WORTH A READ!

[sandyc]

Just catching up with these posts. You may have noticed that I am currently on a US base watching all these young people from many countries passing in and out of Afghanistan.
The European economies are also in one hell of a mess having followed the "greed" economic model. UK forces and capability are being cut to the bones so perhaps that will help keep them out of more "trouble spots". A war is great for the economy in times of hardship. Manufacturing gears up to support the effort - if you have any manufacturing that is.
Ireland has recently felt the fall out from MultiNational companies having taken advantage of tax breaks moving on to greener pastures.
The US seems from my "outside" view to be retreating back inside its borders - even the ludicrous suggestion of building a fence across the 49th Parallel. Wonder how they will manage it through the Great Lakes.
Unrest is been happening in the UK - the disaffected and feral youth - spurred on by the Educated Left Wing. We are supposed to be heading toward to a winter of discontent with the remaining Unions and their extremely well paid full time leaders trying to justify their existence.
Just take a look at the fiasco that is the attempt by Legal process to remove a bunch of Irish travelling people (NO they are not gypsies, who do not seem to do any travelling either). Spurred on by young well-educated "rebels" to make all sorts of ridiculous claims (e.g. Ethnic cleansing).
I know this is beginning to veer off topic (an old standard for ES) and I do not have any immediate answers to the problems - I would not be here if I did.
GREED has been the cause of all the economic woes throughout history and it seems to me that we are once again we are in one of these "natural cycles" (just like "Warming") and some leaders will appear to drag us back to some form of prosperity.
I have to hope that happens - but this one is going to a really tough one - let's see what happens with the Greeks as stage 1.
Good old Laissez-Faire economics at work!!!!
Sandy

[Alastair]

In many respects we're all to blame as our pension companies are some of the largest investors and they all demand high dividends which in turn spurs these huge corporates to go after the money while cutting costs to the bone and hence the BP Oil disaster in the Gulf.

Email is not reliable these days but will Microsoft, Google or any of these companies do anything about it? They make it as difficult as possible to contact them to ask questions. They make billions so why can't they hire more customer service staff to make it easy to contact them and get answers to our problems. Why can't they devote resources to make email more reliable?

Right there you have millions of job possibilities.

Alastair

[Lizzie]

A statement from the Occupy Wall Street participants - the 99 percent tired of being exploited by the 1 percent.

As we gather together in solidarity to express a feeling of mass injustice, we must not lose sight of what brought us together. We write so that all people who feel wronged by the corporate forces of the world can know that we are your allies.

As one people, united, we acknowledge the reality: that the future of the human race requires the cooperation of its members; that our system must protect our rights, and upon corruption of that system, it is up to the individuals to protect their own rights, and those of their neighbors; that a democratic government derives its just power from the people, but corporations do not seek consent to extract wealth from the people and the Earth; and that no true democracy is attainable when the process is determined by economic power. We come to you at a time when corporations, which place profit over people, self-interest over justice, and oppression over equality, run our governments. We have peaceably assembled here, as is our right, to let these facts be known.

They have taken our houses through an illegal foreclosure process, despite not having the original mortgage.

They have taken bailouts from taxpayers with impunity, and continue to give Executives exorbitant bonuses.

They have perpetuated inequality and discrimination in the workplace based on age, the color of one's skin, sex, gender identity and sexual orientation.

They have poisoned the food supply through negligence, and undermined the farming system through monopolization.

They have profited off of the torture, confinement, and cruel treatment of countless nonhuman animals, and actively hide these practices.

They have continuously sought to strip employees of the right to negotiate for better pay and safer working conditions.

They have held students hostage with tens of thousands of dollars of debt on education, which is itself a human right.

They have consistently outsourced labor and used that outsourcing as leverage to cut workers’ healthcare and pay.

They have influenced the courts to achieve the same rights as people, with none of the culpability or responsibility.

They have spent millions of dollars on legal teams that look for ways to get them out of contracts in regards to health insurance.

They have sold our privacy as a commodity.

They have used the military and police force to prevent freedom of the press.

They have deliberately declined to recall faulty products endangering lives in pursuit of profit.

They determine economic policy, despite the catastrophic failures their policies have produced and continue to produce.

They have donated large sums of money to politicians supposed to be regulating them.

They continue to block alternate forms of energy to keep us dependent on oil.

They continue to block generic forms of medicine that could save people’s lives in order to protect investments that have already turned a substantive profit.

They have purposely covered up oil spills, accidents, faulty bookkeeping, and inactive ingredients in pursuit of profit.

