The Prolog for World War III: Russia and Israel Setting the Stage

 

The Russian Front

The New Russian Empire was flushed with pride as it announced the successful test of The RS-12M Topol Stealth nuclear capable missile with a range of about 6125 miles and sporting a 550 kiloton warhead capable of laying waste to a radius of about 14 miles. It now appears that the arsenal of the late Soviet Union has fallen into the hands of a totalitarian dictator who must be counted among the new axis of evil.  True to form the Russians are proud of testing this horrific devise and evidently savoring the fear that such a test engenders among the civilized world. The sickening feeling of having entered a new cold war is now eclipsed by the sickening feeling that the Russian quest for empire will be a driving force in the world for an unknown period of time an may be humanities downfall.  If anyone harbored doubts that Putin’s actions were misunderstood or the result of a miscalculation let them reflect on the testing of a stealth nuclear missile designed to defeat defensive systems such as the one proposed for Poland.  Consider some quotes from an article in the British Paper, The Sun

 

RUSSIA last night provoked fresh fears of a Cold War by boasting it has tested a new long-range nuclear missile.

Moscow’s military chiefs revealed their Topol intercontinental stealth rocket had been fired successfully.

The chilling declaration was aimed at sparking international alarm about the conflict in the Caucasus, diplomats claimed.

 

The Bible predicts the rise of a Russian Strongman who it calls “Gog” in the last days and that Gog will form an alliance with Iran and most of the Islamic powers of the Middle East.  Gog is actually a title, not a racial or tribal reference, and it denotes a term of leadership like De Fuhrer or Ill Duce.  Gog literally means summate of the mountain and this leader will lead the Russian lead and presumably Russian equipped coalition against Israel in the last days. While speculation about who might be “Gog” or who might be the “Antichrist” is inherently dangerous, its impossible to avoid the conclusion that Vladimir Putin is behaving in a way quite consistent with “Gog” as predicted in the Bible.  Once again, every generation felt its living in the last days and any speculation that Putin might be Gog must be seen in that light but the pieces do seem to fit rather well.

1.     Vladimir Putin has clearly cast off democracy for a system including elements of dictatorship and fascism that some have described as corporatism.  Business and government in bed together with a strongman to set goals and focus the national will.

2.     Vladimir Putin who stepped down as President of Russia is still obviously calling the Shots and the new president is clearly a place holder of sorts

3.     Vladimir Putin has actively been involved in transferring nuclear technology to Iran and in protecting Iran while it pursues its own nuclear weapons.  Iran is ancient Persia, who is prominently mentioned, with Gog as a participant in the last day’s coalition army that will attack Israel in the last days.

4.     Vladimir Putin has been clearly warning everyone off an attack on Iran’s nuclear program and has done everything it can to buy Iran time to join the nuclear club.

5.     Vladimir Putin is likely to react rather badly when the Iranian Nuclear program is taken out in the coming days. While all the pieces for Armageddon are clearly NOT in place this attack will doubtless draw Iran, the Islamic Middle East and Russia more closely together.  Such an attack may well plant the seed of Armageddon and when it occurs its possible that the limited use of Weapons of Mass Destruction may be used.

6.     Vladimir Putin is not being kicked out of Georgia by the US or NATO and clearly Moscow has won this opening bid to reclaim the Soviet Empire.  One can’t imagine NATO or the USA raising a finger as the Russians quietly force the old alliance back together.  If Georgia is the template it’s clear that NATO will talk with much sound and fury that will signify nothing.

7.     Vladimir Putin will use, I think successfully, divisions in NATO to avoid most of the sanctions now being discussed as a response to Georgia.

8.     Vladimir Putin will use the Iran Crisis to increase its influence over the Middle East and the Petroleum Recourses it contains.  It’s clearly Russian policy to become the new Oil Czar of the world and thus achieve world domination.

 

The Middle Eastern Front

As if the specter of Vladimir Putin playing with Stealth Nuclear Missiles was not enough to ruin our day I found the lead story in the Jerusalem Post quite instructive.  It says that Israel has made a decision that no matter the consequences and with whatever it takes the Israeli’s policy that Iran can’t have nuclear weapons. They will act alone to stop it if they have to. Consider some excerpts from the story in the Jerusalem Post this morning.

 

Israel will not agree to allow Iran to achieve nuclear weapons and if the grains start running out in the proverbial egg timer, Jerusalem will not hesitate to take whatever means necessary to prevent Iran from achieving its nuclear goals, the government has recently decided in a special discussion.

Because of Israel’s lack of strategic depth, Jerusalem has consistently warned over the past years it will not settle for a ‘wait and see’ approach and retaliate in case of attack, but rather use preemption to prevent any risk of being hit in the first place.

In related news, Israel Radio reported that Iran has finished installing an additional 4,000 centrifuges in the Natanz uranium enrichment facility. The Islamic Republic also announced it will install an additional 3,000 centrifuges in coming months.

If you get right down to it, Israel is such a small country that if anyone lands the first nuclear bomb on them the war is over and so is the nation of Israel.  This is not a frivolous policy position because Israel simply can’t afford to be hit at all. Israel has no choice but to remove the threat of an Iranian Nuclear Weapon before it becomes an actual nuclear weapon. At the end of the day its just that simple.  The time for the West to stop this by diplomacy and sanctions has largely been squandered and now the Israeli’s are sending a clear message of their intentions.  Israel is in no position to bluff.  War is coming unless the West finds a way to neutralize Iran’s nuclear program fast.  The question is: How much time is left before Israel strikes?  Once again time will tell.

 

http://www.thesun.co.uk/sol/homepage/news/article1621970.ece

http://www.jpost.com/servlet/Satellite?cid=1219913194872&pagename=JPost%2FJPArticle%2FShowFull

The Gospel According to Pelosi: Only a Racist, Sexist, Homophobe Would Claim to Know the Truth!

 

 

My heart goes out to Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi as she forgot which congregation she was preaching too when she exposed her fundamentalist progressivism at the expense of her “ardent Christianity.” Modern “Progressivism”, Liberalism, Socialism; whatever you want to call it, is similar to organized religion in so many ways it’s not difficult to understand how the Speaker of the House could confuse a Progressive Sacrament for basic Christianity. Both churches have strong opinions on the issue of abortion. Perhaps her breathless anticipation of the renewal of the democrat parties covenant with women to be able to kill their kids up to and now including birth, clouded her judgment.  Perhaps the prospect of consummating the Democrat Party’s anointing of Barak Obama, in the Temple of Obama as Invesco Field in Denver is now being called, caused her to misspeak. Either way I’m sorry, as an American, that the Speaker of the United States House of Representatives looked as stupid as she did when she declared that her extensive knowledge of the “doctors of the church” caused her to conclude that the church was confused on when life begins.

