NY TImes transcript of Obama’s speech last night

Well, there you go. I decided to put what I hope will be an eternal NY Times link to this speech on this blog so that in the years to come, if Obama wins, we can refer back to this speech in specific, and see just how snookered the country was.

I don’t do this to be deliberately pessimistic. But when you get to be my age, having been politically active since the age of 10, you’ve simply seen and heard far too much bullshit to really believe in anything anymore.

And the important part is, that even more so than JFK, Jimmy Carter, Ronald Reagan and Bill Clinton, THIS candidate is selling something Americans desperately need - hope.

And that is very, very dangerous.

Because the odds are very much against Obama being able to do even a third of what he seems to promise. Unless, of course you don’t count what he’s saying as promises.

John McCain, on the other hand, is selling nothing more than the same neocon snake oil. No one with any intelligence expects much of him. In no small way, that’s a great part of his appeal to his core constituency. If you’re secure and buy off on all the American mythology, you can be sure that McCain stands for you.

But for the rest of us, there’s Obama.

He came out last night swinging for the fences:

We meet at one of those defining moments, a moment when our nation is at war, our economy is in turmoil, and the American promise has been threatened once more.

Tonight, more Americans are out of work and more are working harder for less. More of you have lost your homes and even more are watching your home values plummet. More of you have cars you can’t afford to drive, credit cards, bills you can’t afford to pay, and tuition that’s beyond your reach.

These challenges are not all of government’s making. But the failure to respond is a direct result of a broken politics in Washington and the failed policies of George W. Bush.

Would I be remiss to mention he left himself a bit of an out there by claiming the challenges are not all of the government’s making? The implied message is ’so don’t expect government to solve them all.’ It contradicts a major part of his thrust later on in the speech.

This country is more decent than one where a woman in Ohio, on the brink of retirement, finds herself one illness away from disaster after a lifetime of hard work.

We’re a better country than one where a man in Indiana has to pack up the equipment that he’s worked on for 20 years and watch as it’s shipped off to China, and then chokes up as he explains how he felt like a failure when he went home to tell his family the news.

We are more compassionate than a government that lets veterans sleep on our streets and families slide into poverty…

(APPLAUSE)

… that sits…

(APPLAUSE)

… that sits on its hands while a major American city drowns before our eyes.

That’s heady stuff and it sustains the Obama fans. But inherent in these statements are an implied promise that he’s prepared to do something about all of this. He most certainly is not and he cannot unless he’s truly willing to start a revolution against capital in this country. And that wouldn’t sit well with all the Wall Street hedge fund managers that pumped millions into his campaign.

Sorry to throw the wet rag, but it’s necessary.

The flight of capital from this nation will continue and Obama will not stop it. The cities will continue to die. People will continue to lose everything they have worked all their life because of a sudden illness.

JFK was killed for harboring similar delusions.

Now, now, let me — let there be no doubt. The Republican nominee, John McCain, has worn the uniform of our country with bravery and distinction, and for that we owe him our gratitude and our respect.

I’m sure the Vietnamese citizens he dropped bombs on might feel differently but I guess their lives count as much as Iraqis or Afghanis in the major scheme of things.

(AUDIENCE BOOS) A nation of whiners? Tell that to the proud auto workers at a Michigan plant who, after they found out it was closing, kept showing up every day and working as hard as ever, because they knew there were people who counted on the brakes that they made.

Tell that to the military families who shoulder their burdens silently as they watch their loved ones leave for their third, or fourth, or fifth tour of duty.

These are not whiners. They work hard, and they give back, and they keep going without complaint. These are the Americans I know.

(APPLAUSE)

Now, I don’t believe that Senator McCain doesn’t care what’s going on in the lives of Americans; I just think he doesn’t know.

He gives McCain so much of the benefit of the doubt. Like Clinton and Bush, you’ll probably see them out on the links of private courses one day playing a few rounds. Wanna bet against it?

And for the record, someone who doesn’t remember how many homes he owns doesn’t care.

OBAMA: How else could he offer a health care plan that would actually tax people’s benefits, or an education plan that would do nothing to help families pay for college, or a plan that would privatize Social Security and gamble your retirement?

(AUDIENCE BOOS)

It’s not because John McCain doesn’t care; it’s because John McCain doesn’t get it.

No, he doesn’t care. He may be marching toward senility but his advisers are not stupid. They get it. But it’s not like Obama’s plan is going to provide for single payer national health care - that’s completely off the table; or for affordable college education. He’s no ’socialist.’

