IF THE "WAR FOR VOTES STRATEGY" WORKED IN 2002, WHY WOULDN'T IT WORK AGAIN IN 2008?
Americans were operating in the conflict zone in Georgia during the fighting, says Putin!
“It is not just that the American side could not restrain the Georgian leadership from this criminal act. The American side in effect armed and trained the Georgian army,” Mr Putin said.
“The suspicion arises that someone in the United States especially created this conflict with the aim of making the situation more tense and creating a competitive advantage for one of the candidates fighting for the post of US President.”
* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *
RECESSION GAINING STEAM?
"The US money supply has experienced the sharpest contraction in modern history, heightening the risk of a Wall Street crunch and a severe economic slowdown in coming months.
Data compiled by Lombard Street Research shows that the M3 ''broad money" aggregates fell by almost $50bn (£26.8bn) in July, the biggest one-month fall since modern records began in 1959.
"Monthly data for July show that the broad money growth has almost collapsed," said Gabriel Stein, the group's leading monetary economist." By Ambrose Evans-Pritchard
--flynn
* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *
WHO STARTED THE WAR? BUCHANAN ON RUSSIAN TV!
* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *
BE AFRAID
Hating the Convention, Part I.
Ryan W. McMaken
Here's a how a friend of mine describes the situation here in Denver:
"This week downtown Denver has been turned into a police state. We have mounted cossacks on horses with shields over their eyes. We have flying squads hanging off SUVs as they dash through the streets. Sirens wail as convoys race to their destinations. We have black uniformed storm troopers marching our sidewalks in patrols of ten. Coveys of bicycles carrying officers with utility belts full of deadly devices slowly circle around us. We have police on every corner and reinforcements with automatic weapons secreted in every possible location. Undoubtedly, there are more and more heavily armed troops in Denver this week than in Baghdad."
And make no mistake of it, the convention is bad for business.
The local politicos talk up how the convention is great for tourism, and Denver will now just be swimming in cash until the end of time, but in reality, the people who would normally be downtown spending money or providing professional services are all staying at home, so the people coming in for the convention are actually just crowding out the people who would normally conduct business in town.
Many professional offices are holding no meetings with clients this week because they don't want to subject people to the congestion and the police state brewing on the streets.
And, if you are unlucky enough to have a business in the "Red Zone" every one of your clients or customers who wishes to visit your establishment must be credentialed by the "security" forces. Needless to say, many businesses have just shut down entirely.
"Remember a little more than a year ago when George Steinbrenner, inflated with patriotic fervor, imposed a laughable rule that instructed security officials to ban anyone from "excessive movement" during the 7th inning rendition of "God Bless America." Granted, most New Yorkers seemingly abide by it, but sometimes the system must be tested by one man's agnosticism and patriotic indifference..." Deadspin.com
--flynn
* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *
WAR HERO?
-flynn
* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *
BARRY GOLDWATER, JR.
PURE GOLDWATER
THE GOLDWATER LEGACY with Barry Goldwater, Jr.
Moderated by Charles Goyette
Throughout the 50's, 60's 70's and 80's former Senator Barry Goldwater influenced the baby boom generation - conservatives and liberals alike (Hillary Clinton was a Goldwater girl, after all!). But is his philosophy still relevant today at this important crossroads in modern political history? How did Goldwater perceive his successor, John McCain? How would he relate to Ron Paul or Barack Obama? How has his legacy not only shaped the politics of the boomer generation, but how is it likely to shape those of future generations as well?
Tuesday, Sept. 9, 5:45pm Cocktail Reception and Presentation Gainey Ranch Country Club 7600 Gainey Club Drive, Scottsdale
"Before we start down the road of isolating and encircling Russia with weak NATO allies, let us think through Gen. Petraeus' question in 2003 about Iraq, "Tell me, how does this thing end?"
But, then, these folks never seem to think anything through."
* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *
GREENSPAN SAID IT WAS A WAR FOR OIL...
... AND THEY CAN'T EVEN GET THAT RIGHT! Oh, and Wolfowitz claimed the war would pay for itself!
Iraq Poised to Revive Oil Contract With China - NYTIMES
BAGHDAD — Iraq is on the verge of reviving an 11-year-old contract with China worth $1.2 billion, its largest oil deal since the invasion in 2003, an Oil Ministry official said Tuesday. The deal sets new terms for an agreement reached between China and Iraq under Saddam Hussein in 1997.
* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *
MEANWHILE, CHINA BUILDS INFRASTRUCTURE
"The US is phenomenally if discreetly militarized. The country is neither a democracy, nor a government of laws, nor of men, but an oligarchy of lobbies that press for whatever is of benefit to themselves, though not necessarily to the country. The underlying principle is that honey attracts flies. The federal government collects vast sums in taxes and the lobbies come to get it...
In the military racket, the money is in big-ticket weaponry. The carriers, Aegis boats, subs, fighters, tanks, B1s, B2s, and satellites sell for billions. These sums attract a vast aerospace industry that would collapse without sales to the military. The Pentagon is a captive market, and often a haven for firms that couldn’t compete in the commercial marketplace.
To countries competing with the US, as for example Japan, the American military budget is a godsend, the equivalent of a golf handicap on a rival, because it represents money the US cannot spend to become more competitive. Fortunately for Asia, American military expenditure cannot readily be cut back. Too many jobs, military towns, and corporate profits depend on it. Consequently China builds infrastructure while the US builds fighter planes. The only plausible brake will be conflict with Social Security and Medicare, cuts in which will wake the Public Monster...
BIDEN PREPARES A TWO DAY ACCEPTANCE SPEECH FOR CONVENTION
... WILL BEGIN DELIVERING THE SPEECH ON WEDNESDAY NIGHT AND CONCLUDE IT ON THURSDAY NIGHT!
"We may wind up airing some of it on CNBC or maybe the USA Network, and then cut away to something else," said Carol Foyler on NBC News. "We're basically going to treat it like the hammer throw."
IN OTHER NEWS...
Cindy McCain Unsure How Many Half-Sisters She Has!
"As long as the couple has more homes than half-sisters, they could easily house one of the half-sisters in each of the residences and keep them happy," Dr. Logsdon says. "However, if the number of half-sisters grows faster than the number of homes, that could potentially lead to crowding."
AND IN STILL OTHER NEWS...
China’s Gold Medals Found to Have High Lead Content Phelps Warned Not to Lick Medals
"In other Olympic news, China's hopes for winning more medals in women's gymnastics were dashed when one of their leading gymnasts vanished down a bathtub drain on Tuesday.
Immediately after Jiang Qimin's disappearance, Beijing authorities launched a search for the acclaimed seven-pound athlete."
"Biden was chosen for the number-two spot because he is thought to strengthen the Obama campaign in the area of foreign policy, where the candidate is considered weakest. Biden is presented as a man of experience, and a foreign policy maven to boot. However, it is precisely in the realm of foreign policy that Biden falls far short. Biden supported the president's war policies, at least in terms of ends if not means..." Raimondo
--flynn
* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *
MISH AGAIN!
BOOM TIMES FOR THE REPO MAN!
Though the struggling economy means hard times for most people, it's a godsend for the repo man, the person who shows up — often unexpectedly — to snatch your property when you're behind on payments.
Politicians are the only people in the world who create problems and then campaign against them.
Have you ever wondered why, if both the Democrats and the Republicans are against deficits, we have deficits? Have you ever wondered why, if all the politicians are against inflation and high taxes, we have inflation and high taxes?
You and I don't propose a federal budget. The president does. You and I don't have the Constitutional authority to vote on appropriations. The House of Representatives does. You and I don't write the tax code. Congress does. You and I don't set fiscal policy. Congress does. You and I don't control monetary policy. The Federal Reserve Bank does.
