Foucauldian:  I do not understand your question.  If this site still has a functioning Private Messsage function, please send me one explaining what you want.

Moon, could you leave me with an URL or something. 
You provided one earlier, but I misplaced it.

I’ll be leaving, then ,too—as Facebook is so secure that a US government agent posted a scan of the photo page of MY US passport on my wall—only a US government agent could have done that as since I picked up the passport in Dec. of 2007 it has only been out of my possession when I have had it stamped entering the US or other countries.

If that’s the case, count me out too.  It’s difficult,
however, to believe it’s anything other than TD
succumbing to the usual, commercial or other
pressures.  No great loss anyway, since the quality of
discussion of late was quickly approximating the
boring and the tedious.

INHERENT THE WIND… SORRY TO SEE YOU GO…

Dear Fellow TD Posters:

I recently received an eMail from TD containing the follow two disturbing bits of information:

“With the new system, instead of logging in to your Truthdig account, you’ll see the option to log in and post comments using Facebook, Yahoo!, AOL or Hotmail. If you already have an account with one of these services, you won’t need to create a new login; and if you don’t have one, you can sign up for free.”

“You will not be able to use your current Truthdig account to post comments in the new system. We hoped to avoid this inconvenience, but could not find an alternative compatible with our site architecture. (We actually tried and failed to build a custom comments engine for this reason alone.) Once we get the new feature in place, you’ll need to use one of the aforementioned services to log in and comment. Remember you can create a pseudonym account if anonymity is important to you. We plan to preserve all comment archives, so you don’t need to worry about losing anything you previously wrote.”

When I first started using the Internet many years ago, I used Compuserve, a competitor to AOL. During that time, AOL was twice caught with their pants down selling subscribers’ private and personal information to advertisers without permission.  Both times AOL promised to clean up their act but have been caught again repeating this over the years.  The day AOL purchased Compuserve I cancelled my Compuserve account.

FaceBook has become notorious for violating subscribers’ privacy, promising to make it “better” yet somehow they always have leaks.  I would not be surprised if FB had an engine to locate where anonymous accounts come from and can then tag them to real names.  I learned the hard way a few years ago that even amateur website managers can tag an anonymous account to you. Do not be reassured that your anonymity can be preserved against the likes of FaceBook, Yahoo!, and AOL.  It cannot.

Therefore, I am leaving Truthdig until such time as they change this policy.  It has been fun!

I suspect some will regret my leaving, others will cheer.  So be it!

I wish you all the best,
ITH

Glad you finally admitted it.

Sorry, piecework peon, but I don’t have time to justify your posting any more 2 bits a post belches and farts to invoice you US government employer.

I am outa here for the day.

yeah moonie, that’s just what I’m saying….I’m aghast at non-white people in
power ‘cause it’s like blasphemous and all…..

that’s what we’re all about here and you’re not at all just being a fuckhead

And our resident howler also dropped this big steaming pile of hilarity:

“revolution”  isn’t success, Fou…..it’s process and if it doesn’t lead to something
better than capitalism and liberal democracy…ot’s nothing much.

In the thrid quater of the 18th century a bunch of disgruntled white guys in some British colonies in this hemisphere didn’t want to pay taxed to the king anymore so they called for a “revolution”.

They waged that revolution by hiring a bunch of poor whites—indentured servants, exptariated convicts and the like—to fight for them, with the promise that once they were “successful” (sic) they would receive a hunting license to go after all the indigenous-held territory west of the Ohio River that the Brits had agreed, under the terms of the treaty that ended the mis-named French and Indian Wars, would not be up for grabs.

That revolution managed to “succeed” in installing the rogue state of Gringolandia—which was capialist but NOT even a liberal democrcay, as the majority of the folks living in Gringolandia had no rights—poor whits with no land, blacks, indigenous folks and women.

That rogue state has always been nothing much—except in the Guinness Race for Greatest Genocidal Regime in History, where it has really shown its colors (sic, as it has only shown one color—white).

Heteronym says non-white leaders are not successful.

Yet of course he presents no criteria for success—only that they aren’t successful because they are not white and not licking the boots of his employers.

That and 5 bucks, hetero, will buy you a reheated cuppa joe.

The non-white leaders you so rabidly and racistly malign have been very successful at staying in power despite hundreds of coup attempts against them, not to mention asssassination attempts and the funding of opposition pols and all of the above with US taxpayers’ money.

Not with hetero’s money, of course—the US government agency he works for only pays him 2 bits a post—that doesn’t add up to a taxable income.

prose, were you being serious

ran has stockpiled far too much 20% refined uranium for any civilian use, and any
uranium taken out of Iran won’t be going to the US, but to Russia or Brazil

Reports suggest that America’s second demand will be the export of Iran’s stockpile of medium-enriched uranium.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-middle-east-17702151

The US may be running out of uranium to fuel its electic generation power plants and nuclear aircraft carriers?

Google ‘Case No. 12-00007-UT’ for more info.

Friday April 13, 2012 12:40

IN THE MATTER OF THE APPLICATION OF PUBLIC SERVICE COMPANY OF NEW MEXICO FOR APPROVAL OF RENEWABLE ENERGY RIDER NO. 36 PURSUANT TO ADVICE NOTICE NO. 439 AND FOR VARIANCES FROM CERTAIN FILING REQUIREMENTS

PUBLIC SERVICE COMPANY OF NEW MEXICO,

Applicant   )

Case No. 12-00007-UT

http://www.prosefights.org/pnmrider/pnmrider.htm#pnmset2

SECOND SET OF INTERROGATORIES

everything we do either stinks or makes noise.