For over two decades — for over two decades, he’s subscribed to that old, discredited Republican philosophy: Give more and more to those with the most and hope that prosperity trickles down to everyone else.

In Washington, they call this the “Ownership Society,” but what it really means is that you’re on your own. Out of work? Tough luck, you’re on your own. No health care? The market will fix it. You’re on your own. Born into poverty? Pull yourself up by your own bootstraps, even if you don’t have boots. You are on your own.

(APPLAUSE)

Well, it’s time for them to own their failure. It’s time for us to change America. And that’s why I’m running for president of the United States.

This is probably the most important part of his speech for the sake of future comparisons between hope and reality. I would assume Obama’s advisers are probably already compiling a list of plausible excuses for why they were not able to make the nation that Obama is promising.

And this is a bit of a contradiction in the earlier part of his address about government not creating all of the problems. This sounds like he’s admitting ‘government’ created these problems.

We measure the strength of our economy not by the number of billionaires we have or the profits of the Fortune 500, but by whether someone with a good idea can take a risk and start a new business, or whether the waitress who lives on tips can take a day off and look after a sick kid without losing her job, an economy that honors the dignity of work.

Again, nice words. You’ll need the Army to occupy Wall Street and corporate boardrooms to undo what has been done. How gutsy are you Mr. Obama?

It’s a promise that says the market should reward drive and innovation and generate growth, but that businesses should live up to their responsibilities to create American jobs, to look out for American workers, and play by the rules of the road.

Ours — ours is a promise that says government cannot solve all our problems, but what it should do is that which we cannot do for ourselves: protect us from harm and provide every child a decent education; keep our water clean and our toys safe; invest in new schools, and new roads, and science, and technology.

Once again, there’s the out.  And define a “decent education.”

Two years from now he’ll remind you he never promised you a rose garden.

Specifics:

So — so let me — let me spell out exactly what that change would mean if I am president.

(APPLAUSE)

Change means a tax code that doesn’t reward the lobbyists who wrote it, but the American workers and small businesses who deserve it.

(APPLAUSE)

You know, unlike John McCain, I will stop giving tax breaks to companies that ship jobs overseas, and I will start giving them to companies that create good jobs right here in America.

(APPLAUSE)

I’ll eliminate capital gains taxes for the small businesses and start-ups that will create the high-wage, high-tech jobs of tomorrow.

(APPLAUSE)

I will — listen now — I will cut taxes — cut taxes — for 95 percent of all working families, because, in an economy like this, the last thing we should do is raise taxes on the middle class.

(APPLAUSE)

And for the sake of our economy, our security, and the future of our planet, I will set a clear goal as president: In 10 years, we will finally end our dependence on oil from the Middle East.

(APPLAUSE)

Soooo. How you gonna pay for the continuation of the nation’s wars you tacitly support in the Middle East while giving out all those tax breaks? Hey, as a small business owner, I’m all for the tax breaks but not at the expense of the national economy.

And 10 years to end our dependence on oil from the ME? Paging James Howard Kunstler on that one. You cannot promise this AND promise the continuation of the ‘happy motoring’ suburban society at the same time.

As president, as president, I will tap our natural gas reserves, invest in clean coal technology, and find ways to safely harness nuclear power. I’ll help our auto companies re-tool, so that the fuel-efficient cars of the future are built right here in America.

(APPLAUSE)

I’ll make it easier for the American people to afford these new cars.

OBAMA: And I’ll invest $150 billion over the next decade in affordable, renewable sources of energy — wind power, and solar power (OTCBB:SOPW) , and the next generation of biofuels — an investment that will lead to new industries and 5 million new jobs that pay well and can’t be outsourced.

OK Senator, good luck on all of those.

America, now is not the time for small plans. Now is the time to finally meet our moral obligation to provide every child a world-class education, because it will take nothing less to compete in the global economy.

Ah, now it’s a “world class education.” And it’s to compete in the “global economy.” So Obama believes that the American economy and work force that he so mourns earlier in his speech is still subject to the whims of the “global economy?” Clues, people, clues. He’s a globalist under all that populist baloney.

And we will keep our promise to every young American: If you commit to serving your community or our country, we will make sure you can afford a college education.

Ah yes, we’re back to that Senator - the Civilian National Security Force. Gives me chills when I think about it - for all the wrong reasons.

Now — now is the time to finally keep the promise of affordable, accessible health care for every single American.

(APPLAUSE)

If you have health care — if you have health care, my plan will lower your premiums. If you don’t, you’ll be able to get the same kind of coverage that members of Congress give themselves.

