shills as
the go-to response at mainstream liberal websites. In the comments sections of these
places, I read quite a lot of out-and-out bullsh*t about neoliberalism not being real, and
how charges of it had as much substance as similarly empty schoolyard taunts. If you said
someone was a neoliberal, it had no more meaning than if you'd called them "poopy pants" or
'booger breath." And all this delivered with the usual blistering abuse thrown at anyone not
willing to get down on all fours & kiss St. Hillary's blessed pants suit. It got to the
point where I finally had to stop visiting places like Lawyers, Guns and Money altogether.
They had become unbelievably nasty and unpleasant to progressives.
"One of the great achievements of neoliberalism has been to induce such a level of
collective amnesia that it's now once again possible to claim that these tenets are simply
"fundamental economic rules" handed down directly from Adam Smith on tablets of stone,
unchallenged and unchallengeable in the history of economic thought."
To prove this wrong read Adam Smith. Adam Smith observed the reality of small state, unregulated capitalism in the world around
him. Adam Smith on rent seeking:
"The labour and time of the poor is in civilised countries sacrificed to the
maintaining of the rich in ease and luxury. The Landlord is maintained in idleness and luxury
by the labour of his tenants. The moneyed man is supported by his extractions from the
industrious merchant and the needy who are obliged to support him in ease by a return for the
use of his money. But every savage has the full fruits of his own labours; there are no
landlords, no usurers and no tax gatherers."
So, landlords, usurers and taxes all raise the cost of living and minimum wage. They suck
purchasing power out of the real economy. Western housing booms have raised the cost of living and priced Western labour out of
international markets leading to the rise of the populists. Trickledown, no it trickles up.
Adam Smith on price gouging:
"The interest of the dealers, however, in any particular branch of trade or
manufactures, is always in some respects different from, and even opposite to, that of the
public. To widen the market and to narrow the competition, is always the interest of the
dealers. To widen the market may frequently be agreeable enough to the interest of the
public; but to narrow the competition must always be against it, and can serve only to enable
the dealers, by raising their profits above what they naturally would be, to levy, for their
own benefit, an absurd tax upon the rest of their fellow-citizens."
So this is why hedge funds look for monopoly suppliers of drugs. Big is not beautiful in capitalism, it needs competition and lots of it. The interests of business and the public are not aligned.
Adam Smith on lobbyists:
"The proposal of any new law or regulation of commerce which comes from this order
ought always to be listened to with great precaution, and ought never to be adopted till
after having been long and carefully examined, not only with the most scrupulous, but with
the most suspicious attention. It comes from an order of men whose interest is never exactly
the same with that of the public, who have generally an interest to deceive and even to
oppress the public, and who accordingly have, upon many occasions, both deceived and
oppressed it."
Not surprising TTIP and TPP didn't go down well with the public.
The interests of business and the public are not aligned.
Adam Smith on the 1%:
"All for ourselves, and nothing for other people seems, in every age of the world, to
have been the vile maxim of the masters of mankind."
2017 – Richest 8 people as wealthy as half of world's population
They haven't changed a bit.
Adam Smith on Profit:
"But the rate of profit does not, like rent and wages, rise with the prosperity and
fall with the declension of the society. On the contrary, it is naturally low in rich and
high in poor countries, and it is always highest in the countries which are going fastest to
ruin."
Exactly the opposite of today's thinking, what does he mean?
When rates of profit are high, capitalism is cannibalising itself by:
1) Not engaging in long term investment for the future
2) Paying insufficient wages to maintain demand for its products and services
Today's problems with growth and demand.
Amazon didn't suck its profits out as dividends and look how big it's grown (not so good
on the wages).
The problem with Adam Smith is the same as for Keynes: people quote what they imagine he
said, or what they want him to have said, rather than what he actually did say.
Adam Smith at least wrote more clearly than Keynes did, which makes claims like that
easier to refute.
Yet the problem with Smith is contextualizing the time and space he wrote of vs. that of
Keynes. Keynes was not addressing a burgeoning industrialist – agrarian economy that
had yet to employ oil to its potential with huge amounts of untapped natural resources still
waiting in the wings and nary any counter prevailing force to this periods philosophical
views.
Even if the whole anglophone experience had a touch of the Council of Nicea tinge to it
e.g. making nice between troublesome tribes within the fold.
Keynes at least looked at the data and attempted to reflect what he discern "at the time"
against the prevailing winds of doctrinaires contrary to all the sycophants.
This is was the lesson he attempted to forward, howls from the sycophants is a tell.
A reading of Smith's 'The Theory of Moral Sentiments' written before, but revised after,
WoN is also worthwhile. As is, as ever, Karl Polyani's opening salvo against Smith's take on 'human market nature'
(my term). Everyone should read 'The Great Transformation' at least once.
The 18th century was an interesting time. My take, only partially thought out, is that
Smith's later work was part of that move away from grand theorizing towards practical
improvement of the human condition seen in so many thinkers of the mid-century period. (With
the Lisbon Earthquake of 1755 acting as something of a catalyst)
Mr. Conway must be a fan of Mr. Fukuyama and his exercises for brain stunting.
IMO, Fukuyama's success depended very much on neoliberalism becoming dominant.
In a way, this comment sums up the modern condition very well. Life is always about the
struggle between the have and the have nots. "Civilization" is the human attempt to curb, or
put a respectable face on the raw power struggle between the weak and the powerful. It is
something worth fighting for if justice, equality under the law, and relief from human
suffering is the goal. If greed and self-interest is the only goal, one can be considered a
barbarian and resisted. In such a case, might makes right and the world is full of darkness
and destruction.
Short form- The elite are failing in their duty to humanity- and the rest of life on this
planet. As a scapegoat, they call out anyone not with their agenda deplorables and double
down on their barbarous ways. Greed, exploitation, and subjugation.
Neoliberalism is the refinement of this basic human tendency for domination. It is a
camouflaged form of oppression that is revealed through its ultimate effect, not what it does
at the moment. A neoliberal is a disguised raider or conquerer.
This is an amateur take, but as I see it classical liberalism was pretty much wrecked by
the combination of WWI, great depression, and WWII. The "everything laissez faire" ideology
had simply taken too much damage from the reality of political economy. So it evolved, as it
were, into three new ideologies: libertarianism, which faulted classical liberalism for not
going far enough in reducing the state, which goes a long ways towards explaining why it's
not very popular; the liberal-left/FDR liberalism/SocDem position, which faulted classical
liberalism for ignoring the social element, where there's a heavy welfare state, enterprises
are highly regulated, labor protections, but still private ownership and a capitalist class;
and neoliberalism, which faulted classical liberalism for being ideologically unwilling to
engage in the technocratic tinkering to right the ship, but still sees TIHOTFM as the center
of the economy. The first is the religious orthodoxy response, the second is to put the
market in the sandbox, and the third puts the state in the sandbox.
My take, influenced by Polanyi, is that classical Liberalism collapsed with WWI. In Europe
it was replaced with Socialism (of a sort), Social Democracy or Fascism. Sometimes switching
around and taking a while to settle.
In the US classical Liberalism had a glorious swansong in the 1920s but it finally died in
1929, giving way to Social Democracy in the New Deal.
The Neoliberal project did not properly start until after WWII and did not take over until
around 1980.
Neoliberals prefer a strong state that promotes their ends, not one that opposes them,
or has the ability to oppose the means and methods of private capital . That leaves
the playing field with a single team.
Neoliberals would have the state oppose the goals of others in society. To nurture that
environment, neoliberals seek to redefine society and citizenship as consumerism. Woman's
only role is as one of the species Homo economicus . Neoliberals argue that since
members of H. economicus exist in isolation, they have no need for the extensive
mutual aid and support networks that neoliberals rely on to survive and prosper. Again, that
leaves a single team on the playing field.
I would add tha neoliberalism is inherently about classism. That the wealthy, because of
their education, know more than poor people because of the lack of education. So when voters
complain about the lack of jobs or the poor state of healthcare, the Clintionites wave it
away because, well what do those poor people know anyway?
One of the topics that pops up regulary, is the question "why can't poor people tell how
great the economy is doing?" -face palm- A question that took on fresh important when
Clintion lost the election.
Ironically, the conversation is now, why can't poor people tell how shitty the economy is
with Trump in charge. -dabble face palm-.
You only have to walk around San Francisco or Los Angeles to see that something is wrong
with the current economic environment. This in the wealthy parts of California. There can be
plenty of disagreement over the what, the why, and the solutions, but to demand that I ignore
my lying eyes and believe their words' truthiness is either insulting or insanity and maybe
both.
Mirowski addressed this very issue in this paper –
"The Political Movement that Dared not Speak its own Name: The Neoliberal Thought
Collective Under Erasure" – In this paper I examine the disinclination to treat the
Neoliberal political project as a serious intellectual project motivating a series of
successes in the public sphere. Economists seem especially remiss in this regard.
I disagree that neoliberalism is a thing. There are still only the conservative and
liberal view points. My interpretation of them is as follows:
-Conservative ideology stems from maintaining status quo, tradition, hierarchy and individual
growth ( even at the cost of society). Religion dovetails this ideology as it is something
passed on through generations.
-Liberal ideology stems from growing the society( even at the cost of individual),
challenging the status quo and breaking away from tradition.
Neoliberalism to me is just a part of conservatism
Here is the dictionary definition of conservatism;
" the holding of political views that favour free enterprise, private ownership, and socially
conservative ideas."
A crude example would be to say that Libertarians are closet Republicans.
If I understand neoliberalism correctly it boils down to this: Whoever has money and power gets to make the rules within certain limits which are defined
by:
Whether they get caught
Whether people understand what they are doing
How they market what they do
How much political power they have
Success of the model is defined as success of the richest, most powerful actors. Anyone
who does not succeed is labeled as having been inadequate, lazy, or
socialist/communist/etc. Have I missed anything?
The claim that neoliberalism does not exist reminds me of Baudelaire's "la plus belle des
ruses du Diable est de vous persuader qu'il n'existe pas!" ("the cleverest ruse of the Devil is to persuade you he does not exist!")
We frogs have been in the pot for so long now we've forgotten that there ever was a
pond
A priori, what motivated Hayek's, Mises' and their associates' programme from its
conception in the '30's was that it was a *reaction* against the threat to freedom (as they
defined it) which they considered to be posed by the onward march of what they termed
"collectivism", embodied not only by avowedly socialist governments (as in Austria) but also
in that ostensible bulwark of capitalism the USA (whence Mises had emigrated), in the shape
of the New Deal.
Given that genesis, it baffles me that any historian can seriously question what was the
true nature of the project which (led by Hayek) was conceived in response, which later became
known as neoliberalism. It was conceived as a counter-offensive to what they identified as an
insidious mortal threat to all the values they subscribed to – as in Hayek's phrase
"the road to serfdom". How could any such counter-offensive be implemented other than through
devising and putting into effect a plan of action? How could it ever *not* have been "a
thing" (ie not possess objective reality) yet still achieve its specified objective –
namely to defeat the chosen enemy? To assert that it was not is to fly in the face of logic
and common sense.
Doesn't any serious historian need to deploy both of those faculties in good measure?
I agree that Hayek and others were engaged in a political movement that promoted intense
opposition to social democratic experiments sweeping the West after WWII.
Their chosen enemy seems to have been collective responses generally – governmental
and social – except those that they approved of. Coincidentally, those seem to be
approved of by their wealthy patrons. I don't recall their vocal opposition to the trade
associations, for example, that cooperated to promote the interests of the companies their
patrons controlled.
Hayek and others seem to have overreacted in their opposition to collective action, even
while making exceptions for the social networking and persistent patron funding that promoted
their own endeavours.
"[ ] Well, this one at least is half-true. Like literally every concept that has ever
mattered, the concept of 'neoliberalism' is messy, it's deeply contested [ ]"
Way I see it, it happens to be extremely simple:
Classical liberalism: "The state should leave us elites alone such that we may do what we must, it's our
plantations/factories/banks anyway!"
And, when the former didn't work (the conservative/aristocratic state didn't leave them
alone), came the neo-liberalism: " We should take control of the state and insure that we are not molested by its
services and that it disciplines the lower classes in our name!"
Neo-liberalism is extremely old and the only exceptions to this "new" development were the
so called "totalitarian" states (feared, by neo-libs, most of all things), which mainly
disciplined the elites, with great success, I might add.
In reply to several commenters, who have questioned why "neoliberalism" is not simply
another name for the political expression/ambitions of the greed of the rich-and-powerful,
aka conservatism.
Although it serves the purposes of the rich-and-powerful rather well, I think
"neoliberalism" as a rhetorical engine and set of ideas is the ideology of the 9.9%, the
chattering classes of professionals and bureaucrats who need a cover story for their own
participation in running the world for the benefit of the 0.1% These are the people who need
to rationalize what they do and cooperate and coordinate among themselves and that's a
challenge because of their sheer numbers.
If you try to examine neoliberalism as a set of aims or values or interests, I think you
miss the great accomplishment of neoliberalism as a mechanism of social cooperation.
Neoliberalism says it aims at freedom and social welfare and innovation and other good
things. If neoliberalism said it aimed to make the richest 0.1% richer at the expense of
everyone else, it would provoke political opposition from the 99% for obvious reasons.
Including opposition from the 9.9% whom they need to run things, to run the state, run the
corporations.
Not being clear on what your true objectives are tends to be an obstacle to organizing
large groups to accomplish those objectives. Being clear on the mission objective is a
prerequisite for organizational effectiveness in most circumstances. The genius of
neoliberalism is such that it is able to achieve a high degree of coordination in detail
across large numbers of people, institutions, even countries while still professing [fake] aims and
values to which few object. A high degree of coordination on implementing a political policy
agenda that is variously parasitical or predatory on the 90%.
You can say this is just hypocrisy of a type the rich have always engaged in, and that
would be true. The predatory rich have always had to disguise their predatory or parasitical
activity, and have often done so by embracing, for example, shows of piety or philanthropy.
So, neoliberalism falls into a familiar albeit broad category.
What distinguishes neoliberalism is how good it is at coordinating the activities of the
9.9% in delivering the goods for the 0.1%. For a post-industrial economy, neoliberalism is
better for the mega-rich than Catholicism was for the feudalism of the High Middle Ages. I do
not think most practicing neoliberals among the 9.9% even think of themselves as
hypocrites.
"Free markets" has been the key move, the fulcrum where anodyne aims and values to which
no one can object meet the actual detailed policy implementation by the state. Creating a
"market" removes power and authority from the state and transfers it to private actors able
to apply financial wealth to managing things, and then, because an actual market cannot
really do the job that's been assigned, a state bureaucracy has to be created to manage the
administrative details and financial flows -- work for the 9.9%
As a special bonus, the insistence on treating a political economy organized in fact by
large public and private bureaucracies as if it is organized by and around "markets"
introduces a high degree of economic agnatology into the conventional political rhetoric.
[This comment sounded much clearer when I conceived of it in the shower this morning. I am
sorry if the actual comment is too abstract or tone deaf. I will probably have to try again
at a later date.]
Pierre Bourdieu, the great French sociologist, would say neoliberalism, like the devil, is
one of those things that makes a priority of pretending it does not exist. (Bourdieu cited
many others.) It makes it much harder for those whose interests it does not serve to fight
it, like forcing someone to eat Jello with a single chopstick.
In an ongoing operation, the US imperialist hawks seek to wipe out the last Leftist governments in Latin America
Ten years ago, most of Latin America was governed by Center-Left progressive or even Leftist governments. For example, Cristina Fernandez
in Argentina, Evo Morales in Bolivia, Rafael Correa in Ecuador, Fernando Lugo in Paraguay, Daniel Ortega in Nicaragua, Manuel Zelaya
in Honduras, and Lula da Silva in Brazil, just as an example. And Hugo Chavez, of course, in Venezuela. Since then, the so-called
'pink tide' has receded quite dramatically. Of these 10 governments that were Left of Center, only four remain. Nicolas Maduro in
Venezuela, Morales in Bolivia, Vazquez in Uruguay, and Daniel Ortega in Nicaragua. What happened? Some would argue that the US played
an important role in at least some of these changes.
Speaking to Greg Wilpert and the RealNews , Mark Weisbrot
explains the impact of the Leftist or Center-Left governments on Latin America, as well as the US efforts to overthrow these governments
and replace them by Rright-Wing puppet regimes. This is a struggle that has become common in a region that heavily suffers for decades
by the US dirty interventions as it is considered the backyard of the US empire and the primary colonial field for the big US corporations:
If you look at the region as a whole, the poverty rate dropped from 44 to 28 percent. That was from around 2003-2013. And that
was after the two decades prior where poverty had actually increased, there was no progress at all. So that was a huge change, and
it was accomplished in different countries, in different ways.
There were large increases in public investment in Bolivia and Ecuador. In Brazil you had also some increase in public investment,
big increases in the minimum wage. Every country did different things to help bring healthcare, and increase, in some countries,
access to education. And there were a whole lot of reforms, changes in macroeconomic policy, getting rid of the IMF.
So there were a lot of different things that these governments did that prior governments were either unable, or unwilling to
do to improve people's living standards during a period of higher economic growth, which they also contributed to.
When Right-Wing governments took over most of the continent you have different things that have changed.
One is, of course, they're implementing, as you would expect, Right-Wing reforms. Trying to cut pension system, the pension in
Brazil. Passing a constitutional amendment which, even most economists in the world wouldn't support in Brazil, which prohibits the
government from increasing spending beyond the rate of inflation. You have huge increases in utility prices in Argentina, laying
off thousands of public sector workers. So, everywhere where the Right has come back, you do have some regressive changes.
The US has been involved in most of these countries in various ways. Obviously in Venezuela they've been involved since the coup
in 2002, and they tried to overthrow the government and tried to help people topple the government on several occasions there.
In Brazil, they supported the coup against Dilma, the parliamentary coup. So, they didn't do that strongly, but they sent enough
signals, for example, as the House was voting to impeach Dilma without actually presenting a crime that she committed. The head of
the Foreign Relations Committee from the Senate came and met with the No3 official from the US State Department, Tom Shannon. And
then, in August of that year, the Secretary of State, John Kerry, went down there and had a press conference with the Acting Foreign
Minister, Jose Serra. And they talked about how great relations with the US were going to be before Dilma was actually removed from
office. So these were ways of endorsing the coup.
The FBI, the Department of Justice contributed to the investigation that was instrumental in imprisoning Lula. What they did in
that investigation we don't know exactly, but we do know enough about it to know that it wasn't a neutral investigation. That is,
the investigation did end up decapitating the Workers' Party for now. First helping get rid of Dilma, but more importantly, or more
substantially, in terms of its contribution, they helped put Lula in prison and prevent him from running for office.
In Paraguay, the US helped in the consolidation of that parliamentary coup by organizing within the Organization of American States.
In Haiti, in 2004, they took the president and put him on a rendition plane, and flew him out of the country. That was in broad
daylight.
In Honduras, is probably the biggest role that the US has played, both in consolidating the military coup in 2009. Hillary Clinton
acknowledged her role in making sure that President Zelaya, the democratically elected president, would not return to office, and
then more recently, in November, they helped consolidate the results of an election which pretty much all observers regarded as stolen.
In Argentina, other branches of government were involved as well as the executive, but the executive cut off lending from multilateral
development banks such as the Inter-American Development Bank, and tried to block loans at the World Bank, as well. And they restored
everything as soon as the Right-Wing government was elected. And then, there was Judge Griesa in New York, who took over 90 percent
of Argentina's creditors hostage in order to squeeze them so that the government would pay off the vulture funds. And this was very
political, because he also lifted the injunction as soon as you had the Right-Wing government.
This is very important, because obviously it's not necessarily a conspiracy of all these branches of government. The legislative
branch was involved in this as well, in the United States. But they all have the same mindset, and they're all trying to get rid
of these Left governments, and they had a massive contribution. In Argentina, that did contribute to the downfall of Cristina Kirchner.
It contributed to balance of payments problems that they had there. So this was important, and it's totally ignored in the United
States.
You have intervention in Mexico, for example. US officials have already said how worried they are that AMLO, Andres Manuel Lopez
Obrador, who is the frontrunner in the upcoming election in July. And he's probably going to win, but they're already trying to undermine
him, lobbying accusations of Russia involvement, which is the new trend. Of course, completely unsubstantiated.
In Venezuela they're doing something probably never done in the last 50 years, openly calling for a military coup, and actually
a financial embargo they've put in place, and threatening even a worse embargo if they don't get rid of the current government. So
that's a more aggressive form of intervention than you had even under the prior administrations.
A wave of neoliberal onslaught shakes currently Latin America. While in Argentina, Mauricio
Macri allegedly took the power normally, the
constitutional
coup against Dilma Rousseff in Brazil, as well as, the
usual actions
of the Right opposition in Venezuela against Nicolás Maduro with the help of the US finger, are far more obvious.
The special weight of these three countries in Latin America is extremely important for the US imperialism to regain ground in
the global geopolitical arena. Especially the last ten to fifteen years, each of them developed increasingly autonomous policies
away from the US close custody, under Leftist governments, and this was something that alarmed the US imperialism components.
Brazil appears to be the most important among the three, not only due to its size, but also as a member of the BRICS, the team
of fast growing economies who threaten the US and generally the Western global dominance. The constitutional coup against Rousseff
was rather a sloppy action and reveals the anxiety of the US establishment to regain control through puppet regimes. This is a well-known
situation from the past through which the establishment attempts to secure absolute dominance in the US backyard.
The importance of Venezuela due to its oil reserves is also significant. When Maduro tried to approach Russia in order to strengthen
the economic cooperation between the two countries, he must had set the alarm for the neocons in the US. Venezuela could find an
alternative in Russia and BRICS, in order to breathe from the multiple economic war that was set off by the US. It is characteristic
that the economic war against Russia by the US and the Saudis, by keeping the oil prices in historically low levels, had significant
impact on the Venezuelan economy too. It is also known that the US organizations are funding the opposition since Chávez era, in
order to proceed in provocative operations that could overthrow the Leftist governments.
The case of Venezuela is really interesting. The US imperialists were fiercely trying to overthrow the Leftist governments since
Chávez administration. They found now a weaker president, Nicolás Maduro - who certainly does not have the strength and personality
of Hugo Chávez - to achieve their goal.
The Western media mouthpieces are doing their job, which is propaganda as usual. The recipe is known. You present the half truth,
with a big overdose of exaggeration.
The establishment
parrots are demonizing Socialism , but they won't ever tell you about the money that the US is spending, feeding the
Right-Wing groups and opposition to proceed in provocative operations, in order to create instability. They won't tell you about
the financial war conducted through the oil prices, manipulated by the Saudis, the close US ally.
Regarding Argentina, former president, Cristina Kirchner, had also made some important moves towards the stronger cooperation
with Russia, which was something unacceptable for Washington's hawks. Not only for geopolitical reasons, but also because Argentina
could escape from the vulture funds that sucking its blood since its default. This would give the country an alternative to the neoliberal
monopoly of destruction. The US big banks and corporations would never accept such a perspective because the debt-enslaved Argentina
is a golden opportunity for a new round of huge profits. It's
happening right
now in debt colony, Greece.
Former NSA and CIA head Michael Hayden's new book The Assault on Intelligence: American
National Security in an Age of Lies wants to be the manifesto behind an intelligence
community coup. It ends up reading like outtakes from Dr. Strangelove .
Trump cannot discern truth from falsehood, Hayden says, and is the product of too much
fact-free thinking, especially on social media ("computational propaganda" where people can
"publish without credentials") where lies are deployed by the Russians to destroy the United
States. Instead Hayden calls for artificial intelligence and a media truth-rating system to
"purify our discourse" and help "defend it against inauthentic stimulation."
Hayden believes in the "fragility of civilization" as clearly as he believes there is a
"FOX/Trump/RT" alliance in place to exploit it. Under Trump, "post-truth is pre-fascism, and to
abandon facts is to abandon freedom." Hayden claims Trump has a "glandular aversion" to even
thinking about how "Russia has been actively seeking to damage the fabric of American
democracy."
Salvation, it would seem, depends on the intelligence community. Hayden makes clear,
ominously quoting conversations with anonymous IC officers, that no one else is protecting
America from these online threats to our precious bodily fluids .
He warns that "the structures we rely on to prevent civil war and societal collapse are
under stress." The IC on the other hand "pursues Enlightenment values [and] is essential
not just to American safety but to American liberty."
Hayden recalls how he reminded a lad fresh to the IC to "protect yourself. And above all
protect the institution. American still needs it." He has a bit of advice about the CIA: "We
are accustomed to relying on their truth to protect us from foreign enemies. Now we may need
their truth to save us from ourselves." The relationship between Trump and the IC, Hayden
threatens, is "contentious, divisive, and unpredictable" in these "uncharted waters for the
Republic."
Simply put, Hayden's book is blowing 10 dog whistles at once. Arise ye patriots [of
neoliberalism] of Langley and Fort Meade!
Yet for all his emphasis on truth, Hayden is curiously lax in presenting actual evidence of
the apocalypse. You are left to believe because Hayden says you must: paternalism at its best.
Plus, to disbelieve is to side with Putin. The best we get are executive summary-like
statements along the lines of "There is clear evidence of what I would call convergence, the
convergence of a mutually reinforcing swirl of Presidential tweets and statements, Russian
influenced social media, alt right websites and talk radio, Russian 'white' press like RT and
even mainstream U.S. media like Fox News."
With that established, Hayden informs us that when the IC tried to warn Trump of the Russian
plot, he "rejected a fact-based intel assessment because it was inconsistent with a preexisting
world view or because it was politically inconvenient, the stuff of ideological
authoritarianism not pragmatic democracy." Comrade, er, Candidate Trump, says Hayden
matter-of-factly, "did sound a lot like Vladimir Putin." The two men, he declaims, are "Russian
soulmates."
Hayden figures that if you've read this far into his polemic, he might as well just splurge
the rest of his notes on you. Trump is "uninformed, lazy, dishonest, off the charts, rejects
the premise objective reality even existed." He's fueled by Russian money (no evidence of this
is presented in the book, Hayden says, because it's hidden in the tax returns, as if Line 42 on
Trump's 1040 would read "Putin Black Funds $5 mil," and the IRS, which does have the returns,
overlooked that).
Trump is an "unwitting agent" of Putin, which Hayden tells us in Russian is polezni
durak , so you can see he knows his Cold War lingo. We hear how Wikileaks worked with the
Russkies, how Trump Jr. worked with the Russkies, how the Russkies wormed their way into Tower
so they could see the Big Board, how the whole brouhaha over #TakeAKnee was Russian meddling,
and how Jill Stein existed to "bleed off votes from Clinton" -- every Mueller fan-fiction trope
tumbling from the pages like crumbs left over from an earlier reader.
That's why The Assault on Intelligence: American National Security in an Age of Lies
reads like as a polemic. But it also fails as a book.
There are pages of filler, jumbled blog post-like chapters about substate actors and global
tectonics. Hayden writes in a recognizable style that might be called Bad Military, where
everything must eventually be tied to some Big Idea, preferably with classical references
Googled-up to add gravitas.
So it is not enough for Hayden to state Trump is a liar. He has to blame Trump for usurping
the entire body of Western thought: "We are in a post-truth world, a world in which decisions
are far more based upon emotion and preference. And that's an overturning of the Western way of
thought since the Enlightenment." Bad things are Hobbesian; good things Jeffersonian,
Madisonian, or Hamiltonian. People Hayden agrees with get adjectival modifiers before their
names: the perceptive scholar ____, the iconic journalist ____, the legendary case officer
____. It makes for tiresome reading, like it's Sunday night edging 4 a.m. and you still have
nine undergrad papers on the causes of the Civil War to grade.
Hayden is openly contemptuous of the American people, seeing them as brutes who need to be
led around, either by the Russians, as he sees it now, or by the IC, as he wishes it to be.
Proof of how dumb we are? Hayden cites a poll showing 83 percent of Republicans and 27 percent
of Democrats don't believe the IC analysis that Russia meddled in the 2016 election when they
damn well should. Further proof? Russian bots at work on Twitter influencing conservative minds
by using the hashtags #God and #Benghazi.
In our odd times, Hayden is a Hero of the Resistance. Seemingly forgotten is that, as head
of the NSA, he implemented blanket surveillance of American citizens in a rape of the Fourth
Amendment, itself a product of the Enlightenment, justifying his unconstitutional actions with
a mishmash of post-truth platitudes and still-secret legal findings. Hayden also supported
torture during the War on Terror, but whatever.
This book-length swipe right for the IC leaves out the slam dunk work those agencies did on
Iraq's weapons of mass destruction. Any concern about political motives inside the IC is swept
away as "baseless." Gina
Haspel , who oversaw the torture program, is an "inspired choice" to head CIA. Hayden
writes for the rubes, proclaiming that the IC produces facts when in reality even good intel
can only be assessments and ambiguous conclusions.
That people so readily overlook Hayden's sins simply because he rolls off snark against
Trump speaks to our naiveté. That men like Hayden retain their security clearances while
serving as authors and paid commentators to outlets like CNN speaks to how deep the roots of
the Deep State reach. That some troubled Jack D. Ripper squirreled inside the IC might
take this pablum seriously is frightening.
Peter Van Buren, a 24-year State Department veteran, is the author of We Meant Well : How I Helped Lose the Battle for the
Hearts and Minds of the Iraqi People and Hooper's War : A Novel of WWII Japan. Follow him on Twitter
@WeMeantWell .
He's not blinded by hate. If you actually read the book, he describes his issues with Obama,
Clinton and everyone else. The fact remains he outlined the truth: Trump is a bumbling fool
who cannot distinguish truth fro fiction and is the most corrupt president ever to inhabit
the oval office, and has no idea what he's doing.
This interesting article states:
Gina Haspel, who oversaw the torture program, is an 'inspired choice' to head CIA. Really, torture is used by gangsters and other underworld villains. Therefore, I ask based
on the evidence against governments. "Are We Seeing Government by Gangsters"?
http://graysinfo.blogspot.ca/2018/03/are-we-seeing-government-by-gangsters.html
The guy sounds like a certain Senator from Wisconsin:
"The reason why we find ourselves in a position of impotency is not because the enemy has
sent men to invade our shores, but rather because of the traitorous actions of those who have
had all the benefits that the wealthiest nation on earth has had to offer – the finest
homes, the finest college educations, and the finest jobs in Government we can give."
Peter Van Buren reminds us all: "Seemingly forgotten is that, as head of the NSA, he
implemented blanket surveillance of American citizens in a rape of the Fourth Amendment "
The 4th Amendment to the US Constitution:
"The right of the people to be secure in their persons, houses, papers, and effects, against
unreasonable searches and seizures, shall not be violated, and no Warrants shall issue, but
upon probable cause, supported by Oath or affirmation, and particularly describing the place
to be searched, and the persons or things to be seized."
German Chancellor Angela Merkel, French President Emmanuel Macron and UK Prime Minister
Theresa May have agreed in phone talks that the European Union should be ready to defend its
trade interests if the United States takes any trade measures against the bloc, the German
government said Sunday.
"The chancellor also spoke with the president [Macron] and the prime minister [May] on trade
relations with the United States. They agreed that the United States should not take
trade-linked measures against the European Union and that, otherwise, the European Union should
be ready to defend its interests within the framework of the multilateral trading system," the
statement read.
"... Patrick J. Buchanan is the author of a new book, ..."
"... . To find out more about Patrick Buchanan and read features by other Creators writers and cartoonists, visit the Creators website at www.creators.com. ..."
"Together," President Macron instructed President Trump, "we can resist the rise of aggressive nationalisms that deny our history
and divide the world."
In an address before Congress on Wednesday, France's Macron denounced "extreme nationalism," invoked the UN, NATO, WTO, and Paris
climate accord, and implored Trump's America to come home to the New World Order.
"The United States is the one who invented this multilateralism," Macron went on, "you are the one now who has to help preserve
and reinvent it."
His visit was hailed and his views cheered, but on reflection, the ideas of Emmanuel Macron seem to be less about tomorrow than
yesterday. For the world he celebrates is receding into history. The America of 2018 is coming to see NATO as having evolved into
an endless U.S. commitment to go to war with Russia on behalf of a rich Europe that resolutely refuses to provide for its own defense.
Since the WTO was created in the mid-90s, the U.S. has run $12 trillion in trade deficits, and among the organization's biggest
beneficiaries -- the EU. Under the Paris climate accord, environmental restrictions are put upon the United States from which China
is exempt. As for the UN, is that sinkhole of anti-Americanism, the General Assembly, really worth the scores of billions we have
plunged into it?
"Aggressive nationalism" is a term that might well fit Napoleon Bonaparte, whose Arc de Triomphe sits on the Champs-Elysees. But
does it really fit the Hungarians, Poles, Brits, Scots, Catalans, and other indigenous peoples of Europe who are now using democratic
methods and means to preserve their national homes?
And the United States would seem an odd place to go about venting on "aggressive nationalisms that deny our history." Did Macron
not learn at the Lycee Henri IV in Paris or the Ecole Nationale d'Administration how the Americans acquired all that land? General
Washington, at whose Mount Vernon home Macron dined, was a nationalist who fought for six years to sever America's ties to the nation
under which he was born. How does Macron think Andrew Jackson acquired Florida from Spain, Sam Houston acquired Texas from Mexico,
and Winfield Scott and Zachary Taylor acquired the Southwest? By bartering?
Aggressive nationalism is a good synonym for the Manifest Destiny of a republic that went about relieving Spain of Cuba, Puerto
Rico, Guam, and the Philippines. How does Macron think the "New World" was conquered and colonized if not by aggressive British,
French, and Spanish nationalists determined to impose their rule upon weaker indigenous tribes? Was it not nationalism that broke
up the USSR into 15 nations?
Was not the Zionist movement that resurrected Israel in 1948, and in 1967 captured the West Bank and then annexed East Jerusalem
and the Golan Heights, a manifestation of aggressive nationalism?
Macron is an echo of George H.W. Bush who in Kiev in 1991 warned Ukrainians against the "suicidal nationalism" of declaring independence
from the Russian Federation. "Aggressive nationalisms divide the world," warns Macron. Well, yes, they do, which is why we have now
194 members of the U.N., rather than the original 50. Is this a problem? "Together," said Macron, "we will build a new, strong multilateralism
that defends pluralism and democracy in the face of ill winds."
Macron belongs to a political class that sees open borders and free trade thickening and tightening the ties of dependency, and
eventually creating a One Europe whose destiny his crowd will forever control.
But if his idea of pluralism is multiracial, multiethnic, and multicultural nations, with a multilateral EU overlord, he is describing
a future that tens of millions of Europeans believe means the deaths of the nations that give meaning to their lives.
And they will not go gently into that good night.
In America, too, millions have come to recognize that there is a method to the seeming madness of open borders. Name of the game:
dispossessing the deplorables of the country they love.
With open borders and mass migration of over a million people a year into the USA, almost all of them from third-world countries
that vote 70 to 90 percent Democratic, the left is foreclosing the future. They're converting the greatest country of the West into
what Teddy Roosevelt called a "polyglot boarding house for the world." And in that boarding house the left will have a lock on the
presidency.
With the collaboration of co-conspirators in the media, progressives throw a cloak of altruism over the cynical seizure of permanent
power.
For, as the millions of immigrants here legally and illegally register, and the vote is extended to prison inmates, ex-cons, and
16-year-olds, the political complexion of America will come to resemble San Francisco.
End goal: ensure that what happened in 2016, when the nation rose up and threw out a despised establishment, never happens again.
Patrick J. Buchanan is the author of a new book, Nixon's White House Wars: The Battles That Made and Broke a President
and Divided America Forever . To find out more about Patrick Buchanan and read features by other Creators writers and cartoonists,
visit the Creators website at www.creators.com.
"... In asserting that the EU was primarily formed to divert financial gains from the US, Trump promised that what he termed "disastrous trade deals" would stop, as he was going to personally "take on" the economic European powerhouse, as well as China, the largest economy in Asia and the second largest economy in the world. ..."
As the US president struggles at home with a legislature and judiciary increasingly
unwilling to do his bidding, new bluster and threats of a trade war with other nations appear
to have become Trump's rallying cry to the faithful. US President Donald Trump, at a meeting of
his followers in Michigan on Saturday, suggested that his administration would do everything
within its power to shift what the White House terms Washington DC's trade imbalance with the
European Union, and hinted darkly that Americans must prepare for a bumpy and uncomfortable
ride, according to RT.
In asserting that the EU was primarily formed to divert financial gains from the US,
Trump promised that what he termed "disastrous trade deals" would stop, as he was going to
personally "take on" the economic European powerhouse, as well as China, the largest economy in
Asia and the second largest economy in the world.
At a carefully curated supporters-only promotional speaking event in Michigan, the
strikingly unpopular US leader claimed that EU trade policies existed only "to take advantage
of the United States," cited by RT.
The US president warned of tough economic times for residents of the wealthiest country on
earth, declaring that, "In short term you may have to take some problems, long term -- you're
going to be so happy."
In keeping with an ongoing talking point repeatedly used by the president, Trump blamed
previous US administrations for the issues he describes as problems.
"I don't blame them," the US president declared -- referring to those nations with which he
seeks to engage in trade wars -- adding, "I blame past presidents and past leaders of our
country."
A May 1 deadline has been implemented for the March 1 Trump ultimatum to various nations --
including China and the EU -- to either curb aluminum and steel exports to the US or face
sharply-increased import taxes.
The ultimatum triggered a speedy global backlash alongside threats of retaliation from
China, the EU, and most other nations.
At a meeting of EU members in Sofia on Saturday, Belgian Finance Minister Johan Van
Overtveldt noted that Trump's strong-arm tactics will backfire, adding that trade wars are a
no-win scenario over the long term.
"A trade war is a losing game for everybody," Van Overtveldt observed.
The same for the un-elected Mandarins in Brussels. They are a real swamp. Lazy, clueless, overpaid and greedy still. They are
powerhungry despite their tremendous lack of any political clout.
Vasalls through blackmail by 3 letter agencies?
The same for german Mrs. Merkel. Being a german citizen, I am ashamed of thus woman and her orwellian ,politics'.
Today, the former CEO of Thyssen-Krupp, Prof. Dr. Dieter Spethmann, a lawyer, called for her urgent removal from the job by publishing
an Open Letter in mmnews (a blog).
With just days left until the May 1 deadline when a temporary trade waiver expires and the
US steel and aluminum tariffs kick in, and after last-ditch attempts first by Emmanuel Macron
and then Angela Merkel to win exemptions for Europe fell on deaf ears, the European Union is
warning about the costs of an imminent trade war with the US while bracing for one to erupt in
just three days after the White House signaled it will reject the bloc's demand for an
unconditional waiver from metals-import tariffs .
"A trade war is a losing game for everybody," Belgian Finance Minister Johan Van Overtveldt
told reporters in Sofia where Europe's finance ministers have gathered. " We should stay cool
when we're thinking about reactions but the basic point is that nobody wins in a trade war so
we try to avoid it at all costs. "
Well, Trump disagrees which is why his administration has given Europe, Canada and other
allies an option: accept quotas in exchange for an exemption from the steel and aluminum
tariffs that kick on Tuesday, when the temporary waiver expires. "We are asking of everyone:
quotas if not tariffs," Commerce Secretary Wilbur Ross said on Friday. This, as
Bloomberg points out , puts the EU in the difficult position of either succumbing to U.S.
demands that could breach international commerce rules, or face punitive tariffs.
Forcing governments to limit shipments of goods violates World Trade Organization rules,
which prohibit so-called voluntary export restraints. The demand is also contrary to the
entire trade philosophy of the 28-nation bloc, which is founded on the principle of the free
movement of goods.
Adding to the confusion, while WTO rules foresee the possibility of countries taking
emergency "safeguard" measures involving import quotas for specific goods, such steps are rare,
must be temporary and can be legally challenged. The EU is demanding a permanent, unconditional
waiver from the U.S. tariffs.
Meanwhile, amid the impotent EU bluster, so far only South Korea has been formally spared
from the duties, after reaching a deal last month to revise its bilateral free-trade agreement
with the U.S.
Europe, on the other hand, refuses to reach a compromise, and according to a EU official,
"Trump's demands to curb steel and aluminum exports to 90 percent of the level of the previous
two years are unacceptable." The question then is whether Europe's retaliatory move would be
painful enough to deter Trump and lift the sanctions: the official said the EU's response would
depend on the level of the quotas after which the punitive tariffs would kick in; meanwhile the
European Commission continues to "stress the bloc's consistent call for an unconditional,
permanent exclusion from the American metal levies."
"In the short run it might help them solve their trade balance but in the long run it will
worsen trade conditions," Bulgarian Finance Minister Vladislav Goranov said in Sofia. "The
tools they're using to make America great again might result in certain mistakes because free
world trade has proven to be the best solution for the development of the world so far."
Around the time of his meeting, French President Emmanuel Macron made it clear that the EU
is not afraid of an escalating trade war and will not be intimidated, saying " we won't talk
about anything while there's a gun pointed at our head. "
He may change his opinion once Trump fires the first bullet.
Adding to Europe's disappointment, during her visit to the White House on Friday, Angela
Merkel said she discussed trade disputes with Trump and that she failed to win a public
commitment to halt the tariffs.
Meanwhile, Merkel's new bffs over in France are also hunkering down in preparation for a
lengthy conflict. French economy minister Bruone Le Maire told his fellow European bureaucrats
Sofia during a discussion on taxation: "One thing I learned from my week in the U.S. with
President Macron: The Americans will only respect a show of strength."
Coming from the French, that observation is as accurate as it is delightfully ironic.
And now the real question is who has the most to lose from the imminent Transatlantic trade
war, and will surrender first.
"... "Since the WTO was created in the mid-90s, the U.S. has run $12 trillion in trade deficits, and among the organization's biggest beneficiaries -- the EU." ..."
"Together," President Macron instructed President Trump, "we can resist the rise of
aggressive nationalisms that deny our history and divide the world."
In an address before Congress on Wednesday, France's Macron denounced "extreme nationalism,"
invoked the UN, NATO, WTO, and Paris climate accord, and implored Trump's America to come home
to the New World Order.
"The United States is the one who invented this multilateralism," Macron went on, "you are
the one now who has to help preserve and reinvent it."
His visit was hailed and his views cheered, but on reflection, the ideas of Emmanuel Macron
seem to be less about tomorrow than yesterday.
For the world he celebrates is receding into history.
The America of 2018 is coming to see NATO as having evolved into an endless U.S. commitment
to go to war with Russia on behalf of a rich Europe that resolutely refuses to provide for its
own defense.
Since the WTO was created in the mid-90s, the U.S. has run $12 trillion in trade deficits,
and among the organization's biggest beneficiaries -- the EU.
Under the Paris climate accord, environmental restrictions are put upon the United States
from which China is exempt.
As for the UN, is that sinkhole of anti-Americanism, the General Assembly, really worth the
scores of billions we have plunged into it?
"Aggressive nationalism" is a term that might well fit Napoleon Bonaparte, whose Arc de
Triomphe sits on the Champs-Elysees. But does it really fit the Hungarians, Poles, Brits,
Scots, Catalans, and other indigenous peoples of Europe who are now using democratic methods
and means to preserve their national homes?
And the United States would seem an odd place to go about venting on "aggressive
nationalisms that deny our history."
Did Macron not learn at the Lycee Henri IV in Paris or the Ecole Nationale d'Administration
how the Americans acquired all that land?
General Washington, at whose Mount Vernon home Macron dined, was a nationalist who fought
for six years to sever America's ties to the nation under which he was born.
How does Macron think Andrew Jackson acquired Florida from Spain, Sam Houston acquired Texas
from Mexico, and Winfield Scott and Zachary Taylor acquired the Southwest? By bartering?
Aggressive nationalism is a good synonym for the Manifest Destiny of a republic that went
about relieving Spain of Cuba, Puerto Rico, Guam, and the Philippines.
How does Macron think the "New World" was conquered and colonized if not by aggressive
British, French, and Spanish nationalists determined to impose their rule upon weaker
indigenous tribes?
Was it not nationalism that broke up the USSR into 15 nations?
Was not the Zionist movement that resurrected Israel in 1948, and in 1967 captured the West
Bank and then annexed East Jerusalem and the Golan Heights, a manifestation of aggressive
nationalism?
Macron is an echo of George H.W. Bush who in Kiev in 1991 warned Ukrainians against the
"suicidal nationalism" of declaring independence from the Russian Federation.
"Aggressive nationalisms divide the world," warns Macron.
Well, yes, they do, which is why we have now 194 members of the U.N., rather than the
original 50. Is this a problem?
"Together," said Macron, "we will build a new, strong multilateralism that defends pluralism
and democracy in the face of ill winds."
Macron belongs to a political class that sees open borders and free trade thickening and
tightening the ties of dependency, and eventually creating a One Europe whose destiny his crowd
will forever control.
But if his idea of pluralism is multiracial, multiethnic, and multicultural nations, with a
multilateral EU overlord, he is describing a future that tens of millions of Europeans believe
means the deaths of the nations that give meaning to their lives.
And they will not go gently into that good night.
In America, too, millions have come to recognize that there is a method to the seeming
madness of open borders. Name of the game: dispossessing the deplorables of the country they
love.
With open borders and mass migration of over a million people a year into the USA, almost
all of them from third-world countries that vote 70 to 90 percent Democratic, the left is
foreclosing the future. They're converting the greatest country of the West into what Teddy
Roosevelt called a "polyglot boarding house for the world." And in that boarding house the left
will have a lock on the presidency.
With the collaboration of co-conspirators in the media, progressives throw a cloak of
altruism over the cynical seizure of permanent power.
For, as the millions of immigrants here legally and illegally register, and the vote is
extended to prison inmates, ex-cons, and 16-year-olds, the political complexion of America will
come to resemble San Francisco.
End goal: ensure that what happened in 2016, when the nation rose up and threw out a
despised establishment, never happens again.
Patrick J. Buchanan is the author of a new book, Nixon's White House Wars: The Battles
That Made and Broke a President and Divided America Forever. To find out more about Patrick
Buchanan and read features by other Creators writers and cartoonists, visit the Creators
website at www.creators.com.
Let's remember, it was nationalism that led German, Japan and Italy into the two world wars.
Like everything, nationalism is not absolutely good or absolutely bad.
European nationalism that led them to colonize other weaker countries was not a good
thing. Nationalism that led the colonized countries to fight for independence was a good
thing.
The current rising of nationalism is not a good thing because it is often bound up with
white nationalism, a belief that the non-whites are inferior people undeserving of care and
happiness.
While I understand the anxiety of White people for losing their power of dominance,
multiculturalism is a future that can't be rolled back no matter how much they long for the
past white homogeneity. Because technology that made our world smaller and flatter can't be
uninvented.
I agree the West can't absorb all the immigrants who want to find new life in the West.
The solution is not to shun the immigrants and pretend they don't exist. The solution is to
acknowledge their suffering and their need for a stable home and help them build that at
their home countries.
Biologically, it is known that our genes get stronger with more diversity, that community
gets weaker with too much in breeding. So is our strength as a people, culturally,
philosophically, spiritually and creatively.
Another nice notion on the mis/abuse of the world nationalism from Mr. Buchanan. From a
Central European perspective, however Macron's alleged multilateralism as presented in
Washington is just a pretence peddled for the media – teaming up with Angela Merkel
(more specifically, with Germany's economic strength), Macron pretty much insists on reining
in the rebellious Visegrad 4 politically, without the slightest interest in reaching a
mutually beneficial compromise with them.
Pat points to Macron's globalist trade babble to Congress answers:
"Since the WTO was created in the mid-90s, the U.S. has run $12 trillion in trade
deficits, and among the organization's biggest beneficiaries -- the EU."
President Trump's economic nationalist/fair trade agenda can fix this problem.
It strikes me that both France and Germany have large enough populations, economies and
technical know-how to produce effective modern fighting forces. Second, given the size of EU,
it is clear that the EU, if it could get its act together, would be capable of projecting
force in the world on an equal playing field with the United States.
The European Leaders appeals to Trump to pursue European interests in American foreign
policy are simply pathetic. If Europe has foreign interests, they will only be able to
protect and insure them if they retake their sovereignty and independence on the world
stage.
Europe can, and I suspect Europe will, because their problem is not just Trump and whether
he is impeached or re-elected, it is that European interests are being held hostage to the
American Electorate, which can and will return a Cowboy to the Presidency long after Trump is
gone.
I don't see how, given the developments with the Iran Deal, as well as other frictions,
that the NATO alliance can remain standing. None of the above reflections are particularly
ideological, and it seems impossible that Merkel and Macron couldn't entertain such
thoughts.
Europe can, and inevitably will, declare independence from the Americans, and I see NATO
unraveling and a new dawn of European "multilateralism" taking its place.
Nationalism and Multiculturalism cannot coexist separately, they're in tendsion as we all try
to balance the scales.
Without the benefit of nationalism, the Koreas would not have done what they just did. My
own "ethnic people" are the minority of 1.2 million Hungarians who live in Romania, who have
lived there for centuries and will not leave their homeland except many of them do, like my
parents did, and many of my other relatives and friends–the number was 1.5 million not
too long ago, and I was estimating 1.8, but man, we are dwindling. Only 1.2 million! That
shocks me. Nationalism keeps us alive. But if that's all we had, then the Romanians would be
totally nationalistic too, and they will forcefully seek to curtail minority rights,
language, culture, and slowly choke us out. That's the nationalist philosophy on
minorities.
That's your philosophy, and you're saying what will happen here is liberals will slowly
turn the country into San Francisco. You make the same error as my friend in another thread.
You cannot compare a city and its politics to a province or a country, or to any territory
that contains vast farmlands.
Pat, you are saying that it's possible for the entire Byzantine Empire to take on the
precise political complexion of the walled city of Constantinople. That city cannot feed
itself, it's not a self-contained social or political entity.
The roiling cities of San Francisco/Bay Area and glorious Constantinople are and were
completely and totally dependent on the countryside, and thus, on the politics the rurals
tend to practice. The rurals need to feel the effects of city politics too.
No city anywhere is self-contained, and most cities are more liberal than their
hinterlands, so should we do away with cities?
You can see it as symbiotic or some kind of yin and yang tension, however you prefer. But
one is good and the other is evil? I don't buy that.
I'm pretty sure I should say ALL cities are more liberal then the surrounding countrysides
which feed them. After all, the city is really just the most commonly known major local
market, which the villages eventually form organically. One village in particular stands out,
and the neighbors start flocking more and more to its market, some decide to move there and
contribute even more to the good energy, and voila, the first city is soon born.
