http://thepopulist.libsyn.com Commentary on Politics, Economics, and Military Affairs en A. Scott Piraino populist21@yahoo.com Liberated Syndication - libsyn.com podcasts@libsyn.com (Liberated Syndication) Fri, 01 Sep 2006 17:01:00 GMT 180 The Populist Commentary on Politics, Economics, and Military Affairs Politics, Economics, War on Terror, Military, History The Populist populist21@yahoo.com A. Scott Piraino http://libsyn.com/podcasts/thepopulist/images/us-1nj.gif http://thepopulist.libsyn.com Clean http://thepopulist.libsyn.com/index.php?post_id=126036#
The US economy as we know it will soon collapse. This has happened before, twice, and history is about to repeat itself again. This will be the Third Depression the United States has suffered, and it will probably be the worst.

In the Gilded Age of the 1890's, and the Roaring 1920's, improvements in technology and industry fueled rapid economic expansions. Capitalism was revered as the new engine of progress, onerous government regulations were an impediment to growth. These were days of "laissez faire" economics and unscrupulous robber barons.

Sound familiar?

Inevitably there was a growing disparity in incomes, but the majority of Americans were more concerned with getting rich than helping the poor. Most investors believed these economic booms would last forever, but this optimism proved to be their undoing as exuberance bid up share prices. Inevitably the day came when prices fell, and markets collapsed.

The Gilded Age ended with a monetary crisis in the first decade of the twentieth century. Incoming President Teddy Roosevelt was forced to borrow money from wealthy elites to finance the government. The Roaring Twenties ended in a more spectacular fashion, a stock market crash in 1929 ushered in the Great Depression.

Depressions are created when money disappears. People suddenly become poorer, and they spend less money. With less demand for goods and services, production declines and prices fall, causing a downward spiral of unemployment and falling incomes. Our country has endured deflationary periods after numerous boom and bust cycles, most notably during the Great Depression.

But the coming collapse will be different. Debt, and our dependence on imported oil and manufactured goods are the reasons the Third Depression will be different, and much worse. The U.S. ran a $318 budget deficit last year, but that was dwarfed by our trade deficit of $726 billion, a new record high, and an 18% increase over 2004.  

To finance our current account deficits, we have to import three billion dollars in cash, every working day. Our deficits now consume 80 percent of the entire world's net savings, and our demand for debt is increasing.

This is unsustainable.

Interest rates on our national debt are low only because bondholders are confident in our ability to make payments. The US dollar maintains its value on world markets because foreign nations believe we can afford our appetite for imported goods. As our economy falters and our deficits rise, the world is losing faith in our ability to finance our deficits.

This is why world markets are beginning to reject the US dollar. The dollar has lost about one third of its value against other major currencies since 2002, and has been falling at a much faster rate in recent months. The danger of course is that as the dollar declines in value, it becomes less profitable to hold, and the incentive to sell dollars increases.

If enough central banks and foreign investors began unloading US assets, other investors and financial institutions would see the dollar rapidly losing value. They would have to sell their US securities quickly, to protect themselves from further losses on their dollar denominated holdings.

There would be a financial panic, and the US dollar would collapse.

This danger is very real, and our declining dollar is creating a vicious cycle which will inevitably cause our currency to depreciate more. As our dollar loses value, foreign goods purchased with dollars become more expensive. Since we are now dependent on imported goods, our shrinking dollar means higher prices for those goods.

In addition to the inflation caused by rising prices for imported wares, we have to worry about oil. The price of oil is skyrocketing even faster than the value of our dollar is falling. Oil now costs us 75 dollars a barrel, and gasoline prices nationally are over $3.00 a gallon at the pump.

These market forces are putting immense pressure on our economy. Higher costs for energy and transportation have been driving up prices at a 4% annual rate. While inflation is gaining momentum, recent economic reports and corporate earning statements show an economy rapidly losing steam.

Ford Motor Company just announced plans to cut production by 20%. General Motors reported a net loss of over three billion dollars in their most recent quarter. U.S. purchases of durable goods orders decreased by 2.4 billion dollars last month, (although this is not such bad news, since most of our durable goods are now made abroad).

New housing starts have plunged 20 percent since January, and sales of existing homes plummeted by 11 percent. Every housing indictor is in free fall, including home prices. According to a Bank of America Real Estate survey released Tuesday, "consumer sentiment toward buying a home soured in August" . "Prices fell sequentially for the 11th consecutive month. Prices tumbled in 82% of the markets surveyed".