(APPLAUSE)

And — and as someone who watched my mother argue with insurance companies while she lay in bed dying of cancer, I will make certain those companies stop discriminating against those who are sick and need care the most.

Hey Senator, how about “Medicare for all?” Or how about single payer? Senator. . . Senator?

Hey, could you at least define “affordable” and “accessible?”

Watch this part of Obama’s platform continue to be ratcheted down in terms of expectations. If he dares suggest that the health insurance mafia be destroyed and it’s ashes thrown in the dustbin of history, he will savaged as a SOCIALIST who will GIVE FREE HEALTH CARE to the UNDESERVING out of YOUR POCKET.

Hey it worked in 1912 (TR wanted it - of all people) 1945 (Truman learned his lesson) and 1993 (Hillary learned hers) and it will work again. Hold up the archetypal ‘minority welfare mother’ with several kids and ask Mr. and Mrs. White Middle Class of Topeka, Kansas: ‘you wanna pay for her?’ Create dark conspiracies where the ‘gub’mint’ will choose your doctor (like, say in Canada where they don’t) who will euthanize you for the ‘public good’ if your care gets too problematic.

Case closed every time.

Now is the time to help families with paid sick days and better family leave, because nobody in America should have to choose between keeping their job and caring for a sick child or an ailing parent.

Now is the time to change our bankruptcy laws, so that your pensions are protected ahead of CEO bonuses, and the time to protect Social Security for future generations.

And now is the time to keep the promise of equal pay for an equal day’s work, because I want my daughters to have the exact same opportunities as your sons.

I agree with all of this. It won’t happen. You know it won’t happen.

By the way, let’s stop right here and ask why these issues were never addressed in Obama’s speech:

Rescinding the Patriot Act

Rescinding the Military Commissions Act.

Eliminating the Department of Homeland Security and all of its dark arts at airports and border and basing anti-terrorist efforts on common sense principles rather than fascism.

Ending the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan and closing many if not most of America’s military bases around the world.

Because that would save a LOT of money too and you said:

Now, many of these plans will cost money, which is why I’ve laid out how I’ll pay for every dime: by closing corporate loopholes and tax havens that don’t help America grow.

But I will also go through the federal budget line by line, eliminating programs that no longer work and making the ones we do need work better and cost less, because we cannot meet 21st-century challenges with a 20th-century bureaucracy.

But the military-industrial complex and the burgeoning National Security State are off the table, eh Barack?

Why?

At this part of his speech, Obama gives the usual nod to ‘personal responsibility:’

Yes, we must provide more ladders to success for young men who fall into lives of crime and despair. But we must also admit that programs alone can’t replace parents, that government can’t turn off the television and make a child do her homework, that fathers must take more responsibility to provide love and guidance to their children.

Individual responsibility and mutual responsibility, that’s the essence of America’s promise. And just as we keep our promise to the next generation here at home, so must we keep America’s promise abroad.

Which reminds me of what was written this week by Joe Bageant’s anonymous political consultant about the same justifications that keep getting used:

The recent enthusiastic embrace of Senator Obama of the call for “responsibility” from inner city black fathers is a prime example of this issue. What he is really saying is, “I will never blame the owners of the country for the social problems caused by their economic policies.” Senator Obama knows better than anyone that you can eliminate most of the problems of inner city fathers in a generation with a decent educational system and living wage jobs.

But all systems of power need a convincing and unlikable enemy, which can bury the contradictions of the system. In our case incoherent, undereducated black urban males fit the bill perfectly. They are being attacked not because they are a threat to the power structure, but precisely because they are not.

What voters are expected to believe is that after a 30-year class war against the bottom 90% of income earners, the source of their troubles are black rappers and inner city fathers and not criminality on Wall Street or a corrupt political system. The road to the White House over the past 30 years has been paved by pretending to believe the absurdity that the individuals who pull the levers of power over people’s lives are named Willie Horton, Sister Souljah and Ludicrous, and not Robert Rubin, Phil Gramm and Hank Paulson.

If as a society we are prepared to believe this, then we have lost the stuff that makes free men.

Indeed.

Deep into his speech Obama finally gets into the war and how he wants a better, more efficient war that will probably suck up the rest of the Treasury he’ll be depleting with tax cuts:

For — for while — while Senator McCain was turning his sights to Iraq just days after 9/11, I stood up and opposed this war, knowing that it would distract us from the real threats that we face.

When John McCain said we could just muddle through in Afghanistan, I argued for more resources and more troops to finish the fight against the terrorists who actually attacked us on 9/11, and made clear that we must take out Osama bin Laden and his lieutenants if we have them in our sights.

