Die USA scheinen die Ernennung des dänischen Premier Anders Fogh Rasmussen als neuen Generalsekretär der NATO zu unterstützen.
U.S. Backs Denmark PM for Top NATO Post
By PASCAL MALLET, AGENCE FRANCE-PRESSE
Published: 21 Mar 14:30 EDT (18:30 GMT)
BRUSSELS - The United States has backed Danish Prime Minister Anders Fogh Rasmussen for next secretary general of NATO, a diplomat said March 21, setting him on track to take the alliance's top job in August.
"The United States has made up its mind. It will support Anders Fogh Rasmussen" as the candidate to take over from Dutch diplomat Jaap de Hoop Scheffer as NATO's top civilian official, the alliance diplomat said.
When asked about Washington's position, a senior U.S. official would only say: "A number of people at the alliance are looking at Rasmussen as a leading candidate but there's been no decision yet, and it takes a consensus."
The United States is the biggest and most powerful of the 26 allies that make up the North Atlantic Treaty Organization, and its backing for the Danish premier would certainly place him favorite for the post.
On Friday, Rasmussen, 56, declined to speak to reporters in Brussels about his possible candidature, but he has never officially ruled him himself out of the race. Scheffer's mandate ends at the end of July............
>>>more on: http://www.defensenews.com/story.php?i=4000791&c=EUR&s=TOP
Sunday, March 22, 2009
Saturday, March 21, 2009
Bald eine neue Währung?
Gibt es bald eine neue Reservewährung?
Schenkt man einer Reuters Meldung vom 18 März 2009 Glauben, könnte dies der Fall sein.
Gemäss Reuters soll eine UNO Experten Kommission, am 25 März, eine offizielle Empfehlung heraus geben.
Die Kommission empfiehlt den US-Dollar durch eine neue Rechnungseinheit als Reservewährung zu ersetzen.
Diese neue Rechnungseinheit soll aus eine Korb aus Währungen bestehen, ähnlich wie es der ECU in der EU war zwischen 1979 und 1998.
U.N. panel says world should ditch dollar
Wed Mar 18, 2009 11:16am EDT
By Jeremy Gaunt, European Investment Correspondent
LUXEMBOURG (Reuters) - A U.N. panel will next week recommend that the world ditch the dollar as its reserve currency in favor of a shared basket of currencies, a member of the panel said on Wednesday, adding to pressure on the dollar.
Currency specialist Avinash Persaud, a member of the panel of experts, told a Reuters Funds Summit in Luxembourg that the proposal was to create something like the old Ecu, or European currency unit, that was a hard-traded, weighted basket.
Persaud, chairman of consultants Intelligence Capital and a former currency chief at JPMorgan, said the recommendation would be one of a number delivered to the United Nations on March 25 by the U.N. Commission of Experts on International Financial Reform.
"It is a good moment to move to a shared reserve currency," he said.
Russia is also planning to propose the creation of a new reserve currency, to be issued by international financial institutions, at the April G20 meeting, according to the text of its proposals published on Monday.
>>>>>
more on : http://www.reuters.com/article/newsOne/idUSTRE52H2CY20090318
EGR / 2009-03-21
Thursday, March 19, 2009
Neues von der Krise
EU leaders to discuss response to economic crisis
Today @ 09:24 CET
2009-03-19
EUOBSERVER / BRUSSELS – EU leaders are meeting in Brussels on Thursday and Friday to discuss the best ways to get out of the economic crisis. But despite some calls to spend more to support the bloc's ailing economies, most of the attention is expected to be focused on the need for better regulation of the financial sector and on "fine-tuning" the existing European economic stimulus package.
The EU will aim to reach a strong common position ahead of a G20 meeting in April (Photo: Council of Europe)
The two-day summit comes just as the International Monetary Fund presented the outlines of a gloomy forecast for this year, saying the world economy would shrink by some 0.6 percent, instead of growing 0.5 percent as previously thought.
In the face of the persisting economic turmoil, France and Germany's leaders sent a letter to the Czech EU presidency and to the president of the European Commission on Tuesday reiterating what they see as an urgent need to reform the financial system.
More on: http://euobserver.com/9/27801
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Russia backs EU in pre-G20 stimulus debate
18.03.2009 @ 17:42 CET
EUOBSERVER / BRUSSELS - Russia is siding with the European Union ahead of the April G20 summit in London in opposing new stimulus measures and instead putting the focus on regulatory reform. But Moscow has warned against IMF meddling in the social affairs of its neighbours in eastern Europe.
On Tuesday (17 March), Arkady Dvorkovich, Russian President Dmitri Medvedev's economic advisor and negotiator or "sherpa" in diplomatic discussions leading into the London summit met with the head of European Commission President Jose Manuel Barroso's cabinet in Brussels to discuss his country's perspective on the financial crisis.
More on: http://euobserver.com/9/27800
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Government borrowing soars to £75bn
- Graeme Wearden
- guardian.co.uk, Thursday 19 March 2009 11.14 GMT
- Article history
Britain's budget deficit soared to a record high last month, threatening to leave the government's budget calculations in tatters, data released this morning showed.
The Office for National Statistics reported that public sector net borrowing (PSNB) reached £8.991bn last month, the highest February figure since records began in 1993.
This pushed the total PSNB figure for the current financial year, starting in April 2008, to £75.2bn – another record.
Economists said today's figures underlined the weak state of the UK public finances. "The fiscal outlook is pretty awful and it is going to take a long, long time to repair it," said Ross Walker of RBS Financial Markets.
More on: http://www.guardian.co.uk/business/2009/mar/19/government-borrowing-financial-crisis
The Fight of his Life - Der Kampf seines Lebens, oder die Schlacht am Potomac
Gemäss einer Reuters Meldung vom 17 März 2009, wird Robert Gates, der US-Verteidigungssekretär, am 02 April dieses Jahres, nicht an dem NATO-Gipfel in Strassburg teilnehmen.
«In the first months of the Obama administration, however, Gates has taken a lower profile and focused on the traditional terrain of a Pentagon chief, above all the nitty gritty of the defense budget, set at $534 billion for next year. The clearest sign of the switch in focus came at the end of last week when the Pentagon said Gates would take the unusual step of skipping NATO's 60th anniversary summit, jointly hosted next month by France and Germany, to work on the budget. Gates also stayed away from the Munich Security Conference last month. Vice President Joe Biden spoke for the new administration at the gathering, which is often the venue for a major speech by the U.S. defense secretary.» (Reuters)
Bemerkenswert!
Gates fernbleiben an diesen Gipfel ist eine bedeutende und signifikante Nachricht im Rahmen der Wichtigkeit dieses Gipfels, wenn man sich folgendes vergegenwärtigt:
1-) Die Bedeutung des Gipfels, insbesondere mit der Ankündigung der "Rückkehr" Frankreichs in die NATO, und natürlich, die Bedeutung der USA innerhalb der NATO.
2-) Die Bedeutung des US-Verteidigungsminister in der Regierung der Vereinigten Staaten im Allgemeinen und in der Organisation der NATO und bei der NATO. Seine Abwesenheit in diesem Zusammenhang ist ein wichtiges Ereignis.
3-) • Die Bedeutung des ersten NATO-Gipfel der Obama-Administration, nach acht Jahren anstrengende Bush-Administration, und die Bedeutung innerhalb der Verwaltung Obama, von Robert Gates (der einzigen Überlebenden der Bush-Administration)
Warum kommt Gates nicht nach Stassbourg? Aus Desinteresse an der Situation in Europa, oder der NATO kann es nicht sein.
Sein Fernbleiben ist eher mit der äusserst angespannte Lage im Pentagon zu erklären.
Seit einiger Zeit tobt im Pentagon eine bürokratische Schlacht, welche zu extremen Spannungen geführt hat. Beamten in sensible Bereiche, z.B, in der Materialbeschaffung, werden vereidigt
«Senior Pentagon officials have had to promise they will keep the details of the US military budget secret as the Defense Department prepares to make tough cuts on weapons programs, a spokesman said on Wednesday.
»In an unprecedented move, Defense Secretary Robert Gates asked top military officers and civilian officials to sign non-disclosure forms in which they agree not to reveal deliberations about the politically charged budget. “Everybody who's participating in this process – these are the highest ranking people in this department ... were asked to sign an agreement in which they would agree not to speak to any of the matters that they are working on as part of this budget process,” press secretary Geoff Morrell told a news conference. “This is highly sensitive stuff involving programs costing tens of billions of dollars, employing hundreds of thousands of people and – and go to the heart of national security,” he said.
