15 Most Corrupt members of Congress

Bravo to the Associated Press for writing a news article on the corruption investigation into Charlie Rangel the New York democrat first elected to congress in 1970. Although the news story and the investigation by the House Ethics committee will not cause the 79-year-old politician from Harlem New York any political or financial consequences, the news report by the Associated Press was an example of how some members in the American government are under investigation for using their office for personal financial gain. While the report by the Associated Press may have gotten some more airtime on the conservative media outlets in America, the Associated Press report failed to mention the other 14 members of Congress currently under some sort of investigation. The failure of the news media to report more aggressively on the 15 members of congress currently under some forms of investigation for corruption, is one of the most important factors why the American press is considered as the 41st most free and open in the world. In addition to the low press freedom ranking, the failure of the media to report on the role of lobbyists and the corrupt members of Congress is why America is only considered as the 20th most democratic in the world and interestingly, America is considered the 20th least corrupt country in the world as well.

The report by the Associated Press was most likely released after the management at the Associated Press read the news release by a non-partisan nonprofit 501(c)(3) organization dedicated to promoting ethics and accountability in government. The organization known as Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington (CREW), released its annual list of the most corrupt members of Congress on 15 September 2009. The list comprises two members from the U.S. Senate and 13 members of the House of Representatives. Like their majority in the Congress, members of the Democratic Party have a

This year’s list of 15, at least 12 are under some sort of investigation include Vern Buchanan (R-FL), Roland Burris (D-IL), Ken Calvert (R-CA), John Deal (R-GA), John Ensign (R-NV), Jesse Jackson Jr.(D-IL), Jerry Lewis (R-CA), Mitch McConnell (R-KY), Alan Mollohan (D-WV), John Murtha (D-PA), Charlie Rangel (D-NY), Laura Richardson (D-CA), Pete Visclosky (D-IN), Maxine Waters (D-CA) and Don Young (R-AK).

It should be noted that former Democratic Presidential hopeful Connecticut Chris Dodd and Senator Kent Conrad were not disciplined in any way for their participation in Countrywide Financial’s VIP loan program. This little gem of a perk for the U.S. Senators gave them a sweet heart deal of a loan, all during a time when banks were denying credit applications to everyday Americans. Even as recently as October 2009, a year after the financial crisis, banks are still refusing one on three loan applicants.

To come up with its list of the 15 most corrupt members of Congress, CREW reviewed news media articles, Federal Election Commission reports, court documents, and members’ personal financial and travel disclosure forms. The non-profit organization then analyzed that information in light of federal laws and regulations as well as congressional ethics rules.

Unfortunately, like Charlie Rangel from New York, almost every one of these tainted politicians will get re-elected as Opinione previously documented with the 93 % of incumbents who run for office getting re-elected.

Another reason for America to invest in high speed rail

Nearly a year after the “crisis” began, the United States has done little to encourage private industry to help rebuild America’s industrial manufacturing base. Instead of using federal funds to help stimulate the creation of manufacturing jobs with the building of a high speed national rail network and light rail systems for all the major cities in America, the politicians in Washington D.C. have instead continued to hand out money to the automotive industry, the financial industry, and the petroleum military industrial complex. Just as the Eisenhower administration helped create the interstate highway system with federal tax dollars, which lead to private companies profiting off of the infrastructure such as the trucking industry, the United States now needs to invest in rebuilding the national rail network.

As the creation of the interstate system, created jobs for the people building the roads and helped spur economic development with the increased efficiency of the road system, building a high-speed rail network and local regional rail networks in highly populated states would bring the same economic benefits and supplement the existing road network. Over time, new industries would be created to support and maintain the high-speed rail network such as hundreds of thousands of manufacturing jobs building parts for the trains. Below is a picture of a light rail system and an example of all the different parts new companies in America could be building.

Yet another reason to invest in high-speed rail and regional rail networks is to supplement the aviation infrastructure in the United States. Perhaps the biggest advantage of rail service is the ability of the trains to travel directly into the center of a city, as opposed to an airplane landing over 10 miles away. With the U.S. airline industry shrinking to a size not seen since the months after the 2001 terror attacks and American airlines trimming flights for the past two years, Americans need to have the option of alternative mass transit. Although high-speed rail, even the fastest trains in the world, cannot economically compete with air travel, when the era of peak oil arrives and the price of a barrel of oil exceeds 200 a barrel, Americans will be wishing they invested in a high-speed rail network running off of electricity produced by nuclear power. Now that is what I call energy independence. Of course, the oil and defense industry lobbyists would fight that progressive movement tooth and nail.

To help mitigate the power of the petroleum military industrial complex, American leaders would have to show some courage and implement a federal gas tax to help spur the creation and desire of rail based mass transit. According to the energy economist Phil Verleger, a $1 tax on gasoline and diesel fuel would raise about $140 billion a year. Starting at the .50-cent level, a constructive government policy would gradually increase the tax on gasoline to over 3 dollars a gallon. If I had that money, I would devote 40 cents of each dollar to pay down the deficit and strengthen the U.S. dollar, 40 cents to pay for universal health care and 20 cents to build the high-speed rail network.

For the numerous detractors of rail based mass transit and the disagreement of having the government tax people to build it, perhaps these detractors should question why they support the US government subsidizing aviation companies such as Boeing and Lockheed with lucrative defense contracts, which the corporations than use those profits to invest in building commercial airplanes. Than there are the hundreds of military bases around the world where the US taxpayer is not getting any benefit. Only supporting corrupt governments like the Berlusconi led coalition in Italy and authoritative regimes like Saudi Arabia.

The National Liberation Movement - Transportation Platform

The fascinating story of Beppe Grillo and his social mobilization using the Internet is continuing here in Italy. Beginning with the V-Days, and the gathering of signatures calling for a Clean Parliament and for the Freedom of Information, Grillo then started to create a grass roots political movement at the local Municipal election level with the creation Five-Star Civic Lists. This political movement was accomplianed with a platform of issues known as the Florence Declaration for Municipal Administration. As with most nearly everything Mr. Grillo does, the launching of the Five Star Civic Lists and the Florence Declaration was done solely on the Internet with no additional help from the print or television media, which as you know, is controlled by Berlusconi and the political establishment here in Italy.

Gaining some success with Five Star Civic Lists and the success of getting two candidates elected in the recent European Union elections, Mr. Grillo has now set his sights higher with the decision to establish the National Liberation Movement.

Just as Mr. Grillo did with the Florence Declaration and the Five Star Civic Lists, Beppe Grillo will be announcing and publishing the entire platform for this new movement on the Internet on 4 October. Educated and trained as an accountant, the attention to detail is evident with his recent blog postings detailing seven areas the new movement will be based around. These areas include: Energy, Health, Transport, Economy, Information, Education and the State and the citizens.

To help spread some of the information and details of his movement, Opinione is publishing some of the highlights from the seven platform areas his new movement is centered on.

