USA,IMHO, invaded Iraq,for:-
Establishing a NEW WORLD ORDER.That is a SINGLE WORLD GOVERNMENT.USA's policies,Foreign,included,are deicded by:-
1.Trilateral Commission
2.Council On Foreign Relations.
David Rockefeller was involved with both,as well as,Institute For international Economics.He and his Group,had very "funny",ideas.
Outside USA the Bilderberg group also is active and all the above work together.Please use a search engine like yahoo or Google to know about each of the groups mentioned above,and many of you may be shocked,by what is going on in this world,and what aims these Groups have.
The topics are so huge,that I am unable to present them here.Hence the request to use a search engine.
<!--emo&  --><img src='style_emoticons/<#EMO_DIR#>/biggrin.gif' border='0' style='vertical-align:middle' alt='biggrin.gif' /><!--endemo-->
veerar,
You are on dot, add Ford also.
10-21-2007, 04:31 AM
(This post was last modified: 10-21-2007, 04:47 AM by dhu.)
An Anglosphere Future
by Christopher Hitchens
10-21-2007, 11:19 AM
(This post was last modified: 10-21-2007, 11:58 AM by Husky.)
EU related (not US)
<!--QuoteBegin-->QUOTE<!--QuoteEBegin--><b>Tony Blair could be Europe's first prez</b>
London, Oct 20 (IANS) In a move that appeared to soften up British Euro-sceptics, former prime minister Tony Blair could be installed as the first president of the European Union (EU) following a campaign by French President Nicolas Sarkozy.
"He is a remarkable man, the most European of all the British," Sarkozy said Friday night, adding that he and Blair, who quit as prime minister earlier this year, had discussed the proposal over a meal in Paris this week.<!--QuoteEnd--><!--QuoteEEnd-->mangalorean.com/news.php?newstype=broadcast&broadcastid=55947
On the earlier article:
An interesting recent article brought back certain memories which underlined so clear the kernel of Anglospheric thought. It was quite ironic: I was staying at that time as a guest in a well-appointed room at the Gonville and Caius College and had some fallow time before meeting a delightful friend, as I was escaping the grip of the kR^ityA that had settled on my head like the vetAla which had seized vikrama. I spent the time examining a voluminous book (A History of the English-Speaking Peoples Since 1900) by an English propagandist Roberts, who clearly inspires the mlechChAdhipati-s like George Bush, Dick Cheney and their Anglo-Saxon henchmen. The book is narrower in its focus than a similarly conceived volume by the American far-right political raconteur Murray. In short while Murray makes the case for Leukospheric supremacy Roberts makes the case for Anglospheric supremacy. Why is all this relevant to a Hindu ? This cannot be fully answered in public, but a simple hint: emulate viShNugupta the luminary of Hindu thought.
To illustrate the central issue of relevance to Hindus in all this let us take the following example:
On 13th April 1919 on the day of the Baisakh festival the English general Dyer attacked unarmed Hindus and Sikhs at Jallianwala Bagh with the "weapons of mass destruction" of that era and killed about 500 of them in the least (some estimates place the numbers much higher). Dyer's own words are the following:
"I had made up my mind I would do all men to death... It was no longer a question of merely dispersing the crowd, but one of producing a sufficient moral effect from a military point of view not only on those who were present, but more especially throughout the Punjab." (emphasis added)
His superior, O'Dwyer declared that he had done the right thing. The committee inquiring into the event largely exonerated him by describing his actions as "...an honest but mistaken conception of duty." The House of Lords approved of his valiant actions in saving the British empire from another "mutiny". The Britons raised a purse of #26,000 and presented it to Dyer on his return to England with sword in support of his valorous deeds of killing unarmed Hindus. A white American woman sent him #100 hailing him as the protector of white women. Fast-forward to 1997, the mlechCha rAja Phillip who was visiting Jallianwala Bagh looked a plaque there and commented that casualities listed there were inflated, and Dyer's son with whom he had served in the English army had told him that they were far less. Then come to 2006, the propagandist Roberts (hailed as historian by the Bush-Cheney Anglo-Saxon junta) defended the massacre of Indians by Dyer as a necessary measure to maintain peace. In fact he is seen paraphrasing Dyer's own words.
Let it be clear to every Hindu, that a long line of illustrious mlechChas starting from Kipling to Dyer to Churchill to the barbarian prince Phillip to the propagandist Roberts or their admirers from the Bush-Cheney gang have had the same essential view of pagan Hindu -- the Anglospheric master from his high pedestal declares his acts as moral and the rest have to agree. You may point to the genocides committed by other Leukospheric peoples, for example Russians or Germans, but the genocides of the Anglosphere are out of bounds for discussion- they are Christian Angels after all.
