The stakes could not be higher. Not only the future of the BRICS, but the future of a new multipolar world is in the balance. And it all hinges on what happens in Brazil in the next few months.
by Pepe Escobar for Sputnik News
Let’s start with the Kafkaesque internal turmoil. The coup against President Dilma Rousseff remains an unrivalled media theatre/political tragicomedy gift that keeps on giving. It also doubles as a case of information war converted into a strategic tool of political control.
A succession of appalling audio leaks has revealed that key sectors of the Brazilian military as well as selected Supreme Court justices have legitimized the coup against a President that has always protected the two-year-old Car Wash corruption investigation. Even Western mainstream media was forced to admit that Dilma did not steal anything but is being impeached by a bunch of thieves. Their agenda; to stifle the Car Wash investigation, which may eventually throw many of them in jail.
The leaks also unveiled a nasty internecine carnage between Brazilian comprador elites — peripheral and mainstream. Essentially the peripherals were used as lowly paperboys in Congress for the dirty work. But now they may be about to become road kill – along the illegitimate, unpopular, interim Michel Temer “government”, led by a bunch of corrupt-to-the-core PMDB politicians, the party that is heir to the sole opposition outfit tolerated during the 1960s-1980s military dictatorship.
Meet the vassal chancellor
An insidious character in the current golpeachment scam is the interim Minister of Foreign Relations, senator Jose Serra of the PSDB party, the social democrats turned neoliberal enforcers. In the 2002 presidential election – which he lost to Lula — Serra had already tried to get rid of peripheral Brazilian oligarchies.
Yet now he’s incarnating another role — perfectly positioned not only to retrograde Brazilian foreign policy to some point around the 1964 military coup, but mostly as the Beltway’s point man inside the coup racket.
Exceptionalistan’s key ally in Brazil is the oligarchy in Sao Paulo, the wealthiest state and home to the financial capital of Latin America. This is Brazil’s A-list. It’s from their ranks that an eventual “national savior” may eventually spring up.
Once the peripherals are history, then no holds would be barred to criminalize – and imprison – an array of leftist leaders, Lula included, as well as manufacture a fake election legitimized by a noxious Supreme Court justice, Gilmar Mendes, a PSDB stooge.
It all hinges on what happens in the next two months. The prosecutor general finally asked the Supreme Court to throw three top peripherals in jail; they are all accused of plotting to derail the Car Wash investigation — an extremely complex juridical-political-police network of myriad concentric/parallel circles.
Meanwhile, the final judgment of Dilma’s impeachment at the Senate is bound to happen on August 16 – 11 days after the start of the Olympic Games. The coup plotters suffered a heavy blow as they were trying hard to accelerate the proceedings. As it stands, the outcome is uncertain; after the leaks, four to five senators are already wavering, as the leaks also implicate Temer personally. The “leader” of a zero-credibility, corruption-crammed scam, he’s among the targets of several corruption investigations and has just been banned from running to political office for the next 8 years.The Brazilian mainstream media monopoly (five families) – popularly referred to as PIG, the Brazilian acronym for Pro-Coup Media Party – has changed its anti-left tune and is now also going after selected members of the Temer racket.
According to the constitution, if both the Presidency and Vice-Presidency are vacated in the last two years of a given term, it’s up to Congress to elect the new President.
This implies two possible scenarios. If Dilma is not impeached, it’s increasingly likely she will call for new presidential elections before the end of the year.
If she is impeached, the PIG will tolerate the stooge-crammed Temer interim racket until January 2017 at the most. The next step would be what Serra and about-to-be-jailed Senate leader Renan Calheiros are campaigning for; the end of direct presidential elections and the onset of Brazilian-style parliamentarianism.
The man best positioned to be the national savior in this case is former president Fernando Henrique Cardoso – also former “Prince of Sociology” and a major star (during the 1960s and early 1970s) of the dependency theory, then metamorphosed into an avid neoliberal. Cardoso is a very close pal of both Bill Clinton and Tony Blair. The Beltway/Wall Street axis loves him. Cardoso would be “elected” mostly by the pack of Congress hyenas who got the Dilma impeachment rolling on April 17.The hard node of golpeachment goes way beyond peripheral Brazilian elites. It is comprised of a political party (the PSDB); the Globo media empire; the Federal Police (very cozy with the FBI); the Public Ministry; most of the Supreme Court; and sectors of the military. Only the Beltway/Wall Street axis has the means and the necessary pull to regiment all these players – by hard cash, blackmail or promises of glory.
And that ties in with key unanswered questions regarding the recent audio leaks. Who taped the conversations. Who leaked them. Why now. Who profits from a nation in total political/economic/juridical chaos, with virtually all institutions totally discredited.
Neoliberalism or chaos
Those were the days when Washington could mastermind, with impunity, an old-fashioned military coup in its backyard – as in Brazil 1964. Or as in Chile during the original 9/11 – in 1973, as seen through crack Chilean film maker Patricio Guzman’s moving documentary about Salvador Allende.
History, predictably, now repeats itself as farce as the 2016 coup has turned Brazil – the 7th largest economy in the world and a key Global South player – into a Honduras or Paraguay (where recent US-supported coups were successful).
I have shown how the coup in Brazil is an extremely sophisticated Hybrid War operation going way beyond unconventional warfare (UW); four generation warfare (4GW); color revolutions; and R2P (“responsibility to protect”), all the way to the summit of smart power; a political-financial-judicial-mainstream media soft coup unveiled in slow motion. This is the beauty of a coup when promoted by democratic institutions.
Neoliberalism may have failed, as even the IMF research wing has concluded. But its rotten corpse still encumbers the whole planet. Neoliberalism is not only an economic model; it surreptitiously takes over the juridical realm as well. In another perverse facet of shock doctrine, neoliberalism cannot prevail without a juridical framework.When constitutional attributions are redirected to Congress that keeps the Executive under control while generating a culture of political corruption. Politics is subordinated to economics. Companies engage in campaign financing and buy politicians to be able to influence the political powers that be.
That’s how Washington works. And that’s also the key to understand the role of former leader of the Brazilian lower house Eduardo Cunha; he ran a campaign financing racket out of Congress itself, controlling dozens of politicians while profiting from proverbially fat state contracts.
The Three Stooges in what I called the Provisional Banana Scoundrel Republic are Cunha, Calheiros and Temer. Temer is a mere puppet while Cunha remains a sort of shadow Prime Minister, running the show. But not for long. He’s already been suspended as the speaker in Congress; he bagged millions of US dollars in kickbacks for those fat contracts and stashed the loot in secret Swiss accounts; now it’s a matter of time before the Supreme Court has the balls – it’s not a given — to throw him in the slammer.
NATO vs. BRICS, all across the spectrum
And that brings us once again to The Big Picture, as we proceed in parallel with an analysis by Rafael Bautista, the head of a decolonization study group in La Paz, Bolivia. He’s one of the best and brightest in South America who’s very much alert to the fact that whatever happens in Brazil in the next few months will drive the future not only of South America but the whole Global South.
Exceptionalistan’s project for Brazil is no less than the imposition of a remixed Monroe doctrine. The main target of a planned neoliberal restoration is to cut off South America from the BRICS – as in, essentially, the Russia-China strategic partnership.
It’s a short window of opportunity after all those years under the Bush-Obama continuum where Washington was obsessed with MENA (Middle East/Northern Africa), a.k.a. the Greater Middle East. Now South America is back in a starring role in the geopolitical (soft) war theatre. Getting rid of Dilma, Lula, the Workers’ Party, by all means available, is only the start.It all comes back to the same, defining 21st century war; NATO against the BRICS; the Shanghai Cooperation Organization (SCO); and ultimately the Russia-China strategic partnership. Smashing the “B” in BRICS carries with it the bonus of smashing Mercosur (the South American common market); Unasur (the political Union of South American Nations); ALBA (the Bolivarian Alliance); and South American integration as a whole, compounded with integration with key emerging Global South players such as Iran.
The ongoing destabilization of “Syraq” fits the Empire of Chaos; when there’s no regional integration, the only other possibility is balkanization. And yet Russia graphically demonstrated to Beltway planners they cannot win a war in Syria while Iran demonstrated after the nuclear deal that it won’t become a Washington vassal. So the Empire of Chaos might as well secure its own backyard.
A new geopolitical framework had to be part of the package. That’s where the concept of “North America” fits in, backed by the Council on Foreign Relations and devised mostly by former Iraq surge superstar David Petraeus and former World Bank honcho Bob Zoellick, now with Goldman Sachs. Call it a mini who’s who of Exceptionalistan.
You won’t see it enounced in public, but the Petraeus/Zoellick concept of “North America” presupposes regime changing and gobbling up Venezuela. The Caribbean is seen as a Mare Nostrum, an American lake. “North America” is in fact a strategic offensive.
It implies controlling the massive oil and water wealth of the Orinoco and the Amazonas, something that would forever guarantee Exceptionalistan’s preeminence south of the border.
The Caribbean is already a done deal; after all Washington controls CAFTA. South America is a tougher nut to crack, roughly polarized by what’s left of ALBA and the US-driven Pacific Alliance. With Brazil falling to a neoliberal restoration, it’s over as a promoter of regional integration. Mercosur would eventually be absorbed into the Pacific Alliance – especially with a man like Serra as Brazil’s top diplomat. So, politically, South America must be annulled at all costs.
What’s left for South America would be its aggregation — as marginal players, part of the US-driven Pacific Alliance — to those NATO on trade deals, the TPP and TTIP. The “pivot to Asia” – of which TPP is the trade arm — is the Obama doctrine’s push for containment of China, not only in Asia but also across Asia-Pacific. Thus it’s natural that China (Brazil’s number one trade partner) should also be contained in the hegemon’s backyard, South America.
From the Atlantic to the Pacific, and beyond
It’s never enough to stress the geo-economic importance of South America. The only way South America can be fully integrated to the multipolar world is by opening up to the Pacific, boosting its strategic connection with Asia, especially China. That’s where the Chinese push to invest in a massive high-speed rail project uniting the Brazilian Atlantic coast with Peru in the Pacific fits in. That’s South American interconnectivity in a nutshell. If Brazil is politically annulled, none of this will ever happen.
