Historian Gareth Porter and Real News CEO Paul Jay discuss the state of the US and the world, the Bush doctrine, and Bush’s “war on terror”, near the too long awaited end of the disastrous Bush presidency.

Talking us through the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, though relations with Saudi Arabia and Pakistan, the Iranian view of the larger picture of the Middle East, through the entire simple minded good versus evil worldview of the worst US president in history, Jay concludes the interview with the question: “Maybe someone should ask the empire: Empire, are you better off than you were eight years ago or not?” as the setup for the next in this series.

September 25, 2008 – 8 min 8 sec

Gareth Porter: The US and the world near the end of the Bush administration

Hold on tight to your wallet. They’ve both promised to save you from terrorism, and over the past eight years that’s cost nearly a trillion dollars.

Now they both promise to save you from Wall Street, or Wall Street from you, or somebody from something. But this time time it’s going to start with a bill of nearly a trillion dollars, and the sky’s the limit after that.

So if you’ve been good, and you’ve been responsible, and you avoided saddling yourself with crushing debt, well… you’ve been bad, and they’re going to save you from yourself too. By extending you unlimited credit you haven’t asked for and don’t want, and starting you on the path to personal prosperity with a balance of about 2300 dollars. Owing, that is.

Is “consumer confidence” an oxymoron from here on in? Are they Flying On Hot Air? Are we in for a crash landing?

September 24, 2008 – about 6 minutes

Wall St. waits for blank check from Congress but crisis will last into new presidential term

<sup>Hossein Askari is professor of international business and international affairs at George Washington University.

Noureddine Krichene is an economist at the International Monetary Fund and a former advisor, Islamic Development Bank, Jeddah.</sup>  

The view around the world of the banking crisis and Paulson’s bailout proposal appears to be much less as panicky as closer to home, if at all, and more of recognition of the realities of the situation with a general attitude of encircling and isolating a cancer to keep it localized.

Paulson Plan Throws Oil On Fire

Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson and Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke

Asia Times

With the creation of the so called Mortgage and Financial Institutions Trust (MFI), the unfolding financial crisis, considered by many to be the worst in over 60 years, has become ever-more dangerous.

While such an institution has not existed in any country, the MFI could prove to be disastrous for US public finance, economic growth, the dollar, relations with major foreign holders of dollars, the global financial system, and could ignite the worst inflation in the economic history of the United States and reverse globalization to levels not seen since the Great Depression.

The initial cost of the MFI, put at US$700 billion, could easily escalate to trillions of dollars. At the same time, the Congressional Budget Office had previously projected a record fiscal deficit of US$500 billion for 2009. The MFI will further blow up the deficit to an unprecedented level, exceeding US$1.4 trillion. US debt, jumping with the takeover of Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac to 86% of GDP, has moved to an unsustainable level.

The financing of previous large fiscal deficits under the George W Bush Administration has already caused external deficits (current account) to widen to 5-7% of GDP, turned national savings negative, sent the dollar plummeting, and ignited rapid inflation, particularly in food, energy, and housing prices. Further financing of extraordinary large fiscal deficits, as required by the MFI, can only disrupt economic stability both in the US and world-wide. It will only further undermine the dollar, exacerbate widening external deficits, soaring energy and food prices, and rising unemployment.

Speaking in North Carolina earlier today, Obama said “no blank check when American taxpayers are on the hook for this much money”

Obama: No blank check for Wall St

The Swamp, September 21, 2008

CHARLOTTE, N.C. – In his first comments about a $700 billion government bailout package meant to help stabilize Wall Street, Sen. Barack Obama on Sunday stopped short of saying whether he supports the proposal, as he laid out some broad economic goals he believes such a plan should include.

“As of now, the Bush Administration has only offered a concept with a staggering price tag, not a plan,” Obama said. “Even if the U.S. Treasury recovers some or most of its investments over time, this initial outlay of up to $700 billion is sobering. In return for their support, the American people must be assured that the deal reflects the basic principles of transparency, fairness, and reform.”

Over the weekend, aides said Obama has spoken to congressional leaders about the proposal, as well as both Bill and Hillary Clinton.

As he addressed a crowd here that his campaign said totaled more than 25,000, the Illinois Democrat repeatedly criticized the White House and his Republican rival, Sen. John McCain.

“The radical idea that government has no role to play in protecting ordinary Americans has wreaked havoc on our economy,” he said.

Obama charged that Republicans have run the economy “into the ground,” as he outlined some broad concepts for reform of the financial industry.

“First, there must be no blank check when American taxpayers are on the hook for this much money,” Obama said. “Second, taxpayers shouldn’t be spending a dime to reward CEOs on Wall Street while they’re going out the door.”

h/t to Jeralyn at Talkleft – “You can read the full text of Obama’s remarks here.”

What do Christianity, 911 and The Federal Reserve all have in common?

This is a two hour long film, so I don’t expect too many to watch it. But in light of the economic events of the past few days, and the decades (centuries?) of buildup to them, if you haven’t seen this film it’s definitely worth your time.

