they ...

  .. have a screw (or three) loose

-=*=-

Consider this item:

  «Oil prices soar towards $US55
Posted November 25, 2008 06:03:00

Oil prices have roared higher towards $US55 as equity markets surged on government action aimed at tackling a severe economic downturn.»
[AusBC/justin]

Some keywords used: 'prices soar,' 'roared higher,' 'equity markets surged,' 'rallied,' 'closed up a massive,' 'pumped billions,' and 'mammoth financial stimulus,' 'prices also benefited,' and 'cut production.'

'They' told us that the oil price 'soaring' to US$150 was 'supply and demand.' Then when it fell back to US$50, that was 'China and India reducing demand.' What utter bulls**t, it was the clever d**k speculators all along - apart, that is from the (illegal!) Iraq war effect. 'They' tell us many things; most, as it turns out, is just more bulls**t. The AusBC, as we can plainly see, is right in the s**t with the rest.

-=*=-

'They' (GWBush et al.) told us that "They hate us for our freedoms!"

'They' (GWBush et al.) lied.

'They' (GWBush et al.) screeched "We will disarm him!"

'They' (GWBush et al.) lied.

'They' (Cheney et al.) told us that invading Iraq was not for the oil.

'They' (Cheney et al.) lied.

'They' (Murdoch et al.) told us that invading Iraq would give us US$25 oil.

'They' (Murdoch et al.) lied.

'They' (Howard et al.) told us they'd 'keep interest rates low.'

'They' (Howard et al.) lied.

'They' (Costello et al.) encouraged us to borrow and spend up big.

'They' (Costello et al.) cut the CGT in half, triggering the house-price bubble which took average house-prices to around nine times average earnings, effectively ending the 'Great Aussie Dream' for far too many Ockers.

(I haven't got all day to continue this list - it couldn't be finished in a month of Sundays anyway.)

-=*=-

You can't have democracy when people are lied to (B, B & H; they all *knew* that Saddam had no WMDs.)

You can't have democracy when the MSM retails and extends politicians' lies (almost any media outlet, including AusBC & SBS. Filthy, lying propagandists!)

You can't have democracy when voters are ignored (Howard, calling anti-wars "a mob.")

You can't have freedom when people are concrete-walled in (Iraq, Israel/ex-Palestine.)

You can't have free-trade when the US (and some others) subsidise their own farmers.

(Again I don't have the time to go anywhere near finishing this list.)

-=*=-

'They' are guilty of many more sins, inspect the labels 'neoliberal,' 'privatisation,' 'out-sourcing,' 'off-shoring' and 'neocon.' Add 'free-trade,' 'freedom' and 'democracy.' (And so on; add your own failing/lying keywords.)

The US is the source of all the evil flowing from those labels (and all the etc.s), the only one of those labels which that has a meaning close to the actual word is 'neocon,' not from 'conservative' but as in con-men - which is what they are.

Bush was 'aped' by Blair and Howard following the principle of "Monkey see, monkey do." The whole foul neoliberal, neocon lot of them, 'inspired' by Greenspan have dumped the world deeply into the s**t. Note that it wasn't always Repugs, Clinton had his filthy fingers in there too. Now Obama is 'employing' lots'a Clinton-types. Rudd, whilst being *infinitely* more preferable than Howard, still mouths the same-old same-olds, like "poverty-busting power of free trade."

This blog is called 'nomoreofthesame' for impeccable reasons; if Rudd and Obama only do more of the same - and the indications are so - then we can't expect to climb out of the s**t 'any time soon' (detested Ameri-speak, spit!)

Where are the adults?

culpable ...

  .. and/or incompetent ...

    .. but in any case, wickedly criminal

-=*=-

"All politicians lie!" - or so we were informed, as that ghastly fact became unavoidably obvious in the 'run-up' to the US-led (with UK and Aus as poodle with dag) illegal invasion of Iraq - murder for oil.

Equally obvious - at least to those who wish to see and look closely enough - is that it's not 'just' the politicians who lie; it's also the MSM (main-stream media: largely corrupt and venal), including some public broadcasters, like the AusBC and SBS, say. (Boo! Hiss! How dare they take our dough - then lie to us!!?)

The MSM - and the AusBC, SBS etc. go so far as to deploy 'talking head' so-called experts, many of whom were actually briefed by the Pentagon ('over there;' one suspects a similar process to be under way in the UK and Aus, after the principle of "Monkey see, monkey do." Recall the AusBC 7.30 Report's pre-Iraq war 'make-over,' and the subsequent 'expert' analysis segments.)