So every coup is now literally allowed in South America; indirect attacks to the Brazilian currency, the real; bribing local comprador elites with the backing of the global financial system; a concerted attempt at the implosion, simultaneously, of the top three economies: Brazil, Argentina and Venezuela. SOUTHCOM went so far as to produce a report on “Venezuela Freedom” earlier this year, signed by commander Kurt Tidd, which proposes a “strategy of tension”, complete with “encirclement” and “suffocation” techniques and allowing to mix street action with a “calculated” use of armed violence. Echoes of Chile 1973 do apply.South America is now arguably the prime geopolitical space where Exceptionalistan is laying the bases to restore its unrivalled hegemony — as part of a multi-dimensional, geo-finance war against the BRICS bent on perpetuating the unipolar world.
All previous moves have lead to this geostrategy of imploding the BRICS and reducing South America to an appendix of North America.
Wikileaks revealed how the NSA spied on Petrobras. In 2008 Brazil came up with its own National Defense Strategy, focused on two key areas; the South Atlantic and the Amazon. This did not sit well with SOUTHCOM. Unasur should have developed it to a continental level, but they didn’t.
Lula decided to award to Petrobras the prime exploitation of the pre-salt deposits – the largest oil discovery of the 21st century. Dilma’s administration gave a firm push to the BRICS’s New Development Bank (based on the Brazilian BNDES) and also decided to accept Iranian payments bypassing the US dollar. Anyone involved in South-South trade bypassing the US dollar enters a kill list.
Hillary Clinton is the presidential candidate of Wall Street, the Pentagon, the industrial-military complex and the neocons. She is the Goddess of War – and in a Bush-Obama-Clinton continuum she will go to war against any player in the Global South that dares to defy Exceptionalistan.
So the die is cast. We will know for sure by the time there’s a new US President — and arguably a new, unelected Brazilian President — in early 2017. The geostrategic game though remains the same; Brazil must fall so BRICS-led integration must fall, and Exceptionalistan may concentrate all its firepower in an all-out confrontation against Russia-China.
The question remains why Russia permitted this to happen and what Russia is attemptiing to do do bring the Truth to the attention of western citizens.
Why no UN sanctions against the junta-Brasil?
Why why why ?
For what does Russia have a seat in the UNSC?
All this low-level talk here may keep us a bit busy, but will it address any real issue?
It was long known that South-America is in danger of getting destabalized.
Was in the talks for at least half a year.
Bolivia nd Venzeuela are already on US’s evening menu.
I read a few days ago that USA has increased its military presence in South America to record levels and may consider to invade Venezuela and Bolivia after more intentionally created unrest.
And Russia?
May Lavrow send Kerry a letter where he expresses his disappointment with his western partners and expresses hope for a better joint future in peace and harmony?
Or what’s the plan?
Imagine what the West would be doing in an inverted situation.
The US Army might already have invaded Brasil after the coup, in Russia’ position.
It’s getting boring to read such articles which only tell us in mild words, that something is surprisingly somehow not ideal, ohh, how unexpected. Again.
I’m always aking myself the same. Why? Why and why????
Every country unable to keep its institutions free of corruption and cronyism is easy prey to soft coups. We should just recall the purposes of the NSA, CIA, DIA, DEA, etc. In summary, collect enough dirt (Kompromat) to blackmail every possible opponent and enough behavioral knowledge to exploit weaknesses of everyone else.
That’s why.
Countries that hold up enough self-esteem to stay sovereign are well advised to clean house immediately and to keep it clean.
I am just reading this listing … Brazil, Bolivia, Venezuela … and (lest we forget!) Ukraine … and Libya, yes Libya … and shall we add to that even tiny Montenegro.. . (use your imagination + the map of Europe, Asia, Americas, Africa,…).
And am now contrasting that to those bold, victorious proclamations of self-anointed internet soothsayers, augurs, clairvoyants, diviners, forecasters, oracles, prophets… All chanting in unison in those magic 2007-8+. That the Big Satan is “finally” collapsing, disintegrating, crumpling, foundering, falling, disappearing … (use Thesaurus once again). That was followed by “dollar collapses” … “multipolar world is born” … and muche similar mantras chanting by that same crowd.
And we are now eight years later reading the above country listing.
And there will be much more reading before it is over, school is not on vacation yet.
The Russians and the Chinese probably know better than to bet on a losing horse, and probably have better informers than PT propagandists like Pepe.
What PT propagandist don’t tell is that Dilma won by a very narrow margin. That less than 40% of the voters voted for Dilma, in fact, barely more than 25% of the population voted for her. They don’t tell that she is one of the most unpopular presidents ever. They don’t tell that the largest popular demonstrations in the history of the country were the demos asking for her impeachment.
They don’t tell you that she outright lied during the campaign, and that just a few days after having been elected she decided to adopt the very same neoliberal policies she had denounced during the campaign. Or how the government agencies held up bad statistics, which showed how the economy was tanking and poverty increasing, during the campaign just to help her get elected.
They don’t tell how Lula’s finance minister is the current “neoliberal junta” finance minister. Or how the “junta” economical policy is pretty much the same as Dilma’s, but they aren’t as incompetent in pushing it through parliament as she was.
The “coup” was made by the elected parliament, according to the constitution, was considered legal by the supreme court, and had vast popular support. In fact, she was officially warned that the fiscal manouvers she was doing were illegal and could get her in trouble, but she decided to continue doing it anyway. She couped herself if anything.
So, if the Russians and Chinese are smart, they’re now trying to get influence on the current government’s officials, who have no idelogical alignment at all, rather than clinging to PT’s sinking ship.
Thank you Pepe.
Gosh this is depressing – the masses need to wake up and take back their countries. What can China do to help Brazil? Look at Argentina – already closing down RT and Telsur tv channels. I hope China/Russia will help Venezuela. We can now see why they wanted to get back into Cuba……its all part of the plans above.
Sad, sad times :(.
China?
China, if not part of the empire is worse than it http://www.chinalaborwatch.org/report/109
“China Labor Watch…New York, NY 10001”
I don’t want to idealize China but, for some reason, I hardly think Americans are exposing Chinese working conditions out of kindheartedness.
“Americans”
Your generalisation is symptomatic of the problem.
It is a class war – very little to do with the infantile disease of nationalism which you refer to..
nice article, but you have missed the 800lb gorilla, the Jewish-Zionist intrigue in Latin America. did you know that Israel’ founding father Samuel Zemurray’s owned United Fruit Company, from which untold misery and death was carried out on local peasants? ‘Israeli’ role in the war criminal Montt’s genocide of hundreds of thousands of indigenous persons in Guatemala?
there is more to this then just coup, is this “coup” carried out by Chabad Lubivatchers or Zionist one
‘Fixing’ Latin America for Hillary?
http://bit.ly/1XwQZ1b
Why give Escobar such a platform, more and more articles seem to be from him in here? With all due respect, but his views reflect the typical South American left / socialist attitude towards its own failure. Blaming others and above anything the US for their own misery.
The US has unarguably intervened many times on the continent and allied itself with military strongmen very much to the detriment of the people. Uncounted lives were lost in Central America and during the Military dictatorship in Brazil and Argentina due to US/CIA meddling. The list is long and terrible and nobody’s denying that.
But whenever Latin Americans sought an alternative to military dictatorship all they were offered was a socialist-populist one, depending on the country more or less authoritarian (with Cuba being and outright dictatorship). These same left leaning leaders thoroughly corrupted and embedded in the neo-liberal world order of the west have hurt its people as much as their right wing military counterparts.
What has the left-wing Guerrilla done to Colombia other than bring about uncounted misery and up to 200.000 deaths over the course of 4 decades and fuel the drug war by producing lots of it themselves? What has Chávez and Maduro done to arguably one of the richest and most resource endowed nations on the continent? How has the life of ordinary Nicaraguans improved during the Ortega tenure besides planing an oversized canal project, against wild protests by many locals? Are Cubans really all that happy to have the slowest Internet on earth and limited right to ownership?
What I miss from Escobar is a more balanced and neutral view on Latin America, one that does not only vilify the right while trying to white-wash the left. If the left was truly more democratic and interested in the well-being of its people it would not keep a blind eye on students being tortured in Caracas prisons and people going to bed hungry there because of utter economic mismanagement. It would not place all the blame on some imaginary economic warfare when every 2nd year Economic student is well aware that a lot of the troubles that plague the continent is self-inflicted statism. If the left was truly democratic, it would have called for new elections in Brazil to receive a new mandate from the people. The reason they chose not to, was because they knew Dilma no longer had the 50% support she needed. Calling the impeachment a coup therefore is ridiculous, since if the government still had a majority among the population they could have just called for new elections and renew their mandate.
What Latin America needs in the end is less government, no matter if left or right, more self-determination, the slim government should protects the country from outside interference as best as possible. Whether this be the US or increasingly China, both powers offer opportunities for the continent but both have primarily their own interests in mind. Less government also means less favoritism and less money disappearing in the pockets of corrupt government officials.
Latin Americans are used to either right wing governments that protect the rich and hurt the poor or to left wing governments that give out candies to the poor, make the rich flee the country and when the nation runs out of money, misery hits the poorest of society hardest (as is happening right now in Venezuela). This vicious cycle needs to be broken! But I fear that in the current state of affairs that our world is in, it will be a near impossible task. But we should never give up hope.
(I’m writing as someone who has lived, worked and studied in the region.)
“”””” Alexander P on June 13, 2016 · at 5:31 pm UTC
Why give Escobar such a platform, more and more articles seem to be from him in here? “””””
Why give Alexander P on June 13, 2016 · at 5:31 pm UTC such a platform?
One comment was already too much!
Hi Martin
You are asking, “Why give Alexander P on June 13, 2016 · at 5:31 pm UTC such a platform?”
