Lining Up for the Wall Street Gravy Train

British economist John Maynard Keynes, believed in capitalism, but he was also sharply critical of its structural flaws. He summed it up succinctly like this:

“Our analysis shows… that long-run development is not inherent in the capitalist economy. Thus, specific ‘development factors’ are required to sustain a long-run upward movement.”

What Keynes was alluding to is the fact that mature capitalist economies tend towards stagnation. What happens, is that the rate of return on investment begins to dwindle as overcapacity builds. That causes declining profits which lead to belt-tightening, rising unemployment and falling demand. As investment drops off further, growth slows correspondingly and the economy dips into a protracted slump. This corrosive stagnation is the challenge that all advanced capitalist economies face. The solution–as Keynes notes–lies in “specific development factors”, which in today’s terms means “financial innovations”.

Financial innovation, like derivatives contracts and securitization, have created vast new opportunities for investment and profitmaking. This complex netherworld of highly-leveraged debt-instruments and off-balance sheet operations, constitutes a shadow economy where the process of capital accumulation persists despite pervasive inertia in the underlying economy. This is why the Fed and the Treasury have been doing their best to stitch the system back together without changing its basic structure. The same is true of Congress, which has gone to great lengths to preserve the profit-generating instruments which brought the global financial system to the brink of disaster. This is from the Wall Street Journal:

“Lobbying by Wall Street has blunted efforts to step up regulation on derivatives trading by carving out exceptions or leaving the status quo in place. Derivatives took blame for some of the worst debacles of the financial crisis. But a year after regulators and critics began calling for an overhaul in the way they are traded, some efforts have been shelved and others have been watered down.

The two main issues concerning regulators were trading and clearing of swaps, which allow investors to bet on or hedge movements in currencies, interest rates and many other things. Swaps generally trade privately, leaving competitors and regulators in the dark about the scope of their risks. In November 2008, the chairman of the Senate Agriculture Committee proposed forcing all derivatives trading onto exchanges, where their prices could be publicly disclosed and margin requirements imposed to insure that participants could make good on their market bets.

But a financial-overhaul bill passed by the House of Representatives on Dec. 11 watered down or eliminated these requirements. The measure still allows for voice brokering and allows dealers to use alternatives to public exchanges.” (“How Overhauling Derivatives Died” Randall Smith and Sarah Lynch, WSJ)

“Voice brokering” is Wall Street parlance for making a deal over the phone. It makes a joke out of the anemic regulations passed into law by congressmen who are essentially agents of Wall Street.

The bottom line is that financial institutions will not be forced to trade trillions of dollars of derivatives on public exchanges where margin requirements would protect taxpayers against potential losses. Instead, Congress has given Wall Street the green light to continue selling products that are insufficiently capitalized so they can keep raking in gigantic profits. That means it’s only a matter of time before another one of the financial giants keels over from its bad bets. It will be AIG all over again.

But derivatives are just part of the problem. The real issue is a financial model that doesn’t really work and offers no tangible benefit to society. In its present form, the system–with its exotic OTC markets, its off-book SIVs and SPEs, and its opaque Dark Pools and High Frequency Trading– is more snake oil than high finance. It does not “efficiently allocate capital to productive activity” as advertised, but–more often than not–diverts it away from production altogether into paper claims on all manner of financial exotica. So called “innovations” have had less to do with increasing the overall vitality of the economy or improving living standards than they do with circumventing regulations to enhance earnings by maximizing leverage. Deregulation has utterly transformed the system; creating a financial Frankenstein that hides its activities off public exchanges, that transfers the risk of losses onto the taxpayer, and that requires explicit government guarantees just to attract investment. It’s a mug’s game where only a small group of high-stakes speculators come up winners.

The same is true of the Fed’s emergency lending programs. They’re just another swindle wrapped in fancy public relations ribbon. Ostensibly, the facilities are supposed to provide cheap capital in exchange for dodgy collateral. But that’s not a loan; it’s a subsidy, and it helps to obscure the true, market price of the assets. As systemic regulator, the Fed has every right to provide liquidity during times of market stress or turbulence. But it does not have the right to help financial institutions conceal their losses by paying exorbitant prices for downgraded junk bonds. That’s picking winners and losers, which is far beyond the Fed’s mandate.

Quantitative easing (QE) is another Fed boondoggle. The program has been hyped as a way to get the banks to increase lending to businesses and consumers by creating over $1 trillion of excess bank reserves. But instead of increasing lending, QE does the exact opposite; it creates generous incentives for not lending. The banks who qualify have been taking the Fed’s zero-rate reserves and exchanging them for safe, 10-year Treasury bonds which yield 3.5%. What a deal! Fed chairman Ben Bernanke has promised to maintain this policy for “an extended period” which means the banks will continue to reap the benefits of this stealth bailout for the foreseeable future.

This is the real reason the banks aren’t lending, because the Fed is paying them not to. It’s not a matter of creditworthy applicants. It’s a matter of hopelessly mangled monetary policy. The ongoing credit contraction can be blamed on one man alone; Ben Bernanke.

Even though QE is mainly a backdoor way to recapitalize the banks; some lending has continued, although not to consumers and businesses. So where has the money gone? Here’s part of the answer from the Wall Street Journal:

“Former Salvadoran finance minister Manuel Hinds points out in the latest issue of International Finance that banks have indeed been shirking on their day job of transforming increased deposits into increased private-sector credit. But they haven’t quit entirely. In fact, they’ve funneled significant new funds into nonbank financial institutions—which have not lent them on. What’s happening is that U.S. banks have been behaving exactly like developing country banks during earlier crises, such as Indonesian banks in the late 1990s—raising lending to their worst borrowers to keep them alive, lest the banks themselves collapse from their borrowers’ defaults.

For U.S. banks, these zombie borrowers are their affiliated financial entities set up to manage so-called off-balance-sheet activities—such as the famous SIVs (structured investment vehicles) created by Citigroup and others during the boom. Thus, the massive fiscal and monetary bailouts of the banks have served to worsen the credit misallocation that led to the general economic collapse in 2008.” (“Prepare for a Keynesian Hangover”, Ben Steill, Wall Street Journal)

So the banks are not only taking depositors money and using it in high-risk derivatives transactions and currency “carry trades”, they’re also propping up the long daisy-chain of insolvent creditors whose default could domino Lehman-like through the entire financial system. Funny how the media skips little tidbits like this when they give their rosy evening roundup.

And then there’s this; on Christmas Eve, the Treasury Dept announced that it would lift existing caps on the mortgage-finance giants Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac. The two GSE’s will no longer be limited to a ceiling of $200 billion in losses each. Although, the Treasury’s action looks like it was designed to support the housing market, the real beneficiaries are the banks whose balance sheets are coming under greater pressure from the relentless uptick in foreclosures. It is widely believed that Treasury is laying the groundwork for a major revision of the Obama’s mortgage modification program which has, so far, been a dismal failure. If the critics are right, the administration is planning to slash the principle on millions of mortgages sometime in 2010, thus shifting the sizable losses onto the US taxpayer. Otherwise, the banks will face potential losses on another 4 million foreclosures in the next year alone. (according to Credit Suisse)

Economist Dean Baker says that the Treasury’s surprise announcement is an indication that Fannie and Freddie may have paid too much for the mortgage-backed securities they bought back in 2008 when the GSE’s were used as a dumping ground for distressed bank assets. Here’s Baker:

“This would mean that they were paying too much for mortgages and mortgage-backed securities bought from banks after the financial meltdown was already in full swing. This was the original purpose of the TARP program. Of course, TARP came with at least some restrictions and disclosure requirements. If Fannie and Freddie are overpaying for mortgages, then there are no conditions whatsoever put on the banks that get the money.” (Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac: Just a four Letter Word, Dean Baker, Huffington Post)

The Treasury’s action is tantamount to another stealth bailout by industry reps working within the Obama administration. All policymaking seems to revolve around two fundamental tenets: Increase the profit potential for the big Wall Street banks, and crimp the flow of credit to the real economy to increase privatization, crush the labor movement, and reduce the population to third world poverty. That’s Neoliberalism in a nutshell and, apparently, Obama’s economic dogma. In fact, as economist L. Randall Wray points out, Obama’s new health care bill is just more of the same; another ginormous handout to Wall Street disguised as public policy. Here’s Wray:

“There is a huge untapped market of some 50 million people who are not paying insurance premiums—and the number grows every year because employers drop coverage and people can’t afford premiums. Solution? Health insurance “reform” that requires everyone to turn over their pay to Wall Street. Can’t afford the premiums? That is OK—Uncle Sam will kick in a few hundred billion to help out the insurers. Of course, do not expect more health care or better health outcomes because that has nothing to do with “reform” … Wall Street’s insurers… see a missed opportunity. They’ll collect the extra premiums and deny the claims. This is just another bailout of the financial system, because the tens of trillions of dollars already committed are not nearly enough.”(Healthcare Diversions Part 3: The Financialization of Health and Everything Else in the Universe” L. Randall Wray)

It’s no wonder that the Obama administration’s appeal to China to “expand its domestic market” focuses exclusively on health care and retirement programs. Wall Street is just lining up for the next gravy train.

America Needs Pakistan’s Help — Again (Part 2)

Be not deceived by Barack Hussein Obama’s middle name or by the fact that he spent several childhood years in Indonesia. His political career is a product of a Westside Chicago Ashkenazi network with roots that trace directly back to organized crime of the 1920s.

Top fundraiser Penny Pritzker traces her family lineage to grandfather Abe and great-grandfather Nicholas who served as lawyers for organized crime. She declined a nomination as Secretary of Commerce in the Obama Cabinet, a post typically offered top fundraisers. Her confirmation hearings could have proved a political embarrassment by reminding us of the suspect origins of “our” latest president.

Clinton White House counsel Abner Mikva aptly described this high-profile product of the Chicago Outfit as “the first Jewish president.” Plus his Vice President, only a heartbeat from the reins of power, is the reliably obsequious Joe “I am a Zionist” Biden.

For his Secretary of State, Obama appointed a presidential rival, Hillary Clinton, whose political career traces to the same source. After serving as First Lady in the presidency of Arkansas native Bill Clinton, she fled to New York to run for the U.S. Senate knowing she could not win an election—any election—in Arkansas where she is widely reviled.

By staking out extreme pro-Israeli positions, she joined New York Senator Charles Schumer as, in practical effect, the second Jewish Senator from a key electoral state long dominated by this trans-generational criminal syndicate.

The chiefs of staff for Barack and Michele Obama are both Ashkenazim from Chicago, long a center of foreign espionage. That fact was recently reconfirmed by Federal Bureau of Investigation translator Sibel Edmonds when, from FBI wiretaps, she documented the close working relationship between the Israel Lobby and U.S. officials with power over policy making in the Middle East, including Richard Perle, Wolfowitz understudy Douglas Feith and key members of Congress.

Earlier this month, a Chicago man whose father was a Pakistani diplomat was charged with involvement in planning “India’s 911.” In practical effect, the murder of 166 people in Mumbai, India’s financial center, accelerated the destabilization of Pakistan by drawing troops out of the western provinces for redeployment along the eastern border with India. See: What is Israel’s Role in the Destabilization of Pakistan?

Why Outside Help Is Required

The same syndicate working to destabilize Pakistan is also destabilizing the U.S.—from the inside. That’s why ordinary Americans need the assistance of Pakistanis and others outside the U.S. to restore some semblance of representative government.

The confidence with which this game theory aggression progressed in plain sight could be seen in the behavior of Deputy Defense Secretary Paul Wolfowitz, a key Zionist insider. Four days after 9-11 while in a principals’ meeting at Camp David, a presidential retreat outside Washington, he proposed that the U.S. invade Iraq. At that time, the intelligence did not point to Iraqi involvement and Osama bin Laden was thought to be hiding in a remote region of Afghanistan.

On that same day, San Diego FBI Special Agent Stephen Butler interrogated Iraqi Munther Ghazal at his home near San Diego to determine if he was funding Mel Rockefeller with whom Ghazal traveled to Baghdad in early 1997. After meeting for several days with Nidhal al-Hamdani, a top nuclear physicist with oversight of Iraq’s mothballed nuclear weapons program, Rockefeller returned to the U.S. with a practical proposal for removing Saddam Hussein without this war and without triggering a violent and destabilizing insurgency.
Dr Hamadan talking to Saddam Hussain

When regional specialists at the U.S. Department of State declined to meet with him, he traveled to Ottawa in April 1997 where he met with Middle East specialists in the Canadian government to ensure a written record would confirm there was an alternative to war in Iraq—six years before the invasion. Instead of debriefing him, FBI agents sought to discredit him.