Then it takes on pride, and starts thinking it's superior to the "rubes." It isn't. I was
lucky enough to get my foundations in a village, I know its incredible efficiency and
_conservative_ values and lifestyle, but trust me, there's plenty of drunkenness and scandal,
even among the sainted rubes who raised me.
Keep slapping down the cities, Pat, but don't exaggerate the threat, no self-supporting
society on Earth could live the way those freaks live in San Francisco, or Constantinople,
that's a fact.
My apologies, I know I go on a little long sometimes:
I am an American now, and America is my "us," I don't have mixed political allegiances,
just cultural ones. I don't live in my original homeland anymore. The choice to leave wasn't
mine, though.
If I had a choice to leave my country of origin, the land I was raised in and find
familiar–and I have been in America since age twelve, so I do see it as home and very
familiar–I would be daunted. Speaking as an average American adult, I know that moving
to another English-speaking and equally advanced country is complicated enough for the
average American. Imagine uprooting and going to a foreign land whose language you don't know
yet, where everything is a lot more expensive. Try getting a job there. Let's say you have no
college degree. Try it. I wouldn't want to.
Immigrants are tough as nails, I'm sorry to say. You have no chance against them,
actually. You cannot even conceive of the willpower and trials by fire. Most people quite
understandably can't fathom it, unless they actually try it or see it with their own
eyes.
"... The ultimate goal of the new world order as an ideology is total centralization of economic and governmental power into the hands of a select and unaccountable bureaucracy made up of international financiers. This is governance according the the dictates of Plato's Republic; a delusional fantasy world in which benevolent philosopher kings, supposedly smarter and more objective than the rest of us, rule from on high with scientific precision and wisdom. It is a world where administrators become gods. ..."
"... Large corporations receive unfair legal protection under limited liability as well as outright legislative protection from civil consequences (Monsanto is a perfect example of this). They also receive immense taxpayer funded welfare through bailouts and other sources when they fail to manage their business responsibly. All this while small businesses and entrepreneurs are impeded at every turn by taxation and legal obstacles. ..."
"... Only massive corporations supported by governments are able to exploit the advantages of international manufacturing and labor sources in a way that ensures long term success. Meanwhile economic models that promote true decentralization and localism become impractical because real competition is never allowed. The world has not enjoyed free markets in at least a century. What we have today is something entirely different. ..."
"... The fact is, globalist institutions and central banks permeate almost every corner of the world. Nations like Russia and China are just as heavily tied to the IMF and the Bank for International Settlements and international financial centers like Goldman Sachs as any western government. ..."
"... The first inclination of human beings is to discriminate against ideas and people they see as destructive and counter to their prosperity. Globalists therefore have to convince a majority of people that the very tribalism that has fueled our social evolution and some of the greatest ideas in history is actually the source of our eventual doom. ..."
"... As mentioned earlier, globalists cannot have their "new world order" unless they can convince the masses to ask for it. Trying to implement such a system by force alone would end in failure, because revolution is the natural end result of tyranny. Therefore, the new world order has to be introduced as if it had been formed by coincidence or by providence. Any hint that the public is being conned into accepting global centralization would trigger widespread resistance. ..."
"... This is why globalism is always presented in the mainstream media as a natural extension of civilization's higher achievement. Even though it was the dangerous interdependency of globalism that helped fuel the economic crisis of 2008 and continues to escalate that crisis to this day, more globalism is continually promoted as the solution to the problem. It is spoken of with reverence in mainstream economic publications and political discussions. It receives almost religious praise in the halls of academia. Globalism is socioeconomic ambrosia -- the food of deities. It is the fountain of youth. It is a new Eden. ..."
"... Obviously, this adoration for globalism is nonsense. There is no evidence whatsoever that globalism is a positive force for humanity, let alone a natural one. There is far more evidence that globalism is a poisonous ideology that can only ever gain a foothold through trickery and through false flags. ..."
When globalists speak publicly about a "new world order" they are speaking about something
very specific and rather sacred in their little cult of elitism. It is not simply the notion
that civilization shifts or changes abruptly on its own; rather, it is their name for a
directed and engineered vision - a world built according to their rules, not a world that
evolved naturally according to necessity.
There are other names for this engineered vision, including the "global economic reset," or
the more general and innocuous term "globalism," but the intention is the same.
The ultimate goal of the new world order as an ideology is total centralization of economic
and governmental power into the hands of a select and unaccountable bureaucracy made up of
international financiers. This is governance according the the dictates of Plato's Republic; a
delusional fantasy world in which benevolent philosopher kings, supposedly smarter and more
objective than the rest of us, rule from on high with scientific precision and wisdom. It is a
world where administrators become gods.
Such precision and objectivity within human systems is not possible, of course . Human
beings are far too susceptible to their own biases and personal desires to be given
totalitarian power over others. The results will always be destruction and disaster. Then, add
to this the fact that the kinds of people who often pursue such power are predominantly
narcissistic sociopaths and psychopaths. If a governmental structure of high level
centralization is allowed to form, it opens a door for these mentally and spiritually broken
people to play out their twisted motives on a global stage.
It is important to remember that sociopaths are prone to fabricating all kinds of high
minded ideals to provide cover for their actions. That is to say, they will adopt a host of
seemingly noble causes to rationalize their scramble for power, but in the end these
"humanitarians" only care about imposing their will on as many people as possible while feeding
off them for as long as time allows.
There are many false promises, misrepresentations and fraudulent conceptions surrounding the
narrative of globalism. Some of them are rather clever and subversive and are difficult to pick
out in the deliberately created fog. The schemes involved in implementing globalism are
designed to confuse the masses with crisis until they end up ASKING for more centralization and
less freedom.
Let's examine some of the most common propaganda methods and arguments behind the push for
globalization and a "new world order"
Con #1: Globalism Is About "Free Markets"
A common pro-globalism meme is the idea that globalization is not really centralization, but
decentralization. This plays primarily to the economic side of global governance, which in my
view is the most important because without economic centralization political centralization is
not possible.
Free markets according to Adam Smith, a pioneer of the philosophy, are supposed to provide
open paths for anyone with superior ideas and ingenuity to pursue those ideas without
interference from government or government aided institutions. What we have today under
globalism are NOT free markets. Instead, globalism has supplied unfettered power to
international corporations which cannot exist without government charter and government
financial aid.
The corporate model is completely counter to Adam Smith's original premise of free market
trade. Large corporations receive unfair legal protection under limited liability as well as
outright legislative protection from civil consequences (Monsanto is a perfect example of
this). They also receive immense taxpayer funded welfare through bailouts and other sources
when they fail to manage their business responsibly. All this while small businesses and
entrepreneurs are impeded at every turn by taxation and legal obstacles.
In terms of international trade being "free trade," this is not really the case either. Only
massive corporations supported by governments are able to exploit the advantages of
international manufacturing and labor sources in a way that ensures long term success.
Meanwhile economic models that promote true decentralization and localism become impractical
because real competition is never allowed. The world has not enjoyed free markets in at least a
century. What we have today is something entirely different.
Con #2: Globalism Is About A "Multipolar World"
This is a relatively new disinformation tactic that I attribute directly to the success of
the liberty movement and alternative economists. As the public becomes more educated on the
dangers of economic centralization and more specifically the dangers of central banks, the
globalists are attempting to shift the narrative to muddy the waters.
For example, the liberty movement has railed against the existence of the Federal Reserve
and fiat dollar hegemony to the point that our information campaign has been breaking into
mainstream thought. The problem is that globalism is not about the dollar, U.S. hegemony or the
so-called "deep state," which in my view is a distraction from the bigger issue at hand.
The fact is, globalist institutions and central banks permeate almost every corner of the
world. Nations like Russia and China are just as heavily tied to the IMF and the Bank for
International Settlements and international financial centers like Goldman Sachs as any western
government.
Part of the plan for the new world order, as has been openly admitted by globalists and
globalist publications, is the decline of the U.S. and the dollar system to make way for one
world financial governance through the IMF as well as the Special Drawing Rights basket as a
mechanism for the world reserve currency. The globalists WANT a less dominant U.S. and a more
involved East, while the East continues to call for more control of the global economy by the
IMF. This concept unfortunately flies over the heads of most economists, even in the liberty
movement.
So, the great lie being promoted now is that the fall of the U.S. and the dollar is a "good
thing" because it will result in "decentralization," a "multi-polar" world order and the
"death" of globalism. However, what is really happening is that as the U.S. falls globalist
edifices like the IMF and the BIS rise. We are moving from centralization to
super-centralization. Globalists have pulled a bait and switch in order to trick the liberty
movement into supporting the success of the East (which is actually also globalist controlled)
and a philosophy which basically amounts to a re-branding of the new world order as some kind
of decentralized paradise.
Con #3: Nationalism Is The Source Of War, And Globalism Will End It
If there's one thing globalists have a love/hate relationship with, it's humanity's natural
tribal instincts. On the one hand, they like tribalism because in some cases tribalism can be
turned into zealotry, and zealots are easy to exploit and manipulate. Wars between nations
(tribes) can be instigated if the tribal instinct is weighted with artificial fears and
threats.
On the other hand, tribalism lends itself to natural decentralization of societies because
tribalism in its best form is the development of many groups organized around a variety of
ideas and principles and projects. This makes the establishment of a "one world ideology" very
difficult, if not impossible. The first inclination of human beings is to discriminate against
ideas and people they see as destructive and counter to their prosperity. Globalists therefore
have to convince a majority of people that the very tribalism that has fueled our social
evolution and some of the greatest ideas in history is actually the source of our eventual
doom.
Nationalism served the globalists to a point, but now they need to get rid of it entirely.
This requires considerable crisis blamed on nationalism and "populist" ideals. Engineered war,
whether kinetic or economic, is the best method to scapegoat tribalism. Every tragedy from now
on must eventually be attributed to ideas of separation and logical discrimination against
negative ideologies. The solution of globalism will then be offered; a one world system in
which all separation is deemed "evil."
Con #4: Globalism Is Natural And Inevitable
As mentioned earlier, globalists cannot have their "new world order" unless they can
convince the masses to ask for it. Trying to implement such a system by force alone would end
in failure, because revolution is the natural end result of tyranny. Therefore, the new world
order has to be introduced as if it had been formed by coincidence or by providence. Any hint
that the public is being conned into accepting global centralization would trigger widespread
resistance.
This is why globalism is always presented in the mainstream media as a natural extension of
civilization's higher achievement. Even though it was the dangerous interdependency of
globalism that helped fuel the economic crisis of 2008 and continues to escalate that crisis to
this day, more globalism is continually promoted as the solution to the problem. It is spoken
of with reverence in mainstream economic publications and political discussions. It receives
almost religious praise in the halls of academia. Globalism is socioeconomic ambrosia -- the
food of deities. It is the fountain of youth. It is a new Eden.
Obviously, this adoration for globalism is nonsense. There is no evidence whatsoever that
globalism is a positive force for humanity, let alone a natural one. There is far more evidence
that globalism is a poisonous ideology that can only ever gain a foothold through trickery and
through false flags.
We live in an era that represents an ultimate crossroads for civilization; a time of great
uncertainty. Will we seek truth in the trials we face, and thus the ability to create our own
solutions? Or, will we take a seemingly easier road by embracing whatever solutions are handed
to us by the establishment? Make no mistake -- the globalists already have a solution
prepackaged for us. They have been acclimating and conditioning the public to accept it for
decades now. That solution will not bring what it promises. It will not bring peace, but
eternal war. It will not bring togetherness, but isolation. It will not bring understanding,
but ignorance.
When globalists eventually try to sell us on a full-blown new world order, they will pull
out every conceivable image of heaven on Earth, but they will do this only after creating a
tangible and ever present hell.
* * *
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"... The common good "cannot be reduced to the goods of individual private parties, and cannot be deduced from them. Just as the sum of the parts does not make up the whole, in the same way the sum of private interests may sometimes work even against itself it is the state that represents the common good." Isn't this something we can learn from in the West today? ..."
"... Russia's "[Christian] Orthodox spirit and the ethic of solidarity ..."
"... Like the Catholic Church, the Russian Orthodox Church has recently forged its own Social Concept of the ROC, which fleshes out this call for fairness as an aspect of human dignity. ..."
"... The City of Man ..."
"... Among Russia's virtues, it must be emphasized, is a far greater freedom of speech than it is typically given credit for. Russian participants in the Kaliningrad conference demonstrated a boldness of imagination, a variety and depth of thought on alternate futures for their country that is by no means always evident in political speech even in the United States. ..."
"... The author would like to thank Dr. Adrian Walker, Matthew Cooper and especially Dr. Matthew Dal Santo for their valuable suggestions and comments on an earlier draft. ..."
"... Paul Grenier is an essayist and translator who writes regularly on political-philosophical issues. ..."
A
staunchly traditional society grapples with modernity's disruptions, seeking conservatisms far
beyond Putinism.
It's a truism that America is a liberal place. Americans emphasize the importance of the
individual and tend to reject notions of hierarchy and authority. Russia by contrast is known
to be a more conservative society, one where the interests of the group come ahead of those of
the individual; and where, for centuries, respect for hierarchy and authority has usually been
the norm.
All the same, the "news" of Russia's return to conservatism has hit many observers in the
West like the proverbial ton of bricks. The typical response has been to
blame the Russian president for steering Russia away from the liberal path, the path of
becoming a "
normal country" with "Western values."
Others have sought to understand Russian political culture on its own terms. A recent
analysis ("The New Eurasians," Times Literary Supplement , May 13, 2015) stands out
from the crowd by making a serious effort to read present-day Russian conservatism in its
historical context. Lesley Chamberlain dismisses the glib reduction of Russia to its
present-day leader. Russia, she writes, is not ruled by Vladimir Putin: to the contrary, "the
power that rules Russia is tradition." Far from it being the case that a benighted Russian
public is being led to conservatism artificially by its government, the reverse is the case:
the vast majority of Russians, perhaps eighty percent "are intensely conservative."
Like most in the commentariat, Chamberlain finds cause for alarm in Russia's return to type.
She worries about a Russia seeking to create "an alternative version of the contemporary
Christian, or post-Christian, world, contiguous with but distinct from the West."
Chamberlain reduces today's incarnation of Russian conservatism to the more or less vague
bundle of geographic and neo-imperial notions that goes by the name Eurasianism, often linked
with the name of Alexander Dugin.
To be sure, anti-Western Eurasianism is part of contemporary Russian conservatism.
But it is only one part. Excessive focus on this angle has created the impression that
Dugin-esque Eurasianism is the only game in town when it comes to Russian conservatism. It
isn't. It's not even the only version of what might be called the 'Russian national greatness'
school of conservatism.
If we wish to understand Russia in something like its true complexity, we have to take the
trouble to listen to it, to let it speak in its own voice instead of constantly projecting onto
it all our own worst fears. Precisely because Eurasianism has already hogged all the attention,
I won't deal with it here.
... ... ...
Liberal Conservatism
Some participants straddled several categories of conservatism at once. In other cases, for
example that of the above-mentioned Makarenko, their thought fit neatly within a single
category -- in his case, that of liberal conservatism.
For Makarenko, modern Russian political practice has far too utilitarian an attitude toward
rule of law and democracy. If it can be demonstrated that the latter support state sovereignty,
then all is well and good; but whenever either are perceived as a threat to the state -- then
democracy and rule of law are always the ones that have to suffer. From his perspective, Russia
would do better to learn from Burke, who looked not so much to the sovereignty of the
state as to the sovereignty of the parliament .
Matveichev, no doubt the most eclectic thinker in the group, on certain subjects occupied
the liberal end of the spectrum. For example, in an essay on corruption and the state, he
approvingly cites the work of Peruvian economist Hernando de Soto to make the point that rule
of law -- as it is practiced, nota bene , in the United States -- is the sine qua
non of economic prosperity. What I found fascinating about Matveichev's position is that
he then takes his argument in a Hegelian and Platonic direction.
It is the state -- not the market on its own -- that provides these all important
forms , and bad as the corruption of state institutions may be, a bad form is
nonetheless better than no form at all -- including for business. The common good "cannot
be reduced to the goods of individual private parties, and cannot be deduced from them. Just as
the sum of the parts does not make up the whole, in the same way the sum of private interests
may sometimes work even against itself it is the state that represents the common good." Isn't
this something we can learn from in the West today?
Left Conservatism
The "left conservatives" at the conference -- represented most prominently by Dr. Alexander
Schipkov, an expert on Church-state relations -- are critical of liberal capitalism
and indeed are also critical of the current Russian state to the extent that its "conservatism"
is reducible merely to "family values" without including the all-important component of
economic fairness. His views are close to that of Catholic Distributists as well as to those of
"radical orthodox" theologians like William Cavanaugh and John Milbank.
According to Schipkov, Russians of various backgrounds (left and right, secular and
religious, red and white) need to forge a common ethic. But in truth, Russia already
has such an ethic, one that unifies all the disparate phases in its often tragic and
contradictory history. Consciously playing off of Weber, Schipkov refers to Russia's
"[Christian] Orthodox spirit and the ethic of solidarity ." In a fascinating essay on
this same subject, Schipkov makes clear that his concept of solidarity owes much to the
writings of the early 20th century German philosopher Max Scheler, who likewise had such a big
impact on the thought of Pope John Paul II.
Though the Russian Church continues to play a defining role in the ethical formation of the
nation -- no other pre-1917 institution, after all, still exists -- over time it will be
replaced by other institutions, according to Schipkov. Like the Catholic Church, the
Russian Orthodox Church has recently forged its own Social Concept of the ROC, which fleshes
out this call for fairness as an aspect of human dignity.
Creative Conservatism
Because it tends to evoke the disastrous social and economic effects of "liberalisation"
during the 1990s, the term "liberal" has become something of a swear word in today's Russia.
But what, exactly, does this much reviled "liberalism" consist in? In my own presentation
(English translation forthcoming at SolidarityHall.org ) I suggested that Russians need to define
liberalism -- and conservatism -- more carefully, while distinguishing both from their
ideological perversions.
To his credit, Oleg Matveichev has taken the trouble to craft a precise definition of the
liberal doctrine of human nature in terms worthy of a Pierre Manent ( The City of Man
). According to Matveichev, liberalism reconceives the very essence of man as freedom,
self-sufficiency, and self-definition. Seen through this liberal prism, the goal of our
existence becomes self-emancipation from the chains of the past and the dead weight of
tradition.
Having redefined the meaning of history, Matveichev continues, the "liberals" then set about
condemning those who would thwart its "progress," dismissing them as "conservatives" and
"reactionaries." Is it not time, Matveichev asks, to throw off the chains of this label
invented for us by our adversaries? Why define ourselves as mere "conservatives"? Why not
creatively reimagine an alternative 'meaning of history" ourselves?
Can conservatism be "creative?" And if so, how? Mikhail Remizov, president of the National
Strategy Institute, answered, in effect, "how can it be anything else?" Critics on the left
sometimes attack conservatism by saying, that conservatives do not preserve tradition, they
invent it. Remizov dismisses the implied insult, because it demonstrates a misunderstanding of
how traditions work: (re)invention " is the normal, creative approach to tradition." Remizov
agrees with Hans-Georg Gadamer that sharply contrasting tradition and modernity is a silly and
flat-footed way of looking at tradition, because the latter is always in any case a complex
creative task of making adjustments and dialectical zig-zags. Such an understanding of culture
and tradition as creativity fits, of course, quite nicely with the philosophy of
Nicholas Berdyaev. It is hard to think of another thinker for whom creativity plays a more
central role.
Alexei Kozyrev, associate dean of the philosophy department at Moscow State University,
illustrated the same creative conservative principle when he spoke of the Russian Orthodox
Church's Social Concept. The task of modern man, according to that document, is to find
creative ways to retrieve the thought of the Church Fathers, for example that of Gregory of
Nyssa, who counseled demonstrating our human dignity "not by domination of the natural world
but by caring for and preserving it." The Social Concept likewise calls for defending the
dignity of the unborn embryo and of the mentally ill. Here, in an unexpected twist, the Western
environmental movement meets the pro-Life movement, challenging perhaps our own ideological
boundaries.
... ...
Dialogue with Russia?
Lesley Chamberlain claimed that Russia is not a puzzle. In fact that is precisely what it
is. As should be clear even from the above very partial survey, Russian conservatism, like
Russia itself, embraces a contradictory collection of flaws and virtues. Both the flaws and the
virtues are large.
Among Russia's virtues, it must be emphasized, is a far greater freedom of speech than
it is typically given credit for. Russian participants in the Kaliningrad conference
demonstrated a boldness of imagination, a variety and depth of thought on alternate futures for
their country that is by no means always evident in political speech even in the United
States.
For Western liberals, it is tempting to present Russian conservatism as always intrinsically
dangerous. But I believe the loss is ours. Russian conservatism -- or at any rate important
elements of it -- contains something potentially valuable to the West as it seeks to forge a
strategy for dealing with the growing disorder in the world. What justifies engagement with
Russia is before all else its ability to contribute to solving the problem that all of us face:
how to devise a softer version of western modernity, one which allows for the preservation of
tradition while simultaneously retaining what is most valuable in the liberal
tradition.
The author would like to thank Dr. Adrian Walker, Matthew Cooper and especially Dr.
Matthew Dal Santo for their valuable suggestions and comments on an earlier draft.
Paul Grenier is an essayist and translator who writes regularly on
political-philosophical issues.
The presumption amongst Russian conservatives is not that Russia is perfect as it is but
that Russia's foundational values are good. This is something they have in common with
American conservatives, British Conservatives like Peter Hitchens, and probably most
conservatives in most societies. They would also lament their social ills.
I am not going to accuse you of not having read the article, but that comment of yours
could easily have been made by someone who simply read the title and jumped to the comments
section.
The author's point on free speech is an important one – there is a lot of very deep and
open discussion in Russia at the moment about the country's direction (including even
television debates with ten times the intellectual content of what we find in the States).
Putinism is not a clear ideological system, and for the most part there is no official
orthodoxy being pressed on scholars or the public, many currents exist. Most of the major
viable currents, as this article suggests, are variants of conservatism; Western-style
liberal democracy has (at the moment) lost nearly all it's appeal to the intelligentsia and
the average person alike.
Re: Jon F's comment – unfortunately, in my view he is right. We shouldn't believe
that Russia is a place of thriving family values simply because they say it more often and
louder. Statistics are not the best way to see this – I personally believe (from
experience in the capital and the provinces) that if Russians divorce less, they cheat more.
If they have fewer abortions, they have more children born into undesirable childhoods.
Russian conservatism does have its virtues and the country must to admire, but respect for
women and children are far from a given.
The tendency to see Russia in black/white only, with a pre-imposed bias is no different than
the tendency to see the US (and sometimes the west) and its values in similar manichean
perspectives. Adding depth and colour to the other takes work, and especially the willingness
to empathise, even for a little while, in order to gain more understanding, before employing
a critical eye. And from this perspective I think the article does a good job.
W. Burns: I don't recall that specific issue raised at the conference, but the Revolution and
subsequent experience is much debated, including in other writings by the participants, e.g.
by Shchipkov (his preferred spelling btw, not my Schipkov), whose take is much like that of
Berdyaev: the communist experience is in partial continuity with aspects of Russia's
tradition, e.g. of economic 'fairness' (equalizing plots on the peasant commune, etc.) and
privileging the group over the individual. I started with the analysis by L. Chamberlain in
part because her wide lens-perspective helps make sense of that experience.
David Naas and Cornel Lencar: I wish there were more who shared your perspective. Thanks.
Regarding Russian values vs. practice, aspirations vs. real-world problems. Who among us is
without sin? Is U.S. practice so pristine that we should disdain talking to the Russian side?
That is the material point.
Since the conference I have continued reading the work of these (and other conference)
attendees meant for a Russian audience. They are very, very far from smug about their
internal problems; quite the contrary.
Dave P.: As far as I know, the conference Proceedings so far are only in Russian, but there
are pretty detailed English-language abstracts. Try contacting ISEPR (their site, ISEPR.ru,
also has an English-language version).
This is all about hamster herding, as neoliberalism in is crisis both domestically and
internationally.
Notable quotes:
"... Whoever wrote Trump's speech for him -- he obviously cannot put together two sentences with dependent clauses without wandering onto the far shores of incoherence -- worked the moral-outrage pump hard. The gas attack, by whomever made, killed, eeek, squeak, seventy civilians and little children. More hamster-herding: git along little furry dogies. On many days in the Mid-East, the United States has killed more civilians than all the gas attacks real or invented in the entire war. The pilots, unprincipled as are all military men, know they are doing it, and don't care. They get paid for their humanitarianism. By us. ..."
"... Assad had won his war and had no need of gassing a few civilians. He would have to know that it would give Washington a pretext for an attack. Which it did. Is Assad so foolish? ..."
"... Similarly with the poisoning of what's-his-spy and his daughter. Russia had nothing to gain and a great deal to lose, as we have seen. It is one thing to believe Mr. Putin capable of bad things. To believe him stupid is quite another. Note that Theresa May became hysterical before it was established that Russia did it, which has still not been established. The orchestrated expulsion of Russian diplomats by all the vassal states, also before anything definitive had been determined, was just too cute. ..."
"... Who had anything to gain by the gaseous adventurism Answer: The American Empire -- not America, not Americans -- and Israel. Both are desperate to keep Syria from surviving. Note that Washington has a history of lying the country into wars. The Maine in 1898, the Gulf of Tonkin, the imaginary WMD in Gulf I. Plus ca change, plus ca doesn't. ..."
"... Because the Empire's hegemony over the Mid-East, Asia, and the world weakens. The Empire totters. Syria is at the heart of the looming demise. ..."
"... If -- when -- America leaves, Pakistan will become an economic client state of China, without a shot being fired. Afghanistan will quickly follow as China invests in its minerals. This is why Washington cannot leave. ..."
"... Washington's approach to hegemony is military, relying on bombing and economic sanctions. This requires huge military expenditures that cripple the domestic economy and produces countless countries that would break with America if they could. By contrast, China's approach is economic, smarter and much cheaper. ..."
"... "Get ready Russia, missiles will be coming at Syria, nice and new and 'smart'!" This is not adult language. It is the taunting of a twelve-year-old. Nya hnya nya! Yet it is classic Trump. This man has absolute power to launch wars whose consequences we will have to bear. Is this not splendid? ..."
"... The strangest thing with Syria is how obsessed the Empire is with destroying it. Various reasons are given such as Israel, gas pipelines, and containing Iran. At the end of the day I think it's primarily psychological. The Empire is outraged that the Assman dares to resist. ..."
"... As to "hamster herding", include "media herding", consenting and dissenting alike. The main reasons for the latter are "bread" writing, and real "believes" of ignorance. Seems the layer, includes second tier politicians, "public intellectuals" alike. A case of "garbage in, garbage out" and a secondary condition of individual middle class jockeying. ..."
"... As to the choice of what can be called "military capitalism" of the US, it has no longer any other options, contrary to Russia and China. Give or take a single percentage point or two, there must be some insiders that fully understand that the global system of economics is now running into the wall, there is no solution to that. Neither is there a venue-way for China, or Russia, economically, outside of global consent. They might have a few cycles more of trade, cleaning the plate, which they choose to do, what looks admirable in the short term to many, but ultimately will equally grind to a standstill. ..."
"... the elites depend on the loot provided by enormous military budgets, and sanctions they can work around .Historically, empires are rarely allowed to shrink until the home country is completely bankrupt. ..."
Only three weapons of mass destruction exist: Nuclear explosives, artillery, and aerial
bombing. Think Dresden, Hiroshima, Guernica, Falluja.
Two: Whoever wrote Trump's speech for him -- he obviously cannot put together two
sentences with dependent clauses without wandering onto the far shores of incoherence -- worked
the moral-outrage pump hard. The gas attack, by whomever made, killed, eeek, squeak, seventy
civilians and little children. More hamster-herding: git along little furry dogies. On many
days in the Mid-East, the United States has killed more civilians than all the gas attacks real
or invented in the entire war. The pilots, unprincipled as are all military men, know they are
doing it, and don't care. They get paid for their humanitarianism. By us.
Three: Something smells. The use of toxins, either by Assad in Syria or by Russia in West
Pakistan -- England, I meant, England -- makes no sense. Assad had won his war and had no
need of gassing a few civilians. He would have to know that it would give Washington a pretext
for an attack. Which it did. Is Assad so foolish?
Similarly with the poisoning of what's-his-spy and his daughter. Russia had nothing to
gain and a great deal to lose, as we have seen. It is one thing to believe Mr. Putin capable of
bad things. To believe him stupid is quite another. Note that Theresa May became hysterical
before it was established that Russia did it, which has still not been established. The
orchestrated expulsion of Russian diplomats by all the vassal states, also before anything
definitive had been determined, was just too cute.
Hamster herding.
Four: Who had anything to gain by the gaseous adventurism Answer: The American Empire --
not America, not Americans -- and Israel. Both are desperate to keep Syria from surviving. Note
that Washington has a history of lying the country into wars. The Maine in 1898, the Gulf of
Tonkin, the imaginary WMD in Gulf I. Plus ca change, plus ca doesn't.
Five: Syria is of no importance, at all, to America or Americans. It has nothing America
wants or needs. It poses no danger to America. It is somewhere else. This lack of vital
interest to America it shares with North Korea, Afghanistan, the Ukraine, the Crimea, the South
China Sea, and all the other places where the Empire looks for war. Then why does Washington
risk nuclear war by accident with Russia, which also poses no danger to America?
Because the Empire's hegemony over the Mid-East, Asia, and the world weakens. The Empire
totters. Syria is at the heart of the looming demise.
Things go badly, Empire-wise. Start with the war on Afghanistan, now creeping toward its
third decade, and neighboring Pakistan. China invests heavily in infrastructure in Pakistan:
The Karakoram Highway, the Karachi reactors, the China Pakistan Economic Corridor, the IP
pipeline, Guadar. If -- when -- America leaves, Pakistan will become an economic client
state of China, without a shot being fired. Afghanistan will quickly follow as China invests in
its minerals. This is why Washington cannot leave.
Afghanistan borders Iran, which Washington maintains as an enemy at the behest of Israel.
Iran borders Iraq, wrecked by the United States and sharing a religion with Iran. Without the
threat of American military power, it could easily align itself with Iran and Asia. In Syria,
Assad seems to have won unless the Empire doubles or triples down. Thus the contrived gassing
of children and Trump's missile attack. Turkey balances between east and west, and could easily
decide that Asia is the future.
The Empire totters, wounded and dangerous.
Six: Washington's approach to hegemony is military, relying on bombing and economic
sanctions. This requires huge military expenditures that cripple the domestic economy and
produces countless countries that would break with America if they could. By contrast, China's
approach is economic, smarter and much cheaper. It is China's Belt and Road Initiative to
integrate all of Eurasia into one huge trading block, excluding guess who, that has the Empire
in a panic. How do you bomb a trade agreement?
Seven: Russia and China have adult leadership. Putin and Xi are stable, intelligent, and
competent. Their interests are not Washington's and they will do whatever is in the interest of
their countries, but they are not stupid, ignorant, weak, juvenile, or crazy. By contrast,
Trump is a loon, ignorant of practically everything, mentally chaotic, and easily modified.
"Get ready Russia, missiles will be coming at Syria, nice and new and 'smart'!" This is
not adult language. It is the taunting of a twelve-year-old. Nya hnya nya! Yet it is
classic Trump. This man has absolute power to launch wars whose consequences we will have to
bear. Is this not splendid?
At this stage in the game I'm not one to ramble about "3D Chess", but I get the sense that
Trump's tweeting was intended to warn Putin and thus deescalate. Of course on the flip
side we have (uncomfirmed) reports that Trump and his bloodthirsty NSC chair Fox Bolton were
arguing for a bigger attack than the generals would agree to.
If nothing else it's quite clear that any effort to withdraw from Syria simply immediately
results in a false flag attack. Even if chemical weapons were as awful as is supposed (I
agree with Mr. Reed), that doesn't make it relevant to American interests.
The strangest thing with Syria is how obsessed the Empire is with destroying it.
Various reasons are given such as Israel, gas pipelines, and containing Iran. At the end of
the day I think it's primarily psychological. The Empire is outraged that the Assman dares to
resist. `
"Note that Washington has a history of lying the country into wars. The Maine in 1898 ..":
add the War of 1812. In fact, presumably add all other American wars until, I suppose, WWII.
And even then the US severely provoked Japan, though it seems to me that the blame for the
war was Japan's: even the perfidious Yanks couldn't force her to behave with such reckless
idiocy in the Pacific.
Re: "It serves nicely, however, to alarm publics with minds of low voltage."
In 1958, I still believed that there was a significant intellectual difference between the
American bourgeosie and the cattle one sees peering between the slats of large trucks as they
contentedly munch hay on their way to the abattoir.
That was owing to the public's colossal ignorance of its history, its predatory character,
and its total faith in the national myths of manifest destiny, etc.
The percentage of gas casualties who died as a result of their wound was much lower than
for injuries inflected by other means (shell splinters, explosives, bullets). Taking
countermeasures against chemical attacks is possible. To be effective, gas usually has to be
delivered by the ton, usually by artillery. Nerve gas is much deadlier, but also very tricky
to use.
Not advocating gas warfare, but it's not a death ray.
In the whole of the Unz sphere, the only article that makes sense of Syria pot-shots, by
adhering to a necessary global scope.
Irrelevant. Trump is a punching bag, that is as much as Obama was a surfboard, these
figureheads are actors, better or worse. Putin, Xi, do matter, Putin harnessed a streamlined
decision making nucleus out of chaos internally, it again gave meaning to the mention of
"Russia". Xi probably does matter, we do not know, neither of us were able to observe one or
the other. What matters is that there is rational coherence in both systems, China and
Russia. Because of infighting, the West looks ridiculously bloated, and stumbling.
As to "hamster herding", include "media herding", consenting and dissenting alike. The
main reasons for the latter are "bread" writing, and real "believes" of ignorance. Seems the
layer, includes second tier politicians, "public intellectuals" alike. A case of "garbage in,
garbage out" and a secondary condition of individual middle class jockeying.
As to the choice of what can be called "military capitalism" of the US, it has no
longer any other options, contrary to Russia and China. Give or take a single percentage
point or two, there must be some insiders that fully understand that the global system of
economics is now running into the wall, there is no solution to that. Neither is there a
venue-way for China, or Russia, economically, outside of global consent. They might have a
few cycles more of trade, cleaning the plate, which they choose to do, what looks admirable
in the short term to many, but ultimately will equally grind to a standstill.
Our take,
globally, there is some consensus about above, in minimal, stealthy cycles, and the
situation in Syria today is to be seen as a proverbial napkin sketch of the architect of
project global government. Putin was degraded in his status, his error, to propagate
nationalistic posing on the world scene, was offensive to the project of world rule. He got
away with a warning and loss of face.
There was, and is, to be seen some experimenting with method (stealth outside the public
view), timeliness and international consent. That is hopeful, if one can get from a pot-shot,
and not firing back, to addressing the real problems of the world, all and every, only
solvable by global consent, and in a timely manner, Syria must be seen as a hopeful
experiment of "global collegiate" ruling.
If "real" war, not policing, "real" major shifts of riches, from finite, generational
elites to abhorrent masses of commoners and ridiculous attitudes middle classes, results, we
humbly retract. The crest of the wave will have an undercurrent: even worse conditions
applied to the number of human under-classes, even temporarily more wastelands created, but
adhering to collegiate global consent, and sold to the masses as a prime Hollywood style
production. That is what the elites seem to strive for.
The important element is they seem to grasp, as only sub-group of humanity, that they are
condemned to one another, the "chevalier seul" attitudes are projections to the public.
Indeed, the people want it very much But the elites depend on the loot provided by
enormous military budgets, and sanctions they can work around .Historically, empires are
rarely allowed to shrink until the home country is completely bankrupt.
"... Last week, after a series of controversial prime-time episodes of "Tucker Carlson Tonight," which questioned whether it is in America's best national security interest to overthrow Bashar al-Assad in Syria; what the ultimate end-game looks like, considering the post-coup mess America's made of Libya and Iraq; and if the recent alleged chemical warfare assault on children was actually the work of Assad or even if it happened -- Tucker Carlson was M.I.A. from his own show Wednesday, Thursday and Friday nights. ..."
"... I hear Tucker Carlson is MIA in the USA. Has he been Arkanicided? ..."
"... He recently did an interview totally challenging the permanent state spin on world affairs. As much as I detest the conservatives I absolutely value his honesty and calm tenacity. ..."
We're nearing apocalypse if I'm out here carrying water for Fox News' Tucker Carlson, who is
hopefully not being water-boarded as I type this.
Last week, after a series of controversial prime-time episodes of "Tucker Carlson Tonight,"
which questioned whether it is in America's best national security interest to overthrow Bashar
al-Assad in Syria; what the ultimate end-game looks like, considering the post-coup mess
America's made of Libya and Iraq; and if the recent alleged chemical warfare assault on
children was actually the work of Assad or even if it happened -- Tucker Carlson was M.I.A.
from his own show Wednesday, Thursday and Friday nights.
Tucker Carlson has a tweet up from four hours ago, saying that he will be back on Fox News
tonight, after three days off.
Posted by: lysias | Apr 23, 2018 4:13:07 PM | 123
Let's see if he continues to entertain any truth on Syria. One of the most outstanding
pieces of MSM busting work there recently. Thought he was on the edge of getting Ben Swann'd
on the back of that effort, or maybe even some threatened with some mild waterboarding.
Thanks for the Carla Ortiz post b. She is a great and brave reporter.
I hear Tucker Carlson is MIA in the USA. Has he been Arkanicided?
He recently did an interview totally challenging the permanent state spin on world affairs.
As much as I detest the conservatives I absolutely value his honesty and calm tenacity.
"... Overall, my impression is that a huge amount of the American populace is entirely disengaged from what's going on because all of it is too upsetting of the accustomed comfortable lifestyle. ..."
"... There's no sense of how random and stupid (and increasing) violence connects to neocon policies over the past 20 plus years or so. The problems leading potentially to very serious war conflict are demonized away in terms of black vs. white terms, America always the righteous. ..."
Just back from a road trip in America where I uncharacteristically watched TV in the
evenings. My main impression = appalled at the intellectual decline and I kept saying to
myself, "If anyone wants to know why we're stupid, here (TV) is the reason."
Interestingly, what I formerly could not stand, FOX news, showed some dignity and
intelligence over what appears to be unraveling in the cover-up of what is now "FBI-gate"
versus the old and worn-out Russia-gate stuff. I was amused at FOX news' presentation of the
latest DNC lawsuit as more hopeless apologizing for Clinton's loss, and a development which
could backfire into disclosure finally, and much more focus on what Clinton was up to with
the DNC maligning of Sanders, plus the politicizing of the intelligence agencies, as with
Comey, Brennan, and Clapper.
As to Americans generally, a lot of good people, nice and helpful if they can just relax
into ordinary relating as with services and restaurants. In meeting with relatives, obvious
MSM propaganda layering their opinions. I was struck for example that the homeless problem
could be dismissed because some homeless didn't want to take advantage of housing help
offered (the specifics of that not offered, nor am I aware of what's meant here). The
tendency is to dismiss the troubling into simplification, and get back to what feels good as
soon as possible. But this is completely normal human behavior in my 5 decades or so of
watching political developments.
Overall, my impression is that a huge amount of the American populace is entirely
disengaged from what's going on because all of it is too upsetting of the accustomed
comfortable lifestyle.
There's no sense of how random and stupid (and increasing) violence connects to neocon
policies over the past 20 plus years or so. The problems leading potentially to very serious
war conflict are demonized away in terms of black vs. white terms, America always the
righteous.
I do feel, however, that alternative media, such as via MoA here, are very helpful to
growing awareness, particularly among young people. I am eager to see new independent
political parties, committed to serving the people, but not yet aware of any of these coming
about. I would also echo pyschohistorian and others from the previous thread to ask b to be
the leader/organizer via emails, should there come a time when this site is attacked and
taken out somehow.
Thank you, b, and commenters here for this energetic and hopeful community.
Thanks for that snapshot description. One of the signs of an empire that is failing is the
increasing disconnect (and cynicism) between the rulers and the ruled - no matter what the
system of government may be. Your description provides a graphic picture of that
disconnection.
In another vein, Media again posits the SAA as going against the rebel controlled areas in
the south. I believe that the SAA will instead consolidate areas around Homs and southern
Hama then focus on Deir Ezzour and the cross-river attacks from the US protected eastern
shore of the Euphrates.. This action will take us through to mid-June. At that point I
anticipate some kind of incidents having to do with the Idlib pocket.
Amazingly BBC newsnight just started preparing viewers for the possibility that there was no
sarin attack, and the missile strikes might just have been for show, i plying Trump did it
for political reasons. Narrative changing a bit.
#Germany's state media senior correspondent (who is in Damascus right now & also visited
Douma) on primetime evening news on German television: "#Douma chemical attack is most likely
staged. A great many people here seem very convinced."
I too hope he will return soon, he seems to be one of the last sane voices of the msm.
Hopefully high viewer rates help to bring him back, but he wouldn't be the first one to
vanish from the screen, despite high ratings.
"... It is perfectly possible that the British government manufactured the whole Salisbury thing. We are capable of just as much despicable behavior and murder as the next. ..."
"... Tucker Carlson of Fox News has it nailed down.... https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=M28aYkLRlm0 ..."
"... This "civil war" has been nothing but a war for Syrian resources waged by western proxies. ..."
"... So now, In desperation borne out of their impending defeat, the imperialists have staged a chemical attack in a last throw of the dice to gain popular support for an escalation in military intervention. Like military interventions of the past, it is being justified in the name of humanitarian intervention. ..."
Why is the prime minister of the United Kinkdom on the phone discussing whether or not to bomb a Sovereign country with the highly
unstable, Donald Trump?
Can she not make up her own mind? Either she thinks it's the right thing to do or it isn't. Hopefully,
the person on the other end of the phone was not Trump but someone with at least half a brain.
Proof, let's have some proof. Is that too much to ask? Apparently so. Russia is saying it's all a put up job, show us your
facts. We are saying, don't be silly, we're British and besides, you may have done this sort of thing before.
It is perfectly possible that the British government manufactured the whole Salisbury thing. We are capable of just as
much despicable behavior and murder as the next.
Part of the Great British act's of bravery and heroism in the second world war is the part played by women agents who were
parachuted into France and helped organize local resistance groups. Odette Hallowes, Noor Inayat Khan and Violette Szabo are just
a few of the many names but they are the best known. What is not generally know is that many agents when undergoing their training
in the UK, were given information about the 'D' day landings, the approx time and place. They were then dropped into France into
the hands of the waiting German army who captured and tortured and often executed them.
The double agent, who Winston Churchill met and fully approved of the plan was Henri Dericourt, an officer in the German army
and our man on the ground in France. Dericourt organized the time and place for the drop off of the incoming agents, then told
the Germans. The information about the 'D' day invasion time and place was false. The British fed the agents (only a small number)
into German hands knowing they would be captured and the false information tortured out of them.
Source :- 'A Quiet Courage' Liane Jones.
It's a tough old world and we are certainly capable of a Salisbury set-up and god knows what else in Syria.
From The Guardian articles today that I have read on Syria, it makes absolutely clear that if you in any way question the narrative
forwarded here, that you are a stupid conspiracy theorist in line with Richard Spencer and other far-right, American nutcases.
A more traditional form of argument to incline people to their way of thinking would be facts. But social pressure to conform
and not be a conspiratorial idiot in line with the far-right obviously work better for most of their readers. My only surprise
it that position hasn't been linked with Brexit.
Did anyone see the massive canister that was shown on TV repeatedly that was supposed to have been air-dropped and smashed through
the window of a house, landed on a bed and failed to go off.
The bed was in remarkable condition with just a few ruffled bedclothes considering it had been hit with a metal object weighing
god knows what and dropped from a great height.
"More than 40 years after the US sprayed millions of litres of chemical agents to defoliate"
The Defoliant Agent Orange was used to kill jungles, resulting in light getting through to the dark jungle floors & a massive
amount of low bush regrowing, making the finding of Vietcong fighters even harder!
It was sprayed even on American troops, it is a horrible stuff. Still compared to Chlorine poison gas, let alone nerve gases,
it is much less terrible. Though the long term effects are pretty horrible.
Who needs facts when you've got opinions? Non more hypocritical than the British. Its what you get when you lie and distort though
a willing press, you get found out and then nobody believes anything you say.anymore. The white helmets are a western funded and
founded organisation, they are NOT independent they are NOT volunteers, The UK the US and the Dutch fund them to the tune of over
$40 million. They are a propaganda dispensing outlet. The press shouldn't report anything they release because it is utterly unable
to substantiate ANY of it, there hasn't been a western journalist in these areas for over 4 years so why do the press expect us
to believe anything they print? Combine this with the worst and most incompetent Govt this country has seen for decades and all
you have is a massive distraction from massive domestic troubles which the same govt has no answers too.
""I am strongly in favour of using poisoned gas against uncivilised tribes," [Winston Churchill] declared in one secret memorandum."
The current condemnation by the international community and international law is good and needs enforcement. But no virtue
signalling where there is none.
But we're still awaiting evidence that a chemical attack has been carried out in Douma, aren't we? And if an attack was carried
out, by whom. But before these essential points are verified, you feel that a targeted military response is justified. Are you
equally keen for some targeted military response for the use of chemical weapons, namely white phosphorus, in Palestine by the
Israaeli military? Unlike Douma, the use of these chemical weapons in the occupied territories by the IDF's personnel is well
documented. But we haven't attacked them yet. Funny that.
Instead of "chemicals" why not just firebomb them - you know like we did to entire cities full of women and children in WW2?
Hamburg 27 July 1943 - 46,000 civilians killed in a firestorm
Kassel 22 October 1943 - 9,000 civilians killed 24,000 houses destroyed in a firestorm
Darmstadt 11 September 1944 - 8,000 civilians killed in a firestorm
Dresden 13/14th February - 25,000 civilians killed in a firestorm
Obviously we were fighting Nazism and hadn't actually been invaded - and he is fighting Wahhabism and has had major cities
overrun...
Maybe if Assad burnt people to death rather than gassing them we would make a statue of him outside Westminster like the one
of Bomber Harris?
Remember the tearful Kuwaiti nurse with her heartrending story of Iraqi troops tipping premature babies out of their incubators
after the invasion in 1990? The story was published in pretty much every major Western newspaper, massively increased public support
for military intervention............................and turned out to be total bullshit.
Is it too much too ask that we try a bit of collective critical thinking and wait for hard evidence before blundering into
a military conflict with Assad; and potentially Putin?
Well, this is the sort of stuff that the Israelis would be gagging for. They want Assad neutralised and they are assisting ISIS
terrorists on the Golan Heights. They tend to their wounded and send them back across the border to fight Assad. What better than
to drag the Americans, Brits and French into the ring to finish him off. Job done eh?
Are you sure you are not promoting an Israeli agenda here Jonathan?
Incidentantally what did we in the west do when the Iraqis were gassing the Iranians with nerve agents in the marshes of southern
Iraq during the Iran Iraq War? Did we intervene then? No, we didn't we allowed it to happen.
Come on frip, you have to admit there was absolutely no motive for Assad's forces to carry out this attack. Why do you think the
Guardian and other main stream media outlets are not even considering the possibility the Jihadi rebels staged it to trigger western
intervention? I know, I know.. it's all evil Assad killing his own people for no other reason than he likes butchering people...
blah blah. The regime change agenda against Syria has been derailed, no amount of false flag attacks can change the facts on the
ground.
More than 40 years after the US sprayed millions of litres of chemical agents to defoliate vast swathes of Vietnam and in the
full knowledge it would be have a catastrophic effect on the health of the inhabitants of those area, Vietnam has by far the highest
incidence of liver cancer on the planet.
Then more recently we have the deadly depleted uranium from US shells that innocent Iraqis are inhaling as shrill voices denounce
Assad.
The Syrian people are heroically resisting and defeating western imperialism. This "civil war" has been nothing but a war
for Syrian resources waged by western proxies.
So now, In desperation borne out of their impending defeat, the imperialists have staged a chemical attack in a last throw
of the dice to gain popular support for an escalation in military intervention. Like military interventions of the past, it is
being justified in the name of humanitarian intervention.
But if we have a brief browse of history we can see that US & UK governments have brought only death, misery and destruction
on the populations it was supposedly helping. Hands off Syria.
I always thought that Brexit was UK populati0on protest against neoliberalism.
Notable quotes:
"... Then there is of course the ongoing Brexit shambles. The inflexible Eurocrats have always only had one position on Brexit: accept our terms for leaving the EU or you get nothing. ..."
"... Ukania's chief Brexit negotiator, David Davies, is a retired special-services commando who was given the job because he is the Conservative's most dyed-in-the-wool anti-EU ideologue. ..."
"... On the other hand, this Empire 2.0 fantasy also serves a more sinister purpose. The Brexiteer dream is basically a fusion of neo-imperial illusions with a no-holds-barred neoliberalism. ..."
Tom Nairn coined the phrase "Ukania" to designate the confused and disorganized hotchpotch of an island-nation off the coast of
northern Europe, tottering on the nation-state equivalent of varicose-veined and arthritic legs, and further enfeebled by an unproductive
nostalgia for Empire (aka Empire 2.0).
... ... ...
"Dilapidation" is the word to describe the UK today. I was last there in November and will be there again in July. Frequent, indeed
daily, contact with family and friends confirms that the UK is indeed Nairn's "Ukania".
This week London overtook New York as a "murder capital". Brits were shocked, because this reversed their notion of the US as
a place where gun nuts can kill whenever they want.
I tried to reassure my Brit friends and family that the murder statistics for New York don't include police killings of unarmed
black men, and that inclusion of the latter statistic in the murder toll would probably tell a somewhat different story.
Ukania has stringent gun laws, but nearly all the killings in London are stabbings. Acid attacks have also become increasingly
common.
The causes for this outbreak of knifings and acid-throwing are almost certainly multiple. A decaying social fabric caused by nearly
a decade of Tory austerity, high youth unemployment as well as employed youth who nonetheless dominate the precariat, and savage
cuts in police numbers (a result of deliberate Tory policy to hand over policing to private security firms, who in turn donate generously
to the Tories), are almost certainly key factors here.
The Tories however have "none of the above" on their list of causes for London's crime wave. For them and their allies in the
rightwing media, drugs, a form of rap known as UK drill, and social media are to blame!
This ignorance is obviously contrived -- absolutely unlike the social media-illiterate geriatric US senators who questioned Mark
Zuckerberg on the issue of Facebook's data leaks, and who in their genuine bafflement were unable to tell the difference between
Facebook, Twitter, and WhatsApp, among other things.