One hundred senators, 435 congressmen, one president and nine Supreme Court justices - 545 human beings out of the 235 million - are directly, legally, morally and individually responsible for the domestic problems that plague this country.
I excluded the members of the Federal Reserve Board because that problem was created by the Congress. In 1913, Congress delegated its Constitutional duty to provide a sound currency to a federally chartered but private central bank.
I excluded all but the special interests and lobbyists for a sound reason. They have no legal authority. They have no ability to coerce a senator, a congressman or a president to do one cotton-picking thing. I don't care if they offer a politician $1 million dollars in cash. The politician has the power to accept or reject it.
No matter what the lobbyist promises, it is the legislation's responsibility to determine how he votes.
A CONFIDENCE CONSPIRACY
Don't you see how the con game that is played on the people by the politicians? Those 545 human beings spend much of their energy convincing you that what they did is not their fault. They cooperate in this common con regardless of party.
What separates a politician from a normal human being is an excessive amount of gall. No normal human being would have the gall of Tip O'Neill, who stood up and criticized Ronald Reagan for creating deficits.
The president can only propose a budget. He cannot force the Congress to accept it. The Constitution, which is the supreme law of the land, gives sole responsibility to the House of Representatives for originating appropriations and taxes.
O'neill is the speaker of the House. He is the leader of the majority party. He and his fellow Democrats, not the president, can approve any budget they want. If the president vetos it, they can pass it over his veto.
REPLACE SCOUNDRELS
It seems inconceivable to me that a nation of 235 million cannot replace 545 people who stand convicted -- by present facts - of incompetence and irresponsibility.
I can't think of a single domestic problem, from an unfair tax code to defense overruns, that is not traceable directly to those 545 people.
When you fully grasp the plain truth that 545 people exercise power of the federal government, then it must follow that what exists is what they want to exist.
If the tax code is unfair, it's because they want it unfair. If the budget is in the red, it's because they want it in the red. If the Marines are in Lebanon, it's because they want them in Lebanon.
There are no insoluble government problems. Do not let these 545 people shift the blame to bureaucrats, whom they hire and whose jobs they can abolish; to lobbyists, whose gifts and advice they can reject; to regulators, to whom they give the power to regulate and from whom they can take it.
Above all, do not let them con you into the belief that there exist disembodied mystical forces like "the economy," "inflation" or "politics" that prevent them from doing what they take an oath to do.
Those 545 people and they alone are responsible. They and they alone have the power. They and they alone should be held accountable by the people who are their bosses - provided they have the gumption to manage their own employees.
--flynn
* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *
WHEN THE CURE IS WORSE THAN THE DISEASE
"Mary wonders why the new young doctor she visited recently says to nearly every patient, after examining their throat, that it looks like their esophagus is being eroded by stomach acid and they need to start taking acid-blocking pills. He hands patients free samples provided by pharmaceutical companies. The patients are oblivious to the fact that if they begin using the drug, they may never be able to stop taking it without experiencing an excruciatingly painful bout of rebound heartburn.
One way to build an income in private medical practice is to hook patients on drugs that continually require re-examination, testing and prescription renewal." Bill Sardi...
--flynn
* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *
IS IT POSSIBLE?
IS IT POSSIBLE? COULD BIDEN BE WORSE THANMCCAIN ON IRAQ?
"Obama, whose mushy Iraq plan excites no one, is marrying his own's flawed ideas -- which mostly revolve around beefing up US forces in Afghanistan and unilaterally attacking Pakistan -- with Biden's discredited notion of partitioning Iraq into three squabbling mini-states.
Indeed, last year it was the passage by the US Senate of a resolution in favor of Biden's dangerously misguided ideas that sparked an outburst of Iraqi nationalism. More than the Blackwater killings, more than US efforts to forcibly privatize Iraq's oil, it was the Biden idea of splitting Iraq into three pieces that galvanized Iraqi Arab nationalists."
