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Guest Post: The Fundamental Injustice That Is Poisoning the Nation
Submitted by Charles Hugh Smith from Of Two Minds
The Fundamental Injustice That Is Poisoning the Nation
The guilty are powerful and free, the innocent burdened and oppressed: that is injustice.
There is a fundamental injustice that is poisoning the soul of the nation, and if it is not openly addressed then the nation will face the explosive consequences of institutionalized injustice.
Simply put, it is this: those responsible for the nation's financial crisis and its catastrophic after-effects are not paying for the consequences of their actions--it is the innocent, those who were not responsible, who are paying the price.
You can call it whatever you want: the Anarchy of the Super-Rich (as per Paul Farrell), the Financial Power Elite, the financial Oligarchy, Plutocracy or Corporatocracy, or the unprecedented concentration of financial wealth and political power in a financialized post-industrial economy. Whatever you call it, we all know this class of financiers and its minions got away with high financial crimes.
Do the crime, do the time--unless it's "white-collar" financial crime on a vast scale. Then you might pay a wrist-slap fine (a few million dollars from your treasure of embezzled hundreds of millions) and then you're free to go on your merry way.
The after-effects are not just the losses which can be totalled on a calculator: the really catastrophic losses are to the foundations of democracy and the economy. Democracy has been subverted--oh please, spare us the happy-story propaganda about "reform" and "the system worked"--and the economy has been incentivized to favor poisonously addictive financialization and the shadow institutions of corruption, fraud, embezzlement, favoritism, collusion and misrepresentation of risk. This might be summarized as the protection of vested interests, engineered and overseen by the partnership of the ever more intrusive Central State and the nation's Financial Power Elite.
The Central State, designed to protect the citizenry from an oppressive monarchy or Elite, now protects this Elite from the citizenry. That is how thoroughly the injustice has been institutionalized.
There is a second part to this fundamental injustice: look who will pay for the bailouts, guarantees and the interest on the borrowed trillions. Not the banks and bankers, to be sure. Who will pay? Those who the Central State can easily tap: taxpayers who earn most of their income from wages, and those politically weak players dependent on government payments.
Now that the bills of the bailout are coming due, the State isn't going after GE for more taxes. Heavens no--if you try that, the Panzer Division of GE's tax avoidance army would overrun you. No, the politically easy thing to do is raise taxes on wage earners and trim entitlements, because all the government needs to do is send down the orders and it is done: the taxes are withheld and the bennies trimmed.
To go after the Power Elite is just too difficult. They have the tax attorneys, the lobbyists, the campaign fundraisers, and all the rest.
The U.S. is just a third world kleptocracy on an Imperial scale. I explored the parallels with the Roman Empire in Survival+: the Elites increasingly avoided military service and taxation, the bedrock of Roman power, while the taxes on the middle class rose to such heights that this productive class was basically driven into serfdom. The bottom layer of State dependents was placated and made complicit with bread and circuses--yes, Rome had a vast "welfare state" and much of Rome's population received free bread to keep them quiet and pliant.
That is of course a road to ruin: let the Elite plunder at will, protected by the Imperial Central State, tax the productive class to fund the armed forces and free bread, and then buy off the lower class with bread and circuses.
The only successful model of reconciliation and justice we have is the "truth commissions" in other post-oppression autocratic kleptocracies. In countries that were deeply divided and poisoned by institutionalized injustice and exploitation, the healing process requires a public, transparent "truth commission" in which the guilty are brought forth to confess their sins against the innocent and face the consequences of their actions.
If a society cannot rouse itself to cleanse the fundamental injustice at the heart of its institutions, then it is effectively choosing self-destruction.
So far, the U.S. is pursuing the Roman Imperial model with an institutional zeal unmatched since Rome's fall.
Embedded institutional injustice has a price, a price which rises with every passing day of propaganda and prevarication. Some day the bill will come due and a terrible price paid in full. For those in power, the only concern is that it not be today or tomorrow.
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Ijit, it's two heads, same snake. The cheese eatin vote gardens and those that benefit from them are just as much to blame as the poor MF's in flyover country that are forced to feed them at gunpoint every April.
R and D are simply labled handwheels on two valves, both are piped to the same boiler. Turn one or the other to relieve pressure, doesn't matter. Best if you alternate every cycle or two, it cuts down on unscheduled maintenance due to excessive wear.