Unlike the technologically-senile US senators befuddled by contemporary social media and its associated technologies, the Tories
know damn well the underlying conditions for London's stabbing and acid-throwing epidemic.
Then there is of course the ongoing Brexit shambles. The inflexible Eurocrats have always only had one position on Brexit:
accept our terms for leaving the EU or you get nothing.
The Ukanians in response alternate hopelessly between faux bravado ("we're prepared to leave with nothing") and conciliatory placation
("please, oh please, can we come to a fresh understanding of what's on the table? ").
The Eurocrats see right through the phony bravado and dismiss it outright, while responding to pleas for a "fresh understanding"
with a bored shrug– in effect saying that it is "you deluded Brits who need to understand we are not having negotiations about the
terms of your departure, but only about such minutiae as the timetabling of this this or that move that (according to us) needs to
be made".
The intransigent Eurocrats thus insist that negotiations can only be about "process", while the Ukanian government persists in
thinking the door is somehow still open for negotiations about "substance".
Alas, those who insist on talking about "process" have held all the cards from the beginning. The Ukanians have not helped themselves
by sending absolute third-raters to deal with the meritocratic wolves in Brussels. The EU wolves make it to the top by speaking two
to three, or more, languages fluently, by graduating from Europe's top schools of international relations and public administration,
and by having decades of experience in international diplomacy.
Ukania's chief Brexit negotiator, David Davies, is a retired special-services commando who was given the job because he is
the Conservative's most dyed-in-the-wool anti-EU ideologue. Davies sits at the Brussels negotiating table without a piece of
paper in front of him, while his guileful and well-schooled EU counterparts consult bulky folders as they take the woefully underprepared
and intellectually underwhelming ex-commando to the woodshed. It is, in sporting terms, the equivalent of the lard-encased Donald
Trump presuming he can win an Olympic race against Usain Bolt.
Ukania's self-deceptions are not confined to its dealings with the wolves of Brussels. Most of the Brexiteers (not to be confused
with Lexiteers, of whom I've always been one) are gripped by nostalgic imperial fantasies. The neo-imperial fantasy of these Brexiteers
is that the former members of their Empire will fall in line, dutifully, in order to conclude trading agreements with their ex-imperial
master– the Brexiteer hope being that these Empire 2.0 "agreements" will somehow compensate economically for the cessation of trading
links with the EU countries. This is simply not going to happen, given the dynamos driving post-imperial economic development.
The EU exists for the purpose of extending and sustaining the European embodiment of the current neoliberal order, and in so doing
maintaining the very comfortable livelihoods of its Eurocratic elite. But that, or its equivalent, alas, is also the "mission" of
the members of the ex-Empire, who are supposed by the Brexiteers to salute and fall in line when asked to do so by their erstwhile
imperial master!
The raison d'etre of such countries as India, Australia, Canada, New Zealand, etc., is precisely to subserve the exigencies of
the forms of capitalist of accumulation prevailing in their countries, forms which in turn coincide more or less with the needs of
their national elites.
And this post-imperial raison d'etre is clearly not congruent with daydreamed requirements imposed by a post-Brexit Empire 2.0
nostalgia on the part of Ukania. Australia and New Zealand now have their economic systems attuned, profitably, to demand from China
and the rest of the Pacific Rim; Canada likewise with regard to the US; and India in relation to the economies of the Gulf States;
and so on.
Ukania will get nowhere with Empire 2.0 aprčs Brexit unless it can provide terms of trade and revenues matching or surpassing
those now available to its former colonies.
... ... ...
On the other hand, this Empire 2.0 fantasy also serves a more sinister purpose. The Brexiteer dream is basically a fusion
of neo-imperial illusions with a no-holds-barred neoliberalism.
The EU at least insists on health and safety standards that are better than India's. But why shouldn't India's standards be good
enough for Ukania's pampered workers? The latter's ancestors worked in dark satanic mills, so surely these f*@#ers can work in factories
recycling toxic metals from discarded computers and mobile phones? The EU's food inspection standards are better than China's, but
why should Ukania hold itself to a standard higher than China's? Milk "supplemented" with de-icer fluid anyone? The EU has minimal
standards on bank operations and financial transactions – get rid of these and Ukania can be freed to become the world's premier
haven for tax-dodgers and money launderers. Okay, it already holds the latter title, but Ukania will be able to lower the bar even
more on money laundering once it gets rid of the EU's regulatory shackles.
After Greeks and British, now Italians reject neoliberal EU. Not many ideas what to put
in its place. 06/03/2018 Italian election results: How the world's press reacted
Italy's governing centre-left Democratic Party has seen disappointing losses in the election
result, while the populist League and Five Star Movement have had remarkable gains. Here's how
the world's press reacted to the vote.
Eurosceptic
Italy in race to form majority government
Five Star Movement and the League vie to form a coalition, but ultimate decision is held by
President Sergio Mattarella
Mon 5 Mar 2018
The two populist parties that won major upsets in the Italian election – the
Five Star
Movement (M5S) and the League (La Liga) – are in a race to be the first to try to
form a majority government after the election produced a hung parliament.
The decision will ultimately fall to Italy's president, Sergio Mattarella, who could take
weeks to determine whether the anti-establishment M5S, which took 32.6% of the vote, or a
fragile centre-right alliance led by the League's bombastic Matteo Salvini, with 35.7% of the
vote, are better equipped to create a majority government.
"... People such as Stephen Cohen and myself, who were actively involved throughout the entirety of the Cold War, are astonished at the reckless and irresponsible behavior of the US government and its European vassals toward Russia. ..."
"... In this brief video, Stephen Cohen describes to Tucker Carlson the extreme danger of the present situation: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zvK1Eu01Lz0 Published on Apr 13, 2018 ..."
A normal person would answer "yes" to the three questions. So what does this tell us about
Trump's government as these insane actions are the principle practice of Trump's
government?
Does anyone doubt that Nikki Haley is insane?
Does anyone doubt that John Bolton is insane?
Does anyone doubt that Mike Pompeo is insane?
Does this mean that Trump is insane for appointing to the top positions insane people who
foment war with a nuclear power?
Does this mean that Congress is insane for approving these appointments?
These are honest questions. Assuming we avoid the Trump-promised Syrian showdown, how long
before the insane Trump regime orchestrates another crisis?
The entire world should understand that because of the existence of the insane Trump regime,
the continued existence of life on earth is very much in question.
People such as Stephen Cohen and myself, who were actively involved throughout the entirety
of the Cold War, are astonished at the reckless and irresponsible behavior of the US government
and its European vassals toward Russia. Nothing as irresponsible as what we have witnessed
since the Clinton regime and which has worsened dramatically under the Obama and Trump regimes
would have been imaginable during the Cold War. In this brief video, Stephen Cohen describes to
Tucker Carlson the extreme danger of the present situation:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zvK1Eu01Lz0
Published on Apr 13, 2018
The failure of political leadership throughout the Western world is total. Such total
failure is likely to prove deadly to life on earth.
@11 Yes, Maracutu, shivers are pretty much a daily thing for me in these times. An
"accidental" bombing of Latakia was the spark that finally set off WWIII in the old, but
still popular, nuclear apocalypse novel Alas Babylon .
@ all Meanwhile, as all the Mad Magazine "Spy vs Spy" nonsense spins out in the UK,
the Empire is keeping busy on the other side of the pond. In late March, a couple of nice
folks from the US Southern Command paid a courtesy "friendship" visit to Ecuador:
During his term as President of Ecuador, Rafael Correa had (not very) politely and very
firmly invited US military personnel to go home (or at least elsewhere than Ecuador) and he
shut down the US base at Manta. His successor, Lenin Moreno, has proven to be some kind of
neoliberal mole who wormed himself into the Alianza Pais and has completely betrayed the
Citizens' Revolution. In less than a year in office, he has wrecked most of the progress
slowly and steadily made under 10 years of Correa's leadership. In the past month or so,
there have been three "terrorist" attacks on the Colombian border. These are supposedly
connected with FARC. There had been NO troubles with FARC under Correa.
So far, I have not found any English-Language media talking about any of this. I have not
found mention of how many US troops are involved. I have seen that there are now 500
additional ones in Peru to help with security for some summit Trump is going to. Of course,
the ones in Ecuador are only there to be "helpful" to the country.
Also: RIP Nash Van Drake and his guinea pig siblings (has anyone heard what their names
were, if any?). The murder of these pets may just be a weird side story to this madness, or
it may have been to cover up and destroy evidence. The explanations for their deaths seem
very suspicious to me. Some years ago, I had a male cat whom I let outside sometimes. He got
himself shut in the neighbor's garage one afternoon. I looked everywhere, placed want ads,
etc. No luck. Having basically given up, I discovered by accident he was in there after a
week. I called the neighbor, who came out late at night and opened the garage up and I coaxed
him out. Cat was very happy to be home and glad to see his food and water dish, but he was
hardly malnourished. He essentially was no worse for wear, physically.
It takes quite a long time without food for a healthy, well-fed house cat to become
"severely malnourished," unless perhaps there are some other special health problems already
or special needs. I don't know the timeline of when they went in and found him. Two weeks?
Three? Even then, look at all the videos out there of sick, malnourished cats rescued and
nursed back to health.
I know a lot less about guinea pigs, but similar with them. If they had a bottle waterer
mounted on the side of their cage, it was probably kept refilled pretty often. Even if
already down by half, it should have lasted a while. How much water would they drink in
normal house temperatures in the UK in late winter?
While the U.S. has intentionally kept it trade wide open with China, China has stolen trillions over the last 20 years in intellectual
property, including military technology. It has kept its markets tightly controlled and/or closed while the U.S. has made China
rich. Today China has a 1/2 Trillion trade surplus, is still stealing our intellectual property, and still keeps its markets tightly
controlled and mostly closed and under Chinese control. That might be ok if the goal of making China richer, a member of the world
community, and peaceful had worked, but it has not.
China is a hegemon using its wealth to grow its military, build up military forces in international sea lanes like the South China
sea, and bullying its neighbors like India, Vietnam, Taiwan, Japan, and others while also supporting the Ballistic Nuclear missile
program of NK. Its time for the USA to realize that China is an adversary, not because we want it that way, but because China
sees itself that way. And its time to stop letting an adversary use us, and steal from us, to further its imperial/hegemonic aggressive
ambitions. Apple can make iPhones in Vietnam, the Philippines, and India as cheaply as in China. Let's stop the theft, and shift
the flow of our money to the countries China is bullying like the Philippines, India, Vietnam, as well as more modern allies like
Taiwan and Japan. Let's make India rich, rather than let China continue to steal from us. Let China figure out how to keep hundreds
of millions of Chinese employed from that 1/2 Trillion surplus employed. Keep in mind a richer Vietnam and India with improved
ties with the USA and increasing wealth helped by the USA both border China. China still has time to play fair and leave the path
of hegemony and aggression, but everything point to the fact that they would rather be our adversary than our friend. So we have
to wake up and smell the coffee of that reality and move forward with our eyes open. Thank God Trump isn't sticking his head in
the sand like Bush, and especially weak, worthless, appeasing Obama.
typical trump supporter, can't even do simple arithmetic. on paper the US calculates the trade deficit to be $347 billion not
the half a trillion figure your lying president so often vomits out.
btw if moving production line to another country is so easy you people would've done it ages ago. but they're still in China,
why is that I wonder, since south east asia and india has much much lower wage than China, why dont the brilliant accountants
at Apple tell their CEO to move their production lines? =)
US Trade Deficit with China (2017) is $375.2B/year.
https://www.census.gov/fore... Moving a Production is easy. Moving a production line while improving productivity is very
hard. The US elites found it easier to move production lines overseas to take advantage of low-cost labor. In the alternative
they could have improve productivity so the US could produce the goods in question at competitive prices. That was the US history
from 1935 to 1985. Changing production processes entails risks, you could create competitors who might displace you. Moving a
standard process overseas gave you a cost advantage and increased the US elite 1% share of income from 10% GDP to 22% of GDP.
The benefits of competive destruction now flow to the Chinese. They Globalized Labor to reduce the power of the US working and
middle classes. See Blyth:
https://www.youtube.com/wat... (around 3:00 Min).
What stops China from IP rights violation now? In fact, this is an incentive to go to town with it. China has excess capacity
there is no way to halt production. China's challenge is to find markets. For instance, if they sell a product to a US owner at
$40 a piece where the US owner sells it to consumers at $900, China can sell it direct to consumers at $500 (or even $50) and
be better off. This is what will happen. Consumers outside USA will be able to buy US goods at a fraction of the price and with
time there will be importers in USA who will use third parties to import these to USA clandestinely. Why should US consumers pay
more anyway!
Talking about stealing who can compete with the whites in this game.
Pls go visit museums and galleries in London, Paris and other European capitals to see how much had been looted and stolen from
China, Asia, Arab world and Africa in the last 500.
The essentials of what Mr Brown wrote are that China got rich trading, got richer stealing IP, and spends riches on militarily
expanding with the stated goal of excluding the U.S. Navy west or south of Guam. From the perspective of an American of any political
variety, would you rather the U.S. observe this trend continuing or act to stop the IP theft and military challenge?
The best approach is go with fully reciprocal tariffs and restructure international trade around Warren Buffet's idea of a
market for Import Certificates based on US exports. This would automatically balance trade (an Import Certificate based on exports
is needed for any Import), provide a rules-based approach (vs. bureaucratic), and thus block massive rent-seeking around Trade
Policy. It would dampen potential trade wars because the focus is on reciprocity, balancing trade and not on tariffs to constantly
reduce imports. See:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wi... and
http://thehill.com/blogs/co... We can (perhaps) back off reciprocal trade when we better understand free-markets and can identify
nations who practice this freedom.
There is a reason why China carries a huge trade surplus against USA - Americans have benefitted Chinese cheaper goods and
services (than trying to procure them from other sources). They will pay more for the same service. This will reduce their savings
and increase borrowings. China progressively dumps the US dollar in petroleum purchases which will devalue the USD. This will
make imports even more expensive for Americans. China will devalue its currency again to overcome the tarrif impact.
The worlds largest market for commercial aircraft and Trump just put Boeing out of contention. Betcha Trump gets a yuuuugh
campaign contribution from Airbus on the condition he starts a trade war with the second biggest market of airliners, India, as
well.
China has been preparing for a trade war with the USA for some time. The belt/road project and petroyuan are 2 such projects
looking to build trade relations that bypass the USA altogether. It won't be that difficult for China to find markets for TV's,
dollar store plastic and consumer appliances. I'm sure it will hurt but there are other markets for their products.
Try finding another market for Boeing Dreamliners .... all those high paying specialized jobs. The good news is that with this
trade war markets open up for consumer appliances which Boeing can fill ..... the bad news is the stealth toasters they make will
cost $250,000, will only be operational one day a week as long as it isn't raining and you won't be able to find it on that day
because it's a stealth toaster.
Doesn't matter about finding another market for Dreamliners .. So your implying its ok for China to rip us off and we just
take it. Boeing has done well these last few years.. Boeing plans to increase 737 production to 57 aircraft a month not counting
the 767, 777 and 787. China drops their orders there are customers right behind them to take their slot on the line.
The worse part is the requirement to turn over your intellectual property to the state. Why should they spend the billions
in R&D when they can just wait it out, crack their market open a small bit, then take or steal the property with no recourse from
the owner. Once they have that IP they set up another business putting the original business into bankruptcy.
China is playing an economic war to win. Trump plans to win...
"The worse part is the requirement to turn over your intellectual property to the state."
If that's a condition of the contract why do US companies agree to the contract?
I have a lot of experience negotiating contracts with US firms. The US businesses I've dealt with have always sought favourable
terms to the extent that I really don't like doing business with them.
When I see terms in a contract I can't live with I walk away ..... and I've done it a lot. Now you're trying to tell me US
businesses were coerced into signing contracts that forced them to give away intellectual property?
I don't believe that for a moment.
I have a dozen stories of guys getting screwed over because they didn't bother with the details of a contract. If you are that
naive you take your lumps and if you're smart you learn from it.
What you don't do is keep signing the same agreements that has technology transfers in the terms then cry foul after doing
it for thirty or forty years.
The way I see it technology transfer was likely seen by the Chinese as part of the overall compensation. You got the product
made for a killer price on the condition you tell them how to make it themselves.
You should know that no one works for nothing. If you're getting an unbelievably good price look at the fine print.
Given who your president is, the business he's in and his reputation as a business man I have a pretty good idea what he's
really up to with this tactic and it might play well to the peanut gallery but the Chinese are not going to be played so easily
Most developing countries require some level of technology transfer before they permit foreign firms to operate inside their
borders. It's their only way of avoiding becoming commercial colonies of countries like the US. If firms don't like it, the solution
is as you suggest: they can decline to set up in foreign countries and simply export finished products made in their home country.
Lots of multinational firms have legitimate grievances against the Chinese government for being lax in policing and prosecuting
copyright laws. Fake prestige brand fashion, handbags, cell phones and the like, made in China, are openly sold throughout Asia.
But the crap about 'intellectual property theft' is nonsense.
There is no such thing as FAIR trade among vastly unequal economies. China has a billion citizens (an endless supply of cheap
labor). China is a major polluter (not limited like the US is with it's EPA). The laws concerning wages, working-hours, over-time,
workman's compensation, safety, pensions don't compare between economies. Thus, the US is at a severe competitive disadvantage.
China plays dirty on top of their already significant economic advantages. FAIR trade between China and the US is a fairy-tale.
I support Trump. China is not our friend.
Industrial revolution and consequently polution lasted for decades in west before China jumped into the game. So your "carbon
footprint" is much higher cumulatevely than China's. Also you don't complain about countries like Bangladesh where USA companies
exploit people like modern day slaves. Drop that moralising please! Globalisation is 2 way street, in begining when you "oppened"
3. World markets and flooded them with your superior technologies and products and practically plundered them, it wasn't a problem.
Now when things changed you whine like babies.
Even if U.S. exports to China went to zero, that'd be way less than 1% of our GDP. If China's exports to the U.S. went to zero,
that be about 5% of its GDP.
When one reads Chinese propaganda, Xi is banking heavily on U.S. politics to stop the U.S. from getting tough on China's trade
cheating. He thinks that farmers and other business people will stop the Trump admin from enacting tariffs and other measures
because of fear of Chinese retaliation. Xi faces no similar domestic political pressure because China is an authoritarian state.
The only thing that can mess-up gaining a U.S. trade victory is self-defeat. People here in the U.S. should stop overreacting
and playing into the hands of Xi. Let's get some backbone people!
Given that the U.S. has severely reduced our industrial metal production and manufacturing by failing to modernize years ago,
we do need China. The same goes for several other industrial and manufacturing products. China's pork production is currently
battling a corona virus from bats that is killing off their young swine. Our food products are important to the Chinese given
the high levels of pollution in their country. The U.S. is most vulnerable because China provides nearly all of the Rare Earth
Elements (REEs) that are essential for our high tech industries and defense equipment.
The U.S. would face a real problem anyway if the shipping lanes were closed down because of conflicts or natural catastrophes...better
to prepare for the worst now and get China to open up trade barriers or follow fairer trade policy.
The worst Chinese import is the Marxist-Leninist ideology that slaughtered over 100 million Chinese...blame the Russians!
U.S. free market ideological imports lifted a billion plus Chinese out of poverty.
For anyone travelling in China, being labelled a Laowei or foreignor is commonplace. The current government is pushing a defensive,
Han Chinese based, zenophobic system that seeks to monopolize ideas and keep the imported Marxist-Leninist ideology in total control
of the thoughts and minds of the average Chinese citizen.
The U.S. can't change that, but we can look out for our own sovereign interests in better trade deals, re-establishing vital mining,
industrial and/or manufacturing capabilities, and maintaining strategic reserves of essential elements.
"... The UK and France are in deep economic trouble and need an external enemy such as Russia using an incident such as the Skripal affair to deflect the people from focusing on removing their government leaders. If all else fails, the UK Royals will have a couple of weddings and babies to take up the front pages for most of this year. Meanwhile, like the Skripals, several UK/EU agents involved in the HillaryGate Steele dossier trail of evidence such as Christophe Steele, Joseph Mifsid, and Gianni Pittella have disappeared: ..."
"... In the UK case of May and BoJo, any alternative will result in a continuation of the decline of the society. To be honest, much of the decline is baked in structural with the loss of income from former "slave" colonies and the decline of North Sea oil and gas reserves. Staying in the EU against the will of the people will continue to further drain resources to Germany, which has structurally colonialized Western Europe. ..."
"... France, like the UK, has extracted the wealth from their former colonies and facing a reduction in tribute from these sources. Macron has attempted to maintain control of some colonies such as Mali and really wants to conquer Syria. I suspect the meetings between Macron and MbS will result in an agreement for Saudi Arabia to buy French weapons while France getting financial aid to expand French troop bases in Syria. ..."
"... Almost all sectors of the French society are protesting against the neo-feudal policies of Macron, FIRE economy participants and his dwarves in the National Assembly. There are strikes among: ..."
"... The EU is also experiencing internal dissent with the Visegrad four (Hungary, Poland, Czech Republic and Slovakia) plus Italy and Austria and thus needs an external enemy to distract its members. I suspect that a Ukrainian invasion of DPR/LPR will once again be used as a flash point create "two minutes of hate" against Russia ..."
The UK and France are in deep economic trouble and need an external enemy such as Russia
using an incident such as the Skripal affair to deflect the people from focusing on removing
their government leaders. If all else fails, the UK Royals will have a couple of weddings and
babies to take up the front pages for most of this year. Meanwhile, like the Skripals,
several UK/EU agents involved in the HillaryGate Steele dossier trail of evidence such as
Christophe Steele, Joseph Mifsid, and Gianni Pittella have disappeared:
In the UK case of May and BoJo, any alternative will result in a continuation of the
decline of the society. To be honest, much of the decline is baked in structural with the
loss of income from former "slave" colonies and the decline of North Sea oil and gas
reserves. Staying in the EU against the will of the people will continue to further drain
resources to Germany, which has structurally colonialized Western Europe.
France, like the UK, has extracted the wealth from their former colonies and facing a
reduction in tribute from these sources. Macron has attempted to maintain control of some
colonies such as Mali and really wants to conquer Syria. I suspect the meetings between
Macron and MbS will result in an agreement for Saudi Arabia to buy French weapons while
France getting financial aid to expand French troop bases in Syria.
Somehow, the current revolution in France is blacked out in the Western Media. Videos of
the current revolution are common on Youtube such as: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=g21_myERteQ
Almost all sectors of the French society are protesting against the neo-feudal
policies of Macron, FIRE economy participants and his dwarves in the National Assembly. There
are strikes among:
transportation (rail, airlines, rotating bus and subway workers)
hospital workers
students
teachers (including kindergarden)
retirees
postal workers
television workers
Government workers (Fonctionnaires de France)
lawyers and judges
sanitation workers
EDF and GDF workers (Electricite de France and Gas de France)
Macron has already deployed the CRS assassins and the street war will begin when EU police
and military invade to crush to protestors. This will be far more violent than May 1968 and
may usher in the 6th Republic. Unfortunately, Macron would prefer the cities to burn rather
than resign and turnover the government to the President of the Senate.
The EU is also experiencing internal dissent with the Visegrad four (Hungary, Poland,
Czech Republic and Slovakia) plus Italy and Austria and thus needs an external enemy to
distract its members. I suspect that a Ukrainian invasion of DPR/LPR will once again be used
as a flash point create "two minutes of hate" against Russia : https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=t4zYlOU7Fpk
These EU conflicts will not end peacefully as the system will fight back rather than step
aside.
This Guardian pressitute can't even mentions the term neoliberalism, to day noting to accept that neoliberalism now experience a
crisis (which actually started in 2008)
Globalization blowback will not totally bury neoliberal globalization, but it puts some limits on transnational corporations racket...
hat is happening to national politics? Every day in the US, events further exceed the imaginations of absurdist novelists and comedians;
politics in the UK still shows few signs of recovery after the "
national nervous breakdown " of Brexit.
France "
narrowly
escaped a heart attack " in last year's elections, but the country's leading daily feels this has done little to alter the "
accelerated decomposition " of the political system. In neighbouring Spain, El País goes so far as to say that "the rule of law,
the democratic system and even the market economy are in doubt"; in Italy, "the collapse of the establishment" in the March elections
has even brought talk of a "barbarian arrival", as if Rome were falling once again. In Germany, meanwhile, neo-fascists are preparing
to take up their role as
official opposition , introducing anxious volatility into the bastion of European stability.
But the convulsions in national politics are not confined to the west. Exhaustion, hopelessness, the dwindling effectiveness of
old ways: these are the themes of politics all across the world. This is why energetic authoritarian "solutions" are currently so
popular: distraction by war (Russia, Turkey); ethno-religious "purification" (India, Hungary, Myanmar); the magnification of presidential
powers and the corresponding abandonment of civil rights and the rule of law (China, Rwanda, Venezuela, Thailand, the Philippines
and many more).
What is the relationship between these various upheavals? We tend to regard them as entirely separate – for, in political life,
national solipsism is the rule. In each country, the tendency is to blame "our" history, "our" populists, "our" media, "our" institutions,
"our" lousy politicians. And this is understandable, since the organs of modern political consciousness – public education and mass
media – emerged in the 19th century from a globe-conquering ideology of unique national destinies. When we discuss "politics", we
refer to what goes on inside sovereign states; everything else is "foreign affairs" or "international relations" – even in this era
of global financial and technological integration. We may buy the same products in every country of the world, we may all use Google
and Facebook, but political life, curiously, is made of separate stuff and keeps the antique faith of borders.
Yes, there is awareness that similar varieties of populism are erupting in many countries. Several have noted the parallels in
style and substance between leaders such as Donald Trump, Vladimir Putin, Narendra Modi, Viktor Orbán and Recep Tayyip Erdoğan. There
is a sense that something is in the air – some coincidence of feeling between places. But this does not get close enough. For there
is no coincidence. All countries are today embedded in the same system, which subjects them all to the same pressures: and it is
these that are squeezing and warping national political life everywhere. And their effect is quite the opposite – despite the desperate
flag-waving – of the oft-remarked "
resurgence of the nation state ".
The future of economic globalisation, for which the Davos men and women see themselves as
caretakers, had been shaken by a series of political earthquakes. "Globalisation" can mean many
things, but what lay in particular doubt was the long-advanced project of increasing free trade
in goods across borders. The previous summer, Britain had voted to leave the largest trading
bloc in the world. In November, the unexpected victory of Donald Trump , who vowed to withdraw from
major trade deals, appeared to jeopardise the trading relationships of the world's richest
country. Forthcoming elections in France and Germany suddenly seemed to bear the possibility of
anti-globalisation parties garnering better results than ever before. The barbarians weren't at
the gates to the ski-lifts yet – but they weren't very far.
In a panel titled Governing Globalisation , the economist
Dambisa Moyo , otherwise a well-known supporter of free trade, forthrightly asked the
audience to accept that "there have been significant losses" from globalisation. "It is not
clear to me that we are going to be able to remedy them under the current infrastructure," she
added. Christine Lagarde, the head of the International Monetary Fund,
called for a policy hitherto foreign to the World Economic Forum : "more redistribution".
After years of hedging or discounting the malign effects of free trade, it was time to face
facts: globalisation caused job losses and depressed wages, and the usual Davos proposals
– such as instructing affected populations to accept the new reality – weren't
going to work. Unless something changed, the political consequences were likely to get
worse.
The backlash to globalisation has helped fuel the extraordinary political shifts of the past
18 months. During the close race to become the Democratic party candidate, senator Bernie
Sanders relentlessly attacked Hillary Clinton on her
support for free trade . On the campaign trail, Donald Trump openly proposed tilting the
terms of trade in favour of American industry. "Americanism, not globalism, shall be our
creed," he bellowed at the Republican national convention last July.
The vote for Brexit was strongest in the regions of the UK devastated by the flight of
manufacturing. At Davos in January, British prime minister Theresa May, the leader of the party
of capital and inherited wealth, improbably picked up the theme, warning that, for many, "talk
of greater globalisation means their jobs being outsourced and wages undercut." Meanwhile,
the European far right has been warning against free movement of people as well as goods.
Following her qualifying victory in the first round of France's presidential election,
Marine Le Pen warned darkly that "the main thing at stake in this election is the rampant
globalisation that is endangering our civilisation."
It was only a few decades ago that globalisation was held by many, even by some critics, to
be an inevitable, unstoppable force. "Rejecting globalisation," the American journalist George
Packer has written, "was like rejecting the sunrise." Globalisation could take place in
services, capital and ideas, making it a notoriously imprecise term; but what it meant most
often was making it cheaper to trade across borders – something that seemed to many at
the time to be an unquestionable good. In practice, this often meant that industry would move
from rich countries, where labour was expensive, to poor countries, where labour was cheaper.
People in the rich countries would either have to accept lower wages to compete, or lose their
jobs. But no matter what, the goods they formerly produced would now be imported, and be even
cheaper. And the unemployed could get new, higher-skilled jobs (if they got the requisite
training). Mainstream economists and politicians upheld the consensus about the merits of
globalisation, with little concern that there might be political consequences.
Back then, economists could calmly chalk up anti-globalisation sentiment to a marginal group
of delusional protesters, or disgruntled stragglers still toiling uselessly in "sunset
industries". These days, as sizable constituencies have voted in country after country for
anti-free-trade policies, or candidates that promise to limit them, the old self-assurance is
gone. Millions have rejected, with uncertain results, the punishing logic that globalisation
could not be stopped. The backlash has swelled a wave of soul-searching among economists, one
that had already begun to roll ashore with the financial crisis. How did they fail to foresee
the repercussions?
Comment of the Day : Dennis Drew :
GLOBALIZATION: WHAT DID PAUL KRUGMAN MISS? : "I'm always the first to say that if today's
10 dollars an hour jobs paid 20 dollars an hour
(Walgreen's, Target, fast food less w/much high labor costs) that would solve most social
problems caused by loss of manufacturing (to out sourcing or automation). The money's there.
Bottom 40% income take about 10% of overall income. "Mid" take about 67.5%. Top 1%, 22.5%.
The instrument of moving 10% more from "mid" to the bottom is higher consumer prices arriving
with the sudden reappearance of nationwide, high union density (see below for the easy
application). The instrument of retrieving the "mid's" lost 10% is Eisenhower level
confiscatory taxes for the top 1%.
Jack Kennedy lowered max income tax rate from 92% to 70% to improve incentives (other cuts
followed). But with the top 1% wages now 20X (!) what they were in the 60s while per capita
only doubled since, there will be all the incentive in the world left over while we relieve
them of the burden of stultifying wealth. ;-)
Brad argues that globalization is as good for the USA as Krugman thought in the 1990s. He has three key arguments. One is that
the manufacturing employment which has been off shored is unskilled assembly and such boring jobs are not good jobs. The second is
that the problems faced by US manufacturing workers are mostly due to electing Reagan and W Bush and not trade. Finally he notes
that local economic decline is not new at all and that trade with South Carolina did it to Massachusetts long before China entered
the picture. The third point works against his general argument and is partly personal. I won't discuss it except to note that Brad
is right.
I have criticisms of Brad's first two arguments. The first is that the boring easy manufacturing jobs were well paid. They are
bad jobs in that thinking of doing them terrifies me even more than work in general terrifies me, but they are (or mostly were) well
paid jobs. There are still strong forces that make wages paid to people who work near each other at the same firm similar. As very
much noted by Dennis Drew, unions used to be very strong and used that strenth to help all employees of unionized firms (and employess
of non-union firms whose managers were afraid of unions). I think that, like Krugman, Brad assumes that wages are based on skills
importantly including ones acquired on the job. I think this leaves a lot out.
... ... ...
Kaleberg , April 1, 2018 4:03 pm
An argument no one mentions is about comparative advantage. The US had a comparative advantage in manufacturing. It had the
engineers, the technicians, the labor, the venture capital and so on. When transportation costs are low and barriers minimal,
comparative advantage is something a nation creates, not some natural attribute. The US sacrificed that comparative advantage
on the altar of ideological purity. Manufacturing advantage is an especially useful type of advantage since it can permeate the
remaining economy. We sacrificed it, and we have been paying for it. Odds are, we will continue to pay.
likbez , April 1, 2018 6:38 pm
The problem here is that neoliberalism and globalization are two sides of the same coin.
If you reject globalization, you need to reject neoliberalism as a social system. You just can't sit between two chairs (as
Trump attempts to do propagating "bastard neoliberalism" -- neoliberal doctrine is still fully applicable within the country,
but neoliberal globalization is rejected)
Rejection of neoliberal globalization also implicitly suggests that Reagan "quiet coup" that restored the power of financial
oligarchy and subsequent dismantling of the New Deal Capitalism was a disaster for common people in the USA.
While this is true, that's a very tough call. That explains DeLong behavior.
"... And, quoting his colleague Archon Fung from the Harvard Kennedy School, " American politics is no longer characterized by the rule of the median voter, if it ever was. Instead, in contemporary America the median capitalist rules as both the Democratic and Republican parties adjust their policies to attract monied interests." And finally Mr. Ringen adds, "American politicians are aware of having sunk into a murky bog of moral corruption but are trapped." ..."
"... Trump merely reflects the dysfunctionality and internal contradictions of American politics. He is the American Gorbachev, who kicked off perestroika at the wrong time. ..."
"... Global financial services exercise monopolistic power over national policies, unchecked by any semblance of global political power. Trust is haemorrhaging. The European Union, the greatest ever experiment in super-national democracy, is imploding ..."
"... Probably this is because the Western model of neoliberalism does not provide any real freedom of commerce, speech, or political activity, but rather imposes a regime of submission within a clearly defined framework. ..."
"... america is going through withdraw from 30 years of trickledown crap. the young are realizing that the shithole they inherit does not have to be a shithole, and the old pathetic white old men who run the show will be dead soon. ..."
"... The liberal order is dying because it is led by criminally depraved Predators who have pauperized the labor force and created political strife, though the populists don't pose much threat to the liberal-order Predators. ..."
"... However by shipping the productive Western economies overseas to Asia, the US in particular cannot finance and physically support a military empire or the required R&D to stay competitive on the commercial and military front. ..."
"... So the US Imperialists are being eclipsed by the Sino-Russo Alliance and wants us to believe this is a great tragedy. Meanwhile the same crew of Liberal -neoCon Deep Staters presses on with wars and tensions that are slipping out of control. ..."
Haass writes: " Liberalism is in retreat. Democracies are feeling the effects of growing populism. Parties of the political extremes
have gained ground in Europe. The vote in the United Kingdom in favor of leaving the EU attested to the loss of elite influence.
Even the US is experiencing unprecedented attacks from its own president on the country's media, courts, and law-enforcement institutions.
Authoritarian systems, including China, Russia, and Turkey, have become even more top-heavy. Countries such as Hungary and Poland
seem uninterested in the fate of their young democracies
"We are seeing the emergence of regional orders. Attempts to build global frameworks are failing."
Haass has previously made alarmist statements , but this
time he is employing his rhetoric to point to the global nature of this phenomenon. Although between the lines one can easily read,
first of all, a certain degree of arrogance -- the idea that only we liberals and globalists really know how to administer foreign
policy -- and second, the motifs of conspiracy.
"Today's other major powers, including the EU, Russia, China, India, and Japan, could be criticized for what they are doing,
not doing, or both."
Probably this list could be expanded by adding a number of Latin American countries, plus Egypt, which signs arms deals with North
Korea while denying any violation of UN sanctions, and the burgeoning Shiite axis of Iran-Iraq-Syria-Lebanon.
But Haass is crestfallen over the fact that it is Washington itself that is changing the rules of the game and seems completely
uninterested in what its allies, partners, and clients in various corners of the world will do.
" America's decision to abandon the role it has played for more than seven decades thus marks a turning point. The liberal
world order cannot survive on its own, because others lack either the interest or the means to sustain it. The result will be
a world that is less free, less prosperous, and less peaceful, for Americans and others alike."
Richard Haass's colleague at the CFR, Stewart Patrick, quite agrees with the claim that it is
the US itself that is burying the liberal world order . However, it's not doing it on its own, but alongside China. If the US
had previously been hoping that the process of globalization would gradually transform China (and possibly destroy it, as happened
to the Soviet Union earlier), then the Americans must have been quite surprised by how it has actually played out. That country modernized
without being Westernized, an idea that had once been endorsed by the leader of the Islamic revolution in Iran, Ayatollah Khomeini.
Now China is expanding its influence in Eurasia in its own way, and this is for the most part welcomed by its partner countries.
But this has been a painful process for the US, as it is steadily and irrevocably undermining its hegemony.
"Its long-term ambition is to dismantle the U.S. alliance system in Asia, replacing it with a more benign (from Beijing's perspective)
regional security order in which it enjoys pride of place, and ideally a sphere of influence commensurate with its power.
China's Belt and Road initiative is part and parcel of this effort, offering not only (much-needed) infrastructure investments
in neighboring countries but also the promise of greater political influence in Southeast, South, and Central Asia. More aggressively,
China continues to advance outrageous jurisdictional claims over almost the entirety of the South China Sea , where it continues
its island-building activities, as well as engaging in provocative actions against Japan in the East China Sea," writes Patrick.
And as for the US:
"The United States, for its part, is a weary titan, no longer willing to bear the burdens of global leadership, either economically
or geopolitically.
Trump treats alliances as a protection racket, and the world economy as an arena of zero-sum competition. The result is a fraying
liberal international order without a champion willing to invest in the system itself. "
One can agree with both authors' assessments of the changed behavior of one sector of the US establishment, but this is about
more than just Donald Trump (who is so unpredictable that he has
staffed his own team with a member of the very swamp he was preparing to drain) and North American populism. One needs to look
much deeper.
"Today, American democratic exceptionalism is defined by a system that is dysfunctional in all the conditions that are needed
for settlement and loyalty...
Capitalism has collapsed into crisis in an orgy of deregulation. Money is transgressing into politics and undermining democracy
itself ."
And, quoting his colleague Archon Fung from the Harvard Kennedy School, " American politics is no longer characterized by
the rule of the median voter, if it ever was. Instead, in contemporary America the median capitalist rules as both the Democratic
and Republican parties adjust their policies to attract monied interests." And finally Mr. Ringen adds, "American politicians are
aware of having sunk into a murky bog of moral corruption but are trapped."
Trump merely reflects the dysfunctionality and internal contradictions of American politics. He is the American Gorbachev,
who kicked off perestroika at the wrong time. Although it must be conceded that if Hillary Clinton had become president, the
US collapse would have been far more painful, particularly for the citizens of that country. We would have seen yet more calamitous
reforms, a swelling influx of migrants, a further decline in the nation's manufacturing base, and the incitement of new conflicts.
Trump is trying to keep the body of US national policy somewhat alive through hospice care, but what's really needed is a major restructuring,
including far-reaching political reforms that would allow the country's citizens to feel that they can actually play a role in its
destiny.
These developments have spread to many countries in Europe, a continent that, due to its transatlantic involvement, was already
vulnerable and susceptible to the current geopolitical turbulence. The emergence of which, by the way, was largely a consequence
of that very policy of neoliberalism.
Stein Ringen continues on that score:
"Global financial services exercise monopolistic power over national policies, unchecked by any semblance of global political
power. Trust is haemorrhaging. The European Union, the greatest ever experiment in super-national democracy, is imploding
"
It is interesting that panic has seized Western Europe and the US -- the home of transatlanticism, although different versions
of this recipe for liberalism have been employed in other regions -- suffice it to recall the experience of Singapore or Brazil.
But they don't seem as panicked there as in the West.
Probably this is because the Western model of neoliberalism does not provide any real freedom of commerce, speech, or political
activity, but rather imposes a regime of submission within a clearly defined framework. Therefore, the destruction of the current
system entails the loss of all those dividends previously enjoyed by the liberal political elites of the West that were obtained
by speculating in the stock market, from the mechanisms of international foreign-exchange payments (the dollar system), and through
the instruments of supranational organizations (the UN, WTO, and World Bank). And, of course, there are the fundamental differences
in the cultural varieties of societies.
In his book The Hidden God, Lucien Goldmann draws some interesting conclusions, suggesting that the foundations of Western culture
have rationalistic and tragic origins, and that a society immersed in these concepts that have "abolish[ed] both God and the community
[soon sees] the disappearance of any external norm which might guide the individual in his life and actions." And because by its
very nature liberalism must carry on, in its mechanical fashion, "liberating" the individual from any form of structure (social classes,
the Church, family, society, and gender, ultimately liberating man from his very self), in the absence of any standards of deterrence,
it is quite logical that the Western world was destined to eventually find itself in crisis. And the surge of populist movements,
protectionist measures, and conservative policies of which Haass and other liberal globalists speak are nothing more than examples
of those nations' instinct for self-preservation. One need not concoct conspiracy theories about Russia or Putin interfering in the
US election (which Donald Trump has also denied, noting only that support was seen for Hillary Clinton, and it is entirely true that
a portion of her financial backing did come from Russia). The baseline political decisions being made in the West are in step with
the current crisis that is evident on so many levels. It's just that, like always, the Western elites need their ritual whipping
boy(although it would be more accurate to call it a human sacrifice). This geopolitical shake-up began in the West as a result of
the implicit nature of the very project of the West itself.
But since alternative development scenarios exist, the current system is eroding away. And other political projects are starting
to fill the resultant ideological void -- in both form as well as content.
Thus it's fairly likely that the current crisis of liberalism will definitively bury the unipolar Western system of hegemony.
And the budding movements of populism and regional protectionism can serve as the basis for a new, multipolar world order.
Oh, Wicked Witch of the West Wing, the cleansing fire awaits thy demise! Those meds can only keep you standing for so long.
Keep tripping. Keep stumbling. Satan calls you to him. The day approacheth. Tick tock tick tock. 👹😂
Democracy ultimately melts down into chaos. We have a perfectly good US Constitution, why don't we go back to using it as written?
That said, I am for anything that makes the elites become common.
Democracy is a form of government. Populism is a movement. Populist movements come about when the current form of government
is failing ... historically it seems they seldom choose wisely.
Ridiculous cunt Hillary thinks after getting REJECTED by the voters in the USA that somehow being asked to "go the fuck away
and shut the fuck up" makes her a women's leader. The cocksucker Soros and some of these other non-elected globalist should keep
in mind that while everybody has a right to an opinion: it took the Clinton Crime Family and lots of corruption to create the
scandals that sets a Clinton Crime Family member aside, and why Soros was given a free pass on election meddling and not others
requires congressional investigation and a special prosecutor. And then there is that special kind of legal and ignorant opinion
like David Hogg who I just disagree with, making him in my opinion and many fellow NRA members a cocksucker and a cunt. I'd wish
shingles on David Hogg, Hillary Clinton, and Soros.
america is going through withdraw from 30 years of trickledown crap. the young are realizing that the shithole they inherit
does not have to be a shithole, and the old pathetic white old men who run the show will be dead soon.
all i see is a bunch of fleeting old people who found facebook 10 years late are temporarily empowered since they can now connect
with other equally impotent old people.
The usual self-serving swill from the Best and the Brightest of the Predator Class out of the CFR via Haas.
The liberal order aka the New British Empire, was born 70 years ago by firebombing and nuking undefended civilian targets.
It proceeded to launch serial genocidal rampages in the Koreas, SE Asia, Latin America until finally burning down a large portion
of the Middle East.
The fact that there has not been a catastrophic nuclear war is pure dumb luck. The Deep State came within seconds of engineering
a nuclear cataclysm off the waters of Cuba in 1962. When JFK started dismantling the CIA Deep State and ending the Cold War with
the USSR, Dulles dispatched a CIA hit-squad to gun down the President. (RFK and Nixon immediately understood the assassination
was a CIA-led wet-works operation since they chaired the assassination committees themselves in the past).
The liberal order is dying because it is led by criminally depraved Predators who have pauperized the labor force and created
political strife, though the populists don't pose much threat to the liberal-order Predators.
However by shipping the productive Western economies overseas to Asia, the US in particular cannot finance and physically
support a military empire or the required R&D to stay competitive on the commercial and military front.
So the US Imperialists are being eclipsed by the Sino-Russo Alliance and wants us to believe this is a great tragedy. Meanwhile
the same crew of Liberal -neoCon Deep Staters presses on with wars and tensions that are slipping out of control.
Liberalism is anything but liberal... and I suppose that is the problem with it. It aims to do to the western world what Mao
did to China and Stalin did to Russia. Many people were murdered or imprisoned and people had no rights, just obligations to dictators
and their cronies.
I think this world is past the point where any benefit is gained from having "owners of the people", benevolent or otherwise.
And we certainly do not benefit from perverted demonic entities even if they come bearing technology. The price is too high.
Populism goes along with essential freedoms for the human race.-
As I told the idiotic retards who argued with me on Prodigy fucking 27 years ago, China will not change because of increased
trading and the West making them wealthier. In fact, just the opposite. I wonder if they have caught on yet?
Firs of all Mark Galeotti is very weak. That's incurable.
I want your money poor Pinocchio -- that the new slogan of May government. Kind of
compensation for Brexit losses at Russian oligarchs expense.
What Russophobe Galiotti does not understand is that this another nail in the coffin of neoliberalism. As soon as you
start to distriminate between oligarche neoliberalism stops and nationalism starts
Notable quotes:
"... Of course, the irony is that by driving out Russian money, London would in part be doing Putin's work for him ..."
"... He has launched a " de-offshorization " campaign to try to persuade, cajole, and intimidate oligarchs and minigarchs into bringing their money back home. Along with the stabilization of the economy as a whole, this has had some limited success. While more than $31 billion flowed out of the country last year alone, this is a dramatic fall from 2014's $154 billion . ..."
"... The thought that Britain would actually be returning capital into Putin's grasp may be an uncomfortable one. After all, a third possible policy goal would be actively to seek to undermine the regime in Moscow. ..."
This is also a project in which further international cooperation would be crucial. Chasing
that money and the influence it buys out of London but seeing it find comfortable new homes in
Paris, Frankfurt, and New York is only half the job done and will do little to chasten Moscow.
Although it will be difficult to persuade others to turn away tempting business, the unexpected
support Britain is receiving from European Union partners in particular suggests this may be an
opportune moment to convince them that in its experience this money is too toxic to be safe and
that this is a Western, not just a British, problem.
Of course, the irony is that by driving out Russian money, London would in part be doing
Putin's work for him . Since 2014, the Russian economy has been in the doldrums.
Furthermore, Putin is a man who understands power better than economics, and he is unhappy to
see elites stash their money outside his grasp.
Putin is a man who understands power better than economics, and he is unhappy to see elites
stash their money outside his grasp.
He has launched a "
de-offshorization " campaign to try to persuade, cajole, and intimidate oligarchs and
minigarchs into bringing their money back home. Along with the stabilization of the economy as
a whole, this has had some limited success. While more than $31
billion flowed out of the country last year alone, this is a dramatic fall from 2014's
$154 billion .
The thought that Britain would actually be returning capital into Putin's grasp may be
an uncomfortable one. After all, a third possible policy goal would be actively to seek to
undermine the regime in Moscow. Overt efforts at regime change would be dangerous and
likely counterproductive, but London may feel that it should not pass up opportunities to
weaken the Kremlin
London may feel that it should not pass up opportunities to weaken the Kremlin
, in the hope that this may tame its appetite for playing confrontational
geopolitics.
... ... ...
Mark Galeotti is a senior research fellow at the Institute of International Affairs Prague and a visiting fellow with
the European Council on Foreign Relations.
The recent German Marshall Fund's Brussels Forum, which brought together influential
American neocons and trans-Atlantic leaders from Europe, marked the failure of the
Western-centered globalist idea, Sputnik political observer Dmitry Kosyrev notes, adding that
meanwhile, Russia and China continue to facilitate the emergence of a multi-polar world.
Globalists have admitted their defeat by recognizing that neither Russia nor China will dance
to their tune, Sputnik political observer Dmitry Kosyrev writes
.
"It seems that work has begun to revive the half-dead 'liberal world order'," the observer
noted. "It will take quite some time, and it is not necessary that the United States will be
its epicenter. However, this 'order' will not be global -- goodbye, illusions. It will involve
only part of the countries while China, Russia and some other states won't be affected [by the
project]."
The observer referred to the 2018 German Marshall Fund's (GMF) Brussels Forum ,
citing Josh Rogin of The Washington Post. The Brussels Forum is an annual high-level
meeting of influential politicians, corporate leaders and scholars from North America and
Europe. The event had the eloquent title "Revise, Rebuild, Reboot: Strategies for a Time of
Distrust." The organizers of the forum raised the alarm over "a decline in trust, both in
domestic and international spheres."
"We lost sight of what it took to create this international order and what an act of
defiance of history and even defiance of human nature this order has been. We have the capacity
to push back -- we just need to understand the pushback needs to start occurring," Robert
Kagan, neoconservative American historian and husband of former US Assistant Secretary of State
for European and Eurasian Affairs Victoria Nuland told the forum, as quoted by Rogin.
For
his part, Senator Chris Murphy bemoaned the fact that US President Donald Trump is not
interested in "projecting liberal values" into other countries, let alone trade liberalization.
The White House's recent
initiative to introduce additional tariffs on aluminum and steel imports has prompted a
wave of criticism from the US' global partners and allies.
Furthermore, the US president made it clear that the US will not support numerous
international institutions and withdrew from the United Nations Educational, Scientific and
Cultural Organization (UNESCO).
Murphy called upon the defenders of the liberal world order to team up and "build new
alliances within their societies."
On the other hand, the transatlantic bloc has seemingly recognized its failure to impose a
Western-style political order on Russia and China.
"We can no longer expect that the principles of liberal democracy will expand across the
globe," Rogin wrote. "We can no longer assume the United States will carry the bulk of the
burden."
Following Trump's win in 2016, The New York Times
called Germany's Angela Merkel the last defender of the trans-Atlantic alliance and liberal
values.
However, not everything is rosy in the European garden, Kosyrev noted referring to
the
rise of right-wing forces in Austria, Italy, Hungary, Poland and other EU member states.
Although Merkel still remains at the helm of German politics, the right-wing Alternative for
Germany (AfD) entered the Bundestag in September 2017 as the third-largest party.
Given all of the above, the rebuilding of the liberal international order will take years,
Kosyrev presumed.
According to the political observer, Russia and China could benefit from the inner struggle
in the trans-Atlantic camp. On the other hand, he does not exclude that the West will continue
its overseas operations to maintain the status quo. To illustrate his point, Kosyrev referred
to Syria: While Washington has virtually no leverage to oust Syrian President Bashar al-Assad,
it
continues its saber-rattling, threatening Damascus with a massive strike.
The failure of globalism means the further rise of a multi-polar order based on the
principles of equality and sovereignty with its own norms and regulations, the political
observer concluded.