He is closer to the truth than is Pepe. The embrace of the political ideology presently smashing South American societies and economies to pieces (yet again) provides no answers and no solution and no way out. The trouble is that most South American people do indeed hold the ideology (to a greater or lessor extent) which is destroying them. This leads to terrible suffering and yet no-one seems to ever learn- the mistakes are repeated generation upon generation.
In South America socialism of various flavours has done the people in. As is always the case it brings impoverishment, corruption, suffering and violence. The most productive get fed up and either stop producing or depart for superior climes. The rest of the people do not reach their potential for excellence, wealth, standard of living, creativity, innovation, productivity, development, culture or civilised living. They can’t as they are hindered or even halted by the politics of failure and the ideas that support those politics. As bad as Europe can be, South America is a train wreck.
As far as Russia and China are concerned, South America is not in the near abroad. Russian and Chinese governments do not consider themselves “exceptional” in the sense that they interfere in a continent half a world away. They’d willingly enable trading and investment with Brasil but what is going on with Brasil’s government is not their affair, nor there sound reason to make it so.
The term “BRICS” is misleading. There is not some mighty all encompassing alliance between these disparate national governments. What does exist is the RC part of it. The new silk-road comes to mind as an example of what is developing with RC. That is the very real. Perhaps the “I” might commit one day, but it is likely that the first “I” to join might well be a slightly smaller one, Iran perhaps… Meanwhile we have RC.
Siotu
Thank You Siotu, I could not have replied any better to Martin, it matches my view of the situation very well.
Also might I add, who created the term BRICS? Was it a Chinese or Russian invention? For those unaware of its origin I recommend looking at that, which should go a long way in explaining that this ‘alliance’ was bound to be difficult to maintain.
“In South America socialism of various flavours has done the people in. As is always the case it brings impoverishment, corruption, suffering and violence.”
Yay, let’s ignore they are the backyards of Washington’s imperialism, death squads and, historically, european imperialism. Their poverty really stems from “socialism”…
“As bad as Europe can be, South America is a train wreck. ”
European “socialist” hells are regularly ranked as the most livable countries in the world..
@Anonymous Death Squads in Brazil? In Argentina? Besides Colombian paramilitaries fighting FARC rebels and killing innocent civilians while they’re at it I don’t see many left in the region. The country whose homicide rate has skyrocketed in recent years is Socialist utopia Venezuela. Thugs roam the cities and kill you over some food, I’m sure you will blame that also on European Imperialism.
Yes do compare European highly developed nations in Scandinavia with strong institutions with South America, I’m sure that comparison is very valid.
The “socialism-capitalism” dichotomy is sort of a red herring, is my point. Many countries accused of being socialist in Europe (usually by americans..) are classified as highly livable.
As for the “death squads”, it was just a word highlighting the colonial history of Latin America. Nicaragua had death squads (?), Chile had something similar under Pinochet, Brazil has had some pretty bad dictatorships in near history, etc.
I’m sure Venezuela having the worlds biggest oil reserves has nothing to do with suddenly being a target of regime change…
“””””I’m sure Venezuela having the worlds biggest oil reserves has nothing to do with suddenly being a target of regime change…”””””
There we come closer to what’s going on ;)
What the commentors seem to miss is all is being fomented by the elites in the S.A. nations mentioned. Just as throughout the world their insatiable greed, their b.s. meme that their victims the poor are lazy, thuggish swine. The crap that states why should government work for common good. You make the same bogus arguments made by the elites. They want it all. Mass poverty creates violence. If basic food stuffs and products were intentionally not being distributed to the masses, would you not get a little violent when your family and you were hungry? Take off the blinders sir. You couldn’t define socialism without an assist from wiki.
The country with the highest murder rate is Honduras. The situation has worsened since the U.S. abetted coup. And Venezuela always had a very high crime rate, at least in Caracas. This phenomenon long precedes Chavez.
All the socialist countries which are vilified by these doctrinaire trolls have seen marked improvement in poverty rates. Whatever socialism these countries have adopted is not responsible for the corruption, it was well entrenched before-hand. Uruguay has had several successive leftist governments; it is quite free of corruption.
Have you been to Venezuela or Honduras larry? Recently even? Well I have been to both places the former one in the last year even and what you’re saying is just ‘TeleSur’ Propaganda lies. The country is unsafe, I have ample experience with other countries there and while I did not experience Venezuela prior to Chavez I trust locals enough when they tell me it was better than the mess they’re in currently. But keep believing your own propaganda.
Anonymous
Quoting, “European “socialist” hells are regularly ranked as the most livable countries in the world..”
Chanelling Stalin; it isn’t the rank that counts, it is who is doing the ranking.
Siotu
For someone who claims to be neutral you spend an inordinate amount of time bashing the left.
I had the feeling I did not have to elaborate on Pinochet, United Fruit Company, Washington Consensus and the Bay of Pigs etc. in here as you all seem very familiar with those. What you are, however, lacking is a balanced view of Latin America’s left, or do you directly disagree with some of the points I mentioned above?
This guy sounds like a closeted Libertarian apologist for the American Empire and its latest “democratic” coup d’etat–this time against Brazil–which ultimately targets all the BRICS nations.
American “agents of influence” come in many different guises and wear many different masks.
But they all serve the same master and agenda: American Full Spectrum Domination of the world.
Great analysis; you said it before I could. He shows all of the signs of being a libertarian. You know the kind who hate government until they need the police. Social Darwinist punks.
As always, the Empire’s exploring the weaknesses of Nations. The Aquiles heel of all nations: corrution.
In my humble point of view, the NSA “aim and shoot at he see, and hit he’s don’t see”, like we talk here, in a very popular idiomatic expression.
Corruption is the major mankind’s problem and in this modus operandi, the Empire of Chaos is the most AAA grade. All others are amateurs. But, the problem is:
In the NSA’s Rousseff and Petrobras espionage, petabites of data was stolen to sabotage this Big Oil Company and, if possible remove Rousseff, who is a big problem for the Uncle Sam’s New Brazil boot lick project. In the begining, they have no ideia what’s find. But, during the process, the US Department of State discovers he was digging pure gold. A huge constellation of powerfull people in national politics sunk until the ears in this mud sea. A perfect opportunity to throw Brazil in a most perfect anarchy. And now, here it is:
An illegitimate government working in a 24-7 light speed to promote the total disassembly of Petrobras, Eletronuclear, Embraer and Engesa & Imbel, and make so much damage as possible before other nationalist leader rise to power and put order in the house again. If is possible…
Very depressing reading (true,but depressing). Nothing surprising,in fact I’m surprised it took the US this long . I never try to blame the “empire” for doing what the empire “does”. They want World domination,so it should be expected they they will try and dominate the World. Those that I blame are those on “our side” that permit them to succeed. We’ve had a lot of evidence of the US plans for Brazil and all Latin America for several years now. And what was done to stop them. Where were the Russian and Chinese agents reporting on these plots. Where (especially in China’s case) were the funds and investments made in these countries to buy support.There are only three possibilities for that foolish inaction (that I can think off).One, that our side “really” just didn’t see what was happening (which means we need a total revamping and purge of our intelligence networks.So that never happens again). Two,we couldn’t get the countries threatened to take the needed actions to save themselves. They would rather fall victim (again) to the empire’s control.Then to purge their 5th column class and save themselves. Or three,Russia and China have decided that Latin America is so tied to,and important to the US,that they should not bother. And write it off,to concentrate on Eurasian lands only. I consider it a mistake to allow the US a “free reign” in any area of the World. It makes it easier for the empire if we do that. But Moscow and Beijing don’t ask me for my opinion. I’m forced to give it to them through comments.
“”””” Uncle Bob 1 on June 13, 2016 · at 6:17 pm UTC
Those that I blame are those on “our side” that permit them to succeed. “””””
Brilliant!
Well, except I might meanwhile add: Are they on our side?
“Are they on our side?”
Nope.
We may well be in the middle of the matrix – but we can’t count on a nero.
No more waiting around for benevolent monarchs, white (unknown) wizards etc etc..
It’s, somehow, up to us to stop the enveloping animal farm…no analysis of history / Stalin can help now.
Uncle Bob, I think neither have China or Russia given up on South America nor have they had any plans to entirely ‘control’ it. This is one of the main ideological differences, so far at least, between the Eurasian Multipolar nations and the US Unipolar one. Also the notion that Brazil at one point was fully embedded in the Multi-polar world and anti-American is ludicrous. Embrear, Vale and other Brazilian multinationals were busy making deals and contracts with western companies and Lula collaborated and worked with many multinationals in the country from the US and Europe during his presidency. Petrobras was not nationalized under their government but was actually owned nationally long before that since its foundation by Getulio Vargas and has weathered many pro US governments.
Brazil in 2014 bought arms from the US worth 6.4 billion USD. This is just one more fact to highlight that if anything Lula and Dilma were trying to diversify their economies and never contemplated leaving or entirely breaking with the US as a partner. The same can be said about Brazil’s business elite which has lots of connections to America and Europe (Lemann, Safra etc.). So now talking about some sort of ‘American take-over’ after Dilma was impeached is wrong, but it suits the socialist views of Escobar of course because they were unseated.
One final thing I may add, if anything China has deserted Latin America and Brazil, in particular in the last 2 years, with the cooling of their economy and lower industrial production. Subsequently, commodity asset prices crashed, leading to the current economic turmoils in Brazil that we’re seeing.
Cause and consequences, although seemingly straight-forward, are not as black and white as they may appear Bob.
“Where were the Russian and Chinese agents reporting on these plots ?”
The NSA is reading every single email and tapping every phone call in Brazil. What good are agents when you’re up against that ?
From what I understand this is a legal coup (impeachment of Dilma) that will be followed with another legal coup (removal presidential elections). The only way to reverse this is by popular uprising or a military coup.
Where does Brazil’s Army stand with regard to all these shenanigans?
Good questions. But since Russia and China spends a lot of money on intelligence,I suspect that they find agents useful. You are right with,”The only way to reverse this is by popular uprising or a military coup”. Which has always been my point on all these countries enslaved by the empire.In Brazil’s case though (true of almost all Latin America), I doubt you can count on the military much. They are usually the first group that is co-opted by the US in Latin America.