Though FBI agents interviewed Munther Ghazal numerous times, they have yet to meet with Mel Rockefeller. Four packages sent to the Phoenix divisional office of the FBI documenting ongoing treason and criminal stalking were returned, marked “refused.”

FBI Special Agent Butler cashed checks and paid rent for the two San Diego-based hijackers who piloted planes into the World Trade Center towers. The same Iman who counseled Major Nidal Hasan (with FBI knowledge) before he was transferred to Fort Hood—where he went on a shooting spree—alsoFax counseled the San Diego-based hijackers—likewise with FBI knowledge.

As of December 18, 2009, no one from either federal law enforcement or national security had debriefed Mel Rockefeller—eight years after 9-11. Had he been engaged in good faith in early 1997 after his return from Baghdad or in early 2001 after his return from Jakarta, the facts suggest that 9-11 might well have been prevented. Good faith engagement after 9-11 could have prevented the invasion of Iraq. Instead, extraordinary steps were taken to discredit him.

When President George H.W. Bush declined to invade Baghdad to remove Saddam Hussein during the 1991 Gulf War, Pentagon Under Secretary for Policy Paul Wolfowitz imposed a No-Fly Zone in northern Iraq. By the time that the invasion of March 2003 began, the Israeli Mossad had more than 100 agents deployed for a decade in the northern Iraqi city of Mosul.

Intelligence reports of Iraqi ties to Al Qaeda were also traced to Mosul—reports that proved false. Mosul again emerged in November 2004 as a center of the insurgency that destabilized Iraq. That reaction precluded the speedy exit of coalition forces promised in Congressional testimony by senior war-planner Wolfowitz.
In the lead-up to the invasion, Wolfowitz assured policy-makers of a swift and welcome regime-change whose $50 billion cost would be recovered from the proceeds of Iraqi oil. Nobel laureate economist Joseph Stiglitz has since projected the total cost will exceed $3,000 billion, all of it borrowed. That total, 60 times the original estimate, includes $700 billion in interest paid on war-related debt.

See: A Closer Look at Israel’s Role in Terrorism

Ft. Hood: “Death By Political Correctness”?

Fort Hood Tragedy: The Real Story of the Terrorist “Mad Doctor Hasan”

Next in the series: Game Theory Warfare

Obama’s Role in the Militarization of Mexico

An interview with Laura Carlsen…

“Militarization is not the way to deal with Mexico’s political crisis.” Laura Carlsen

Mike Whitney— Will you explain what Plan Mexico is and how it relates to the North American Free Trade Agreement? (NAFTA)

Laura Carlsen: Plan Mexico, also called the Merida Initiative, is a three-year regional security cooperation plan devised by the former Bush administration and presented in October of 2007. The plan grew out of the extension of NAFTA into security areas, known as the Security and Prosperity Partnership. Originally Plan Mexico was to be announced in the context of the SPP trinational summit but was delayed. It is presented as a petition of the Mexican president Felipe Calderon for US help in the war on drugs but in reality it was designed in Washington as a way to “push out the borders” of the US security perimeter, that is, that Mexico would take on US security priorities including policing its southern border and allowing US companies and agents into Mexico’s intelligence and security operations.

Plan Mexico proposed $1.4 billion in mostly foreign military financing. It is referred to as a “Counternarcotics, Counterterrorism and Border Security” proposal.

MW—Shortly after he was elected president, Felipe Calderon began using the military in the so-called War on Drugs. Since then, there has been a steady rise in troop deployments and an escalation in the violence. What is the Washington’s role in this ongoing counterinsurgency operation?

Laura Carlsen: The Obama administration has supported the plan and even requested, and received from Congress, additional funds beyond what the Bush administration requested. In the three years since Calderon launched the war on drugs in Mexico with the support of the US government drug related violence has shot up to over 15,000 executions and formal reports of violations of human rights have increased sixfold. More than 45,000 solders have been deployed in streets and communities throughout Mexico. Washington recognizes serious problems with the drug war model and yet continues to claim, absurdly, that the rise in violence in Mexico is a good sign–it means that the cartels are feeling the heat, the argument runs. the plan itself does not contain any real benchmarks of what citizens should expect as signs of progress so it can continue to be funded despite its failure.

The State Department was required to submit a human rights report to release 15% of some portions of the appropriations and finally did so last summer. But the report stated that even given a lack of progress in human rights (including reported use of torture with impunity, lack of civilian justice for military forces, killings of civilians and corruption) the mere fact of reporting constituted compliance and released the funds.

So far the effort is not described as a counterinsurgency effort, because Mexico does not have a formal widespread insurgency movement. However, the targeting of grassroots opposition leaders in recent years has raised fears that dissidents are and will be a target of the increasingly militarized society.

MW— In your article you say that the Merida Initiative is the direct outgrowth of the national security framework imposed on bilateral relations. Does that mean that the Bush Administration was using the War on Drugs and the War on Terrorism to conceal its real political goals? If so, what are those goals?

Laura Carlsen: The Bush administration used the counterterrorism paradigm to extend US presence in strategic areas. In Mexico, the idea was to open up lucrative defense and intelligence contracts while aiding the rightwing government, which still faced serious questions of legitimacy due to unresolved accusations of fraud in the 2006 elections.

MW—Are there US intelligence agents, special forces or mercenaries conducting counterinsurgency operations in Mexico? Is Mexico required to allow the US military to operate in Mexico due to security and/or trade agreements?

Laura Carlsen: Mexico does not allow US soldiers on its territory. However there is a growing presence of DEA and other types of US agents in the country, as well as a private security companies. We do not have a good system for tracking the presence and activities of the private firms contracted for security and training purposes. This is a major problem.

MW—What effect has militarization had on political expression? How has it affected grass roots organizations, unions, and indigenous groups? Has there been an uptick in military-related violence, such as rape, beatings, torture and homicide?

Laura Carlsen: There has been an increase in human rights violations by the armed forces. In some regions, dissident leaders have been targeted by the military. Women, indigenous people, migrants, dissidents and youth are particularly vulnerable.

Note: “The militarization of Mexico has led to a steep increase in homicides related to the drug war. It has led to rape and abuse of women by soldiers in communities throughout the country. Human rights complaints against the armed forces have increased six-fold…. The Mexican Armed Forces are not subject to civilian justice systems, but to their own military tribunals. These very rarely terminate in convictions.” “The Perils of Plan Mexico“, Laura Carlsen, counterpunch.

MW—More than 50 Mexican human rights organizations have petitioned Congress to withdraw support for the Merida Initiative. Their letter reads:

“We respectfully request that the U.S. Congress and Department of State, in both the Merida Initiative as in other programs to support public security in Mexico, does not allocate funds or direct programs to the armed forces …

We urge the United States to consider ways to support a holistic response to security problems; based on tackling the root causes of violence and ensuring the full respect of human rights; not on the logic of combat.”

Have you seen any improvement or shift in policy since Barack Obama was elected?

Laura Carlsen: No. The administration has given its full support to the failed drug war. however, there are signs of drug policy reform in domestic policy that could eventually affect the way foreign counternarcotics efforts are viewed. The rhetoric of “ci-responsibility” is really nothing new and the efforts at reducing gunrunning and demand have not been followed up by new policies. the approach continues to be primarily military and violent, with no money whatsoever included in the Merida initiative for heath aspects such as addiction treatment or prevention.

Bio—Laura Carlsen, director of the Americas Policy Program in Mexico City, holds a B.A. in Social Thought and Institutions from Stanford University and a Masters degree in Latin American Studies, also from Stanford. In 1986 she received a Fulbright Scholarship to study the impact of the Mexican economic crisis on women and has lived in Mexico City since then. She has published numerous articles and chapters on social, economic and political aspects of Mexico and recently co-edited Confronting Globalization: Economic integration and popular resistance in Mexico, and co-authored El Café en Mexico, centroamerica y el caribe: Una salida sustentable a la crisis. Prior to joining the Americas Policy Program, where her most recent analysis can be found at www.americaspolicy.org, Carlsen was a correspondent for Latin Trade magazine, editor of Business Mexico, freelance writer and researcher. The Americas Policy Program is a program of the Center for International Policy in Washington DC, at www.ciponline.org.

Obama Is Preparing for War in South America

Interview with Eva Golinger…

1 Mike Whitney—-The US media is very critical of Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez. He’s frequently denounced as “anti-American”, a “leftist strongman”, and a dictator. Can you briefly summarize some of the positive social, economic and judicial changes for which Chavez is mainly responsible?

Eva Golinger—-The first and foremost important achievement during the Chávez administration is the 1999 Constitution, which, although not written nor decreed by Chávez himself, was created through his vision of change for Venezuela. The 1999 Constitution was, in fact, drafted – written – by the people of Venezuela in one of the most participatory examples of nation building, and then was ratified through popular national referendum by 75% of Venezuelans. The 1999 Constitution is one of the most advanced in the world in the area of human rights. It guarantees the rights to housing, education, healthcare, food, indigenous lands, languages, women’s rights, worker’s rights, living wages and a whole host of other rights that few other countries recognize on a national level. My favorite right in the Venezuelan Constitution is the right to a dignified life. That pretty much sums up all the others. Laws to implement these rights began to surface in 2001, with land reform, oil industry redistribution, tax laws and the creation of more than a dozen social programs – called missions – dedicated to addressing the basic needs of Venezuela’s poor majority. In 2003, the first missions were directed at education and healthcare. Within two years, illiteracy was eradicated in the country and Venezuela was certified by UNESCO as a nation free of illiteracy. This was done with the help of a successful Cuban literacy program called “Yo si puedo” (Yes I can). Further educational missions were created to provide free universal education from primary to doctoral levels throughout the country. Today, Venezuela’s population is much more educated than before, and adults who previously had no high school education now are encouraged to not only go through a secondary school program, but also university and graduate school.

The healthcare program, called “Barrio Adentro”, has not only provided preventive healthcare to all Venezuelans – many who never had access to a doctor before – but also has guaranteed universal, free access to medical attention at the most advanced levels. MRIs, heart surgery, lab work, cancer treatments, are all provided free of cost to anyone (including foreigners) in need. Some of the most modern clinics, diagnostic treatment centers and hospitals have been built in the past five years under this program, placing Venezuela at the forefront of medical technology.

Other programs providing subsidized food and consumer products (Mercal, Pdval), job training (Mission Vuelvan Caras), subsidies to poor, single mothers (Madres del Barrio), attention to indigents and drug addicts (Mission Negra Hipolita) have reduced extreme poverty by 50% and raised Venezuelans standard of living and quality of life. While nothing is perfect, these changes are extraordinary and have transformed Venezuela into a nation far different from what it looked like 10 years ago. In fact, the most important achievement that Hugo Chávez himself is directly responsible for is the level of participation in the political process. Today, millions of Venezuelans previously invisible and excluded are visible and included. Those who were always marginalized and ignored in Venezuela by prior governments today have a voice, are seen and heard, and are actively participating in the building of a new economic, political and social model in their country.

2 MW—On Monday, President Chavez threw a Venezuelan judge in jail on charges of abuse of power for freeing a high-profile banker. Do you think he overstepped his authority as executive or violated the principle of separation of powers? What does this say about Chavez’s resolve to fight corruption?

Eva Golinger—-President Chávez did not put anyone in jail. Venezuela has an Attorney General and an independent branch of government in charge of public prosecutions. Chávez did publicly accuse the judge of corruption and violating the law because that judge overstepped her authority by releasing an individual charged with corruption and other criminal acts from detention, despite the fact that a previous court had not granted conditional freedom or bail to the suspect. And, the judge released the suspect in a very irregular way, without the presence of the prosecutor, and through a back door. The suspect then fled the country.

This is part of Venezuela’s fight against corruption. Unfortunately – as in a lot of countries – corruption is deeply rooted in the culture. The struggle to eradicate corruption is probably the most difficult of all and will probably not be achieved until new generations have grown up with different values and education. In the meantime, the Chávez administration is trying hard to ensure that corrupt public officials pay the consequences. That judge, for example, engaged in an act of corruption and abuse of authority by illegally releasing a suspect and therefore was charged by the Public Prosecutor’s office and will be tried. It has nothing to do with what Chávez said or didn’t say, it has to do with enforcing the law.

