American Liberalism - McDissent

The "Liberal vs Conservative" paradigm has been manufactured by the establishment. The two viewpoints are presented in the media and other places in our culture, and people are invited to subscribe to one of the two ideologies. The action proposed by either instrument of these ideologies (Democrats for Liberal and Republicans for Conservative) are all sanctioned by the establishment. So to be a Liberal in the sense that you support the Democrats and their policies as the lesser of two evils or even that you support them as a good choice in your mind, you have chosen the establishment sponsored version of dissent. When you subscribe to a particular ideology, you have made a purchase with your intellectual capital. You have purchased... McDissent.

As a McDissenter, you are entitled to disagree vehemently with the current administration. You are entitled to march in the streets and protest the war. You are entitled to question our president and call him a liar. You are even entitled to claim that he wasn't fairly elected in the first place (he wasn't) and that the Democrats are losers for not pressing the issue of election fraud. The most extreme McDissenter will claim that Bush is responsible for 9/11 and call for his Impeachment (or impalement). An emboldened McDissenter can even (gasp) Vote Green!! I know it sounds crazy, but yes, you can be a McDissenter and not vote for one of the two major corporate parties. As long as you don't question the fabric of the system, you can support any action taken within the system.

The one thing a McDissenter is not entitled to do is question the dominant social order. That would be actual dissent. No, a McDissenter questions the actions of government, pressuring them to go in a different direction. But they never question the ideas that the dominant social order is founded upon. McDissent is patriotic. Dissent is revolutionary.

Patience in watching the development of geopolitical issues

I have made a lot of noise about the Iranian Oil Bourse, or Kish International Oil Bourse (KIOB), and I write this now to remind myself and others that despite my and others' intial alarm, the events that are now unfolding may not have immediate and dire consequences, but will most likely spur the beginning of a long road down for the dollar and an increasing role for the Euro as a world reserve currency.

In January of 2006, Iran had this to say about their upcoming oil exchange:

"At the meeting, Dr Asemipur, the executor of the oil exchange project, and Salehabadi, secretary-general of the country's stock exchange, spoke about the different stages and the progress of the oil exchange.... the structure has to be defined in a way in which it is not limited to Iran's 2.5m barrels of oil but should bring the oil of the regional countries into the exchange and to present up to a ceiling of 25m barrels."

Also on 17 January, Jam-e Jam newspaper quoted Kamal Daneshyar, the chairman of the Majlis Energy Committee, as saying:

"At meetings held with Oil Ministry officials, it was decided that the first phase of the oil exchange will become operational within three months. In the first phase, the oil exchange will operate on a short-term basis, but, in the second phase, the exchange will become international and its activities will become very extensive."

And from William R. Clark:

"It is true that the ECB has a staunch anti-inflationary bias, but international oil transactions do not result in inflation pressures if those euros are being used outside the eurozone for oil sales. That is precisely what the US does - it exports its inflation, but unlike the EU, the US runs huge trade deficits. To suggest that the euro money supply can not be raised therefore the Kish International oil bourse can not function sets up a false dilemma..."

The volume of sales on the KIOB will likely open quite small--and in the beginning no crude oil at all will be traded there--only oil derivatives. However, where the problem arises is when the volume of transactions rises towards the 25 mbpd ceiling that Dr Asemipur and Salehabadi have stated. The US dollar money supply is increased by about 20% annually. This means that the number of dollars in circulation doubles about every 3½ years... If/when even 10% of the world's oil transactions were conducted in Euros, the oil money that is bankrolling this massive inflation and US deficit spending will be reduced significantlyy, and the Federal Reserve's policy of massive currency inflation will no longer be feasible. And when that happens--well, that's going to present some problems...

And so it's no coincidence that the M3 Monetary Aggregate will cease to be published by the Fed... Investors would likely throw up all sorts of red flags if the money supply increases began to slow and eventually reverse themselves. I'm pretty sure that the last time that happened was the Great Depression...