Hi,
hard to say, but in the past they were no friends:
http://www.washingtonsblog.com/2016/05/washington-coup-brazil-incoming-president-us-embassy-informant.html
“””””How deeply are Washington’s fingers in the pie of Brazil’s political crisis? There is at least one precedent, Greenwald notes in the above article. After years of strident US denial, secret documents were finally released revealing the central role played by the US in Brazil’s 1964 military coup to remove a left-wing government. Plus ça change?”””””
https://www.theguardian.com/world/2016/may/09/dilma-rousseff-brazil-impeachment-fight-congress-vote
“””””Rousseff was a key player in an militant group that resisted Brazil’s 1964-85 military dictatorship, and she was imprisoned for it.”””””
“”””” Alexander P on June 13, 2016 · at 6:56 pm UTC
Subsequently, commodity asset prices crashed, leading to the current economic turmoils in Brazil that we’re seeing.
Cause and consequences, although seemingly straight-forward, are not as black and white as they may appear”””””
Argggh, you believe that “free markets” are “free” or at least “markets”?
Gold price? Silver price? LIBOR? HFT? Bonds? Oil price? You suggest that offer versus demand == price – in ideal market conditions? The city (of London) and Wallstreet don’t “help” any slightest bit – its all “socialist gossip”?
Come on, don’t pretend to be familiar with capitalism if you only repeat Bloomberg “News”, err, lies.
Let alone the currency war.
“””””One final thing I may add, if anything China has deserted Latin America and Brazil, in particular in the last 2 years, with the cooling of their economy and lower industrial production. Subsequently, commodity asset prices crashed, leading to the current economic turmoils in Brazil that we’re seeing.”””””
What? “Of their economy”????
That’s not some communist’s fault but a *global* recession across your beloved capitalist countries, even the IMF confirms this meanwhile:
Commodity prices:
Chart: http://www.imf.org/external/np/res/commod/images/chart_lg.jpg
http://www.imf.org/external/np/res/commod/index.aspx
Hi Martin from Soviet East-Berlin
Brazil’s economy started falling apart due to completely inept and corrupt government actions over an extended period of time. Too much debt. Too little capital. Too little productivity. Too much govt spending.
They are doing it to themselves. That allows the “exceptionals” the opportunities to interfere and exploit the situation.
Siotu
Martin you replied to me on so many occasions here, it has become somewhat difficult to keep an overview. I will try nevertheless to respond.
Yes, I agree with you in that we no longer have free markets and price mechanisms fail or are distorted. Does that mean they are totally detached from fundamentals? No. Are you saying the Brazilian government under Lula’s and Dilma’s leadership did anything to prepare for the inevitable crash of commodity prices and the evil empire tricked them?
I don’t know how familiar you are with the region and culture of its people, but Latin Americans, unfortunately, aren’t long term planers (unlike East Asians). Corruption is rampant in that part of the world and that applies as much to your despised neo-liberal conservative politicians as to leftist ‘neo-communist’ ones. This created the perfect storm Brazil is currently in (and it’s not just Brazil but Argentina, Ecuador, not to mention Venezuela).
Regarding the Chinese economic downturn, I never wrote China was dragging down western economies, I said the lack of demand for resources from China was dragging down Brazilian and other Latin American economies, that’s a different thing Martin.
For China I will only say this much, the downturn is real, it is only partly to blame on the lack and endemic growth in Europe and the US, and it will get worse because the Chinese are extremely indebted and producing at total overcapacity. Meaning they produce more than the world can possibly consume. Rebalancing this with all their accumulated debt will be nasty to put it mildly.
Look I know your admiration for communism and I respect that, even though my realities and believes are far apart, but instead of just ranting at people with other opinions try to understand their point also! Bring some constructive criticism.
After a FireFox crash I need to post it again, I hope it wasn’t already. Nevertheless I have added a sentence.
“””””One final thing I may add, if anything China has deserted Latin America and Brazil, in particular in the last 2 years, with the cooling of their economy and lower industrial production. Subsequently, commodity asset prices crashed, leading to the current economic turmoils in Brazil that we’re seeing.”””””
What? “Of their economy”????
That’s not some communist’s fault but a *global* recession across your beloved capitalist countries, even the IMF confirms this meanwhile:
Commodity prices:
Chart: http://www.imf.org/external/np/res/commod/images/chart_lg.jpg
http://www.imf.org/external/np/res/commod/index.aspx
BTW: China is the West’s provider of cheap labour. As the western economies were crashing this decreases the demand for the latter. This reduces China’s growth. So it is a plain lie when you repeat Neocon Bloomberg style fluff that “China is dragging down western economies”. It was the other way around.
What did you say? Economy is not a trivial matter to understand?
Just in case nobody told ya, do not say you were left out: China is nothing but the ole western manufacturing sector. It has no internal market. None.
Sure, the hardware is there, so are the jobs – ready to implode any minute. It is a slave colony.
‘ad hominem’ attack removed … mod-hs
sorry, I beg to differ. As soon as the Chinese let their currency appreciate, they will become the world’s biggest market. They won’t need to export to anyone.
“”””” Serbian girl on June 14, 2016 · at 12:22 am UTC
sorry, I beg to differ. As soon as the Chinese let their currency appreciate, they will become the world’s biggest market. They won’t need to export to anyone”””””
That’s correct.
Google images for the simple serach string: china modern
https://www.google.de/search?q=china+modern&biw=1280&bih=851&source=lnms&tbm=isch&sa=X&ved=0ahUKEwiT8tiFqKbNAhWP0RoKHaShAlcQ_AUIBigB
The shift is almost done as facts on the ground, only waiting for the western fiat collapse.
Hi Serbian Girl
It is not as easy as that for China.
There are two massive problems within the Chinese economy presently. Firstly, they are a large holder of US govt debt. So, in practice they are joined at the hip with the USA economy. That economy is in trouble and beginning to slip. When it is understood that US debt obligations can’t be and won’t ever be able to be discharged, then they become worthless. Unfortunately this is harmful in the extreme for China.
Second problem is the internal debt within China itself. This is usually referred to as “the Red Ponzi”. When that debt goes bad (as it will) the decisions made by the leadership will be most incredibly critical to the future of Chinese society & culture. If they attempt bail outs and welfare policies, then they are going to wreck the next few generations (as an analogy see what has happened in Japan and more recently in the US and in Europe when financial institutions holding toxic debt are bailed).
Neither of these issues are trivial to solve. Trying to revert to communism or even socialism will merely make matters worse.
Putting aside the bad tidings though, there are two good bits of information that can be presented. China has a lot of specie to back a new hard currency should it be decided to introduce one. Secondly, so does Russia. In some ways (several) Russia is better off. Putin and his team are thoughtful, deliberate and careful with their approach. They do not appear to have a looming toxic debt problem either.
Siotu
@Siotu:
yes: China is one of the largest US bond holders
yes: if those crash China would stand there with worthless paper for decades of work
no: your conclusions.
China dumped already hundreds of Billions of US bonds, and ironically bought something from it which the Dollar empire keeps artificially heavily undervalued to maintain the ill(!)-usion of a “strong US-Dollar”” G o l d
china dumped us bonds
https://www.google.de/search?q=china+dumped+us+bonds&ie=utf-8&oe=utf-8&gws_rd=cr&ei=G9tfV__VOIquU-eOpcAC
Siotu wrote:
> Second problem is the internal debt within China itself.
While this is true and almost lead to a bust inside China last year, this is not the consequence of too much Communism, but of too much Oligarchy and capitalism in post-Mao post-communist China.
I agree that it is non trivial to deal with the situation, unless maybe one first dumps all US Treasuries and then dumps the Yuan itself and re-introduces a new Gold-backed currency with limited circulation (non-fiat, strictly Gold backed).
> Trying to revert to communism or even socialism will merely make matters worse.
Why?
How?
In which sense?
BTW, regrettably I don’t see where China attempts to “re-introduce Communism”.
But making themselves less dependent from Cabal controlled “international” monetary organisations (B.I.S., IMF, Worldbank) and from manipulative speculative stock markets around the world, how do you believe would that make China’s matter’s worse???
Rather hillariously to what you claimed, such state dictatorship measures (although not really communist) saved China last year when the West tried to crush it.
“””””Secondly, so does Russia. In some ways (several) Russia is better off. Putin and his team are thoughtful, deliberate and careful with their approach. They do not appear to have a looming toxic debt problem either.”””””
Are you genuinely Siotu?
Maybe you should read Starikov’s books.
/the-duran-interviews-paul-craig-roberts-a-warning-from-a-fierce-critic-of-washington/comment-page-1/#comment-247548
Now, here in an excerpt from page 28 (of 300) in http://lit.md/files/nstarikov/rouble_nationalization-the_way_to_russia's_freedom.pdf
“””””The law on the Central Bank is full of controversies. It is technically
federal property, and nevertheless, the Central Bank has no obligations
towards the state. What is more, should we, that is the state, decide to get
rid of the annoying man and use the gold and foreign currency reserves of
the Central Bank to build new factories and roads, we would be doomed to
failure. The three guys next to the lift would not beat us up while we still have
the Russian army and the nuclear shield. But very soon a fourth roughneck
would come to the flat. ‘Independent International Court’ is written on his
back. You must have already guessed that there is no chance for justice.
The Central Bank of Russia, if the Russian state wants to use what allegedly
belongs to it… can file a complaint to the international court!
‘Article 6. The Bank of Russia is authorised to file suits to courts in ac
–
cordance with the legislation of the Russian Federation. The Bank of Russia
is entitled to appeal to international courts, courts of foreign countries and
courts of arbitration for protection of its rights’.
The Bank of Russia and the state cannot decide a controversy themselves.
