While reading through Saturday’s Links at the Naked Capitalism website, I came across a posting by Jane Hamsher entitled, “Hillary Clinton Hosts ‘Iraq Opportunities’ Party For War Profiteers”. I was reminded that a war, initiated under the pretext of finding Saddam Hussein’s “weapons of mass destruction”, was really all about creating “Iraq Opportunities”. Using the “good cop / bad cop” routine, the “bad cops” of our One-Party System (the “Republican” branch of the Republi-cratic Corporatist Party) promoted a war, which the “good cop” Democrat branch of the Republi-cratic Corporatist Party claimed it was “forced” to support. Just because Saddam wasn’t really stockpiling any weapons of mass destruction, doesn’t mean we can’t find any “Iraq Opportunities”.
Sure, there’s been a “changing of the guard” since the Iraq war began, but a look at the guest list for Hillary’s “Iraq Opportunities Party” will reveal the identities of some corporations, which expect to benefit from the expenditure of human lives and trillions of taxpayer dollars on the Iraq war effort. Of course, Halliburton and KBR were invited to send some partygoers to the fete. But don’t forget – the Obama Administration has been in charge for over two years . . . so Alex von Sponek of Goldman Sachs was on the guest list. As you can imagine, a Tupperware Party just wouldn’t be a Tupperware Party without a representative from Tupperware in attendance. Accordingly, Rick Goins, the company’s CEO, received an invitation.
News of this event confirmed my worst suspicions about the Iraq war. I wasn’t simply reacting to what Jane Hamsher had to say about Hillary’s Tupperware Party:
Ben White of Politicodescribed the event as an expansion of Wall Street’s tentacles:
FIRST LOOK: WALL STREET IN IRAQ? – Secretary of State Hillary Clinton and Deputy Secretary Tom Nides (formerly chief administrative officer at Morgan Stanley) will host a group of corporate executives at State this morning as part of the Iraq Business Roundtable. Corporate executives from approximately 30 major U.S. companies – including financial firms Citigroup, JPMorganChase and Goldman Sachs – will join U.S. and Iraqi officials to discuss economic opportunities in the new Iraq.
While most of us have been conditioned to think of the Iraq War as a product of the neoconservative agenda, several commentators have discussed the role of neoliberalism as a motivator for the invasion of Iraq. In a great essay entitled, “On Neoliberalism”, Sherry Ortner of the Anthropology Of This Century website, discussed the role of what Naomi Klein, author of The Shock Doctrine, called “disaster capitalism” in bringing us to that moment of “shock and awe”:
If social or natural disasters do not offer themselves up, Klein shows convincingly that they will be manufactured, the war in Iraq being the latest case in point. Let us follow the Iraq war thread into David Harvey’s 2007 book, A Short History of Neo-Liberalism, where it is his opening example. Like Klein, Harvey sees “the management and manipulation of crises” (p. 162), whether floods, wars, or financial melt-downs, as part and parcel of establishing the neoliberal agenda. And like Klein, he provides abundant evidence to show that the war in Iraq was a crisis manufactured to “impose by main force on Iraq… a state apparatus whose fundamental mission was to facilitate conditions for profitable capital accumulation”(p. 7).
Harvey offers a clear definition of neoliberalism as a system of “accumulation by dispossession,” which has four main pillars: 1) the “privatization and commodification” of public goods; 2) “financialization,” in which any kind of good (or bad) can be turned into an instrument of economic speculation; 3) the “management and manipulation of crises” (as above); and 4) “state redistribution,” in which the state becomes an agent of the upward redistribution of wealth (159-164 passim).
Harvey places particular emphasis on the last point, the upward redistribution of wealth. He takes issue with other writers who argue that the enormous growth of social inequality since the beginnings of neoliberalization in the 1970s is an unfortunate by-product of what is otherwise a sound economic theory. Instead Harvey sees the vast enrichment of an upper class of capital owners and managers at the expense of everyone else as an intrinsic part of the neoliberal agenda: “Redistributive effects and increasing social inequality have in fact been such a persistent feature of neoliberalization as to be regarded as structural to the whole project.” (p. 16).
The only real surprise to me was the revelation that the elite “upper class of capital owners and managers” likes to attend Tupperware parties.
I always enjoy it when a commentator appearing on a talk show reminds us that President Obama has become a “tool” for the Wall Street bankers. This theme is usually rebutted with the claim that the TARP bailout happened before Obama took office and that he can’t be blamed for rewarding the miscreants who destroyed our economy. Nevertheless, this claim is not entirely true. President Bush withheld distribution of one-half of the $700 billion in TARP bailout funds, deferring to his successor’s assessment of the extent to which the government should intervene in the banking crisis. As it turned out, during the final weeks of the Bush Presidency, Hank Paulson’s Treasury Department declared that there was no longer an “urgent need” for the TARP bailouts to continue. Despite that development, Obama made it clear that anyone on Capitol Hill intending to get between the banksters and that $350 billion was going to have a fight on their hands. Let’s jump into the time machine and take a look at my posting from January 19, 2009 – the day before Obama assumed office:
On January 18, Salon.com featured an article by David Sirota entitled: “Obama Sells Out to Wall Street”. Mr. Sirota expressed his concern over Obama’s accelerated push to have immediate authority to dispense the remaining $350 billion available under the TARP (Troubled Asset Relief Program) bailout:
Somehow, immediately releasing more bailout funds is being portrayed as a self-evident necessity, even though the New York Times reported this week that “the Treasury says there is no urgent need” for additional money. Somehow, forcing average $40,000-aires to keep giving their tax dollars to Manhattan millionaires is depicted as the only “serious” course of action. Somehow, few ask whether that money could better help the economy by being spent on healthcare or public infrastructure. Somehow, the burden of proof is on bailout opponents who make these points, not on those who want to cut another blank check.