Yet Manmohan Singh the Sikh ruler of India (yes, Sikhs were victims at Jallianwala Bagh) says in his address at Oxford University:
"Not just by the perceived negative consequences of British imperial rule... "
"...it is possible for an Indian Prime Minister to assert that India's experience with Britain had its beneficial consequences too. Our notions of the rule of law, of a Constitutional government, of a free press, of a professional civil service, of modern universities and research laboratories have all been fashioned in the crucible where an age old civilization met the dominant Empire of the day." [emphasis added]
It is amazing to see how many a Hindu including the PM they have elected have internalized the propaganda of the Anglosphere and even hope to belong to it, as Manmohan goes on the state in his address.
As another example of the Anglospheric narrative on Hindus take the work of Professor Carroll Quigley, one of whose students was Bill Clinton, the puMschali-grAhin and ex-mlechChAdhipati. In his voluminous tome, "Tragedy and Hope: A History of the World in Our Time", which was very influential amongst many an American politician he outlines a history of India. Here he paints the Hindus as a depraved mass of imbeciles enslaved by Islam and Isaism. He narrates a history where the Hindu Marathas were brigands and thieves ruining the land through their depredations, when the British brought the rule of law.
Undoubtedly Billy imbibed his teacher's word well. We hear him say the following in a preface of a recent book by M. Albright: "During my visit to India in 2000, some Hindu militants decided to vent their outrage by murdering 38 Sikhs in cold blood. If I hadnât made the trip, the victims would probably still be alive. If I hadnât made the trip, I couldnât have done my job as president of the United States".
Apparently he has edited it since, but there is no doubt about what the Anglospheric view on Hindus is.
From Jimmy Watson to the Anglospheric mafia ruling in the backyard they still insist in subtle and not so subtle ways that they are lords of the world. And we continue to buy into that...
10-21-2007, 11:45 AM
(This post was last modified: 10-21-2007, 12:05 PM by Husky.)
Post 169 above (by HH) more important.
A few days back, came across this headline in msn.in -
Bush's picture with this title next to it: <b>'Stop Iran or get set for WW III'</b>
Couldn't be bothered looking into it then. But found somethings referring to the incident:
www.theaustralian.news.com.au/story/0,25197,22609794-15084,00.html
<!--QuoteBegin-->QUOTE<!--QuoteEBegin-->October 19, 2007
<b>'World War III' if Iran nuclear-armed - Bush</b>
George W. Bush raised the spectre of "World War III" if Iran was able to possess nuclear weapons in the latest instalment of a cold war of words between Washington and Russian President Vladimir Putin.
While Mr Bush said he still believed Mr Putin wanted to stop Iran from developing nuclear weapons, he also left no doubt he wanted further clarification from his Russian counterpart.
The front pages of US newspapers splashed photographs of Mr Putin with Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad together in Tehran, where a clear signal was sent to the US that any military action in Iran would not be tolerated.
Within hours, Mr Bush was fronting the press having woken "with a lot on his mind", according to staffers.
"We've got a leader in Iran who has announced that he wants to destroy Israel," Mr Bush said. "If Iran had a nuclear weapon, it'd be a dangerous threat to world peace.
"So I told people that if you're interested in avoiding World War III, it seems like you ought to be interested in preventing them having the knowledge necessary to make a nuclear weapon."
Washington said it was pursuing a diplomatic solution in Iran, but also refused to take a military option off the table.
But Mr Putin warned yesterday against any military action in Iran. "We should not even think of making use of force," he said.
Mr Bush was quizzed at the press conference about the fact that Mr Putin and Mr Ahmadinejad shook hands and smiled and appeared to get along.
Mr Bush said it was not a surprise that two leaders were photographed in a "pretty picture" but he added he was "looking forward to getting President Putin's read-out from the meeting".
"The thing I'm interested in is whether or not he continues to harbour the same concerns that I do," Mr Bush said. "And I say 'continues' because when we were in Australia (for the APEC meetings last month) he reconfirmed to me that he recognised it's not in the world's interest for Iran to have the capacity to make a nuclear weapon."
Last week, Mr Putin said after talks in Moscow with French President Nicolas Sarkozy that Russia had no information that Iran was trying to make a nuclear bomb.
Mr Sarkozy said the two countries might "not have quite the same analysis of the situation".
"I look forward to having him clarify those (comments)," Mr Bush said.
Proposed new UN sanctions, pressed in particular by the US and France, have so far been blocked by Russia, which holds a veto on the Security Council and favours continued dialogue with Tehran.
