Psy-goat
15 Jan 2007, 03:18 AM
R.I.P. USA 1776-20??
Per request of management I am re-posting comments that I had made and deleted the other night about the state of the American Empire in the toughing it out thread (http://forums.intpcentral.com/showthread.php?t=17832). The premise of the thread was that the country was going down the drain and would you jump ship?
I don't mean to bait patriots or inspire anti-American rhetoric, just to provoke thought about how things are, the way they are. The question raised by Plato's Allegory of the cave was this, if you could see things the way they are would you brave the glare of the sunlight or find comfort in the darkness of familiar thoughts? If you haven't read plato the question is red pill, blue pill?
Please discuss
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Things to consider:
1. All roads lead to Rome. Barbarians used these roads to infiltrate Rome and bring down her power. Think Al Gore's Internet
2. The movie Syriana, inspired by a disaffected CIA operative Bob Behr. The movie cites a figure that the US represents 50% of all military spending, a character states that when a country spends this much money on weapons her powers of persuasion are in decline.
3. Is America the new Rome? People value wealth and power, the country's elites are the military and the business class to the exclusion of all else!!! The fundamentalists were weirdo catamites who allowed this administration to gain power for cheap, sycophantic lip service. People with enormous amounts of wealth live lives completely seperated from ordinary people. They have their own laws, transportation, zip codes and police.
4. Lee Kwan Yew, former PM of Singapore speaks of Chinas rise as happening over 50 years, will the worlds resources last that long? Will we be able to breathe if they are building 10 coal fired power plants every month? Where will China get her food from if she continues to despoil her own soil and waters with industrial pollution?
5. The reason Bob Behr was disaffected was that he saw the intelligence services of the United States being perverted for the purposes of private interests. Eg Michael Scheuers Imperial Hubris speaks about how the US in Afghanistan co-opted the Tajiks and Azerbaijanis at the expense of the majority Pashtung poplulation. The Pashtung are there to stay, and to probably side with the Taliban. The other ethnic groups are allied with the nations that will supply gas and oil through pipelines that will run through Afghanistan. Do these pipelines make sense? They make sense to particular interests, wouldn't it make sense for the gas and oil to travel east? Oh, sorry, India and China are enemies er competitors for use of hydrocarbons.
Saddam drained the lands of the Marsh Arabs, Shi'ite settlers. There is a theory out there that the goal of the invasion of Iraq was not just oil that had not been fully exploited for fifteen years, but that the fresh waters of the Tigris and Euphrates would supply all of the middle east including Israel, Jordan etc etc etc. Control the water and you control the region.
Who are your collaborators going to be? Shi'a? They might want their water back. They might find their interests are better served by an alliance with Iran, they are more like them, they would find a common enemy in the Baathist Sunni. The Kurds are most likely to destablize Turkey, what the fuck were you thinking George?
6. US supremacy is based on a ten year advantage in military technology. Her assets are intellectual property rights, eg pharmaceutical, engineering, entertainment. Rights not altogether respected the world over, ever download a song? Nature abhors a vacuum, wealth, power, knowledge will spread throughout the world whether the US controls it or not.
7. The fall of the Berlin Wall was supposed to mark an end to world terror, not the beginning. The ancien regime had lost an old foe and a raison d'etre. The CIA and american intelligence was now devoted to economic espionage. Power corrupts and absolute power corrupts absolutely. Latin America is particularly sensitive to American economic clout, read 'Confessions of an Economic Hit Man' by john perkins. Think it is a coinky dink that the world bank is headed by the former undersecretary of defense and PNAC honcho Paul Wolfowitz? American banks that make stupid loans to foreign countries need to be bailed out by a forgiving power structure. Talk about corporate welfare bums! Talk about plundering the worlds resources.
8. Politics makes strange bedfellows. The US may be the pre-eminent single nation out there, but alliances will arise to challenge her hegemony. Why the fuss over France and Iraq? France, Russia and Germany as an alliance is viable, according to Chalmers Johnson's Sorrows of Empire. Imagine Russian resources, German technology and French catering going up against Texas oil, Ford Pintos and the Big Mac. Whose side do you want to be on?
9. 400 years ago the civilizations of the world were fairly equal in technological and material progess. Do we need technology? I'm all for clean water and sewerage to take dirty water away, but do we 'need' HDTV, gameboys, internet, 300hp automobiles and fast food? Certainly they might be important for young persons who are establishing themselves in the world, but would a 70 year old value them? Isn't he more likely to say that the quality of his life was affected by his connection to a parent, a spouse or child, a neighbour, or nature itself?
Knock yourself out, live for the opiate of nationalism, identify with your country. I'm all for people contributing to the community that they live in. I am sickened when people let soporific statements awaken their inner 'F', watch out for the onslaught of Jingoism. I think that we are living in times similar to that of the British empire of the mid 1800's.