The church didn’t seem to be amused as they corrected the errant Speaker on one of the basic tenants of her church, assuming she really is Christian, and not a Progressive Humanist Obmananon. The Catholic Church bravely corrected the Speaker, publicly, while she seemed shocked that they would dare correct her: and then she challenged the authority of the church as she stood by her conclusions that the church is confused about when life begins. It seems to me that the doctrine of papal infallibility has been co-opted by the Progressive Humanist Church of the Obamanon as they hand down theological dictums that cannot be questioned.  Abortion is good because we can’t tell when a baby is really alive.  Clearly this may have been written by the finger of Obama himself as the beginning of a new 10 commandments for the 21^st century. The Speaker certainly seems to think that this dictum constitutes words to live by.  (Unless you’re a product of conception of course.aka. POC) Perhaps Obama himself will explain when life begins at his replica of an ancient Greek temple where he intends to accept the accolades and the nomination of the Democrat party.  After all if a political party is going to hand down a Godlike opinion on when life begins, they might as well do it at a pagan temple right?  I wish someone would ask Speaker Pelosi if the fake Temple of Delphi, where Obama will deliver his valedictory, looks like a typical Christian church to her?  I dare not guess at her answer.

Clearly the Speaker of the House is indeed an ardent Christian and an active, practicing member of her church.  Who among us can call her a liar for saying the Catholic Church is confused on when life begins?  Let she who is without sin throw the first stone; because when we discern between  good and evil or truth and falsehood we’re nessisarily making a judgement.  We can’t judge.  That’s in the bible.  “Judge not lest yea be judged” is certainly in the Bible.   So we can’t call her an outright liar for being an ardent Catholic who believes the church can’t determine when life begins because that would violate a fundamental tenant of Christianity; like “thou shalt not kill,” for example. Nancy Pelosi would further teach the Body of Christ that we’re to be powerless in the face of moral questions because to resolve an issue of morality fundamentally requires us to make a Judgment about right and wrong or truth and a lie.  I guess the moral of this Pelosi display of theological acumen is best summed up by another dictum that may have been written by the finger of Obama: Moral Paralysis is good because judging between good and evil should only be done by the Party which is Multicultural, the ultimate source of truth. After all, has not Obama taught us that; all truth is socially created?  To insist on absolute truth is racist because all societies conceive truth in their own image and these crazy attempts to impose our morality on others should be aborted at once.

I guess the only question left for Speaker Pelosi to resolve is if the child gets aborted before the truth, or the truth gets aborted before the baby. I would ask the officials of the Catholic Church but in the Gospel of the Church of Progressivism, they’re too confused by the issue to offer an appropriate rebuttal to the speaker of the House: St. Pelosi the Obamanon!

I guess I should go to confession for writing this….  Of course my confessor may then have to go to confession because of this……. And so on.   And so on.

Passivity in Europe: The Monster Next Door Stirs and Probes for Weakness

The Russians put on an impressive display as they castrated the US trained Georgian Military.  Flushed with an easy victory, the Russian Military is resplendent with resurgent pride and professionalism and only too glad to emerge from the wilderness of ignominy after Afghanistan and Chechnya.  It’s not that the conflict wasn’t terribly one, it was, it’s that the presumed disrepair of the Russian Armed forces after the fall of the Soviet Union has been put behind them. Much treasure has been poured into the Russian military and the return on this investment is quite good if not startling.  The Russian army is a lot better than the West gave it credit for and that’s a disheartening revelation. Clearly a confident thug in the region is in no one’s best interest: but that’s today’s new normal.

 

“The Russian incursion into Georgian territory — and the air campaign against Georgian military targets — show a confident Russian military,” Jane’s analyst Nathan Hodge wrote in a report. “This is not the degraded Russian military of the 1994-1996 Chechen War, when Russian fighting units were plagued by corruption, poor leadership and lack of funding.”

 

This begs the question of what Russia intends for this new, confident, fighting force and for what purpose has it been raised up?  The Russians government just claims it’s to defend Russia and its allies against the possibility of foreign aggression from passivist NATO or perhaps an attack from Kosovo or someplace like that.  Perhaps they’re alarmed at the Islamic Terrorists running lose in the world today and the possibility that they might attack an office building in Minsk or a chicken farm in the hinterland perhaps:  and the Russians just want a force that can give the “terrorists “a moment of pause.  Perhaps Russia has become much more serious about the resurrection of its former “sphere of influence”. It’s hard to tell.

 

The resurgent military deployed in Georgia gives Russia a credible threat of force as it seeks to check the pro-Western aspirations of its neighbors. Backed by the U.S., the North Atlantic Treaty Organization in April promised Georgia and Ukraine, both former Soviet republics, eventual membership in the military alliance.

“The Russians regard the Georgian episode as merely the start of a sustained campaign to restore their country’s sphere of influence,” wrote Jonathan Eyal, director of International Security Studies at London’s Royal United Services Institute, on its Web site. “It is now impossible to persuade the East Europeans that a Russian threat is remote.”

 

The British are looking askance at the recent Russian moves and are beginning a dialogue in “Old Europe” that is as familiar as it is terrifying:  We have another threat emerging that we have to deal with and at what point does diplomacy become appeasement and an enticement for further aggression?  Now that’s a good question and it’s taken long enough to work its way into the British Press but I dare say that the other members of the EU are likely not on the same page as Brittan right now. In fairness to its fellow EU members, these are not easy questions to answer but they must not only be asked but answered by the EU lest events get out of hand.  Europe needs to ask itself a question: Are the Russians going to take over the old buffer zone countries and in the 21’st century will the EU allow that to happen?  No one knows the answer right now.

 

A former British ambassador to Tbilisi said that NATO might have to send troops to the region. Donald McLaren, who was Ambassador to Georgia from 2004 to July last year and is now retired, told the Today programme on Radio 4: “I think we shouldn’t be too complacent or too scared in a situation like this.”

He suggested that a peacekeeping force made up of troops from the US, Britain, France, Germany and Russia should be sent to Georgia to replace the Russian units. If Moscow rejected such a proposal, he said, NATO had only two choices: “To give up and surrender and say to the Russians, ‘It’s your backyard, you’ve won’, or to put men on the ground to protect Georgia’s sovereignty and the east-west oil and gas pipeline from the Caspian and Central Asia.”

The Foreign and Commonwealth Office said that there was no prospect of troops being deployed to Georgia.