Even more telling is a report prepared by the Economic Policy Institute in April of 2005. The report shows that wages and salaries as a share of national income fell to their lowest levels on record, even lower than the Great Depression of 1929. Although corporate profits are at all time highs, wages, (which represent total income for 80% of Americans), have not kept pace with inflation.

The US economy may be expanding as government statistics claim, but the majority of Americans are actually getting poorer. US household debt now stands at $10 trillion, ( a record high, of course), and has been increasing by over one trillion dollars per year since 2002. Americans cannot spend enough money to lift the economy out of the doldrums, nor can they afford higher prices, or higher interest rates.

The trembling dollar, inflation jitters, stagnating wages, a collapsing real estate market, wars in the Middle East, these are all very bad signs, but our economic problems are even worse.

Derivatives are financial holdings that derive their value from other securities. These new financial instruments have created a speculative bubble unlike anything ever seen, and pose a mortal danger to our economy. In a letter to shareholders, billionaire investor Warren Buffet warned that derivatives were "time bombs, both for the parties that deal in them and the economic system".

He went on to explain how derivatives work, and why they are so dangerous:

"Essentially, these instruments call for money to change hands at some future date, with the amount to be determined by one or more reference items, such as interest rates, stock prices or currency values. If, for example, you are either long or short an S&P 500 futures contract, you are a party to a very simple derivatives transaction -with your gain or loss derived from movements in the index."

"Unless derivatives contracts are collateralized or guaranteed, their ultimate value also depends on the creditworthiness of the counterparties (sic) to them. In the meantime, though, before a contract is settled, the counterparties record profits and losses -often huge in amount- in their current earnings statements without so much as a penny changing hands."

In 1986, the global market for derivatives stood at just over one trillion dollars. By 2004, The U.S. Comptroller of the Currency estimated the value of derivatives held by U.S. commercial banks at around $84 trillion. That's seven times the size of the US economy. 

Derivatives are now one of the pillars of our financial system. Fannie Mae, a federally subsidized home-mortgage corporation, admitted to $8.4 billion dollars in losses stemming from derivatives last year. JP Morgan Chase has over $40 trillion in derivatives contracts, by far the largest portfolio of any commercial bank.

The implosion of one of our banks or lending agencies due to losses on derivatives would cause a panic, and wipe out the US economy. And the fact is, many of our financial institutions are only solvent as long as their derivative holdings are profitable. This situation is now very dangerous because 87% of derivative positions consist of interest rate contracts.

The Federal Reserve is trapped. The Fed must raise interest rates to improve the rate of return on dollar investments, and keep foreign investors from abandoning the US currency. That's why the Fed has increased rates seventeen times since June of 2004.

But higher interest rates will slow down the already moribund US economy,  force borrowers and to pay more in interest, and create immense losses on derivative contracts.

Monetary policy cannot save us from an impending financial reckoning caused by our soaring levels of debt and speculation. The only people who can get us out of our economic difficulties are the very people who have put us in this mess. Yet the Bush administration appears to be blithely marching the United States over the brink of an economic abyss.

After the economic crises following the Gilded Age and Roaring Twenties, there was a backlash against the excesses of capitalism. Teddy Roosevelt reined in monopolies, and passed the first income tax into law. During the Great Depression, Franklin D. Roosevelt raised taxes on the wealthy to finance his New Deal legislation.

Unfortunately, we don't have a Roosevelt in office to champion the majority against business interests. President Bush has repeatedly cut taxes for our wealthiest citizens, and signed more free trade agreements, while our deficits have soared. He and his cronies have offered nothing but the same warmed over Reaganomics that created our trade and budget deficits in the first place. 

If the US Government does not take drastic action immediately to reduce our deficits and increase investment in the US economy, one or more of the following scenarios will take place:

1) The dollar's value will depreciate until enough investors and foreign central banks decide to unload our currency, causing a financial panic.

2) Higher interest rates will cause multi-billion dollar losses in derivatives trading, and when a financial institution admits to the scale of those losses, there will be a financial panic.

3) Too many Americans will foreclose on variable-rate mortgages and credit card debts, causing a default in a bank or lending agency, and a financial panic.

4) Fearing any of the above eventualities, US and global stock markets melt down as investors liquidate their holdings, causing a financial panic.

Either way, the house of cards that Reaganomics built will soon collapse. We have a right to be angry about the economic calamity we are about to experience, but we have no right to be surprised. This is the Third Depression after all.   