3 MW—Why is the United States building military bases in Colombia? Do they pose a threat to Chavez or the Bolivarian Revolution?

Eva Golinger—-On October 30th, the US formally entered into an agreement with the Colombian government to allow US access to seven military bases in Colombia and unlimited use of Colombian territory for military operations. The agreement itself is purported to be directed at counter-narcotics operations and counter-terrorism. But a US Air Force document released earlier this year discussing the need for a stronger US military presence in Colombia revealed the true intentions behind the military agreement. The document stated that the US military presence was necessary to combat the “constant threat from anti-US governments in the region”. Clearly, that is a reference to Venezuela, and probably Bolivia, maybe Ecuador. It’s no secret that Washington considers the Venezuelan government anti-US, though it’s not true. Venezuela is anti-imperialist, but not anti-US. The US Air Force document also stated that the Colombian bases would be used to engage in “full spectrum military operations” throughout South America, and even talked about surveillance, intelligence and reconnaisance missions, and improving the capacity of US forces to execute “expeditionary warfare” in Latin America.

Clearly, this is a threat to the peoples of Latin America and particularly those nations targeted, such as Venezuela. Most people in the US don’t know about this military agreement, but it they did, they should question why their government, led by Nobel Peace Prize winner Barack Obama, is preparing for war in South America. And, in the midst of an economic crisis with millions of people in the US losing jobs and homes, why are millions of dollars being spent on military bases in Colombia? The US Congress already approved $46 million for one of the bases in Colombia. And surely more funds will be supplied in the future.

4 MW—What is ALBA? Is it a viable alternative to the “free trade” blocs promoted by the US?

Eva Golinger—-The Bolivarian Alliance of the Americas – Trade Agreement for the People, is a regional agreement created five years ago between Venezuela and Cuba, and now has 9 members: Bolivia, Cuba, Ecuador, Honduras, Nicaragua, Venezuela, Antigua and Barbuda, St. Vincent and the Grenadines, and Dominica. ALBA is a trade agreement based on integration, cooperation and solidarity, contrary to US trade agreements which are based on competition and exploitation. It promotes a way of trading between nations that assures mutual benefits. For example, Venezuela sells oil to Cuba and Cuba pays with services – doctors, educators and technological experts that help to improve Venezuela’s industries. Venezuela sells oil to Nicaragua and Nicaragua pays with food products, agricultural technology and aide to build Venezuela’s own agricultural industry, which long ago was abandoned by prior governments only interested in the rich oil industry. ALBA seeks to not just provide economic benefits to its member nations, but also social and cultural advances. The idea is to find ways to help members develop and progress in all aspects of society. ALBA recently created a new currency, the SUCRE, which will be used as a form of exchange between member nations, eliminating the US dollar as the standard for trade.

5 MW—Are US NGO’s and intelligence agents still trying to foment political instability in Venezuela or have those operations ceased since the failed coup?

Eva Golinger—-In fact, the funding of political groups in Venezuela, and others throughout Latin America that promote US agenda, has increased since the April 2002 coup against President Chávez. Through two principal Department of State agencies, USAID and the National Endowment for Democracy (NED), the US government has channeled more than $50 million to opposition groups in Venezuela since 2002. The USAID/NED budget to fund groups in Venezuela in 2010 is nearly $15 million, doubled from last year’s $7 million. This is a state policy of Washington, which the Obama Administration plans to amp up. They call it “democracy promotion”, but it’s really democracy subversion and destabilization. Funding political groups favorable to Empire, equipping them with resources, strategizing to help formulate political platforms and campaigns – all geared towards regime change – is a new form of invasion, a silent invasion. Through USAID and NED, and their “partner NGOs” and contractors, such as Freedom House, International Republican Institute, National Democratic Institute, Pan-American Development Foundation and Development Alternatives, Inc., hundreds of political groups, parties and programs are presently being funded in Venezuela to promote regime change against the Chávez government. US taxpayer dollars are being squandered on these efforts to overthrow a democratically elected government that simply isn’t convenient for Washington. Remember, Venezuela has 24% of world oil reserves. That’s a lot!

6 MW—How hard has Venezuela been hit by the economic crisis? Do the people understand Wall Street’s role in the meltdown?

Eva Golinger—-Actually, the Chávez government has taken important steps to shelter Venezuela from the financial crisis. People here in Venezuela absolutely understand Wall Street’s role in the crisis and know that the US capitalist-consumerist system is principally responsible for causing the financial crisis, but also the climate crisis that the world is facing. The Venezuelan government took preventive steps against the financial crisis, such as withdrawing Venezuela’s reserves from US banks two years ago, creating cushion funds to ensure social programs would not be cut and diversifying Venezuela’s oil clientele so as not to be dependent solely on US clients. Recently, several banks have been nationalized by the Venezuelan government and others have been liquidated. But this was more due to the mismanagement and internal corruption within those banks. The Venezuelan government reacted quickly to take over the banks and guarantee customers’ savings would not be lost. In fact, it’s the first time in Venezuela’s history that no customers have lost any of their money during a bank liquidation or takeover. This is part of the Chávez Administration’s policy of prioritizing social needs over economic gain.

7 MW—Here’s an excerpt from a special weekend report by Bloomberg News:

“Americans have grown gloomier about both the economy and the nation’s direction over the past three months even as the U.S. shows signs of moving from recession to recovery. Almost half the people now feel less financially secure than when President Barack Obama took office in January…Fewer than 1 in 3 Americans think the economy will improve in the next six months….Only 32 percent of poll respondents believe the country is headed in the right direction, down from 40 percent who said so in September.” (Bloomberg)

The frustration and disillusionment with the US political/economic system has never been greater in my lifetime. Do you think people in the United States are ready for their own Bolivarian Revolution and steps towards a more progressive, socialistic model of government?

Eva Golinger—-The rise of Barack Obama neutralized a growing sentiment for profound change inside the US. Hopefully, the slowdown in US activism will only be temporary. South of the border, there is tremendous change taking place. New social, political and economic models are being built by popular grassroots movements in Venezuela, Bolivia and other Latin American nations that seek economic and social justice. I believe strongly that models in process, like the Bolivarian Revolution, provide inspiration and hope to those in the US and around the world that alternatives to US capitalism do exist and can be successful.

The US has a rich history of revolution. There are many groups inside the US dedicated to building a better, more humanist system. Unity and a collective vision are essential aspects of building a strong movement capable of moving forward. Every nation has its moment in history. This is the time of Latin America. But there is great hope that the people of the US will soon unite with their brothers and sisters south of the border to bring down Empire and help build a true world community based on social and economic justice for all.

Eva Golinger, winner of the International Award for Journalism in Mexico (2009), named “La Novia de Venezuela” by President Hugo Chávez, is a Venezuelan-American attorney from New York, living in Caracas, Venezuela since 2005 and author of the best-selling books, “The Chávez Code: Cracking US Intervention in Venezuela” (2006 Olive Branch Press), “Bush vs. Chávez: Washington’s War on Venezuela” (2007, Monthly Review Press), “The Empire’s Web: Encyclopedia of Interventionism and Subversion”, “La Mirada del Imperio sobre el 4F: Los Documentos Desclasificados de Washington sobre la rebelión militar del 4 de febrero de 1992” and “La Agresión Permanente: USAID, NED y CIA”. Since 2003, Eva, a graduate of Sarah Lawrence College and CUNY Law School in New York, has been investigating, analyzing and writing about US intervention in Venezuela using the Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) to obtain information about the US Government’s efforts to destabilize progressive movements in Latin America. Her first book, The Chávez Code, has been translated and published in six languages (English, Spanish, French, German, Italian & Russian) and is presently being made into a feature film.

America’s Terrorist Ally

A Closer Look at Israel’s Role in Terrorism…

“It’s very good….Well, it’s not good, but it will generate immediate sympathy (for Israel)”.

Response of former Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu when asked on September 11, 2001 what the attacks meant for U.S.-Israeli relations

Game theory war-planners rely on mathematical models to anticipate and shape outcomes with staged provocations. For the agent provocateur, the reactions to a provocation—as well as the reactions to those reactions—thereby become predictable within an acceptable range of probabilities.

With ongoing wars in Iraq and Afghanistan poised to expand to Iran and Pakistan, it is time to take a closer look at how conflicts are catalyzed—by way of deception.

When Israeli game theorist Robert J. Aumann received the 2005 Nobel Prize in economic science, he conceded from Jerusalem, “the entire school of thought that we have developed here in Israel” has turned “Israel into the leading authority in this field.” A professor at the Center for the Study of Rationality at Hebrew University, Aumann’s Nobel lecture, titled “War and Peace,” expounded on the rationality of war.

With a well-modeled provocation, a target’s anticipated reaction can even become a weapon in the aggressor’s arsenal. In response to the provocation of 9-11, how difficult was it to foresee that the U.S. would deploy its military to avenge that attack? With U.S. intelligence “fixed” by well-placed insiders around a predetermined goal, how difficult was it to anticipate that the reaction to 9-11 could be redirected to wage war in Iraq?

The emotional component of a provocation plays a key role in game theory warfare. With the nationally televised mass murder of 3,000 people, a state of shock, grief and outrage made it easier for Americans to believe that a known Evil Doer in Iraq was responsible—regardless of the facts.

For false beliefs to displace real facts requires mental preconditioning so that a targeted population can be persuaded to put their faith in fictions. That conditioning enhances the probability of a successful deception. Those who deceived the U.S. to invade Iraq in March 2003 began a decade beforehand to lay the “mental threads” and make the requisite mental associations to advance that agenda.

Notable among those threads was the 1993 publication in Foreign Affairs of a theme-setting article by Harvard University professor Samuel Huntington. By the time his analysis appeared in book-length form in 1996 as The Clash of Civilizations, more than 100 think tanks were prepared to promote it. The result created a widely touted narrative—a thematic storyline—supporting a “clash consensus” five years before 9-11 provided a plausible rationale for war.

Also published in 1996 under the guidance of Richard Perle was A Clean Break: A New Strategy for Securing the Realm (i.e., Israel). A member since 1987 of the U.S. Defense Policy Board, this self-professed Zionist became its chairman in 2001.

As an adviser to Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, Perle’s Pentagon advisory post provided a powerful insider position to shape the national security mindset around the removal of Saddam Hussein, a key theme of A Clean Break—released five years before 9-11. That same year Netanyahu addressed a joint session of Congress at the invitation of Newt Gingrich, the Christian Zionist Speaker of the House.

Murders, books, articles, think tanks and well-placed insiders are common components in a “probabilistic” model deployed by war-planning game theorists. Lawmakers are also a customary ingredient. They provide credibility and a facade of legitimacy—a critical element when inducing a nation to war with phony intelligence fixed around a preset agenda.

That role was eagerly filled by Senators John McCain, Joe Lieberman, a Jewish Zionist from Connecticut, and Jon Kyl, a Christian Zionist from Arizona, when they co-sponsored the Iraq Liberation Act of 1998. By promoting Israel’s 1996 agenda for Securing the Realm, their legislation laid yet another mental thread in the public mindset by calling for the ouster of Saddam Hussein—three years before 9-11.

The legislation also appropriated $97 million to promote their agenda. Distracted by mid-term Congressional elections and impeachment proceedings catalyzed by a well-timed presidential affair with White House intern Monica Lewinsky, Bill Clinton signed that Zionist agenda into law in October 1998—4-1/2 years before a U.S.-led invasion removed the Iraqi leader.

After 9-11, McCain and Lieberman became inseparable travel companions and irrepressible advocates for the invasion of Iraq. Striking a presidential pose aboard the aircraft carrier USS Theodore Roosevelt in January 2002, McCain—a son and grandson of admirals—laid another mental thread when he waved an admiral’s cap and proclaimed, alongside Lieberman, “On to Baghdad.”

By Way of Deception

The confidence with which this game theory strategy progressed in plain sight could be seen in the behavior of Deputy Defense Secretary Paul Wolfowitz, another Zionist insider. Four days after 9-11 while in a principals’ meeting at Camp David, he proposed that the U.S. invade Iraq. At that time, the intelligence did not point to Iraqi involvement and Osama bin Laden was thought to be hiding in a remote region of Afghanistan.

On that same day, San Diego FBI Special Agent Stephen Butler interrogated Iraqi Munther Ghazal at his home near San Diego to determine if he was funding Mel Rockefeller, an American with whom Ghazal traveled to Baghdad in early 1997. After meeting for several days with a top nuclear physicist with oversight of Iraq’s mothballed nuclear weapons program, Rockefeller returned to the U.S. with a practical proposal for removing Saddam Hussein without this war and without triggering an insurgency.

