Ambassador Husain Haqqani will discuss the current situation in Pakistan.
Vodpod videos no longer available.
see
Are You Ready For Nuclear War? By Paul Craig Roberts + Musharraf resigns (vid)
Pakistan President Musharraf Resigns! + Pakistan after Musharraf
by John F. Harris
Politico.com
8/19/08
Count Ralph Nader as unimpressed by the crop of supposed finalists to be Barack Obama’s running mate.
“I don’t think he’s that dumb,” said Nader, commenting on widespread speculation that Obama’s choices are down to Sens. Joe Biden, Evan Bayh, or Virginia Gov. Tim Kaine.
The smart pick, according to Nader, is Hillary Rodham Clinton. Nader phoned into Politico Tuesday afternoon to offer his prediction that a surprise nod to Clinton is actually what Obama has in store—never mind the talk of mistrust between the Clintons and Obama.
via Nader predicts Obama to pick Clinton – John F. Harris – Politico.com
Ralph’s Daily Audio
Ralph Nader for President in 2008
- Differences Between the Two Parties
8/19/2008
How do the differences compare to the similarities?- The Bloated Defense Budget
8/18/2008
President Dwight Eisenhower warned us…
see
Red State Update invite to Nader!
Ashley Sanders: The Dem Party is the Party of Perpetual Plan B
Bye Bye Barry by Joel S. Hirschhorn
Crisis in the Caucasus. What Were They Smoking in the White House?
Joe Lauria on Antiwar Radio (Sibel Edmonds; MIC)
By Ron Paul
08/19/08 “ICH”
We’ve heard how the value of the dollar affects gas prices – and indeed the price of everything. I was pleased that my request for a hearing on such was granted by the Financial Services committee and we were able to hear some very informative testimony. Certainly domestic policies, regarding off-shore oil drilling bans, ethanol mandates, refining capacity, and CAFE standards are interventionist and harmful enough in the energy market.
But how does foreign policy affect gas prices? One important factor is that oil on the world market has been priced in dollars exclusively since 1973. Only two leaders have gone against this arrangement – Saddam Hussein in 2000 and more recently Mahmoud Ahmadinejad with the recently opened Iranian Oil Bourse which trades in non-dollar currencies. But since oil is otherwise exclusively traded in dollars, this means that oil producers have vast amounts of assets held in dollars. Especially since the War on Terror and the PATRIOT Act, many oil-producing nations and banks are concerned the US government may freeze assets based on flimsy pretexts. This fear contributes to dollar weakness, and therefore also high oil prices.
Recently I and other members of Congress spoke out against H Con Res 362 and exposed this seemingly innocuous bill for what it really is – a call for a blockade and a build up to war with Iran. Thankfully it has not come to the floor for a vote as I had fully expected it would. But to even propose legislation like this, and get an alarming 261 cosponsors, makes the oil markets jittery and encourages more capital flight from the dollar. We only isolate ourselves on the world stage with actions and attitudes like this. After all, how can it be wise for the rest of the world to bank on America, when we tend to freeze assets and blockade entire countries for no good reason?
Another major factor is our intervention in international military conflicts. These conflicts are often much more complicated, and have more to do with oil than our own leaders are willing to acknowledge. Too often the side we support points our weapons right back at us down the road. The best policy is always free trade with all and entangling alliances with none, but instead we isolate ourselves by picking sides and making enemies out of our friends or potential friends. In the recent conflict with Russia and Georgia, it appears that once again the administration is going to pick sides and send taxpayer money, when we are in a deep recession here at home. There is no good reason for us to put a dog in every fight around the world.
The contributing factors in the price of oil are complicated and legion. The fact is, it is an immensely valuable resource, and, as our demand for this resource is great, our relationships with world leaders who control it should be handled with reason and intelligence. However, our interventionist mindset when it comes to foreign policy never ceases to get us into sticky situations, for which we pay a premium at the gas pump.