But you know I'm down with that scalp bounty.
Republicans, Republicans, Republicans. A great example of a land grab is the golden coast of Chicago. Who runs Chicago? It isn't Republicans. Although, the land grab was made possible by Jack Kemp's voucher genius. Oh no, someone blaming both parties! But without the partisan bickering between shills, what will distract people from the financial r*ping of the populace?
JP Morgan says 100’s Town’s & City’s in U.S. Won’t ‘Make It’ Out of Debt Crisis http://goo.gl/HO8Xb / http://goo.gl/L9Gjd So expect a Corporate Land Grab!
Republican Land Grab is the second link..
Republicans Block! a Push by Democrats To End The Tax Break for Sending U.S. Jobs Offshore! http://goo.gl/6qhnK
Robbing Social Security! Democrats and Republicans both are Owned by “We the Corporate Lobby $’s” not “We the People” http://goo.gl/6qhnKSocial Security was total theft to begin with.
Serously, though, I want to know how good Democrat boots taste.
I hate the corporate lobby whores equally.
I just like fishing for the republicans in the crowd.
Wow, someone still blaming Bush... guess there really is no expiration date to that one. Sad. As if the anti-Bush is any better.
Politics is a sucker's game.
Fantastic Read, if you would like to better understand who owns the Government Puppets we see on T.V. http://goo.gl/autZf
http://goo.gl/GRdPf Gov. Scott Walker Testifies before Congress! Proven Union Buster / Tea Party / Koch Bros Puppet!
The Republicans have pursued an outright war against "We the People" going back a good long while, not to say that they are alone..
http://goo.gl/KAtOI 10 Congressional Leaders who undermine the Constitution for the Rich!
this is 2 hours long.. the 1st hour is about the dead guy who provided America with an accurate History Book.. but the Plutocracy info (fair and balanced) is in there.. if you can suffer some good long winded info!
Bill Moyers at the Howard Zinn Lecture http://www.bu.edu/buniverse/view/?v=20ZaW9POI no longer blow my time and energy on politics.
.
let's see here...the bankers collapsed their banks with vaults full of ponzi debts where they sliced and diced and sold the same mortgage 3 times, then did the same with the slices and dices, resliced and rediced and resold 3 times.
And the shit came apart. So the gov steps up and GIVES them money. The people cry...so they step up and then LEND them money at 0%. The people cry...so they step up and say you borrow money but we will GUARANTEE your debt. And the people can't maintain attention span and it goes over.
Then what do the bankers running these collapsed institutions do? They fucking use the loan money to declare record profits (treating debt as a profit) and pay themselves record bonuses and pay packages.
This type of behavior is utterly brazen and totally shameless. There is not an ounce of contrition here. As a matter of fact, it's just more abuse.
How's 'bout a campaign to boycott NYC tourism?
+1 as usual Trav. Right out in broad daylight for all to see. That says everything that anyone ever needs to know about this mess and where it is heading.
Seriously what are WE to do? Americans are terrified of their government and what it will do to dissenters. Hell they don't even need stormtroopers if the proles get uppity and march on DC. All they need is to scatter 2 or 3 microwave trucks with small crews manning each one and aim them at the crowd. Then flip the switch and watch the roaches scurry. We passed the point long ago where we could actually fight these people. Their equipment and training is 100x better than anything a civilian might own or have access to. You can't fight that. The only thing you can hope for is their mercenaries won't actually be able to fight their own people but I wouldn't even hold my breath on that one. Forget it man. Enjoy the crumbs they give you lest you go out like Joe Stack as a lunatic footnote in some Alex Jones article.
http://www.defensereview.com/video-thor-shield-anti-taseranti-microwave-...
Reverse Engineering. It's the Chinese Way.
Predators will not change unless they're forced too. SEC and Justice Department and FBI should be doing some en-forcing on these pigs, but no, not a hand-cuffed suit in sight.
I agree Trav...shameless.
Top notch.
The Fundamental Injustice That Is Poisoning the Nation
The guilty are powerful and free, the innocent burdened and oppressed.
Bumper stickers and big flags, please.
Bravo. So well said....
Ahh, there are no bumper stickers anymore...Look Around..
Everybody is afraid.
All true, but after we scream and cry for a bit, we have to DO something.
The only positive solution is to build and use alternative economic structures. Abandon the skimming elite.
Live beneath your means.