“Zeitgeist is originally a German expression that means ‘the mind of the age’, literally translated as ‘time (Zeit) mind (Geist)’. It denotes the intellectual and cultural climate of an era.” —wikipedia

John Fitzgerald Kennedy
Address to the American Newspaper Publishers, 27 April 1961

The very word “secrecy” is repugnant in a free and open society; and we are as a people inherently and historically opposed to secret societies, to secret oaths, and to secret proceedings.
…
For we are opposed around the world by a monolithic and ruthless conspiracy that relies primarily on covert means for expanding its sphere of influence — on infiltration instead of invasion, on subversion instead of elections, on intimidation instead of free choice, on guerrillas by night instead of armies by day. It is a system which has conscripted vast human and material resources into the building of a tightly knit, highly efficient machine that combines military, diplomatic, intelligence, economic, scientific, and political operations.

Its preparations are concealed, not published. Its mistakes are buried, not headlined. Its dissenters are silenced, not praised. No expenditure is questioned, no rumor is printed, no secret is revealed.

Markets nosedive, recession spreads, world financial system shaken

September 18, 2008 – 5 min 28 sec

Markets in New York were rocked again on Wednesday as anxieties about the financial system ran high after the government’s bailout of insurer American International Group left investors with little confidence in many banking stocks. The Dow Jones industrial average nosedived about 450 points, down more than 800 points or 7 percent so far this week. The market was more unnerved than comforted by news that the Federal Reserve is giving a two-year, 85 billion dollar loan to AIG in exchange for a nearly 79.9 percent stake in the company, which lost billions in the risky business of insuring against bond defaults. With the markets rattled, waiting to see who the next victim could be, shares of two other major financial firms Morgan Stanley and Goldman Sachs, sank 24 percent and 14 percent respectively

Doug Henwood is the founder and editor of the Left Business Observer. Henwood is also a contributing editor of The Nation and does a weekly program on WBAI radio, New York’s Pacifica outlet. His book, The State of the USA Atlas, was published by Simon & Schuster in 1994; his Wall Street was published by Verso in 1997 (paperback, 1998) to great acclaim.

“Novus Ordo Seclorum” is Latin for “New Order of the Ages”

Richard Fuld, CEO, Lehman Brothers. John Thain, CEO, Merrill Lynch.

Stan O’Neal, former CEO, Merrill Lynch. James Cayne, CEO , Bear Stearns.

A video essay from ANP’s Nick Penniman and Eric Fritz, about the CEOs who got very rich while their firms crumbled, putting names and faces to the men operating these firms and making the disastrous executive decisions that are now affecting and destroying the lives of so many people.

Pepe Escobar dissects the cluelessness of McCain and Palin…

September 13, 2008 – 8 min 27 sec

Sarah Palin wouldn’t “blink” against Russia, Iran, Pakistan, “the terrorists”…

In her long-awaited first prime-time interview – to ABC News’ Charles Gibson – since appointed as running mate to Senator John McCain in the Republican presidential ticket, Alaska governor Sarah Palin was able to display her foreign policy knowledge – which does not include understanding the meaning of the Bush doctrine of preemptive war. Adding to the chorus of Americans who suspect Palin is not prepared to be a heartbeat away from the Presidency in case McCain wins the election, the neoconservatives who gave her a crash course in international relations before she sat for the interview did not fail to commit a series of blunders.

It’s enough to bring tears to your eyes…

Darwinic pilgrims claim the image fills them with an overwhelming feeling of logic.

Evolutionists Flock To Darwin Shaped Wall Stain

DAYTON, TN-A steady stream of devoted evolutionists continued to gather in this small Tennessee town today to witness what many believe is an image of Charles Darwin-author of The Origin Of Species and founder of the modern evolutionary movement-made manifest on a concrete wall in downtown Dayton.

“I brought my baby to touch the wall, so that the power of Darwin can purify her genetic makeup of undesirable inherited traits,” said Darlene Freiberg, one among a growing crowd assembled here to see the mysterious stain, which appeared last Monday on one side of the Rhea County Courthouse. The building was also the location of the famed “Scopes Monkey Trial” and is widely considered one of Darwinism’s holiest sites. “Forgive me, O Charles, for ever doubting your Divine Evolution. After seeing this miracle of limestone pigmentation with my own eyes, my faith in empirical reasoning will never again be tested.”

Added Freiberg, “Behold the power and glory of the scientific method!”

Since witnesses first reported the unexplained marking-which appears to resemble a 19th-century male figure with a high forehead and large beard-this normally quiet town has become a hotbed of biological zealotry. Thousands of pilgrims from as far away as Berkeley’s paleoanthropology department have flocked to the site to lay wreaths of flowers, light devotional candles, read aloud from Darwin’s works, and otherwise pay homage to the mysterious blue-green stain.

It’s here! It’s about time! This really is wonderful news!

Finally, after all their talk and noise about the mission from God to spread freedom and democracy around the world, and all the complaining over the past eight years from crazed left wing spaced out paranoid disconnected from reality radicals that too many billion$ were being spent overseas and not enough spent domestically, and that totalitarianism was just around the corner, all the ridiculous fears are magically allayed, and bushco is at long last living up to their bright promise, and bringing true participatory democracy to the country.

Finally the people will have a true voice in the affairs of the nation, with the knowledge that everything they say, every opinion they express, every concern and suggestion and profuse thanks to their compassionately conservative dear leaders will go directly to the ears of those who need to know, without delay, mere milliseconds after it’s typed!

And the best part is… you won’t even have to type it.

They’ll come to you!

At last! It just doesn’t get any better than this! Thanks George!