France has argued that aggressive moves towards multilateral sanctions against Iran are the best way to avoid military action against Iran.<!--QuoteEnd--><!--QuoteEEnd-->
Incident is also referred to in the following, where the equally-confused Obama gives his confused alter-take. They're both wrong in their own way:
firstread.msnbc.msn.com/archive/2007/10/18/418954.aspx
<!--QuoteBegin-->QUOTE<!--QuoteEBegin--><b>Obama warns of âdrums of warâ</b>
Posted: Thursday, October 18, 2007 5:41 PM by Domenico Montanaro
Categories: 2008, Barack Obama
From NBC/NJâs Aswini Anburajan
RENO, Nev. -- On the heels of President Bushâs reference to World War III with Iran in a press conference yesterday, Obama told the crowd of about 2,000 people here, âWe now hear the drums of war beating again.â
Obama placed much of the blame for Bushâs comments on the shoulders of Congress and blasted legislators who voted for the Kyl-Lieberman amendment on Iran saying they are repeating the mistake they made five years ago with the vote to authorize war in Iraq.<!--QuoteEnd--><!--QuoteEEnd-->
Apparently MSN.in's title had a more sensationalist take on what Bush meant. MSN.in implied he threatened with WWIII if Iran wasn't "stopped". However, it seems Bush meant to say that WWIII would somehow 'just happen' if Iran went nuclear?
But then, perhaps Bush means for us to read this incident the way Iraq played out - where Bush threatened his country with "Iraq has WMD and could destroy us" and therefore went to war in Iraq. In short, it could mean Bush is just declaring WWIII (if Iran gets its atomic toy) and the MSN.in title was apt in a roundabout sorta way...
thinkprogress.org/2007/10/17/bush-warns-of-world-war-iii-with-iran/
<!--QuoteBegin-->QUOTE<!--QuoteEBegin--><b>Bush warns of World War III with Iran.</b>
Asked about Iranâs nuclear ambitions at his press conference today, President Bush warned for the first time in public of the risk of âWorld War IIIâ if Iran gets nuclear weapons. âIâve told people that if youâre interested in avoiding World War III,â said the President. âIt seems like you ought to be interested in preventing them from have the knowledge necessary to make a nuclear weapon.â TPM has the video and Matthew Yglesias parses Bushâs words. October 17, 2007 4:20 pm | Comment (122)<!--QuoteEnd--><!--QuoteEEnd-->Some of the comments I read on that page are funny, and I agree with the incisive comment 108:
<!--QuoteBegin-->QUOTE<!--QuoteEBegin-->Iâm a helluva lot more scared of George Bush than I am of Iran.
Comment by Willy â October 18, 2007 @ 1:02 am<!--QuoteEnd--><!--QuoteEEnd-->No kidding.
Here's hoping the USA emerges unscathed (in terms of loss of life) <i>but also</i> neutered of superpower status from this "WWIII" Bush has been envisioning/hoping/planning.
Maintained in China: Burma's foul regime depends on Beijing.
By Christopher Hitchens
Excerpt:
Joining the young and passionate demonstrators outside the office of a certain Washington military attaché last week (and there was I, having thought that my "demo" days were over) helped me to settle one trivial question. The crowd was united in chanting "Free, Free, Free Burma." This may seem like a detail, but I think it's right to object to the grotesque renaming of Myanmar and Yangon, and I am glad that the Washington Post, at least, continues to say Burma and Rangoon. (You can tell a lot from this sort of emphasis. Lanka is the Sinhala word for Ceylon, and Sri means "holy," so the name Sri Lanka expresses the concept that the island is both Sinhala and Buddhist, an idea that is alienating to many Tamils on the island. As a result, some Tamils still call it Ceylon or demonstrate their own nationalism by calling it Eelam. Lives are lost on the proposition.)
10-23-2007, 02:37 PM
(This post was last modified: 10-23-2007, 02:44 PM by Husky.)
<!--QuoteBegin-dhu+Oct 22 2007, 12:45 AM-->QUOTE(dhu @ Oct 22 2007, 12:45 AM)<!--QuoteEBegin--> Maintained in China: Burma's foul regime depends on Beijing.
By Christopher Hitchens
Excerpt:
Joining the young and passionate demonstrators outside the office of a certain Washington military attaché last week (and there was I, having thought that my "demo" days were over) helped me to settle one trivial question. The crowd was united in chanting "Free, Free, Free Burma." This may seem like a detail, but I think it's right to object to the grotesque renaming of Myanmar and Yangon, and I am glad that the Washington Post, at least, continues to say Burma and Rangoon. (You can tell a lot from this sort of emphasis. Lanka is the Sinhala word for Ceylon, and <b>Sri means "holy," so the name Sri Lanka expresses the concept that the island is both Sinhala and Buddhist, an idea that is alienating to many Tamils on the island</b>. As a result, some Tamils still call it Ceylon or demonstrate their own nationalism by calling it Eelam. Lives are lost on the proposition.)
