Aug. 18, 2008 at 21:33
by BrendaBee
The Israelis have ever been both tough and inventive in their defense of their country. But have they gone too far with this defensive weapon??
"BILIN, West Bank (AFP) - The Palestinian protestors massed at the fence expected tear gas and rubber bullets; what they got instead was a putrid yellow wind, Israel's newest weapon against West Bank demonstrators."
"The noxious mist, which Israeli police refer to as "skunk," was used for the first time earlier this month, when a truck-mounted cannon sprayed it over the heads of protesters, sending them racing down the hillside, retching and tearing off their shirts to try to escape the stench."
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Aug. 14, 2008 at 11:50
by BrendaBee
Americans tried for the dreamed of world peace with Globalization, or capitalism world wide, under the premise that people who trade together stayed together. The idea is logical as it would give every country in the world a way to gather wealth and therefore well being. The consequence of well-being is a nation has no reason to covet their neighbors wealth. They also have a strong incentive to protect their own wealth. War would be eliminated because war destroys wealth. A simply formula for a simple dream.
We Americans really are the worlds cock-eyed optimist! We are the worlds strongest most stable country and this came about because of democratic ideals of freedom for all people and capitalization, or the right to grow wealthy thru individual effort. So why not pass it along? And to go a step further we will even insure that it works by financing it and policing the entire world until every country in the world gets on their feet.
Sounds so good and so reasonable because altruistic behavior is the United State's most favored world position. Understanding the world of men as they really are and not as we wish them to be is the United State's favored self-delusion.
The following article speaks to this self-delusion. BB
http://townhall.com/columnists/VictorDavisHanson/2008/08/14/brave_old_world
Thursday, August 14, 2008
"Russia invades Georgia. China jails dissidents. China and India pollute at levels previously unimaginable. Gulf monarchies make trillions from jacked-up oil prices. Islamic terrorists keep car bombing. Meanwhile, Europe offers moral lectures, while Japan and South Korea shrug and watch -- all in a globalized world that tunes into the Olympics each night from Beijing.
"Citizens of the world" were supposed to share, in relative harmony, our new "Planet Earth," which was to have followed from an interconnected system of free trade, instantaneous electronic communications, civilized diplomacy and shared consumer capitalism.
In reality, to the extent globalism worked, it followed from three unspoken assumptions:
First, the U.S. economy would keep importing goods from abroad to drive international economic growth.
Second, the U.S. military would keep the sea-lanes open, and trade and travel protected. After the past destruction of fascism and global communism, the Americans, as global sheriff, would continue to deal with the occasional menace like a Muammar al-Gaddafi, Slobodan Milosevic, Osama bin Laden, Saddam Hussein, Kim Jong-il or the Taliban.
Third, America would ignore ankle-biting allies and remain engaged with the world -- like a good, nurturing mom who at times must put up with the petulance of dependent teenagers.
But there have been a number of indications recently that globalization may soon lose its American parent, who is tiring, both materially and psychologically."
Yet globalization, in all its manifestations, will run out of steam the moment we tire of fueling it, as the world returns instead to the mindset of the 1930s -- with protectionist tariffs; weak, disarmed democracies; an isolationist America; predatory dictatorships; and a demoralized gloom-and-doom Western elite.
If America adopts the protectionist trade policies of Japan or China, global profits plummet. If our armed forces follow the European lead of demilitarization and inaction, rogue states advance. If we were to treat the environment as do China and India, the world would become quickly a lost cause
If we flee Iraq and call off the war on terror, Islamic jihadists will regroup, not disband. And when the Russians attack the next democracy, they won't listen to the United Nations, the European Union or Michael Moore.
Brace yourself -- we may be on our way back to an old world, where the strong do as they will, and the weak suffer as they must.
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Aug. 11, 2008 at 12:28
by BrendaBee
Soon after Vladimir Putin came on the scene in the mid 1990's I saw him on TV and told my husband that the majority of the Russian people have finally gotten back what they had lost when the Berlin Wall fell. They had gotten back their cradle to grave security.
