Wednesday, June 30, 2010

Paul Krugman: The Third Depression

The Third Depression
By PAUL KRUGMAN article link
June 27, 2010 | The New York Times Opinion

Recessions are common; depressions are rare. As far as I can tell, there were only two eras in economic history that were widely described as “depressions” at the time: the years of deflation and instability that followed the Panic of 1873 and the years of mass unemployment that followed the financial crisis of 1929-31.

Neither the Long Depression of the 19th century nor the Great Depression of the 20th was an era of nonstop decline — on the contrary, both included periods when the economy grew. But these episodes of improvement were never enough to undo the damage from the initial slump, and were followed by relapses.

We are now, I fear, in the early stages of a third depression. It will probably look more like the Long Depression than the much more severe Great Depression. But the cost — to the world economy and, above all, to the millions of lives blighted by the absence of jobs — will nonetheless be immense.

And this third depression will be primarily a failure of policy. Around the world — most recently at last weekend’s deeply discouraging G-20 meeting — governments are obsessing about inflation when the real threat is deflation, preaching the need for belt-tightening when the real problem is inadequate spending.

In 2008 and 2009, it seemed as if we might have learned from history. Unlike their predecessors, who raised interest rates in the face of financial crisis, the current leaders of the Federal Reserve and the European Central Bank slashed rates and moved to support credit markets. Unlike governments of the past, which tried to balance budgets in the face of a plunging economy, today’s governments allowed deficits to rise. And better policies helped the world avoid complete collapse: the recession brought on by the financial crisis arguably ended last summer.

But future historians will tell us that this wasn’t the end of the third depression, just as the business upturn that began in 1933 wasn’t the end of the Great Depression. After all, unemployment — especially long-term unemployment — remains at levels that would have been considered catastrophic not long ago, and shows no sign of coming down rapidly. And both the United States and Europe are well on their way toward Japan-style deflationary traps.

In the face of this grim picture, you might have expected policy makers to realize that they haven’t yet done enough to promote recovery. But no: over the last few months there has been a stunning resurgence of hard-money and balanced-budget orthodoxy.

As far as rhetoric is concerned, the revival of the old-time religion is most evident in Europe, where officials seem to be getting their talking points from the collected speeches of Herbert Hoover, up to and including the claim that raising taxes and cutting spending will actually expand the economy, by improving business confidence. As a practical matter, however, America isn’t doing much better. The Fed seems aware of the deflationary risks — but what it proposes to do about these risks is, well, nothing. The Obama administration understands the dangers of premature fiscal austerity — but because Republicans and conservative Democrats in Congress won’t authorize additional aid to state governments, that austerity is coming anyway, in the form of budget cuts at the state and local levels.

Why the wrong turn in policy? The hard-liners often invoke the troubles facing Greece and other nations around the edges of Europe to justify their actions. And it’s true that bond investors have turned on governments with intractable deficits. But there is no evidence that short-run fiscal austerity in the face of a depressed economy reassures investors. On the contrary: Greece has agreed to harsh austerity, only to find its risk spreads growing ever wider; Ireland has imposed savage cuts in public spending, only to be treated by the markets as a worse risk than Spain, which has been far more reluctant to take the hard-liners’ medicine.

It’s almost as if the financial markets understand what policy makers seemingly don’t: that while long-term fiscal responsibility is important, slashing spending in the midst of a depression, which deepens that depression and paves the way for deflation, is actually self-defeating.

So I don’t think this is really about Greece, or indeed about any realistic appreciation of the tradeoffs between deficits and jobs. It is, instead, the victory of an orthodoxy that has little to do with rational analysis, whose main tenet is that imposing suffering on other people is how you show leadership in tough times.

And who will pay the price for this triumph of orthodoxy? The answer is, tens of millions of unemployed workers, many of whom will go jobless for years, and some of whom will never work again.

Paul Krugman joined The New York Times in 1999 as a columnist on the Op-Ed Page and continues as professor of Economics and International Affairs at Princeton University.

The New York Times Articles by Paul Krugman
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Eight ways the Great Recession has changed Americans
Fifty-five percent of Americans in the labor force have experienced a job loss, a pay cut, or a reduction in hours since the onset of the Great Recession in 2007, a new survey finds.
By Mark Trumbull, Staff writer article link
June 30, 2010 | CSM
The Christian Science Monitor home page

Stimulus or Austerity: The People vs. the Banks
by Shamus Cooke article link
June 30, 2010 | Global Research

Economic Crisis: The Next Round of Financial Slaughter
The G-20 Summit Charade
by Matthias Chang article link
June 29, 2010 | Global Research
Global Research home page

The G-20 Power Grab Accelerates
by Gary North article link
June 30, 2010 | LewRockwell
LewRockwell home page

Count Your Days For An Impending Economic Collapse
By Devinder Sharma article link article link
29 June, 2010 | Ground Reality | CounterCurrents
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The New Ideological Divide
by Peter Schiff article link
06.30.10 | Silver Bear Cafe
Euro Pacific Capital home page
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Amy Goodman: We Can’t Afford War

We Can’t Afford War
by Amy Goodman article link article link
June 30, 2010 | TruthDig | CommonDreams

“General Petraeus is a military man constantly at war with the facts,” began the MoveOn.org attack ad against Gen. David Petraeus back in 2007, after he had delivered a report to Congress on the status of the war in Iraq. George W. Bush was president, and MoveOn was accusing Petraeus of “cooking the books for the White House.” The campaign asked “General Petraeus or General Betray Us?” on a full-page ad in The Washington Post. MoveOn took tremendous heat for the campaign, but stood its ground.

Three years later, Barack Obama is president, Petraeus has become his man in Afghanistan, and MoveOn pulls the critical Web content. Why? Because Bush’s first war, Afghanistan, has become Obama’s war, a quagmire. The U.S. will eventually negotiate its withdrawal from Afghanistan. The only difference between now and then will be the number of dead, on all sides, and the amount of (borrowed) money that will be spent.

Petraeus’ confirmation to become the military commander in Afghanistan was never in question. He replaces Gen. Stanley McChrystal, who resigned shortly after his macho criticisms of his civilian leadership became public in a recent Rolling Stone magazine article.

The statistics for Afghanistan, Obama’s Vietnam, are surging. June, with at least 100 U.S. deaths, is the highest number reported since the invasion in 2001. 2010 is on pace to be the year with the highest U.S. fatalities. Similar fates have befallen soldiers from the other, so-called coalition countries. Petraeus is becoming commander not only of the U.S. military in Afghanistan, but of all forces, as the invasion and occupation of Afghanistan is run by NATO.

U.S. troops, expected to rise to 98,000 this year, far outnumber those from other nations. Public and political support in many of those countries is waning.

Journalist Michael Hastings, who wrote the Rolling Stone piece, was in Paris with McChrystal to profile him. What didn’t get as much attention was Hastings’ description of why McChrystal was there:

“He’s in France to sell his new war strategy to our NATO allies—to keep up the fiction, in essence, that we actually have allies. Since McChrystal took over a year ago, the Afghan war has become the exclusive property of the United States. Opposition to the war has already toppled the Dutch government, forced the resignation of Germany’s president and sparked both Canada and the Netherlands to announce the withdrawal of their 4,500 troops. McChrystal is in Paris to keep the French, who have lost more than 40 soldiers in Afghanistan, from going all wobbly on him.”

The whistle-blower website WikiLeaks.org, which received international attention after releasing leaked video from a U.S. attack helicopter showing the indiscriminate slaughter of civilians and a Reuters cameraman and his driver in Baghdad, has just posted a confidential CIA memo detailing possible public relations strategies to counter waning public support for the Afghan War. The agency memo reads: “If domestic politics forces the Dutch to depart, politicians elsewhere might cite a precedent for ‘listening to the voters.’ French and German leaders have over the past two years taken steps to preempt an upsurge of opposition but their vulnerability may be higher now.”

I just returned from Toronto, covering the G-20 summit and the protests. The gathered leaders pledged, among other things, to reduce government deficits by 50 percent by 2013. In the U.S., that means cutting $800 billion, or about 20 percent of the budget. Two Nobel Prize-winning economists have weighed in with grave predictions. Joseph Stiglitz said, “There are many cases where these kinds of austerity measures have led to ... recessions into depressions.” And Paul Krugman wrote: “Who will pay the price for this triumph of orthodoxy? The answer is, tens of millions of unemployed workers, many of whom will go jobless for years, and some of whom will never work again.”

In order to make the cuts promised, Obama would have to raise taxes and cut social programs such as Social Security and Medicare. Or he could cut the war budget. I say “war budget” because it is not to be confused with a defense budget. Cities and states across the country are facing devastating budget crises. Pensions are being wiped out. Foreclosures are continuing at record levels. A true defense budget would shore up our schools, our roads, our towns, our social safety net. The U.S. House of Representatives is under pressure to pass a $33 billion Afghan War supplemental this week.

We can’t afford war.

Denis Moynihan contributed research to this column.

