Lying by Telling Half the Truth

Anyone that has been a child -- that's all of us – or anyone that forgot what it was like to be a child but has seen one lately knows that lying is written into our DNA. In fact, anyone that has studied the behavior of animals (from the mother bird that feigns being lame to lure a predator away from the nest where her young lay helpless, to the monkey that sneaks away from the dominant aging male to have sex with a younger male then returns to the troupe where she enjoys the protection of the aging male) realizes that to lie is to practice an essential component in the strategy for survival.

Which is why it is kinda funny – if I'm not lying – to read Victor Davis Hanson's essay on lying. He gave it the title: “The Poison of Postmodern Lying” and the subtitle: “When truth is relative, political expediency becomes the truth.” It was published on January 30, 2014 in National Review Online. As can be seen already, even if the title suggests this is a discussion on lying in general, the subtitle limits it to the political arena which is a lie in itself because it pretends that only politicians tell lies. And so, we can draw the early conclusion that to tell half the truth is to tell a lie. Call it a half-lie if you wish but it is a lie nevertheless.

To go from here to the examples he has in mind and discusses in detail, Hanson gets into a kind of intellectual gymnastics that would tax any mind. He makes it clear in the first paragraph that political lying is the result of the “relativism that infects our entire culture.” And this is happening, he says, because the current cultural fad is to attack the idea of having rules, a posture that regards the “truth” as being a fiction. And this is a bad idea, says he, because it can poison an entire society which is what is happening now.

This done, he picks on three women of the Left: Wendy Davis, Elizabeth Warren and Hillary Clinton, and tells about their lies. He also picks on one man, James Clapper, who lied to protect the Muslims. And he picks on another male, President Barack Obama, the one he will never stop attacking even if he – by some magic – could prove he has the ability to turn water into wine. And so you wonder if Hanson knew of people, be they women or men, from the Right who might have lied to enhance their image, not to protect someone like the Muslims.

Of Wendy Davis, he says that she is promoting a feminist agenda. Of Elizabeth Warren, he says that she is promoting a progressive agenda. In both cases, the women took liberty with the truth, he says, because they view their causes as serving the greater truth of social change. The same goes for the President of the United States whose good intention of having a universal health care trumped all other considerations, including telling the truth that his plan will alter the existing plans.

As to Hillary Clinton, he says that she did not believe the surge in Iraq was working because the war itself was unpopular therefore to say that the surge was working was reduced to a narrative that was competed against by an opposing narrative. She also dismissed the circumstances surrounding the Benghazi events – lie or no lie – because her good intention was to oppose religious bias and help re-elect a progressive president.

And when it comes to James Clapper, he not only lied to the American people about snooping on them, he lied under oath to the Congress which is supposed to be a greater sin. Yes, this may be the case, but not if you consider, as he did, that he was silencing Obama's right-wing critics. Also, when he said the Muslim Brotherhood was largely secular, he was showing tolerance for Islamists. How can that be a bad thing?

This done, Victor Hanson contrasts the difficulty of judging the validity of a work of art which would be a subjective exercise against the certainty of math and science whose theories can be proved or disproved by experiments.

Which leaves us with the question: How to judge the validity of the Hanson essay? Can we call it a work of art because it depends a great deal on subjective arguments? Or can we call it a science experiment that failed because the math does not add up in the sense that he attacks many considered to be on the Left, but none considered to be on the Right?

He might have demonstrated that you can lie simply by telling half the truth.

Imagine the Shoe on the Other Foot

Tom Perkins wrote a letter to the editor of the Wall Street Journal about a week ago, and I responded in an article under the title: “They Smoke themselves out at Times”. Apparently, many more people responded to that letter according to the editors of the Journal who came to his defense because – judging from what they say – the almost universal reaction has been one of condemnation. Poor fellow, the world treated him badly in their view, and so they felt compelled to come to his defense.

I am not here taking up the subject again; I am only interested in the Journal's reaction to the public's reaction to it. And that Journal reaction came in a piece they wrote under the title: “Perkinsnacht” and the subtitle: “Liberal vituperation makes our letter writer's point.” They published it on January 30, 2014 in the Journal.

Imagine now a self-appointed leader of the Muslims – an imam, for example – saying or writing something that would be construed as the moral equivalent of what Tom Perkins, the Jewish self-appointed leader wrote. Well, you don't have to go too far with your imagination because it's all there in black and white, in thousands upon thousands of pieces written by hundreds upon hundreds of Jews and their gentile echo repeaters over something like three or four decades. And much of that vituperation has appeared in none other than the Wall Street Journal.

What you would see will be not only condemnation of what the Muslim leader has said; it would be a demonstration to the effect that all Muslims are dangerous to Israel, to America and to the World. What the imam said would be interpreted as being a sample of what lurks in the hearts of ten percent of a Muslim population that numbers a billion and a half people or more. And all their thinking will lead to the conclusion that America must transfer its military to the Jews who have the wisdom to know what to do with it, and how to use it to eliminate the Muslim threat, thus save the world.

And so you ask: Is this not what the editors of the Wall Street Journal did with the Perkins letter? Did it not happen that this time, they saw the shoe being worn on the Jewish foot rather than the Muslim foot? Of course not. What do you think they are; lackeys of the self-appointed Muslim leaders? No, their vision could not have taken them beyond a fixation on one foot because they are as mentally amputated as a one-footed specimen that is so misinformed about humanity, might as well consider him to be an alien from outer space.

If that's the case, what did the Journal editors do? Believe it or not, they more than doubled down – they tripled down, quadrupled down and more. They began like this: “The irony is that the vituperation is making our friend's point about liberal intolerance – maybe better than he did.” They repeated what he said and then blamed it not on him but on the fact that he was forced to say what he said in 186 words. Hey, Journal editors, that's more than the 140 characters of the twitter world … and besides, Tom Perkins wasn't tweeting; he was writing a letter to an editor that happens to be his “friend.”

The main thing to these editors is that he did not repudiate “his larger argument” to whose defense they came. And to make their point clear, they attacked those who criticized their friend. To do this effectively, they attacked the boys at Bloomberg View, the people at the IRS, the prosecutors in Wisconsin, the New York Governor Andrew Cuomo, the New York City mayor Bill de Blasio, the New York Times and others – all of whom the Journal editors called liberals.

And then they added the following to end their presentation: “The liberals aren't encouraging violence, but they are promoting personal vilification and the abuse of government power to punish political opponents.”

Which prompts you to ask the question: And what are the editors of the Wall Street Journal promoting beside the involvement of America in a never ending war against all of humanity, not just the liberals. And by the way, that would be violence of Armageddon dimension.

Redundant Echoes from the Past

On January 27, 2014, John Bolton wrote another one of those articles in which he warns that Iran is a dangerous nation that's about to obtain dangerous weapons. The thing is that this time, he begins with these words: “For nearly three decades, Iran … has outmaneuvered Western counter-proliferation efforts.” Well, John Bolton does not realize that when he says three decades, and then tries to say that Iran poses an imminent danger, no reader believes him and everyone laughs at him. You can't say imminent for three decades and remain credible.