»Members of the Joint Chiefs of Staff were among those required to sign, and Gates himself signed the form, Morrell said “This is to reinforce the message that indeed this is classified material. These are highly secret discussions. And we should remember that, be mindful of it, and honor it,” Morrell said. [...]
»The non-disclosure forms may carry less legal weight than the strict security clearances already governing top officials and officers. But the defense secretary's step may have been designed more as a symbolic message to curb leaks about sensitive budget negotiations, analysts said. Gates is “trying to invoke personal loyalty,” said Michael O'Hanlon at the Brookings Institution, a Washington think tank.» (AFP/Yahoo 25 Februar 2009)
Mehrere Vorzeichen hatten uns schon auf wichtige Ereignisse vorbereitet, wir vermuten, dass die entscheidenden Momente des Machtkampfes, um Kostenreduktionen (sprich: Verzicht auf gewisse Waffen-Programme) bevorstehen. Es bestätigt sich was seit längerem vermutet wird, dass nämlich eine grundlegende Reform der Pentagon-Bürokratie bevorsteht.
Und Robert Gates steht da im Mittelpunkt.
Diese Vorzeichen bestätigen, dass Robert Gates es ernst meint mit der Reform.
Der Militärisch-industrieller Komplex ist mit den geplanten Reformen ganz und gar nicht glücklich, sehen doch die Waffenproduzenten ihre Felle davon schwimmen.
Am 16 März 2009 schrieb William S. Lind in einer radikale Analyse:
“What would real reform of defense procurement entail? First, the U.S. government would reform what is being procured. Most current and projected major defense programs are buying weapons and other "systems" that are outdated or simply represent a false understanding of war.
The U.S. government spends tens of billions of dollars on computerized command and control systems that encourage more and more centralization of decision-making. But sound military doctrine calls for decentralized decision-making.
The U.S. Army's Future Contract System, the most expensive current Pentagon program, is a Rube Goldbergian, semi-portable Maginot Line that in combat would collapse of its own internal complexity. The Lockheed Martin F-35 fighter-bomber is another F-111, a flying piano that is useless for the one attack aviation function that really works, supporting ground troops.
Only a handful of the ships the U.S. Navy wants are useful in coastal waters, where future naval actions are likely to be fought. These and many similar "legacy" systems are military museum pieces, designed for wars with the armies, navies and air forces of other states. Serious defense procurement reform would start by canning all of them.”
http://www.spacewar.com/reports/Pentagon_Set_To_Sucker_Yet_Another_President_Over_Procurement_Reform_Part_One_999.html
In einem am 17 März2009 im Boston Globe erschienen Artikel schreibt Winslow Wheeler über den Ernst des Reformwillens:
«Yet even some of the Pentagon's fiercest critics, such as Winslow Wheeler of the liberal Center for Defense Information, believe the Obama administration may have a unique opportunity with Gates at the helm. Wheeler, a former Capitol Hill defense aide, noted that Gates has shown a unique toughness, including removing the Army secretary and the civilian and military heads of the Air Force for lapses on their watch. “That demonstrates there is a spine there,” said Wheeler.» (“Spine” signifiant autant “épine” que “résolution à vous glacer le sang”.)
«As the Bush administration was drawing to a close, Robert M. Gates, whose two years as defense secretary had been devoted to wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, felt compelled to warn his successor of a crisis closer to home. The United States “cannot expect to eliminate national security risks through higher defense budgets, to do everything and buy everything,” Gates said. The next defense secretary, he warned, would have to eliminate some costly hardware and invest in new tools for fighting insurgents. What Gates didn't know was that he would be that successor.
»Now, as the only Bush Cabinet member to remain under President Obama, Gates is preparing the most far-reaching changes in the Pentagon's weapons portfolio since the end of the Cold War, according to aides.
»Two defense officials who were not authorized to speak publicly said Gates will announce up to a half-dozen major weapons cancellations later this month. Candidates include a new Navy destroyer, the Air Force's F-22 fighter jet, and Army ground-combat vehicles, the officials said. More cuts are planned for later this year after a review that could lead to reductions in programs such as aircraft carriers and nuclear arms, the officials said.»
Even his closest friends acknowledge Gates is in the bureaucratic fight of his life
«Girding for a showdown with Congress, Gates took the unusual step of making the Joint Chiefs of Staff and other participants in budget deliberations sign nondisclosure agreements to prevent leaks.
»But already lawmakers and defense contractors are preparing to fight back. Lockheed, maker of the F-22 jet, recently launched an ad campaign to protect its fighter. Northrop Grumman, which could face cutbacks to its ship-building programs, has hired consultants to write op-eds. Unions are raising alarms about job losses.
»Even his closest friends acknowledge Gates is in the bureaucratic fight of his life.»
http://www.commondreams.org/print/39574
»Even his closest friends acknowledge Gates is in the bureaucratic fight of his life.»
Dieser Satz verweist natürlich auf die Rede von Donald Rumsfeld am 10 September 2001. Und damit befindet sich Robert Gates in einer Paradoxe Situation.
Als Nachfolger des in Ungnade gefallenen D. Rumsfeld musste er die katastrophalen Zustände der damaligen gescheiterten Reformversuche aufräumen.
Gleichzeitig befindet sich Gates jetzt in der Schlacht seines Lebens gegen Moby Dick, gegen den Militärisch-industrieller Komplex, dieses Monströse System welches sich als Staat im Staat längst sehr Tief eingenistet hat.
Wednesday, March 18, 2009
Das Grosse Spiel
Ein neues Great Game um Zentralasien?
Im frühen 20. Jahrhundert prägten Rudyard Kipling und Halford Mackinder den Begriff „Great Game“ für die britisch-russische Konkurrenz um Zentralasien. Seit dem Zusammenbruch der Sowjetunion mehrt sich die Zahl derjenigen, die von einem neuen Great Game sprechen. Durch die US-amerikanische Intervention in Afghanistan, den Konflikt um Irans Atomprogramm, Russlands militärisches Vorgehen gegen Georgien und den Run auf die zentralasiatischen Erdgas- und Erdölvorkommen wird diese These gestützt.
Von Sören Scholvin
EM 03-09 • 01.03.2009
Zwei Faktoren erklären die Instabilität Zentralasiens: Erstens sind die Staaten der Region autoritär, korrupt und von einer boomenden Schattenökonomie geprägt. Zweitens konkurrieren dort verschiedene externe Mächte um Einfluss. Hieraus ergeben sich Spannungen, die enormes Konfliktpotenzial bergen.
• Die EU und die USA sind an den zentralasiatischen Ressourcen interessiert, um ihre Abhängigkeit vom russischen Erdgas und vom Erdöl der OPEC zu verringern. Sicherheitspolitisch streben sie danach, durch Demokratisierung und marktwirtschaftliche Entwicklung Rückzugsräume für Terroristen aufzulösen.
• Russland zählt die fünf postsowjetischen Republiken zu seiner Einflusssphäre und versucht, sie sicherheits- und wirtschaftspolitisch über intergouvernementale Organisationen, Pipelines und den Kauf von Förderrechten eng an sich zu binden.
• China hofft, seine Ressourcenversorgung über Zentralasien zu diversifizieren, Entwicklungsimpulse für seine westlichen Provinzen zu erzeugen und so dort separatistischen Bestrebungen entgegenzuwirken.
• Auch Indien, Iran, Pakistan, Saudi-Arabien und die Türkei haben Interesse an Zentralasien. Sie sind jedoch deutlich weniger einflussreich als China, die EU, Russland und die USA.
>>>>>>
more on: http://www.eurasischesmagazin.de/artikel/?artikelID=20090307
Tuesday, March 17, 2009
Chas Freeman hat das Wort
A statement by Chas Freeman
The tactics of the Israel Lobby plumb the depths of dishonor and indecency
By Chas Freeman, Middle East Policy Council, March 10, 2009
To all who supported me or gave me words of encouragement during the controversy of the past two weeks, you have my gratitude and respect.
You will by now have seen the statement by Director of National Intelligence Dennis Blair reporting that I have withdrawn my previous acceptance of his invitation to chair the National Intelligence Council.
I have concluded that the barrage of libelous distortions of my record would not cease upon my entry into office. The effort to smear me and to destroy my credibility would instead continue. I do not believe the National Intelligence Council could function effectively while its chair was under constant attack by unscrupulous people with a passionate attachment to the views of a political faction in a foreign country. I agreed to chair the NIC to strengthen it and protect it against politicization, not to introduce it to efforts by a special interest group to assert control over it through a protracted political campaign.........
>>>>>more oe: http://warincontext.org/2009/03/10/a-statement-by-chas-freeman/
The tactics of the Israel Lobby plumb the depths of dishonor and indecency
By Chas Freeman, Middle East Policy Council, March 10, 2009
To all who supported me or gave me words of encouragement during the controversy of the past two weeks, you have my gratitude and respect.
