Some interesting background on the Middle East (apologies for the coughing)

  By emma | May 27, 2012 - 02:47 |

Written by: emma on May 27, 2012.
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  • Guest

    whee are you geting al thies nuts?

    • Emmazedbend

      hello adam.sergej433@googlemail.com thanks for your considered opinion.

  • Lyle

    Thanks Emma,

    I made it through the coughs…. arggg!

    More later.

  • CSArichardo

    My Bottom Line
    Interesting to listen to but it really boils down to the concept that our population is growing faster than their population and because of this they will turn into nut bars to try and stop us from taking over the world so our only defence is to blow them up first with our nuclear weapons before they blow us up with their nuclear weapons.
    OK …. here is my summary from the video

    1.  The more educated the lower the fertility rates.
    2.  The more political/social freedom given to women the lower the fertility rates.
    3.  The more religious the population the higher the fertility rates.
    4.  Other ?

    From the questions.

    1.  Basically the US and Israel need to be the tough guys on the block to save both nations from Iran. 
    2.  Iran should have been attacked a long time ago, I think he said yesterday.  Their population is declining and they will act irrational and become more aggressive as the regime declines in influence from both reduced oil (money) and population in the years ahead.
    3.  Israel population is growing at a fertility rate of about 3.  It will need room.  A tongue in cheek (but dumb) comment that they might have to repopulate Poland.
    4.  Israel should sit around and wait for Syria and Egypt to both further implode and tactically take advantage when appropriate.  No need to be more aggressive in the short term with either.  Not so clear on Lebanon.
    5.  Turkey might be taking over some portions of Syria, the Kurds might get a piece of Turkey (as their population is growing very quickly as opposed to the Turks), etc.  Expects alot of wars in the near future.
    6. Other ?

    My observation

    For any side to win (as it appears we need a winner) it requires higher fertility rates.  However if you also want more equality for women and a more educated society the only way that higher ferility rates can happen is through a more religious focused society (which might mean less tolerance for others?).  It appears the author sees the US and Israel as being more religious states than Iran, Egypt and Syria ???? 

    • Lyle

      Now THAT is one helluva summary. Sounds right on the mark to me. Only because I listened to the entire thing a few house ago. A few more hours and most all of it would have left my memory – for sure. :)

      • Lyle

        Early last year I looked at the mideast region on Google earth. Looks obvious most all these folks appear to have is heat, sand, and oil. One can write a fairly accurate futuristic ‘script’ from simply that.

        My brain is currently still playing with BC’s thermodymics modeling toward the economic questions.
        Me thinks he might be on to something there more broad in view than the mineutiae commonly discussed here.  Physics seems pertinent to most everything else – why not economics.

        Don’t answer that please. I’m having too much fun floating the ideas around among synapses at present.
        ;-)

        • Lyle

          OK – after reviewing Wiki’s “Laws of Thermodynamics” and being amazed that I can half-way understand what it says – give me another year. :)

          Change ‘wealth’ to ‘energy’ ( potential to do work ). Then off to someplace related to “the system’s conjugate variable, its entropy ”.  Oy…

          I know… I’m off in la la land. If I return before I get back – keep me there.  :)

          • Emmazedbend

            Here is a metaphore instead of energy or wealth think life blood. What happens to a human body when the blood starts flowing out?

            • Lyle

              While feeding my feral cat colonies today, I had the thought that I’m providing them with energy.
              Energy ultimately from the sun. We use fiat money ( claimed to have value – theoretical value) to exchange energy stored in various commodities and products. Gold ( example only ) is on the same physical plane operative within the boundaries of universal physical laws – as the commodities and products we need and value. Fiat - theoretical value – functions at another plane while still robbing value from the more concrete plane.

              Told ya I was off in la la land.  :)

              Perhaps BC is seeing the fiat money as the blood sucker without a plasma return.

              Guess most of us who gather here are fairly well convinced the damned circus tent is about to collapse for any myriad of reasons regardless of which comes first.

              Hope Nick is recovering well. Missing our fearless leader.  :) 

              • Paul

                Feeding the feral cats while pondering gold, fiat money and thermodynamics.  You are a trip, Lyle~!
                I don’t think we will all be crushed when the circus tent collapses.  But, we will have a much diminished quality of life and comfort level.  Let’s face it, we have been living high on the hog for way too long.  It’s time to pay the piper.  It’s a good time to pay off debts and tighten the belt.  That will make the impact much less severe.  For those people in sub-Saharan Africa or India who continue to have 15 children, well, they will experience something much more catastrophic.
                I have been worried about Nick, too.  Hope he is well.

