This page has been archived and commenting is disabled.
Heads, You Lose
Submitted by James Kunstler of Kunstler.com,
Obama Pushes Iraqis to Mend Sectarian Rifts
— Headline, The New York Times
Have they tried diversity training? I doubt it. That’s not how things are done in the Shithole Formerly Known as Iraq (SFKI). They’re headhunters now. For the moment the ISIS hasn’t had the inclination to shrink any of their trophies. Their method for preserving the memory of all that is the smart phone video of decapitation posted on the Internet. So let’s skip the part where both sides talk about their feelings.
It all happened pretty quickly last week, but in case you haven’t noticed, Humpty Dumpty fell off the wall over there. The bonehead American news media affects to be too stunned to even ask the pertinent questions, starting with: is that all it took to undo eight years and — what? — maybe two trillion dollars in US-sponsored nation-building? Oh, plus 4,000 US dead and 50,000 wounded. So, my question would be: when do the political recriminations kick in? Pretty soon, I reckon, and when they do, expect them to be fiercely perverse. The theme of who lost Iraq? may cost more than who lost Vietnam?
How perverse is the loose talk of Iran joining forces with “the Great Satan” to support the Shiite-dominated government of Nouri al-Maliki. Prediction: not going to happen. Events are moving so quickly that the ultimate nightmare scenario is at hand: the ISIS penetrates the “Green Zone” surrounding the US embassy in Baghdad. They take hostages and commence systematic decapitations of American personnel. This is not something I would like to happen, mind you. Just saying. And the thought must have loosened a few sphincters down at the US Department of State, too.
You can be sure that Obama will be blamed both for pulling out in 2011 and then not going back to war, to protect our two trillion dollar previous investment. I have to imagine that distrust for civilian control of the US military by a corps of rising officers will reach never-before-seen depths. It may not be expressed right away, but the knock-on effects of political breakdown in the Middle East could go long and far in upsetting US politics. The defeat of Eric Cantor is just the beginning of what could be the unraveling of the federal system.
The Iraq fiasco already threatens to spike oil prices way beyond the $107 level of today. That will crush whatever remains of the US economy all over again. God knows what it might do to the financialized Rube Goldberg shadow economy of counterparty booby traps that overlays an abyss of unpayable debt. You can’t squash price discovery forever, and one morning you might wake up to discover that the price of all those shenanigans was your political heritage.
Oh, one more thing: not much attention is being paid to Saudi Arabia, but note that it has been the chief sponsor of Sunni insurgency everywhere but Saudi Arabia itself, and that the genie they let out of that flask will probably come back and tear that country to shreds, especially in so far as King Abdullah at age 90 is a virtual mummy, and that many other clans besides the Saud tribe have designs on the throne (and its mighty revenue stream from oil production). Add to that inter-tribal tension the possibility of an ISIS-style insurgency in Saudi Arabia itself, with righteous Islamic puritan warriors drawn from all over the region, and you have quite the recipe for a global clusterfuck. Surely a lot of things would get broken in the event. Given all the jealousy and ill-feeling and toward Saudi Arabia, it is a wonder that over the last 30 years no mischief-makers have, for instance, blown up the Ras Tenura oil terminal on the Persian Gulf. That would put the schnitz on global oil supply lines on a world war scale.
For the moment, it is hard to see how anything can be salvaged in Iraq. The ISIS may cause enough havoc there to shut down Iraqi oil production forever. They can start World War III. They can inspire insurgencies across the whole Islamic world and beyond. The caliphate they establish will then have to figure out how to support a population twenty times as great as the region truly can support with a medieval economy. Sooner or later, they’ll be selling shrunken heads in the souks.
»
- 20387 reads
- Printer-friendly version
- Send to friend
- advertisements -
Right now the headline is Tony Gwynn, Baseball player dead...
Say it ain't so. Tony Gwynn? This is why I ZH. I still get important news that lets me know my portfolio of rookie cards just improved. Not that I'd ever sell, I'm a bit like a CB sitting on equities.
My condolences to the family.
OK, so Osama won the war. We can all agree on that.
But who the hell was the Secretary of State who was supposed to be forging peace in the past couple of years?
Osama was a CIA asset. (It's on official public record, it's not debatable.)
Everything that is happening now is a result of long term US policy to remove volatility from the system, i.e. control the world. Now it's all blowing up in the State Dept's face. The world will be on fire. Break out the weenies and beer.
You imply that the USA has had an actual foreign policy since the 1960's.