NATO diplomatic sources said that no one within the alliance was speaking about sending troops. “We have no mandate to act in the Caucasus,” a source said. Even the European Union, which is to hold a summit next month, has downgraded its most likely response to the Russian military presence in Georgia from deploying peacekeepers to sending observers.

 

It’s very much analogous to the bully on the play ground who must learn that you will defend yourself and will not become the victim and the easy prey the bully is counting on.  Naturally the scale is much larger.  The bully on the schoolyard may give you a black eye with his fists and you might return the favor with yours,  but nations in the 21 first century have weaponry available that’s staggering and capable of unimaginable destruction. Today’s combatants in Russia, Europe and the USA can chose from economic warfare, cyber warfare, covert warfare, cold warfare, hot warfare and so on while limiting the conflict to military targets, economic targets, social and cultural targets, or the population as a whole.  Putin, like the school yard bully, is probing for his limits, and if we in the west know what’s good for us: he had better find them soon.  A bully without limits or credible fear of the consequences can make peoples life a living hell if they don’t understand that conflict is unavoidable in this world and that defending civility and national borders in this world is not optional.  We’ve all been down this road before and we’ve all said that Hitler should have been opposed much sooner and the cost would have been much less and yet here we are again.

 

Britain led a chorus of support for Ukraine on Wednesday as western fears rose of possible Russian attempts to build on its victory in Georgia by threatening neighboring states.

Speaking during a visit to Kiev, David Miliband, the UK foreign secretary, called on the European Union and Nato to prepare for “hard-headed engagement” with Moscow following its military action in Georgia.

“Russia must not learn the wrong lessons from the Georgia crisis. There can be no going back on fundamental principles of territorial integrity, democratic governance and international law,” he said.

Mr Kouchner warned that the situation was “very dangerous” because Russia might now be considering other targets such as the divided state of Moldova and Ukraine, with its strategically important Crimean peninsula.

 

The old saying goes that “those who don’t learn from history are condemned to repeat it.”  Clearly this has gone beyond a conflict between Georgia and Russia and morphed into a regional conflict with broad geo political consequences.  The Age old question of where to draw the line rears its ugly head as old Europe reluctance to face the bully threatens old alliances, and even European self respect, as the wily Putin adroitly works his will.  What will it take for the Europeans to face the monster and take a stand?  How many will fall before the new Russian army, or simply give up and surrender to the inevitable?  No sane person wants war but unfortunately, not everyone is sane.  The only way to find out if Putin is out for empire or just to see what he can get is to stand up to him and be ready for either outcome.  It’s better to get this out of the way as soon as possible because the countries involved will harden their positions of either belligerence or passivity around the events now being exclusively directed by Russia.  Can the EU face the Russian Monster in 2008 or will it shrink into denial and despondency while the seeds of World War III germinate next door?  Has Europe learned from the past?  Has Europe been mastered by the past?  Time will tell.

Check out these fine articles from Bloomberg, The Times Online, and the Financial Times:

http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=20601087&sid=aRlwRZ0To7_8&refer=home

http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/world/europe/article4622422.ece

http://www.ft.com/cms/s/0/54acc1fc-743d-11dd-bc91-0000779fd18c.html

Change you can believe in: USA avoids docking aid ships in Occupied Poti

 

 

It would seem the Bush Administration had second thoughts about sending our aid laden warships into  occupied Poti and instead opted to have them dock at Batumi. The mission to sail our ships to Potti apparently went through several changes of destination before the confrontational move was reconsidered.  One can only wish to have been a fly on the wall as the military leaders and the politicians debated the pros and cons of such a move and the reason why they decided to stand down before the forces of the enraged Strongman Vladimir Putin.  Just what sort of signals did the resurgent Russian Empire send to Washington to prompt them to reverse itself so many times about the destination of this humanitarian aid?  Here are some quotes from and a story on Associated Press this morning and to me it paints quite a picture of the brave new world Putin is building.

BATUMI, Georgia (AP) — A U.S. military ship carrying humanitarian aid docked at the Georgian Black Sea port of Batumi on Wednesday, avoiding the port of Poti, which is still controlled by Russian forces.

The U.S. embassy changed its version of events several times in the last 24 hours. At first, it announced Tuesday that its aid ship would dock Wednesday at Poti. Then early Wednesday, the embassy said that plans had changed, and the ship would dock at Batumi.

Later in the day, the U.S. Embassy retracted its earlier statement that an aid ship would dock in Poti. The spokesperson would not allow their name to be used.

“The decision of where to send aid was made at the highest level of the Pentagon and the only decision was to send it to Batumi,” a U.S. Embassy spokesman said on condition of not being further identified.

If our sailors were being sent into this tense environment without proper support, if the Russians decided to start firing on US warships, than I applaud the move to divert these vessels away from certain defeat.  Assuming Russia indicated its willingness to block our arrival at this port and to destroy the ships if we didn’t respect their blockade, I would very much like to know why we didn’t have sufficient forces to back up our words and what genius planned this ill advised mission. This mission should never have been announced if we didn’t have the muscle to carry it out.   Who came up with this idiotic stunt and when can we expect their resignation?  If you say something to a war crazed Russian Strongman: you better deliver, lest the Strongman be encouraged by our stupidity, and feel emboldened to push even further.  In the words of the Cuban Missile Crisis of long ago:  “We were eyeball to eyeball, and the other fellow just blinked.”  The only problem is that we’re doing all the blinking and the Russians are coming off as an invincible machine of fate with ever increasing powers to intimidate their neighbors with the slightest gesture.  This sort of thing can’t continue if anyone on Earth is serious about trying to stop the reacquisition of the Soviet Empire by the new, much stronger, Russian Fascist Empire.

The Russians have all the subtlety of a belch in church with the targeting of the oil pipeline and their willingness to use oil as leverage against the Western Democracies.  This is the Achilles heal and the true legacy of the worst generation, the baby boomers, who derailed any attempt at a rational energy policy for thirty years because the legislation never achieved its uncompromising standards of environmental perfection.  Our posturing as “hip environmentalists” has endangered our national security and our way of life and the Russians may be using our folly to crush the fledgling democracies that became independent with the fall of the Soviet Union. Becoming dependant on Islamic nations and totalitarian leaning nations like Russia was a huge mistake.  Opening up our mouth about delivering aid to the port of Poti and then chickening out is a huge mistake.  Thinking that the Russians will not be using oil as a club to beat us into submission is a big mistake.  Thinking that the Arab oil rich nations are not in admiration of what Russia is doing to us is a big mistake.  The Arabs will be only too willing to join Russia in beating up the West in general, and America in particular, with great glee. The Russians are showing the Arabs how to slap around the “Great Satin “and the Arabs are loving every minute of it. Consider these quotes from World Net Daily this morning:

Putin, while denying claims that he targeted pipelines, is having a hard time selling that to the international community. The Baku-Tbilisi-Ceyhan pipeline carries oil that is headed for the West to the Mediterranean Sea, much of that oil finds its way to America.