When regional specialists at the U.S. Department of State would not meet with him, he traveled to Ottawa in April 1997 where he met with Middle East specialists in the Canadian government to ensure a written record was made to confirm there was an alternative to war in Iraq—six years before the invasion. Instead of debriefing him, FBI agents sought to discredit him. Though FBI agents interviewed Ghazal many times, they have yet to meet with Mel Rockefeller.

Agent Butler cashed checks and paid rent for the two San Diego-based hijackers who piloted planes into the World Trade Center towers. The same Iman counseling Major Nidal Hasan (with FBI knowledge) before he was transferred to Fort Hood also counseled the San Diego-based hijackers—with FBI knowledge. As of December 1, 2009, no one from the FBI or national security had debriefed Mel Rockefeller—eight years after 9-11.

See: Ft. Hood: “Death By Political Correctness”?

and Ft. Hood Tragedy: The Real Story of the Terrorist “Mad Doctor Hasan”

When President George H.W. Bush declined to invade Baghdad and remove Saddam Hussein during the 1991 Gulf War, Pentagon Under Secretary for Policy Paul Wolfowitz imposed a No-Fly Zone in northern Iraq. By the invasion of March 2003, the Israeli Mossad had agents deployed for a decade in the northern Iraqi city of Mosul.

Intelligence reports of Iraqi ties to Al Qaeda were also traced to Mosul—reports that proved false. Mosul again emerged in November 2004 as a center of the insurgency that destabilized Iraq. That reaction precluded the speedy exit of coalition forces promised in Congressional testimony by senior war-planner Wolfowitz in the lead-up to the invasion.

An Inside Job?

The common pro-Israeli source of the phony intelligence that induced war in Iraq has yet to be acknowledged even though intelligence experts agree that deception on such a scale required a decade to plan, staff, pre-stage, orchestrate and—until now—cover up. The leaders of the 9-11 Commission conceded they were thwarted by Commission members adamantly opposed to hearing testimony on the hijackers’ motivation for 9-11: the U.S.-Israeli relationship.

The fictions reported as facts by mainstream media included Iraqi WMD, Iraqi ties to Al Qaeda, Iraqi meetings with Al Qaeda in Prague, Iraqi mobile biological weapons laboratories and Iraqi purchases of “yellowcake” uranium from Niger. Only the last claim was conceded as bogus prior to the invasion.

Only after the war began were the balance of the claims disclosed as false, flawed or outright fabricated. An attempt to punish former U.S. Ambassador to Iraq Joe Wilson for his exposure of the phony yellowcake account led to a federal conviction of vice-presidential chief of staff Lewis Libby, another well-placed Zionist insider.

The multi-decade consistency of agent-provocateur fact patterns suggests that this game theory-modeled warfare includes the Israeli provocation that catalyzed the Second Intifada. An intifada is an uprising or, literally, a “shaking off” of an oppressor. The Second Intifada dates from September 2000 when Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon led an armed march to Jerusalem’s Temple Mount—one year before 9-11.

After a year of calm during which Palestinians believed that Israel was sincere about peace, suicide bombings recommenced. As Sharon conceded, his march was meant to demonstrate Israeli control over a site considered holy by Muslims worldwide. In response to this second failed attempt at “shaking off” Israeli domination, Sharon and Netanyahu observed that only when Americans “feel our pain” would they understand the plight of the victimized Israelis.

These Likud Party leaders commented that the requisite empathy (“feel our pain”) would require a weighted body count of 4,500 to 5,000 Americans lost to terrorism—the initial estimate of those who died in the twin towers of the World Trade Center—one year later.

In other words, only with pain could we identify with the Israelis. Does that mean that only with a mass murder could we be induced to respond with our military to advance their agenda? Was the U.S. response mathematically modeled at the Center for the Study of Rationality? Seven months after 9-11, Benjamin Netanyahu gave a speech in a U.S. Senate office building where he was introduced by Senators Jon Kyl and Joe Liebermn

American Valkyrie?

When successful, game theory warfare strengthens the agent provocateur while leaving the target discredited and depleted by the anticipated reaction. By game theory standards, 9-11 was a strategic success because the U.S.—by its response—was widely criticized for waging war on false pretenses. Only in hindsight did a deceived public realize that Iraq had nothing to do with that mass murder. However, that invasion had everything to do with “securing the realm.”

Our response (predictably) triggered a deadly insurgency with devastating consequences for Iraqis, the U.S. and a “coalition of the willing” led to war by a successfully duped U.S. From a game theory perspective, that insurgency was a predictable reaction in a nation populated by three long-feuding sects: Sunnis, Shiites and Kurds. A violent invasion led by a nation closely allied with Jewish nationalists only further fueled the flames of violence and extremism—another foreseeable outcome.

Until the U.S.-led invasion, peace was maintained by an unsavory dictator and former U.S. ally who was rebranded an Evil Doer in the lead-up to war. As the cost in blood and treasure from our “liberation” of Iraq expanded, the U.S. became overextended militarily, financially and diplomatically.

The sectarian violence unleashed in Iraq is precisely what Messrs. Rockefeller and Ghazal were cautioned against in early 1997 should Saddam Hussein be removed suddenly and violently. The 1.3 million Iraqi deaths from war-related causes exceeds the worst of Saddam Hussein’s atrocities. As any competent game theory war-planner knew, the strategic winner in this war was certain to be Tehran as the U.S. neutralized its key foe—and is now urged by Israel to wage war on Iran.

As the U.S.—the primary target of this deception—emerged in the foreground, the agent provocateur faded into the background. But only after catalyzing dynamics that steadily drained the U.S. of credibility, resources and resolve. This “probabilistic” Israeli victory also ensured widespread cynicism, insecurity, distrust and disillusionment along with a steadily declining capacity to defend our real interests.

Meanwhile the American public came under a system of oversight and surveillance packaged and sold as “homeland security.” This ominously titled operation includes rhetorical echoes of a WWII-era “fatherland” featuring a domestic security force completely alien to U.S. traditions. It is not yet clear whether this new agency was established to protect Americans. Or whether it is meant to shield from Americans those responsible for deceiving us to wage their wars.

In January 2003, Secret Service Agent Richard Sierze interrogated Mel Rockefeller at his home in Fresno, California after he sent an email to Florida Governor Jeb Bush. The email said, in effect, that if the governor’s brother (President George Bush) did not interview him on a public record prior to invading Iraq, he would do his best to ensure that lawful means were deployed to see the president executed for treason by a firing squad.

When questioned by Sierze, Rockefeller offered to have the agent speak with Dr. Glenn Olds, an adviser to four presidents, his senior adviser since 1994 and a former U.N. Ambassador who assisted him in entering Iraq through Jordon at a time when Americans were prohibited from traveling there. Sierze declined.

He also repeated his intent to see the president executed for treason and insisted that he be charged and taken before a federal magistrate to present evidence that Iraq had no weapons of mass destruction and that an alternative to war had been available since early 1997. Agent Sierze declined his demand to be arraigned in a U.S. Federal District Court—seven weeks before the invasion.

Agent Sierze should be interviewed to see if, in retrospect, he agrees that—had this advice been followed—the war in Iraq may well have been prevented. To date, no one with line responsibility has interviewed Mel Rockefeller on a public record. Why? The answer to that question would reveal those responsible for this ongoing deception.

The victims of these serial deceptions, including the families of those murdered in November at Fort Hood, may have a wrongful death cause of action against those with line responsibility who aided these operations by failing to engage the Rockefeller record in a timely fashion.

Foreseeable Futures

By manipulating the shared mindset, skilled game theory war-planners can wage wars on multiple fronts with minimal resources. One proven strategy: Pose as an ally of a well-armed nation predisposed to deploy its military in response to a mass murder.

In this case, the result destabilized Iraq while creating (predictable) crises that could be exploited to greater strategic advantage by expanding the conflict to Iran, another Israeli goal announced in A Clean Break—seven years before the invasion of Iraq.

Today’s mathematically model-able outcomes undermined U.S. national security by discrediting our leadership, degrading our financial condition and disabling our political will. In game theory terms, this devastation was perfectly predictable—within an acceptable range of probabilities.

Pakistan is primed to emerge as the next battleground for game theory war-planners. When India, an ally of Israel, became the nation honored by the Obama administration’s first state dinner, that occasion gave reason for concern due to the dynamics already at work in the background.

See “What Is Israel’s Role in the Destabilization of Pakistan?”

In the asymmetry that typifies modern warfare, those who are few in number have no alternative when pursuing an expansionist agenda but to wage their wars by way of deception. To maintain its perceived status as a perennial victim, Israeli aggression must proceed non-transparently. Its only option is to operate with duplicitous means, including leveraging the power of its insider influence to advance an agenda from the shadows.

Thus the strategic necessity that this extremist enclave befriend the U.S.—with the intent to betray that friendship to advance its geopolitical goals. Thus the strategic need to create a relationship of trust with a post-WWII super power—in order to defraud us. How else could Colonial Zionists wage their wars except with our military? How else could Jewish nationalists induce our aggression absent the widely shared belief that Israel is not an aggressor but a victim?

Winning Wars from the Inside Out

Game theory war-planners manipulate the shared mental environment by shaping the perceptions and impressions that become consensus opinions. With a combination of well-timed crises, fixed intelligence and a complicit media, policy-makers can be induced to support a predetermined agenda—not because lawmakers are Evil Doers but because the public mindset has been pre-conditioned to respond to manipulated thoughts, emotions and beliefs.

Without the mass murder of 9-11, would America’s credibility be in tatters and its creditworthiness in jeopardy? By steadily displacing facts with false beliefs, those duplicitous few-within-the-few amplify the impact of their deceit. By their steady focus on the mental environment, game theory war-planners can defeat an opponent with vastly superior resources.

Today’s intelligence wars are waged in plain sight and under the cover of shared beliefs. By manipulating consensus opinion, psy-ops wars can be won from the inside out by inducing a targeted populace to freely choose the very forces that imperil their freedom.

Thus in the Information Age the disproportionate power wielded by those with outsized influence in media, popular culture, think tanks, academia and politics—domains where Zionist influence is pervasive not only in the U.S. but also in other nations induced to war on false pretenses.

Germany offers a case study in manipulation of the public mindset in plain sight and under the banner of a free press. In 2003, Zionist media mogul Haim Saban acquired the second largest media conglomerate in Germany. Why? As Saban investment banker Steve Rattner explained his client’s motivation: “Because Germany is important to Israel.” Or, as Saban concedes: “I have only one issue and that issue is Israel.”

By 2005, Saban had succeeded in electing Angela Merkel as German Chancellor. She quickly became the European Union’s most reliable and forceful advocate for Israel. By November 2009, she was prepared to sponsor in Berlin an unprecedented joint session of the German and Israeli governments. Following his political success in Germany, Saban acquired in 2007 a controlling interest in Univision, a Latino-focused network serving the fastest-growing voting bloc in the U.S.

Media manipulation serves as an essential force-multiplier to wage intelligence wars from the periphery or, as with Haim Saban, in plain sight. At the operational core of such psy-ops are game theory war-planners skilled at personality profiling and masterful at anticipating responses to staged provocations and then incorporating those responses into their arsenal.

In the case of Iraq, our (mathematically) foreseeable response to 9-11 led, in practical effect, to Israel’s deployment of our military to invade Iraq. For aggressors adept at psy-ops warfare, facts are only an inconvenience to be overcome when waging war by way of deception. Thus the key role played by consensus-shapers featured in mainstream media outlets who focus not on informing the public but on mental conditioning.

For targeted populations dependent on facts and informed consent to protect their freedom and preserve the rule of law, such treachery poses the greatest possible threat. Yet even now many Americans believe that Israel is not an aggressor but a victim and even an ally despite facts confirming a multi-decade pattern of expansionist nationalism and geopolitical deception.

Adhering to an Enemy

The U.S. is far less secure than before 9-11. Tel Aviv clearly intends to continue its serial provocations as evidenced by its ongoing expansion of settlements and its continuing blockade of Gaza. Israel has shown no willingness to negotiate in good faith. With few exceptions, Barack Obama has named as senior advisers either Zionists are those known to be strongly pro-Israeli.

The greatest threat to world peace is not Islam. The most fundamental threat that underlies all others is our “special relationship” with a skilled agent provocateur. Without U.S. support for an enclave of nuclear-armed religious extremists, the common source of this threat could long ago have been identified and steps taken to ensure its containment.