© 2010 Amy Goodman

Amy Goodman is the host of "Democracy Now!," a daily international TV/radio news hour airing on more than 800 stations in North America. She is the author of "Breaking the Sound Barrier," recently released in paperback and now a New York Times best-seller.

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The Mythology Surrounding Petraeus' Surge in Iraq Will Keep Us Trapped in Afghanistan
By Joshua Holland article link
June 30, 2010 | AlterNet
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The Pentagon's Threat to the Republic
by: Melvin A. Goodman article link
28 June 2010 | t r u t h o u t | Op-Ed
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Tuesday, June 29, 2010

Andrew Gavin Marshall: Revolution and Repression in America

Revolution and Repression in America
The Technological Revolution and the Future of Freedom, Part 2
by Andrew Gavin Marshall article link
June 29, 2010 | Global Research

This is Part 2 of the series, ``The Technological Revolution and the Future of Freedom.``

Introduction

As outlined in Part 1 of this series, “The Technological Revolution and the Future of Freedom,” there are two major geopolitical realities in the world today, both largely brought about as a result of the “Technological Revolution” in which technology and electronics have come to define and shape our society.

The Technological Revolution has led to a diametrically opposed, antagonistic, and conflicting geopolitical reality: never before has humanity been so awakened to issues of power, exploitation, imperialism and domination; and simultaneously, never before have elites been so transnational and global in orientation, and with the ability to impose such a truly global system of scientific despotism and political oppression. These are the two major geopolitical realities of the world today. Never in all of human history has mankind been so capable of achieving a true global political psycho-social awakening; nor has humanity ever been in such danger of being subjected to a truly global scientific totalitarianism, potentially more oppressive than any system known before, and without a doubt more technologically capable of imposing a permanent despotism upon humanity. So we are filled with hope, but driven by urgency. In all of human history, never has the potential nor the repercussions of human actions and ideas ever been so monumental.

Not only is the awakening global in its reach, but in its very nature. It creates within the individual, an awareness of the global condition. So it is a ‘global awakening’ both in the external environment, and in the internal psychology. This new reality in the world, coupled with the fact that the world’s population has never been so vast, presents a challenge to elites seeking to dominate people all over the world who are aware and awakened to the realities of social inequality, war, poverty, exploitation, disrespect, imperialism and domination. This directly implies that these populations will be significantly more challenging to control: economically, politically, socially, psychologically and spiritually. Thus, from the point of view of the global oligarchy, the only method of imposing order and control – on this unique and historical human condition – is through the organized chaos of economic crises, war, and the rapid expansion and institutionalization of a global scientific dictatorship. Our hope is their fear; and our greatest fear is their only hope.


This essay (Part II) will undertake an examination of these two geopolitical realities on a national scale, focusing primarily on the “American Awakening.”

The American Awakening

In the past decade, there has been an enormous surge in popular political activism, which has corresponded to the expansion of imperialism, exploitation and despotism in the world. The events of September 11th, 2001, sparked two major geopolitical events. The first was the implementation of the Bush Doctrine – the “War on Terror” – which was organized in response to the terrorist attacks. This imperialist expansion led to the war and occupation of Afghanistan, the war on Iraq and subsequent occupation, the war in Lebanon in 2006, the war on Somalia, continuing military expansionism and imposition in the Palestinian territories, as well as expansive covert operations in the Middle East, Central Asia, Africa and around the world.

The second major geopolitical trend instigated by the 9/11 attacks was the formation of what has come to be known as the “9/11 Truth Movement,” in which millions of people around the world, including thousands of academics, architects, engineers, government officials, intelligence and military officials and other professionals, as well as an exponentially growing abundance of people in the general population internationally have sought to question and challenge the official accounts of the events of 9/11. Like all activist groups, there are fringe and radical elements within the movement, those who claim that “no planes” were used in the attacks, or that the attacks were undertaken by Israel – with anti-Semitic undertones – or other such fringe theories. Regardless of the fringe elements, the main focus of the movement is based around the fact that the official story of events does not stand up to any form of independent and unbiased, rational analysis. The media for years ignored the growing international movement, but only in recent years have acknowledged the movement; however, they did not address the movement by analyzing the information and issues, but rather by seeking to discredit and demonize the political movement, focusing on the fringe elements and beliefs and applying labels of “conspiracy theorist,” attempting to discredit anyone who questions the official story.

In 2006, Time Magazine acknowledged that the 9/11 Truth Movement is not a “fringe movement,” but is, in fact, “a mainstream political reality.” They also cited a major political poll by Scripps-Howard in 2006, which revealed that 36% of Americans think it is “very likely” or “somewhat likely” that government officials either allowed the attacks to be carried out or carried out the attacks themselves.[1]

The growth of this movement spurred on major new movements and political activism, driven almost exclusively by organized and ‘politically awakened’ civilians. Driven largely by the Internet, this movement has awakened a mass of people globally to the political and strategic reality of what is known – in military terms – as a “false flag operation”, in which an attack is carried out against a certain target, where those undertaking the attack fly the flag of someone else (i.e., “false flag”) in an effort to implicate them in the attack; and thus the response to an attack would be against the perceived attackers. It is, essentially, a covert military strategem: a strategic deception. The Greek dramatist and playwright Aeschylus wrote that, “In war, the first casualty is truth.” A false flag attack an act of war that is deliberately designed to deceive and hide the truth. It is an attack carried out and blamed on one’s enemy in order to justify implementing a political agenda. Governments have used such tactics for centuries, and especially western nations in the past half-century.[2]

This movement has spawned an activist resurgence in other global issues, such as the global economic system, and most notably, the central banking system, particularly the Federal Reserve. While many Americans knew next to nothing about their central bank, the Federal Reserve, a growing movement of Americans and others around the world were educating themselves about the Federal Reserve System and the global banking system in general. Many found a leader in a Texas Congressman named Ron Paul, who campaigned on the Republican ticket for President in 2008, and who drew the widest grassroots support from across the nation of any Republican candidates. Among Democrats, “9/11 Truthers” and others critical of US foreign policy came to find a passionate leader in Cynthia McKinney, who was one of the lone voices in Congress to directly challenge the Bush administration on the official version of events, and has challenged the election fraud in 2000 and 2004, conducted a Congressional hearing on covert activities in Africa, exposing the hand of western nations behind the Rwandan genocide and Congo Civil War.

In late 2008, as the government began its financial bailout of the banks, the “End the Fed” movement emerged in sporadic protests at the 12 Federal Reserve Banks located around the country, and over 40 protests took place across the nation within a matter of months.[3]

The “Homeland Security State” Targets Dissenters

With the increasing militarization of foreign policy, we also see the increasing militarization of domestic politics, and most notably the emergence of a high-tech surveillance police state: a “Homeland Security State.” National and international elites are in the process of incrementally constructing a ‘new totalitarianism’ in replacing democracy.[4] Civil rights and freedoms are dismantled through anti-terrorist legislation, wiretapping and internet surveillance are rampant and expansive, “watch lists” are constructed, which often include the names of dissenters, and the military is increasingly poised to partake in policing. Further, over the past decade, we have seen the rapid expansion of “Continuity of Government” (COG) plans, which plan for the suspension of the Constitution and imposition of martial law in the event of an emergency.[5] At this point in American society, if there was a rapid and expansive economic collapse or another major terrorist attack on US soil, America would transform into a military government, more fascist in nature than anything; but equipped with an arsenal and “technetronic” police state the likes of which no dictator in history has had access to. Freedom has never been so threatened; yet, people have never been so mobilized in modern history to challenge the threats to freedom and democracy in America, in the west, and in the world.


In 2003, General Tommy Franks gave an interview with Cigar Aficionado magazine in which he elaborated on this concept. Tommy Franks was the former Commander of the Pentagon’s Central Command over the Middle East, and thus he was the top General overseeing the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq. In his interview with the magazine, Franks stated that the objective of terrorism is “to change the mannerisms, the behavior, the sociology and, ultimately, the anthropology of a society,” and thus, in the event of another major terrorist attack in America or in the West:

the western world, the free world, loses what it cherishes most, and that is freedom and liberty we've seen for a couple of hundred years in this grand experiment that we call democracy. Now, in a practical sense, what does that mean? It means the potential of a weapon of mass destruction and a terrorist, massive casualty-producing event somewhere in the western world—it may be in the United States of America—that causes our population to question our own Constitution and to begin to militarize our country in order to avoid a repeat of another mass-casualty-producing event. Which, in fact, then begins to potentially unravel the fabric of our Constitution.[6]

One interesting facet that very little is known about in the militarization of domestic society and incremental totalitarianism is how the coercive state apparatus, while being justified under the guise of fighting terrorism or “protecting the Homeland,” is in fact being directed against citizen activists and popular political movements. For example, following 9/11, the Department of Homeland Security established what are known as “Fusion Centers,” set up all over the United States, and which are designed as “information sharing and collecting” hubs, in which agencies like the CIA, FBI, Department of Justice, Homeland Security and the US Military collect and analyze information together. As of July 2009, there were 72 acknowledged Fusion Centers around the United States.[7] Think of them as local surveillance centers, because that’s what they are.