Please see below some of the ideas Mr. Grillo and his supporters have come up for the idea of transportation. Many of these same ideas can be applied to any urban area and integrated into a country’s transportation policy. If American politicians were really serious about weaning America of foreign oil and becoming more energy independent, the political leaders would take some of these suggestions.

TRANSPORTATION


- Provide disincentives for the use of private motorized transport in urban areas

- Develop a network of protected cycle tracks throughout the whole urban area and beyond

- Set up spaces for parking bicycles in urban areas

- Introduce a heavy tax for private cars with only one person inside, entering a historic centre

- Strengthen public transport for collective use and public transport for individual use (car sharing) with electric motors fed through a network

- Immediately block the Messina Bridge (mafia handout)and the TAV in Val di Susa

- Prohibit the construction of new car parks in urban areas

- Develop rail tracks connected to commuter routes

- Cover the whole country with Broadband

- Give incentives for the companies that use tele-working

- Provide a system of efficient connections between different forms of public transport

- Have lanes reserved for public transport in urban areas

- Oblige towns to have a mobility plan for people with disabilities

The genesis of man from a natural state to a political state

Thomas Hobbes was a 17th century Englishman who was one of the most important political philosophers in the field of political science. The process of how a civil society is created is discussed by Hobbes in a scientific way that leads to the creation of a civil society through the transfer of Rights and the Nature of Agreements. The transformation of mankind out of the miserable state of nature and into civil society is discussed by Hobbes in his book De Cive (On the Citizen), which means to do the duty. The manner and way that man gives up his natural rights and to whom, is a key step in the evolution to creating a commonwealth. To get a better understanding of how Thomas Hobbes helped shape the world we live in today, a closer look at the natural laws and rights of man is required.

Hobbes believed that due to the nature of man and his ability to kill each other regardless of the size or strength, man unlike other beasts in nature, are equal with one another. Man is controlled by a natural law and has no control over it. In this law, like nature, the strong will survive and those who are born fit will succeed. This natural law is not promulgated and no one dictates the law. Hobbes asserted that humans are obliged to seek it.

The first natural law is that man must pursue the good and avoid violent death and gain advantage to avoid the bad. The first natural law has two natural rights that accompany it. The first natural right is that man has a right of self-preservation. The foundation of this natural right is that each man protects his life and limbs as much as he can. The second natural right is that man has a right to all means.

The second natural law is that man is his own judge in exercising the first rule of nature. Hobbes in chapter one of De Cive (On the Citizen) uses the example of a son killing his father. In the example, he states that in the state of nature a son does not understand that as soon as he was born, the son is in power and under the authority of the person who has given him his preservation. In modern society this is applied to when a child does something bad, but it is not punished like an adult because the child is said to lack reason. This reason is taught to him by society and without this teaching; it would not exist in the state of nature.

When in nature, man does not need friends, and only has them for the sole purpose of benefiting himself. There is no honor in the state of nature, but with man when you attain glory you gain advantage, because with man it is easier to dominate and thus it is easier to have a firmer control over them. Man in society does not seek friends for company, but rather to further his own standing and benefit from it. This leads to the final natural right which is that man has the right to all things.

This final natural right leads to conflict when both men claim something and the mutual fear they have of each other and the equal power they have on each other. This natural tendency of men to exasperate each other combined with emotions and passions, gives both the attacker justification for claiming what he wants and justification for the possessor of that item to defend it. The result is a war between all men.

Out of this fear of one another, man will enter into agreements with one another because man cannot live in a state of war and must seek peace whenever possible. In these agreements Hobbes discusses the golden rule. Unlike the golden rule in the biblical sense, Hobbes says that you should put yourself in the other pan of a scale (of justice), and unlike Christian rule where love is involved, Hobbes does not believe in love, but justice. When a wrong is committed it is a breach of an agreement. While Hobbes’s rule is consistent with the scriptures, he does not enforce them as the religion does. Hobbes also believes that the natural law is the same as the moral law, and that anything associated with natural law is like the moral law.

Hobbes believes that peace is the highest good and that anything that contributes to it is good. The common good of the commonwealth keeps you in the commonwealth, while the common fear of that same commonwealth keeps you in line. Security is necessary for the practice of natural law. The appetites of man changes as opposed to other animals in that man distinguish from wrong and harm with each other.

One of the fundamental rights of all citizens is to remember the first natural law that we are all created equal and that this precept should be practiced by all citizens of a commonwealth with each other. In the simplest terms, the wealthy in a society should give up some up some of their wealth to better the whole of society, instead of using the laws of the commonwealth to their own advantage. While a common fear has helped to form the commonwealth, the commonwealth should not turn that fear back on the citizen to its own political advantage.

The natural equality of humankind has been replaced with the political science of man wanting to get out of the state of nature which has led to the formation of a commonwealth with common law. This common law offers the citizen civic equality that offers the citizen a much better way of life than in the state of nature. This is evident when you compare even the most repressive governments and discover that even the most repressive commonwealth is still better for the individual than being in the state of nature when man has to fear all men, including his own family.

A look at the OECD report- Doing Better for Children

To commemorate the recent new school year for students, Opinione will look at some recent data from the Organization for Economic Co-Operation and Development (OECD) and see how children in several different countries measure up to one another and how effective government spending on children is in some selected countries. Although the country reports in the 2009 Doing Better for Children report tend to highlight the negative areas more than the positive, the report offers a good starting point for citizens to see how their own country compares to other advanced industrial countries that belong to the OECD.

The brief analysis will look at several European countries such as Germany, Italy, and Great Britain, the Asian country of Japan, and the United States of America. The analysis is based on the country highlight reports offered on the Doing Better for Children website. It will be interesting to see if the slogans such as 1980s era Head Start Program and the 2000s era No Child Left Behind chosen by the elitist politicians in Washington D.C. are actually a true reflection of the effectiveness of public spending on children in America. Head Start…..Falling Behind, seems the USA is losing ground somewhere.

Starting with the largest economy in Europe, the report found that while the German government spends above the OECD average on children, there were some areas that Germany could improve in. This country profile report was misleading due to variables such as the integration of the lower income area of former East Germany and the population of the country as compared to other OECD members like Luxemburg. Even with Germany outspending other countries on younger children, the report still suggested that Germany should spend more on younger children that are more vulnerable. The report did however conclude on a positive note and this could contribute as to why Germany has remained the leading economic power in Europe.

South of Germany where the German magazine Süddeutsche Zeitung, has rechristened its southern neighbor Italy as the "stinking boot”, the OECD country report for Italy is a bit more critical of the Italian government’s spending on children. The report found that while Italian government spending on children is close to the OECD average overall, in many areas Italian children do less well than their peers in other countries. The report also noted that Italian children do very poorly at school. Italy has the fourth worst average educational performance, and the second largest gap between good and poor performers, after Mexico. The number of Italian youth not in employment, education or training reflects the poor schooling outcomes, again being the third worst in the OECD after Mexico and Turkey.