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]]> The Third Depression Fri, 1 Sep 2006 17:01:00 GMT http://thepopulist.libsyn.com/index.php?post_id=126036# 00:10:45 Politics, Economics, War on Terror, Military, History The Populist Clean http://thepopulist.libsyn.com/index.php?post_id=125989# A. Scott Piraino

Last year the United States posted a trade deficit of 726 billion dollars, that's an astronomical, outrageous amount of money. Our cumulative trade deficits since 1980 add up to over six trillion dollars. That's the second largest transfer of wealth in history, second only to our national debt.

Nowhere is this transfer of wealth more apparent than in East Asia. Over the last twenty five years growing trade surpluses with the US have fueled an unprecedented economic expansion. In key industries such as computers, electronics, and automobiles, the US is now dependent on Asian imports.

China has grown from an agrarian backwater into the world's third largest economy in the last twenty five years. While our yearly trade deficits with China have risen from zero to over 200 billion dollars a year, their country has been the world's fastest growing economy. China has become a colossus precisely because of these trade deficits.

The global economy has been very good to China. Their country has been industrialized with someone else's money, ours. Throughout the 1990s US corporations increased their factory investments in China, seeking an endless supply of cheap labor. Our trade deficit with China grew by 25% last year, and is now the largest international deficit in history.

Empty cargo containers are our largest export to China. Over 60% of the cargo containers that come into the U.S. from Asia return empty.

Of the top fifteen U.S. exports to China, three are "waste and scrap" that is - scrap metal, scrap paper and cardboard. Four are raw materials or agricultural products such as soybeans and seed oils. Six are parts, most of which will return as finished products.

By contrast, China now leads the world in the production and export of televisions, refrigerators, cameras, bicycles, motorbikes, computers, and computer components, microwave ovens, DVD players, cell phones, cotton textiles, and countless other manufactured products.

Even last year's trade gap doesn't tell the whole story. Our merchandise trade deficit totaled a whopping 782 billion dollars. This larger deficit was offset by surpluses in agriculture and "services", which is a very broad category that includes tourism and foreign student tuition.

What happened to our country while we traded food, vacations, and college degrees for goods, and lost six trillion dollars in the process? While the Pacific Rim was booming, corporate downsizing, factory closures, and mass layoffs became an economic way of life for American workers. Per capita incomes have soared throughout the Pacific Rim, while wages in the US have stagnated.

Even the record economic expansion of the 1990's failed to raise hourly pay for Americans. Our wages have been squeezed by the loss of millions of manufacturing jobs since 1980. The Federal Reserve Bank of New York calculated that 3.8 million jobs were displaced by U.S. trade in manufactured goods as of 2003.

Those jobs have been replaced, but with lower paying work in the service sector.

Now even those service sector jobs are leaving the United States. The evidence can be seen in the rapid growth of "outsourcing", or transferring information jobs to foreign nations. US service industries such as finance, healthcare, and software development are rapidly expanding in lower wage nations.

As this trend continues, these high-tech careers are being exported just as manufacturing jobs have fled in the past.

Despite the preponderance of evidence that we are losing a trade war, there is simply no public dialogue about our skyrocketing trade deficits. And this issue is certainly not being discussed like the impending economic crisis that it is.

Most of the damage is already done. Detroit Michigan is a wasteland, while Shanghai China is booming. Yet there are few "mainstream" politicians or news programs that will even acknowledge the problem, much less speak out against our trade policy.

Protectionism remains out of fashion in the United States. Our political establishment refuses to connect our trade deficits with stagnating wages and a beleaguered middle class. Instead voter's insecurities are assuaged with vague promises of prosperity in an emerging "global economy".

Our national managers assure us that free trade will raise our standard of living. Technology and information industries will link the world into one giant market for goods and services. Expanding markets overseas will create millions of jobs for American workers.

But this begs an obvious question: Has the global economy created our trade deficits, or have our trade deficits created the global economy?

The world is wealthier than ever because the world has spent our money, six trillion dollars of it. For some parts of the world the global economy means new investment, new jobs, and rising prosperity. For Americans globalization is a kinder, gentler word for the export of jobs, factories, and technology.

A small elite of investors and multinational corporations profits most from the global economy, while the American people sacrifice their incomes to create it.

So what is the true cost of our trade deficits? It's how much wealthier we would be if the economic boom that enriched East Asia had enriched our country instead. Ultimately, it's the difference between America today, and the America that could have been if we had spent six trillion dollars here instead of exporting it.