Of course for this security there is a huge price that must be paid in freedom and dignity, but the Russian population had had 70 years of this lifestyle and they really didn't want anything else. Most little people once they have lost their ability to face life on their own two feet haven't the courage to stand up again. The few in Russia who yearned for freedom to make their own way did prosper, but the slackers, the dullards, the lazy, the cheats didn't do as well. You see they were required to work for a living for the first time in their lives. A privately owned business expects their employees to earn their pay or they are replaced. The state owned businesses on the other hand accepted the inferior products and productivity of the "employed for life" workers.
You might point out just how much Vladimir Putin has done for the Russian people. Russia fell because the Communist system of government doesn't work and the state was finally bankrupt. This of course precipitated terrible hardships on most of the population who due to the bare essentials provided from Communist Russia had no resources to carry them thru the difficulty. As stated above, those who were enterprising found ways to survive and prosper, but most did not. Then of course the criminals and mobs took over and the weakened state could not control the crime.
Vladimir Putin had been Head of the KGB so he knew what to do to control the criminals and he did. Then he concentrated on running the state own businesses more efficiently. Then came the kicker: he took over all the privately own businesses that had come about to supply the needs no longer supplied by the state.
During his eight years as President of Russia he has been very popular with the Russian people because he was the man who "saved" them. The economy skyrocketed because of the measures he took, wages increased from an average of $80 a month to $640 (of course so did prices! but people just feel richer with more money to spent just ask us Americans). Best of all, poverty was cut in half. Poverty of those who hadn't been able to stand on their own two feet after the bankruptcy of the state run system. Poverty that happen when the state no longer provided jobs because any good comunist will tell you there was no poverty before the Berlin Wall fell.
So while Putin was violating every single human rights issue in his own country the majority of his country men were praising him.
In the meantime, other countries that had once been under the hard heel of Communist Russia had managed to prosper under their own forms of capitalism and relatively free elections. It is these countries that Putin wants back in the fold and he has been working towards this end. Attacking Georgia is, I believe, the first step. The tanks are rolling and will continue to roll right over all the small independent countries so that Putin can recreate the Russian Empire. And there is absolutely no one to stop him.
And make no mistake, Vladimir Putin the former head of thje Communist KGB has no love for America. he has been able to keep the United States from putting in missile bases in some of the former Russian provinces. He has managed to get moist of Europe hooked on Russian oil. He is manuevering to get and keep the US and the UN tied up in the Middle East fiddling with Iran. He has watched China become a now greedy semi-capitalist country that doesn't want to shake the boat so they will look to their own interest by looking the other way while he plunders.
For a student of history it is going to be quite a show, albeit a sad show for any who love liberty. BB
Robert Kagan in today's Washington Post says it very well and gives some pertinent facts that I didn't include with my opinion:
"This war did not begin because of a miscalculation by Georgian President Mikheil Saakashvili. It is a war that Moscow has been attempting to provoke for some time. The man who once called the collapse of the Soviet Union "the greatest geopolitical catastrophe of the [20th] century" has reestablished a virtual czarist rule in Russia and is trying to restore the country to its once-dominant role in Eurasia and the world. Armed with wealth from oil and gas; holding a near-monopoly over the energy supply to Europe; with a million soldiers, thousands of nuclear warheads and the world's third-largest military budget, Vladimir Putin believes that now is the time to make his move. "
See the rest of this article in today's Washington Post
Headline: Putin Makes His Move
Monday, August 11, 2008; Page A15
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2008/08/10/AR2008081001871.html?wpisrc=newsletter&wpisrc=newsletter&wpisrc=newsletter
Addendum: EDITORIAL: Subverting Iran sanctions
The Washington Times Wed, 13 Aug 2008 1:28 AM PDT
While the United States emphasizes the need to halt investment in Iran's energy sector, Russia and China continue to forge ahead with billions of dollars in new investments that will enable Iran to finance its military buildup and fund terrorist groups. During the past year, Washington has had some success in persuading European allies not to go forward with projects that would provide capital ...