Live and work in the cash economy.as much as possible.
Starve the beast.
Sounds good to me!
Many of us are doing that, but there are not enough of us. I have referred many to the ZH site. The majority drop out after one or two visits. Comments I get back are that its right wing or radical for them.
The old adage of leading a horse to water......... is so true.
Armed rebellion, at the Mall in Washington... RIGHT NOW!
Time for the "take back our country moment". We will come locked and loaded, but we will not discharge fire unless fired upon
Peacefully overthrow the government to replace it with one that does the bidding of the American people. This means the FED will need to be shutdown as well, as they are not owned or accountable to anyone in this country!
Peacefully overthrow the government to replace it with one that does the bidding of the American people. This means the FED will need to be shutdown as well, as they are not owned or accountable to anything in this country!
We want our freedoms and liberty back!
You're going to have to be patient.
A zerohead army?
It could happen.
yeah, that is something I would love to see.
It is Fight Club after all.
Out of almost 535 in congress + 100 in the Senate, only 1, maybe 2, represent anything close to the country our Founding Fathers gave us. THIS IS A PROBLEM, no?
I want to see some real populist uprising. Like Gerald Celente says, "Progressive Libertarism". Progressive in the sense we return to the values that made this country the freest and most prosperous in the history of the world.
Like Jefferson said, "When governments fear the people, there is liberty. When the people fear the government, there is tyranny".
they are not afraid of us, yet.
Some sort of Revolution is going to be necessary. The less bloodshed, the better. I had high hopes for the Tea Party, I really did. TPTB just laughed in our faces, jammed home fascist medical care, started new wars and blew additional trillions after we screamed in their faces to STOP!
Is it really because the S&P has more than doubled that no one protests or has the spirit to march on Washington like we did on 9/12? (not associated with Beck, of course).
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-VMXz6xGeqc
I have no interest spending the rest of my life, raising my future children in a 3rd World Banana Republic with a overbearing Police State.
Don't expect the American oligarchs to go down without a fight. They have the money and the political clout to turn the military against the people. And if you wonder whether U.S. armed government personnel would or would not engage its own people, history can answer that question.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Gv4u5dIRouM&feature=related
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dku-MFnIxaU&feature=related
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=k6BsZUuZmr4&feature=related
I am prepared to fight it out in the streets to restore America to glory. If egypt comes to America, I will be in the streets on the side of Liberty!
I have 100% confidence in my beliefs. I will die before I surrender a damn thing.
turn this shit way up,
http://youtu.be/7H_pumoMmJ0
Two words: microwave truck(s).
Revolt done and done.
"What truly destroys the economy is the collapse in the Rule of Law. This opens the door to the decline and fall of a nation for once the Rule of Law is silenced; then tyranny can truly blossom. Politicians are free to pursue self-interest even if that brings down the entire nation and creating inflation is debasing law."
Martin Armstrong
http://www.martinarmstrong.org/files/Other%20Side%20of%20Inflation%20Mar...
June is almost here. It will be interesting to see if the model is accurate. Stay perky!
Ah yes, I was wondering when someone was going to bring up the rule of law and the "moral hazard" that has been unleashed for some time now.
Charge Henry "Trojan Horse" Paulson with TREASON.
Unfortunately there is no solution that everyone can agree with.
We have comments that anyone with money is essentially the enemy. Others seem to believe limiting government is the issue we need to address.
I propose my simple solution.
Tax code of one page in length
Tax earned and unearned income the same.
No bailouts for anyone.
No deficit spending allowed.
In any system you will have winners and.losers and a top.one percent.
No Thank you..... I prefer to not have my income taxed. Abolish income taxes both state and federal and have a VAT
Fine with me.
VATs are a nightmare. We need to repeal the 16th amendment and replace all taxes with a transparent consumption tax at point of sale for new retail goods and services, aka the FairTax.
I am open to that as well redpill...
Too bad our oligarchical snake politicians aren't, they won't give up their favorite class-dividing, voter bribing, agenda-promoting tool for arbitrarily picking winners and losers, aka the income tax code.
VAT is not a fair tax. A poor (pay check to pay check) spent all his money on necessities and will be taxed and rich spent fraction of their wealth on necessities and will not be taxed on the rest of their income.
