THE PIMP ISSUE: VOLUME 32, ISSUE 53
THE PRIME MERIDIAN
by Malik Isasis
George W. Bush has created a world where his perversity of failure and anti-intellectualism is the Gold Standard for which the corporate media has used to disseminate propaganda to hide the trillions he has jacked and the millions he has killed and displaced. While tumbling down this rabbit hole for eight years, I have called Bush several names—all very fitting, but none fit as snug as Caligula, who was the third Emperor of Rome, who ruled Rome with brutality, extravagance, and sexual and violent perversity.
Just recently in September 2008 it was discovered that officials from the Bush administration were literally in bed with Big Oil.
Government officials in charge of collecting royalties from oil companies accepted ski holidays and other gifts from the firms they were meant to be regulating, as well as using cocaine and having sex with industry executives, according to an official report released yesterday.
The inspector general's investigation found a "culture of substance abuse and promiscuity" operating at the mineral management service (MMS), the government agency charged with regulating oil companies.
Writer/Columnist Naomi Klein noticed a trend—or rather a financial scheme by Bush and Cheney that went something like this:
On August 5, 2004, the White House created the Office of the Coordinator for Reconstruction and Stabilization, headed by former US Ambassador to Ukraine Carlos Pascual. Its mandate is to draw up elaborate "post-conflict" plans for up to twenty-five countries that are not, as of yet, in conflict. According to Pascual, it will also be able to coordinate three full-scale reconstruction operations in different countries "at the same time," each lasting "five to seven years."Fittingly, a government devoted to perpetual pre-emptive deconstruction now has a standing office of perpetual pre-emptive reconstruction.
Gone are the days of waiting for wars to break out and then drawing up ad hoc plans to pick up the pieces.
Enter Iraq, and the occupation. During the first three years of the Iraq Occupation, the first Director of Reconstruction and Humanitarian Assistance in Iraq, and an awardee of the Medal of Freedom, Paul L. Bremer lost $9 billion dollars. $9 billion dollars disappeared into thin air and the media went almost silent, yet they spent nearly two months talking about a black preacher from Chicago.
Nearly $9 billion of money spent on Iraqi reconstruction is unaccounted for because of inefficiencies and bad management, according to a watchdog report published Sunday.
Philip Giraldi, a former CIA Officer wrote in The American Conservative on October 24, 2005, “The American-dominated Coalition Provisional Authority could well prove to be the most corrupt administration in history, almost certainly surpassing the widespread fraud of the much-maligned UN Oil for Food Program. At least $20 billion that belonged to the Iraqi people has been wasted, together with hundreds of millions of U.S. taxpayer dollars. Exactly how many billions of additional dollars were squandered, stolen, given away, or simply lost will never be known because the deliberate decision by the CPA not to meter oil exports means that no one will ever know how much revenue was generated during 2003 and 2004.”
In August 2005 Hurricane Katrina offered another opportunity for Bush and Cheney. On Christmas Day, December 25, 2006, the AP reported, “The tally for Hurricane Katrina waste could top $2 billion next year because half of the lucrative government contracts valued at $500,000 or greater for cleanup work are being awarded without little competition.”
Starving the Beast
Bush’s hatred for government is in line with the modern Republican philosophy of contempt toward the American people, popularized by Ronald Reagan who famously said, “The nine most terrifying words in the English language are, 'I'm from the government and I'm here to help.'” So, throughout the Reagan and Bush I administrations, but more significantly in Bush II administration, the government has been deliberately weakened and unresponsive as a self-fulfilling prophecy as evidenced of big government being bad for the people, and it is when run by sociopathic Republicans.
The Republicans would like to destroy social welfare programs like social security, welfare and medicare and medicaid. They could never say that, but they can bankrupt the country, therefore starving the programs out of existence. In Conservative circles, this is referred to as “Starving the Beast”.