In the same way that lengthy pre-staging was required to induce the U.S. to invade Iraq, a similar strategy is now underway to persuade the U.S. to invade Iran or support an attack by Israel. Pakistan is also now on the agenda of those marketing The Clash narrative with its vision of a perpetual war against “militant Islam.” Similar mental conditioning is again at work, including the high profile branding of the requisite Evil Doer: Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinajad.

From its outset, the Zionist enterprise sought supremacy in the Middle East. To date, its alliance with the U.S. has enabled the deployment of American military might in pursuit of goals set by Jewish nationalists more than a half-century before a Christian Zionist U.S. president was induced to extend nation-state recognition. Harry Truman made that fateful decision despite his fears that Israel would become what Zionist lobbyists assured him it would not become—and what it immediately became: a racist and theocratic state.

Only one nation had the means, motive, opportunity and stable nation state intelligence required to take the U.S. to war in the Middle East while making it appear that Islam—not Israel—is the problem. When a long-deceived American public—especially the U.S. military—grasps the common source of this devastating duplicity, the response will shift the geopolitical landscape. The facts suggest that “sympathy for Israel” is not among the probable reactions.

If Barack Obama continues to cater to these extremists, this Nobel peace laureate can rightly be blamed when the next attack features the usual orgy of evidence pointing to a pre-staged Evil Doer. Should another mass murder occur, that incident may well be traceable to the U.S.-Israeli relationship and to the failure of our policy-makers to protect America—and world peace—from this enemy within.

Dr King Spanks Obama: Part 4

Some months ago, at the 23rd Annual Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., Holiday Celebration in San Francisco, attendees were asked to answer the question, “What would Dr. King want to say to Barack Obama?” [1] This article series is an effort to provide Dr. King an opportunity to answer that question for himself from the pages of a book he wrote in 1967 entitled: “Where Do We Go From Here: Chaos or Community?”. But more than a mere contrast between two persons, this article series seeks to compare recent American history with contemporary struggles, and to explore visions of a more desirable future. This is the spirit of Dr. King’s book title and of Obama’s campaign slogan, “Change We Can Believe In”. At this point, we’ve reached chapter 5 of Dr. King’s book, which advances the following centerpiece of his philosophy:

“I am now convinced that the simplest approach will prove to be the most effective — the solution to poverty is to abolish it directly by a now widely discussed measure: the guaranteed income… This proposal is not a “civil rights” program, in the sense that that term is currently used. The program would benefit all the poor, including the two-thirds of them who are white. I hope that both Negro and white will act in coalition to effect this change, because their combined strength will be necessary to overcome the fierce opposition we must realistically anticipate.” — Dr. Martin Luther King Jr., 1967 [2]

Now termed the “Basic Income Guarantee” (BIG), this measure doesn’t receive quite the discussion or popular acclaim that it did 40-years ago. But it has been advanced by a historic list of prominent supporters, including Thomas Paine, Milton Friedman, John Kenneth Galbraith, and more recently, Richard C. Cook. [3] This essay will argue that higher levels of economic democracy are a prerequisite, not a byproduct, of such a measure. Meanwhile, with a vast body of contemporary support, Barack Obama has recently advanced a similar proposal:

“I happen to be a proponent of a single-payer universal health care plan. I see no reason why the United States of America, the wealthiest country in the history of the world, spending 14-percent — 14-percent of its gross national product — on health care, cannot provide basic health insurance to everybody. And that’s what Jim’s talking about when he says ‘everybody in, nobody out’, a single-payer health care plan, universal health care plan. That’s what I’d like to see. But as all of you know, we may not get there immediately, because first we’ve got to take back the White House, we’ve got to take back the Senate, and we’ve got to take back the House.” — Barack Obama, 2003 [4]

At first glance, Barack Obama and Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. might seem to be on the same page, or at least somewhere in the same ballpark. But now that Democrats have finally taken back the White House and Congress, Rob Kall asks an essential question: “Who would have thought that Obama’s health care plan would enrich big Pharma and raise profits for health insurers while raising taxes on small businesses and threatening to jail people who were uninsured?” [5] As Progressives Democrats of America complain, “the one option that would produce enough savings to include every single American, contain rising costs, and ensure no one ever faces a medical bankruptcy again was never seriously considered despite the fact that 86 members of Congress have co-sponsored HR 676, The Medicare for All Act. Congress has failed to debate the one option that nearly 60% of doctors and nurses support, most Americans want, along with a growing number of unions, cities and towns” — single payer health care. [6]

In my home state of Washington, the Spokesman Review reports: “The 1 in 5 adults lacking insurance stand to sink the financial stability of the state’s health care providers… Many health care providers have softened the losses by charging more for those with insurance… We’re reaching a point where we can’t sustain this system”. [7] Even from a strictly “free market” perspective, this continuing trend is a market failure [8] that the Obama administration now seeks to mandate for every US citizen instead of a more sustainable single payer system that was originally proposed. According to Stephen Lendman: “If Obamacare is enacted, it will cost more, deliver less, leave millions uninsured, millions more underinsured and leave a broken system in place. It will enrich the insurance, drug and large hospital chain cartels at the expense of universal coverage. It will solidify a class-based system delivering the best care money can buy. Others will get sub-standard treatment, and for millions none at all.” [9] Kate Randall adds, “Obama’s health care counterrevolution is of a piece with his entire domestic agenda. It parallels the multi-trillion-dollar bailout of the banks, the imposition of mass layoffs and wage and benefits cuts in the auto industry, and a stepped-up attack on public education and on teachers.” [10]

Nonetheless, public support for Barack Obama and his alleged “centrist” approach appears to remain fairly high, as for some reason he was recently awarded the Nobel Peace Prize. According to the Nobel committee, Obama has created “a new climate in international politics.” But Paul Craig Roberts remands:”Tell that to the 2 million displaced Pakistanis and the unknown numbers of dead ones that Obama has racked up in his few months in office. Tell that to the Afghans where civilian deaths continue to mount as Obama’s “war of necessity” drones on indeterminably. No Bush policy has changed. Iraq is still occupied. The Guantanamo torture prison is still functioning. Rendition and assassinations are still occurring. Spying on Americans without warrants is still the order of the day. Civil liberties are continuing to be violated in the name of Oceania’s ‘war on terror’. Apparently, the Nobel committee is suffering from the delusion that, being a minority, Obama is going to put a stop to Western hegemony over darker-skinned peoples. The non-cynical can say that the Nobel committee is seizing on Obama’s rhetoric to lock him into the pursuit of peace instead of war. We can all hope that it works. But the more likely result is that the award has made ‘War is Peace’ the reality.” [11] So the Nobel committee has essentially discredited themselves and the Peace Prize itself by awarding it to a warmonger like Barack Obama. This should raise serious questions about how they were coerced into doing so, and by whom.

When Martin Luther King was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize in 1964, he responded, “I am mindful that debilitating and grinding poverty afflicts my people and chains them to the lowest rung of the economic ladder. Therefore, I must ask why this prize is awarded to a movement which is beleaguered and committed to unrelenting struggle; to a movement which has not won the very peace and brotherhood which is the essence of the Nobel Prize. After contemplation, I conclude that this award which I receive on behalf of that movement is a profound recognition that nonviolence is the answer to the crucial political and moral question of our time – the need for man to overcome oppression and violence without resorting to violence and oppression. Civilization and violence are antithetical concepts.” [12]

Meanwhile, the violence driven by American imperialism continues to spread throughout the world while most black Americans are still chained to the “lowest rung of the economic ladder” as Dr. King lamented more than 40-years ago. While they are joined by a growing population of whites, Hispanics and other races, it is significant to note that an inordinate proportion of African Americans still find themselves living in poverty. In fact, Professor David Harvey suggests the recent mortgage foreclosure crisis is largely a racial phenomenon, “a financial Katrina”, with its devastation focused mainly in the inner-city of places like Cleveland, Detroit and Baltimore where the concentration of ethnic minorities is typically highest. [13] [14] The Chicago Tribune reports that “deep recession is hitting African-Americans more severely than the overall population”. As the nation’s seasonally adjusted unemployment rate nudged toward 10 percent, the African-American jobless rate was 15.5 percent with Illinois blacks at 18.6 percent in the third quarter, according to estimates by the Economic Policy Institute.

The Tribune goes on to say: “The United States historically has seen higher unemployment rates for minorities, but the gap has widened in this recession, in part because of job losses in the manufacturing and auto sectors. And the jobless growth, coupled with the predatory lending that flourished in segregated neighborhoods during the real estate boom, have led to dramatic spikes in mortgage foreclosures, sending home values into a downward spiral. The bottom line: A silent depression for African-Americans”. [15] According to Larry Pinkney, “the underbelly of this nation is the black underclass. Instead of becoming smaller and moving out of poverty and disenfranchisement, the black underclass has grown much, much larger and become even more impoverished and disenfranchised”.

In chapter 5 of his book, Dr. King implores the American black population to educate themselves and to become more actively involved in politics. [2] While some have successfully heeded this call to action, Pinkney further observes, “The relatively small black elite has shamelessly, in complicity with the elite of its white counterpart, helped spawn an insidious new form of racism and economic apartheid. Moreover, members of the black underclass are themselves chastised and blamed by this insidious black elite and intelligentsia for being the economic and social victims of a callous, avaricious, capitalist system which now finds itself in deep trouble nationally and globally”. [16]

But is it any surprise that a black rise to power under capitalism would be proportionately similar to a white rise to power under the same system? Is it any surprise that the interests of “black power” would closely match and collaborate with the interests of “white power”? Under capitalism, is it any surprise that the interests of power are directly opposed to the interests of the remaining population regardless of skin color? Is it any surprise that a black President would advance an agenda very similar to most of his lily white predecessors?

In chapter 2 entitled, “Black Power”, Dr. King argues, “The problem of transforming the ghetto is, therefore a problem of power — a confrontation between the forces of power demanding change and the forces of power dedicated to preserving the status quo.” With this, Dr. King obviously understands that opposing interests are involved. But until this antagonism is dissolved, any personal transition from one pole to the other merely erases one’s sympathetic relationship with the opposing pole. There is no incentive for any President of the United States to “transform the ghetto”, as his position of power is contingent upon the powerlessness of others. So the goal of “equality”, which Dr. King so fervently pursued, is not for any individual or group to rise to power over others, but to dismiss the existing power structure as much as possible in all human activity in order to maximize democracy and to minimize opposing interests. “Are we seeking power for power’s sake? Or are we seeking to make the world and our nation better places to live? If we seek the latter, violence can never provide the answer. The ultimate weakness of violence is that it is a descending spiral, begetting the very thing it seeks to destroy. Instead of diminishing evil, it multiplies it.” In chapter 2, Dr. King goes on to say:

“Power, properly understood, is the ability to achieve purpose. It is the strength required to bring about social, political or economic changes. In this sense power is not only desirable but necessary in order to implement the demands of love and justice… There is nothing essentially wrong with power. The problem is that in America power is unequally distributed. This has led Negro Americans in the past to seek their goals through love and moral suasion devoid of power and white Americans to seek their goals through power devoid of love and conscience. It is leading a few extremists today to advocate for Negroes the same destructive and conscienceless power that they have justly abhorred in white. It is precisely this collision of immoral power with powerless morality which constitutes the major crisis of our times.” [17]

Many argue that one year is not nearly long enough for any President to effect “change” in these regards. And granted, President Obama probably didn’t intend “Change We Can Believe In” to suggest he could solve all the world’s problems overnight. But it does seem entirely reasonable for us to expect him to at least initiate a “change” of direction in the most damaging trends. Instead, Barack Obama continues to deliberately fortify those trends in the same direction they have been headed for the past 40-years since Martin Luther King Jr. was assassinated by his own government. [18] “For the first time in humanity, over 1 billion people are chronically hungry”, says a United Nations World Food Programme online video. The US Department of Agriculture reports recently that in 2008, one in six US households were “food insecure”, the highest number since the figures were first gathered in 1995. [19] Once again, these aren’t static snapshots, they are dynamic and growing economic trends.

How is it that citizens of the wealthiest nation in human history increasingly find themselves living in tents and under bridges and without adequate nourishment? At the same time, how is it that 75-percent of all American youth aged 17-24 are too fat and stupid to pass a military entrance exam? [20] [21] Is all this due to irresponsibility amongst the lower classes, or is it because of upper class greed? The best answer is probably that our class-based socioeconomic system is inherently is designed to channel economic wealth and political power away from producers and into the hands of non-producers. Whether we are aware of the fact or not, each of us consent to this antagonistic relationship and actively contribute to its predominance through daily participation.