I don't want no peace,
I need equal rights and justice
Peter Tosh
I blogged this very thing back in December. Obama was installed by bankers to trun a blind eye and give them all amnesty. It worked. http://thecivillibertarian.blogspot.com/2010/12/government-failure-guara...
Down with the State
Read Rothbard
One of my heros ;)
Yes.
The state itself is an injustice.
In theory, the state is supposed there to protect us from criminals and uphold the law. But police operate using stolen funds. It is logically inconsistent to be a protector of property rights while at the same time expropriating property.
Why do I say the police use stolen funds? Think about it. If someone mugs you on the street, it is theft. And if 20 neighbors hold a vote and decide to break into your house to steal property, it is theft. And if it's 1 million people voting, it's still theft. Using a euphemism like "taxes" does not magically make the immorality go away.
Even if I break into your house and steal something with the intention of spending the stolen funds on feeding starving children, it is still theft. And in reality, the state bombs starving children. The state is a coercive apparatus abused by corporations, politicians, and voters to extract legal concessions (e.g. tarriffs) and warfare and welfare money. It does not really protect people's rights but merely enforces its arbitrary rules that prohibit such heinous crimes as growing the wrong kind of plant, taking too large of a dump http://mises.org/daily/3997, having too stuffy of a nose http://blog.mises.org/13834/buy-sudafed-and-go-to-jail/, and buying the wrong kind of vegetables http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Onion_Futures_Act.
Unfortunately, people are brainwashed into state-worship from the start (e.g. Pledge of Allegiance) and questioning this is viewed as radical and crazy, just as atheism was viewed centuries ago. They simply can't contemplate any alternatives.
Very well stated Dr. Acula...I thought about things like this as I was given a warning today by an officer of the state(NC) to wear my seatbelt or pay them $130.00. Such a heinous criminal I am not wearing a seatbelt.
quotas + desperate need for revenue = bullshit tickets
Think of Golgafrincham Ark "B", and take a deep inward look.
The banksters have been plundering the rest of the world for decades using the same scam they are now running on us. Now that the U.S. is Brazil/Mexico -- id est, the new native population of the U.S. is used to this sort of thing -- the banksters will probably get away with it. So far, there have been only a handful of investigations and fewer prosecutions, and the feckless U.S. sheeple are as inactive and useless as ever.
It is the original implementation of a tax that is the hard part. Once a tax is in place it is an easy, usually quiet, adjustment process. Adding an additional tax is a very bad idea. Do you really believe government will willingly remove the "bad" tax you dislike? Get real. Stop asking for more taxes.
Rusty,
Of course I don't for one moment believe the government would willingly remove any tax. I'm not asking for more taxes and would not accept one being added...far from it...if you think that you don't know me, but if this system collapses and we need to form a new one the income tax would not be the way to go it is regressive and steals from the fruit of our labor. I can walk and chew gum at the same time ...I also believe that wether it be VAT or consumption tax it should not be added without abolishing income tax in conjunction.
So I am real.... but just as many others do on here I talk about what I would like to see happen.
La Guillotine shall claim her bloody prize.
There's no way to "beat 'em" - the only pragmatic course of action is to "join 'em."
Unfortunately... I'm not a pragmatist.
All we can do is pray that men with guns who think as we do will successfully make their move.
so what can we do-- better yet what can we plan-- my thought is to change the game so that "little people" have a level playing field.
just what if-- the US treasury issued a "US Treasury Dollar" (with full faith backing by the treasury) that would by law be allowed to be used as legal tender for all debts public and private. What if the "new" dollar would be introduced into the economy in a parallel capacity to the FRN. Just suppose that a person could trade FRNs on a one for one to the treasury up to the limit of say $30K FRNs per citizen per year ( a US LLC or a US corp. being a person). The new law would require all things sold in the US to be priced in both UST Dollars and FRNs. A law would make the UST Dollars illegal to hold outside the US and subject to confiscation. A law would make it legal for anyone to hold the UST Dollar. Aside from the original trade the UST dollar would be allowed to float with all other currencies. What if the treasury sold bonds at the float rate, a max of $30K per year per citizen, denominated in UST Dollars and set the interest at 5%.
A little help here-- what would make this work--
If a car priced in FRNs and UST dollars had the prices next to each other and the FRN is falling in value - how would the prices compare-- maybe $50k FRNs or $500 UST dollars--
buy guns.. the problem with rome is they controlled the military and there was no recourse for the average citizen. If eveyone owns a gun that creates leverage for the average citizen to defend themselves and it is hard for 1% to defend against 99%!!!