You will by now have seen the statement by Director of National Intelligence Dennis Blair reporting that I have withdrawn my previous acceptance of his invitation to chair the National Intelligence Council.
I have concluded that the barrage of libelous distortions of my record would not cease upon my entry into office. The effort to smear me and to destroy my credibility would instead continue. I do not believe the National Intelligence Council could function effectively while its chair was under constant attack by unscrupulous people with a passionate attachment to the views of a political faction in a foreign country. I agreed to chair the NIC to strengthen it and protect it against politicization, not to introduce it to efforts by a special interest group to assert control over it through a protracted political campaign.........
>>>>>more oe: http://warincontext.org/2009/03/10/a-statement-by-chas-freeman/
Aufrüstung im Osten
Russland stellt neuste RS-24-Rakete in Dienst
Gemäss eine Meldung von Ria Novosti von heute 17 März 2009 wird Russland ab dem 05 Dezember 2009 neuen Strategische Raketen in Dienst nehmen.
Die RS-24-Rakete sollen die veralteten RS-18 und RS-20 ersetzen und künftig gemeinsam mit Topol-M (Einfachsprengkopf) die Grundlage der Offensivwaffen der Strategischen Raketentruppen bilden.
>> RIA Novosti: http://de.rian.ru/safety/20090317/120604799.html
Gemäss eine Meldung von Ria Novosti von heute 17 März 2009 wird Russland ab dem 05 Dezember 2009 neuen Strategische Raketen in Dienst nehmen.
Die RS-24-Rakete sollen die veralteten RS-18 und RS-20 ersetzen und künftig gemeinsam mit Topol-M (Einfachsprengkopf) die Grundlage der Offensivwaffen der Strategischen Raketentruppen bilden.
>> RIA Novosti: http://de.rian.ru/safety/20090317/120604799.html
Monday, March 16, 2009
The Lobby und die Affäre Freeman, ein Paar Ansichten
March 13 / 15, 2009
The State That Tolerates No Criticism
How Israel Gives Jews a Bad Name
By SAUL LANDAU
Most Jews I know get little pleasure from the existence of Israel; just the opposite. They feel disgusted by the behavior of their tribal kin toward Palestinians. This antipathy doesn’t concern Israel’s right to exist, a phony argument still maintained by hard line Zionists. Israel exists, period. Most of the world recognizes that. Anyone wanting to eliminate it belongs in the loony bin or prison.
Israelis have just elected a right wing majority. The number three vote-getting party, Yisrael Beytenu led by Avigdor Lieberman, will occupy a strong place in the new government. Lieberman will become a Minister in the Netanyahu Cabinet. Last year, Lieberman rammed through Israel’s Central Election Committee a ban on Arab political parties. The Israeli Supreme Court ruled the ban unconstitutional before the recent election. Lieberman also demanded the Knesset expel Arab Members. He went further. If Arab citizens of Israel don’t sign oaths of loyalty to Israel, they should have their citizenship revoked. Disloyalty for Arabs included students wearing kefiyahs to school; Muslim Israelis collecting medicine and aid for Gaza relief also falls into the non-trustworthy category. >>>>>>>>>>>>
>>>>more on: http://www.counterpunch.org/landau03132009.html
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March 12 , 2009
Full-Spectrum Penetration
Israeli Spying in the United States
By CHRISTOPHER KETCHAM
Scratch a counterintelligence officer in the U.S. government and they'll tell you that Israel is not a friend to the United States.
This is because Israel runs one of the most aggressive and damaging espionage networks targeting the U.S..
The fact of Israeli penetration into the country is not a subject oft-discussed in the media or in the circles of governance, due to the extreme sensitivity of the U.S.-Israel relationship coupled with the burden of the Israel lobby, which punishes legislators who dare to criticize the Jewish state. The void where the facts should sit is filled instead with the hallucinations of conspiracy theory -- the kind in which, for example, agents of the Mossad, Israel’s top intelligence agency, engineer the 9/11 attacks, while 4,000 Israelis in the Twin Towers somehow all get word to escape before the planes hit. The effect, as disturbing as it is ironic, is that the less the truth is addressed, the more noxious the falsity that spreads.>>>>>>>>
>>>> more on: http://www.counterpunch.org/ketcham03122009.html
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March 16, 2009
The Freeman Affair
by Robert Dreyfuss and Tom Engelhardt
Because one man, conceding defeat, didn't issue the typical statement indicating that he preferred to spend more time with his family, and instead launched a frontal attack on those who had attacked him, the foreign policy equation in Washington might have changed in discernible ways last week. On withdrawing from his nomination as director of the National Intelligence Council, Charles Freeman, former ambassador to Saudi Arabia and a rare provocative thinker in Washington, let loose with a broadside against his enemies. Of accusations from the generally right-wing groups and individuals who claim to represent the Jewish community in official Washington, he wrote:
>>>>>>more on: http://www.antiwar.com/engelhardt/?articleid=14408
The Lobby at work........
Israel lobby humiliates Obama Administration
By Uri Avnery
15 March 2009 "Information Clearing House" -- Returning home from a very short visit to London, I found the country in the grip of uncontrollable emotions.
No, it was not about the looming danger of the radical right gaining control. It is now almost certain that the next government will consist of an assorted bunch of settlers, explicit racists and perhaps even outright fascists. But that does not evoke any excitement.
Nor was there much excitement about yet another interrogation of the (still) incumbent prime minister in his various corruption affairs. That is hardly news anymore.
All the excitement was about a “press conference” given by the former president of Israel, Moshe Katsav, after the attorney-general announced that he might be indicted for rape.
Katsav, it may be remembered by those who remember such things, was accused by several of his female staff of persistent sexual harassment and at least one case of rape. He had to resign.
An Iranian-born immigrant and a protégé of Menachem Begin, Katsav had made a career based on a kind of affirmative action. Begin believed that, for the sake of integration, promising young immigrants from Oriental countries should be promoted to positions of responsibility. Katsav, a rather nondescript right-wing politician with all the customary right-wing opinions, became minister of tourism and then was elected by the Knesset to the ceremonial post of president, mainly to spite the rival candidate, Shimon Peres. Wags said that the Knesset was reluctant to spoil Peres’s (then) unbroken record of lost elections.
Since his abdication two years ago, the Katsav affair has dragged on and on, almost to the point of farce. Revelations were leaked by the police, several women disclosed lurid details, the ex-president made a plea agreement admitting to lesser offences, he then revoked the deal, the attorney-general procrastinated and now he seems to have made up his mind about the indictment.
So Katsav called a press conference in his remote home town, Kiryat Malakhi (the former Arab village of Qastina, now within reach of the Qassams). It was an unprecedented performance. The ex-president spoke solo for nearly three hours, airing his grievances against the police, the attorney-general, the media, the politicians and almost everybody else. All this was, incredibly, broadcast live on all three of Israel’s TV channels, as if it had been a State of the Union address. Katsav rambled on and on, repeating himself again and again. No questions were allowed. Respected journalists, hungry for scoops, were evicted if they dared to interrupt.
So when I came back yesterday morning [13 March], I found this feat dominating the front pages of all our newspapers. Everything else was banished to the back pages.
Because o this, Charles Freeman got hardly a mention. Yet his affair was a thousand-fold more important than all the sexual activities of our ex-president.
Freeman was called by Barack Obama’s newly-appointed chief of national intelligence, Admiral Dennis Blair, to the post of Chairman of the National Intelligence Council. In this position, he would have been in charge of the National intelligence Estimates (NIE), summarizing the reports of all the 16 US intelligence agencies, which employ some 100,000 people at an annual cost of 50 billion dollars, and composing the estimates that are put before the president.
In Israel, this is the job of the Directorate of Military Intelligence, and the officer in charge has a huge influence on government policy. In October 1973, the then intelligence chief disregarded all reports to the contrary and informed the government that there was only a “low probability” of an Egyptian attack. A few days later the Egyptian army crossed the canal.
Throughout the 1990s, the man in charge of intelligence estimates, Amos Gilad, deliberately misled the government into believing that Yasser Arafat was deceiving them and was actually plotting the destruction of Israel. Gilad was later openly accused by his subordinates of suppressing their expert reports and submitting estimates of his own, which were not based on any intelligence whatsoever. Later, as the guru of Prime Minister Ehud Barak, Gilad coined the phrase “We have no Palestinian partner for peace”.
In the US, the intelligence chiefs famously supplied President George W. Bush with the (false) intelligence he needed to justify his invasion of Iraq.