One argument against this conclusion is that increasing numbers of workers, involuntarily displaced by technological advancement and other economic developments, qualify as “non-producers” who have no share in the wealth and power generated by production. But the result of their displacement is increased competition for jobs at the individual level, which tends to drive aggregate wages down. So the active role of rising unemployment and a growing “underclass” is to reduce and discipline the remaining workforce, to increase its productive output and to drive wages down, thereby delivering more wealth and power into the hands of a shrinking upper class. While some analysts might refer to this as “economic efficiency”, Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. presents another view:

“Now we realize that dislocations in the market operation of our economy and the prevalence of discrimination thrust people into idleness and bind them in constant or frequent unemployment against their will… We have come to the point where we must make the non-producer a consumer or we will find ourselves drowning in a sea of consumer goods. We have so energetically mastered production that we now must give attention to distribution… The problem indicates that our emphasis must be two-fold. We must create full employment or we must create incomes. People must be made consumers by one method or the other… The contemporary tendency in our society is to base our distribution on scarcity, which has vanished, and to compress our abundance into the overfed mouths of the middle and upper classes until they gag with superfluity. If democracy is to have breadth of meaning, it is necessary to adjust this inequity. It is not only moral, but it is also intelligent. We are wasting and degrading human life by clinging to archaic thinking. The curse of poverty has no justification in our age. It is socially as cruel and blind as the practice of cannibalism at the dawn of civilization, when men ate each other because they had not yet learned to take food from the soil or to consume the abundant animal life around them. The time has come for us to civilize ourselves by the total, direct and immediate abolition of poverty.” [2]

While Dr. King’s vision is both admirable and perhaps attainable, he also anticipates “fierce opposition”. Moreover, he seems to realize his suggested measures are impossible without “deep structural change” implemented through “some form of constructive coercive power”. [22] For example, in chapter 5 of his book, King states: “It was not the marching alone that brought about integration of public facilities in 1963. The downtown business establishments suffered for weeks under our almost unbelievably effective boycott. The significant percentage of their sales that vanished, the 98 percent of their Negro customers who stayed home, educated them forcefully to the dignity of the Negro as a consumer.” [2]

It might be surmised from this that Dr. King merely advocates consumer activism whereby people “vote with their dollars.” But consumers can’t vote with dollars they don’t possess. Moreover, unemployment and poverty are structural features of the predominant economic system, not a mistake or an aberration that can be corrected through some kind of reform. So effective withdrawal of mass consent for the existing wage-based system involves more than a mere “boycott” or failure to participate. Structural transformation of the decision-making process involves the construction of an entirely new socioeconomic system where human beings are no longer enslaved by either masters or wages. Further study indicates that Dr. King not only understood the severe limitations of his prior campaigns but that he also had much higher goals in mind:

“We must frankly acknowledge that in past years our creativity and imagination were not employed in learning how to develop power. We found a method in nonviolent protest that worked, and we employed it enthusiastically. We did not have leisure to probe for a deeper understanding of its laws and lines of development. Although our actions were bold and crowned successes, they were substantially improvised and spontaneous. They attained the goals set for them but carried the blemishes of our inexperience… The future of the deep structural changes we seek will not be found in the decaying political machines. It lies in new alliances of Negroes, Puerto Ricans, labor, liberals, certain church and middle-class elements.” [2]

Here, Dr. King describes what David Harvey has more recently termed The Right To The City: “The question of what kind of city we want cannot be divorced from the question of what kind of people we want to be, what kinds of social relations we seek, what relations to nature we cherish, what style of daily life we desire, what kinds of technologies we deem appropriate, what aesthetic values we hold. The right to the city is, therefore, far more than a right of individual access to the resources that the city embodies: it is a right to change ourselves by changing the city more after our heart’s desire. It is, moreover, a collective rather than an individual right since changing the city inevitably depends upon the exercise of a collective power over the processes of urbanization. The freedom to make and remake ourselves and our cities is, I want to argue, one of the most precious yet most neglected of our human rights.” [23]

Both Dr. King and Professor Harvey go on to suggest that transforming our social relations to effect deep structural change involves far more than mere labor movements or consumer uprisings or civil rights activism or ecological arguments or mournful cries from the unemployed, homeless and starving. Instead, a unified cooperative alliance amongst all these common interests is essential to effect the needed transition from capitalism toward a more equitable and sustainable socioeconomic system. David Harvey insists that democratic control of productive surplus is imperative, and Dr. King is very explicit in defining his view of cooperative alliance:

“A true alliance is based upon some self-interest of each component group and a common interest into which they merge. For an alliance to have permanence and loyal commitment from its various elements, each of them must have a goal from which it benefits and none must have an outlook in basic conflict with the others.” [2]

So a truly cooperative “alliance” involves a set of “common interests” with no “basic conflict”. There is nothing complicated about this, as most human interests are generally held in common and are best managed democratically. The most obvious exceptions are any sort of personal drive for financial independence or political power, derived through private accumulation and exclusive individual control of capital surplus. These pursuits tend to promote hostile relations with others and establish opposing sets of interests. Everyone wants control of capital surplus — and everyone should have it — democratically. For the very essence of capital is social improvement, and there is no justification for that power to be concentrated in the hands of an exclusively entitled minority. Economic democracy and political service are collaborative, not individual, pursuits, and the wreckage of our dying system is potentially fuel for more universal and sustainable levels of human cooperation. Unemployed capital and unemployed labor living side-by-side is always an opportunity to transform the system. So there is no reason Dr. King’s dream of racial equality through the abolition of poverty can’t materialize. But there is also no reason to expect such blessings to be delivered from the President of the United States or his floundering Congress. As Dr. King further suggests:

“When a people are mired in oppression, they realize deliverance when they have accumulated the power to enforce change. When they have amassed such strength, the writing of a program becomes almost an administrative detail. It is immaterial who presents the program; what is material is the presence of an ability to make things happen. The powerful never lose opportunities — they remain available to them. The powerless, on the other hand, never experience opportunity — it is always arriving at a later time. The deeper truth is that the call to prepare programs distracts us excessively from our basic and primary tasks… Our nettlesome task is to discover how to organize our strength into compelling power so that government cannot elude our demands. We must develop, from strength, a situation in which the government finds it wise and prudent to collaborate with us. It would be the height of naiveté to wait passively until the administration had somehow been infused with such blessings of goodwill that it implored us for our programs. The first course is grounded in mature realism; the other is childish fantasy.” [2]

The abolition of poverty will begin here and now — in the United States of America — with a deliberate and aggressive expansion of the cooperative business sector supported by a network of publicly owned banks. [24] For higher levels of economic democracy are a prerequisite, not a byproduct, of programs like Basic Income Guarantee and Single Payer Health Care. To demand progressive programs from a conservative government is “the height of naiveté”. To expect a conservative government to magically become progressive with the election of a black man to the Presidency is “childish fantasy”. The challenge and the responsibility for the pursuit of progressive measures belongs to individuals and firms at the community level who already understand the root of the problem and the potential solutions. Lots of people simply “don’t get it”, and that’s okay. The responsibility of those who do understand is not to persuade or convince those who stubbornly object, but to transform social relations at the community level by providing a superior living example of economic democracy [25] to others who are more receptive.

Michael Moore recently distributed a list of “15 Things Every American Can Do Right Now” in these regards. [26] But as stated above, the most urgent measures on that list involve democratizing the workplace and capital investment: 1) Fire your boss and reorganize the workplace cooperatively. 2) Close your bank account and deposit your money in a credit union or some other form of publicly owned bank. That is, any kind of system that does not feed back into the currently predominant debt-based monetary system. The combination of both measures is a large-scale dismissal of the current socioeconomic system. Instead of money being loaned into circulation at interest from a fractional reserve and exclusively controlled by a handful of private bankers, cooperative firms will pool some portion of their productive surplus into an investment fund which is democratically ploughed back into the economy in the form of grants, specifically for the purpose of expanding the cooperative business sector.

Thus, money is earned, not loaned, into circulation, and economic growth for the sake of political power is no longer an imperative. The newborn economy will deliberately operate parallel to — and in direct competition with — the existing system, and it will steadily grow from within it. The main criteria for success is a transfer of popular consent from the old system to the new. So transition will most likely be slow and painful, and the new system must constantly innovate to develop and maintain competitive advantage without compromising the basic principles of the democratic local cooperative. Laws and customs will eventually change. But until they do, the challenging cooperative economy must be led voluntarily by a growing body of individuals and organizations who already understand the urgent need for deep systemic transformation. Without this fundamental understanding in mind, any movement against capitalism will certainly fail.

In summary, British philosopher James Allen (1864 – 1912) wrote a short volume called “As A Man Thinketh” during the turbulent Industrial Revolution of late nineteenth-century England. In that small book he presents the following overview of human cooperation: “It has been usual for men to think and to say, ‘Many men are slaves because one is an oppressor; let us hate the oppressor.’ Now, however, there is among an increasing few a tendency to reverse this judgment to say, ‘One man is an oppressor because many are slaves; let us despise the slaves.’ The truth is that oppressor and slave are cooperators in ignorance, and, while seeming to afflict each other, are in reality afflicting themselves. A perfect Knowledge perceives the action of law in the weakness of the oppressed and the misapplied power of the oppressor; a perfect Love, seeing the suffering which both states entail, condemns neither, a perfect Compassion embraces both oppressor and oppressed.” [27]

Notes:

[1] Staff. (February 02, 2009). “What would Dr. King want to say to Barack Obama?”. The Martin Luther King, Jr. Research and Education Institute. http://mlk-kpp01.stanford.edu/index.php/news/article/what_would_dr_king_want_to_say_to_barack_obama/

[2] King, Dr. Martin Luther (1968). “Where Do We Go From Here: Chaos Or Community?”. New York, NY: Beacon Press. Excerpts from chapter 5. ISBN 0807005711

[3] Wikipedia. (11-23-2009). “Economic democracy: National dividend”. Wikipedia.org. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Economic_democracy#National_dividend

[4] Obama, Barack. (2003). “Obama on single payer health insurance”, speech to the AFL-CIO. YouTube. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fpAyan1fXCE

[5] Kall, Rob. (11-10-2009). “Top-down blowback; The GOP Discovers that the Grassroots Bites Back”. OpEd News. http://www.opednews.com/articles/Top-down-blowback-The-GOP-by-Rob-Kall-091110-686.html

[6] Progressive Democrats of America. (07-23-2009). “The Mad as Hell Doctors Road Tour”. PDA Web site. http://www.pdamerica.org/articles/alliances/2009-07-23-09-33-18-alliances.php

[7] Stucke, John. (11-20-2009). “Ranks of uninsured swell in state”. Spokesman Review. Spokane, WA. pg 1. http://www.spokesman.com/stories/2009/nov/20/ranks-of-uninsured-swell-in-state/

[8] Kendall, David. (09-03-2009). “Health Care and the Free Market”. OpEd News. http://www.opednews.com/articles/Health-Care-and-the-Free-M-by-David-Kendall-090830-360.html

[9] Lendman, Stephen. (11-18-2009). “Universal Single Payer Health Care Coverage: An Economic Stimulus Plan”. Countercurrents. http://www.countercurrents.org/lendman181109.htm

[10] Randall, Kate. (07-28-2009). “Obama’s health care counterrevolution”. World Socialist Web Site http://wsws.org/articles/2009/jul2009/pers-j28.shtml

[11] Roberts, Paul Craig. (10-10-2009). “Warmonger Wins Peace Prize “. Countercurrents. http://www.countercurrents.org/roberts101009.htm

[12] King, Dr. Martin Luther. (12-10-1964). “Nobel Peace Prize Acceptance Speech”. Nobelprize.org. http://nobelprize.org/nobel_prizes/peace/laureates/1964/king-acceptance.html

[13] Harvey, David. (11-21-2009). “Race and the Mortgage Crisis”. Wordpress. http://rortybomb.wordpress.com/2009/05/19/race-and-the-mortgage-crisis/

[14] Harvey, David. (10-29-2008). “A Financial Katrina – Remarks on the Crisis”. City University of New York Graduate Center: Reading Marx’s Capital with David Harvey. http://davidharvey.org/2008/12/a-financial-katrina-remarks-on-the-crisis/