Discomfort about another hasty dispersal of the remaining TARP funds was shared by a few prominent Democratic Senators who, on Thursday, voted against authorizing the immediate release of the remaining $350 billion. They included Senators Russ Feingold (Wisconsin), Jeanne Shaheen (New Hampshire), Evan Bayh (Indiana) and Maria Cantwell (Washington). The vote actually concerned a “resolution of disapproval” to block distribution of the TARP money, so that those voting in favor of the resolution were actually voting against releasing the funds. Earlier last week, Obama had threatened to veto this resolution if it passed. The resolution was defeated with 52 votes (contrasted with 42 votes in favor of it). At this juncture, Obama is engaged in a game of “trust me”, assuring those in doubt that the next $350 billion will not be squandered in the same undocumented manner as the first $350 billion. As Jeremy Pelofsky reported for Reuters on January 15:
To win approval, Obama and his team made extensive promises to Democrats and Republicans that the funds would be used to better address the deepening mortgage foreclosure crisis and that tighter accounting standards would be enforced.
“My pledge is to change the way this plan is implemented and keep faith with the American taxpayer by placing strict conditions on CEO pay and providing more loans to small businesses,” Obama said in a statement, adding there would be more transparency and “more sensible regulations.”
Of course, we all know how that worked out . . . another Obama promise bit the dust.
The new President’s efforts to enrich the Wall Street banks at taxpayer expense didn’t end with TARP. By mid-April of 2009, the administration’s “special treatment” of those “too big to fail” banks was getting plenty of criticism. As I wrote on April 16 of that year:
Criticism continues to abound concerning the plan by Turbo Tim and Larry Summers for getting the infamous “toxic assets” off the balance sheets of our nation’s banks. It’s known as the Public-Private Investment Program (a/k/a: PPIP or “pee-pip”).
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One of the harshest critics of the PPIP is William Black, an Economics professor at the University of Missouri. Professor Black gained recognition during the 1980s while he was deputy director of the Federal Savings and Loan Insurance Corporation (FSLIC).
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I particularly enjoyed Black’s characterization of the PPIP’s use of government (i.e. taxpayer) money to back private purchases of the toxic assets:
It is worse than a lie. Geithner has appropriated the language of his critics and of the forthright to support dishonesty. That is what’s so appalling — numbering himself among those who convey tough medicine when he is really pandering to the interests of a select group of banks who are on a first-name basis with Washington politicians.
The current law mandates prompt corrective action, which means speedy resolution of insolvencies. He is flouting the law, in naked violation, in order to pursue the kind of favoritism that the law was designed to prevent. He has introduced the concept of capital insurance, essentially turning the U.S. taxpayer into the sucker who is going to pay for everything. He chose this path because he knew Congress would never authorize a bailout based on crony capitalism.
Although President Obama’s hunt for Osama bin Laden was a success, his decision to “punt” on the economic stimulus program – by holding it at $862 billion and relying on the Federal Reserve to “play defense” with quantitative easing programs – became Obama’s own “Tora Bora moment”, at which point he allowed economic recovery to continue on its elusive path away from us. Economist Steve Keen recently posted this video, explaining how Obama’s failure to promote an effective stimulus program has guaranteed us something worse than a “double-dip” recession: a quadruple-dip recession.
Many commentators are currently discussing efforts by Republicans to make sure that the economy is in dismal shape for the 2012 elections so that voters will blame Obama and elect the GOP alternative. If Professor Keen is correct about where our economy is headed, I can only hope there is a decent Independent candidate in the race. Otherwise, our own “lost decade” could last much longer than ten years.
The world is beset by a plague of goofiness. I thought it was limited to the United States until recent events demonstrated that goofiness has become a worldwide phenomenon. Premature European austerity programs, commenced before unemployment subsided, have led to higher deficits, elevated bond yields and more recession. Although sober-minded economists warned against implementation of austerity measures until justified by economic circumstances, there was this itch that politicians had to scratch. Now they have a nice infection.
In America, everyone had some good laughs of this video clip of President Obama’s discovery that he was locked out of the White House upon his return from Brazil. Although it was widely reported that the White House staff was “caught off guard” by the First Family’s early return from their Brazilian vacation, I don’t believe it. Such things don’t happen by accident. My suspicion is that Chief of Staff, Bill Daley and his real boss, The Dimon Dog, deliberately locked Obama out of the White House as an admonition against cracking down on the megabanks, increasing taxes on the rich and empowering Elizabeth Warren.