THE MCCAIN CAMPAIGN IS BRINGING UP THE P.O.W. THING OVER AND...
...OVER AND OVER AND OVER AGAIN!
How many houses? "P.O.W."
Cindy for topless pageant? "P.O.W."
His taste in music? "P.O.W"
Campaign ethics? "P.O.W."
"While McCain’s experience was heroic, did it create a worldview incapable of anticipating the limits to U.S. military power in Iraq? Did he fail to absorb the lessons of Vietnam, so that he is doomed to always want to refight it? Did his captivity inform a search-and-destroy, shoot-first-ask-questions-later, “We are all Georgians,” mentality?"
"And if the greenback continues its slide in 2008, as expected, more and more criminals are likely to exchange euros for illicit goods, said Criminal Intelligence Service Canada in its annual report."
" 'Change' and 'hope' are not words one associates with Senator Joe Biden, a man so ripely symbolic of everything that is unchanging and hopeless about our political system that a computer simulation of the corporate-political paradigm senator in Congress would turn out 'Biden' in a nano-second." CounterPunch
--flynn
* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *
SLINGIN' IT
* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *
SUCCESS AT LAST
* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *
QUICK DRAW McGEE
* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *
McCAIN CAN TOO TEXT
* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *
JOE BIDEN ON GOING TO WAR IN IRAQ!
October, 2002
"I do not believe this is a rush to war. I believe it is a march to peace and security."
"I believe that failure to overwhelmingly support this resolution is likely to enhance the prospects that war will occur. ... [Saddam Hussein] possesses chemical and biological weapons and is seeking nuclear weapons. ... For four years now, he has prevented United Nations inspectors from uncovering those weapons...
The terms of surrender dictated by the United Nations require him to declare and destroy his weapons of mass destruction programs. He has not done so. ...
Many predicted the administration would refuse to give the weapons inspectors one last chance to disarm. ...
Mr. President, President Bush did not lash out precipitously after 9/11. He did not snub the U.N. or our allies. He did not dismiss a new inspection regime. He did not ignore the Congress. At each pivotal moment, he has chosen a course of moderation and deliberation. ...
For two decades, Saddam Hussein has relentlessly pursued weapons of mass destruction. There is a broad agreement that he retains chemical and biological weapons, the means to manufacture those weapons and modified Scud missiles, and that he is actively seeking a nuclear capability. ...
We must be clear with the American people that we are committing to Iraq for the long haul; not just the day after, but the decade after.... [Biden confided to his colleagues that this would be a long fight, but was still for it.]I am absolutely confident the President will not take us to war alone. I am absolutely confident we will enhance his ability to get the world to be with us by us voting for this resolution."
* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *
"THIS IS A VERY SERIOUS MATTER, BEING TREATED IN THE AMERICAN PRESS AS IF THE UNITED STATES HAS NOT BEEN PLAYING WITH DYNAMITE!"
"... who is ultimately responsible for an American policy toward Russia that since the collapse of the Soviet Union has been aggressive, militarily overbearing and threatening to the integrity of Russia, to absolutely no useful purpose.
... who in Washington is promoting this strategy of hostile military and political encirclement of Russia? What conceivable interest of the West does this serve?
It is a senseless policy, apparently meant to intimidate Russia, but why? For the sake of perpetuating international tension so as to strengthen the forces that with Vice President Dick Cheney and President Bush have been promoting constitutionally unaccountable executive rule in the United States?"
Meet Randy Scheunemann, John McCain's Henry Kissinger!
"He is a dual loyalist, a foreign agent whose assignment is to get America committed to spilling the blood of her sons for client regimes who have made this moral mercenary a rich man. From January 2007 to March 2008, the McCain campaign paid Scheunemann $70,000 – pocket change compared to the $290,000 his Orion Strategies banked in those same 15 months from the Georgian regime of Mikheil Saakashvili.