[15] Bergen, Kathy. (11-06-2009). “African-Americans hit inordinately hard by recession”. Chicago Tribune. Chicago, IL. http://www.chicagotribune.com/business/chi-fri-black-jobs-nov06,0,2759566.story

[16] Pinkney, Larry. (11-05-2009). “And What of the Black Underclass?”. The Black Commentator. http://www.blackcommentator.com/349/349_kir_black_underclass_printer_friendly.html

[17] King, Dr. Martin Luther (1968). “Where Do We Go From Here: Chaos Or Community?”. New York, NY: Beacon Press. Excerpts from chapter 2. ISBN 0807005711

[18] Douglass, James W. (March 15. 2000). “The King Assassination: After Three Decades, Another Verdict”. Christian Century. http://www.precaution.org/lib/09/prn_king_assassination_another_verdict.000315.htm

[19] Goodman, Amy. (11-19-2009). “Hungering for a True Thanksgiving”. Information Clearinghouse. http://www.informationclearinghouse.info/article24016.htm

[20] Wallace, William S. (06-01-2009). “Most young people don’t meet standards for military service”. Spokesman Review. Spokane, WA. pg 1. http://www.spokesman.com/stories/2008/jun/01/most-young-people-dont-meet-standards-for/?print-friendly

[21] Davenport, Christian, and Emma Brown. (11-06-2009). “Most young unfit for military”. Washington Post-ABC News poll reported in the Spokesman Review. Spokane, WA. pg 1. http://www.spokesman.com/stories/2009/nov/06/most-young-unfit-for-military/

[22] King, Dr. Martin Luther (1968). “Where Do We Go From Here: Chaos Or Community?”. New York, NY: Beacon Press. Excerpts from chapter 4. ISBN 0807005711

[23] Harvey, David. (2008). “The Right To The City”. Text: http://davidharvey.org/media/righttothecity.pdf. Video Lecture: http://www.a0n.com/medellin/righttothecity.htm

[24] Dorrien, Gary. (05-15-2009). “A Case For Economic Democracy”. OpEd News. http://www.opednews.com/populum/print_friendly.php?p=A-Case-for-Economic-Democr-by-Gary-Dorrien-090513-750.html

[25] Wikipedia. (11-23-2009). “Economic democracy”. Wikipedia.org. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Economic_democracy

[26] Moore, Michael. (10-22-2009). “Michael Moore’s Action Plan: 15 Things Every American Can Do Right Now. MichaelMoore.com. http://www.michaelmoore.com/words/mikes-letter/michael-moores-action-plan-15-things-every-american-can-do-right-now

[27] Allen, James. (B 1864 – D 1912) (published 1992). “As A Man Thinketh”. Barnes & Noble. pg 37

The Rise Of The US Surveillance State

CENTRALIZING POWER INTO THE EXECUTIVE BRANCH is yet another ploy of the powerful Zionist-Jewish network in America to consolidate their influence-peddling into a single power bloc.

The Jew-bought President Obama in his approach to National Security Agency surveillance, CIA renditions, drone assassinations, and military detention, has embraced the expanded executive powers championed by his predecessor, George W Bush and his Zionist-Jew enablers.

We should not be surprised then, when, in the midst of our fabricated “crisis society,” advanced surveillance methods developed in our recent wars migrate from Baghdad, Kandahar, and Tel Aviv to our own neighborhoods – ALL by Executive order with Congressional (a record number of Jews are now in Congress) approval.

US wars abroad have been living laboratories for the undermining of a free society at home, a process which has brought covert Counter-intelligence penetration to the homeland.

Wartime Geospatial intelligence mapping, unmanned reconnaissance & spy drones, portable wireless data transfer by satellite to a central biometric data base, microchip-tracking, facial/body imaging & movement profiling, electronic eavesdropping, iris scans, advanced camera technology, and disinformation tactics translate into an invasive internal security apparatus that is now being utilized in the War on Terror’s latest target, American citizens.

And Zionist Jews, both on Capitol Hill, the White House, US government agencies, and the myriads of Jewish organizations & lobbies, are plotting the destruction of our once free society and the throttling of the dissenting voice of White Gentile Americans through their beloved Jew-created agency, the US Department of Homeland Security (DHS) with its security technology imported from US wars abroad.

Homeland Security/NSA now has a wiretapping program in place, code-named STELLAR WIND, interfaced with Treasury’s Financial Crimes Enforcement Network (FINCEN); the Pentagon’s Counter-Intelligence Field Activity (CIFA)/Threat & Local Observation Notice (TALON); and FEMA database of American citizens, code-named MAIN CORE. All began operating in concert in 2002 to monitor anti-war groups such as the Quakers, People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals (PETA), Greenpeace, and alternative-news journalists. Wayne Madsen Report Here.

THE JEWS BEHIND HOMELAND SECURITY SPYING

US HOMELAND SECURITY LAUNCHED its most frightening spy maneuver in the discharge of Predator-B drones to patrol the North Dakota-Manitoba border that Congressional leaders, (the same ones who disavowed the recent Goldstone Report on Israeli war crimes), called America’s “weakest link.”

US border official, Michael Kostelnik, when describing “future drone operations” during the launching ceremonies, said that in these “dangerous times it’s more important than ever for both countries to know who and what is crossing the border.”

But who launches a $10 million drone to watch out for cows crossing the America-Canada border? The Jew-inspired US Homeland Security spy-on-you apparatus that’s who. See Future Drone Operations Here.

In conjunction with the US Justice Department in 2002, Homeland Security, led by the Talmudic Jew, Michael Chertoff, launched Operation TIPS (Terrorism Information and Prevention System) which planned for millions of postal employees, American truckers, letter carriers, train conductors, ship captains, utility employees and others to aid the government by spying on their fellow Americans.

Such citizen surveillance sparked strong protests, forcing Homeland Security and Talmudic Jew Senator Joseph Lieberman, who chaired the powerful Senate Government Operations Committee at the time & who opposed the patriotic protesters, to bury the program.

Lieberman, through Zionist TOTAL CONTROL of our Jew-bought Congress, who is currently Chairman of the Senate Homeland Security Committee, (how did a Talmudic Jew whose loyalties are to his own tribe NOT Americans become Chairman?), and Zionist Jew, Carl Levin, who is an Associate member of DHS and Chairman of the Senate Armed Services Committee, (how did a Zionist Jew whose loyalties are to his own tribe NOT Americans become Chairman?), are now vigorously pushing the Patriot Act Extension Act. The current Act with all of its intrusions on our liberties expires the end of 2009.

The key sponsor of the Bill, is, of course, a Zionist Jew — Senator Dianne Feinstein — a member of the House Judiciary Committee and the Chairman of the Senate Intelligence Committee. (How did a Zionist Jew whose loyalties are to her own tribe NOT Americans become Chairman?)

The Bill allows for greater freedom of “government roving wiretaps to monitor suspects who may switch cell phone numbers” and to track “lone wolves” who “act on behalf of foreign powers.” (Jews like Lieberman, Levin, and Feinstein, are the “wolves” who act “on behalf of a foreign power” known as the State of Israel.) And, of course, Obama, pathological liar that he is, who promised to abolish the Patriot Act, supports the Jew-inspired Bill.

CYBER SECURITY & FREEDOM-HATING JEWS

IN A BID TO SEIZE CONTROL OF THE INTERNET, the freedom-hating Jew, Congressional Representative Jane Harman introduced with full support of Abraham Foxman of the Anti Defamation League, a Zionist “thought crime” legislation known as the Violent Radicalization and Homegrown Terrorism Prevention Act.

The ACT proposed a national commission (made up of Jews of course) to “combat the threat posed by homegrown terrorists.” The Bill passed the House by an overwhelming 404 to 6 vote before stalling, and then dying, in a Senate slightly more mindful of civil liberties.

Harman’s legislation focused on “cyber security,” that is, Zionist control of the Internet, our last bastion of free speech, stating in the Bill in typical Zionist lying fashion:

“The Internet has aided in facilitating violent radicalization, ideologically based violence, and the homegrown terrorism process in the US by providing access to broad and constant streams of terrorist-related propaganda to American citizens.” View Harman’s Bill Here.

SENATOR JOSEPH LIEBERMAN announced his plans on October 30, 2009 for a “cyber security czar” to operate out of the White House in co-ordination with Homeland Security which Lieberman chairs. Lieberman’s agenda will give Zionists control of the Internet by manipulating with their billions of Jewish dollars only “one” White House “czar,” rather than numerous department heads. The following captures the essence of Lieberman’s plans:

“We need to establish a Cyber Security Coordinator within the Executive Office of the President. This position would have the authority to monitor civilian networks. Currently, Homeland Security has this responsibility by Executive Order but it lacks the direct cooperation from the White House to succeed.” View Entire Story Here.

Lieberman is acting in concert with the pending Cybersecurity Bill S. 773 which will give Obama “emergency powers” to control the Internet. The Bill grants Obama the authority to shut down all online traffic by taking control of private networks in the event of a “Cyber-Emergency.” The problem is, a “Cyber-Emergency” is not defined.

Zionist Jews fear the Internet. Why? Because it is the only venue that exposes their lies, their agendas, and their quest for world domination. They MUST be stopped!

http://www.realzionistnews.com/?p=463

Obama’s China Junket

“We’re Opening Doors for Wall Street and Nothing More”

Barack Obama took Hu Jintao to task this morning, scolding the dejected-looking Chinese leader at a press conference held in Beijing. Obama delivered one ferocious jab after another, claiming that China’s dollar-peg has cost the US millions of high-paying manufacturing jobs while creating gigantic trade imbalances which have destabilized the global economy and thrust the world into severe economic contraction. Obama demanded that the Chinese government convert to market-oriented exchange rates immediately to preserve jobs in America and to end the de facto tariff that China applies to US goods through its persistent currency manipulation. Obama’s sharply-worded prepared statement left the Chinese President gasping for air while the assembled members of the western media snapped to their feet in raucous applause.

Hard to believe, isn’t it? Hard to believe that an American president would stand up for his own people and act in the national interest.

The aforementioned press conference never took place. It’s a fairy tale. Barack Obama made a few innocuous comments about repricing the renimbi, but it was all just meaningless blather concocted for the American audience. US policymakers have no intention of rocking-the-boat and upsetting their Chinese benefactors. The system works just fine as it is…for the Big money guys, that is.

Do you know the real reason that Obama is in China?

Obama is carrying on the work of George W. Bush and Henry Paulson. He’s trying to pry open Chinese markets to US financial services. That’s right, the lavish executive junket doesn’t have anything to do with human rights, climate change, or dollar/yuan rebalancing. That’s all just public relations mumbo-jumbo. 100% bunkum.

True, China’s dollar-peg creates an unfair advantage for China’s manufactured goods, but so what? The Congress could change that in a minute by applying trade sanctions. But they won’t. Because Congress is owned by Wall Street, and Wall Street thrives on the current system. Here’s how it works: China sells the US cheap lead-based widgets, and then recycles the dollars into US Treasurys and “complex and utterly worthless” financial products. This provides the gargantuan investment banks with an endless flow of cheap capital to goose stocks and fatten the bottom line. Of course, the process does have it’s shortcomings, like the fact that it crushes the domestic work-force, but that’s how it was designed to work anyway. What economists call “unsustainable imbalances” are praised at the big brokerage houses as “windfall profits”. The total destruction of the US labor movement is just an added perk for these well-heeled, flag-waving, uber-patriots.

And here’s another item that might be of interest curious readers. This is an excerpt from an interview with Morgan Stanley’s Stephen Roach:

Question: How big are China-based multinational corporations now and how do they factor into this issue of global imbalances?

Stephen Roach: “They’re a big deal. Over 60 percent of export growth over the past twelve years has come from growth by Chinese subsidiaries of Western multinationals, but again the problem I have is that too many in the United States, especially the Congress but also Washington, focus on the bilateral trade imbalance between the United States and China. That’s just a fundamental economic mistake that’s being made.” http://www.cfr.org/publication/20486/avoiding_a_uschina_trade_showdown.html
peter Roach

Hmmm. So, a large portion of China’s industrial capacity is actually “China-based multinational corporations”. Now that’s interesting. So US workers are actually competing with US industries that are using sweatshop labor to enrich themselves while savaging the American middle class. Great. I wonder how many of these “industry leaders” affix the stars-n-stripes to their lapel each morning before they trundle off to work?