You know, John McCain likes to say that he’ll follow bin Laden to the gates of Hell, but he won’t even follow him to the cave where he lives.

He’s cheerleading for more war people. Anyone get that? Anyone care? Helllooo - anyone in there?

And do you notice he never specifically says what those “real threats” we face are? But we always have to have ‘threats.’ We always need that bogeyman. And Barack Obama embraces that bogeyman and clutches it to his breast the same way that John McCain and George W. Bush and Bill Clinton did and do.

Without the bogeyman there is no justification (or a lot less of one) for the National Security State.

Why doesn’t Obama use “FINISH THE FIGHT!” as one of his campaign rally slogans?

Perhaps, more accurately, that should be START AND THEN FINISH THE FIGHT(S)!:

You don’t defeat — you don’t defeat a terrorist network that operates in 80 countries by occupying Iraq. You don’t protect Israel and deter Iran just by talking tough in Washington. You can’t truly stand up for Georgia when you’ve strained our oldest alliances.

Protect Israel. Again, as if Israel with the trillion dollar military we paid for and the 200+ nuclear weapons in its arsenal, needs American blood to protect it. But don’t touch THAT third rail, eh? And what are we “deterring” Iran from doing? And why?

And “Stand up for Georgia?” You mean the client state whose Army we equipped and trained and dangled NATO membership in front of and then acted shocked, shocked, when the Georgians launched an unprovoked sneak attack in South Ossetia, killing the Russian peacekeepers that stood with them and bombing and attacking civilian targets including hospitals?

But we need to “stand up” for that kind of state?

Remind me again why I should vote for Obama over McCain as a progressive? Oh right, because we have a fixed and rigged two party system in which the issues that really count are met with bipartisan support and we get to argue and fight about abortion, creationism and prayer in schools. Read the essay on Bageant’s site that I linked to above. That guy knows the real deal.

We are the party of Roosevelt. We are the party of Kennedy. So don’t tell me that Democrats won’t defend this country. Don’t tell me that Democrats won’t keep us safe.

Don’t tell us we won’t protect and grow the already rapacious National Security State and continue to bring ‘democracy’ to the rest of the savage world at the business end of a rifle and B-1 bomber! Kennedy? You mean the Cuban Missile Crisis, the Bay of Pigs and Vietnam?

As commander-in-chief, I will never hesitate to defend this nation, but I will only send our troops into harm’s way with a clear mission and a sacred commitment to give them the equipment they need in battle and the care and benefits they deserve when they come home.

Bomb first, negotiate later. And “sacred commitment” is scary Hitlerian language that should make any freedom loving person shudder.

I will end this war in Iraq responsibly and finish the fight against Al Qaida and the Taliban in Afghanistan. I will rebuild our military to meet future conflicts, but I will also renew the tough, direct diplomacy that can prevent Iran from obtaining nuclear weapons and curb Russian aggression.

So Barack, how can you do all of that military machine making and pay for those programs at home? Oh, we’re not supposed to ask those questions. And if we couldn’t prevent North Korea from obtaining nuclear weapons how will we prevent Iran from getting them? And Russian aggression? After we’ve done nothing but poke and provoke them for the last several years - even Pat Buchanan agrees with that - and surround them with military bases, client states and weaponry on their border, we have the AUDACITY to call THEM aggressors?

I would like an American president that curbs American aggression for once. But then, caring about the future of the WORLD for my kids and everyone else’s makes me a ‘bad American,’ right?

I will build new partnerships to defeat the threats of the 21st century: terrorism and nuclear proliferation, poverty and genocide, climate change and disease.

And I will restore our moral standing so that America is once again that last, best hope for all who are called to the cause of freedom, who long for lives of peace, and who yearn for a better future.

Or we’ll bomb the shit out of them if they don’t do it our way. Their choice.

And now what I call the ‘token throw outs:’

We may not agree on abortion, but surely we can agree on reducing the number of unwanted pregnancies in this country.

Translation: status quo for better or worse. In reality, Obama could care less about this issue. His daughters don’t ever have to worry about it.

The — the reality of gun ownership may be different for hunters in rural Ohio than they are for those plagued by gang violence in Cleveland, but don’t tell me we can’t uphold the Second Amendment while keeping AK-47s out of the hands of criminals.

OK full stop here.

The Second Amendment DID NOT read: A well-armed sporting contingent being necessary to the success of rural deer hunts, the right of the People to keep and bear certain sporting rifles with non-detachable magazines, shall not be unduly infringed.

Or does Mr. Constitutional Scholar really have no idea what the original intent of the Second Amendment was?

