CORRUPTION UPDATES 179

The Week in Review

first posted: August 9 to 15, 2008, Draft edition

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1]

Russia, the Black Sea, and the American Corporate Empire

Russian Bear Awake

This week we have finally seen the first act in what is sure to be Russia's expanding response to the series of American provocations spanning the time from the Soviet Breakup to the present.

The problem is that America, Europe, and NATO have extended their economic, political, and military influence right up to the borders of Russia when Russia was weak. Now that Russia is strong enough to respond, it is readjusting the imbalances of power along its borders that the West established during its weakness.

This situation was born in the character of America's response to the Soviet Breakup. We showed no restraint in our attempts to extract every advantage from the breakup of the Eastern European Soviet States when the young Russia was disorganized and weak.

Corporate Betrayal of American Values

Although we sacrificed long-term stability for short-term advantage when the Soviet Union broke up, our greatest sacrifice was of our values. Now that the short term advantages have evaporated we are just beginning to pay the price for that short term advantage with instability into the foreseeable future. And at just the moment that we need democratic values, when our military and political influence is in decline, we have none left to fall back on.

America did not fill the Soviet power vacuum with our supposed higher ideals, but rather filled the void with opportunism and greed. This behavior exposed our ideals as no more than propaganda and a thin veneer of lies hiding the true nature of our global corporate empire to the whole world.

When the Soviets fell away, so too did our image as a democratic nation.

Rather than promoting democracy or freedom when the Russian Bear fell, we exposed the true nature of our government through our corporate government's global support for dictators, kings and tyrants who would steal their nation's resources and do the bidding of our corporate empire. In Russia this was expressed through our support for Russia's own robber barons, the "oligarchs."

In Eastern Europe, we extended our political, economic, and military influence and power right up to Russia's borders, through the post-Soviet states.

Here's the nut of the problem: When the Soviet Union fell, instead of demanding that the post-Soviet States become completely and honestly neutral, demilitarized, and unable to present a threat to Europe or Russia, we tried to hedge Russia in behind a wall of hostile western backed border states.

Our bad behavior was not just limited to Eastern Europe. With the end of the Cold War American power was virtually unchecked, and few nations could resist our domination of their polity and economy.

War as a Tool of State

Now that Russia has matured politically and economically, it is responding strongly to these intolerable intrusions of American power on its borders. And ironically, in Georgia Russia is using the very same tools that America made acceptable to settle geopolitical disputes: War.

It sounds ridiculous to me to hear Bush, Rice, and Gates defending the sovereignty of nations against illegal invasion when they are the leading global advocates of unilateral regime change by military means.

What will Bush, Rice, and Gates do if Russia declares Georgia a "terror" state and begins kidnapping, torturing, and holding show trials with its citizens just as we are doing with Arabs?

Russia's invasion of Georgia is opening a new chapter in world history. The Russian bear has come out of hibernation, and he appears willing to hoist the American System on its own petard.

This means that a new global contest for power has begun, and if Russia plays it like we have, there will be no rules, treaties, or international laws that will hinder their, or any nation's pursuit of wealth and power. The world is a much more dangerous place as they will now play the Empire Game by American rules, which is no rules at all.

According to Russia, they are not just responding to our intrusions on their borders. According to Russian moderates, America has been building a lawless global empire that is a direct threat to not only Russia, but to all countries that seek self-determination and autonomy.

As an American you should seriously consider the possibility that America is just beginning to enter a period of increasing negative repercussions to our attempt to impose a global empire on the world.

You should be nervous that every region of the world is realigning its political, economic and military relationships to counter American thievery of their political rights and natural resources.

A New World Order

It appears that our violent attempt to form a Global Corporate Empire after the fall of the Soviet Union has not just put unilateral violence, torture, and the police state back into the toolkit of state powers, but has resparked the naked international contest for global domination that led the world into the world wars of the last century.

A new world order is rising, not in response and obedience to American power, but in direct opposition to our quest for global power.

Resistance is rising to our Corporate Empire around the world. This resistance is manifesting itself through the new relationships of influence and power that are being established around the world by Russia, China, India, Iran, and Venezuela, with nations under the thumb of our corporate empire.

These are the emerging fault lines upon which the struggle for a new balance of world power will be played out, and all of these emerging relationships are polarized against America's dominance of the world's resources.

Our Allies are dictators and tyrants

We have been playing the same crooked game around the world that we played in post-Soviet Eastern Europe since the fall of the Soviet Union: We will do anything to support any type of regime as long as it obeys and profits our corporations. This has put us in bed with the worse examples of every kind of tyrant the world can produce.