Our President has been busy puzzling over the situation in Libya, where he (with authorization from the United Nations) has joined in on the “kinda-sorta” invasion. Few people have dared to suggest that interloping in the Libyan civil war is sheer goofiness. Many Republicans, such as Newt Gingrich, were in favor of intervention until Obama made the decision to launch air strikes. Gingrich and his contrarian cohorts suddenly found it necessary to do a 180 on the issue. Meanwhile, the smart conservative, George Will, was asking all the right questions. I’ll reprint just a few of them here – but be sure to read his complete list. These questions are among those that remain unanswered:
The world would be better without Gaddafi. But is that a vital U.S. national interest? If it is, when did it become so? A month ago, no one thought it was.
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Presumably we would coordinate aid with the leaders of the anti-Gaddafi forces. Who are they?
Libya is a tribal society. What concerning our Iraq and Afghanistan experiences justifies confidence that we understand Libyan dynamics?
. . . America has intervened in a civil war in a tribal society, the dynamics of which America does not understand. And America is supporting one faction, the nature of which it does not know. “We are standing with the people of Libya,” says Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, evidently confident that “the” people are a harmonious unit. Many in the media call Moammar Gaddafi’s opponents “freedom fighters,” and perhaps they are, but no one calling them that really knows how the insurgents regard one another, or understand freedom, or if freedom, however understood, is their priority.
While many commentators have been busy condemning Bradley Manning as a “terrorist” and the worst American traitor since John Anthony Walker, few of those hypocrites would admit that the “people power” revolutions now taking place throughout the Middle East have resulted from the publication of Manning’s purloined files by WikiLeaks. Beyond that, few – if any – of those self-righteous journalists have hesitated to quote from those leaked documents in their own essays. A look at one of those leaked cables (dated February 15, 2008 and originating from the American Embassy in Tripoli) gives us a better understanding of who some of those Libyan “freedom fighters” really are:
xxxxxxxxxxxx partly attributed the fierce mindset in Benghazi and Derna to the message preached by imams in eastern Libyan mosques, which he said is markedly more radical than that heard in other parts of the country. xxxxxxxxxxxx makes a point of frequenting mosques whenever he visits Libya as a means to connect with neighbors and relatives and take the political pulse. Sermons in eastern mosques, particularly the Friday ‘khutba’, are laced with “coded phrases” urging worshippers to support jihad in Iraq and elsewhere through direct participation or financial contributions. The language is often ambiguous enough to be plausibly denied, he said, but for devout Muslims it is clear, incendiary and unambiguously supportive of jihad. Direct and indirect references to “martyrdom operations” were not uncommon. By contrast with mosques in Tripoli and elsewhere in the country, where references to jihad are extremely rare, in Benghazi and Derna they are fairly frequent subjects.
The foregoing cable was discussed in a recent piece by Alexander Cockburn of CounterPunch. Mr. Cockburn also focused on some information contained in the so-called Sinjar Records, which American forces retrieved from an Al Qaeda stronghold in northern Iraq during 2007:
The West Point study of the Iraqi Sinjar Records calculates that of the 440 foreign al-Qaeda recruits whose hometowns are known, 21 came from Benghazi, thereby making it the fourth most common hometown listed in the records. Fifty-three of the al-Qaeda recruits came from Darnah, the highest total of any of the hometowns listed in the records. The second highest number, 51, came from Riyadh, Saudi Arabia. Darnah (80,000) has less than 2 per cent the population of Riyadh. Darnah contributed “far and away the largest per capita number of fighters.”
The Embassy cable from February of 2008 and the Sinjar Records provide some useful information to consider when pondering the questions raised by George Will. Is Team Obama “up to speed” on any of this?
The aforementioned CounterPunch article by Alexander Cockburn covered another episode of tragic goofiness – the Fukushima power plant disaster. As I previously discussed here and here, the feeble information flow concerning this crisis has been downright sleazy. Mr. Cockburn provided a must read critique of how this critical situation has been mishandled and misrepresented by the media:
Amid reasonable suspicions that leading news media might have been in receipt of informal government advisories to stop creating panic, it became much harder to find credible bulletins on what was actually happening. In fact careful perusal of the daily briefings at the Vienna hq of the UN’s International Atomic Energy Agency in Vienna disclosed absolutely no substantive progress and indeed discreet admissions that “[this was on March 23) the “Agency still lacks data on water levels and temperatures in the spent fuel pools at Units 1, 2, 3 and 4.”
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On our own website, by contrast, several articles and interviews stressed what Hirose Takashi said:
“All of the information media are at fault here I think. They are saying stupid things like, why, we are exposed to radiation all the time in our daily life, we get radiation from outer space. But that’s one millisievert per year. A year has 365 days, a day has 24 hours; multiply 365 by 24, you get 8760. Multiply the 400 millisieverts by that, you get 3,500,000 the normal dose. You call that safe? And what media have reported this? None. They compare it to a CT scan, which is over in an instant; that has nothing to do with it. The reason radioactivity can be measured is that radioactive material is escaping. What is dangerous is when that material enters your body and irradiates it from inside. . . .”