                • Lyle

                  Ditto on the tent analagy. I think we all may agree that the world at large is beginning to get it that we’re in one mell of a hess and there’s no easy way out – if in fact there’s a way out period. The mental light still think some politician or trainload of politicians can fix it. Ha!

                  I’ve been watching TV documentaries lately on WWI, WWII, and Vietnam. Simply bizarre. Shows how the unimaginable and incomprehensible is entirely possible among humans.

                  • Paul

                    I watched an excellent BBC documentary entitled The First World War.  When you see how supposedly civilized govt’s, leaders and men behaved toward one another, you realize that anything is possible.  Also, the atrocities suffered under the Soviet Communists, perpetrated on their own people, was insane as well.  It is amazing that we never had a nuclear war with those socio-paths.
                    I remember Mystic once saying that every few years he re-reads the “Gulag Archipelago”, just to remind him of the thin veneer of civilization.

              • Emmazedbend

                Sounds like a good explanation to me! I miss Nick I’ve been wondering how he’s doing. I hope this brush with illness doesn’t put him off blogging; sometimes after a serious illness people can reapraise their life and decide to change direction; I hope not though.

              • snedmeister1

                Morning Lyle…

                I am curious, how does FIAT money rob value from the `physical plane`..??
                Money is just our unit of account, and it holds value because everyone else accepts it has value…

                Why is Gold backed currency any different…???
                IMO, Gold is absolutely over rated…. 
                We have depleting resources, but we are willing to squander them digging holes for a lump of metal, not for much practical use, but because of an ideology of money..??? Crazy..!!!

                My last point isn’t a question, but an observation;

                We, as people, seem intent on placing all the ills on the door step of the monetary system, and while it is a contributing factor, we can see that even a Gold backed currency would be trying to manipulate a depleting resource….!!!

                I don’t think the issue is FIAT / Gold… The issue is that we can not control our resources whichever monetary system we use…!!??

                I’m not sure about collapse either, I’m more of a slow motion `getting worse and worse` person 
                ( at the moment…!! New info, means new conclusions..!!! )

                Don’t take this as a `your wrong – I’m right` comment, just a `thinking while I type` comment…!!??

                • Lyle

                  I’m totally with you on every count.  Which doesn’t mean much for most of you guys and gals have a hundred times better grasp on the monetary economics side than I. Hell, I had to look up FIAT on wiki to even begin my space cadet adventure into the hinterland. You’d think after reading and listening to thousands of comments and vids here and other places I’d have a decent grasp on FIAT by now. :)Partly why I added ( example only ) after the Gold mention. It could be Peanuts or Slick Rocks – for they’re still within the world of physical ‘stuff’.

                  Another BC comment simply rang some bell in my head – paraphrasing – trouble ( hyperinflation ) begins when we try to use FIAT money to ‘create’ or ‘make happen’ ( I think that’s what he really meant ) real things like food, commodities, etc. He also threw in his need to bring in ‘physics’ and ‘reversibility’ in order to explain more clearly which he thought would only be viewed as nonsense.

                  I thought perchance the dude might be on to something from an entirely different reference frame than what is the norm here and maybe interesting to take a look-see.

                  BC takes a lot of wrath here. I’m surprised he still hangs in although responses have become much more kindly. Maybe he’s trying to convey something of some merit only not able to translate it well.

                  Or maybe I’m wasting everyone’s time on a worthless magical mystical head trip down an endless rabbit hole. Most likely.  :)
                   ”Money is just our unit of account, and it holds value because everyone else accepts it has value…”
                  This is ‘value’ within the ‘thought’ plane. No ‘substance’. If I trade you a potato for a turnip – we both may eat and live. If you give me your turnip for my ‘unit of account’ – you may go hungry. You may find you cannot purchase another turnip because ‘everyone else’ changed their ‘accepted’ value of the unit.I should stop before I embarrass myself too much.  :)

                  • Lyle

                    Oh well shit…

                    We all know economics, monies, etc. are ultimately theoretical in nature right on down to human emotions and subjective definitions of ‘value’.

