President Betray-us

"We’ve shot an amazing number of people, but to my knowledge, none has ever proven to be a threat."
General Stanley McChrystal

Today President Obama fired General Stanley McChrystal for what he called "poor judgement" in his candid remarks recorded in a Rolling Stone article criticizing several senior level officials. McChrystals' staff members also joined in with comments about Joe Biden in which he is nick named "Bite me" and Richard Holbrooke is called a "wounded animal". One of the generals' staff members discussed an oval office meeting between Obama and McChrystal in which they worked out the surge of troops into Afghanistan last year, a strategy that McChrystal lobbied heavily to implement. The staff member interviewed described Obama as "not very engaged" and added that his boss General McChrystal "was pretty disappointed." I wonder if Obama were to speak candidly if he might be "disappointed" in McChrystals failed strategy, and the overall failure in Afghanistan.

But here is the most interesting part of the puzzle, the previous US ambassador to Afghanistan Karl Eikenberry was also targeted by McChrystals comments. Leaked internal discussions last November revealed Eikenberrys' opposition to McChrystals' surge of 40,000 additional troops based on the corruption of Afghan president Hamid Karzai and his brother who heads one of the largest opium poppy trades in the country. This came not long after a demonstrably rigged election in which Karzai retained his presidential seat and his unofficial title of "The mayor of Kabul". Obama threw in his lot with this US puppet by endorsing the elections despite the overwhelming evidence of vote rigging.

Not surprisingly, McChrystal said he felt "Betrayed" by Eikenberrys' comments. I could understand why a senior commander in the context of a war would not want internal disagreements to be aired to the public, but is it really a matter of betrayal to simply disagree? Or was it only a problem because this was someone who had all of the necessary facts to come to his conclusions instead of someone from the outside who can state the obvious again and again and simply be dismissed by the top brass as not knowing the details of the situation on the ground? Whatever happened behind the scenes, Eikenberry headed to Washington a few short weeks later to tell congress that he fully supported McChrystals planned surge, even though nothing had changed to address his previously stated concerns.

So the buzz in the media and the word from Obama himself is that these comments from McChrystal and his staff showed "poor judgment". But Obama decided to hold firm to the surge policy still in effect in Afghanistan. If McChrystal showed signs of poor judgement, and it was his poor judgement that persuaded Obama to adopt the surge in opposition to the dire warnings of the US ambassador to Afghanistan, why then can we not question the ongoing policy there? The answer is simple, Obama does not want to appear weak, a sure sign that he actually is weak and that the current policy is the real "wounded animal". Obamas' strongest virtue is his critical thinking intellectual skills, if he is unwilling to use these skills for fear of attack from the right, he is bound and gagged and utterly powerless.

To make matters worse Obama is replacing Stanley McChrystal with general David Petreus, currently head of CentCom and previously commander in Iraq under George W. Bush. Petraeus was the architect of Iraqs counter-insurgency strategy of surging the country with tens of thousands of additional troops. We heard over and over again that this "surge was working" as Republicans squeezed it for more and more political capital in the elections taking place around the US at that time. But later we learned that it wasn't the surge of troops that was having the largest effect on the insurgency, but the surge of cash that those soldiers were given to hand out to people who simply promised not to shoot at them.

The apparent success of Petraeus' surge was purchased by the American tax payers so that the strategy would lend legitimacy to the Republican party and the Bush administrations' war of terror. We never had enough troops for a real counter-insurgency occupation of Iraq so Petraeus decided that the Iraqi forces would be quadrupled to pick up the slack. With this single decision Petraeus showed his poor judgement by trusting that hundreds of thousands of Iraqis would be loyal to their chain of command and not simply turn around and take their new weapons and training and join the insurgency against the armies occupying their homeland. To this day Iraq is a broken country having cost billions of US taxpayer dollars, tens of thousands of dead and wounded soldiers, and millions of dead and displaced Iraqi civilians.

It's no wonder John McCain is happy Petraeus will be taking over, he wanted an endless war and now he knows he'll get what he wants.

Opt out revolution!

The time has come for the vast majority of the people of earth to deal once and for all with our oppressors and those responsible for the destruction of our environments. I am not calling for a violent revolt against the governments of the world, that is the only scenario they are prepared for. Instead the governments should be dismissed, ignored, demoralized, and gutted of their former glory and romantic sentiments. Nations and their various apparatus should be boycotted and the most effective way to achieve this is boycotting government currency. Alternative currencies are functioning in many communities around the world and they (and their model) are ready to take over at any moment if/when a global cataclysm occurs.

In cities like Ithaca, New York and Madison, Wisconsin there are alternative currencies based on the "Hours" system. These currencies are widely accepted around their respective communities and have for years been gaining more and more credibility. The concept of "Hours" is an alternative to "Dollars" or "Euros" or any other government backed units of currency. To understand "hours" first one must ask themselves what "dollars" represent? Gold? No, dollars have not represented gold for almost 40 years, and even when they did, who decided how much gold? Dollars and other government currencies represent absolutely nothing, they are nothing more than paper and ink, and now magnetic strips and computer chips. Dollars only have power if we all agree that they do, like tinkerbell, if we just believe.

Hours, however, are based on something very real, one "hour" equals one hour of human labor. Though these hours look like regular paper money, or notes, they are forever pegged to an unwavering standard. It may not seem fair to some that an hour of hard labor, such as building roads, is somehow equal to an hour of light office work, especially for an executive who has secretaries doing most of their work for them. But consider how the dollar works: as it is now the road builder can work full time with no vacation and make less than $50,000 a year while the corporate executive spends little time in the office and receives a $5,000,000 bonus on top of a $600,000 annual salary. Even if we don't soon feel the need to buck off our corporate overlords, wouldn't it be nice if they could make no more than minimum wage? And receive no more bonuses?