Allow me to repeat Hirose Takashi’s question: “And what media have reported this? None.” That’s because the media are incapable of covering serious (non-goofy) subjects. Unfortunately, those vested with positions of responsibility and authority all over the world are impaired by a degree of goofiness, leaving them incapable of making the right decisions or taking the necessary steps to protect public safety and welfare. Is this a permanent situation or just a temporary condition?
Well, it’s that time once again! The 2008 competition brought us a robust field of candidates, probably because it was an election year. This year, I’ve decided to ignore the one-event wonders and stick with nominees demonstrating a consistent pattern of jackass behavior. The isolated exhibitions of foolishness illustrated by Richard Heene’s “balloon boy” hoax and Janet Napolitano’s “the system worked” gaffe, just don’t rise to the level of an award-winning honor. I’m also avoiding individuals categorized as “the usual suspects” — the media darlings who are already getting beaten-up in the 2009 retrospective shows. That list includes such notables as Tiger Woods, Carrie Prejean and “The Undiebomber” (Umar Mutallab).
This year I have narrowed the competition down to two people.
In just a few short weeks, our first nominee will be celebrating the anniversary of his inauguration as President of the United States. During his early days in office, he enjoyed an approval rating as high as 69 percent, according to Gallup. By early December, Gallup reported that his approval rating had taken a 22-point drop to 47 percent. At that time, Rasmussen Reports revealed that not only had the President’s approval rating dropped to 48 percent — his disapproval rating actually reached 52 percent! On December 9, Quinnipiac University published the results of a poll conducted during December 1 – 6. The results gave the President a job approval rating of only 46 percent, and those disapproving Obama’s performance amounted to 44 percent. The Ipsos/McClatchy Poll taken during that period, disclosed that the President received his highest “unsatisfactory” rating on the issue of “jobs and the economy” with 45 percent giving the President an unsatisfactory grade (D or F) while only 36 percent gave him a satisfactory grade (A or B) and 19 percent gave him a C.
Many commentators have pondered over the reasons for President Obama’s decreasing approval ratings. I have previously discussed the subject here, here and here. In doing so, I found the criticism of Obama’s performance as expressed by Edward Harrison of Credit Writedowns, to be particularly insightful. In his December 27 posting, Mr. Harrison posed a question that has obviously been on the minds of many disappointed Obama supporters:
The question is this:
Did President Obama sell out (i.e. he was a good guy but has been corrupted in short order) or;
Did Obama find out he couldn’t change the status quo so easily (i.e. he was a good guy who was naive about the President’s real power)or;
Did the President simply bamboozle us (i.e. he was a bad guy who tricked the electorate with his silver tongue)?
Mr. Harrison contended that the foregoing inquiry is actually irrelevant because it involves ascribing an intent behind the President’s behavior, when we should be looking at either motive or outcome. Mr. Harrison eventually focused on a recent op-ed piece by Ross Douthat of The New York Times entitled: “The Obama Way”. Obama’s track record of broken campaign promises, including “no more trickle-down economics” and those documented on The Obameter, is something that obviously weighs on the minds of dispirited Obama supporters. Ross Douthat explained how the President’s leadership style is itself a broken campaign promise:
He’s a doctrinaire liberal who’s always willing to cut a deal and grab for half the loaf. He has the policy preferences of a progressive blogger, but the governing style of a seasoned Beltway wheeler-dealer.
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It’s also puzzling because Obama promised exactly the opposite approach while running for the presidency. He campaigned as a postpartisan healer who would change the cynical ways of Washington — as a foe of both back-room deals and ideology-as-usual. But he’s governed as a conventional liberal who believes in the existing system, knows how to work it and accepts the limitations it imposes on him.
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The upside of this approach is obvious: It gets things done.
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The downside, though, is that sometimes what gets done isn’t worth doing. The assumption that a compromised victory is better than no victory at all can produce phony achievements — like last week’s “global agreement” on climate change — and bloated, ugly legislation. And using cynical means to progressive ends (think of the pork-laden stimulus bill or the frantic vote-buying that preceded this week’s Senate health care votes) tends to confirm independent voters’ worst fears about liberal government: that it’s a racket rigged to benefit privileged insiders and a corrupt marketplace floated by our tax dollars.
Ross Douthat’s conclusion implied that it’s still too early determine whether Obama’s political approach will ultimately result in success or failure. By this time next year, the mid-term elections will be over. If the careers of many Democratic politicians are over at that point, we will then have to assess whether President Obama’s leadership style helped to bring them down. As a result, we will have to defer to next year’s competition before deciding whether our new President rates the title “Jackass of the Year”.