It will be decided by the Stockholm court of arbitration. Or the independent
court of the State of New York. This is as ridiculous as if the Central Party
Committee and the People’s Commissioners for Finances at the times of
Stalin did not solve their disputes in the Kremlin or government sessions,
but at the court of the Third Reich. It was equally independent from the
Central Committee of the All-Union Communist Party and from the USSR
government. Right? Right. Therefore it could decide who was right and who
was wrong in the USSR, being the court of Nazi Germany. It would have
been fair and impartial. And of course, it would have been guided only by
the interests of Russia and by the letter of the law. But the funniest thing is
that should the Central Bank appeal to the International Court of Justice,
it would inevitably win. And Russia, that is us, would inevitably lose. Why?
Because the Central Bank is a part of a whole system of similar central banks
which, in their turn are a part of a web called the International Monetary
Fund (IMF).
And what is most important: the gold and foreign currency
reserves of the Central Bank of Russia are not stored in Russia”””””
“”””” Anonymous on June 13, 2016 · at 11:29 pm UTC
Just in case nobody told ya, do not say you were left out: China is nothing but the ole western manufacturing sector. It has no internal market. None.”””””
Wow. Mr. China expert speaking?
How often have you been to China? Let me guess: 0.0000 times.
In contrast to you I don’t need anybody who tells me such stuff, because I was there repeatedly and have friends with whom I exchange emails.
I traveled across China by train repeatedly, among the normal people. Sometimes with the poor in a seater’s coach, other times with the middle class in hard-sleeper coaches.
Always without travel guide, simply among the normal people. For several weeks.
Now, reality is different if you suddenly know what you are talking about.
Neither the western neocon propaganda is correct, nor is the leftish criticism in this case. Yes, the slavery conditions shown on globalresearch.ca and corbet report do exist, but that’s not the entire society! Yes, there is no Communism in China anymore, because it was sold out by traitors after Mao’s death. But no, these slaves are not 100% of the Chinese citiziens. China is one of the few countries worldwide which still has a stable middle class. A few months ago there was even an article on ZH confirming this with charts, namely that China has at this point the largest real MiddleClass globally! Not only in absolute terms (due to the large number of Chinese), but also in percentage terms inside China. You won’t find as many homeless in 3 weeks across China as in any aberage western city in the first 30 minutes at the central train station.
Most Chinese have modern cars – I wonder myself how they pay it.
They have money. They have jobs. They have modern cities. It is unbelievanle. had you ever been to China you would feel ashamed for writung such ridiculous nonsense.
You have never in your life seen any city as modern or large as the quite westernised contemporary Chinese metropols.
And this is also tru if you are from USA (which appears to be the case, judging from your slang).
Judging from your slang you’re still pissed about your ole job with the stasi.
Sure, you’re right, never been.
Nevertheless, what would ya call a people, who manufacture shite(literally) for the whole world for paper with ink on it?
I call them slaves.
Anyway, who cares about cityes? Who wants to live in them? I sure don’t.
No more comments needed regarding Mr. Joe Sixpack “Ya, proud to be an American, yey, yaah!”
And no, we were not even member of the SED in my family.
Back then we were pro-West and tired of the East.
Only the West made a communist out of me.
And trolls like you are the reason why I think about the USA like I’m doing.
Decide yourself who is intelligent here, it is a clash of civilisation (singular) against lack of [.] :
DDR-Grenztruppen-Oberst wird 1987 am Berliner Checkpoint Charlie von ehem. Flüchtlingen gereizt.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kUvy1YI0vf8
“””””Nevertheless, what would ya call a people, who manufacture shite(literally) for the whole world for paper with ink on it?
I call them slaves.
Anyway, who cares about cityes? Who wants to live in them? I sure don’t.”””””
Yes, the majority of humanity lives in cities plus works for (often not even) printed fiat zeroes.
Call them Rothschild’s slaves.
But to limit this to China shows that your data processing capabilities appear to be buggy.
Most Americans (who are lucky enough to have some job) do the same.
So do the Germans or French or whatever.
As you appear to prefer residing in the woods I wonder who gave you Internet access.
And what makes you believe you are not a slave.
Well ol buddy, I sure do prefer the woods, and yes, you can peruse the internet from here jes fine.
And no, me no americano amigo, although I like the idea and the Constitution of the States – wish they used it more often.
As for becoming a commie after the fact, relax, you are in the right place in the CCCP – I mean ECCP sorry ossie – I thought you aught to know better.
Hey, there is always north corea, if brussels doesn’t work out for your liking…
“””””Hey, there is always north corea, if brussels doesn’t work out for your liking…”””””
Bad luck that real Communists hate Brussels as much as Washington, London or Tel-Aviv, as *we* know the difference between 4th Reich versus CCCP, unlike you and your sorts of.
But not your fault as you couldn’t notice this for reasons which I cannot speak out due to my politeness.
It’s now certain however, that you are at most a “wannabe Ami” somewhere (outside the USA).
I wonder why the Mods allow this trash.
That’s it from me for this time waster.
Really now.
Wrong again censorboy, altough I used to live there, you couldn’t pay me enough to move back – unless of course Trump makes that land great again.
Same for your merkelistan, I hope a man was born already, to lead your fatherland back to sanity.
As for communism, that is what you have, why, what did you and your dreamy-eyed communistas expect? A stateless society handed to you by a despotic state?
Lol…
This back and forth arguing needs to stop between you two. If not the comments will not be posted,and sent to Saker to decide.MOD
“Anyway, who cares about cityes?”
:-) :-) :-)
“Anonymous on June 14, 2016 at 2:36 am UTC” humour supreme :-)
PS: An don’t gimme no sheet maaaan, yo ma fa …
(For the Mod:
Oxford Dictionary: sheet
1) a large piece of thin cloth used on a bed to lie on or lie under
2) piece of paper for writing or printing on, etc. usually in a standard size
3) a flat thin piece of any material, normally square or rectangular
4) a wide flat area of something, covering the surface of something else
5) a large moving mass of fire or water
6) a rope or chain fastened to the lower corner of a sail to hold it and to control the angle of the sail
And “cityes”, “yo”, “ma” and “fa” not in Oxford Dictionary. Perhaps Chinese :-?)
What do you call a people who don’t manufacture shite, live off the labor and products created by workers in other countries, yet are in debt up the ass to Wall Street, Corporate America, or the US government?
You call them American citizens.
I call them parasitic slaves.
Americans are parasites who live off the blood and sweat of other countries, while at the same time they are also debt slaves to their own US elite.
Unfortunately for Americans, the clock is ticking on their precious Dollar Vampire system, and they will not be able to suck the economic blood of other nations for much longer.
Best buckle up, and get ready for the mother of all economic implosions–Made in America!
Why America is Out of Tricks to Parasite off Global Economies
http://www.fort-russ.com/2016/03/why-america-is-out-of-tricks-to.html
G7 – The Race For Titanic
http://www.fort-russ.com/2016/05/g7-race-for-titanic.html
I have also spent months at a time in China, in similar situations, traveling by train, bus, spending weeks with middle class Chinese families. One of my Chinese friends, a salesperson for an export company told me she could not talk with me this week.
She is on her way to Bali for a week with some of her Chinese friends. Is she rich? No, but if she can afford to take a vacation abroad, as many Chinese do, that says something.
I live in Chiang Mai, Thailand, have since 2004. When I first arrived, there were only Westerners here as tourists, now Chinese as well as Koreans, Japanese, Malaysians and so on are all over Thailand. Thailand is to China what Mexico is to the US. Close by and not expensive as a travel destination.
China has a superb high speed rail system where trains go up to 180 miles an hour.
The Shanghai Museum is truly world class, unlike Kolkota, India’s, which is a shabby disgraceful mess.
China is a country that lost 20 million people in 19th century chaos and another 20 million in the 30’s and 40’s. Ravaged for two centuries by the West and then Japan.
From the ashes, in 1949, it has risen like a Phoenix. Problems of course. But what can we say about a dictatorship of 1.3 billion people with a prison population less than the US, with a population 1/4 the size. And a military budget of about 1/6 that of the US.
One African, who owned an English language school in Xiamen, with a Ph D in economics, explained the difference between China and Western trade policies.
Western trade policies are designed to ‘extract’ as much wealth as possible from its mainly 3rd world ‘partners’. China creates win/win deals where both benefit.
To sum up, critics of China are brainwashed imperialists. As are critics of Russia.
@ Anonymous on June 14, 2016 · at 2:35 pm UTC
Tnx! Sounds very authentic.
That’s the real China.
Probably youve never set foot upon the delhi metro.. its the 2nd best in the world.
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/travel/rail-journeys/Railways-The-worlds-best-metros-and-underground-lines/delhi-tunnel/
Probably uve never set foot upon the Delhi metro.. its the 2nd best in the world.
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/travel/rail-journeys/Railways-The-worlds-best-metros-and-underground-lines/delhi-tunnel/
“Most Chinese have modern cars – I wonder myself how they pay it.”
Sounds like the US a few years ago.
The masses in China are being prepared for an even bigger turkey shoot.
“Also the notion that Brazil at one point was fully embedded in the Multi-polar world and anti-American is ludicrous. ”
True,but that is “why” you don’t find that statement in my comment you replied to. I never claimed that.
Hi Alexander P
I think you are much closer to the truth with your view of what is going on with Brazil etc.
Where we would disagree is with this statement, “Subsequently, commodity asset prices crashed, leading to the current economic turmoils in Brazil that we’re seeing.”
My understanding is that Brazil was in serious economic trouble long before the commodity prices dropped. It was a perfect short really. Too much corruption. Too much debt. Socialist ideology and politics (too many promises of freebies). Fiat money. Inefficiencies. Protectionisms of insider groups. Presence of daft regulation. Corrupt banking structure. Corruption in general throughout politics. Underwhelming and unimpressive productivity. Over-reliance on windfalls mentality (look at all these resources, we don’t have to work because the ground yields up so much free wealth which belongs to all the people- even the ones who have not worked a micro-Watt to extract or win any of it) etc etc etc etc. Economic turmoil was in store for Brazil no matter what. It was just a matter of time. It didn’t matter whether commodities dropped or not either. It was an inevitability.
