We have met the enemy and he is us.

If you think the recent stimulus bill passed by the US Congress in a large amount of money, the size of this latest slush fund for politically connected people and corporations still does not equal the amount of money the military industrial complex takes consumes every year. According to calculations by the National Priorities Project, a non-profit research organization that examines the local impact of federal spending policies, military spending today consumes 40% of every tax dollar.

President Dwight D. Eisenhower identified this phenomenon, in the draft version of his 1961 farewell address, as the “military-industrial-congressional complex.” 46 years later, in a way even Eisenhower probably couldn’t have imagined, the defense budget is beyond any serious congressional oversight or control.

It is virtually impossible for a member of Congress or an ordinary citizen to obtain even a modest handle on the actual size of military spending or its impact on the structure and functioning of our economic system. Some $30 billion of the official Defense Department (DoD) appropriation in the current fiscal year is “black,” meaning that it is allegedly going for highly classified projects. Even the open DoD budget receives only perfunctory scrutiny because members of Congress, seeking lucrative defense contracts for their districts, have mutually beneficial relationships with defense contractors and the Pentagon. The DoD always tries to minimize the size of its budget by representing it as a declining percentage of the gross national product. What it never reveals is that total military spending is actually many times larger than the official appropriation for the Defense Department.

For fiscal year 2006, Robert Higgs of the Independent Institute calculated national security outlays at almost a trillion dollars - $934.9 billion to be exact - broken down as follows (in billions of dollars):
Department of Defense: $499.4
Department of Energy (atomic weapons): $16.6
Department of State (foreign military aid): $25.3
Department of Veterans Affairs (treatment of wounded soldiers): $69.8
Department of Homeland Security (actual defense): $69.1
Department of Justice (1/3rd for the FBI): $1.9
Department of the Treasury (military retirements): $38.5
NASA (satellite launches): $7.6
Interest on war debts, 1916-present: $206.7

Totaled, the sum is larger than the combined sum spent by all other nations on military security.

At the height of the financial crisis in October 2008, when Congress was debating the 700 billion dollar bailout package for the banks that acted irresponsibly and were asking for a government bailout, the Congress without much public outcry or press coverage, passed a defense spending bill totaling over 614 billion dollars.

Average Americans should become more aware the danger the military industrial complex creates for their own social well being. While researching this blog entry, I discovered a paper The FY 2009 Defense Budget Request: The Growing Gap in Defense Spending published on the conservative and pro military Washington DC think tank, The Heritage Foundation, which calls for even more defense spending. In a chilling statement by the author of this paper, Baker Spring, writes that a number of external and internal pressures on the defense budget will threaten the national security of the Unites States. Mr. Baker believes or is paid to write that, the external pressures are posed by the rapid projected growth in spending for Social Security, Medicare, and Medicaid. If these entitlement programs are not reformed soon, they will crowd out needed defense funding even though defense expenditures as a percentage of GDP are already near a post-World War II low.

Another words, this stooge for the defense industry and the Military Industrial Complex is saying that social programs that help everyday Americans are going threaten the amount of money the Pentagon can waste. This should be a wake up call for average Americans as to the danger of the military industrial complex.

I hope more people begin to see the need to downsize the military and reign in the amount of money being wasted on war and military purchases.

If you want to read the paper by Baker Spring, (what the hell kind of name is that?) I attached a link for it here.

America needs to create a goal for itself

America has achieved the goals of being the most powerful economy, military power, and world leader, in the world. Being at the top for so long with no viable challenger like in the cold war era and the Soviet Union, it appears that America lost some of its competitive spirit.

Just as President Kennedy created the goal for America to reach the moon by the end of the decade in the 1960s, President Obama and his administration also need to set a goal for the American people. Given the competitive and patriotic spirit of the American people, I know the American public will rise to the challenge and pull themselves up as President Obama asked them to do in his inauguration speech.

Instead of the cosmic goal of reaching another foreign body in space, the goal Americans should reach for the in the 21st century is more terrestrial. This new national goal should be to create and build a new transportation infrastructure for the 21st century and beyond which all Americans could benefit from. Based on a mass rail network, this new transportation infrastructure could begin with regional rail systems that would later be linked up to a larger national rail system. This new national goal would allow the United States government to address the long term strategic goal of energy independence with the new transportation infrastructure be fueled with nuclear energy. In addition to the long-term strategic goals of energy independence met, the US government could also provide the social and economic benefits a new mass rail network would offer the American people.

Using the pre-existing interstate system as a backbone, the United States over the next twenty years, should start to build a new mass transit system based on high-speed trains for long distance travel, and light and medium rail networks for American cities and towns. These new mass transit regional rail systems would help stimulate the economy, alleviate traffic from the existing transportation infrastructure, and create new industries in the American economy.

The Rust Belt of America could be reborn with the steel mills producing the material for the train tracks, wheels for the trains, and other related steel material needed in rail systems. The Sun Belt and South could provide the needed material for the inside of the trains such as the cloth seats from southern grown cotton growers, while the Sun Belt communities could provide the manufactured textiles for the inside of the trains and trams.

In addition to these new industries, high paying jobs for the white color and blue-collar work forces will be created from the investment into a new mass rail network. Some of the types of new jobs and careers for the next generation and future generations of Americans could pursue include, mechanical and industrial engineers designing the trains and trams, civil engineers and urban planners designing the rail stations, over passes, and tunnels for the mass rail network. In addition to the white and blue-collar jobs, the new rail based infrastructure would create millions of service-orientated positions. Some of the types of these positions include, people selling and assisting customers, people cleaning the trains, and other jobs in the thousands of new stores in all the stations around the country. From the high paying white and blue collar jobs to the service positions for the non college educated segment of American society, this new network of trains, trams, and the associated supporting infrastructure is a source of enormous sustained job growth and investment potential for new businesses.