All this shows how vitally important it is to have an estimates chief of intellectual integrity and wide experience and knowledge. Admiral Blair could not have chosen a better person than Charles Freeman, a man of sterling character and uncontested expertise, especially about China and the Arab world.
And that was his undoing.
As a former ambassador to Saudi Arabia, Freeman is an expert on the Arab world and the Israeli-Arab conflict. He has strong opinions about American policy in the Middle East, and makes no secret of them.
In a 2005 speech, he criticized Israel's "high-handed and self-defeating policies" originating in the "occupation and settlement of Arab lands", which he described as "inherently violent".
In a 2007 speech he said that the US had "embraced Israel’s enemies as our own" and that Arabs had "responded by equating Americans with Israelis as their enemies." Charging the US with backing Israel’s "efforts to pacify its captive and increasingly ghettoized Arab populations" and to "seize ever more Arab land for its colonists", he added that "Israel no longer even pretends to seek peace with the Palestinians”.
Another conclusion is his belief that the terrorism the United States confronts is due largely to "the brutal oppression of the Palestinians by an Israeli occupation that has lasted over 40 years and shows no signs of ending".
Naturally, the appointment of such a person was viewed with great alarm by the pro-Israel lobby in Washington. They decided on an all-out attack. No subtle behind-the-scenes intervention, no discreet protestations, but a full-scale demonstration of their might right at the beginning of the Obama era.
Public denunciations were composed, senators and congressmen pressed into action, media people mobilized. Freeman’s integrity was called into question, shady connections with Arab and Chinese financial interests “disclosed” by the docile press. Admiral Blair came to his appointee’s defence, but in vain. Freeman had no choice but to withdraw.
The full meaning of this episode should not escape anyone.
It was the first test of strength of the lobby in the new Obama era. And in this test, the lobby came out with flying (blue-and-white) colours. The administration was publicly humiliated.
The White House did not even try to hide its abject surrender. It declared that the appointment had not been cleared with the president, that Obama had no hand in it and did not even know about it. Meaning: of course he would have objected to the appointment of any official who was not fully acceptable to the lobby. The portrayal of the power of the lobby by Professors John Mearsheimer and Stephen Walt, has been fully vindicated.
This has a significance which goes far beyond the already far-reaching implications of the affair itself.
Many people in Israel, who view the establishment of the new rightist government with apprehension, cite as their main fear the danger of a clash with the new Obama administration. Such a clash, they believe, could be fatal for Israel’s security. But the rightists deride such arguments. They assert that no American president would ever dare to confront the Israeli lobby. The captive congressmen and senators, as well as the supporters of the Israeli government in the media and even in the White House itself, would sink on sight any American policy opposed by even the most extreme right-wing government in Israel.
Now the first skirmish has taken place, and the president of the United States has blinked first. Perhaps one should not rush to conclusions, perhaps Obama needs more time to find his bearings, but the signs are ominous for any Israeli interested in peace.
It may be too early to call this episode the rape of Washington, but it is certainly vastly more important than Katsav’s sexual escapades.
By the way, or not by the way, a word about my trip to London.
I went there to lend support to a group of Jewish personalities, well-known in academic and other circles, who have set up an organization called “Independent Jewish Voices”.
Recently ,they published a book called “A Time to speak out”, in which several of them contributed to the debate about Israel, human rights and Jewish ethics. The views expressed are very close to those current in the Israeli peace camp. But when they offered their book for presentation in the Jewish Book Week, they were rudely rejected. In protest, they convened an event of their own, and that’s where I spoke.
I believe that it is of utmost importance that such Jewish voices be heard. In several countries, including the US, groups of brave Jews are trying to stand up to the Jewish establishment that unconditionally supports the Israeli right. In the US, several such groups have sprung up, some quite recently. One of them, called “J Street”, is trying to compete with the formidable and notorious AIPAC...
Uri Avnery is an Israeli journalist, writer and peace activist.
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In accordance with Title 17 U.S.C. Section 107, this material is distributed without profit to those who have expressed a prior interest in receiving the included information for research and educational purposes. Information Clearing House has no affiliation whatsoever with the originator of this article nor is Information ClearingHouse endorsed or sponsored by the originator.)
http://informationclearinghouse.info/article22216.htm
By Uri Avnery
15 March 2009 "Information Clearing House" -- Returning home from a very short visit to London, I found the country in the grip of uncontrollable emotions.
No, it was not about the looming danger of the radical right gaining control. It is now almost certain that the next government will consist of an assorted bunch of settlers, explicit racists and perhaps even outright fascists. But that does not evoke any excitement.
Nor was there much excitement about yet another interrogation of the (still) incumbent prime minister in his various corruption affairs. That is hardly news anymore.
All the excitement was about a “press conference” given by the former president of Israel, Moshe Katsav, after the attorney-general announced that he might be indicted for rape.
Katsav, it may be remembered by those who remember such things, was accused by several of his female staff of persistent sexual harassment and at least one case of rape. He had to resign.
An Iranian-born immigrant and a protégé of Menachem Begin, Katsav had made a career based on a kind of affirmative action. Begin believed that, for the sake of integration, promising young immigrants from Oriental countries should be promoted to positions of responsibility. Katsav, a rather nondescript right-wing politician with all the customary right-wing opinions, became minister of tourism and then was elected by the Knesset to the ceremonial post of president, mainly to spite the rival candidate, Shimon Peres. Wags said that the Knesset was reluctant to spoil Peres’s (then) unbroken record of lost elections.
Since his abdication two years ago, the Katsav affair has dragged on and on, almost to the point of farce. Revelations were leaked by the police, several women disclosed lurid details, the ex-president made a plea agreement admitting to lesser offences, he then revoked the deal, the attorney-general procrastinated and now he seems to have made up his mind about the indictment.
So Katsav called a press conference in his remote home town, Kiryat Malakhi (the former Arab village of Qastina, now within reach of the Qassams). It was an unprecedented performance. The ex-president spoke solo for nearly three hours, airing his grievances against the police, the attorney-general, the media, the politicians and almost everybody else. All this was, incredibly, broadcast live on all three of Israel’s TV channels, as if it had been a State of the Union address. Katsav rambled on and on, repeating himself again and again. No questions were allowed. Respected journalists, hungry for scoops, were evicted if they dared to interrupt.
So when I came back yesterday morning [13 March], I found this feat dominating the front pages of all our newspapers. Everything else was banished to the back pages.
Because o this, Charles Freeman got hardly a mention. Yet his affair was a thousand-fold more important than all the sexual activities of our ex-president.
Freeman was called by Barack Obama’s newly-appointed chief of national intelligence, Admiral Dennis Blair, to the post of Chairman of the National Intelligence Council. In this position, he would have been in charge of the National intelligence Estimates (NIE), summarizing the reports of all the 16 US intelligence agencies, which employ some 100,000 people at an annual cost of 50 billion dollars, and composing the estimates that are put before the president.
In Israel, this is the job of the Directorate of Military Intelligence, and the officer in charge has a huge influence on government policy. In October 1973, the then intelligence chief disregarded all reports to the contrary and informed the government that there was only a “low probability” of an Egyptian attack. A few days later the Egyptian army crossed the canal.
Throughout the 1990s, the man in charge of intelligence estimates, Amos Gilad, deliberately misled the government into believing that Yasser Arafat was deceiving them and was actually plotting the destruction of Israel. Gilad was later openly accused by his subordinates of suppressing their expert reports and submitting estimates of his own, which were not based on any intelligence whatsoever. Later, as the guru of Prime Minister Ehud Barak, Gilad coined the phrase “We have no Palestinian partner for peace”.
In the US, the intelligence chiefs famously supplied President George W. Bush with the (false) intelligence he needed to justify his invasion of Iraq.
All this shows how vitally important it is to have an estimates chief of intellectual integrity and wide experience and knowledge. Admiral Blair could not have chosen a better person than Charles Freeman, a man of sterling character and uncontested expertise, especially about China and the Arab world.
And that was his undoing.
As a former ambassador to Saudi Arabia, Freeman is an expert on the Arab world and the Israeli-Arab conflict. He has strong opinions about American policy in the Middle East, and makes no secret of them.
In a 2005 speech, he criticized Israel's "high-handed and self-defeating policies" originating in the "occupation and settlement of Arab lands", which he described as "inherently violent".
In a 2007 speech he said that the US had "embraced Israel’s enemies as our own" and that Arabs had "responded by equating Americans with Israelis as their enemies." Charging the US with backing Israel’s "efforts to pacify its captive and increasingly ghettoized Arab populations" and to "seize ever more Arab land for its colonists", he added that "Israel no longer even pretends to seek peace with the Palestinians”.