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]]> The Forgotten Deficit Fri, 1 Sep 2006 13:26:00 GMT http://thepopulist.libsyn.com/index.php?post_id=125989# 00:05:28 Politics, Economics, War on Terror, Military, History, News The Populist Clean http://thepopulist.libsyn.com/index.php?post_id=125720#
A. Scott Piraino

In 1981, when Ronald Reagan was sworn in, this country faced the worst economic downturn since the Great Depression. President Reagan proposed a novel solution, lowering tax rates on the wealthiest Americans so they could spend and invest more money. His administration argued that only this increased economic activity could lift the country out of recession.

Quasi-economic terms like "supply side" and "trickle down" were used to give Reagan's proposal an academic veneer. In fact Reaganomics was nothing more than intellectual camouflage for cutting tax rates on the rich. And if these tax cuts were unfair and would create the largest national debt in history, well so what.

Twenty five years later our national debt has climbed to 8.5 trillion dollars. Yearly interest payments on that debt have ballooned to 300 over billion dollars. But these facts did not deter President Bush.

His administration used the recession of 2001 to justify a 1.35 trillion dollar tax cut package. Like Reagan, President Bush sold his plan as a tax break for all Americans, knowing these reductions would favor the wealthy. While reducing income taxes for everyone, his administration quietly increased payroll taxes on working Americans.

Social Security and Medicare are flat taxes on all wage income. That means there are no write-offs or deductions, and all payroll income is taxed at the same flat rate.

Of course the wealthiest Americans don't worry about payroll taxes because they don't have jobs. They own capital, invested money that makes more money. President Bush reduced top capital gains tax rate from 20 to 15 percent and cut the top rate on dividends from 35 to 15 percent.

Since this is not payroll income, the owners of capital do not contribute to Social Security and Medicare.

What that means is, an American working a burger flipping job pays 7.5 percent in payroll taxes before his income tax rate is even calculated. Then he pays income tax on top of that.

Now lets say some Wall Street trader made a million dollars in profits from stock dividends. He would pay a flat fifteen percent in taxes on all that money. In other words, the Wall Street Trader would pay taxes at a lower rate than an American worker flipping burgers.  

Payroll taxes account for over one third of federal revenue, and nearly all the budget surpluses up to 2001. Yet President Bush did not suggest reducing these taxes, or making them fair. Instead the Bush administration continues the fiction that workers are contributing to a "trust fund", while spending the surpluses from payroll taxes as general revenue.

This would have been just another craven transfer of wealth to the rich if not for the tragic events of September 11th.

After the terrorist attacks, the recession of 2001 suddenly looked like an economic crisis. The surpluses of the previous four years disappeared, spent on military operations, emergency relief, and a bailout for the airlines. The Bush administration announced an emergency budget increase, and a return to deficit spending.

The budget deficit for 2002 exceeded 400 billion dollars, a new record high.

With US forces occupying Iraq and Afghanistan, the Bush administration had the audacity to suggest another round of tax cuts for the wealthy. They even had the nerve to call it "patriotic tax relief". In the spring of 2003, President Bush signed legislation further reducing taxes by 350 billion dollars.  

The War in Iraq is costing over four billion dollars a month, there are one million fewer jobs in this country than when George the Second took office, our trade and budget deficits are soaring, and this President either doesn't have a clue, or he doesn't care.

It's not that he believes in Reaganomics, or "supply side", or "trickle down". George Bush doesn't believe in anything. He's a wealthy thief, and a paid mouthpiece for wealthy thieves.

Make no mistake, Reaganomics has done exactly what it was supposed to do. It has made the richest Americans much wealthier, while transferring more of the tax burden to the middle class and working poor.

There is simply no mystery to Reaganomics.

The poorest Americans have seen their living standards decline over the last twenty five years, while incomes for our wealthiest citizens have soared. Under president Bush our wealthiest citizens have received more tax cuts, while the rest of us pay for the War on Terror, and pay down the debt created by Reaganomics.

It's a disgrace.

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]]> Reaganomics at War Thu, 31 Aug 2006 20:16:00 GMT http://thepopulist.libsyn.com/index.php?post_id=125720# 00:04:38 Politics, Economics, War on Terror, Military, History The Populist Clean http://thepopulist.libsyn.com/index.php?post_id=125713#
There is a simple, and logical explanation for Islamic terrorism.

In an interview broadcast after the September 11th attacks Osama Bin Laden asked a question: "Why should fear, killing, destruction, displacement, orphaning and widowing continue to be our lot, while security, stability and happiness be your lot?"  He answered this question by saying, "This is unfair."