With Hours instead of Dollars the current class system could not exist, no person could accumulate wealth greater than the hours they could work in their lifetime. Hours are essentially immune to interest and inflation and the exportation of wealth, and prices and wages rarely need adjustment. The manipulation of government currencies through interest, inflation, and excessive printing have turned our markets into a cruel game in which the winners constantly tinker with the rules so that the game is less and less fair. The ability for one person to accumulate limitless dollars means that for every millionaire their are thousands more people who cannot afford their next meal, for every billionaire their are thousands of people who cannot afford their rent or mortgage payment. The cost of privately held wealth is the destitution of the greater population, a cost too great and a collective burden too heavy to bear.

The truth is that government currency is worthless, it is like an insolvent corporation whose stock went belly up long ago. In fact, governments are really nothing more than corporations and their currencies are the stocks we trade. Our acceptance of government currencies validates not only the currency but the entity, the government, the ultimate limited liability corporation. No matter what you buy with your US dollar you are simultaneously buying the United States federal government, you are not only validating it's existence but in a way you are entering into a contractual agreement completely on it's terms. Essentially every legal entanglement we have with our governments begin to fade as we terminate this contractual relationship, they cannot, even if they wanted to, tax you for any alternative currency you hold because they don't own it.

Once you realize that government is just another greedy corporation destroying our planet a simple solution emerges: Boycott! If you are lucky enough to have an hours based community currency in your area, participate in it as much as possible. If you do not, begin to study these examples and lay the groundwork for this alternative in your community. The day when the almighty dollar is only as valuable as the paper it's printed on is right around the corner, if it's not already worthless. So remeber what you're buying with your US Dollars: The class system, the casino economy, war, global hegemony, torture, etc. If however, you believe that you too will someday be fabulously wealthy, think about all of the people who will have less so you can have more, people just like you.

Jesus goes Rambo

In my last post I went about as far as I could go in personally declaring WAR ON ISRAEL, and I'm only too happy to elaborate. Do you remember how we were led to war with Iraq and Afghanistan and supporting the war meant that you had to believe it was the only option and therefore a worthy cause? I didn't believe those wars were (or still are) worthy or legitimate. But I do feel that way about Israels dangerously unstable and volatile behavior and they do have nuclear weapons and are chomping at the bit to use them on the people of Iran. That's right, you heard me correctly, I said the nation of Israel is an unstable and volatile force in the region directly threatening the innocent people of Iran. Does this sound backwards to you?

I am in solidarity with all oppressed people against all governments and elitist organizations including the upper echelons of wealth and power. I am not a fan of the Iranian government any more or less than the average government including (if not especially) the American government. Wars are pretty much the sole domain of nations orchestrated by politicians and generals, if anyone outside of these institutions tries to get in on the business of war they are considered terrorists. Even if those engaged in battle are the victims of an invading country, such as insurgents in Iraq and Afghanistan. But in the rare case of Palestine, a country with a government and flag is not allowed to take up arms to defend itself without being labeled "terrorists".

As we know there is a backlash when our military kills innocent civilians, it is a primary recruiter for the enemy of the day. At least that's how the government frames it, the truth is that anyone whose family has just been brutally murdered would be justified in wanting to take up arms against the offending army. In fact if you compare the motives of young American soldiers trained to reign down hell and brainwashed into attacking anyone referred to as "enemy" with the motives of a young man turned "insurgent" whose wife and children, brothers, sisters, parents, and grandparents have died in the bombing of a wedding, you have a hard time determining who the "good guys" are. We the people were promised a country without "standing armies" and somehow we ended up with the military/congressional industrial war complex Eisenhower warned us about.

So governments corner the market on war and we're supposed to hate whomever they tell us to, so that we might go against our "good nature" long enough to wish hell, death, and terror on another people. But the war crimes of a government are displayed not just in whom they unjustly attack, but whom they do not justly attack. In this case Israel has met every criteria ever given by our government as just cause for war, and even preemptive war. And yet we have a "special relationship" with Israel and our government is locked into a sugar daddy role with no influence whatsoever. A more colorful analogy would be to paint America as a pimp and Israel as a crack whore, both are sociopathic and do not respond to logic or the sentiment of public opinion. And both seem to be oblivious to the destruction they are causing to themselves and the community they exist in.

I feel very strongly that no peaceful strategy will convince the Israel or American governments to change their minds, goals, or strategies. I also don't feel that violence will achieve that end, but war is looking more and more likely. Israel may be fighting a PR battle right now but they will not have good relations with any country for a long time and may find themselves at war with Turkey (a member of the EU) unless they can strong arm the UN with a little help from their friends in the state department. And now the world finally cannot deny the crime of Israels blockade and occupation of Palestine. But I sincerely hope for the sake of the people of the region (especially the Palestinians) that no violence breaks out on any scale. Unfortunately, Israels' behavior makes that tinder box look like an inevitable catastrophe.

And to speak directly to those defenders of Israel, whether you are cynically aware of Israels crimes or blissfully ignorant and naive. Those peace activists on the boats had very clear intentions and you wish to make them out to be terrorists on a suicide mission against Israel. They were heading for the coast of a sovereign nation which Israel illegally occupies, blockades, and terrorizes daily. They had no weapons but what you might take camping, do you really think that invaders intent on attacking the Israeli military would arm themselves with swiss army knives? And to suggest that their intent was to provoke this kind of reaction simply as a PR stunt for Palestine is absurd. Peaceful people have been demonstrating under threat of death through the ages and justice is ALWAYS on their side.