Don't F yourself people!
Per request of management I am re-posting comments that I had made and deleted the other night about the state of the American Empire in the toughing it out thread (http://forums.intpcentral.com/showthread.php?t=17832). The premise of the thread was that the country was going down the drain and would you jump ship?
I don't mean to bait patriots or inspire anti-American rhetoric, just to provoke thought about how things are, the way they are. The question raised by Plato's Allegory of the cave was this, if you could see things the way they are would you brave the glare of the sunlight or find comfort in the darkness of familiar thoughts? If you haven't read plato the question is red pill, blue pill?
Please discuss
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Things to consider:
1. All roads lead to Rome. Barbarians used these roads to infiltrate Rome and bring down her power. Think Al Gore's Internet
2. The movie Syriana, inspired by a disaffected CIA operative Bob Behr. The movie cites a figure that the US represents 50% of all military spending, a character states that when a country spends this much money on weapons her powers of persuasion are in decline.
3. Is America the new Rome? People value wealth and power, the country's elites are the military and the business class to the exclusion of all else!!! The fundamentalists were weirdo catamites who allowed this administration to gain power for cheap, sycophantic lip service. People with enormous amounts of wealth live lives completely seperated from ordinary people. They have their own laws, transportation, zip codes and police.
4. Lee Kwan Yew, former PM of Singapore speaks of Chinas rise as happening over 50 years, will the worlds resources last that long? Will we be able to breathe if they are building 10 coal fired power plants every month? Where will China get her food from if she continues to despoil her own soil and waters with industrial pollution?
5. The reason Bob Behr was disaffected was that he saw the intelligence services of the United States being perverted for the purposes of private interests. Eg Michael Scheuers Imperial Hubris speaks about how the US in Afghanistan co-opted the Tajiks and Azerbaijanis at the expense of the majority Pashtung poplulation. The Pashtung are there to stay, and to probably side with the Taliban. The other ethnic groups are allied with the nations that will supply gas and oil through pipelines that will run through Afghanistan. Do these pipelines make sense? They make sense to particular interests, wouldn't it make sense for the gas and oil to travel east? Oh, sorry, India and China are enemies er competitors for use of hydrocarbons.
Saddam drained the lands of the Marsh Arabs, Shi'ite settlers. There is a theory out there that the goal of the invasion of Iraq was not just oil that had not been fully exploited for fifteen years, but that the fresh waters of the Tigris and Euphrates would supply all of the middle east including Israel, Jordan etc etc etc. Control the water and you control the region.
Who are your collaborators going to be? Shi'a? They might want their water back. They might find their interests are better served by an alliance with Iran, they are more like them, they would find a common enemy in the Baathist Sunni. The Kurds are most likely to destablize Turkey, what the fuck were you thinking George?
6. US supremacy is based on a ten year advantage in military technology. Her assets are intellectual property rights, eg pharmaceutical, engineering, entertainment. Rights not altogether respected the world over, ever download a song? Nature abhors a vacuum, wealth, power, knowledge will spread throughout the world whether the US controls it or not.
7. The fall of the Berlin Wall was supposed to mark an end to world terror, not the beginning. The ancien regime had lost an old foe and a raison d'etre. The CIA and american intelligence was now devoted to economic espionage. Power corrupts and absolute power corrupts absolutely. Latin America is particularly sensitive to American economic clout, read 'Confessions of an Economic Hit Man' by john perkins. Think it is a coinky dink that the world bank is headed by the former undersecretary of defense and PNAC honcho Paul Wolfowitz? American banks that make stupid loans to foreign countries need to be bailed out by a forgiving power structure. Talk about corporate welfare bums! Talk about plundering the worlds resources.
8. Politics makes strange bedfellows. The US may be the pre-eminent single nation out there, but alliances will arise to challenge her hegemony. Why the fuss over France and Iraq? France, Russia and Germany as an alliance is viable, according to Chalmers Johnson's Sorrows of Empire. Imagine Russian resources, German technology and French catering going up against Texas oil, Ford Pintos and the Big Mac. Whose side do you want to be on?
9. 400 years ago the civilizations of the world were fairly equal in technological and material progess. Do we need technology? I'm all for clean water and sewerage to take dirty water away, but do we 'need' HDTV, gameboys, internet, 300hp automobiles and fast food? Certainly they might be important for young persons who are establishing themselves in the world, but would a 70 year old value them? Isn't he more likely to say that the quality of his life was affected by his connection to a parent, a spouse or child, a neighbour, or nature itself?
Knock yourself out, live for the opiate of nationalism, identify with your country. I'm all for people contributing to the community that they live in. I am sickened when people let soporific statements awaken their inner 'F', watch out for the onslaught of Jingoism. I think that we are living in times similar to that of the British empire of the mid 1800's.
Don't F yourself people!