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Aug. 4, 2008 at 12:54
by BrendaBee
Oil jumps above $126 in Asia on Iran concerns
CNN.com Mon, 04 Aug 2008 2:09 AM PDT
SINGAPORE (AP) -- Oil prices jumped above US$126 a barrel Monday in Asia on concern that a showdown over Iran's nuclear program could threaten crude supplies out of the Middle East.
Iran: 'new weapon' for use at sea tested
AP via Yahoo! News Mon, 04 Aug 2008 0:58 AM PDT
Iran's official IRNA news agency is quoting the chief of the country's Revolutionary Guards as saying that Iran has tested a new weapon for use at sea.
These two Alerts this morning correspond very well with my post last week entitled, "Are You Prepared to Live in a 19th. Century World?". BB
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Aug. 3, 2008 at 13:45
by BrendaBee
Good and bad coming out of the energy crisis. Today's New York Times reports on a trend that bodes well for the low tech/skills jobs that may be coming back to the US due to the high costs of energy. This should take care of the high unemployment rate among the unskilled/uneducated segment of the population. Therefore this should prove to be a cure for some of our increasing social ills because employed people are more likely to keep to the straight and narrow and build for a future. Marriages and stable families are more likely to increase among the minorities leading to upward mobility and a better educated second generation. These things that the United States has lost in the last 30 years with a corresponding rise in crime.
It will not however do a great deal to save the high tech jobs that have been going overseas unfortunately. When I call for help with my new Dell computer I get this help from the Philippines.
Then again the United States will undoubtedly continue to be the creators of new technology. Surely ours will be the new technology for alternative sources of energy which will perhaps save the earth from further degradation from fossil fuels, as well as reducing our need to placate the more unstable and troublesome countries who seem to have the lions share of fossil fuels (Middle East, Russia, some South American countries) .
We have always been the inventors and entrepreneurs while other countries have thaken the role of copiers. Other countries reap the benefits of our first rate minds and then out perform us because we have a gigantic gape between our super intelligent inventors and our workers! It would be a joke if not so sad. ( this is of course simplistic because much more is involved that just an inadequate work force that caused jobs to go overseas, but it certainly is a very significant yet unacknowledged reason for being upstaged by others. Americans tend to be a pampered, greedy and very lazy people.)
Anyhow, I have lifted some quotes from the article if you want to read more about it. BB
Headline: " Shipping Costs Start to Crimp Globalization
http://www.nytimes.com/2008/08/03/business/worldbusiness/03global.html?th&emc=th
| Cheap oil, the lubricant of quick, inexpensive transportation links across the world, may not return anytime soon, upsetting the logic of diffuse global supply chains that treat geography as a footnote in the pursuit of lower wages. Rising concern about global warming, the reaction against lost jobs in rich countries, worries about food safety and security, and the collapse of world trade talks in Geneva last week also signal that political and environmental concerns may make the calculus of globalization far more complex. |
"The industries most likely to be affected by the sharp rise in transportation costs are those producing heavy or bulky goods that are particularly expensive to ship relative to their sale price. Steel is an example. China’s steel exports to the United States are now tumbling by more than 20 percent on a year-over-year basis, their worst performance in a decade, while American steel production has been rising after years of decline. Motors and machinery of all types, car parts, industrial presses, refrigerators, television sets and other home appliances could also be affected."
"The spike in shipping costs comes at a moment when concern about the environmental impact of globalization is also growing. Many companies have in recent years shifted production from countries with greater energy efficiency and more rigorous standards on carbon emissions, especially in Europe, to those that are more lax, like China and India.o avoid having to ship all its products from abroad, the Swedish furniture manufacturer Ikea opened its first factory in the United States in May. Some electronics companies that left Mexico in recent years for the lower wages in China are now returning to Mexico, because they can lower costs by trucking their output overland to American consumers."
"But with transportation costs rising, more wood is now going to traditional domestic furniture-making centers in North Carolina and Virginia, where the industry had all but been wiped out. While the opening of the American Ikea plant, in Danville, Va., a traditional furniture-producing center hit hard by the outsourcing of production to Asia, is perhaps most emblematic of such changes, other manufacturers are also shifting some production back to the United States."
