Category: 03 Economy

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Penguin: CIA’s Metamorphis Into the Drone Machine

03 Economy, 07 Other Atrocities, 10 Security, 11 Society, Corruption, Director of National Intelligence et al (IC), Government, IO Deeds of War
Who, Me?

If you build it, they will come….

CIA's Push for Drone War Driven by Internal Needs

Gareth Porter

The World News, 6 September 2011

EXTRACT:

The shift in the CIA mission's has been reflected in the spectacular growth of its Counter-terrorism Center (CTC) from 300 employees in September 2001 to about 2,000 people today – 10 percent of the agency's entire workforce, according to the Post report.

The agency's analytical branch, which had been previously devoted entirely to providing intelligence assessments for policymakers, has been profoundly affected.

More than one-third of the personnel in the agency's analytical branch are now engaged wholly or primarily in providing support to CIA operations, according to senior agency officials cited by the Post. And nearly two-thirds of those are analysing data used by the CTC drone war staff to make decisions on targeting.

Read full article.

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Winslow Wheeler: True Cost of Post-9/11 Wars $5T+

03 Economy, 04 Inter-State Conflict, 05 Civil War, 07 Other Atrocities, 09 Justice, 10 Security, 11 Society, Civil Society, Corruption, DoD, Government, IO Deeds of War, Military, Peace Intelligence
Winslow Wheeler

What Has Been the Cost of the Post-9/11 Wars?

Email from Winslow Wheeler

This week, as the media runs its displays on America ten years after the 9/11 attacks, there will be references to the dollar costs.  A figure some will use is the one trillion dollars President Obama cited as for the war in Iraq.  That figure is a gross underestimate.

The war in Iraq and its costs are inseparable from the wars in Afghanistan, Yemen, Pakistan, the Philippines, Somalia and elsewhere.  Indeed, when the Defense Department seeks appropriations for them, it does not distinguish the costs by location; nor does Congress in appropriations bills.

Moreover, the DOD costs are hardly the whole story: add costs in the State Department budget for aid to the governments (such as they are) of Iraq, Afghanistan, Pakistan, Yemen and elsewhere.

Add also the costs to care for the US veterans of these wars.  That would include the care already extended and the care now obligated for the duration of these men's and women's lives.

Add to that the expanded costs of domestic security against terrorism.

Add also the interest we annually pay for the deficit spending that has financed the wars.

Continue reading “Winslow Wheeler: True Cost of Post-9/11 Wars $5T+”

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Chuck Spinney: Big Oil Screwing US for Peak Profits

03 Economy, 03 Environmental Degradation, 05 Energy, 07 Other Atrocities, 11 Society, Advanced Cyber/IO, Blog Wisdom, Civil Society, Collective Intelligence, Commerce, Commercial Intelligence, Corporations, Cultural Intelligence, Earth Intelligence, Government, Misinformation & Propaganda, Politics of Science & Science of Politics, Power Behind-the-Scenes/Special Interests, Waste (materials, food, etc)
Chuck Spinney

It looks increasingly likely that President Obama is going to cave into the oil interests promoting the pipeline to move oil mine in tar sands of Canada to the Port Arthur Free Trade Zone in Texas.

One of the prime selling points of this scheme, which has environmentalists all in uproar will no doubt be that the pipeline is needed  for energy security.  So what is going on?  My good friend Pierre Sprey's answer may surprise you.  He has graciously given me permission to distribute it.

Peak Oil or Peak Profits?

email from Pierre Sprey, 5 September 2005

A new Oil Change International report has injected a breath of fresh air into the endless stream of media BS about peak oil, declining US oil production, disastrous dependence on foreign oil, need for new offshore drilling, blah, blah , blah, blah…. The report's charts show that our domestic oil production has been rising  markedly since 2008. The excess domestic oil and the new Keystone pipeline oil are unneeded for the domestic market and will go largely to exports to fatten Big Oil's bottom line.

The most interesting conclusions are:

  • “Gasoline demand is declining due to increasing vehicle efficiency and slow economic growth;
  • Meanwhile the surge in new shale oil production in North Dakota and Texas has led to the first rise in U.S. oil production since 1970 and is forecast to continue for some time;
  • As a result of stagnant demand and the rise in both domestic and Canadian oil production, there is a glut of oil in the U.S. market.

Refiners have therefore identified export markets as their primary hope for growth and maximum profits.