Ron Paul is a Republican United States Congressman from Lake Jackson, Texas, a physician, a bestselling author, and a former 2008 U.S. presidential candidate.
FAIR USE NOTICE: This blog may contain copyrighted material. Such material is made available for educational purposes, to advance understanding of human rights, democracy, scientific, moral, ethical, and social justice issues, etc. This constitutes a ‘fair use’ of any such copyrighted material as provided for in Title 17 U.S.C. section 107 of the US Copyright Law. In accordance with Title 17 U.S.C. Section 107, the material on this site is distributed without profit to those who have expressed a prior interest in receiving the included information for research and educational purposes. If you wish to use copyrighted material from this site for purposes of your own that go beyond ‘fair use’, you must obtain permission from the copyright owner.
see
Stagflation is Here, and It is a Weapon of Mass Destruction by Richard C. Cook
Blockades: Acts of War by Stephen Lendman
U.S. Armada En Route to the Persian Gulf: “Naval Blockade” or All Out War Against Iran?
A Vote For Military Force Against Iran? AIPAC’s House Resolution, H. Con. Res. 362
HR 362 and the Alarming Escalation of Hostility Towards Iran
Ron Paul: Something Big is Happening
Ron Paul on Iran Policy (videos)
by Richard C. Cook
featured writer
Dandelion Salad
richardccook.com
Aug. 19, 2008
U.S. wholesale prices in July 2008 grew at the fastest rate since 1981. The cost of materials has risen 9.8 percent in the last twelve months, according to government data. While gasoline prices fell the week of August 18 to $3.74 a gallon, they remain far higher than the $2.40 a gallon of mid-2005. Meanwhile, the price of food at the grocery store continues to climb, while consumer purchasing power remains stagnant.
According to analyst Michael Hodges, average family income adjusted for inflation declined six percent from 1999 to 2005, and the drop has continued since then. With families no longer able to borrow on their shrinking home equity for purchasing power due to the collapse of the housing bubble, they have had to tap into their savings. According to Hodges, “As of summer 2007, savings were a negative 1.3 percent, an all-time low.” (Grandfather Economic Report, August 2008)
The government claimed that GDP grew during the 2nd quarter of 2008—hence no recession—admitting at the same time that the chief driver of growth was the economic stimulus rebates sent by the IRS to taxpayers. The rebates, however, were paid for by more government debt, with a $490 billion federal budget deficit projected for fiscal year 2009 that begins next month.
Whether even the paltry 2nd quarter growth at an annual rate of 1.9 percent was “real” is subject to debate. Since the U.S. began to lose its manufacturing economy, a long-term slide that began after the Vietnam War, all economic growth has been in the services and financial sectors.
The government counts any financial transaction that can be taxed as part of the GDP whether or not it results in the creation of goods and services of tangible value. Bizarrely, a transaction can add to GDP even if it is based on money that has been borrowed and must be repaid with interest in the future.
So this type of debt-based GDP growth can actually be destructive in the long-run. This has happened in the U.S., where total household, student, business, and government debt will soon be pushing $70 trillion against an annual GDP in 2007 of $13.8 trillion.
The best measure of economic health for working men and women in the producing economy is not GDP but rather M1. This is money available as immediate purchasing power from cash-on-hand, checking accounts, and NOW accounts.
M1 measures what can be bought today without a consumer being required to incur new debt. The amount of money available as M1 has fluctuated in the $1.3-$1.4 trillion range since December 2003. Growth in M1 has essentially been flat.
This means that even moderate inflation can result in erosion of consumer purchasing power. By this measure, the producing economy has been in a mild recession for four-and-a-half years. But according to the M1 Money Stock Forecast of the independent Financial Forecast Center, M1 was projected to fall from June to August of 2008 from 1.3883 trillion to 1.386 trillion.
Thus with inflation now running at close to ten percent, we have entered a period of stagflation potentially worse than the 1970s. And stagflation is nothing less than a weapon of mass destruction aimed at the livelihoods not only of the elderly and those on fixed incomes, but also on students, the unemployed, families, and almost everyone who has a job in the producing economy.