But that's not the only contradiction you encounter in the article, as indeed you do in every article of this nature – whether written by him or by someone like him. Here is another one: “sanctions were extremely effective before Geneva” contradicted by: “The sanctions have not simply been less effective in their economic impact and failure to slow, let alone cripple, Iran's nuclear-weapons program. U.S, sanctions advocate made a far more basic miscalculation...”

You want to see another contradiction? There is another one except that it is not something he says in the same article but something he has been hollering about for many years. Here is what he says now: “Tehran played on the West's obsessive belief that uranium enriched to 20 percent was more threatening than uranium enriched to 3 to 5 percent.” And that is in direct contradiction to what was convenient to say previously, which is that uranium enriched to 20 percent took Iran as close as 90 percent of the way to having a bomb.

What was convenient then is convenient no more, and so he changes his assertion. But on whom does he blame his change of heart? Believe it or not, he blames it on the victim. Even though the Iranians never said anything about how close 3 percent or 5 percent or 20 percent enrichment gets them to the bomb – which they always denied making – he wants us to believe that they played on the West's obsession. And this reminds us of the time when they did not find Weapons of Mass Destruction in Iraq, so they blamed the fiasco on Saddam Hussein whom they accused of letting them believe he had such weapons ... when in reality he always denied he had them. These people never change, do they?

You want to see something else that is just as ridiculous as the above? Here it is: “'Lawfare' will also be an important element in Iran's campaign to dismantle sanctions.” So here you have a lawyer who complains about “lawfare.” Instead of welcoming the adjudication of disputes between parties through the courts, which is what lawyers who respect their profession do, you have here a case in which recourse to the rule of law is slammed by an officer of the court in a country that prides itself on the rule of law. What else could he have said to flabbergast you more?

But what is it that he relies on to convince himself the reader will believe what he says? He seems to rely on the assertions that he makes to satisfy every occasion. Here is one; probably his most direct assertion: “Tehran will cheat.” Well, my friend, do you believe in the honesty of someone who contracts himself time after time; someone who has nothing but contempt for his own profession? Or do you suspect that his nemesis – the Iranian negotiators – are a lot more deserving of your trust than the self-contradicting machine which Bolton has proven himself to be?

But why is he doing all that? Here is why: “We hope that Congress will take Obama's measure on Iran because we are on a course toward failure with consequences for Israel.” That's really what preoccupies him; nothing else. The darling he wants to protect is Israel, and the workhorse that will do the protection is the American Congress; the very Congress that keeps rubbing America's nose in the mud.

But Bolton cannot stop here or the American people will rise and protest that the Israelis will have to choose between getting along with their neighbors and suffering the consequences of their actions alone. This is because the Americans have had it up to here, and they want to see a change in foreign policy.

For these reasons, Bolton finds it necessary to say that these would be consequences “for Israel even for America itself.” So now the security of America is in the balance. And if this were not enough to scare people, Bolton has demagoguery up his sleeve: “If Geneva does not measure up to Munich 1938, it will soon be a close second.”

So get scared America, because that's how Israel can maintain a Svengali hold on you.

And They Believe They Are Smart

Here is a stark demonstration of another reason why Jews always lose in the end; they are pushovers for flattery. Look what Dennis Prager is telling us now. He is saying it in an article titled: “What Bothers You Most?” and subtitled: “The answer says a lot about your moral universe.” It was published on January 27, 2014 in National Review Online.

To see how he got to the point of saying what he says, imagine someone telling a judge: I don't understand why this cop stopped me and gave me a speeding ticket when there is so much more that is going on in the city – matters that should occupy the attention of this cop and all the other cops. In fact, your honor, I don't even understand why you bother to preside over this case when there are more pressing matters to which you should be devoting your attention.

And no matter how many times you explain to Prager and to people like him that they cannot run loose, and do anything they want till all matters on the planet have been resolved, they keep going back to the Alan Dershowitz doctrine which says that Israel – and by extension all Jews – have the right to do to the Palestinians anything and everything that anyone has done or is doing to someone else.

And this is basically what Dennis Prager is saying now ... which is not different from what he has been saying all along, except that he has a new angle through which to present his case this time. To this end, he lines up all the horrible things which are being committed on the planet, then condemns the United Nations, the West and just about everybody else for being preoccupied with two matters. One of these is what he calls: “The alleged racism of the name of the National Football League's Washington team, the Redskins.” And the other matter is the continued occupation and looting of Palestine by the hordes of Jews who come from every direction.

But there is a noble exception this time, he says, which is Canada under Stephen Harper. And this is where you realize what pushovers these people are. Repeating a few words that happen to be the talking points they say about themselves, bestows nobility on Harper's Canada, in their view.

But did they study closely how he formulated what he said? They couldn't have because if they did, they would have come to a different conclusion. In fact, he spoke of the world constantly condemning Israel, and called that “nothing short of sickening.” Well, did he get sick? No, he did not. On the contrary, he had a jolly good time singing happy songs, and serenading someone or something. That's not being sick; not even in Canada.

The truth is that Canadians are thought to be polite because they are a very subtle people. And there is one important thing to know about their politicians. When they see a tragedy in the making, they take the side of the one most likely to get hurt so that if and when it happens, they will claim they took the right side but could do nothing to prevent the tragedy from occurring.

And having been the racist party from Western Canada before it became the Conservative party of all Canada, this group believes that the Jews are about to repeat history, and get themselves hurt again. Thus, the Harper group has decided to play it safe – play it the typically Canadian way.

As to Stephen Harper himself, in addition to being Canadian, he is an accountant, and has the temperament of one. He, like all accountants, does not like to be distracted. He will do a cost-benefit analysis of every situation, and pay the price that will remove the distraction regardless of the moral value of the situation.

In this case, his own people have been running around trumpeting what they are doing as being nothing more and nothing less that crass politics. They are not hiding it; they are bragging about it. To them, it is brag, brag, brag, incessant brag.

And this is what Prager has convinced himself is a noble act. What a pushover.

Equity and Privacy through Time and Space

Bret Stephens of the Wall Street journal thought he was going back to a future that has expired, only to discover that the flux capacitor, which sets the date to where his DeLorean is supposed to go, had malfunctioned. Instead of going to the year 1948 as intended, he ended up in the year 1961 where he met not the Winston Smith he was looking for but the Harrison Bergeron he was not looking for.

And this was the man who took Bret Stephens on a journey 120 years into the future where “everybody was finally equal” in the year 2081. He tells this story in a piece he wrote under the title: “Kurt Vonnegut's State of the Union” and the subtitle: “Updating a story about government-mandated absolute equality.” The story was published in the Wall Street Journal on January 28, 2014.

And guess what happened after that, my friend. Stephens kicked Bergeron out of the time machine, and tried to get back alone to his own time. However, he missed the target by 5 years there too, and ended up in the year 2019 instead of 2014. What's more, time differential was not the only malfunction that the flux capacitor had suffered as Stephens soon discovered. He realized that he ended up not on his native Planet Earth, but its twin planet that is located in a parallel universe.

And like the people who achieved absolute equality in the year 2081, he met a breed of people calling themselves Americans who “were finally on their way toward real equality,” says Stephens. And he tells of the many things that these people did to come this close to their ultimate goal. It was mostly due to government actions, he explains; they were initiatives that the Liberal faction had managed to impose on everyone despite stiff opposition from the Conservatives who failed to stop them.