[right][snapback]74510[/snapback][/right]<!--QuoteEnd--><!--QuoteEEnd-->Christopher Hitchens has confused himself. Sri does mean sacred - possibly it does so in Buddhism, it *most certainly* does in Hinduism and for longer than Buddhism has existed. "Sri Rama", "Sri Vinayakar" and a thousand other examples. Sri is also the proper name of Lakshmi. In "Sri Rama" it has both the meanings at the same time. (In Tamil Nadu we often use Thiru - the Tamil equivalent of Sri - for temples, but we still say Sri Rama.)
In any case, Sri Lankan Tamil Hindus call the island "Sri Lanka"; they find Ceylon to be colonialist. Although it is likely true that the christian LTTE and christian Lankans call it Ceylon - a christian Tamil SL family with Portuguese surname certainly label their famous tea "Made in Ceylon".
Perhaps Hitchens has overlooked the fact that to both the Buddhists and Hindus in SL, the country is "Sri"=Holy. But I can well understand christian Tamils are entirely "alienated by the idea" of a sacred homeland (outside of Jerusalem). But in this case the distinction has to be made between Hindus and christians as opposed to Buddhists and a generalised "Tamils". Or perhaps western journalists imagine that all Sri Lankan Tamils have successfully been converted to the christoterror? Sorry to disappoint them then, but no.
<!--emo&  --><img src='style_emoticons/<#EMO_DIR#>/sad.gif' border='0' style='vertical-align:middle' alt='sad.gif' /><!--endemo-->
It takes a second to judge a leader
25 Oct 2007, 0033 hrs IST,REUTERS
WASHINGTON: A study at Princeton University has revealed that a split-second glance at two candidates' faces is all voters need to judge their competence during an election.
Princeton psychologist Alexander Todorov has demonstrated that quick facial judgments can accurately predict real-world election outcomes.
Todorov's previous research showed that people unconsciously judge the competence of an unfamiliar face within a tenth of a second, and he has moved it to the political arena. His laboratory tests have revealed that a rapid appraisal of the relative competence of two candidates' faces was sufficient to predict the winner in about 70% of the races for US senator and state governor in the 2006 elections.
"We never told our test subjects they were looking at candidates for political office - we only asked them to make a gut reaction response as to which unfamiliar face appeared more competent," said Todorov, an assistant professor of psychology and public affairs. "The findings suggest that fast, unreflective judgments based on a candidate's face can affect voting decisions," he added.
Todorov and his colleague Charles Ballew, an undergraduate psychology major who graduated from Princeton in 2006, conducted three experiments in which several dozen participants had to make snap judgments about faces.
Participants were shown a series of photos, each containing a pair of faces, and asked to choose, based purely on gut feeling, which face they felt displayed more competence.
The differences among the experiments largely concerned the amounts of time an observer was allowed to view the faces - as brief as a tenth of a second or longer - and to pass judgment afterward.
Participants were not aware in the third experiment that the image pairs were actually the photographs of the two frontrunner candidates for a major election being held somewhere in the United States during the time of the experiment in late 2006.
The elections were either for state governor or for a seat in the US Senate.
In cases where an observer recognised either of the two faces, the researchers removed the selection from the data.
Two weeks later elections were held, and the researchers compared the competency judgments with the election results.
After the comparative analysis, it was found that the judgments predicted the winners in 72.4% of the senatorial races and 68.6% of the gubernatorial races.
"This means that with a quick look at two photos, you have a great chance of predicting who will win. Voters are not that rational, after all. So maybe we have to consider that when we elect our politicians," Todorov said.
The study is published in the October 22 issue of the journal Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences .
must read -
<b>US cultural exchange turns into nightmare for Pune girl</b> <!--QuoteBegin-->QUOTE<!--QuoteEBegin-->"I was asked to clean the kitchen, dining room, wash clothes, clean utensils, mow the lawn. I also cleaned the barn where the horses were kept," the girl, who returned to India on October 26, told PTI.
"It seemed to me that what they wanted was a domestic slave who parades as a cultural ambassador," a disillusioned Nikita said.
.......................
"Once in a fit of rage, the host mom physically pushed me when I requested her to encash my cheque as I needed money. Ryan took every opportunity to insult me."
A fall in the barn fractured her left hand. The Raffs took her to hospital to plaster it but did not care to keep the follow-up dates with the doctor, Nikita recounted
.....................
On her arrival in Delhi, Nikita met Adnan Siddiqui, cultural counsel at the US embassy. He had been briefed by AFS activists. "He told me he would look into the matter," said Nikita,<!--QuoteEnd--><!--QuoteEEnd-->
Same had happened with lot of other kids from other countries. Some were robbed and abused by host families.