We do not support freedom anywhere. We support tyrannical kings, emirs, authoritarian governments and dictators across the middle-east and around the world. Freedom has been discarded in favor of control of resources, power, and profits.

Whole regions unhooking from American Corporate Empire

Russia is beginning to exploit this weakness. Russia has established deep ties with Iran, including a mutual defense pact, sales of sophisticated weapons systems, nuclear technology, and political support in the Security Council.

I expect this trend to continue and expand. Expect Russia to offer strong support for any popular government that rises in Egypt after the American Dictatorship of Mubarak inevitably fails.

In South America we have lost most of our influence, and we have little good-will in the region outside of the tiny Spanish elites who formerly dominated South American politics. Our support for the last wave of failed dictators and death squads that failed to maintain American domination of South America means we are finished in South America.

You should expect Russia to strengthen its relationships with Cuba, Ecuador, and Venezuela. You should expect Russia to give or sell arms, jets, anti-aircraft missiles and ballistic missile technology to Cuba and Venezuela.

We support the Chinese Police State. We support the Corrupted Corporate states of S. Korea, Japan, Singapore, the Philippines, and Taiwan. The politics of all these states (excluding China) is dominated from the top, by the corporate elites of each state, and none of them emanate from their citizens. In the case of China, we are directly supporting and enriching a weird commie elite that dominates an unlimited police state.

You should note that China has repaired and strengthened its political and economic relationship with Russia, while simultaneously rising to be the dominant power in Asia. All with the wealth of our middle-class that our corporate government gave to China.

End of the American Age

The American Age is over and it failed. An age of global contest for power and resources is emerging in the wake of our failed attempt to impose a corporate empire on the world. Our failed empire is first and foremost the fault of our failure to preserve our domestic democracy. We lost our democracy to corporate power, and the corporate power has used the power of our nation to commit crimes around the world.

We squandered our time at the top because we betrayed our own principals and pursued the same powers our Revolution and Constitution rejected: empire.

It is coming to the point in time where the only way to stop our surge towards a third world war will be to overthrow the criminals who have betrayed and taken over our country, hang them all, and reassert our democratic republic.

It's Time to Take out the Trash.

background

recent events

Yushchenko’s decree on Black Sea Fleet new anti-Russian move, itar-tass, 8-13-08

Lavrov describes Georgia as one of US special projects, vor, 8-14-08

S Ossetian, Abkhazian FM to arrive in Moscow to hold discussions on the recognition of these republics, itar-tass, 8-14-08

US, Poland Deal Angers Russia, time, 8-14-08

Robert Gates warns of strained US-Russia relations 'for years' after Georgia conflict, timesonline, 8-14-08

The real Situation

Russia will Dominate the Black Sea, alex, aug 10, '08

The Americans arrive, economist, 8-14-08

Georgia, recently

Russia declares victory

Russia's Back

Georgia Conflict Background

timeline of aggresions, stories

timeline of aggresions, reuters

excellent map of region

recent highlights in Russian-US Relations

all russia links

2]

Hey Stupid:

It's a Corruption Crisis, not a Budget Crisis that is Crippling California

We've been Robbed

Only the uninformed believe that California is having a budget crisis. Our "budget crisis" is nothing more than the result of the complete breakdown of our democracy, and the subsequent looting of our country by the very same corporate interests that bribed our politicians and our democracy into submission.

The fact is that "our" politicians belong to and represent the corporations, not our citizens. You must understand that politicians work for their constituents, and that the people have been replaced by the corporations as our state's (and our nation's) constituents.

Thus during the recently ended period of the biggest profits and the greatest concentration of wealth in our country's history we were unable to fund our schools, roads, health care, or retirements. Our corrupt politicians would not fund social services during "good" times, when our country was drowning in profits, and now the "good" times are over.

So today, when the hangover of our festival of greed and corruption is just setting in, California is faced with broken schools, cracked roads and bridges, no health care, no decent old age plan, and prisons that are a crime against humanity.

Thus it should be no surprise that "Our" politicians, the same ones that have robbed us of our wealth, our rights, our schools, our medicine, and our freedom during the recent good times, cannot provide for our basic needs during bad times.

They worked for the corporations during the good times, and they are still corporate employees today, and the politicians are continuing to use every means at their disposal to continue to move the wealth of our nation into the hands of their corporate sponsors today, during the height of this supposed budget crisis.

This corrupt situation will continue as long as politicians are dependent on corporate bribes for political power. Until this is changed the politicians will continue to be incapable of acting in the interests of the citizens of California. Our schools, hospitals, prisons, and our society will remain crappy until we change who elects our politicians from corporations that profit from stealing our rights, to citizens that demand that our rights and resources are protected.