But this tale is not without intrigue, as there was backstabbing like you would find in every good story. Here is how Stephens tells this part of the tale: “Though most Conservatives were resistant to the Equality Movement, some found the new political environment congenial to their anti-elitist aims.” And this is what distressed Stephens no end because he always thought that the Conservatives were moral people. In fact, he felt so badly that he hopped into the time machine and got back to his native planet where he ended up in the year 1948.

He looked all over England for someone called George Orwell, and found him as he was putting the finishing touches to a novel he titled: “Nineteen Eighty-Four.” After introducing himself as a fan of his who came from the future, Bret Stephens congratulated Orwell for the novel, informing him that his predictions came true.

The only thing, he went on to say, is that the predictions will not happen in 1984 but 30 years later in 2014. They will happen because the great capitalist nation of America will prove to the world how much more advanced politically, socially and morally it is than the Socialists who will remain frozen in the dark age of what they call respect for the privacy of their citizens. 

And this is where George Orwell explodes in a fit of rage:

You mean to tell me it will not be the Socialists who create Big Brother but the Conservatives of your time?

Yes. Isn't that what you meant to say in your novel?

No, no, no. But wait here; don't move.

Orwell goes into the adjacent room and comes back accompanied by a man and a woman:

Do you know who these two are?

I recognize Elizabeth Warren.

And he is Winston Smith, the man who goes after Big Brother. You take him to your time, and let him educate your Conservatives what it means to respect the privacy of citizens. As to Elizabeth Warren, she stays here to educate us on how to run an equitable economy.

Think outside the Box or Lose your Industry

Steven Rattner wrote an article that is a good analysis of the dire situation in which America's industries find themselves today but offered no solution that will make enough of a difference to change the outlook. And yet a workable solution exists that will offer at least a temporary relief till a permanent new approach can be worked out. The temporary solution can be attained with little effort; requiring only that the political goodwill be there and be real. The Rattner article was published in the New York Times under the title: “The Myth of Industrial Rebound” on January 25, 2014.

His argument is that yes, manufacturing is coming back to America, but doing so at a trickle compared to what was lost over the years. Also, what is coming back pays wages that are barely higher than those of the Third World, which is bad enough ... but the worst part is that American industries could not afford to pay even this much were it not for the subsidies they receive from the various levels of government. And all that contributes to the slowness of the recovery because low wages mean low purchasing power. In turn, this means low spending by the consumer in an economy that is driven to the tune of 70 percent of GDP by consumer spending.

And things are bound to get worse for America, says Rattner, because the competition for manufacturing jobs from the emerging markets will continue to increase as more countries decide to follow the Chinese example and lure industries to them, offering low wages, tax advantages and lax work rules. America's answer will have to be increased efficiency but when this happens, it will mean less people working, a situation that does not help the employment situation or the economic recovery.

In addition, there is the fact that even the high tech industries where America always had an advantage, are now relocating to places like Mexico and China, and Rattner gives a few examples of that. He goes on to point out that there is a study out there showing that only one-tenth of manufacturing involves significant energy costs. And this means that the energy boom in America will do very little to help industry.

It is a good thing that Steven Rattner came up with this article when he did because only a day before, the same New York Times had published an article by Vikas Bajaj under the title: “Submerging Markets” in which he gives a totally erroneous picture of what is happening in the world today. His article is the kind of talk that investment bankers and brokers peddle when they decide the time has come to motivate investors to switch from one market to another.

And what these characters are doing now is tell the people who will listen to them; they should pull their money out of the emerging markets and put it somewhere else, perhaps in America. And this happens to suit the strategy of the bankers and the brokers who see the emerging markets entering a new phase. They want everybody out of there so that they get in at the bottom, and position themselves in the right places for when the cycle begins anew.

But what solution is Rattner offering? He says that America still has an advantage in the service industries such as education and medicine. He wants America to rely on them to keep the economy going at a high clip, but he also wants the country to maintain an industrial presence. And the reason, he says, is that “companies locate research and development facilities – stuffed with high paying jobs – near their manufacturing facilities.” This, in turn, yields more innovation and more jobs in the field as well as additional employment in the service and supplier positions to the tune of almost 5 new jobs per industrial position.

Is this enough? No it's not. And that's because as much as foreigners like to get an American education, Americans like to go overseas and get an education there too. And as much as foreigners like to get healed in American hospitals, Americans go to foreign lands where they get healed there too.

And so, the thing to do is not to mentally create some kind of division of labor where America will specialize in some things while ceding other things to the emerging economies. A country the size of America has to be in all the places where its own consumers are willing to spend their money and that include the manufacturing of cheap goods.

Thus, the thing to do is to open training centers where youngsters are encouraged to go learn a trade. Also, it will help a great deal to have subsidized on the job training programs in some places – especially those that keep the prisons stuffed with inmates. It will be cheaper to pay these youngsters while teaching them than to look after them in a jail cell. And the effect on the economy will be good.

And so America, you must leave the old views behind, and think outside the box because – believe it or not – you're not only in the same boat, you're also in the same box. Everyone else is looking for a way out, and those who don't will remain locked up inside it.

They Smoke themselves out at Times

Once in a while someone would ask me who are the self-appointed Jewish leaders I keep referring to in my writings. These people say they know about the journalists and the commentators who write on Jewish and Israeli matters, but this kind of writing hardly qualifies as evidence that the authors are self-appointed leaders of the causes they take up.

That would be correct, I respond, if two conditions were met. The first is that the authors have other interests they can write about with the same level of knowledge they have for the Jewish and Israeli subjects, and the same level of conviction they devote to them. The second condition is that these authors write not only to pressure the political class or urge it to help advance their causes, but do other things also. They should, in fact, write primarily to participate in an ongoing debate so as to add insight to it. They may, on occasions, respond to another participant that would have made a point they believe has harmed a cause near to their heart.

The difficulty that ordinary people have in discerning what some authors are up to stems from the fact that the authors are highly skilled writers able to make the insidious sound like innocuous talk. They know how to coat themselves with a veneer of innocence that leaves the readers with the sense they are seeing authentic concern that is based on reliable information when, in reality, these are bogus concerns based on false information.

Thus, the question that comes to mind: How can ordinary people find out what these authors really want, and how they go about obtaining it? One way to find out is to follow not only the professional writers who know how to express one thought while conveying a different thought, but also follow the amateur writers who speak their mind in public or write letters to the editor. Motivated by the same drive as the professionals, these people express the same kind of ideas but do so in a way that is not sophisticated, thus reveal their true selves. In effect, they smoke themselves out and smoke the sophisticated authors along with them.

One of these people is a successful mogul in a field that is far removed from journalism. He is Tom Perkins who co-founded an incubator of high tech firms. He comes out once in a while and reveals what's on his mind – telling it like he thinks it is, and saying it in plain English. In so doing, he also reveals what's on the mind of those who take up the same sort of subjects but present them differently. His latest foray into the field came in a letter he wrote to the editor of the Wall Street Journal.

Responding to an article that appeared in the Journal, he wrote a piece that was published on January 24, 2014 under the title: “Progressive Kristallnacht Coming?” In it, he says this: I would call your attention to the parallels of fascist Nazi Germany to its war on its “one percent,” namely its Jews, to the progressive war on the American one percent, namely the “rich.”