Copyright 2008 by Richard C. Cook
Richard C. Cook is a former U.S. federal government analyst, whose career included service with the U.S. Civil Service Commission, the Food and Drug Administration, the Carter White House, NASA, and the U.S. Treasury Department. His articles on economics, politics, and space policy have appeared on numerous websites and in Eurasia Critic magazine. His book on monetary reform, entitled We Hold These Truths: The Hope of Monetary Reform, will be published soon by Tendril Press. He is also the author of Challenger Revealed: An Insider’s Account of How the Reagan Administration Caused the Greatest Tragedy of the Space Age, called by one reviewer, “the most important spaceflight book of the last twenty years.” His website is at richardccook.com. Comments may be sent via email to EconomicSanity@gmail.com.
see
Inflation and the New World Order by Richard C. Cook
Large U.S. Bank Collapse Seen Ahead
Louis T. McFadden (1876-1936): An American Hero by Richard C. Cook
Richard C. Cook: On The Eve of WW3 (videos)
Status Report on the Collapse of the U.S. Economy by Richard C. Cook
Engineered Collapse of the US Economy – Alex Jones interviews Richard C Cook
The Economy Sucks and or Collapse
***
By Eric Margolis
ICH
08/19/08 “Lew Rockwell”
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.
Equally important, Russia’s Vladimir Putin swiftly and decisively checkmated the Bush administration’s clumsy attempt last week to expand US influence into the Caucasus, and made the Americans and their Georgian satraps look like fools.
We are not facing a return to the Cold War – yet. But the current US-Russian crisis over Georgia, a tiny nation of only 4.6 million, and its linkage to a US anti-ballistic missile system in Eastern Europe, is deeply worrying and increasingly dangerous.
On 7 August, Georgia’s president, Mikheil Saakashvili, ordered his US and Israeli-advised and equipped army to invade the breakaway region of South Ossetia, which has been struggling for independence from Georgia since 1992. Most of its people were Russian citizens who wanted union with Russian North Ossetia.
If not directly behind Georgia’s invasion of South Ossetia, Washington had to have been at least fully aware of Saakashvili’s plans. The Georgian Army was trained and equipped by US and Israeli military advisors stationed with its troops down to battalion level. CIA and Israel’s Mossad operated important intelligence stations in Tbilisi and coordinated plans with the Saakashvili, whose political opponents have long accused him of being very close to CIA and the Pentagon.
Georgia’s attack on South Ossetia was launched while the world was absorbed by the Beijing Olympics, and Prime Minister Putin was in the Chinese capital. The attack was clearly planned to be a lightening strike that would occupy all of South Ossetia and then Abkhazia before Moscow could react, presenting the Kremlin with a fait accompli.
Who in Bush’s or Cheney’s office approved this stupid adventure? Why did the very smart Israelis get sucked into this imbroglio?
Saakashvili’s stealth “coup de main” quickly turned into a disaster. Russia’s 58th Army responded by routing Georgian forces and delivering a humiliating strategic and psychological blow to the Bush administration. Saakashvili fell right into Moscow’s trap.
Georgia and Russia have been feuding since 1992 over two Georgian ethnic enclaves, South Ossetia and Abkhazia, whose people differ in ethnicity and language from Georgians and who wanted to rejoin Russia.
The young, US-educated Saakashvili became Georgia’s president in 2003 after an uprising, believed organized by CIA and financed by US money, overthrew the former leader, Eduard Shevardnadze. I came to know and respect Shevardnadze in Moscow when he was Mikhail Gorbachev’s principal ally and architect of Soviet reform.
Had the able, clever Shevardnadze still been in power, this misadventure would never have happened.