That we are being deliberately lied to was exposed largely due to 'citizen journalist' efforts associated with (against!) the illegal invasion of Iraq (now been morphed into an equally brutal and murdering occupation), and we won't forget that Iraq is only one modern occurrence, there's the almost concurrent invasion of Afghanistan (murder for a pipeline), and a looong list of US transgressions stretching at least from WW2 - the A-bombing war crime, my own chosen 'starting point,' but plenty more before that - right down to this day. The US is a war-oriented organization, they murder for spoil. See Blum's "Rogue State," Chomsky's "What Uncle Sam Really Wants" and Perkins' "Economic Hit Man" for examples.

That we were being deliberately propagandised occurred to me relatively early in my own investigations into the Iraq imbroglio, stimulated by the crooked works of Judith Miller (NYT) and Tony Parkinson (theAge) amongst other journalist-traitors. "Why that?" I cried to myself. Finding the answer took some deep digging, and a bit of serendipity.

We all should know by now the chilling implications of "the big lie;" try reading that ref. as a refresher to see if it rings any alarm bells anew. I draw particular attention to this bit:

  «His primary rules were: never allow the public to cool off; never admit a fault or wrong; never concede that there may be some good in your enemy; never leave room for alternatives; never accept blame; concentrate on one enemy at a time and blame him for everything that goes wrong; people will believe a big lie sooner than a little one; and if you repeat it frequently enough people will sooner or later believe it.»
[wiki/Big_Lie, ibid.]

(Any viewer of AusBC's "The Howard Years" could keep the above in mind.)

But there was a predecessor to 'The Big Lie,' namely Bernays.

Reading that reference exposes nearly all, to wit, that we the sheople® are being deliberately propagandised - but worse: with malice aforethought.

In a nutshell, that's how our so-called democracies - US, UK, Aus & Israel - most of the Anglo/Judaic group and possibly, probably many others - are being deliberately corrupted. I regard that, and the subsequent results like murder for oil in Iraq (and all such lies and transgressions) as being filthily criminal.

hoist on their own petard ...

  .. by some  'reverse engineering'

-=*=-

Here's a bit of a laugh:

November 19, 2008 | 01:02 PM (EST)
Jane Hamsher
Chinese Want To Buy the Big 3 Automakers

  «It appears that the Chinese car makers SAIC and Dongfeng have plans to acquire the Big 3:
...
At current market valuations (GM is worth less than Mattel) the Chinese government can afford to buy GM with petty cash. Even a hundred billion $ would barely dent China's more than $2t in currency reserves. For nobody in the world would buying GM and (while they are at it) Chrysler make more sense than for the Chinese. Overlap? What overlap? They would gain instant access to the world's markets with accepted brands, and proven technology.»
[huffingtonpost/jane-hamsher]

Read it yourself and consider; the Chinks have about US$2Trio burning a hole in their pockets. They could 'dump' some/all of it of onto the ForEx market and sink the US$ - or they could deploy it to buy up bits'a the US finance-collapse caused 'fire-sale.'

That would give them (the Chinks) many advantages; they'd pick up any 'intellectual property' the Big 3 have, give them the brand-names, and they'd be able to source components from wherever - mostly outside'a the US, a process called 'out-sourcing,' not to mention vertical integration. They'd have the dealerships (worldwide) jumping into their pockets (see 7.30 last night), the Chinks'd have a perfect monopoly position: wouldn't that be sweet? (As revenge, say. The bleeding of the US would move into 'high gear.' Haw!)

-=*=-

Now, for the BIG Q: is this communism (Chink buy-outs), socialism (US bail-outs) or what?

(Cue Costello: "Haw, haw, haw! - Let us prey.")

not just in Iraq, is the US jackboot ...

  .. crushing down on a hapless, helpless nation's neck ...

    .. it's basically the whole, wide world suffering similar - why that?

-=*=-

Preamble: The world is drowning in equal parts of lies, greed, corruption, outright theft and (often mass-) murder most foul. As self-titled 'leader of the free(?) world,' the US is 'responsible' for this situation, not just because it has failed to prevent it - Oh, no - but because the US has created most of it. Worse, worser, worst: they knew beforehand what they were doing, they planned it(!!?)

Almost invariably, when I reach the end of some analysis, I screech "Why?" In this case, I wish to know a bit more: not just a) why has this happened, but b) why do we only find out about it now, and most importantly, c) why has there been no effective resistance?

In other words, where are the adults?

-=*=-

Intermezzo: There's an old saw, that goes:

"Lies, damned lies, and statistics."

I propose a slightly different form:

"Lies, damned lies - and economists (Chicago School) ..."

To which I add:

  ".. and filthy, propagandising trolls."