Then he claimed that we "bear hate and grudge against Islam". He continued by saying, "The US government has committed acts that are extremely unjust, hideous and criminal".

Well, what hideous and criminal acts did we commit against Islam?  

The Gulf War in 1990 was the first war the United States waged against an Islamic nation before September 11th 2001. We fought that war to liberate Kuwait, and we fought with a coalition that included Islamic troops. And remember, Bin Laden said these things before George Bush the Second's second invasion of Iraq.  

By contrast, Britain occupied many Islamic nations for over a century, and created the modern map of the Middle East. Britain carved Persia into Iraq and Iran, and it was Britain that gave the Israelis control of Palestine.

The Soviet Union invaded Afghanistan, killing tens of thousands of Muslims, and today the Russians are fighting a war in Chechnya. Serbia has ethnically cleansed hundreds of thousands of Muslims in Bosnia and Kosovo.

And let's not forget Saddam Hussein. Before he invaded Kuwait he had launched an unprovoked war against Iran that left 400,000 soldiers dead on both sides.

If Al Qaeda's real purpose is to strike at those who "bear hate" against Islam, they would be attacking the Serbs, the Russians, or maybe the British. Hell, they would have gone after Saddam Hussein.

Osama Bin Laden is a psychotic murderer and we should never have had anything to do with him. But the fact is, we supported him when he was fighting the Soviet occupation of Afghanistan. After we helped him drive the Russians out, he formed Al-Qaeda and declared a holy war against "Jews and Crusaders".

Bin Laden's reasoning makes no sense, but that is not because he's irrational. He is lying. The truth is Osama bin laden has only made one statement that provides the real motivation for his attacks against us. Here it is:

"Our terrorism is a good accepted terrorism because it is against America, it is for the purpose of defeating oppression so America would stop supporting Israel, who is killing our children."

When Israel was recognized by the United Nations in 1948, Arab armies from Egypt, Syria, Jordan, and Lebanon, attempted to drive them into the sea. The Israelis held their ground, then drove the Arab armies from their territory. In 1949 a UN brokered armistice brought an end to outright war, but no end to guerrilla attacks from Arab territories.

Then in 1956, Egypt's President Nasser nationalized the Suez canal and denied passage to Israeli shipping. He also signed a tripartite agreement with Syria and Jordan placing Nasser in command of all three Arab armies. Israel retaliated by launching an air and ground assault that captured the entire Sinai peninsula, and forced Egypt to settle the canal dispute.

Over the next decade the Arab alliance received massive arms shipments from the Soviet Union, and by 1967, another war was inevitable. Faced with an imminent invasion, Israel launched an air campaign that destroyed the Arab air forces. With total air superiority, the Israeli army routed the Arabs and captured the West Bank, Gaza strip, and Jerusalem in only six days.

In 1973 Egypt and Syria made a final attempt to destroy Israel by launching an invasion on the Jewish holy day of Yom Kippur. The Israelis were taken by surprise and were on the verge of being over run. Only superior generalship allowed the Israelis to regroup, and counter-attack into Egypt and Syria. 

With a population of only five million citizens, Israel has repeatedly defeated the Arab armies of the Middle East. The Israelis have also occupied the West Bank and Gaza Strip since 1967, and forced Palestinians to live under an Israeli government. These humiliations at the hands of Israel are the real motivation behind Islamic terrorism.

When Egypt's President Nasser led the Arab Alliance in wars against Israel he declared his intentions were, "the eradication of Israel". He said, "we aim at the destruction of the state of Israel". "We will not accept any...coexistence with Israel...The war with Israel is in effect since 1948". "There will be no peace on Israel's border because we demand vengeance, and vengeance is Israel's death". 

 On May 18th, 1967, two weeks before the Six Day war began, the Voice of Arabs radio station broadcast this proclamation: 

"We shall exercise patience no more. We shall not complain any more to the UN about Israel. The sole method we shall apply against Israel is total war, which will result in the extermination of Zionist existence."

These statements sound similar to the rhetoric of today's Islamic terrorists. But when President Nasser and the Voice of Arabs spoke, they still believed they could destroy Israel. After 1973 no Arab army could openly challenge Israel on the battlefield.

So they began waging war by other means, with guerrilla attacks, hijackings, and terrorism.

The PLO began as an umbrella group for various Palestinian factions fighting Israel. The PLO was guided by the Palestinian National Covenant, a document with the clearly stated goal of "the elimination of Zionism in Palestine". In the name of eliminating Zionism, The PLO adopted a radical, and despicable strategy:

They have the right to kill civilians of any nationality, anywhere, because they are at war with Israel.