The country report for Italy is troubling due to the fact that the poor education system in Italy is one of the factors that has and is continuing to contribute to the power of the mafia in Italy. As David Lane writes in his recent book, Into the Heart of the Mafia, the mafia has historically grown and prospered because of poverty and weak state institutions. Ironically, the weak institutions of the state like the police and judiciary, has helped the mafia penetrate and control the lucrative local business in Messina Sicily, where the University of Messina employs over 6,000 staff and teaches around 40,000 students. Where there is big business, there is the mafia.

Crossing the English Channel, the British government appears to be doing a good job with spending on children of all ages. The report did note however, that British children have the highest rates of underage drinking and teenage pregnancy rates in the OECD. The country report for Great Britain also reports the fourth highest teen pregnancy rate after Mexico, Turkey and the United States.

Flying across to the Pacific Rim area, the country report for Australia highlighted that government spending on children and the welfare of children in Australia was one of the best countries in the OECD. For example, Australian families with children report the lowest levels of poor environmental conditions in the OECD. As with all the other country reports, the OECD report concluded that although Australian child policies are getting solid value for money, more money could be spent on younger children.

The country report for Japan highlighted the relatively poor environmental conditions children in Japan have to deal with for a country that is the top third of the OECD for family income levels. While the lack of space and noise pollution is understandable considering the population density of the country, it was surprising to read that Japan ranks as the one of the worse countries in the OECD for children having a key set of educational possessions such as a quiet study space, a computer, or textbooks. The report did however conclude that Japan like South Korea have a very low rate of teenage pregnancy and the third lowest child mortality rates in the OECD.

The country report for the United States did not paint a very good picture for the condition of children in America and the effectiveness of government spending on children. The report noted that although the United States is a high-income country, and spends more than the OECDD average on children, the US ranks very badly in several categories for the well-being of children. Some examples include infant mortality (4th worst in the OECD after Mexico, Turkey and the Slovak Republic), Child mortality (5th worst in the OECD), Rates of low birth weight (sixth worst in the OECD), and the rate of teen births is over three times the OECD average. Amongst the OECD, the rate of births per girls aged 15-19 in the United States is lower only than Mexico.

Highlighting the negative aspects of the capitalist economic model the United States embraces is the high amount of children living in poverty. Nearly double the OECD average of 12.4%, over 21 percent of children in the United States live in poverty. That is one in five children for the country with the largest military expenditures in the world.

Perhaps the co-author of the report Simon Chapple summed up the condition of children living in America when he said, "Despite the United States' strong research and policy tradition in the area of child well-being, too many American children are still left behind".

A message to my Congressman- Ron Klein

I recently received an email from my Congressman, Ron Klein, where his staff spoke of all the help and federal dollars he was bringing to the Florida 22nd Congressional District. In the email message he spoke of his ability to fund 12 new police officers with the COPS federal grant, (he failed to mention the local government would have to pick up the tab for those officers after the three year period is up), and of the $465 million and 130 projects his district is getting as part of the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act.

As a political analyst, I liked to analyze these types of emails from politicians and the following passage caught my attention.

I also visited the Tri-Rail Station in West Palm Beach, where $13,567,108 in funding for the South Florida Regional Transportation Authority will purchase four new locomotives and support additional efforts to develop a 21st century mass transit system in South Florida.

As a long time supporter and believer in mass transit, this passage elicited a response that I have included below.

Feel free to copy, paste, and send to your own elected official.

To the staff at Ron Klein’s office,

As an American living in Italy and Europe, I constantly see the economic and social benefits of mass transit. I applaud the efforts to secure funds to purchase four new locomotives for the South Florida Regional Network. However, these locomotives run on diesel, which is a product, derived from fossil fuels and I believe a better alternative would have been to fund the electrification of the Tri Rail line.

All mass transit systems in Europe are run with electrified lines. In order for the congressman’s claim of building a 21st century mass transit system for south Florida to be true, than the Tri-Rail line should be converted to 21st century technology.

I have long sent emails and letters to the Obama administration and even applied on Change.gov for a position with these ideas. In addition to living in Europe, I am also a political scientist with two degrees and have a good understanding of the political economy.

Building and repairing infrastructure based on 20th century technology is not the answer to helping to rebuild America. If American leaders in Congress stopped allowing themselves to be influenced by lobbyists and took the long-term interests of the nation and its people in consideration, than American leaders would begin to copy the other most advanced industrial countries in the world and seriously invest in mass transit.

Instead of declaring a national goal with inter planetary goals like the Kennedy administration did in 1961, Mr. Obama and the democratically controlled House and Senate could have begun the process of rebuilding the infrastructure of the United States for the next 150 years.

The economic and social benefits of rail based mass transit are enormous. With large elderly demographics in south Florida, a mass transit system running down the centers of all the major roads like Alt A1A, US One, Donald Ross Road, Military trail, etc….would greatly increase the mobility of this demographic group. Moreover, to answer the critics as to where the right of way would be, the answer is already there as the center of the road, which is currently not used, could be the location for these light rail systems.

For the Americans that want their cake and eat it to, those days are over. It is time Americans begin to stop thinking of their country as exceptional and see how other countries like Japan, France, Germany, and even China are all investing and enjoying the economic and social benefits of mass rail based systems.

How to pay for it? Be a leader and increase the tax on gasoline over a 10-year period. Instead of cars and buses that use oil and rubber and deteriorate after 10 years, the factories in the rust belt of America could be producing high speed and light rail train cars for all the towns and cities across the United States.

Thank you for listening to my suggestion.

A look at Berlusconi's long history of trying to control the press in Italy

Not satisfied with controlling over 80 percent of the media in Italy, the media tycoon turned Italian Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi has recently filed two civil libel lawsuits against the daily newspapers La Repubblica and L'Unità part of the L’Espresso-Repubblica publishing group. The latest lawsuit by Berlusconi on the L’Espresso-Repubblica publishing group is the latest battle in an ongoing war between Berlusconi and the owners of the center left publishing group. When not able to silence his critics in the press by buying them out and controlling them, Berlusconi then turns to the courts in Italy, which have a historical record of being corrupted Berlusconi and his lawyers.

The long ongoing war between Berlusconi and the L’Espresso-Repubblica publishing group goes back to 1991 when Berlusconi tried to monopolize his control of the publishing industry in Italy by controlling Mondadori, the largest book-publishing firm in Italy. In addition to La Repubblica, which was and still is the nation’s second largest newspaper, Mondadori publishes several popular magazines such as Panorama the country’s largest selling newsmagazine. Understanding the political power he was gaining from his control of the private television market, Berlusconi in the late 1980s and early 1990s turned his attention and resources to gain control of the print media in Italy.

Having crossed paths with the financier Carlo DeBenedetti and becoming adversaries in the financial battle to control an Italian food company SME that was being privatized in the mid 1980s, DeBenedetti and Berlusconi fought a legal battle to control Mondadori. Although DeBenedetti had previously entered into an agreement to acquire the shares owned by the Formenton-Mondadori family, Berlusconi challenged the sales agreement between the two parties.