What were Mikheil's marching orders to Tbilisi's man in Washington? Get Georgia a NATO war guarantee. Get America committed to fight Russia, if necessary, on behalf of Georgia. Scheunemann came close to succeeding.
Had he done so, U.S. soldiers and Marines from Idaho and West Virginia would be killing Russians in the Caucasus, and dying to protect Scheunemann's client, who launched this idiotic war the night of Aug. 7. That people like Scheunemann hire themselves out to put American lives on the line for their clients is a classic corruption of American democracy."
* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *
FORGET MT. PELERIN SOCIETY
Just Another NeoKook Sandbox
"I have come to the conclusion that the Mont Pelerin Society is no longer an effective force for freedom, becoming instead another tool in behalf of US hegemony, ringing Russia with US military bases and puppet governments in the name of "supporting democracy." As far as I am aware, the MPS has not addressed the Bush administration's assault on US civil liberties or the disrespect the Bush administration has shown for the US Constitution and international law, particularly the Geneva Conventions. Nor has the society taken exception to US wars of aggression in behalf of undeclared agendas."Paul Craig Roberts
--flynn
* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *
CHARLES TO MC JESSE VENTURA 9/11 EVENT!
* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *
WHO SAYS NEOCONS BUNGLE EVERYTHING?
At Least They're Getting the New Cold War They Want!
Russian aircraft carrier heads to Syria; Assad says he's "open" to a Russian base!
Also expressed interest in the establishment of Russian missile air defence facilities on his land. BarentsObserver.com
"The bananastans are going bananas, Iran's down the can, al Qaeda is a more dangerous enemy than ever and our "victory" in Iraq has gone off in our faces like a joke shop cigar. Less than a decade into the New American Century, young Mr. Bush and the neoconservatives who promised us an empire have squandered everything our forefathers achieved in the America's first two and a quarter centuries as a nation. Yet, incredibly, bewilderingly, stupefyingly, a septuagenarian Senator who steals Christian prisoner stories from Alexander Solzhenitsyn and promises to protract the Bush foreign policy fumble-rama is a viable contender for the presidency of the United States."
* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *
MISH ON FANNIE MAE AND FREDDIE MAC
$223 BILLION DOLLARS IS A LOT OF MONEY!
Unless Henry Paulson is talking about using Goldman Sachs and his own money!
"It is a near certainty taxpayers will be bailing out Fannie and Freddie....
Paulson has virtually zero credibility at this point, on the dollar, on Fannie, on anything."
WHAT'S A THIN RICH PERSON TO DO? Obama finally gets specific, at least somewhat, about his intentions for taxes. Our DC-insider friend "Mick Danger" isn't happy.
Let's call America a shopping mall. Should some people shop for free? Or, call it a school, is it good that some students graduate without going to class or taking exams. Paying, or learning, it's just so middle class!
We're all so nice now to lower income people. We must want more of them.
The ugliest effect (and it's not a "side" effect or an "unintended consequence") of exempting lower earning people from income taxes is not that it shifts the burden up the ladder, it's that it cuts the rungs off the ladder which is the escape route up and out. More people making more money is good for society. Making it easier to not strive is not good. Obesity, it seems, is driven by cheap food, and grows fastest if both brain and body are inactive.
The flat tax addresses this. Obama wants to make it worse, shopping for voters by his tax plan to cut 17 million more in on a free ride in America.
An article ... on Wednesday about the role of Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac in financing multifamily housing projects misstated the average price that buyers are paying for apartment buildings that are being sold by Archstone, a national apartment company. It is $200,000 per unit, not per square foot. Similarly, Tishman Speyer and Lehman Brothers paid $240,000 per unit, not per square foot, when they bought the company last October.
OK, we know housing prices got a bit high, but $240,000 per square foot? ;-)
Also from the Times, one that has (deservedly) received a good deal of note around the web, from a would-be breathless revelation of mass corporate tax evasion...