<!--emo&:felx--><img src='style_emoticons/<#EMO_DIR#>/flex.gif' border='0' style='vertical-align:middle' alt='flex.gif' /><!--endemo--> House Republicans seek debate on Cheney issue
By William L. Watts, MarketWatch
Last Update: 6:06 PM ET Nov 6, 2007Print E-mail Subscribe to RSS Disable Live Quotes
WASHINGTON (MarketWatch) -- The U.S. House voted along party lines Tuesday to send a resolution calling for the impeachment of Vice President Dick Cheney to the House Judiciary Committee, where it likely won't see daylight any time soon.
The impeachment resolution, sponsored by Democratic presidential candidate Dennis Kucinich, an Ohio congressman, accuses Cheney of violating his pledge to protect the U.S. Constitution. It says that Cheney misled the public about weapons of mass destruction in Iraq and ties between al Qaeda and Saddam Hussein's regime, as well as by making threats against Iran "absent any real threat to the United States."
Top House Democrats, including Speaker Nancy Pelosi, D-Calif., have said that they won't consider an impeachment measure. House Majority Leader Steny Hoyer, D-Md., moved to "table" the resolution, a parliamentary maneuver that would effectively shelve the measure.
The motion to table the resolution appeared headed for easy passage. But Republicans soon changed course and voted overwhelmingly against the measure in a bid to force a debate on the resolution on the House floor.
'We're going to help [Democrats] out, to explain themselves.'
â Pete Sessions, R-Texas
"We're going to help them out, to explain themselves," said Rep. Pete Sessions, R-Texas, according to the Associated Press. "We're going to give them their day in court."
Hoyer then moved to send the measure to the judiciary panel. After further procedural wrangling, the House voted 218 to 194, largely along party lines, to refer the matter to the committee and shut down the prospect of a floor debate.
In a written statement, Hoyer reiterated that Democratic leaders have decided not to proceed with impeachment and criticized Republican leaders for attempting to force a debate on the resolution.
"I am surprised that Republicans would treat an issue as important as the potential impeachment of a vice president of the United States as a petty political game," he said. "It is beneath the dignity of this institution."
If the House approves an article of impeachment, it then goes to the Senate for trial. An official can be removed from office after a two-thirds vote by the Senate.
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<!--QuoteBegin-->QUOTE<!--QuoteEBegin--><b>OPEC leaders upset over dollar slide:</b> Ahmadinejad RIYADH, Nov 19 (AFP) -
Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad said Sunday OPEC heads of state were annoyed about the decline in the dollar and asked their finance and oil ministers to study the issue of pricing oil. âThe dollar is falling, all heads of state were upset today because of the dollar. The value of their (financial) reserves has dropped,â Ahmadinijad told a press conference. âAll leaders taking part in the meeting were willing to convert the pricing of oil into a currency other than the dollar,â he said. âThe meeting decided to direct our ministers of finance and oil to talk about this and later produce their findings,â he said. Ahmadinijad also said that Iran proposed that OPEC should have its own strong currency because that would serve the interests of all world countries, besides OPEC. (Posted @ 10:00 PST)<!--QuoteEnd--><!--QuoteEEnd--> <!--emo&:bhappy--><img src='style_emoticons/<#EMO_DIR#>/b_woot.gif' border='0' style='vertical-align:middle' alt='b_woot.gif' /><!--endemo-->
USA and CIA <!--emo& --><img src='style_emoticons/<#EMO_DIR#>/biggrin.gif' border='0' style='vertical-align:middle' alt='biggrin.gif' /><!--endemo-->
http://www.youtube.com/swf/l.swf?video_id=...&rel=1&border=0
11-28-2007, 01:37 PM
(This post was last modified: 11-28-2007, 01:38 PM by dhu.)
<b><!--QuoteBegin-->QUOTE<!--QuoteEBegin--> Can We End the American Empire Before It Ends Us?</b>
By Chalmers Johnson
----------------------------------------------------
Comment -
Posted by: rwa on May 17, 2007 10:32 AMÂ
<b>
The 19th century world was conquered by Indians, who constituted 2/3 of the imperial forces.</b>
Hegemony is deeper than military or economic might. Right now the U.S. is well past it's hegemonic prime. International capital is dithering as to where to esconce itself, looking for the new hegemonic power. <!--QuoteEnd--><!--QuoteEEnd-->
The policy of the current US Administration to take strong measures against Iran has got a jolt in view of the latest US intelligence report leak. It is once again a case, where military and other punitive action is being advocated on the basis of false presumptions.
The best way to tackle the situation is for the US to engage Iran diplomatically rather than trying to take a hard line. After Iraq, the closest of the friends of USA are not going to take it seriously and provide arms and manpower for any military action. There is no other alternative left with the USA except to get into negotiation with Iran.
12-14-2007, 02:10 PM
(This post was last modified: 12-14-2007, 03:04 PM by dhu.)
