The Presidential race/soap opera is a gaudy distraction, not much talk of impeachment anymore, Bush admits to torture on tv *crickets*, an election has more importance if you do not perceive the true state of your nation, when your nation is an Empire.
The notions that within the body of empire lurks the heart of an egalitarian, constitutional republic, or a libertarian minarchy, or a parliamentary social democracy are the purest forms of political self-flattery.
The media have helped to turn the race into a millionaires playground where the currency seems to be who has the greatest capacity for genocide and noticing the underclass is pejoratively labelled Marxism by people who daily call for slaughter as a solution to any imperial problem. In the meantime the Bush Whitehouse has been pushing even further into its realm of Royal decree and manifest legal exceptionalism, in the meantime it has continued its secret torture gulag and enacting the steps necessary to attack Iran, while the electoral show filled the mediasphere, while you were sleeping the relentless death machine has continued its plotting, killing and torturing. And now grows the fear again it is close to having all its pieces in position, its ducks in a row for the assault on Iran.
Is it the fact that the largest economy of the world, which is driven by the military industrial complex and uses 25% of the planets oil, has concluded that only Iran stands in its way to controlling 60% of the globe’s known petrochemical reserves?
The imperial logic of the politician’s will be weighing- if the attack is under Bush and in time for the election that will favour a continuation of the neocon dominated GOP war party, if it is firmly resisted by the establishment , but the signs are key figures of antipathy towards the plan have and are being removed. Even with resistance the Bush cabal have the chance in the dying weeks of their administration to launch a series of strikes and leave the incomer to clean up the political mess while they profit via their corporate ties in the clean up, disaster capitalism is so very versatile. And then there is the dark reasoning, attacking demonised Middle East states is by and large good for the President who does it, such is the conditioning of an imperial populace, such is patriotism. So an attack is political currency, so why give an opponent the chance to use it? If Clinton steals the nomination this calculation would become more acute, while his rhetoric and charisma may represent a wild card, Obama’s stated policies are not anti-imperial. So both could use that currency, although Clinton may enjoy it more.
The corporatist elite then largely would favour attacking, timing dependent on political calculations once logistical issues are resolved, these issues now look suspiciously as if they are close to operational readiness, ByTheWay- none of this would even happening if impeachment had been used as framers of the constitution intended, not rejected by a political class comfortable in their imperial senate. Ducks in a row?-
- The March 11 resignation of CENTCOM Commander Admiral William Fallon
- The recent removal of Vice Admiral John Stufflebeem, Commander of the 6th Fleet (Mediterranean Sea), also known to be a critic of the administration’s war plans.
- Two U.S. warships took up positions off Lebanon last month. According to US News & World Report, “The United States would want its warships in the eastern Mediterranean in the event of a military action against Iran.”
- The Israeli air strike against Syria last September was advertised as an attack on a nuclear facility. Current speculation is that the real purpose of the raid was to “force Syria to switch on the targeting electronics for newly received Russian anti-aircraft defenses.” Knowing the electronic signatures of these systems would reduce the risks for U.S. and Israeli warplanes heading to Iranian targets.
- Israel conducted its largest military exercises ever beginning the week of April 6. This exercise simulated missile strikes from Iran, Lebanon, and Syria.
One day after a March visit from Vice President Cheney, the Saudi government announced “national plans to deal with any sudden nuclear and radioactive hazards that may affect the kingdom.”
- According to former U.N. chief weapons inspector Scott Ritter, the Pentagon has contracted for additional bunker-buster bombs and planes that carry them. Delivery is due this month.
- As you might observe in our latest Order of Battle, the US Navy is currently operating two Carrier Strike Groups in the Middle East. Additionally, we are observing two Expeditionary Strike Groups and a British Carrier Strike Group in the region as well. As we read the events as they are disclosed in public sources, we believe the United States is on the verge of major offensive operations in the Middle East.
War pimps remain in lucrative employment and spewing forth propaganda-
There are two stories in the London Times which have rightwing “War party” pundits frothed up today. One alledges that British hostages taken in Iraq are being held in Iran by the Revolutionary Guard. The other says that North Korea has built a James-Bond-Villain supersecret base under a mountain as protection against US airstrikes which might be launched in the aftermath of the White House’s allegations about Nork co-operation on a reactor in Syria. The main body of the story, oddly, is more about Syria’s alleged perfidy than the alleged Nork’s base.
Both stories come from the typewriter of Uzi Mahnaimiin, a yellow journalism reporter who always relies – as these stories do – on anonymous “leaks” as his authority. The trouble is that Mahnaimiin is a “serial liar”, as Pajamas Media’s Meryl Yourish has described him. In a race crowded with Mike Ledeens and Amir Taheris, he may be the biggest war-shill in Middle east journalism.
And let’s be straight about Israel’s motivations-
Israel’s military leaders and their political yes-men don’t believe, and never have believed, that Iran, if it possessed nuclear weapons, would unleash them in a first strike against the Zionist state. The real problem for its leaders is that the moment Israel ceased to be the only nuclear-armed power in the region, would be the moment it lost its ability to impose its will on the region. And actually the world.
Understanding of the power games of our ruling elites neutralises their use of propaganda to whip up ‘righteous’ anger against countries on simple right and wrong patrio-porn set ups that enable our corporatist elites to achieve greater private profit via our labour and our publicly financed wars. Saddam Hussein killed hundreds of thousands and tortured people in the notorious Abu Ghraib prison!!!!! All that changed were the names in charge. Of course there is a proportion of people who do not care about that, they are filled with fear and hate and bigotry and any chance to kill and dominate ‘others’ is good news. They are the pro-war right & left, the left ones often engage in fantastical imaginings of how this time contrary to all human history, this time western military action really is about humane goals, what was that you said about oil reserves and spheer of influence? Bah cynic!
At this point awareness of the real venal motives behind the pro-occupation pro-attack bloc is unlikely to be achieved via corporate owned media, people will as before -maybe grumbling- but they will not oppose the warfare state enough to make this violent manner of pursuing business untenable. Most work too hard just to get by to have time to search for better information sources in order to make informed judgements, assuming they have that instinct in the first place. Our politician’s supposedly do a lot of that work for us…stop laughing.
Our ruling classes tend towards war not peace, when the exploitation of the domestic populace no longer provides enough profit for their growing debauched tastes they jump in boats, planes and find new ‘markets’. Waiting for the moment some war pimping news story explodes- innocent soldiers (oxy meet moron), western women and children and kittens and puppies tortured and killed by eveel Iranians or some such it will be too late to derail the plans being worked on right now.
According to the Union of Concerned Scientists, a “limited” nuclear attack on the main Iranian underground site in Esfahan would result in three million people killed by radiation within two weeks and 35 million people exposed to dangerous levels of radiation in Afghanistan, Pakistan, and India.