Fusion Centers are also positioned to take part as local command centers in the event of a national emergency or implementation of “Continuity of Government” plans to declare martial law. State and local law enforcement agencies provide the majority of information to the local Fusion Centers, which is then analyzed and disseminated to the major intelligence, military or Homeland Security departments and agencies. However, in recent years, Fusion Centers have been criticized for their purported agenda, as they are justified on the basis of acting as centers designated for “counter-terrorism” purposes, but in practice are directed against citizen groups.

In the spring of 2009, it was revealed that the Missouri Information Analysis Center (MIAC) – a Fusion Center – had put out an information pamphlet designed to help law enforcement officials identify “potential domestic terrorists.” According to the report:

If you're an anti-abortion activist, or if you display political paraphernalia supporting a third-party candidate or a certain Republican member of Congress, if you possess subversive literature, you very well might be a member of a domestic paramilitary group.[8]

When did our society become something out of 1984? When did our governments designate “subversive literature” as a sign of terrorism? The report classified such activities as being part of a “Modern Militia Movement,” and further identified “potential threats to American security” as:

People who supported former third-party presidential candidates like Texas Rep. Ron Paul, Chuck Baldwin and former Georgia Rep. Bob Barr are cited in the report, in addition to anti-abortion activists and conspiracy theorists who believe the United States, Mexico and Canada will someday form a North American Union.[9]

In other words, those who are opposed to the political and economic process of “North American integration”[10] are seen and identified as “potential militia members.” The report even directly identified possession of such films like the anti-Federal Reserve film, “America: Freedom to Fascism” as “potential signals of militia involvement.”[11] The document put out by the Fusion Center further warned law enforcement officials to be “on the lookout” for “bumper stickers advertising third party candidates, or people with copies of the United States Constitution.” The report wrote that due to the economic crisis, “a lush environment for militia activity has been created,” and:

It goes on to cite possible militia members as people who talk about the New World Order conspiracy, express anger with the Federal Reserve banking system, resist paying taxes, warn other citizens about the perceived dangers of radio frequency identification (RFID) or lobby for a return to strict constitutionalism as possible threats to law enforcement.

While the memo does offer something of a lopsided summary of many of the various groups which swelled enormously following the terrorist attacks of Sept. 11, 2001, it also links individuals who are otherwise peaceful with the Ku Klux Klan and other violent organizations.[12]

Another Fusion Center in Virginia identified many universities as potential “radicalization nodes” for terrorists, singling out “historically black colleges” as potential threats, and “it also contains an extensive list of peaceful American and International activist groups from nearly all cross-sections of political engagement, placing them side-by-side with groups that have long been known for resorting to violence.”[13]

In April of 2009, the ACLU (American Civil Liberties Union) released a report on the threat to liberties and civil rights posed by the Fusion Centers, saying that, “Fusion centers have experienced a mission creep in the last several years, becoming more of a threat than a security device. With no overarching guidelines to restrict or direct them, these centers put Americans’ privacy at huge risk.” The ACLU report identified several “troubling incidents” in regards to Fusion Centers violating privacy and civil rights:

- A May 7, 2008 report entitled “Universal Adversary Dynamic Threat Assessment” authored by a private contractor that labeled environmental organizations like the Sierra Club, the Humane Society and the Audubon Society as “mainstream organizations with known or possible links to eco-terrorism”;

- A potential abuse of authority by DHS officials who improperly monitored and disseminated the communications of peace activists affiliated with the DC Anti-War Network (DAWN);

- A report produced on February 19, 2009 by the North Central Texas Fusion System entitled “Prevention Awareness Bulletin” which described a purported conspiracy between Muslim civil rights organizations, lobbying groups, the anti-war movement, the U.S. Treasury Department, hip hop bands and former Congresswoman and presidential candidate Cynthia McKinney to “provide an environment for terrorist organizations to flourish”;

- A “Strategic Report” produced February 20, 2009 by the Missouri Information Analysis Center that described a purported security threat posed by the “modern militia movement” but inappropriately included references to social, religious and political ideologies, including support of third party presidential candidates such as Congressman Ron Paul and former Congressman Bob Barr; and

- A “Protective Intelligence Bulletin” issued by the DHS Intelligence Branch of the Threat Management Division of the Federal Protective Service which improperly collected and disseminated information regarding political demonstrations and inappropriately labeled peaceful advocacy groups and other activists as “extremists.”[14]

To those in power, ‘peace’ is an ‘extremist’ idea, because ‘war’ and ‘violence’ are the norms to them. Now it has come to the point where those who challenge the structures of power are simply designated as terrorists and extremists. This is an incredibly dangerous political road at which the end is despotism and the death of democracy. Congresswoman Cynthia McKinney, as one of those identified by Fusion Centers as providing “an environment for terrorist organizations to flourish,” had this to say about the Fusion Center report:

As a student of COINTELPRO, the government's infamous Counter-Intelligence Program [directed against the Civil Rights Movement in the 1960s], I know what my government is capable of doing to quash dissent. That's why I voted against the Patriot Act, worked in Congress to roll back the Secret Evidence Act, and introduced legislation to repeal the Military Commissions Act. I come from a long legacy of activists for justice and freedom inside this country. I am on the advocacy front lines for peace abroad and justice at home. But I know that we will not have peace or justice without truth. Truth is the foundation of the dignity that we seek. Dignity for all is not a threat to the United States.[15]

It has become evident that the response of the American government to the “global political awakening” within the United States is aimed at demonizing, discrediting, and oppressing activist groups and political movements. But how far can this oppression go?

Detention Camps for Dissidents?

One startling and deeply concerning development in the area of “Homeland Security” is the highly secretive and deliberately quiet establishment of “detention centers” within the United States, designed to house millions of people in the event of an “emergency.” In 2002, Attorney General John Ashcroft “announced [a] desire for camps for U.S. citizens he deems to be ‘enemy combatants’,” and that his plan “would allow him to order the indefinite incarceration of U.S. citizens and summarily strip them of their constitutional rights and access to the courts by declaring them enemy combatants.”[16]

Also in 2002, it was reported that FEMA, the Federal Emergency Management Agency (now under the purview of the Department of Homeland Security), was “moving ahead with plans to create temporary cities that could handle millions of Americans after mass destruction attacks on U.S. cities.” Newsmax reported that, “FEMA was seeking bids from three major real estate and/or engineering firms to help prepare for the creation of the emergency cities, using tents and trailers – if an urban area is attacked by NBC (nuclear, chemical or biological) weapons.”[17]

In 2006, Dick Cheney’s former company, Halliburton, and its subsidiary company, Kellogg-Brown & Root (KBR) received a major contract from the Department of Homeland Security worth $385 million, which was given “to support the Department of Homeland Security's (DHS) U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) facilities in the event of an emergency.” A press release on KBR’s website stated that:

The contract, which is effective immediately, provides for establishing temporary detention and processing capabilities to augment existing ICE Detention and Removal Operations (DRO) Program facilities in the event of an emergency influx of immigrants into the U.S., or to support the rapid development of new programs.[18]

Further, it stated that, “The contract may also provide migrant detention support to other U.S. Government organizations in the event of an immigration emergency, as well as the development of a plan to react to a national emergency, such as a natural disaster. In the event of a natural disaster, the contractor could be tasked with providing housing for ICE personnel performing law enforcement functions in support of relief efforts.”[19]

Within two weeks, “Homeland Security Secretary Michael Chertoff announced that the Fiscal Year 2007 federal budget would allocate over $400 million to add 6,700 additional detention beds (an increase of 32 percent over 2006).” As historian and author Peter Dale Scott reported:

Both the contract and the budget allocation are in partial fulfillment of an ambitious 10-year Homeland Security strategic plan, code-named ENDGAME, authorized in 2003. According to a 49-page Homeland Security document on the plan, ENDGAME expands "a mission first articulated in the Alien and Sedition Acts of 1798." Its goal is the capability to "remove all removable aliens," including "illegal economic migrants, aliens who have committed criminal acts, asylum-seekers (required to be retained by law) or potential terrorists.”[20]

Considering that the government labels anti-war activists, libertarians, progressives, and other peaceful citizens groups as “extremists,” “paramilitary members” and “terrorists,” this is especially concerning. In 2008, a former US Congressman wrote an article for the San Francisco Chronicle in which he warned that, “Since 9/11, and seemingly without the notice of most Americans, the federal government has assumed the authority to institute martial law, arrest a wide swath of dissidents (citizen and noncitizen alike), and detain people without legal or constitutional recourse in the event of ‘an emergency influx of immigrants in the U.S., or to support the rapid development of new programs’.” He elaborated:

Beginning in 1999, the government has entered into a series of single-bid contracts with Halliburton subsidiary Kellogg, Brown and Root (KBR) to build detention camps at undisclosed locations within the United States. The government has also contracted with several companies to build thousands of railcars, some reportedly equipped with shackles, ostensibly to transport detainees.[21]

As Peter Dale Scott explained:

the contract evoked ominous memories of Oliver North's controversial Rex-84 "readiness exercise" in 1984. This called for the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) to round up and detain 400,000 imaginary "refugees," in the context of "uncontrolled population movements" over the Mexican border into the United States. North's activities raised civil liberties concerns in both Congress and the Justice Department. The concerns persist.