The views and opinions expressed by Dmitry Kosyrev are those of the contributor and do
not necessarily reflect those of Sputnik.
President Donald Trump has ordered the expulsion of 60 Russian diplomats and the closure of
the Russian consulate in Seattle. It comes in response to the poisoning of Sergei Skripal in
Salisbury, which the UK has blamed on Russia. The move follows major diplomatic pressure by the
UK on its allies to follow their lead in expelling Russian diplomats. The Russian embassy in
Washington had previously urged Trump not to heed the "fake news " on Skripal's
poisoning.
British Prime Minister Theresa May has accused Moscow of being behind the poisoning of the
former spy Skripal and his daughter in the town of Salisbury in early March.
Breaking: US to expel 48 Russian embassy workers in Washington, D.C. and 12 at the Russian
mission to the U.N. U.S. says they were intel officers using diplo status as cover.
pic.twitter.com/mRuwY8Tes6
Of the 60 diplomats expelled, 12 formed part of the Russian mission to the United Nations.
In a statement, US ambassador to the UN Nikki Haley said the 12 Russians in question had "
abused their privilege of residence" in the US and had "engaged in espionage
activities that are adverse to our national security."
The Trump administration's proposed tariffs on steel and aluminum imports will target China, but not the way most
observers believe. For the US, the most important bilateral trade issue has nothing to do with the Chinese authorities'
failure to reduce excess steel capacity, as promised, and stop subsidizing exports.
CAMBRIDGE – Like almost all economists and most policy analysts, I
prefer low trade tariffs or no tariffs at all. How, then, can US President Donald Trump's decision to impose substantial
tariffs on imports of steel and aluminum be justified?
3
Trump no doubt sees potential political gains in steel- and
aluminum-producing districts and in increasing the pressure on Canada and Mexico as his administration renegotiates the
North American Free Trade Agreement. The European Union has announced plans to retaliate against US exports, but in the
end the EU may negotiate – and agree to reduce current tariffs on US products that exceed US tariffs on European
products.
But the real target of the steel and aluminum tariffs is China. The
Chinese government has promised for years to reduce excess steel capacity, thereby cutting the surplus output that is
sold to the United States at subsidized prices. Chinese policymakers have postponed doing so as a result of domestic
pressure to protect China's own steel and aluminum jobs. The US tariffs will balance those domestic pressures and
increase the likelihood that China will accelerate the reduction in subsidized excess capacity.
Because the tariffs are being levied under a provision of US trade
law that applies to national security, rather than dumping or import surges, it will be possible to exempt imports from
military allies in NATO, as well as Japan and South Korea, focusing the tariffs on China and avoiding the risk of a
broader trade war. The administration has not yet said that it will focus the tariffs in this way; but, given that they
are being introduced with a phase-in period, during which trade partners may seek exemptions, such targeting seems to be
the likeliest scenario.
For the US, the most important trade issue with China concerns
technology transfers, not Chinese exports of subsidized steel and aluminum. Although such subsidies hurt US producers of
steel and aluminum, the resulting low prices also help US firms that use steel and aluminum, as well as US consumers
that buy those products. But China unambiguously hurts US interests when it steals technology developed by US firms.
Until a few years ago, the Chinese government was using the Peoples
Liberation Army's (PLA) sophisticated cyber skills to infiltrate American companies and steal technology. Chinese
officials denied all wrongdoing until President Barack Obama and President Xi Jinping met in California in June 2013.
Obama showed Xi detailed proof that the US had obtained through its own cyber espionage. Xi then agreed that the Chinese
government would no longer use the PLA or other government agencies to steal US technology. Although it is difficult to
know with certainty, it appears that such cyber theft has been reduced dramatically.
The current technology theft takes a different form. American firms
that want to do business in China are often required to transfer their technology to Chinese firms as a condition of
market entry. These firms "voluntarily" transfer production knowhow because they want access to a market of 1.3 billion
people and an economy as large as that of the US.
These firms complain that the requirement of technology transfer is a
form of extortion. Moreover, they worry that the Chinese government often delays their market access long enough for
domestic firms to use their newly acquired technology to gain market share.
1
The US cannot use traditional remedies for trade disputes or World
Trade Organization procedures to stop China's behavior. Nor can the US threaten to take Chinese technology or require
Chinese firms to transfer it to American firms, because the Chinese do not have the kind of leading-edge technology that
US firms have.
So, what can US policymakers do to help level the playing field?
This brings us back to the proposed tariffs on steel and aluminum. In
my view, US negotiators will use the threat of imposing the tariffs on Chinese producers as a way to persuade China's
government to abandon the policy of "voluntary" technology transfers. If that happens, and US firms can do business in
China without being compelled to pay such a steep competitive price, the threat of tariffs will have been a very
successful tool of trade policy.
"... The UK is clearly past the point where it could undo Brexit . There was pretty much no way to back out of Brexit, given the ferocious support for it in the tabloids versus the widespread view that a second referendum that showed that opinion had changed was a political necessity for a reversal. Pundits and politicians were cautious about even voicing the idea. ..."
"... The UK still faces high odds of significant dislocations as of Brexit date . All sorts of agreements to which the UK is a party via the EU cease to be operative once the UK become a "third country". These other countries have every reason to take advantage of the UK's week and administratively overextended position. Moreover, these countries can't entertain even discussing interim trade arrangements (new trade deals take years) until they have at least a high concept idea of what the "future relationship" with the EU will look like. Even though it looks likely to be a Canada-type deal, no one wants to waste time negotiating until that is firmed up. ..."
"... On the World Service this morning, the BBC reported from the "cultural front line against Putin". A playwright (perhaps a member of playwrights against Putin) was given half an hour from 5 am to witter on. This is half an hour more than what Brexit will get on the airwaves today. ..."
"... I think the key thing that is driving the politics for the moment is that May has shown an absolute determination to hold on to power at any cost, and she realises that having a transition agreement is central to this. ..."
"... I think you are right that the main political priority now in London is preserving May in her position. ..."
A
reader was kind enough to ask for a Brexit update. I hadn't provided one because truth be told,
the UK press has gone quiet as the Government knuckled under in the last round of
negotiations.
It is a mystery as to why the hard core Brexit faction and the true power brokers, the press
barons, have gone quiet after having made such a spectacle of their incompetence and refusal to
compromise. Do they not understand what is happening? Has someone done a whip count and
realized they didn't have the votes if they tried forcing a crisis, and that the result would
probably be a Labour government, a fate they feared far more than a disorderly Brexit?
As we've pointed out repeatedly, the EU has the vastly stronger negotiating position. The UK
could stomp and huff and keep demanding its super special cherry picked special cake all it
wanted to. That was a fast track to a crash-out Brexit. But it seems out of character for the
Glorious Brexit true believers to sober up suddenly.
Some observations:
The transition deal is the much-decried "vassal state ". As we and others pointed out, the
only transition arrangement feasible was a standstill with respect to the UK's legal
arrangements with the EU, save at most some comparatively minor concessions on pet issues. The
UK will remain subject to the authority of the ECJ. The UK will continue to pay into the EU
budget. As we'd predicted, the transition period will go only until the end of 2020.
The UK couldn't even get a break on the Common Fisheries Policy.
From the Guardian :
For [fisherman Tony] Delahunty's entire career, a lopsided system of quotas has granted up
to 84% of the rights to fish some local species, such as English Channel cod, to the French,
and left as little as 9% to British boats. Add on a new system that bans fishermen from
throwing away unwanted catch and it becomes almost impossible to haul in a net of mixed fish
without quickly exhausting more limited quotas of "choke" species such as cod .
Leaving the EU was meant to change all that .Instead, growing numbers of British fishermen
feel they have been part of a bait-and-switch exercise – a shiny lure used to help reel
in a gullible public. Despite only recently promising full fisheries independence as soon as
Brexit day on 29 March 2019, the UK government this week capitulated to Brussels' demand for it
to remain part of the common fisheries system until at least 2021, when a transition phase is
due to end. Industry lobbyists fear that further cave-ins are now inevitable in the long run as
the EU insists on continued access to British waters as the price of a wider post-Brexit trade
deal.
The one place where the UK did get a win of sorts was on citizen's rights, where the
transition deal did not make commitments, much to the consternation of both EU27 and UK
nationals. Curiously, the draft approved by the EU27 last week dropped the section that had
discussed citizens' rights. From
the Express :
Italy's Minister of Foreign Affairs and International Cooperation, Angelino Alfano,
demands EU citizens' rights be protected after Brexit .
The comments from Italy's foreign minister come after the draft Brexit agreement struck
between Britain and the EU on Monday was missing "Article 32", which in previous drafts
regulated the free movement of British citizens living in Europe after Brexit.
The entire article was missing from the document, which goes straight from Article 31 to
Article 33.
MEPs from the Conservatives, Liberal Democrats, Labour, Greens, SNP and Plaid Cymru have
written to Brexit Secretary David Davis for clarification about the missing article, while
citizens' group British in Europe said the document failed to provide them with "legal
certainty".
A copy of the letter sent to Mr Davis seen by the Independent said: "As UK MEPs we are
deeply worried about what will happen to British citizens living in EU27 member states once
we leave the EU.
This issue has apparently been pushed back to the April round of talks. I have not focused
on the possible points of contention here. However, bear in mind that EU citizens could sue if
they deem the eventual deal to be too unfavorable. Recall that during the 2015 Greece-Troika
negotiations, some parties were advocating that Greece leave the Eurozone. A counterargument
was that Greek citizens would be able to sue the Greek government for their loss of EU
rights.
The UK is backing into having to accept a sea border as the solution for Ireland. As many
have pointed out, there's no other remedy to the various commitments the UK has already made
with respect to Ireland, as unpalatable as that solution is to the Unionists and hard core
Brexiters. The UK has not put any solutions on the table as the EU keeps working on the
"default" option, which was included in the Joint Agreement of December. The DUP sabre-rattled
then but was not willing to blow up the negotiations then. It will be even harder for them to
derail a deal now when the result would be a chaotic Brexit.
The UK is still trying to escape what appears to be the inevitable outcome. The press of the
last 24 hours reports that the UK won't swallow the "backstop" plan that the EU has been
refining, even though it accepts the proposition that the
agreement needs to have that feature . The UK is back to trying to revive one of its barmy
ideas that managed to find its way into the Joint Agreement, that of a new super special
customs arrangement.
Politico gives an outline below. This is a non-starter simply because the EU will never
accept any arrangement where goods can get into the EU without there being full compliance with
EU rules, and that includes having them subject to the jurisdiction of the ECJ and the various
relevant Brussels supervisory bodies. Without even hearing further details, the UK's barmy
"alignment" notions means that the UK would somehow have a say in these legal and regulatory
processes. This cheeky plan would give the UK better rights than any EU27 member. From
Politico :
The key issues for debate, according to one senior U.K. official, is how the two sides can
deliver "full alignment" and what the territorial scope of that commitment will be -- the U.K.
or Northern Ireland.
The starting point of the U.K.'s position will be that "full alignment" should apply to
goods and a limited number of services sectors, one U.K. official said.
On the customs issue, the proposal that Northern Ireland is subsumed into the EU's customs
territory is a non-starter with London
The alternative would be based on one of the two customs arrangements set out by the
government in August last year and reaffirmed by May in her Mansion House speech. They are
either a customs partnership -- known as the "hybrid" model internally -- or the "highly
streamlined customs arrangement" known by officials as "max-fac" or maximum facilitation.
The hybrid model would mean the U.K. continuing to police its border as if it were the
EU's customs border, but then tracking imports to apply different tariffs depending on which
market they end up in -- U.K. or EU. Under this scenario, because Northern Ireland and the
Republic of Ireland would share an external EU customs border, as they do now, it would
remove the need for checks on the land border between the two.
The complexity and unprecedented nature of this solution has led to accusations from the
Brussels side that it amounts to "magical thinking."
The "max-fac" model is simpler conceptually but would represent a huge logistical effort
for U.K. customs authorities. It would involve the use of technological and legal measures
such as electronic pre-notification of goods crossing the border and a "trusted trader"
status for exporters and importers, to make customs checks as efficient as possible.
While the U.K. will present both customs arrangements as possible ways of solving this
aspect of the Irish border problem, one senior official said that the "hybrid" model was
emerging as the preferred option in London.
The UK is already having trouble getting its customs IT upgrade done on time, which happens
to be right before Brexit. As we wrote early on, even if the new programs are in place, they
won't be able to handle the increased transactions volume resulting from of being outside the
EU, and I haven't seen good figures as to what the impact would be of the UK becoming a third
country but having its transition deal in place. In other words, even if the "mac-fac" scheme
were acceptable to the EU (unlikely), the UK looks unable to pull off getting the needed
infrastructure in place. Even for competent shops, large IT projects have a high failure rate.
And customs isn't looking like a high capability IT player right now.
So the play for the EU is to let the UK continue to flail about and deliver Ireland
"solutions" that are dead on arrival because they violate clearly and consistently stated EU
red lines. The UK will then in say September be faced with a Brexit deal that is done save
Ireland, and it then have to choose between capitulating (it's hard to come up with any way to
improve the optics, but we do have a few months for creative ideas) or plunging into a chaotic
Brexit.
6.The approach outlined below reflects the level of rights and obligations compatible with
the positions stated by the UK
7. In this context, the European Council reiterates in particular that any agreement with
the United Kingdom will have to be based on a balance of rights and obligations, and ensure a
level playing field. A non-member of the Union, that does not live up to the same obligations
as a member, cannot have the same rights and enjoy the same benefits as a member.
The European Council recalls that the four freedoms are indivisible and that there can be
no "cherry picking" through participation in the Single Market based on a sector-by-sector
approach, which would undermine the integrity and proper functioning of the Single
Market.
The European Council further reiterates that the Union will preserve its autonomy as
regards its decision-making, which excludes participation of the United Kingdom as a
third-country in the Union Institutions and participation in the decision-making of the Union
bodies, offices and agencies. The role of the Court of Justice of the European Union will
also be fully respected.
8. As regards the core of the economic relationship, the European Council confirms its
readiness to initiate work towards a balanced, ambitious and wide-ranging free trade
agreement (FTA) insofar as there are sufficient guarantees for a level playing field. This
agreement will be finalised and concluded once the UK is no longer a Member State.
The EU also reaffirmed the obvious, "Nothing is agreed until everything is agreed."
The EU nevertheless has relented in its negotiating tactics . The EU's initial approach was
to put the most contentious issues up front: the exit tab, Ireland, freedom of movement. You
will notice it has achieved closure only only one of those issues where the EU's initial
position had been that they had to be concluded before the two sides would discuss "the future
relationship," as in trade. This is the opposite of the approach that professional negotiators
use, that of starting with the least contentious issues first to establish a working
relationship between both sides and create a sense of momentum, and then tackling the difficult
questions later. The EU has now allowed the UK to defer resolving the messy issue of Ireland
twice, and it is not clear if any progress has been made on the citizens' rights matter.
The UK is clearly past the point where it could undo Brexit . There was pretty much no way
to back out of Brexit, given the ferocious support for it in the tabloids versus the widespread
view that a second referendum that showed that opinion had changed was a political necessity
for a reversal. Pundits and politicians were cautious about even voicing the idea.
As we've pointed out, coming up with the wording of the referendum question took six months.
In the snap elections last year, the Lib Dems set forth the most compact timeline possible for
a Brexit referendum redo which presupposed that the phrasing had been settled. That was eight
months. And you'd have to have a Parliamentary approval process before and a vote afterwards
(Parliament is sovereign; a referendum in and of itself is not sufficient to change
course).
Spain has been making noises about Gibraltar but they aren't likely to mean much . I could
be proven wrong, but I don't see Spain as able to block a Brexit deal. Article 50 says that
only a "qualified majority" vote is required to approve a Brexit agreement. Spain as a lone
holdout couldn't keep a deal from being approved. And I don't see who would join Spain over the
issue of Gibraltar. In keeping, Spain joined with the rest of the EU27 in approving the latest
set of texts.
The UK still faces high odds of significant dislocations as of Brexit date . All sorts of
agreements to which the UK is a party via the EU cease to be operative once the UK become a
"third country". These other countries have every reason to take advantage of the UK's week and
administratively overextended position. Moreover, these countries can't entertain even
discussing interim trade arrangements (new trade deals take years) until they have at least a
high concept idea of what the "future relationship" with the EU will look like. Even though it
looks likely to be a Canada-type deal, no one wants to waste time negotiating until that is
firmed up.
May has lasted in office longer than many pundits predicted she would because, weak as her
grip on power may have been since she lost her parliamentary majority last year, she has
timed her surrenders cleverly.
It looks chaotic and undignified, but the prime minister has hunkered down and let pro-
and anti-Brexit factions in her party shout the odds in the media day and night, squabble
publicly about acceptable terms for a deal, leak against each other and publish Sunday
newspaper columns challenging her authority.
Then in the few days before a European summit deadline for the next phase of a deal, she
has rammed the only position acceptable to Brussels through her Cabinet and effectively
called the hard Brexiteers' bluff.
But what kind of leader marches her country into at worst an abyss and at best a future of
lower prosperity, less clout, and no meaningful increase in autonomy? Like it or not, the UK is
a small open economy, and its leaders, drunk on Imperial nostalgia, still can's stomach the
idea that the UK did better by flexing its muscle within the EU that it can ever do solo.
I'm curious as to the ramifications of the Northern Ireland sea border. Is reunification
possible with the ROI, given that the Unionists have been completely castrated?
I'm a Californian so am not one that is tuned into the history.
Theoretically, there is no fundamental problem with a NI sea border and NI remaining
within the UK. Northern Ireland already has its own Assembly and its own laws (the Assembly
is suspended at the moment), so it can, if the EU agreed, stay within the EU (albeit without
a separate vote or voice at the table). There are precedents for this, such as the
dependant territories of France . It would be constitutionally messy, but if authorized
by Parliament in London and in the EU itself, it would likely be legally watertight so far as
I am aware.
Hardline Unionists oppose this partly because they are ideologically opposed to the EU
anyway (although its highly likely many of their constituents don't agree), but also because
they see this as a 'thin end of the wedge' leading to a United Ireland. More thoughtful
Unionists realise that a sort of 'foot in both camps' approach might actually be an economic
boon to Northern Ireland – it could attract a lot of investment from companies wishing
easy access to both the internal UK market and Europe.
"The UK press has gone quiet as the Government knuckled under in the last round of
negotiations." The MSM, corporate or government (BBC and Channel 4), are under orders to go
quiet. In any case, it's easier and more fun to cover the anti-semites and anti-transgender
whatever in the Labour Party, Trump's extra-marital goings-on and whatever dastardly plot
Putin has come up with.
On my 'phone's news feed yesterday and today, the Corbyn's anti-Semitism is not shifting
from the top line. The only change is from where the latest article is sourced.
On the World Service this morning, the BBC reported from the "cultural front line against
Putin". A playwright (perhaps a member of playwrights against Putin) was given half an hour
from 5 am to witter on. This is half an hour more than what Brexit will get on the airwaves
today.
How are things playing out locally, Buckinghamshire in my case? The economy is slowing
down. More shops are closing. Some IT contractors report contracts not being renewed and
having to look for business outside the UK. East Europeans working in farming, care and
social services have been replaced in many, but not all, cases by immigrants from south Asia.
An cabbie and restaurateur report the worst festive season and first quarter of the year for
many, many years.
At Doncaster races last Saturday, the opening day of the flat season, some bookies were
offering odds of Tory victory in 2022, if not an earlier khaki one. It seems that May is a
survivor and Corbyn's Labour has peaked. All very depressing.
I think the key thing that is driving the politics for the moment is that May has shown an
absolute determination to hold on to power at any cost, and she realises that having a
transition agreement is central to this. I've also been puzzling over the relative
acquiescence of the hard Brexiteers – I think they've been told by their paymasters
that accepting a lousy transitional deal is the key to a 'clean' and firm Brexit. I believe
the phrase Gove was reported as using was that they should 'keep their eye on the prize'. I
think, as Yves says, the Tory establishment fears a move against May will precipitate a
Corbyn government, so they see it as a strategic necessity to keep her in position, and
postpone the main Brexit fallout for later.
Of lesser importance, but also I think a relevant consideration given the strong support
given by Merkel, Barnier and Tusk to the Irish PM, Varadkar, is that he is rumoured to be
planning a snap election in the autumn. His stance on Brexit has proven popular and he sees
the time as ripe to go for an overall majority (he is currently leading a minority
government). He is very much an EU establishment favourite, so I don't doubt that some of the
motivation is to help his domestic politics by giving him what are perceived as 'wins' over
Brexit.
If this is the case, then barring an unexpected event, I think there will be a strong
political push on both sides to sign off a transition deal which would be both a complete
surrender by the UK, but with sufficient spin by a supportively dim witted UK press will
allow her to push the whole Brexit issue politically to one side for a year or two. The
Tories will be hoping that this can be sold to the public as a success for long enough for
them to work out how to stop Corbyn.
I'm taking the liberty of re-posting a comment I made yesterday on one of the links
– a Richard North piece – to which none of the usual Brexit scholars responded
(Sunday .). It bears very much on this discussion and echoes a number of points made
above.
"Richard North's Brexit article is well informed as one would expect, but I think that, like
a lot of other commentators, he's missing something. May is a post-modern politician, ie
there is no particular link between what she says and does, and her understanding of its
impact on the real world. Only her words and actions actually count, and, whether it's
threatening Russia or threatening Brussels, real-world consequences don't form part of the
calculation, insofar as they actually exist. Her only concern (and in this she is indeed
post-modernist) is with how she is perceived by voters and the media, and as a consequence
whether she can hang onto her job. I think May has decided that she will have an agreement at
any cost, no matter if she has to surrender on every single issue, and throw Northern Ireland
to the wolves. She wants to be seen as the Prime Minister who got us "out of Europe," just as
Ted Heath got us in. The content of the final deal is secondary: not that she wouldn't prefer
to please the City and the Brexit ultras if she could, but if there's a choice she will
sacrifice them for a picture of her shaking hands with Barnier and waving the Union Jack with
the other hand. The resulting chaos can then be blamed on a treacherous Europe. Indeed, if
May can stick it out until next year, I think she'll keep her job. What a thought." I think
many of the hardline Brexiters have the same idea – the political prize is exiting the
EU: the damage is a secondary consideration. Any deal, no matter how humiliating, can be spun
in the end as a triumph because we will have broken the shackles of Brussels.
I'd add that the EU's emphasis on the priority to give to NI was an each-way bet, as I argued
at the time. Either the Tory government collapsed, and something more reasonable took its
place, or May gave way on everything else, in the hope of surviving and somehow finding a NI
solution later. This has indeed proved to be the case.
Finally, I wouldn't put too much store by the imperial nostalgia argument, not least because
few Brexiters were even alive then. The real nostalgia is for an independent Britain capable
of playing a role on the world stage, perhaps at the head of a coalition of likeminded
nations. The idea of a Commonwealth Free Trade area, for example, was raised in the 1975 EU
referendum debate, and has its ultimate origins in the ideas of Mill and others in the 19th
century for a kind of British superstate, incorporating Australia, New Zealand, Canada and
perhaps South Africa. Its ghost still walks.
Finally, let's not get too carried away with the small size of the British economy. It's the
fifth or sixth largest economy in the world, depending on how you calculate it, ahead of
Russia, India, Italy and Spain.
I think you are right that the main political priority now in London is preserving May in
her position. Whether or not she does a good deal (or any other good policy work) has become
irrelevant. Its all about survival, and keeping Corbyn at bay.
Who are the 'wolves' to whom NI may be thrown?
More interesting, who are the strange Tory Brexiteers, not exactly in sync with the needs and
expectations of the City of London, big business in Britain, etc? The people for whom an
imperial past is still a ghost that walks? A possible answer here: https://www.lrb.co.uk/v40/n05/william-davies/what-are-they-after
Thank you David. I agree with your definition of the present Brexit set-up and May herself
as post-modernist . The same could be said even more so about Trump . They have in their very
different ways taken politics to a place beyond policies and even identities ( it's most
recent iteration ) to this very new place where the public ( translation : American people )
simply roll over and get out of bed the next day to whatever is new and move on whether it be
bombing in Syria, or Trump and a prostitute . I think the technology of the smart phone and
everything that emanates from it is the handmaiden to this change . The speed of daily life
as orchestrated by the smart phone has brought us all , whether we like it or not, to this
post-modern , everything is a cultural construct , position which is possibly the most
terrifying reality the West has ever had to face and yet it barely registers .
On your last point – it used to be larger. It would have been inconcievable even 50
years ago that the UK's economy could be compared with Spain's.
The point being that the correlation of physical closeness and trade is about as close as
you get in economics to a natural law. The UK is now spurning (wilfully limiting its access
to) the closest and the richest markets it has. That will have impact – and no amount
of Brexiter's wishful thinking will replace it – if for nothing else, the likelyhood of
the UK SMEs suddenly wanting to export to China/India/NZ/whatever is not going to grow with
Brexit. Those who wanted and could, already do. The other don't want and are unlikely to want
to in a new world.
Vlade, 50 years ago Africa still started at the Pyrenées, as the saying was in
France. It is not that the UK has shrunk so much as that Spain has dramatically improved its
position. So, unhelpful comparison. How the UK fared over those 50 years relative to, say,
France and Germany or even Italy, would be more instructive.
In relation to France it stayed roughly the same. But actually the share of British GDP to
world GDP is much smaller and international specialisation and globalisation is much
increased. For the question if the UK can act as a "big" economy in relation to economic
policy the latter is more important.
You watch. About the same time that the British wake to find that the elites have sold
them down the river through devastating incompetence and sheer bloodymindedness, they will
find that in the transition to Brexit that the government would have voted themselves all
sorts of laws that will give them authoritarian powers. And then it will be too late.
It won't matter how bad May is at that point and she might just resign and let somebody else
deal with all the fallout over the new regulations at which time she will be kicked upstairs
to the House of Lords. Isn't the way that it works in practice? Don't make any preparations,
tell the people that they have got it all organized, then when it all hits they start pumping
out emergency orders and the like.
It all seems quite curious does it not (curiouser and curiouser?). I wonder if I smell a
rat? Forgive me; I have a suspicious nature. I was thinking partly of the role of Gove, which
prompted some idle musings.
Gove is reportedly telling people who support Brexit to keep their eyes on the prize, by
which he is said to mean letting the clock run down to 29 March 2019 at which time the UK is
officially out of the EU. When I read Gove, I tend to think Murdoch, who pulls Gove's
strings. Yves quite rightly asks what the press barons are about; that is generally worth
knowing when it comes to UK politics. Is Murdoch playing a longer game?
The argument goes that once the UK is out of the EU it will be much harder to get support
for it to go back in again as the UK would only be allowed back in without the special
privileges it had negotiated for itself over the decades : opt out from Euro, Schengen,
various justice issues, the budget rebate. Is this determining Murdoch's approach at the
moment – ensure that the UK is outside the EU at almost any cost before proceeding to
the next stage, when Ministers will be largely unable to call Brussels in to help them
against him and his allies?
Why might Murdoch want to do that? There is talk that May will be ditched once she does a
deal. If it is seen as a bad deal then she becomes the scapegoat (and Gove steps in to her
shoes?). Post March 2019, it might then be the plan to seek to undercut the effect of any
deal struck now by, for example, pulling out of the Good Friday Agreement if that proves to
be an obstacle to the trade deals Fox is so keen to sign (is he expecting kickbacks?). At
that point the UK might declare that with the demise of the GFA it was no longer constrained
by the terms of the Withdrawal Agreement with regards to the Irish Border and with one leap
the UK would be free. I have seen cynics suggest that the men of violence in Northern Ireland
might be encouraged to go on a bit if a spree to justify claims that the GFA had failed.
I hope I am wrong but as I said I have a suspicious nature and, having watched more of
Murdoch's machinations than I have ever wished, know that he is very capable of playing a
long game.
I'm loath to indulge in conspiracy theorising, but when it comes to Brexit (and Northern
Ireland) conspiracies are legion and real.
I'm sure in any spiders web Murdoch will be found in the middle of it, and there is
certainly something up, thats the only explanation for the low key response of the hard
Brexiters. It wouldn't surprise me if he has realised that a tanking UK economy isn't exactly
good for his investments (its also worth noting that it seems to have belatedly been realised
by the UK media economy that many of them will have to up sticks to Europe if they are to
keep broadcasting rights).
My guess is that they 'have a plan' which will involve Gove playing middle man, but
actually working for a decisive Brexit doing his duty for the country at some stage to step
into Mays shoes. All sorts of behind the scenes promises (mostly jobs, no doubt) have
probably been made. I suspect a centre piece of it would be a dramatic repudiation of any
deal, supposedly on the UK's terms.
As for Northern Ireland, anything is possible. Several of the
Loyalist terrorist groups have been shown over the years to be little more than puppets
of the security forces, they will do what they are told. And there have long been rumours
that at least one of the fringe Republican groups is so completely infiltrated that they are
similarly under control. There have been nearly 50 years of shady assassinations and bombings
in NI and the Republic which have the fingerprints of intelligence services, so quite
literally, I could believe almost anything could happen if it was in their interest. People
who c ould
maintain a boys home as the centre of a paedophile ring for political purposes are
capable of almost anything.
Oh yes, this is a big part of the history of "the troubles". So much of what went on in
that conflict was beneficial to the U.K. government. Budget, manpower, little oversight,
draconian powers and a lot more besides was enabled merely because of the paramilitary
activities. It's not hard to look for well documented examples -- such as the mass
warrantless surveillance of all U.K.- Republic telecommunications http://www.lamont.me.uk/capenhurst/original.html
by the U.K. security services.
And, there's more, a lot of provisional activity was just your common or garden organised
crime -- protection rackets, kidnapping and bribery.
To say that the troubles were merely to do with republicanism and unionism is like saying
US Civil War was only about racism and ignoring the politics and the economics.
I think that we should remember how much the anti-EU fraternity in politics and the media
have had a symbiotic, if not downright parasitic, relationship with the EU itself. Much of
their commerce depended on us being members, and so being able to strike poses and make cheap
cracks about Europe and Brussels. I have a feeling that reality is starting to dawn, and they
are standing to understand that politics will be a great deal more complicated, and probably
nastier, after Brexit than even it is now.They'll have to find something else to complain
about for easy applause instead of just bashing Brussels.
As for conspiracy theories, well I have the same skepticism about them of most people who've
worked in government, and I happen to have been reasonably close to a number of people who
had to deal with these issues in the 1970s and 1980s. There was certainly complicity in some
cases, and some of the actors involved broke the rules badly , but it's a stretch from that
to talk of conspiracies. With what objective? And what objective would such conspiracies have
today, and how could they be implemented? The universal refrain among everyone I knew
involved in the security forces at the time was Get Us Out of Here.
It'll put a cat amongst the pigeons and no mistake. If I may put in a word from the
deplorables who voted Brexit, there's a lot which -- for both the UK and the EU -- was made a
whole lot easier because a problem issue could simply be labelled as the British complaining
and not understanding The Project.
Take energy. It was probably energy supply as much as Greece and the Ukraine which tipped
me over into Brexit. At the behest of the U.K., the European energy industry became, at least
in theory, a pan-continental endeavour free from national restrictive practices. Well, a fat
lot of good that turned out to be. As exemplified by the recent cold weather snap, UK
wholesalers when faced with a shortfall in natural gas supplies spiked the offer price into
the stratosphere
http://mip-prod-web.azurewebsites.net/PrevailingViewGraph/ViewReport?prevailingViewGraph=ActualPriceGraph&gasDate=2018-03-26
. No -- and I mean no -- EU suppliers made any bids. Now, it's either a Single
Market or it isn't. It either looks and acts like it's subject to market forces or it
doesn't. The rules are either enforced properly amongst all participants or they aren't.
Irony's of irony's, when the U.K. needed an augmented natural gas input to match system
demand, the only country to answer their doorbell was Russia. That, and some U.K. big
capacity users releasing stocks from storage.
Now, the smell of the nationalist pulling up the drawbridge in energy supply is causing
the Commission to try to document how in fact the Single Market sometimes isn't a market at
all but just a token gesture and is working on the usual eurofudge
http://eur-lex.europa.eu/legal-content/EN/TXT/?uri=uriserv:OJ.L_.2018.032.01.0052.01.ENG&toc=OJ:L:2018:032:TOC
(the contortions of which did genuinely have me laughing out loud). There's going to be a lot
more of this to come once the U.K. can't be the donkey this kind of tail is routinely pinned
on.
And it'll be the same in the U.K. of course. Without the EU ready to play it's role of
perpetual bogeyman, we'll have no one to blame but ourselves. And I still cannot, in all
honesty, say anything other than bring it on.
People have avoided the difficulty of reciprocal citizen's rights. How can the UK
reciprocate with all the EU countries? Simultaneously? Where UK non-citizen residents can
relocate for 30 years to an EU country then relocate back in the same way that a Brit in
France can move to Germany for 30 years and then move back under current rules? It's even
worse if you consider reciprocity to include the rights of all people outside their
citizenship country's right to relocate.
The only obvious solution is to reduce Brits to the same status of any immigrant to a EU
country. That means not being able to shift your permanent residency without applying for
immigration.
Unless you are blue card eligible that's non-trivial.
This guy is a neoliberal stooge. Still some of his observations are interesting
Neoliberalism emerged in late 70th, not after WWII (althouth this ideology existed since late
30 in some smaa think tanks). First couple of decades after WWII were the triumph of New Deal
Capitalism -- the gold age for the US workers, and the USA as a country. Only with Reagan
neoliberal coup d'état, the dismantling of the New Deal and reemergence of financial
oligarchy as the "owners" of the country begin in full force. Traitors of his class and party
such as Clinton (who sold Democratic Party to Wall Street, converting it into yet another party
of financial capital) and Obama just ended the process which started in full force under
Reagan.
Notable quotes:
"... After a run of nearly one thousand years, quipped the French philosopher and writer Voltaire, the fading Holy Roman Empire was neither holy nor Roman nor an empire. Today, some two and a half centuries later, the problem, to paraphrase Voltaire, is that the fading [neo]liberal world order is neither [neo]liberal nor worldwide, nor orderly. ..."
"... [neo]Liberalism is in retreat. Democracies are feeling the effects of growing populism. Parties of the political extremes have gained ground in Europe. The vote in the United Kingdom in favor of leaving the EU attested to the loss of elite influence ..."
"... Attempts to build global frameworks are failing. Protectionism is on the rise; the latest round of global trade talks never came to fruition. There are few rules governing the use of cyberspace. ..."
"... The rise of populism is in part a response to stagnating incomes and job loss, owing mostly to new technologies but widely attributed to imports and immigrants. Nationalism is a tool increasingly used by leaders to bolster their authority, especially amid difficult economic and political conditions. And global institutions have failed to adapt to new power balances and technologies. ..."
"... the US is not just another country. It was the principal architect of the [neo]liberal world order and its principal backer. It was also a principal beneficiary. ..."
"... America's decision to abandon the role it has played for more than seven decades thus marks a turning point. The [neo]liberal world order cannot survive on its own, because others lack either the interest or the means to sustain it. ..."
America's decision to abandon the global system it helped build, and then preserve for more
than seven decades, marks a turning point, because others lack either the interest or the means
to sustain it. The result will be a world that is less free, less prosperous, and less
peaceful, for Americans and others alike.
After a run of nearly one thousand years, quipped the French philosopher and writer
Voltaire, the fading Holy Roman Empire was neither holy nor Roman nor an empire. Today, some
two and a half centuries later, the problem, to paraphrase Voltaire, is that the fading
[neo]liberal world order is neither [neo]liberal nor worldwide, nor orderly.
The United States, working closely with the United Kingdom and others, established the
[neo]liberal world order in the wake of World War II. The goal was to ensure that the
conditions that had led to two world wars in 30 years would never again arise.
... ... ...
All this and more was backed by the economic and military might of the US, a network of
alliances across Europe and Asia, and nuclear weapons, which served to deter aggression. The
[neo]liberal world order was thus based not just on ideals embraced by democracies, but also on
hard power. None of this was lost on the decidedly illiberal Soviet Union, which had a
fundamentally different notion of what constituted order in Europe and around the world.
The [neo]liberal world order appeared to be more robust than ever with the end of the Cold
War and the collapse of the Soviet Union. But today, a quarter-century later, its future is in
doubt. Indeed, its three components – [neo]liberalism, universality, and the preservation
of order itself – are being challenged as never before in its 70-year history.
[neo]Liberalism is in retreat. Democracies are feeling the effects of growing populism.
Parties of the political extremes have gained ground in Europe. The vote in the United Kingdom
in favor of leaving the EU attested to the loss of elite influence . Even the US is
experiencing unprecedented attacks from its own president on the country's media, courts, and
law-enforcement institutions. Authoritarian systems, including China, Russia, and Turkey, have
become even more top-heavy. Countries such as Hungary and Poland seem uninterested in the fate
of their young democracies.
It is increasingly difficult to speak of the world as if it were whole. We are seeing the
emergence of regional orders – or, most pronounced in the Middle East, disorders –
each with its own characteristics. Attempts to build global frameworks are failing.
Protectionism is on the rise; the latest round of global trade talks never came to fruition.
There are few rules governing the use of cyberspace.
At the same time, great power rivalry is returning...
There are several reasons why all this is happening, and why now. The rise of populism
is in part a response to stagnating incomes and job loss, owing mostly to new technologies but
widely attributed to imports and immigrants. Nationalism is a tool increasingly used by leaders
to bolster their authority, especially amid difficult economic and political conditions. And
global institutions have failed to adapt to new power balances and technologies.
But the weakening of the [neo]liberal world order is due, more than anything else, to the
changed attitude of the US. Under President Donald Trump, the US decided against joining the
Trans-Pacific Partnership and to withdraw from the Paris climate agreement. It has threatened
to leave the North American Free Trade Agreement and the Iran nuclear deal. It has unilaterally
introduced steel and aluminum tariffs, relying on a justification (national security) that
others could use, in the process placing the world at risk of a trade war. It has raised
questions about its commitment to NATO and other alliance relationships. And it rarely speaks
about democracy or human rights. "America First" and the [neo]liberal world order seem
incompatible.
My point is not to single out the US for criticism. Today's other major powers, including
the EU, Russia, China, India, and Japan, could be criticized for what they are doing, not
doing, or both. But the US is not just another country. It was the principal architect of
the [neo]liberal world order and its principal backer. It was also a principal beneficiary.
America's decision to abandon the role it has played for more than seven decades thus
marks a turning point. The [neo]liberal world order cannot survive on its own, because others
lack either the interest or the means to sustain it. The result will be a world that is
less free, less prosperous, and less peaceful, for Americans and others alike.
"... President Trump was said to complain that Tillerson disagreed with him and McMaster talked too much. Bolton seems likely to combine both of those traits in one pugnacious, mustachioed package. ..."
"... Bolton may find that in this job, he's the midlevel munchkin. Remember, the national security adviser is supposed to be the coordinator, conciliator, and honest broker among Cabinet officials, managing a process by which all get a fair say and the president makes well-informed decisions. Outgoing National Security Adviser H.R. McMaster reportedly lost favor with Defense Secretary Mattis and Chief of Staff John Kelly for failing to defer to them, and for being too emotional . ..."
John Bolton has been one of liberals' top bogeymen on national security for more than a decade now. He seems to relish the
role, going out of his way to argue that the Iraq War wasn't really a failure, calling for U.S.-led regime change in Iran and
preventive war against North Korea, and writing the foreword for a
book
that proclaimed President Obama to be a secret Muslim. He is a profoundly partisan creature, having started a
super-PAC whose largest donor was leading Trump benefactor Rebekah Mercer and whose provider of analytics was Cambridge
Analytica, the firm alleged to have improperly used Facebook data to make voter profiles, which it sold to the Trump and
Brexit campaigns, among others.
Recently Bolton's statements have grown more extreme, alarming centrist and conservative national security professionals along
with his longtime liberal foes. He seemed to
say
that the United States could attack North Korea without the agreement of our South Korean allies, who would face the
highest risk of retaliation and casualties; just two months ago he
called for
a regime change effort in Iran that would allow the U.S. to open a new embassy there by 2019, the 40th
anniversary of the Iranian Revolution and the taking of Americans hostage in Tehran. His
hostility toward Islam
points toward a set of extreme policies that could easily have the effect of abridging American
Muslims' rights at home and alienating America's Muslim allies abroad.
As worrying as these policies are, it's worth taking a step back and thinking not about Bolton, but about his new boss, Donald
Trump. Trump reportedly considered Bolton for a Cabinet post early on, but then
soured
on him, finding his mustache unprofessional. His choice of Bolton to lead the National Security Council reinforces
several trends: right now, this administration is all about making Trump's opponents uncomfortable and angry. Internal
coherence and policy effectiveness are not a primary or even secondary consideration. And anyone would be a fool to imagine
that, because Bolton pleases Trump today, he will continue to do so tomorrow.
Yes, Bolton has taken strong stances against the policies of Russian President Vladimir Putin (though he has also been
quoted
praising Russian "democracy" as recently as 2013). That's nothing new: Defense Secretary Jim Mattis, incoming
Secretary of State Mike Pompeo, and outgoing National Security Adviser H.R. McMaster have called for greater pushback on
Russia as well. But there's every reason to think that, rather than a well-oiled war machine, what we'll get from Bolton's
National Security Council is scheming and discord – which could be even more dangerous.
President Trump was said to complain that Tillerson disagreed with him and McMaster talked too much. Bolton seems likely
to combine both of those traits in one pugnacious, mustachioed package.
Their disagreements are real – Bolton has
famously pooh-poohed the kind of summit diplomacy with North Korea that Trump is now committed to. While Trump famously backed
away from his support for the 2002 invasion of Iraq, courting the GOP isolationist base, Bolton continues to argue that the
invasion worked, and seldom hears of a war he would not participate in. Trump
attempted
to block transgender people from serving in the military, but Bolton has declined to take part in the right's
LGBT-bashing, famously hiring gay staff and
calling for
the end of Don't Ask, Don't Tell.
That's all substance. What really seems likely to take Bolton down is his style, which is legendary – and not in a good way.
His colleagues from the George W. Bush administration responded to Trump's
announcement
with
comments like
"the obvious question is whether John Bolton has the temperament and the judgment for the job" – not exactly
a ringing endorsement. One former co-worker
described
Bolton as a "kiss up, kick down kind of guy," and he was notorious in past administrations for conniving and
sneaking around officials who disagreed with him, both traits that Trump seems likely to enjoy until he doesn't. This is a
man who can't refrain from
telling Tucker Carlson
that his analysis is "simpleminded" – while he's a guest on Carlson's show. Turns out it's not true
that he threw a stapler at a contractor – it was a
tape dispenser.
When Bolton was caught attempting to cook intelligence to suggest that Cuba had a biological weapons
program, he bullied the analyst who had dared push back, calling him a "
midlevel
munchkin
." How long until Trump tires of the drama – or of being eclipsed?
Bolton may find that in this job, he's the midlevel munchkin. Remember, the national security adviser is supposed to be
the coordinator, conciliator, and honest broker among Cabinet officials, managing a process by which all get a fair say and
the president makes well-informed decisions. Outgoing National Security Adviser H.R. McMaster reportedly lost favor with
Defense Secretary Mattis and Chief of Staff John Kelly for failing to defer to them, and for being
too emotional
.
Love Bolton or hate him, no one imagines he will be a self-effacing figure, and no one hires him to run a no-drama process.
It's also hard to imagine that many of the high-quality professionals McMaster brought into the National Security Council
staff will choose to stay. McMaster repeatedly had to fight for his team within the Trump administration, but Bolton seems
unlikely to follow that pattern, or to inspire the kind of loyalty that drew well-regarded policy wonks to work for McMaster,
regardless their views of Trump.
So even if you like the policies Bolton espouses, it's hard to imagine a smooth process implementing them. That seems likely
to leave us with Muslim ban-level incompetence, extreme bellicosity, and several very loud, competing voices – with
Twitter feeds
– on the most sensitive issues of war and weapons of mass destruction.
" As far as we all know now are quite hard times to Russia and to the world as a whole.
"
Why do we have these hard times ?
Could it be globalisation, western greed, and western aggression ?
Well, probably it can be more clear for those who are attacking and humiliating Russia in
all directions? The West-ZUS-UK
But I think it's just an agony of Empire seeing the world order is about to change. And
yes it's "western greed" which have a "western aggression" as a consequence.
The "globalisation" actually IS that world order which the West trying to
establish. Russia in all times in all its internal structure was a subject of annexation and
submission. But we never agreed and never will do it, until alive. The West is too stupid to
get that simple thing to know and leave us to live as we are about to.
Robert Bartley, the late editorial page editor of The Wall Street Journal, was a free trade
zealot who for decades championed a five-word amendment to the Constitution: "There shall be
open borders."
Bartley accepted what the erasure of America's borders and an endless influx or foreign
peoples and goods would mean for his country.
Said Bartley, "I think the nation-state is finished."
His vision and ideology had a long pedigree.
This free trade, open borders cult first flowered in 18th-century Britain. The St. Paul of
this post-Christian faith was Richard Cobden, who mesmerized elites with the grandeur of his
vision and the power of his rhetoric.
In Free Trade Hall in Manchester, Jan. 15, 1846, the crowd was so immense the seats had to
be removed. There, Cobden thundered:
"I look farther; I see in the Free Trade principle that which shall act on the moral world
as the principle of gravitation in the universe -- drawing men together, thrusting aside the
antagonisms of race, and creed, and language, and uniting us in the bonds of eternal
peace."
Britain converted to this utopian faith and threw open her markets to the world. Across the
Atlantic, however, another system, that would be known as the "American System," had been
embraced.
The second bill signed by President Washington was the Tariff Act of 1789. Said the Founding
Father of his country in his first address to Congress: "A free people should promote such
manufactures as tend to make them independent on others for essential, particularly military
supplies."
In his 1791 "Report on Manufactures," Alexander Hamilton wrote, "Every nation ought to
endeavor to possess within itself all the essentials of national supply. These comprise the
means of subsistence, habitat, clothing and defence."
This was wisdom born of experience.
At Yorktown, Americans had to rely on French muskets and ships to win their independence.
They were determined to erect a system that would end our reliance on Europe for the
necessities of our national life, and establish new bonds of mutual dependency -- among
Americans.
Britain's folly became manifest in World War I, as a self-reliant America stayed out, while
selling to an import-dependent England the food, supplies and arms she needed to survive but
could not produce.
America's own first major steps toward free trade, open borders and globalism came with
JFK's Trade Expansion Act and LBJ's Immigration Act of 1965.
By the end of the Cold War, however, a reaction had set in, and a great awakening begun.
U.S. trade deficits in goods were surging into the hundreds of billions, and more than a
million legal and illegal immigrants were flooding in yearly, visibly altering the character of
the country.
Americans were coming to realize that free trade was gutting the nation's manufacturing base
and open borders meant losing the country in which they grew up. And on this earth there is no
greater loss.
The new resistance of Western man to the globalist agenda is now everywhere manifest.
We see it in Trump's hostility to NAFTA, his tariffs, his border wall.
We see it in England's declaration of independence from the EU in Brexit. We see it in the
political triumphs of Polish, Hungarian and Czech nationalists, in anti-EU parties rising
across Europe, in the secessionist movements in Scotland and Catalonia and Ukraine, and in the
admiration for Russian nationalist Vladimir Putin.
Europeans have begun to see themselves as indigenous peoples whose Old Continent is mortally
imperiled by the hundreds of millions of invaders wading across the Med and desperate come and
occupy their homelands.
Who owns the future? Who will decide the fate of the West?
The problem of the internationalists is that the vision they have on offer -- a world of
free trade, open borders and global government -- are constructs of the mind that do not engage
the heart.
Men will fight for family, faith and country. But how many will lay down their lives for
pluralism and diversity?
Who will fight and die for the Eurozone and EU?
On Aug. 4, 1914, the anti-militarist German Social Democrats, the oldest and greatest
socialist party in Europe, voted the credits needed for the Kaiser to wage war on France and
Russia. With the German army on the march, the German socialists were Germans first.
Patriotism trumps ideology.
In "Present at the Creation," Dean Acheson wrote of the postwar world and institutions born
in the years he served FDR and Truman in the Department of State: The U.N., IMF, World Bank,
Marshall Plan, and with the split between East and West, NATO.
We are present now at the end of all that.
And our transnational elites have a seemingly insoluble problem.
To rising millions in the West, the open borders and free trade globalism they cherish and
champion is not a glorious future, but an existential threat to the sovereignty, independence
and identity of the countries they love. And they will not go gentle into that good night.
First Steele dossier. Now Skripals.. What's next ?
Notable quotes:
"... But even to an outsider, and even if we take it all at face value, that official account of the Wiltshire poisoning is nowhere near solid enough to justify the steps taken. "If you have a weak argument, shout louder" is sufficient therefore to explain the surprising volume of anti-Russian PR coming out of London just now. ..."
"... I think they're probably shouting loud enough to gain their point. A sufficient number of us in the UK public will accept that Wiltshire incident as further proof of Putin's malevolence. We will therefore accept further anti-Russian measures. ..."
"... For the Westminster bubble all our eggs are in the American neocon basket. One could say that the respective swamps are inextricably connected. What's in it for our politicians is nothing less than the maintenance of a comfortable and familiar status quo. There's therefore no choice but to be more Roman that Rome when it comes to pursuing neocon objectives. ..."
"... As ever therefore it all centres around Trump. Is he getting dragged along by his neocons? Or is he now one of them? ..."
"... Trump is not only up against his own establishment. He's up against the European establishment as well. Hence the hammering he's getting from our European press and politicians. Hence also the dossier scandal, which for my part I now see for certain as a joint attempt by the American/UK status quo supporters to weaken or unseat Trump. ..."
Kooshy - I should have checked down-thread before submitting my comment. Then I'd have seen that "London Bob" (87) had given
a brief account of what is happening in Westminster.
"London Bob" explains something that puzzles some in the UK (and bothered me a lot over Syria). Why isn't Corbyn, the opposition
leader in the House of Commons and now stronger than he was, coming out with all guns firing against the present anti-Russian
hysteria? He'd have plenty of ammunition, that's for sure.
As that brief account explains, he's in no position to do so. He's leading a divided party. He has some support from within
his party rank and file but not from many of his own colleagues in the House. We now see, incidentally, some of his colleagues
making public statements that are only a hair's breadth away from disavowing Corbyn or his spokesmen.
In addition Corbyn is already suspected of being anti-patriotic and doesn't want to give his opponents a bigger stick to beat
him with on that.
Therefore resistance to the current Russophobia from within the Westminster bubble is likely to be weak.