Among the infamous attacks conducted by the PLO are the mid-air explosion of a Swissair jetliner that killed 47, the murder of 11 Israeli athletes at the 1972 Munich Olympic Games, and the coordinated shoot-outs at the Rome and Vienna Airports.

Hezbollah was founded in 1985 as a Shia militant organization committed to destroying the "Zionist entity". Hamas was formed in the late 1980s by Palestinians in the occupied territories. The Charter forming the group clearly states that, "Israel will exist and will continue to exist until Islam will obliterate it". 

In September of 2000, Hamas and other Palestinian terrorist groups employed a new and terrible weapon in their war against Israel. Suicide bombers succeeded in detonating 112 of their grisly bombs, killing 450 Israelis.

The Palestinians know who the bombers are, they are publicly paraded and feted before going on their suicide missions. Nevertheless, Palestinian authorities have adamantly refused to take responsibility for the suicide bombers, or restrain them. They do complain loudly when Israel uses security checks and fences to prevent suicide bombers from entering Israel, however.

Most recently, Hezbollah launched a diversionary rocket and mortar attack while carrying out one of their endless raids into Israel from Lebanon. They managed to kill eight Israeli soldiers and capture two more. Israel decided to fight, and launched an invasion of southern Lebanon.

Hezbollah's response was to hide among civilians, while raining down nearly 4000 rockets into Israeli cities.

During the recent hostilities in Lebanon, the "General Secretary" of Hizballah, Sayyid Hasan Nasrallah, described his fighters and the loyal population as, "a people of nobility, dignity, and pride, not a people of servility, submissiveness, and surrender".

Of course for the Lebanese and Palestinians "servility and surrender" to Israel would mean living in modern houses, getting an education, earning decent pay, and having access to the internet. In short life in a modern, free society.

Nasrallah continued his address by offering his listeners a choice: "...Either we submit completely to its conditions, which means taking Lebanon into an Israeli age under Israeli domination -- or we stand steadfast. That is the other choice: that we persevere, that we persevere and confront."

This latest war has killed over 2000 people, and displaced nearly one million Lebanese, and half a million Israelis. Nevertheless, the Arab world is celebrating a great victory. Because although Southern Lebanon is destroyed, they made Israel suffer. 

When Islamic fascism was brought home to the United states on September 11th, 2001, Americans were shocked to see Palestinians celebrating by dancing in the streets.

Most of us didn't see a connection between the 9/11 attacks, Al-Qaeda, and Israel. But to the Palestinians and the rest of the Arab world, the connection was obvious. They were elated, they were celebrating because we were finally made to pay for our support of the Jewish state.

The Arab world loathes the State of Israel.

They are Islam's true enemy, not the Russians, the Serbs, or even Saddam Hussein. The Arab powers have tried every means to annihilate the Jewish state. If they had succeeded there would be no Hamas, Hezbollah, or Al-Qaeda.

But Israel has survived, and grown into a prosperous, modern democracy. For the Islamic world, this is the worst humiliation of all. 

While Israel has prospered, the Arab nations have stagnated. Islamic governments have squandered their oil wealth on their own opulent regimes, or purchased weapons to make war on each other. In many Arab countries, per-capita incomes, educational levels, and living standards have declined over the last twenty years.

A report commissioned by the United nations in 2002 illustrates how far Islamic civilization has fallen behind the modern world. The gross domestic product for all Arab countries is less than the GDP of Spain. Arab unemployment, at 15 percent, is the highest in the developing world. This dismal economic performance is despite over three trillion dollars in oil revenue investment over the past 20 years.

The UN report also cites a more ominous statistic: 51 percent of older adolescents expressed a desire to emigrate, citing lack of education, freedom, and job opportunities. The cities of the Islamic world are seething with underemployed Muslim men. These radicalized, frustrated young men have become the standard bearers of Islamic terrorism.

Islam is not at war with us because they hate freedom or oppose democracy. Arab voters have made Hamas the ruling party in the occupied territories. Hezbollah delegates sit on the Parliament of Lebanon. Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, the newly elected president of Iran has called for Israel to be "wiped off the map".

Nor is Islam attacking us in the name of Allah, Mohammed, Fatwa or Jihad. They claim to be attacking us in the name of religion, but this is just another excuse. Islam is using religion in this conflict like they use diatribes of lies and propaganda, to justify their attacks.