I haven’t suggested it’s anything other than a
process.  But in order to appreciate the value of
stopping the march of capitalism, one must be in the
position to envisage the deleterious aftereffects of
capitalist type of progress (along with the forms of
polity which enable it).

“revolution”  isn’t success, Fou…..it’s process and if it doesn’t lead to something
better than capitalism and liberal democracy…ot’s nothing much.

Stopping capitalist expansion is already a form of
success.  And it’s not a question of enshrining any of
these or future efforts or expecting success from “the
first wave” but of keeping true to the revolutionary
dogma that if and when we fail the first time, we must
try again.

somewhat true, but their value is severely diminished by lack of success. what’s
the real point of an alternative that isn’t as successful?

and it’s further diminished by turning to repression to stifle alternatives to the
alternative

overthrowing the old ugly order is good and necessary, but things have to move
on from the first wave and not stay stuck with enshrining the first failed
replacement.

“On Hugo Chavez and the other “wild card” leaders in
South America. Their comparative success in
capitalist terms is irrelevant. (endangered
species?) They have value as a living alternative in
our politically mono-cropped world, and even if
their socialist populism rhetoric reflects haphazard
implementation, at least it remains an affront to
the creeping corporate fascist feudalism that is
enveloping most of the planet.”

Exactly.  It’s about time to abandon the capitalist
notion of economic success as any kind of model, and
to judge Chavez or Morales in those terms is to be
employing the very categories of economic and
political thought we should be doing our best to
obliterate.

Friday April 13, 2012 06:33

Electricity production, not nuclear weapons, is at issue?

Reports suggest that America’s second demand will be the export of Iran’s stockpile of medium-enriched uranium.

World War III in May?

Speculation is building as to just when the world-ending fighting will begin (if it does, at all). Specifically, there’s a slow clock running on Iran, which is coming into talks on April 23rd with what most experts agree are less than “clean hands” on the matter of weapons development. And backing them up? Well, there’s a worrisome reports that “Russia is massing troops on Iran’s northern border waiting for a Western attack.”

Urban Survival
Thursday April 12, 2012

More here

http://www.prosefights.org/pnmrider/pnmrider.htm#pnmset1

And

Tuesday April 3, 2012 06:00

The US produces only 7% of the uranium it consumes, Byron King reported.

Written material has the problem that it is written by authors. And they cannot be trusted. Especially MSM.

Five new generators are on track for completion this decade, including two reactors approved just a few weeks ago (the first new reactor approvals in the US in over 30 years). Those will add to the 104 reactors that are already in operation around the country and already produce 20% of the nation’s power.
Those reactors will eat up 19,724 tonnes of U3O8 this year, which represents 29% of global uranium demand. If that seems like a large amount, it is! The US produces more nuclear power than any other country on earth, which means it consumes more uranium that any other nation. However, decades of declining domestic production have left the US producing only 4% of the world’s uranium.

With so little homegrown uranium, the United States has to import more than 80% of the uranium it needs to fuel its reactors. Thankfully, for 18 years a deal with Russia has filled that gap. The “Megatons to Megawatts” agreement, whereby Russia downblends highly enriched uranium from nuclear warheads to create reactor fuel, has provided the US with a steady, inexpensive source of uranium since 1993. The problem is that the program is coming to an end next year.

The Upside to a Natural Gas Downturn
Marin Katusa, for The Daily Reckoning
Monday April 2, 2012

To say that public education is all the poorer
because sexism has broken down is to say Walmart is
all the poorer because Ann Romney preferred staying
home to raise 5 boys to a hot digital scanner with
a come-hither light. We moralists tend to stereo-
type our underdogs so that we can’t see how male
teachers are insulted by this pc reasoning.
Whomever occupies the public teaching slots today
is a punching bag for fascists mostly because all
the commons are being fenced (wholesale
privatization to enhance Oligarch’s income stream).

On Hugo Chavez and the other “wild card” leaders in
South America. Their comparative success in capitalist terms
is irrelevant. (endangered species?) They have value as a living
alternative in our politically mono-cropped world,
and even if their socialist populism rhetoric
reflects hap-hazard implementation, at least it
remains an affront to the creeping corporate fascist
feudalism that is enveloping most of the planet.
If a trans-sexual dictator turned California into a pool-party
state with cotton candy money, even that would be
an improvement on the Austerity myth smothering
rationality (even on this page) in contemporary
discourse.

BR:

Ah, another little Foxy Loxie guy who’s unable to find venezuela on a MARKED world map.

Shit, you sure convinced me.

Shut my over-educated elitist wooden INdian mouth….

That close enough to bubba talk for you?

Wow!

I bet you’re gonna convince all those other gringo sockpuppets posting here that YOU and Foxy Loxie News are right—and that Chavez, not Mickey Mouse Bubba, is the Devil!

But your foamcore excrement cuts no ice with this Bolivarian, pipsqueak.  I have been spending a fair amount of time in Venezuela for the past 10 years, and have accumulated enough credibility so that unlike you, who is paid to post bullshit by some low-roller US government agency, I get paid relatively decent money plus airfares, per diem and so forth to present conferences about Venezuela in other countries that want to see if THEY, too, can achieve growth of right around 10% per year for a string of years long enough to pull their folks out of poverty and put them on the global playing field.

Of course you can be Cold War Charlie and say I’m a commie and therefore don’t count—or some other Guillen defamation doggerel.

The facts were posted by me.  They are available to other folks who want to see that there is a credible leader in this hemisphere and are not going to throw a tantrum because that leader ain’t white.