They purposefully keep people misinformed and fearful through their control of the media.

They have accepted private contracts to murder prisoners even when presented with serious doubts about their guilt.

They have perpetuated colonialism at home and abroad.

They have participated in the torture and murder of innocent civilians overseas.

They continue to create weapons of mass destruction in order to receive government contracts. *

To the people of the world,

We, the New York City General Assembly occupying Wall Street in Liberty Square, urge you to assert your power.

Exercise your right to peaceably assemble; occupy public space; create a process to address the problems we face, and generate solutions accessible to everyone.

To all communities that take action and form groups in the spirit of direct democracy, we offer support, documentation, and all of the resources at our disposal.

Join us and make your voices heard!

[1938 Observer]

Great post, Gordon. But none of this need not have happened if there had been a hundred like Wilkie with the courage to refute and ask questions ten years ago. BTW where did you post about him. I skimmed over the article and wanted to return and read it properly.

Hi Lizzie,

Here is the link back to the topic on Andrew Wilkie for you....



http://www.electricscotland.org/show...=andrew+wilkie


Gordon.

[Lizzie]

SO THAT'S THE REASON FOR WORLDWIDE CHAOS!


Stopping the Insanity
by David Sirota

Like most people living through this jarring age of economic turbulence and political dysfunction, you can probably recall a moment in the last few months when you thought to yourself that our lawmakers and corporate leaders are all crazy. And not just run-of-the-mill crazy, a la George Costanza's parents, but the kind of crazy that makes films like "Silence of the Lambs" and "One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest" so frightening.

The good news for you is that you aren't insane for thinking this. The bad news for all of us, though, is that according to two new scientific analyses, you are more correct in your assessment than you may know.

The first revelation came from Dr. Nassir Ghaemi of Tufts University. In his recent book, "A First-Rate Madness," he went beyond merely restating the old adage that anyone crazy enough to run for public office probably shouldn't occupy that office. Instead, the book sheds light on what Ghaemi calls an "inverse law of sanity," whereby tumultuous times like these actually reward and promote political figures who are "mentally abnormal (or) even ill."

Now comes a new study from Switzerland's University of St. Gallen showing that the most successful of the global financial elite probably pose more of a menace to society than known psychopaths.

As the website Newser reported, the researchers "pitted a group of stockbrokers against a group of actual psychopaths in various computer simulations and intelligence tests and found that the money men were significantly more reckless, competitive, and manipulative." Even more striking, the researchers note that achieving overall success was less important to the stock speculators than the sadistic drive "to damage their opponents."

The findings build on similar research in the recent past. In 1996, investigators at Glasgow Caledonian University discovered connections between psychopathy and successful financial speculation, concluding that "with the right parenting, (psychopaths) can become successful stockbrokers instead of serial killers." Likewise, in 2004, researchers at the University of British Columbia reacted to similar findings and created a test to help firms detect "corporate psychopaths" within their ranks.

That same year, the award winning-documentary "The Corporation" used World Health Organization metrics to show that if companies really are "people," as our Supreme Court insists, then many of them are mentally ill.

Obviously, these results reflect the not-so-surprising fact that the extreme nature of the modern political process and of today's casino economy inherently self-select for certain kinds of traits. And no doubt, wholly changing that dynamic may be impossible or undesirable — or both.

However, the findings are a reminder of why now — more than ever — we must refuse to succumb to political apathy and laissez-faire demagoguery. Indeed, it's time to redouble our commitment to strengthening checks on political and corporate power because that power is often being wielded by the most unstable among us.

So what does that mean in practice? It means that when we see a wild-eyed White House ignore the constitution and claim the despotic right to assassinate American citizens without criminal charge, we demand that Congress stop the madness — rather than quietly acquiesce. It means that when we see a spontaneous grassroots movement physically occupy Lower Manhattan and challenge banks' deranged rapaciousness, we applaud the effort as long overdue — rather than scoff at it as unrealistic. It means, in short, that we refuse to stay silent in the face of insanity.

Frankly, if we have scientific proof that the inmates are running the Wall Street and Washington asylums, this is the least we should do — and we really should do a whole lot more.
© 2011 Creators.com

[1938 Observer]

I particularly enjoyed this statement.................

A First-Rate Madness," he went beyond merely restating the old adage that anyone crazy enough to run for public office probably shouldn't occupy that office.


I wonder if this old "Classic",,,,,,,,,,,,, was not a crystal ball preview of political/military leaders ?????


phone conversation U.S President