The Ugly American Visits The UN

To be fair, he was just doing his job... just going through a script that was no doubt fully vetted and written for him...

To be unfair, he was perpetuating a myth... a pack of lies... presenting the UN as an unyielding champion of human rights... as this great organization that only exists to do good in the world...

The "he" I am speaking of was the poor Italian chap who had the utter misfortune of being my tour guide around the UN in Vienna this morning... he was handsome, fluent in several languages, and engaging... I looked forward to his presentation...

My assault began quickly... he took us into a large circular room that contained all of the flags of the 192 member states of the UN... he pointed out the various flags of the other members in my group and they smiled and took pictures... I, of course, had to be the sand in the Vaseline... I asked where the Kurdish flag was... and the Palestinian one... and the Tamil one... and the Tibetan one...

I watched as the color left his face (oh no, a troublemaker...) and he correctly informed me that these were not actual "countries" and therefore not represented... So I asked him about the UN charter of human rights, in which the preamble states: "The recognition of the inherent dignity and of the equal and inalienable rights of all members of the human family is the foundation of freedom, justice and peace in the world”

His cheeks were now getting rosy...

I asked, are people not represented by an official country undeserving of basic human rights? Who speaks for them? Do Turkey, Iraq and Iran represent the interests of the Kurds? Do the Israelis look out for the Palestinians? China for Tibet? You see, this is where the UN fails... I explained my fierce opinion that ethnic groups with grievances towards their captors deserve a seat at the table... His response was a weak attempt at placating me with some party line nonsense that I don't even care to remember... Instead of really being interested in the basic human rights of the unrepresented, the UN is about as inclusive as an all-white golf cub in Georgia.

Next we waddled over to the UN peacekeepers display... where we were informed about the great success of their mission... having been a UN peacekeeper, this subject was close to my heart...

I asked him about the Srebrenica massacre, where Dutch UN peacekeepers stood idly by while a bunch of blood thirsty Serbs led by war criminal Ratko Mladić slaughtered 8,300 men and boys... I asked if he had read "Shake Hands with the Devil", in which General Romeo Dallaire recounted how the UN left him (due to pressure from the Clinton White House, who were scared of a repeat of Somalia, and France, who supported the Hutus cause, fearing a loss of French influence in Rwanda) and his peacekeepers swinging in the wind as Hutu militia slaughtered nearly 800,000 Tutsis... and what of the continuing failure to prevent genocide or provide assistance in Darfur? And what of the situation in Gaza?

At this point the others in my group were getting a little scared as I may have been foaming at the mouth... but I felt a point had to made... you can't just run around and say the UN is a powerful force for good when it fails miserably at the ONE THING its supposed to do more than anything else... which is protect the lives of the innocent... not to say there haven't been successes... at least they aren't butchering each other in the Balkans... for now...

We took a jaunt over to the IAEA (International Atomic Energy Agency) where he told of the UN's aims to stop the spread of nuclear weapons via the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty. There are currently 189 countries party to the treaty, five of which have nuclear weapons: United States, United Kingdom, France, Russia, and China (the permanent members of the UN Security Council)... all well and good... but when four major nuclear powers, India, Israel, Pakistan and North Korea refuse to sign the treaty then what good is it?

Four out of nine give the UN the finger? Those aren't real good odds when you are talking about the atomic bomb.

On a side note, at least India, Pakistan and North Korea openly admit to having the bomb... while Israel chooses the time honored strategy of "don't ask, don't tell". Even Iran played along and signed the damn thing, not that they'll actually have to abide by it... because the UN is all smoke and no fire...

We took a look at Dr. Mohamed ElBaradei's Nobel Peace medal... you know... the one he was awarded for stopping the US from pre-emptively invading Iraq because they had "nucular" weapons... oops... wrong again...

It went on and on... over to the IMF (International Monetary Fund) where we were told how they manage the global economy and lend money to the poor... at this point my ears were bleeding profusely...

Really? Manage the global economy? Ask Argentina how that worked out in 2001... Or ask the Icelanders how that is working out for them right about now... Ask the rest of us the same question a year from now... If by "managing" you mean "stealing, grifting and manipulating" well then, you are correct sir...

And the lending of money to poorer countries? Fucking hilarious... if by "lending" you mean "forcing" third world governments to take on loans they can never repay so that richer nations may rape their natural resources for pennies on the dollar... Its all in how you define things I guess...

As far as I am concerned the IMF is nothing more than the mafia in a bunny suit...