Also in this thread DH is casting a sceptical eye over the Wiltshire poisoning. It's an indication of how far down public discussion
in the UK has gone that specialists in the UK who know their stuff no longer get airtime while people like Luke Harding, who plainly
don't, are all over the media. This blanking out of the voice of reasoned criticism in the UK media is, I suspect, already proving
counterproductive for the status quo. It merely reinforces that general public feeling, evident to some extent in the Brexit vote,
that we do at least know we're being conned even if we don't always know how. I don't know how widespread that feeling is in this
case.
But even to an outsider, and even if we take it all at face value, that official account of the Wiltshire poisoning is
nowhere near solid enough to justify the steps taken. "If you have a weak argument, shout louder" is sufficient therefore to explain
the surprising volume of anti-Russian PR coming out of London just now.
I think they're probably shouting loud enough to gain their point. A sufficient number of us in the UK public will accept
that Wiltshire incident as further proof of Putin's malevolence. We will therefore accept further anti-Russian measures.
What's in it for us? As you perhaps indicate, bent money will be running like the devil away from London, which one would think
can't be good news for the City or for the London property market. Hence the repeated calls for European and American solidarity;
if the Russian expatriates can simply move their fortunes to other Western boltholes that's going to leave Westminster looking
ineffectual.
I don't accept the argument I sometimes see put forward that we, and the East Europeans for that matter, are at present dragging
the Americans along with us. However weak the American economy is or is said to be, there's no question but that ours is considerably
more fragile. For the Westminster bubble all our eggs are in the American neocon basket. One could say that the respective
swamps are inextricably connected. What's in it for our politicians is nothing less than the maintenance of a comfortable and
familiar status quo. There's therefore no choice but to be more Roman that Rome when it comes to pursuing neocon objectives.
So when it comes to the various neocon establishments, the little dogs can kick up more racket but it's still the big dog running
the show.
As ever therefore it all centres around Trump. Is he getting dragged along by his neocons? Or is he now one of them?
If the first, then it's accurate to see this as many of us here have seen it from the start. Trump is not only up against
his own establishment. He's up against the European establishment as well. Hence the hammering he's getting from our European
press and politicians. Hence also the dossier scandal, which for my part I now see for certain as a joint attempt by the American/UK
status quo supporters to weaken or unseat Trump.
If the second then all is still not lost. Better to have the cronies falling out amongst themselves - and it's evident at least
that that's happening - than have them as united as they were before Trump.
What is US interest in the Middle East? I don't see any. We've got plenty of oil. And the
Canadians will happily sell us more.
The millenia old conflicts there are really no business of ours. The possibility that
we'll go to war with Russia and risk our own population to further Israeli perceptions shows
how far down the rabbit hole we've gone. The zionists "own" our political, media,
governmental establishments lock stock and barrel for this possibility to exist.
If Putin is so diabolical and his information operations so elegant and effective he
should execute one that breaks the chain of zionist influence on the US polity. That would
prevent Armageddon and the world would be thankful.
Honestly I have no idea what the firing of Tillerson and his replacement by Pompeo means.
Maybe it's because Tillerson called Trump a moron and Pompeo is an ass licker. Hillary,
Rubio, etc al wanted a no-fly-zone over Syria. That would have brought instant conflict with
Russia. If Nikki Haley's threats come to pass we'll get there.
Trump is attempting to change many past arrangements. One being trade where the US has
bled for decades running massive trade deficits. How the GOP does in the mid-terms will
influence his position on many issues.
"... As of leaving the EU, we have fought long and hard (sometimes each other) to be independent and free. 45 years of communism (with the obligatory internationalism) does not fade out unnoticed. I have written a long essay some two years ago here on SST about 'if it looks like a duck'. ..."
"... human rightsism has turned into a full fledged monotheistic religion, with a credo, an instutionalized church, and a serious hate against unbelievers. All that in the name of tolerance and progress. ..."
I can't speak for the whole V4 as czechs and slovaks have been sneaky in diplomacy in the last
century, and even as V4 members. We Hungarians and our Polish brothers were usually stupid
enough to say what we meant (and damn the consequences) and not hide away behind ambigous
terms or actions. While I can understand their cautiousness (Sp?), we 'dwa bratinki' usually
say yes or no. For the czech/slovaks it is usually abstain, even if everybody knows what
their stand is.
As of leaving the EU, we have fought long and hard (sometimes each other) to be
independent and free. 45 years of communism (with the obligatory internationalism) does not
fade out unnoticed. I have written a long essay some two years ago here on SST about 'if it
looks like a duck'.
We have sensors for unsaid intentions becuase of that oppression, and for us (V4) Brussels
is turning into Moscow in an ever increasing pace, only the tanks have been replaced by
banks, as a late hungarian politician has said. Of course everybody welcomes free money (EU
funds), but as
Most of it flows back to german/french/italian/austrian companies anyway
The previously hidden internationalist and centralized agenda is slowly turning into
reality, not to mention the intended connection between the two (funds and internationalist
policies).
It is more and more seen as Judas Iskariotes' 30 silver pieces. None wants war again in Europe, and none wants to leave the EU unless forced to do
it. There has been a more or less functioning proto-EU, the Austro-Hungarian Empire that is. A
similar EU, where none really can and should question German French leadership is viable,
with the following terms.
Internal policies are handled locally from education, to justice system, from internal
affairs to other local issues etc. No human rights meddling in partner countries, no SJW
pushing to accept economical migrants to poor countires etc.
ONLY foreign affairs and military affairs are handled centrally, but no typical french
meddling in ex colonies or R2P. European army CAN be exclusively used abroad, with all
parliaments giving consent (In the age of IT this should not be a problem) or in case of
foreign attack against or own soil.
ONLY money to finance the above two are handled centrally. euro can stay, but no
pressure to join it. And V4 will definitely want a say in it how it used.
Dismantling of the social justice warrior turned, democratically deficited,
internationalist, and non-transparent bureaucracy in Brussels/Strasbourg.
Exactly. I always say to my students, that like it or not, agree or not, human rightsism has
turned into a full fledged monotheistic religion, with a credo, an instutionalized church,
and a serious hate against unbelievers. All that in the name of tolerance and progress.
Like many high demand cults neoliberalism is a trap, from which it is very difficult to escape...
Notable quotes:
"... A large, open-border global free market would be left, not subject to popular control but managed by a globally dispersed, transnational one percent. And the whole process of making this happen would be camouflaged beneath the altruistic stylings of a benign humanitarianism. ..."
"... Globalists, as neoliberal capitalists are often called, also understood that democracy, defined by a smattering of individual rights and a voting booth, was the ideal vehicle to usher neoliberalism into the emerging world. Namely because democracy, as commonly practiced, makes no demands in the economic sphere. Socialism does. Communism does. These models directly address ownership of the means of production. Not so democratic capitalism. This permits the globalists to continue to own the means of production while proclaiming human rights triumphant in nations where interventions are staged. ..."
"... The enduring lie is that there is no democracy without economic democracy. ..."
This 'Washington Consensus' is the false promise promoted by the West. The reality is quite
different. The crux of neoliberalism is to eliminate democratic government by downsizing,
privatizing, and deregulating it. Proponents of neoliberalism recognize that the state is the
last bulwark of protection for the common people against the predations of capital. Remove the
state and they'll be left defenseless .
Think about it. Deregulation eliminates the laws. Downsizing eliminates departments and their
funding. Privatizing eliminates the very purpose of the state by having the private sector take
over its traditional responsibilities.
Ultimately, nation-states would dissolve except perhaps for armies and tax systems. A large, open-border global free
market would be left, not subject to popular control but managed by a globally dispersed, transnational one percent. And the
whole process of making this happen would be camouflaged beneath the altruistic stylings of a benign humanitarianism.
Globalists, as neoliberal capitalists are often called, also understood that democracy, defined
by a smattering of individual rights and a voting booth, was the ideal vehicle to usher
neoliberalism into the emerging world. Namely because democracy, as commonly practiced, makes
no demands in the economic sphere. Socialism does. Communism does. These models directly
address ownership of the means of production. Not so democratic capitalism. This permits the
globalists to continue to own the means of production while proclaiming human rights triumphant
in nations where interventions are staged.
The enduring lie is that there is no democracy
without economic democracy.
What matters to the one percent and the media conglomerates that disseminate their worldview is
that the official definitions are accepted by the masses. The real effects need never be known.
The neoliberal ideology (theory) thus conceals the neoliberal reality (practice). And for the
masses to accept it, it must be mass produced. Then it becomes more or less invisible by virtue
of its universality.
The crisis of neoliberalism is at the core of current anti-Russian campaign.
Notable quotes:
"... So, as long as Russia remained open to the West's political maneuvering and wholesale thievery, every thing was hunky-dory. But as soon as Vladimir Putin got his bearings (during his second term as President) and started reassembling the broken state, then western elites became very concerned and denounced Putin as an "autocrat" and a "KGB thug." ..."
"... As the Western countries' elites were implementing a policy of political and economic containment of Russia, old threats were growing and new ones were emerging in the world, and the efforts to do away with them have failed. I think that the main reason for that is that the model of "West-centric" globalization, which developed following the dismantling of the bipolar architecture and was aimed at ensuring the prosperity of one-seventh of the world's population at the expense of the rest, proved ineffective. It is becoming more and more obvious that a narrow group of "chosen ones" is unable to ensure the sustainable growth of the global economy on their own and solve such major challenges as poverty, climate change, shortage of food and other vital resources . ..."
"... The American people need to look beyond the propaganda and try to grasp what's really going on. Russia is not Washington's enemy, it's a friend that's trying to nudge the US in adirection that will increase its opportunities for peace and prosperity in the future. Lavrov is simply pointing out that a multipolar world is inevitable as economic power becomes more widespread. This emerging reality means the US will have to modify its behavior, cooperate with other sovereign nations, comply with international law, and seek a peaceful settlement to disputes. It means greater parity between the states, fairer representation in global decision-making, and a narrower gap between the world's winners and losers. ..."
"... Admit it: The imperial model has failed. It's time to move on. ..."
The United States has launched a three-pronged offensive on Russia. First, it's attacking Russia's economy via sanctions and oil-price
manipulation. Second, it's increasing the threats to Russia's national security by arming and training militant proxies in Syria
and Ukraine, and by encircling Russia with NATO forces and missile systems. And, third, it's conducting a massive disinformation
campaign aimed at convincing the public that Russia is a 'meddling aggressor' that wants to destroy the foundation of American democracy.
(Elections)
In response to Washington's hostility, Moscow has made every effort to extend the olive branch. Russia does not want to fight
the world's biggest superpower any more than it wants to get bogged down in a bloody and protracted conflict in Syria. What Russia
wants is normal, peaceful relations based on respect for each others interests and for international law. What Russia will not tolerate,
however, is another Iraq-type scenario where the sovereign rights of a strategically-located state are shunted off so the US can
arbitrarily topple the government, decimate the society and plunge the region deeper into chaos. Russia won't allow that, which is
why it has put its Airforce at risk in Syria, to defend the foundational principle of state sovereignty upon which the entire edifice
of global security rests.
The majority of Americans believe that Russia is the perpetrator of hostilities against the United States, mainly because the
media and the political class have faithfully disseminated the spurious claims that Russia meddled in the 2016 elections. But the
allegations are ridiculous and without merit. Russia-gate is merely the propaganda component of Washington's Full Spectrum Dominance
theory, that is, disinformation is being used to make it appear as though the US is the victim when, in fact, it is the perpetrator
of hostilities against Russia. Simply put, the media has turned reality on its head. Washington wants to inflict as much pain as
possible on Russia because Russia has frustrated its plan to control critical resources and pipeline corridors in Central Asia and
the Middle East. The Trump administration's new National Defense Strategy is quite clear on this point. Russia's opposition to Washington's
destabilizing interventions has earned it the top spot on the Pentagon's "emerging rivals" list. Moscow is now Public Enemy#1.
Washington's war on Russia has a long history dating back at least 100 years to the Bolshevik Revolution of 1917. Despite the
fact that the US was engaged in a war with Germany at the time (WW1), Washington and its allies sent 150,000 men from 15 nations
to intervene on behalf of the "Whites" hoping to staunch the spread of communism into Europe. In the words of British Prime Minister
Winston Churchill, the goal was "to strangle the Bolshevik baby in its crib."
According to Vasilis Vourkoutiotis from the University of Ottawa:
" the Allied intervention in the Russian Civil War.. was a failed attempt to eradicate Bolshevism while it was still weak .As
early as February 1918 Britain supported intervention in the civil war on behalf of the Whites, and in March it landed troops
in Murmansk. They were soon joined by forces from France, Italy, Japan, the United States, and ten other nations. Eventually,
more than 150,000 Allied soldiers served in Russia
The scale of the war between the Russian Reds and Whites, however, was such that the Allies soon realized they would have little,
if any, direct impact on the course of the Civil War unless they were prepared to intervene on a far grander scale. By the end
of April 1919 the French had withdrawn their soldiers .British and American troops saw some action in November 1918 on the Northern
Front but this campaign was of limited significance in the outcome of the Civil War. The last British and American soldiers were
withdrawn in 1920. The main Allied contributions to the White cause thereafter were supplies and money, mostly from Britain .
The chief purpose of Allied intervention in Soviet Russia was to help the Whites defeat the Reds and destroy Bolshevism." (Allied
Intervention in the Russian Revolution", portalus.ru)
The reason we bring up this relatively unknown bit of history is because it helps to put current events into perspective. First,
it helps readers to see that Washington has been sticking its nose in Russia's business more than a century. Second, it shows that–
while Washington's war on Russia has ebbed and flowed depending on the political situation in Moscow– it has never completely ended.
The US has always treated Russia with suspicion, contempt and brutality. During the Cold War, when Russia's global activities put
a damper on Washington's depredations around the world, relations remained stretched to the breaking point. But after the Soviet
Union collapsed in December, 1991, relations gradually thawed, mainly because the buffoonish Boris Yeltsin opened the country up
to a democratization program that allowed the state's most valuable strategic assets to be transferred to voracious oligarchs for
pennies on the dollar. The plundering of Russia pleased Washington which is why it sent a number of prominent US economists to Moscow
to assist in the transition from communism to a free-market system. These neoliberal miscreants subjected the Russian economy to
"shock therapy" which required the auctioning off of state-owned resources and industries even while hyperinflation continued to
rage and the minuscule life savings of ordinary working people were wiped out almost over night. The upshot of this Washington-approved
looting-spree was a dramatic uptick in extreme poverty which intensified the immiseration of tens of millions of people. Economist
Joseph Stiglitz followed events closely in Russia at the time and summed it up like this:
"In Russia, the people were told that capitalism was going to bring new, unprecedented prosperity. In fact, it brought unprecedented
poverty, indicated not only by a fall in living standards, not only by falling GDP, but by decreasing life spans and enormous
other social indicators showing a deterioration in the quality of life ..
(Due to) the tight monetary policies that were pursued firms didn't have the money to even pay their employees . they didn't
have enough money to pay their pensioners, to pay their workers .Then, with the government not having enough revenue, other aspects
of life started to deteriorate. They didn't have enough money for hospitals, schools. Russia used to have one of the good school
systems in the world; the technical level of education was very high. (But they no longer had) enough money for that. So it just
began to affect people in every dimension of their lives .
The number of people in poverty in Russia, for instance, increased from 2 percent to somewhere between 40 and 50 percent, with
more than one out of two children living in families below poverty. The market economy was a worse enemy for most of these people
than the Communists had said it would be. It brought Gucci bags, Mercedes, the fruits of capitalism to a few .But you had a shrinking
(economy). The GDP in Russia fell by 40 percent. In some (parts) of the former Soviet Union, the GDP, the national income, fell
by over 70 percent. And with that smaller pie it was more and more unequally divided, so a few people got bigger and bigger slices,
and the majority of people wound up with less and less and less . (PBS interview with Joseph Stiglitz, Commanding Heights)
So, as long as Russia remained open to the West's political maneuvering and wholesale thievery, every thing was hunky-dory.
But as soon as Vladimir Putin got his bearings (during his second term as President) and started reassembling the broken state, then
western elites became very concerned and denounced Putin as an "autocrat" and a "KGB thug." At the same time, Washington continued
its maniacal push eastward using its military catspaw, NATO, to achieve its geopolitical ambitions to control vital resources and
industries in the most populous and prosperous region of the coming century, Eurasia. After promising Russian President Gorbachev
that NATO would never "expand one inch to the east", the US-led military alliance added 13 new countries to its membership, all of
them straddling Russia's western flank, all of them located, like Hitler, on Russia's doorstep, all of them posing an existential
threat to Russia's survival. NATO forces now routinely conduct provocative military drills just miles from the Russian border while
state-of-the-art missile systems surround Russia on all sides. (Imagine Russia conducting similar drills in the Gulf of Mexico or
on the Canadian border. How would Washington respond?)
Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov gave an excellent summary of post Cold War history at a gathering of the Korber Foundation
in Berlin in 2017. Brainwashed Americans who foolishly blame Russia for meddling in the 2016 elections, should pay attention to what
he said.
LAVROV– "Ever since the fall of the Berlin Wall we have shown our cards, trying to do our best to assert the values of equal
partnership in international affairs .Back in the early 1990s, we withdrew our troops from Eastern and Central Europe and the
Baltic states and dramatically downsized our military capacity near our western borders
When the cold war era came to an end, Russia was hoping that this would become our common victory – the victory of both the
former Communist bloc countries and the West. The dreams of ushering in shared peace and cooperation seemed near to fruition.
However, the United States and its allies decided to declare themselves the sole winners, refusing to work together to create
the architecture of equal and indivisible security. They made their choice in favor of shifting the dividing lines to our borders
– through expanding NATO and then through the implementation of the EU's Eastern Partnership program
As the Western countries' elites were implementing a policy of political and economic containment of Russia, old threats
were growing and new ones were emerging in the world, and the efforts to do away with them have failed. I think that the main
reason for that is that the model of "West-centric" globalization, which developed following the dismantling of the bipolar architecture
and was aimed at ensuring the prosperity of one-seventh of the world's population at the expense of the rest, proved ineffective.
It is becoming more and more obvious that a narrow group of "chosen ones" is unable to ensure the sustainable growth of the global
economy on their own and solve such major challenges as poverty, climate change, shortage of food and other vital resources .
The latest events are clear evidence that the persistent attempts to form a unipolar world order have failed .The new centers
of economic growth and concomitant political influence are assuming responsibility for the state of affairs in their regions.
Let me reiterate that the emergence of multipolar world order is a fact and a reality. Seeking to hold back this process and keep
the unfairly gained privileged positions is going to lead nowhere. We see increasing examples of nations raising their voice in
defense of their right to decide their own destiny ." (Sergey Lavrov, Russian Foreign Minister)
The American people need to look beyond the propaganda and try to grasp what's really going on. Russia is not Washington's
enemy, it's a friend that's trying to nudge the US in adirection that will increase its opportunities for peace and prosperity in
the future. Lavrov is simply pointing out that a multipolar world is inevitable as economic power becomes more widespread. This emerging
reality means the US will have to modify its behavior, cooperate with other sovereign nations, comply with international law, and
seek a peaceful settlement to disputes. It means greater parity between the states, fairer representation in global decision-making,
and a narrower gap between the world's winners and losers.
Who doesn't want this? Who doesn't want to see an end of the bloody US-led invasions, the countless drone assassinations, the
vast destruction of ancient civilizations, and the senseless slaughter of innocent men, women and children? Who doesn't want to see
Washington's wings clipped so the bloodletting stops and the millions of refugees and internally displaced can return to their homes?
Lavrov offers a vision of the future that all peace-loving people should welcome with open arms.
Admit it: The imperial model has failed. It's time to move on.
Are powerful intelligence agencies compatible even with limited neoliberal democracy, or
democracy for top 10 or 1%?
Notable quotes:
"... I recall during the George II administration someone in congress advocating for he return of debtor's prisons during the 'debat' over ending access to bankruptcy ..."
"... Soros, like the Koch brothers, heads an organization. He has lots of "people" who do what he demands of them. ..."
"... Let's give these guys (and gals, too, let's not forget the Pritzkers and DeVoses and the Walton Family, just among us Norte Americanos) full credit for all the hard work they are putting in, and money too, of course, to buy a world the way they want it -- one which us mopes have only slave roles to play... ..."
You have a good point, but I often think that, a the machinery of surveillance and repression
becomes so well oiled and refined, the ruling oligarchs will soon stop even paying lip
service to 'American workers', or the "American middle class" and go full authoritarian. Karl
Rove's dream to return the economy to the late 19th Century standard.
The Clintonoid project seems set on taking it to the late 16th century. Probably with a
return of chattel slavery. I recall during the George II administration someone in congress
advocating for he return of debtor's prisons during the 'debat' over ending access to
bankruptcy
Soros, like the Koch brothers, heads an organization. He has lots of "people" who do what he
demands of them.
Do you really contend that Soros and the Koch brothers, and people like Adelson, aren't busily "undermining American democracy," whatever that is, via their
organizations (like ALEC and such) in favor of their oligarchic kleptocratic interests, and
going at it 24/7?
The phrase "reductio ad absurdam" comes to mind, for some reason...
Let's give these guys (and gals, too, let's not forget the Pritzkers and DeVoses and the
Walton Family, just among us Norte Americanos) full credit for all the hard work they are
putting in, and money too, of course, to buy a world the way they want it -- one which us
mopes have only slave roles to play...
"... he Dems disgust me with their neo-McCarthyism and the Repubs disgust me because of the way they are playing out their hand right now as well. Games within corrupt games, and yet normal behavior especially in waning empires (or other types of polities, including powerful int'l corporations). ..."
"... Chapter 14 of Guns, Germs and Steel is titled "From Egalitarianism to Kleptocracy" and it used to be available online but my old link is dead and I couldn't find a new one. But a basic definition should suffice: "Kleptocracy, alternatively cleptocracy or kleptarchy, is a form of political and government corruption where the government exists to increase the personal wealth and political power of its officials and the ruling class at the expense of the wider population, often without pretense of honest service." I have no idea how one turns this around and I doubt it's even possible. ..."
"... The Real Reason Establishment Frauds Hate Trump and Obsess About Russia https://libertyblitzkrieg.com/2018/02/20/the-real-reason-establishment-frauds-hate-trump-and-obsess-about-russia/ ..."
"... Blaming Russia for all the nation's problems serves several key purposes for various defenders of the status quo. For discredited neocons and neoliberals who never met a failed war based on lies they didn't support, it provides an opportunity to rehabilitate their torched reputations by masquerading as fierce patriots against the latest existential enemy. Similarly, for those who lived in denial about who Obama really was for eight years, latching on to the Russia narrative allows them to reassure themselves that everything really was fine before Trump and Russia came along and ruined the party. ..."
jsn @16 & 40, in complete agreement with you. Great comments! T he Dems disgust me
with their neo-McCarthyism and the Repubs disgust me because of the way they are playing out
their hand right now as well. Games within corrupt games, and yet normal behavior especially in
waning empires (or other types of polities, including powerful int'l corporations).
Chapter 14 of Guns, Germs and Steel is titled "From Egalitarianism to Kleptocracy" and
it used to be available online but my old link is dead and I couldn't find a new one. But a
basic definition should suffice: "Kleptocracy, alternatively cleptocracy or kleptarchy, is a
form of political and government corruption where the government exists to increase the
personal wealth and political power of its officials and the ruling class at the expense of the
wider population, often without pretense of honest service." I have no idea how one turns this
around and I doubt it's even possible.
Back when I used to subscribe to STRATFOR, founder George Friedman always made a point of
evaluating the elites of whatever country he was analyzing and how they operated amongst
themselves and relative to the people and how effective they were or were not in governing a
country. But he never did that for the US. I would have paid extra for that report! But of
course he could not stay in business if he did such a thing as those people are his
clients.
I think Mike Krieger over at Liberty Blitzkrieg nails it from another perspective with this
post:
Blaming Russia for all the nation's problems serves several key purposes for various
defenders of the status quo. For discredited neocons and neoliberals who never met a failed war
based on lies they didn't support, it provides an opportunity to rehabilitate their torched
reputations by masquerading as fierce patriots against the latest existential enemy. Similarly,
for those who lived in denial about who Obama really was for eight years, latching on to the
Russia narrative allows them to reassure themselves that everything really was fine before
Trump and Russia came along and ruined the party.
By throwing every problem in Putin's lap, the entrenched bipartisan status quo can tell
themselves (and everybody else) that it wasn't really them and their policies that voters
rejected in 2016, rather, the American public was tricked by cunning, nefarious Russians.
Ridiculous for sure, but never underestimate the instinctive human desire to deny
accountability for one's own failures. It's always easier to blame than to accept
responsibility.
That said, there's a much bigger game afoot beyond the motivations of individuals looking to
save face. The main reason much of the highest echelons of American power are united against
Trump has nothing to do with his actual policies. Instead, they're terrified that -- unlike
Obama -- he's a really bad salesman for empire. This sort of Presidential instability threatens
the continuance of their well oiled and exceedingly corrupt gravy train. Hillary Clinton was a
sure thing, Donald Trump remains an unpredictable wildcard.
... Obama said all the right things while methodically doing the bidding of oligarchy. He
captured the imagination of millions, if not billions, around the world with his soaring
rhetoric, yet rarely skipped a beat when it came to the advancement of imperial policies. He
made bailing out Wall Street, droning civilians and cracking down on journalists seem
progressive. He said one thing, did another, and people ate it up. This is an extraordinarily
valuable quality when it comes to a vicious and unelected deep state that wants to keep a
corrupt empire together.
Trump has the exact opposite effect. Sure, he also frequently says one thing and then does
another, but he doesn't provide the same feel good quality to empire that Obama did. He's
simply not the warm and fuzzy salesman for oligarchy and empire Obama was, thus his inability
to sugarcoat state-sanctioned murder forces a lot of people to confront the uncomfortable
hypocrisies in our society that many would prefer not to admit.
------------
I can't stand Kushner's smirky face and got a good chuckle from this prince's fall as I am
not a fan of his passion for Israel. But I don't think he's a stupid idiot either. He's
probably very smart in business, but he seems to have no feel for politics. Trump is much
better at it than Kushner. Of course they are going after Kushner as a way to attack and
disadvantage Trump. Politics is a form of warfare after all.
My take is that Trump survives but mostly contained by the Borg
"... The U.S. cannot and will not protect its citizens against attacks by violent armed assailants, especially as politicians are being bought off by gun manufacturers and the National Rifle Association. ..."
"... The U.S. will not provide jobs or a living wage to a significant proportion of its population, especially youth and racial minorities. ..."
Author's note: This article contains over 100 hyperlinks. It is suggested that you read the
text of the article first then go back and explore the linked sources at your leisure.
The elevated position of the military and its immunity from political control propagate the
falsehood that force and violence are the
legitimate way to solve problems.
Influence on Hollywood by the military exploits and glorifies violence and is a major
propaganda tool.
Video games , supported by
the military and corporate interests, teach young people that killing is fun.
The stealing of resources began with the assault by white Americans on Native
Americans and the theft of their lands and continues today in Latin America, Africa, the
Middle East, and around the world.
The U.S. military and police are conditioned to regard reformers
and protesters as enemies of the state, not people exercising their rights.
War is being waged against Russia and other countries through economic sanctions and
military threats without any constitutional declaration by Congress.
Wall Street creates and destroys businesses for the sake of
financial profits regardless of the impact on individuals, families, and society.
The U.S. economy is not driven by honest business enterprise such as manufacturing but is
kept afloat artificially by bank and
government-created bubbles , including the debt-driven bubble of military spending.
The
elimination of the gold standard in favor of bank-controlled fiat currency debased the
national currency and has led to a half-century of inflation.
Panic has set in as other nations steer away from the use of inflated U.S. dollars in the
petroleum markets and as a
reserve currency .
People are being sent to jail for non-payment of debt. Some with out-of-control debt
commit
suicide.
The federal government's
national debt is a growing burden to society that can never be paid off. George W. Bush
with his wars doubled the national debt in eight years. It doubled again during the Obama
eight-year war period.
The lack of decent jobs drives huge numbers of people into cybercrime, drug dealing,
prostitution, and other criminal pastimes simply as a mode of survival.
The Deep State tries to overthrow any government abroad that
undertakes to reform itself in the direction of greater fairness to its own population.
Secretive government vastly increased its powers by setting up the
Department of Homeland Security and passing the Patriot
Act after the false flag of 9/11.
The Deep State, the media, and the military
foment hatred of countries like Russia and China in order to conceal their own abuses and
consolidate their power.
The Deep State controls government at all levels --
federal, state, and local.
The government seeks to foster Nazi-like practices in raising a cult to
worship the flag , and by promoting wars abroad and oppressive police practices at
home.
The media spew forth hatred and lies through such outlets as Fox News
.
The media are controlled by
a handful of oligarchic interests that suppress honest news reporting while attacking
independent journalism at every turn.
The corporate-orchestrated
attack on net neutrality seeks to eliminate independent opinion on the internet as was done
in the past on cable TV.
Major media outlets such as the New York Times , Washington
Post ,
CNN , and the national TV broadcast networks are controlled by the oligarchy and Deep State
which use them as propaganda organs for their pro-war, corporate agendas.
The media-driven lie of the U.S. as " the exceptional
nation " is a particularly pernicious piece of propaganda that has been used to justify
abuses inflicted on other countries.
Racism against
people of color and other nationalities remains deeply lodged in the national psyche and is
used by the oligarchy as a means of control.
Can the U.S. survive as a nation for another generation? It seems doubtful without a
major
reform movement dedicated to correcting ALL the above-mentioned abuses. But before the U.S.
destroys the planet it may simply collapse from
its internal failures or through its policies of endless war and the guilt this has
produced.
At present a major war between the
American empire and the Eurasian nations
seems a real possibility, though it would be much better if the U.S.,
Russia , and China
came together in a positive alliance.
"... So, you and I don't agree on a lot of issues but I think we share the same concern about this story, and that is that American journalists are being manipulated for whatever reason by the intelligence community in the United States, and I'm wondering why after years of having this happen to American journalists, they are allowing this to happen again. ..."
"... Well, that's the thing I would refrain that a little bit. I don't actually think so much that journalists are the victims in the sense of that formulation that they're being manipulated. I think at best what you can say for them is they are willingly and eagerly being manipulated. ..."
"... Because what you see is over and over they publish really inflammatory stories that turn out to be totally false and what happens in those cases? Nothing. They get enormous benefits when they publish recklessly. They get applause on social media from their peers, they get zillions of re-tweets, huge amounts of traffic, they end up on TV. They get applauded across the spectrum because people are so giddy and eager to hear more about this Russia and Trump story. ..."
Tucker
Carlson interviews Green Greenwald of The Intercept about journalists "willingly" being
taken advantage of by the intelligence community on stories about Russia to reap the benefits,
even when they know what they are publishing is "totally false."
From Tuesday's broadcast of Tucker Carlson Tonight on the FOX News Channel:
TUCKER CARLSON: So, Glenn, just to get to the facts of this story, it is conclusively shown
that the story about the 21 voting systems being hacked is untrue, correct?
GLENN GREENWALD, JOURNALIST: It's false in two ways, one is that several of the states
included in the list, such as Wisconsin, California, and Texas, said that the websites that
the Homeland Security Department cited had nothing to do with voting systems, they are
entirely unrelated.
And it's false in a second way, which is a lot of the stories, in fact, most of them said
that Russia tried to hack into the voting systems when in fact even Homeland Security, it can
only show that what they did was scan those computer systems, which is basically casing
something to say for vulnerabilities and made no attempts to actually hack into them. So, it
was false on various levels.
CARLSON: So, you and I don't agree on a lot of issues but I think we share the same
concern about this story, and that is that American journalists are being manipulated for
whatever reason by the intelligence community in the United States, and I'm wondering why
after years of having this happen to American journalists, they are allowing this to happen
again.
GREENWALD: Well, that's the thing I would refrain that a little bit. I don't actually
think so much that journalists are the victims in the sense of that formulation that they're
being manipulated. I think at best what you can say for them is they are willingly and
eagerly being manipulated.
(LAUGHTER)
Because what you see is over and over they publish really inflammatory stories that turn
out to be totally false and what happens in those cases? Nothing. They get enormous benefits
when they publish recklessly. They get applause on social media from their peers, they get
zillions of re-tweets, huge amounts of traffic, they end up on TV. They get applauded across the spectrum
because people are so giddy and eager to hear more about this Russia and Trump story.
And when their stories get completely debunked, it just kind of, everybody agrees to
ignore it and everyone moves on and they pay no price. At the same time, they are feeling and
pleasing their sources by publishing these sources that their sources want them to publish.
And so, there is huge amounts of career benefits and reputational benefits and very little
cost when they publish stories that end up being debunked because the narrative they are
serving is a popular one, at least within their peer circles.
CARLSON: Gosh! That is so dishonest. I mean, I think all of us and journalism have gotten
things wrong, I certainly have. If you feel bad about it, I mean, you really do and there's a
consequence. Do you really think there's that level of dishonesty in the American press?
GREENWALD: I think what it is more than dishonesty is a really warped incentive scheme
bolstered by this very severe groupthink that social media is fostering in ways that we don't
yet fully understand.
CARLSON: Yes.
GREENWALD: Most journalists these days are in Congressional Committees or at zoning board
meetings or using -- they're sitting on Twitter talking to one another and this produces this
extreme groupthink where these orthodoxies arise in deviating from them or questioning them
or challenging, believe me, results in all kinds of recrimination and scorn. And embracing
them produces this sort of in group mentality where you are rewarded, and I think a lot of it
is about that kind of behavior.
CARLSON: That is really deep. I mean, you live in a foreign country, I'm not on social
media, so maybe we have a little bit of distance from this, where do you think the story is
going? What's the next incarnation of it?
GREENWALD: Well, the odd part about it, and about the inpatients that journalists have in
trying to just jump to the finish line is that there are numerous investigations underway in
the city, including by credible investigators, including Senator Burr and Warner and the
Senate Intelligence Committee, which most people seem to trust and certainly Robert Mueller
who is armed with subpoena power, and everyone is really eager to lavish with praise.
So, we are going to find out presumably one way or the other soon enough. I guess that one
thing that is so odd to me Tucker, is that, this has been going on now for a year, this
accusation that the Trump administration or the Trump campaign colluded with the Russians to
hack the DNC and John Podesta's email and we know that there are huge numbers of people
inside the government who are willing to leak, even at the expense of committing crimes in
order to undermine Trump and yet, there has been no leaks so far showing any evidence of that
kind of collusion leading one to wonder why that is.
So, I hope that everybody is willing to wait until the actual investigation reveals
finally the real answers. But it doesn't seem that will be the case.
CARLSON: Bravery is when you disagree in public with your peers. And by that definition,
you are a very brave man. Glenn Greenwald, thanks for joining us tonight. I appreciate
it.
At the core of Trumpism is the rejection of neoliberalism
Pat Buchanan does not understand neoliberalism well and mixes apples with oranges, but the key idea expressed here stands: " Consider
this crazed ideology of free trade globalism with its roots in the scribblings of 19th-century idiot savants, not one of whom ever built
a great nation. Adhering religiously to free trade dogma, we have run up $12 trillion in trade deficits since Bush I. Our cities have
been gutted by the loss of plants and factories. Workers' wages have stagnated. The economic independence Hamilton sought and Republican
presidents from Lincoln to McKinley achieved is history."
Notable quotes:
"... Patrick J. Buchanan is the author of a new book, "Nixon's White House Wars: The Battles That Made and Broke a President and Divided America Forever." ..."
"I walk through this world with greater courage and hope when I find myself in a relation of friendship and intimacy with this
great man, whose fame has gone out not only over all Russia, but the world. We regard Marshal Stalin's life as most precious to the
hopes and hearts of all of us."
Returning home, Churchill assured a skeptical Parliament, "I know of no Government which stands to its obligations, even in its
own despite, more solidly than the Russian Soviet Government."
George W. Bush, with the U.S. establishment united behind him, invaded Iraq with the goal of creating a Vermont in the Middle
East that would be a beacon of democracy to the Arab and Islamic world.
Ex-Director of the NSA Gen. William Odom correctly called the U.S. invasion the greatest strategic blunder in American history.
But Bush, un-chastened, went on to preach a crusade for democracy with the goal of "ending tyranny in our world."
... ... ...
After our victory in the Cold War, we not only plunged into the Middle East to remake it in our image, we issued war guarantees
to every ex-member state of the Warsaw Pact, and threatened Russia with war if she ever intervened again in the Baltic Republics.
No Cold War president would have dreamed of issuing such an in-your-face challenge to a great nuclear power like Russia. If Putin's
Russia does not become the pacifist nation it has never been, these guarantees will one day be called. And America will either back
down -- or face a nuclear confrontation. Why would we risk something like this?
Consider this crazed ideology of free trade globalism with its roots in the scribblings of 19th-century idiot savants, not one
of whom ever built a great nation. Adhering religiously to free trade dogma, we have run up $12 trillion in trade deficits since
Bush I. Our cities have been gutted by the loss of plants and factories. Workers' wages have stagnated. The economic independence
Hamilton sought and Republican presidents from Lincoln to McKinley achieved is history.
But the greatest risk we are taking, based on utopianism, is the annual importation of well over a million legal and illegal immigrants,
many from the failed states of the Third World, in the belief we can create a united, peaceful and harmonious land of 400 million,
composed of every race, religion, ethnicity, tribe, creed, culture and language on earth.
Where is the historic evidence for the success of this experiment, the failure of which could mean the end of America as one nation
and one people?
Patrick J. Buchanan is the author of a new book, "Nixon's White House Wars: The Battles That Made and Broke a President and
Divided America Forever."
Pat Buchanan does not understand neoliberalism well and mixes apples with oranges, but the key idea expressed here stands:
" Consider this crazed ideology of free trade globalism with its roots in the scribblings of 19th-century idiot savants,
not one of whom ever built a great nation. Adhering religiously to free trade dogma, we have run up $12 trillion in trade deficits
since Bush I. Our cities have been gutted by the loss of plants and factories. Workers' wages have stagnated. The economic
independence Hamilton sought and Republican presidents from Lincoln to McKinley achieved is history."
The truth is that now Trump does not represent "Trumpism" -- the movement that he created which includes the following:
– rejection of neoliberal globalization;
– rejection of unrestricted immigration;
– fight against suppression of wages by multinationals via cheap imported labor;
– fight against the elimination of meaningful, well-paying jobs via outsourcing and offshoring of manufacturing;
– rejection of wars for enlargement and sustaining of neoliberal empire, especially NATO role as global policemen and wars for
Washington client Israel in the Middle East;
– détente with Russia;
– more pragmatic relations with Israel and suppression of Israeli agents of influence;
– revision of relations with China and addressing the problem of trade deficit.
– rejection of total surveillance on all citizens;
– the cut of military expenses to one third or less of the current level and concentrating on revival on national infrastructure,
education, and science.
– abandonment of maintenance of the "sole superpower" status and global neoliberal empire for more practical and less costly "semi-isolationist"
foreign policy; closing of unnecessary foreign military bases and cutting aid to the current clients.
Of course, the notion of "Trumpism" is fuzzy and different people might include some additional issues and disagree with some
listed here, but the core probably remains.
Of course, Trump is under relentless attack (coup d'état or, more precisely, a color revolution) of neoliberal fifth column,
which includes Clinton gang, fifth column elements within his administration (Rosenstein, etc) as well from remnants of Obama
administration (Brennan, Comey, Clapper) and associated elements within corresponding intelligence agencies. He probably was forced
into some compromises just to survive. He also has members of the neoliberal fifth column within his family (Ivanka and Kushner).
So the movement now is in deep need of a new leader.
That's a good summary of what the public voted for and didn't get.
And whether Trump has sold out, or was blackmailed or was a cynical manipulative liar for the beginning is really irrelevant.
The fact is that he is not doing it – so he is just blocking the way.
At some point the US public are going to have to forget about their "representatives" (Trump and Congress and the rest of
them) and get out onto the street to make themselves heard. The population of the US is 323 million people and if just 1/2
of 1% (1,6 million) of them decided to visit Congress directly the US administration might get the message.
pyrrhus, March 3, 2018 at 2:15 am GMT
@anon
Finally, Pat understands that the American [Neoliberal] Empire and habit of intervention all over the world is a disaster.
"... The globalists envision the earth as a plantation with oligarchs (stateless corporate monopolists) as planters, former national governments as overseers and the people of earth as niggers. ..."
what is the vision, what is the historic goal our elites offer to inspire and enlist our
people?
The globalists envision the earth as a plantation with oligarchs (stateless corporate
monopolists) as planters, former national governments as overseers and the people of earth as
niggers.
I'm an American and proud of it. But compare us to the country we had when the Soviets
were predicting our downfall: we now have VASTLY higher levels of government debt, private
household debt, opioid addiction, disability real and exaggerated, children born to people
who never marry or even live together consistently, long-term underemployment of intelligent
hardworking qualified people, infrastructure decay (failing roads and bridges), long-term
welfare dependency, open hatred and intimidation or worse against whites, a Mexican "fifth
column" that is being led to separatism and hostility against us (and is attaining the number
to take political power and eventually secede), and more.
We are far less socially and culturally cohesive than we were back then, in substantial
part due to the suicidal decision to admit tens of millions of people of different races to
settle here who do not share enough of our values, traditions, expectations, and do not have
loyalty to us or our NATION.
This includes one racial group (jewish people) and one religious group (Muslims) that are
inherently untrustworthy because of their conception of non-members / goyim / infidels as
inferior human beings to be manipulated, harmed, exploited, and subjugated. This will make a
critical difference in times of real scarcity and deprivation, let alone a major war.
Whether or not it made sense to predict the usa's collapse or impoverishment 30 or 60
years ago, it is an altogether too plausible prediction these days.
Superbly stated, Fran. The people excoriating all "capitalism" typically are not talking
about real free enterprise, fair competition, and a system where big corporations and
subsidy-seeking leeches aren't favored over smaller & family businesses.
There are several very different systems that are being carelessly called capitalism
without distinction.
I don't want the current western system of crony-capitalist / fascist
sort-of-welfare-State, either.
The "capitalism" that we largely used to have, the one I support, does NOT involve
Privileges, subsidies, bailouts, or even lower effective tax rates for wealthy "connected"
people, corporations, and paper-shuffling brokers and bankers who create little of tangible
value and profit from deliberately confusing complex "financial instruments" at our
expense.
Very weak analysis The authors completely missed the point. Susceptibility to rumors (now
called "fake new" which more correctly should be called "improvised news") and high level of
distrust to "official MSM" (of which popularity of alternative news site is only tip of the
iceberg) is a sign of the crisis and tearing down of the the social fabric that hold the so
social groups together. This first of all demonstrated with the de-legitimization of the
neoliberal elite.
As such attempt to patch this discord and unite the US society of fake premises of Russiagate
and anti-Russian hysteria look very problematic. The effect might be quite opposite as the story
with Steele dossier, which really undermined credibility of Justice Department and destroyed the
credibility o FBI can teach us.
In this case claims that "The claim that, for example, Mrs. Clinton's victory might aid Satan
" are just s a sign of rejection of neoliberalism by voters. Nothing more nothing less.
Notable quotes:
"... It has infected the American political system, weakening the body politic and leaving it vulnerable to manipulation. Russian misinformation seems to have exacerbated the symptoms, but laced throughout the indictment are reminders that the underlying disease, arguably far more damaging, is all American-made. ..."
"... A recent study found that the people most likely to consume fake news were already hyperpartisan and close followers of politics, and that false stories were only a small fraction of their media consumption. ..."
That these efforts might have actually made a difference, or at least were intended to,
highlights a force that was already destabilizing American democracy far more than any
Russian-made fake news post: partisan polarization.
"Partisanship can even alter memory, implicit evaluation, and even perceptual judgment," the
political scientists Jay J. Van Bavel and Andrea Pereira wrote in a recent paper . "The human attraction to fake and
untrustworthy news" -- a danger cited by political scientists far more frequently than
orchestrated meddling -- "poses a serious problem for healthy democratic functioning."
It has infected the American political system, weakening the body politic and leaving it
vulnerable to manipulation. Russian misinformation seems to have exacerbated the symptoms, but
laced throughout the indictment are reminders that the underlying disease, arguably far more
damaging, is all American-made.
... ... ...
A recent study found
that the people most likely to consume fake news were already hyperpartisan and close followers
of politics, and that false stories were only a small fraction of their media
consumption.
Americans, it said, sought out stories that reflected their already-formed partisan view of
reality. This suggests that these Russians efforts are indicators -- not drivers -- of how
widely Americans had polarized.
That distinction matters for how the indictment is read: Though Americans have seen it as
highlighting a foreign threat, it also illustrates the perhaps graver threats from
within.
An Especially Toxic Form of Partisanship
... ... ...
"Compromise is the core of democracy," she said. "It's the only way we can govern." But, she
said, "when you make people feel threatened, nobody compromises with evil."
The claim that, for example, Mrs. Clinton's victory might aid Satan is in many ways just a
faint echo of the partisan anger and fear already dominating American politics.
Those emotions undermine a key norm that all sides are served by honoring democratic
processes; instead, they justify, or even seem to mandate, extreme steps against the other
side.
In taking this approach, the Russians were merely riding a trend that has been building for
decades.
Since the 1980s , surveys have found that Republicans and Democrats' feelings toward the
opposing party have been growing more and more negative. Voters are animated more by distrust
of the other side than support for their own.
This highlights a problem that Lilliana Mason, a University of Maryland political scientist,
said had left American democracy dangerously vulnerable. But it's a problem driven primarily by
American politicians and media outlets, which have far louder megaphones than any Russian-made
Facebook posts.
"Compromise is the core of democracy," she said. "It's the only way we can govern." But, she
said, "when you make people feel threatened, nobody compromises with evil."
The claim that, for example, Mrs. Clinton's victory might aid Satan is in many ways just a
faint echo of the partisan anger and fear already dominating American politics.
Those emotions undermine a key norm that all sides are served by honoring democratic
processes; instead, they justify, or even seem to mandate, extreme steps against the other
side.
Those shootings is a sign of the crisis of the US society caused by neoliberalization.
Collapse of moral norms. When a person is assumed to be a wolf to other person and greed is
good.
Notable quotes:
"... it seems a common denominator of the atrocities to which we have been witness in recent years is that the perpetrators are nobodies who wish to die as somebodies. ..."
In a society of advanced decomposition and moral
depravity, these perpetrators are nobodies who wish to die as somebodies
.... ... ...
In his case, the conscience was dead, or was buried beneath hatred, rage or
resentment at those succeeding where he had failed. He had been rejected, cast aside, expelled.
This would be his revenge, and it would be something for Douglas High and the nation to see --
and never forget.
Indeed, it seems a common denominator of the atrocities to which we have been witness in
recent years is that the perpetrators are nobodies who wish to die as somebodies.
... ... ...
Some of these individuals who seek to "go out" this way take their own lives
when the responders arrive, or they commit "suicide by cop" and end their lives in a shootout.
Others, Cruz among them, prefer to star in court, so the world can see who they are. And the
commentators and TV cameras will again give them what they crave: massive publicity.
And we can't change this. As soon as the story broke, the cameras came running, and we
watched another staging of the familiar drama -- the patrol cars, cops in body armor,
ambulances, students running in panic or walking in line, talking TV heads demanding to know
why the cowards in Congress won't vote to outlaw AR-15s.
... ... ...
Another factor helps to explain what happened Wednesday: We are a formerly Christian society
in an advanced state of decomposition.
Nikolas Cruz was a product of broken families. He was adopted. Both adoptive parents had
died. Where did he get his ideas of right and wrong, good and evil? Before the Death of God and
repeal of the Ten Commandments, in those dark old days, the 1950s, atrocities common now were
almost nonexistent.
Here's a twist on the commentary: Not every ill-formed, life-hating psychopath in this
country can go to Harvard School of Law, the halls of Congress or the Pentagon. Some are
stuck in the lower classes.
The past, callous destruction by drones of whole wedding parties in Waziristan AND their
rescuers raised no eyebrows under the Obama administration yet we we are appalled at a dozen
and a half Americans getting wasted. When a culture shows that it does not value life,
everyone 'gets it' eventually and incorporates that view into their own lives and
communities. Ours is a culture of death. Banning guns won't change that. The psychopaths who
own our media establish the narrative of what our culture is. The narrative is nihilism.
This has much to do with our culture of narcissism and spiritual hollowing out. It is the
idea that I am The Most Important Human On Earth, the center of the universe, and any insult
or injury to me simply can not be tolerated.
Narcissists are fragile. They have no coping mechanism when life doesn't give them what it
"should" give them, or metes out tragedy or sadness, as it has a way of doing.
I am reminded of Christopher Dorner, the ex-LAPD officer who killed his instructor and his
wife after having failed an exam, and going on a shooting spree, ending up being killed by
SWAT in a cabin in the mountains above LA. He was not "insane." The letter he left behind
exposed him as a narcissist who simply could not bear the insult to his "honor" for having
been failed on an exam he had the "right" to pass.
I doubt this Cruz monster is a howling lunatic, either, but a spiritually dead ego-zombie
whose only sense of meaning comes from anger and a sense of not being granted all he wanted
and "deserved."
I've read that there were enough red flags surrounding Nicholas Cruz to fill up Moscow's Red
Square on parade day. In the face of multiple warnings, local law enforcement, the FBI, and
the DOJ all failed to perform their due diligence in preventing this miscreant from falling
through the cracks. You can have all the laws you want, stacked high and thick, but if you're
not going to follow through on them, then what is the point?
You can ban guns and abolish the second amendment, but that will not address the moral
sickness that is permeating the culture and giving shade to the depraved heart of human
darkness or the sense of despair and hopelessness that life is at its material root,
meaningless and hollow. We insist on calling out racism, bigotry, sexism, and violence, but
if not grounded in God those values are not grounded in anything other than subjective
emotion and preference. They are no more right, or good, or true than any inverse value and
enforced only by those with the bigger gun. Indeed, this is the logical conclusion of
progressive atheism with all its secular post-modern, post-truth, post-ethics moral
relativism. Each person becomes a law unto themselves. And once we start shredding the
Constitution in the name of safety and welfare, what then? Some slippery slopes are real. The
only safe place without crime is a police state also without freedom of thought, conscience,
expression, or movement.
Germany was the most educated country in Europe prior to WW 2. In the 19th century,
European universities had driven God from their classrooms and were expounding the atheistic
ideologies of Marxism, socialism, communism, anarchism, nihilism, Darwinism, etc In the slow
march of time, these ideas came to fruition in the 20th making it the bloodiest century of
the common era.