And does Mr. Constitutional Scholar know that owning “AK-47’s,” which are fully automatic rifles, is already illegal under current law? And that under current law, felons cannot legally own firearms? Or is Obama talking about legal semi-automatic versions of the AK-47 design that just make suburban housewives wet their pants because they look so scary?

Methinks the Senator needs to go back to school on this issue. All the protections in the Bill of Rights are contingent on the protections of the Second Amendment.

Or is the Senator simply being disingenuous?

I know there are differences on same-sex marriage, but surely we can agree that our gay and lesbian brothers and sisters deserve to visit the person they love in a hospital and to live lives free of discrimination.

Note to gay community: this is your bone. Take it and shut the hell up.

You know, passions may fly on immigration, but I don’t know anyone who benefits when a mother is separated from her infant child or an employer undercuts American wages by hiring illegal workers.

One of these things is not like the other. Two separate issues that require separate policies. So we are left to wonder exactly what Obama will do in both cases.

I know there are those who dismiss such beliefs as happy talk. They claim that our insistence on something larger, something firmer, and more honest in our public life is just a Trojan horse for higher taxes and the abandonment of traditional values.

Oh no Senator Obama, I don’t this is happy talk at all. This is dangerous talk because it sets extremely high expectations atop a Potemkin village of unpleasant economic facts.

For instance, not ONCE in your speech did you dare to mention, in specifics, the perilous state of the nation’s economy and how THAT issue, ABOVE ALL, is going to demand serious and sober decisions upon the next President and CANDOR from that President to the American people.

Anyone notice? Anyone there? Helloooo? And no, I don’t mean ‘feeling your pain’ about your credit card debt or your home mortgage but the SYSTEMIC economic problems that link ALL of these potential economic catastrophes.

You know, the crushing national debt, the obscene trade deficit, the failing banks, the fact that the FDIC is going to beg the Treasury for emergency cash, the wobbling stock market, the crashing housing market, Freddie Mac and Fannie Mae and the rape of the taxpayers who paid for the bailouts, the crashing value of the dollar that will eventually sink ALL of your grand plans, the sharply rising price of fuel and food, etc., etc. etc?

What say you about THAT Mr. Obama? Too much of a ‘downer?’ No room here for ‘blood, toil, sweat and tears,’ sacrifice eh, Mr. Obama? What justification or excuse will you use when the market finally crashes and the economy implodes? Will you wring your hands about it or point the finger squarely at Wall Street and the corporate CEOs who caused this and put the miscreants in prison and overhaul our entire economic way of life for the benefit of the average people you claim to champion?

Do you have serious people as your economic advisers? What are they whispering in your ear Mr. Obama? What are you NOT telling us?

The rest of the speech was standard bloviation.

And Democrats and Obama fans - would you perform an intellectually honest exercise? Go through the entire speech as linked by the NY Times. Go through every sentence, every paragraph. And then ask yourself honestly - could, say, 90 percent of this speech have been given by any mainstream Republican?

And isn’t that the point?

I knew what was about to happen in the media and the blogs. A massive suspension of disbelief and a willful cashiering of rational thought. It’s so predictably American it’s scary.

And then as I ambled up the stairs to bed, I heard Keith Olbermann and Chris Matthews join forces in an orgy of orgasmic hyperbole about “the speech.”

I knew then we were in big trouble.

A great article worth your time by Lenora Foerstel in Global Research.ca

I always love a great history lesson, especially when it’s about American history that is NEVER taught in our schools:

Shortly before World War II, Hjalmer Schacht (see below - ed.), a German banker, toured the United States soliciting American corporate support for Hitler’s new fascist state. U.S. corporations not only agreed to support Germany against the socialist economic system of the Soviet Union, but also declared their opposition to the strong labor movement arising in the United States and Europe.

General Motors was prominent among the corporations that supported the Nazi government, investing $20 million in industries owned or controlled by Herman Goering and other Nazi officials. Other US multinational corporations that profited from and supported Hitler’s industrial war machine included General Electric, Standard Oil, Texaco, International Harvester, ITT and IBM. Today, Standard Oil of New York is unabashed in honoring its chemical cartel that manufactured Zyklon-B, the poison gas used by the Nazi gas chambers. (1)

Among the eminent business leaders backing these multinational corporations were the Rockefellers and Prescott Bush, father of George Bush and grandfather of George W. Bush. Prescott Bush worked with his father-in-law, George Herbert Walker, in the family firm Union Banking Corporation to raise $50 million by selling German bonds to American investors from 1924 to 1930.