"Almost certainly this is preparation for a roundup after the next 9/11 for Mid-Easterners, Muslims and possibly dissenters," says Daniel Ellsberg, a former military analyst who in 1971 released the Pentagon Papers, the U.S. military's account of its activities in Vietnam. "They've already done this on a smaller scale, with the 'special registration' detentions of immigrant men from Muslim countries, and with Guantanamo."

Plans for detention facilities or camps have a long history, going back to fears in the 1970s of a national uprising by black militants. As Alonzo Chardy reported in the Miami Herald on July 5, 1987, an executive order for continuity of government (COG) had been drafted in 1982 by FEMA head Louis Giuffrida. The order called for "suspension of the Constitution" and "declaration of martial law."[22]

More recently, there have been several reported incidents of small towns having major “detention centers” being built in them which remain empty and maintained for the event of an “emergency.” One such facility is being proposed for the City of Italy to build “a detention center for illegal immigrants.”[23] There was also an effort to have a detention center built in Benson City “to house illegal immigrants.”[24] A major American prison corporation, Corplan Corrections, “has been at the center of numerous controversies, including a bizarre prison-building scheme in Hardin, Montana that involved a private military force called American Police Force run by an ex-con. The prison cost the small town $27 million but never housed any prisoners.” Further, Corplan “has approached city officials in several towns across the U.S. – Benson, Arizona; Las Cruces, New Mexico; and Weslaco, Texas – with a proposal to build a new detention center for immigrant families.”[25]

These facilities, built under the pretences of housing “illegal immigrants” yet largely remaining empty, could potentially be used to house not only immigrants, but also Muslims and “possibly dissenters” following a major emergency, such as an economic collapse or terrorist attack within the United States. After all, in World War II, Canada and the United States rounded up Japanese and German immigrants into internment camps. Again, it becomes evident that the response of power structures to the manifestation of the global political awakening within the United States is to oppress and suppress the people, and with that, undermine democracy itself.

The Prospects of Revolution

During the first phase of the global economic crisis in December of 2008, the IMF warned governments of the prospect of “violent unrest on the streets.” The head of the IMF warned that, “violent protests could break out in countries worldwide if the financial system was not restructured to benefit everyone rather than a small elite.”[26] Naturally, the IMF director leaves out the fact that he is part of that small elite and that the IMF functions for the benefit of that very same elite.

In late December of 2008, “A U.S. Army War College report warn[ed] an economic crisis in the United States could lead to massive civil unrest and the need to call on the military to restore order.” The report stated that, “Widespread civil violence inside the United States would force the defense establishment to reorient priorities ... to defend basic domestic order and human security.”[27]

Throughout 2009, there was an abundance of civil unrest, protests and even riots all across Europe in response to the economic crisis. In February of 2009, Obama’s intelligence chief, Dennis Blair, the Director of National Intelligence, told the Senate Intelligence Committee that the economic crisis has become the greatest threat to U.S. national security:

I’d like to begin with the global economic crisis, because it already looms as the most serious one in decades, if not in centuries ... Economic crises increase the risk of regime-threatening instability if they are prolonged for a one- or two-year period... And instability can loosen the fragile hold that many developing countries have on law and order, which can spill out in dangerous ways into the international community.[28]

In other words, the economic crisis poses two major social threats to the “national security” (i.e., imperial status) of the United States. Of key importance is that America and other western nations may lose control of their colonial possessions and interests in the developing world – Africa, South America and Asia – as the people in those regions, the most “politically awakened” in the world, can cause “regime-threatening instability” as the prospects of riots, rebellion and revolution expose the failure of their national leaders and governance structures. This would pose an immense threat to the interests of the west in those regions, as they primarily rely upon local nation-states to control the populations and resources. Concurrently, these revolts could spread to the developing world. So western elites are faced with the prospects of possibly losing their control over the world’s resources and even their own domestic populations. The natural reaction, in imperial logic, is to militarize both the foreign and domestic spheres.

No wonder then, that in 2008, the highest-ranking general in the United States, “Adm. Michael Mullen, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, ranks the financial crisis as a higher priority and greater risk to security than current wars in Iraq and Afghanistan.” He explained, “It's a global crisis. And as that impacts security issues, or feeds greater instability, I think it will impact on our national security in ways that we quite haven't figured out yet.”[29]

The head of the World Trade Organization (WTO) warned that, “The global economic crisis could trigger political unrest equal to that seen during the 1930s.” He elaborated, “The crisis today is spreading even faster (than the Great Depression) and affects more countries at the same time.”[30]

In February of 2009, renowned economic historian and Harvard professor, Niall Ferguson, predicted a “prolonged financial hardship, even civil war, before the ‘Great Recession' ends,” and that, “The global crisis is far from over, [it] has only just begun, and Canada is no exception,” he said while at a speaking event in Canada. He explained, “Policy makers and forecasters who see a recovery next year are probably lying to boost public confidence,” while, “the crisis will eventually provoke political conflict.” He further explained:

There will be blood, in the sense that a crisis of this magnitude is bound to increase political as well as economic [conflict]. It is bound to destabilize some countries. It will cause civil wars to break out, that have been dormant. It will topple governments that were moderate and bring in governments that are extreme. These things are pretty predictable.[31]

Even in May of 2009, the head of the World Bank warned that, “the global economic crisis could lead to serious social upheaval,” as “there is a risk of a serious human and social crisis with very serious political implications.”[32] Zbigniew Brzezinski himself warned in February of 2009 that, “There's going to be growing conflict between the classes and if people are unemployed and really hurting, hell, there could be even riots!”[33]

In March of 2010, Moody’s, a major credit ratings agency, warned that “social unrest” is coming to the west, as the US, the UK, Germany, France, and Spain “are all at risk of soaring debt costs and will have to implement austerity plans that threaten ‘social cohesion’.”[34]

In 2007, a British Defence Ministry report was released assessing global trends in the world over the next 30 years. In assessing “Global Inequality”, the report stated that over the next 30 years:

[T]he gap between rich and poor will probably increase and absolute poverty will remain a global challenge... Disparities in wealth and advantage will therefore become more obvious, with their associated grievances and resentments, even among the growing numbers of people who are likely to be materially more prosperous than their parents and grandparents. Absolute poverty and comparative disadvantage will fuel perceptions of injustice among those whose expectations are not met, increasing tension and instability, both within and between societies and resulting in expressions of violence such as disorder, criminality, terrorism and insurgency. They may also lead to the resurgence of not only anti-capitalist ideologies, possibly linked to religious, anarchist or nihilist movements, but also to populism and the revival of Marxism.[35]

Further, the report warned of the dangers to the established powers of a revolution emerging from the disgruntled middle classes of the west:

The middle classes could become a revolutionary class, taking the role envisaged for the proletariat by Marx. The globalization of labour markets and reducing levels of national welfare provision and employment could reduce peoples’ attachment to particular states. The growing gap between themselves and a small number of highly visible super-rich individuals might fuel disillusion with meritocracy, while the growing urban under-classes are likely to pose an increasing threat to social order and stability, as the burden of acquired debt and the failure of pension provision begins to bite. Faced by these twin challenges, the world’s middle-classes might unite, using access to knowledge, resources and skills to shape transnational processes in their own class interest.[36]

From the Old World to the New

So here we are, in the year 2010, the end of the first decade of the 21st century; and what a century it has been thus far: 9/11, a recession, the war on Afghanistan, the “war on terror”, the war on Iraq, terrorist attacks in Bali, Madrid, London and all across the Middle East; the war on Somalia, the Congo Civil War (the deadliest conflict since World War II, with upwards of 6 million innocent civilians killed since 1996); the Russia-Georgia war, the expansion of the war into Pakistan, the election of Barack Obama, the global economic crisis and here we are.

All of human history is the story of the struggle of free humanity – the individual and the collective – against the constructs of power, which sought to dominate and control humanity. From humanity’s origins in Africa, civilizations rose and fell, dominated and decimated. From Ancient Egypt to Greece and Rome, the Chinese dynasties, the Mayans and Aztecs, all sought domination of land and people. The Persian Empire and the Ottoman Empire expanded and controlled vast populations and diverse people; and with the emergence of Capitalism came the emergence of the European powers.

For the past 500 years, Europe and America have dominated the world; and in fact, only in the last 65 years has America dominated the globe. The Peace of Westphalia was signed in 1648, ending the Thirty Years’ War in the Holy Roman Empire and the Eighty Years’ War between Spain and the Republic of the Seven United Netherlands. This agreement effectively ended the Holy Roman Empire, and marked the emergence of the idea of the modern nation-state. University studies in International Relations begin with the Peace of Westphalia, as it is viewed as the beginning of the international system we know today.