Whoa! There is a mouthful here in that the writer constructs a full blown parallel between a horrible historical event and what he sees happen in America today. But that's not all because there is a good chance the parallel is false. The fact remains that there is no reliable record as to what percentage of the German population the Jews represented in the 1930s, yet he asserts that it was one percent. It is obvious he is trying to make the number coincide with the one percent that is said to represent the number of rich Americans today.

But what is it that he says reminds him of Kristallnacht? Well a few things do: (1) There is the Occupy movement. (2) There is the protest that sprung up around buses carrying high tech employees to work. (3) There is the resentment expressed by some people to the rising real-estate prices. (4) There is the fact that those prices are taken to such levels by the bidding of the highly paid tech workers. (5) And there is the calling of Danielle Steel a “snob” which, according to him, is a label she does not deserve because she is a charitable woman.

And so, when someone as intelligent as Tom Perkins can be overtaken by an upbringing that is fed to him with his mother's milk, the world must ask what kind of upbringing is that? The answer is that these people are told the world is a dangerous place for Jews, and will so remain till they take full control of it. They are the self-appointed Jewish leaders who keep messing it up for their followers, and for everyone else on the Planet.

The world being dangerous to Jews is also the message the professional writers advance, but doing it in subtle ways. And the more the rest of society gets to know what they are doing, the more they will be neutralized. And that's what is needed to keep the world safe from the horror they unleash on humanity every so often.

Numerology + Comparison = Superstition

Finally, an American Jew has brought the two legs of Jewish superstition in one place to discuss them simultaneously. They are Numerology and Comparison; the two legs upon which stand the vaunted Jewish wisdom. The Jew is Tom Friedman, and the article he wrote was published in the New York Times on January 26, 2014 under the title: 1; 5,000; 500,000

While these are three numbers, the author assures the reader at the start that together, they only form one of three questions he will tackle to eliminate any confusion the reader may have about what he calls “all the turmoil in the Arab world.” The other two questions have to do with Tunisia where the US has had the least involvement but where the most progress was made; and Egypt where General Sisi has so many medals on his chest, the reader should worry, says he. Tunisia and Egypt; that's where the comparison is attempted.

To elaborate on the Tunisian situation, Friedman relies on an opinion expressed by none other than the New York Times which, writing about the newly forged Tunisian Constitution, said that it “is a carefully worded blend of ideas that has won the support of both the Islamist party and the secular opposition.” He praises the concoction for being the most liberal in the Arab world but then cautions that “the whole thing could still blow up at any time.” So much for Jewish superstition. But he is not ready to give up yet, so he says that's still an achievement, then asks: What's the secret?

He answers that question in two parts, the first being his own idea; the second being that of someone else. His idea is that the main forces in Tunisia seem to have come together and have accepted the principle that power will be shared and rotated. The second idea is that of Craig Charney who is a pollster in South Africa and the Middle East, says Friedman. And Charney points out that Tunisia already had strong civil society institutions that played a moderating role between the various factions, which is different from the situation in Egypt where the military stands as the strongest institution.

Wow! How magnificent, you say to yourself! Now Friedman is going to tell us why civilian civil society is better than the military at playing a moderating role between the various factions in a country that just had a revolution. But instead of getting this, you get a slap in the face. It comes in this form: “And that leads to those numbers.” What a disappointment, from the superstition of the comparison, the Jew slips into the superstition of numerology, giving no explanation as to why he believes one moderator is better than the other.

As to the numbers, he elaborates that depending on what the people of a country want, what they will or will not accept, and how their temperament has been forged, they might need one Mandela to unify them; 5,000 peacekeepers to police the partition lines between them like it was done in Bosnia and Lebanon; or 500,000 troops to do a few things like it was done in Iraq – a country that Friedman does not mention because of what he finally admits: “Even then, failure is a real option.”

So you ask in exasperation: What do we have here? The whole thing might blow up in Tunisia at any time. An Iraq style failure is real in the places where America may again be tempted to poke its nose. So why not root for the Egyptian model? Are these people not lucky to have a powerful military; one that can impose discipline where and when it will be necessary during the transition period? After all, calling on peacekeepers like it was done in Bosnia, Lebanon and Iraq is calling on someone else's military. Why not one's own military?

Yes, a few decent people may be swept along with the bad guys, but this happens in every revolution. It is partly the fault of the strong faction that takes control of the situation and rules with impatience. It is also partly the fault of the decent people who fail to see that the time has come to curtail their revolutionary fervor, and give the country a chance to stabilize so that the millions of other ordinary people can get back to normal – live their lives, raise their children and rebuild the country.

With 4 times the population of Iraq, and three years after the change of regime, Egypt has had 3,000 dead and no refugees whereas Iraq had hundreds of thousands of dead people and millions of refugees. Which is more tolerable?

Finally, who cares what medals are pinned on General Sisi's chest? The one thing we can be certain of is that he will not pin one on Friedman's chest.

Ask not the Neighbors to Change, Ask Israel

There are times when it is useful to remember what President John Kennedy said to the nation on his inaugural: “Ask not what your country can do for you, ask what you can do for your country.” The usefulness stems from the fact that the saying can be paraphrased and used in those places and those moments when we get used to one way of doing things and lose the ability to see that the status quo can no longer be sustained. We let the opportunities slip by at a time when a different approach would have set things straight for us, and the exact opposite approach would have set them even straighter.

The moment is now and the place is the Middle East where America must stop asking Israel's neighbors to do this or do that for it – and do it at a time when it is obvious that Israel is the one that must be asked to do things in relation to its neighbors as well as refrain from doing other things if it is to be welcomed into the neighborhood. What must not be forgotten is that the neighborhood was once regarded as being an image of paradise; one that was unfortunately transformed into a hellish place with the injection into it of the foreign entity called Israel by the big powers of the day.

What seems to complicate matters further is that North America is showing signs of going through a period you might call the age of the “robot banging on the keyboard.” It is a weird age during which the computer is becoming more intelligent while the human that is banging on its keyboard is becoming more robotic. In fact, the computers are becoming more sophisticated at correcting the spelling and grammatical errors, while the humans are becoming more robot-like at echo-repeating in one place the stereotypes they hear about in another place, even if what they repeat does not apply where they use it.

And the echo they always repeat with regard to the Middle East is that Israel's neighbors must alter their attitude toward Israel because when it comes to international relations, Israel has always maintained the correct norm while the neighbors have always been out of line. And this idea is so entrenched in the American subculture that no one in America fails to mention it, let alone take the time to reflect on it or question it. You can see an example of this in the New York Times editorial that came under the title: “Iran's Charm Offensive” and was published on January 25, 2014.

What follows is the mind boggling passage which tells you that the editors of the New York Times are suffering from a severe case of dyslexia of the moral compass: “Iran must also be seen as contributing to stability in other ways, including ending the hostility toward Israel.” So here you have an American publication telling Iran to be good to Israel at a time when Israel is adopting a most belligerent posture towards Iran.

And the way that Israel executes what it plans is by sending instructions to its army of echo repeaters who are strewn around North America, including the offices of the New York Times. Israel instructs these people to incite the Congress of the Immature and the Useless, urging it to initiate a chain of events that will lead to the American military raiding Iran and destroying it.