Another conclusion is his belief that the terrorism the United States confronts is due largely to "the brutal oppression of the Palestinians by an Israeli occupation that has lasted over 40 years and shows no signs of ending".
Naturally, the appointment of such a person was viewed with great alarm by the pro-Israel lobby in Washington. They decided on an all-out attack. No subtle behind-the-scenes intervention, no discreet protestations, but a full-scale demonstration of their might right at the beginning of the Obama era.
Public denunciations were composed, senators and congressmen pressed into action, media people mobilized. Freeman’s integrity was called into question, shady connections with Arab and Chinese financial interests “disclosed” by the docile press. Admiral Blair came to his appointee’s defence, but in vain. Freeman had no choice but to withdraw.
The full meaning of this episode should not escape anyone.
It was the first test of strength of the lobby in the new Obama era. And in this test, the lobby came out with flying (blue-and-white) colours. The administration was publicly humiliated.
The White House did not even try to hide its abject surrender. It declared that the appointment had not been cleared with the president, that Obama had no hand in it and did not even know about it. Meaning: of course he would have objected to the appointment of any official who was not fully acceptable to the lobby. The portrayal of the power of the lobby by Professors John Mearsheimer and Stephen Walt, has been fully vindicated.
This has a significance which goes far beyond the already far-reaching implications of the affair itself.
Many people in Israel, who view the establishment of the new rightist government with apprehension, cite as their main fear the danger of a clash with the new Obama administration. Such a clash, they believe, could be fatal for Israel’s security. But the rightists deride such arguments. They assert that no American president would ever dare to confront the Israeli lobby. The captive congressmen and senators, as well as the supporters of the Israeli government in the media and even in the White House itself, would sink on sight any American policy opposed by even the most extreme right-wing government in Israel.
Now the first skirmish has taken place, and the president of the United States has blinked first. Perhaps one should not rush to conclusions, perhaps Obama needs more time to find his bearings, but the signs are ominous for any Israeli interested in peace.
It may be too early to call this episode the rape of Washington, but it is certainly vastly more important than Katsav’s sexual escapades.
By the way, or not by the way, a word about my trip to London.
I went there to lend support to a group of Jewish personalities, well-known in academic and other circles, who have set up an organization called “Independent Jewish Voices”.
Recently ,they published a book called “A Time to speak out”, in which several of them contributed to the debate about Israel, human rights and Jewish ethics. The views expressed are very close to those current in the Israeli peace camp. But when they offered their book for presentation in the Jewish Book Week, they were rudely rejected. In protest, they convened an event of their own, and that’s where I spoke.
I believe that it is of utmost importance that such Jewish voices be heard. In several countries, including the US, groups of brave Jews are trying to stand up to the Jewish establishment that unconditionally supports the Israeli right. In the US, several such groups have sprung up, some quite recently. One of them, called “J Street”, is trying to compete with the formidable and notorious AIPAC...
Uri Avnery is an Israeli journalist, writer and peace activist.
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In accordance with Title 17 U.S.C. Section 107, this material is distributed without profit to those who have expressed a prior interest in receiving the included information for research and educational purposes. Information Clearing House has no affiliation whatsoever with the originator of this article nor is Information ClearingHouse endorsed or sponsored by the originator.)
http://informationclearinghouse.info/article22216.htm
Wort des Tages
Dass der Westen die Welt zwei Jahrhunderte dominiert hat, war eine Anomalie der Geschichte
Kishore Mahbubani
Kishore Mahbubani
Friday, March 13, 2009
Wort des Tages
Bis jetzt war die ganze Geschichte der Menschheit nur ein beständiges und blutiges Opfern von Millionen armer menschlicher Wesen für irgendeine unerbittliche Abstraktion: Götter, Vaterland, Staatsmacht, nationale Ehre, geschichtliche Rechte, juridische Rechte, politische Freiheit, öffentliches Wohl.
Michail A. Bakunin
Thursday, March 12, 2009
The lobby: oder wer das sagen hat im Land der Unbegrenzten Möglichkeiten
Freeman Withdrawal Marks Victory for Israel Lobby
By Daniel Luban and Jim Lobe*
WASHINGTON, Mar 10 (IPS) - Amb. Chas Freeman withdrew from consideration for a top intelligence post in the Obama administration on Tuesday, following a vitriolic battle that pitted Republican lawmakers and pro-Israel hardliners opposed to his appointment against liberals and members of the intelligence and diplomatic communities who had come to his defence.
Freeman’s withdrawal came as a surprise to many in Washington, particularly since it came only hours after Adm. Dennis Blair, the administration’s director of national intelligence (DNI) who made the appointment, issued a strong defence of Freeman during his testimony before the U.S. Senate.
His withdrawal is likely to be viewed as a significant victory for hardliners within the so-called "Israel lobby," who led the movement to scuttle his appointment, and a blow to hopes for a new approach to Israel-Palestine issues under the Obama administration.
A brief notice posted late Tuesday on the DNI website stated that "Director of National Intelligence Dennis C. Blair announced today that Ambassador Charles W. Freeman Jr. has requested that his selection to be Chairman of the National Intelligence Council not proceed. Director Blair accepted Ambassador Freeman’s decision with regret."
The DNI did not provide any further reason for Freeman's withdrawal.
Senator Chuck Schumer, a critic of Freeman who privately conveyed his concerns to White House Chief of Staff Rahm Emanuel last week, released a statement taking credit for the withdrawal, according to Greg Sargent of the Plum Line blog.
"Charles Freeman was the wrong guy for this position," Schumer's statement read. "His statements against Israel were way over the top and severely out of step with the administration. I repeatedly urged the White House to reject him, and I am glad they did the right thing."
The battle over Freeman began in late February, soon after Blair appointed him as chairman of the National Intelligence Council (NIC). The NIC, among other responsibilities, is tasked with producing National Intelligence Estimates (NIEs), which are consensus judgments of all 16 intelligence agencies.
Freeman was reportedly Blair’s hand-picked choice for the job. He is a polyglot with unusually wide-ranging foreign-policy experience - his previous jobs have included chief translator during President Richard Nixon’s historic 1972 trip to China, ambassador to Saudi Arabia, and assistant secretary of defence for international security affairs.
But Freeman is also known for his outspoken and often caustic political views. He has been especially critical of the Bush administration’s conduct of the "war on terror" and of Israeli policies in the occupied territories.
Initial resistance to the appointment came from neoconservatives and other pro-Israel hardliners who were opposed to Freeman’s critical views of Israeli policies. The campaign against Freeman was spearheaded by Steve Rosen, a former official for the powerful American Israel Public Affairs Committee (AIPAC) who is currently facing trial for allegedly passing classified information to the Israeli government.
It was quickly taken up by neoconservative commentators in the Wall Street Journal, the Weekly Standard, and the New Republic, among other places.
However, Freeman’s critics soon shifted their focus from his views on Israel to his ties with Saudi Arabia. The Saudi royal family has provided funding to the Middle East Policy Council, a think tank that Freeman headed, leading to allegations that he was "on the Saudi payroll" or even a "Saudi puppet."
Last week, 11 congressional representatives - including several with major financial ties to AIPAC and other right-wing pro-Israel groups - called on the DNI’s inspector-general to investigate Freeman’s financial ties to Saudi Arabia.
Later in the week, Blair sent the representatives a letter offering his "full support" for Freeman and praising the appointee’s "exceptional talent and experience." The letter also discussed Freeman’s financial ties to Saudi Arabia, stressing that "he has never lobbied for any government or business (domestic or foreign)" and that he "has never received any income directly from Saudi Arabia or any Saudi-controlled entity."
Blair’s letter appeared to have defused the case against Freeman based on his Saudi ties.
On Monday, the seven Republican members of the Senate Intelligence Committee sent their letter of concern to Blair, but they made no mention of the Saudi charges that formed the backbone of their House colleagues’ letter from the previous week. Instead, the senators focused on Freeman’s alleged intelligence inexperience and his "highly controversial statements about China and Israel."
It was the China issue that had become the central attack against Freeman in recent days. Critics pointed to a leaked email that he sent to a private listserv about the Chinese government’s 1989 repression of demonstrators in Tiananmen Square, in which he appeared to argue that the Chinese authorities’ true mistake was not the violent repression but their "failure to intervene on a timely basis to nip the demonstrations in the bud."
Blair and others countered that the email was taken out of context, and that Freeman was not describing his own views but what he referred to as "the dominant view in China."
One member of the listserv who did not wish to be identified said that Freeman’s email came in the context of an extended conversation about what lessons the Chinese leadership took from the Tiananmen Square events, and that Freeman himself has always regarded the events as a "tragedy."