As an economist, hettie, you are not even in diapers.  If you knew anything about growing an economy you’d be growing your own so that you don’t have to post here 24/7 for two bits a post.

If I had any compassion left for hateful little white power patriots, I’d pity you.

But I am fresh outa that.

heterochromatic, April 12 at 4:54 pm

I agree with you on your take about Chavez. At the beginning he was actually showing some promise, but now I just think he’s become part of his own problem, irrespective of our own totally inept foreign policy.

moonie—- say what you will and cite irrelevant stats
based on nothing but the higher price that oil has
fetched….Chavez has failed and the economy of
Venezuela hasn’t advanced as it should have and
healthy growth is lagging behind the that of other SA
countries and isn’t gonna get better.

all that extra money from the oil boom and none of it
was invested in development that would reap future
growth.

the stats from the Venezuelans are not trustworthy,
the currency had to be devalued, the nation is viewed
as one of the 2 or 3 most corrupt in the hemisphere
after Haiti and maybe Uruguay. Chavez’s confiscations
and nationalizations and demonizations means that
he’s not gonna be attracting investment ...except
from the Chinese at horrendous rates.

Venezuela under Chavez started out OK and took a turn
for the absurd…the sooner he and his flunkies are
out, the better. the longer they hang on and continue
to screw up the worse it’‘ll get and might even cause
the next govt to be a right-wing repressive mess as a
reaction to this so-called socialist repressive mess.

you’re seeing with your heart, hon, and not with your
eyes.

mrfreeze:

Hetero just makes up the numbers.

As someone who has lived in Mexico for the past 20 years and regularly reads the newspapers here, I can tell you that approximately 400,000 undocumented Mexicans cross the border looking for work every year.  They are about 55% of the undocumented popoulation that immigrates to the US.

That would mean that the entire total is less than 1 million per year—although there have been years with more than 1 million.

Hetero:

Chavez screwed up the economy of Venezuela, huh?

I suggest you swallow your bile and take a deep breath and then

1.  look at the percentage of growth that Venezuela has accumulated since Chavez became president, and THEN

2.  Look at the percentage of growth that the US has accumulated since 1999.

Sour grapes.

I thought even a troll like you was smarter than that.

I over-rated you!

You are an ignorant, uner-educated and untravelled gringo patriot!

Chavez is expected to win again as the opposition polls—not the government polls—indicate that he will capture 64% of the vote.

I would like you to use your google finger to track down the last US president who won an election with more than 60% of the vote.

But, since you can’t seem to read anything statistical, I’ll help you out here—it was not Reagan in 1984—that was only 58% I think.

I remember it well, it was Nixon in 1972—who grabbed just over 60% and McGovern only won one state—Massacusetts, where I was living and where I voted for him.  The one and only time I voted for the Demopublicans.  We Mass folks all put stickers on our bumpers saying Don’t blame me:  I’m from Massachusetts! 

And within 2 years, Nixon was g o n e.

If Chavez is gone 2 years after October’s election, it wil be because he DIED—not because he was forced to resign.

you’re citing only legal immigration. freeze

low end estimate——

In a 2011 news story, Los Angeles Times reported, “The annual report, relied upon
by both sides in the contentious immigration debate, found 11.2 million illegal
immigrants living in the U.S., statistically identical to the 11.1 million estimated in
2009. .

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Immigration_to_the_United_States

heterochromatic - I did enough poking around after I read your “wing-it” comment (in which you stated 3million immigrants per year) to satisfy my curiosity. I’ll stand by the numbers I gathered.

forgot the link

http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/books/NBK11500/#a2001345eddd00033

freeze—- go look up the numbers….

foreign grad students in US U’s were about 33% and rising until after 9/11 and
hasn’t dropped all that much since…..

BTW in my city, the foreign-born part of the pop is about 35%

heterochromatic - I’ll enlighten you about immigration numbers:

1) If 3 million people immigrate to this country each year, this would mean that in the last decade we’ve absorbed 30 million new people? 10% of the population is composed of new immigrants…..I think not.

2) If you spent a little time looking at the stats from various immigration sites, you’d note that the number on average is more like 800K. Sometimes the number goes up, and the numbers are skewed due to “illegals”(of which there are far fewer since the recession).

3) You haven’t been paying attention to reality. The fact is far more E. Indians and Chinese (the main group of foreigners coming to U.S. universities are staying home to get their higher educations because, low and behold, they are developing their own good university systems. I live here in the Seattle Area where there are far fewer E. Indians attending college these days because it’s simply cheaper to stay home.

kazy=====People are not coming here in droves like they use to. In fact there
has been record breaking exoduses out of America like never before because there
is so little opportunity.====

you want to try showing some support for that assertion. we’re still getting more
than 3,000,000 immigrants annually and those Americans moving abroad sure
aren’t demonstrating to intention not to return by giving up their citizenship and
applying for new citizenships, ASAIK.

please enlighten me.

This decline is no mere accident or quirk in the vagaries of larger scale economics. What the average media viewing sloth fails to comprehend is that this decline has all been scripted. Parts of this script go back to the turn of the last century with J.D. Rockefeller breaking the back of corporate charter restrictions through monopolization and corruption, the adoption of the Militia Act, adoption of the Federal Reserve, and the 17th Amendment taking us ever closer to Federalism by forcing Senate loyalties away from their respective states and toward the federal government. And that’s just for starters.