@ clinger. they, the ruling elite, have weaponry more sophisticated than we can imagine.
True. It is called television, but is pretty easy to disable if you are motivated enough.
they'd drone you before they'd allow the disabling of the propaganda box.
They still have to sleep and eat. If it's that far gone what are their hired protectors still working for?
Nice thread hijack here. - The discussion changes from a consideration of macro injustice to the micro absurdity of Fox News in a heartbeat. It's best to simply ignore this stuff as background noise. Allowing oneself to be diverted from the real issues benefits only the oppressors.
Selfishness has become a cherished holy virtue. Granted it was cultivated and nourished by our Overlords. The readjustment will be harsh and brutal.
It is amazing. The public opinion on the online community is completed shifted. The planted troll bloggers are outnumbered 20 to 1 by real opinions on posting I am seeing across the board. Of Course, you have the hack sites like Facebook that censor but overall the online opinion belongs to the masses. Simply amazing. I can only hope that 1st amendment does what it is suppose to do and pushes corruption out of system by means of exposure and redress of grievence of it citizens. God Bless America! Down with corruption that has wrecked our great country. The people who have attempting to quell the 1st amendment through intimidation and other means should be ashamed of themselves. Regardless if it is 5 years from now or tomorrow, this country will come back to justice. If you are employed as a troll, bait and switch spin goon for these people, you are nothing more than a tool for these dirtballs and you know it now! American's interest and future do not rest in the interest of the top 1% thieves who blew out a multi-trillion dollar hole in the economy and jeapordized our national security interests and American way of life.
I have two friends who purchased pleasure yachts two years ago. One bought a small $25,000 Bayliner to cruise around the bay with his family and friends. He bought it from a dealer and was required to pay a "Use Tax" of 8.5% or about $2125. My other friend purchased a handbuilt yacht from Hong Kong that cost $7.5 million. He was able to park his yacht in Ensenada for six months and when he brought it into the state he paid $0.00 in "Use Tax" to the state. Little loopholes like this are slipped into our laws everywhere to benefit the rich. Loopholes and exemptions engineered by a corrupt Congress allow the rich of this country to pay very little tax.
We all grow impatient, living in a cage designed by bankers and built by government, but as should be obvious to anyone who gets it enough to read ZH, we are in a very precarious position. The world's systems, and the nations that share the world are mostly balanced on a tipping point.
Things cannot continue on their current path, based on many criteria, like debt payments, oil prices and availability of reserves, clean water, and lack of maintenance on critical plants and infrastructure. The world has been bled to feed the bankers, and like a car with no regular maintenance, it could break at any time.
A system on the edge of chaos needs only a small trigger to resonate a much larger domino effect collapse. Nature is full of surprises, a volcanic eruption triggers a cold summer and widespread crop failures. An earthquake destroys several nuclear reactors in a large industrial nation precipitating a host of financial problems that have yet to fully resonated.
California, one of the largest economies in the world is overdue for an earthquake on both its largest southern city, Los Angeles, and it's largest northern city, San Fransisco. Imagine if both earthquakes happen in the same year. Pandemic diseases have the potential to spread globally in a matter of days if not weeks, 12 monkeys.
We are quite simply living on luck at the moment. Luck doesn't last forever as much as we would like it to. Whether the sun vents a hot glob of plasma in our direction, or a kilometer size asteroid falls on New York city, something will change the status quo within twenty years. Plan for the worst and hope for the best and realize we are all at the mercies of nature, and survive only by its providence. Even the Pentagon can't stop an earthquake.
Unstable, rigged systems, collapse, we are merely trapped in the inertia between cataclysms. On a long enough time line we are all zeros.
what a downer
Nonsense, enjoy your time here it is finite. We are not residents, merely visitors. The world is what it has always been, it is just more people can see it for the dicey ball of dreams held together with spit and rubberbands.
The world hasn't changed, we have. We expect justice and truth, love, peace and happiness and are disappointed daily.
"Be the change that you want to see in the world."
Mohandas Gandhi
Great post, TMP.
The world is falling apart, anyone that cannot see that needs a good kick in the head.
How anyone can accept the status-quo as the new normal, is reason alone to be in perpetual state of pessimism
The guilty are powerful and free, the innocent burdened and oppressed: that is injustice.