-=*=-

I will 'deal' with (b) 1st;

Q: "Why do we only now find out about it?"

A: Because we have been mislead (aka lied to); another old saw, we've been enrolled in the "Mushroom Club," i.e. kept in the dark - and fed on bulls**t.

Thanks, but "No, thanks!" to the impetus of the fatally hubristic GWBush&Co, plus a bit'a serendipity - namely the internet, those who wish to see now can - and what an eff'n mess it is!

Until GWBush&Co showed up, my 'prime source' of information was the AusBC. Although we now see that the mainstream, corporate media (aka the venal and corrupt MSM) are the main conduit for, augmentors - and even creators of the propaganda-flood, it was predominantly the AusBC which kept me personally in the dark - and fed me on bulls**t, since I generally avoided the commercial alternates. QED against any 'left bias' slur; that's only a furphy, one of many similar deliberately deployed by 'the enemy.' And speaking of enemies, see this[2].

More generally, the world has fallen to propaganda, starting first perhaps with the dumbing-down of the US' own sheople® and their now apparently complete addiction to TV, with its distorted 'news,' Madison Ave., Hollywood - all, as we now see, poisonous to greater or lesser degree. In summary (possibly looping - comme d'habitude), we've been lied to - deceived, and that deliberately - also by publicly financed broadcasters, boo! Hiss!

-=*=-

To (a) the crime and its 'why:' That's too easy; the US set out to take more (far, far more) than its 'fair' share, and it set out to do that by deploying 'power tactics:'

  «We should cease to talk about vague and—for the Far East—unreal objectives such as human rights, the raising of the living standards, and democratization. The day is not far off when we are going to have to deal in straight power concepts. The less we are then hampered by idealistic slogans, the better.»
[wiki/Memo_PPS23]

Kennan was regarded as 'dovish:'

  «"The final answer might be an unpleasant one, but...we should not hesitate before police repression by the local government. This is not shameful since the Communists are essentially traitors....It is better to have a strong regime in power than a liberal government if it is indulgent and relaxed and penetrated by Communists. "»
[discuss ...the United States' military and political objectives ...]

Some dove, and 'Communist' was the epithet used on anyone who thought government functions included providing what would otherwise be termed 'normal' services to, or otherwise providing 'support' for the local peasantry(??!) 'Communist' has now been morphed/generalised to 'Socialist,' and attempts were made to smear Obama as such, just this year. Same old same old -

  - as most of the above is old, but the situation has continued. Using WYSIWYG (what you see is what you get - in other words, propaganda-created blinkers off and see what's really going on), we see that the US, still with 5% of the world's population now has 25% of the world's resources - and they have gone fat to the point of obese with their vicious, thieving greed and over-consumption.

But: anyone thinking this is not an extremely acute and current problem could try reading the whole of the article this quote[3] comes from.

-=*=-

Finally (c), why has there been no effective resistance? Who let the US 'get away with it,' up till now?

In other words, where are the (moral, clever) adults?

Search me. Lazy? Corrupt themselves?

Thatcher cried "TINA!" - it was a lie (no surprise), but now we've got an alternative - i.e. do nothing, and complete the drowning - or more likely crashing, starving and/or burning-up, as our ecosphere crisps in the excess-CO2 caused greedastrophe®.

Or some adults could take charge and follow my tip: finger out, dump the US and the $US with it, start soonest on saving our once jewel-like planet.

-=*end*=-

Ref(s):

[1] jackboot n. 1 military boot reaching above the knee. 2 this as a militaristic or fascist symbol. [POD]

[2] «The Pentagon's Information Operations Roadmap now describes the Internet as an enemy "weapons system."»
[globalresearch/Psychological Operations are my specialty]

[My comment: Not a truly serious article perhaps, but may contain more than a little truth - like that quoted bit, say.]

[3] November 12, 2008
Obama's Economic Advisors
Against Volcker
By Patrick Bond

  «Elmar Altvater of Berlin's Free University recalls how the world "slid into the debt crisis of the 1980s after the US Federal Reserve tripled interest rates (the so called 'Volcker Shock'), leading to what later has been described as the 'lost decade' for the developing world."