Our broken society and our broken democracy are the direct results of the fact that "Our" Senate and Assembly represent their corporate bribers, not the citizens of California.

This clearly defines "our" politicians are traitors and criminals, not representatives of the people of this state.

The corrupted corporate hacks in Sacramento stole our state's wealth long before this year's budget crisis. The politicians have stolen the money required to provide the health, education, and old age security that are the basic tasks of government, and they are not going to give us either our money back, nor the services it should have provided to our society.

They gave the money, our money, to their corporate sponsors. "Our" politicians are criminals who have robbed us of our wealth, our democratic rights, and our social and natural infrastructures.

This is the reason we are confronting the stark situation of having schools, prisons, and a medical "system" that looks like they came right out of a poverty-stricken third world nation, while our corporate elite lives like Roman Senators.

Our "democratic" politicians have crafted a society of abject poverty alongside extreme wealth, with no middle-class to balance the power of the super-rich they serve.

The Corporate hacks in Sacramento that pretend to represent us long ago betrayed their trust and allowed their bribers to completely strip our state of its resources, and suck its social infrastructures dry to pad their profits.

So we are left with the annual farce of our corrupted politicians pretending it's each other's fault that they mutually betrayed our democracy and looted our state. We should hang them all.

Thus our schools, prisons, and medical "system," not to mention our democracy, will be as dysfunctional and damaged as they were before this year's "budget" crisis.

It's time for change. It's time to take out the trash.

Death to the Corporate Fascists and All who Serve Them

California's Budget Crisis:

The Real Deal

This is a Corruption Crisis, not a Budget Crisis, alex, aug 8, '08

California's Schools: FAILED

recent news

Students' test scores rise, but fewer than half in California are proficient in either English or math, lat, 8-14-08

Study: Schools need Billions, bee, 3-16-06

background

CALIFORNIA SCHOOLS IN A DEATH SPRIAL, alex, 3-16-07

We've been Robbed, alex, 3-16-08

CORPORATE-DEMOCRAT IMMIGRATION POLICY SUCCESSFUL: POVERTY, alex, 3-1-07

CA's Failed Educational System

the links

California's Prisons: FAILED

Federal overseer seeks to seize $8 billion for California prison healthcare, lat, 8-14-08

background

State Prisons in "Tailspin," lat, 1-26-07

ca prison conditions inhumane, bee, 3-6-08

CA's Failed Prison System

the Links

3]

Police State Olympics

You should be aware that the wealth and filth on display at China's Olympics is the wealth of the American middle class. Our politicians moved the manufacturing and labor of our middle-class to China to supercharge the profits and power of their corporate sponsors.

The filth of China on display at the Olympics is the product of all the American manufacturing being done without American pollution control.

The wealth of China on display at the Olympics is the wealth of American manufacturing being done at slave level wages.

Yep, your leaders betrayed your interests and sent your work to China, where it is being done at slave wages in a country with no pollution, product safety, labor laws, or political freedom.

The beneficiaries of this betrayal are our politician's corporate sponsors and China. Understand that your interests as citizens are, at best, thought of third by your politicians, far behind the profits of their corporate sponsors and China.

Your leaders are traitors to our Constitution, our political and civil rights, and our general welfare. They are better friends to the Chinese and Corporations than they are to the citizens of the United States.

The Olympics of Filth, alex, 8-6-08

Olympic Filth not questioned, nor its sources tracked by the corporate media

Naomi Klein: The Olympics Officially Unveil "Police State 2.0," opednews.com, 8-10-08

background

china links: Deadly Trade

china links: econ links

china links: environment

china Links: Police State

china Links: Military Power

china domestic security-military Links

essay: Ban China Trade

essay: US National welfare Secondary to Corporate Profits in China Trade

essay: China's Police State: On our Dime

4]

The Economy

On july I7 warned that the global markets were going to get very turbulent as the big market players, the sovereign wealth funds, the hedge funds, and other big players moved their funds between energy-metals-food commodities, equity markets, bonds, and global currencies in an attempt to preserve and increase wealth in a declining global economy.