It was faith in God that gave us science, the enlightenment, and the foundation of
democratic values. It was faith in God that ended slavery, racism, fought for civil rights,
and founded almost all of our institutions of higher learning. It was faith in God that
grounded our belief in human dignity and the value of life. Sure, great evil has been done by
hypocrites in the name of Christianity but who is also first on the scene of a natural
disaster with aid and relief, or working for improved medical care and clean water in third
world countries, or working to end human trafficking? It is the true Christ followers who put
their faith where their mouth is not some slimly politician or charlatan wearing a Christian
mask. I would argue that America has become one of the most Biblically illiterate people in
western civilization because we have pushed god from the public square, the school room, the
university campus, much of the government and the military, as well as the board room,
concomitant with an agenda to make those who believe in God a cultural exotica a bunch of
anti-reason, anti-science, and anti-intellectual retrogrades to be treated with skeptical
curiosity if not outright suspicion and hostility. Media touts every negative example and
ignores all the good that doesn't fit the narrative.
We do this with great peril because we've seen what happens when this is done in history.
The arc of history that visited ruin on Europe will surely bring it here in a hundred years'
time or sooner. We're on the same path.
I am a hunter and gun owner. I have more than one gun. I am not anti-gun. I even own an
AR-style rifle.
I believe mass shooting atrocities will never go away completely. However .. I believe the
onus of proposing a viable solution to REDUCE the number of mass shootings rests squarely on
the Republican party and the NRA.
They are always the coalition of 'We offer our sincere prayers and condolences', 'Now is
not the time to politicize this tragedy', and 'That shooting last week is old news, time to
move on'.
This is a warning to The Republicans and the NRA. I believe the American public has just
about had it with lack of legislation to address this horrible problem. The Republicans must
develop proposals for real solutions. Some of these proposals will not sit well with a part
of it's base. So be it.
These proposals must be sold to all American citizens and be followed up with legislation
that is effective on achieving what was proposed. The Democrats will certainly join if
workable solutions are proposed.
Right now The Democrats are incredibly energized. The last thing The Republicans need at
this time is to energize them even more, and turn even more Independents against them. They
also should be very concerned about stirring up the 50% of eligible voters that do not vote.
And they should be really concerned about the Republican brand with the 18-25 year olds.
Among them the Republicans are increasing seen as the party that caters to unreasonable gun
nuts, and not the population in general.
Pat is sinking deeper and deeper into dementia. Or he is simply a moron. No other developed
country has this level of mass shootings, no other developed country has a rate of gun
violence anywhere near what we have in this country. And yet not a word about reasonable gun
restrictions, instead Pat the Righteous tells us about moral decay. If pornography can be
regulated, restricted or banned, why not AK-15s?
"... Paul Brian is a freelance journalist. He has reported for BBC, Reuters, and Foreign Policy, and contributed to the Week, The Federalist, and others. He covered the fledgling U.S. alt-right at a 2014 conference in Hungary as well as the 2015 New Hampshire primary, and also made a documentary about his time living in the Republic of Georgia in 2012. You can follow him on Twitter @paulrbrian or visit his website www.paulrbrian.com . ..."
The hawks and internationalists who set our house on fire don't now deserve the contract to rebuild it.
While it may have significant popular support, much of the anti-Trump "Resistance" suffers from a severe weakness of message.
Part of the problem is with who the Resistance's leading messengers are: discredited neoconservative poltroons like former president
George W. Bush, unwatchable alleged celebrities like Chelsea Handler, and establishment Republicans who routinely
slash and burn the middle class like Senator Jeff Flake. Furthermore, what exactly is the Resistance's overriding message? Invariably
their sermonizing revolves around vague bromides about "tolerance," diversity, unrestricted free trade, and multilateralism. They
routinely push a supposed former status quo that was in fact anything but a status quo. The leaders of the Resistance have in their
arsenal nothing but buzzwords and a desire to feel self-satisfied and turn back to imagined pre-Trump normality. A president like
Donald Trump is only possible in a country with opposition voices of such subterranean caliber.
Remember when Trump steamrolled a crowded field of Republicans in one of the greatest electoral upsets in American history? Surely
many of us also recall the troupes of smug celebrities and Bushes and Obamas who lined up to take potshots at Trump over his unacceptably
cruel utterances that upset their noble moral sensibilities? How did that work out for them? They lost. The more that opposition
to Trump in office takes the same form as opposition to him on the campaign trail, the more hypocritical and counterproductive it
becomes. Further, the resistance to Trump's policies is coming just at the moment when principled opposition most needs to up its
game and help turn back the hands of the Doomsday Clock. It's social conservatives who are also opposed to war and exploitation of
the working class who have the best moral bona fides to effectively oppose Trump, which is why morally phrased attacks on Trump from
the corporate and socially liberal wings of the left, as well as the free market and interventionist conservative establishment,
have failed and will continue to fail. Any real alternative is going to have to come from regular folks with hearts and morals who
aren't stained by decades of failure and hypocrisy.
A majority of Democrats now have
favorable views
of George W. Bush, and that's no coincidence. Like the supposedly reasonable anti-Trump voices on their side, Bush pops up like a
dutiful marionette to condemn white supremacy and
"nativism," and to
reminisce about the good old days when he was in charge. Bush also lectures about how Russia is ruining everything by meddling in
elections and destabilizing the world. But how convincing is it really to hear about multilateralism and respect for human rights
from Bush, who launched an unnecessary war on Iraq that killed hundreds of thousands of civilians and left thousands of American
servicemen and women dead and wounded? How convincing is it when former secretary of state Madeleine Albright, who famously remarked
that an estimated half a million Iraqis dead from our 1990s sanctions was "worth it," haughtily claims that she's
"offended" by Trump's travel ban ? "Offended" -- is that so, Madame Secretary? I have a feeling millions of Muslims in the Middle
East may have also been "offended" when people like you helped inflame their region and turned it into an endless back-and-forth
firestorm of conflict between U.S.-backed dictators and brutal jihadists, with everyone else caught in between.
Maybe instead of being offended that not everyone can come to America, people like Albright, Kerry, and Bush shouldn't have contributed
to the conditions that wrecked those people's homes in the first place? Maybe the U.S. government should think more closely about
providing military aid to 73 percent of the world's dictatorships? Sorry, do excuse the crazy talk. Clearly all the ruthless
maneuvering by the U.S. and NATO is just being done out of a selfless desire to spread democratic values by raining down LGBT-friendly
munitions on beleaguered populations worldwide. Another congressman just gave a speech about brave democratic principles so we can
all relax.
Generally, U.S. leaders like to team up with dictators before turning on them when they become inconvenient or start to upset
full-spectrum dominance. Nobody have should been surprised to see John Kerry fraternizing in a friendly manner with Syrian butcher
Bashar al-Assad and then moralistically threatening him with war several years later, or Donald Rumsfeld grinning with Saddam Hussein
as they cooperated militarily before Rumsfeld did an about-face on the naďve dictator based on false premises after 9/11. Here's
former president Barack Obama
shaking Moammar Gaddafi's hand in 2009 . I wonder what became of Mr. Gaddafi?
It's beyond parody to hear someone like Bush sternly opine that there's
"pretty clear evidence" Russia meddled in the 2016 election. Even if that were deeply significant in the way some argue, Bush
should be the last person anyone is hearing from about it. It's all good, though: remember when Bush
laughed about how there hadn't been weapons of mass destruction
in Iraq at the White House Correspondents Dinner in 2004? It's all just a joke; don't you get it? (Maybe Saddam Hussein had already
used all the chemical weapons
the U.S. helped him get during the 1980s on Iran in the Iran-Iraq War, which killed over one million people by the time the coalition
of the willing came knocking in 2003). That's the kind of thing people like Bush like to indirectly joke about in the company of
self-satisfied press ghouls at celebratory dinners. However, when the mean man Mr. Trump pals around with Russian baddie Vladimir
Putin, mistreats women, or spews out unkind rhetoric about "shitholes," it's far from a joke: it's time to get out your two-eared
pink hat and hit the streets chanting in righteous outrage.
To be fair, Trump is worthy of opposition. An ignorant, reactive egotist who needs to have his unfounded suppositions and inaccuracies
constantly validated by a sycophantic staff of people who'd be rejected even for a reality show version of the White House, he really
is an unstable excuse for a leader and an inveterate misogynist and all the other things. Trump isn't exactly Bible Belt material
despite his stamp of approval from Jerry Falwell Jr. and crew; in fact he hasn't even succeeded in
getting rid of the Johnson Amendment and allowing churches to get more involved in politics, one of his few concrete promises
to Christian conservatives. He's also a big red button of a disaster in almost every other area as commander-in-chief.
Trump's first military action as president reportedly killed numerous innocent women and children (some unnamed U.S. officials
claim some of the women were militants) as well as a Navy SEAL. Helicopter gunships strafed a Yemeni village for over an hour in
what Trump called a
"highly successful" operation against al-Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula (AQAP). A senior military official felt differently,
saying that
"almost
everything went wrong." The raid even killed eight-year-old American girl Nawar al-Awlaki, daughter of previously killed extremist
leader Anwar al-Awlaki, whose other innocent child, 16-year-old Abdulrahman al-Awlaki, was also droned while eating outdoors at a
restaurant in 2010 (with several friends and his 17-year-old cousin). The Obama administration dismissed Abdulrahman's death at the
time as
no big deal .
The list goes on with the Trump administration, a hollow outfit of Goldman Sachs operatives and detached industry and financier
billionaires helping out their hedge fund friends and throwing a small table scrap to the peasants every now and then. As
deformed babies are born in Flint, Michigan , Ivanka grandstands about
paid parental leave
. Meanwhile, Trump and Co. work to
expand the war in Afghanistan
and Syria. It's a sad state of affairs.
So who are the right voices to oppose the mango man-child and his cadre of doddering dullards? Not degenerate celebrities, dirty
politicians of the past, or special interest groups that try to fit everyone into a narrow electoral box so mainline Democrats can
pass their own version of corporate welfare and run wars with more sensitive rhetoric and politically correct messaging. Instead,
the effective dissidents of the future will be people of various beliefs, but especially the pro-family and faith-driven, who are
just as opposed to what came before Trump as they are to him. The future of a meaningful political alternative to the underlying
liberalism, materialism, and me-first individualism on the left and right will revolve around traditionalists and pro-family conservative
individuals who define their own destinies instead of letting themselves be engineered into destinies manufactured by multinational
corporations and boardroom gremlins with diversity outreach strategies. It's possible, for example, to be socially conservative,
pro-worker, pro-environment, and anti-war. In fact, that is the norm in most countries that exist outside the false political
paradigm pushed in America.
If enough suburbanite centrists who take a break from Dancing With The Stars are convinced that Trump is bad because
George W. Bush and Madeleine Albright say so, it shows that these people have learned absolutely nothing from Trump or the process
that led to him. These kind of resistors are the people nodding their heads emphatically as they read Eliot Cohen talk about why
he and his friends
can't stomach the evil stench of Trump or
Robert Kagan whine about fascism in The Washington Post. Here's a warning to good people who may not have been following
politics closely prior to Trump: don't get taken in by these charlatans. Don't listen to those who burned your town down as they
pitch you the contract to rebuild it. You can oppose both the leaders of the "Resistance" and Trump. In fact, it is your moral duty
to do so. This is the End of the End of History As We Know It, but there isn't going to be an REM song or Will Smith punching an
alien in the face to help everyone through it.
Here's a thought for those finding themselves enthusiastic about the Resistance and horrified by Trump: maybe, just maybe
, the water was already starting to boil before you cried out in pain and alarm.
Paul Brian is a freelance journalist. He has reported for BBC, Reuters, and Foreign Policy, and contributed to the Week, The
Federalist, and others. He covered the fledgling U.S. alt-right at a 2014 conference in Hungary as well as the 2015 New Hampshire
primary, and also made a documentary about his time living in the Republic of Georgia in 2012. You can follow him on Twitter @paulrbrian
or visit his website www.paulrbrian.com .
"The future of a meaningful political alternative to the underlying liberalism, materialism, and me-first individualism on the
left and right will revolve around traditionalists and pro-family conservative individuals who define their own destinies instead
of letting themselves be engineered into destinies manufactured by multinational corporations and boardroom gremlins with diversity
outreach strategies."
They will have to lose their faith in "Free Market God" first. I don't believe that will happen.
I enjoyed the heat. The comments made are on point, and this is pretty much what my standard response to reactionary trump dissidents
are. Trump is terrible, but so is what came before him, he is just easier to dislike.
Even with inadequate opposition, Trump has managed to be the most unpopular president after one year, ever. I'm guessing this
speaks to his unique talent of messing things up.
Wow! Paul! Babylon burning. Preach it, brother! Takes me back to my teenage years, Ramparts 1968, as another corrupt infrastructure
caught fire and burned down. TAC is amazing, the only place to find this in true form.
Either we are history remembering fossils soon gone, or the next financial crash – now inevitable with passage of tax reform
(redo of 2001- the rich got their money out, now full speed off the cliff), will bring down this whole mass of absolute corruption.
What do you think will happen when Trump is faced with a true crisis? They're selling off the floorboards. What can remain standing?
And elsewhere in the world, who, in their right mind, would help us? Good riddance to truly dangerous pathology. The world
would truly become safer with the USA decommissioned, and then restored, through honest travail, to humility, and humanity.
You are right. Be with small town, front porch, family and neighborhood goodness, and dodge the crashing embers.
The Flying Burrito Brothers: 'On the thirty-first floor a gold plated door
Won't keep out the Lord's burning rain '
The depressing thing to me is how hard it is to get people to see this. You have people who still think Trump is doing a great
job and on the other side people who admire the warmongering Resistance and think Hillary's vast experience in foreign policy
was one of her strengths, rather than one of the main reasons to be disgusted by her. Between the two categories I think you have
the majority of American voters.
"... What kind of a moron would believe the Steele dossier on Trump and Russia? Lots of Democrat and hollywood elite morons and lots of morons at MSNBC and CNN. It's so transparently partisan, outrageous and full of fictitious claims, the dossier reads like a parody of a badly written spy novel. ..."
"... It is funny to watch how they are divided (republicans and democrats) on domestic issues but they are as one on aggressive and militaristic foreign policies. Bomb, invade, bomb... rinse and repeat. No objection from either side. ..."
"... Watch Jerome Corsi and James Kalstrom great video's about all the felony crimes Barry's DNC/DOJ/FBI were involved in including the dossier. ..."
"... to deflect the Seth Rich /WikiLeaks affair...and the Keystone Kops have been tripping all over as well as tripping up themselves ever since trying to "make it happen"...and if it was not for almost the "entire" mainstream media 'covering' for them many more people would actually realize that they are the biggest 'comedy' in town... ..."
What kind of a moron would believe the Steele dossier on Trump and Russia? Lots of Democrat
and hollywood elite morons and lots of morons at MSNBC and CNN. It's so transparently partisan, outrageous and full of fictitious claims, the dossier reads
like a parody of a badly written spy novel.
Amazingly, the dossier is what the FBI used to justify spying on American citizens.
Tucker Carlson easily debunks the many claims that Democrats in Congress repeatedly cited as
reason to stop the normal functioning of government, so that millions of tax payer dollars can
be spent trying to figure out if Trump has been a Russian spy for the last 10 years.
It is funny to watch how they are divided (republicans and democrats) on domestic issues
but they are as one on aggressive and militaristic foreign policies. Bomb, invade, bomb...
rinse and repeat. No objection from either side.
No need to convince me Tucker...have been calling them morons with regards to "Putin did
it" since the ex "moron in chief"...who by the way is now a certified fifth columnist with
the blessing of the treasonous mainstream media...insinuated as much after the "loser"
lost....to deflect the Seth Rich /WikiLeaks affair...and the Keystone Kops have been tripping
all over as well as tripping up themselves ever since trying to "make it happen"...and if it
was not for almost the "entire" mainstream media 'covering' for them many more people would
actually realize that they are the biggest 'comedy' in town...
The oligarchy's desire to turn the clock back to 'the good old days' knows no
bounds -- they want it all and they want it know; they're absolute ideal state
for all us ordinary types would be a return to feudalism, so I guess bringing back slavery,
all be it with a shiny new coat of point, is pretty much to be expected...
Once upon a time many, many years ago in the land of Anywhere, in a world long since
forgotten, there was, at one time, a kind of Golden Age. It was not, it has to be said, an
age that was Perfect but it was agreed by almost all that it was an age that was much, much
better than That Which Had Gone Before. That time is best described by quoting from a
well-known article historical document contemporaneous to the period
' after Generations Of Struggle against Social Injustice and two Catastrophic And
Immensely Bloody Wars with the nearby land of Anotherplace, in which the Ordinary Folk had
died and suffered to a catastrophic degree, it was decided by all except the Rapaciously Rich
that Things Had To Change.
From that point on, Ordinary Folk were given access to Free Education, Free Healthcare,
Pensions, Benefits to help those who fell upon Hard Times and all the advantages of what you
would know in your world as a Welfare System. New taxes were introduced to redistribute some
of the vast sums of money accumulated (mostly from Stealing, Cheating and Aggressive Tax
Avoidance) by the Wealthy and the Aristocracy (known in the land of Anywhere as The Greedy
One Percent) over the years and Political Reforms introduced to break their stranglehold over
the Political And Economic Life of the country. Additionally, the Right to Vote was given to
all.
And the land of Anywhere blossomed, for it was found that a populace Free From Hunger And
Illness, that was properly Educated and Cared For, produced huge numbers of Talented men and
women who previously had Languished due to Poverty And Lack of Opportunity. These Talented
men and women drove the land of Anywhere to new heights of success, founding businesses,
employing people, making a mark in the worlds of politics, science, medicine and culture.
Slowly but surely, the Dead Grip of The Greedy One Percent, who had dominated and controlled
the land of Anywhere for as long as anyone could remember, was broken.'
And the psychopathic Greedy One Percent, the Devil's Children, hated this new world, this
New Bargain and Better Society, and all it stood for. They vowed to destroy it
Trump lost in large cities.
May lost in major cities, the Anti-Brexit folks won instead.
The globalists have their tight grip on virtually every major city in the world.
They want megacities, logistic cities etc. in the world.
The globalists have had enough with America. (Trump wasn't happy so he wants to make it
great again) The globalists made their money through capitalism, now they need Bitnation,
blockchain (as a state, govt, you can no longer own citizens and print money because they'll be
the citizens of Bitnation and they'll mine their own money) there will be home-made gold soon,
they want middlemen eliminated, they sell you products without owning any stores (Amazon,
Alibaba) they can transport you a-b without owning any vehicles (Uber) they control the media
without employing any correspondents (facebook, youtube, twitter, instagram etc.) they don't
need any banknotes (Trump=dollar), they want AI, they want Human 2.0, (first one was created by
God and the new one will be fathered by the globalists) they want transhumanism, IOT, they want
robots and female/male robots and marriage with robots, they want to produce economy and
technology but they are not interested in the hearts and minds of the human beings, when you
are thirsty they'll give you filtered seawater, hungry? they'll give you GMO food, the Chinese
had sweatshops but now they have workshops manufacturing electronics, nothing has changed for
them really, now they have 1 belt 1 road via logistic cities, trains to Tibilisi, then to the
world's largest airport in Istanbul, people need peace and tranquility but the globalists have
sold you the idea of 'happiness', they want LGBT, children with 2-3 mothers, Trump hates
Obama's toilets, they want covert ops and proxies (Katie Perry has 60 million followers mostly
fake and why is that? Because she's rigged for a future suicide bombing case, she'll say "I
have seen a UFO" or "I made millions out of BTC" or whatever role is assigned to her) but Trump
is conventional, he wants the US armed forces mobilized and wants them to face the country
A-B-C straightforward like in the olden days, he has the soldiers and oil barons with him, a
war cabinet... And the story goes on and on...
We are in 21st century.
Trump = Guns+Oil, KKK, Evangelists (Zionist Christians)...
The real America however belongs to = Finance capital + Technology = Globalists
We have to take all those above to see what's going on around us.
"... Things "should" be made locally. There's no reason, especially with declining energy resources, that a toaster should be shipped from thousands of miles away by boat, plane, truck, rail. That's simply ridiculous, never mind causing a ton of extra pollution. We end up working at McDonald's or Target, but, yay, we just saved $5.00 on our toaster. ..."
"... I don't know how you know about the so-called safety net. I know because I had to use it while undergoing treatment for 2 types of stage 4 breast cancer the past 4 years. It is NOT what people think. It beats the already vulnerable into the ground -- -- this is not placating -- -- it is psychological breaking of human minds until they submit. The paperwork is like undergoing a tax audit -- - every 6 months. "Technicians" decide one's "benefits" which vary between "technicians". ..."
"... Food stamps can be $195 during one period and then $35 the next. The technicians/system takes no responsibility for the chaos and stress they bring into their victims' lives. It is literally crazy making. BTW: I am white, a member of Phi Beta Kappa, have a masters' degree, formerly owned my own business and while married lived within the top 10%. ..."
"... In addition, most of those on so-called social programs are children, the elderly, chronically ill, veterans. You are correct that the middle class is falling into poverty but you are not understanding what poverty actually looks like when the gov holds out its beneficial hand. It is nothing short of cruelty. ..."
Yes, but increasingly there is no "working class" in America due to outsourcing and automation.
I hear that Trump wants to reverse all of that and put children to work in forward-to-the-past factories (versus
back-to-the-future) and mines working 12 hours a day 7 days a week as part of his Make America Great Again initiative.
With all the deregulation, I can't wait to start smoking on airplanes again. Those were great times. Flying bombs with
fifty or more lit fuses in the form of a cigarette you can smoke. The good old days.
backwardsevolution , February 5, 2018 at 5:50 pm
Cold N. Holefield -- it's like Ross Perot said re NAFTA and globalization: "When the rest
of the world's wages go up to $6.00/hour and our's come down to $6.00/hour, globalization
will end." That's what's happening, isn't it? Our wages are being held down, due in large
part to low-skilled labor and H-1B's flooding into the country, and wages in Asia are rising.
I remember Ross Perot standing right beside Bill Clinton when he said this, and I also
remember the sly smile on Bill Clinton's face. He knew.
Our technology was handed to China on a silver platter by the greedy U.S. multinationals,
technology that was developed by Western universities and taxpayer dollars, technology that
would have taken decades for China to develop on their own.
Trump is trying desperately to bring some of these jobs back. That's why he handed them
huge corporate tax breaks and cut some regulations.
Things "should" be made locally. There's no reason, especially with declining energy
resources, that a toaster should be shipped from thousands of miles away by boat, plane,
truck, rail. That's simply ridiculous, never mind causing a ton of extra pollution. We end up
working at McDonald's or Target, but, yay, we just saved $5.00 on our toaster.
Trump is trying to cut back on immigration so that wages can increase, but the Left want
to save the whole world, doing themselves in in the process. He wants to bring people in with
skills the country can benefit from, but for that he's tarred and feathered.
P.S. I remember sitting behind a drunk on a long flight, and I saw him drop his cigarette.
It rolled past me like it knew where it was going, and I couldn't find it. I called the
stewardess, and she and I searched for a few anxious seconds until we found it. Yes, the good
old days.
I don't know how you know about the so-called safety net. I know because I had to use it
while undergoing treatment for 2 types of stage 4 breast cancer the past 4 years. It is NOT
what people think. It beats the already vulnerable into the ground -- -- this is not
placating -- -- it is psychological breaking of human minds until they submit. The paperwork
is like undergoing a tax audit -- - every 6 months. "Technicians" decide one's "benefits"
which vary between "technicians".
Food stamps can be $195 during one period and then $35 the
next. The technicians/system takes no responsibility for the chaos and stress they bring into
their victims' lives. It is literally crazy making. BTW: I am white, a member of Phi Beta
Kappa, have a masters' degree, formerly owned my own business and while married lived within
the top 10%.
In addition, most of those on so-called social programs are children, the
elderly, chronically ill, veterans. You are correct that the middle class is falling into
poverty but you are not understanding what poverty actually looks like when the gov holds out
its beneficial hand. It is nothing short of cruelty.
backwardsevolution , February 6, 2018 at 4:48 pm
Diana Lee -- I hope you are well now. It breaks my heart what you went through. No, I
cannot imagine.
I didn't mean the lower class were living "well" on food stamps and welfare. All I meant
was that it helped, and without it all hell would break loose. If you lived in the top 10% at
one point, then you would surely notice a difference, but for many who have been raised in
this environment, they don't notice at all. It becomes a way of life. And, yes, you are
right, it is cruelty. A loss of life.
Due to automation, offshoring and transnational communications/internet, the elitists no
longer need a large domestic underclass of undocumented workers to artificially lower wages.
That is likely the reason that every Administration since Slick Willy have sought to reduce
illegal immigration.
After all, it was the Obama Administration that deported more undocumented immigrants than
any other in history, and it was in those years after the 2008 economic crash that saw net
migration from Mexico hit zero, or even negative numbers.
What the MSM is telling us is that the Trump Administration is more draconian in carrying
out practices that have been US policy for decades. That might even be true.
backwardsevolution , February 6, 2018 at 6:53 pm
Daniel -- " the elitists no longer need a large domestic underclass of undocumented
workers to artificially lower wages."
Oh, sure, that's why corporations and the Chambers of Commerce are fighting so hard to
keep chain migration, legal and illegal immigration numbers up! Because they don't need them.
Yeah, right.
And technology companies are clamoring for more H-1B's so they can pay them less.
Come on, Daniel.
Daniel , February 7, 2018 at 12:22 am
backward,
Please provide evidence that the "Chambers of Commerce are fighting so hard.." Please try to
keep your rebuttal to my statement that "elitists no longer need a large domestic underclass
of undocumented workers" and not various forms of legal migration. Because I do agree that
there is a market for "skilled labor" who are legal. Part off the reason for this labor
market is the drop in STEM-educated USAmericans.
I'm afraid the population has been so thoroughly incapacitated via a Dumbing Down
Education System coupled with 24/7 Media Misinformation and the Stultifying Effects of Social
Media that there will be no Revolution. Instead, it looks like it will be a steady
capitulation and acquiescence of personal sovereignty all the way to the Gas Chambers and no
doubt when or if that time comes, there will be an a nifty Application from Silicon Valley to
guide you through your Final Processing.
backwardsevolution , February 5, 2018 at 5:18 pm
Cold N. Holefield -- a "Dumbing Down Education System", but also lots of benefits on the
lower end: food stamps, disability, subsidized housing, free cell phones, etc. If these
things were removed (no, I'm not saying they should be), things would be completely
different. There'd be a riot in a fortnight.
If your stomach is empty, it doesn't really matter how dumbed down you've become, you are
going to feel fear and react. That's why they keep the lower end placated.
It is the middle class who is slipping down into the lower class, and these are the people
who are getting angry and fearful, mainly for their children. Those people have actually lost
something.
Concerning the discussion on "globalism" - and please excuse me if I've missed prior
discussion, I wasn't following that point back in the last thread - this word as used today
essentially is referring to neoliberal economic policies, which are the handmaiden of neocon
"war & plunder" policies. Both doctrines walk hand in hand. The so-called "free trade
agreements" remove barriers not so much against free trade as against corporate regulation -
this is the whole point of them. The TPP agreement that Trump withdrew from was the most vile
such agreement ever yet proposed.
"Globalism", so called, is the opening of doors in target nations to predatory capitalism,
disaster capitalism, the economic part of the John Perkins playbook. As corporatism gains
strength in a nation, fascism as Mussolini defined it (i.e. as corporatism) becomes the
reality. Maybe the word meant something good once, I don't know. But it stands for everything
bad now.
@ Grieved
Globalism is also blogs like this.
Globalism has been turned into a dirty word as it has been used, same as colour revolutions
ect, but I suspect it will also help bring down corporate globalism.
For me, in the latter part of my life, it has brought great interest for cultures and people
that are different to my own upbringing.
@21 Nationalism is seen as narrow, regressive and responsible for conflict. It's only
acceptable at sporting events. (Turks and Kurds haven't got the message yet.) Globalism is
seen as progressive. One world government is supposed to bring peace and prosperity to all.
Of course there are all kinds of racial and religious contradictions but the basic choice is
looking backwards or forwards.
Nationalism, globalism, sovereignty.
There is a word missing. Sovereignty does not seem to cover it but is the closest I can
find.
This is the wikipedia definition of sovereignty.. "Sovereignty is the full right and power
of a governing body over itself, without any interference from outside sources or bodies. In
political theory, sovereignty is a substantive term designating supreme authority over some
polity.[1] It is a basic principle underlying the dominant Westphalian model of state
foundation."
Also similar to nationalism.
What is the correct word or term for full sovereignty plus respect for other countries and
cultures?
globalisation - the information highway (apart from road blocks) - a place where a shitkicker
from the mad monks anglosphere (oz) can converse or argue with people from all round the
world.
"Well, with regard to Germany, the EU project was the longest period of peace for the last
200 years. Same for France." somebody writes.
France and Germany have both been at war several times since the EU came into being. Of
course being US satraps, under NATO, they haven't fought each other.
As to Germany its existence, as a state, begins in 1870 and, in the past 150 years has
gone through several revolutionary changes, such as Anschluss, the Allied Occupation regime
and the Bundesrepublik-Democratic Republic interlude.
And then there are the border changes which, over the period are dramatic.
The point is that this cant apology for the EU is cheap and demagogic.
Any defence of the EU has to begin with a justification of its two cardinal objects: Wall St
forged neoliberalism and Pentagon directed policies designed to advance US geo-strategy
Seems like a discussion on semantics - rocky ground.
Putin once set up two words to explain a thing. He said that patriotism was love of one's
country. Nationalism was hatred of other countries. Great set of concepts, but there's no
real consensus of the meaning of those two words, in any group of people you could assemble
at random.
Important to agree on concepts and be wary of words when they're not solidly established
in a broad and functional consensus.
My apologies. I thought "globalism" as I described it was commonly held ground, but it's
not. I respectfully withdraw from the discussion, leaving disaster capitalism as the great
enemy, and global fraternity and exchange as the great friend of the ordinary people of the
whole world.
The words for all this I leave to others to establish. My apologies again for butting
in.
@30 Nothing to apologize for Grieved. The term 'globalism' means different things to
different people. Some see is as paradise on earth ....some see it as a subtle form of
hegemony.
@33 So many of the terms we use today are profoundly affected by the dilemma that Nietzsche
described in his statement (I paraphrase): 'God is dead, we have killed him. And no amount of
water can wash the blood from our hands'
This was not a statement of triumph, rather of despair. In the loss of the divine as the
source of morality, Nietzsche anticipated that people would invest that authority in other
structures - including the state (Nazi-ism, Marxism), the military, economics ('free-market'
capitalism) etc.
The loyalists in each of those 'causes' would see all their associated terms positively,
just like all adherents of religious systems. Those outside, or those who suffered abuse at
their hands, see those terms quite differently.
So Nationalism can be positive (as in pride in the legitimate achievements of your
country) or negative (where the people ascribe to the state/nation/race the right to define
what is morally right) where the nation has God-like authority to remove from whole classes
of people all their rights - even the right to life.
Wikipedia (under types of government) slices and dices your options when it comes to
political terms for the ruling elite. Two stand out to me, with the second suffering from an
unrecognisable name:
Plutocracy: Rule by the wealthy; a system wherein governance is indebted to, dependent
upon or heavily influenced by the desires of the rich
Ochlocracy: Rule by the crowd; a system of governance where mob rule is government by mob
or a mass of people, or the intimidation of legitimate authorities. As a pejorative for
majoritarianism, it is akin to the Latin phrase mobile vulgus meaning "the fickle crowd",
from which the English term "mob" was originally derived in the 1680s. Ochlocratic
governments are often a democracy spoiled by demagoguery, "tyranny of the majority" and the
rule of passion over reason; such governments can be as oppressive as autocratic tyrants.
Ochlocracy is synonymous in meaning and usage to the modern, informal term "mobocracy".
Personally, when it comes to describing the state of affairs in the empire, I lean toward
a despotic corporatism as being the best description. Others may prefer militarism over
corporatism, but when the two forces (the corporate and the military) unify you get
fascism.
Again, this is just how I, at this time, understand it.
Liberal democracy is not democratic. Let us stop lying, and dispense with the false
narrative that granting anyone a term of office in which they can steal from the commons and
not be immediately fired or even killed is anything remotely "cratic". It's feudalism, plain
and simple, and those who defend it are typically of a class long known to be
problematic.
i think the big challenge for the world is letting economics trump the environment...
until that changes, we're in trouble.. maybe it doesn't have to be an either/or thing... i do
think corporate power and the various trade deals (tpp - canada has bought into this with
mexico, so tpp is still happening, although the usa is not presently a part of it) are mostly
about ignoring local or national laws or trying to over-ride them so that corporations can
have all the power.. les7 calls something like this "despotic corporatism", but i mostly
think of it as just plain corporatism.. it is all despotic...
well, i feel the same way about the accumulation of ridiculous amounts of wealth in the
hands of a few as well.. how can this happen when people are struggling to survive on the
planet? do these people have no sense of shame? apparently not! they go about their business
accruing wealth oblivious to the pain and suffering they are directly, or indirectly
inflicting on others.. then there are those types who realize what they have done and try to
make amends by changing their ways and staring foundations - gates foundation and etc. etc...
to me, why not just not fuck people over, instead of thinking you have to trample on others
to get ahead and that the universe can only be seen as a dog eat dog universe? well, i can't
change others, i can only change myself and do what i feel good about and can live with..
thanks for the conversation..
@ 42 john gilberts.. canada continues to go down the wrong road, being sucked into the
made in the us bs.. freeland is a warmonger, with undisclosed financial support from soros to
continue the war on russia and etc. etc.. i can't believe we are that stupid to have such a
women is such a prominent role here in canada... anyone would be better..
Needless to say that there is only one me and I am grateful that b has deleted the fake ones.
Although it is known in car design that plagiarism is a form of admiration, in
my case it was the cheap attempt to soil my name. Ironically, the only people that believe
that they could succeed with this kind of gas lighting have an IQ that is surpassed by
the
shoe size of their little feet.
Allow me to contribute in regards to Nationalism. Having been born in a country that was
once ruled by a "National Socialist" party, I needed to find out more about what had caused
Nationalism to go rogue and destroy the Nation it emanated from.
Stories by family members did provide some answers, but we're insufficient at best, since
no one had seen it coming this way.
Then I discovered the lecture by J. Krishnamurti about Nationalism. My own parents were
toddlers when Krishnamurti spoke about Nationalism in Argentina in 1935.
The time spent listening to this speech was the best spent time ever in regards to finding
answers. While I have the speech on my computer, I will link here to the Krishnamurti
repository where all of his speeches can be found.
In an extremely ironic and the saddest way, his words about Nationalism were absolutely
prophetic. The transition from 'National Identity' to deadly Nationalism is fleeting.
Humanity has not been able to overcome Nationalism and struggles with the concept of
'sovereignty', as it appears to be dependent on Nationalism and not National identity.
Imo, sovereignty can only arise from Interdependence. The acknowledgement of
Interdependence at the root of sovereignty will allow for a National identity, that would not
resort to Nationalism and its cancerous degeneration into a murderous, inhumane tragedy.
"... We support free trade, but it needs to be fair," he chided. "It needs to be fair and it needs to be reciprocal." He went on to announce his support for "mutually beneficial, bilateral trade agreements with all countries, ..."
The president tries to sell business tycoons and world leaders on his "America First" policy
and sounds like a small-town mayor wooing Walmart to open a store in his community.
... ... ...
"I'm here to represent the interests of the American people," he began, ignoring the fact
that the majority of the American people don't want him representing their interests. "America
hopes for a future in which everyone can prosper," he said, describing the American dream as "a
great job, a safe home and a better life for their children." All true, but right now there are
also plenty of Americans dreaming of a president who won't embarrass them.
... ... ...
Trump naturally brought his patented "America First" routine to the august gathering, but he
was less belligerent about it than usual, almost conciliatory. "As president of the United
States I will always put America first," he said. "But America first does not mean America
alone," he added, as the audience of business tycoons and international leaders breathed a sigh
of relief. Of course, Trump wasn't yet done rebuking them. " We support free trade, but it
needs to be fair," he chided. "It needs to be fair and it needs to be reciprocal." He went on
to announce his support for "mutually beneficial, bilateral trade agreements with all
countries, " even hinting at rejoining TPP. That Donald, he's such a tease.
Bannon backed candidate later lost. So much for this Bannon "success".
This idea of Trump playing 6 dimensional chess is a joke. It's the same explanation that was pushed for Obama disastrous neocon
foreign policy. Here is one very apt quote: "What Trump has done are disasters, and equates to treason. Selling billions of dollars
of weapons the our enemies the terrorists/Saudis, killing innocent people in Syria, and Yemen, sending more troops to
Afghanistan..." What 6-dimetional chess?
According to Occam razor principle the simplest explanation of Trump behaviour is probably the most correct. He does not control
foright policy, outsourcing it to "generals" and be does not pursue domestic policy of creating jobs as he promised his
electorate. In other words, both in foreign policy and domestic policy, he became a turncoat,
betraying his electorate, much like Obama. kind of Republican Obama.
And as time goes by, Trump looks more and more like Hillary II or Republican Obama. So he might have problems with the candidates he supports
in midterm elections. His isolationism, if it ever existed, is gone. Promise of jobs is gone. Detente with Russia is gone.
What's left?
Note the level disappointment of what used to be Trump base in this site comment section...
Notable quotes:
"... In a serious rebuke for President Trump (and perhaps moreso for Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell), ousted judge and alt-right favorite Roy Moore has won the Alabama Republican Primary by a landslide ..."
"... The Steve Bannon-backed candidate, who defied court orders to remove the Ten Commandments from his courtroom and refused to recognize gay marriage after the Supreme Court's June 2015 ruling legalizing same-sex marriage, is leading by 9.6 points with 92% of the votes counted... ..."
"... These attacks on Bannon were one of the most prominent news stories in the first week following Trump's election victory. It didn't take long, however, for a counter-attack to emerge - from the right-wing elements of the Jewish community. ..."
"... Bannon is a true fucking patriot trying to pull this once great country from the sinkhole. ..."
"... I think the reality is that this was a message to McConnell much more than Trump. That message is simple: I'm coming to kill your career. Bannon went out of his way to say he fully supports Trump (despite backing the opposite candidate). And, let's face it, if Bannon buries McConnell, he's doing everyone a service, Trump included. ..."
"... The echo chamber media "is so surprised" that in Germany and the US we are seeing a rising tide of pissed off people, well imagine fucking that? Leaving the echo chamber and not intellectually trying to understand the anger, but living the anger. ..."
"... Well, we can only hope that Trump gets the message. He was elected to be President of the USA, not Emperor of the World. Quote from that Monty Python film: "He's not the Messiah; he's a very naughty boy!" ..."
"... A cursory background reading on Roy Moore tells me that he is one of the worst types for public office. And he might just turn out to be like Trump -- act like an anti-swarm cowboy and promise a path to heaven, then show his real colors as an Establishment puppet once the braindead voters put him in office. ..."
"... When Trump won the Republican nomination, and then the Presidency it was because people were rebelling against the establishment rulers. There is considerable disgust with these big government rulers that are working for themselves and their corporate cronies, but not for the US population. ..."
"... Trump seems to have been compromised at this point, and his support of the establishment favourite, Luther Strange is evidence that he isn't really the outsider he claimed to be. Moore's victory in Alabama says the rebellion still has wheels, so there is some hope. ..."
"... In Missouri where I live, the anti-establishment Republican contender for the upcoming US Senatorial 2018 race is Austin Peterson. It will be interesting to see how he, and his counterparts in other states do in the primaries. Both of the current Missouri Senators are worthless. ..."
"... I remember well the last "3-Dimensional Chess master" Obama while he too was always out maneuvering his apponents, per the media reports... ..."
"... Every now and then Trump tends to make huge blunders, and sometimes betrayals without knowing what he is doing. "Champions"- (great leaders) do not do that. ..."
"... What Trump has done are disasters, and equates to treason. Selling billions of dollars of weapons the our enemies the terrorists/Saudis, killing innocent people in Syria, and Yemen, sending more troops to Afghanistan... ..."
"... It is epitome of self-delusion to see people twisting themselves into pretzels, trying to justify/rationalize Trump's continuing display of disloyalty to America ..."
"... YOU CAN'T BE A ZIONIST AND AN AMERICAN FIRSTER, IT IS ONE OR THE OTHER. ..."
Congratulations to Roy Moore on his Republican Primary win in Alabama. Luther Strange started way back & ran a good race. Roy,
WIN in Dec!
In a serious rebuke for President Trump (and perhaps moreso for Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell), ousted judge and
alt-right favorite Roy Moore has won the Alabama Republican Primary by a landslide
The Steve Bannon-backed candidate, who defied court orders to remove the Ten Commandments from his courtroom and refused to
recognize gay marriage after the Supreme Court's June 2015 ruling legalizing same-sex marriage, is leading by 9.6 points with 92%
of the votes counted...
... ... ...
However, as Politco
reported this evening, President Donald Trump began distancing himself from a Luther Strange loss before ballots were even cast,
telling conservative activists Monday night the candidate he's backing in Alabama's GOP Senate primary was likely to lose ! and suggesting
he'd done everything he could do given the circumstances.
Trump told conservative activists who visited the White House for dinner on Monday night that he'd underestimated the political
power of Roy Moore, the firebrand populist and former judge who's supported by Trump's former chief strategist Steve Bannon, according
to three people who were there.
And Trump gave a less-than full-throated endorsement during Friday's rally.
While he called Strange "a real fighter and a real good guy," he also mused on stage about whether he made a "mistake" by backing
Strange and committed to campaign "like hell" for Moore if he won.
Trump was encouraged to pick Strange before the August primary by son-in-law and adviser Jared Kushner as well as other aides,
White House officials said. He was never going to endorse Alabama Republican Rep. Mo Brooks, who has at times opposed Trump's agenda,
and knew little about Moore, officials said.
... ... ...
Déjŕ view -> Sanity Bear •Sep 26, 2017 11:19 PM
AIPAC HAS ALL BASES COVERED...MIGA !
On Sept. 11, the Alabama Daughters for Zion organization circulated a statement on Israel by Moore, which started by saying
the U.S. and Israel "share not only a common Biblical heritage but also institutions of representative government and respect
for religious freedom." He traced Israel's origin to God's promise to Abram and the 1948 creation of modern Israel as "a fulfillment
of the Scriptures that foretold the regathering of the Jewish people to Israel."
Moore's statement includes five policy positions, including support for U.S. military assistance to Israel, protecting Israel
from "Iranian aggression," opposing boycotts of Israel, supporting Israel at the United Nations, and supporting direct Israeli-Palestinian
negotiations without outside pressure. He added, "as long as Hamas and the Palestinian Authority wrongly refuse to recognize Israel's
right to exist, such negotiations have scant chance of success."
While those views would give Moore common ground with much of the Jewish community regarding Israel, most of the state's Jewish
community has been at odds with Moore over church-state issues, such as his displays of the Ten Commandments in courthouses, and
his outspoken stance against homosexuality, both of which led to him being ousted as chief justice.
moore misreads the Bible as most socalled christians do. they have been deceived, they have confused the Israel of God( those
who have been given belief in Christ) with israel of the flesh. They cant hear Christs own words, woe is unto them. they are living
in their own selfrighteousness, not good. they are going to have a big surprise for not following the Word of God instead following
the tradition of men.
They were warned over and over in the Bible but they cant hear.
I Claudius -> VinceFostersGhost •Sep 27, 2017 6:27 AM
Forgive? Maybe. Forget? NEVER!! He tried to sell "US" out on this one. We now need to focus on bringing "Moore" candidates
to the podium to run against the RINO's and take out McConnell and Ryan. It's time for Jared and Ivanka to go back to NYC so Jared
can shore up his family's failing empire. However, if his business acumen is as accurate as his political then it's no wonder
the family needed taxpayer funded visas to sell the property. Then on to ridding the White House of Gen Kelly and McMaster - two
holdover generals from the Obama administration - after Obama forced out the real ones.
Clashfan -> Mycroft Holmes IV •Sep 26, 2017 11:33 PM
Rump has hoodwinked his supoprt base and turned on them almost immediately. Some refuse to acknowledge this.
These attacks on Bannon were one of the most prominent news stories in the first week following Trump's election victory.
It didn't take long, however, for a counter-attack to emerge - from the right-wing elements of the Jewish community. The
Zionist Organization of America (ZOA) came to Bannon's defense and accused the ADL of a "character assassination" against Bannon.
The Wizard -> Oh regional Indian •Sep 26, 2017 10:12 PM
Trump should figure out the Deep State elites he has surrounded himself with, don't have control of the states Trump won. Trump
thought he had to negotiate with these guys and his ego got the best of him. Bannon was trying to convince him he should have
stayed the course and not give in.
~"American politics gets moore strange by the day..."~
Technically speaking OhRI, with Moore's win politics became less Strange, or "Strange less", or "Sans Luther", depending on
how one chose to phrase it [SMIRK]
Adullam -> Gaius Frakkin' Baltar •Sep 26, 2017 11:05 PM
Trump needs to fire Jared! Some news outlets are saying that it was his son in law who advised him to back Strange. He has
to quit listening to those who want to destroy him or ... they will.
overbet -> Killtruck •Sep 26, 2017 9:41 PM
Bannon is a true fucking patriot trying to pull this once great country from the sinkhole.
Juggernaut x2 -> overbet •Sep 26, 2017 10:07 PM
Trump better pull his head out of his ass and quit being a wishy-washy populist on BS like Iran- the farther right he goes
the greater his odds of reelection because he has pissed off a lot of the far-righters that put him in- getting rid of Kushner,
Cohn and his daughter and negotiating w/Assad and distancing us from Israhell would be a huge help.
The whole Russiagate ploy was a diversion from (((them)))
NoDebt -> Killtruck •Sep 26, 2017 9:42 PM
I think the reality is that this was a message to McConnell much more than Trump. That message is simple: I'm coming to
kill your career. Bannon went out of his way to say he fully supports Trump (despite backing the opposite candidate). And, let's
face it, if Bannon buries McConnell, he's doing everyone a service, Trump included.
Oldwood -> NoDebt •Sep 26, 2017 10:08 PM
I think it was a setup.
Bannon would not oppose Trump that directly unless there was a wink and a nod involved.
Trump is still walking a tightrope, trying to appease his base AND keep as many establishment republicans at his side (even
for only optics). By Trump supporting Strange while knowing he was an underdog AND completely apposed by Bannon/his base he was
able to LOOK like he was supporting the establishment, while NOT really. Trump seldom backs losers which makes me think it was
deliberate. Strange never made sense anyway.
But what do I know?
Urahara -> NoDebt •Sep 27, 2017 12:20 AM
Bannon is hardcore Isreal first. Why are you supporting the zionist? It's an obvious play.
general ambivalent -> Urahara •Sep 27, 2017 2:23 AM
People are desperate to rationalise their failure into a victory. They cannot give up on Hope so they have to use hyperbole
in everything and pretend this is all leading to something great in 2020 or 2024.
None of these fools learned a damn thing and they are desperate to make the same mistake again. The swamp is full, so full
that it has breached the banks and taken over all of society. Trump is a swamp monster, and you simply cannot reform the swamp
when both sides are monsters. In other words, the inside is not an option, so it has to be done the hard way. But people would
prefer to keep voting in the swamp.
Al Gophilia -> NoDebt •Sep 27, 2017 3:58 AM
Bannon as president would really have those swamp creatures squirming. There wouldn't be this Trump crap about surrounding
himself with likeminded friends, such as Goldman Sachs turnstile workers and his good pals in the MIC.
Don't tell me he didn't choose them because if he didn't, then they were placed. That means he doesn't have the clout he pretends
to have or control of the agenda that the people asked him to deliver. His backing of Stange is telling.
Bobbyrib -> LindseyNarratesWordress •Sep 27, 2017 5:38 AM
He will not fire Kushner or Ivanka who have become part of the swamp. I'm so sick of these 'Trump is a genius and planned this
all along.'
To me Trump is a Mr. Bean type character that has been very fortunate and just goes with the flow. He has nearly no diplomacy,
or strategic skills.
NoWayJose •Sep 26, 2017 10:35 PM
Dear President Trump - if you like your job, listen to these voters. Borders, Walls, limited immigrants (including all those
that Ryan and McConnell are sneaking through under your very nose), trade agreements to keep American jobs, and respect for our
flag, our country, and the unborn!
I had hope for Trump, but as someone who reads ZH often, and does not suffer from amnesia (like much of America), I knew he
was way too good to be true.
We all know his back tracking, his flip flops...and while the media and many paid bloggers like to spin it as "not his fault",
it actually is.
His sending DACA to Congress was the last straw. Obama enacted DACA with a stroke of his pen, but Trump "needed to send it
to Congress so they could "get it right". The only thing Congress does with immigration is try and get amnesty passed.
Of course while Trump sends DACA to Congress, he does not mind using the military without Congress, which he actually should
do.
Why is it when it's something American's want, it has to go through the "correct channels", but when its something the Zionists
want, he does it with the wave of his pen? We saw the same bull shit games with Obama...
Dilluminati •Sep 26, 2017 11:02 PM
Anybody surprised by this is pretending the civility at the workplace isn't masking anger at corporate America and Government.
I'll go in and put in the 8 hours, I'm an adult that is part of the job. However I'm actually fed up with allot of the stupid
shit and want the establishment to work, problem is that we are witnessing failed nations, failed schools, failed healthcare,
even failed employment contracts, conditions, and wages.
The echo chamber media "is so surprised" that in Germany and the US we are seeing a rising tide of pissed off people, well
imagine fucking that? Leaving the echo chamber and not intellectually trying to understand the anger, but living the anger.
You haven't seen anything yet in Catalonia/Spain etc, Brexit, or so..
This is what failure looks like: That moment the Romanovs and Louis XVI looked around the room seeking an understanding eye,
there was none.
Pascal1967 •Sep 26, 2017 11:19 PM
Dear Trump:
Quit listening to your moron son-in-law, swamp creature, Goldman Sachs douchebag son-in-law Kushner. HE SUCKS!! If you truly
had BALLS, you would FIRE his fucking ass. HE is The Swamp, He Is Nepotism! THE AMERICAN PEOPLE HATE HIM.
MAGA! LISTEN TO BANNON, DONALD.
DO NOT FUCK THIS UP!
ROY MOORE, 100%!!!!
You lost, Trump ... get your shit together before it is too late!
ElTerco •Sep 26, 2017 11:28 PM
Bannon was always the smarts behind the whole operation. Now we are just left with a complete idiot in office.