How 'lost'? The British Medical Journal complained in 1999 of orthodox World Bank structural adjustment policies that immediately followed: "According to Unicef, a drop of 10-25% in average incomes in the 1980s - the decade noted for structural adjustment lending - in Africa and Latin America, and a 25% reduction in spending per capita on health and a 50% reduction per capita on education in the poorest countries of the world, are mostly attributable to structural adjustment policies. Unicef has estimated that such adverse effects on progress in developing countries resulted in the deaths of half a million young children-and in just a 12 month period."»
[counterpunch/Patrick Bond]

The implications flowing from that article have local repercussions; suffice it to say that with an honest media (and politicians similarly honest), our wide-brown may suffer quite a bit less than it currently does. Our resources are being ripped out of the ground without adequate recompense; our politicians actively assist this rip-off. Our governments are being strangled by tax policies which favour the already filthy-rich, the list of malfeasances is looong. At the root of the problems is the so-called 'Washington Consensus,' an erring, filthy rip-off ideology. See "Economic Hit Man." Why should we be forced to suffer these depredations?

Final comment: Just when you think things can't get worse, they quite often do. The more I find out about what's been done - and what's been largely hidden from us, the madder - I mean angrier - I get. We the sheople - here I mean it with respect, all our fellow-citizens everywhere, shorthand 'humanity,' we do not deserve to be so ripped-off, so deceived. It's gotta be stopped, reversed, our world made whole again - and all the irresponsible criminals must be thrown straight into gaol.

unsustainable ...

  .. an unknown concept to the lying NeoCons ...

    .. all they ever do is moreofthesame - mostly criminal bulls**t

-=*=-

ww1 - war to end war - obviously didn't

ww2 - peace, justice & the Amerikan way = prime bulls**t

cw - fear - unnecessary - except as theft-enabler for US aggressor

planet-wide US murdering violence now worse, worser, worst

cultural colonisation via the boob-tube = propaganda

sub-prime - biggest rip-off of all time

recall the filthy super-profit scam

the US doesn't buy, it steals

all planned by the self-titled 'masters of the Universe,' all a complete and utter failure - all they really enabled was the obscene to the point of going horribly obese US over-consumption

IF only moreofthesame - criminal bulls**t, THEN the bigger the eventual crash

Murphy says: If it can happen, it will.

Q1: How smart is Obama? Will he push on, or pull back?

Q2: How smart are we the sheople®, to tolerate the essentially intolerable?

Fallen at the first hurdle?

The election of Barack Obama was greeted with joy and a great deal of hope and expectations. However, as emotional a moment it was and as much as reality was suspended for a time, reality in the shape of the obstacles that will confront President Obama and his own positions on a range of issues might leave many hopes unfulfilled.

One way to gauge what Obama's policies might be is who he appoints to his staff. We have already one key appointment that does not bode well for a change in approach on a key issue. That appointment is of Rahm Emanuel as his chief of staff.

In the first major appointment of his administration, President-elect Barack Obama has named as his chief of staff Congressman Rahm Emanuel, an Israeli citizen and Israeli army veteran whose father, according to the Israeli newspaper Haaretz, was a member of Menachem Begin's Irgun forces during the Nakba and named his son after "a Lehi combatant who was killed" -- i.e., a member of Yitzhak Shamir's terrorist Stern Gang, responsible for, in addition to other atrocities against Palestinians, the more famous bombing of the King David Hotel and assassination of the UN peace envoy Count Folke Bernadotte.

In rapid response to this news, the editorial in the next day's Arab News (Jeddah) was entitled "Don't pin much hope on Obama -- Emanuel is his chief of staff and that sends a message". This editorial referred to the Irgun as a "terror organization" (a judgment call) and concluded: "Far from challenging Israel, the new team may turn out to be as pro-Israel as the one it is replacing."

That was always likely. Obama repeatedly pledged unconditional allegiance to Israel during his campaign, most memorably in an address to the AIPAC national convention which Israeli peace activist Uri Avnery characterized as "a speech that broke all records for obsequiousness and fawning", and America's electing a black president has always been more easily imagined than any American president's declaring his country's independence from Israeli domination.

Not a good start. And here.

I had really wanted to celebrate Barack Obama's remarkable victory for a day or so before becoming cynical again. I really did.

And yet, less than 24 hours after the first polls closed, the president-elect chose as his chief of staff -- perhaps the most powerful single position in any administration -- Rahm Emanuel, one of the most conservative Democratic members of Congress.

The chief of staff essentially acts as the president's gatekeeper, determining with whom he has access for advice and analysis. Obama is known as a good listener who has been open to hearing from and considering the perspectives of those on the Left as well as those with a more centrist to conservative perspective. How much access he will actually have as president to more progressive voices, however, is now seriously in question.

Illinois Congressman Rahm Emanuel is a member of the so-called New Democrat Coalition (NDC), of group of center-right pro-business Congressional Democrats affiliated with the Democratic Leadership Conference, which is dedicated to moving the Democratic Party away from its more liberal and progressive base. Numbering only 58 members out of 236 Democrats in the current House of Representatives, the NDC has worked closely with its Republican colleagues in pushing through and passing such legislation as those providing President Bush with "fast-track" trade authority in order to bypass efforts by labor, environmentalists and other public interest groups to promote fairer trade policy.