Even though the United States helped to defeat Nazi Germany in World War II, many of the powerful elite families continued to support Hitler’s fascist ideology after the war. John Rockefeller III was an uncritical believer in the doctrine of Thomas Robert Malthus, who claimed that population always increased at a geometric rate while food supply increased at the slower arithmetic rate. Malthus therefore concluded that population growth had to be rigidly controlled. Today, his theory is widely criticized for failing to take into account the vast technological advances in agriculture and food production.

Rockefeller also accepted Hitler’s concept of an Aryan race, leading him to propose population control on the poor and people of color, whom he believed were producing children of inferior intelligence. In an effort to support such views, the Rockefeller family became involved with Eugenics, a fascist doctrine that advocated breeding a superior race by eliminating the mentally ill, physically handicapped, and racially inferior.

OK, as a historian I have to perform just a little cleanup on this otherwise fantastic piece. On Schacht - his full name, believe it or not, was Dr. Hjalmar Horace Greeley Schacht and he was President of the Reichsbank in Nazi Germany between 1933-39. He was quite an interesting character and was implicated in the 1944 plot to kill Hitler and was liberated by the Allies from a Nazi concentration camp. He was acquitted at Nuremberg.

One must, to a certain extent, have pitied Schacht for he had to function surrounded by a colossal army of dunces in German economics, especially Walther Funk, the Nazi Minister of Economics whom even Hitler regarded as a demented fool. In one of Hitler’s favorite Funk stories, the looney Minister would grab the first batch of new banknotes (with his name on them) that rolled off the printing presses and rush out into the streets, handing them out to passersby saying “try one of the new Funks,” note: “funk” in German means “sparks” as in electricity. The joke was not lost on Hitler who would tell the story to friends, laughing himself to tears.

Thankfully, so many demented crackpots occupied high places in the Nazi hierarchy that even a few near-geniuses such as Albert Speer, could not save the Nazi state from itself.

Ahem, well, wandered far afield on that one eh?

Anyway, a great article that once again shows that everything we were taught as school children about American history and world history is not what it seems to be.

And that other nations and leaders can and do function independently of the United States of America and it’s arrogant obsession to rule the world.

If I didn’t blog this right away, I was worried I’d forget it.

In this Mike Whitney article about the US dollar, the Euro and gold, Whitney speaks to the spanking the Euro and gold have taken while the dollar rises like Dracula from the grave to fly again.

For those who deal in gold and believe in the government manipulation of that commodity’s price Whitney writes:

So, we shouldn’t be surprised when foreign central banks unexplainably purchase $28 billion of US government securities at the 11th hour (as they did last month) to conceal our trade imbalance and prop up the waning dollar. Don’t forget, it’s their chestnuts they’re keeping out of the fire, too. But, that doesn’t mean the Fed has super powers or that every time gold goes into a tailspin its because the black helicopters fired invisible lasers into the currency markets.

You know he had to be smiling when he wrote that. But Mike, it’s the ‘orbiting mind control lasers’ that we tin foil hatters are really worried about. Gold is a secondary issue compared to that.

But Whitney says FEAR NOT gold buggers:

No one knows where the bottom is for gold, but one thing is certain; it’s future prospects are a lot brighter than the dollar’s. The Bush administration has yet to demonstrate that it can enforce Dollar Hegemony via military intervention. That is a very big deal. If the dollar isn’t backed by (stolen) Iraqi oil, then the $6 trillion stockpile of dollars and dollar-denominated assets that are languishing in foreign central banks and funds, will continue to dwindle until the dollar’s position as “reserve currency” comes to an end.

That’s one doomsday scenario, but there is another. If Bernanke and Paulson continue to pile all of the nation’s credit problems on top of the greenback; foreign capital will head for the exits and the dollar will crash. Either way, the troubles are mounting and something’s got to give .

Sweet dreams!

Moore in Information Clearing House from The London Guardian

There WAS a time when Michael Moore really WAS for the little guy/gal. When he was for working Americans.

But then, see, he got fame and fortune which tend to ruin everyone in this country. Even Moore forgets where he came from. Famously, when TV Nation was in production, Moore didn’t want to pay the technicians union scale and fought vigorously against it.

The minute you put a tuxedo on the man and dangle an Oscar, that man will change.

Because at some point the message gets delivered: do you like this lifestyle? Do you like being famous and mingling with the ‘beautiful people?’ Do you want to keep this? Then from now on you do as we say. Because just as fast as you got here you can go back to the alternative press in Flint. People suddenly won’t lend you financial assistance to make your films. You suddenly won’t get a distribution deal. You’ll be mysteriously disinvited from those wonderful parties. Politicians will forget to return your calls. Get the picture?