<!--QuoteBegin-->QUOTE<!--QuoteEBegin-->Roberto Gonzales âTowards Mercenary Anthropology: The New US Army Counterinsurgency Manual FM3-24 and <b>the Military-Anthropology Complexâ, </b>Anthropology Today, Vol. 23, Iss. 3 (June 2007).
http://kingsofwar.wordpress.com/2007/10/17...-any-time-soon/<!--QuoteEnd--><!--QuoteEEnd-->
<!--QuoteBegin-->QUOTE<!--QuoteEBegin--><b>A Conversation Continued: A World Without the West</b>
by Marisa Morrison and Sean R. Singer
08.07.2007
<b>If the United States and Western Europe were erased from the map, what would the world look like?</b> Speaking at The National Interest on August 2, Steven Weber, director of University of CaliforniaâBerkeleyâs Institute of International Studies, offered his thoughts on the shape of such a worldâone whose contours are rapidly emerging.
U.S. and European officials and experts tend to see the rest of the world's policy choices through the distorted lens of U.S. hegemony, so they have failed to give proper consideration to significant developments elsewhere. Westerners believe that non-Western states face two stark choices: integration into the existing international order or defiance of Western global leadership.<b> Yet these countries have avoided this binary bind by taking a third pathâone that avoids interaction with U.S. power and Western-crafted global institutions. </b> A "significant group" of states is in the process of building a parallel international system with the goalâ"if there is one"âof making U.S. power irrelevant, the scholar said.
<b>Weberâs data indicated that the rate of economic and political interconnection is growing much faster within the World without the West than between the West and everyone else. </b> Consequently, a new "bloc" founded upon "modern mercantilist, resource-based notions" has sprung up. This bloc, unlike the one constructed by the Soviets, features "high interconnectivity, but low coordination", Weber noted.
<b>Western ideas have little resonance in this part of the globe. </b>A neo-Westphalian view of state sovereigntyâthat states exercise absolute control over events within their bordersâholds sway over UN-approved notions of universal human rights. Moreover, Western-endorsed concepts of globalization and economic liberalization garner only tepid support, since non-Western populations have benefited little from them. These people perceive that improvements in their material conditions have come not from Western free-market capitalism but from state-directed capital and resource nationalism.
<b>Weber noted that it is convenient for Americans to ignore the burgeoning ties within the non-Western world. </b>While complacency may be comforting, U.S. policymakers must face the reality that the trends Weber describes are not illusory.
The United States has three imperfect options for dealing with these new circumstances, he said. First, the United States can seek to block the growth of the World without the West, a poor choice. <b>Since this region of the world possesses huge reserves of U.S. Treasury bills, any attempt to stymie this emerging bloc's economic development will likely lead to a U.S. financial crisis. </b>A military confrontation with non-Western states would prove similarly reckless. Alternatively, the United States could simply ignore the competing system, engaging it only at unavoidable "points of connection." This is also not a responsible strategy, Weber said.
The best option is to "try to get serious about competing for the allegiance of states in play", Weber said. This strategy would require the United States to immediately take drastic measures, like eliminating agricultural subsidies or allowing generic drug producers to copy patented drug molecules. Certainly, such policy reversals would create an uproar in Washington.
<b>Although the United States is regarded in the rest of the world as a dysfunctional power, many states, including China, benefit from the United States' global pre-eminence.</b> The Chinese and others "free-ride on the U.S. provision of global public goods." Weber suggested that the United States might make "China ante up" if U.S. policymakers proved will to let China share the decision-making responsibilities associated with hegemony. Unfortunately, Weber is "not sure we're willing to face that choice."
Commentary on a World Without the West
Following Steven Weberâs discussion of "A World Without the West", several audience members took the opportunity to question and challenge Weberâs thesis.
Dov Zakheim, vice president of Booz Allen Hamilton and former undersecretary of defense and comptroller, shifted the discussion to the broader West beyond the United States.
"There are alignments that are starting to take place", Zakheim said, referring to Japan, Europe and India. "To what extent does that change things?"
While the United States might be struggling to adapt to a new global order, its allies around the world might not be, rendering the West far less monolithic and unresponsive than Weber and his co-authors suggest.
Devin Stewart, of the Carnegie Council, elaborating on his commentary in National Interest online, emphasized "the growth of ethics in foreign policy" and their absence in A World Without the West.
"What drives norms? Just states?" Stewart asked rhetorically.
As the economies of emerging countries continue to grow, new interests will emerge that shape policy. Foreign direct investment and human rights are interrelated, as investors seek out countries that promise long-term stability and growth opportunities, which depend on human rights.
Furthermore, citing distrust between China and Russia as an example, Stewart spoke of the lack of commonalities between emerging countries such as Russia, India and China, which will limit the emergence of a competitor bloc to the West.