Sickened by what you see, you join the civilized world and ask aloud: What are these people asking the Iranians to do? Kiss every Jew they encounter and thank him or her for being so belligerent towards Iran? Are these people mad? Are they screwed up in the head? Have they got their emotions so disturbed, they cannot relate emotionally to what is right or what is wrong?

In looking at their multi-pronged seemingly insoluble problems, the Americans are slowly discovering that most problems have one and the same source; the deterioration of their culture. Where the Americans have not as yet put their finger is the reason why the culture is deteriorating at such a rapid rate. Sooner or later they will find that a subculture has latched onto their culture, and like a parasite, has been sucking the life out of it.

When they fully realize what is happening – watch out, you who have been taking advantage of the weaknesses you have identified in the American system of governance. There is no way knowing at this point what is going to happen, but whatever will be, it will not be pleasant.

Doing the Same, Expecting a different Result

It is said that doing the same thing and expecting a different outcome would be one of the ways by which madness can be defined. Well, once again Michelle Dunne is trying to pull an old stunt, and expecting that a different outcome will result. But there is a caveat in what she did this time because we could continue these remarks with “unless of course,” and add something to them.

As to why we can continue; it is that she has shown us the way. She does so in the article she wrote with Thomas Carothers under the title: “Egypt's evolving governance is no 'democratic transition'” and published in the Washington Post on January 23, 2014. She says towards the end of the article that “Washington must not pretend that some empty imitations of democratic processes constitute a return to the path that Egyptians rightfully demanded in 2011.”

Having attributed pretense to someone in Washington, forces us to see if she is not the one pretending something. And it does not take long to find the evidence because she speaks of what the Egyptians “rightfully” demanded in 2011. However, the Egyptians did not stop there, having gone on to demand more things after that. To ignore this part of history, and stick with only what they demanded in 2011 makes it sound like she says the Egyptian people had no right to ask for anything more.

So, here we have little snort Michelle Dunne telling the people of Egypt what rights they have in their own country, and what rights they do not have. Well, I have something to tell this lady: Listen to me Michelle; dictatorship is bad enough when practiced locally; it is worse when practiced across the oceans. As much as the people of the world – including the Egyptians – get disgusted seeing Israeli dictatorship practiced in America, they will get disgusted seeing you practice dictatorship in Egypt if you ever manage to pull this thing off. Don't hold your breath.

As if this were not enough, the big word bouncing off the walls of punditry in America these days is “spiral.” And so you have the healthcare death spiral, the downward spiral, and now the “downward political spiral” which she uses to describe the situation in Egypt. Another thing that is big in America these days is the idea of protecting “U.S. security interests” which she is using in association with the imposition on Egypt of the political system she envisages for the country.” And this too is more evidence that Michelle Dunne is going in cycles, repeating the same thing over and over again in search of a result that keeps eluding her. The lady has accurately defined herself, and done so beyond redemption.

A hint as to where she gets her ideas is encapsulated in this sentence: “Getting the words right on Egypt has become all the more important.” When stated outside the context in which it is usually used, the sentence sounds reasonable. But when used in the context it is often used, turns it into a comical absurdity. To see how that works, first imagine a fictitious situation that may go as follows:

A police officer is called to a school where a robbery was committed. He grabs the first student he encounters and says: “Tell me who did this or I'll throw you in jail.” But the principal cuts him off and says: “You can't throw someone in jail that did nothing wrong.” And in front of the student, the officer responds: “I know that, but I'm only trying to scare the kid.” He turns to the student and repeats: “Tell me who did this or I'll throw you in jail.” Laughter please? Or is it too absurd to extract a laugh?

Who does this sort of thing in real life? Four types do it. They are the Israelis, the self-appointed Jewish leaders, the Jewish organizations and their non-Jewish running dogs. They put words in the mouth of American officials when they can, but when they cannot, they tell them to say this or that so as to scare this one or that one. And they do so in full view and full auditory range of this one and that one. So you ask: What kind of running does Michelle Dunne practice?

I have no idea, and I could not care less. I can also assure her that no one in Egypt cares about what she says or what she thinks of them.

Who will you trust most from now on?

One after the other, they came out and said they believed what the Iranian president Hassan Rouhani has said. What is puzzling is that they did so after years of beating the drums of war saying they did not believe anything the Iranians were saying. Furthermore, they wanted the whole world to go along with them during all of those years, and disbelieve the Iranians. But now, they want the whole world to go along with them, and believe what the Iranians are saying. What is going on?

Well, Clifford D. May tells you what is going on in an article he wrote under the title: “World Powers Surrender to Iran” and the subtitle: “Iranian president Rouhani says so. The evidence doesn't contradict him.” It was published on January 23, 2014 in National Review Online.

He says that after the Geneva talks, the Iranian president tweeted something to the effect that the world powers have surrendered to Iran's national will; an expression that conveys a different meaning than the title of the article which simply says that the world has surrendered to Iran. It is that the first conveys the notion of accepting the Iranian arguments, while the second conveys the notion of surrender after a military defeat.

I cautioned many times in my previous writings about relying too much on the literal translation of words from one language to another especially when the two languages are far apart; each being rooted in a different culture. I would like now to give an example of two languages that are, in fact, very close to each other and yet convey two different meanings using one and the same word. The two languages are French and English; the word is exploitation.

Say in French: “L'exploitation des mines” and you mean the development and use of mines. Nobody gets shocked by that. Now say the exploitation of mimes in English, and people will hear it as the victimization of mines. The response on the part of some people will be to raise an eyebrow. Why is that? It is because the English carries with it the baggage of people having victimized other people in the past. Thus, etymology defines the word in French whereas in English, it is the culture, with all its baggage, that does.

Even in Canada which is a mining country and where the two languages are official, you still see English speaking people become confused when you speak of the exploitation of mines. Now imagine what it is like to translate words from Farsi to English or from Arabic to English. You do not only translate a word, you translate a whole culture and all the baggage that it brings with it.

I do not speak Farsi, and so I do not know what exactly happened in the case that Clifford May discusses in his article. But I speak Arabic and I can imagine someone tweeting the word “istislam” which can be translated into surrender or submission. As shown earlier, and depending on how you use the word surrender, it can either convey the notion of surrender to the negotiating will of the Iranian people, or convey the notion of surrender after a military defeat. As to the word submission; it can mean submit to the superior negotiating skills of the Iranian delegation or submit to the realities of the situation and accept the inevitable.

Another example that shows how culture can play a big role not only in the choice of words but also in the way that an author formulates a thought. Look at this passage in May's article: “Iran also is sending warships into the Atlantic Ocean for the first time – a not-so-subtle message, perhaps?” No. The author is here deliberately deceiving his readers.

It is that the whole world knows what happened here. These warships were originally sent to the Mediterranean Sea to shadow the American fleet that was menacing Syria, Iran's ally. But now that the tension between America and Iran has been reduced, the Iranians took those ships out of the area.

Thus, if someone wants to see a message in this move, it is that the Iranians are happy being friendly with America – which is certainly not what May was trying to convey. In the context of the subculture that he and his likes have fashioned in America, the move is translated into a threat. In the subculture that the Iranians have been cultivating, the move is an expression of their goodwill toward America.