While DeBenedetti won an arbitration board decision that the sales agreement stipulated should be used to resolve any challenge of the sale of the shares of the Mondadori family, Berlusconi then took the case to the Court of Appeals in Rome. That court overturned the seemingly strong sales agreement between DeBenedetti and the Mondadori family. A second court case however awarded Mondadori back to DeBenedetti but then in the third and final round in the Italian judicial system, the court found in favor for Berlusconi. This victory in 1992 gave Berlusconi control of the largest book publishing firm, two major daily newspapers (including the country’s second largest), and the largest magazine publishing group with the two biggest newsmagazines, L’Espresso and Panorama. The third court case even went so far as giving Berlusconi control of the L’Espresso-Repubblica group, which DeBenedetti had acquired in a consensual agreement separate of the Mondadori case.

The concentration of power in the media that Berlusconi would have after the third court ruled in his favor was not lost on the political establishment and the conservative Christian Democrat (DC) party that still controlled Italy at the time. The powerful DC politician Giulio Andreotti sent a representative to talk Berlusconi into giving control of La Repubblica and L’Espresso back to DeBenedetti and with no legal authority, Andreotti was able to get Berlusconi to give L’Espresso and La Repubblica back to Carlo DeBenedetti.

More than 10 years after this event, an Italian court ruled that Berlusconi’s lawyer, Cesare Previti had bribed some of the judges in both of the cases involving Berlusconi and DeBenedetti. The court found that money was used by Berlusconi’s advertising firm, Fininvest, to bribe the judges and that entire passages written by Berlusconi’s lawyers were found in the final ruling of the case.

This latest court case is an example of why Italy is the only western European country ranked as a partial free country by Freedom House and has recently drawn criticism from a top official with the media freedom unit of the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe.

The continual decline of media freedom in Italy is evident when the Vienna-based inter-governmental organization, which is often critical of media freedoms in former Soviet republics, begins to openly criticize a founding member of the European Union.

Addendum - Concerning Auxiliaries, Mixed Soldiery, And One's Own

In the blog posting entitled Concerning Auxiliaries, Mixed Soldiery, And One's Own, a comment by a paid mercenary in the comments section of the blog, pointed out an error was made when the blog published that military contractors do not fall under the United States military justice system known as the Uniform Code of Military Justice (UCMJ). While researching the issue of mercenaries falling under the UCMJ umbrella, there is some more information regarding paid mercenaries and military contractors that needs to be examined in more detail. With the recent news of military contractors and mercenaries outnumbering U.S. Troops in Afghanistan, the analysis is even more crucial.

Since there has not been a formal declaration of war by Congress for 65 years, the UCMJ previously could only be applied “in times of war [to] persons serving with or accompanying an armed force in the field”. Responding to this U.S. Constitutional legal loophole, the political liability paid mercenaries were having in Iraq and concerns raised by American military leaders in Iraq and Afghanistan, Congress in 2007 passed the MEJA Expansion and Enforcement Act of 2007. Although this legislation closed some of the legal loopholes covering paid mercenaries, the legislation also opened additional legal loopholes tailor made for any future defense attorney or criminal defendant facing any serious war crime such as rape or murder.

While some mercenary soldiers may technically fall under the UCMJ and the Military Extraterritorial Jurisdiction Act of 2000, which already allows the prosecution of contractors, in almost all cases of contractor abuse and criminal activity, the contractor will not face any punishment. Mirroring the extraterritorial status for American troops who commit crimes against local civilians in the countries where the United States has a Status of Forces Agreement, military contractors who are often former military members themselves, also enjoy this aspect of the legal grey zone of these SOFA agreements. As Chalmers Johnson meticulously details in his book, The Sorrows of Empire, at the time of the September 11 terrorist attack, the United States had SOFA agreements with over 93 countries in the world. Many of these SOFA agreements are so embarrassing to some host governments in the Islamic world, that they are kept secret in those countries and not discussed in the American mainstream press.

Here are some recent examples of military contractors and mercenaries avoiding punishment the MEJA Expansion and Enforcement Act of 2007 and Military Extraterritorial Jurisdiction Act of 2000 was supposed to cover.

A federal appeals court dismissed a 2004 lawsuit against two American military contractors by Iraqi victims of torture, saying the companies had immunity as government contractors. The suit was filed on behalf of Iraqis who say they or their relatives had been tortured or mistreated at Abu Ghraib prison.
Lawyers for the plaintiffs had argued that the contractors were not immune because the alleged torture fell outside the scope of the work they had agreed to perform.

In July 2007, The Virginian Pilot uncovered documents regarding the U.S. response to a Blackwater employee responsible for shooting to death Iraqi Vice President Adil Abdul-Mahdi's security guard on December 24, 2006. Blackwater's general counsel has stated that the employee was fired and returned to the U.S. A released memo from the U.S. Embassy in Iraq to Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice quotes Abdul-Mahdi as stating, "that Iraqis would not understand how a foreigner could kill an Iraqi and return a free man to his own country." At a Congressional hearing of the Committee on Oversight and Government Reform, the general counsel of Blackwater admitted that one of its employees had shot and killed an Iraqi security officer that day. However, the US Attorney’s office of the Western District of Washington refuses even to confirm if an investigation is underway and if charges will be filed. To date, the employee has not faced an indictment.

A former KBR contractor, Jamie Leigh Jones, was reportedly gang-raped by a group of fellow KBR co-workers in 2005. She claims she was drugged, raped, and subsequently detained in a container without food or telephone access. Despite being on Army contract, the Department of Defense refuses to probe the charges citing its status as an open case with the Department of Justice. However, repeated attempts by Rep. Ted Poe (R-Texas) and Sen. Bill Nelson (D-Florida) to determine why this case has yet to be prosecuted and to have questions answered concerning any on-going investigation, have been met with silence from the Department of Justice (DoJ).

With contractors making up to 57 percent of the Pentagon’s force in Afghanistan, and if the figure is averaged over the past two years, 65 percent, there will undoubtedly be an increase of the rapes and murders committed by military contractors serving in Iraq and Afghanistan. In a report by the Congressional Research Service of military contractors in Iraq and Afghanistan, the report said that the American military has had to adapt to a far less regimented and, in many ways, less accountable force. The report also raised the question of how cost effective contractors and mercenaries are compared to traditional military service members. A force made up of nearly 60 percent of mainly of contractors whose salaries were often triple or quadruple those of a corresponding soldier or Marine is far more expensive to the American taxpayer.

Although the military is founded on the ideals of patriotism, defense of the nation, and loyalty to an abstract set of values known as the American way of life, most mercenaries are instead motivated by money. The privatization of war has turned the civic function of war into an economic enterprise.