Our second nominee is the so-called “Supreme Leader” of Iran, Ali Khamenei. Khamenei decided to rig the June elections to ensure that his tool, the equally crazy Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, would be re-elected. The resulting public outrage was escalated by Khamenei into a bloodbath. Since that time, Khamenei’s ham-handed tactics in attempting to squelch opposition have only made things worse. A recent New York Times editorial entitled “Iran’s War on Its People” put it this way:
Iran’s leaders are so desperate to repel a rising tide of popular unrest that even Ashura — which marks the death of Shiite Islam’s holiest martyr — is no longer sacred.
The anniversary, which fell on Sunday, is supposed to be a time of peaceful commemoration. Even during war, Iranian governments have honored the prohibitions against violence during a two-month period surrounding Ashura. Tehran’s current rulers have proved again that their only belief is in their own survival.
On Sunday, the police opened fire on a crowd of protesters, reportedly killing at least 10 people, and arrested hundreds more. Government forces are also believed to be behind the assassination of Ali Moussavi, nephew of the opposition leader Mir Hussein Moussavi, the leading candidate in June’s fraudulent presidential election.
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The government still appears to have firm control of the main levers of power, including the brutish Revolutionary Guard and the Basij militia. But Ayatollah Khamenei — who helped lead the 1979 revolution against the shah — should not ignore the echoes of history when protesters defy the death blows of security forces and chant “Death to the dictator” on the streets of Tehran.
Al Jazeera’s Teymoor Nabili reported that Baqer Moin, London-based analyst and Ayatollah Khomeini biographer, explained that Iran’s opposition party, the Greens, would still settle for modest reform, if the regime would compromise. Nevertheless, Mr. Nabili’s report quoted other sources who expressed concern that the upcoming anniversary of the revolution could be “the next potential spark”. Will the Supreme Leader negotiate? Based on his record over the past six months, there is no reason to believe that he will. His strategy of cracking down on the Greens with more deadly repression is exactly the approach that could lead to the regime’s demise. Mr. Nabili added this insight to an already gloomy picture:
A contact in Iran tells me that, given the arrests over the past two days, the trend points to the possibility that the regime is slowly tightening the screws, and that before then we might see martial law and the arrest of Mousavi and/or Karroubi/Khatami/Rafsanjani’s daughter (Rafsanjani himself is still beyond the pale, it would seem.)
Brilliant plan, huh? Another Al Jazeera report revealed that the Iranian government’s desperate actions are a sign of weakness that could ultimately lead to the end of Khamenei’s days as “Supreme Leader”:
Fatemeh Haghighatjoo, a former member of the Iranian parliament, told Al Jazeera that the government faced a fundamental crisis.
“They can’t control the events so they made the Ashoura incidents as a scenario that could give [them] enough confidence to crack down on the [Green] Movement,” she said from Massachusetts in the United States.
“They think that if they could use more violence, they can stop the movement … if this strategy continues I think we could see the collapse of the government.”
After George W. Bush overthrew the regime of Saddam Hussein in Iraq, many commentators expressed concern that this development could bring about an era of Iranian hegemony in the Middle East. Nevertheless, Iran’s relentless efforts to create a nuclear arsenal and the craziness of its Supreme Leader, who would likely detonate an atomic bomb in Israel if he had such a weapon, have apparently made the Iranian people more than a little uncomfortable with their government. The events since June could only serve to underscore fears that the Khamenei regime would attempt a nuclear strike on Israel, resulting in a retaliatory move that would wipe Tehran off the map. The Iranian people are obviously not going to sit on their hands and wait for that to happen. Al Jazeera’s Teymoor Nabili provided us with some insight on the current mood of the Iranian protesters:
To outside observers, though, the protestors have defied expectations. Their continued willingness to make themselves targets has been a surprise; now it seems as if they are willing to take it even further, protesting not only against the election result but against the very essence of the regime.
Although it may be too early to celebrate the demise of the Khamenei regime, the time is certainly right to honor Iran’s Supreme Leader, Ali Khamenei, with TheCenterLane.com‘s Jackass of the Year Award. Congratulations, Jackass!
All over the world, people are waiting with abated breath as the Obama Presidency begins. Some thought it would never happen. I have often wondered whether, at the last minute, the Bush-Cheney junta might decide that it does not want to give up its authority. Would they contrive some sort of “national security emergency” as a pretext for declaring martial law and suspending the Constitution? Such a tactic would be entirely consistent with what we have seen for the past eight years. Surely, there must be some provision buried in the so-called “Patriot Act” allowing the Bush-Cheney regime to continue, despite the expiration of its Constitutionally-prescribed existence. Constitutional restrictions to unlimited executive power have been ignored by the outgoing administration for the past eight years. Why should now be any different? My skepticism on this matter will continue until Barack Obama completes his recitation of the Presidential Oath.
In the mean time, there are those who question whether President Obama will really deliver on his promise of change. From the liberal side of the political spectrum, plenty of opinions have been published (by reputable commentators) expressing apprehension as to what likely will happen and what actually may not happen during Obama’s tenure in the White House.