On to the outer-space display... making it safe for banking and marketing interests to follow our every move and buying habits via satellite... due to the RFID chips implanted in our passports, credit cards and driver's licenses... Gee... I loved being tracked like inventory... or livestock...

Over to the "War on Drugs" display... where he proudly told us of the UN's effort to rid Afghanistan of heroin production... I then proudly told him that the US Army made devil deals with poppy growing Afghan warlords... "You make nice, we leave you alone... see no, hear no..."

At this point I was seething... The poor Italian kid was rather flummoxed and worse yet, didn't seem to know what the hell I was roaring about... Surely this couldn't be true... he worked for the UN after all... he had the proper ID, the nice black suit; he was educated and spoke several languages...

And then it occurred to me... he was just another wheel in the machine... much in the same way I was when I was in the military... before I became an annoying, enlightened, wannabe "illuminati"... I shook his hand and gave him a tip... he was a good kid and did his best...

Let me finish by saying that I actually do believe the UN could be a force for good if it actually followed its charter and behaved in a ethical and moral fashion... I'd be in favor of a much stronger and more inclusive UN, not rigged towards Western banking interests... but then again, I'm naive...

Maybe I'll tour OPEC tomorrow... kick over a shithouse or two over there...

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The Great Carpocalypse

One can't help but notice the difference in how Washington treats Wall Street in comparison to Main Street. The Fed and the Treasury donate great gobs of money in order to rescue failed financial institutions with no strings attached... while the auto industry (you know... people who make things instead of steal things...) has to make concessions and put on a dog and pony show just to borrow a paltry $14 billion... is it me or does something seem out of order here?

In September Fed Chairman Ben Bernanke and Treasury Secretary (and Goldman-Sachs shill) Hank Paulson went boogedy-boo and spooked Congress into approving somewhere in the ballpark of $8.5 trillion in virtual money for their pals in the "banking" industry... To get this bailout they relied on the tried and true All-American traditions of extortion, threats, and bald-faced lies...

Benny and Hank pulled off this heist (let's call it what it is...) while cunningly shunning any possibility of oversight, claiming immunity from any future prosecution, and illegally altering tax law without anyone's knowledge or approval... Most of the money, about $5.5 trillion, comes from the Federal Reserve, which as an independent entity does not need congressional approval to lend money to banks or, in "unusual and exigent circumstances," to other financial institutions. In other words since they get to print it, they also get to decide where it goes, who gets it and who (which would be you and me...) pays for it in the end...

And now we have the Big 3 auto makers... GM, Chrysler (and to a lesser extent Ford), all banging their gold plated tin cups on the table, begging for a measly $14 billion bailout (in relative terms) so they can stay in the business of building cars no one wants...

Last Friday, Republican senators were successful in making sure the Big 3 were denied their auto bailout legislation, on the basis that it didn't provide enough oversight of the ailing companies and could end up being a huge waste of taxpayer money.

Oh really?

So it was the lack of oversight that got them religion... and concern over wasted money?

Where the hell were Republican Senators McConnell, Shelby and Corker during the $8.5 trillion bank bailout? Am I supposed to assume that the OTC derivative disaster is all cleaned up and that the banks have a plan for solvency? Absolute bullshit. (And isn't it interesting that Senators McConnell, Shelby and Corker all come from states which subsidize foreign auto makers... hmmm... and yet, they refuse to assist the domestic auto makers... who are their direct competition... surely that has nothing to do with their militant stance on this... surely not...)

It smacks of vicious irony that Congress appropriates hundreds of billions of dollars with lightning speed and no questions asked to banks whose greed and criminality destroyed the global economy while holding a carrot and stick over the heads of a major industry brought to its knees by this financial armageddon.

Understand this brilliant logic... they are deeply concerned over $14 billion, but not at all worried about $8.5 trillion... Well kids, that gives a whole new meaning to that tired old phrase "penny wise and dollar foolish"...

I am against bailouts in principle... in a free market economy, businesses should be allowed to prosper or fail based upon their ability to compete... but we don't have (nor have we ever had) a free market economy... we have a rigged ponzi scheme and in the spirit of fairness (HA!) if the ruling classes are going to get bailed out, then the same should apply to people who actually work for a living...

Hell, what do they care? Its all just pixel money anyhow... it came from nowhere and that is exactly where it is going... just numbers that are transferred from bank to bank, akin to a swirling death matrix bent on devouring itself...