                    Seems a relatively rare but nonetheless ‘real’ commodity standard  ’anchors’ the theoretical and human whim to reality in some important way. I’ll try and leave it at that.  :)

                    I have Real tasks waiting whilst I wile away the hours pissing around in my mental playground. :)

                  • snedmeister1

                    He might be onto something..!!!
                    ( Although I am not quite sure what…! )
                    Maybe I just don’t get it..!!?? :)

                    Pondering and discussing how the world works, is probably never going to be a waste of time though and your last paragraph holds some truth, in that money can not be eaten, and peoples opinions on value change with time and circumstances…. 

                    I wouldn’t stop thinking about it myself, but between everyone, try and factor in all the variables.??

                    My initial response may be, that although I understand exactly what you are suggesting, that the turnip scenario is a bit extreme…
                    Not least because there are a multitude of substitutes for a Turnip, and if there were ever a scenario where my life depended on one turnip, the relative prices of food would reflect that fact…???
                    ( ie, you probably wouldn’t sell it in the first place )

                    Embarrass yourself…??? 
                    Quite the opposite IMO, all we can do, is put our ideas out there for scrutiny….

                    Hopefully, someone will see a flaw, or confirm a theory, and suggest their reasoning to you/ us….
                    You will know yourself, that trying to decipher this all on your own is impossible…
                    There is too much info, and too much contradiction…

                    The best we have, are many minds thinking and reading, then comparing ideas between themselves..!??

                    As for BC, I try not to slate him ( as frustrating as some of the BC posts are, it may be as frustrating for him trying to express them..?? ) 

                    I hope one day he finds a way to describe in a way I understand exactly what he envisions and why…
                    Then between us, we can start the discussion about validity etc…???
                    ( I don’t think anyone gives him a hard time for any other reason, than apart from not being able to convey the opinions to everyone, we keep getting the same sentences again and again..!!?? )

                    No offence meant BC ( If you read this ), maybe it’s time for a video from you..??? 

                    • Lyle

                      Thanks Snedster. I needed that.  :)I think more clarity is developing for me about the riff I’m off on. I suspicion it’s basically a re-run of what’s already been discussed in various ways.

                      Two worlds. The world of electronic digits whereby investors, computers, interest, etc. thrash, slash, and screw around with value systems/worth  with little or no direct connection or affect as those poor folks much closer connected/dependent on said system.

                      Investors affect and raise gas prices in the etheral universe… Joe Schmoe can’t afford as many turnips in the real creature world.  :)
                      Sumpin’ like dat. Of course that’s nothing new – just pressing against the Newtonian vs. Quantum principles analogy. Can quanta rot your potatoes?  :)

                • Paul

                  Hello Sned and Lyle,

                  Gold backed currency means that you cannot print more fiat currency than you hold in actual, physical gold reserves.  It is impossible in today’s mega economies to hold to that standard, especially since the US dollar is the world’s reserve currency.  BC’s point is that since the actual dollar is in itself worthless, it must be backed by something real in the physical world.  Since it is not, we will collapse under a phony fiat money-printing ponzi scheme.  I agree that we need to curtail spending and strengthen the value of the dollar.  But, since commodities are priced in US dollars, a strong dollar, over weaker currencies, means that half the world would starve to death.  It is walking a tightrope trying to maintain the value of the dollar, while trying to maintain normal price levels.  Otherwise, we will have global famine and wars.  Right now, we are in deflation.  Every time Bernanke does his QE dance (money-printing) at the Fed, those dollars are immediately sucked by the global markets.  So, hyper-inflation is not an issue now.
                  However, getting out of a global deflationary spiral is a big problem~!  Fiscal spending and money printing are the solutions the US “geniuses’ have chosen.  Will it work~?  I certainly hope so~!  Am I confident it will work?  No.  But, I am certainly not worried about BC’s prediction of the US dollar reaching Zimbabwe hyper-inflation levels anytime soon.  Gold is a non-issue in today’s global economies.  Use gold for investment reasons, like stocks, bonds, Forex and other commodities.  I think Oil is a better investment; shrinking supply, increasing demand.