On January 18, Salon.com featured an article by David Sirota entitled: “Obama Sells Out to Wall Street”. Mr. Sirota expressed his concern over Obama’s accelerated push to have immediate authority to dispense the remaining $350 billion available under the TARP (Troubled Asset Relief Program) bailout:
Somehow, immediately releasing more bailout funds is being portrayed as a self-evident necessity, even though the New York Times reported this week that “the Treasury says there is no urgent need” for additional money. Somehow, forcing average $40,000-aires to keep giving their tax dollars to Manhattan millionaires is depicted as the only “serious” course of action. Somehow, few ask whether that money could better help the economy by being spent on healthcare or public infrastructure. Somehow, the burden of proof is on bailout opponents who make these points, not on those who want to cut another blank check.
Discomfort about another hasty dispersal of the remaining TARP funds was shared by a few prominent Democratic Senators who, on Thursday, voted against authorizing the immediate release of the remaining $350 billion. They included Senators Russ Feingold (Wisconsin), Jeanne Shaheen (New Hampshire), Evan Bayh (Indiana) and Maria Cantwell (Washington). The vote actually concerned a “resolution of disapproval” to block distribution of the TARP money, so that those voting in favor of the resolution were actually voting against releasing the funds. Earlier last week, Obama had threatened to veto this resolution if it passed. The resolution was defeated with 52 votes (contrasted with 42 votes in favor of it). At this juncture, Obama is engaged in a game of “trust me”, assuring those in doubt that the next $350 billion will not be squandered in the same undocumented manner as the first $350 billion. As Jeremy Pelofsky reported for Reuters on January 15:
To win approval, Obama and his team made extensive promises to Democrats and Republicans that the funds would be used to better address the deepening mortgage foreclosure crisis and that tighter accounting standards would be enforced.
“My pledge is to change the way this plan is implemented and keep faith with the American taxpayer by placing strict conditions on CEO pay and providing more loans to small businesses,” Obama said in a statement, adding there would be more transparency and “more sensible regulations.”
Meanwhile, there is worldwide concern about what Obama and Secretary of State Hillary Clinton can accomplish in the foreign relations and anti-terrorism arenas. As discussed in an editorial from the January 18 Times of London:
Mr Obama’s biggest immediate challenge is in Afghanistan. The president is hoping a troop surge, which he opposed in Iraq, will work. However, the prospect of a military solution in Afghanistan is remote and he may learn that the hard way. In the meantime, he has to hope Iraq does not flare up again and that the Iran nuclear question remains one for diplomacy rather than military conflict. His drive for a Middle East peace deal is not the first by a US president and nor will it be the last.
As the sun finally rises over the Obama Presidency, there are still plenty of clouds in the sky. Does this mean we are in for more turmoil? Some people might take this as a sign that it’s about to start raining money.
At a fundraiser in Detroit on July 18, John McCain revealed that Barack Obama would be traveling to Iraq and Afghanistan on the weekend of the July 19-20. For some reason, McCain saw fit to make this indiscrete comment:
I believe that either today or tomorrow, I am not privy to his schedule, Senator Obama will be landing in Iraq with some other Senators. There will be a Congressional delegation – and I am sure that Senator Obama is going to arrive in Baghdad in a much, much, safer and secure environment than the one that he would have encountered before we started the siege.
Of course, McCain was more than willing to “back up” his claim that Iraq is now safer — with other people’s lives at stake on that bet. Included in that delegation was McCain’s fellow Viet Nam War veteran, Senator Chuck Hagel. Senator Hagel is also a Republican (for now) and a true bipartisan (unlike McCain’s traveling companion: Joe “The Tool” Lieberman).
McCain knows damned well that his trips to Iraq, as well as those of his mentor, George W. Bush, were kept in secrecy until they were concluded. Nevertheless, McCain chose to disclose the Obama – Hagel trip to Iraq, and risk the lives of his opponent and his fellow Viet Nam War veteran, to potentially fatal consequences. Why he would have done this, crossed the minds of people other than you and me. Needless to say, I was outraged by McCain’s security breach. It reminded me of the similarly traitorous “outing” of Valerie Plame Wilson as a CIA Case Officer by the Bush Administration, to advance its case for the invasion of Iraq.
On July 18, Richard Wolffe of Newsweek appeared on MSNBC’s “Countdown with Keith Olbermann”. During that interview, this exchange took place:
Olbermann: About this Obama trip, two questions about the mechanics: 1) Why the secrecy about it? and 2) If there is a good reason for that secrecy, why would is Senator McCain try to give away the secret today in Michigan?
Wolffe: The reason for the secrecy is security, of course, and we in the media have been very careful about what we are putting out there. You know – security of these trips – and I went with President Bush to Iraq. Security is tight for a reason. So it is remarkable that a member of Congress would even speculate that way. Why he did that, I can’t really be sure, but obviously they’re trying to backtrack now.
I have a guess: Perhaps McCain is just a “snitch” by nature. Maybe it’s time to look into the rumors from his 2000 Presidential campaign, supporting the notion that McCain made it back from the Hanoi Hilton by “ratting out” his fellow Americans. The fact that he tried to “rat-out” his fellow Viet Nam veteran, Chuck Hagel, on this trip to Iraq could lend some credence to those claims. His motives for disclosing the details of this trip were apparently twofold: Scare Obama, Hagel and the others from that delegation, so they would stay away from Iraq and Afghanistan. A possible second motive might have been to make sure they would not live to brag about this adventure to Iraq, should they actually undertake it.