The current economic stimulus package is only going to provide a band-aid on the problem, and American leaders need to explain to Americans the benefits and cost advantages of building and investing into a new mass rail network. Under the current economic stimulus plan, congressional leaders are still thinking in the 20th century car mentality. Congressional leaders need to take charge of the direction of America and embrace the high-speed rail networks and light tram systems that almost every highly developed economy has. If America needs a rival to get her motivated like the Soviet Union was during the race to the moon, than American political leaders should compare America to the rest of the world. China for example if investing heavily in long distance and high speed rail systems. This country and many others are building for the future with the future of a limited supply of fossil fuels in mind.

America needs to retain and rebuild her industrial base of manufacturing. Creating a new generation of high speed trains for inter state travel and a light tram systems for America’s ever growing cities and towns, is an excellent starting point to answer America’s current economic problem and a solution to its long term energy and infrastructure needs.

In a time like this, America needs leaders with bold ideas and the courage and fortitude to challenge the vested interests and obstructionists to change.

An enemy of democracy supported by America

In November 2008, the CIA issued an intelligence briefing for senior government officials as to how the world may look in 2025. These white paper estimates as they are known are just another bureaucratic tool for the CIA to publish, which tries to justify their estimated 40 billion dollar budget that is not known to the US public taxpayer as required by the US Constitution. In the declassified briefing that was leaked to the US press, the report predicted that the United States would not be the world’s superpower, the dollar would not be the dominant currency, and that there would be a mafia controlled state in Europe. While some Italians I have spoken to think the report is alluding to Hungry or Romania, I believe however that the report is referring Italy.

Controlling over 130 billion dollars a year and controlling around 7 percent of the entire gross domestic product in Italy, I believe that Italian government is already largely influenced by the mafia. As an Italian-American I am not proud of this fact and accept and feel sorry for the help my government gave the mafia in World War II that led to it becoming strong again. However, instead of the year being 2025, I think the time is now and has been since Silvio Berlusconi came to power in 1994 and then later in 2001, and then again in 2008.

According to the independent think tank, Transparency International, Italy currently ranks as the 42nd least corrupt country in the world. This low ranking is due to both the government corruption and the influence and power of the mafia in Italy. Ahead of Italy in the country rankings are some countries you would think would be behind the eighth largest economy in the world and a founding member of the European Union and one of America’s strongest allies. Some of the countries in the world which are less corrupt that Italy include the south American country, Uruguay (26), a former soviet union Baltic country, Estonia (28), and the authoritarian Persian Gulf countries Qatar (32), and the United Arab Emirates (36). Coming ahead of Italy are the eastern European and former communist countries, Hungry coming in at 40th and the Czech Republic as the 41st least corrupt country in the world.

As I have discussed earlier, there is a strong correlation between how corrupt a country is and how democratic that same country is. In addition to the corruption index, another world ranking Italy is not doing too well in is the press freedom ranking and how Italy compares to other countries in the world. Due to the conflict of interest of Silvio Berlusconi owning a large amount of the private media in Italy, and his position as Prime Minister, it is no surprise that Italy currently ranks 44th in the world for press freedom. Analogous to the negative impact of corruption on a democracy, a healthy democracy also depends on a free and vibrant press. A leading British academic expert on Italian history Paul Ginsborg and an American journalist Alexander Stille have fully documented and identified the current Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi, as an enemy of democracy due to his position as a media tycoon and a political party leader.

Silvio Berlusconi is a subtle and clever inventive figure in modern Italian politics. Starting his career as a builder of apartment houses in Milano in the 1960s, Silvio Berlusconi began to reap the benefits from a corrupt political system in a short amount of time. Playing by the rules in Italian society during the First Republic by bribing politicians to first benefit his early career in real estate and later in building his media empire, the source of Berlusconi’s seemingly unlimited capital in his early days has always been under speculation.
These political connections and questionable business contacts has enabled Silvio Berlusconi to be a great survivor in business and politics.

In his first run for political office in 1993, Silvio Berlusconi had to answer questions about his links to the mafia. In one of the few times he was questioned hard by the Italian press, Berlusconi said that his only dealing with the mafia was a result of his family being threatened by the mafia in the 1970s. While this may be true to a certain degree, his future criminal court cases would reveal a much more questionable relationship with the Sicilian Cosa Nostra mafia. From his close relationship with Marcello Dell’ Utri, to his business ventures in Sicily and Naples, it is hard to believe that Berlusconi has never taken or given money to the mafia for political gain.

If you believe Berlusconi’s story on his brief contact with the mafia in the 1970s to protect his family, you may be watching too much is his television broadcasts and the TV news he controls. Surely, a man now is so much power would want to punish those people and criminal organizations who threatened his family in the past.

For a man who controls vast sums of personal wealth, to the power of the entire state at his disposal, Silvio Berlusconi has a unique opportunity to attack the mafia and rid Italian society of this virus sucking the lifeblood out of the everyday Italian. The lack of action by his government to attack the mafia may be an indication who really may be in control of the state.