Siotu
Hi Siotu,
Thank you, some interesting points you mention here also and I completely agree with them. The commodity bubble crash was the trigger but structural underlying deficits, such as a lack of investment in infrastructure, education and over indebtedness accumulated long before that are the main reasons for the misery of course. I guess I was too brief in my description there.
Actually it is interesting to compare Mexico and Brazil in that regard, the two largest economies in Latin America, Mexico so far is weathering the global economic slump better (2% growth) than Brazil, both countries have rampant corruption though. But Mexico being much less regulated probably helped. Also the Mexican economy relies near completely on the US whereas Brazil’s economy is much more diversified exporting to Asia but also North America. So the Chinese downturn is hurting Brazil more than Mexico.
How do you see Latin America ever leaving this vicious cycle of boom and bust, foreign control and interference, corrupt elite, without the usual rhetoric of Russia/China being their saviors in here? For me it’s hard to see and it makes me sad, as I hold the region dear.
Hi Alexander P
You ask this difficult question, “How do you see Latin America ever leaving this vicious cycle of boom and bust, foreign control and interference, corrupt elite, without the usual rhetoric of Russia/China being their saviors in here?”
First point is that the govts of Russia and China are not about to attempt “rescue” of South America by either military or other political interferences. That just is not about to happen. They will probably be open to encouraging Russian and Chinese businesses and individuals to investigate trade and investment possibilities, but that would be about the sum total of it (plus some intelligence gathering so they are up to date and know what is going on). South America is not part of the near abroad for either govt and neither of them appears to be expansionist so far as I can tell. So, my expectation is that there is not a great likelyhood of exceptionalism behaviours being exhibited by Russian and Chinese govts. Both have bigger issues and looming challenges of their own to deal with.
You enquire how South American nations can get out of the self-destructive cycle they engage in over and over. That is difficult for me to imagine at this point. It requires substantial changes in culture, ideology, individual behaviours and expectations. What is desperately needed is a widespread understanding of economics at a fundamental level. In general, that they have not got. Still, there are some encouraging signs with several groups appearing at particular institutions of higher learning, some well written papers and analysis being published and some seminars held. It is early days.
While I do expect to see some serious impoverishment and heavy suffering in this bust (which is not too far along as yet), it is unlikely that, in itself, will direct changes in the political, social or economic thinking. Learning from the terrible adversity experienced as a consequence of previous defective economic decision making is not something you can expect to see in this instance. It has not happened before there and it is hard to imagine what is so vitally different this time around. Perhaps I have missed something important, but I suspect not. Anyway, for South America, change and improvement is more likely to come as examples are set by other countries and so more people become aware of how economics actually operates. That is, they have examples right before them. For example, it is quite possible that Central Africa will develop further and faster. The potential is certainly there and it has been demonstrated in certain locations (look to see what happens with Chinese investment in Africa- could be more than just slightly significant).
Sorry not to be much help with the question. I shall retreat to Zhou Enlai’s alleged response to a question directed at him ~1945. He was being asked about the outcome of the French Revolution of the late 1700s. He is supposed to have answered, “It’s too early to tell.”
Siotu
@Siotu, self proclaimed “economic expert better than Pepe”
What’s your problem with debts?
This alone shows that you didn’t learn much here about economy and finances.
I seriously wonder what makes you write such things.
Do you know what western “money” is?
Answer: *debts*
Money is created as debts, otherwise it wouldn’t come into existance.
It is impossible to pay all debts, because there are by definition more debts than the total amount of money, due to the interest that gets immediately added to the non-existing money created from thin air when boorowed by private banks running central banks to governments who need it, at interest! – No matter how you look at it and what you try to do.
You want a debts-free country? 1989 Romania was debts-free! Romania did not give in to western pressure and instead paid back all its loans. You may remember in which kind of austerity this resulted for the Romanians.
Or let’s to the contrary have a look of some of the allegedly “richest nations of the world”‘s debts:
http://www.usdebtclock.org/
http://www.nationaldebtclocks.org/debtclock/germany
Zeitgeist – The Movie: Federal Reserve (Part 1 of 5)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_dmPchuXIXQ
The Money Masters Full Documentary- The rise of the bankers
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UrJGlXEs8nI
The only system which ever in the past 1000 years worked against this and functioned well was the Soviet Union under Stalin and it continued to run in some countries like GDR until 1989.
No inflation!
No boom/bust cycle!
No speculation on the cost of the working class!
Factories owned by the workers!
Free healthcare for all!
Constitutional right for a job!
Constitutional right for not getting homeless!
Free education!
Free work clothing!
Free (heavily subsidized) prices for really all things one needs for daily life!
Very extremely cheap public transport night and day with an excellent web of railway connections much better than today!
The irony is that Communism gets criticized most by those who never learned what it is.
The world’s problem is not Communism, but lack of Communism.
The problem is Interest-Interest times exponential growth:
The Most IMPORTANT Video You’ll Ever See Part 1 of 8
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=u5iFESMAU58
Arg, typo correction:
not borrowed by private banks to governments, but of course *lent* to them and borrowed by the govs.
Hi Martin from S.E.B.
What is my (personal) objection to debt? Well, for me it depends on what sort of debt it is we are considering. Some types of debt I do not object to at all, while others I most certainly would object to.
Take an example. Imagine a person taking on credit card debt to fund a consumptive life-style for which that person lacks sufficiency of regular income to otherwise enjoy. That is what is known as “dumb” debt. Painting a more specific picture of it, let’s examine what happens.
The credit card is used for going out to restaurants and cafes, movies and the theatre. It is used to purchase nice fashionable clothes and footware, along with accessories and PEDs (iPhone or similar). The credit card is used to purchase such things as furniture, holidays overseas, whitegoods, browngoods and other items. Meanwhile, the weekly paycheck is insufficient to have supported the purchase of all these items. The credit card and the growing debt placed upon it does enable the purchases and it allows them to continue for an extended period of time. Nevertheless, eventually the credit card balance gets to the point where it is not possible to pay it off. Instead the most that can be done is to make the minimum payment each month. Now that would be bad enough, but it can (and does often) get much worse.
The person faces austerity. They can no longer increase the balance on that card. They can’t continue purchases to the level they have been operating at. They should stop and change their habits and behaviours immediately. Indeed they ought since things are getting so serious that a few late payment penalties later and they are in deep trouble with the daily finances. Yet…….. they still want to continue with the nice lifestyle they were enjoying and that requires continuing the spending at a level higher than what they are able to earn.
So, they go off and get a second credit card (one of those no interest for six month deals) and start spending up on that one, soon running up a balance on it, even using it to make the minimum payment on the first credit card. The final stage is drawing down on assets (taking out a second mortgage on the house or even selling it altogether). You can imagine where this is going to end up. This is a kind of debt I most certainly do have a problem with.
Now that debt scenario is analogous to what has occurred, presently is occurring, with Brazil. Its government has racked up a lot of dumb debt which has funded its consumption. Now here arrive the consequences. They are not going to be pleasant. There will be suffering. It is unavoidable. Less and less freebies. No more giveaways. As is said in these circumstances, “Pay up sucker.”
I have a problem with this sort of debt for the same reasons as in the first example. It is worse though in that it is not the members of the government who are personally responsible for servicing the debt they initiated, rather it is the people of the country today as well as generations of the yet unborn! They are on the hook for it! As stated, I have a problem with this and object to it.
You write, “Do you know what western “money” is? Answer: *debts*”
I know. It’s awful. It is indeed unsustainable. Definitely unsustainable over the long run. The justification is banalities like, as is attributed to Keynes, “In the long run we are all dead.” Well now the long run has arrived! Lord Keynes may be dead but those people living today are not. We get to deal with the consequences.
The term “debt money” is often applied in respect of Western fiat currencies. I am well aware of this attribute of the present fiat currency system. It allows governments and their cronies to consume much wealth in the economy stealthily and without people realising how seriously they are being robbed. My strong preference is for specie backed money or directly employing specie as money. I disagree with fractional reserve banking, central banking and fiat money. Government should not be trusted sufficiently to be allowed to control money or issue currency at all. Govt can’t be trusted with something like that! Most bankers can’t be either!
In regards what you have written in respect of communism, sorry Martin I do not agree. For a start the system of Stalin was completely and utterly immoral. It was toxic and unfit for humans. I’d go further than that even and state it was evil (as was the man himself). A great leader of the people does not deliberately organise the suffering, impoverishment, fear, torture and murder of tens of millions of them.
Even Lenin came to the conclusion that communism could not work. He acted in the light of what he had learned and made some changes to policy (he had gained certain knowledge that his theories and ideologies were wrong at the price of wrecking many lives and introducing much suffering to Russian people). In a sense he became a heretic! Stalin had been present throughout all of this and was well aware. That he proceeded as he did is eloquent testimony to his base evil. Stalin was a monster. Note, I am not saying he was an idiot or foolish. He was clever and he was capable. He knew exactly what he was doing to people.
More recently, prior to the fall of the USSR, I saw enough of the remains of the communist system (during its final days in Eastern Europe) to witness and understand what a total failure it was. As it happens, anywhere communism is tried the results are the same. Loss of productivity. Impoverishment. Looting. Bludging. Rorting. Corruption. Coercion. Threats. Violence. Failure. Inevitable collapse.
By the time the USSR fell, as an economy it could not support itself by production or by trade. It could not even borrow the currency so desperately needed from anywhere or from anyone. Well before then the general population knew the system was useless, that the ideology was fraudulent and that the economy was toast (even if the CIA and Paul Samuelson didn’t realise it). Once that point is reached (where the majority of the population have lost faith and no longer believe by and large), then the jig is up.
Turning now to the list of attributes posited for the communist system and taking each in turn.
“No inflation!”
Inflation is when the supply of currency is increased by the introduction of more and more newly created currency. This is often described as “money printing”, the creation of money “out of thin air” or “legalised counterfeiting”. One of its consequences is a decreasing purchasing power of each unit of currency. Eventually people notice and then they begin abandoning the currency, searching for something superior to use for storing value and transacting with.