Regardless, the leaked email became the focal point of the debate over Freeman. On Thursday, 87 Chinese dissidents and human rights activists released a letter conveying their "intense dismay" at his appointment and asking President Obama to withdraw it.
But others stepped in to defend Freeman’s record on human rights in China. China scholar Sidney Rittenberg told James Fallows of the Atlantic that Freeman was "a stalwart supporter of human rights who helped many individuals in need" during his diplomatic career in Beijing. Jerome Cohen, an expert in Chinese law, told Fallows that the allegations that Freeman endorsed the Tiananmen Square repression were "ludicrous."
Fallows was one of several prominent media figures - including Joe Klein of Time and Andrew Sullivan of the Atlantic - who came to Freeman’s defence in recent days. While many of them disagree with Freeman’s outspoken views, they warned against what Fallows calls the "self-lobotomisation" of U.S. foreign policy that results from shutting out dissenting voices.
Diplomatic and intelligence professionals in the foreign policy bureaucracy - in which Freeman was seen as enjoying strong support - also rallied to his defence.
Last week, 17 former U.S. ambassadors – including former ambassador to the U.N. Thomas Pickering and former ambassador to Israel Samuel Lewis – wrote a letter to the Wall Street Journal praising Freeman as "a man of integrity and high intelligence who would never let his personal views shade or distort intelligence estimates."
On Tuesday, seven former senior intelligence officials wrote to Blair in support of Freeman. They called the attacks on him "unprecedented in their vehemence, scope, and target" and perpetrated by "pundits and public figures... [who are] aghast at the appointment of a senior intelligence official able to take a more balanced view of the Arab-Israel issue".
These endorsements by figures with solidly establishmentarian credentials appeared to have strengthened Freeman’s position. This made Tuesday’s announcement especially unexpected, since many felt that Freeman had succeeded in riding out the storm.
Despite the Saudi and Chinese angles of the Freeman controversy, many still saw it as heart a neoconservative campaign to shut out critics of Israel from positions of power.
"The whole anti-Freeman effort was engineered by the people who fear that Obama will abandon current policies toward Israel from acceptance of the occupation to forceful opposition to it," M.J. Rosenberg of the Israel Policy Forum wrote on the Huffington Post.
The timing of Freeman’s withdrawal is likely to prove especially bad for the Obama administration, since it came after Blair had committed a significant amount of political capital to defending his appointee.
In his testimony before the Senate on Tuesday, Blair responded to concerns raised by Lieberman by praising Freeman’s "inventive mind" and argued that his critics "misunderstand the role of the development of analysis that produces policy."
"I can do a better job if I’m getting strong analytical viewpoints to sort out and pass on to you and the president than if I’m getting precooked pablum judgments that don’t really challenge," Blair told Lieberman.
Lieberman seemed unsatisfied with Blair’s answer. "OK, I guess I would say, ‘to be continued’," he replied.
As it turned out, Lieberman did not have to wait long to get the response he wanted.
*Jim Lobe's blog on U.S. foreign policy can be read at http://www.ips.org/blog/jimlobe/.
Wednesday, March 11, 2009
Rezession und kein Ende......
Ein Paar Titeln der Letzten Tagen
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Worst collapse in UK manufacturing in four decades
The “horrendous” scale of Britain’s industrial recession has been laid bare by figures showing that manufacturing output is declining at the fastest rate since records began more than 40 years ago.
By Edmund Conway
Last Updated: 7:45PM GMT 10 Mar 2009
In figures labelled by analysts as “shocking” and “a horror show”, Britain’s industrial production dived at record speed, underlining how hard the global downturn has hit producers and exporters. The statistics are doubly surprising because many economists had expected the weakness of the pound over the past year to have boosted their fortunes. ................................
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/finance/economics/4966992/Worst-collapse-in-UK-manufacturing-in-four-decades.html
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US Recession Could Last Up to 36 Months: Roubini
By Jane Wells
March 10, 2009 "CNBC" - -The man who predicted the current financial crisis said the US recession could drag on for years without drastic action.
Among his solutions: fix the housing market by breaking "every mortgage contract."
"We are in the 15th month of a recession," said Nouriel Roubini, a professor at New York University's Stern School of Business, told CNBC in a live interview. "Growth is going to be close to zero and unemployment rate well above 10 percent into next year.".................................
http://informationclearinghouse.info/article22187.htm
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1 in 50 Children in US is Homeless
Ranks of homeless kids climb
By Cynthia Hubert
March 10, 2009 "Sacbee.com" -- In and out of classrooms, sleeping in shelters, shielded by parents, homeless children can seem invisible to society at large.
A national study released Monday finds that one in 50 children in America is homeless. They're sharing housing because of economic hardship, living in motels, cars, abandoned buildings, parks, camping grounds or shelters, or waiting for foster care placement.
"That is something that I don't think most people intuitively believe to be true," said Ellen Bassuk, an associate professor of psychiatry at Harvard Medical School and president of the National Center on Family Homelessness.......................................
http://informationclearinghouse.info/article22186.htm
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Worst collapse in UK manufacturing in four decades
The “horrendous” scale of Britain’s industrial recession has been laid bare by figures showing that manufacturing output is declining at the fastest rate since records began more than 40 years ago.
By Edmund Conway
Last Updated: 7:45PM GMT 10 Mar 2009
In figures labelled by analysts as “shocking” and “a horror show”, Britain’s industrial production dived at record speed, underlining how hard the global downturn has hit producers and exporters. The statistics are doubly surprising because many economists had expected the weakness of the pound over the past year to have boosted their fortunes. ................................
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/finance/economics/4966992/Worst-collapse-in-UK-manufacturing-in-four-decades.html
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US Recession Could Last Up to 36 Months: Roubini
By Jane Wells
March 10, 2009 "CNBC" - -The man who predicted the current financial crisis said the US recession could drag on for years without drastic action.
Among his solutions: fix the housing market by breaking "every mortgage contract."
"We are in the 15th month of a recession," said Nouriel Roubini, a professor at New York University's Stern School of Business, told CNBC in a live interview. "Growth is going to be close to zero and unemployment rate well above 10 percent into next year.".................................
http://informationclearinghouse.info/article22187.htm
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1 in 50 Children in US is Homeless
Ranks of homeless kids climb
By Cynthia Hubert
March 10, 2009 "Sacbee.com" -- In and out of classrooms, sleeping in shelters, shielded by parents, homeless children can seem invisible to society at large.
A national study released Monday finds that one in 50 children in America is homeless. They're sharing housing because of economic hardship, living in motels, cars, abandoned buildings, parks, camping grounds or shelters, or waiting for foster care placement.
"That is something that I don't think most people intuitively believe to be true," said Ellen Bassuk, an associate professor of psychiatry at Harvard Medical School and president of the National Center on Family Homelessness.......................................
http://informationclearinghouse.info/article22186.htm
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Tuesday, March 10, 2009
Fünf vor Zwölf - Die Uhr tickt
Noch vor ein Paar Monaten negierten viele Politiker und Experten die Realitäten einer Krise deren Vorboten schon länger sichtbar waren. Warner wurden als Schwarzmaler, als ewige Pessimisten abgetan und zum schweigen verdammt. Die fundamentale Daten zur Wirtschaft wurden immer wieder als gut bis bestens hervorgehoben, obwohl alles auf Luft aufgebaut war. Mit dem Einschiessen von Liquiditäten wurde immer wieder probiert die stotternden Wirtschaft am laufen zu halten.
Inzwischen hat sich einiges geändert. Panik macht sich breit, und seit September 2008 herrscht einen hektischen Aktivismus. In den USA wird seit dem Spätherbst 2008 auch von „Rezession“ gesprochen.
Aber noch immer werden Stärke und Tiefe der Krise heruntergeredet, es wird von Bankenkrise, von Finanzkrise, von Wirtschaftskrise geredet. Politiker und Mächtigen aus der Wirtschaft schliessen noch immer die Augen vor dem wahren Ausmass der Krise die auf die Welt zurollt.
Wie viel Zeit der Welt noch bleibt um einen totalen Kollaps zu verhindern kann niemanden genau sagen.