Modern Muslims are faced with a choice: Accept their part in their military, economic, and cultural failures... Or blame someone else. 

These are sick people. People who desperately want to believe that they are the victims of a conspiracy by "Jews and Crusaders". That Israel and the United States are the source of all their troubles. Otherwise they would be responsible.

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]]> Responsible Terrorism Thu, 31 Aug 2006 19:40:00 GMT http://thepopulist.libsyn.com/index.php?post_id=125713# 00:10:41 Politics, Economics, War on Terror, Military, History The Populist Clean http://thepopulist.libsyn.com/index.php?post_id=126887#
This is how Rome fell. First a vibrant empire comprised of wealthy citizens was reduced to an aristocracy. Then that decadent, impoverished empire was overcome by external enemies.

Roman civilization has many parallels to our own. The Roman Empire is a historical construct, contemporary Romans always referred to their country as a Republic. Of course Rome was an empire, as successive Emperors consolidated power and began ruling far flung provinces. But the republican values were an egalitarian fiction until the fall of Rome.

It is interesting to note that the United States is never officially referred to as an empire, although our country has assumed many imperial characteristics.

As their empire expanded, the Romans built the greatest road network the world had ever seen so their marching legions could defend any threatened territory. These roads facilitated trade and commerce, and were necessary for the growth of the Empire.

After WW II, the United States began construction of the Federal Highway system. The original purpose of our Interstate Highways was to move tanks, in the event the US was ever invaded. These highways have not just radically improved transportation, they have affected the growth of suburbs, malls, and even whole cities.

The Romans built great coliseums to celebrate sporting events and watch plays or other public entertainments. Our sports amphitheaters are actually modeled on these Roman designs. Aside from modern technology, there is very little difference between the Superdome and the Colosseum. We are also a culture that worships entertainment. Instead of plays and gladiators, we have football teams, rock bands, and movie stars.

But besides our public works, the United States shares other, more disturbing similarities with the Roman Empire.

In the early Roman period the curials were the backbone of society. These were middle class landowners who could vote, and fought in the legions during times of war. By the end of the Empire, the curials had been reduced to the status of serfs. Wealth was concentrated in the hands of a few landowners, and the curials worked the land for them.

The Fall of the Roman Empire can be traced to the demise of the republican values that created it. In modern terms we can compare this to the death of our middle class. Our country was founded not just on Democratic principles, but the idea that the people were the owners of the country.

The first Americans were predominantly small farmers who owned their land, (with the exception of the black slaves, of course). In early American history just as in Rome, voting and military service where the duties of citizenship, and ownership of property was a right. As industrialization eclipsed agriculture, rural farmers became urban factory workers.

But the goal of life in America has always been the same, to own a house, buy a car, in short, to live the American dream.

Over the past twenty five years, the ability of the average American to live that dream has all but disappeared. Per capita income continues to climb only because a small number of Americans have grown much wealthier. Incomes for the working poor and middle class have stagnated, and even declined. The average American is increasingly a renter, not an owner.

Twenty five years ago a high school graduate in Akron Ohio could look forward to a lifetime of factory employment, and earn enough from his wages to buy a house and a car. Today Akron Ohio consists of ghettos, and boarded up factories. Those jobs have moved to China and Mexico, and what were once middle class neighborhoods are now tenements for the poor.

How did this happen? To answer that, we must address the issue of leadership.

The first Roman Emperors were crusaders for the Glory of Rome. After the initial conquests of the Mediterranean, France, and Britain, the Roman borders remained essentially unchanged for three hundred years. The later Emperors maintained the trappings of the earlier heroic period, but they served themselves, not the greater good of Rome.

Our founding fathers were idealists. They can rightfully be compared to the Caesars, and the early Romans. But though our present leadership uses the same slogans, and shrouds their policies in the same idealism, it is clear they don't believe in anything. It is said that Nero fiddled while Rome fell, our leadership has fiddled as well, while our country has descended into mediocrity.

The source of our economic decline can be traced to Ronald Reagan and his successors. Reaganomics was nothing more than an excuse to cut taxes for the rich. Just as free trade is an argument for exporting manufacturing jobs to foreign nations where our corporations can pay much lower wages.

In 1981 the United States was the largest creditor nation in history. Today our national debt stands at over eight trillion dollars and growing. The US posted a trade deficit of over 700 billion dollars last year, a new record high.

Our budget deficits transfer wealth from taxpayers to bondholders, while our trade deficits transfer wealth from American consumers to offshore producers. These huge transfers of wealth are responsible for the death of our middle class.