Give me a fucking break. I mean grow up.
Thanks for the big news flash Charlie.
"You can call it whatever you want: the Anarchy of the Super-Rich (as per Paul Farrell), the Financial Power Elite, the financial Oligarchy, Plutocracy or Corporatocracy, or the unprecedented concentration of financial wealth and political power in a financialized post-industrial economy. Whatever you call it, we all know this class of financiers and its minions got away with high financial crimes"
Cant i just call them Zionists ?
fine with me.
This Is The IMPORTANT HISTORY of US TERRORISM
Who Are The Real Terrorists?
Oklahoma City reality check
By wmw_admin on April 20, 2011
Brasscheck TVThree bombs inside the building
You probably never saw this.
Two big bombs were found INSIDE the Oklahoma City federal building and defused.
These clips ran on local news live…and were never broadcast again.
There is no way a truck bomb regardless of size could have done the damage that was done to that building.
The government’s story is a complete lie and they know it.
The “terrorism expert” and the end of this clip Dr. Randall Heather was never seen on TV again and can’t be found on Google (except in relation to this appearance.)
Rather than test the site to assess the exact composition of the bomb material as Dr. Heather and USAF General Partin (ret) recommended, the building was demolished and all the wreckage was removed to a fenced in landfill and buried.
No tests were ever done.
Source
See the complete catalog of free Brasscheck TV videos
Please Everyone View the VIDEO in the previous link.
And this is why, as the nation and the world goes up in flames, the Oligarchy is having a good laugh while drinking their champagne on a new yacht with a Bahamas flag.
82% of the people want to tax the rich (10% of the population) more. They know in their gut what is wrong with the system. Unfortunately this 82% is divided between left and right, fighting each other, and losing sight of the problem ....
so... it's the old Divide And Conquer ..
courtesy of the Koch Bros., the Fed. Banks Board Members (95% jewish ?!?!), and all the millionaires populating all branches of our government ....
US Gov't Emergency Order Of 129,000 Copies Of FEMA Camp Document
How do you view this? "FEMA Camp" sounds like a "prisoner's camp" to me.
FEMA CAMP handbook order by US Government – expedited orderBy wmw_admin on April 19, 2011
There are many who believe that there are over 800 FEMA prison camps currently ready to accept US citizens if martial law is declared. Do some research on Rex 84 as this is where the camps came from. They were originally intended to house mass refugees from South America during some kind of catastrophe. Some like Alex Jones of Prison Planet speculate these camps will be run by foreign and UN troops to house Americans unwilling to go along with a world government.
http://www.apfn.org/apfn/camps1.htm
" So far, the U.S. is pursuing the Roman Imperial model with an institutional zeal unmatched since Rome's fall. Embedded institutional injustice has a price, a price which rises with every passing day of propaganda and prevarication."
Good summary wrap-up, Tyler, but your (rape, pillage, & plunder economics; i.e. official state-sanctioned looting by the kleptocracy) "unmatched since Rome's fall" qualifier betrays the intentional disinformation (institutionalized ignorance) of the American 'education' system, because you are neglecting to mention both the Great Irish famine, and the Opium War, and, hell, throw in Conrad's Heart of Darkness - the near 50% depopulation of the Congo river basin in late 1800s, aka "Free State Congo" to describe King Leopold II's very private genocidal resource extraction plantation - all of which claimed to be "FREE MARKET CAPITALISM" based (as opposed to, say, Nazi & Soviet gulag economics which made no pretense of concern for "free market capitalism" - even though, in creating the Soviet nuclear war machine, Joe Stalin was quite the uber-capitalist!)
In particular, the Great Famine was a slow-motion on-going ethnic cleansing PURGE of Catholic Irish, not only from "Ulster Plantation" (as their Northern Ireland cleansed 'plantation" gulag was called by the British), but, with the Great Famine and other food-supply-restricted famines, throughout the isles as well. Wiki does a fairly good job of catching the genocidal economics of imperial, race-based colonial ethnic cleansing: "Laws that RESTRICTED the RIGHTS of the Irish" (namely, the 'right' to own productive, food producing farms and estates)http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Great_Famine_(Ireland)#Laws_that_restricted_the_rights_of_the_Irish
and "FOOD EXPORTS _TO ENGLAND_ at VERY HEIGHT of the Famine" http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Great_Famine_(Ireland)#Food_exports_to_England
As good as he is as a hired gs/jpm/fed (=rothchilds) henchman Little Economic Hit Man timmy geithner is (and his boss, president o., are) he still has a LONG way to go, before he (they) can truly fill the "factor," "agent" loan collectors, and eviction lords' shoes from the brutal, mass-murderous Great Famine (& nearly equivalent, dismal English & Scottish "Clearances") era.