Out of this emerged the great European empires: the Portuguese, the Spanish, the Dutch, and later the French, British and German empires, which created the first global political economy with the Atlantic Slave Trade, trading weapons and goods in exchange for captured slaves, fueling internal civil wars among the large African empires to feed them a supply of slaves which they then took to the Americas to use as a labour force. That labour force would produce goods taken back to Europe, traded among the world’s empires, and ultimately financing the continued flow of weapons into Africa. It was a triangular trade between Europe, Africa and the Americas. At this time, the notion of ‘race’ originated through a series of legal decisions made in the colonies.

In the 1600s, the colonies in the Americas were made up of white, Indian and black indentured labourers and slaves, both ‘un-free blacks and whites, with blacks being a minority, yet they still “exercised basic rights in law.” A problem arose for elites attempting to control the labour class: the un-free native labour force knew the land and could escape easily (so they would later be largely eliminated through genocide); and in the 1660s, the labour class was becoming rebellious, where black and white labourers worked together and rebelled against local elites. The entire lower class of society was united – regardless of their varied and expansive differences – and they were united against the elites. Thus, a doctrine of ‘divide and conquer’ was implemented against the psycho-social foundations of the people.[37]

The elite “relaxed the servitude” of the white labourers, and “intensified the bonds of black slavery,” and subsequently “introduced a new regime of racial oppression. In doing so, they effectively created the white race – and with it white supremacy.” Thus, “the conditions of white and black servants began to diverge considerably after 1660.” Following this, legislation would separate white and black slavery, prevent “mixed” marriages, and seek to prevent the procreation of “mixed-race” children. Whereas before 1660, many black slaves were not indentured for life, this changed as colonial law increasingly “imposed lifetime bondage for black servants – and, especially significant, the curse of lifetime servitude for their offspring.”[38]

A central feature of the social construction of this racial divide was “the denial of the right to vote,” as most Anglo-American colonies previously allowed free blacks to vote, but this slowly changed throughout the colonies. The ruling class of America was essentially “inventing race.” Thus, “Freedom was increasingly identified with race, not class.”[39]

In 1648, the nation-state emerged; in 1660, racism was created through legal decisions; and in 1694, the Bank of England was created and the birth of the central banking system took place. All of these were essentially ‘social constructions’ – nation, race, currency – in which they are simply ideas that are accepted as reality. A nation is not a physical entity, race has no true basis for discrimination or hierarchy, and a currency has no actual value. They only hold as true because everyone accepts them as true.

From this period of immense transition, European imperial nations dominated the world; racism justified their domination, and central banks dominated the empires at home and abroad. The 1800s saw the Industrial Revolution, which instigated the decline of slavery and the emergence of paid labour and hourly wages. Eventually, the notion of ‘race science’ emerged within the eugenics movement, originating in Europe, and later migrating to the United States in the late 19th century. This helped justify the ‘Scramble for Africa’, which began in the 1880s and entailed the European empires formally colonizing the entire continent of Africa, carving it into nations among them, but justifying it on the basis of a racist “civilizing mission.”

The European imperial age declined with World War I, a battle of empires and economies. This led to the collapse of many European empires as well as the Ottoman and Russian empires, with the emergence of the Soviet Union as well as nation-states in the Middle East. The emergence of fascism took root in the 1920s and 30s, and grew to coalesce in World War II, which led to the ultimate decline of the British and French empires, and the emergence of the American empire.

America became the engine of empire for the Atlantic community, Europe and North America. It created and ran international organizations allowing for transnational elites to share power among an increasingly global – an increasingly smaller – group of elites. The World, for nearly fifty years, was defined as a global struggle between Communism and Democracy – between the Soviet Union and the West. This historical myth hides the face of global domination: a struggle between two blocs for global domination of the world’s people and resources.

With the end of the Cold War came the emergence of the New World Order, a world in which there was only one global power: the United States. I was born shortly before the Berlin Wall came down, and I developed a memory only after the Soviet Union collapsed; the only world I know is the one in which the United States has been the only global power. I know only the era of ‘globalization’ and the promises it made my generation. Think of the effect upon the youth this great period of transition will have.

The history of humanity is one of constant change, sometimes slow and incremental, at other times rapid and expansive. Today, we are in a period in which we are seeing a convergence of never-before-seen global realities. The population of the world has never been so monumentally large – at 6.8 billion – and among the global population, for the first time in human history, there is a true “global political awakening.” This does not mean that everyone is correct in their views, but it does mean that the world’s people are thinking and acting – even if incidentally or unknowingly – about the global polity. This is most especially so in the areas where the Atlantic world has dominated for so long, as they have been subjected to poverty, racism, and war like no other people on earth. Their ‘awakening’ was forced upon them, and the west is now having its awakening forced upon it.

At our current position, we are about to undergo a global historical period of transition, the likes of which has never before been seen. The incremental and slow building ‘global political awakening’ that emerged around the world in the past century, is reaching a precipice and rapid expansion at the beginning of the 21st century. Global power has never been so centralized, with international institutions and systems of global governance holding authority over several realms of humanity. We are partaking in global wars seeking to dominate populations and control resources, democracy is eroding in the west, and wealth disparities have never been so great in all of human history.

For the first time in the last 500 years, the East has risen – with China and India – as new global powers, rising within the system not against it; marking the first time that nation-states have not risen against the global power, but with the global power. China and India are being brought within a new global political and economic system that is being constructed: a global totalitarian system of continental colonies to a global state. In 1998, then Secretary-General of NATO, Javier Solana, gave a speech in which he said:

It is my general contention that humanity and democracy - two principles essentially irrelevant to the original Westphalian order - can serve as guideposts in crafting a new international order, better adapted to the security realities, and challenges, of today's Europe.[40]

Further, he explained, “the Westphalian system had its limits. For one, the principle of sovereignty it relied on also produced the basis for rivalry, not community of states; exclusion, not integration.” Thus, to truly have global power, the international system of nation-states must be ‘re-imagined’ and altered: first, into continental governance structures, and ultimately a global structure. As Solana said, “In the United Nations, the ideal of a global institution including all nations became a reality,” and “the ideal of European integration was set in motion.” He elaborated:

But an integral part of the evolution of the Atlantic Alliance was the idea of reconciliation: the integration of our militaries, the common project of collective defence, and the willingness to work towards a common approach to defend the Alliance's common values.

Unfortunately, also out of the same ashes of the second world war emerged the East-West confrontation that left Europe deeply divided for more than four decades. As our century comes to an end, we at last have the opportunity to overcome this division and to set free all the creative energies this continent can muster to build the new security order which will lead us into the 21st century.[41]

It is a difficult balancing act for global powers – particularly the United States – to manage the integration of China into the ‘new world order’, while simultaneously both of them compete for control of global resources, located primarily in regions of the world which are experiencing the most rapid and extensive ‘awakening’. The imperial mindset – like that of Brzezinski’s – seeks to rationalize global power as being equated with ‘global stability’, and that without empire, there is only ‘chaos’. Thus, imperial logic dictates that America must seek to dominate as much of the world as fast as possible, and hence control global resources, which will allow it to determine the terms of China and other powers’ inclusion in the new world order. This has the potential to spark a global war – a World War III type of scenario between the NATO powers and the China-Russia alliance – the Shanghai Cooperation Organization (SCO) – who seek to share power, not to be dominated. Global populations at home and abroad have never been so challenging to control: global war is inevitable in the imperial mindset. As Brzezinski himself stated in a speech to Chatham House in London in 2009:

But these major world powers, new and old, also face a novel reality: while the lethality of their military might is greater than ever, their capacity to impose control over the politically awakened masses of the world is at a historic low. To put it bluntly: in earlier times, it was easier to control one million people than to physically kill one million people; today, it is infinitely easier to kill one million people than to control one million people.[42]

In many people’s view of the global economic crisis, the problem was ‘greed’. Greed is not the problem, it is but a symptom of the disease that is ‘power’; which, like a cancer, expands and kills its host. Humanity is entering what will likely be the most turbulent period in human history. The future is not yet written; all that is certain is that everything will change. What it comes down to is the greatest human struggle in the history of our small little planet: the struggle of the world’s people – in every corner of the world, from every religion, ‘race’, ethnicity, ideology, language, sex, gender and variation – against a global power elite who control the most advanced, technological, and lethal tools of oppression every conceived. Make no mistake, we are not repeating history, we are making it.

The Power of Ideas

Our awakening is the greatest threat to these global elites, and it is our only hope of protecting any notions of freedom, liberty, family, equality and individuality. It is these notions that have led to and created the greatest developments and ideas in human history. Humanity’s best is within these concepts, and its worst is within power. The shame of humanity is within its systems of power, so for humanity to survive we must re-imagine and remodel our global system and global power.