Instead of attacking the mafia, Berlusconi has decided to attack the independent judicial system and the Italian Constitution. Always a thorn in his side starting with the 1984 Constitutional Law outlawing his ownership of a near monopoly of television stations in Italy, the judicial system here in Italy is now the final frontier for Berlusconi to control. Similar to the way he carved up the state owned national airline and gave the profitable parts to his business friends, Berlusconi seems to have own personal interests in mind before the interest of Italy and the Italian people.

A politician campaigns in black and white but governs in grey

One of the leading factors behind America being considered the 20th least corrupt country in the world and the 18th most democratic in the world, is due to the influence lobbyists and other special interest groups have on elected officials in the American political process. These consulting firms and the lobbyists who earn hundreds of thousands of dollars a year corrupt and influence congressional leaders. In what will be a very clear indication to this political analyst if President Obama and his administration are going to live up to their campaign rhetoric of change is his stance and support of a lobbyist, William Lynn, who was recently nominated to be the Pentagon’s second in command behind Robert Gates.

This selection of a former defense company lobbyist to be the second in command at the Pentagon and the government agency he used to lobby for on behalf of one of the largest Pentagon suppliers is one of the most blatant examples of a conflict of interest and collusion of military and industrial representatives in high-level administration positions. With thousands of well educated people looking for work, the nomination of a defense industry lobbyist who earned over $ 500,000 in salary and preferred stock options in 2008, does not send a good message to everyday Americans who may have hoped that Obama would govern differently than President George W Bush. This nomination also makes a mockery of the questionnaire sent out to prospective applicants seeking a position in the Obama administration, which demanded that no former lobbyists or politically connected people would be considered for a position in the new administration.

Raytheon, the company who William Lynn lobbied for in 2008, is one of the leading players in the military industrial complex in America. This company received over $ 18.3 billion in U.S. government business in 2007. Some of this money was spent on questionable and unproven technology like the missile Defense Shield. Instead of investing billions of dollars into American infrastructure and helping more average hard working Americans build a future, the efforts of William Lynn as a lobbyist for Raytheon diverted money to unneeded programs that will only increase the personal wealth of a limited amount of politically connected people.

The nomination of William Lynn follows the same practice George W Bush and Dick Cheney followed when they also nominated former military and defense industry executives for high-level positions in the defense department. These individuals included; Peter B Teets the former president and CEO of Lockheed Martin as undersecretary of the Air force, former brigadier general and Enron Corporation executive Thomas E White as secretary of the Army, and Gordon England, who was the vice president of General Dynamics as Secretary of the Navy.
If Obama supporters think the nomination of William Lynn may be an anomaly in the campaign pledge by Obama to change the revolving door of lobbyists in high level government positions, the Obama administration nomination of Michele Flournoy as the Pentagon’s number three pick as undersecretary of defense will prove that assumption false. Ms. Flournoy was a paid lobbyist with her husband in a consulting firm whose clients included high-level defense contractors such as Lockheed Martin and BAE Systems North America. In her confirmation process, Flournoy was required to disclose that she received $60,000 in consulting fees from the lobbyist firm, AVA Partners, and a salary of $254,820 from her role as president and co-founder of the Center for a New American Security, a defense industry related think tank.

The nomination of William Lynn and Michele Flournoy highlight the influence of the military industrial complex in American politics and its negative impact on the standard of living for average hard working Americans. This revolving door of lobbyists that the Obama administration said it was going to eliminate acts like a cartel that further weakens The State Department, and eventually drives a militarized American foreign policy and a culture of militarism in America.

Economies of scale and the local butcher shop

Most of the time, my political writings and blog entries are inspired by news stories. Sometimes however, the inspirations for my blog postings and my political writings come from everyday life here in Italy. Leaving the local butcher shop on Monday evening with some fresh turkey cutlets that I just purchased from Roberto the local butcher in the neighborhood, I began to think how the answer to America’s current economic problem lies in the return of the small mom and pop business in America and the end to the big box retailers.

Watching Roberto skillfully cut the meat off the carcass of the turkey, and then slice the meat into smaller portions, I began to understand the importance of economies of scale, and Roberto’s butcher shop is so essential to a larger economy. With the obvious economic role Roberto’s butcher shop plays in good financial times, the advantage a small business like Roberto’s butcher shop and Ennio’s bicycle shop, is that in hard financial times, the owners of these small businesses will be more willing to provide short-term micro credit to families and individuals who may need the financial help. As opposed to large impersonal corporate banks and big box retailers, a small mom and pop shop is often willing to risk extending credit to someone they know and have a long time relationship with. Maybe that is another reason why Italy is riding out the financial storm in addition to the fact that the banks here in Italy did not participate in the credit swap and other questionable financial dealings the banks in the US, Great Britain, and Switzerland participated in. I guess the money owned by the mafia in all the banks in Italy, is handled with a bit more prudence than the money of John Doe in an American owned bank is.

The financial help in the form of micro credit the local butcher shop or grocery store is allowed to extend a family in financial need, is a far more powerful economic tool and practice, than any government bureaucrat and lobbyist inspired policy could ever offer the average hard working America.

In addition to the financial service of micro credit, mom and pop stores also tend to be more ethical and offer their employees competitive wages and better wages than the large big box retailers employees receive. The exploitation of Americans who cannot afford a college education, in the form of substandard health and wage benefits, is one of the main reasons why the prices at these big box retailers are less than a locally owned store like a bicycle store, a running show store, or a local hardware store.

The large big box retailers also contribute to the problems of suburban sprawl and global warming. With more land area being paved over with asphalt and concrete, these big box retailers add to the problem of water and soil pollution with more roads needed to feed these ever expanding creations resulting in more miles needs to reach them and creating more green house gases like CO2 omissions.