The New Rape
After eight years of having his way with the people he governs, Bush has taken the latest manmade catastrophe, the collapse of the American banking system, to ask the American people for $700,000,000,000 dollars…without any strings attached. Just as the rush to go to war on lies on Weapons of Mass Destruction, just as the rush to pass the U.S. Patriot Act , Play-it-Again-Sam Bush is rushing the Congress to pass a “clean bill” without any strings attached for seven-hundred billion dollars---eleven zeroes. This time around Bush hasn’t even attempted to hide his agenda. It is out in the open for the public to see, and he is daring the Congress to not pass it.
Here is some of the language in some of Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson’s proposal:
For example, in his initial three-page proposal, Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson advocated giving himself unchecked authority to spend $700 billion in taxpayers’ money without any oversight or review whatsoever. The language of the proposal was stark:
“The Secretary is authorized to purchase … on such terms and conditions as determined by the Secretary …”
“The Secretary is authorized to take such actions as the Secretary deems necessary …”
“Decisions by the Secretary pursuant to the authority of this Act are nonreviewable … and may not be reviewed by any court of law or any administrative agency.”
As Morgan Stanley and Goldman Sachs are the only investment banks standing, they will have first dibs at the trough.
Goldman Sachs Group -- formerly run by Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson, and Morgan Stanley, stand to be among the biggest beneficiaries of a $700 billion US bailout.
"Its benefits, in its current form, will be largely limited to investment banks and other banks that have aggressively written down the value of their holdings and have already recognized the attendant capital impairment," Jeffrey Rosenberg, Bank of America's head of credit strategy research, wrote in a report obtained by Bloomberg News yesterday.
The corporate media congratulate themselves daily on their disinformation campaigns and trivialities and ignore the fact that Bush creates chaos in order to pretend to be doing something about it.
French philosopher Voltaire once said, “All murderers are punished unless they kill in large numbers and to the sound of trumpets.” Bush would be called an extortionist or embezzler, but since it’s on a grand scale, it is call a bail out or rescue plan.
THE PRIME MERIDIAN
by Malik Isasis
George W. Bush has created a world where his perversity of failure and anti-intellectualism is the Gold Standard for which the corporate media has used to disseminate propaganda to hide the trillions he has jacked and the millions he has killed and displaced. While tumbling down this rabbit hole for eight years, I have called Bush several names—all very fitting, but none fit as snug as Caligula, who was the third Emperor of Rome, who ruled Rome with brutality, extravagance, and sexual and violent perversity.
Just recently in September 2008 it was discovered that officials from the Bush administration were literally in bed with Big Oil.
Government officials in charge of collecting royalties from oil companies accepted ski holidays and other gifts from the firms they were meant to be regulating, as well as using cocaine and having sex with industry executives, according to an official report released yesterday.
The inspector general's investigation found a "culture of substance abuse and promiscuity" operating at the mineral management service (MMS), the government agency charged with regulating oil companies.
Writer/Columnist Naomi Klein noticed a trend—or rather a financial scheme by Bush and Cheney that went something like this:
On August 5, 2004, the White House created the Office of the Coordinator for Reconstruction and Stabilization, headed by former US Ambassador to Ukraine Carlos Pascual. Its mandate is to draw up elaborate "post-conflict" plans for up to twenty-five countries that are not, as of yet, in conflict. According to Pascual, it will also be able to coordinate three full-scale reconstruction operations in different countries "at the same time," each lasting "five to seven years."Fittingly, a government devoted to perpetual pre-emptive deconstruction now has a standing office of perpetual pre-emptive reconstruction.
Gone are the days of waiting for wars to break out and then drawing up ad hoc plans to pick up the pieces.
Enter Iraq, and the occupation. During the first three years of the Iraq Occupation, the first Director of Reconstruction and Humanitarian Assistance in Iraq, and an awardee of the Medal of Freedom, Paul L. Bremer lost $9 billion dollars. $9 billion dollars disappeared into thin air and the media went almost silent, yet they spent nearly two months talking about a black preacher from Chicago.