Most U.S. Corporations Pay No Income Tax
Two out of every three United States corporations paid no federal income taxes from 1998 through 2005, according to a report released Tuesday by the Government Accountability Office, the investigative arm of Congress ... The study covers 1.3 million corporations of all sizes, most of them small, with a collective $2.5 trillion in sales .... At a basic corporate tax rate of 35 percent, all the corporations covered in the study in theory owed $875 billion in federal income taxes.
Uh ... no ... not even "in theory". Income taxes are owed not on revenue or sales but on income, which equals revenue minus the cost of earning the revenue, that is, expenses. Don Luskin More...
--flynn
* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *
THINK AGAIN
"After luring the Red Army into Georgia, President Saakashvili now wants the U.S. to bail his country out. He has a willing sucker in McCain, the former POW who craves the smell of cordite. The slick Georgia president has hedged his bets by sweetening the U.S. bailout with hard cash.
The government of Georgia reportedly has paid more than $1 million to the firm of McCain's top adviser who puts foreign policy words in his candidate's mouth. The aide, Randy Scheunemann, recently took a pressured leave of absence from his two-man operation that continues to work under contract for President Saakashvili's government." Newsday More...
Credit crunch may take out large US bank warns former IMF chief
"...“The US is not out of the woods. I think the financial crisis is at the halfway point, perhaps. I would even go further to say the worst is to come,” Prof Rogoff said at a conference in Singapore.
In an ominous warning, he added: “We’re not just going to see mid-sized banks go under in the next few months, we’re going to see a whopper, we’re going to see a big one — one of the big investment banks or big banks,” he said. " TimesOnline
--flynn
* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *
... AND THEN SHE SAID THE U.S. WILL "FIGHT" FOR GEORGIA...
ARE THEY OUT OF THEIR EVER-LOVIN' MINDS?
MORE FOREIGN POLICY DEFTNESS FROM THE BUSH GENIUSES!
"The Bush administration appears to have pulled off its latest military fiasco in the Caucasus. What was supposed to have been a swift and painless takeover of rebellious South Ossetia by America’s favorite new ally, Georgia, has turned into a disaster that left Georgia battered, Russia enraged, and NATO badly demoralized. Not bad for two days work."
"If the Russia-Georgia war proves nothing else, it is the insanity of giving erratic hotheads in volatile nations the power to drag the United States into war.
The arrogant folly of the architects of U.S. post-Cold War policy is today on display. By bringing three ex-Soviet republics into NATO, we have moved the U.S. red line for war from the Elbe almost to within artillery range of the old Leningrad. "
Pat Buchanan, conservative commentator and author, most recently of Churchill, Hitler and the Unnecessary War, discusses the crisis in Georgia, why he thinks the Russian action on behalf of South Ossetia was justified, comparisons between Russian moves in the Caucasus to interwar Germany and Britain, the stupidity of the war guarantees and new missile defense systems going into Eastern Europe, the limits of American imperial power and the question of whether the administration gave Saakashvili the green light to attack South Ossetia.
"Just a few weeks ago, predictions of Arctic ice collapse were buzzing all over the internet. Some scientists were predicting that the "North Pole may be ice-free for first time this summer". Others predicted that the entire "polar ice cap would disappear this summer".
The Arctic melt season is nearly done for this year. The sun is now very low above the horizon and will set for the winter at the North Pole in five weeks. And none of these dire predictions have come to pass. Yet there is, however, something odd going on with the ice data." TheRegister More...
--flynn
* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *
LAND OF THE FREE, HOME OF THE BRAVE -- FRANZ K., CALL HOME
"I was recently stopped by Homeland Security as I was returning from a trip to Syria. What I saw in the hours that followed shocked and disturbed me.