Ronald Reagan was either a demented fool or a corrupt servant of the rich, depending on whether he believed his own agenda or not. But there can be no doubt about his successors. George Bush the First called Reagan's policies "voodoo" economics while campaigning against him, then carried on the same policies during his four years in office.

In 1992 when the Democrats returned to office, our country had an opportunity to reverse the corrupt policies of the Reagan era. Instead we elected a cheap whore named Bill Clinton. His administration continued the same policies, only in a trendier, more liberal guise.

George Bush II has wasted no time getting back to Reaganomics, passing two tax cut packages into law that favor the wealthy, and supporting more free trade agreements. The difference of course is that our country is now the biggest debtor nation in history.

We are also at war.

The Roman Empire did not fall to one superior enemy. Rather the Empire died the death of a thousand cuts, suffering repeated attacks against her frontiers and invasions by increasingly larger and better organized enemies. By the end of the Empire, Roman citizens were loathe to join the legions and defend their country.

The dangerous job of soldiering was left to slaves, and foreign mercenaries. The date for the fall of the Roman Empire is commonly noted as 476 A. D. That year a Germanic mercenary commanding Roman armies deposed the last, enfeebled Roman Emperor.

Today's US servicemen are predominantly poor whites and poor blacks, even foreign citizens are allowed to enlist to fill the ranks. Our youth increasingly distain the armed forces, preferring a more relaxed urban lifestyle. For those young Americans who do opt for military service, there is plenty of action.

After September 11th, President Bush ordered an invasion of Afghanistan, seeking the terrorists responsible for the attacks. Osama Bin Laden has not been found, nor has the Al Qaeda terrorist network been eliminated. But 18000 US troops are still in Afghanistan, enduring ambushes, bombings, and fighting an elusive enemy.

No one could question our right to attack Afghanistan after September 11th, but that moral authority has been squandered by the reckless invasion of Iraq. 150,000 US troops are now attempting to occupy the country against increasing resistance from indigenous guerrillas. One third of our standing Army is now committed to Iraq and Afghanistan, and the War on Terror is far from won.

The occupation of Iraq is unraveling, and showing signs of becoming a full fledged civil war. North Korea has nuclear weapons, and Iran will have an atomic arsenal within three years. Both nations already have ballistic missiles, and someday they will wreak havoc with these weapons. Nor can we discount China. That nation is now the world's third largest economy, thanks to our trade deficits, and no friend of the United States.

The American people have good reasons to fear for the future, and nowhere to turn for answers. Roman civilization faced this uncertainty as well, and by searching, found new answers. The end of the Roman Empire was also the end of the ancient world, and the rise of Christianity.

Roman civilization was so much more advanced than anything before it, so much wealthier, more comfortable and safe, that people's view of the universe began to change. In the early Roman period pantheons of gods like Zeus and Apollo were worshipped, and great temples were built to honor them. But after centuries of peace and prosperity, sacrificing to these old gods seemed superstitious, even quaint.

As the old ways declined Romans sought cults, astrology, and mystic traditions to address their spiritual needs, before the Empire converted to Christianity. The first Christians were young, urban, educated Romans. The rural people held to the old ways the longest, sacrificing to the old gods, and maintaining shrines to local spirits.

The word "pagan" is Latin for rural person, with the connotation of hillbilly or hick.

Just as the old gods made no sense to the late Romans, Christianity makes no sense in the modern world. The new generations of Americans, baby boomers and their progeny, don't look to the Christian faith anymore. Younger, more modern Americans seek new age bookstores and any number of wonkish solutions to their spiritual questions.

The last vestiges of Christianity in our country can be found predominantly in rural America. There you can still find people who go to church on Sundays, and read, or even believe, the Bible. They are the pagans, the rural people holding to the old ways.

The cynicism and moral relativity of these times is part of this change in the way we view our universe.

We have called the future post-modern, the information age, the space age, and the nuclear age. Whatever this new age is, we are seeing its birth in our time. Part of that change is a new morality, a new spirituality if you will.

But faith that all will end as it should is no excuse for the incompetence and corruption of our national leadership. Historians will look back on the last twenty five years as an era of decadence and decline. Our economy is left tottering, our enemies are plotting our destruction, and we are left with an inevitable sense of fatalism about the future. 

This too shall pass

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]]> On the Fall of Empires Thu, 31 Aug 2006 16:48:00 GMT http://thepopulist.libsyn.com/index.php?post_id=126887# 00:10:00 News, politics, history, economics, military The Populist Clean