At an earlier news conference that morning, McCain claimed that:
He (Obama) would be going to a very different Iraq, if we had done what he wanted to do.
In other words, McRat claimed that Iraq would be much different now than it would have been if the United States had been following Obama’s plan for resolving that war. In harsh contrast to that lie, we have the July 19 report from Jake Tapper of ABC News:
The White House this afternoon accidentally sent to its extensive distribution list a Reuters story headlined “Iraqi PM Backs Obama Troop Exit Plan – magazine.”
The story relayed how Iraqi Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki told the German magazine Der Spiegel that he supported prospective U.S. Democratic presidential candidate Barack Obama’s proposal that U.S. troops should leave Iraq within 16 months … “U.S. Presidential candidate Barack Obama talks about 16 months. That, we think, would be the right timeframe for a withdrawal, with the possibility of slight changes,” the prime minister said.
The White House employee had intended to send the article to an internal distribution list, ABC News’ Martha Raddatz reports, but hit the wrong button.
The misfire comes at an odd time for Bush foreign policy, at a time when Obama’s campaign alleges the President is moving closer toward Obama’s recommendations about international relations — sending more U.S. troops to Afghanistan, discussing a “general time horizon” for U.S. troop withdrawal and launching talks with Iran.
Oops! It looks as though the handlers for McRat’s own mentor are admitting that Iraq agrees to Obama’s plan for an exit strategy in Iraq and nobody told McRat.
Well … Obama, Hagel and the network news anchors didn’t “chicken out”. Beyond that, it looks like they will live to come back here and put McRat where he belongs: caught in his own McTrap.
Comments Off on The Tool” Picks Up Fear Flag and Gets Shot Down By A Real Soldier
June 30, 2008
Last week, John McCain’s chief campaign strategist, Charlie Black, caused quite a stir with his invitation for an Al Qaeda attack on the United States, to help improve McCain’s chances for election. Black was obviously thinking about Osama bin Laden’s last “October Surprise” in which bin Laden released a video right before the 2004 election. That video was widely considered to have given Bush a crucial “bump”, putting him over the top to defeat John Kerry. Knowing that Al Qaeda (and other terrorist groups) hate to see moderates get elected, Charlie Black saw fit to remind Al Qaeda that they would have no rallying call if Barack Obama were to become President and pull the U.S. troops out of Iraq. Al Qaeda’s best chance for maintaining their status quo appears to Black as another terrorist attack in the U.S. He knows they want McCain to win the election because they wanted Bush to win in 2004. Four days before Election Day in 2004, bin Laden released an 18-minute videotape taunting George Bush about the events of September 11, 2001 and he claimed credit for directing the 19 hijackers. Osama’s gambit in helping Bush win seems to have paid off. The incompetent Bush will likely leave office without having caught bin Laden.
After Charlie Black tried his shot at a self-fulfilling prophecy last week, with his announcement (in an interview with Fortune magazine) that a terrorist attack in the United States would “be a big advantage” to help McCain get elected President, Black was widely scorned and criticized. Many commentators placed this remark in context with Black’s earlier statement that the assassination of Benazir Bhutto helped McCain in the New Hampshire Primary. Although McCain attempted to distance himself from Black’s remarks, he has kept Black onboard “The Straight Talk Express”.
Just as criticism of the McCain campaign, for relying on “the politics of fear”, is starting to die down, along comes our old friend, Joe “The Tool” Lieberman. On June 29, The Tool appeared on the CBS television program, “Face The Nation”. Looking into his crystal ball (perhaps that should be plural) The Tool predicted a terrorist attack against the United States in 2009. Out of fear of getting caught at an attempted, self-fulfilling prophecy similar to Black’s, The Tool, speaking with his forked tongue, tried to distinguish his prediction from Black’s wish:
Certainly the implications there I know were not what Charlie intended. And he apologized for it. Senator McCain said he didn’t agree. And, of course, I feel the same way.
Actually, The Tool feels the same way as Charlie Black. He continued on by picking up Black’s “fear flag” to carry it on to victory for McCain in November:
If we had done what Senator Obama asked us to do for the last couple of years, today Iran and al Qaeda would be in control of Iraq. It would be a terrible defeat for us and our allies in the Middle East and throughout the world. Instead, we’ve got a country that’s defending itself, that’s growing economically, where there’s been genuine political reconciliation, and where Iran and al Qaeda are on the run. And that’s the way it ought to be.
Iraq is “growing economically”? It has yet to rebuild its infrastructure. The Tool is obviously talking to those people referred to as “low information voters”. He is insulting the intelligence of everyone else. Iraq is “defending itself”? Tell that to our troops who are stationed there. If Iraq really is defending itself, then we should be able to leave. Iran is “on the run”? I thought they were getting ready to nuke Israel. The Tool is now so used to telling lies that he can effortlessly spit out a sentence containing three big ones.