Concerning Auxiliaries, Mixed Soldiery, And One's Own

Due to the fast paced 48 hour news cycle and the under reporting of sensitive and embarrassing stories related to the perpetual war in Iraq and Afghanistan, the media has again failed to extensively report on the negative consequences of using private contractors and paid mercenaries to fight America’s Global War on Terror (GWOT). However, as Niccolo Machiavelli, the father of modern day political science warned Prince Lorenzo Medici in his famous book The Prince, “Mercenary soldiers should be avoided for they are disadvantageous to a leader that uses them. For losing, one is undone, and winning, one is their captive.”

The latest news story of drunken military contractors in Afghanistan highlights the precarious relationship American leaders have embarked on with their over-reliance on mercenary soldiers to fill the shortages of an over extended military and the available pool of willing members to fill the All Volunteer Force (AVF). As Andrew Bacevich eloquently explains in his book, Limits of Power- The End of American Exceptionalism, due to the cap on the available pool of recruits to staff the imperial garrisons around the globe and to the fight wars a declining world power fights, the Pentagon is using paid mercenary soldiers to fill in the gaps. The continuing use of paid mercenaries by the Pentagon by such companies as Xe, formally known as Blackwater, will only increase their lobbying power inside Congress, and result in the captive relationship Machiavelli warns about in The Prince.

The danger of using paid mercenary soldiers is not limited to domestic American politics, but also hurts the geo-political objectives American leaders are trying to pursue in countries such as Iraq and Afghanistan. Episodes of military contractors killing unarmed civilians in Iraq such as when Blackwater guards opened fire in Nisoor Square killing 17 civilians, and the latest example of the drunken Kabul embassy guards, are examples of the harm paid mercenaries have on counter insurgency tactics being conducted by US military forces. Each of these incidents by contractor-mercenaries can set back months of progress in a country where the United States is trying to win the hearts and minds of the people. As pentagon paid mercenaries shoot their way through traffic and kill unarmed civilians, while American soldiers give away candy to school children and re-build hospitals, it is no wonder why there has been so little political progress in these countries.

Not falling under the military’s Uniform Military Code of Justice (UCMJ), contractor mercenaries operate in a legal grey zone of international law and accountability. Exacerbating the problem further is that most of the contractor-mercenaries are former military members, which cause a further conflict of interest in the pursuit of accountability and neutrality. Iraqi officials say there are more than 180 mainly US and European security companies in the country, with estimates of the number of American contractors running at 100,000. Many Iraqis see the firms as little more than trigger-happy private armies, and incidents involving these contractor mercenaries have strained relations between Iraq and the US.

Later in the chapter, Concerning Auxiliaries, Mixed Soldiery, And One's Own, Machiavelli advocates that:

“The wise prince, therefore, has always avoided these arms and turned to his own; and has been willing rather to lose with them than to conquer with others, not deeming that a real victory which is gained with the arms of others.”

The increased use of private contractor mercenaries by the Bush administration should come as no surprise due to the fact that President Bush was the first president to posses an advanced business degree with a family purchased M.B.A. from Harvard University. Helped by the political connections of his vice president being link to Halliburton, other war profiting corporations such as Blackwater, Vinnell, and DynCorp all began to get into the new lucrative contractor-mercenary marketplace. An August 2008 Congressional Budget Office (CBO) report showed just how lucrative this new marketplace was in the post 9-11 world, when it reported that the U.S. had already spent at least $100 billion on private contractors in Iraq alone. Since is an official government figure, it should be considered low ball figure of the actual amount of public tax dollars going to private firms such as Halliburton and Backwater.

Just as corporate America continuously puts profits first and ethics second, the private armies employed by the Pentagon mirror their counterparts in the private sector. The only real victor in the wars being waged in Iraq and Afghanistan are the shareholders and owners of companies such as Xe, formally known as Blackwater.

Below are pictures of drunken contractor mercenaries depicting the moral hazzard of employing the types of arms that Nicolo Machiavelli wanrned about.

The Max Baucus Health Care Lobbyist Complex

Possessing a well-informed understanding of how the legislative process works in Congress, political analysts often feel like a director of a play knowing how the next act in a play or an author knowing the outcome of a book that they have written will turn out. On Wednesday, almost performing on cue for the next act to open or the next chapter to be written in the ongoing health care reform debate, Senator Max Baucus of Montana, chairman of The Senate Finance Committee,performed like a puppet on a string for the well-educated political analysts and Washington D.C. insiders.

Writing an Op-ed piece in the conservative and business friendly Wall Street Journal, Senator Max Baucus announced he would not be seeking any bipartisan support for the health care legislation his committee is working on. If the recent health-insurer and managed-care stocks performance is any indication, the health care industry is already considering it will not face any serious threat of new government regulation in its access and control of the 2.5 trillion dollar health care industry.

If you look at the chart for the price of the Standard and Poor's Supercomposite Managed Health Care Index, it was down in the March-April time period, but has since climbed back up after all the lobbying on the congressional leaders.

Thanks to the blog, TomDispatch, a contributor to that blog, Andy Kroll, recently wrote an extremely insightful piece on how the influence machine in Washington D.C. works. Citing information from a Bloomberg.com news story, Kroll discussed how the health care industry in America has hired 3,300 lobbyists on the issue of health care reform. That comes out to a staggering six lobbyists for every one of the 535 members of Congress. These lobbyists and the groups they represent have spent over $263.4 million on lobbying during the first six months of 2009. The amount of lobbyists working for the health care industry is by far the largest group of lobbyists, far outnumbering the 2,400 lobbyists working for the financial industry and the 1,000 lobbyists working for the defense industry.

So that brings us back to Senator Max Baucus the unassuming Senator from Montana who received $1.2 million from health industries for his 2008 re-election campaign, $690,050 of which came from health-related political action committees, the most for any Washington politician. It should be no surprise to learn that Senator Baucus is against the public option and supports a non-profit co-op model, a pseudo-public option that, while successful in a handful of settings nationwide, would, most experts believe, likely fail dismally in any competition with heavyweight private health insurers.

Just as the military industrial complex has a revolving door of retired military officers becoming high priced lobbyists, five former members of Senator’s Max Baucus staff, including two former chiefs of staff are now lobbyists for the health care industry. As detailed by the Sunlight Foundation, a non partisan think tank dedicated to exposing corruption in the U.S. government, five of Baucus’ former staffers currently work for a total of twenty-seven different organizations that are either in the health care or insurance sector or have a noted interest in the outcome. The organizations represented include some of the top lobbying organizations in the health sector: Pharmaceutical Manufacturers and Researchers of America (PhRMA), America’s Health Insurance Plans (AHIP), Amgen, and GE Health Care.

With the health care industry in America comprising over 17 percent of the entire US economy, it is no wonder the naïve and idealistic Hillary Clinton failed in her efforts in the 1990s. Unless the American people elect a grass roots political party in 2010 and 2012, the power and influence lobbyists continue to have in the legislation process will be why the Obama administration will face the same result as Hillary Clinton.

Which kills more, the vaccine or the virus?