The fact that strategic oil pipelines were targeted is a clear indication that Putin is willing to use the strained oil markets as political leverage in defeating the Georgians. Russians fight wars to win.

Russia is one of the strong voices telling the world to leave Iran alone in its pursuit of nuclear capacity. Russia provides nuclear technology and material to Iran’s nuclear program. Iran is a good customer.

The Western Democracies are in an unfavorable position and are shockingly unprepared for both petroleum warfare and the burgeoning alliance between Russia and the Middle East, under Russian leadership, in which oil becomes the talisman to break American power.  Europe is in denial about Russia’s ultimate intentions and America is being blackmailed with petroleum while Pelosi’s Politburo, remains gridlocked.  Russia has found the secret to controlling the United States and incidents like the aborted showdown in the Georgian occupied port of Poti only serve to underline our impotence and helplessness.  The United States has been very successful over the years and we have many enemies who envy our success; we can’t afford to advertise our weakness like this.  We need a well thought out energy policy and an equally well thought out Russian policy and we need it now.  And when they’re done with that; an economic policy that removes the insidious powers of the Federal Reserve would be nice too. 

We’re in disillusioning times and the fragility of our freedom is being unmasked daily, in a downright Biblical way, as Putin does a good job of impersonating “Gog” and the Islamic powers are inexorably drawn into the Russian “sphere of influence”.  Our support of Israel is a thorn in the side of the entire world, if the UN is to be accepted as an indicator of such things.  American culture had degenerated to incivility and an arbitrary rejection of logic and reason as the basis for good argument and the foundation of rational opinions.  Ideology and the cult of self image seems to inform the political behaviors of half the nation while threats to our way of life multiply. We have all the unity of today’s democrat party as multiculturalism has made any assimilation into American Culture a legally actionable civil rights issue. 

If disillusionment can have an advantage it must be a return to valuing the truth over our ideology and self discipline instead of our self destructive national policies.  There is great hope in seeing the truth of how our dependence on foreign oil has led to the difficulties we face and as we begin again to insist on greater truth about ourselves and the world.  When we’re determined to discover and act on the truth we return to the values that made the nation great.  Once we face ourselves, and how far we’ve strayed from the path our founders laid out for us, we have the capacity to regain our strength and correct our mistakes.  I can only hope that the fiasco in Georgia will help us begin that process because the time is short and the stakes are high.

Check out these links for AP :

http://hosted.ap.org/dynamic/stories/G/GEORGIA?SITE=OHALL2&SECTION=HOME&TEMPLATE=DEFAULT

 

Showdown in Georgia: Russia and the United States Ramp Up the Conflict

 

With seeming disregard for the consequences, Russia has recognized the independence of Georgia’s breakaway regions, South Ossetia and Abkhazia deepening the crisis with the USA and, theoretically, NATO. The deed was done by the puppet president Dmitry Medvedev and he called on other states to follow Russia’s sterling example. Russia’s actions evoked a range of statements from our European Allies from the British who “categorically” rejected the move and the French and the Italians who expressed “regret”.  I’m not quite sure what the French and Italians “regret”; was it the invasion, or the occasion of their hiding under their beds shaking in fear that Russia might slap them around next?  But this is the consequences of countries that have too long been able to avoid the nasty reality inherent in defending Europe because the much maligned USA has done it for them all these years.  If the United States were out of the equation one wonders if Europe might do more than express “regret”. Europe has its eyes wide shut in the face of naked Russian aggression and clearly it has no stomach for the US actions to keep the pressure on Russia. 

The US embassy in Tbilisi said Tuesday, Aug. 26, that two warships will deliver aid to Georgia Wednesday through the Black Sea port of Poti, the day after Russian forces announced they would search all incoming cargoes.

The first US aid warship docked at Batumi Saturday, to avoid friction with the Russian naval, infantry and armored forces which control Poti port…….

In Moscow, DEBKAfile’s military sources report, Capt. Igor Dygalo, deputy commander of the Russian Navy, announced that the Moskva missile cruiser would carry out a naval exercise on the Black Sea.

The Russians are clearly marking out their control of the Black Sea in the face of the USS McFaul guided missile destroyer’s arrival with aid for Georgia. Our sources report that the McFaul carries 50 Tomahawk cruise missiles capable of striking land and sea targets.

Capt. Dygalo said the Moskva would practice its wire-guided weapons, communications and missile guidance systems. The exercise will no doubt interfere with the movements of NATO vessels, as clearly intended.

 

This is the classic cold war methodology for dealing with the Soviets: never back down and never give them an inch or they’ll take a mile.  This really ramps up the conflict significantly because it’s no longer about Georgia: it’s now clearly about Russia and the United States. Russia wants to reconstitute the Soviet Empire and the United States wants to keep that from happening.  The Europeans want to pretend that none of this is happening as they sit on the sidelines, expressing regret, while their future is decided by the Russian whom they fear and the Americans whom they envy and despise.  What a mess.  And into this cauldron of uncertainty and insanity sails the Captain and Crew of the guided missile destroyer USS McFaul.

What happens if the Russians accidently send the USS McFaul to the bottom of the ocean?  What happens if things get out of hand during the inspection of the “humanitarian aid” and Russians and American sailors start shooting at each other?  What happens if the Russian lets the McFaul offload its cargo and then essentially impounds it or turns it into a bond fire?  One wonders if the USS McFaul is slapped around a bit but not destroyed if the NATO countries will honor the terms of the alliance and come to our aid?  I would bet lots of money on the idea that France and Italy are expressing more than “regret” to Washington and are instead calling President Bush every name in the book. Lots of bad things continue to happen over the Georgia war that both the American People and the Europeans seem to be deliberately ignoring.  If shooting is going to happen it needs to be intentional and well thought out shooting not a series of impulsive escalations to escalating provocations punctuated by European displays of “regret” rather than their customary apathy. No one knows what’s going to happen if the Russians interdict our aid shipments.  I doubt that NATO would do more than protest if the Russians blew the USS McFaul out of the water.  Europe is missing in in action and Bush and Putin are toe to toe: what do we think is going to happen!

Russia’s RTS Index fell to the lowest level since 2006, the ruble extended its drop and the cost of protecting the country’s bonds rose as the government recognized the independence of Georgia’s breakaway regions.