                  • snedmeister1

                    Yes, yes, we all understand those concepts…. But…

                    If we are to use Gold coins, for example, then we hit the problem of not enough Gold to go around for everyone to have Gold coins…
                    ( And how inefficient is that, to ship Gold coins around the world after squandering resources to dig it out of the ground…??? )

                    If we say it will be Gold backed, then have paper notes to represent Gold, then we get the issue, where you can still print more paper than Gold ( defeating the point of Gold backed )…..

                    No-one says FIAT has to be printed into oblivion, but the option is there and some take it, as they would with Gold backed currency…

                    It is possible to have FIAT that has a fixed supply ( Not that I agree a fixed supply is always good )…

                    The Dollar IS backed by something… Peoples confidence that others value it, ( Same as Gold )…
                    The US Gov’t enforce taxes to make you use them, and the rest of the world have to use them for trade in certain commodities….

                    This printing money issue is not as straight forward as `we must never print`…
                    The Western world was built on credit, it has done us good, the point is whether it is productive credit…

                    What the money is spent on, is the key… ( IMO )…

                    ( Good morning Paul )

                    • Paul

                      Hello Sned,

                      I never said “we must never print”.  We should be printing now and spending too.  The problem with money printing is that if you do it during bad times, then you must reverse the process during the good times, and pay down your debt/deficits with the excesses.  TPTB never do that~!  They just keep printing and  spending, so the system is collapsing under its own weight.
                      The credit system only works when it is used in moderation.  The “0% down” mortgages with their “liar loan” stated income was not moderate.  That is why the it blew up on us.  All home loans should require at least a 30-40% down payment.  That’s what the old timers did.  50% down was the norm.  Then, you have skin in the game and are not likely to default on your home loan.  Auto loans should be at least 50% down, or just pay cash for a used car.  Credit cards with usury interest rates should be outlawed.  They were until the 1980′s!  University loans are a complete joke now.  The only reason universities began charging more and more every year is because the stupid govt was making more and more credit available to the students.  The university scam is corrupt to the bone~!  Don’t get me started on spiraling American health-care costs.  Those 1% doctors might be seeing the guillotine someday as well~! 
                      We need to return to a production based economy, and put these finance bastards in a dark hole.
                      Is the system beyond repair?  I think so.  I feel it is too late to turn back the clock now and return the days of moderate spending and credit.  I might be wrong, but I don’t think so.  The very best we can hope for now is a 20 year deflationary period like we’ve seen in Japan.  Let’s hope it doesn’t get much worse, because it easily could.  Don’t forget the peak oil catastrophe looming before us. 
                      People should be using what income they now receive to pay off all their debts and then begin to save for a rainy day.  The hurricane season is upon us~!
                      It’s not all gloom and doom.  Our number one cost, housing, will continue to decline for years to come, so homes will be much more affordable in the future.  Of course, wages will be flat as well.  But, the system will eventually reach equilibrium.  Autos, trinkets, etc will get cheaper as well.  Food might rise a bit because of higher petroleum prices.
                      All these issues can be boiled down to jobs and wages.  Everything will eventually be priced down to the median wage level.  You can’t get blood out of a turnip.

                    • snedmeister1

                      Hello…

                      Yes, I think I was editing my post to you when you were typing this…!!!

                      I understand you hold very similar views to me on this…

                      I am trying to lever out the contrary opinions of `Gold money` people etc…

                      ( As I editied into my comment above… When I re-read it, it sounded as though I was saying you thought these points I raised, which I wasn’t, so I altered it..!!! :) )

                    • Paul

                      Very clever maneuver, Sned.  Using editing to your advantage.  I am watching you~!

                    • snedmeister1

                      Watch away….
                      If you’re not fast….. You’re last….!!!! :)

                      LOL…

                    • Paul

                      Are you sure you don’t work for Goldman Sachs~?!

                    • snedmeister1

                      They made me a good offer, but I had to refuse..!!!

                      I have my standards to keep up…!!!

                    • Lyle

                      Garsh, you guys aren’t much fun at all. No spyder monkeys, polka dots and zebras, with a little flotsam and jetsom thrown in for laughs.  :)

                      Actually… it’s hard for me to envision much changing at all. The peoples of the world will just keep adjusting and muddling through whatever comes. People bitch and talk talk talk while politicians do the same. In my 63 years there’s been much technoligical change but not so much in human and social behaviours. The distance between the haves and have nots keeps growing – that’s about it. And I think that’s to be expected when all the “variables” are accounted ie population bomb, dwindling resources, etc.