Saakashvili quickly became the golden boy of US rightwing neoconservatives and their Israeli allies, who held him a model of how to turn former Russian-dominated states into “democratic” US allies. Georgian critics claim Saakashvili kept power by intimidation, bribery, and vote rigging. The youthful Georgian leader, his head swelled by promises of US support and NATO membership, launched a war of words against Moscow.
Amazingly, Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice, a supposed Russian expert, even publicly assured Saakashvili that the US would “fight” for Georgia. Washington’s latest fiasco falls squarely into her lap.
US money, military trainers, advisers, and intelligence agents poured into the former Soviet Republic of Georgia. Israeli arms dealers, businessmen and intelligence agents quickly followed, reportedly selling some $200 million or more of military equipment to the Georgian government.
By expanding its influence into Georgia, the Bush administration brazenly flouted agreements with Moscow made by president George H.W. Bush not to expand NATO into the former USSR. President Bill Clinton and George W. Bush both violated this pact. Under the feeble Yeltsin regime, bankrupt Russia could do nothing. But under Putin, newly wealthy Russia finally pushed back after a long series of provocations fromWashington.
Russia’s tough deputy prime minister, Sergei Ivanov, sneeringly observed that Georgia had become a “US satellite.” He was absolutely right. And Ivanov, a former KGB colleague of Vlad Putin, knows a satellite when he sees one. Georgia provided the US oil and gas pipeline routes from Azerbaijan, Turkmenistan and Kazakhstan that bypassed Russian territory. Russia was furious its Caspian Basin energy export monopoly had been broken, vowing revenge.
Now that the Russians have checkmated the US and client Georgia, South Ossetia and Abkhazia will likely move into Russia’s orbit. The west rightly backed independence of Kosovo from Serbia. The peoples of South Ossetia and Abkhazia, who are ethnically and linguistically different from Georgians, should have as much right to secede from Georgia.
Besides thwarting Bush’s clumsy attempt to further advance US influence into Russia’s Caucasian underbelly, Putin delivered a stark warning to Ukraine and the Central Asian states: don’t get too close to Washington. Putin put the US on the strategic defensive and showed that NATO’s new eastern reaches – the Baltic, Bulgaria, Romania, and the Caucasus – are largely indefensible.
It’s a good thing Georgia was not admitted to NATO, as the White House had reportedly promised Saakashvili. Had Georgia been admitted before this crisis, the US and its NATO allies would have been in a state of war with Russia. Disturbingly, Germany’s conservative prime minister, Angelika Merkel, rushed to Tbilisi to assure Saakashvili that her nation still backed NATO membership for Georgia.
Is the west really ready to be dragged into a potential nuclear war for the sake of South Ossetia? Are American and German troops ready to fight in the Caucasus? Georgia is a bridge too far for NATO.
President George Bush, VP Dick Cheney and Sen. John McCain all resorted to table pounding and Cold War rhetoric against Russia. McCain, whose senior foreign policy advisor is a neoconservative and was a registered lobbyist for Georgia, demanded that the US and NATO “punish” Russia and put it into diplomatic isolation.
Unfortunately, the indignant John McCain’s could not even properly pronounce “Abkhazia.”
America’s neocon amen chorus demanded a confrontation with Russia, chanting their usual mantras about Munich, appeasement and the myths of World War II. One certainly wondered if the Caucasian fracas was not staged by the Republicans to provide Sen. McCain with the “three a.m. phone call” he has been longing for and a chance to sound tough. This he did, even though his rhetoric was empty and his solutions vapid. Barack Obama ducked the issue or issued a few tepid bromides about halting “Russian aggression.”
Meanwhile, hypocrisy flew thicker than shellfire. Bush, who ordered the invasion of Afghanistan, Iraq and Somalia, and is threatening war against Iran, accused Russia of “bullying” and “aggression.” Putin, who crushed the life out of Chechnya’s independence movement, piously claimed his army was saving Ossetians from Georgian ethnic cleansing and protecting their quest for independence.