On the same program, we heard from someone who, unlike Lieberman, actually has some military experience. Retired General Wesley Clark told host Bob Schieffer: “I think Joe has it exactly backwards here.” After comparing the qualities of Obama to those of McCain, General Clark said:
And I think what we need to do, Bob, is we need to stop talking about the old politics of left and right, and we need to pull together and move the country forward.
Both Lieberman and McCain used to pride themselves on being centrists in a highly-partisan Senate. Both are now singing the same, sorry tune we’ve been hearing from our unpopular President for the last seven years, at a time when we would expect a theme of hope and bipartisan progress. With Obama singing solo on that theme, the prospects for any Republican candidate this year don’t appear much better than the outlook for the S&P 500.
Most of the eulogies about Hillary Clinton’s Presidential campaign have focused on the theme that she was a “groundbreaker”, who proved that a woman could make it to the Senate and become a serious contender for the highest office in the land. Meanwhile, there are a number of women presently in the Senate, who got there without having been married to a former President (whose surname could be relied upon for recognition purposes). In fact, two of these women are presently working on closing the so-called “Enron loophole” in the Commodity Futures Modernization Act of 2000, 7 U.S.C. §2(h)(3) and (g), which existed throughout Bill Clinton’s tenure in the Oval Office. This “Enron loophole” is what has made it possible for speculators to drive the price of gasoline beyond $4 per gallon. Surely, the increased demand for oil by China and India has explained part of the soaring cost of gasoline here in the United States. However all authorities on the subject agree that unchecked speculation in the American markets has greatly facilitated the skyrocketing increase in gas prices. That speculation owes its existence to the so-called “Enron loophole”, which is once again coming under attack in the Senate.
There is abundant interest focused on whatever Hillary Clinton’s mission will be when she returns to the Senate after her month of R&R and what role she might play if Barack Obama is elected our next President. I suggest that we turn our sights to the Senate right now, to witness what other women are doing there and find out for ourselves who the real “trailblazers” are. We should also consider these pioneers when looking toward the day when a woman finally makes it to The White House.
Our first potential future candidate is Senator Amy Klobuchar of Minnesota, whose role on the Senate Commerce Committee has found her fighting against the “Enron loophole”. Looking on Wikipedia.org we learn:
She received her bachelor’s degree magna cum laude in political science from Yale University in 1982, where she was a member of the Yale College Democrats and the Feminist Caucus. … Klobuchar served as an associate editor of the Law Review and received her J.D. in 1985 at the University of Chicago Law School.
Bam! She has made the prerequisite pilgrimage to Iraq (March, 2007) and voiced her frustration with Prime Minister Nouri Al-Maliki upon her return. She is a member of the following Senate Committees: the Agriculture Committee, the Environment and Public Works Committee and the Commerce Committee. She is also a member of the Congressional Joint Economic Committee.
Our second potential future candidate is Senator Maria Cantwell from the State of Washington. She is also currently working to close the “Enron loophole”. Senator Cantwell received a Bachelor’s Degree in Public Administration from Miami University of Ohio. She has served in the Senate since January of 2001. Although she supported the Joint Resolution for the Use of the Armed Forces in Iraq, she explained the qualifications for her support in an extensive press release the day before the vote on that Resolution. She is a member of the following Senate Committees: Finance, Indian Affairs, Finance and Entrepreneurship, Energy and Natural Resources, as well as the Committee on Commerce, Science and Transportation.
At this juncture, it remains to be seen whether Hillary Clinton will join these two sister Senators in their efforts to close the “Enron loophole”. It never bothered her husband during his eight years in the White House and she never spoke up about it during that time.
For our third potential future candidate, we can’t forget about Governor Kathleen Sebelius of Kansas. Although she is being promoted as a possible running mate for Barack Obama, her five years as Governor of Kansas are considered by many as a bit short for the position of Vice President. (She faced that criticism when she had served only one year as Governor and was considered as a possible running mate for John Kerry in 2004.) She earned a Master’s Degree in Public Administration from the University of Kansas after earning a Bachelor’s Degree from Trinity Washington University in Washington, D.C. (Trinity Washington University is not associated with the late Jerry Falwell, who died and went to hell. It is a Catholic – affiliated University.) As Governor of Kansas, she has an established record as an advocate of environmental protection.
As the pundits watch Hillary Clinton’s political future, some of us will be looking toward other American women, one of whom may turn out to become the first female President of the United States.
TheCenterLane.com offers opinion, news and commentary on politics, the economy, finance and other random events that either find their way into the news or are ignored by the news reporting business. As the name suggests, our focus will be on what seems to be happening in The Center Lane of American politics and what the view from the Center reveals about the events in the left and right lanes. Your Host, John T. Burke, Jr., earned his Bachelor of Arts degree from Boston College with a double major in Speech Communications and Philosophy. He earned his law degree (Juris Doctor) from the Illinois Institute of Technology / Chicago-Kent College of Law.