Ian Bremmer, president of Eurasia Group and a contributing editor to The National Interest, did not see "this alternative system coming into being."
Russia fits the model Weber, Barma and Ratner describe, Bremmer said, but Russia is "functionally irrelevant in the world." While Russia might see its future in Asia, Asia does not necessarily see its future in Russia. He cited Latin America as a region where the World Without the West thesis doesnât work before shifting his analysis to China.
"Number one, the notion of hedging China is farcical to me", Bremmer said. "There is a mutually assured economic destruction between the West and China."
"If âTickle Me Elmoâ becomes âPoison Me Elmo", China will suffer the consequences, Bremmer said, referring to Chinaâs export of unsafe products.
Paul Starobin, of The Atlantic and National Journal, questioned the place of the Islamic world in A World Without the West. "What are the fault lines?" he asked.
Starobin also had questions about Chinaâs leadership role in a World Without the West.
"Do they [the Chinese] want to drive the bus, or do they want to make the bus?" he asked. "How can the parallel system develop without a conflict at some point?"
Flynt Leverett, senior fellow at The New America Foundation, stressed the limits of the thesis, suggesting that "there is a certain lack of causality in the analysis."
"Why is this happening? Itâs happening because U.S. hegemony is becoming, in important ways, dysfunctional for their interests", Leverett said. "Most Chinese would like the United States to be behaving as an effective hegemon, as a hegemon that stabilizes this critical region."
But the Bush Administrationâand its predecessorsâhave done the opposite, he said.
"As a vision, it [A World Without the West] is quite compelling", Nixon Center president and National Interest publisher Dimitri Simes said, citing the backlash against American hegemony.
"These nations are not looking for a hegemonic power", he said. "They are not pushing their ideologies."
If the division between the West and the rest worsens, Simes mentioned the risk for military confrontationâbetween the United States and China over Taiwan, and between Russia and Georgia, with the possibility of American intervention, over Abkhazia and South Ossetia in the wake of a final-status agreement on Kosovo.
http://www.nationalinterest.org/Article.aspx?id=15112<!--QuoteEnd--><!--QuoteEEnd-->
<!--QuoteBegin-->QUOTE<!--QuoteEBegin-->Lakota Indians Withdraw Treaties Signed With U.S. 150 Years Ago
Thursday, December 20, 2007
WASHINGTON â The Lakota Indians, who gave the world legendary warriors Sitting Bull and Crazy Horse, have withdrawn from treaties with the United States.
"We are no longer citizens of the United States of America and all those who live in the five-state area that encompasses our country are free to join us,'' long-time Indian rights activist Russell Means said.
A delegation of Lakota leaders has delivered a message to the State Department, and said they were unilaterally withdrawing from treaties they signed with the federal government of the U.S., some of them more than 150 years old.
The group also visited the Bolivian, Chilean, South African and Venezuelan embassies, and would continue on their diplomatic mission and take it overseas in the coming weeks and months.
Lakota country includes parts of the states of Nebraska, South Dakota, North Dakota, Montana and Wyoming.
The new country would issue its own passports and driving licences, and living there would be tax-free - provided residents renounce their U.S. citizenship, Mr Means said.
The treaties signed with the U.S. were merely "worthless words on worthless paper," the Lakota freedom activists said.
Withdrawing from the treaties was entirely legal, Means said.
"This is according to the laws of the United States, specifically article six of the constitution,'' which states that treaties are the supreme law of the land, he said.
"It is also within the laws on treaties passed at the Vienna Convention and put into effect by the US and the rest of the international community in 1980. We are legally within our rights to be free and independent,'' said Means.
The Lakota relaunched their journey to freedom in 1974, when they drafted a declaration of continuing independence â an overt play on the title of the United States' Declaration of Independence from England.
Thirty-three years have elapsed since then because "it takes critical mass to combat colonialism and we wanted to make sure that all our ducks were in a row,'' Means said.
One duck moved into place in September, when the United Nations adopted a non-binding declaration on the rights of indigenous peoples â despite opposition from the United States, which said it clashed with its own laws.
"We have 33 treaties with the United States that they have not lived by. They continue to take our land, our water, our children,'' Phyllis Young, who helped organize the first international conference on indigenous rights in Geneva in 1977, told the news conference.
The U.S. "annexation'' of native American land has resulted in once proud tribes such as the Lakota becoming mere "facsimiles of white people,'' said Means.
Oppression at the hands of the U.S. government has taken its toll on the Lakota, whose men have one of the shortest life expectancies - less than 44 years - in the world.
Lakota teen suicides are 150 per cent above the norm for the U.S.; infant mortality is five times higher than the U.S. average; and unemployment is rife, according to the Lakota freedom movement's website.
http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,317548,00.html <!--QuoteEnd--><!--QuoteEEnd-->
The next time these US clowns talk about "Dalit freedom" we should bring this up.