if you think I am giving the r's perhaps a bit too much 'credit' for creating the conditions behind (Ireland's) Great Famine of 1845-1852 (one of many famines under British + Anglicized Scots/Irish occupation), check this link - the r's were building palatial mansions like so many mushrooms popping up DURING the Great Famine era (no doubt with "profits" extorted from the starving colony), and every time the Irish sought a political solution to the famine (STOP EXPORTING FOOD to pay debts/"profits" of British banksters!) Queen Victoria, the English parliament, and the r's would 'ride to the rescue' and QUASH any semblance of self rule for the starving Irish....
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hannah_Primrose,_Countess_of_Rosebery#Politics
I never thought I'd be living in a Banana Republic. Soon we're going to be looking up to Third World countries.
Where is the anger? Not here among the 'chosen' but out there among the 'frozen'? I am consistently amazed by how hard it is to get through to a single sheep.
And then, get this,... sometimes when I wake one up they get mad! They actually prefer the numbed Dancing-with-the-Stars CNN-enduced coma.
Thankfully I have 0H and the rest of the internet to keep me sane...
yes, the "frozen masses" are in a media zombie-land hypnotic drug induced stupor.
I call it "The CONFEDERATE SOLDIER SYNDROME" - Reb soldiers were happy to risk their lives, and endure extreme privation & hardship, as long as they felt that they were part of a superior culture & race - what Michael Lind calls a "Herrenvolk" or warrior/dictatorship society, with pretensions of democracy harnessed & welded by a theocratic "warriors for god" imperative. See also the Prussians, Spartans, Zealots... and British aristocratic elites (see my below comment for just how genocidal they were - against fellow white, "Christian" Europeans, much less against Indians, Chinamen, natives, etc.)
For an example of that relentless PROPAGANDA NARRATIVE in action, see the Hollywood semi-animated movie about the Spartans, "300", with the lead character _____ shouting "FREEDOM!" every 5 minutes. The Spartans, of course, relentlessly ENSLAVED their Helot (fellow Greek) neighbors to run their entire society; the use of the word "freedom" to describe their anti-like warrior cult dedication to the mother colony, is pure American fiction.
In America today, as long as the hypnotic media can perpetrate the notion of "American exceptionalism", the Frozen masses will continue to endure, like the German 6th army troops at Stalingrad (before the encirclement trap was sprung on them, and even after).
I originally posted this Friday in response to events in Bolivia. Either the Government (any & all) gets its act together or there is anarchy (regardless of whether it is the State or Citizenry pulling the trigger).
Without RULE OF LAW and all that it entails, ANARCHY will reign. As governments tend to employ the largest body of thugs they are able to thrive under ANARCHY, and oppress the citizenry. The most glaring current example of the absence of the RULE OF LAW in developed economies today is the utter lack of prosecution and imprisonment of bankers for their frauds, thefts, and lies. Expropriation in Bolivia is an example of the same phenomenon in a less developed economy. It is HYPOCRITICAL of observers to rally against expropriation of wealth by the banker class while supporting expropriation of wealth by the political class.
Bystanders often DELUDE themselves as to the insidiousness of expropriation when there is a conscious or unconscious expectation that may be the BENEFICIARYof the largess of the thief, which they rarely are, unless they actively collude in the theft. There is often popular support for raising the taxes of one's neighbor or boss if there is an expectation that the revenues raised will support a subsidy that one receives. The political class very often markets its expropriations through the demonization of the victim, and wraps it in the rhetoric of nationalism or populism. In Bolivia, the thieves claim that the theft will benefit the economy and the citizenry. Several years ago, the same thief, at the same crime zone, chanting the same rhetoric, committed another theft. The economy and the citizenry are not better off as a result of the previous theft, just as they will not be as a result of the current theft. Rinse, Repeat. Even the Bolivian unions are expressing hesitancy at the latest political maneuvering, even though they are aligned ideologically with the political powers and are often at cross purposes economically with the intended victim of the politicians’ theft.