Others will try to coopt the new president.

To avoid falling for the same old, Ray McGovern suggests that President Obama ask questions at Presidential Daily Briefings ... and some personnel changes might help, as well.

Suggestions for changes.

In one area, foreign policy, there are warning signs examined in the above material. Other areas will be examined as appointments and other indicatorts become available. Not, perhaps a good start, but much will depend on whether President Obama respionds to the desires of the electorate or to other influences ... and his own attitudes and strength.

The Bush/Cheney Legacy.

A few days to go to the election and a few months left for the Bush Administration Questions are being raised about what damage has been done in the past eight years and what will or can change. Some people have placed their hopes in Barack Obama but is he going to be any different. The Democrats were tasked by the American electorate in the 2006 mid-terms with implementing change but, well, what has changed?

In this article Dr Dennis Loo examines the Bush/Cheney legacy and suggests ways for change to be made.

Ex-Treasury Secretary Paul O’Neill, one of many disaffected former Bush White House officials, recounts Vice-President Dick Cheney saying in a 2002 White House meeting: “Reagan proved that deficits don’t matter.”

The Bush/Cheney years prove that the rule of law and truth don’t matter.

Tom Engelhardt addresses the Bush/Cheney years in "Foreclosed".

They may have been the most disastrous dreamers, the most reckless gamblers, and the most vigorous imperial hucksters and grifters in our history. Selling was their passion. And they were classic American salesmen -- if you're talking about underwater land in Florida, or the Brooklyn Bridge, or three-card monte, or bizarre visions of Iraqi unmanned aerial vehicles armed with chemical and biological weaponry let loose over the U.S., or Saddam Hussein's mushroom clouds rising over American cities, or a full-scale reordering of the Middle East to our taste, or simply eternal global dominance.

When historians look back, it will be far clearer that the "commander-in-chief" of a "wartime" country and his top officials were focused, first and foremost, not on the shifting "central theaters" of the Global War on Terror, but on the theater that mattered most to them -- the "home front" where they spent inordinate amounts of time selling the American people a bill of goods. Of his timing in ramping up a campaign to invade Iraq in September 2002, White House Chief of Staff Andrew Card infamously explained: "From a marketing point of view, you don't introduce new products in August."

A sign of how well they did - Glenn Greenwald.

In February, 2007, David Broder -- the Dean of the Washington Press Corps -- announced that "President Bush is poised for a political comeback" and "is demonstrating political smarts that even his critics have to acknowledge." Today, his own paper, The Washington Post, documented how painfully wrong that was, that George Bush's presidency is one of the greatest failures in all of American history, and he is so widely despised that he dare not show his face in public for fear of further hurting his party's nominee:

Even for a declared optimist, Bush has appeared remarkably sanguine in this season of discontent. The economy is melting down, his own party has shunned him, and Tuesday's election is shaping up as a searing rebuke to his eight years in office. . . .

"Everybody kind of wanted to spend the last 100-plus days doing some legacy things, and the financial crisis has thrown a wrench into that," said one prominent Republican who regularly talks with senior White House officials.

"You have a combination of no legacy stuff, a horrible economic mess and the likelihood that Obama is going to win," this person added. "There is a real sadness there."

None of this would matter, of course, if not for Bush's deep and abiding unpopularity. Bush has not commanded approval from a majority of the nation since early 2005, making him arguably the most disliked president since polling on the question began in the 1930s. A Washington Post-ABC News tracking poll last week put Bush's approval rating at 24 percent and found that McCain had made little headway in separating himself from Bush or his policies.

It's not for lack of trying. For the first time in recent memory, a sitting president has effectively sat out the presidential race, avoiding public appearances on behalf of McCain and other Republicans and raising far less money than usual in private fundraisers. Bush voted for McCain by absentee ballot rather than voting in person in Texas, as he has for the past three elections, and officials say he plans to spend election night at the White House rather than at a rally or other campaign-related event. . . .

"This is unprecedented for a president to be this invisible during a campaign," said Charlie Cook, editor of the nonpartisan Cook Political Report. "This is what happens when you have a 25 percent approval rating."

Dick Cheney finally made an entry into the campaign by endorsing John McCain. To the obvious pleasure of the Obama camp.

Matters which we have explored here and elsewhere and which display a frightening degree of criminality and corruption. But will it change/? Read the article for one view. But as I have expressed in the past - Obama might just be another representative of the elites and something more is required. For consideration - an interview with Naomi Wolf.