Some Italians, who are critical of Beppe Grillo, declare that he is nothing more than a buffoon and is too radical in his political discussions. These same critics however, tend to watch a lot of Berlusconi controlled television or read newspapers such as Il Giornale, the newspaper owned by Mr. Berlusconi’s brother. Other newspapers influenced by Berlusconi such as La Stampa, and Libero in addition to several television stations such as Media Set 5, Italia 1, and Rete 4, all portray Beppe Grillo as a radical political extremist. However, after an analysis of the material posted by Mr. Grillo over the last 18 months, these accusations by Berlusconi and his minions are not based on fact, but on the political desire to discredit and marginalize Mr. Grillo and to protect their obsolete media organizations. Unlike some partisan hack or buffoon that the followers and supporters of Berlusconi make him out to be, Beppe Grillo often interviews Nobel prize winners such as Joseph Stiglitz, winner of the Nobel prize for Economics for the theory of the asymmetry of information and also includes links to information backing up his statements and allegations.

In addition to discussing the host of issues plaguing the Italian republic such as a corrupt and entrenched political establishment, the power and influence of the mafia, and the conflict of interest of a political leader such as Berlusconi owning and controlling nearly 80 percent of the media in Italy, Mr. Grillo discusses a wide range of issues on his blog. However, due to the fact that politics and the decisions by governments, which are just institutions, composed of people like you and I and touches all aspects of our lives, Beppe Grillo also discusses issues such as global warming, legalizing marijuana, and even the H1N1 virus, also known as Swine Flu.

Along with these video and text interviews he posts, Beppe Grillo and his team of bloggers at his blog which is the 7th most popular blog in the entire world, often posts information on current subjects. On Tuesday, Mr. Grillo posted some information on a study of the new Swine Flu vaccine.

“According to a study carried out in 21 Spanish hospitals and made known by the International Society for Infectious Diseases, there are no existing factors or pre-existing illnesses that can facilitate contracting the influenza A (pandemic A (H1N1) 2009 virus). The healthy patients without risk factors should however not underestimate the risk of contracting the virus. If on the one hand it is true that the great majority of those that contract the influenza get over it without complications, a minority of patients get worse around the fourth or the fifth day. "The natural symptoms of the disease are usually three or four days of fever, generally over 38 degrees with a steady improvement in the following days.” (Jordi Rello, head of the intensive care unit of Tarragona Joan XXIII Hospital)

The health authorities should concentrate not just on the prevention of the illness and on the treatment of the less severe cases, but also on the care of the patients with complications who are in Intensive Care. It is estimated that only 0.2% of patients suffer serious complications from the flu. That means that for every million people affected, about 2,000 suffer complications. A number that is often unmanageable by the Intensive Care Units.
Obesity and pregnancy are risk factors for the development of serious complications. The average age of patients being treated in the Intensive Care Units for influenza A is 40 years and about 25% of these die.”

If you would like to receive email notifications for outbreaks on infectious diseases, please click on the link for the International Society for Infectious Diseases.

Has America become so intolerant?

A friend from Palm Beach County recently emailed me and told me that cyclists who want to cycle on Jupiter Island have to attach a pole with a red flag attached to it. While I guess many people in PBC had seen this coming, as an American ex pat living in Europe, it really displays the ugly side of America. It is disturbing to see how some people in American society have become so intolerant and how the wealthy are allowed to abuse their political power in America. Instead of harassing noisy gas burning motorcyclists who also enjoy riding up their precious scenic coastal road, the intolerant and temporary wealthy homeowners of Jupiter Island are targeting the wrong people in Palm Beach County.

In addition to hearing that cyclists were continuing to be harassed by the Jupiter Island police department, it was disappointed to hear that all the cyclists now travel on the more dangerous and high traffic state road US one. I still cringe when I think of the cycling deaths I have heard about on US 1. I especially remember this one instance where an intoxicated woman in an SUV, struck and killed a cyclist and only stopped when she entered Tequesta when someone spotted the bicycle under her car. When I meet people here in Rome and they learn that I ride a road bicycle in the busy Rome traffic and in the surrounding area on weekends, they are surprised to hear me say that cycling here in Rome traffic is actually safer then in South Florida. Perhaps if the snowbirds and part time wealthy residents of Jupiter Island drove smaller cars, the road would not seem so small to them.

Along with the cyclists having to ride on the more dangerous US 1, it was disappointing to hear that the cyclists in PBC and Martin County rolled over and let the homeowners on Jupiter Island win this battle. The failure of the cyclist in PBC and Martin County to mobilize and protest against this new law will only encourage other areas to consider such restrictions and possible bans on cycling. Cyclists should have banded together and showed their solidarity in protest to this ban. Has American become such a police state and a country of intolerant people that it would arrest dozens of cyclists in spandex pants and tap shoes for civil disobedience on a Sunday morning?

While some people may argue that this issue is more about private property due to the fact that the road is private property, people have failed to argue that the draw bridges connecting the residents of Jupiter Island to Palm Beach and Martin country were built with federal and state tax dollars. If it was not for these draw bridges, most of the residents on Jupiter Island would not even live there.

Living in Italy has opened my eyes to how people here all co-exist in a tolerant manner. The close urban and dense living conditions almost mandate a level of tolerance and understanding more Americans should have. For example, it still boggles my mind how home owners associations have banned people from hanging clothes outside the very homes they purchased. Like the homeowners on Jupiter Island, this is also a demonstration of the level of intolerance Americans are becoming accustomed to. Like the bicycle which consumes no energy and is good for the environment, hanging clothes to dry on a clotheslines offers the same environmental and non polluting advantages.

For a country that likes to brag about democracy and being the Beacon on top of the hill for the rest of the world, I can tell you most of my Italian cycling teammates will see this harassment on cyclists as what it really is: agents of the government harassing and arresting other citizens on the behalf of the more elite in a society.

Peace and building Jewish settlements on Occupied Territories, are two parallel lines that do not meet in the Middle East

Due to the polemical characteristic of the Israeli occupied territories in the West Bank, Gaza, and East Jerusalem, it was no surprise the recent news story of the Netanyahu government decision to build more settlements in the West Bank and East Jerusalem only got a passing mention in the media. The corporate 48 hour news cycle weapons of mass distraction media failure to discuss the continued violation of international law by the Jewish State, is one of the reasons why the American press ranks as only the 41st most free and open press in the world. The tenuous and superficial manner in which the media in America discusses the issue of the occupied territories in one of the main reasons why more Americans do not have a more unfeigned understanding of the plight of the Palestinian people.

The settlements are a core issue in the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. Nearly 500,000 Israelis now live in towns and neighborhoods built in the West Bank and east Jerusalem — lands captured by Israel in the 1967 Mideast war and claimed by the Palestinians. The Palestinians say the ever-growing settler presence will soon make it impossible for them to establish an independent state in these areas. The decision by the Netanyahu government to build new settlements in the West Bank and East Jerusalem will only add to the rancorous relationship between Jews and Arabs in the area. Instead of following a more pragmatic approach favored by members of the Obama administration, the extreme right wing influence in the Netanyahu government is proving that the Israeli state does not feel is has to be complaisant to the wishes of its largest economic and military supporter or obey international law.