Identifying the problem, let us all call our congressional leaders local office and voice our support for the creation of more small-owned companies and businesses and the increase in taxes on the big box retailers. With the support of these small businesses, the local economies will then be prepared to supply the needed material and services for the new mass rail and light rail networks that will be the backbone of the 21st American infrastructure. The huge areas of land the big box retailers once occupied could then be transformed into parks and other public places for leisure and rest as opposed to consumerism.

Say no to lobbyists and yes to individual civic involvement.

America up for sale.

One of the more enjoyable aspects of living here in Italy has been viewing and sometimes driving in the small fuel efficient and stylish European cars. From the very cool looking and fun to drive Mercedes built Smart car to the new retro Fiat 500, European cars are both practical and efficient. In addition to the size and more modern styling the European cars offer, over 60 percent of European cars are diesel powered offering over 40-45 MPG and almost 80 percent of European cars have a manual stick shift. In addition to increasing fuel efficiency, driving a stick shift in Rome traffic is one of life’s more memorable experiences.

Watching the ever-escalating price of gasoline last year and seeing the elegant styling and cool looks of the European cars compared to the brute and aggressive looking American cars that I occasionally see on the streets of Europe, I have long questioned why the European carmakers have not entered the American market. On Tuesday, in addition to seeing Bush leave Washington DC, my wish came true for more European cars like the Smart car to be sold in the USA with the announcement that the new Fiat 500 will be sold in the US car market with a partnership with Chrysler.

From a geo-economic political analytical viewpoint, the recent news of the Italian car company Fiat buying a 35 percent stake in the ailing American private car company Chrysler is proof of the continual decline of the American dollar and the condition of American manufacturing. This merger makes prefect sense due to the more valuable Euro currency and the weakened financial position of the American car company Chrysler and its need for new capital. Chrysler is becoming a symbolic example of what other foreign companies in South America in the 1980s and later some of the NICs also known as New Industrial Countries like the seven Asian tigers felt like in the 1990s.

In the not so distant past, American and European venture capitalists would gain market share and purchase foreign companies at discount prices with the help from the International Monetary Fund and the World Bank. This was done by requiring countries that needed a loan from these international financial institutions, to open up their markets to foreign investment and competition, which often meant selling state owned companies to private foreign investors at reduced prices. With a stronger dollar in those days, the foreign owned companies and assets were a bargain to American and European venture capitalists.

The recent investment by Fiat to purchase a 35 percent controlling stake in Chrysler, and the 50 billion dollar sale of Budweiser breweries last year to a Belgium owned company should be a wake up call for Americans as to the danger of trillion dollar deficits. The Euro is fast becoming the most stable and attractive currency in the world.

I wonder if all the laid off GM and Ford workers know that the beer they may be crying in is not American owned anymore.

Can the system be challenged ?

While I am happy with the election of President Obama and the Executive Branch of the US government being under democratic control, I want to stress to the readers of this blog, that Barrack Obama is only one man and cannot change the way politics is played in Washington overnight. Granted he has more political capital than President Bush had in 2005, but the cold hard truth is that political power still lies in the hands of the thousands of lobbyists influencing and corrupting the US congress. Until money is taken out of the American political process, the American republic and the interests of everyday Americans who were standing in the cold on Tuesday to greet the new President of the United States , will continue to be left out in the cold, while the wealthy and politically connected donors and lobbyists continue to increase their standard of living.

In a cruel reversal of fortune, I am afraid that the bar of expectations that was set so low for President George W Bush, is being set too high for President Obama and that when these great expectations have not started to begin to materialize in a year from now, it will weaken his administration and the democratic party.

I feel the only hope President Obama has to be elected in 2012 and for the democrats to increase their majority in the congress and the senate, is if he hires me as a senior political analyst and listens to my political and economic advice on how to rebuild America .

With the historic election of President Obama, only history will prove if he has the courage and fortitude to challenge the vested powerful interests in Washington DC that are sucking the lifeblood out of middle class America and everyday Americans standard of living.

Joe the Plumber needs to be flushed off the air.

In what comes to no surprise to this political analyst, the latest brutal military campaign waged by Israel is ending with a brokered cease-fire between the Hamas militants in the Occupied Palestinian Territory of Gaza and the Israel government. Average Americans and casual political observers who think this cease-fire was due to a vote in the Israel Parliament; have been watching too much American Idol and propaganda generated by the pro-Israeli mass media in America. This entire brutal military campaign by Israel, killed hundreds of innocent Palestinian civilians with cluster bombs, white phosphorous, and 500-pound bombs dropped from US manufactured aircraft in one of the most densely populated areas on Earth. This selective war and military campaign by the Israeli military was pre-scheduled and pre-approved by the Bush administration in its waning days in power. The recent cease-fire and end of the brutal and sadistic military campaign by the Israeli government is an attempt by the Israeli leaders to curry favor with the new Obama administration and not create a problem for the new Obama administration that comes to power on Tuesday.