Who do you trust now, my friend? Straight talking and straight acting peaceful Iran or devious and warmongering Jewish Americans?

Brave Kirsten Powers Defies Convention

Kirsten Powers has defied the Convention, and may have broken it for good. She wrote: “Give Egypt some credit” which may sound normal to people around the world but not in North America where it is as sacrilegious to say something good about Egypt as it is to say something bad about Israel or anything Jewish. Powers wrote the article for USA Today, which also came under the subtitle: “The recent vote demonstrates that the country is moving towards democracy,” and was published on January 22, 2014.

She put the readers in the correct frame of mind by telling them in the first paragraph of her piece that Egypt is an ancient society, which means that change does not come to it easily. But despite this reality, the country has “made history” says the author, by voting on a constitution that protects the rights of women, and bans religious discrimination among other desirable provisions.

Unhappy with what she saw happen in America in response to the Egyptian referendum on the constitution, especially what the Washington Post expressed in an editorial that was titled: “Egypt's bogus democracy,” Kirsten Powers responded with her own article to set the record straight. This is a constitution that stands in stark contrast to the previous ones, she reminded everyone; it is groundbreaking and it sets the stage for holding presidential and parliamentary elections in the coming months. As friends of Egypt, she calls on Americans to celebrate rather than criticize.

She spoke with Amr Moussa who drafted the constitution, with Dr. Mona Makram-Ebeid who was a member of Egypt's parliament, and is now a professor at the American University in Cairo, and she spoke with Frank G. Wisner who was President Obama's envoy in 2011. All three have stressed the fact that Egypt's new constitution expands on the rights of individuals, and bans all sorts of discrimination.

Yes, like says the Washington Post, the constitution does not diminish the power of the military sufficiently but like Wisner put it to Kirsten Powers: “Egyptians hate chaos … they look around the Arab world, and say 'do we want to go down the road of Libya or Syria or Yemen? No. We don't want the chaos.'”

Well, that's what the American envoy said because it is what he heard the Egyptians say about themselves. So, allow me to elaborate further, being of Egyptian origin and still in tune with the culture there. Seven thousand years of civilizations have given the Egyptians the time to shape a society that comes as close as you can imagine to being both a law and order society and a compassionate one.

In fact, time and time again, the people of Egypt have demonstrated how comfortable they feel being “one with the army,” and seeing nothing wrong in letting the latter as well as the police rule over them. They will tolerate the security apparatus as long as it does not get out of line the way it did under a previous administration that had gotten too old and too distracted.

In addition to that, and to make sure that things will never get out of hand again, the people of Egypt insisted on having term limits placed on the administration, and they got it in the new constitution. Also, to have a system of checks and balances that suits their temperament; they gave the judiciary – that which will oversee all aspects of the nation's management – as much powers as the security apparatus.

In short, the people of Egypt gave themselves the sort of constitution which they, at this time, believe is the best that can be for them. Will they feel the same way two years from now, two elections down the road or two generations into the future? Let time speak in its own behalf. Meanwhile, you can be certain that the one thing the Egyptians do not fear is time itself.

In the end, let it be said that Kirsten Powers, has done Egypt … and more importantly has done America a great big service because living a lie about what goes on can only hurt someone. It will hurt Egypt, but only a little while doing considerable damage to America and to its people. These are the people who certainly do not deserve living a hoax they would not approve of; one that suits someone else's temperament.

Being Offended no Longer a Sufficient Cause

There was a time when a Jew anywhere in the world crying out or whispering “I am offended,” would cause the entire Jewish apparatus to rise up and demand that the relevant governments, the irrelevant ones and those in-between – be they near the offending source or far away from it – get involved in the matter and contribute to the effort of quashing the mouth that has muttered the offending words.

And so, you would see presidents and prime ministers, legislators and journalists come out of the woodwork, and one by one, condemn the practitioner of free speech for not knowing the difference between legitimate free speech protected by the first amendment of the American Constitution, and the expression of antisemitism that may or may not be protected but is, for this occasion, considered to be.

Those days are gone at least for now, my friend, and you know why? Because every Jew and his sidekick that felt like offending others – most especially the Muslims – came out of the woodwork and started racing past each other in a mad competition to see who will mutter the most offensive expression to hurt those they target, and do so not because there ever was a reason for doing it but because it was the thing to do – just like the social punks of today who sucker-punch someone for no reason except that it is the thing to do.

And so, the offended people started to use the principles that were put down in the law and in the tradition by the Jews themselves to go after the offending Jews, their sidekicks and the cultural punks who made offending others a part of the new subculture. And this is when the Jews rose up and hollered: “but what about free speech?” And they went on to explain that the first amendment of the American Constitution allows them to say anything they want to say in America and everywhere else in the world as long as the speech does not criticize Israel or the Jews for any reason whatsoever.

And a dismayed world looked at the Jew and said: “Shove it, you little punk! From now on you will be treated like everyone else; and everyone else will be treated like you.” And bit by bit, the unreasonable parts of the old culture of political correctness began to come down while new ones began to go up. But if you ask how far this process will go, the answer is that no one knows ... but this is how cultures develop and progress for good and for ill. The important thing that can be said for now, however, is that Jewish matters no longer matter as much as before, and they take no precedent over every other matter.

And this has had a profound effect on how the world, especially the “Western” part of it, began to deal with Israeli and Jewish demands. It has changed as you will be able to see from two articles that have appeared recently. The first is titled: “Obama is Eagerly Mainstreaming the Iranian Regime,” was written by Benjamin Weinthal and published on January 21, 2014 in National Review Online. The second appears in the Wall Street Journal under the title: “The Iran Gold Rush” and the subtitle: “Western businesses line up for post-sanctions business with Tehran.” It was written by the editors themselves and published on January 22, 2014.

You will see a Weinthal who lives in Europe, and apparently remains oblivious of the changes taking place in America, operate according to the old mentality. He calls on the superpower to continue maintaining a war footing posture towards Iran because of some silly thing he says has appeared on an Iranian website that must have offended him no end. That is, his brain tells him that the future of the Planet with the seven billion people that it harbors do not matter as much as a Jew being offended by what he believes was posted on that website … whether or not it was actually posted like he was told it was.

And then, you will see from the editorial of the Wall Street Journal how much that mentality has changed in general terms in America, and changed among the European political class and business people. In short, you will see that with the waning of the nefarious Jewish influence on America, the World is getting back to normal again which is cause for celebration.

May the World continue to improve till it can no longer restart the old cycle again.

When Madmen Stop Taking Themselves Seriously

Look what David Pryce-Jones did. He set up a parallel that involves the American Secretary of State John Kerry, and the Israeli minister of defense Moshe Ya'alon. He vilified the American for what he said and did; and he sang the praises of the Israeli for what he said and did. He then ended his article with this sentence: “Ya'alon told the truth. 'What is truth? said jesting Pilate and would not stay for an answer.'” And like Pilate, the restless David Pryce-Jones quickly existed the scene.”