Uh, no.
The only foreign policy is the incorporated conquest for money, not national interests (where those that enlist are converted to pension equity), or even the common good.
Everyone on ZH loves to make excuses that the entire catastrophe in the desert is anything other than greed.
The USA will be mocked more than Rome by history.
That's exactly what US foreign policy has been since WWI, except ever increasingly nastier: oligarchy, fascism, whatever you choose to call it.
Since Smedly Butler (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/War_Is_a_Racket), nothing has changed except the individual players. The stakes have only gone higher. Hopefully when it falls, it doesn't destroy the world in the process.
The Israelis noticed this a long time ago, and figured out that if nobody in the US is interested in a coherent foreign policy, why not take it over as a tool for Israel's interest?
That basically explains just about everything...
Thought you typed 'OK, so Obama won the war.'
Gave you an up arrow for such edgy sarcasm!
Historically the Secretary of State doesn't forge peace. As examples, Kissinger, Madeleine Albright, Colon Bowel, Condoleezza, and Hillary shine. Kerry is doing his best to walk in those shoes of his lying, cheating, stealing and killing predecessors as well.
Killary The Horrible!!!!!!
So is this what will be blamed for the collapse of the first world's socio-economic system? Gotta blame someone other than the central banks and their captured governments.
"Three more fingers pointed back at me."
To win "you have to take ownership." Someone has otherwise the Marines wouldn't be in their way.
Once they're there...they're in charge and "everything else is History."
SCORCHED EARTH.
It's like reading Gibbon. It's the end of the empire. None of this should be a surprise.
Entropy is a bitch.
A bitch, but also an inevitability.
Barbarians at the gates...
Here is what the liberals of the United Kingdom have done to their former democracy and centuries old culture.
"Terror alerts, 9/11-style bombings and murders of British citizens will soon come to London’s streets, according to chilling threats from UK citizens fighting alongside Islam’s most violent terrorist group operating in Syria and Iraq.
The threat comes from British nationals fighting for the Sunni militant group calling themselves the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (ISIL/ISIS) in Syria. According to the Sunday Times, they promise that after they’re done there, Britain is next. The message comes from three such fighters, all youngsters in their teens and twenties."
The Federal system is in no danger of collapsing. 'Muricans only care that the Football/Wings/Beer feed keeps flowing. If THAT stops, then they will have a problem on their hands.
Wrong. They also care about keeping their iPhones charged.
For all you pacifists...we will be fighting Islam for many years to come....that is if you like to keep your head....if its okay for you to have it cut off...then it will be....I for one like my western lifestyle and my religion...and I will fight for it...Islam is the enemy of the nonbelievers....and if you are not Muslim..you are one....just the facts
Well, the Islamist will win. If they haven't already. They've invaded all the western nations, and are establishing their presence and their laws.
But, the fucktwit politicians keep letting them in. Diversity is good, it's the religion of peace, etc...
Western politicians refuse to accept that Muslims are at war with the west. They abjectly refuse to acknowledge that it is indeed WAR, and so, they'll lose. Better start learning the Koran, before you lose your head.
The Shiites did not attack us on 9/11.
That might be the only thing we've gotten right here actually.
Remains to be seen if Baghdad is an American Stalingrad.
"I have my Pen and my Phone. an EO will assure we are under Sharia Law by 2016."
Counting on Rick Santorum to win?
Not much to choose from between Biblical Law and Sharia Law...
The politicos in GB and the continent are letting the Muzzies in, because europeans aren't reproducing at replacement levels. After all, somebody's gotta pay for the natives' Nanny State bennies. As far as the Muzzies destroying the natives' culture, hell. If the euro trash don't care enough even to reproduce themselves, you think they could give a sh*t about their culture? Getting mine before I check out, that's the name of the game in "The West."
'I for one like my western lifestyle and my religion.'
... with all its hatred and prejudice toward Arabs.
If your religion wasn't stealing their land, they'd probably be friendly enough.
I'm pretty sure the baptists, mormons, and methodists aren't stealing any land in the middle east.
Or are you refering to "Statism" as a religion?
For all the retards immune to historical context, Islam IS the answer to wealth inequality, and has been for over 1200 years.
What do you take from those that have nothing? Nothing, its a reward to die. This perverted way of thinking is only becoming entrenched in Westerners paradise with [soon to have] nothing, too.
