The Facts Of Life

Source: Decline of the Empire

I want to respond to some reader comments I received overnight. In doing so, I am forced to discuss the facts of life. I was going to write about the The False Promise of Biofuels, but the attempt to replace oil with biofuels will still be a failure tomorrow, so that story can wait.

I sometimes get comments telling me I’m not writing about the right things. Regular reader JC sent such a missive last night.

Dave — generally I agree with you. Actually you don’t say anything that I wouldn’t agree with. BUT… can you get a set of balls and tell the whole truth for God’s sake! WAR!!!!! is the future. These pathetic protests do nothing. The economy is gone, destroyed, in waste; please stop making it the central point to your great blog. Many people in the US can survive, but what about the effect of a dying empire on the world’s kids, their parents who are like us but live in a dreadful place coveted by the US military (e.g., Libya, Yugoslavia, Syria, Iran,Iraq, Afghan, etc). Your blog drives me crazy in that respect. (Although it is a must read daily.)

Let’s talk about future wars and the Human Condition. Adding 2 + 2, what can we conclude about future wars? There will be some. I last wrote about such wars in Is A War With China Inevitable? Here’s what I said on September 21st.

We live in the days of a powerful but waning Empire. Domestically, things are unraveling fast. Unless I miss my guess, or Human Nature changed in the last few minutes, those running the show will require a Big Distraction to rally (pacify) the People, who must be made to live in a constant state of fear of an External Enemy so they don’t notice that their lives have turned to crap.

This is also the thesis of Gerald Celente, who stated it my recent post Society Is Breaking Down. The power of 9/11 and the ongoing War on “Terrorism” to keep us sufficiently fearful is waning, despite National Propaganda Radio’s assiduous, unflagging efforts to keep us mired in that 10-year old event and report on various terrorism threats around the world. Something new is required. The size of the distraction must be commensurate with the grim reality at home the distraction obscures. Should this lead to World War III, then I guess we’d all be off the hook, right? And as Paul Krugman is likes to remind you, World War II led America out of the Great Depression

Is war with China, now America’s biggest global rival, inevitable?

You can see that I’ve already acknowledged the inevitability of future wars. The constant sabre-rattling with Iran, including the latest absurd story in which some failed clowns (Iranian ex-pats) were going to assassinate the Saudi ambassador, is obviously a concern.

A major terror plot to assassinate the Saudi Arabian ambassador to the United States has been foiled by the  FBI and DEA.

Attorney General Eric Holder announced Tuesday a foiled plot by “factions of the Iranian government” to assassinate the Saudi ambassador to the United States.

“The United States is committed to hold Iran accountable for its actions,” Holder told reporters during an afternoon news conference.

Is there some particular reason why I should get all get bent out of shape because the Empire is doing what Empires do? I think not. What will be will be. Does anybody seriously think we could do something about it if the odious Imperial Powers That Be decided to go off on Iran? This is part of the Human Condition. Power corrupts, absolute power corrupts absolutely. We’re sunk here, folks. All we can hope for is that wiser heads prevail. That’s a slim hope.

Some readers think I don’t do my homework. Reader Riban thought my report on the Maldives was incomplete.

Some Maldivian are leaving not because of overfishing or climate change. Some are migrating or thinking of migrating because of the brutal treatment of the current president Nasheed to his people. People are being sacked from their jobs merely because they are not from his party. This is the reality. Why can’t you people investigate these issues?

My post on the Maldives was about global warming and sea level rise, it was about the environment. It was not about typical human politics, which doesn’t vary much any place where human polities exist, be it the Maldives, Italy, South Africa, Peru or the United States. People are being sacked from their jobs merely because they are not from Nasheed’s party! This is indeed shocking! Here’s my response.

In the future, when I write about environmental degradation in some foreign land X, I’ll be sure to throw in a sentence like “and oh yeah, politicians in X behave like politicians everywhere else.” Happier now?

Speaking of business-as-usual—corrupt power politics and beating the war drum—reader Teri Shooley reminds me that I didn’t tell the whole story about Elizabeth Warren in my post The Demonization Of Elizabeth Warren.

