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Friday, February 23, 2007 |
Indymedia: "America is headed for 'a long emergence', according to author, James H. Kunstler. He's convinced that the days of the economy running on a cheap supply of fast-fading oil will soon be history. He spoke at Loyola College in Baltimore, MD, on Feb. 20, 2007. Kunstler said it's time for the country to think: 'Downscale!' He sees hard times ahead. Kunstler also doesn't think much of how the U.S. looks either. He said much of it is a 'piece of crap'.
As for alternate fuels or energy procedures, Kunstler wrote: 'No combination... will even permit us to operate a substantial fraction of the systems we currently run. We are in trouble.' In summing up, he said: 'We are going to have to reorganize [in our society] as a whole vast system of local networks of economic interdependence. It's a tremendous task."
This is not only happening in America; the same holds true for Europe as well. My neighbours have three cars and if they need some wood they simply chop down a few young trees from the nearby park. And then you must know that houses in Dutch cities usually have no garages or carports. All that junk is parked on the street and is a real nuisance. There is no general concern about the future or our environment. What they are thinking about is the short term money they will get in their greedy hands, not the health or future of their children. Nevertheless, they think they are on top of the world. They don't realise they are harming themselves.
Timothy Garton Ash: "What is the elephant in all our rooms? It is the global triumph of capitalism. Democracy is fiercely disputed. Freedom is under threat even in old-established democracies such as Britain. Western supremacy is on the skids. But everyone does capitalism. Americans and Europeans do it. Indians do it. Russian oligarchs and Saudi princes do it. Even Chinese communists do it. And now the members of Israel's oldest kibbutz, that last best hope of egalitarian socialism, have voted to introduce variable salaries based on individual performance. Karl Marx would be turning in his grave. Or perhaps not, since some of his writings eerily foreshadowed our era of globalised capitalism. His prescription failed but his description was prescient.
As George Soros (who should know) points out, global markets are now more than ever constantly out of equilibrium - and teetering on the edge of a larger disequilibrium. Again and again, it has needed the visible hands of political, fiscal and legal correction to complement the invisible hand of the market. The bigger it gets, the harder it can fall.
Then there is inequality. One feature of globalised capitalism seems to be that it rewards its high performers disproportionately, not just in the City of London but also in Shanghai, Moscow and Mumbai.
What will be the political effects of having a small group of super-rich people in countries where the majority are still super-poor? In more developed economies, such as Britain and America, a reasonably well-off middle-class with a slowly improving personal standard of living may be less bothered by a small group of the super-rich - whose antics also provide them with a regular diet of tabloid-style entertainment. But if a lot of middle-class people begin to feel they are personally losing out to the same process of globalisation that is making those few fund managers stinking rich, while at the same time outsourcing their own middle-class jobs to India, then you may have a backlash.
It's that core logic of ever-expanding desires that is unsustainable on a global scale. But are we prepared to abandon it? We may be happy to insulate our lofts, recycle our newspapers and cycle to work, but are we ready to settle for less so others can have more? Am I? Are you?"
11:29:23 AM 
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RawStory: "In the March issue of GQ, Wil S. Hylton argues that Vice President Richard Cheney should be impeached for committing 'high crimes and misdemeanors'.
'Over the past six years, as the country has spiraled into military misadventure, fiscal madness, and environmental meltdown, the vice president has not merely been wrong about the issues; he has been duplicitous, deceitful, and deliberately destructive to the American democracy,' Hylton writes."
TruthOut: "As a federal jury deliberates the fate of former Cheney chief of staff I. Lewis 'Scooter' Libby, several watchers agree. If the jury decides Libby knew he was lying to investigators, it could spur investigators to explore further whether Cheney was involved in conspiring to obstruct justice, they believe."
SomaliNet: "The report of the seizure over 11 American soldiers by the ousted Islamist movement in southern Somalia is getting momentum on Arab media."
Guardian: "Much of the intelligence on Iran's nuclear facilities provided to UN inspectors by US spy agencies has turned out to be unfounded, diplomatic sources in Vienna said today."
Independent: "More than 1,000 extra troops and equipment are to be sent to Afghanistan. The Defence Secretary Des Browne is due to announce the deployment of the extra troops on Monday.
The deployment - to combat an expected spring offensive by the Taliban - will reportedly cost the Treasury £250m."
Journalismus: "An Iranian scientist who worked at the country's Isfahan nuclear facility may have been assassinated by Israeli operatives, it was reported Sunday."
"Fusion Centers are the latest attempt at cooperation between several entities, especially law enforcement groups, at combating terrorism and crime. Or so we are told. But anytime you give a group of mostly neocon white guys that much intelligence capability, you will see basic civil liberties get pissed upon."
11:06:57 AM
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© Copyright 2008.
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