Zionist Halloween

David Salzer Broder, the highly respected, Pulitzer Prize, Pundit on the OpEd board of the Washington Post has decided to ring in Halloween with a sorcerer’s call for “confrontation” against Iran. The witches’ brew of Broder’s argument goes like this:

1. To get reelected in 2012, Obama must get the economy moving again (i.e., “harness the forces that might spur new growth”).

2. No human being can do anything to accelerate the immutable “tidal force” of the “business cycle” (i.e., the invisible hand of that “market magic” that governs our lives like some remote and impersonal god).

3. But there is one other thing that “might affect the economy” and that thing is “war”. After all, it was World War II, that “finally resolved” the Great Depression.

4. Therefore if he wants to get reelected, Obama should prepare for war against Iran because “as tensions rise and we accelerate preparations for war, the economy will improve.”

If Broder truly swallows his own bubbling concoction of sophistries, he needs to locked up in a sanatorium as a demented, dangerous psycopath.

In fact even if Broder does not swallow his own fetid brew he needs to be locked up as a demented, dangerous psycopath for once again doing Israel’s dirty work of poisoning the public well.

The Washington Post has long provided pulp for Washington’s coven of think-tank experts and press pundits agitating on Israel’s behalf. What David Broder is stirring up is simply more of the same ol’ tired Zionist swill for war against an Iran whom Broder labels --- without an iota of explanation or argument -- as “the greatest threat to the world”... The one which now replaces that former greatest threat to the world which replaced the one before that came after the one that came before.... But we digress.

Let us deconstruct Broder’s Brew

“I am not suggesting,” Broder intones piously, “that the president incite a war to get elected.” Oh nooooo. Far be it from Broder to do such an “awful and frightening” thing. Noooo. Noooo. BUT

“[C]hallenging Iran’s ambition” and “orchestrating a showdown with the mullahs” will:

a. “help” Obama “politically” because the GOP will have to support him.

b. “And, as tensions rise and we accelerate preparations for war, the economy will improve.”

Anyone can see that being helped “politically” has nothing to do with the stated issue of reviving the economy. Item “a” is thrown into the stew as a polemical “extra benefit” to Obama. More importantly, this irrelevant extra goodie occupies the space where the middle premise normally appears and thus conveniently obscures the fact that Broder’s economic “argument” boils down to: “Orchestrating a showdown” will improve the economy because “as tensions rise” the economy will improve.

Such a logical tour de force is truly awesome! A more exquisite petitio principii can hardly be imagined! A tethered ox could not trod a more perfect circle!

To wrap it all up, Broder concludes with the marvelous non sequitur of :

“The nation will rally around Obama because Iran is the greatest threat to the world ... [and] ... if he can confront this threat... he will have made the world safer and may be regarded as one of the most successful presidents in history.”

In other words, the Q.E.D. of it all has nothing to do with economics but is all a question of “rallying” the nation and being hailed as a hero in the saecula saeculorum of history.

The sum and substance? David S. Broder is incapable of anything resembling an argument and simply throws anything into the bubbling pot in order to urge a confrontation with Iran.

But let it be granted that, being a paid political cackler, Broder isn't very good at a passably cogent sequence of thought; and, Broder's inarticulateness aside, let us analyze the claim on its merits that "accelarating preparations for war" will improve the economy. No sane or decent person would make such an “argument”.  Ever.

Saying that war resolved the Great Depression is a highly dubious proposition. That global catastrophe left only two nations in the entire world standing: the United States and Argentina. Argentina held maybe 3% of the world gold reserves (there were so many bars that they were stacked in the Ministry’s corridors); the United States held the remainder. In addition, the United States had the only factories, railways, roads and vessels that weren’t bombed, blasted, sunk or otherwise destroyed. (Argentina had the cows.) In this sense, and at the cost of a mere 60 million lives around the world, the U.S.A. was left economically triumphant and could dictate terms to everyone else to its own benefit -- which is what we did.

That situation did not improve the economy so much a it destroyed the competition and left the victor with a huge hoard of plunder. Serious historians (and this excludes cackling harpies like Broder) understand that the underlying issue of the World War was economic hegemony: who would amass control of what regions’ gold and resources to the detriment and loss of whom else. If Broder is arguing for this type of “economic growth” a warrant for his arrest needs to be issued forthwith so that he may be arraigned before the International Court in the Hague and tried on counts of inciting genocide, crimes against humanity and war. Yes.... Broder’s little brew is a crime under European law.