This just proves that the outsourcing of jobs, the off-shoring of businesses, and the “free trade” laws are mainly the work of cutthroat American corporatists not the “rascally Chinese” as the media would like everyone to believe. China is not destroying America; blue-blooded, brandy-guzzling, Harvard-educated Americans are. It’s just good-old-fashioned class warfare….and our class is losing.

For those who want to know what Obama’s trip is really all about; ignore Obama altogether and read Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner’s article in the Wall Street Journal, “The Road Ahead for Asia’s Economies.” It tells the whole story. Geithner candidly admits that US markets will remain stagnant for years to come and that other emerging nations (ie China) will have to develop their own domestic markets so that Wall Street speculators can attach themselves parasitically to a more succulent host.

Timothy Geithner: “As U.S. households save more and the U.S. reduces its fiscal deficit, others must spur greater growth of private demand in their own economies……We also must keep our sights on maximizing the potential of global markets. Both exports and imports remain critical stimulate the flow of knowledge and innovation that is enabling emerging economies to catch up with developed-world living standards….To achieve durable growth, all of our economies must have flexible labor markets.”

In other words, more lowering of trade barriers, more lost jobs at home, more unemployment.

Geithner again: “Each of us has recognized the importance of strong financial regulation and fiscal balance, and is pursuing these goals in ways that reflect our own circumstances but complement each others’ efforts.”

Check.

The article concludes with a spirited appeal from Geithner to China to open its markets to the gaggle of financial pirates and bank-vermin who just blew up the global system and are looking for new prey.

Geithner again: “Among other things, emerging economies must strengthen their social safety nets through sustainable health and retirement-benefit schemes,(re: Wall Street) thus reducing the need for high precautionary saving that contributes to global imbalances. Regulatory frameworks conducive to competitive markets will support private enterprise, investment and innovation. (re: MBS, CDOs, CDS and other debt-backed exotica) In the emerging economies, deeper and more efficient financial markets will enable better intermediation of savings and enhance investment productivity.(re: “Please, let G-Sax and JPM hang their shingles in Tienanmen Square. We promise we won’t blow up your financial system like we did ours.”)

Reforms are also necessary to promote cross-border private investments, while ensuring an institutional capacity and prudent regulatory framework to enable markets to absorb capital flows … finance ministers of our respective countries, we are keenly aware that our future prosperity will be founded on a continued commitment to globalization.” (Timothy Geithner, Wall Street Journal, “The Road Ahead for Asia’s Economies”)

Blah, blah, blah.

Summary: Geithner and Co. see the US economy languishing in a low-grade Depression for the foreseeable future, therefore, Wall Street must progressively move its base-of-operations eastward.

This is the real reason behind Obama’s trip to China. There’s no truth to the rumor that US policymakers care about “currency manipulation” or the ongoing looting of the American middle class. That’s rubbish. China’s “dollar-peg” essentially serves the interests of the giant multinational corporations and Wall Street speculators who own the media, the courts, the congress, the White House and most of the country.

U.S. Sustainable Immigration Policy For All Americans

The United States races into the 21st century like a seasick captain at the helm of a battleship plowing into Hurricane Katrina. The more he vomits, the bigger the mess to clean up. The further he heads into the 50 foot waves, the sooner he could be washed overboard. The worse the storm grows, the more the windows fog up so he cannot see where he’s going in rough seas. The more he tries to maintain a steady rudder, the faster his ship takes on water to ultimately follow the Titanic’s fate.

Today, our country, the United States of America, charges full steam ahead into a Human Katrina in the 21st century that becomes fiercer, more powerful and more ominous with every year that passes. If ‘people’ represent the North Atlantic waters of Titanic’s sinking moment—and they do—the United States cannot maintain itself as to sustainability, clean water, food, energy and quality of life.

Every 30 days, the USA takes on 200,000 to 240,000 immigrants from a never ending line of an added 77 million annually of desperately poor from around the world. They add up to over 2.5 million annually pouring into the USA. They stress our infrastructure, overwhelm our water supplies, our food supplies, our hospital facilities, our educational systems and overload our prisons.

At the bow of the Titanic, our most populace state: California–adds 1,700 mostly immigrants net gain per day, seven days a week, 365 days a year on their way to adding 20 million to their already overloaded 38 million in 2009. They destroy 250,000 acres of wilderness annually to cope with their added human payload. They add 400 cars net gain daily. California represents everything happening to America—and none of it equates to good.

As Governor Schwarzenegger said, “We are out of money….” He’s not only out of money, but he’s loaded up with a $26 billion debt, gridlocked highways, toxic air, trashed schools, filled prisons, 86 bankrupted hospitals and ER wards and water shortages. The cause? Unrelenting, massive and unending legal and illegal immigration!

In Dr. Otis Graham’s “Unguarded Gates: A History of America’s Immigration Crisis”, he writes, “Most Western elites continue urging the wealthy West not to stem the migrant tide, but to absorb our global brothers and sisters until their horrid ordeal has been endured and shared by all–ten billion humans packed onto an ecologically devastated planet.”

Al Gore, gracing Newsweek Magazine this week, pitches to stop global climate change. He pretends to solve the problem but he won’t whisper the cause.

The eminent US demographic expert, Dr. Albert Bartlett said, “Can you think of any problem in any area of human endeavor on any scale, from microscopic to global, whose long-term solution is in any demonstrable way aided, assisted, or advanced by further increases of population, locally, nationally, or globally.”

Can you? Can adding 200,000 immigrants monthly to the USA solve our toxic air over our cities? Gridlocked highways? School crowding? Water shortages? Energy costs? Hospital facilities? Enhance our quality of life?

As Mike Matz said in a Denver Post article, we lose 6,000 acres daily to human encroachment and expect to lose another 1.26 billion acres of wilderness within 35 years, i.e, ‘ecological footprint’ or, the amount of land that must be destroyed to support one American. That number equals 12.6 acres of land.

“In America today you can murder land for private profit. You can leave the corpse for all to see, and nobody calls the cops.” ~Paul Brooks, The Pursuit of Wilderness, 1971

Yes! I could present a dozen more examples of this “Human Katrina” swamping our country. You read about them daily, so you know what I speak about.

So how do we stop this mess without sinking our country as surely as the Titanic sank?

Dr. Jack Alpert said, “TEMPORAL BLINDNESS is a limitation in cognitive process. People with temporal blindness cannot gather and process available information into predictions of future conditions. Their processes cannot connect future conditions to a causing behavior. When their processes do create unpleasant predictions, and identify the causal behavior, they fail to create enough present meaning for the future conditions to motivate a change in that behavior.”

What’s causing our ship to sink? Fact: mass immigration.

What do we do about it? Take action!

Let’s propose a “US Sustainable Immigration Policy” of 100,000 or less annually in order to keep our country afloat today, next decade and throughout the 21st century.

Why 100,000? That many people egress the country annually. Voila! Net gain of zero!

Simple, smart, proactive, reasonable and sustainable!

Yes, you can become emotional citing that this nation’s greatness stemmed from its greatness via immigration. That was a mathematical possibility then, but now, a non-mathematical equation. We cannot continue with unrelenting immigration.

Thirty years from now our kids will ask two questions. If we fail to engage a “US Sustainable Immigration Policy”, they will be swimming in 100 million more people fighting for diminished water, resources, energy and clean air. They will gasp, “What were you thinking?”

Or, if we do enact an immigration policy, and we do not add 100 million people, and our kids enjoy quality of life, a decent living, and a balanced and thriving environment, they might ask, “Were my parents smart or what?!”

As a nation, as a culture, as a people, we must think about the 7th generation to come. How will they be able to live, eat, work, play and enjoy their lives if we fail to act responsibly?

Each of us carries a sacred trust to our children and the children of the future of this amazing United States of America as well as our planet. I urge every person reading this column to join www.numbersusa.com and become a faxer of prewritten letters to your Congress critters. Also, www.capsweb.org ; www.alipac.us ; www.firecoalition.com ; www.thesocialcontract.com and www.fairus.org .

This will prove THE single greatest issue facing our civilization in the 21st century. By our collective action, we can turn this Ship of America toward calmer, more peaceful and viable waters.

Propping Up a Broken Capitalism

Five years ago it would be unthinkable that a harsh critique of capitalism would attract a mass audience. But this is exactly what Michael Moore’s new movie — Capitalism: A Love Story — has done. The source of Moore’s success is his willingness to focus on what the media ignores: the human faces behind unemployment, bankruptcy, foreclosures, evictions, etc., and the faces benefiting from this misery — the corporate-elite sitting atop the financial system.

This reality has quickly educated millions of Americans, who now understand that our economic system is dominated by a tiny crust of super-rich individuals, bailing themselves out with taxpayer money while playing deaf to an exploding social crisis.

To combat these truths, the corporate-elite are planning a pro-capitalist media blitz.

The U.S. Chamber of Commerce is an organization where the biggest U.S. corporations come together to chat, organize, and throw money at politicians. Now, they are launching their “dream big” campaign, with the aim of “…preserving and advancing the American free enterprise system [capitalism].”

This $100 million campaign — as explained on the Chamber’s website — will focus on “national advertising,” “grassroots advocacy,” “research and ideas leadership” [think tanks and universities], and “Citizen, Community, and Youth Engagement” — combining “…outreach to governors, mayors, and young audiences…” with “…online social networking” (Facebook).

Aside from saving capitalism, the campaign aims to save “… the 7 million jobs lost to the current recession and create the 13 million new jobs that will be needed over the next decade.”

But as Albert Einstein pointed out, “no problem can be solved from the same level of consciousness that created it.” No serious economist is predicting that the economy is going to start pumping out jobs, let alone 20 million of them.

The Chamber of Commerce isn’t the only entity trying to shore up the profit system. Corporate-oriented pundits and politicians are falling over themselves to sing high praises to our troubled economic system.

Bush gave such a speech shortly after the system crashed, where he admitted that people were beginning to equate the market economy [capitalism] with “…greed, exploitation, and failure.” This was wrong, Bush claimed. Instead, regulation was the culprit, a simple, easy-to-fix problem. The giant banks and other mega-corporations — owned and controlled by tiny groups of ultrarich individuals — could remain in place.

Another rescuer of capitalism is Newsweek Editor and savvy politician, Fareed Zakaria, who wrote a Newsweek article entitled, The Capitalist Manifesto. In it, Zakaria explains, “What we are experiencing is not a crisis of capitalism. It is a crisis of finance, of democracy, of globalization and ultimately of ethics.” To further obscure the problem, he concludes that the banks and corporations are not to blame… everybody is:

“… there is enough blame to go around and many fixes to make…But at heart, there needs to be a deeper fix within all of us, a simple gut check. If it doesn’t feel right, we shouldn’t be doing it.” (June 13, 2009).

Of course not every defense of capitalism is as ridiculous as Bush’s or Zakaria’s. A more nuanced approach can be heard by both Ariana Huffington and Ron Paul, who both share the same perspective: capitalism did not fail because capitalism did not exist — “corporatism” did.

Assuming that Paul and Huffington are defining “corporatism” as an economy dominated by large banks and other corporations, they’re right. They’re wrong to think that “corporatism” and capitalism are mutually exclusive. In fact, capitalism has been dominated by large corporations for over a hundred years, with the advent of the “robber barons” — monopoly corporation owners like Rockefeller, Morgan, Carnegie, Vanderbilt, etc.

At its foundation, however, capitalism hasn’t changed. The system has always produced goods for the purpose of private profit, not people’s need, and the people who profit from capitalism have always been those who own the wealth, machines and buildings that produce these goods, whether they be cars, computers, or loans.

Although capitalism’s essence remains intact, its appearance has morphed over the years. In the early days, small businesses dominated, alongside small banks. But as transportation and technology developed, the world seemed to get smaller, while more and more goods were being produced.

This created the conditions that led to a capitalist free for all; a relentless battle to out-sell the others on the global marketplace. The big dogs ate the little dogs, and became bigger and bigger dogs — super-corporations that now span the globe, with gigantic facilities producing unimaginable amounts of commodities.

This is the world we live in today. These companies wield absolute power over political and social life: their tremendous wealth enables them to purchase politicians and army generals, while keeping certain topics in Congress “off the table.” This is the reality of capitalism as it exists today, a fact that must be acknowledged by anybody offering a credible solution.

We cannot regulate capitalism to meet our needs when we do not control the system; those who own the banks and corporations do. Real social change will require that this dynamic be smashed, so that socially precious institutions are not the property of any individual or small group. Any entity that seriously affects the general public should be run in the interest of the public, and thus owned by no one.

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