There is a lot more to the article which came under the title: “John Kerry and the truth” and was published in National Review Online on January 21, 2014. From the start, you get the feeling that the author is setting himself up to do what a suicide bomber would do, which is to blow himself up in the end. Pryce-Jones gives you that hint as he begins the article like this: “Moshe Ya'alon is probably the best minister of defense since Moshe Dayan.” Well, people who know their history know that incompetent Dayan went berserk during the 1973 war, and ended up in a mental hospital.” Is the other Moshe ripe to repeat the performance? The author seems to say yes.

But why would Pryce-Jones do what he did? This is like asking why do suicide bombers do what they do. There is no rational answer to give in both cases but there is a difference to which you can point. It is that the young bombers are programmed by their elders to believe they have a cause for which they are best suited to sacrifice their lives. As to our aging literary suicide bomber, he seems to have realized that nobody is taking his madness seriously, so he stopped taking himself seriously as well. Seeing that he was going nowhere dishing out all the nonsense he has been spewing, he thought it would be nice to go out in a massive and glorious flash.

The nonsense that the writer has been advancing in this current article is the same old nonsense that Israel and all the Jewish writers who write on the subject have been advancing for decades. It is that “now” is never the right time to ask Israel to end the occupation of Palestine. Why is that? Because there is always something that must be done first somewhere else in the world. And when there is nothing happening, they always find an excuse that sounds as silly as saying there must be someone out there wearing brown shoes on a Wednesday; go find him before asking Israel to end the occupation.

Another point that Pryce-Jones makes is also an old and worn out argument. It is to the effect that anything Israel does to secure peace will represent a mortal danger to Israel, and to all the Jews around the world. And so, the conclusion they reach, each time and every time, is represented in the following message which they never cease giving to the Americans: “Give us all that we ask for in terms of money and weapons, then vanish till we get into trouble at which time feel obliged to come and rescue us.”

And then, out of ignorance or malice – depending on how well he remembers the history of the region – Pryce-Jones brings up the subject of the Palestinians being split into two camps. He says there is Fatah, and there is Hamas, and he makes the point that “Ya'alon clinches his case with the observation that the Israeli army is all that maintains Abbas [President of Fatah] in power.” This would be an irony brought to light out of malice if the author were aware that Hamas was created by Israel to undermine Fatah. It would be an act of woeful ignorance if he did not know this history.

Still, he finds time to stab his own credibility in the heart before committing the final act of literary suicide. First, he ignores the fact that the Palestinians have accepted the long sought request that they recognize Israel's right to exist on their land – which they formally did long ago. Second, he ignores the reality that the Israelis have not reciprocated by accepting the Palestinian right to have a state of their own, a fact they negate by their continued occupation of Palestine.

And so, as he stands on those two historical powder kegs, the author gleefully sings the following incendiary words: “Kerry's fancies are met persistently by Palestinian insistence that they will never accept a Jewish state.”

And that's when the kegs explode as the author shouts his final cry: What is truth?

These Indexes Are for the Birds

As a former teacher I learned one thing that proved to apply in more places than I imagined. I learned never to judge a book by its cover, a lesson that later proved to apply in other fields as well; not least of which the tendency to predict what the future of a student will be, judging by his school performance during the few months that you have him in your class. The only certainty you can rely on in such cases is that you will be wrong most of the time.

Even before that, as I went into the world where I saw many things, got involved with many of them and became a lifelong student of the human condition, one fallacy stood out as the most glaring from among the tendencies that some people develop. It is that they obsess about creating a rating system according to criteria they imagine will encapsulate the truth. And so they establish an index, rate people or nations accordingly, and project a picture of the world they want the rest of us to believe is the gospel truth. Nothing can be more false than that.

You can get a feel for all that when you read the James Pethokoukis article that came under the title: “No. 12 in the Index of Economic Freedom” and the subtitle: “We rank behind Estonia, but if we had a true accounting, we'd be even lower on the list.” It was published on January 21, 2014 in National Review Online.

As you can see, the subtitle alone points to two matters that should raise your eyebrow. The first is that the author of the article does not believe there is true accounting, which causes you to ask: Why then is he wasting his time discussing a subject he knows is false? And the second is that a great deal of emotion is involved in what is supposed to be a mathematically precise gauging of things. And that emotion is without a doubt of the worst kind because it rests on the xenophobic tendency to resent being in the company of say, Estonia.

Pethokoukis begins with the lamentation that America “down, down, down she goes” according to the ranking of economic freedom that the Heritage Foundation put together in collaboration with the Wall Street Journal some twenty years ago. And he blames what he calls Obamanomics for the trouble, a point that should tell the reader, there is a great deal of politics in them words.

But then he goes on to say that the analysis and the ranking are “too charitable” toward the current American economy, and too harsh toward the President. What? Is he now saying that Obamanomics isn't as bad as the analysis made it out to be? Hey, did you hear that, you Heritage Foundation? And you Wall Street Journal? Pethokoukis says you're wrong.

To make his point, the author of the article compares the economy of boogeyman “social-democratic” Sweden with that of America, and finds that Sweden clearly beats America in seven of the subcategories that make up the index of Economic Freedom, yet it is ranked number 20 while America is ranked as number 12.

But wait a minute, that's not the whole story because when you closely analyze the 3 categories where America beats Sweden – which he thoroughly does – you find that “if government spending were calculated in [a] more transparent way, the U.S would fall to Swedish levels if not a bit lower. Likewise, if Sweden spent the way the index thinks the U.S. does, it would take America's spot behind Estonia.”

Worse than that, says Pethokoukis, there is this fact: “Not only does America have market-distorting government as big as Sweden’s; it runs a welfare state that's heavily targeted toward the top rather than the middle or bottom.” To buttress this point, he quotes Monica Prasad who wrote: “the United States is not a laissez-faire or liberal political economy at all, and never has been.”

To which James Pethokoukis adds his own observation: “It's a worst-of-all worlds situation, and it didn't start with the Affordable Care Act and Dodd-Frank” which is probably why he said earlier that Obamanomics isn't as bad as the heritage Foundation and the Wall Street Journal made it sound.

Cheer up, Mr. President, you got yourself a new friend that happens to be a right-winger.

A Socio-Economic Compact for the Times

The world has changed enormously since the day when the folks in past centuries put down principles to take into account while determining how the state ought to interact with its people in matters concerning citizenship and the distribution of wealth. The difference between then and now is that we now understand social and economic realities better than ever before, and have developed tools to deal with deficiencies that were unknown to previous generations.

But we also realize that the issues have become more complex both from the social and the economic points of view. Thus, our current task is to untangle the issues, deal with them separately, and rewrite the socio-economic compact in a way that will be equitable to all participants – as well as be conducive to the kind of society we strive to become. What follows are only a few ideas; not the entire compact.

Two realities, one social and one economic, stand as the most complex factors among those we encounter when putting together the compact that we want. The social factor stems from the reality that we now live mostly among strangers in an urban jungle ... as opposed to living on the land among family and friends the way things used to be. We also tend to live long, which means that we spend many years in retirement; not always in the best of health. And all these realities require that we strengthen the social safety net lest our society degenerate to resemble the most unfortunate of primitive societies.

As to the complex economic factor, it stems from the reality that the use of fiat money has become the predominant method of doing commercial transactions. And so, while we continue to produce goods, and continue to deliver services by the “sweat of our forehead,” the way we used to do it in the past, those goods and those services are not considered assets till someone bids on them a definite monetary value. This is the unfortunate reality of our times even though the said goods and services make up the wealth of the nation.