EGR 2009/03/10
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GEAB N°32 ist angekommen! 4. Quartal 2009 – Beginn der fünften Phase der umfassenden weltweiten Krise: Die öffentliche Ordnung zerfällt
- Pressemitteilung des GEAB vom 18. Februar 2009 -
Seit Februar 2006 vertrat LEAP/E2020 die Auffassung, dass die umfassende weltweite Krise in vier Grundphasen ablaufen würde, nämlich die Anfangsphase, die Beschleunigungsphase, die Aufprallphase und die Dekantierungsphase. Die Ereignisse der letzten zwei Jahre fügten sich hervorragend in dieses Schema. Jedoch müssen wir uns endlich in die Einsicht finden, dass die Regierenden unfähig sind, die wahre Natur der Krise zu verstehen. Denn seit nunmehr mehr als einem Jahr bekämpft die Politik mit ihren Maßnahmen nur die Symptome der Krise, nicht aber die Ursachen Deshalb gehen wir heute davon aus, dass mit dem vierten Quartal 2009 eine fünfte Phase der Krise einsetzen wird, in der die öffentlichen Ordnung zerfallen wird.
Nach der Auffassung von LEAP/E2020 werden zwei bedeutende Phänomene diese neue Phase der Krise prägen; die kommenden Ereignisse werden damit in zwei parallelen Entwicklungen ablaufen:
A. Die zwei bedeutenden Phänomene:
1. Das Wegbrechen der globalen Finanzbasis (Dollar + Schulden)
2. Die sich beschleunigende Divergenz der Interessen der großen Staaten und der internationalen Organisationen
B. Die zwei parallelen Entwicklungen:
1. Die rasche Auflösung des gesamten gegenwärtigen internationalen Systems
2. Die Auflösung der Handlungsfähigkeit der mächtigen Staaten und großen internationalen Organisationen
Wir hatten gehofft, dass die Dekantierungsphase den Regierenden dieser Welt ermöglichen würde, die Schlussfolgerungen aus dem Zusammenbruch der Nachkriegsweltordnung zu ziehen. Man kann heute mit größtem Bedauern nur feststellen, dass solcher Optimismus nicht mehr zu rechtfertigen ist (1). In den USA wie auch in Europa, in China oder in Japan handeln die Regierenden, als ob die Weltordnung nur von einer vorüber gehenden Krise erfasst wäre und es genügen würde, noch etwas Treibstoff (Liquidität, also weitere Schulden) und weitere Tinkturen (Leitzinssenkungen, staatlicher Aufkauf von wertlosen Forderungen, Konjunkturförderprogramme zu Gunsten insolventer Industriezweige …) in das System zu gießen, um den Motor wieder zum Anspringen zu bringen. Sie wollen einfach nicht verstehen, dass, wie der Begriff der umfassenden weltweiten Krise, den LEAP/E2020 im Februar 2006 prägte, zu vermittelt versucht, die Weltordnung nicht mehr funktionsfähig ist. Statt verzweifelt zu versuchen, diese am Boden liegende, unrettbare Weltordnung zu retten, muss endlich die Schaffung einer neuen Weltordnung angegangen werden.
Geschichte wartet nicht, bis die Menschen für sie bereit sind. Da die Schaffung der neuen Weltordnung nicht vorausschauend und planend möglich war, wird der Zerfall der öffentlichen Ordnung während dieser fünften Phase der Krise die Welt in ein solches Chaos stürzen, dass die neue Weltordnung als Zufallsprodukt und Improvisation entstehen wird. Die beiden parallelen Entwicklungen, die wir in dieser 32. Ausgabe des GEAB beschreiben, werden für einige der großen Staaten und internationalen Organisationen tragisch sein.
Nach unserer Auffassung verbleibt nur ein sehr kleines Zeitfenster, während dem das Schlimmste noch vermieden werden kann, nämlich bis zum Sommer 2009. Dann wird die Zahlungsunfähigkeit erst Großbritanniens und dann der Vereinigten Staaten die Grundlagen des bestehenden Systems zusammen stürzen lassen (2) und Chaos ausbrechen. Wir gehen sehr konkret davon aus, dass der geplante G20-Gipfel April 2009 die letzte Chance für die bestehende Weltordnung ist, die aktuell wirkenden Kräfte so auszurichten, dass der Übergang in die neue Weltordnung sich mit dem geringst möglichen Schaden vollzieht. Wenn ihnen das nicht gelingt, wird den Mächtigen der aktuellen Weltordnung die Kontrolle über die Ereignisse vollständig entgleiten (3), und zwar nicht nur auf globaler Ebene, sondern für einige von ihnen auch in ihren eigenen Ländern; die Welt wird in die Phase, in der die öffentliche Ordnung zusammen bricht, gleiten wie ein Schiff, dessen Ruder gebrochen ist. Am Ausgang dieser Phase des Zusammenbruchs der öffentlichen Ordnung wird die Welt mehr dem Europa von 1913 ähneln als der Welt, an deren reale Existenz die meisten noch bis 2007 glaubten.
Die meisten der von der Krise betroffenen Staaten, unter ihnen die mächtigsten dieser Erde, versuchten verzweifelt, das immer weiter anwachsende Gewicht der Krise zu schultern; sie verstanden nicht, dass sie damit die Gefahr herauf beschworen, unter dieser Last zusammen zu brechen. Sie vergaßen, dass Staaten, von Menschen geschaffen, nur solange Bestand haben, wie sich eine Mehrheit dieser Menschen mit ihnen identifiziert. In dieser 32. Ausgabe des GEAB wird LEAP/E2020 seine Analysen über die Auswirkungen dieser Phase des Zusammenbruchs der öffentlichen Ordnung auf die USA und die EU vorlegen.
Es wird für alle, Privatpersonen wie Wirtschaftsführer, dringlich, sich auf eine sehr schwierige Zeit vorzubereiten, in der ganze Bereiche unserer Gesellschaft wegbrechen werden und zumindest zeitweise oder sogar dauerhaft aufhören werden, Bestandteile der Gesellschaft zu bilden (4). So wird z.B. der Zerfall des Weltwährungssystems im Sommer 2009 nicht nur den Dollar (und aller Geldanlagen in Dollar) zusammen brechen lassen, sondern das Vertrauen in alle Papierwährungen (also ohne Gold- oder Silberdeckung) massiv unterminieren. Alle Empfehlungen in dieser Ausgabe des GEAB sollen auf diese Situation vorbereiten.
Weiterhin gehen wir davon aus, dass die Staaten (5), die besonders monolithisch, besonders mächtig, besonders zentralistisch sind, diejenigen sein werden, die von der fünften Phase der umfassenden weltweiten Krise besonders massiv betroffen sein werden. Weitere Staaten, die unter dem Schutz dieser Staaten stehen, werden ihre Schutzmächte verlieren und damit dem Chaos in ihren Regionen ausgeliefert sein.
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Noten:
(1) Barack Obama wie auch Nicolas Sarkozy oder Gordon Brown werden nicht müde, von der historischen Dimension der Krise zu schwadronieren, und versuchen hinter diesen Worten nur ihre Unfähigkeit zu verstecken, die wahre Natur der Krise zu verstehen ; worum es ihnen geht, ist, sich schon jetzt für schuldlos am Scheitern ihrer Politik zu erklären. Alle anderen ziehen es vor, sich einzureden, dass es sich bei der Krise nur um ein übliches Konjunkturproblem handele, wobei ein Zyklus einen etwas größeren Ausschlag verzeichne als üblicher Weise. Und all diese „Weltführer“ spielen weiterhin an ihrem Spiel nach den Spielregeln, die seit Jahrzehnten gelten und wollen nicht verstehen, dass dieses Spiel vor ihren Augen untergeht.
(2) Vgl. die vorher gehenden Ausgaben des GEAB
(3) Es ist sogar wahrscheinlich, dass schon die Abhaltung des G20-Treffens auf Schwierigkeiten stoßen wird, weil immer mehr Staaten ihr Heil in einer Politik suchen, die ausschließlich auf ihre eigenen Interessen zugeschnitten ist und damit kein Interesse an einem konzertierten Vorgehen auf multilateraler Ebene haben.
(4) Quelle: New York Times, 14/02/2009
(5) Dies ist genauso wahr für die großen multinationalen Unternehmen
Mittwoch 18 Februar 2009
Mercredi 18 Février 2009
http://www.leap2020.eu/GEAB-N-32-ist-angekommen!-4-Quartal-2009-Beginn-der-f%C3%BCnften-Phase-der-umfassenden-weltweiten-Krise-Die-offentliche_a2818.html
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Inzwischen hat sich einiges geändert. Panik macht sich breit, und seit September 2008 herrscht einen hektischen Aktivismus. In den USA wird seit dem Spätherbst 2008 auch von „Rezession“ gesprochen.
Aber noch immer werden Stärke und Tiefe der Krise heruntergeredet, es wird von Bankenkrise, von Finanzkrise, von Wirtschaftskrise geredet. Politiker und Mächtigen aus der Wirtschaft schliessen noch immer die Augen vor dem wahren Ausmass der Krise die auf die Welt zurollt.
Wie viel Zeit der Welt noch bleibt um einen totalen Kollaps zu verhindern kann niemanden genau sagen.