C'mon... why not let us all go down in blaze of diabetic coma induced glory... give every man, woman and child a million dollars and let the chaos of mass consumption savagely reign upon every culturally devoid hellhole of a shopping mall across this great busted land...

You got a better idea? Yeah? I didn't think so...

Ok... back to reality...

Let us take a look at the numbers to get a better perspective of what is actually on the table... First of all, $14 billion is a mere 2% of the $700 bailout TARP fund we've given to banks... but wait, it gets worse... that $700 billion is less than one tenth of the $8.5 TRILLION already committed to financial rescue initiatives...

So... Just how much money is $8.5 trillion? Well, its damn near 60 percent of the estimated gross domestic product of the United States of America.

Current Score: Wall Street $8.5 trillion, Detroit $0
(Looks as if the Lions aren't the only losers in the Motor City...)

It is important to note that as with anything involving governments and spending, the true cost to taxpayers will likely be far greater than what appears on the current ledger. Given the unprecedented size and complexity of these programs and the fact that many have never been tried before, it's impossible to predict how much they will cost taxpayers. The final tally won't be known until most of us are pushing up daisies... but our great grandkids will know, that is for damn sure... and they'll be cursing our names...

Jim Rogers (one of the world's most brilliant investors) says that US banks are flat busted. Jim Rogers knows his shit. This is nothing more than don't ask, don't tell economics, as the balance sheets of these troubled banks are nothing but pure fantasy. Where is the oversight when it comes to the banks, who are the ones responsible for this entire mess? And let's not forget that it was the Republicans' lack of oversight in the financial sector that led to the disastrous economic conditions beyond the control of the automakers... As credit and jobs vanished, so did car sales.

Not that I mind conditions for loaning money... One can't deny that the Big 3 have been severely derelict in modernizing their designs and business practices. You could demand that Detroit design and sell vehicles that reduce our dependency on foreign oil. You could demand that the management be given a pink slip. You could demand that they design and build light rail and other green friendly modes of mass transit...

But nooooooooooo... According to the Republican senators, the failure of the entire auto industry was due to organized labor... Their sole demand was a $20 an hour cut in union wages, pension and health care.

Might I ask what concessions they demanded from the Wall Street bankers? Or did the Republican wing of the senate force concessions from low level bank tellers before approving the wholesale giveaway of our economic future? I presume when the airlines come for their handouts (trust me, it's coming) the flight attendants will take the fall for that industry's failure...

Using that logic, the failure of the Iraq war should be blamed on the lower enlisted troops and not the idiots at the Pentagon... perhaps the Republicans would like the soldiers to take a pay cut as well...

Hey, shit rolls downhill, right?

This should be seen for what it is... as nothing more than a concerted effort by the Republicans to destroy the UAW, one of he last bastions of organized labor in this country... so incensed are they with the working middle class that they have chosen to throw them out into the street...

Do the Republican Senators understand that if they deny assistance to Detroit, millions more jobs will be lost? The short answer is yes... and you want to know why?

Because the sinking of the domestic auto industry will saddle Obama with an even more catastrophic economy, one that will tank his administration the minute he takes his oath (Sorry to be a bummer, but he's pretty much screwed as it is...) Understand that we are in the midst of a class war here... there will be no grace period, no honeymoon, no spirit of bipartisanship with the Obama presidency. The Republican wing of the senate are doing everything in their power to make certain that Obama starts his presidency in reverse, with four flat tires, a blown engine and a Denver boot on each wheel.

Even Dick Cheney emerged from his undisclosed tomb to state that if the auto bailout doesn't get done it's Herbert Hoover time for the Republican party... the Bush Administration does not want this whole thing to go to shit on their watch... It is quite obvious that the Republican Congress has cut themselves off from their "great" Oxford ducking leader and gone rogue... These idiots are so full of loathing that they are blinded to the consequences of their actions. If the Republican senators hang the northern industrial states out to dry they can say goodbye to any support for at least a generation... or two...

These guys hate unions with a passion... they hate everything unions stand for... fair wages, health care, workplace safety, pensions, affirmative action and the fact that the unions overwhelmingly supported Barack Obama for president.

Here is an idea... Do you really want to get rid of unions? Then fucking pay people a decent living wage in a safe environment... treat them with respect... had management initially done that, no one would have ever had a reason to start a union in the first place...

If it wasn't for unions we'd still have 12-year-olds working 70-hour weeks in filthy and dangerous dirt floor factories for a dollar a day... like in Pakistan...

But then again, perhaps that is the right wing establishment's goal...

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