So the man who once stumped for Ralph Nader turns on him and become yet another shill for the two-party American political shell game. Bought and paid for. But, my oh my, doesn’t fame feel great?

Does Moore really believe that by supporting Obama that the working people of this country who have been so savaged by George W. Bush AND Bill Clinton (traitors both) will somehow get a decent deal?

This isn’t a democracy in any sense of the word and it’s really not a constitutional republic anymore. The United States is an oligarchy controlled by the multi-national business and banking interests tied in with their various social clubs like the Council on Foreign Relations, etc.

So Moore’s latest assignment, as it were, is to somehow make a lot of noise that there is some salient difference between the two parties.

Let’s get this straight once and for all.

There are only two issues that matter to the masters of our universe.

1. How will the wealth derived from the natural resources of the earth be generated and divided.

2. How will the world’s money supply be controlled and for whose benefit?

That’s it. Nothing else matters.

Nothing.

Especially not the idiotic social issues we tear ourselves apart arguing about. Our masters care nothing for these issues because when you live in the rarefied air that they do, such issues have no meaning for them.

Like abortion. The wealthy always have and always will be able to get an abortion and pretty well do anything they want. The issue is the major one for the rubes to fight over as if either party really cared. Ask yourself conservatives - after all those years of Reagan and Bush what did you really get on this issue?

Prayer in public schools/curriculum - again, an issue thrown to the rubes to get them as Mark Hanna once famously stated “whooping it up for the cause.” Hanna knew what a sham American politics was and remains. The elite have set up the public school systems to keep the mass of citizens trained for whatever the economy needs them for but not educated enough to understand their political system and demand better for themselves. The elite, like the Bush family, send their children to Exeter and Groton and other elite prep schools where they are specifically educated to rule the world.

Health care/health insurance - beginning to see a pattern here? The elite never have to worry a day in their lives about this. You do. Because your life is fairly expendable. Theirs isn’t. Why should they expend the nation’s wealth they are busily stealing for themselves to provide you with affordable health insurance or (gasp!) single payer universal health insurance? Can’t cut into the profits of the military-industrial complex to actually help ordinary schmucks! Hell, call single payer SOCIALISM. That’ll quash it! We’ve conditioned the rubes to respond like Pavlov’s drugs whenever they hear that word.

And you know the funny thing about this brainwashing? That the people who run blogs like Bizzy Blog and NixGuy, Lone Star Times and all those other poor deluded idiots actually BELIEVE the system gives a shit about them! It’s unreal. They don’t realize the system and the people they worship and support look upon them as they same expendable human widgets they view the rest of us as.

But they want so hard to BELIEVE. It’s quite sad actually, but no one said that taking the red pill would be easy.

I’m sitting here with Wolf “The Tool” Blitzer going on an on with the usual Sunday morning disinformation. And I notice the sponsors all generally banks and investment firms and right wing energy exploiters. And they say Fox is the right wing network. Take a solid serious look at CNN’s programming, guests and sponsors and you’ll see there is no such thing as ‘liberal media.’

I had a nice lady in my store even go on to me about the ‘liberal media’ this week. The brainwashing of ordinary Americans never ceases to amaze me even though I’m no longer surprised by it. And even though I’m running a business, I’m getting less inclined to let such comments pass without correction. So I said, “hmmm, like NBC owned by General Electric, the country’s largest defense contractor?”

I try to be nice about it but I’ve had it. I can’t afford to emigrate so if I have to be trapped inside the Matrix I’m not going to play nice and keep quiet anymore.

So that brings us to fighting about the media. Again the elite are privy to the real news and information, not the disinfo crap and outright lies that Americans are served up every night on Fox News AND CNN and MSNBC and the three networks, wire services, etc. The elite group control the means of information dissemination and they say what they say for public consumption. The last frontier of real information? You’re looking at it. And they’re working to shut that down eventually too.

We are constantly fighting and arguing about things that are so vitally important to us that mean nothing to the real rulers of this country and the class of people that serve them.

To recap:

All that matters is:

1. How will the wealth derived from the natural resources of the earth be generated and divided?

2. How will the world’s money supply be controlled and for whose benefit?

Are we clear on that?

So when you read crap like Moore, know that he’s really smart enough to know that he’s playing a clown’s role in this grand charade. The Democratic candidates go in the tank on purpose (and on cue) just like the Republicans did in 1992 and 1996. Does anyone remember Dan Quayle looking like a mentally challenged person throwing waffles? These images, in tightly controlled campaigns, don’t happen by accident or error.