EGR 2009/03/10
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GEAB N°32 ist angekommen! 4. Quartal 2009 – Beginn der fünften Phase der umfassenden weltweiten Krise: Die öffentliche Ordnung zerfällt
- Pressemitteilung des GEAB vom 18. Februar 2009 -
Seit Februar 2006 vertrat LEAP/E2020 die Auffassung, dass die umfassende weltweite Krise in vier Grundphasen ablaufen würde, nämlich die Anfangsphase, die Beschleunigungsphase, die Aufprallphase und die Dekantierungsphase. Die Ereignisse der letzten zwei Jahre fügten sich hervorragend in dieses Schema. Jedoch müssen wir uns endlich in die Einsicht finden, dass die Regierenden unfähig sind, die wahre Natur der Krise zu verstehen. Denn seit nunmehr mehr als einem Jahr bekämpft die Politik mit ihren Maßnahmen nur die Symptome der Krise, nicht aber die Ursachen Deshalb gehen wir heute davon aus, dass mit dem vierten Quartal 2009 eine fünfte Phase der Krise einsetzen wird, in der die öffentlichen Ordnung zerfallen wird.
Nach der Auffassung von LEAP/E2020 werden zwei bedeutende Phänomene diese neue Phase der Krise prägen; die kommenden Ereignisse werden damit in zwei parallelen Entwicklungen ablaufen:
A. Die zwei bedeutenden Phänomene:
1. Das Wegbrechen der globalen Finanzbasis (Dollar + Schulden)
2. Die sich beschleunigende Divergenz der Interessen der großen Staaten und der internationalen Organisationen
B. Die zwei parallelen Entwicklungen:
1. Die rasche Auflösung des gesamten gegenwärtigen internationalen Systems
2. Die Auflösung der Handlungsfähigkeit der mächtigen Staaten und großen internationalen Organisationen
Wir hatten gehofft, dass die Dekantierungsphase den Regierenden dieser Welt ermöglichen würde, die Schlussfolgerungen aus dem Zusammenbruch der Nachkriegsweltordnung zu ziehen. Man kann heute mit größtem Bedauern nur feststellen, dass solcher Optimismus nicht mehr zu rechtfertigen ist (1). In den USA wie auch in Europa, in China oder in Japan handeln die Regierenden, als ob die Weltordnung nur von einer vorüber gehenden Krise erfasst wäre und es genügen würde, noch etwas Treibstoff (Liquidität, also weitere Schulden) und weitere Tinkturen (Leitzinssenkungen, staatlicher Aufkauf von wertlosen Forderungen, Konjunkturförderprogramme zu Gunsten insolventer Industriezweige …) in das System zu gießen, um den Motor wieder zum Anspringen zu bringen. Sie wollen einfach nicht verstehen, dass, wie der Begriff der umfassenden weltweiten Krise, den LEAP/E2020 im Februar 2006 prägte, zu vermittelt versucht, die Weltordnung nicht mehr funktionsfähig ist. Statt verzweifelt zu versuchen, diese am Boden liegende, unrettbare Weltordnung zu retten, muss endlich die Schaffung einer neuen Weltordnung angegangen werden.
Geschichte wartet nicht, bis die Menschen für sie bereit sind. Da die Schaffung der neuen Weltordnung nicht vorausschauend und planend möglich war, wird der Zerfall der öffentlichen Ordnung während dieser fünften Phase der Krise die Welt in ein solches Chaos stürzen, dass die neue Weltordnung als Zufallsprodukt und Improvisation entstehen wird. Die beiden parallelen Entwicklungen, die wir in dieser 32. Ausgabe des GEAB beschreiben, werden für einige der großen Staaten und internationalen Organisationen tragisch sein.
Nach unserer Auffassung verbleibt nur ein sehr kleines Zeitfenster, während dem das Schlimmste noch vermieden werden kann, nämlich bis zum Sommer 2009. Dann wird die Zahlungsunfähigkeit erst Großbritanniens und dann der Vereinigten Staaten die Grundlagen des bestehenden Systems zusammen stürzen lassen (2) und Chaos ausbrechen. Wir gehen sehr konkret davon aus, dass der geplante G20-Gipfel April 2009 die letzte Chance für die bestehende Weltordnung ist, die aktuell wirkenden Kräfte so auszurichten, dass der Übergang in die neue Weltordnung sich mit dem geringst möglichen Schaden vollzieht. Wenn ihnen das nicht gelingt, wird den Mächtigen der aktuellen Weltordnung die Kontrolle über die Ereignisse vollständig entgleiten (3), und zwar nicht nur auf globaler Ebene, sondern für einige von ihnen auch in ihren eigenen Ländern; die Welt wird in die Phase, in der die öffentliche Ordnung zusammen bricht, gleiten wie ein Schiff, dessen Ruder gebrochen ist. Am Ausgang dieser Phase des Zusammenbruchs der öffentlichen Ordnung wird die Welt mehr dem Europa von 1913 ähneln als der Welt, an deren reale Existenz die meisten noch bis 2007 glaubten.
Die meisten der von der Krise betroffenen Staaten, unter ihnen die mächtigsten dieser Erde, versuchten verzweifelt, das immer weiter anwachsende Gewicht der Krise zu schultern; sie verstanden nicht, dass sie damit die Gefahr herauf beschworen, unter dieser Last zusammen zu brechen. Sie vergaßen, dass Staaten, von Menschen geschaffen, nur solange Bestand haben, wie sich eine Mehrheit dieser Menschen mit ihnen identifiziert. In dieser 32. Ausgabe des GEAB wird LEAP/E2020 seine Analysen über die Auswirkungen dieser Phase des Zusammenbruchs der öffentlichen Ordnung auf die USA und die EU vorlegen.
Es wird für alle, Privatpersonen wie Wirtschaftsführer, dringlich, sich auf eine sehr schwierige Zeit vorzubereiten, in der ganze Bereiche unserer Gesellschaft wegbrechen werden und zumindest zeitweise oder sogar dauerhaft aufhören werden, Bestandteile der Gesellschaft zu bilden (4). So wird z.B. der Zerfall des Weltwährungssystems im Sommer 2009 nicht nur den Dollar (und aller Geldanlagen in Dollar) zusammen brechen lassen, sondern das Vertrauen in alle Papierwährungen (also ohne Gold- oder Silberdeckung) massiv unterminieren. Alle Empfehlungen in dieser Ausgabe des GEAB sollen auf diese Situation vorbereiten.
Weiterhin gehen wir davon aus, dass die Staaten (5), die besonders monolithisch, besonders mächtig, besonders zentralistisch sind, diejenigen sein werden, die von der fünften Phase der umfassenden weltweiten Krise besonders massiv betroffen sein werden. Weitere Staaten, die unter dem Schutz dieser Staaten stehen, werden ihre Schutzmächte verlieren und damit dem Chaos in ihren Regionen ausgeliefert sein.
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Noten:
(1) Barack Obama wie auch Nicolas Sarkozy oder Gordon Brown werden nicht müde, von der historischen Dimension der Krise zu schwadronieren, und versuchen hinter diesen Worten nur ihre Unfähigkeit zu verstecken, die wahre Natur der Krise zu verstehen ; worum es ihnen geht, ist, sich schon jetzt für schuldlos am Scheitern ihrer Politik zu erklären. Alle anderen ziehen es vor, sich einzureden, dass es sich bei der Krise nur um ein übliches Konjunkturproblem handele, wobei ein Zyklus einen etwas größeren Ausschlag verzeichne als üblicher Weise. Und all diese „Weltführer“ spielen weiterhin an ihrem Spiel nach den Spielregeln, die seit Jahrzehnten gelten und wollen nicht verstehen, dass dieses Spiel vor ihren Augen untergeht.
(2) Vgl. die vorher gehenden Ausgaben des GEAB
(3) Es ist sogar wahrscheinlich, dass schon die Abhaltung des G20-Treffens auf Schwierigkeiten stoßen wird, weil immer mehr Staaten ihr Heil in einer Politik suchen, die ausschließlich auf ihre eigenen Interessen zugeschnitten ist und damit kein Interesse an einem konzertierten Vorgehen auf multilateraler Ebene haben.
(4) Quelle: New York Times, 14/02/2009
(5) Dies ist genauso wahr für die großen multinationalen Unternehmen
Mittwoch 18 Februar 2009
Mercredi 18 Février 2009
http://www.leap2020.eu/GEAB-N-32-ist-angekommen!-4-Quartal-2009-Beginn-der-f%C3%BCnften-Phase-der-umfassenden-weltweiten-Krise-Die-offentliche_a2818.html
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