From: wolda002@umn.edu
Date: Fri Aug 14 2009 - 22:49:18 EDT
Obamageddon: War as the "Solution" to Economic Depression
The Celente thesis
By Justin Raimondo
Global Research, August 12, 2009
Antiwar.com - 2009-08-10
An American president is launching the most ambitious, the most expensive,
and certainly the most dangerous military campaign since the Vietnam War
– and the antiwar movement, such as it is, is missing in action. After a
long and bloody campaign in Iraq and the election of a U.S. president
pledged to get us out, our government is once again revving up its war
machine and taking aim at yet another "terrorist" stronghold, this time in
Afghanistan. Yet the antiwar movement’s motor seems stuck in the wrong
gear, making no motions toward mounting anything like an effective protest.
What gives?
We shouldn’t doubt the scope of the present war effort. Make no mistake:
the Obama administration is radically ramping up the stakes in the "war on
terrorism," which, though renamed, has not been revised downward, as the
Washington Post reports:
"As the Obama administration expands U.S. involvement in Afghanistan,
military experts are warning that the United States is taking on security
and political commitments that will last at least a decade and a cost that
will probably eclipse that of the Iraq war."
There are always "warnings" in the beginning, aren’t there? For some
reason, however, they are never heeded. Instead, we just barrel ahead,
undaunted, into the tall grass where ambush awaits us. War opponents
predicted the Iraq invasion would prove unsustainable – and we were
right. We said that, far from greeting us with cheers and showers of roses,
the Iraqis would soon be shooting at us and demanding our ouster – and we
were right. We said the rationale for war was based on a series of
carefully manufactured and marketed lies – and that was the truth, now
wasn’t it? Yet it seems we are caught in an endlessly repetitive
nightmare, where the same prophetic voices are being drowned out by a
chorus of "responsible" voices – to be followed by an all-too-familiar
disaster.
The problem, however, is that the scale of these disasters seems to be
increasing exponentially. As Gerald Celente, one of the few economic
forecasters who predicted the ‘08 crash, put it the other day,
"Governments seem to be emboldened by their failures." What the late Gen.
William E. Odom trenchantly described as "the worst strategic disaster in
American military history" – the invasion of Iraq – is being followed
up by a far larger military operation, one that will burden us for many
years to come. This certainly seems like evidence in support of the Celente
thesis, and the man who predicted the 1987 stock market crash, the fall of
the Soviet Union, the dot-com bust, the gold bull market, the 2001
recession, the real estate bubble, the “Panic of ‘08,” and now is
talking about the inevitable popping of the "bailout bubble," has more bad
news:
"Given the pattern of governments to parlay egregious failures into
mega-failures, the classic trend they follow, when all else fails, is to
take their nation to war."
As the economic crisis escalates and the debt-based central banking system
shows it can no longer re-inflate the bubble by creating assets out of thin
air, an economic and political rationale for war is easy to come by; for if
the Keynesian doctrine that government spending is the only way to lift us
out of an economic depression is true, then surely military expenditures
are the quickest way to inject "life" into a failing system. This doesn’t
work, economically, since the crisis is only masked by the wartime
atmosphere of emergency and "temporary" privation. Politically, however, it
is a lifesaver for our ruling elite, which is at pains to deflect blame
away from itself and on to some "foreign" target.
It’s the oldest trick in the book, and it’s being played out right
before our eyes, as the U.S. prepares to send even more troops to the
Afghan front and is threatening Iran with draconian economic sanctions, a
step or two away from outright war.
A looming economic depression and the horrific prospect of another major
war – the worst-case scenario seems to be unfolding, like a recurring
nightmare, and there doesn’t seem to be any way to stop it. Are we
caught, then, helpless in the web of destiny, to be preyed upon by those
spiders in Washington?