From now until November we’ll be force fed a steady stream of bullshit and lies to get us whooped up into believing that our vote actually means something. With Diebold at the ready, the result is already pre-ordained. What is going on now is the giant show of democracy - if people still believe, they’ll still go to their little jobs, obey the ‘law’ and pay their taxes - and that makes life so much easier for the elite.

And, of course, we have the Olympics, the NFL, Paris and Brittany and the whole wonderful bread and circuses to distract the people from their pockets being picked and their rights being eroded.

We wouldn’t want the people to know the truth, become disaffected and then (gasp) understand the real power they might wield in concerted action! Imagine what a well coordinated general strike would do to the elite of the United States? Or even a slowdown?

So dance Michael Moore, dance on! You know what side your bread is buttered. Maybe at night when you lie in your expensive bed in your nice home you find some way of justifying what you do. Maybe, like so many other people, if you repeat the lies enough to yourself you eventually believe them.

Yeah, maybe Obama really is being pulled to the center by well-meaning but mistaken political advisers. Maybe he does really want to work for the plight of the Palestinians but has to kow tow to AIPAC to ‘get elected,’ poor guy. Yeah, maybe he really does want to repeal the Patriot Act and NAFTA and end the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan but unscrupulous people are advising him to do the opposite and he naively takes their advice.

Yeah, right.

Columbus Dispatch

Four of America’s 10 fastest-dying cities are in the Buckeye State, according to a list produced by Forbes magazine.

snip

The 10 cities are as follows in alphabetical order, with comments from the article about the Ohio cities.

- Buffalo, N.Y.

- Canton: “Like many cities on our list, the Canton-Massillon area has been victim to the decline of the so-called Rust Belt.”

- Charleston, W.Va.

- Cleveland: “Only Pittsburgh and New Orleans have seen sharper population declines this decade, and New Orleans was because of a natural disaster.”

- Dayton: “Dayton has suffered as manufacturing in the region has gradually tapered off. It has been particularly hard hit by the decline in automotive manufacturing.”

- Detroit

- Flint, Mich.

- Scranton, Pa.

- Springfield, Mass.

- Youngstown: “It’s been many years since the Republic Steel Company dominated the economy of Youngstown, Ohio, and nearby Warren and Boardman, Ohio.”

I know that the right wing blogs in Ohio (the ones that are actually on BlogNetNews Ohio), will say (in unison) that these cities didn’t prostrate themselves in front of big business offering slave labor wages, unlimited tax abatements, no enforcement of environmental laws, union free workplaces, etc. etc.

As if.

No matter what, there was no way any of these cities could have saved themselves for the pleasure of the business community. You simply cannot compete with (1) the wage scales in Asia and (2) the government subsidies to those industries in Asia. No amount of tax incentives or incentive packages could have or would have made much of a difference.

In fact you may remember how many union concessions were made and companies STILL moved their production overseas. It was a sick little game these businesses played with the unions and the cities, dangling a carrot on a stick that could never be reached nor was ever meant to be reached.

But the conservatives on these sites and their buddies in corporate America could have cared less about these workers. They regarded them (and still do) as disposable. Basically ants. Working class America has been destroyed by the logical extension of capitalism and it was done on purpose.

And these bloggers sit there and giggle about it. They high five each other at the destruction of the union, and, by extension, the American way of life. These people who made the steel, the rubber, the cars, the ships, the glass, etc. never counted as human beings.

I’ve seen what happened to these people. Many of them were in my own extended families. They worked their entire lives to build this country and their thanks was to have America kick them in the teeth at the end of their lives. Pensions?! Did you earn them suckers!? That money is better spent on CEO benefit packages and dividends.

Are there no work houses?

So the once thriving cities of Ohio that gave sustenance to decent hard working people and helped to build this country now get thrown on the ash heap of capitalism, or at least the capitalism practiced in this country.

The rot from these neighborhoods and shattered lives and economies continues to spread. And yet the conservatives, like the ones over at BizzyBlog and NixGuy continues to whine and cry that business has been asked to donate too much to the communities in the form of taxes and, really, shouldn’t have to pay any taxes at all.

The public commons? That’s communistic! Screw the public commons. You have to prove that you have earned whatever standard of living you get.

I could go on, but what of it? People have been sufficiently brainwashed to believe that they are powerless to stop this. And, in truth, the government has aided and abetted this slaughter of American industry. THEY mad their money, so who cares what happens to all the people in Youngstown? Screw ‘em, the bunch of losers.

Lou Dobbs talks about the War on the Middle Class but how does one define middle