Journal: Will Pakistan Implode Because of US in AF?

04 Inter-State Conflict, 05 Civil War, 07 Other Atrocities, 08 Wild Cards, 09 Terrorism, 10 Security, 11 Society, Advanced Cyber/IO, Civil Society, Cultural Intelligence, Government, InfoOps (IO), Intelligence (government), Military, Peace Intelligence, Power Behind-the-Scenes/Special Interests, Strategy, Waste (materials, food, etc)

editor spinney time — Chuck Spinney Sounds Off

Pakistan will implode if the US does not leave Afghanistan

The continuing US presence in Afghanistan fuels extremism in neighbouring Pakistan

Imran Khan The Observer, Sunday 9 January 2011

The assassination of Salmaan Taseer has shown only too clearly the growing extremism in Pakistan, the radicalisation of its society and the polarisation that is taking hold. This is not just between the religious and the secular, but also the polarisation that the “war on terror” has caused between the various religious sects.

Read rest of article Chuck Spinney is commenting on…

Is the Global War in Terror Creating More Problems than it is Solving?

Chuck Spinney

The late historian Chalmers JOHNSON popularized the term “blowback” to describe the unintended grand-strategic consequences resulting from interventionist foreign policies and military actions. The term blowback dates to the CIA's internal history of the US’s 1953 Iranian coup that threw out the Iran's democratically elected Prime Minister Mohammed Mossadegh (a progressive social reformer who wanted to nationalize the oil industry among other things) and replaced him with the tyrannical American puppet Shah Mohammed Reza Pahlevi. No one can doubt that contemporary problems with Iran today are rooted in resentments dating back to the 1953 coup.

Continue reading “Journal: Will Pakistan Implode Because of US in AF?”

2011/01/082011/01/08

Journal: Wikileaks & Israel, Wikileaks & Vatican

07 Other Atrocities, 08 Wild Cards, 11 Society, Civil Society, Corruption, Cultural Intelligence

Published on Wednesday, January 5, 2011 by Reuters

WikiLeaks: Israel Aimed to Keep Gaza Economy on Brink of Collapse

by Reuters

Cable from the U.S. Embassy in Tel Aviv says Israeli officials wanted Gaza's economy ‘functioning at the lowest level possible consistent with avoiding a humanitarian crisis.'

Israel told U.S. officials in 2008 it would keep Gaza's economy “on the brink of collapse” while avoiding a humanitarian crisis, according to U.S. diplomatic cables published by a Norwegian daily on Wednesday.

Three cables cited by the Aftenposten newspaper, which has said it has all 250,000 U.S. cables leaked to WikiLeaks, showed that Israel kept the U.S. Embassy in Tel Aviv briefed on its internationally criticized blockade of the Gaza Strip.

The territory, home to 1.3 million Palestinians, is run by the Islamist Hamas group, which is shunned by the West over its refusal to recognize Israel, renounce violence or accept existing interim Israeli-Palestinian peace deals.

“As part of their overall embargo plan against Gaza, Israeli officials have confirmed to (U.S. embassy economic officers) on multiple occasions that they intend to keep the Gazan economy on the brink of collapse without quite pushing it over the edge,” one of the cables read.

Israel wanted the coastal territory's economy “functioning at the lowest level possible consistent with avoiding a humanitarian crisis”, according to the Nov. 3, 2008 cable.

Read rest of story at HAARETZ.com…

Wikileaks & Israel

Wikileaks & Vatican

2011/01/08

Journal: The Rise and Sell-Out of the Enviro Establishment

01 Agriculture, 03 Economy, 03 Environmental Degradation, 05 Energy, 07 Health, 09 Justice, 11 Society, 12 Water, Advanced Cyber/IO, Civil Society, Commerce, Commercial Intelligence, Cultural Intelligence, Earth Intelligence, Government

Herewith are the first two parts of Jeff St Claire's important multipart series on the systemic corruption and corporatization of the environmental movement.

A Concise History of the Rise and Fall of the Enviro Establishment

How Green Became the Color of Money

By JEFFREY ST. CLAIR, Counterpunch

Part I

New Year's Edition
December 31, 2010 – January 2, 2011

EXTRACT: Watt, Gorsuch, Levelle and Crowell were magnificent villains for fundraising: direct mail revenues of the top environmental groups exploded tenfold from 1979 to 1981. Green became the color of money, and the rag-tag band of hardcore activists who populated the Hill in the 1970s gave way to a cadre of Ivy League-educated lobbyists, lawyers, policy wonks, research scientists and telemarketers. Executives enjoyed perks and salaries that rivaled those of corporate CEOs.

A Concise History of the Rise and Fall of the Enviro Establishment

How Green Became the Color of Money

By JEFFREY ST. CLAIR, Counterpunch

Part II

Weekend Edition
January 7 – 9, 2011

EXTRACT:

By the end of Reagan’s second term, the big environmental organizations were well-pickled in the political brine of Washington, with freshness and passion drained out.

. . . . . .

EXTRACT: Under instructions from Bush, Lujan ordered the Bureau of Land Management to fast track the purchase of the Goldstrike Mine by Barrick Resources, a Toronto-based company controlled by financier Peter Munk. The way thus lubricated, Barrick acquired the 1,800 acre gold mine near Elko, Nevada, for the princely sum of $9,500. By the time the mine is shuttered, the Goldstrike will yield an estimated $10 billion in gold. In 1995, in consideration for his favors, George Bush was invited to join Barrick’s board of advisers.