Also, unlike Trump, Bannon actually gives a shit about what happens to the American people rather than the American tax system.
At the end of the day, all Trump really cares about is himself.
samsara •Sep 26, 2017 11:25 PM
I think most people get it backwards about Trump and the Deplorables.
I believed in pulling troops a from all the war zones and Trump said he felt the same
I believed in Legal immigration, sending people back if here illegal especially if involved in crime, Trump said he felt the
same.
I believed in America first in negotiating treaties, Trump said he felt the same.
I didn't 'vote' for Trump per se, he was the proxy.
We didn't leave Him, He left us.
BarnacleBill •Sep 26, 2017 11:31 PM
Well, we can only hope that Trump gets the message. He was elected to be President of the USA, not Emperor of the World.
Quote from that Monty Python film: "He's not the Messiah; he's a very naughty boy!" It's high time he turned back to the
job he promised to do, and drain that swamp.
napper •Sep 26, 2017 11:47 PM
A cursory background reading on Roy Moore tells me that he is one of the worst types for public office. And he might just
turn out to be like Trump -- act like an anti-swarm cowboy and promise a path to heaven, then show his real colors as an Establishment
puppet once the braindead voters put him in office.
America is doomed from top (the swarm) to bottom (the brainless voters).
Sid Davis •Sep 27, 2017 1:40 AM
When Trump won the Republican nomination, and then the Presidency it was because people were rebelling against the establishment
rulers. There is considerable disgust with these big government rulers that are working for themselves and their corporate cronies,
but not for the US population.
Trump seems to have been compromised at this point, and his support of the establishment favourite, Luther Strange is evidence
that he isn't really the outsider he claimed to be. Moore's victory in Alabama says the rebellion still has wheels, so there is some hope.
In Missouri where I live, the anti-establishment Republican contender for the upcoming US Senatorial 2018 race is Austin Peterson.
It will be interesting to see how he, and his counterparts in other states do in the primaries. Both of the current Missouri Senators
are worthless.
nevertheless -> pfwed •Sep 27, 2017 7:33 AM
I remember well the last "3-Dimensional Chess master" Obama while he too was always out maneuvering his apponents, per the
media reports...
LoveTruth •Sep 27, 2017 2:56 AM
Every now and then Trump tends to make huge blunders, and sometimes betrayals without knowing what he is doing. "Champions"-
(great leaders) do not do that.
nevertheless -> LoveTruth •Sep 27, 2017 7:16 AM
What Trump has done are disasters, and equates to treason. Selling billions of dollars of weapons the our enemies the terrorists/Saudis,
killing innocent people in Syria, and Yemen, sending more troops to Afghanistan...
But most treasonous of all was his sending DACA to "get it right", really? Congress has only one goal with immigration, amnesty,
and Chump knows dam well they will send him legislation that will clearly or covertly grant amnesty for millions and millions
of illegals, dressed up as "security".
Obama enacted DACA with the stroke of a pen, and while TRUMP promised to end it, he did NOT. Why is it when it's something
Americans want, it has to be "Constitutional", but when it comes form his banker pals, like starting a war, he can do that unilaterally.
It is epitome of self-delusion to see people twisting themselves into pretzels, trying to justify/rationalize Trump's continuing
display of disloyalty to America, and loyalty to Zionism.
Trump should always have been seen as a likely Zionist shill. He comes form Jew York City, owes everything he is to Zionist
Jewish bankers, is a self proclaimed Zionist...
YOU CAN'T BE A ZIONIST AND AN AMERICAN FIRSTER, IT IS ONE OR THE OTHER.
Either Zero Hedge is over run with Zionist hasbara, giving cover to their boy Chump, or Americans on the "right" have become
as gullible as those who supported Obama on the "left".
"... By lan Cibils and Mariano Arana, Political Economy Department, Universidad Nacional de General Sarmiento, Buenos Aires, Argentina. Originally published at Triple Crisis ..."
"... desendeudamiento ..."
"... desendedudamiento ..."
"... Source: Ministry of Finance, Argentina. ..."
"... World Economic Outlook ..."
"... The grand history of Latin America: borrow billions of $$$ from U.S. banks, hand the money to the wealthy who immediately deposit it right back in American banks, and let the poor pay back the principal and interest. Hmmm . seems more and more the way this country is going. ..."
"... Brazil's recent neoliberal turn was frustrating for a variety of reasons, but being a big, diverse economy, they've got more sovereignty than their neighbors. However, the business and political elites in Brazil decided to hammer through austerity (spending cuts and interest rate hikes) because they WANTED to, not because external forces made them do it. ..."
Selling Out
Argentina's Future -- Again Posted on January 5, 2018 by
Yves Smith Yves
here. While you were busy watching Trump and the Middle East, and maybe Brexit and China once
in a while, some supposed neoliberal success stories are likely to be anything but that.
By lan Cibils and Mariano Arana, Political Economy Department, Universidad Nacional de
General Sarmiento, Buenos Aires, Argentina. Originally published at Triple Crisis
In Argentina's 2015 presidential run-off election, the neoliberal right-wing coalition
"Cambiemos" (literally, "lets change"), headed by Mauricio Macri, defeated the populist
Kirchnerista candidate by just two percentage points. Macri's triumph heralded a return to the
neoliberal policies of the 1990s and ended twelve years of heterodox economic policies that
prioritized income redistribution and the internal market. The ruling coalition also performed
well in the October 2017 mid-term elections and has since begun implementing a draconian set of
fiscal, labor, and social security reforms.
One of the hallmarks of the Cambiemos government so far has been a fast and furious return
to international credit markets and a very substantial increase in new public debt. Indeed,
since Macri came to power in 2015, Argentina has issued debt worth more than $100 billion. This
marks a clear contrast to the Kirchner administrations, during which the emphasis was debt
reduction.
The Kirchner Years: Debt Reduction?
Both Néstor and Cristina Kirchner pointed to desendeudamiento -- debt
reduction -- as one of the great successes of their administrations. To what extent was debt
reduced during the twelve years of Kirchnerismo?
Figure 1 shows the evolution of Argentina's public debt stock and the debt/GDP ratio between
2004-2017. One can see that there was a substantial reduction in the debt to GDP ratio between
2004-2011 -- the first two Kirchner terms -- due primarily to: a) the 2005 and 2010 debt
restructuring offers, b) a deliberate policy of desendedudamiento (debt cancellation),
and c) high growth rates. Indeed, debt/GDP dropped from 118.1% in 2004 to 38.9% in 2011. One
can also see that the actual stock of public debt fell after the 2005 debt restructuring
process, and then remained relatively stable until 2010. In 2011, it began a slow upward trend,
due to the re-appearance of the foreign exchange constraint once the commodity bubble burst and
capital flight increased.
Figure 1: Public Debt Stock (millions of dollars) and Debt/GDP ratio
Source: Ministry of Finance, Argentina.
An additional, fundamental change occurred during the first two Kirchner administrations:
the change in currency composition of Argentina's public debt. Indeed, as Figure 2 shows,
peso-denominated public debt reached 41% of total debt after the 2005 debt-restructuring
process. Between 2005 and 2012 it remained relatively stable, and then, after 2012,
dollar-denominated public debt began to grow again although never reaching pre-2005
debt-restructuring levels. The currency composition change is key, since it reduces
considerably the pressure on the external accounts.
Figure 2: Currency Composition of Argentina's Public Debt (as a % GDP)
Source: Ministry of Finance, Argentina.
Fast and Furious
Since Macri became president in December 2015, there has been a dramatic change in official
public debt strategy, radically reversing the process of debt reduction of the previous decade.
As shown in Figure 1, there was a substantial jump in the stock of public debt in 2016, and it
has continued to grow in 2017.The result to date has been a substantial increase in the stock
of Argentina's dollar-denominated public debt, as well as an increase of the debt service to
GDP ratio. New debt has been used to cover the trade deficit, pay off the vulture funds,
finance capital flight, and meet debt service payments. All of this has resulted in growing
concerns about Argentina's future economic sustainability, not to mention any possibility of
promoting economic development objectives.
Upon taking office, the Macri Administration rapidly implemented a series of policies to
liberalize financial flows and imports, and a 40% devaluation of the Argentine peso. [1] In
this context, it also went on a debt rampage, increasing dollar denominated debt considerably.
Between December 2015 and September 2017, Argentina's new debt amounts to the equivalent of
$103.59 billion. [2] This includes new
debt issued by the Treasury (80%), provincial governments (11%), and the private sector (9%).
While Argentina's debt had been increasing slowly since 2011, the jump experienced in 2016 was
unlike any other in Argentina's history.
If the increase in debt is alarming, the destination of those funds is also cause of
concern. Data from Argentina's Central Bank (Banco Central de la República Argentina or
BCRA) show that during the first eight months of 2017, net foreign asset accumulation of the
private non-banking sector totaled $13.32 million, 33% more than all of 2016, which itself was
17% more than all of 2015. This means that since December 2015, Argentina has dollarized assets
by approximately $25.29 billion.
According to the BCRA, during the same period there was a net outflow of capital due to debt
interest payments, profits and dividends of $8.231 billion. Additionally, the net outflow due
to tourism and travel is calculated at roughly $13.43 billion between December 2015 and August
2017.
In sum, the dramatic increase in dollar-denominated debt during the two first Macri years
served to finance capital flight, tourism, profit remittances, and debt service, all to the
tune of roughly $50 billion.
Where is This Headed?
Argentina's experience since the 1976 military coup until the crash of 2001 has shown how
damaging is the combination of unfavorable external conditions and the destruction of the local
productive structure. The post-crisis policies of the successive Kirchner administrations
reversed the debt-dependent and deindustrializing policies of the preceding decades. However,
since Macri took office in December 2015, Argentina has once again turned to debt-dependent
framework of the 1990s. Not only has public debt grown in absolute terms, but the weight of
dollar-denominated debt in total debt has also increased. Despite significant doubts regarding
the sustainability of the current situation, the government has expressed intentions of
continuing to issue new debt until 2020.
What are the main factors that call debt-sustainability into question? First, capital
flight, which, as we have said above, is increasing, is compensated with new dollar-denominated
public debt. Second, Argentina's trade balance turned negative in 2015 and has remained so
since, with a total accumulated trade deficit between 2015 and the second quarter of 2017 of
$6.53 billion. Import dynamics proved impervious to the 2016 recession, therefore it is
expected that the deficit will either persist as is or increase if there are no drastic
changes. Furthermore, in the 2018 national budget bill sent to Congress, Treasury Secretary
Nicolás Dujovne projects that the growth rate of imports will exceed that of exports
until at least 2021, increasing the current trade deficit by 68%.
Finally, according to the IMF's World Economic Outlook (October 2017), growth rate
projections for industrialized countries increase prospects of a US Federal Reserve interest
rate increase. This would make Argentina's new debt issues more expensive, increasing the
burden of future debt service and increasing capital flight from Argentina (in what is
generally referred to as the "flight to safety").
The factors outlined above generate credible and troublesome doubts about the sustainability
of the economic policies implemented by the Macri administration. While there are no signs of a
major crisis in the short term (that is, before the 2019 presidential elections), there are
good reasons to doubt that the current level of debt accumulation can be sustained to the end
of a potential second Macri term (2023). In other words, there are good reasons to believe that
Argentines will once again have to exercise their well-developed ability to navigate through
yet another profound debt crisis. This is not solely the authors' opinion. In early November
2017 Standard & Poor's placed Argentina in a list of the five most fragile economies.
[3] It looks like,
once again, storm clouds are on the horizon.
'What are the main factors that call debt sustainability into question? First, capital
flight.'
Capital flees Argentina whenever the opportunity arises because successive governments --
whether leftist or conservative -- refuse to control inflation and maintain a stable
currency.
Since 2001, the Argentine peso has slid from one-to-one with the US dollar to about 19 to
the dollar today. With Argentine inflation running in the low to mid twenties (according to
INDEC and Price Stats), the peso can be expected to carry on weakening against the dollar
indefinitely.
A hundred years during which the peso has lopped off thirteen (13) zeros owing to chronic
inflation shows that Argentina is politically and culturally incapable of responsibly
managing its own currency.
Argentines know this. Unfortunately, only the richer ones have assets they can move to
safety outside the country. The hand-to-mouth poor will continue being ravaged by inflation,
not to mention the large quantities of counterfeit pesos in circulation.
Letting Argentines play with fiat currency is like handing out loaded pistols to rowdy
5-year-olds. In both these sad cases, adult supervision is urgently needed.
The grand history of Latin America: borrow billions of $$$ from U.S. banks, hand the
money to the wealthy who immediately deposit it right back in American banks, and let the
poor pay back the principal and interest. Hmmm . seems more and more the way this country is
going.
The fixed exchange rate under Kirchner was totally unsustainable. One difference between
Macri's neoliberalism and his predecessors is Macri is allowing much more of a floating
currency than in the pre 2001 time period (We can debate how much it is actually is floating
and clearly a lot of this debt issuance is for currency stablization that I personally don't
approve of).
I'm not an expert in this at all, but in Peru, you could hold bank accounts in either
national currency or dollars. The national currency accounts spared you currency exchange
fees and also had higher interest rates. Most people who could hedged their bets by putting
money in both accounts.
It seems like a happy medium between abandoning national currencies and letting savers get
ravaged? No?
While not as spectacular of a return as Bitcoin, but impressive nonetheless, the escape
route for an Argentinean @ the turn of the century was the golden rule, an ounce of all that
glitters was 300 pesos then and now around 25,000 pesos, a most excellent 'troy' horse.
So, is austerity good or is austerity bad? And in what conditions?
I'm for expansionary government expense (and direct government ownership of some
industries, such as with an NHS) balanced by taxes on high incomes.
So in my view the problem happens when the government lowers taxes on the rich, as seems
likely in this case.
On the other hand taxes on the rich are likely to cause capital flight.
So why did Macri get elected to do this? Yeah he didn't win by much, but he won.
>The hand-to-mouth poor will continue being ravaged by inflation
Which is freaking weird. Argentina has cropland. They have energy sources (and I won't
bore everybody ok, I will with the observation that the Industrial Age is generously a
300/8000 year ratio part of human history).
And doesn't the below need some unpacking?:
>only the richer ones have assets they can move to safety outside the country
What are these assets? Why are said assets mobile? How did they come to "own" them? What
percentage of the population is encompassed by "the richer ones" phrasing?
Question: why doesn't MMT thinking work for countries like Argentina?
As wikipedia notes:
"The key insight of MMT is that "monetarily sovereign government is the monopoly
supplier of its currency and can issue currency of any denomination in physical or
non-physical forms. As such the government has an unlimited capacity to pay for the things
it wishes to purchase and to fulfill promised future payments, and has an unlimited ability
to provide funds to the other sectors. Thus, insolvency and bankruptcy of this government
is not possible. It can always pay."
Is this a general flaw in MMT? Does MMT only apply to dominant nation-states like the
U.S., who can use foreign military and financial pressures to protect the currency, aka the
petrodollar? Is the petrodollar a true 'fiat currency' or is it somehow based on control of
commodities (especially oil)? Is there something peculiar about Argentina and other countries
facing currency devaluation that MMT doesn't handle well? Any ideas on this?
That wikipedia write up isn't wrong, but it could be better. Probably need to hammer home
the point that the sovereign can always pay IN THE CURRENCY THAT IT ISSUES.
Most of the MMT related conversations on this site, and the posts that are written up on
the subject are mostly about explaining how there are constraints that many people THINK
exist in the USA, but don't actually exist, at least in economic terms (political constraints
notwithstanding). A country cannot be forced to default on a currency it issues. If the USA
had significant debts in EUR or JPY, then it'd be a very different conversation.
External constraints are a big deal for most countries, especially developing countries
that depend on exports of primary commodities. Chile, for instance, is constrained by balance
of payments problems when the price of copper declines. Also, developed countries that are
relatively smaller have much more limited sovereignty. The Swiss Central Bank has to follow
what the ECB does, to a large degree.
On the other hand, there's episodes where some countries have found room for maneuver when
they give up their sovereign currency. I didn't expect that Ecuador's economy would perform
quite as well as it has in recent years. But, they've shown that you can find ways to get
creative to compensate for loss of monetary sovereignty. Of course, the fiscal constraints
are real since Ecuador can't print USD.
Brazil's recent neoliberal turn was frustrating for a variety of reasons, but being a
big, diverse economy, they've got more sovereignty than their neighbors. However, the
business and political elites in Brazil decided to hammer through austerity (spending cuts
and interest rate hikes) because they WANTED to, not because external forces made them do
it.
No doubt an MMT prescription for Argentina would advice them to lay off the $ denominated
debt and stick to pesos as much as possible. I'd imagine Stephanie Kelton or any of the UMKC
crew would advise curtailing imports or doing some import substitution in order to take
pressure off balance of payments issues. They'd also take a look at what was driving
inflation domestically and try to find ways to relieve it with a targeted approach, instead
of risking recession and unemployment. Neoliberal/Washington Consensus type economists would
say hike interest rates, cut government spending in order to curtail demand. They'd argue
that the private sector will make the best decisions about where to reign in spending to
reduce inflation.
Trump's campaign to return manufacturing to America and repatriate profits held overseas
makes good business sense. The ravaging of America's once mighty industrial base to boost
corporate profits was a crime against the nation by unscrupulous Wall Street bankers and
short-sighted, greedy CEO's.
The basis of industrial power is the ability to make products people use. Shockingly, US
manufacturing has shrunk to only 14% of GDP. Today, America's primary business has become
finance, the largely non-productive act of paper-passing that only benefits a tiny big city
parasitic elite.
Trump_vs_deep_state is a natural reaction to the self-destruction of America's industrial base. But the
president's mania to wreck international trade agreements and impose tariff barriers will
result in diminishing America's economic and political influence around the globe.
Access to America's markets is in certain ways a more powerful political tool than
deployment of US forces around the globe. Lessening access to the US markets will inevitably
have negative repercussions on US exports.
Trump has been on a rampage to undo almost every positive initiative undertaken by the Obama
administration, even though many earned the US applause and respect around the civilized world.
The president has made trade agreements a prime target. He has targeted trade pacts involving
Mexico, Canada, the EU, Japan, China and a host of other nations by claiming they are unfair to
American workers. However, a degree of wage unfairness is the price Washington must pay for
bringing lower-cost nations into America's economic orbit.
This month, the Trump administration threatened new restrictions against 120 US trade
partners who may now face much higher tariffs on their exports to the US.
Trump is in a hurry because he fears he may not be re-elected. He is trying to eradicate all
vestiges of the Obama presidency with the ruthlessness and ferocity of Stalinist officials
eradicating every trace of liquidated commissars, even from official photos. America now faces
its own era of purges as an uneasy world watches.
"... The reception of God's mercy in dependent upon a person's acknowledgement of his sins, Pope Francis said Wednesday, because "the proud person is unable to receive forgiveness." ..."
"... "What can the Lord give to those whose hearts are full of themselves and their own success?" the Pope asked the thousands of pilgrims gathered in the Vatican for his General Audience . "Nothing, because the presumptuous person is unable to receive forgiveness, since he is full of his supposed justice." ..."
The reception of God's mercy in dependent upon a person's acknowledgement of his sins,
Pope Francis said Wednesday, because "the proud person is unable to receive
forgiveness."
"What can the Lord give to those whose hearts are full of themselves and their own success?"
the Pope asked the thousands of pilgrims gathered in the Vatican for his General
Audience . "Nothing, because the presumptuous person is unable to receive forgiveness,
since he is full of his supposed justice."
The Pope called to mind Jesus's parable of the Pharisee and the
publican, where only the publican, or tax collector, receives forgiveness for his sins and
returns home justified.
"Those who are aware of their own miseries and lower their eyes with humility, feel the
merciful gaze of God resting on them," Francis said. "We know from experience that only those
who can acknowledge their faults and ask forgiveness receive the understanding and pardon of
others."
Money quote: "And even given that, I would have to qualify the nature of the threats. Russia and China are best described as adversaries
or competitors rather than enemies as they have compelling interests to avoid war, even if Washington is doing its best to turn them
hostile. Neither has anything to gain and much to lose by escalating a minor conflict into something that might well start World War
3. Indeed, both have strong incentives to avoid doing so, which makes the actual threat that they represent more speculative than real.
And, on the plus side, both can be extremely useful in dealing with international issues where Washington has little or no leverage,
to include resolving the North Korea problem and Syria, so the US has considerable benefits to be gained by cultivating their cooperation."
Notable quotes:
"... And even given that, I would have to qualify the nature of the threats. Russia and China are best described as adversaries or competitors rather than enemies as they have compelling interests to avoid war, even if Washington is doing its best to turn them hostile. Neither has anything to gain and much to lose by escalating a minor conflict into something that might well start World War 3. Indeed, both have strong incentives to avoid doing so, which makes the actual threat that they represent more speculative than real. And, on the plus side, both can be extremely useful in dealing with international issues where Washington has little or no leverage, to include resolving the North Korea problem and Syria, so the US has considerable benefits to be gained by cultivating their cooperation. ..."
"... Cohen-Watnick is thirty years old and has little relevant experience for the position he holds, senior director for intelligence on the National Security Council. But his inexperience counts for little as he is good friend of son-in-law Jared Kushner. He has told the New York Times ..."
"... Both Cohen-Watnick and Harvey share the neoconservative belief that the Iranians and their proxies in Syria and Iraq need to be confronted by force, an opportunity described by Foreign Policy ..."
"... What danger to the U.S. or its actual treaty allies an Iranian influenced land corridor would constitute remains a mystery but there is no shortage of Iran haters in the White House. Former senior CIA analyst Paul Pillar sees "unrelenting hostility from the Trump administration" towards Iran and notes "cherry-picking" of the intelligence to make a case for war, similar to what occurred with Iraq in 2002-3. And even though Secretary of Defense James Mattis and National Security Advisor H.R. McMaster have pushed back against the impulsive Cohen-Watnick and Harvey, their objections are tactical as they do not wish to make U.S. forces in the region vulnerable to attacks coming from a new direction. Otherwise they too consider Iran as America's number one active enemy and believe that war is inevitable. Donald Trump has unfortunately also jumped directly into the argument on the side of Saudi Arabia and Israel, both of which would like to see Washington go to war with Tehran on their behalf. ..."
"... You forgot the third significant potential threat from a friendly nation, i.e. Israel. Israel will sabotage any effort to normallize relations with Russia or even Iran. They will resort to false flag operations to start a war with Iran. ..."
"... The problem with this White House, as well as the previous ones, is that none of the so-called experts really understand the Middle East. The US is not interested in having friendly relations with all nations. All her efforts are towards one goal, the world domination. Even if President Trump wanted to normalize relations with Russia, the MSM, the democrats, as well as, his republican opponents will not let him. ..."
"... That is why the constan drumbeat of Russia's meddling in the 2016 election despite the fact that no proof has been given so far. Similarly, the "Iran has nuclear weapons" narrative is constantly repeated, the reports by IAEA and the 17 Intelligence Agencies to the contrary not withstanding. ..."
"... The elevation of Muhammad bin Salman to the Crown Prince position will only make the Middle East situation worse. Israel will be able to manipulate him much more easily than the old guard. ..."
"... The titanic elephant in the room -- that US foreign policy is not governed by "rationality" but by "special interests" seems .missing ..."
"... Trump has no control of most government functions, particularly foreign affairs. The Deep State takes care of that for him. The Deep State has been calling the shots for decades and all Presidents who weren't assassinated have complied. Democracies never work and ours quit long ago. ..."
"... I fully agree that attacking Iran would be yet another disaster but I don't understand why Saudi Arabia is portrayed as an 'enemy', the 'real' one, no less, in alt-media circles like this. I mean let's be honest with ourselves. KSA is the definition of a vassal state. Has been so since the state established established relations with the USA in the 1940s and the status was confirmed during the 1960s under King Faisal. Oil for security. Why pretend that they have any operational clearance from the US? ..."
"... The BIGGEST threat to the USA is from within, as we are nothing more than an occupied colony of Apartheid Israel, paying that bastard state tributes each year in the form of free money and weapons, political backing at the UN, and never tire of fighting her wars of conquest. ..."
"... The also have a choke-hold on Congress, which is always eager to wag their tail and hope their Yid Overlord gives them a treat and not a dressing-down in the Jew MSM, which is a career killer. ..."
"... Israel's current "agreements" and its "kowtowing" to Saudi Arabia speaks VOLUMES. Once again, Israel is about to get others to do their "dirty work" for them. ..."
"... There's no alternative to Saudi royal family rule of the peninsula. Who's there to replace them? Any other group, assuming there might be one somewhere waiting in the wings, would probably be anti-American and not as compliant as the Saudis. They've spent gigantic sums in the endless billions buying military equipment from the US, weapons they can't even fully use, as a way of making themselves indispensable customers. Many other billions of petrodollars find their way westward into our financial systems. They collaborate with the US in various schemes throughout the Muslim world using their intelligence services and money in furtherance of US goals. ..."
"... Mattis still seems stuck with his Iran obsession. Shame I thought he had the intellectual curiosity to adapt. Trump has good instincts, I hope Tillerson comes to the fore, and Bannon stays influential. ..."
"... Iran is US enemy #1 not only because it is against that country smaller than New Jersey with less people (Israel) but also because Iran has been a model for other countries to follow because of its intransigence to US oppression and attacks, financial political and cyber. As the world becomes multi-polar, Iran's repeated wise reactions to the world hegemon have been an inspiration to China and others to go their own way. The US can't stand that. ..."
"... Contrary to the popular view, Wahabism is necessary to keep the local population under control. Particularly the minority Shia population who live along the eastern coast, an area, which incidentally also has the all the oil reserves. USA fully understands this. Which is why they not only tolerated Wahabism, but strongly promoted it during Afghan jihad. The operation was by and large very successful btw. It was only during the '90s when religion became the new ideology for the resistance against the empire across the Muslim world. Zero surprise there because the preceding ideology, radical left wing politics was completely defeated. Iran became the first country in this pattern. The Iranian left was decimated by the Shah, another vassal. So the religious right became the new resistance. ..."
"... And as far as the KSA is considered, Wahabi preachers aren't allowed to attack the USA anyway. If any individual preacher so much as makes a squeak, he will be bent over a barrel. There won't be any "coming down very hard on Saudi Arabia" because USA already owns that country. ..."
"... The British Empire 'made' the House of Saud. Thinking it wise to use Wahhabism to control Shia Islam is like thinking it wise to use blacks to control the criminal tendencies of Mexicans. ..."
It is one of the great ironies that the United States, a land mass protected by two broad oceans while also benefitting from the
world's largest economy and most powerful military, persists in viewing itself as a potential victim, vulnerable and surrounded by
enemies. In reality, there are only two significant potential threats to the U.S. The first consists of the only two non-friendly
countries – Russia and China – that have nuclear weapons and delivery systems that could hit the North American continent and the
second is the somewhat more amorphous danger represented by international terrorism.
And even given that, I would have to qualify the nature of the threats. Russia and China are best described as adversaries
or competitors rather than enemies as they have compelling interests to avoid war, even if Washington is doing its best to turn them
hostile. Neither has anything to gain and much to lose by escalating a minor conflict into something that might well start World
War 3. Indeed, both have strong incentives to avoid doing so, which makes the actual threat that they represent more speculative
than real. And, on the plus side, both can be extremely useful in dealing with international issues where Washington has little or
no leverage, to include resolving the North Korea problem and Syria, so the US has considerable benefits to be gained by cultivating
their cooperation.
Also, I would characterize international terrorism as a faux threat at a national level, though one that has been exaggerated
through the media and fearmongering to such an extent that it appears much more dangerous than it actually is. It has been observed
that more Americans are killed by falling furniture than by terrorists in a year but terrorism has a particularly potency due to
its unpredictability and the fear that it creates. Due to that fear, American governments and businesses at all levels have been
willing to spend a trillion dollars per annum to defeat what might rationally be regarded as a relatively minor problem.
So if the United States were serious about dealing with or deflecting the actual threats against the American people it could
first of all reduce its defense expenditures to make them commensurate with the actual threat before concentrating on three things.
First, would be to establish a solid modus vivendi with Russia and China to avoid conflicts of interest that could develop
into actual tit-for-tat escalation. That would require an acceptance by Washington of the fact that both Moscow and Beijing have
regional spheres of influence that are defined by their interests. You don't have to like the governance of either country, but their
national interests have to be appreciated and respected just as the United States has legitimate interests within its own hemisphere
that must be respected by Russia and China.
Second, Washington must, unfortunately, continue to spend on the Missile Defense Agency, which supports anti-missile defenses
if the search for a modus vivendi for some reason fails. Mutual assured destruction is not a desirable strategic doctrine
but being able to intercept incoming missiles while also having some capability to strike back if attacked is a realistic deterrent
given the proliferation of nations that have both ballistic missiles and nukes.
Third and finally, there would be a coordinated program aimed at international terrorism based equally on where the terror comes
from and on physically preventing the terrorist attacks from taking place. This is the element in national defense that is least
clear cut. Dealing with Russia and China involves working with mature regimes that have established diplomatic and military channels.
Dealing with terrorist non-state players is completely different as there are generally speaking no such channels.
It should in theory be pretty simple to match threats and interests with actions since there are only a handful that really matter,
but apparently it is not so in practice. What is Washington doing? First of all, the White House is deliberately turning its back
on restoring a good working relationship with Russia by insisting that Crimea be returned to Kiev, by blaming Moscow for the continued
unrest in Donbas, and by attacking Syrian military targets in spite of the fact that Russia is an ally of the legitimate government
in Damascus and the United States is an interloper in the conflict. Meanwhile congress and the media are poisoning the waters through
their dogged pursuit of Russiagate for political reasons even though nearly a year of investigation has produced no actual evidence
of malfeasance on the part of U.S. officials and precious little in terms of Moscow's alleged interference.
Playing tough to the international audience has unfortunately become part of the American Exceptionalism DNA. Upon his arrival
in Warsaw last week, Donald Trump doubled down on the
Russia-bashing, calling on Moscow to "cease its destabilizing activities in Ukraine and elsewhere and its support for hostile regimes
including Syria and Iran." He then recommended that Russia should "join the community of responsible nations in our fight against
common enemies and in defense of civilization itself."
The comments in Warsaw were unnecessary, even if the Poles wanted to hear them, and were both highly insulting and ignorant. It
was not a good start for Donald's second overseas trip, even though the speech has otherwise been interpreted as a welcome defense
of Western civilization and European values. Trump also followed up with a two hour plus discussion with President Vladimir Putin
in which the two apparently agreed to differ on the alleged Russian hacking of the American election. The Trump-Putin meeting indicated
that restoring some kind of working relationship with Russia is still possible, as it is in everyone's interest to do so.
Fighting terrorism is quite another matter and the United States approach is the reverse of what a rational player would be seeking
to accomplish. The U.S. is rightly assisting in the bid to eradicate ISIS in Syria and Iraq but it is simultaneously attacking the
most effective fighters against that group, namely the Syrian government armed forces and the Shiite militias being provided by Iran
and Hezbollah. Indeed, it is becoming increasingly clear that at least some in the Trump Administration are seeking to use the Syrian
engagement as a stepping stone to war with Iran.
As was the case in the months preceding the ill-fated invasion of Iraq in 2003, all buttons are being pushed to vilify Iran. Recent
reports suggest that two individuals in the White House in particular have been pressuring the Trump administration's generals to
escalate U.S. involvement in Syria to bring about a war with Tehran sooner rather than later. They are Ezra Cohen-Watnick and Derek
Harvey, reported to be holdovers from the team brought into the White House by the virulently anti-Iranian former National Security
Adviser Michael Flynn.
Cohen-Watnick is thirty years old and
has little relevant experience for the position he holds, senior director for intelligence on the National Security Council.
But his inexperience counts for little as he is good friend of son-in-law Jared Kushner. He has told the New York Times
that "wants to use American spies to help oust the Iranian government," a comment that reflects complete ignorance, both regarding
Iran and also concerning spy agency capabilities. His partner in crime Harvey, a former military officer who advised General David
Petraeus when he was in Iraq, is the NSC advisor on the Middle East.
Both Cohen-Watnick and Harvey share the neoconservative belief that the Iranians and their proxies in Syria and Iraq need
to be confronted by force,
an opportunity described by Foreign Policy magazine as having developed into "a pivotal moment that will determine whether
Iran or the United States exerts influence over Iraq and Syria." Other neocon promoters of conflict with Iran have described their
horror at a possible Shiite "bridge" or "land corridor" through the Arab heartland, running from Iran itself through Iraq and Syria
and connecting on the Mediterranean with Hezbollah in Lebanon.
What danger to the U.S. or its actual treaty allies an Iranian influenced land corridor would constitute remains a mystery
but there is no shortage of Iran haters in the White House. Former senior CIA analyst Paul Pillar
sees "unrelenting hostility from the Trump administration" towards Iran and notes "cherry-picking" of the intelligence to make
a case for war, similar to what occurred with Iraq in 2002-3. And even though Secretary of Defense James Mattis and National Security
Advisor H.R. McMaster have pushed back against the impulsive Cohen-Watnick and Harvey, their objections are tactical as they do not
wish to make U.S. forces in the region vulnerable to attacks coming from a new direction. Otherwise they too consider Iran as America's
number one active enemy and believe that war is inevitable. Donald Trump has unfortunately also jumped directly into the argument
on the side of Saudi Arabia and Israel, both of which would like to see Washington go to war with Tehran on their behalf.
The problem with the Trump analysis is that he has his friends and enemies confused. He is actually supporting Saudi Arabia, the
source of most of the terrorism that has convulsed Western Europe and the United States while also killing hundreds of thousands
of fellow Muslims. Random terrorism to kill as many "infidels and heretics" as possible to create fear is a Sunni Muslim phenomenon,
supported financially and doctrinally by the Saudis. To be sure, Iran has used terror tactics to eliminate opponents and select targets
overseas, to include several multiple-victim bombings, but it has never engaged in anything like the recent series of attacks in
France and Britain. So the United States is moving seemingly inexorably towards war with a country that itself constitutes no actual
terrorist threat, unless it is attacked, in support of a country that very much is part of the threat and also on behalf of Israel,
which for its part would prefer to see Americans die in a war against Iran rather that sacrificing its own sons and daughters.
Realizing who the real enemy actually is and addressing the actual terrorism problem would not only involve coming down very hard
on Saudi Arabia rather than Iran, it would also require some serious thinking in the White House about the extent to which America's
armed interventions all over Asia and Africa have made many people hate us enough to strap on a suicide vest and have a go. Saudi
financing and Washington's propensity to go to war and thereby create a deep well of hatred just might be the principal causative
elements in the rise of global terrorism. Do I think that Donald Trump's White House has the courage to take such a step and change
direction? Unfortunately, no.
Saudi Arabia is THE worst nation in the Middle East.
Why does the US follow along blindly? Well, it is a WASP thing. We are the new Brit Empire. By the height of the Victorian
era, virtually all English Elites were philoSemitic. Roughly half of the UK WASP Elite philoSemitism was pro-Jewish and half was
pro-Arabic/Islamic. And by the time of WW1, the English Elite pro-Arabic/Islamic faction came to adore the house of Saud. So,
our foreign policy is merely WASP culture continuing to ruin most of the rest of the world, including all the whites ruled by
WASP Elites.
In reality, there are only two significant potential threats to the U.S. The first consists of the only two non-friendly
countries – Russia and China – that have nuclear weapons and delivery systems that could hit the North American continent and
the second is the somewhat more amorphous danger represented by international terrorism.
No, the only threats are the following three:
Too many Meso-Americans invading from the border. These people have totally changed the SW and may drastically alter parts
of US as well. This is an invasion. Meso-Americans are lackluster, but Too Many translates into real power, especially in elections.
The other threat is Hindu-Indian. Indians are just itching to unload 100s of millions of their kind to Anglo nations. Unlike
Chinese population that is plummeting, Indian population is still growing.
The other threat, biggest of all, is the Negro. It's not Russian missiles or Chinese troops that turned Detroit into a hellhole.
It is Negroes. And look at Baltimore, New Orleans, Selma, Memphis, Oakland, St. Louis, South Side Chicago, etc.
Afromic Bomb is more hellish than atomic bomb. Compare Detroit and Hiroshima.
Also, even though nukes are deadly, they will likely never be used. They are for defensive purposes only. The real missiles
that will destroy the West is the Afro penis. US has nukes to destroy the world, but they haven't been used even during peak of
cold war. But millions of Negro puds have impregnanted and colonized white wombs to kill white-babies-that-could-have-been and
replaced them with mulatto Negro kids who will turn out like Colin Kapernick.
The real missile gap is the threat posed by negro dong on white dong. The negro dong is so potent that even Japanese women
are going Negroid and having kids with Negro men and raising these kids as 'Japanese' to beat up real Japanese. So, if Japan with
few blacks is turning like this, imagine the threat posed by Negroes on whites in the West.
Look at YouTube of street life and club life in Paris and London. Negro missiles are conquering the white race and spreading
the savage genes.
Look how Polish women welcomed the Negro missile cuz they are infected with jungle fever. ACOWW will be the real undoing of
the West.
Besides what Priss Factor said above the following is to be reinforced with every real American man, woman and child.
Israel , which for its part would prefer to see Americans die in a war against Iran rather that sacrificing its
own sons and daughters.
Israel, the REAL enemy! ,
@K India is looking to unload hindus to U.S? Quite the opposite. India is 'losing' its best brains to the U.S so its
trying to attract them back to their country. For eg: The chief- architect of IBM's Watson is a Hindu Indian and so is the
head of IBM's neuro-morphic computing. These people are advancing western technology.... civilian and also defense (IBM
is collaborating with the American defense organization DARPA) instead of helping India achieve technological competence.
And most of other super intelligent Indians also India is losing them to the west.
(i dont hate the west for doing that. Any country in amercia's place would have done the same. It is india's job to keep
its best brains working for it and not for others. And india is trying its best to do that albeit unsuccessfully.)
100 Words #UNRIG adds AMERICA FIRST, NOT ISRAEL to Agenda.
."A.I.P.A.C.. you're outta business!"
Due to slanderous attacks by a Mossad internet psy-op, Steele now prioritizes Israeli malign influence on US. Also, check out
Cynthia McKinney's twitter.
#UNRIG – Robert David Steele Weekly Update
@Durruti Nice action approach
to cure ills of society.
Enclosing copy of flier we have distributed - with a similar approach at a cure.
*Flier distributed is adjusted & a bit more attractive (1 sheet - both sides).
The key is to Restore the Republic, which was definitively destroyed on November 22, 1963.
Feel free to contact.
Use this, or send me a note by way of a response.
For THE RESTORATION OF THE REPUBLIC
"We hold these truths to be self-evident: that all men are created equal governments are instituted among men, deriving their
just powers from the consent of the governed; that whenever any form of government becomes destructive of these ends, it is the
right of the people to alter or abolish it and to institute new government, laying its foundation on such principles "
The above is a portion of the Declaration of Independence, written by Thomas Jefferson.
We submit the following facts to the citizens of the United States.
The government of the United States has been a Totalitarian Oligarchy since the military financial aristocracy destroyed
the Democratic Republic on November 22, 1963 , when they assassinated the last democratically elected president, John Fitzgerald
Kennedy , and overthrew his government. All following governments have been unconstitutional frauds. Attempts by Robert
Kennedy and Martin Luther King to restore the Republic were interrupted by their murder.
A subsequent 12 year colonial war against Vietnam , conducted by the murderers of Kennedy, left 2 million dead in a
wake of napalm and burning villages.
In 1965, the U.S. government orchestrated the slaughter of 1 million unarmed Indonesian civilians.
In the decade that followed the CIA murdered 100,000 Native Americans in Guatemala .
In the 1970s, the Oligarchy began the destruction and looting of America's middle class, by encouraging the export of industry
and jobs to parts of the world where workers were paid bare subsistence wages. The 2008, Bailout of the Nation's Oligarchs
cost American taxpayers $13trillion. The long decline of the local economy has led to the political decline of our hard working
citizens, as well as the decay of cities, towns, and infrastructure, such as education.
The impoverishment of America's middle class has undermined the nation's financial stability. Without a productive foundation,
the government has accumulated a huge debt in excess of $19trillion. This debt will have to be paid, or suffered by future generations.
Concurrently, the top 1% of the nation's population has benefited enormously from the discomfiture of the rest. The interest rate
has been reduced to 0, thereby slowly robbing millions of depositors of their savings, as their savings cannot stay even with
the inflation rate.
The government spends the declining national wealth on bloody and never ending military adventures, and is or has recently
conducted unconstitutional wars against 9 nations. The Oligarchs maintain 700 military bases in 131 countries; they spend as much
on military weapons of terror as the rest of the nations of the world combined. Tellingly, more than half the government budget
is spent on the military and 16 associated secret agencies.
The nightmare of a powerful centralized government crushing the rights of the people, so feared by the Founders of the United
States, has become a reality. The government of Obama/Biden, as with previous administrations such as Bush/Cheney, and whoever
is chosen in November 2016, operates a Gulag of dozens of concentration camps, where prisoners are denied trials, and routinely
tortured. The Patriot Act and The National Defense Authorizations Act , enacted by both Democratic and Republican
factions of the oligarchy, serve to establish a legal cover for their terror.
The nation's media is controlled, and, with the school systems, serve to brainwash the population; the people are intimidated
and treated with contempt.
The United States is No longer Sovereign
The United States is no longer a sovereign nation. Its government, The Executive, and Congress, is bought, utterly owned
and controlled by foreign and domestic wealthy Oligarchs, such as the Rothschilds, Rockefellers, and Duponts , to name only
a few of the best known.
The 2016 Electoral Circus will anoint new actors to occupy the same Unconstitutional Government, with its controlling International
Oligarchs. Clinton, Trump, whomever, are willing accomplices for imperialist international murder, and destruction of nations,
including ours.
For Love of Country
The Restoration of the Republic will be a Revolutionary Act, that will cancel all previous debts owed to that unconstitutional
regime and its business supporters. All debts, including Student Debts, will be canceled. Our citizens will begin, anew, with
a clean slate.
As American Founder , Thomas Jefferson wrote, in a letter to James Madison:
"I set out on this ground, which I suppose to be self evident, 'that the earth belongs in usufruct to the living':"
"Then I say the earth belongs to each of these generations, during it's course, fully, and in their own right. The 2d. Generation
receives it clear of the debts and incumberances of the 1st. The 3d of the 2d. and so on. For if the 1st. Could charge it with
a debt, then the earth would belong to the dead and not the living generation."
Our Citizens must restore the centrality of the constitution, establishing a less powerful government which will ensure
President Franklin Roosevelt's Four Freedoms , freedom of speech and expression, freedom to worship God in ones own way, freedom
from want "which means economic understandings which will secure to every nation a healthy peace time life for its inhabitants
" and freedom from fear "which means a world-wide reduction of armaments "
Once restored: The Constitution will become, once again, the law of the land and of a free people. We will establish a government,
hold elections, begin to direct traffic, arrest criminal politicians of the tyrannical oligarchy, and, in short, repair the damage
of the previous totalitarian governments.
For the Democratic Republic!
Sons and Daughters of Liberty [email protected]
In reality, there are only two significant potential threats to the U.S. The first consists of the only two non-friendly
countries – Russia and China – that have nuclear weapons and delivery systems that could hit the North American continent and
the second is the somewhat more amorphous danger represented by international terrorism.
You forgot the third significant potential threat from a friendly nation, i.e. Israel. Israel will sabotage any effort
to normallize relations with Russia or even Iran. They will resort to false flag operations to start a war with Iran.
The problem with this White House, as well as the previous ones, is that none of the so-called experts really understand
the Middle East. The US is not interested in having friendly relations with all nations. All her efforts are towards one goal,
the world domination. Even if President Trump wanted to normalize relations with Russia, the MSM, the democrats, as well as, his
republican opponents will not let him.
That is why the constan drumbeat of Russia's meddling in the 2016 election despite the fact that no proof has been given
so far. Similarly, the "Iran has nuclear weapons" narrative is constantly repeated, the reports by IAEA and the 17 Intelligence
Agencies to the contrary not withstanding.
The elevation of Muhammad bin Salman to the Crown Prince position will only make the Middle East situation worse. Israel
will be able to manipulate him much more easily than the old guard.
The western world is dependent on oil, especially ME oil. Saudi Arabia was made the USA's main oil supplier at the end of 1944.
The Saud dynasty depends on the USA. That the Saudis would sponsor terrorism, why would they ? And which terrorism is Muslim terrorism
?
Sept 11 not, Boston not, Madrid and London very questionably. We then are left with minor issues, the Paris shooting the biggest.
That Saudi Arabia is waging war in Yemen certainly is with USA support. The Saudi army does what the USA wants them to do.
Mr. Giraldi, you forgot to mention Israel as one of America's biggest liabilities besides Saudi Arabia. But with such amateur
dramatics in the White House and on the Security Council, the US is destined for war but only against the wrong enemy such as
Iran. If the Saudis and the right-wing Netanyahu regime want to get after Iran they should do it alone. They surely will get a
bloody nose. Americans have shed enough blood for these rascal regimes. President Trump should continue with his rapprochement
towards Russia because both nation states have more in common than expected.
I'm a little disappointed in this article. Not that it's a bad article per se: perfectly rational, reasonable, academic even.
But unfortunately, it's simply naive.
"Realizing who the real enemy actually is and addressing the actual terrorism problem would not only involve coming down very
hard on Saudi Arabia rather than Iran, it would also require some serious thinking in the White House about the extent to which
America's armed interventions all over Asia and Africa have made many people hate us enough to strap on a suicide vest and have
a go."
Realize who the real enemy is ? Come down hard on the Saud's ? No -- really ?
The titanic elephant in the room -- that US foreign policy is not governed by "rationality" but by "special interests" seems
.missing. Israel, the Saudi's themselves, the MIC & so on & so forth ARE the special interests who literally "realise" US Policy.
Well, the real enemy of the people are the real terrorists behind the scenes. Those who planned the 9/11 false flag.
Those who sent the Anthrax letters to resisting congress members. Those who pre-planned the wars of aggression in the whole middle
east.
So any appeal to the "White House" is almost pointless since the White House is one element of the power structure captured
by the war-criminal lunatics.
To change something people in the US should at first stop buying their war criminal lying mass media.
Then they should stop supporting ANY foreign intervention by the US and should stop believing any of the preposterous lies
released by the media, the state dept., or any other neocon outlet.
Actually Trump was probably elected because he said he was anti-intervention and anti-media. But did it help?
The US needs mass resistance (demonstrations, strikes, boycotts, non-participation, sit-ins, grass-root information, or whatever)
against their neocon/zionist/mafia/cia power groups or nothing will change.
We need demonstrations against NATO, against war, against false flag terrorism, against using terrorists as secret armies,
against war propaganda!
B.t.w. Iran has always been one of the main goals. Think of it: Why did the US attack Afghanistan and Iraq? What have those
two countries in common? (Hint: a look on the map helps to answer this question.)
I am beginning to get interested in why some people are sure 9/11 was a false flag affair covered up by a lot of lies.
So may I try my opening question on you. How much, if any of it, have you read of the official 9/11 commission report? ,
"The White House is targeting Iran but should instead focus on Saudi Arabia"
Trump has no control of most government functions, particularly foreign affairs. The Deep State takes care of that for
him. The Deep State has been calling the shots for decades and all Presidents who weren't assassinated have complied. Democracies
never work and ours quit long ago.
I fully agree that attacking Iran would be yet another disaster but I don't understand why Saudi Arabia is portrayed as an 'enemy',
the 'real' one, no less, in alt-media circles like this.
I mean let's be honest with ourselves. KSA is the definition of a vassal state. Has been so since the state established
established relations with the USA in the 1940s and the status was confirmed during the 1960s under King Faisal. Oil for security. Why pretend that they have any operational clearance from the US?
Contrary to the popular view, Wahabism is necessary to keep the local population under control. Particularly the minority Shia
population who live along the eastern coast, an area, which incidentally also has the all the oil reserves.
USA fully understands this. Which is why they not only tolerated Wahabism, but strongly promoted it during Afghan jihad. The
operation was by and large very successful btw.
It was only during the '90s when religion became the new ideology for the resistance against the empire across the Muslim world.
Zero surprise there because the preceding ideology, radical left wing politics was completely defeated. Iran became the first
country in this pattern. The Iranian left was decimated by the Shah, another vassal. So the religious right became the new resistance.
And as far as the KSA is considered, Wahabi preachers aren't allowed to attack the USA anyway. If any individual preacher so
much as makes a squeak, he will be bent over a barrel. There won't be any "coming down very hard on Saudi Arabia" because USA
already owns that country.
So what's the answer? Well, props to Phillip as he understood – "it would also require some serious thinking in the White House
about the extent to which America's armed interventions all over Asia and Africa have made many people hate us enough to strap
on a suicide vest and have a go."
Your analysis starts too late. The US supports Wahhabism and the House of Saud because the pro-Arabic/Islamic English
Elites of 1910 and 1920 and 1935 supported Wahhabism and the House of Saud.
The British Empire 'made' the House of Saud,
Thinking it wise to use Wahhabism to control Shia Islam is like thinking it wise to use blacks to control the criminal
tendencies of Mexicans.
In reality, there are only two significant potential threats to the U.S. The first consists of the only two non-friendly
countries – Russia and China – that have nuclear weapons and delivery systems that could hit the North American continent and
the second is the somewhat more amorphous danger represented by international terrorism.
No, the only threats are the following three:
Too many Meso-Americans invading from the border. These people have totally changed the SW and may drastically alter parts
of US as well. This is an invasion. Meso-Americans are lackluster, but Too Many translates into real power, especially in elections.
The other threat is Hindu-Indian. Indians are just itching to unload 100s of millions of their kind to Anglo nations. Unlike
Chinese population that is plummeting, Indian population is still growing.
The other threat, biggest of all, is the Negro. It's not Russian missiles or Chinese troops that turned Detroit into a hellhole.
It is Negroes. And look at Baltimore, New Orleans, Selma, Memphis, Oakland, St. Louis, South Side Chicago, etc.
Afromic Bomb is more hellish than atomic bomb. Compare Detroit and Hiroshima.
Also, even though nukes are deadly, they will likely never be used. They are for defensive purposes only. The real missiles
that will destroy the West is the Afro penis. US has nukes to destroy the world, but they haven't been used even during peak of
cold war. But millions of Negro puds have impregnanted and colonized white wombs to kill white-babies-that-could-have-been and
replaced them with mulatto Negro kids who will turn out like Colin Kapernick.