The heinous military tactics used by Israeli Defense Forces (IDF) were unmeasured and did little to stem the base of support that Hamas leaders and the organization has inside the Gaza strip. Perhaps if the American public received more independent information on the different Palestinian factions that control the Occupied Palestinian Territories such as Hamas in Gaza, and Fatah in the West Bank, than maybe the American people would begin to see that the problem is not as simple as the Israeli government and pro-Israeli Bush administration make it out to be. The American people should take the time to learn about the different political factions inside the Palestinian territories and discover that the Fatah organization supported by Israel lost the January 25, 2006 election in the Occupied Palestinian Territories due to the high level of corruption in the Fatah organization. Before the election in 2005, Mahmoud Abbas leader of the Fatah political party, tried to buy people’s vote, by increasing the salaries of 135,000 civil servants and 58,000 security forces. This late move by Mahmoud Abbas just before the election only reinforced the perception of the Palestinian people had of the Fatah party. President Bush in 2005 who believed that Fatah would prevail in the Palestinian elections was under the naive belief that elections means "democracy" and "democracies" are pro-western. This miscalculation by the Bush administration made it become trapped in its own rhetoric of democracy. President Bush and the European Union then made the critical mistake of declaring Hamas a terrorist organization and did not recognize its victory or its legitimacy.

Perhaps even more shameful for the western powers and people that support Israeli actions is the war crime like tactics used by the Israeli government in the military campaign in the Occupied Palestinian Territory of Gaza. In a blatant disregard for international law and the laws of war set forth in The Hague Conventions and later the United Nations Geneva Conventions, the Israeli willfully targeted Hamas political leaders for assassination. Maybe this is why Israel along with its main sponsor and protector, The United States, are not signatories of the International Criminal Court, where acts of war crimes would be tried and persecuted.

This tactic used by the Israeli military and approved by the Israeli government will only rally the Palestinian people further behind the remaining Hamas leaders and inspire a new generation of Hamas militants to take up the call to avenge the deaths of their loved ones. In a similar manner in which President Bush justified his military attack on Afghanistan and Iraq with calling for the vengeance for the people killed on September 11, 2001, the Palestinian supporters of Hamas will be similarly justified in their own rally behind the flag effect and continue the struggle against a brutal occupying power.

A county like Israel that has a high standard of living and a nation with an advanced military, the military tactics and wanton destruction of the civilian infrastructure in the Palestinian territory of Gaza, appears to be callous and malicious. Perhaps, one of the reasons why more people in Europe view Israel in a negative perspective, is that these populations have a more free and vibrant press in their countries, that report on the military campaigns Israel wages, in a more even handed and investigative manner. Perhaps that is why America is ranked 41st for press freedom in the world in the latest ranking by the independent non government organization, Reporters Without Borders, while most all the other countries in that same ranking come from the European continent.

Watching Joe the Plumber be used as a tool for the Israeli propaganda machine inside the American mass media market, is probably one reason why America has the poor ranking it has in the latest report from Reporters without Borders for Press Freedom in the World.

Any self respecting American should call whatever “news” organization that carries any of his propaganda reports for the Israeli lobby and demand that they flush him off the airwaves.

The bully pulpit and propaganda.

As President Bush leaves office, there is no other President who has used the political tactic of the Rally behind the Flag effect for political and financial award. In an attempt to use the bully pulpit of the Presidency one last time to define his Presidency, this political analyst as my long time supporters have known, have never been fooled or tricked by believing the propaganda his administration and other institutions and organizations issued over the years while he was in office to support this propaganda.

In a final farewell speech on Thursday, President Bush made one last attempt at this revisionist history when he said that he kept America safe on his watch. The President and his speechwriters have come to believe that the Bush administration was inaugurated on September 12, 2001. History will show however that like President elect Barrack Obama who be inaugurated in January 20, George W. Bush was inaugurated on January 20, 2001. Unlike the herds of people who did not follow the early months of the Bush administration, this political analyst followed the early actions of the new Bush administration.

One of the more prominent actions and policy decisions by the Bush administration, or what should be known as the Bucheny administration due to the power of Dick Cheney in the administration was the formation on the National Energy Policy Development Group in the second week of the Bush/Cheney administration. The behind closed door meetings of the NEPDG meetings by the Bush/Cheney administration with previous careers in the oil industry, should have instigated early congressional oversight investigations and conflict of interest debate in the American discussion. As an example of the conflict of interest and an early indication of the priorities of the Bush administration are the timing of the meetings and the February 14, 2001 meeting of task force staff members with Archie Dunham, who was the chairman of oil company, Conoco.

These early behind closed door meetings were an early example of the secretive and authoritarian nature of the Bush administration, managed under Dick Cheney’s expert knowledge of how to run a bureaucracy for personal and political gain. These early meetings with oil companies have a direct link to the war in Iraq and the possible allocation of the oil fields to the American oil companies attending these behind closed-door meetings. While Bush benefited and the masses of people who were victims of the rally behind the flag after the September 11 terrorist attacks allowed to happen on his watch and under his administration, I was never fooled by his administrations press releases and statements about Iraq. I always knew the larger strategic goal was to secure the oil reserves Iraq has and to establish a military presence next to Iran to isolate that country further.

The constant messages of Iraq being linked to the War on Terror and part of the Axis of Evil, the Bush administration along with certain media outlets in America, assisted in the spread of these messages. These half truths and out right lies by the Bush administration and its supporters have killed over 4,000 young men and woman of the US armed forces and killed over a half million Iraqi civilians and seriously damaged the standing and prestige of the United States.

As Bush leaves office, let us hope that President elect Obama and his allies can hold these men accountable to the catastrophic damage these men like Dick Cheney and Donald Rumsfield have done to the American Republic and the standing of America in the world.

Quoting a famous 19th century Scottish poet, journalist, and song writer Charles Mackay,

"Men, it has been well said, think in herds; it will be seen that they go mad in herds, while they only recover their senses slowly, and one by one."

Let us hope that the American public regains its senses quickly and changes the way they think.