Phi Beta Iota: The work of Jeffrey St. Claire and CounterPunch are representative of public intelligence in the public interest–the work suffers from being isolated and lacking holistic integrity–there is no means for the public to “connect the dots” or evaluate each predatory move in situ and in context. That is the emergent challenge and opportunity of the 21st Century.

2011/01/082011/01/08

Weak Signals: Reality Sandwich Business Shamanism

03 Economy, 04 Education, 07 Other Atrocities, 11 Society, Advanced Cyber/IO, Civil Society, Collective Intelligence, Commerce, Corporations, Counter-Oppression/Counter-Dictatorship Practices, Cultural Intelligence

Business Shamanism

Daniel Pinchbeck

Using the tools of corporations to reprogram global society and distribute a new cultural operating system

Image by fdcomite, courtesy of Creative Commons license.

Now that the Evolver network and brand have established themselves to a certain extent, I want to look ahead to developments I hope to see in the near future, with this organization and other initiatives. For the next phase of development, I propose the term “business shamanism.” “Corporate alchemy” would be a viable alternative.

. . . . . . . .

We tend to forget that Roosevelt's New Deal was not a good-hearted gift to the working classes but a compromise to stave off mass uprising. The current oligarchy has determined that it will make no such deal this time around. I suspect they assume that the pulverizing of the populace with mind-numbing media, psychotropic drugs, police state tactics, and poison food had the desired effect. And they may be right.

. . . . . . . .

Phi Beta Iota: Below the line are excerpts. Click on the title to read the entire rant. The author is educated and thoughtful, his rant is provoking and worth studying.

Continue reading “Weak Signals: Reality Sandwich Business Shamanism”

2011/01/062011/01/06

Story Of 2011 Will Be The Second US Housing Crash

03 Economy, Civil Society, Commerce, Corruption, Government

BUSINESS INSIDER / Money Game

Story of 2011 Will Be The Second US Housing Crash

20% price drop certain, 40% price drop probable, 80% possible

By Ilargi on The Automatic Earth. Jan. 3, 2011, 6:24 AM

EXTRACT: Many people claim Stoneleigh and I must be crazy, and doomers and all that, for predicting an 80%+ drop in real estate values, but we in turn can't seem to understand why home prices would fall “only” 20% from here, or why they would fall “just” 40%, as Mish suggested for instance. We think that more than 20% is in the cards just because of the bubble coming back to earth; we think 40% is certain because of the bubble bursting, and we think 80%+ will then happen because the bursting bubble will take the entire financial system down with it. Pretty simple really.g, and it is worth reading….every single word of it.

EXTRACT: According to L. Randall Wray, lenders may have the right to collect debt on certain loans, if they can prove ownership of the loan, but they can't foreclose unless and until they have a clear record (chain) of all transactions the loans went through, through their entire existence. And MERS effectively killed that chain.

EXTRACT: The entire US housing system, lenders, builders, borrowers, the whole thing, is in grave danger, and that means both the financial system and the economy at large are as well. We're looking at not just one or two, but a whole series of reinforcing feedback loops. Which neither Obama nor Geithner nor Bernanke have any control over, other than fleetingly and temporarily. And that will be the story of 2011. Well, that and, of course, the euro crumbling, Japan deflating, China inflating, cities, counties and states defaulting, violent street protests, millions more Americans sinking into abject poverty, misery and hardship, and so on.

Read every word….

Phi Beta Iota: This is the best review we have found and it is chillingly credible. In our view, the Secretary of the Treasury means well but has absolutely no clue how to actually manage the US economy back to a more stable ethical state.

2011/01/052011/01/05

Journal: Supreme Court OK’s Astroturfed Zombie Army

11 Society, Civil Society, Corporations, Cultural Intelligence, Misinformation & Propaganda, Money, Banks & Concentrated Wealth, Power Behind-the-Scenes/Special Interests

An Astroturfed Zombie Army

The Future of American Democracy?

By Werther*

ElectronicPolitics, January 2, 2011

EXTRACT: With the Citizens United Supreme Court decision (certainly one of the ten most consequential rulings in the court's history), all pretense of restraint is gone. The reader can see just how unrestrained in the January 1 edition of the Washington Post. The article recounts the adventures of one Gena Bell, a declassé Ohioan of modest intellectual gifts balanced by an unbounded anger over a sense of entitlement slipping through her fingers. Otherwise a very unremarkable individual, made remarkable only by the fact that the Koch brothers, through the front group Americans for Prosperity, paid for her to demonstrate against the United Nations climate change summit in Cancun, Mexico.

Read entire article with quotes and links….

2011/01/052011/01/05

Crisis Group CrisisWatch N°89, 3 January 2011

02 Diplomacy, 04 Education, 04 Inter-State Conflict, 05 Civil War, 07 Other Atrocities, 08 Wild Cards, 09 Terrorism, 10 Security, 10 Transnational Crime, Civil Society, CrisisWatch reports, Government, Law Enforcement, Military, Non-Governmental

Five actual or potential conflict situations around the world deteriorated and two improved in December 2010, according to the latest issue of the International Crisis Group's monthly bulletin CrisisWatch.

Côte d’Ivoire was gripped by political crisis as incumbent President Laurent Gbagbo refused to cede power after losing to rival Alassane Outtara in the late-November presidential runoff polls. Post-election violence claimed the lives of at least 170 people and more than 15,000 fled to neighbouring countries.

Continue reading “Crisis Group CrisisWatch N°89, 3 January 2011”