The refusal of Israel to follow the wishes of the Obama administration and to ignore international law is ironic due to the fact the United Nations created the Jewish State in 1948. It was in that year that the UN General Assembly adopted its plan (Resolution 181) to partition Palestine into two states. The Palestinians were to remain the majority in the two states and their rights were to be maintained and protected.

Since its establishment in 1948 however, Israel has violated numerous UN resolutions including the very one creating it and international law by occupying and annexing land recognized and designated to the future Palestinian state and by uprooting Palestinians from their legal and historical homeland. Additionally, Israel is in breach of international law by refusing the return of the uprooted Palestinians, by transferring its nationals, by building settlements and by changing the character of the occupied Palestinian territory.

Recently the head of the Head of the Negotiations Affairs Department in the Palestine Liberation Organization, Saeb Erekat, remarked that the new settlements in the occupied Palestinian Territories would only add to the deception Israeli leader’s claim of wanting to pursue peace. Speaking to the UN Special Coordinator for the Middle East Peace Process Robery Serry and US Consul General Daniel Rubenstein in a meeting alongside Greek Consul General Soterios Athanasius, Erekat asked, “If the US administration is unable to make the Israeli government to stop its settlement activities then who will ever believe it will be able convince them to withdraw to the 1967 borders, or solve the issues of the final status?”

The Head of the Negotiations Affairs Department for the Palestine Liberation Organization further elaborated on the problem of the settlements by saying, “If Israel wants to make peace in the region, they must know peace and settlement are two parallel lines that do not meet.”

The to continue build settlements on occupied land is a key reason why the recent news of is further reason to stop the unyielding US taxpayer support of the Jewish State.

The slap in the face to the Obama administration’s opposition to any new settlements is proving that the Israel government is increasingly becoming more recalcitrant due to the domestic political influence of AIPAC in American politics. With the United States bleeding red ink with trillion dollar deficits, it is time American leaders start to withhold any future funding to the state of Israel and start putting the interests of the American people, before the interests of foreign nationals who are increasingly treating American leaders and the American people for that matter with contempt.

Before reforming Health Care in America, Congress should start with itself first

The recent media coverage of the sometimes disruptive and boisterous town hall meetings held by members of congress highlight how important it is for more people to vote. The media coverage of the public outcry against the proposed reforms to health care negatively impacted the debate about public health care reform in America because the media coverage gave the impression that a majority of the electorate is against health care reform. This coverage was flawed and was a disservice to the people who voiced their opinions and desires over the last two election cycles. It would have been interesting to see the turnout and attitude of these town hall meetings, if attendance was limited to people who had voted in the last election. Just like the war in Iraq and the desire of the American people to see the occupation end in that country, the recent issue of health care reform in the latest example of how special interests demands override the voter at the ballot box.

In the 2006 mid term elections, voters gave the Democratic Party a mandate against the war in Iraq and the handling of the occupation of Iraq by the Bush administration. However, even with this mandate and the Democratic Party gaining a slight majority in the house and Senate, the occupation in Iraq and the open-ended conflict in Afghanistan is continuing. This is due in large part to democratic leaders such as Senator Diane Feinstein and Barbara Boxer being from the powerful defense industry state of California. Both of these politicians know that the CEOs and other defense industry employees and corporations who would feel threatened by any cuts in their lucrative defense contracts, would easily support their opponents in the next election.

The 2008 election was another mandate for change and the Democratic Party won an even stronger majority in the House of Representatives and a near filibuster proof majority in the Senate. However, the media and the special interests in Washington D.C. are undermining the democratic process by colluding to weaken support for health care reform. Like the defense industry lobbyists requesting unnecessary and costly weapons programs that do little for the national security of the United States, lobbyists from the health care insurance companies, American Medical Association, and the powerful pharmaceutical industry will make sure their corporate and profitable interests are protected at the expense and well being of the general public’s access to affordable health care.

Although health care is an area the U.S. government should become more involved in, the more important and critical issue the members of congress should be trying to reform and change is their own institution.

The misguided Keynesianism economic policy of American leaders

The United States government is hiring!

While this may sound like good news to the millions of unemployed job seekers in the American labor market, the negative characteristic of this hiring, is that a large proportion is related to the National Security State Apparatus. The tens of thousands of government jobs available are funding national security state agencies like the Department Of Defense and dozens of alphabet soup intelligence agencies such as the National Geospatial-Intelligence Agency.

This misguided Keynesianism economic policy is providing little economic growth for American industries such as the steel and textile industries, just to name a few, and is actually contributing to the continued economic decline of America with more service industry jobs being funded by the government while the more economically valuable manufacturing jobs are ignored. Instead of some “analyst” performing a redundant job for the national security state apparatus, just imagine if that energy and time was focused on designing and implementing a mass rail network project for California or light rail system for your own community in America.

A close analysis of a recent job posting entitled GEOINT Analysts (Imagery Intelligence) for the national security supports this view. Breaking down the job qualification and requirements for this position located in Seoul South Korea within the national security state apparatus sufficiently proves the redundant and unnecessary work these bureaucratic positions entail.

JOB DESCRIPTION: GEOINT Analysts (Imagery Intelligence) task and exploit imagery in support of national and military security goals, concerns, and strategies. They conduct multi-INT research, populate intelligence databases, and produce written, graphic, and oral intelligence products. This sounds like a lot of duplicate work some people in the military and the CIA should already be doing.

They primarily analyze military force structure, capabilities, intentions, and vulnerabilities of adversaries and potential adversaries, weapons proliferation, emerging technologies, and treaty monitoring. Again, this is something the military should be doing and treaty monitoring is something the State Department should be responsible for, not the Department of Defense.

They also work on diverse issues such as environmental concerns, counter narcotics, disaster assessments, infrastructure, underground facilities, and counterterrorism. Put another way, the job requires the person to look at any situation and apply the national security state apparatus goals and ambitions in order to justify its ever growing power and influence in the government and American society.

In some assignments, they may apply specialized science and technology skills in analysis, imagery extraction and visual scene creation, advanced geospatial techniques, CAD modeling, photogrammetry, and precise mensuration to produce highly detailed, labor-intensive products. This sentence actually exposes that the incumbent hired will not perform all the duties listed in the job description. How can anyone be knowledgeable in CAD design and modeling and be qualified in treaty review and analysis? CAD is computer animated design and is usually earned with a engineering degree, while to monitor a treaty signed between two parties, the expert usually has a law degree or political science education.

Instead of funding thousands of bureaucratic white collar positions for the revolving door cartel of the national security state where members of the military transfer into highly paid DOD positions, more Americans should be demanding that their tax dollars be spent on programs that benefits the American economy and their own standard of living. Infrastructure projects like mass rail systems that would benefit and increase economic output while also benefiting the average American, are the types of jobs and industries the American government should be funding.