"No one saw it coming." - JQ Horshit
Now going off in Kabul as well, ISIS 25 miles from Baghdad, world markets rally , you just cannot make this shit up! as Oil and Gold turn negative
How the fuck is that even possible. If you told me , over a year ago, everything that was happening now, I wouldn't have believed you and gold should be st $5,500.
It's cognitive dissonance on a grand scale.
Also known by its street name, finance.
Anything is possible, on Bizarro World.
Good thing we have oceans on each side of us...hate too be landlocked in that Euro sinkhole.
Apparently it all fell apart when Maliki was immaculated, but the MSM here has covered it up.
Otherwise Obumbles comments this weekend about how Maliki needs to end sectarian division is incomprehensible. Actually it's incomprehensible in any case.
Of course even now the truth is hard to find, and probably messy and ugly when you do find it.
I don't get it. How come all these Islam folks are not all Commies? I mean we were told if we lost Vietnam we'd soon be the only non-commie country left. It was not "maybe" the commies would take over everything.... it was 'bet your life on it"
And now it's the same storyline with the terrorists.
Hmmmmmmmmmmmm.
Government-run health plans?
Accounting rules (mark-to-fantasy) determined by government?
Wealth transfers from the poor and middle-class to the rich explained as 'shared sacrifice'??
For the only non-commie country left, the above headlines from our recent past sound pretty commie.
our two trillion dollar previous investment = sunk cost
Interesting pay off.
2015 is when the real fun begins. The debt ceiling debate will pop up again around election time (starting in August), and in order for the government to distract the populace from the incoming debt storm, they'll start another war.
9/11 and Iraq/Afghan were less about killing muslim extremists and their regimes overseas (which the CIA helped set up) and more about covering up the fact that the Pentagon "lost" 2+ trillion (to military contractors), the Fed now had an excuse to print up money at ZIRP, covering up massive amounts of fraud past (LTCM) and present (Enron) but not future (see: 2008) while making Wall St trillions, and that China was allowed into the WTO without much fanfare (goodbye jobs).
We all live in a garbage submarine.
@Shizzmoney - you forgot to mention the extremely expensive and shameful Savings and Loan Swindle...
As long as Boehner is the speaker, there is nothing to worry about - he will cave in again and push everything down the road until the election is over.
I am so bullish I dont know which cow to stick my boner in.
You dont say!
The heifers in the pasture with me, will laugh you over the fence. Showing up with your step ladder and with your too short of a dick. (too short for heifers)
James Kunstler wrote:
OK, for the LAST freaking time: Eric Cantor lost his primary election PRIMARILY due to his support for unrestricted immigration into the USA. How many freaking times do we, the unemployed or under-employed, have to state this??
-- Paul D. Bain
PaulBain@PObox.com
Neither the "Republican" Party or the "Democrat" Party can admit this.
It goes against their plans to obliterate the USA.
"UNRAVELLING OF THE FEDERAL SYSTEM????"
No, I don't see that.
This is not 1865. We haven't actually had a Federal system in over a century.
Lincoln undid the federal system many years ago......and sowed the seeds of this lawless behemoth that now threatens us.
"Hahaha, my destruction of America is proceeding as planned. Minion! I need H1B visas for our friends in ISIS!"
"Already on it, sir."
I run with the Peak Oiler crowd, but JHK went overboard on this if you ask me.
Heads we lose...
No worries when you have corporations and the guys that run them -like this one! You feel safe!...
Is it possible he isn't a dual citizen of the "Tribe" with a home in Lucerne and Tel Aviv???... I seriously doubt it!
Not only is Western Europe and U.S. the new "third world" model, but you may very well be paying handsomely for that most precious of life sustaining elements worth more than oil, precious metal and "land" combined in the very near future.
@Capt. Nemo: and while on the subject of Nestle: "Nestlé has already announced further patent applications on genetically manipulated yoghurt bacteria as well as genetically modified cocoa and coffee." It's not just the water but also what you'll mix into it. Nestle is truly on the march.
Well.... we stayed in Germany for how many years after we "won".
How do we think we can do this with a bunch of crazy arabs in 8 years and leave......
No, James, I don't blame Obama for pulling out of Iraq or not going in. I blame him for causing the very chaos, in Libya and Syria, that has led to this. Nice try letting him off the hook, you missed the entire point.
The Iraq fiasco already threatens to spike oil prices way beyond the $107 level of today. That will crush whatever remains of the US economy all over again.
Constant theme in JK's writing. But even with rising gas prices, here, I-80 has never been so crowded with cars.