Then we have the United Nations, that once revered bastion of multinational cooperation, which fed the starving masses, has been
exposed as nothing more than the administrative vehicle for forcing 3rd and 4th world countries to adopt this dysfunctional British model of hegemonic governance and become forever beholden to the World Bank as this cartel of parasitic elites steals those countries’ natural resources to increase the wealth of the already wealthy.

No, this was no mere fluke of economics, yet many Americans’ heads will continue to spin with confusion, wondering where the truth lies in all of today’s chaos, and then go back to watching Dancing with the Stars with a cocktail. If you are confused, it is because the average person, who struggles to make a living, was left out of the informational loop in order to make connecting the necessary dots next to impossible.

I saw this bumper sticker the other day. It read:

I AM:
  ____ Republican

  ____ Democrat

  __X_ Awake

For anyone still thinking that Obama will come through with Hope and Change, get real. And thinking that Romney is going to do any better, the Washington Post is already suggesting that the Bilderberg Group select his Romney’s VP. Oh, and for all you Republican’s who thought Romney was a clean as his freshly starched shirts, he wouldn’t have been allowed to get this far if he wasn’t willing to look the other way as the globalist elites had their way with this country.

I used to think that Jimmy Carter, out of all those slithering slimebags clamoring to get into office, was a nice guy and had a set of convictions ........ until I learned that even his administration was packed with Trilateral Commission members, who were hell bent on using the wealth of the US to gain global dominance and then eviscerate the US, itself, as the UN became the global police force. Any of you proud U.S. Army, Navy, and Marine veterans out there will be seething when they learn that all of the branches of our military will be morphed under UN control and that, under the Trilateral Commission’s objective, the US Constitution, which they all swore to uphold, will be intentionally thrown under the bus.

You wonder why you never hear about Constitution supporting candidates like Ron Paul, Bob Barr, Chuck Baldwin, Lyndon LaRouche, Cynthia McKinney, Mike Gravel, and a host of others? It’s because the media is OWNED by members of the Trilateral Commission and Bilderberg Group and you are only supposed to vote for their select pair of candidates. That is why, over the last 50 years, no matter who got into office, we always went further downhill. The further down we went, the more the voters would become polarized, and since the voters hadn’t figured out the truth of their manipulation, they would continue to blame supporters of the OTHER party for all that was going wrong with this country.

Republican supporters will have their wealth continue to decline and Democrat supporters will continue to lose the benefits they all love so well. You’ve both been had. To use the elites’ own language, they see us as “useless eaters”; their words, not mine.

Predicted….“We have met the enemy and HE is us”. Pogo spaketh a long
time ago.

Hetero,

Yes. - people which represent cultures from every corner of the planet will keep the United States amongst the pinnacle of strength and influence for, at least, the next 100 years.

IMax—- you forgot something pretty important…... we not only continue to have
people enter the country to provide cheap labor, but we also attract highly
educated and highly skilled people as well as people coming to complete their
education at our universities.

America in decline has been a topic of discussion since the privy and thunder-bucket.

I am an optimist by nature.  On a Continent which has an overwhelming plethora of the richest natural resources, immense quantities of fresh water (the richest of resource on the planet), the perfect climate and soil for an overabundance of food, a highly educated and motivated work-force, where woman are outnumbering men, in the hands of people which represent cultures from every corner of the planet will keep the United States amongst the pinnacle of strength and influence for, at least, the next 100 years. - My guess is fresh water alone will near guaranty this.

It’s a shame so many are disappointed by the whole prospect.  Considering the many alternatives I find myself pleased overall.

Of course, I may revise my outlook 21 December. - 

freeze—- tell it to Jeff Davis.

moonraven - “Don’t condescend to me” No condescension was intended…..

hetero - Last time I checked, the U.S. wasn’t a country either…more like a bunch of conflicting, loosely bound territories like the former Yugoslavia.

moonie—Chavez has screwed up the economy. say
whatever you wish, but them’s the facks.

he didn’t nationalize the oil, but we appointed a
bunch of fools to the board and output is way down,
and Hugo gave the Chinese WAY too favorable contracts
for crude.
look into the contracts and you’ll see that not only
are the discounts ridiculous but the terms of payment
are absurd and spurred by Hugo’s turning to the
Chinese for arms and loans for development projects
that should have been financed by oil profits.

If Chavez manages to get re-elected it’ll only be due
to the gerrymandering that he carried out ahead of
the last legislative election. the corruption in that
one was blatant.
And should he steal another term, he ain’t gonna
serve all of it anyway.

He had a chance at being a hero and instead is gonna
get buried a failure who surrounded himself with
sycophants and fools and incompetents because he
wanted to be a one-man band.

American in decline? Is decline even the word… Its more like America in free fall….

Take a look at this country from the View of Wall Mart, or any of the other stores that
ape wall mart with specials on frozen pink slime wrapped and frozen for preppers in
plastic ...

A nation full of fat bodies and fat heads, of illiterate children,  and a military up to the
gills on anti psychotic meds and anti depressants by some counts as high as 30%..

American in decline? Fifty million or so on food stamps, with Paul Ryan threatening to
cut them off..

Out their in the vast nothingness that this once great country has become, the feds are
busy trying to locate Meth labs, while the USDA tries to do the same to Dairy’s that sell
raw milk…

Does any of it make any sense? If anything is clear it is that the Neocons got rich doing
it to us, and the great liberal institutions that made the old America a wonder to the
world are going, yet continue to be reviled..Along with liberal politicians who can no
longer get it up.