It appears that this is just what has been happening since then:

MARKET VOLATILITY: The Shark Tank is getting violent. Goldfish should refrain from entering the water, alex, 7-17-08

recent news

US inflation at highest since 1991, ft, 8-14-08

Eurozone economy shrinks for first time, ft, 8-14-08

Key analysis

Status of the Econ Crisis: How we got here, where it is Going, and what you should expect to happen, alex, 7-13-08

background

the whole story: essays on our ethical-political-economic meltdown

recently

U.S. may not be in recession, but 170 metro areas could be, reuters, 8-10-08

A Few Thoughts on the Markets, july 2, 2008

Track our ethical/economic MELTDOWN: all economic links

essays

ap reports start of the Credit Crunch 8-12-07

why we are supporting china 8-13-07

Markets ready to Kill Economy 8-4-07

Feds Bail out Greedy Speculators, 8-17-07

How much Mortgage Liability do the Banks Have? 9-5-07

Poverty Hidden Behind Cooked Stats, september 22, 2007

Housing Credit Crisis Exposed Rotten Core of Economy 11-24-07

The impending meltdown, 1-14-08

death of the new economy, get ready for the big selloff, 3-14-08

economic or ethical crisis? 3-29-08

death of bubble psychology, 4-7-08

economic/market update: Last week's historic run-up: Perception Vs. Reality, 4-7-08

bernake says prime mortgages inverted: how we got here, how we crawl out, may 6, 2008

All of Inflation’s Little Parts, nyt, May 3, 2008: Interactive Chart

A Few Thoughts on the Markets, july 2, 2008

Status of the Economic Crisis: How we got here, where it is Going, and what you should expect to happen, draft document, 7-13-08

MARKET VOLATILITY: The Shark Tank is getting violent. Goldfish should refrain from entering the water. 7-17-08

5]

The Environmental Meltdown

Bush is maintaining his attempts to murder nature all the way to the bitter end of his administration. Not that the Dems will change course, when they take power in November.

The plain facts of our environmental situation are that both political parties are dedicated to massive demographic growth as the economic engine of the United States. This is what is driving the drastic changes in our environment, and is the root cause of the massive extinction event that is taking place.

Despite the change in the seasons, the decline in crop yields, the mass extinction that is going on right now, the massive change in ocean circulation patterns, and the radical increase in the frequency and intensity of violent weather here in the US and around the world, the Dems and Repugs are pushing forward with the massive population expansion they started in the 1970s.

Since 1975 our population has doubled, and our consumption of everything, and especially energy, has increased by a factor of 25. To end the death spiral our environment is in, we are going to have to do a bit more than paint this pig green.

If we are going to restore even a shadow of the natural world in our own country, we are going to have to immediately replace demographic growth as the engine of our economy with qualitative growth.

To do our own part to save, let alone lead the world in reversing the drastic changes in the climate of the world, the United States must first stop being the leading global defender of the destruction of our environment.

To take the lead in the national and global efforts to preserve our environment we are going to have to radically change our domestic economy. We must immediately stop our present trajectory of massive population growth, and completely end the irresponsible demographic growth of the United States.

Our first step should be to reduce the number of people in the United States by at least 12 million illegals.

Until we take this fundamental step to end our irresponsible growth, all of the rest of our efforts to stop, or even slow the drastic changes in our climate will continue to pale in comparison to the effects of the massive increases in our consumption that are being driven by our irresponsible and historically unprecedented growth in population.

Endangered Species Act -- parts of it could become extinct, lat, 8-12-08

Mass Extinctions And 'Rise Of Slime' Predicted For Oceans, science daily, 8-13-08

background

Wildlife populations 'plummeting,' bbc, 5-16-08

recently

Bird species plummet as habitat dwindles, sf chron, 7-11-08

related

Extinction risk 'underestimated,' bbc, 7-3-08

background articles: Only 50 years left for sea fish. BEES: Honey, I'm Gone. Study finds huge decreases in bird populations. Record Gulf of Mexico ‘Dead Zone’ Is Predicted. Ocean dead zones expanding. Tiny Delta fish at center of huge water war. Exploring an amphibian epidemic. Natural decline hurting lives. Hansen: Past the tipping point. World fish stocks collapse: africa feeling it first. Yangtze almost dead. Global warming killing sierra trees. Salmon arriving in record low numbers. Ocean map: Oceans trashed. delay in polar bear protections. Mangrove loss put Burma at risk. Tropics insects face extinction. Wildlife populations plummeting. Fast fall of Mediterranean sharks. Shark populations near extinction. 30% of Alaska salmon wasted.

also see

Hansen: Past the tipping point, ng, 12-14-07

White House blocked EPA studies, GAO reports, sf chron, April 30, 2008

Bush's "secret" attempts to kill nature

Species rulings get hard look, Former U.S. official's intervention assailed by investigators, Sacbee, 5-22-08

EPA chief mum on contact with White House:
He refuses to say whether Bush pressured him to veto state bid for tougher auto emission rules, mcclatchy, 5-21-08

The politicization of Everything

executive branch: censorship of science.

links: Big Oil runs the government.

links: Corruption in every executive branch agency.

links: Manipulating the rule of law: US Attorneys.

A Balanced View: the dems are corporate whores too.

environment index page

All environmental links