"But with transportation costs rising, more wood is now going to traditional domestic furniture-making centers in North Carolina and Virginia, where the industry had all but been wiped out. While the opening of the American Ikea plant, in Danville, Va., a traditional furniture-producing center hit hard by the outsourcing of production to Asia, is perhaps most emblematic of such changes, other manufacturers are also shifting some production back to the United States."
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May. 24, 2008 at 13:08
by BrendaBee
Will the United States as the only super power left standing attack Iran or at least remove the threat of a nuclear Muslim state from the world by bombing their nuclear facilities? Well, the pressure is surely on to do so. Israel and the Middle Eastern countries are quite open in their requests. The rest of the world is sitting back assuming two postures while lending their own pleas undercover. Russia, China, North Korea and France are outwardly vehemently opposed to the United States attacking Iran. The rest of the world is holding to their silence. While behind the scenes ALL I am sure are begging us to go forward.
An article in Time/CNN reports is informative reading on this subject. Time (as in minutes, hours, days) is of the essence as all know that after the November presidential elections President Bush will be unable to act, and if a Democrat is elected there is really not much hope of stopping Iran. There is also the fact that President Bush has General David Petraeus on board an in a position to oversee this operation. His being located next door in Iraq is precisely where American troops will be needed to put down any Iranian backlash.
Some analyst feel General Petraeus was in effect warning Congress and the world of possible attack in the near future when speaking before Congress this past Thursday. He was grilled by the Senators who are more favorably assured of a need for such an attack by answering their questions regarding the dangers to the area and to the world of an nuclear Iran. The General having at stake his appointment as the U.S. Central Commander answered the questions as truthfully as possible while still trying to assure the more timid Senators of his caution in using any kind of force in Iran.
I personally have little doubt that the time has come when the US will have to act finally because otherwise Iran will not be stopped. And the very real possibility that they are within weeks of having the capability of at least taking Israel out and threatening the other Middle Eastern States rather forces the Presidents hand. All other nuclear countries are held in check by a neighbor and/or their growing economic power that precludes their harming themselves by going to war. This simply is not the case with Iran.
I was saying as early as January 2006 that the US would eventually have to go to war, or at least a limited bombing war with Iran. Negotiations just would not stop[ them. And it seems I was correct in my thoughts. Negotiations and stalling by Iran as they continued their quest to join the World Nuclear Brotherhood is all we have seen accomplished by any country who stepped up to the plate to talk sense to them. Of course their membership will be a short one and last only until their leaders decide it is time to adhere to what they believe is Allah's command to wipe out the Infidel. It won't matter that they too will be annihilated since they will all enter Paradise as holy martyrs. Their leaders have openly stated their ultimate beliefs and goals for the destruction of the world, so why are we not believing them? Their action have been consistent with the goal of destroying the world, so why are we not believing them?
Apparently the Iranians, the other Middle Eastern Countries and Israel believe that only President Bush has the fortitude to act to stop these fanatics, so why are we not also backing the President and encouraging him to save the world from the Iranian's bid for leadership in the world of the hereafter? BB
You might want to glance as the related articles as suggested as good points are made in them also. BB
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May. 12, 2008 at 13:54
by BrendaBee
A Townhall.com commentary refutes the so called anti-American wave and the hysterical cries that the United States is losing influence in the world. Newsweek and The New York Times are best at leading these "America is hated" parades. So here is one for followers of that nonsense. BB
***************************************
May 12, 2008
A New Conservative Tide
—Michael Medved
With Newsweek running a cover story on "The Post American World" and Democrats complaining that President Bush destroyed our influence abroad, it's instructive to consider a recent string of election successes for foreign candidates who support our values and our policies.
In Canada, Mexico, Germany, Denmark, Greece, Ukraine and France the parties identified as "pro-American" swept to important victories. Most recently, the conservative candidate in Italy, Silvio Burlesconi, won a smashing triumph to return to power and Rome elected its first right-wing mayor in 50 years. Then in local elections throughout Britain, the Conservatives thumped the ruling Labor Party, 44 percent to 24 percent, and turned out the anti-American mayor of London, "Red Ken" Livingstone. The global trend favors politicians who back free markets and welcome U.S. leadership--hardly a sign of a "Post American World."
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