                      My space cadet brain started thinking about a shallow box of marbles and a finger, yesterday during my back porch meditations.  :)  A possible analogy related to population and the potential for social change.
                      A few marbles in the box – enter finger – little change. Keep adding marbles and at some point the entry of a finger will shift all the marbles. More marbles added – finger can’t get in to make any effect. Force the finger in at this point and the box blows apart and all the marbles scatter.

                      Obviously I tend to think in intuitive picture analogies. Soma times some merit is discoverd – most of the times just a way to wile away the hours. More fun for me.

                      May the force and flotsam and jetsom be with you today.

                    • Lyle

                      my logy’s seem to be becoming ligy’s… eh the ole brain hain’t what she used to be.  :)

                    • Paul

                      You are a trip, man!  You need to write a book entitled “Lyle Logic”.  It would be a big hit.
                      Everything you said made perfect sense.  Technology only gets us so far in this world.  Just think of all the man-hours wasted surfing the net in all the cubicles in America.
                      It’s important to maintain a sense of humor about Life.  If you take it too seriously, you’ll burn out quick.  The population explosion of the last 50 years or so is what is causing so many of the problems we face today, on every level.  We should feel fortunate that our big problems will be a lower daily caloric intake and having to wear a sweater around the house in the winter time.  It will be brutal in many parts of the world, and there is not a damn thing we can do about it.  It’s sad, but true.

                    • Lyle

                      As one old friend of mine years ago said after another one of our bad nights at the dog track: “I don’t know why I’m laughing, I guess it’s because tears look so bad on me.”  :)

                      I’ve been blessed or cursed with a creative brain since childhood. Have invented lots of little things, created and built more. Can honestly say over my 36 year career with AT&T I probably saved them millions with advancing more simple and clear methods of managing different tasks.

                      Searched for meaning, purpose, and understanding over a lifetime. Came to the final conclusion that all and everything is simply an absurdity. And as an old sober drunk in Texas said: “When ya know ya don’t know – you begin to know.”  :)

                    • Paul

                      I think the Buddha was preaching a similar message 2500 years ago.  Understand the 4 Noble truths and follow the Noble Eightfold Path and we’ll be just fine.  Silly is, as silly does.

    • Paul

      I would add “the more affluent a  society, the lower the birth rates” and “the more urbanized a society, the lower the birth rates”.  Poor, rural societies tend to have large families.
      He definitely skews his data interpretation to favor the United States and Israel.  The UN stats he cites have a 3 level predictive outcome.  He states Israel will have 25 Million people in the year 2100, which is even higher than the UN’s highest predicted level of around 22 Million.  The UN’s lowest level is around 10 Million.  So, his predictions are suspect and biased.
      I think, with the advent of peak oil, peak economy, peak agricultural output and peak water, the lowest UN level of population prediction is the most accurate.
      http://esa.un.org/unpd/wpp/country-profiles/country-profiles_1.htm

      • Emmazedbend

        I found the details about Turkey of interest the East West split, I have a cousin living out there married to a Turkish man this will affect her and her newly born son.

        • Paul

          Turkey is in an East vs West transition period.  When they elected their latest president, there was almost a coup d’etat by the military.  The president is from an Islamic based party.  The generals and admirals want to maintain the secular nature of the Turkish govt first imposed by Atatürk.  One of the major reasons reasons that Turkey has grown from a backward agricultural nation into a strong industrialized nation is that they fully adopted the Western principles of govt, economics, law, education, etc.  Most of the other Muslim nations have been mired in a religion based form of govt.  No one wants to invest with fanatics.  Iran is a good example.  It descended from first world to third world status following the Iranian Revolution.  Now, it is a pariah in the world community, and is being as such.  Egypt could very well follow their lead. 

  • Pettie

    Pretty awful stuff discussed in there and would be a great showpiece into the mind of evil, maglomanical devils. but then again the arabs, asians, south-americans, africans etc. only have themselves to blame for allowing themselves to played off of one another by the westerners. 

    • Lyle

      No evil – no devils – just people doing what people do and have done since the very beginning.
      Life feeds on life.

  • NascentMind

    We are all people just like me and you. Does it matter what culture you are as long as you respect each
    other? Its as repulsive as class distinction. 