Bush and McCain demand Russia be punished and isolated. The humiliated Bush is sending some US troops to Georgia to deliver “humanitarian” aid. Equally worrisome, the US rushed to sign a pact with Warsaw to station anti-missile missiles and anti-aircraft batteries, manned by US troops, in Poland. This response is dangerous, highly provocative, and immature. The next president will have to deal with the Bush administrations reckless and foolish acts in the Mideast, Eastern Europe, Afghanistan and now, the Caucasus
The west must accept Russia has vital national interests in the Caucasus and the former USSR. Russia is a great power and must be afforded respect. The days of treating Russia like a banana republic are over. Have we learned nothing from World War I or II, both of which began with flare-ups in obscure Sarajevo and the Danzig Corridor?
The US’s most important foreign policy concern is keeping correct relations with Russia, which has thousands of nuclear warheads pointed at North America. Georgia is a petty sideshow. US missiles in Poland and radars in the Czech Republic are a dangerous, unnecessary provocation that is sowing dragon’s teeth for future confrontation.
Eric Margolis, contributing foreign editor for Sun National Media Canada, is the author of War at the Top of the World. See his website.
Copyright © 2008 Eric Margolis
FAIR USE NOTICE: This blog may contain copyrighted material. Such material is made available for educational purposes, to advance understanding of human rights, democracy, scientific, moral, ethical, and social justice issues, etc. This constitutes a ‘fair use’ of any such copyrighted material as provided for in Title 17 U.S.C. section 107 of the US Copyright Law. In accordance with Title 17 U.S.C. Section 107, the material on this site is distributed without profit to those who have expressed a prior interest in receiving the included information for research and educational purposes. If you wish to use copyrighted material from this site for purposes of your own that go beyond ‘fair use’, you must obtain permission from the copyright owner.
see
The Force Be With Us But Not With You by Bruce Gagnon
Alexander Cockburn on Russia Today: McCain uses Ossetian bloodshed to score points
Why Not Simply Abolish NATO? by Rodrigue Tremblay
Why are we pretending we would fight for Georgia?
Margolis: It’s like August, 1914 – US missile deal enrages Russia
Russian General threatens Poland over missile deal
RNN: Margolis: Russians checkmate US in Georgia
Row escalates over US media bias + New Cold War is an option
By Paul Craig Roberts
08/19/08 “ICH”
Pervez Musharraf, the puppet installed by the US to rule Pakistan in the interest of US hegemony, resigned August 18 to avoid impeachment. Karl Rove and the Diebold electronic voting machines were unable to control the result of the last election in Pakistan, the result of which gave Pakistanis a bigger voice in their government than America’s. Continue reading
by Joe Lauria
Huffington Post
Aug 14, 2008
If you didn’t know who Randy Scheunemann was until the New York Times wrote about him Thursday morning I bet he and John McCain preferred it that way. He is a lot more than just a former lobbyist for Georgia.
Russia Today
August 19, 2008, 15:12
An Israeli TV channel has found out that anyone who has a satellite dish can watch live transmissions of the country’s Defence Ministry. No special passwords are needed and transmissions can be easily accessed not only in Israel but all across the Middle East, including countries with which Israel hardly has warm relations.
RussiaToday : News : Israel’s secret missile test goes out live on air.
Video link (in Hebrew only)
h/t: NewsofTheDay
David Harvey: Exit the neocon global project, enter competing capitalist blocks
In the first part of his interview with Pepe Escobar, David Harvey talks about competing capitalist blocks, the US-China relationship, the neoconservative global project and Barack Obama as the new face of US neoliberalism.
Warning
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This video may contain images depicting the reality and horror of war/violence and should only be viewed by a mature audience.