We cannot design a society for humanity without taking into consideration human nature. If you build it, they will come. If we keep creating positions of great power, and continually globalize power, it will attract exactly the wrong type of people to those positions of power: the ones that want it and want to abuse the power. These people are more likely to get to these positions of power because they are willing to do anything to get there, which means that once they have it, they will do anything to maintain and expand it. And so power grows, and the cancer spreads. Imagine if Hitler’s rise to power took place not in the era of nation-states, but in the era of the ‘global state.’ All that is required is one tyrant, and humanity is nothing if not proof that there are always tyrants in waiting.

What is a nation? Is it an army, a flag, an anthem, or a building of government? A nation is an idea – and is constructed by a series of ideas. There is no ‘real’ border, it is an imaginary line, and everyone in the world pretends they are there, and nation-states (which are really people who are in control of these ideas), govern accordingly. Now we are in a period in which elites are attempting to re-imagine the international community, to erase the ‘idea’ of borders, and to ultimately re-program humanity to follow their example. Social planners seek to control not simply our land, resources and bodies, but most importantly, our minds. World government will be sold to us on the ‘ideas’ of peace, something all of humanity wants; all save the powerful, for war and conflict is the means through which power is accumulated and society is transformed.

True peace will never be possible with a singular global power structure; for once power is globally centralized, what more can the powerful seek to achieve? Thus, the powerful fight each other for control of the centralized authority, paranoia governs their minds, and distrust and hatred directs their actions. Power subsequently becomes its own worst enemy, as it eats away at its host and destroys the body within which it lives.

True peace can only come from human understanding. Free humanity must understand each other if we are to live among each other. We cannot any longer view each other through the lenses of power: through the media, government, economic, and social structures. These structures are designed with the intent to mislead and misrepresent people, they are illegitimate and must be considered as such. We must view and understand each other on a human level: on ideas of freedom, liberty, family, equality and individually. To achieve that understanding, one realizes that freedom must be for all or none, that liberty is not to be selective, the importance of family, the necessity of equality and the acceptance and celebration of individuality. With that, peace is inevitable. With power, peace is impossible.

Just as elites seek to re-imagine and recreate our world, we too, can do the same. This must begin with the human understanding, where we enter into a new Renaissance or Enlightenment, not western, but global; where the people communicate and interact with each other on a personal basis, not through elite structures. This must be the aim of the global political awakening: to achieve peace through peaceful means. If everyone in the world simply decided to no longer acknowledge people and positions of power, that power would vanish. If there is no army, because the soldiers decided to no longer recognize the government, there is no one to pull the trigger on people in the street.

I think, therefore I am. If I think I am free, I will become free. But while an individual can do this, it does not work if everyone doesn’t do it. This requires all people, everywhere, to work together, talk together, learn together, think together and act together. We can either do this now, or potentially be subdued for decades if not longer. If we do not achieve global peace and freedom for all people, if we do not understand each other, power will win, at least for a while. What is important to note is that the emergence of a technetronic society reduces the need for people, as technology can watch, listen, control and kill people with the push of a button. We are also in danger of becoming a docile, tranquilized society, lost in drugs – whether recreational or even more notably, pharmaceutical. We must avoid entering into a ‘brave new world’, and instead bravely construct a different world.

From the militarization of domestic society, it would appear as if we are moving into a world quite reminiscent of George Orwell’s 1984, in which the world is divided into a few major regional blocs that war against each other and terrorize their populations through acts of physical terror and total surveillance (“Big Brother”). This is but a phase and evolution into the final stage – the grand idea – or as Aldous Huxley referred to it, “The Ultimate Revolution”: the global scientific dictatorship. That will be the focus of the third and final part in this series.

Endnotes

[1] Lev Grossman, Why the 9/11 Conspiracy Theories Won't Go Away. Time Magazine: September 3, 2006: http://www.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,1531304,00.html
[2] Andrew Gavin Marshall, State-Sponsored Terror: British and American Black Ops in Iraq. Global Research: June 25, 2008: http://www.globalresearch.ca/index.php?context=va&aid=9447; Andrew Gavin Marshall, Breaking Iraq and Blaming Iran. Global Research: July 3, 2008: http://www.globalresearch.ca/index.php?context=va&aid=9450 ; Andrew Gavin Marshall, Operation Gladio: CIA Network of "Stay Behind" Secret Armies. Global Research: July 17, 2008: http://www.globalresearch.ca/index.php?context=va&aid=9556 ; also see: Daniele Ganser, NATO's secret armies: operation Gladio and terrorism in Western Europe, (Frank Cass: 2005).
[3] Chris Steller, Minneapolis Federal Reserve draws third protest in six months. The Minnesota Independent: April 25, 2009: http://minnesotaindependent.com/33400/end-the-fed-minneapolis
[4] Andrew Gavin Marshall, The Transnational Homeland Security State and the Decline of Democracy. Global Research: April 15, 2010: http://www.globalresearch.ca/index.php?context=va&aid=18676
[5] Peter Dale Scott, Supplanting the United States Constitution: War, National Emergency and "Continuity of Government". Global Research: May 19, 2010: http://www.globalresearch.ca/index.php?context=va&aid=19238 ; Peter Dale Scott, Martial Law, the Financial Bailout, and War. Global Research: January 8, 2009: http://www.globalresearch.ca/index.php?context=va&aid=11681
[6] Marvin R. Shanken, General Tommy Franks: An exclusive interview with America's top general in the war on terrorism. Cigar Aficionado Magazine: December 1, 2003: http://www.cigaraficionado.com/Cigar/CA_Profiles/People_Profile/0,2540,201,00.html
[7] Amy Goodman, Broadcast Exclusive: Declassified Docs Reveal Military Operative Spied on WA Peace Groups, Activist Friends Stunned. Democracy Now! July 28, 2009: http://www.democracynow.org/2009/7/28/broadcast_exclusive_declassified_docs_reveal_military
[8] Joshua Rhett Miller, 'Fusion Centers' Expand Criteria to Identify Militia Members. Fox News: March 23, 2009: http://www.foxnews.com/politics/2009/03/23/fusion-centers-expand-criteria-identify-militia-members/
[9] Joshua Rhett Miller, 'Fusion Centers' Expand Criteria to Identify Militia Members. Fox News: March 23, 2009: http://www.foxnews.com/politics/2009/03/23/fusion-centers-expand-criteria-identify-militia-members/
[10] Andrew Gavin Marshall, Tyrants and Traitors: The “Evolution by Stealth” of a North American Union. Global Research: August 7, 2007: http://www.globalresearch.ca/index.php?context=va&aid=6475
[11] Joshua Rhett Miller, 'Fusion Centers' Expand Criteria to Identify Militia Members. Fox News: March 23, 2009: http://www.foxnews.com/politics/2009/03/23/fusion-centers-expand-criteria-identify-militia-members/
[12] Stephen C. Webster, Missouri retracts police memo which labeled activists as 'militia'. The Raw Story: March 26, 2009: http://rawstory.com/news/2008/Missouri_retracts_police_memo_which_labeled_0326.html
[13] Stephen C. Webster, Fusion center declares nation's oldest universities possible terror threat. The Raw Story: April 6, 2009: http://www.rawstory.com/news/2008/Virginia_terror_assessment_targets_enormous_crosssection_0406.html
[14] Press Release, ACLU Calls For Internal DHS Investigations On Fusion Centers. ACLU: April 1, 2009: http://www.aclu.org/technology-and-liberty/aclu-calls-internal-dhs-investigations-fusion-centers
[15] Press Release, ACLU Calls For Internal DHS Investigations On Fusion Centers. ACLU: April 1, 2009: http://www.aclu.org/technology-and-liberty/aclu-calls-internal-dhs-investigations-fusion-centers
[16] Jonathan Turley, Camps for Citizens: Ashcroft's Hellish Vision. Los Angeles Times: August 14, 2002: http://www.commondreams.org/views02/0814-05.htm
[17] Christopher Ruddy, FEMA’s Plan for Mass Destruction Attacks: Of Course It’s True. Newsmax: August 6, 2002: http://archive.newsmax.com/archives/articles/2002/8/6/183147.shtml
[18] Press Release, KBR Awarded U.S. Department of Homeland Security Contingency Support Project for Emergency Support Services. KBR: January 24, 2006: http://www.kbr.com/Newsroom/Press-Releases/2006/01/24/KBR-Awarded-US-Department-of-Homeland-Security-Contingency-Support-Project-for-Emergency-Support-Services/
[19] Ibid.
[20] Peter Dale Scott, 10-Year U.S. Strategic Plan For Detention Camps Revives Proposals From Oliver North. New American Media: February 26, 2006: http://news.ncmonline.com/news/view_article.html?article_id=9c2d6a5e75201d7e3936ddc65cdd56a9
[21] Lewis Seiler and Dan Hamburg, Rule by fear or rule by law? The San Francisco Chronicle: February 4, 2008: http://articles.sfgate.com/2008-02-04/opinion/17140386_1_martial-law-kbr-national-defense-authorization-act
[22] Peter Dale Scott, Homeland Security Contracts for Vast New Detention Camps. Global Research: February 6, 2006: http://www.globalresearch.ca/index.php?context=va&aid=1897
[23] Cindy Sutherland, Italy City Council hears proposal for commercial development. Italy Neotribune: May 18, 2010: http://www.italyneotribune.com/stories/italy-city-council-hears-proposal-for-commercial-development
[24] Thelma Grimes, Council 'nay' on detention center; City wants project funding assurance. Benson News: May 11, 2010: http://www.bensonnews-sun.com/articles/2010/05/12/news/news03.txt
[25] Forrest Wilder, For the Lucios, Private Prison Consulting is a Family Affair. Texas Observer: April 23, 2010: http://www.texasobserver.org/forrestforthetrees/for-the-lucios-private-prison-consulting-is-a-family-affair
[26] Angela Balakrishnan, IMF chief issues stark warning on economic crisis. The Guardian: December 18, 2008: http://www.guardian.co.uk/business/2008/dec/16/imf-financial-crisis
[27] Military.com, Study: DoD May Act On US Civil Unrest. McClatchy-Tribune Information Services: December 29, 2008: http://www.military.com/news/article/study-dod-may-act-on-us-civil-unrest.html
[28] Stephen C. Webster, US intel chief: Economic crisis a greater threat than terrorism. Raw Story: February 13, 2009: http://rawstory.com/news/2008/US_intel_chief_Economic_crisis_greater_0213.html
[29] Tom Philpott, MILITARY UPDATE: Official: Financial crisis a bigger security risk than wars. Colorado Springs Gazette: February 1, 2009: http://www.gazette.com/articles/mullen-47273-military-time.html
[30] AFP, WTO chief warns of looming political unrest. AFP: February 7, 2009: http://www.google.com/hostednews/afp/article/ALeqM5gpC1Q4gXJfp6EwMl1rMGrmA_a7ZA
[31] Heather Scoffield, 'There will be blood'. The Globe and Mail: February 23, 2009: http://www.theglobeandmail.com/report-on-business/article973785.ece
[32] BBC, World Bank warns of social unrest. BBC News: May 24, 2009: http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/business/8066037.stm
[33] Press TV, Economic Crisis: Brzezinski warns of riots in US. Global Research: February 21, 2009: http://www.globalresearch.ca/index.php?context=va&aid=12392
[34] Ambrose Evans-Pritchard, Moody's fears social unrest as AAA states implement austerity plans. The Telegraph: March 15, 2010: http://www.telegraph.co.uk/finance/economics/7450468/Moodys-fears-social-unrest-as-AAA-states-implement-austerity-plans.html
[35] DCDC, The DCDC Global Strategic Trends Programme, 2007-2036, 3rd ed. The Ministry of Defence, January 2007: page 3
[36] Ibid, page 81.
[37] Andrew Gavin Marshall, War, Racism and the Empire of Poverty. Global Research: March 22, 2010: http://www.globalresearch.ca/index.php?context=va&aid=18263
[38] Ibid.
[39] Ibid.
[40] Dr. Javier Solana, "Securing Peace in Europe", NATO speech: November 12, 1998: http://www.nato.int/docu/speech/1998/s981112a.htm
[41] Ibid.
[42] Zbigniew Brzezinski, “Major Foreign Policy Challenges for the Next US President,” International Affairs, 85: 1, (2009), page 54 (emphasis added)