    I’m listening to:
    http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iSifCF8k27A&feature=related 

  • Emmazedbend

    I posted the video because it informed me of things I didn’t know about the countries featured; It doesn’t mean I agree with all the points in it – as the Mystic says one must look up many skirts or in my case trouser legs.

    • NascentMind

      I Can see into what you mean!
      I’m listening to:http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lfzRbvJ9fdM&feature=related 

      • Lyle

        Hell – that haint nuthin…  :)http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=q-_J4jsN4Ng

        About 130 miles south and in the deep mountains of where I am in the 1990′s.

        • Lyle

          Oh my… it got better for ole Jesco.http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8ykoTbRocrA&feature=related

          Gives a new dimension to “The meek shall inherit.”  :)

          • Paul

            Sue Bob must have been pretty cute when she was young!
            Too much meth, Oxycontin and Mountain Dew in dem der hills~!
            http://wildandwonderfulwhites.com/family/sue-bob-white.html

            • Lyle

              I think it was a NY Times article not long ago spoke of how the oxycontin and script drugs epidemic started in the coal fields of WV. Miners having much pain related to being bent over for long hours started being treated with oxy’s… then the kids found them and the race is on.  Too, followed a number of unscrupulous pill mill drug stores, some of which the owners are now in prison. Big pharma and all doctors handing out oxy like they were M&M’s doesn’t help much either.

              “Deliverence” is still somewhat alive and well in the southern coal fields of WV and western KY. The Hatfield’s and McCoy’s areas.http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=myhnAZFR1po&feature=related

              WV is a starkly divided state. From simple farmers to multi-generational coal miner families to the highly sophisticated in the larger cities. Charleston for example held the highest per capita PhD rate in the world during the 50′s, 60′s and 70′s.  Primarily due to also being the “Chemical Center of the World” via Union Carbide, Monsanto, and Dupont. While TV viewers saw only The Beverly Hillbillies.  :) 

              • Lyle

                make that eastern KY

  • snedmeister1

    This had quite an interestingly different perspective on the usual `rise of Islam` theories…

    I have one question for you Emma; 
    Where did your other videos go..??? :)

    • NascentMind

      MI6

      • snedmeister1

        LOL

        Nice one..:)

    • Emmazedbend

      I accidentally deleted them and I couldn’t restore them!

  • Paul

    Thanks, Emma.  That was interesting.  Demographics is a very under-rated social science.  Peak populations and peak resources definitely part of the OTP discussion.
    I like Eric Kaufman’s presentation better.  Less political, more factual.
    http://fora.tv/2010/09/05/Eric_Kaufmann_Shall_the_Religious_Inherit_the_Earth

    • Emmazedbend

      thanks I will check it out.

  • Boz

    Found it a bit chilling how confident he was in his understanding and how naturally/casually he suggests violent and tyrannical imposition of American will. He just assumes a tangible middle-eastern nuclear threat (unlikely as history proves!) and that any nation that possesses them are prepared to use them (historically only America!). Seems like the same sort of justification as used to go and bash Iraq ….WMD… The guys overall arrogance can only come from a very deep ignorance me thinks!?

    • Paul

      I think this speaker definitely has an agenda.  This Kaufman speaker gives a less biased assessment.
      http://fora.tv/2010/09/05/Eric_Kaufmann_Shall_the_Religious_Inherit_the_Earth

      As for the nuclear weapons use, America invented them first.  I have no doubt that Hitler, Stalin or Tojo would have used them if they had invented the nuclear bomb first.  Instead of Nagasaki and Hiroshima, it would have been Moscow, Berlin, London or New York.
      Remember, the Japanese would not surrender.  They were preparing for a “fight to the last man” defense of Japan.  American casualty estimates to take Japan exceeded 1 million American soldiers.  In the same light, millions of Japanese would have been killed or wounded in the assault on Japan.  President Truman made the correct decision to use the nukes.   The decision saved millions of lives, both American and Japanese.  The Japanese bombed us first at Pearl Harbor.  They woke the Sleeping Giant.  They were fanatics; the Rape of Nanking, the Bataan Death March.  They had to be stopped, by any means necessary. 