Quoting a famous writer and intellectual of the 20th century Noam Chomsky and his view of the type of propaganda that Bush and the Cheney administration used to the run up and execution of the War on Terror, perhaps this quote sums it up the best.

"Propaganda is to a democracy what the bludgeon is to a totalitarian state."

The 300-pound gorilla no one wants to discuss.

In what will be an important and historic speech by President elect Barrack Obama next week, early indications coming out of Washington D.C., suggest that the Obama administration will not seize this historic opportunity and change the country from the wrong path most Americans think the country was heading under President Bush and Dick Cheney. In what should be a historic turnaround from the destructive policies of the Bush administration and its embrace of unilateralism and its closed fist foreign policy approach, the incoming Obama administration does not appear ready to challenge the power of the military industrial complex in America. This failure will continue the country on its course towards an ever-increasing amount of militarilism in American politics and an erosion of American civil liberties started under the Bush administration following the September 11 terrorist attack in New York. The erosion of civil liberties orchestrated by Dick Cheney and other Bush administration allies who were more concerned with personal power and financial gain rather than the United States Constitution, is a direct result of militarilism in American politics. This militarilism and the ever-increasing amount of military expenditures consuming the federal budget and the required enemy to justify those ever-increasing military budgets, is a self-created need.

If the recent remarks by Hillary Clinton during her Senate confirmation hearings for Secretary of State are any indication, it does not appear that Mr. Obama will be living up to his campaign promise of change, and appears unwilling or afraid to challenge the power of the military establishment in American politics. This analysis is based on the recent remarks by the new Secretary of State, Hillary Clinton, who said that American foreign policy in the Obama administration will be based on a mixture of diplomacy and military power. Although she tried to fool most people with the euphemistic use of the word defense, when referring to military force, this speech by Hillary Clinton is an early indication that the Obama administration is not going to make any substantive change in American foreign policy and the continued influence of the military industrial and military-petroleum complex in American politics.

This speech by Hillary Clinton is another indication of the continual march towards militarism in America that has been going on over the last 20 years. The pace and scale of this militarilism does not appear to be slowing with the election of President elect Barrack Obama. Like the previous democratic administration in the 1990s under Bill Clinton, the new Obama administration appears to have buckled under the pressure and influence the MIC in America has by having a few members of the military industrial complex in the incoming Executive Branch. Similar to the time when William Cohen a republican from Maine served as Secretary of Defense under Bill Clinton, the political power of the MIC is evident with the recent political decision by the Obama inner circle to keep Robert Gates as the Secretary of Defense. Gates, who served in the senior Bush administration, as the chief of the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) was involved with the illegal activity of the Iran-Contra scandal in the late 1980s. This inclusion of Robert Gates does not indicate that there will be much change in the Obama administration’s foreign policy or its ability to challenge the power of the military industrial complex in American politics.

Unfortunately, for the vast majority of Americans, it appears that the political establishment in America is going to cut back on social programs like Medicaid and Social Security, than cut back on the wasteful military spending that only benefits a mush smaller segment of American society.

With memories of the political assassination of John F. Kennedy in the political conscious, maybe some Obama advisors are afraid to challenge this powerful segment in American politics. On the other hand, maybe, the power of the military industrial complex that Dwight D Eisenhower warned about in 1961 is the correct reason. Either one you want to believe will not matter in the long run, for both reasons will lead to an Imperial President and a population living a reduced standard of living in an authoritative society.

Beware of the Weapons of Mass Distraction

The mass media and the other weapons of mass destruction like sports and entertainment shows used by the status quo establishment and the state want to keep people distracted from discussing and knowing important events. These tactics and devices used by the corporate for profit mass media and the elites that control them, have no effect on this blogger and political analyst. This freedom from the corporate media controlled by the status quo, allows me to select exactly what stories I want to read about and what sources to get that information from. I am not forced to believe that the lead story the media leads with is the important news story of that day or even week.

Borrowing a word overused by the corporate media in 2008, I am protected from these feeble attempts by the status quo and remain in a bubble free world from the corporate media’s manipulation and coercion. Helping me remain insulated in this bubble is an ability to get my news from independent and accredited news services on the internet, like the Associated Press, Reuters, and AFP.

Living in this corporate news media free bubble allows me to use the limited amount of time I have to read the news stories I know are important. This allows me to get information that will have an impact in mine own life and the lives of my family members. I know that learning about the finer details of an economic plan or why a country is attacking a mainly civilian population with planes and tanks is much more important to me than who won an NFL playoff game.

Reading information about some elite and rich American like Paris Hilton or which celebrity is getting divorced from some other media created celebrity, will not impact my life. Having the ability to select the information in an economic stimulus plan and the pros and cons of that plan, are much more important to me than who won a playoff game or if it snows in January. If someone wants to have the ability to learn about a snowstorm, they have the ability as I do to click on another news story on the internet, or to change the station with their remote control. While I understand that people need to be entertained, corporate news outlets are not the source for this kind of information. News should be delivered in a straightforward manner and not be turned into an entertainment like broadcast like is the norm in American society. I know that the elites and people, who control America like the Hilton, Walton, and Bush families, love the American people to follow these stories. They know that the more the average American is distracted by these stories; they will be allowed to screw the American people and continue to live the good life.

With the Internet now being in almost every home in America and the ever increases rates of bandwidth available to people to access that Internet, I am disappointed that more people are not cancelling their cable service and opting only to get their news and entertainment from the Internet. But most people are hesitant and a little scared of change, so the for profit entertainment/news outlets controlled by the status quo are still able to control the message and limit the damage when events like the Gaza War leak out to the world.