If Broder means that the process of manufacturing tanks and bombs and boots and tons of tins of spam is what “got the economy going again” -- that too is a dubious proposition because while it certainly made capitalist cash registers jingle, it did so by running up a stratospheric public debt... a public debt that was only balanced by the fact that we could get the rest of the world to pay off huge junks of it because, as just stated, we were left as the sole standing top dog.

But let us indulge further and let it be supposed that a “war economy” gets things booming by creating jobs in munitions, shoe and spam factories and by running up orders for the slaughter of millions of pigs to be hashed up into tins. Every economist who has studied this issue knows that this process is a “junk recovery” much like the spam is the junk food the process produces. This type of recovery benefits what used to be called “war profiteers” but it benefits no one else. Instead of creating anything that can be further capitalized, it creates a mountain of destructibles -- stuff that gets blown up, sunk to the bottom of the sea, pulverized. Just as spam or fast food don’t produce anything resembling real nutrition, this type of “economic growth” in fact only leads to further impoverishment.

Has Broder truly forgotten that the "preparations for war" in Vietnam far from making the United States more prosperous bankrupted the prospects for the Great Society?

A simple but basically true observation will illustrate the point. “To he who hath, more shall be given...” and “It takes money to make money” are two proverbs that focus on the same thing: capital creates more capital. But capital is not just money profits. Resources and materials that are put into production are capital, as is the machinery used to process those materials, as are the roads and railroads that are used to transports the goods, as are the schools and books that are used to produce an intelligent work force. An economy that produces serviceable things that can be used to create more serviceable things is an economy that truly grows because it is always producing more useable forms of capital. An economy that produces bombs that get blown up, basically wastes capital in order to produce a mere monetary profit for a few.

Thus, even on its own terms Broder’s argument is economically obscene. What he is palavering for is to “stimulate” the economy by throwing more money at the military industrial complex and the excuse for doing so is saber rattling against Iran.

The “defense budget” of the United States already exceeds the defense budgets of all other nations in the world combined. A HUGE amount of public treasure is already spent on defense procurement, research and development. And still the economy is in the tank. How is throwing yet more money at this devouring gargantuan monster going to “create good paying jobs” for the 20 million unemployed. It isn’t. Nor will it solve the problems of liquidity and what is now being called “foreclosuregate”.

Broder’s argument is unworthy of an imbecile.

But let us boldly go where no imbecile has gone before. Let it be supposed that we could “revive” the economy by making war-like noises and preparations all “without suggesting of course that the president incite a war to get reelected.”

Noooo! Noooo! Perish the thought. David Salzer Broder is simply recommending a form of economic and diplomatic masturbation that will stop short of actually shooting.

To which one may reply: good luck.

We suggest that Broder, even if it is late in life, engage in some penis practice and when he is finished, come back and re-write the article.

©Barfo, 2010

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The Mudia and the Mud

According to the Associated Press, the White House is now letting it leak that, in expectation of getting trounced in the November elections, Obama "will put greater emphasis on fiscal discipline, a nod to a nation sick of spending and to a Congress poised to become more Republican." ["Obama Likely..."]

As usual, the corporate mudia muddies the issue by not making clear which nation it has in mind. If the mudia means the "corporate nation" then, true enough, any spending on the poor, the unemployed, the sick, the young is just plain profligate! But if by "nation" the AP means the rest of us, the what the "popular nation" is sick of is spending to bail out banks and crooks -- but I repeat myself.

Worse than mudia mudification is Obambi's craven cowardice. A Quisling would have shown more gumption; and, in fact, Palestinian President Abbas has -- which is not saying much. After pre-emptively caving in to the Mitch McConnell and his gang of corporate slime within days of his inaugural and getting roundly kicked in the teeth for doing so, Obambi now says that he must crawl even more abjectly than before licking the boot of the Budget Balancers.

What kind of imbecile could have lived through the Clinton years and be in politics and not know that the Republicans are not interested in consensus. In fact anyone with a smattering acquaintence with America history realizes that they have never, never, ever been interested in reasonable consensus. They are rabid ideologues of corporate selfishness. The only time they ever raise a plaintive, pitiable cry for cooperation is when they are about to get trounced and the instant their opponent gives pause to consider they spring up from their hunched and meek position and stab him in the kidneys. Republicans are a moral and human putresence. How could Obambi not have known that?