Continue reading “Chuck Spinney: Big Oil Screwing US for Peak Profits”

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Seth Godin: Back to (the wrong) school — inspires a plan to retrain 44% of the US workforce in one year

03 Economy, 04 Education, 11 Society, Advanced Cyber/IO, Collaboration Zones, Collective Intelligence, Communities of Practice, Ethics, InfoOps (IO), IO Deeds of Peace, Methods & Process, Open Government, Policy, Politics of Science & Science of Politics, Serious Games, Standards, Strategy, Technologies, Threats
Seth Godin

Back to (the wrong) school

A hundred and fifty years ago, adults were incensed about child labor. Low-wage kids were taking jobs away from hard-working adults.

Sure, there was some moral outrage at seven-year olds losing fingers and being abused at work, but the economic rationale was paramount. Factory owners insisted that losing child workers would be catastrophic to their industries and fought hard to keep the kids at work–they said they couldn't afford to hire adults. It wasn't until 1918 that nationwide compulsory education was in place.

Part of the rationale to sell this major transformation to industrialists was that educated kids would actually become more compliant and productive workers. Our current system of teaching kids to sit in straight rows and obey instructions isn't a coincidence–it was an investment in our economic future. The plan: trade short-term child labor wages for longer-term productivity by giving kids a head start in doing what they're told.

Large-scale education was never about teaching kids or creating scholars. It was invented to churn out adults who worked well within the system.

Of course, it worked. Several generations of productive, fully employed workers followed. But now?

Continue reading “Seth Godin: Back to (the wrong) school — inspires a plan to retrain 44% of the US workforce in one year”

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Howard Rheingold: Infotention Skills + Citizen Intel RECAP

03 Economy, 04 Education, 11 Society, Academia, Advanced Cyber/IO, Civil Society, Collective Intelligence, Cultural Intelligence, Hacking
Howard Rheingold

Infotention Skills: From Information Overload to Knowledge Navigation

An immersive learning experience from the Institute for Social & Network Literacy

21st Century Information Fluency

Self-guided Assessment and Tutorial Packages

Phi Beta Iota:  US education, like the rest of government-dominated programs, is totally broken.  Apart from the 22% now unemployed, another 22% can expect to be unemployed when the security state collapses and secret intelligence, defense, and homeland security are cut back to a quarter of their current inflated and dysfunctional numbers.  An intelligent president with integrity would not leave those people handing–needed is an emergency Public Education program that gives all of those people (44% of the working public) a one year sabattical with structured online and face to face re-training–a PAID year of education funded by the huge cost savings that an intelligent President with integrity can quickly achieve.  Howard Rheingold is the gold standard in this arena.  Every university across America should be gearing up to offer a massive community-focused 21st Century retraining program.

See Also:

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Chuck Spinney: Can USA Move Beyond 9/11 Pathology?

01 Poverty, 03 Economy, 04 Inter-State Conflict, 05 Civil War, 06 Genocide, 07 Other Atrocities, 08 Proliferation, 09 Terrorism, 10 Security, 10 Transnational Crime, Civil Society, Corruption, Cultural Intelligence, DoD, Government, IO Deeds of War, Media, Military, Money, Banks & Concentrated Wealth, Officers Call, Policy, Politics of Science & Science of Politics, Power Behind-the-Scenes/Special Interests, Strategy, Waste (materials, food, etc)
Chuck Spinney

CS Note: Lightly reformatted by text unchanged and nothing added

Can the United States move beyond the narcissism of 9/11?

The unity brought about by the tragedy was intense but fleeting. The war on terror has been disastrous abroad and divisive at home

Gary Younge, guardian.co.uk, Sunday 4 September 2011 18.00

In the immediate aftermath of the September 11 attacks the then national security adviser, Condoleezza Rice, called in her senior staff and asked them to think seriously about “how [to] capitalise on these opportunities”.

The primary opportunity came from a public united in anger, grief and fear which the Bush administration sought to leverage to maximum political effect. “I think September 11 was one of those great earthquakes that clarify and sharpen,” Rice told the New Yorker six months afterwards. “Events are in much sharper relief.”

Ten years later the US response to the terror attacks have clarified three things:

  1. the limits to what its enormous military power can achieve,
  2. its relative geopolitical decline and
  3. the intensity of its polarised political culture.

It proved itself

  • incapable of winning the wars it chose to fight and
  • incapable of paying for them and
  • incapable of coming to any consensus as to why.

The combination of domestic repression at home and military aggression abroad kept no one safe, and endangered the lives of many. The execution of Osama bin Laden provoked such joy in part because almost every other American response to 9/11 is regarded as a partial or total failure.

Read original online–safety copy below the line.

Continue reading “Chuck Spinney: Can USA Move Beyond 9/11 Pathology?”

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