My personal experience with communist system currencies was the uniformly poor purchasing power. Everywhere I went people expressed strong preference for US dollars or deutschmarks. The local currency was in disfavour compared to what was termed “hard currency”. There were even shops which would not accept the local currency under any circumstance! I remember the “dollar shops”. People used to ask me to purchase items for them (because I had “hard currency”) and then they’d offer to pay me back with the local stuff. It was not uncommon to be approached by active serving military personnel who sought good vodka from a dollar shop. As a foreigner I could go in there and transact. They could not. What sort of economic system did they understand themselves to be “defending” I wondered.
“No boom/bust cycle!”
Oh yes there was and in the end the bust was total. We are all most fortunate that when the bust arrived, the leadership of the USSR made the decision not to start a war. Rather, they took a far more civilised option.
“No speculation on the cost of the working class!”
This is ‘xactly what the nomenklatura and commissars built their lifestyles upon. They were not productive in the slightest. Think of all the productive efforts of other people they looted in order to live in the manner they did.
“Factories owned by the workers!”
The workers owned nothing. Look, if you possess ownership in economic goods/assets, then disposition and/or disposal of those items is decided by you. If you are not able to sell, consume or give these away, then you are not the real owner. For example, I can sell my house. I can sell shares in the businesses I own. I can give one of my cars to my wife or children as a gift or even to a friend should I so decide. My property so I decide. A worker in the communist factory would soon find he could not sell his “ownership”. He sure had no control over the disposition, use or disposal of what was supposedly his property! He couldn’t even use “his portion” of it as collateral.
“Free healthcare for all!”
Nothing is free. Someone pays somewhere. No free lunches in this life! Even where the extraction of wealth to support the freebie is not immediately and obviously visible, it still exists. The main trouble with these freebies is that someone has to pay whether they agree or not. If they do not agree, then there is coercion, threat of violence and ultimately expressions of violence. Pay tribute OR ELSE.
Besides that issue there is the fact that the standard of healthcare available “for free” was not exactly best practice (let alone cutting edge medical and surgical technology of the day) …..unless, of course, you knew the right people, or were numbered among the right people, hence had options such as wangling your way out of the country and into a modern Western medical clinic or hospital. Don’t forget exactly that strategy is what the top people of the USSR would do when it suited- Switzerland usually, but it was not unknown for them to go to the UK. Too bad if you had a serious malady but were a mere peon worker…..
“Constitutional right for a job!”
“Constitutional right for not getting homeless!”
There is no right to a job or a home. Certainly there is not a right to anything that someone else is to be coerced or forced to pay for. Sure you can write such promises in a constitution, nevertheless they are not a right. Property is something you have to work for, to produce sufficient wealth to acquire (even to lease or to rent). There is no right to steal, even if the stealing is done by a third party, in this case the state.
Now, as far as a job is concerned, ask yourself, is a job property that can be owned by me? How can I expect someone to be forced to employ me? If there is no work that person needs me to do, why should they be forced to employ me? Why should anyone be forced to pay for a make-work job for me?
There is a lot of misunderstanding of what rights are. They are a negative obligation upon every individual. That and that alone. For example, the right to life requires of me that I do not initiate violence, fraud, threat, coercion and murder upon other people. Same requirement applies to you. Same for anyone else. Another example, the right to pursue happiness (which is actually another way of stating the right to pursue goals and objectives) requires of me I do not initiate violence, threat, coercion etc in an interference with other people’s life choices. I may not like their choice but apart from attempting persuasion I have no right to initiate an interference and absolutely not a coercive or violent one. Same goes for you. Same goes for anyone.
“Free education!”
Let’s examine whether “free education” is a right or not. The way to determine whether you are examining a real individual right or a fake claim of one is to ask particular questions. The answers point you in the correct direction.
Is this claimed right a negative obligation or not? If it isn’t, then it is not a right. Apply this to free education and it is readily demonstrated that free education is not a right. It can’t be, as it is not a negative obligation upon the recipient of the free education.
Is there requirement to supply or pay for something even if satisfying said requirement is undertaken involuntarily? This question is an inquiry as to whether someone is paying involuntarily. Free education requires someone other than the recipient (who is gaining the education free of charge) to pay whether he wants to or not OR ELSE! Again, free education can’t be a right. It is merely the false claim to something.
“Free education” is not free. Someone has to pay.
“Free work clothing!”
“Free (heavily subsidized) prices for really all things one needs for daily life!”
“Very extremely cheap public transport night and day with an excellent web of railway connections much better than today.”
See above. None of these are negative obligations. People other than the recipient are forced to pay involuntarily.
Anyway, private transport is far superior than is public transport, hence it remains the preference for the vast majority of people when they acquire sufficient wealth to afford it.
Well. That has been a bit of a marathon. I wouldn’t have expended the effort for just someone I did not respect. You have been kind enough to supply information for me for follow up on previous occasions. I appreciated it.
Regards
Siotu
Yes, I agree a change of culture and mentality is needed. And I can actually feel that at least in Brazil the younger generation really wants a change that goes beyond the usual socialist/neo-liberal mantra. I hope I can still experience some of it during my lifetime.
Saludos
“””””both countries have rampant corruption though. But Mexico being much less regulated probably helped. “””””
How does that fit together?
“””””How do you see Latin America ever leaving this vicious cycle of boom and bust, foreign control and interference, corrupt elite, without the usual rhetoric of Russia/China being their saviors in here? For me it’s hard to see and it makes me sad, as I hold the region dear.”””””
With capitalist Russia and capitalist China it won’t help, either.
What you described as “vicious cycle of boom and bust, foreign control and interference, corrupt elite” is the very normal very uasual cycle of very traditional capitalist Imperialism.
Oh I forgot, in other comments you stated that you love capitalism. So there you go …
Martin, are you ranting again? I thought you read my reply to you further up asking for more constructive criticism but apparently you have not. Instead you go on posting 3-4 comments, with random claims about what people wrote. I never said I loved capitalism, if anything what we have today is not a free market anymore. Also you claim Siotu doesn’t know what money or debt is, yet I haven’t seen him comment on the subject at all.
Your comments seem rather incoherent and inconsistent in a desperate attempt to underline how great Stalinism and Soviet Communism worked. (Which clearly it didn’t or Russia would not have had to go through its painful transition in the early 90s). You claim there was no inflation in that time, you say there was no bust in that time, everything that can be refuted with a click on the internet. But in this thread we’re talking about Latin America, not China, not Russia nor the Soviet Union.
Yes Mexico having less stifling regulations on companies what they’re allowed to do and aren’t allowed to do made them more flexible to respond to an economic downturn, how hard is this to understand Martin?
Again I will gladly continue to argue with you but on a constructive bases and not with angry rants.
Alexander P on June 14, 2016 · at 3:46 pm UTC :
Removed. Please stay polite to other commenters – even if you have different views. Thanks. Mod
The problem is: I cannot see such a development in your texts.
Instead of providing any real counter-arguments the first trick you use is to blame me for “desparately ranting”.
Do you believe this is a smart move to start talking?
If you try this with your wife, believe me, soon your problems get bigger.
You pretend having known and addressed all of my points, yet you never did (correct me if I am wrong, but with precise url’s where you wrote what, rather than with such general condemnations and accusations).
“””””Your comments seem rather incoherent and inconsistent in a desperate attempt to underline how great Stalinism and Soviet Communism worked. (Which clearly it didn’t or Russia would not have had to go through its painful transition in the early 90s).”””””
Well, it depends on everybody’s own processing what he makes out of any given chunk of data.
You claim “my statements were inconsistent” and then provide such nonsense as “proof”.
I told many already: Take a lesson in Boolean Algebra! Believe me, this helps in the long run …
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Boolean_algebra
Again: Why did what you call “collapse” (which sounds quite “passive”) of the Eastern Block happen? Because “Stalinism and Soviet Communism” didn’t work? Why then didn’t it collapse when Stalin was still alive? It did not “collapse”, it got destroyed!!!!!
Listen to Hitlery itself:
SPY EYES – Secretary of State Hillary Clinton admitted that the U.S. created the Al Qaeda.flv
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=z5oMyZwz10Q
Hillary Clinton: ‘We Created al-Qaeda’
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WnLvzV9xAHA
And why did they destroy the Soviet Union? Because it worked too well (not too bad) and the USA couldn’t accept it. It was destroyed in a mixture of teason, naivity, stupidity and sabotage. Not because of too much Stalinism, but it started with Anti-Stalinism when Gorbachev came into power in 1985, after Breschnew and Tschernienkow had died after one another in the years before. This time they wanted a young elader, not somebody as senile as Breschniew and dying soon. And how much they got one. Bad luck only he was not a Communist anymore.
Back to Boolean Algebra: If I thrown down your beloved Ming Vase, and then you have to use a Tea-cup for your flowers and they need to live through Perestroika (and get no water anymore and die). Is it the Ming-Vase’s fault?
Start making sense out of your own wild claims before accusing me of making no sense (to *you*).
Alexander P wrote:
“””””Again I will gladly continue to argue with you but on a constructive bases and not with angry rants.”””””
Then do so, if you have enough arguments.
As repeated many times, here again: The Soviet Union like China did not end because “Communism failed”, but because they got completely sold out by a tiny but powerful treasonous fraction of the old elite who decided to believe USA neocon promises and to sell their soul and countrymen out due to very simple capitalist personal *greed*.
Deal With the Devil: How the Global Elite Re-colonized China
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yFQhVAwbB6o
Communism was the highest form of human development of all times.
I was there (in East-Berlin and traveled across Eastern Europe) :
(My address is not a house and not a street, my address – is the Soviet Union!)
Мой адрес Советский Союз
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3CeBtpC4eds
Киев 50-х / Kiev (Kyiv) 1950s
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KChDRkSH7rc
Kiev. Soviet time.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6oy9PU9CI7A
Considering Siotu provided you with a long and thorough response about the failures of Communism in a way much better than I could ever phrase it and you did not even bother to reply to him, or somehow counter his arguments, I do not feel like I need to discuss any more. Maybe in a different threat, but do take his comments serious, they pretty much match my own.