I arrived at JFK Airport two weeks ago after a short vacation to Syria and presented my American passport for re-entry to the United States. After 28 hours of traveling, I had settled into a hazy awareness that this was the last, most familiar leg of a long journey. I exchanged friendly words with the Homeland Security official who was recording my name in his computer. He scrolled through my passport, and when his thumb rested on my Syrian visa, he paused. Jerking toward the door of his glass-enclosed booth, he slid my passport into a dingy green plastic folder and walked down the hallway, motioning for me to follow with a flick of his wrist. Where was he taking me, I asked him. "You'll find out," he said." Emily Feder at alternet.org
--flynn
* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *
NEOCON PNAC GOES AWOL
"The Project For The New American Century, PNAC, has gone Absent Without Leave. They have seemingly vanished with the sands of time. It sounds too good to be true which means, it probably is not true.
What alerted me to the sudden disappearance is the fact that the PNAC website, chock full of bombastic and arrogant reports, declarations, letters and memos is now "suspended." Their boastful website is down and with it much of their inter-asylum memos along with some of their "best" work." Tom Chartier More...
With commodity costs rising for so long, why are we feeling the impact so suddenly? The answer is that China can no longer bail us out with low-cost manufacturing. For years, American manufacturers and retailers offset rising costs by sourcing more products from China, where they could be made cheaply. That kept prices down for American consumers and also restrained pressures on wages, abetting price stability. But now costs are rising quickly in China, too.
... But when President Bush was first told of Habbush’s report that there were no WMD in Iraq, Suskind’s sources say the president reacted by saying, “Well, why don’t you tell him to give us something we can use to make our case?”
Apparently, Habbush was unable or unwilling to oblige by changing his story. Nevertheless, later in 2003, when it became clear that he had been telling the unwelcome truth, Habbush was helped to resettle in Jordan and given $5 million to keep his mouth shut....
It was, no doubt, pure coincidence that President Bush made a highly unusual visit to CIA headquarters, also on Thursday, before leaving for Crawford on vacation. Or was it?
The official line is that he wanted an update on the situation in Georgia and the Soviet role there, but Bush did not need to go to Langley for that. Rather, given the record of the past seven years, it is reasonable to suggest that he also wanted to assure malleable Mike Hayden, the CIA director, and his minions that they will be protected if they continue to stiff-arm appropriate congressional committees, denying them the information they need for a successful investigation.
* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *
WHY COLLECTIVIST VISIONS ALWAYS END BADLY
"The ideal of conscious control of social phenomena has made its greatest influence felt in the economic field. The present popularity of "economic planning" is directly traceable to the prevalence of the scientistic ideas we have been discussing. As in this field the scientistic ideals manifest themselves in the particular forms which they take in the hands of the applied scientist and especially the engineer, it will be convenient to combine the discussion of this influence with some examination of the characteristic ideals of the engineers.
We shall see that the influence on current views about problems of social organization of his technological approach, or the engineering point of view, is much greater than is generally realized. Most of the schemes for a complete remodeling of society, from the earlier utopias to modern socialism, bear indeed the distinct mark of this influence." Friedrich Hayek
--flynn
* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *
BLOWBACK FROM BEAR-BAITING!
"Americans have many fine qualities. A capacity to see ourselves as others see us is not high among them."
Pat Buchanan Gets it Right on Russia/Georgia! Click Here!
When the Soviet Union broke into 15 nations, we celebrated. When Slovenia, Croatia, Macedonia, Bosnia, Montenegro, and Kosovo broke from Serbia, we rejoiced. Why, then, the indignation when two provinces, whose peoples are ethnically separate from Georgians and who fought for their independence, should succeed in breaking away?
Are secessions and the dissolution of nations laudable only when they advance the agenda of the neocons, many of whom viscerally detest Russia?
* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *
BILL KRISTOL AND BAD ADVICE GO TOGETHER LIKE COLD ON SNOW
Bill Kristol and the Menshevik myth of democratic Georgia
by Justin Raimondo
The commander in chief of America's laptop bombardiers, Weekly Standard editor Bill Kristol, can always be counted on to reveal not only the content of the neoconservative party line, but also, in so many words, the impulse that motivates it. In his latest peroration from his perch at the New York Times, the intellectual architect of our disastrous war in Iraq lays out a rationale for yet another catastrophic blunder in the foreign policy realm, this time in the Caucasus:... More...
--flynn
* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *
MUST READ! You've been seeing China for the first time on the Olympics...
NOT QUITE WHAT THE MEDIA HAD YOU BELIEVING, RIGHT?
China will surpass the United States as the world’s largest economy in as little as twenty years.
• The Chinese economy’s growth rate has averaged 9 percent since the start of the 1980s.
• China’s savings rate is over 35 percent (in America, it’s 2 percent).
• 40 percent of China’s output goes to exports (so there’s no crippling foreign debt).
• $60 billion a year in direct foreign investment, combined with a trade surplus, has brought Beijing’s foreign currency reserves to over $1 trillion.
• China’s fixed assets–ports, bridges, and roads–double every two and a half years.
"ALL OF JIM ROGERS' BOOKS DESERVE READING, BUT NONE IS MORE TIMELY THAN THIS ONE!"
DEMS OUTRAGED THAT CORPORATIONS PAY NO TAXES At least they don't pay them in one way -- it turns out they pay them in another. The unaccountably Government Accountability Office has released a report which, according to the AP, finds
Two-thirds of U.S. corporations paid no federal income taxes between 1998 and 2005... about 68 percent of foreign companies doing business in the U.S. avoided corporate taxes over the same period.
Collectively, the companies reported trillions of dollars in sales, according to GAO's estimate.
Lots of obligatory quotes from outraged -- outraged! -- Democrats, natch:
"It's shameful that so many corporations make big profits and pay nothing to support our country," said Sen. Byron Dorgan, D-N.D., who asked for the GAO study with Sen. Carl Levin, D-Mich.
And...
"It's time for the big corporations to pay their fair share," Dorgan said.
But then, after we get through the sensationist lede, we find
The GAO study did not investigate why corporations weren't paying federal income taxes or corporate taxes and it did not identify any corporations by name. It said companies may escape paying such taxes due to operating losses or because of tax credits.
The explanation?
An outside tax expert, Chris Edwards of the libertarian Cato Institute in Washington, said increasing numbers of limited liability corporations and so-called "S" corporations pay taxes under individual tax codes.
"Half of all business income in the United States now ends up going through the individual tax code," Edwards said.
But let's not let the facts get in the way of a good display of outrage. Thanks to reader E. M. Schultze for the link. More...
--flynn
* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *
EQUALITY AS AN INSULT TO INTELLIGENCE
"But this does not mean that the struggle over egalitarianism is over. Far from it. On the contrary, after the New Left of the late 1960s and early '70s had been discredited by its bizarre turn to violence, it took the advice of its liberal elders and "joined the system." New Leftists launched a successful Gramscian "long march through the institutions," and by becoming lawyers and academics – particularly in the humanities, philosophy, and the "soft" social sciences – they have managed to acquire hegemony over our culture. Seeing themselves defeated and routed on the strictly economic front (in contrast to the Old Left of the 1930s, Marxian economics and the labor theory of value was never the New Left's strong suit), the Left turned to the allegedly moral high ground of egalitarianism.
And, as they did so, they turned increasingly to what was suggested in the last paragraph of my essay: de-emphasizing old-fashioned economic egalitarianism in favor of stamping out broader aspects of human variety. Older egalitarianism stressed making income or wealth equal; but, as Helmut Schoeck brilliantly realized, the logic of their argument was to stamp out in the name of "fairness," all instances of human diversity and therefore implicit or explicit superiority of some persons over others. In short, envy of the superiority of others is to be institutionalized, and all possible sources of such envy eradicated." --Rothard More...