Yet the Neocons still hold the sod buster population in their grip, like moths mesmerized
by the flame that will eventually burn them to death.. And they won’t stop until the nation
is full of crackers, strung out on drugs, or religiously preoccupied like a mental patient, 
armed to the teeth with nuclear weapons and a lying political class that views itself as
Royalty.

While the people have been taught that they are extraordinary, and they struggle to
convince each other this is so, they have instead become the most ordinary third world
nation in the world… And like most third world countries on the road to police state, or
something even worse..

PS:  Of course what Chavez did not know when he walked to the UN podium and complained about the cloud of sulphur laid by Bubba was that all Texas oilmen’s farts smell strongly of sulphur.

Keep kidding yourself, piecework peon.

Chavez screwed up NOTHING:

1.  When he entered the power in 1999 oil was selling for 7 bucks a barrel.  Because he had inherited an empty treasury, he set off to meet with the other OPEC country leaders and they decided as a group not to be paid peanuts because the gringos threatened them.  Where have oil prices been for the past say, 5 years:  Hint between 75 and 160 bucks a barrel. 

2.  Ten years ago TODAY the gringo-backed coup in Venezuela took Chavez out of the power for 47 hours.  The PEOPLE put him back in.  There are lots of festivities going on in Venezuela this week.  Those folks know how to celebrate—I was there in April of 2003 to celebrate the first anniversary of the coup reversal, so I am an eyewitness.  That was the first time a coup had been reversed in this hemisphere—and since then although the gringos tried again in Bolivia in 2008 and in Ecuador in 2010, the coups have not been successful.

3.  Chavez was not the president who nationalized Venezuelan oil, but he took it away from being a piggy bank for the white colonialists in Caracas, took majority control of all petroleum projects (Exxon sued for 12 billion and ended up being paid about 500 million—less than Chavez’ original offer of one billion).

4.  Almost ALL the UN Millenium Goals for 2015 were met in Venezuela several years back—including elimination of illiteracy and reduction of poverty by MORE than 50%.

5.  Gini coefficient is now less than 4.00—down there with the Scandinavian countries, while the US’s and Mexico’s are more than 5 and closing in on such swell spots as Zimbawbwe.

6.  Chavez, Evo Morales and Diego Maradona took their shovels and buried the hemisphere free trade agreement Bubba Bush took to the mar de la Plata Summit.

7.  Chavez started up the South American coalition of countries and was later joined by Lula to give it Brazil’s muscle (Brazil’s is the 5th economy on the planet now, BTW).

8.  Chavez is a tireless builder of networks and alliances—he has one most of the countries on the planet.  he doesn’t need one with Gringolandia—he’s your number three petroleum vendor.

9.  Chavez is expected to be re-elected in October.  The people of Venezuela are the most satisified country in this hemisphere with their democracy.  They are always in the top 5 of the happiest countries, too.  You gringos seem pretty unsatisfied with your phony democracy—and not too happy, either.

10.  Nobody cares whether you admire Chavez or not, piecework peon—yo’ve never been to Venezuela, and you’ve never met Chavez.  You have no credibility here.  You’re just pissed because Chavez mentioned the strong smell of sulphur surrounding the UN podium even a day after Bubba’s speech (sic—for ventriloquism).

moonie—Venezuela’s has been screwed up by Hugo’s
mismanagement and isn’t in any shape to do anything
but hope to recover. I admire that early on, he took
the money from the oil boom and spent it on social
services, but since then, nothing he’s done has been
wise.

Iran has a mess for an economy and if they don’t make
a deal with the West, their economy is about to melt
down.

The Saudis are never gonna be any more influential.

which of the BRICs will rise to real power in coming
decades?

(I suspect that the Chinese are in for some hard
times at home)

heteronym:

Actually, although Goldman Sachs took many of the EU countries to the cleaners just like it did to the US—and all its taxpayers—the EU IS more likely to recover than the US.  It may have to dump some countries, but overall the quality of life is much higher there, there are more services (although the fascists in Spain are cutting those like mad—but there I have little sumpathy, as those boobs voted in the neofraquistas which means they didn’t learn jack shit from all those years of the Franco dictatorship when nobody had a pot to piss in) and folks are a bit more politically savvy and active than the gringo couch spuds.

But the jig is basically up for them too in the long run, as the countries that control the resources (BRICS, Saudi, Iran, Venezuela) are already taking the ascendancy.

mrfreeze:

Don’t condescend to me:  Historically in the US you white CIVILIANS have killed a heckuvalot of non-whites for their land and resources.

Or sometimes just for the hell of it.

“We understand our repression better when we admit
that we do not yet possess the needed words.”           
GradyLeeHoward

QFT

moonraven - That’s what we “pay” the military to do.

It’s intersting you should bring up the notion about us killing people (all sorts really) in other lands. Today I heard an article on NPR about the thousands of drones that will soon be allowed to fly over our own domestic airspace…....for our protection (ya, right). Just another manifestation of our tax dollars being used to fund the military which turns around and uses military technology against US. Police departments have begun to use all sorts of devices perfected in the Iraq war against us.

I love the idea: Put some good old “innovation” to work whilst killing people in other countries; bring the technology back and manufacture all sorts of devices for detection, surveillance and subduing folks (manufacture said devices off-shore of course), and then monopolize these “security” companies….Wow, I just created a model for the new American economy!!!!!!!

mrfreeze—- europe ain’t a country and ain’t any more likely to recover than the US

mr freeze——- the context was world’s most powerful nation.

surpass says nothing about me.

mrfreeze:

You forget Best at KILLING NON-WHITES for their land and resources.