The RTS index of 48 companies posted the biggest decline among 89 global equity measures tracked by Bloomberg, while Russia’s currency slid to the lowest level in almost seven months against the dollar. Credit-default swaps on Russian debt climbed 7 basis points, according to CMA Datavision prices in London, as President Dmitry Medvedev risked a deepening rift with the West by recognizing South Ossetia and Abkhazia.

 

Russia is paying a financial price right now that may or may not be a good thing.  If the Russians get tired of the world giving them the cold shoulder and trashing the economic good times they’ve been enjoying they’re quite capable of manipulating the price of oil to make it much worse on the West.  How do you suppose our friends in Europe will react if all the Russian petroleum products that were coming from Russia suddenly stopped?  I wonder if NATO would have a position on that or if it would join the French in expressing regret?  All this stuff is a big deal for everyone, Russia, Europe and The United States and I don’t think either the US or Europe is prepared for the possible consequences.  I think NATO is more likely to disband in an oil boycott than to stand firm and tell the Russians to get out of Georgia or NATO will kick them out.  I just don’t see it.  The Russians with their dictator and a people accustom to privations will withstand the economic war better than the West.  If it comes to down and dirty economic warfare the Russians are far more likely to win than the West.  Russia is paying a price right now but they could decide that we will pay in like manner and they may well achieve more than they could with all their artillery and armored divisions. 

While the Soviets fell and the Russians emerged: the Europeans and Americans became soft and utterly dependant on foreign oil.  If the escalating confrontations between Russian and American military don’t end soon, the world’s investors will be rushing to sit on the sidelines inadvertently starting an economic war that could be just as devastating as a shooting war.  In our interdependent world, where the global economy is the new normal, we may be able to back off a shooting war but will the free markets continue to invest in Russia?  Are we already locked into a shooting war or an economic war no matter what happens?  While we watched the Olympics, and the Speeches at the Democrat convention; the world has become an ever more dangerous place.  The conflict between Russia and the United States is escalating and it’s entirely possible that Bush is bluffing from a busted flush. (I can only hope he knows that.)  If there’s going to be a winner out of this conflict his name is going to be Vladimir Putin because we can’t do it alone and our European Allies want nothing to do with this conflict.  That just leaves the Captain and Crew of the USS McFaul who sail into harm’s way while everyone holds their breath. 

Dont forget to check out Bloomberg.com and the Debka File for more news!

Haven’t You Got Any Euros? Canadian Organized Crime Rejects the Dollar.

 

 

There’s a report from a French News Agency that I found grimly amusing.  It seems that organized crime has taken a good look at the falling dollar and now prefers payment for narcotics and other nefarious products, in Euros rather than US Dollars!  This was in the annual report from Canada’s Criminal Intelligence Service and reported by Agence France Presse. Here are some quotes from the report worth pondering.

“The US dollar weakened significantly against other major currencies in 2007 and according to some economists, is expected to depreciate further in 2008.”

“As a consequence, other currencies — particularly the euro — are poised to weaken the US dollar’s dominance as the currency of choice for international remittances and payments.”

“This trend could also drive an increase in observed instances of bulk-cash transfers denominated in currencies other than Canadian and US dollars.”

Organized criminal groups, topping 900 in Canada, are primarily focused on the illicit drug trade, but have also expanded into credit card fraud, organ trafficking, identity theft and even illegal logging of Canada’s vast forests.

“The illicit drug market remains the largest criminal market in terms of extent, scope, and the degree of involvement by the majority of organized crime groups,” many of them operating across international borders.

It’s unfortunate to have one more reason to be ticked off with organized crime but here it is:  When even the Mafia demands payment in Euros, instead of dollars, it’s just one more signal for everyone to dump dollars and buy something of value, like oil.  Russia has Oil and so do the Moslems of the Middle East.  We have Dollars:  Lots of them.  Oil has ever increasing value and was once again heading skyward, this afternoon, even as the dollar dropped. Just when you thought the oil crisis was over and sanity was returning; back up the creek we go and we still can’t find a paddle.  As of this writing the stock market is down about 214 points and its being led by banks like JP Morgan as they discover that their Fannie Mae holdings have lost value.  By startling coincidence it seems that the inventory of unsold real-estate is an ever expanding thing while the aforementioned Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac have an ever more difficult time finding anyone to buy their paper.  Shocker!

I say all that to say this:  What does it say to you when you have reason to trust the accounting practices and the financial judgment of Canadian Organized Crime, The Russian Strongman cum dictator Putin, over the holder of half of all US mortgages and the whole financial sector of the stock market? 

I intend to drown my sorrows this week in some overpriced diet cola while I go to see the movie IOUSA this weekend, which makes the author of this blog look like a cockeyed optimist.  Perhaps later I’ll turn on the Democrat Convention and listen to the litany of additional spending they’re proposing to make us a more just and prosperous country. I find a certain amusement in the spectacle of  all those democrats trying to sell us Obama while our standing in the world diminishes and our economy becomes too speculative for drug pushers.

I can’t say that I blame them.  I would rather talk about a world in which we all get free healthcare, education, pensions, disability, housing and perhaps a free eclectic car: but that’s not the world we live in.  Still the puppet theatre must go on but just once I would like to see a democrat even mention the insolvency of social security, Medicare, and the bankrupted federal government, and discuss that at their convention.

A convention is supposed to be a happy time, a joyous coronation of a “heaven sent leader like Obama” and it should remain unsullied by talk of rising dictators, oil blackmail, the gridlock on energy policy, the falling dollar and illegal immigration.  Who wants to talk about that at the convention?  I still wish they would mention it at least once in a speech somewhere…..

Singing a Different Tune: Did the USA Flip-flop? Or Did Its Position Get More Evolved and Nuanced?

 

The American Ambassador to Moscow, John Beyrle,   said that Russia was justified in defending itself when it came under Georgian attack ;but what we don’t like is blowing up all that Georgian infrastructure and calling for a change in government. In the recent past the President and the Secretary of State have never really admitted that Georgia was the initial aggressor. Perhaps the support for Georgian President Mikhail Saakashvili is softening a bit as the harsh rhetoric of recent days has a sobering effect on the world.  I would never suggest that the recent, more conciliatory tone, was adopted by Washington because the high tensions had begun to undermine the dollars strength and the moderation of oil prices.  Heaven forbid that this would be the reason for this unexpected olive branch.  It appears that Washington is looking for face saving ways to cool the tensions and to but the Georgia issue on the back burner so cooler heads can prevail. It could also be the case that no one supports getting into the Russians face in the EU, NATO, the UN, the WTO and a host of other alphabet soup organizations .  Everyone deplores what Russia did but no one wants to present them with any consequences because everyone is afraid of Putin.  Apparently Washington, according to Ambassador Beyrle, still supports Russian membership in the WTO and the threat to oppose this membership has vanished into thin air.