The economic benefits of people building a mass rail network and other infrastructure projects will contribute more to the American economy by providing new wealth opportunities in communities across the country. The people building the trains and related infrastructure would then have money to spend in local communities further creating more service industry and economic opportunities to average hard working Americans.

The controlled and sanitized media coverage of the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan

Link to Associated Press Interactive:Death of a Marine.

Not satisfied with fighting multi wars in far away countries, Secretary of Defense Robert Gates has begun to attack the Associated Press for publishing a photo of an American Marine lying wounded in a fire fight in Afghanistan while fighting a group of lightly armed Taliban militants. Although American leaders did not learn any valuable strategic or military lessons from The Vietnam War, American political leaders however, with the help of a compliant and weak press, did learn that to suppress and stifle any future anti-war movement, media coverage of any future wars, should be controlled and sanitized as much as possible. The recent news story of Secretary of Defense, Robert Gates, criticizing The Associated Press for releasing the photo of a Marine killed in battle, is a key example of this political tactic. While Robert Gates called the decision by the Associated Press “appalling” to release the photo, it is more appalling and a threat to the free press and American democracy that a leading government official should make these kinds of remarks.


One of the leading reasons why the American electorate is not more disgusted and yelling at their congressmen and women like there were during Town Hall meetings on health care reform in America is due to the lack of media coverage of the war in Iraq and Afghanistan. The lack of daily coverage showing the reality of war such as soldiers dying on a dirt road in some province in Afghanistan or showing close up pictures of innocent civilians killed in an accidental air bombing by the US military , is the main reason why more Americans are not protesting to end the wars in the far away countries. The decaying moral fiber of America and the lack of discussion in the mass media of more substantive issues such as the human and financial cost of the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, is alarming. Just as American corporations outsourced American jobs to India, China, and other low cost labor countries, the American public has outsourced and distanced themselves from the harsh and disturbing realities of war.

Instead of refusing government help in having the government try to reduce skyrocketing medical insurance premiums and the high cost of medical care in America, these same protestors should be screaming at the their elected officials for using the youth who have the honor and courage to serve in the military as canon fodder. It is truly disheartening to see Americans yell at their elected officials and call Obama a socialist Hitler like leader, while no one screams bloody murder about the needless deaths of Americans soldiers in Iraq and Afghanistan.

Instead of wasting your time watching a Glenn Beck video clip or any of the other various airheads on the Cable News outlets, I hope you take the time to view this photo essay.

Link to Associated Press Interactive:Death of a Marine.

As a amateur photographer and a political analyst, I find the rules governing press access and what is allowed to be published in the war zones of Iraq and Afghanistan truly alarming and a threat to my freedom. I find it disturbing that the American public is constantly exposed to the fantasy land violence of popular television shows and movies, while it is isolated and not allowed to see pictures and images of American soldiers fighting and sometimes dying in combat zones their elected officials sent them to fight in.

Unlike other people who don’t believe things can change, I hope you take the time to view the photos and audio dialogue from the Associated Press website on the firefight that the Marine died in. Viewing the pictures and hearing the reporter tell her story is like reading a book and turning the pages of a powerful story.

Photograph of 21 year old Lance Cpl. Joshua Bernard.

The negative effects of foreign military Keynesianism

John Maynard Keynes was a British economist who believed that government spending should increase during slow downs in economic activity to help stimulate the economy. The United States used this policy, known as Keynesianism, during The Great Depression to fund government projects like the Hoover Dam in Nevada and The Tennessee Valley Authority. This same type of government funded economic stimulus was later used to fund the American war effort during World War II which helped put millions of Americas to work in factories which would be known as the Arsenals of Democracy. Unfortunately, history is proving that while the United States may have won the battle against fascism in Europe, Imperial Japanese aggression in the Pacific, and the ideological battle against the Soviet Union, the United States is now losing the war to survive as a global power. Due to the trillion dollar deficits caused by the Pentagon and the institutions of militarism in America, to help stem the tide of trillion dollar deficits, Americans need to stop the practice of military Keynesianism by first reducing the amount of US taxpayer money in foreign countries. The failure of the American public to link the lack of social services and economic opportunities in America to the ever-increasing Pentagon budget is the primary reason why the American standard of living and American power is declining. Unlike the mainstream media, the blog will look at how military spending in foreign military bases, also known as military Keynesianism, is one of the leading factors contributing to the decline of the American economy.

Using the US Naval Base in Naples as a starting point, according to the 2007 Pentagon Base Structure Report, the number of US taxpayer supported jobs at the US Naval base in Naples is well over 3,000 people and a lot of American tax dollars going into the Italian economy helping to keep Italians employed. These figures by the Pentagon’s annual Base Structure Report do not include the U.S. sailors stationed on ships on patrol in the Mediterranean who pull into Naples for a port visit, further contributing to the local economy. Considering that one visiting aircraft carrier carrying over 5,000 sailors and marines could substantially further stimulate the local Naples economy.

Due to the irregular variable of the number of sailors visiting the US Naval Base in Naples, perhaps a better case example to examine the macroeconomic impact of foreign military Keynesianism is to examine the economic and social benefits of US taxpayer money for Italians living in the Tuscany region.

Located among the rolling hills of olive trees, vineyards, and small medieval towns is the small U.S. Army Garrison in Livorno known as USAG Livorno. This small Cold War era weapons depot is part of the larger Camp Darby military installation located near Pisa, Italy. USAG Livorno employs nine foreign nationals at the main base of Livorno and employs 330 at the Livorno Supply and Maintenance area.

Highlighting the negative effects of foreign military Keynesianism, if the average worker employed at USAG Livorno earns only 2100 Euro a month ($1.38 = $ 2898.00 a month) the total cost of the 339 Italians working at these two small locations equals nearly 12 million dollars a year. Although some critics to this argument and discussion of military spending will say that 12 million dollars is a small amount of money, just imagine what 12 million dollars of US taxpayer money could do for your community. Just imagine the help from the federal government could provide your community in terms of health care or economic stimulus programs such as building a light rail network and employing people to run it.Perhaps the more important factor to consider is the fact that foreign nationals employed at US military in foreign countries will not face higher taxes in their country, like the American people will who are responsible for the ever increasing deficits needed to pay their salaries.

This is only a superficial analysis of the economic impact of two U.S. military bases in an Empire of Bases located around the world. According to the Pentagon’s own Base Structure Report for 2008, there are still another 760 U.S. military bases in other people’s countries and 104 U.S. territories, which produces a grand total of 865 U.S. taxpayer funded military bases around the world.

Due to the lack of political discussion in America, there is no question why Americans do not have health care funded by the government or other social services most other countries enjoy and demand of their government. It is ironic that in a majority of the countries where US military bases are located, the people living in those countries actually have a higher standard of living than most Americans enjoy.