01-06-2008, 05:20 AM
(This post was last modified: 01-06-2008, 05:21 AM by Husky.)
Taiwan learning that their 'friend' is as untrustworthy as their threatening neighbour.
United States of "we want democracy and justice in the world" America has predictably abandoned Taiwan to side with China. I hear the clucking of a chicken. "Who's afraid of the big bad wolf?" Well, the US certainly is.
iht.com/articles/2007/12/22/america/21cnddiplo.php ('International Herald Tribune')
<!--QuoteBegin-->QUOTE<!--QuoteEBegin--><b>China and Taiwan draw fire from Washington</b>
By Thom Shanker and Helene Cooper Published: December 22, 2007
WASHINGTON: Senior Bush administration officials on Friday sharply criticized both China and Taiwan for unnecessarily inflaming tensions between each other and with the United States.
Secretary of State <b>Condoleezza Rice issued an unusually sharp rebuke to the Taiwanese government, taking the rare step of pointedly calling a planned referendum on United Nations membership for Taiwan "provocative."</b>
<b>And at the Pentagon, Defense Secretary Robert Gates dismissed as "specious" an explanation from China that it canceled and refused port visits by American warships because Gates had not told officials in Beijing of planned arms sales to Taiwan.</b>
During a State Department news conference Rice said that the United States would "monitor closely" the Taiwan referendum issue.
<b>"We think that Taiwan's referendum to apply to the United Nations under the name 'Taiwan' is a provocative policy," Rice said. "It unnecessarily raises tensions in the Taiwan Strait</b>, and it promises no real benefits for the people of Taiwan on the international stage."
Rice's sharp comments, one of a handful of issues that she raised without being prompted by the reporters she spoke to, were meant to send a signal to both China and Taiwan. <b>While Rice reiterated the Bush administration line â that the United States "opposes any threat to use force and any unilateral move by either side to change the status quo" â she placed the United States solidly on the side of China on the issue of Taiwan's referendum. China regards Taiwan as a breakaway province which should ultimately be reunited with the mainland, by force if necessary.</b>
Administration officials said that there was increased frustration with Taiwanese president Chen Shui-Bian this year. Beijing has criticized Taiwan's referendum as a step toward formal independence; the attempt at a name change is important because Taiwan's formal name right now â the Republic of China â is taken by Beijing as connoting fealty to the one-China idea.
Even if Taiwan's bid got out of the United Nations, it would likely fail in the Security Council anyway since China would probably block it with its veto.
At the Pentagon, Gates said he explicitly told the Chinese leadership during his visit to Beijing last month that arms sales to Taiwan were consistent with law and would be continued for as long as China built up its military along the strait.
Referring to his talks with the Chinese leadership in Beijing on Nov. 5 and 6, Gates said that "in those conversations, they raised at various levels our arms sales to Taiwan, and I was very explicit that our arms sales were consistent with the Taiwan Relations Act and the joint statement."
The comments were his most explicit comments on Beijing's last-minute cancellation of a Thanksgiving visit to Hong Kong by the carrier Kitty Hawk and its refusal to allow two American minesweepers to enter Hong Kong harbor for shelter during a Pacific storm.
The refusal of assistance to the two minesweepers seeking fuel and a safe port was viewed by United States Navy officers as a violation of centuries of custom and law. Chinese officials said the decisions were reached because Gates had not informed them of arms sales to Taiwan that were announced in Washington shortly after the defense secretary's return from Asia.
But Gates told a Pentagon news conference that he had told the Chinese "that as long as they continued to build up their forces on their side of the Taiwan Strait, we would continue to give Taiwan the resources necessary to defend itself. So I think that to a certain extent, I find that argument a little specious."
At the same time, Gates said that despite Beijing's military modernization efforts, he did not consider China a adversary and called for better communications between the two nations.
"I don't consider China an enemy," Gates said, "and I think there are opportunities for continued cooperation in a number of areas."
Gates said the refusal of entry privileges to Hong Kong for American warships, along with China's test of an anti-satellite weapon, are possibly indications of "a disconnect within the Chinese government."
On the anti-satellite test, he said, "the foreign ministry didn't seem to understand or know what had happened and there appeared to be some confusion." Likewise, he said, the Chinese military in forbidding the port visits "may have made a decision that was not communicated to the political side of the government."<!--QuoteEnd--><!--QuoteEEnd-->Taiwan is not a part of China.
Taiwan is where the Chinese royalists escaped to after the communists brutally won and took over China. Taiwan's character is what China's might have been had the latter not become christocommunist. It continues to be the underlying natural character of China (and will be as long as it remains unconverted to christianism) though this has been obscured/kept stifled by communism for many decades.
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