Both sides, American and Russian, are pushing to have a new summit meeting between President Bush and Prime Minister Vladimir Putin.  Interesting how the summit is between the Lame Duck Bush, with a few months left to go in his Presidency, and the Russian Strongman Putin, who is not the President anymore, but is very much the Supreme Leader of Russia. It’s hoped that this summit will reassure the world that the lame duck Bush and the new Czar Putin can reclaim their goodwill and once again look into each others eyes and establish that famous soul bond. An olive branch is being extended and I suspect that the rhetoric will end, and the Georgia story will fade, and the former Soviet client states will move ever closer to Russia, having realized that the Western Democracies won’t help them.  The world has looked beyond Georgia and found larger interests in the future and will simply step by this naked aggression and move on.  I suspect that Mr. Saakashvili will not be President of Georgia within a year and that the Georgian experiment with democracy will be defunct by two years.  All that remains is to hold face saving meetings in which the West will cede Georgia to Russia, with a tacit admission that we won’t interfere with reacquisition’s of the other Soviet states, as long as its not quite so naked in aggression.  The message of the West is to take back its empire in such a way that’s not bad for business and that doesn’t unduly call attention to the impotence of the West.  Russia must be subtle in its takeovers and we in the West will pretend they never occurred.

No one wants another cold war.  No one wants a hot war with Russia either.  The West has neither the will, the money, nor the courage to stand up to Putin at this time.  NATO is shaking in its boots and if war broke out the idea that NATO could survive a week as the main opposition force to Putin’s tanks is silly.  The sad and sorry fact remains that Russia has all the cards and the West has none.  Putin need not fire a shot but keep the rhetoric frightening and without firing a shot, he can watch the price of oil and the value of the dollar convince the West to see the crisis his way. No one wants war but don’t be deceived either:  Putin and Russia won this round and highlighted the weakness of NATO and America on the world stage.  The cost of our loss of prestige over this incident will have mounting consequences for both Europe and America in the days to come.  Bush has rolled over and given Putin access to our throat and its quite clear that Putin knows that too.  This is a very dangerous situation and but the first of the former client states to fall.  The Russians have emerged once again as a super power and the West has been unmasked as a paper tiger.  And Georgia?  No one wants war…..   Farewell Georgia!  We’re sorry.

Check out this artical at the Debka File:  http://www.debka.com/headline.php?hid=5528

A Whiff of Armageddon: Russia, China, Europe, America All Conforming to Prophesy

 

The world seems bent on dividing itself into teams for some future competition in a sport that no one dares contemplate.  Russia is extending olive branches to Syria and Iran, in addition to nuclear technology, even while it beats up Georgia for trying to join NATO.  Russia is threatening to turn the Middle East into a theatre for great power conflict and diplomacy even as it tries to reconstitute Soviet client states into a new Russian empire. 

NATO has proved itself to be quite worthless as a deterrent to the expansion minded Russians and its glory days are clearly behind it.  America and European NATO nations are forever at each other’s throat and the alliance has clearly outlived its usefulness.  The United States has stayed in NATO for too long and given too much blood and treasure to keep the spineless alliance alive in a day of real emerging threats. NATO has become a debating society between European and Americans rather than a credible fighting force.  I can’t help but believe the Russians look at NATO and smile because with the departure of the Soviet Union, the alliance has become fat lazy and utterly ineffective: no match for an emergent petro Russia flushed with cash and spoiling for a fight.  

In the “Last Days” the Bible seems to say that the Russians will lead a confederation of Islamic nations, including Iran, into an attack on Israel with a gigantic military force that will ultimately be defeated in grand style by supernatural intervention from above. The Bible gives the tribal names as they existed back in biblical times for the peoples involved, but by careful study of those names some interesting things emerge.  First, The Russia of the invasion (Gog) seems to have regained most if not all of the former Soviet States. That might have grave implications for the current Georgia crisis.  It may well be that the West is about to lose the conflict over Russia reacquiring the old Soviet Satellite states.   So too Russia is moving to reestablish soviet bases in Syria and even now is moving a mighty Aircraft Carrier Force, The  Admiral Kuznetsov, into the Middle East.  They’re establishing new defense agreements with Syria right now as a response to the condemnation they’ve received by invading Georgia.

Second, The NATO alliance that we know today is not the NATO of the future biblical times because Turkey is included in the Russian led coalition that will attack Israel.  Today Turkey is a member of NATO and has relations with Israel but the inclusion of Turkey, a secular Islamic country, in NATO has always been on the problematic side.  One can easily imagine a surge of fundamentalism in Turkey or a successful attack that defangs Iran by Israel as something that fundamentally changes and solidifies Islamic Nations and even drives them further into the Russian “sphere of influence.” Add to this the tremendous influx throughout Europe of unassimilated Moslems and a rising militant sentiment among their immigrants and the secular aspects of Turkey’s government may not be long for this world.  

In addition the bible makes clear that Israel will be at peace, with a guaranteed security agreement, when she is attacked by Russia and her neighbors to usher in Armageddon.  Clearly Israel is not at peace in 2008 and the prospects for such a peace seem to be very low, if not nonexistent.  The Bible repeats this condition that Israel will be at peace about three times for emphasis.  This doesn’t mean that bad things won’t happen and that war will be avoided between Israel and Iran at this time but it’s unlikely to be Armageddon.

I don’t think the conditions are right for the War of Armageddon as the bible describes it but I do think the coming conflict with Iran and Syria, the actions of Putin in Russia, the divisions in NATO,  the emergence of China and the economic conditions in America may well set the stage for Armageddon at some future point.  No one knows when Armageddon will occur but we can know the general season in which it’s going to occur and that season is looking a lot like our generation.

One can see the challenges for the American economy and the potential meltdown of the US Dollar and the economic devastation of America from all the debt we’re foolishly acquired.  Our good friends China and Saudi Arabia are major creditors of the USA and they could sink us without firing a shot by trashing our currency.  If the day should come when they don’t think we can make good on the debt and they sell off dollars, for whatever they can get, then America will no longer be a player on the world stage.  Internal strife will demand all our attention and the military budget will just have to suffer for awhile. Our energy dependence and addiction to spending has undermined our national security and it will be decades before we can end that situation, especially with a gridlocked congress.  Remember: The USA is not mentioned or implied as a player in the world of the last days.  This might mean we are a part of the European Alliance via some structure like NATO, or it may mean we’ve turned isolationist, or that some disaster befalls us either natural disaster, economic disaster, or what have you, that takes us out of world leadership. If I had to guess right now I would say the USA will be destroyed economically as a consequence of no one buying our debt anymore.