Research has shown that when people are told information that is not true enough times, they will believe that information is the truth. Some cold hard examples of this include the run up to the war with Iraq and the stories of weapons of mass destruction. It was proved that more people that got their news from one source, believed even after there were never any weapons of mass destruction found, people still believed that the weapons were in fact found.

The demographics behind the lastest attack by Israel

Watching the horror filled faces of civilians living in Gaza running for their lives and reading stories of entire families killed, does not justify the over handed response by Israeli Defense Forces in the Occupied Palestinian Territories. However, what disturbs me the most is when I try to answer the question: Why are some human lives valued more than others are? Why is that when we hear about 20 American deaths in a mall shooting it makes national news for a week, but when over 200 Palestinians are killed in a single day, American public officials appear indifferent or only mildly concerned at best?

In the current Israeli Gaza offensive or what should be called a brutal attack, there have been over 800 Palestinian lives lost while less than 10 Israeli lives have been lost. Even before the brutal attack was started by Israel, the rockets that Hamas militants launched injured only a few people and did not kill anyone. Observing the actions and conduct of Israeli soldiers from my vantage point in Europe and reading the international press reports, I find it truly amazing how such a small and strategically insignificant country like Israel has in American foreign policy and American domestic American politics. If any other country in the world did the things that this country has done like attacking and killing UN and Red Cross members like Israel did on Thursday, the uproar would be intense. However, as a political analyst I understand how both the American and Israeli interests are served in the current Israeli attack on Palestinians and the perpetual war ideology it proliferates.

The propaganda stories of scared Jewish settlers being terrorized by stray rockets fail to mention that most of these Jewish settlers are not all Israeli citizens, but recent immigrants who emigrated to Israeli from the former Soviet Union in the 1990s when Russia was growing through her own economic crisis during the Yeltsin years. These Jewish immigrants were more like economic and political refugees from the former Soviet Union, than they were idealistic Zionist’s. It is estimated that these immigrants now make up over 14 percent of Israel’s total population. This population influx would be comparable to the entire population of Greece moving to France.

The large influx of immigrants from the former Soviet Union also hurt the Palestinian economy, which relied heavily on trade with Israel. When border closures started in 1993, it has been found to be one of the main causes of the implosion of the Palestinian economy. The new immigrants living in the Occupied Palestinian Territories allowed Israel not to rely on the Palestinian workers performing jobs in the Israeli economy similar to the way immigrants are treated in the American economy, to work and sell their produced goods.This new influx of immigrants at the end of the 1990s, in addition to the depressed Palestinian economy, and the visit in 2000 by Ariel to the Wailing Wall helped to push the Palestinian people to starting the Intifada uprising in 2000.

With this addition understanding of the demographics inside Israel, maybe you can appreciate why Hamas militants broke the six-month-old cease-fire after Israeli cut off food and fuel supplies for over two weeks before Hamas launched the first rocket.

After the brutal attack is over by Israel, there will most likely be a security zone where Palestinians can no longer live, making more room for more immigrants to live in land sized by the Israeli Defense Forces.

Just like their protector the United States, the Israeli government does not call their military a war department but Defense Forces. For what I have seen on the news for almost two weeks, there is nothing defensive in the brutal war it is waging on mainly defenseless Arab civilians.

A signpost along the way to the impending end of American supremacy

In an effort to appear concerned with the massive amount of money being issued by Washington and the ever-escalating federal deficit, which on Wednesday was reported to be over 1.6 trillion dollars for the FY 2009, President elect Barrack Obama today announced the appointment of a new chief performance officer.

The official Nancy Killefer, is a former Treasury Department official with the Clinton administration. I found it amusing that senior level Obama officials decided to answer the problem of uncontrollable government spending and lax accounting standards for that money with the appointment of yet another government salary. However, this is a normal in government agencies and the Obama administration is just another bureaucracy. Like any government agency and bureaucracy, the Obama administration has answered the problem of big government with more government.

What makes this appointment more comical is that Ms. Killefer in her new position in charge of streamlining and eliminating government waste, will most likely have one or two assistants, a government car, a driver for that car, a generous salary, most likely at least $ 150,000 or more, and full medical coverage for her and her family. The appointment of a career Beltway insider is another sigh that that the Obama administration does not want to redistribute the power and wealth inside the Beltway and only has the goal of getting re-elected in 2012. The political investment in Ms. Killefer with a comfortable well paying position for her and her staff, will contribute to that goal with more people having a vested interest in 2012.

If I were asked by the senior level Obama advisors as to how to make suggestions as to what government programs to cut, I would start with first asking the Obama administration to download the latest version of the US federal budget and make some common sense approaches to the problem. One of the easiest ways to accomplish this is to look at the departments with the biggest budgets and know that these departments are the ones to cut. Any first year political analyst knows that these departments are the departments of defense and homeland security. While the CIA budget is not public which is against the US constitution, another department to locate areas to cut is that secretive and immoral government agency.

During my research into militarism in America, I discovered some information that the Obama advisors must have known about. This information while shocking and disquieting came from the deputy inspector general at the Pentagon, which reported in 2001 that over 4.4 trillion dollars in adjustments to the Pentagon’s books had to be cooked in order to compile required financial statements to Congress. The more disturbing fact is that over 1.1. trillion dollars was simply gone and no one can be sure of when, where, or to whom the money went. To put this figure in perspective, the amount US income taxes Americans paid in 1999 was only 855 billion dollars. Anyone, paying even the slightest amount of attention to the war profiteering in Iraq and the amount of waste there would agree this is nothing new in Washington.