A rather glaring lapse of memory.

heterochromatic - Your use of the word “surpass” reveals a lot about your world view. Surpass us at what?

What are we “best” at? I’ll concede the following: innovation, military spending, monopolies…....that’s about it…not bad, but it won’t sustain us for much longer.

Innovation is a two headed coin: it’s been far better at eliminating work for people…great for profits. It’s not exactly “replacing” lost industries and jobs.

Military spending, simply the worst use of our tax dollars….no real pay-off these days.

Monopolies - Huge banks, huge agri-business, fewer and fewer players…..speaks for itself.

Once Europe readjusts (which it will), they’ll kick our ass in the future….(my prediction).

heteronym:

The point of BRICS is that they are not one country.

While the gringos have been beating off to the gory stories of massacres in Afghanistan, Iraq, Libya (especially hard core stuff that sodomizing of Gadafi with a post hole digger) the non-white countries on the planet (and some that are not dominantly non-white) have been making agreements to trade among themselves, defend each other, and shut the bigmouth gringos out of the loop.

I read the non-gringo press daily.  The news is waaaaay different from the way it’s dribbled out to you folks in the gringo press (sic).  In fact, we have an exprression in Spanish which describes the relationship of the US government/news media to US citizens:  Darle atole con el dedo.

The news even in most of the European press is also waaay different.

Keep on licking that atole off Obama’s finger, sucker.

moonie, m’dear…..we’re not gonna go poof no matter how hard you rub your
lamp…...

so perhaps you could nominate some countries likely to surpass us any time
soon…....

ya think one of the BRICs might?

IMax - “Barring some unforeseen catastrophe, with an abundance of natural resources, the largest body of fresh water, a highly skilled and educated work-force and an unparalleled ability to produce an overabundance of food the United States will likely be one of several “Super Powers” for the next 100 years.”

I think you should read Tyler Cowen’s “The Great Stagnation” before you proclaim the U.S. an endless beacon of hope, prosperity and freedom. Quite the contrary, the very things you claim are our national assets (natural resources, educated work force & food production) are exactly the low-hanging fruit that Cowen argues are no longer our saviors.

I would add this: How exactly will the U.S. (I’m talking about the people not corporations) continue to pay for this future-fantasy America? Where will the money come from to simply manage the country (its infrastructures, it’s human resources, etc.)?  What exactly will people be “doing” in the future that will generate real products and services?

IMax, I’m sincerely interested to know what you think the “new-new” thing is that will sustain us in the decades to come: pushing cheap junk on each other or designing time-wasting apps?

Private enterprise today, the so-called saviour of our country, has made it abundantly clear that its collective priority is to maximize shareholder value but we all know that “shareholder value” does not translate to jobs or investment in the general welfare.

The eternal gringo optimist, dream on, sucker.

Maybe if you visited a few other countries, you’d change your pimping for patriotism to building a backyard shelter.

MudRagin,

Usted está enfermo de odio.

1000 is a stretch…fifty isn’t.

Imax:

How much are they paying you to pimp for patriotism so shamelessly?!

Superpower for the next 100 years, my red ass.

You’ve been reading the Plan for a New American (century) to the point of blindness.

The US is in the bottom of the toilet with many hands poised just above the handle to flush it.

My only woory is that you Dogs in the Manger will set off a few nukes to take the rest of the planet with you.

I honestly couldn’t find anything in this piece to agree with.  Most particularly Mr. Pfaff’s dark and brooding pessimism.

-The “liberation” of American woman is the cause of declining educational standards? 
-Everything is so much prettier and works better in Europe? 
-Americans thought they had settled Asia with The Bomb in 1945? Who thinks like that?  We can all recall how the Japanese, in the late 70’s - early 80’s, were poised to own the world.
-Who believed only the United States could build a navy?  U.S. policy was never based on the premise that no other nation could build a navy.  U.S. foreign policy, right or wrong, was based on the premise that it was ‘preferable’ for the United States to control the seas.

Barring some unforeseen catastrophe, with an abundance of natural resources, the largest body of fresh water, a highly skilled and educated work-force and an unparalleled ability to produce an overabundance of food the United States will likely be one of several “Super Powers” for the next 100 years.

yes, the gap between the US and many other nations has
been closing and continues to close. the US will not
long remain the lone dominant power on the planet and
we shouldn’t wish for it.

other than that, the reports of the US’s death are
greatly exaggerated.

Interesting article by W. Pfaff.

The way American society embarked on the pursuit of happiness was by turning everything -from natural resources to human beings- here and around the world, into commodities. In order to secure this path, an enormous military force was created and those with the most to gain became in charge of promoting warfare and installing the leadership in this and other countries. For a number of years this approach worked for a large segment of the US population (not for everybody!) who then became self-righteous and addicted to consuming and being entertained. This situation came to be considered normal and, in the minds of many, also eternal. The lessons from history and some success models for problem-solving from other societies were constantly rejected.

Now, the country seems to be producing more waste than valuable products, and every aspect of American life is increasingly riddled with problems. This deterioration is bad enough, but that’s not the worst of it. The worst part is that the population still continues to embrace a destructive path by ignoring reality, blaming others, and turning a deaf ear to those who offer wise warnings and possible solutions. One example of this syndrome is the attention being paid to the Democrat vs Republican election issues which are nothing but political entertainment.

Okay patriots:  Who wrote the head for this piece?

It says America, and the article specifically opens with a references to the United States.

America, this hemisphere, is NOT in decline, as Brazilian president Dilma Rousseff made clear to Obomber in her meeting with him in Washington two days ago.

Of COURSE the U.S. in decline!  What are the clear indicators?