The problem with the current situation is that no one but the central bank has the authority to print money, a reality that made it necessary to build a network through which money flows from the bank to all the members of society where it should be delivered to each according to merit. The trouble is that real value in terms of goods and services is created all over the country at different levels, but the way that money flows never gets to match those levels. Instead, money tends to accumulate more readily in places where little is produced while neglecting to go to the places where much is produced.

This is a reflection of the mismatch that exists between the reality of the economic situation on the ground, and the fact that the network is operated by people who care more about their own welfare than they do about upholding the sense of justice which requires them to distribute the money equitable. The net result of this mismatch is that those who produce wealth for the nation by making things or by delivering services, receive just enough money to get by while those who produce little or nothing but handle the money, get to keep most of it. And this is how the makers get to be called takers even though they make a lot and take very little; and how the takers get to be called makers even though they make near to nothing and take just about everything.

So then, what must we include in a modern socio-economic compact to remedy the situation? The first thing we include is a recognition that civilization has advanced so much, it would be a grave dereliction of duty on the part of the government to have a shortage of labor in any of the service industries. Thus, the first priority of the government should be to ascertain that there are schools and training centers producing enough workers in those fields.

The next item to be included in the compact is recognition that most of those who require assistance are the very young and the old. What these people usually need are services rather than hard goods. Thus, a nation that has an adequate supply of service workers can easily handle the cost of the safety net, turning it into a useful sector of the economy without becoming a burden.

There must also be mention that the self-serving part of the financial services does not count as part of the economy. It must nevertheless be reported; and anything that exceeds one tenth of one percent of the national income will be shaved by taxation. This will be done on a progressive, pro rata basis among the individuals who work in the financial services and make gains by serving themselves while serving the public or pretending to do so. There is no reason why these people should make more than 20 billion dollars in ill-gotten gains in an economy that is worth 20 trillion dollars.

Another item should specify that in the interest of keeping a check on inflation, the service industries as a whole must not exceed 75 percent of the national income. If it goes beyond that value in a given year, a tax surcharge is automatically activated at such level that it will shave the excess.

As to the production of hard goods, the government should encourage self-sufficiency in the industries where it is possible to make gains. But where the country needs to import raw material, semi-finished goods or complete products, the government must strive to maintain a fairly even balance of payment with the world by making sure that the imports are offset by exports. To this end, it will further encourage the industries where the country has an export advantage by subsidizing them if it must.

These provisions in the social compact will insure that there is an equitable distribution of the wealth among those who produce it; each receiving as much as he or she produces or close to it. Those provisions will also make sure that while the needy among the current generation will be cared for, they will not be a burden on their contemporaries or future generations.

Other than that, the usual items that normally go into a social compact should be there too.

Return of old Demons Wearing new Wings

Throughout history all sorts of dominions around the planet were ruled by all sorts of regimes before the so-called Liberal-Democracies were established in some places, such as Europe, and not in other places. Despite the claim to the effect that because these nations had a special something about them, they were destined from the start to adopt that system of government, the fact remains that only random historical occurrences have generated the forces that led those nations to adopt that system.

What's more, the historical record shows that this group of democracies lived for thousands of years with the demons that everyone else lived with. They democratized for a short period of time but seem to be coming full circle now; and this is happening at a time when the non-democratic nations are beginning to rethink the system under which they have been operating. Thus, the two groups are going through some kind of transformation with the difference that the old demons are returning to the Liberal-Democracies – albeit in a different form – while the non-democracies are experimenting with something that comes close to a democracy – albeit in a form that suits them better. In short, the two groups seem to trade places.

And this leads to the question: What is happening to the Liberal-Democracies at this time? Well, it is happening to some of them – the United States of America, for example – which is being pulled into the embrace of the old demons both on the national and the international stages. Whereas in the old days, the local government in the European nations reflected the work of a dictatorship; and whereas the international relations reflected a continuous state of conflict, these conditions have returned to America but with a twist. It is that the local dictators are not local people anymore but Jews who have managed to impose themselves on the system. As to the international relations, they are run by the overseas entity known as Israel to which American foreign policy – under the pressure and the connivance of local Jews – has been subcontracted.

And what about the nations that did not democratize at the same time as did the Europeans? What is happening to them at this time? Well, it happens that these nations are coming under the same sort of forces which led the European nations to democratize a century or two before. It is the power of industrialization, and the various forces that this phenomenon normally unleashes on a society. But these being different societies living at a different time, they experience the forces of change and respond to them in a slightly different way.

Still, industry is the great equalizer because it injects into society an element that compels a change in human relations. That element is the compression of time. Whereas agriculture and construction used to be the main industries of the past, the assembly line has become the main industry of the industrial age. The first progresses in months, seasons and years; the second progresses in hours, minutes and seconds. Control of the first is passed on by inheritance from one generation to the next; control of the second remains largely in the hands of the entrepreneurs and the inventors that launch it.

Whereas in the old days, the worker that did not perform his duties in total obedience of the master could be disposed of and replaced by another without worrying about diminished productivity, the worker on the production line has a better control of his destiny because an hour of his time that is lost to the assembly line can make an appreciable dent in the profitability of the operation. He may not have become an exact equal to the owner of the enterprise where he works, but he can talk to the boss without bowing, even quit his job to start his own enterprise and compete against what is now his former boss.

These realities brought about the revolutions that compelled the old fiefdoms of Europe to adopt the democratic system of government which they enjoyed for a while but could not sustain for long without having a continuous high rate of growth in the economy. They needed that growth to absorb the new entrants into the industrial age, those migrants that came to the urban industrial regions from the farming communities. And this is why the Europeans turned to the colonization of other countries; and why America turned to the ownership of slaves.

When the colonization of a country by another, and when the enslavement of a human being by another were coming to an end, the industrial democracies found themselves unable to sustain the growth upon which they relied in the past. They responded by adopting a kind of immigration policy and guest worker programs that allowed them to stay in business and remain viable as a system. And because the other nations were duplicating what the Democracies had gone through before, they were now able to register the growth that was eluding the old Democracies. The result has been that they started to accumulate the surpluses they could lend to the old Democracies. It is that the tables were turned, a situation in which the lenders became borrowers, and the borrowers became lenders.

This is where the Jews and Israel have entered the picture, and said to the old Democracies they may not be aware of it but they are living in a state of existential threat. Their salvation depends on the guidance of the Jews who, in a nutshell, recommend the rehabilitation of the old demons: colonization and enslavement. These two need not look the same as before but they should play the same old roles.

And the Jewish leaders, working in concert with Israel, have been maneuvering what they call the “West” ever since that time. They got it to give them all the help upon which they rely to maintain the colonization of Palestine. And this is something they are able to do, ironically, because they found a way to maintain the West in a constant state of moral slavery to their pompous buffoonery. They got the slaves, and so they can maintain their grip on the colony.

I am the all-knowing Jew, said the Jew to the American Congress. Sing me a song and I'll hand you my country, said the Congress of morons. The Jewish leaders sang, and the morons handed their America to the World Jews and to Israel.