So when on March 21st (one day after the Bourse opens) when the world doesn't fall apart, don't simply start to ignore this issue. It will take years to develop and many geopolitical events in the interim will be in some way connected... At the very worst--it could mean World War III with some very interesting alliances and enemies... At the very best--it could mean very hard times for the USA and the re-emergence of a bi-polar world power system. Any way you slice it, we're teetering on the edge of great change...

I Thought This Was About Abortion?!?!

Pro-life does not mean what people think it means. What is commonly called pro-life would be more accurately described as "anti-abortion" or "anti-choice."

The abortion issue as it is now being raised is an attempt to challenge Roe v Wade and swing the pendulum back in favor of states' rights vs federal gov't hegemony. In theory I agree that states should have more rights and responsibilities and that the federal gov't should be eviscerated or at least greatly reduced in size and power.

A wedge issue (abortion) has purposefully been chosen by the establishment to raise the states' rights issue so that people will take sides according to how they identify themselves in terms of the left/right paradigm. The left will side in favor of the federal government and the right will side in favor of the states (just like the slavery issue), when in actuality, it is in neither side's best interests to side with the federal gov't. The left is being duped into opposing states' rights. It is being done this way by design, and purposefully being done at exactly this point in time.

Why now? Because America's economic situation is quickly worsening... And with the alleged opening of the Iranian Oil Bourse in just one week, it's most likely going to continue to worsen. The empire will be broken. And if the people are united, they would easily be able to reclaim their government from the corporate/financial powers that have usurped it. But instead, things will likely degenerate into a second civil war. Martial law will be imposed. Civil liberties will be completely trashed. The dominant paradigm of society will continue to shift and morph in horrible ways. The abortion issue is being used to re-enforce the federal government's supreme jurisdiction over all people who reside in any of the states within its union.

There is seemingly no way around this, as people will cling to their identities in the left/right paradigm so fiercely that they will not see the new paradigm being formed in front of their eyes nor the current situation that is developing behind the curtain of the left/right paradigm. So for now--the big wedge issue is abortion. It's obvious to any rational thinking person that to be anti-choice is anti-American in the fullest. To limit another person's freedom based on your own definition of "life" is in direct opposition to the bill of rights. So the left, in defense of the bill of rights, will defend the federal government's power over state governments. The left will think that they are fighting for the truth and for justice. And in some way, they are. But at the essence of it--they are being controlled as pawns...

So if the Supreme Court strikes down Roe v Wade and returns some power over and responsibility for its own citizens to the States, all Americans will have won a victory. It bothers me deeply that people may have to lose their rights to obtain a safe and legal abortion in their own states for this victory to happen, and half of us will feel enraged and defeated anyway. But as no ban on abortion is ever going to stop its practice, and given how high the stakes are I think it's a trade-off that I can live with.

If the Supreme Court upholds Roe v Wade (which I suspect it will) the left will see it as a great victory... In actuality, Roe v Wade shifts the balance of power firmly in favor of a centralized and highly corrupted hegemonic power, subservient to the interests of the global elites and planning a paradigm shift that will be very unpleasant for all human beings. We are teetering on the edge of a very dangerous situation and the best way to lean has been totally obfuscated by years upon years of social conditioning that amounts more or less to mind-control.

Talk about a complex probelm...

Corporate Personhood

Corporate personhood has been legally established by the supreme court's interpretation that the 14th amendment rights to life, liberty, and the pursuit of property guaranteed to people should also be guaranteed to corporations.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Corporate_Personhood

In my view, this is a result of the influence of money on our legal system and on our government. Our particular form of capitalism has developed through large sums of money being funneled through corporate accounts and back out to people, who recycle the money at banks and by exchanging it with corporations for goods, and also paying the government in the form of taxes. Corporate entities have basically "purchased" the rights that people are entitled to based on the nature of their dominant share of the economic activity that takes place. This dominant share of the economy has translated to a dominant share of our government and our legal system.

To remove the right of personhood from corporate entities is not to limit their right to make money or do business in any way. It simply states that the individual and collective rights of human beings will not be superseded by the rights of corporations. I think the vast majority of Americans, if they could be brought to understand this without superimposing the left vs right paradigm over it and dismissing the idea as "leftist" or "communist", would support the elimination of corporate personhood.