If this is what Harvard does to the human brain, parents are advised to Save Their Children by sending them to some junior college which will at least leave their balls alone.

Of course Obambi was already licking the heel of the Social Security Doomsdayers, indicating that he is ever willing to "balance the budget" on the broken back of the old and the infirm, when, that is, he is not balancing it on the shoulders of the young, the jobless, the weak.

If Obama really wants to balance the budget GET OUT OF THE MIDDLE EAST.

If Obama really wants to balance the budget CUT DEFENSE SPENDING.

If Obama really wants to balance the budget TAX THE RICH AT PROGRESSIVE RATES.

If Obama really really really wants to balance the budget he will increase productivity which will generate revenues; and the way to do that is to STOP INCENTIVISING THE EXPORT OF JOB AND CAPITAL OVERSEAS.

Yes, folks, although we at BARFO'S have, the mudia will never tell you ; but American banks and corporations are currently rewarded for shipping production overseas and for NOT reinvesting the profits earned overseas back into the U.S. More and more, everything corporations do they do abroad. The only connection they have with the United States is a shadow office. The Republican claim that tax breaks will create jobs is a brazen cheat. It will create jobs, indeed, OVERSEAS.

What the Democrats need to do is pull the dildo out of their asses and start marching with determined fearlessness to the left in order to put some social sanity back into the country's political economy while there still is something worth being called a "country".

Oh for a party that had the courage to say: "We will march into the marble halls of Congress, bringing with us the revolutionary will of the broad masses from which we came, called by fate and forming fate. We do not want to join this pile of manure. We are coming to shovel it out!

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A Large Investment into Britains Future

In addition the Chancellor of the Exchequer announced the lay-off of 500,000 paid government workers and drastic cuts to social services, pensions, and local council subsidies. Chancellor George Osborne said the cuts were needed to promote sanity, fairness and growth. "It is a hard road, but it leads to a better future," Mr. Osborne said.

Bravoh ol' Boy
Osborne getting the Pat Pat from PM

The Difference an Ocean Makes

The news from France shows what a stiff mid-section can do. Since September, French workers have been on intermittent strikes in protest against President Sarkozy's austerity reforms.

Like pro-bank, pro-corporate, pro-fat cat politicians anywhere, Sarkozy has been warning and whining of the need to cut back on worker living standards in order to protect the "national" (i.e. corporate) balance sheet.

Compared to the draconian cut-backs in Greece and the seldom mentioned IMF devastation imposed on Lithuanian society, Sarkozy's proposal to increase the retirement age by two years seems small beer. But the French worker is quick to taste the vinegar in wine. The International Monetary Order (aka IMF) is out to fatten up something called "trade" on the backs of the actual working people who produce the goods and services traded. The French worker is taking a stand.

At the beginning of September 1.2 to 2.7 million workers throughout the country went on strike. On 23 September and again on 2 October 1 to 3 million. On 12 October an estimated 1.2 - 3.5 million filled the streets.

Not unexpectedly the whores in the French National Assembly voted the Sarkozy line notwithstanding this outpouring of popular discontent. The response of the French worker since Saturday (16 October) has been to go on Stike Plus: they have barricaded petrol stations and shut down the country's oil refineries.

Oil is to countries what blood is to humans, and the Workers Tourniquette has put the squeeze on the Elysée Palace.

It remains to be seen what the government will do. To date, it is treading cautiously, warning its own forces of repression (the police) not to provoke anything. This has nothing to do with humanitarian sentiment, a quality lacking in most governments and certainly not one of Sarko's salient characteristics, as was amply demonstrated by his violent response to the unrest in immigrant housing projects and, more recently, in his Reich-like deportation of gypsies.

No-- the government is treading lightly because the polls show that 70% of the French people continue to support the strike action. The government is sitting on the proverbial tinderbox -- or, perhaps more acurately, doesn't know that it isn't.

This is an astonishing figure. There can be no doubt that the strikes have inconvenienced the rest of the French population; and yet despite that, the people still support the strike.

What a difference an ocean makes! The French are not afraid of revolution. They know that revolutions are at times the only way to rectify organized injustice and that, despite the temporary pain, society survives and improves.

It is a canard that revolutions leave things worse off than before or that they do not change anything. Revolutions can never change human nature; but while they usually fall short of their highest goals, they just as usually do result in corrective change. For a people that have the courage, stand up for their own interests the gains are worth the risk.