Mosaic needs your help! Donate here: http://linktv.org/contribute
“Musharraf Resigns,” Dubai TV, UAE
“Israel to Release 200 Palestinian Prisoners,” Abu Dhabi TV, UAE
“Iran’s Rocket Can Carry Low-Orbit Satellite,” IBA TV, Israel
“Yemen’s Parliament Rejects Electoral Amendment,” Al Jazeera TV, Qatar
“Hezbollah & Salafists Sign Memorandum of Understanding,” Al Arabiya TV, UAE
“Arab League Returns to Iraq,” Al Sharqiya TV, Iraq
“Pilgrims Walk to Karbala,” Al-Alam TV, Iran
Produced for Link TV by Jamal Dajani.
Vodpod videos no longer available.
by Bruce Gagnon
featured writer
Dandelion Salad
Bruce’s blog post
space4peace.blogspot.com
Aug. 19, 2008
When you have “freedom” on your side you can do whatever you wish. The U.S. can use force in Iraq, Afghanistan, Haiti, Panama, Iran, Yugoslavia, etc. because we “value life” while terrorists and Russians don’t. Freedom means free to impose capitalist “free market” solutions in order to bring “stability” to the world. Anyone who stands in the way of “freedom” must be destroyed.
Here are a few interesting and contradictory quotes that reveal the U.S. (and its allied lap dogs) hypocrisy and double-standards at work:
However, Polish Foreign Minister Radoslaw Sikorski told the BBC’s World Tonight programme that the timing of the deal had nothing to do with the hostilities [between Georgia-Russia]. “We agreed this negotiating phase a week ago, which was… before the events in Georgia, and because of the U.S. calendar there was some urgency,” he said. “But, what is crucial, and what decided the success of the talks over the last couple of days, was that the U.S. offered us new proposals.”
Welcome to the New World Odor.
see
Alexander Cockburn on Russia Today: McCain uses Ossetian bloodshed to score points
Why Not Simply Abolish NATO? by Rodrigue Tremblay
Why are we pretending we would fight for Georgia?
RNN: Margolis: Russians checkmate US in Georgia
Row escalates over US media bias + New Cold War is an option
Saakashvili’s War + Russian troops begin withdrawal from Georgia
Russian General threatens Poland over missile deal
After Georgia conflict – Missile agreement with Poland intensifies danger of US-Russian clash
Missile Defense: Washington & Poland just moved the World closer to War
Medvedev signs six-point truce with Georgia + Russia will pull out troops on Monday
Dutchoven08
August 18, 2008 Continue reading
By Greg Palast
For Tricycle: The Buddhist Review
18 August 2008
Lhasa, Tibet – China’s secret police are just terrible at keeping themselves secret.
The detective, dressed in her business suit and pumps appropriate to urban Lhasa, did not expect to be trailing my wife and me up the steep hillside to a monastery 15,000 feet up an ice-crusted ridge. Even at 200 yards behind us, I could see her shivering in the thin, frozen air, trying, absurdly, to look like just another hiker on the barren slope.
But then, she really wasn’t trying to hide. Her presence was meant to send a message of fear and intimidation.
I got the point earlier when a photographer we’d helped sneak into Tibet was arrested, her film of protesting Tibetans seized and her camera smashed as she was hustled onto the first plane leaving the country.
When my police shadow looked away, I snapped a photo of the long boxes below me, roofs of the prison complex. It housed more Buddhist monks than any monastery.
FAIR USE NOTICE: This blog may contain copyrighted material. Such material is made available for educational purposes, to advance understanding of human rights, democracy, scientific, moral, ethical, and social justice issues, etc. This constitutes a ‘fair use’ of any such copyrighted material as provided for in Title 17 U.S.C. section 107 of the US Copyright Law. In accordance with Title 17 U.S.C. Section 107, the material on this site is distributed without profit to those who have expressed a prior interest in receiving the included information for research and educational purposes. If you wish to use copyrighted material from this site for purposes of your own that go beyond ‘fair use’, you must obtain permission from the copyright owner.
August 18, 2008
The conflict between Georgia and South Ossetia has become a genuine issue in U.S. presidential campaigning. The situation is very welcome to Republican contender John McCain, says Alexander Cockburn, an American political journalist.
Dandelion Salad 