Analogous to the treasure of young American lives being wasted in Iraq and Afghanistan, Dick Cheney, Richard Pearl and Paul Wolfowitz, have pushed the country towards bankruptcy.

America needs new friends

Most everyone will agree that the United States and Israel are strong allies and support each other. Americans have been indoctrinated to believe that the strong support the US government bestows upon the Israel is based on the fact that Israel is a democratic country. The reality however is that this support is more based on domestic political pressure from American Jewish interest groups like AIPAC and a shared economic and political ideology on the premise of continual war.

It appears the close “friendship” the United States has with Israel is not limited to political ideology but also extends to wanting to use the same successful techniques that Israel has used to combat terrorism. While a relatively new kid to the school of occupying a hostile territory, the United States appears to have turned to Israel to help with its occupation of Iraq.

Taking a playbook from the Israelis, American forces in 2008 tried to segregate and divide the city of Baghdad with a security wall around Sadr City. This idea was taken from the Israelis and their illegal security wall also known as the Apartheid Wall that they have built in the occupied territories. Unlike in Iraq however, the Israeli security wall was just another tactic by the Israeli government to acquire more land and water, and make a two state solution nearly impossible by separating the Gaza and West Bank territories.

In addition to the barrier wall, the Israelis like the Americans in Iraq and Fallujah in 2006 are also using the chemical weapon, white phosphorus, in the attack on Gaza. The Geneva Treaty of 1980 stipulates that white phosphorus should not be used as a weapon of war in civilian areas, but there is no blanket ban under international law on its use as a smokescreen or for illumination. The Gaza strip with over 1.5 million people, is one of the world’s mostly densely population areas.

Recently over 100 countries signed a treaty to outlaw this chemical weapon. However, like most treaties, international agreements, and UN resolutions, both Israel and the United States refused to sign this human and ethical treaty. To be fair though, China, Russia, and North Korea also refused to sign the treaty as well.

Guess it shows the company the US and Israel likes to keep in the International community.

Progress not perfection for 2009

Entering 2009, there is a lot of talk in the media about getting over the bad financial year in 2008 and looking forward to 2009. While I agree that times are tough for the unemployed and people looking for a job, it seems to me however, that the media has been looking at 2008 through the lens of a developed world where just 15 percent of the world’s population controls over 80 percent of the world’s wealth. Since the dawn of civilization and the Ulbaid culture to the Assyrian, Egyptian, Greek, and Roman Empires, one thing seems to remain constant; the rich and powerful stay in power while the poor and disenfranchised struggle for survival.

An example that highlights this problem is the latest bombing of defenseless Palestinians in the Gaza strip. For the last 60 New Years Day celebrations, they have hoped and prayed for a permanent two-state solution and be allowed to govern themselves. Nevertheless, as we have seen over the last 7 days, the Israelis are allowed to do whatever they want while the international community looks on without doing anything. The Europeans and especially the French and Italians who try to come off as honest brokers to the Arab world, are just as guilty as the Americans are.

Living in Italy, everyday I see another ethnic minority group, the Roma, (gypsies) living among a privileged class of people but who are marginalized by Italian society and the government. However, while some Italians and other members of the international community living here in Italy will say that is how they want to live, or that is the way their culture is, I think it is a lame excuse and an easy way to explain the situation. No human wants to dig through a garbage can for food or clothes to wear. No human wants to beg for food or money. There are basic human rights world citizens are guaranteed by the United Nations Universal Declaration of Human Rights, and the Italian government is failing to meet its obligation to this treaty it is a signatory to.

Like the Palestinians in the Occupied Territories, the Roma here in Italy are segregated, treated like second-class citizens and treated badly by the Italian people.

This blog however, does not want to only criticize and only point out the instances of poor governance, this blog wants to also offer solutions to complex and historic problems. Some of the solutions may be very simple and practical but like most issues in politics, it goes down to the political will of the government in that state.

The Palestinians in the Occupied Territories, like the Roma here in Italy are being used by the government as a way for the politicians do show the citizens that allow them to be in power that are doing something. A few months earlier in the summer of 2008, the Italian government began to persecute and use the power of the state on the Roma here in Italy with a proposed law of finger printing all the Roma. Defended by the neo-Fascists parties in power here in Italy as a way to fight crime, the real truth is that there is more graft and corruption by the political class and institutions here in Italy that do more harm to the society as a whole, than all the entire Roma population in Italy combined. The People’s Liberty Party led by Silvio Berlusconi the Lega Nord (Northern League), and the neo-fascist party the National Alliance, formally the MSI, singled out the Roma as scapegoats. If the Italian political leaders were serious about crime than they would in addition to addressing the Rome issue, crack down more on the Mafia, tax evasion by over 40 percent of Italians, and reform their own government bureaucracies.

The Catholic Church with its vast network of churches, property, and even hospitals here in Italy, should also work with the Italian state and tackle the issue of the Roma. One solution I thought of was to use the Vatican administered schools as the education centers for the Roma children to start to attend. The core problem of the Roma is that the Roma children cannot go to school due in large part to the stigma the Italian children put on them. We all know children can be cruel, and here in Italy, the kids are no exception to the rule. It just seems to be human nature.

While the Gregorian calendar may proclaim it is 2009, with the Paleolithic era and the end of the ice age just a mere 40,000 years ago, the struggle for all humans to be equal appears to be a very long struggle.