“””””Alexander P. on June 15, 2016 · at 10:53 am UTC
Considering Siotu provided you with a long and thorough response “””””
His arguments are only correct at the surface, where and if at all.
He downplays or ignores the role which the west played all the time.
It was not a vacuum with fair ideal conditions.
Both of you (believe me) do not want me to respond and debunk that stuff.
Also, forgive me, I cannot sit here night and day and respond to every potentially incoming new message.
Also, show me where one of you two responded to my arguments.
But being the annoying bug swirling around me that you Alexander P. are I drop out of here for some while.
I have more important things to get finished.
Those who lived in the east know the Truth anyway, and as for the others (rgds. and tnx to my friends here!) – if I cannot convince each and every person, that’s a reality I shall accept.
I wish you tons of fun with your capitalism, enjoy!
This is simply bad journalism. I’ve read about half of it and know less about Brasil, than b4. Unreadable.
Sorry, Pepe, that is my oppinion.
well which anon are you anon? anon-ism is so chickenshit rude .
Pepe is actually an entertaining writer, especially for someone touching on economics (which is usually boring). Try actually reading the *whole* article and make specific counter-arguments.
Anonymous (please, please use a name, a pen-name, a tag, anything but anonymous; no more anonymous since there are too many of those already)
Pepe is indeed an entertaining writer and often well informed. He is always well worth checking out, but not when he wanders into economics. That is a subject he really does not do very well with and it shows. Digressing slightly. This is somewhat reminiscent of Rothbard’s Law, as applied to various authors and researchers (wherein “people tend to specialize in what they are worst at. Henry George, for example, is great on everything but land, so therefore he writes about land 90% of the time. Friedman is great except on money, so he concentrates on money….”). Economics is not an area where Pepe is great.
Siotu
@ Pepe on June 14, 2016 · at 10:39 am UTC
“””””Economics is not an area where Pepe is great.
Siotu”””””
From what *you* wrote today this is a good self-description, Siotu.
BTW: You are correct that it is respectless to write as “Anonymous”.
But posting under a stolen name is even more impolite, unprofessional or call it what you want.
I really thought Pepe wrote this comment. Removed. The name has been updated. Mod
Martin from SEB
“How can you Siotu enter the name “Pepe” into the [Name:] field?”
By making a mistake for which I sincerely apologise. It was late. I was tired and I was distracted by things happening around me here. I had been thinking about Pepe and what he wrote so the name “Pepe” was stuck on my mind.
Usually I write my comments prior to scrolling back up the page to fill in the required fields. Occasionally I have forgotten to do that in the past. I do try to sign my name to the bottom of my contribution anyway so you know who it is that is writing.
Sorry to everyone about my error in writing “Pepe” in the name field to my contribution. It was an error and certainly not intentional.
Siotu
Siotu, no need to apologies – it was an error – I will find the comment and correct it for you. Mod
Hi Siotu,
Ok, no problem.
It is understood and I produce enough typos and spelling errors myself here :/
What puzzles me about these types of articles is that the term BRIC was originated by Goldman Sachs as an advertising gimmick to promote interest in emerging market investments. At which point did this classification become an actual Geo-strategic alliance between these countries?
Very valid point Jonathan,
This is what I tried pointing out above. The whole BRIC ‘alliance’ was nothing more than an investment guidance from Goldman Sachs with no geopolitical reasoning at all. Siotu pointed this out nicely already, if anything there is currently a closer relationship between Russia and China (even that one more out of need, rather than mutual trust), India is in the progress of turning to the US and Brazil never really left the western sphere of influence to begin with. It’s therefore completely wrong to pretend that the BRIC are somehow being sabotaged by the US. The US will try to weaken any country it regards as adversary, for instance Syria, a country which is far from being a member of the BRIC. These are two completely different things though.
I agree, from the viewpoint of Goldman Sachs and Wall Street, the BRICs are simply viewed as strategic investment asset classes. The purpose of which is to maximize wealth transfer to money centers such as Wall St and the City of London.
In turn, US government foreign policy is expected to support these interests. Third World developing countries are then required to maintain a favorable environment for investment. That is, ensuring free flow of capital, protection of trade routes and capital investment in those countries, elimination of trade barriers and anything else inhibiting optimal return on capital.
They are already in Peru .
So is a heavy US military presence.
A sit-rep on that country would help highlight what s really going on there.
Where’s Jack?
Oh, we didn’t see you for an eternity.
Where was eimar so long?
to martin – big hug ! And Elsi too if she’s looking in :-)
There is a reply glitch on my new tablet – that’s why my ‘answer’ is floating up here!
I have posted a few times as ‘anonymous’ but not much. Lots of work to catch up on.
Great to see you still here.
Am missing Elsi, Purple Library Guy, P.J. Antonsen, Outlaw Historian, but glad to see Uncle Bob still going strong:-)
Now – a question for you: how did communism deal with the issue of usury? It seems to me the critics of Latin American socialism and rhe general disdain for the region’s economic ‘backwardness – at least according to some of the posters here do not address this (to me) central issue.
Big hug to you and elsi, well, and I might add blue to your list of valuable commentators.
“””””Now – a question for you: how did communism deal with the issue of usury?”””””
Very simple: It was forbidden.
And not a real problem in my country, because there was no shortage of food.
It was only for luxury items such as a color-TV, used cars (without having to wait many years) or tropical fruits and such things. Those were paid in Western currency, nicknamed in ebay like buy/resell 2nd hand newspapers as “Blaue Fliesen” (Blue tiles).
https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/7/7a/100_DM_Serie3_Vorderseite.jpg
Backwardness? The east produced lots of world-market competitive high quality items which were sold in the West under fake brand names. It weren’t all “low quality” goods.
They sold in West-Germany and partially exported to the entire world SLR cameras 6×6 medium format cameras, Zeiss lenses, telescopes, refrigerators, motorcycles etc. And even more so industrial machines were very competitive at the time and were sold to the world market.
Of course the quality of products got worse in the 1980ties, when the Soviet Union came under increased arms race and sanctions pressure and when it was attempted to optimize the Eastern economies by savaing resources at the wrong spots.
Let’s stay with this consideration before 1980.
Martin, I hope you consider writing a book some day on life in the former Eastern Bloc. Including such topics as management of the financial system, the economy, property ownership, the social contract, etc.
Tnx Jonathan,
maybe we can decide that if we are still alive on this planet in 2 years.
Otherwise: Wasted effort, not profitable due to a lack of buyers.
(yep – one has to adopt western marketing logic)
China’s Maritime Moves Are Nothing More Than a Show of Strength
http://www.marketoracle.co.uk/Article55517.html
BY GEORGE FRIEDMAN : The Chinese have a strategic problem in the South and East China Seas. China is obviously interested in what happens in these waters, but there is much speculation as to why the level of interest is so high.
The answer is simple: China wants to keep foreign powers away from its coast and away from waters vital to its global trade routes.
China’s greatest threat in these waters is the United States. Given the size of the US Navy and the location of the islands off China’s coast, the Navy is capable of blocking China’s access to the ocean. This would deal a serious economic blow to China.
Countering this threat means building a navy that could challenge the US… a far from easy task. So, the Chinese actions in these seas are meant to suppress American influence and boost China’s ability to control shipping lanes.
This calls for a show of strength.
Why is Russia so friendly with Israel? Why didn’t Russia help Gaddafi? Why are they not helping Yemen? Israel annexed the Golan Heights from Syria and Putin says nothing! What’s the point of being in the UNSC? If this keeps going on then Russia will be erased from the South, forgotten in Libya, Iraq, Egypt, forgotten in Yugoslavia with Montenegro joining NATO, surrounded, plagued, isolated and“sanctioned.”
Comrade Hamza 13sg ,
my questions exactly-actly!!!!!!!!!!
Maybe because Russia’s government also doesn’t serve its own people’s interests anymore – like in all other countries?
“Maybe because Russia’s government also doesn’t serve its own people’s interests anymore – like in all other countries?”
How do we organise (excluding those who think Apple’s Chinese factory is doing the people who work there a favour)
?????
Yes?????
I’m listening …
Did you provide a suggestion?
https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2007/11/071112133759.htm
“Instead of a model in which opinion flows only from the media to influentials, and then only from influentials to the larger populace, Watts and Dodds created an influence network with opinion flows in many directions at once, adjusted for the probability that a given individual will adopt a change when the information comes from a certain source.
They then introduced an event into the simulation, evaluating what factors resulted in an overall shift in opinion in their model system. They also introduced “hyper influentials” and monitored their effects, tried grouping individuals together into sub-networks, and adjusted the degree at which attitudes shift.”
??
Too little multimedia and no nostalgia.
Nobody will only start reading it.
We need more like this:
http://www.kommunistische-initiative.de/
https://twitter.com/egon_krenz
https://twitter.com/MfStasi
I just saw that these pro-GDR twitter accounts speak out for Moarrrrr migrants.
Also I meanwhile doubt if the real Egon Krenz is actually affiliated with “his” twitter account.
In general this migrants invasion has split all the sub-fragments of the european society even further.
Honestly speaking I don’t see any sense in being politically active outside Russia anymore.
My favorite films on Allende — The Battle Of Chile, Parts 1 to 3, by Patrizio Guzman.
Part 2, the Coup —
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=d4I5LZbNbZs
My belief is that is spite of, to SPITE, and because of, the Yanqui aggresssion, sabotage and criminal subversion of BRICS nations, they should ACCELERATE the bastion of BRICS finance, strategies and solidarity. That is the only message to send to the Pentagon/Washington/Wall Street demons — ”You are merely bringing forward your own doom”.
Meh I’d like to see this social democratic dwarf go up against this intellectual titan: https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=3mhbILG4Hes
Wondering why Telesur and RT are getting booted from Argentina?
That’s just the start.
http://www.telesurtv.net/english/analysis/For-More-Than-50-Years-CIA-Went-Deep-into-Ecuadorean-Society-20160605-0028.html