It remains to be seen what the denouement will be. Much depends on whether the 70% holds. The government will do everything it can divide the people before marginalizing "disruptive radicals" and, it must be said, governments have a good record at doing precisely that.

But the contrast remains. Americans like nothing more than thumping their guts and sneering at the supposedly "cowardly" and "effete" French; and yet, when successive state and federal governments propose cut backs to social security, medicare and social services, make college education a road to debt peonage, allow illness to become the road to bankruptcy and plunder the country by shipping jobs overseas and rewarding corporations for investing their capital in foreign countries, the response of the American so-called "middle class" is so enfeebled as to make Calvin Coolidge look like an activist.

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Democracy In Action

Without warning, GAP, the San Francisco-based clothing chain, changed its logo from white-on-blue letters to blue on blue letters within a white square. The company, which has a Facebook Following of 700,000 received an immediate negative feedback from its customer base.

Thoroughly chastened, GAP put the old logo back. "We've heard loud and clear that you don't like the new logo. We've learned a lot from the feedback. We only want what's best for the brand and our customers," the company said.

Fans were relieved; said one: "Thanks for listening. The blue box logo is truly classic. We love it as it is."

Democracy is at least as alive in America as it was in Byzantium where the wrong preference for an icon was enough to cause a riot in the stadium and the fall of the government.

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A Life to Mull Over False Oaths

In the news, Faisal Shahzad, the Pakistani born American citizen who pled guilty to attempted car-bombing in Times Square, was sentenced today to life in prison without parole. In imposing sentence U.S. District Judge Miriam Goldman Cedarbaum said "I do hope you will spend some of the time in prison thinking carefully about whether the Quran wants you to kill lots of people." Shazad replied, the "Quran gives us the right to defend. And that's all I'm doing, " adding "We do not accept your democracy or your freedom because we already have Sharia law and freedom." Judge Cederbaum cut him short to ask if he had sworn allegiance to the United States when he became a citizen last year.

"I did swear but I did not mean it," said Shahzad.

"So you took a false oath," the judge told him.

Torquemada, wherever he is, must certainly have managed a smile.

But it is not likely Shazad will mull over anything very concrete for long. As a "terrorist" he will no doubt be subject to a Super Max regimen. For those who have no idea what the United States does to convicted "terrorists" suffice to say that it boils down to being locked in a white box 24/7/365. As one defense attorney has put it, "Within a year they become living mushrooms"

There is no reason under Heaven for such sadism. The official justification is that as "potential terorrists" these convicts need to be guarded extra heavily. The problem lies in the "potential". What potential does a person behind several layers of barbed wire, concrete walls and steel bars have of committing further social harm? None. Zero. Zip. An ordinary lock and key will suffice quite well.

No. The Super Max regimen is simply institutionalized sadism of the vilest sort. It is extremely painful to be isolated from human contact, to feel yourself loosing grip as you fall into repeating loops of your own fantasy until, tired of hearing yourself, you become deaf to yourself and turn into a mushroom.

The Government can certainly be expected to punish criminals of various sorts and to take steps to protect the nation and the public from further harm. We have no quarrel with that principle. But no government has the right to engage in cruelty and governments that do are at the end of their historical cycle.

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A Map is Worth 1000 Words

For years Barfo has implored the U.S. mudia to print a map of Jewish settlements in the West Bank. We must have sent at least 10 chips to the Public Bullshit System's News Hour alone. Back in the 1990's when the Washington Post and the New York Times were blaring away that Arafat had "rejected" Israel's "magnanimous" offer neither of those august organs of disinformation bothered with a MAP. Of course, maps were available. They were just not made available to the American public.... all the more to keep it stupidly in Israel's corner.

Today the headlines from Palestine were much the same as always. Quoth the NY Times,

Palestinian Leaders Urge End to

 Talks With Israel

In an article by Ethan Bronner and Mark Lander it was explained to the rest of us that once again them stiff necked Arabs were refusing to speak to Israel... to an Israel that plaintively just wanted to talk.... for the sake of peace... and to talk some more... and some more

BBC also carried the story that the Palestinian were refusing to talk unless Israel ceased building settlements while the talks went on... and on... But lo and behold -- mirabilis dictu -- BBC also published a MAP:

Makes all the difference in the world, don't it?

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Rahm Emmanual Leaves White House for Greener Pastures

Nice Tie Rahm......

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