1.  Gini coefficient heading skyward to resemble wealth distribtion in Zimbawbwe.  Other countries in the American hemisphere are heading in the opposite direction—Venezuela’s is now down there with those of the Scandinavian countries.

2.  Folks losing their jobs and houses right and left. 

3.  “Disappointing” job creation numbers.

4.  Banks that have to be subsidized regualary by massive injections of narcodollars and US tax dollars.

5.  A government that insults the electorate with presidents, governors and legislatures that are bought and paid for by corporations.

6.  A government that opened hunting season on its own citizens, spies on those same citizens and does not provide habeaus corpus.

7.  A government which will NEVER be able to pay its debt load. 

Are we talking about a comic-strip banana republic with figureheads in the national palace and which is really run by United Fruit?

Close, but it’s not called United Fruit anymore….

THE QUALITY OF LEADERSHIP DEFINES AMERICAS DECLINE…WHOEVER LIES
THE THE BEST GETS TO PLAY…LEADER ...

The issue of decline is relevant only to those of us willing to look at and around and inside as well as outside the margins (not difficult when you live here).

The issue has been alive and well in several academic disciplines, since Socrates inspired the creation of the academy, and before that (as well as after) in poetry, though, to be honest, there, too,(in poetry, philosophy and the whole academic world) honest appraisals are rarely the stuff of popular fads.

We, the people, have too often found it convenient to slide into ever deepening denials.  We are in denial about our spiritual emptiness (the churches are possibly the worst here), we are in denial about our intellectual emptiness (not just the television/talk radio philosophers here), we have been in denial about what it means as a human to actually have heart, as well as have a healthy and hearty blood-pumper, and we have even been in denial about our bodies - especially what it means to have a body that is the temple of whatever we hold and know is sacred.  Perhaps, we have even let the slide into denial take us beyond where we can any longer imagine that anything might be sacred, sacred as in inseparable from life itself.

But, alas, why cry in the wilderness?

“money corruption in US politics”??? and only in politics??? i conclude that
abuse of money occurs in all parts of daily living of any person and not
just politics [or warfare, exploitation, deceiving, godology]
and not just in US and not centuries ago, but in all lands in which it had
been used since it had been invented in ?anatolia 3.5 millennia ago.
===,
pfaff probably knows better, but being a selfserving and servant of the
TWENTYPERCENT ‘progressive’ or ‘liberal’, just keeps on mending the old
pants.

@ kerryrose
I think his point is that women who would be teaching 40 years ago are now doctors or lawyers or CEOs, leaving perhaps the less talented to teach. Probably some truth there, but that’s not the cause of the decline in education. The first major assault on education was Prop 13, 1978, the first wave of the Republican Revolution. Since then the RR has hit virtually every aspect of society, but none with more effect than the ongoing dumbing down of America.
But even the RR can’t take all the blame. Student performance on SAT tests peaked in 1963. One commenter above suggested things have gone downhill since Bobby Kennedy’s death. Maybe he’s not old enough to remember Jack’s death, and the national mourning not just for the president, but for the nation. Every American felt the dream was over. And it was.

“globalization” of which pfaff and all of us talk may be viewed as an overgeneralized term and as such means too much or too little
to be of any protreptic value. this observation is not meant as criticism towards pfaff—i am merely pointing out the fact that
overgeneralized labels cannot ever be understood or known. [and in a short piece, one, perforce, must also use generalizations,
conclusions, moralizations, wishful thinking, etc]
however, saying that americans built manufacturing plants abroad can be understood even by a child. and then each person is free
to extract any conclusion from that or any other fact.
i at this time am not drawing a single conclusion from that fact. of course, not jumping to a conclusion is also a conclusion. [to
make any conclusions from the term “globalization”, i wld need even days to think about it before i’d dare posit conclusions about
it]
===
about pfaff’s conclusion that women [and others] were once receiving an accurate/adequate [or enlightening] education, i conclude
from it that that no american ever got an elucidatory education from colleges, schools, or universities.
but fear not, neither has an asian or european.
however, most europeans are freer, more at peace/secure, etc., than USans because, seems to me, there are also strong socialist
and communist parties even in evil empires like germany, france, italy, russia, UK.
that’s the only diff that makes the difference.
in US ‘08, 98% of ballots cast went to the ONEPERCENT and/or TWENTYPERCENT. in ‘12, one can expect that at least 90% of ballots
cast will go to the agents of the TWENTYPERCENT and/or ONEPERCENT.  thanks, bozhidar b. planet moon

@ kerryrose
I think his point is that women who were teaching 49 years ago are now doctors or lawyers or CEOs, leaving perhaps the less talented to teach. Probably some truth there, but that’s not the cause of the decline in education.

The 7th paragraph is William Pfaff’s strongest
finding in his autopsy.

Truthdig has had a cross-promotion with
Moyers&Company; recently. I like Hedges better but I
watch Moyers. In his April 8th editorial Moyers (in
support of Carne Ross) recommends saving our
banking system by organizing an Occupy bank and
other local alternative banks. I wrote this reply
to explain why his plan is ludicrous:

According to old accounts Diogenes the Cynic threw
a plucked chicken into Athens’ assembly after Plato
defined a person as “an animal, biped and
featherless.” Diogenes vowed poverty and slept in a
tub near the market. He’d been expelled from his
hometown for defacing the currency (minting strange
coins with derogatory legends). Once, as a
performance piece, he took a lit lantern in
daylight and scoured the city seeking “a genuine
person.” Would Diogenes accept this essay
(Restructuring Wall Street From the Bottom Up) as
genuine?