This is Part 2 of the series, ``The Technological Revolution and the Future of Freedom.``

Andrew Gavin Marshall is a Research Associate with the Centre for Research on Globalization (CRG), and is studying Political Economy and History in Canada. He is co-editor, with Michel Chossudovsky, of the recent book, "The Global Economic Crisis: The Great Depression of the XXI Century," available to order at Globalresearch.ca.

Andrew Gavin Marshall is a frequent contributor to Global Research.

Global Research Articles by Andrew Gavin Marshall
Global Research home page

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Monday, June 28, 2010

Stephen Lendman: Competing Ideologies: G20 v US Social Forum

Competing Ideologies: G20 v. US Social Forum
By Stephen Lendman article link
June 28, 2010 | OpEdNews

Established in 1999, G20 finance ministers, central bank governors, and, at times, heads of state meet semi-annually to "discuss key issues in the global economy," the initial 1999 meeting in Berlin, hosted by German and Canadian finance ministers.

G20.org calls its itself "the premier forum for our international economic development that promotes open and constructive discussion between industrial and emerging-market countries on key issues related to global economic stability," saying it "support(s) growth and development across the globe," or does it?

The reality suggests otherwise about a political power elite gathering to review past achievements, challenges, and prospects for greater exploitation of world markets, resources, and people everywhere. In other words, to support power and privilege over beneficial social change, a consideration not addressed, discussed, or thought about, except with regard to instituting policies leading to the disintegration and elimination of social democracies, replacing them with the worst elements of developing world harshness, tolerating no opposition.

What economist Michael Hudson suggested in his recent article titled, "Europe's Fiscal Dystopia: The 'New Austerity' Road to Financial Serfdom," saying:

"Europe is committing fiscal suicide - and will have little trouble finding allies at this weekend's G-20 meetings," attendees "calling for cutbacks in public spending" when economic recovery requires stimulus, job creation, and public investment, not global wars, banker bailouts, or other counterproductive measures.

Hudson called the meeting "a carefully orchestrated financial war against the 'real' economy," initiated in America, Obama having "stacked his White House Deficit Commission....with the same brand of neoliberal ideologues who comprised the notorious 1982 Greenspan Commission on Social Security 'reform,' " a topic this writer addressed earlier in a "maestro of misery" article about a man who wrecked the lives of millions for the rich, now cashing in big late in life, claiming no responsibility for decades of harm, a legacy others won't let him forget.

Now it's going global, why Hudson sees Europe "dying....succumb(ing) to a financial coup d'etat rolling back the past three centuries of Enlightenment social philosophy." In lock step, America is erasing its New Deal and Great Society gains, planning mass impoverishment, human misery, and fascist harshness, the hidden G20 agenda not reported in the mainstream, sticking to its party line propaganda, the usual rubbish top officials preach to conceal their real plans from hell.

The G20 - An Explanation

Comprising 85% of global GDP, 80% of world trade, and two-thirds of its population, participating countries include America, Canada, Germany, France, Britain, Italy, Spain (a permanent guest), China, Japan, India, South Korea, Indonesia, Russia, Brazil, Argentina, Mexico, Turkey, Australia, South Africa, and Saudi Arabia as well as EU Council and Commission Presidents.

Other attendees include:

-- the IMF's managing director and chairman;
-- the World Bank's president;
-- the international Monetary and Financial Committee (IMFC); and
-- chairman of the IMF/World Bank Development Committee.

Even though they rank higher economically than some members, excluded are Switzerland, Norway, Taiwan, Iran and Venezuela. Included only as part of the EU are Spain, Netherlands, Poland, Belgium, Sweden, Austria, Greece and Denmark.

The G20 superseded the G33 that replaced the G22. The year 1975 inaugurated the G6 comprised of America, France, Germany, Britain, Italy and Japan. Adding Canada in 1976 made it the G7, then G8 by including Russia in 1997, the EU also included, but it doesn't host or chair.

On June 26 and 27, 2010, G20 officials met inside the Metro Toronto Convention Centre, Toronto, Canada. Thousands of protestors filled city streets outside, Reuters reporting over 600 arrested, many in a so-called "free speech zone," police spokeswoman Michelle Murphy calling it "quite a messy protest" on Saturday, continuing on Sunday, accusing "masked anarchists" of smashing store and bank windows, then torching two or more police cars.

Prime Minister Stephen Harper said "Free speech is a principle of our democracy, but thugs (provocateurs he dispatched) that prompted violence earlier today represent in no way, shape or form the Canadian way of life," he and his government have been systematically destroying in league with Washington.

Against peaceful activists were more than six KM of barriers topped with concertina wire, thousands of newly installed surveillance cameras, patrolling helicopters, the Canadian Armed Forces at undisclosed locations, and over 7,000 police, plain clothes officers, mounted patrols, snipers on rooftops, US Navy Seals (trained killers), about 1,000 private security guards, and planted ("Black Bloc") provocateurs. More on them below.

Police, acting as hooligans, used tear gas, pepper spray, rubber bullets, bean bag guns, batons, and other intimidations, a security operation costing Canada a reported $1.2 billion, the Harper government's communications director, Dimitri Soudas, calling protestors "a bunch of thugs who pretend to have a difference of opinions and instead choose violence in order to express" them, adding that police were "ensuring these thugs don't rampage across the city and create even more damage."

In fact, protestors were peaceful, but not police, independent reports saying they exhibited extreme brutality, including against journalists (men and women), beating and punching them, injuring others, and arresting hundreds, some before the summit convened to intimidate others.

Protest organizer, Niki Thorne, reported that 20 police raided her house and arrested four people, saying:

"Police forcibly detained and cuffed a number of people, and refused to allow those in the house to call for legal advice. Without showing warrants, asking consent, or giving notice, (they) did an illegal cursory search of some of the people on the premises as well as the house itself."