Europe has made great strides toward economic and political union but it needs to go much further in military union.  Frankly it needs an armed forces of Europe that is uniquely its own and it needs to stop relying on America and NATO because it’s looking increasingly like America can’t continue funding European defense.  The US is overcommitted and fiscally irresponsible and if the Europeans don’t take action to secure their own defense they risk coming under the Russian thumb, ironically, much like Georgia.  The Bible makes it clear that some form of the Roman Empire must rise again and it’s from Europe in the last days that the Antichrist will appear.  This leader will find solutions to gut wrenching problems in all areas of life from economic, to peace in the Middle East, and will consolidate control of the world’s economy and truly unify it.  He will create a currency that people can depend on but he will have lots of controls to weed out counterfeiting and illegal activities and even solve many security issues by biometric access to economic assets.  The world will trade many civil liberties for a stable economic system and the illusion of security and peace.  After the scare the Russians are giving us and the near certainty of an attack against Iran it might get a bit stressful in this old world!

The Russians are clearly about reconstituting the Soviet Empire and obtaining a strangle hold on the Earths most precious commodity: Oil. Russia is not entitled to takeover boarder states because it wants a buffer from the Western Democracies.  We don’t get to takeover Mexico as a buffer to Venezuela right?  This kind of thinking is what sank the world into two world wars, and Soviet Communism, for most of the Twentieth Century.  Russia is clearly in the wrong but it’s got lots of money, it’s got lots of oil, and lots of influence because Europe needs their oil.  It won’t take much for Russia to drive a wedge between Europe and America because the Europeans are only too happy to trade the former Soviet States, some of them fledgling democracies, for peace.  The Russian see the USA in the same position the Old Soviet Union was in before it died: We’re broke, we’re overextended, and our infrastructure and dependence on foreign oil makes us vulnerable to catastrophic change.  The Soviets had a dependency on foreign grain and food stuffs but dependency is dependency.

So what happens from here?  What’s the next big shoe to drop?  Assuming that we are indeed in the last days here is MY SPECULATION: NOT THE WORD OF THE BIBLE! 

I suspect that we’re going to face in America an economic event, a depression and currency collapse which will remove us from power and force Europe to become a military power in her own right and produce a leader that will deal with both the economic mess and world peace.  I think Israel will attack Iran, perhaps with our help, perhaps before the American Elections and certainly before the new President is sworn in.  I would further guess that the Russians will win the Georgia crisis and that they’ll successfully incorporate by force or coercion the client states of the Soviet Union. I would guess that the coming war in Iran will greatly tick off the Iranians and the Russians and the Syrians and that such a war could do great damage to the region precipitating the possible use of limited WMD’s.  Certainly there is an unfulfilled prophesies that Damascus will be wiped off the map and there are verses that suggest some sort of chemical or biological weapon will be used against Jerusalem in the last days.  Either way I think we may see the setting of the stage for the Biblical Predictions of Armageddon within a matter of years.

ONCE AGAIN THIS IS MY SPECULATION BASED ON MY UNDERSTANDING OF BIBLICAL PROPHESY. I  MAY WELL BE WRONG.  It does strike me as a plausible transition from the world of today to the world predicted by Ezekiel and John.  Interesting how the Bible can suggest such a plausible outcome to the events we’re witnessing right now, when you consider that it was written by lots of different authors between about 1440 BC. – 96 AD. Go figure! 

A Feckless NATO and a Cringing EU: Trying to Chastise Russia Using Only Empty Rhetoric and Dr. Spock

 

There is a certain grim humor inherent in watching Baby Boomers, in various government organizations, on both sides of the Atlantic, trying to persuade the Russian Strongman Vladimir Putin to stop raping Georgia.  The generation raised under the permissive ministering of Dr. Benjamin Spock, toe to toe with real “absolute power” in the form of Vladimir Putin, trying to reason in friendly fashion with a childlike beast. After the war and bloodshed of the Twentieth Century; the Europeans have finally conquered their thirst for conquest and empire;  only to find their nations overrun by Islamic Immigrants, and the reemergence of Russia bent on the reconstitution of the Soviet empire.

 

 

Europeans have surrendered their fate to socialist elites whose social programs have reared a continent of frightened children who would rather whistle in the dark than deal with what monsters may come in the glare of noonday sun.  Hiding from problems is not an effective strategy for solving problems.  You can’t simply appease the Neo Fascist Russian monster now feeding on the blood of Georgians because the monsters appetite is never satisfied.  In closing the curtains while Georgia is being brutally attacked you haven’t solved the problem; you’ve hidden from it.  The only courage in Europe is in Eastern Europe and the former Soviet States whose gestures of defiance are destine to blow up in their face while Western European Boomers try to “influence” an increasingly out of control Russia.

 

Allied and Georgian officials say Russian troops remain in control of about a third of Georgia, including the Black Sea port of Poti and the central city of Gori, in defiance of a cease-fire agreement signed Aug. 16.

Masha Lipman, a political analyst at the Moscow Carnegie Center, said that while there has been “no shortage of rhetoric” from U.S. officials “there doesn’t seem to be any effective leverage that the West can use” to force a Russian withdrawal. “This conflict has clearly shown the limits of American influence and power,” she said.

 

The European elites have tried vacant multiculturalism to deal with the immigration waves that are steadily eroding their culture, and now the elites seem to be trying Outcome Based Education on Russian Expansionism.  They seem to be saying that they can understand some of what Vladimir doesn’t like about Georgia and freedom but can we think of an answer that might be even more correct then assimilating, by force, states with whom we disagree?

 

 

Is it possible to tell Russia to get out of Georgia immediately while affirming Russia’s  unique personhood, enhancing Russian self esteem, and refusing to be insensitive to Russian cultural affinity for dictators?  Will Russia come to respect and understand the higher purpose of the European Elites as it works through Fascism and Militarism and seeks to become spineless and vapid, but with a more evolved sensibility, like Europe?  Europe and NATO have had almost a friendly response to Russian Militarism very much in the vein of the psychobabble first promulgated by Dr. Spock.  What is the rape of Georgia but an opportunity to patiently explain and describe a better way of national conduct and the path toward a true utopia where no one is punished and everyone is affirmed?  Isn’t that what we all want?

 

Far from pulling out, the Russian military is sharpening its threat to Georgia. It has moved more than a dozen SS-21 missile launchers into the pro-Russia breakaway region of South Ossetia, according to a senior U.S. defense official who spoke on condition of anonymity. This may put the Georgian capital, Tbilisi, in range of the missiles, which can fly as far as 75 miles (120 kilometers), according to the Federation of American Scientists’ Web site.