Nearly $9 billion of money spent on Iraqi reconstruction is unaccounted for because of inefficiencies and bad management, according to a watchdog report published Sunday.
Philip Giraldi, a former CIA Officer wrote in The American Conservative on October 24, 2005, “The American-dominated Coalition Provisional Authority could well prove to be the most corrupt administration in history, almost certainly surpassing the widespread fraud of the much-maligned UN Oil for Food Program. At least $20 billion that belonged to the Iraqi people has been wasted, together with hundreds of millions of U.S. taxpayer dollars. Exactly how many billions of additional dollars were squandered, stolen, given away, or simply lost will never be known because the deliberate decision by the CPA not to meter oil exports means that no one will ever know how much revenue was generated during 2003 and 2004.”
In August 2005 Hurricane Katrina offered another opportunity for Bush and Cheney. On Christmas Day, December 25, 2006, the AP reported, “The tally for Hurricane Katrina waste could top $2 billion next year because half of the lucrative government contracts valued at $500,000 or greater for cleanup work are being awarded without little competition.”
Starving the Beast
Bush’s hatred for government is in line with the modern Republican philosophy of contempt toward the American people, popularized by Ronald Reagan who famously said, “The nine most terrifying words in the English language are, 'I'm from the government and I'm here to help.'” So, throughout the Reagan and Bush I administrations, but more significantly in Bush II administration, the government has been deliberately weakened and unresponsive as a self-fulfilling prophecy as evidenced of big government being bad for the people, and it is when run by sociopathic Republicans.
The Republicans would like to destroy social welfare programs like social security, welfare and medicare and medicaid. They could never say that, but they can bankrupt the country, therefore starving the programs out of existence. In Conservative circles, this is referred to as “Starving the Beast”.
The New Rape
After eight years of having his way with the people he governs, Bush has taken the latest manmade catastrophe, the collapse of the American banking system, to ask the American people for $700,000,000,000 dollars…without any strings attached. Just as the rush to go to war on lies on Weapons of Mass Destruction, just as the rush to pass the U.S. Patriot Act , Play-it-Again-Sam Bush is rushing the Congress to pass a “clean bill” without any strings attached for seven-hundred billion dollars---eleven zeroes. This time around Bush hasn’t even attempted to hide his agenda. It is out in the open for the public to see, and he is daring the Congress to not pass it.
Here is some of the language in some of Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson’s proposal:
For example, in his initial three-page proposal, Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson advocated giving himself unchecked authority to spend $700 billion in taxpayers’ money without any oversight or review whatsoever. The language of the proposal was stark:
“The Secretary is authorized to purchase … on such terms and conditions as determined by the Secretary …”
“The Secretary is authorized to take such actions as the Secretary deems necessary …”
“Decisions by the Secretary pursuant to the authority of this Act are nonreviewable … and may not be reviewed by any court of law or any administrative agency.”
As Morgan Stanley and Goldman Sachs are the only investment banks standing, they will have first dibs at the trough.
Goldman Sachs Group -- formerly run by Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson, and Morgan Stanley, stand to be among the biggest beneficiaries of a $700 billion US bailout.
"Its benefits, in its current form, will be largely limited to investment banks and other banks that have aggressively written down the value of their holdings and have already recognized the attendant capital impairment," Jeffrey Rosenberg, Bank of America's head of credit strategy research, wrote in a report obtained by Bloomberg News yesterday.
The corporate media congratulate themselves daily on their disinformation campaigns and trivialities and ignore the fact that Bush creates chaos in order to pretend to be doing something about it.
French philosopher Voltaire once said, “All murderers are punished unless they kill in large numbers and to the sound of trumpets.” Bush would be called an extortionist or embezzler, but since it’s on a grand scale, it is call a bail out or rescue plan.
posted by Malik Isasis at
2:37 AM
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