I think not. What if John Brown had started out in
1855 “to restructure slavery from the bottom up”?
By the time such a bill had gotten through Congress
they’d have had something as self-defeating as the
Affordable Healthcare Act or Medicare Part D,
something tat served power and predation as it
pretended to protect human rights. Carne Ross has
fallen into the same habit as Moyers because in
this corrupt society no one can search out an
“honest bank” (analogous to Diogenes’ proverbial
honest man) even with the candlepower of the Sun.
The credit union exists already and is better only
because it is smaller. And what is the purpose of
maintaining the banking system, as we know it when
most of our citizens are debtors, and our very
government is said to lie prostrate before
financiers: bankrupt. What could one have done to
reform slavery while keeping the unwieldy and
outdated, and not the least; barbaric, institution
intact? If in trading the slave was protected in
not being “sold down the river” (exported to
Mississippi or Cuba) or by keeping nuclear families
whole the speculators in slave marketing would
immediately claim such restrictions as onerous,
would say they defeated commercial efficiency, and
would begin threatening to disobey Federal statute
under the cloak of states rights. (Strangely
enough, the speculators would have had a good
point.) After a period of false compromise we would
have returned to the brink of Civil War, with much
time and many lives wasted. Our financial system,
like slavery, cannot be reformed, because it is
outmoded by technology and intellectual
sophistication. It is riddled with endemic
corruption and collapsing upon itself globally. And
in the face of this Moyers and Ross recommend we
replicate this catastrophe in a more transparent
and humane local form. So I must ask; how long does
a weak sister last in a milieu of piracy?
(I am reminded of the South Seas cargo cultists
smoothing ritual runways and fashioning headphones
from coconut shells after WWII largesse dried up.)

My point here is that Moyers, through Ross, is
playing with a faint idea of Anarchy, and is so
steeped in the present conventions, that discussing
the needed paradigm shifts is unthinkable. (We
understand our repression better when we admit that
we do not yet possess the needed words.) If we
take the basic premises of Ross and many more
imaginative modern anarchists they recommend direct
democracy and posit a perfectible citizenry. Money
as we know it is absent from these postulations, so
how can it make any sense to waste energy building
banks? It’s like flint knapping in a junkyard.
Diogenes would have a good laugh.
“Defaced currency” indeed!!!!! Talk about illusions
and fetishism…

The US in decline? Preposterous, Mr. Pfaff. The New American Century is still young!

http://michaelfury.wordpress.com/2010/06/15/unipolar-disorder/

http://michaelfury.wordpress.com/2009/01/15/new-yorks-bravest/

America has turned into a sad version of Kevin Bacon near the end of “animal house” where he stands amidst the chaos of the parade and screams “All is well!”

I grow tired of people insisting that america is the “greatest nation” the world has ever seen. We sound like an old athlete, unable to accept his fate as he ages and his talent dwindles. We WERE a great nation (from about 1945 to 1965) but we have been in decline since a bullet passed through Bobby Kennedy’s head.

The rest of the world needs to worry that, like Rome, a selfish america may just try to drag down everybody else with them.

Anyone paying even the slightest bit of attention to recent history, to globalization and to the growth of the economies of emerging countries knows Pfaff is correct. We’ve known the decline has been going on for some time now.

Here are the important follow-up questions:

Does it matter? Must the U.S. be #1? Do we really fill a “need” other than consuming all the junk other countries are producing?

Many of my friends, acquaintances and family overseas remind me constantly that the U.S. has become nothing but a political, military and cultural bully in recent times. Our “exceptionalism” is looked upon with a justifiable contempt….and for good reason.

Basically a sound article—and the illustration is more important than the words.  I am inclined to want to think about it—symbolically, America behind bars, imprisoned. Not free. Confined within boundaries. Not a free country. Lacking basic human rights.
  How come?  Who or what confined us?Could it be we ourselves are responsible for our own imprisonment? If so, why do we tolerate that?  Maybe we don’t want to be free?  Why not? How much responsibility for ourselves and others do we sincerely want?  Do we think we are escaping something worse than freedom?
  What are the main agents of our imprisonment? Why are we being imprisoned? Is it our own fear that confines us?  Fear of what, exactly?  Lack of knowledge and awareness? Confidence? Denial of truth?
A way of saving us from unwanted responsibilities?Fear of what goes on outside the bars>  Because we feel some crime for which we deserve imprisonment? Is this a healthy situation for us to be in as a nation?
  What evidences are there that this is really true? And what can we or must we do to regain our freedom?
  Stupid questions that require intelligent answers. Why do we brush them aside?  Might it be part of
our national imprisonment—the lack of willingness to see possibilities for opening doors?
  Freedom, use it or lose it, they say. Literally, what freedom did I use today”  How will I free myself, my family, friends, neighbors, associates, politicians? America?
  And the toughest question:  Will our freedom cause someone else to be imprisoned?

Not sure about that either kerryrose, but good article nonetheless.  I want 200mph trains damnit!

Great little article but no new info. I found his remark about women teachers a little odd? The education system failed in the U.S, because was defunded, politicised, and turned into a for profit system that doesn’t work. The first rule in capitalism is maximize profits and the best way to do this is to minimize service or product through artificial shortages or poor quality of product"Cheap” this allows maximum price increases. [think vouchers and private schools.]

Interesting. If I follow the author’s logic then professional male teachers are failing our children, but not the women that are teaching?

I don’t get the sense of this.  Women have moved into other fields, but still dominate the teaching field.