The real missile gap is the threat posed by negro dong on white dong. The negro dong is so potent that even Japanese women
are going Negroid and having kids with Negro men and raising these kids as 'Japanese' to beat up real Japanese. So, if Japan with
few blacks is turning like this, imagine the threat posed by Negroes on whites in the West.
Look at youtube of street life and club life in Paris and London. Negro missiles are conquering the white race and spreading
the savage genes.
Look how Polish women welcomed the Negro missile cuz they are infected with jungle fever. ACOWW will be the real undoing of
the West.
Replies: @Sowhat And what grudge
is that? The only two I can find are connected. The deposing of our puppets, the Assads and the nationalization of their natural
resources. I have the impression that it removes around future hegemon and the rich gas reserves off their coast and the decades
long desire to run a pipeline west to the Mediterranean.
The BIGGEST threat to the USA is from within, as we are nothing more than an occupied colony of Apartheid Israel, paying that
bastard state tributes each year in the form of free money and weapons, political backing at the UN, and never tire of fighting
her wars of conquest.
You won't see Israeli troops in the streets, since their confederates control the economy thru their control of the FED and
US Treasury and most of those TBTF banks, which we always bail out, no matter the cost.
The also have a choke-hold on Congress, which is always eager to wag their tail and hope their Yid Overlord gives them
a treat and not a dressing-down in the Jew MSM, which is a career killer.
The WH is also Israeli territory, especially now with a Jew NYC slumlord now Trump's top adviser and his fashion model faux
Jew daughter egging Daddy on to kill more Arab babies, since she can't stand the sight of dead babies
@Paul Well, the real enemy of
the people are the real terrorists behind the scenes. Those who planned the 9/11 false flag. Those who sent the Anthrax letters
to resisting congress members. Those who pre-planned the wars of aggression in the whole middle east.
So any appeal to the "White House" is almost pointless since the White House is one element of the power structure captured
by the war-criminal lunatics.
To change something people in the US should at first stop buying their war criminal lying mass media.
Then they should stop supporting ANY foreign intervention by the US and should stop believing any of the preposterous lies
released by the media, the state dept., or any other neocon outlet.
Actually Trump was probably elected because he said he was anti-intervention and anti-media. But did it help?
The US needs mass resistance (demonstrations, strikes, boycotts, non-participation, sit-ins, grass-root information, or whatever)
against their neocon/zionist/mafia/cia power groups or nothing will change.
We need demonstrations against NATO, against war, against false flag terrorism, against using terrorists as secret armies,
against war propaganda!
B.t.w. Iran has always been one of the main goals. Think of it: Why did the US attack Afghanistan and Iraq? What have those
two countries in common? (Hint: a look on the map helps to answer this question.) I am beginning to get interested in why some
people are sure 9/11 was a false flag affair covered up by a lot of lies. So may I try my opening question on you. How much, if
any of it, have you read of the official 9/11 commission report?
@eah The WH should focus on
the USA. And what grudge is that? The only two I can find are connected. The deposing of our puppets, the Assads and the nationalization
of their natural resources. I have the impression that it removes around future hegemon and the rich gas reserves off their coast
and the decades long desire to run a pipeline west to the Mediterranean.
Israel's current "agreements" and its "kowtowing" to Saudi Arabia speaks VOLUMES. Once again, Israel is about to get others
to do their "dirty work" for them.
The point that everybody seems to miss is the fact that Judaism and Islam are inextricably linked. In fact, one could safely
argue that Islam is an arabicized form of Judaism.
1. Both Judaism and Islam promote their own forms of supremacy, relegating non-adherents as "lesser human beings", or in Judaism's
take "no better than livestock, albeit with souls, to be used for the advantage of the jew".
2. Both systems proscribe lesser (or no) punishment for those of each respective "tribe" who transgress against "outsiders"
-- goyim
or infidels. Both systems proscribe much harsher punishments against "outsiders" who transgress against those of each respective
"tribe".
3. When it comes to "equality under law", Israel is no better than Saudi Arabia, as a jew who has a disagreement with an "outsider"
will always have the advantage of a judicial system which almost always rules for the jew.
4. Both Judaism and Islam have taken it upon themselves to be arbiters of what the rest of the world should follow, demanding
that "outsiders" conform to what THEY believe, thinking that they know what is best (for the rest of us). Just look at the demands
moslems (who are guests in western Europe) make of local non-moslem populations.
Read the jewish Talmud and islamic Koran you will find virtually identical passages that demonize and marginalize those of
us who are "goyim" or "infidels".
A pox on both their houses
Now before I say what I'm going to say I want to say that Israel has the right to define and defend her interests just
as China, Russia and USA do, as Geraldi says above. No nation or people can be denied this (without force).
Having said that, I am grateful to you, anarchyst, for having pointed out the familial similarities between Islam and
Judaism. In addition to what you say there is the fact that the Jewish genome is virtually identical to that of the Palestinians--except
for that of Ashkenazi Jews who are more than half European.
As far as I can see, Ashkenazi Jews have an existential choice. They can identify with their European half whereby they
acknowledge that the Greeks and not Moses made the greatest contributions to humanity (and more particularly, their humanity)
or they can go with their atavistic Semitic side and regress to barbarism. Science, Logic, Math, History, Architecture,
Drama and Music or blowing up Buddhas and shrouding your women. Take your pick.
Of course, this is sorta unfair in as much as they were kicked out of Europe and now dwell in the ME where if they try
to act like Europeans they will be persecuted by their neighbors as apostates. The Jews do indeed have a tough row to hoe.
, @bjondo Jews/Judaism
bring death, destruction, misery.
Muslims/Islam (minus Western creation of "Muslim"terrorists) brought golden ages to many areas.
Christianity and Islam elevate the human spirit. Judaism degrades.
June 7, 2017 We Have Met the Evil Empire and It Is Us
Life in America was pure injustice, the lash and the iron boot, despite the version of history we have been given by the Ford
and Rockefeller Foundations who "re-invented" America and its history through taking control of public education in the late 1940s.
You see, the multi-generational ignorance we bask in today is not unplanned. The threat represented by advances in communications
and other technology was recognized and dealt with, utterly quashed at birth.
@anarchyst Israel's current
"agreements" and its "kowtowing" to Saudi Arabia speaks VOLUMES. Once again, Israel is about to get others to do their "dirty
work" for them.
The point that everybody seems to miss is the fact that Judaism and Islam are inextricably linked. In fact, one could safely argue
that Islam is an arabicized form of Judaism.
1. Both Judaism and Islam promote their own forms of supremacy, relegating non-adherents as "lesser human beings", or in Judaism's
take "no better than livestock, albeit with souls, to be used for the advantage of the jew".
2. Both systems proscribe lesser (or no) punishment for those of each respective "tribe" who transgress against "outsiders"--goyim
or infidels. Both systems proscribe much harsher punishments against "outsiders" who transgress against those of each respective
"tribe".
3. When it comes to "equality under law", Israel is no better than Saudi Arabia, as a jew who has a disagreement with an "outsider"
will always have the advantage of a judicial system which almost always rules for the jew.
4. Both Judaism and Islam have taken it upon themselves to be arbiters of what the rest of the world should follow, demanding
that "outsiders" conform to what THEY believe, thinking that they know what is best (for the rest of us). Just look at the demands
moslems (who are guests in western Europe) make of local non-moslem populations.
Read the jewish Talmud and islamic Koran...you will find virtually identical passages that demonize and marginalize those of
us who are "goyim" or "infidels".
A pox on both their houses... Now before I say what I'm going to say I want to say that Israel has the right to define and defend
her interests just as China, Russia and USA do, as Geraldi says above. No nation or people can be denied this (without force).
Having said that, I am grateful to you, anarchyst, for having pointed out the familial similarities between Islam and Judaism.
In addition to what you say there is the fact that the Jewish genome is virtually identical to that of the Palestinians–except
for that of Ashkenazi Jews who are more than half European.
As far as I can see, Ashkenazi Jews have an existential choice. They can identify with their European half whereby they acknowledge
that the Greeks and not Moses made the greatest contributions to humanity (and more particularly, their humanity) or they can
go with their atavistic Semitic side and regress to barbarism. Science, Logic, Math, History, Architecture, Drama and Music or
blowing up Buddhas and shrouding your women. Take your pick.
Of course, this is sorta unfair in as much as they were kicked out of Europe and now dwell in the ME where if they try to act
like Europeans they will be persecuted by their neighbors as apostates. The Jews do indeed have a tough row to hoe.
Trump is torn between Israel's permanent need to weaken its powerful neighbors (Iraq, Iran) and the necessity to protect the USA
from terrorists attacks.
Iran is an hypothetical threat to Israel, Saudi Arabia has proven to be a threat to the world.
In Tehran and other Iranian cities including Iran's holiest, that is, most conservative cities like Mashad. there are taxi
companies owned and run by women.
Tehran traffic makes NYC look like Mayberry RFD; many Iranians use small motorcycles to commute and take care of daily chores.
It's not at all uncommon to see an Iranian woman in full chador driving a motorcycle with a child and parcels in tow.
Iranian women could offer to teach the women of Saudi Arabia to drive.
@Wizard of Oz I am beginning
to get interested in why some people are sure 9/11 was a false flag affair covered up by a lot of lies. So may I try my opening
question on you. How much, if any of it, have you read of the official 9/11 commission report? A better question: Have YOU read
The Commission: The Uncensored History of the 9/11 Investigation by Phillip Shenon?
There's no alternative to Saudi royal family rule of the peninsula. Who's there to replace them? Any other group, assuming
there might be one somewhere waiting in the wings, would probably be anti-American and not as compliant as the Saudis. They've
spent gigantic sums in the endless billions buying military equipment from the US, weapons they can't even fully use, as a way
of making themselves indispensable customers. Many other billions of petrodollars find their way westward into our financial systems.
They collaborate with the US in various schemes throughout the Muslim world using their intelligence services and money in furtherance
of US goals.
They live the royal life thanks to being able to use the money from their nation's resource wealth as their own personal kitty,
living in palaces, buying obscene amounts of jewelry and other luxury goods, and so on. They'll never give that up and being a
close ally of the US affords them protection which of course they pay for. They may be seen as an enemy by the average person
but not at the elite level with whom they all consort and roll around in the money with.
Mattis still seems stuck with his Iran obsession. Shame I thought he had the intellectual curiosity to adapt. Trump has
good instincts, I hope Tillerson comes to the fore, and Bannon stays influential.
Iran is US enemy #1 not only because it is against that country smaller than New Jersey with less people (Israel) but also
because Iran has been a model for other countries to follow because of its intransigence to US oppression and attacks, financial
political and cyber. As the world becomes multi-polar, Iran's repeated wise reactions to the world hegemon have been an inspiration
to China and others to go their own way. The US can't stand that.
@Paul Well, the real enemy of
the people are the real terrorists behind the scenes. Those who planned the 9/11 false flag. Those who sent the Anthrax letters
to resisting congress members. Those who pre-planned the wars of aggression in the whole middle east.
So any appeal to the "White House" is almost pointless since the White House is one element of the power structure captured
by the war-criminal lunatics.
To change something people in the US should at first stop buying their war criminal lying mass media.
Then they should stop supporting ANY foreign intervention by the US and should stop believing any of the preposterous lies
released by the media, the state dept., or any other neocon outlet.
Actually Trump was probably elected because he said he was anti-intervention and anti-media. But did it help?
The US needs mass resistance (demonstrations, strikes, boycotts, non-participation, sit-ins, grass-root information, or whatever)
against their neocon/zionist/mafia/cia power groups or nothing will change.
We need demonstrations against NATO, against war, against false flag terrorism, against using terrorists as secret armies,
against war propaganda!
B.t.w. Iran has always been one of the main goals. Think of it: Why did the US attack Afghanistan and Iraq? What have those
two countries in common? (Hint: a look on the map helps to answer this question.) "Well, the real enemy of the people are the
real terrorists behind the scenes. Those who planned the 9/11 false flag."
Saudi Arabia is THE worst nation in the Middle East.
Why does the US follow along blindly? Well, it is a WASP thing. We are the new Brit Empire. By the height of the Victorian
era, virtually all English Elites were philoSemitic. Roughly half of the UK WASP Elite philoSemitism was pro-Jewish and half was
pro-Arabic/Islamic.
And by the time of WW1, the English Elite pro-Arabic/Islamic faction came to adore the house of Saud.
So, our foreign policy is merely WASP culture continuing to ruin most of the rest of the world, including all the whites ruled
by WASP Elites. SECOND worst,my friend.
@Chad I fully agree that attacking
Iran would be yet another disaster but I don't understand why Saudi Arabia is portrayed as an 'enemy', the 'real' one, no less,
in alt-media circles like this.
I mean let's be honest with ourselves. KSA is the definition of a vassal state. Has been so since the state established
established relations with the USA in the 1940s and the status was confirmed during the 1960s under King Faisal. Oil for security.
Why pretend that they have any operational clearance from the US?
Contrary to the popular view, Wahabism is necessary to keep the local population under control. Particularly the minority
Shia population who live along the eastern coast, an area, which incidentally also has the all the oil reserves. USA fully understands
this. Which is why they not only tolerated Wahabism, but strongly promoted it during Afghan jihad. The operation was by and large
very successful btw. It was only during the '90s when religion became the new ideology for the resistance against the empire across
the Muslim world. Zero surprise there because the preceding ideology, radical left wing politics was completely defeated. Iran
became the first country in this pattern. The Iranian left was decimated by the Shah, another vassal. So the religious right became
the new resistance.
And as far as the KSA is considered, Wahabi preachers aren't allowed to attack the USA anyway. If any individual preacher
so much as makes a squeak, he will be bent over a barrel. There won't be any "coming down very hard on Saudi Arabia" because USA
already owns that country.
So what's the answer? Well, props to Phillip as he understood - "it would also require some serious thinking in the White House
about the extent to which America's armed interventions all over Asia and Africa have made many people hate us enough to strap
on a suicide vest and have a go."
Bingo. Your analysis starts too late. The US supports Wahhabism and the House of Saud because the pro-Arabic/Islamic English
Elites of 1910 and 1920 and 1935 supported Wahhabism and the House of Saud.
The British Empire 'made' the House of Saud. Thinking it wise to use Wahhabism to control Shia Islam is like thinking it
wise to use blacks to control the criminal tendencies of Mexicans.
1,000 Words @RobinG#UNRIG
adds AMERICA FIRST, NOT ISRAEL to Agenda.
..................."A.I.P.A.C.. you're outta business!"
Due to slanderous attacks by a Mossad internet psy-op, Steele now prioritizes Israeli malign influence on US. Also, check out
Cynthia McKinney's twitter.
#UNRIG - Robert David Steele Weekly Update Nice action approach to cure ills of society.
Enclosing copy of flier we have distributed – with a similar approach at a cure.
*Flier distributed is adjusted & a bit more attractive (1 sheet – both sides).
The key is to Restore the Republic, which was definitively destroyed on November 22, 1963.
Feel free to contact.
Use this, or send me a note by way of a response.
For THE RESTORATION OF THE REPUBLIC
"We hold these truths to be self-evident: that all men are created equal governments are instituted among men, deriving their
just powers from the consent of the governed; that whenever any form of government becomes destructive of these ends, it is the
right of the people to alter or abolish it and to institute new government, laying its foundation on such principles "
The above is a portion of the Declaration of Independence, written by Thomas Jefferson.
We submit the following facts to the citizens of the United States.
The government of the United States has been a Totalitarian Oligarchy since the military financial aristocracy destroyed
the Democratic Republic on November 22, 1963 , when they assassinated the last democratically elected president, John Fitzgerald
Kennedy , and overthrew his government. All following governments have been unconstitutional frauds. Attempts by Robert
Kennedy and Martin Luther King to restore the Republic were interrupted by their murder.
A subsequent 12 year colonial war against Vietnam , conducted by the murderers of Kennedy, left 2 million dead in a
wake of napalm and burning villages.
In 1965, the U.S. government orchestrated the slaughter of 1 million unarmed Indonesian civilians.
In the decade that followed the CIA murdered 100,000 Native Americans in Guatemala .
In the 1970s, the Oligarchy began the destruction and looting of America's middle class, by encouraging the export of industry
and jobs to parts of the world where workers were paid bare subsistence wages. The 2008, Bailout of the Nation's Oligarchs
cost American taxpayers $13trillion. The long decline of the local economy has led to the political decline of our hard working
citizens, as well as the decay of cities, towns, and infrastructure, such as education.
The impoverishment of America's middle class has undermined the nation's financial stability. Without a productive foundation,
the government has accumulated a huge debt in excess of $19trillion. This debt will have to be paid, or suffered by future generations.
Concurrently, the top 1% of the nation's population has benefited enormously from the discomfiture of the rest. The interest rate
has been reduced to 0, thereby slowly robbing millions of depositors of their savings, as their savings cannot stay even with
the inflation rate.
The government spends the declining national wealth on bloody and never ending military adventures, and is or has recently
conducted unconstitutional wars against 9 nations. The Oligarchs maintain 700 military bases in 131 countries; they spend as much
on military weapons of terror as the rest of the nations of the world combined. Tellingly, more than half the government budget
is spent on the military and 16 associated secret agencies.
The nightmare of a powerful centralized government crushing the rights of the people, so feared by the Founders of the United
States, has become a reality. The government of Obama/Biden, as with previous administrations such as Bush/Cheney, and whoever
is chosen in November 2016, operates a Gulag of dozens of concentration camps, where prisoners are denied trials, and routinely
tortured. The Patriot Act and The National Defense Authorizations Act , enacted by both Democratic and Republican
factions of the oligarchy, serve to establish a legal cover for their terror.
The nation's media is controlled, and, with the school systems, serve to brainwash the population; the people are intimidated
and treated with contempt.
The United States is No longer Sovereign
The United States is no longer a sovereign nation. Its government, The Executive, and Congress, is bought, utterly owned
and controlled by foreign and domestic wealthy Oligarchs, such as the Rothschilds, Rockefellers, and Duponts , to name only
a few of the best known.
The 2016 Electoral Circus will anoint new actors to occupy the same Unconstitutional Government, with its controlling International
Oligarchs. Clinton, Trump, whomever, are willing accomplices for imperialist international murder, and destruction of nations,
including ours.
For Love of Country
The Restoration of the Republic will be a Revolutionary Act, that will cancel all previous debts owed to that unconstitutional
regime and its business supporters. All debts, including Student Debts, will be canceled. Our citizens will begin, anew, with
a clean slate.
As American Founder , Thomas Jefferson wrote, in a letter to James Madison:
"I set out on this ground, which I suppose to be self evident, 'that the earth belongs in usufruct to the living':"
"Then I say the earth belongs to each of these generations, during it's course, fully, and in their own right. The 2d. Generation
receives it clear of the debts and incumberances of the 1st. The 3d of the 2d. and so on. For if the 1st. Could charge it with
a debt, then the earth would belong to the dead and not the living generation."
Our Citizens must restore the centrality of the constitution, establishing a less powerful government which will ensure
President Franklin Roosevelt's Four Freedoms , freedom of speech and expression, freedom to worship God in ones own way, freedom
from want "which means economic understandings which will secure to every nation a healthy peace time life for its inhabitants
" and freedom from fear "which means a world-wide reduction of armaments "
Once restored: The Constitution will become, once again, the law of the land and of a free people. We will establish a government,
hold elections, begin to direct traffic, arrest criminal politicians of the tyrannical oligarchy, and, in short, repair the damage
of the previous totalitarian governments.
For the Democratic Republic!
Sons and Daughters of Liberty [email protected]
are studying US states and ranking them according to financial stability measures. The states with biggest problems -- Illinois,
California, New Jersey, Connecticut -- are in the mess they are in largely because of pension liability issues: some pensions
are unfunded or underfunded.
I recall that ten years ago about a dozen Jewish organizations formed the "Iran Task Force," ** whose primary activity was
to persuade managers of State pension funds to divest from Iran-connected companies; that is, corporations & banks, etc. that
did business with Iran. I recall very clearly that Arnold Schwartznegger was the poster child for California's vanguard role in
divesting from such nasty nasty companies, in accord with the wishes of Jewish Israel-firsters.
Perhaps the Mercatus scholars could prepare an exercise in alternative financial history: What shape would the US economy,
and the various States's economies, be in if the US were NOT so overwhelmingly influenced by Israel firsters, and were NOT persuaded,
Against Our Better Judgment, to entangle themselves in Israel's nefarious activities?
____
** The 2007 Iran Task Force is NOT the same as the group formed in 2015 or so, embedded in US House/Senate, with Joe Lieberman
and Michael Hayden playing prominent roles in attempting to influence the Iran Deal.
The 2007 initiative was sponsored by groups such as ZOA, RJC, AIPAC, etc., and / or spun off groups such as Foundation for
Defense of Democracy, United Against Nuclear Iran.
"... My predecessor Benedict XVI likewise proposed "eliminating the structural causes of the dysfunctions of the world economy and correcting models of growth which have proved incapable of ensuring respect for the environment". [10] He observed that the world cannot be analyzed by isolating only one of its aspects, since "the book of nature is one and indivisible", and includes the environment, life, sexuality, the family, social relations, and so forth. It follows that "the deterioration of nature is closely connected to the culture which shapes human coexistence" ..."
"... Patriarch Bartholomew has spoken in particular of the need for each of us to repent of the ways we have harmed the planet, for "inasmuch as we all generate small ecological damage", we are called to acknowledge "our contribution, smaller or greater, to the disfigurement and destruction of creation". [14] He has repeatedly stated this firmly and persuasively, challenging us to acknowledge our sins against creation: "For human beings to destroy the biological diversity of God's creation; for human beings to degrade the integrity of the earth by causing changes in its climate, by stripping the earth of its natural forests or destroying its wetlands; for human beings to contaminate the earth's waters, its land, its air, and its life – these are sins". [15] For "to commit a crime against the natural world is a sin against ourselves and a sin against God". [16] ..."
"... He asks us to replace consumption with sacrifice, greed with generosity, wastefulness with a spirit of sharing, an asceticism which "entails learning to give, and not simply to give up. It is a way of loving, of moving gradually away from what I want to what God's world needs. It is liberation from fear, greed and compulsion". ..."
"... It is possible that we do not grasp the gravity of the challenges now before us. "The risk is growing day by day that man will not use his power as he should"; in effect, "power is never considered in terms of the responsibility of choice which is inherent in freedom" since its "only norms are taken from alleged necessity, from either utility or security". [85] But human beings are not completely autonomous. Our freedom fades when it is handed over to the blind forces of the unconscious, of immediate needs, of self-interest, and of violence. In this sense, we stand naked and exposed in the face of our ever-increasing power, lacking the wherewithal to control it. We have certain superficial mechanisms, but we cannot claim to have a sound ethics, a culture and spirituality genuinely capable of setting limits and teaching clear-minded self-restraint. ..."
"... Human beings and material objects no longer extend a friendly hand to one another; the relationship has become confrontational. This has made it easy to accept the idea of infinite or unlimited growth, which proves so attractive to economists, financiers and experts in technology. It is based on the lie that there is an infinite supply of the earth's goods, and this leads to the planet being squeezed dry beyond every limit. It is the false notion that "an infinite quantity of energy and resources are available, that it is possible to renew them quickly, and that the negative effects of the exploitation of the natural order can be easily absorbed". ..."
"... We have to accept that technological products are not neutral, for they create a framework which ends up conditioning lifestyles and shaping social possibilities along the lines dictated by the interests of certain powerful groups. Decisions which may seem purely instrumental are in reality decisions about the kind of society we want to build. ..."
"... Technology tends to absorb everything into its ironclad logic, and those who are surrounded with technology "know full well that it moves forward in the final analysis neither for profit nor for the well-being of the human race", that "in the most radical sense of the term power is its motive – a lordship over all". [87] As a result, "man seizes hold of the naked elements of both nature and human nature". [88] Our capacity to make decisions, a more genuine freedom and the space for each one's alternative creativity are diminished. ..."
"... At the same time, we have "a sort of 'superdevelopment' of a wasteful and consumerist kind which forms an unacceptable contrast with the ongoing situations of dehumanizing deprivation", [90] while we are all too slow in developing economic institutions and social initiatives which can give the poor regular access to basic resources. We fail to see the deepest roots of our present failures, which have to do with the direction, goals, meaning and social implications of technological and economic growth. ..."
"... The specialization which belongs to technology makes it difficult to see the larger picture. The fragmentation of knowledge proves helpful for concrete applications, and yet it often leads to a loss of appreciation for the whole, for the relationships between things, and for the broader horizon, which then becomes irrelevant. ..."
"... It becomes difficult to pause and recover depth in life. If architecture reflects the spirit of an age, our megastructures and drab apartment blocks express the spirit of globalized technology, where a constant flood of new products coexists with a tedious monotony. Let us refuse to resign ourselves to this, and continue to wonder about the purpose and meaning of everything. Otherwise we would simply legitimate the present situation and need new forms of escapism to help us endure the emptiness. ..."
"... All of this shows the urgent need for us to move forward in a bold cultural revolution. Science and technology are not neutral; from the beginning to the end of a process, various intentions and possibilities are in play and can take on distinct shapes. Nobody is suggesting a return to the Stone Age, but we do need to slow down and look at reality in a different way, to appropriate the positive and sustainable progress which has been made, but also to recover the values and the great goals swept away by our unrestrained delusions of grandeur. ..."
"... Modern anthropocentrism has paradoxically ended up prizing technical thought over reality, since "the technological mind sees nature as an insensate order, as a cold body of facts, as a mere 'given', as an object of utility, as raw material to be hammered into useful shape; it views the cosmos similarly as a mere 'space' into which objects can be thrown with complete indifference" ..."
"... Once the human being declares independence from reality and behaves with absolute dominion, the very foundations of our life begin to crumble ..."
"... This situation has led to a constant schizophrenia, wherein a technocracy which sees no intrinsic value in lesser beings coexists with the other extreme, which sees no special value in human beings. But one cannot prescind from humanity ..."
"... Nor must the critique of a misguided anthropocentrism underestimate the importance of interpersonal relations. If the present ecological crisis is one small sign of the ethical, cultural and spiritual crisis of modernity, we cannot presume to heal our relationship with nature and the environment without healing all fundamental human relationships. ..."
"... The culture of relativism is the same disorder which drives one person to take advantage of another, to treat others as mere objects, imposing forced labour on them or enslaving them to pay their debts. The same kind of thinking leads to the sexual exploitation of children and abandonment of the elderly who no longer serve our interests. ..."
"... We are convinced that "man is the source, the focus and the aim of all economic and social life". [100] Nonetheless, once our human capacity for contemplation and reverence is impaired, it becomes easy for the meaning of work to be misunderstood. [101] We need to remember that men and women have "the capacity to improve their lot, to further their moral growth and to develop their spiritual endowments". [102] Work should be the setting for this rich personal growth, where many aspects of life enter into play: creativity, planning for the future, developing our talents, living out our values, relating to others ..."
"... it is essential that "we continue to prioritize the goal of access to steady employment for everyone", [103] no matter the limited interests of business and dubious economic reasoning. ..."
"... We were created with a vocation to work. The goal should not be that technological progress increasingly replace human work, for this would be detrimental to humanity. Work is a necessity, part of the meaning of life on this earth, a path to growth, human development and personal fulfilment. Helping the poor financially must always be a provisional solution in the face of pressing needs. The broader objective should always be to allow them a dignified life through work. ..."
"... The loss of jobs also has a negative impact on the economy "through the progressive erosion of social capital: the network of relationships of trust, dependability, and respect for rules, all of which are indispensable for any form of civil coexistence". [104] In other words, "human costs always include economic costs, and economic dysfunctions always involve human costs". [105] To stop investing in people, in order to gain greater short-term financial gain, is bad business for society. ..."
"... In order to continue providing employment, it is imperative to promote an economy which favours productive diversity and business creativity. For example, there is a great variety of small-scale food production systems which feed the greater part of the world's peoples, using a modest amount of land and producing less waste, be it in small agricultural parcels, in orchards and gardens, hunting and wild harvesting or local fishing. Economies of scale, especially in the agricultural sector, end up forcing smallholders to sell their land or to abandon their traditional crops. ..."
"... To ensure economic freedom from which all can effectively benefit, restraints occasionally have to be imposed on those possessing greater resources and financial power. To claim economic freedom while real conditions bar many people from actual access to it, and while possibilities for employment continue to shrink, is to practise a doublespeak which brings politics into disrepute. Business is a noble vocation, directed to producing wealth and improving our world. It can be a fruitful source of prosperity for the areas in which it operates, especially if it sees the creation of jobs as an essential part of its service to the common good. ..."
6. My predecessor Benedict XVI likewise proposed
"eliminating the structural causes of the dysfunctions of the world economy and correcting models of growth which have proved incapable
of ensuring respect for the environment".[10]
He observed that the world cannot be analyzed by isolating only one of its aspects, since "the book of nature is one and indivisible",
and includes the environment, life, sexuality, the family, social relations, and so forth. It follows that "the deterioration of
nature is closely connected to the culture which shapes human coexistence".[11]
Pope Benedict asked us to recognize that the natural environment has been gravely damaged by our irresponsible behaviour. The social
environment has also suffered damage. Both are ultimately due to the same evil: the notion that there are no indisputable truths
to guide our lives, and hence human freedom is limitless. We have forgotten that "man is not only a freedom which he creates for
himself. Man does not create himself. He is spirit and will, but also nature".[12]
With paternal concern, Benedict urged us to realize that creation is harmed "where we ourselves have the final word, where everything
is simply our property and we use it for ourselves alone. The misuse of creation begins when we no longer recognize any higher instance
than ourselves, when we see nothing else but ourselves".[13]
United by the same concern
7. These statements of the Popes echo the reflections of numerous scientists, philosophers, theologians and civic groups, all
of which have enriched the Church's thinking on these questions. Outside the Catholic Church, other Churches and Christian communities
– and other religions as well – have expressed deep concern and offered valuable reflections on issues which all of us find disturbing.
To give just one striking example, I would mention the statements made by the beloved Ecumenical Patriarch Bartholomew, with whom
we share the hope of full ecclesial communion.
8. Patriarch Bartholomew has spoken in particular of the need for each of us to repent of the ways we have harmed the planet,
for "inasmuch as we all generate small ecological damage", we are called to acknowledge "our contribution, smaller or greater, to
the disfigurement and destruction of creation".[14]
He has repeatedly stated this firmly and persuasively, challenging us to acknowledge our sins against creation: "For human beings
to destroy the biological diversity of God's creation; for human beings to degrade the integrity of the earth by causing changes
in its climate, by stripping the earth of its natural forests or destroying its wetlands; for human beings to contaminate the earth's
waters, its land, its air, and its life – these are sins".[15]
For "to commit a crime against the natural world is a sin against ourselves and a sin against God".[16]
9. At the same time, Bartholomew has drawn attention to the ethical and spiritual roots of environmental problems, which require
that we look for solutions not only in technology but in a change of humanity; otherwise we would be dealing merely with symptoms.
He asks us to replace consumption with sacrifice, greed with generosity, wastefulness with a spirit of sharing, an asceticism
which "entails learning to give, and not simply to give up. It is a way of loving, of moving gradually away from what I want to what
God's world needs. It is liberation from fear, greed and compulsion".[17]
As Christians, we are also called "to accept the world as a sacrament of communion, as a way of sharing with God and our neighbours
on a global scale. It is our humble conviction that the divine and the human meet in the slightest detail in the seamless garment
of God's creation, in the last speck of dust of our planet".[18]
... ... ...
I. TECHNOLOGY: CREATIVITY AND POWER
... ... ...
105. There is a tendency to believe that every increase in power means "an increase of 'progress' itself", an advance in "security,
usefulness, welfare and vigour; an assimilation of new values into the stream of culture",[83]
as if reality, goodness and truth automatically flow from technological and economic power as such. The fact is that "contemporary
man has not been trained to use power well",[84]
because our immense technological development has not been accompanied by a development in human responsibility, values and conscience.
Each age tends to have only a meagre awareness of its own limitations. It is possible that we do not grasp the gravity of the
challenges now before us. "The risk is growing day by day that man will not use his power as he should"; in effect, "power is never
considered in terms of the responsibility of choice which is inherent in freedom" since its "only norms are taken from alleged necessity,
from either utility or security".[85]
But human beings are not completely autonomous. Our freedom fades when it is handed over to the blind forces of the unconscious,
of immediate needs, of self-interest, and of violence. In this sense, we stand naked and exposed in the face of our ever-increasing
power, lacking the wherewithal to control it. We have certain superficial mechanisms, but we cannot claim to have a sound ethics,
a culture and spirituality genuinely capable of setting limits and teaching clear-minded self-restraint.
II. THE GLOBALIZATION OF THE TECHNOCRATIC PARADIGM
106. The basic problem goes even deeper: it is the way that humanity has taken up technology and its development according
to an undifferentiated and one-dimensional paradigm. This paradigm exalts the concept of a subject who, using logical and rational
procedures, progressively approaches and gains control over an external object. This subject makes every effort to establish the
scientific and experimental method, which in itself is already a technique of possession, mastery and transformation. It is as if
the subject were to find itself in the presence of something formless, completely open to manipulation. Men and women have constantly
intervened in nature, but for a long time this meant being in tune with and respecting the possibilities offered by the things themselves.
It was a matter of receiving what nature itself allowed, as if from its own hand. Now, by contrast, we are the ones to lay our hands
on things, attempting to extract everything possible from them while frequently ignoring or forgetting the reality in front of us.
Human beings and material objects no longer extend a friendly hand to one another; the relationship has become confrontational. This
has made it easy to accept the idea of infinite or unlimited growth, which proves so attractive to economists, financiers and experts
in technology. It is based on the lie that there is an infinite supply of the earth's goods, and this leads to the planet being squeezed
dry beyond every limit. It is the false notion that "an infinite quantity of energy and resources are available, that it is possible
to renew them quickly, and that the negative effects of the exploitation of the natural order can be easily absorbed".[86]
107. It can be said that many problems of today's world stem from the tendency, at times unconscious, to make the method and aims
of science and technology an epistemological paradigm which shapes the lives of individuals and the workings of society. The effects
of imposing this model on reality as a whole, human and social, are seen in the deterioration of the environment, but this is just
one sign of a reductionism which affects every aspect of human and social life. We have to accept that technological products
are not neutral, for they create a framework which ends up conditioning lifestyles and shaping social possibilities along the lines
dictated by the interests of certain powerful groups. Decisions which may seem purely instrumental are in reality decisions about
the kind of society we want to build.
108. The idea of promoting a different cultural paradigm and employing technology as a mere instrument is nowadays inconceivable.
The technological paradigm has become so dominant that it would be difficult to do without its resources and even more difficult
to utilize them without being dominated by their internal logic. It has become countercultural to choose a lifestyle whose goals
are even partly independent of technology, of its costs and its power to globalize and make us all the same. Technology tends
to absorb everything into its ironclad logic, and those who are surrounded with technology "know full well that it moves forward
in the final analysis neither for profit nor for the well-being of the human race", that "in the most radical sense of the term power
is its motive – a lordship over all".[87]
As a result, "man seizes hold of the naked elements of both nature and human nature".[88]
Our capacity to make decisions, a more genuine freedom and the space for each one's alternative creativity are diminished.
109. The technocratic paradigm also tends to dominate economic and political life. The economy accepts every advance in technology
with a view to profit, without concern for its potentially negative impact on human beings. Finance overwhelms the real economy.
The lessons of the global financial crisis have not been assimilated, and we are learning all too slowly the lessons of environmental
deterioration. Some circles maintain that current economics and technology will solve all environmental problems, and argue, in popular
and non-technical terms, that the problems of global hunger and poverty will be resolved simply by market growth. They are less concerned
with certain economic theories which today scarcely anybody dares defend, than with their actual operation in the functioning of
the economy. They may not affirm such theories with words, but nonetheless support them with their deeds by showing no interest in
more balanced levels of production, a better distribution of wealth, concern for the environment and the rights of future generations.
Their behaviour shows that for them maximizing profits is enough. Yet by itself the market cannot guarantee integral human development
and social inclusion.[89]At the same time, we have "a sort of 'superdevelopment' of a wasteful and consumerist kind which forms an unacceptable contrast
with the ongoing situations of dehumanizing deprivation",[90]
while we are all too slow in developing economic institutions and social initiatives which can give the poor regular access to basic
resources. We fail to see the deepest roots of our present failures, which have to do with the direction, goals, meaning and social
implications of technological and economic growth.
110. The specialization which belongs to technology makes it difficult to see the larger picture. The fragmentation of knowledge
proves helpful for concrete applications, and yet it often leads to a loss of appreciation for the whole, for the relationships between
things, and for the broader horizon, which then becomes irrelevant. This very fact makes it hard to find adequate ways of solving
the more complex problems of today's world, particularly those regarding the environment and the poor; these problems cannot be dealt
with from a single perspective or from a single set of interests. A science which would offer solutions to the great issues would
necessarily have to take into account the data generated by other fields of knowledge, including philosophy and social ethics; but
this is a difficult habit to acquire today. Nor are there genuine ethical horizons to which one can appeal. Life gradually becomes
a surrender to situations conditioned by technology, itself viewed as the principal key to the meaning of existence. In the concrete
situation confronting us, there are a number of symptoms which point to what is wrong, such as environmental degradation, anxiety,
a loss of the purpose of life and of community living. Once more we see that "realities are more important than ideas".[91]
111. Ecological culture cannot be reduced to a series of urgent and partial responses to the immediate problems of pollution,
environmental decay and the depletion of natural resources. There needs to be a distinctive way of looking at things, a way of thinking,
policies, an educational programme, a lifestyle and a spirituality which together generate resistance to the assault of the technocratic
paradigm. Otherwise, even the best ecological initiatives can find themselves caught up in the same globalized logic. To seek only
a technical remedy to each environmental problem which comes up is to separate what is in reality interconnected and to mask the
true and deepest problems of the global system.
112. Yet we can once more broaden our vision. We have the freedom needed to limit and direct technology; we can put it at the
service of another type of progress, one which is healthier, more human, more social, more integral. Liberation from the dominant
technocratic paradigm does in fact happen sometimes, for example, when cooperatives of small producers adopt less polluting means
of production, and opt for a non-consumerist model of life, recreation and community. Or when technology is directed primarily to
resolving people's concrete problems, truly helping them live with more dignity and less suffering. Or indeed when the desire to
create and contemplate beauty manages to overcome reductionism through a kind of salvation which occurs in beauty and in those who
behold it. An authentic humanity, calling for a new synthesis, seems to dwell in the midst of our technological culture, almost unnoticed,
like a mist seeping gently beneath a closed door. Will the promise last, in spite of everything, with all that is authentic rising
up in stubborn resistance?
113. There is also the fact that people no longer seem to believe in a happy future; they no longer have blind trust in a better
tomorrow based on the present state of the world and our technical abilities. There is a growing awareness that scientific and technological
progress cannot be equated with the progress of humanity and history, a growing sense that the way to a better future lies elsewhere.
This is not to reject the possibilities which technology continues to offer us. But humanity has changed profoundly, and the accumulation
of constant novelties exalts a superficiality which pulls us in one direction. It becomes difficult to pause and recover depth
in life. If architecture reflects the spirit of an age, our megastructures and drab apartment blocks express the spirit of globalized
technology, where a constant flood of new products coexists with a tedious monotony. Let us refuse to resign ourselves to this, and
continue to wonder about the purpose and meaning of everything. Otherwise we would simply legitimate the present situation and need
new forms of escapism to help us endure the emptiness.
114. All of this shows the urgent need for us to move forward in a bold cultural revolution. Science and technology are not
neutral; from the beginning to the end of a process, various intentions and possibilities are in play and can take on distinct shapes.
Nobody is suggesting a return to the Stone Age, but we do need to slow down and look at reality in a different way, to appropriate
the positive and sustainable progress which has been made, but also to recover the values and the great goals swept away by our unrestrained
delusions of grandeur.
III. THE CRISIS AND EFFECTS OF MODERN ANTHROPOCENTRISM
115. Modern anthropocentrism has paradoxically ended up prizing technical thought over reality, since "the technological mind
sees nature as an insensate order, as a cold body of facts, as a mere 'given', as an object of utility, as raw material to be hammered
into useful shape; it views the cosmos similarly as a mere 'space' into which objects can be thrown with complete indifference".[92]
The intrinsic dignity of the world is thus compromised. When human beings fail to find their true place in this world, they misunderstand
themselves and end up acting against themselves: "Not only has God given the earth to man, who must use it with respect for the original
good purpose for which it was given, but, man too is God's gift to man. He must therefore respect the natural and moral structure
with which he has been endowed".[93]
116. Modernity has been marked by an excessive anthropocentrism which today, under another guise, continues to stand in the way
of shared understanding and of any effort to strengthen social bonds. The time has come to pay renewed attention to reality and the
limits it imposes; this in turn is the condition for a more sound and fruitful development of individuals and society. An inadequate
presentation of Christian anthropology gave rise to a wrong understanding of the relationship between human beings and the world.
Often, what was handed on was a Promethean vision of mastery over the world, which gave the impression that the protection of nature
was something that only the faint-hearted cared about. Instead, our "dominion" over the universe should be understood more properly
in the sense of responsible stewardship.[94]
117. Neglecting to monitor the harm done to nature and the environmental impact of our decisions is only the most striking sign
of a disregard for the message contained in the structures of nature itself. When we fail to acknowledge as part of reality the worth
of a poor person, a human embryo, a person with disabilities – to offer just a few examples – it becomes difficult to hear the cry
of nature itself; everything is connected. Once the human being declares independence from reality and behaves with absolute
dominion, the very foundations of our life begin to crumble, for "instead of carrying out his role as a cooperator with God
in the work of creation, man sets himself up in place of God and thus ends up provoking a rebellion on the part of nature".[95]
118. This situation has led to a constant schizophrenia, wherein a technocracy which sees no intrinsic value in lesser beings
coexists with the other extreme, which sees no special value in human beings. But one cannot prescind from humanity. There can
be no renewal of our relationship with nature without a renewal of humanity itself. There can be no ecology without an adequate anthropology.
When the human person is considered as simply one being among others, the product of chance or physical determinism, then "our overall
sense of responsibility wanes".[96]
A misguided anthropocentrism need not necessarily yield to "biocentrism", for that would entail adding yet another imbalance, failing
to solve present problems and adding new ones. Human beings cannot be expected to feel responsibility for the world unless, at the
same time, their unique capacities of knowledge, will, freedom and responsibility are recognized and valued.
119. Nor must the critique of a misguided anthropocentrism underestimate the importance of interpersonal relations. If the
present ecological crisis is one small sign of the ethical, cultural and spiritual crisis of modernity, we cannot presume to heal
our relationship with nature and the environment without healing all fundamental human relationships. Christian thought sees
human beings as possessing a particular dignity above other creatures; it thus inculcates esteem for each person and respect for
others. Our openness to others, each of whom is a "thou" capable of knowing, loving and entering into dialogue, remains the source
of our nobility as human persons. A correct relationship with the created world demands that we not weaken this social dimension
of openness to others, much less the transcendent dimension of our openness to the "Thou" of God. Our relationship with the environment
can never be isolated from our relationship with others and with God. Otherwise, it would be nothing more than romantic individualism
dressed up in ecological garb, locking us into a stifling immanence.
120. Since everything is interrelated, concern for the protection of nature is also incompatible with the justification of abortion.
How can we genuinely teach the importance of concern for other vulnerable beings, however troublesome or inconvenient they may be,
if we fail to protect a human embryo, even when its presence is uncomfortable and creates difficulties? "If personal and social sensitivity
towards the acceptance of the new life is lost, then other forms of acceptance that are valuable for society also wither away".[97]
121. We need to develop a new synthesis capable of overcoming the false arguments of recent centuries. Christianity, in fidelity
to its own identity and the rich deposit of truth which it has received from Jesus Christ, continues to reflect on these issues in
fruitful dialogue with changing historical situations. In doing so, it reveals its eternal newness.[98]
Practical relativism
122. A misguided anthropocentrism leads to a misguided lifestyle. In the Apostolic Exhortation
Evangelii Gaudium, I noted that the practical relativism typical of our age is "even more dangerous than doctrinal relativism".[99]
When human beings place themselves at the centre, they give absolute priority to immediate convenience and all else becomes relative.
Hence we should not be surprised to find, in conjunction with the omnipresent technocratic paradigm and the cult of unlimited human
power, the rise of a relativism which sees everything as irrelevant unless it serves one's own immediate interests. There is a logic
in all this whereby different attitudes can feed on one another, leading to environmental degradation and social decay.
123. The culture of relativism is the same disorder which drives one person to take advantage of another, to treat others
as mere objects, imposing forced labour on them or enslaving them to pay their debts. The same kind of thinking leads to the sexual
exploitation of children and abandonment of the elderly who no longer serve our interests. It is also the mindset of those who
say: Let us allow the invisible forces of the market to regulate the economy, and consider their impact on society and nature as
collateral damage. In the absence of objective truths or sound principles other than the satisfaction of our own desires and immediate
needs, what limits can be placed on human trafficking, organized crime, the drug trade, commerce in blood diamonds and the fur of
endangered species? Is it not the same relativistic logic which justifies buying the organs of the poor for resale or use in experimentation,
or eliminating children because they are not what their parents wanted? This same "use and throw away" logic generates so much waste,
because of the disordered desire to consume more than what is really necessary. We should not think that political efforts or the
force of law will be sufficient to prevent actions which affect the environment because, when the culture itself is corrupt and objective
truth and universally valid principles are no longer upheld, then laws can only be seen as arbitrary impositions or obstacles to
be avoided.
The need to protect employment
124. Any approach to an integral ecology, which by definition does not exclude human beings, needs to take account of the value
of labour, as Saint John Paul II wisely noted in his Encyclical
Laborem Exercens. According to the biblical account of creation, God placed man and woman in the garden he had created (cf.
Gen 2:15) not only to preserve it ("keep") but also to make it fruitful ("till"). Labourers and craftsmen thus "maintain the
fabric of the world" (Sir 38:34). Developing the created world in a prudent way is the best way of caring for it, as this
means that we ourselves become the instrument used by God to bring out the potential which he himself inscribed in things: "The Lord
created medicines out of the earth, and a sensible man will not despise them" (Sir 38:4).
125. If we reflect on the proper relationship between human beings and the world around us, we see the need for a correct understanding
of work; if we talk about the relationship between human beings and things, the question arises as to the meaning and purpose of
all human activity. This has to do not only with manual or agricultural labour but with any activity involving a modification of
existing reality, from producing a social report to the design of a technological development. Underlying every form of work is a
concept of the relationship which we can and must have with what is other than ourselves. Together with the awe-filled contemplation
of creation which we find in Saint Francis of Assisi, the Christian spiritual tradition has also developed a rich and balanced understanding
of the meaning of work, as, for example, in the life of Blessed Charles de Foucauld and his followers.
126. We can also look to the great tradition of monasticism. Originally, it was a kind of flight from the world, an escape from
the decadence of the cities. The monks sought the desert, convinced that it was the best place for encountering the presence of God.
Later, Saint Benedict of Norcia proposed that his monks live in community, combining prayer and spiritual reading with manual labour
(ora et labora). Seeing manual labour as spiritually meaningful proved revolutionary. Personal growth and sanctification came
to be sought in the interplay of recollection and work. This way of experiencing work makes us more protective and respectful of
the environment; it imbues our relationship to the world with a healthy sobriety.
127. We are convinced that "man is the source, the focus and the aim of all economic and social life".[100]
Nonetheless, once our human capacity for contemplation and reverence is impaired, it becomes easy for the meaning of work to be misunderstood.[101]
We need to remember that men and women have "the capacity to improve their lot, to further their moral growth and to develop their
spiritual endowments".[102]
Work should be the setting for this rich personal growth, where many aspects of life enter into play: creativity, planning for the
future, developing our talents, living out our values, relating to others, giving glory to God. It follows that, in the reality
of today's global society, it is essential that "we continue to prioritize the goal of access to steady employment for everyone",[103]
no matter the limited interests of business and dubious economic reasoning.
128. We were created with a vocation to work. The goal should not be that technological progress increasingly replace human
work, for this would be detrimental to humanity. Work is a necessity, part of the meaning of life on this earth, a path to growth,
human development and personal fulfilment. Helping the poor financially must always be a provisional solution in the face of pressing
needs. The broader objective should always be to allow them a dignified life through work. Yet the orientation of the economy
has favoured a kind of technological progress in which the costs of production are reduced by laying off workers and replacing them
with machines. This is yet another way in which we can end up working against ourselves. The loss of jobs also has a negative
impact on the economy "through the progressive erosion of social capital: the network of relationships of trust, dependability, and
respect for rules, all of which are indispensable for any form of civil coexistence".[104]
In other words, "human costs always include economic costs, and economic dysfunctions always involve human costs".[105]
To stop investing in people, in order to gain greater short-term financial gain, is bad business for society.
129. In order to continue providing employment, it is imperative to promote an economy which favours productive diversity
and business creativity. For example, there is a great variety of small-scale food production systems which feed the greater part
of the world's peoples, using a modest amount of land and producing less waste, be it in small agricultural parcels, in orchards
and gardens, hunting and wild harvesting or local fishing. Economies of scale, especially in the agricultural sector, end up forcing
smallholders to sell their land or to abandon their traditional crops. Their attempts to move to other, more diversified, means
of production prove fruitless because of the difficulty of linkage with regional and global markets, or because the infrastructure
for sales and transport is geared to larger businesses. Civil authorities have the right and duty to adopt clear and firm measures
in support of small producers and differentiated production. To ensure economic freedom from which all can effectively benefit,
restraints occasionally have to be imposed on those possessing greater resources and financial power. To claim economic freedom while
realconditions bar many people from actual access to it, and while possibilities for employment continue to shrink, is to
practise a doublespeak which brings politics into disrepute. Business is a noble vocation, directed to producing wealth and improving
our world. It can be a fruitful source of prosperity for the areas in which it operates, especially if it sees the creation of jobs
as an essential part of its service to the common good.
New biological technologies
130. In the philosophical and theological vision of the human being and of creation which I have presented, it is clear that the
human person, endowed with reason and knowledge, is not an external factor to be excluded. While human intervention on plants and
animals is permissible when it pertains to the necessities of human life, the Catechism of the Catholic Church teaches that
experimentation on animals is morally acceptable only "if it remains within reasonable limits [and] contributes to caring for or
saving human lives".[106]
The Catechism firmly states that human power has limits and that "it is contrary to human dignity to cause animals to suffer
or die needlessly".[107]
All such use and experimentation "requires a religious respect for the integrity of creation".[108]
The Last but not LeastTechnology is dominated by
two types of people: those who understand what they do not manage and those who manage what they do not understand ~Archibald Putt.
Ph.D
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