According to the Toronto Globe and Mail, those arrested were charged with conspiracy to commit mischief, police alleging they were "planning to break off from peaceful protest and launch violent attacks," with no corroborating evidence.

In fact, quite the opposite, according to reports, video, and other evidence exposing undercover police violence, posing as "street thugs," hooded and dressed in black (the so-called "Black Bloc"), instigating disorder and brutishness, destroying public property, smashing windows, burning police cars, blamed on protestors - an old story in Canada, America, and other global venues to blame state crimes on peaceful activists, the major media reporting it without question, independent journalists kept away to suppress it, public perceptions manipulated by misinformation.

This is how a police state operates, Ameri/Canadian fascism, making false accusations and arrests, employing hooligan tactics against peaceful protestors, and refusing non-mainstream reporters entry into Canada, others arrested to prevent their coverage - violating Section 2(b) of the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms, a constitutional bill of rights, affirming:

"freedom of thought, belief, opinion and expression, including freedom of the press and other media communication (as well as) freedom of peaceful assembly (and) freedom of association."

The US Social Forum (USSF) - Another World is Possible

Evolving from the World Social Forum's (WSF) alternative vision, the USSF first met in Atlanta in mid-2007, this year in Detroit for activists, organizers, minorities, labor, the poor, indigenous peoples and others wanting social justice and a better world, mirror-opposite of the G20 agenda - supporting privilege over the common good, plotting to extinguished those old-fashioned notions, forcibly when necessary.

On its web site (ussf2010.org), USSF headlines "Another World is Possible, Another US Is Necessary," calling itself:

"a movement building process. It is not a conference but is a space to come up with the peoples' solutions to the economic and ecological crisis. (It's) the next important step in our struggle to build a powerful multi-racial, multi-sectoral, inter-generational, diverse, inclusive, internationalist movement that transforms this country and changes history."

"We must declare what we want our world to look like and we must start planning the path to get there. The USSF provides spaces to learn from each other's experiences and struggles, share our analysis of the problems our communities face, build relationships, and align with our international brothers and sisters to strategize how to reclaim our world."

No wonder, the major media ignore it, instead supporting power and privilege, corporate interests, imperial wars, democracy for the few, sham elections, and street thuggery hooliganism. At the same time, social justice concerns are suppressed, ones affecting most people everywhere, their voices never heard, their issues unaddressed, their struggles disregarded and spurned.

But not in Detroit from June 22 - 26, ground zero for the failed economy and counterproductive measures causing it, over 20,000 attending in solidarity for a better world, one that can't come a moment too soon, that won't happen without mass grassroots support no longer tolerating official policies preventing it - in Toronto, Washington, or other global cities where governments deny their own people justice. What better time for change than now, USSF's agenda an inspirational call for it.

Stephen Lendman lives in Chicago and can be reached at lendmanstephen@sbcglobal.net. Also visit his blog site at sjlendman.blogspot.com and listen to cutting-edge discussions with distinguished guests on the Progressive Radio News Hour on the Progressive Radio Network Thursdays at 10AM US Central time and Saturdays and Sundays at noon. All programs are archived for easy listening.

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Socialist Project: Mass Arrests, the Security State and the Toronto G20 Summit

Mass Arrests, the Security State and the Toronto G20 Summit
by Socialist Project article link
June 27, 2010 | Socialist Project | Global Research

The massive police presence in Toronto over this week has been officially justified on the basis of protecting the leaders of the G8 and G20 countries meeting in Huntsville and Toronto. We were told that the creation of the fenced-in fortress, the massive mobilization of police (estimates ranging from 10-20,000) from across Canada, and even the passing of a secret law on policing (by the executive of the Ontario government without reference to the Legislative Assembly and the opposition parties) that made it a crime to appear within five metres of the security fence would protect our right to protest as well.

This is not what has unfolded in Toronto over the weekend.

Thousands of protesters marched peacefully on Friday, challenging the purpose and agenda of the G20, although completely hemmed on all sides by thousands of heavily armed police over the entire march (and severely hampering the freedom of assembly). On Saturday, in the midst of a larger demonstration (estimated at between 10-25,000), organized by the labour, anti-privatization and peace movements, a series of unwarranted acts of vandalism by a small number of protesters against stores, vehicles and buildings, was used as an excuse for a massive unleashing of repression and attacks by police against the democratic rights of both protestors, and Torontonians as a whole. (Like what happened at the Montebello Summit of North American leaders in August 2007, it will come out over the next weeks how widely the police had infiltrated some of the key groups – especially the so-called Black Bloc, knew the planning and participated as agent provocateurs.)

There seemed to be no real efforts on the part of the police to stop the attacks on the stores. As well, none of the massive police contingents tried to stop some of this small group from burning three of their police vehicles. It was as if the police weren't all that concerned with these actions. Reporters from European broadcasters and newspapers reported that this was totally out of keeping with any real concern to prevent violence.

The police then unleashed waves of repression against the legitimate protesters, those who wished to push toward the security fence – in an effort to challenge the militarization of the streets and demand that the G20 leaders respond to concerns about austerity and attacks on poor and working people – those who were simply voicing their concerns about the G20 agenda (with its radical austerity agenda of having the public sector and the poor pay for the bailout of the banks), journalists and even innocent and curious bystanders. In one attack on a “free protest” zone (previously negotiated with the police) rubber bullets and tear gas was used, and people were indiscriminately taken down, beaten and arrested.

In all, by Sunday morning estimates were that some 500 people were arrested (and there have been hundreds more over the course of today); it is impossible for anyone to know how many of these were the instigators of violence and how many were people simply exercising their right to protest. But clearly the mass majority were only protesting and exercising their rights to assembly and free speech, which the Toronto police and the wider security forces have been systematically violating.

The temporary jail that protestors have been placed in is located at the old Toronto Film Studios on Eastern Avenue in the eastern edge of the downtown, converted into a series of cages in essentially a huge warehouse. The jail is described by inmates as a kind of Guantanamo North: cold, dirty and especially humiliating for those who were said to have refused arrest. People have been held for hours without recourse to legal representation, of which there has been a large legal team at hand. Protesters hoping to provide some type of support for those incarcerated, have themselves been attacked, tear-gassed and dispersed by police violence.

Listening to the mass media and the interviews with the police and security spokespeople for Toronto and the Canadian state, one would have thought that there was full scale rioting, and that the massive, billion dollar spending spree on security for the Summit – that angered people across the country – was somehow worth it. As part of this, all protesters are being demonized and the police are being portrayed as heroes, notably by the political leadership and the Mayor of Toronto, David Miller.

The message of the protests (and of the thousands who protested across the week at hundreds of talks, meetings, protests, cultural events) – that the G20 meeting reflected the underlying agenda of the corporations and the political elites, to make sharp cutbacks across the public sector, to impose wage cuts, to not raise significant (or any) new taxes on financial capital and to impose new forms of hardship in the form of higher taxes and cuts in benefits for working people and the poor – was to be drowned out in a demonizing of the entire project of the protest. That is, that the ruling classes in the G20 were doing everything in their power to have the working classes pay for the crisis and their project of re-constructing neoliberalism and the political hegemony of the banks and financial capital.

The police and much of Toronto's political and economic establishment, sought to use the incidents to change the entire discourse of the G20 week.

Socialists, of course, take their distance from the foolish acts of the few who confuse violent attacks and trashing with revolutionary politics. This is to substitute individual acts of dissent for the working class and the mass movement as a whole. It is the adventurism that calls forth the most violent features of the security and policing apparatuses of the state, catching hundreds of innocents in the wake, and helps justify to the endless expansion of the security state. To challenge the neoliberal globalization agenda of the G20, and overturn all the undemocratic exploitative relations of capitalism, we need to build a political movement in Canada, based among the working classes who don't earn their income from capital ownership, and who also are oppressed by the unequal relations of race, gender, sexuality and nationality.

At this moment, it is a point of fundamental solidarity to denounce, as forcefully as possible, the police repression being unleashed against G20 protesters. We insist that those incarcerated on Eastern Avenue have their full civil rights restored and that civilian authorities take control from the Toronto Police Services of oversight of these proceedings. They have proven incapable of protecting – and understanding – basic civil rights (starting from the special emergency powers asked for by Police Chief Blair, and granted by stealth by Premier Dalton McGuinty). The accused should immediately be released without charge, or be freed on bail and given the right to defend themselves in open courts (not the kangaroo courts with limited or no public access that have been operating over this week).

The police occupation of Toronto should end immediately, and our full civil rights – and especially our rights to our city and streets – be restored. There clearly will need to be a full and independent investigation about the role of the police in the violence of the last few days, the role of agent provocateurs and plants in the planning of these events and the astonishing violation of the rights of ordinary people and protesters alike on the streets of Toronto over the last week.

G20 Police State: Toronto is burning! Or is it?
by Judy Rebick article link
June 27, 2010 | Global Research
Global Research home page

The G20 Toronto Summit Declaration
BY RABBLE STAFF article link
JUNE 28, 2010 | rabble
rabble home page

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