I have to admit that, at times, I’m inclined to believe it: the early
years of the Bush era, particularly the dark days right after 9/11, were
hard times for advocates of liberty and peace. For us here at Antiwar.com,
they were days of nearly unrelieved gloom. As the Bush era drew to a close,
however, there were many signs that we were in for a turnaround, that the
dark ages were over and a new day was dawning. The Iraq war was
discredited, along with its cheerleaders, and the collapse of the War
Party’s political fortunes seemed all but assured with the rise of an
insurgent movement within the Democratic Party, a movement that happened to
coalesce around Barack Obama but could have rallied to any charismatic or
even remotely appealing figure, so desperate were people for any sign of
hope.
In the beginning, I was enamored of the possibilities of this electoral
insurgency against the presumed nominee, Hillary Clinton. By stubbornly
sticking to her pro-war position and refusing to second-guess her decision
to support the invasion of Iraq, Hillary turned the primary campaign into a
tug-of-war between the interventionist faction of the Democratic Party –
centered in the leadership – and the antiwar rank-and-file, many of whom
were beginning to develop a comprehensive critique of interventionist
foreign policy and were well on their way to becoming principled opponents
of imperialism.
Then Obama stepped into the picture.
I am not among those who are currently whining that Obama has somehow
"betrayed" his antiwar supporters – prominent among them the organizers
of the principal peace coalition, United for Peace and Justice. After all,
he’s just doing what he said all along he’d do, and that is fight the
"right war," which, he averred, we ought to be waging in Afghanistan rather
than Iraq. At the end of this month, his generals will report to him on how
many more troops they need to "do the job," and you can bet they won’t be
calling for any reductions.
History has shown that Afghanistan is practically unconquerable, and we
could send an army of a million or more and still fail miserably. But think
how the endless expenditures will "stimulate" our economy!
Forecaster Celente has identified several bubbles, the latest being the
"bailout bubble," slated to pop at any time, yet there may be another
bubble to follow what Celente calls "the mother of all bubbles," one that
will implode with a resounding crash heard ’round the world – the
bubble of empire.
Our current foreign policy of global hegemonism and unbridled aggression is
simply not sustainable, not when we are on the verge of becoming what we
used to call a Third World country, one that is bankrupt and faces the
prospect of a radical lowering of living standards. Unless, of course, the
"crisis" atmosphere can be sustained almost indefinitely.
George W. Bush had 9/11 to fall back on, but that song is getting older
every time they play it. Our new president needs to come up with an
equivalent, one that will divert our attention away from Goldman Sachs and
toward some overseas enemy who is somehow to be held responsible for our
present predicament.
It is said that FDR’s New Deal didn’t get us out of the Great
Depression, but World War II did. The truth is that, in wartime, when
people are expected to sacrifice for the duration of the "emergency,"
economic problems are anesthetized out of existence by liberal doses of
nationalist chest-beating and moral righteousness. Shortages and plunging
living standards were masked by a wartime rationing system and greatly
lowered expectations. And just as World War II inured us to the economic
ravages wrought by our thieving elites, so World War III will provide
plenty of cover for a virtual takeover of all industry by the government
and the demonization of all political opposition as "terrorist."
An impossible science-fictional scenario? Or a reasonable projection of
present trends? Celente, whose record of predictions is impressive, to say
the least, sees war with Iran as the equivalent of World War III, with
economic, social, and political consequences that will send what is left of
our empire into a tailspin. This is the popping of the "hyperpower" bubble,
the conceit that we – the last superpower left standing – will somehow
defy history and common sense and avoid the fate of all empires: decline
and fall.
We are in for some "interesting" times, and, these days, I know you won’t
want to be without Antiwar.com, which is going to be more essential than
ever before. However, we can’t guarantee our continued survival – in
fact, I can predict our imminent demise – if we fail to enjoy your
continued financial support. You’ll notice that we are now embarked on
our summer fundraising campaign, and, let me tell you, summers are always
the worst. Everyone who can afford to give is off on vacation, and these
are difficult times, to boot. I have the feeling this one is going to be a
long, hard slog, but I’d love to be pleasantly surprised. So, please,
surprise me.
The prospects of a major war just over the horizon are increasing by the
hour, yet we haven’t heard much in the way of protest from the formerly
"antiwar" liberal-progressive community, or, at least, not from their
institutions and leaders, who are getting in line behind the Obama
administration and are afraid to rock the boat.
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