      • Andrew_m_norris

        America didnt invent nuclear weapons i think it was was a Hungarian physicist Leo Szilard they just developed them. I agree Hitler, Stalin, Tojo would undoubtedly use them had they had them! My point was how casually the speaker was prepared to use American military might to further American interests with no moral compunction whatever! There seems to be a popular belief that America as the ‘defenders of democracy and freedom’ are morally justified to conduct whatever foreign policy they wish, i find this scary! The acceptance of the popular notion that Japan was preparing to “fight to the last man” and America had to drop the bombs in order to ‘save lives’ is a good example of this. I am not necessarily against the dropping of the bombs on Japan but it is historically inaccurate to say the motivation was to save lives. To use Nicks analogy the speaker has some sort of prism (american/Israeli imperialism perhaps?) he’s looking through and then uses ‘facts’ to justify his agenda. This is an entirely different process to looking at all the evidence before coming to a conclusion! 

        • Paul

          “America didn’t invent nuclear weapons i think it was was a Hungarian physicist Leo Szilard they just developed them.”
          Just developed them?!  There is a huge difference between inventing an obscure, academic theory and inventing a real, working atomic bomb.  Do you have any idea what an enormous engineering program the Manhattan Project was?!  Do you realize how many man-hours by some of the greatest minds on the planet were involved in inventing the atomic bomb?!

          “I am not necessarily against the dropping of the bombs on Japan but it is historically inaccurate to say the motivation was to save lives.”
          You are incorrect.  It saved American lives by eliminating the need for a huge invasion of the Japanese mainland.  Truman bluffed the Japanese by saying he was going to being a “Rain of Ruin” by dropping a bomb on every major Japanese city.  Truman was bluffing because we didn’t have any more atomic bombs available.  They quickly surrendered.  Until that speech, the Japanese high command was waffling and preparing a massive defense.  They were even training women how to use crude swords to attack American troops.  The Japanese always fought to the last man.  Do you not remember the Pacific islands battles?  It was considered shameful to surrender; a dishonor to your family and the Emperor, who was a god in their eyes.
            
          The speaker has an implied, pro-Israel agenda.
          He is an Orthodox Jew with dual American-Israeli citizenship.  It’s not a “prism”; it’s a clear window.  American Jews advocating Israeli interests is nothing new.

          America will use its military if it feels it is required.  America does not wait for UN approval.  The stupidity of the recent Iraq War is a good example; same for the necessity of the Afghanistan invasion.  I am not for unchecked American militarist endeavors.  I am strongly against it, unless absolutely necessary.
          The UN needs to assemble a few infantry and tank battalions to be used as stand-by rapid reaction forces.  So far, the UN’s record is pretty shoddy on interventions.  Just ask the people of the Congo, Rwanda and Darfur about the UN’s track record.

          • BOZ

            You are right there is a huge difference between inventing something and developing it! The discovery or the idea is the invention even if the development may be more difficult. I simply highlighted that, as i thought it was arrogant for you to say the Americans invented the atomic bomb!  The ideas behind it were not American and the team that developed it was international! Also just re-iterating the same tired old excuse that dropping the bomb was to save lives doesn’t change the fact that its not true! The Japanese had been trying to negotiate a surrender long before the bomb was dropped, they were beaten and they new it! It was American insistence on surrender under the terms of the Potsdam declaration rather than the Atlantic charter that prevented them. They could have simply starved Japan through navel blockade or bombed them conventionally into submission to meet the Potsdam terms (or just accepted surrender under the Atlantic terms!). The Allies didn’t have to invade the mainland etc etc .. go and read the history!
            Yet again i am not necessarily against the use of the bomb against Japan but it was for different reasons than saving lives, probably to be able to dictate policy to the Russians and test the new technology. There is no real debate here all the evidence is now published, even the academics who support the decision to drop the bomb do not support it with the propaganda that it saved lives! It cost lives, many of them women and children! Here is a challenge for you i can find quotes from almost every senior US commander in the army navy and airforce stating that it was unnecessary to drop the bomb, that it was a political not a military decision! Can you find any quotes from senior military commanders that support its use ? 

  • axionication1

    Hiya Emma,
    Drove to work this morning (lllong commute) listening to Alan Froncovich’s 80′s CIA film ” on company business”. Now late at nite, listening to your Mr Goldman.

    Hard to know what to believe & what agendas are being pushed. All very very Fucked up indeed.

    Thanks for vid.