Saturday, January 19, 2008

IGNORANCE IS BLISS Yahoo: "Wall Street resumed its downward trek Friday as skittish investors, unable to hold on to much optimism about the economy, drew little comfort from President Bush's stimulus plan. Investors had already pulled back from a big early gain, with the major indexes trading mixed as Bush began to speak. By the time the president finished announcing a plan for about $145 billion worth of tax relief, the indexes were well into negative territory. Disappointment with Bush's plan came as investors were searching for those companies that might be weathering the economic slowdown well." George W. Bush blew it. And everyone with an objective view could see from the very start that he was a liar and a warmonger. But the neocons lauded him because they considered Bush the best person to increase their personal financial profits. Forget about statesmanship, bringing democracy to the world, it was all about greed and more greed. Well, even there Bush's short-term vision has led everyone astray. When he came into power he promised to cut government spending. He robbed every nickel he could lay his hands on. Now America is in recession. The fraud of Bushenomics: they're looting the country. Economist: "Ben Bernanke once spoke of dropping money from helicopters, if necessary, to save an economy in distress. The chairman of the Federal Reserve probably did not envisage that choppers bearing the insignia of oil-rich Gulf states and cash-rich Asian countries would hover over Wall Street. Yet just such a squadron has flown to the rescue of capitalism's finest. At a time when Western governments have at last learned to let the private sector run banks (however lousily it is sometimes done), it is far from ideal that state-owned funds from emerging economies should be buying stakes in them, even minority ones. On the other hand, such cross-border bargain-hunting gives developing countries a bigger direct stake in capitalism's future. The chief danger will not lie with them. The problem is likely to be in the rich world - and a rising nervousness about foreign money." On the one hand the private sector is taking over in our national economies and on the other hand foreign corporations are taking over our economies. Which simply means our governments are in the hands of private and foreign enterprises. Sovereignty no longer means anything. It's money that counts and is counted. People are secondary considerations. That is the problem with our Western economies. It's the beginning of the end. Private or other corporations do not have the welfare of the people in mind, they go for the profit. The essential tenets of our civilization are being breached in ever increasing measure. A global economy without regulation by elected representatives of the people results in chaos and destruction. Profit is the codeword, but profit to do what, for what end? Not to make this world a better place for all. The rich are getting richer, the poor are getting poorer. And the methods that are being used are despicable. Deregulation means nothing but ... deregulation, i.e. a lawless society where money dictates everything. Doug's: "The United States has been listed as a country where prisoners are at risk of torture in a training document produced by the Canadian foreign ministry. It also classifies some US interrogation techniques as torture." FPIF: "Here's the secret to the last seven years of foreign policy disasters coming from Washington. President Bush has become an acolyte of Timothy Ferriss. Haven't heard of Ferriss yet? He's the motivational author who champions a four-hour work week. In order to slim down his schedule, Ferriss recommends a low-information diet. 'I never watch the news or buy the newspaper,' he writes. 'I read the headlines through newspaper machines as I walk to lunch each day. My selective ignorance has never caused a single problem for me.' Ferriss has become a guru to many who are overwhelmed by the modern disease of TMI (Too Much Information). Even the lords of Silicon Valley, many of whom have helped make TMI an epidemic, are now putting up little altars to Ferriss in their offices. No one has yet explored the impact of Ferriss on Washington. But 'selective ignorance', based on a cursory understanding of world events, is a powerful explanation for the failures of U.S. policy in Iraq. We knew so little about Iraq before invading it. We knew even less, it seems, when we tried to occupy it. And we continue to be ignorant of Iraqi realities as we desperately search for a face-saving way out of the debacle. The low-information diet also helps to explain the administration's inability to understand the Israeli-Palestinian problem or why a hard-line policy toward Iran is such a disaster. It's not just the Bush administration, of course, that has gone on the low-information diet. Large swathes of the media have cooperated in this strategy by reducing the actual news content from their reporting. But newspapers, too, have closed down foreign bureaus as part of their own slim-fast regimen. So it's no surprise that the Bush administration was able to gull the public into supporting the war in Iraq through manipulation of information." The mainstream democrats won't make a change in America. (By the way, vote Kucinich, he could make a difference. Pick your candidate.) Hillary and Obama are Bush Lite. While the global situation is deteriorating rapidly, many people recoil into their personal private life and concomitant private gain. Until the tsunami reaches them too. 11:41:31 AM

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