Dave, I think we have all misjudged Elizabeth Warren to some extent. She understands finances and truly seems to get the disparity in wealth in this country and issues related to regulations, TBTF, etc. I haven’t read much about her on other topics, however; mostly because she has not been asked about anything beyond finance until now. With her announcement that she is running for the Senate, we are just now beginning to see her views on other matters. Some of her opinions on international affairs lean to the neocon side of things, much to my great disappointment. For example, she said yesterday that she thinks we should take action against Iran. (Over the most idiotic of false flag ops ever presented outside of a comedy movie? Yes, yes, that is exactly the provocation she has fallen for, sorry to say.) She then burbled on about how the government’s primary job is to protect us. I gather that as smart and appealing she is otherwise, she has still not identified war spending as one of our financial problems, and is apparently a hawk on foreign matters. It appears doubtful, given her remarks, that she could be counted on to reduce Pentagon spending or use her (potential) Senate vote to help bring an end to our insane policies of bombing the crap out of countries we want to exploit/ruin/bring to heel. Here’s a short article which includes her statements WRT Iran. See Elizabeth Warren’s Jobs Plan : War With Iran (Naked Capitalism).

Here’s what I said about Elizabeth Warren at the end of my post.

I admire Elizabeth Warren. It is truly unfortunate that she has chosen to play the game within our unalterable, corrupt political system instead throwing stones at it from the outside.

And now that Warren is running a campaign within “our unalterable, corrupt political system,” she has become corrupt, just another soldier for the Empire. I read that Naked Capitalism article, and it was mostly a hatchet job. For example, the author excoriated her over her response to the question of whether she supports the Occupy protesters. In fact, there was nothing wrong with her answer. (Watch the referenced video, starting at the 49:50 mark.) But sadly, we now see stories like this one in the Boston Herald.

U.S. Senate candidate Elizabeth Warren left the door open yesterday to military action against Iran in the face of that country’s growing nuclear threat — bolstering her national security credentials as she looks to challenge U.S. Sen. Scott Brown on one of his bread-and-butter campaign issues.

“Our number one responsibility is to protect Americans from terrorism, that’s our job, so being tough on terrorism is enormously important,” said Warren yesterday at a campaign stop in Gloucester.

“We should take nothing off the table, but the facts are still emerging,” the Senate candidate said when asked if she would support military action against Iran…

Brown, who serves in the National Guard and has made homeland security one of his signature issues while in the Senate, said the United States needs to take action against Iran if facts prove that nation is behind the assassination plot.

As Kurt Vonnegut would say, So It Goes. If you choose to wrestle in the mud, you’re going to get dirty. And that’s exactly what is happening with Elizabeth Warren. As I said, it is truly unfortunate. By the time she ends her corrupt, bullshit political campaign, Warren will be calling on the United States to nuke Iran, invade China, and declare the entire Arctic Circle to be property of the United States. Because she wants to win, and that’s what it takes.

And finally, I end with one more comment and a quote. The quote is from my post Idealism Is Not Your Friend.

I don’t like to give you the bad news, my friends, but here it is: the Human Condition is shit. It has always been shit, and it always will be. You can not change it. The Human Condition can not be improved, as each ism or ideology promises but inevitably fails to deliver. Pursuing ideals makes the Human Condition worse when idealists try to make Reality conform with what only exists in their heads. The pursuit of imaginary ideals is part & parcel of our tragic existential dilemma…

Those are the facts of life. The Human condition is shit, and it always has been. But reader Enjoying The Show believes he knows the true purpose of Life and what my surreptitious agenda is.

Today I helped an older, frail woman down the steps. I didn’t share any subversive ideas with her; I simply met her developmentally where she was at. As the Native Americans have attested, wisdom is most often found among the silent. Those who speak, often don’t know. It felt good to simply help someone today, although I know I would stroke my ego much more and generate much more self-aggrandizement by complaining ad nauseum and vomiting out of my skull cage. I understand and respect how some individuals will never know how that feels . . .

[And in a response to another comment]

… Also, we could use some individuals engaged in civic change instead of spouting off behind their laptops in efforts to become King of the Internet Mountain

Here I have been accused, albeit indirectly, by someone who won’t use his own name of being a pontificator who has never helped an old woman down the steps or across the street. (Over-the-top Egoists like myself and “individuals engaged in civic change” are apparently mutually exclusive.) I am further accused of attempting to become King of the Internet Mountain. All this by someone who doesn’t know me personally, and therefore couldn’t possibly know my motives and what my true feelings are. Nor has he read the posts I wrote earlier on this blog about living the good life, and what that means.

And here I thought I was doing my civic duty by writing this blog. Silly me! Don’t I realize that Silence Is Golden? I should shut the fuck up!

Like I said, the Human Condition is shit.

Read more at Decline of the Empire