 

The tenor of diplomacy today seem bent on displaying the displeasure of the West in ways that enhance and affirm Russian self esteem.  The strategy of not inflaming the situation by making a big thing of Russia trying to assimilate her neighbors won’t be made better by threats that might only escalate the situation.  It’s not that Georgia and Poland and Ukraine have the right to expect Western support simply because they are in the right and Russia is in the wrong; it’s that we don’t want to make Russia mad until it figures out that peace is better than war.  We don’t want to extend NATO membership to people like Georgia and Ukraine, who really need it, because that might damage the Russians Self Esteem causing them to “act out” by concurring even more former Soviet States.  We don’t want to deny Russia membership in the WTO (World Trade Organization) because not talking to nations with whom we disagree is counterproductive because it fails to draw them into a global identity. 

 

 

It’s just like the kid who draws all over the walls with his permanent magic marker; you don’t have to damage his self esteem by “punishment” all you have to do is express your disappointment and the problem will resolve itself.  This is how we do things in the new world order!  Punishment is out and dialog is in!  Russia will rejoin the civilized world when it sees that it has nothing to fear from the West and, to that end, the empty rhetoric of NATO and America has made great strides.  Vladimir Putin is full of self esteem, so is Russia, and it’s never been more clear how little fear they have of the West. 

 

The U.S. declined to push for putting NATO membership for Georgia or Ukraine, another former Soviet republic, on a fast track, and French Foreign Minister Bernard Kouchner said the European Union wouldn’t reconsider its support for Russia’s bid to join the World Trade Organization. NATO earlier this year offered the two countries the possibility of eventual membership.

 

Check out this story at Bloomberg.com:  http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=20601087&sid=awoVPr85pSJ0&refer=home

Carnage Continues in Banking Industry: Global Financial Crisis Expected to Deepen

 

The Price of Oil may be down, the price of unleaded dropping at the pump, but the banking meltdown continues unabated.  It seems that each day brings news of yet another bank “writing down” (Declaring a Loss) on more loans usually totaling in the billions, like the 4 billion Lehman Brothers is likely to write down in the third quarter. It’s becoming old hat to see massive amounts of wealth disappear in a puff of smoke as the financial sector continues to be rocked by the storm set off by the subprime crisis. There are limits to how far we can go without major consequences being faced, by one and all, about greedy lending practices and the incomprehensibly socialist meddling of the Federal Reserve System.

 

Aug. 19 (Bloomberg) — Credit market turmoil has driven the U.S. into a recession and may topple some of the nation’s biggest banks, said Kenneth Rogoff, former chief economist at the International Monetary Fund.

“The worst is yet to come in the U.S.,” Rogoff said in an interview in Singapore today. “The financial sector needs to shrink; I don’t think simply having a couple of medium-sized banks and a couple of small banks going under is going to do the job.”

 

I distinctly remember Treasury Secretary Henry; call me Hank, Paulson, testifying before congress that he was sure he wouldn’t need to use taxpayer money to buy shares of the defunct Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac but it would calm the market if investors knew he could do that if he needed too.  I distinctly remember some of the senators grilling him about the idea that authority like this tends to magically get used despite the best efforts of whatever administration is requesting it and that they wanted a downside number as to how much of a risk they were taking by granting this authority.  Needless to say Secretary Paulson declined to give a real number and now we, as well as the senate, will find out together how much it’s going to cost us to nationalize Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac.

 

Freddie Mac and Fannie Mae “should have been closed down 10 years ago,” he said. “They need to be nationalized; the equity holders should lose all their money. Probably we need to guarantee the bonds, simply because the U.S. has led everyone into believing they would guarantee the bonds.”

U.S. Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson asked Congress on July 13 for emergency powers to inject “unspecified” amounts of government funds into the companies if necessary.

 

So what are we in for in the future?  It would seem that despite the best efforts of the government, and the Central Bank of the United States, otherwise known as the Federal Reserve; we’re going to be treated to “consolidation” of investment banks, (More Bank Failures) and an inflationary wave that’s going to be years before it’s contained. But isn’t that what granting the Fed sweeping new powers in the banking and securities industry was designed to stop?  Isn’t that why Secretary Paulson got sweeping new powers to use our tax dollars to outright nationalize bankrupt lenders like Freddie and Fannie so these insane government bailouts or “nationalizing” elements of the finance industry would not be necessary?  How bad is the crisis if a Freddie and Fannie can borrow directly from the Federal Reserve with a guarantee that the United States Treasury will “support” their stock with our tax dollars because they’re “too big to fail” and yet Freddie and Fannie are expected to fail anyway?  I suspect our future is not unlike that of a mushroom: we’re to be “kept in the dark and fed prodigious amount of fertilizer.”

 

“Like any shrinking industries, we are going to see the exit of some major players,” Rogoff told Bloomberg, declining to name the banks he expects to fail. “We’re really going to see a consolidation even among the major investment banks.”

 

Chairman of our branch of the Global Money Trust, also known as the Federal Reserve System, Benjamin Bernanke, has kept rates low so that all the loans necessary to keep the financial and banking industries afloat can be made, for the common good, even at the cost of an inflationary tsunami that’s even now bearing down on us.  The question becomes what if, despite the low rates   that’s killing the purchasing power of ordinary Americans; we lose lots of banks and finance institutions anyway while having made the recovery that much worse by the inflation unleashed by the failed rescue effort?  It’s bad enough to have huge banks and finance companies go belly up but what happens when government bailouts fail to contain the situation?  Its bad enough that the world looks on our finance system as problematic but when our governments unprecedented rescue efforts are for not: can the crisis of confidence spread to our governments financial credibility?  Who bails out the government when no one buys their debt instruments anymore?  Now that’s a real meltdown and a party I would just as soon skip. 

 

“Rates are too low,” Rogoff said. “They must realize we’re going to get inflation if things stay where they are. They need to raise rates but I don’t think they are going to because they’re way too nervous.”

 

The government is playing a dangerous game with its interference in the free markets.  Its so intent on saving the credibility of the financial markets that its risking far more of its own credibility than is prudent or even legal if we bothered to follow our own laws.  Our own folly is dragging us inexorably toward bankruptcy and the failure of our currency which in turn is dragging us inexorably toward socialism as we frantically try to solve the problem with steadfast refusal to accept the consequences of our actions. For the moment things may seem fine with gas prices going down and the dollar “strengthening” from the fear of the Russians.  Just wait until the next big institution goes down the drain!  Enjoy this interlude because the government is playing Russian roulette with this crisis and when the gun goes off none of us will ever be the same again.

 

Check out this artical at Bloomberg!  http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=20601087&sid=admWYNXiEBEs&refer=home