There also tends to be a NAIVETY amongst the cheerleaders of expropriation that the wrath and greed of the Black Mercedes Brigades will not trickle-down to them. Whilst the pundits may document the epic battles, they do not concern themselves with the everyday encounters when a member of the Brigade sees a small business owner as a competitor to his interests, or covets the property of neighbor who is not a member of the Brigade. In the United States, the UAW colludes with the political arm of the Black Mercedes Brigade, which conveniently camouflages itself if UAW cars, against the banker arm of the Brigade. By circumventing RULE OF LAW and existing bankruptcy processes, the UAW was the beneficiary of tens of billions of dollars in expropriated wealth from other creditors, which ironically included both individual shareholders and creditors who were members of the UAW as well as the other unions and pension funds who were among the institutional shareholders and creditors. It will be interesting to see if the UAW continues to support the Black Mercedes Brigades when the debt beast the Brigade has created needs to be fed again and the 401(k) and IRA plans of their members are perceived as the most readily available food source.
RULE OF LAW is the best protection that both the individual and institution have against the expropriator’s greed. Retreat and evasion are only effective strategies as long as the holder of wealth is able to avoid the Medusa’s greedy gaze. Physical precious metals may protect one from a collapse of the financial system, but they cannot protect one against expropriation by a coveting neighbor, much less the superior numbers and firepower of a coveting State. Strength in numbers may serve as a temporary deterrent against greed, and delay expropriation by the Coveter until an implementable strategy and be developed and implemented. The weak can often be tempted into striking a deal with the Devil and joining the side of ANARCHY as a means of self preservation, but this solution entails sacrificing and subjugating one’s soul and one’s ideology to the Devil’s greed. So in the end, the choice is ultimately reduced to RULE OF LAW or ANARCHY.
Bad terms, UR. Anarchy is good; it is chaos you are rightly concerned about.
Anarchy does NOT = bomb-throwing commie wackos. Really, it = real capitalism... as in voluntary trade without restriction.
Oh, and that "war of all against all" stuff is bullshit. It's statist propaganda, and always was.
My word choice wasn't the result of philosophical distinction it was the result of intentional personal bias.
To get anything done on a reasonable scale (good or bad) in a third world shit-hole you usually have to play nice with guys who are at most one pogrom removed from personally implementing tyranny against the oppressed. Then when I return to “civilization”, I am confronted with "anarchists." These civilized “anarchists” tend to get their ideas of the ideal state from books or TV. However, they would all turn into retching babies and try to climb back into their mothers’ wombs at the mere sight of what happens in actual anarchy. I may be personally agnostic about creative destruction on a national scale as a solution for society’s ills, but I can’t stand the wining of fools, who sole purpose for continued existence under such a scenario is to be my bitch.
In short- I despise the hypocrisy of one advocating elimination of all portions of social contract, except those which serve to protect the interests of the one advocating the change.
pure gold
And the people of the US sit and enjoy the poison brought to them by the Corporate State.
So many different ways to break their economic plaything here, CDS, CDO , CDO squareds, buying mortgage shit shovelers, back shorting long clients, a bald MERS assumption of our notaries, lobbyist open staffing of reform writing "representatives".
Anyways, its quite easy to fix.
Just repeal, undo, and unglue, ourselves, from both "Modernization" Acts created by Sen. Phil Gramm-TX, in 1999 and 2000. That's when all this new mischief started!!!
The Commodity Futures Modernization Act, and the Financial Services Modernization Act (aka Gramm-Leech-Bliley Act) of 1999.
There!, Go tell all your friends! This would be fixed in a jiffy.
"kleptocracy on an imperial scale", an interesting way of looking at it.
Kelptocracy in this case is aided by imperialism. If they can only steal from the domestic population, they won't last long. But if they can steal from the whole world, and use some of the loot to buy off imperial citizens (bread and circus), it becomes a viable strategy. The Roman Empire lasted several hundred years.
Historically no race/culture has proven capable of resisting imperialism when a chance presented itself. The key here is, if you endorse looting other peoples, you are morally compromised, which makes your argument less convincing, even to yourself, when you try to resist being looted by the more powerful.
This problem will be solved the moment people invest half as much time into doing something about it as they currently spend moaning about it in forums.
All talk, no action == no change. Welcome to the USSA.