Maybe $200 per barrel ($8 gas?) would get driver's attention.
Kunstler is full of Schlitz when he suggests that Kantor´s defeat was symtomatic of a generalized breakdown. Kantor was defeated for a number of reasons including the perception that he was in favor of an amnesty for illegal immigrants, greater loyalty to Israel than to the US, generalized arrogance, inconsistency of positions (no principles) and neglect of constituants.
RE Kantor - so, a putz then.
Obozo will not be blamed for anything...Ever! Not by the suck-up ass kissing media.
That would be raycist!
"The defeat of Eric Cantor is just the beginning of what could be the unraveling of the federal system" ... Let's hope so!
Please forgive my english not good.I was watching tv when phone rang-"Iraq is kill"..no"
Might as well split this desert ghetto into a bunch of little countries. They can have thousand of them for all I care. Every little town or group of tents can be a separate country. Then they can have religion bind the countries intoa cohesive unit that makes sense. Cause that has worked over time so well.
This was a stupid war which we should have never gotten into. I blame the elder bush for this. Yes the elder one. He should have aborted that mentally deraged GW when he saw the aboration he and his wife had created.
And the Obama? Well he has walked into every mess he could find... So the ones that were presented to him on a stick have mixed well with the ones he earned...
"You can be sure that Obama will be blamed both for pulling out in 2011 and then not going back to war, to protect our two trillion dollar previous investment. "
Anyone care to explain how blowing $2 Trillion ( $3 Trillion? $4 Trillion? ) in Iraq was an 'investment', IF it was/is an 'investment' what the implied rate of return on that investment has been and is projected to be in the years to come, or how much this investment can be sold for now that the market is up nearly 300% from the 666 market bottom?
This is way out americas league. I propose we send in the samurai. They like chopping heads even more than Isis does, are a lot better at it and just generally downright kickass. Theyre experienced in assymetric warfare as theyve dealt with those pesky ninjas before and isis fighters look like ninjas anyway so you don't have to explain anything. Japan seems very keen to flex some military muscle these days...
Go git'em boys!
Suppose, just suppose, all this is INTENTIONAL! TPTB ain't dumb, they are among the best informed. They know when you've been sleeping, and with whom! TPTB are not weak, they can throw the most powerful of weapons into battle, some surreptiously (micro-nukes, think 9-11). The USI (aka USSA) tosses DU into people's lives willy-nilly -- so many battles, so many people to do away with. Vaccines so slow, chemtrails even slower, so it seems. The USofA as I thought I once knew it is going down, taken down, daily, and some insist it's about leadership (no, the captains will head off to South America), some say stupidity (no, the smart ones may be left behind, but after a lifetime of pleasure at our expense). The foreign entanglements, O! the foreign entanglements.
Two thoughts: There is that old rule about the next financial crisis starting at the site of the world's tallest building (a proxy for maximum hubris) which is now Burj Khalifa /Dubai; the trumped up nonsense about Gen. Shinseki and others recently to get independent-minded leadership out of the way. Who, exactly, is in control? where are the grown-ups?
'Cat and dogs living togehter'
What an incoherent rambling of events and a mess of a post. Usuallly his posts are better than this one.
"Shut down Iraqi oil production forever." - Kunsler
Yeah, if months is now considered forever, James
They didn't want Gw Jr's "Democracy" after all?
What a stupid idea that was!
Seriously Tyler? OBAMA WILL BE BLAMED????
LMFAO@Idiocy Blamed By WHOM?
Who in the mainstream Socialist Semite Media has ever blamed the ObowelMovement for anything?
Under Bush. the std. was "it happened on his watch"....where the fuck is that standard today, or for the last 5+ years?
two down arrows? Chalky and the Wook must be online today.
"How perverse is the loose talk of Iran joining forces with “the Great Satan” to support the Shiite-dominated government of Nouri al-Maliki. Prediction: not going to happen. Events are moving so quickly that the ultimate nightmare scenario is at hand: the ISIS penetrates the “Green Zone” surrounding the US embassy in Baghdad. They take hostages and commence systematic decapitations of American personnel. This is not something I would like to happen, mind you. Just saying. And the thought must have loosened a few sphincters down at the US Department of State, too."
Honestly, what difference would it make?
A few less of the current cabal of Progressive, gay, Ivy League sphincters in the State Dept. might well be a good thing.
Kunstler is a known poodle, so no mention of Israel in his diatribe.