http://www.alalam.ir/English/detail.aspx?id=79790
By: Omar Waraich / Time's Islamabad Correspondent
Iran's neighbors could play a decisive role in determining whether any sanctions aimed at curbing Tehran's nuclear programs are effective - and one Iran neighbor from whom the US should expect little support on the issue is Pakistan. Ostensibly Washington's key ally in the troubled region, Pakistan also maintains a longtime friendship with Tehran. And as President Asif Ali Zardari's government moves to strengthen ties with its neighbor in a bid to enhance Pakistan's economic prospects, Islamabad is keen to sit out the nuclear dispute. While Pakistan insists that it is not actively encouraging Iran to join it in the élite club of nuclear-weapons states, officials in Islamabad appear decidedly untroubled by developments across its southwestern border.
"The government of Pakistan, and the average Pakistani citizen, looks at Iran as a friendly nation," Pakistan's Deputy Foreign Minister, Malik Amad Khan, told TIME in an interview. After Iran, Pakistan has the second largest Shi'ite Muslim population; its 33 million Shi'ites constitute nearly double the number in Iraq. Before the 1979 Islamic revolution, both countries were members of the anti-Soviet CENTO security pact, and despite the Islamic Republic's anti-US stance, Pakistan became one of the first countries to recognize Ayatollah Khomeini's system.
The Deputy Foreign Minister declined to comment on how Islamabad would react in the event of sanctions or tougher forms of pressure on Iran. Instead, Islamabad's focus remains on an "enhanced level of engagement" that can draw Iranian support for Pakistan's "energy, trade and communications" sectors. The new relationship with Iran has already seen a 28% rise in trade, according to Deputy Minister Khan, and with chronic shortages of electricity supply, Islamabad is eagerly awaiting the construction of a decades-old proposed Iran-Pakistan gas pipeline - plans for which remain doubtful.
With anti-Americanism running high - an August poll by the Pew Research Center revealed that 64% of Pakistanis "regard [the U.S.] as an enemy" - backing new sanctions against Iran could provoke a domestic backlash. "It would be seen as Pakistan against the Muslim world," says analyst Fair.
Iran agrees to draft deal on uranium: diplomats
Bombs and Bailouts : How the U.S. 'pissed away' 14 Trillion dollars
After four years sifting through a morass of US government records, the Brookings Institution reports that the US government has spent $5.1 trillion on the development and manufacture of nuclear weapons, adding that if 'clean up, stockpiling and dismantlement' is included, the cost rises to $5.5 trillion.
US officials have called it: "money well-spent". Having spent trillions threatening the world, the US has recently bailed out the crooked banksters and other robber barons to the tune of$8.5 trillion for the total cost of the bailouts. See the spreadsheet graphic below. Click on it for the complete story.
We’ve spent the last few decades shoveling money at the rich like there was no tomorrow. We abandoned the poor, put an economic stranglehold on the middle class and all but bankrupted the federal government — while giving the banks and megacorporations and the rest of the swells at the top of the economic pyramid just about everything they’ve wanted.
And we still don’t seem to have learned the proper lessons. We’ve allowed so many people to fall into the terrible abyss of unemployment that no one — not the Obama administration, not the labor unions and most certainly no one in the Republican Party — has a clue about how to put them back to work.
US officials have called it: "money well-spent". Having spent trillions threatening the world, the US has recently bailed out the crooked banksters and other robber barons to the tune of$8.5 trillion for the total cost of the bailouts. See the spreadsheet graphic below. Click on it for the complete story.
Since 1945, the United States has manufactured and deployed more than70,000 nuclear weapons to deter and if necessary fight a nuclear war. Some observers believe the absence of a third world war confirms that these weapons were a prudent and cost-effective response to the uncertainty and fear surrounding the Soviet Union's military and political ambitions during the cold war. As early as 1950, nuclear weapons were considered relatively inexpensive- providing "a bigger bang for a buck"-and were thoroughly integrated into U.S. forces on that basis. Yet this assumption was never validated. Indeed, for more than fifty years scant attention has been paid to the enormous costs of this effort-more than $5 trillion thus far-and its short and long-term consequences for the nation....................................
--Atomic Audit: The Costs and Consequences of U.S. Nuclear Weapons Since 1940, Brookings Institution
We’ve spent the last few decades shoveling money at the rich like there was no tomorrow. We abandoned the poor, put an economic stranglehold on the middle class and all but bankrupted the federal government — while giving the banks and megacorporations and the rest of the swells at the top of the economic pyramid just about everything they’ve wanted.
And we still don’t seem to have learned the proper lessons. We’ve allowed so many people to fall into the terrible abyss of unemployment that no one — not the Obama administration, not the labor unions and most certainly no one in the Republican Party — has a clue about how to put them back to work.
--Bob Herbert, Safety Nets for the Rich
Exclusive: Pakistan: On The Edge of The Precipice
http://axisoflogic.com/artman/publish/Article_57253.shtml
Driven by paranoia with resurgent Islam as a threat to the established social order in the West and their obsession to control this very important oil rich region, American strategists have toyed with the idea of redrawing political boundaries of Islamic states along ethnic lines. The American attack on Afghanistan and Iraq on false pretexts of ‘war on terror’ was the initiation of this strategy. Now they seek to legitimize their actions by labeling them as efforts to dispense justice for ‘oppressed Muslim minorities’.
They believe that smaller entities would be easier to micromanage through puppet regimes, enabling them to contain militancy and squeeze into extinction Jehadi outfits by choking their funding.
This ‘remapping’ involves splintering the Muslim world and creating sovereign states of Balochistan, Kurdistan and Arab Shia State by carving out and unifying Pakistani and Iranian Baluchistan territories to create Free Balochistan; unifying Iranian, Iraqi and Turkish Kurdistan to create Greater Kurdistan and slicing off Eastern Saudi Arabia to unite it with Southern Iraq to create Shia Arab State. It is no coincidence that these territories hold bulk of the world oil and host anti-imperialist movements.
Brilliant thinking! This promises them a picture-perfect Muslim world, tailored to their needs. The difficulty, however, is that the undertaking is too ambitious, out of sync with reality and unachievable....
American global interests have routinely propelled it into adversarial engagement with the Muslims, losing their hearts and minds. More often than not, Israeli interests have defined American foreign policy direction, particularly where their interests are congruent. For instance, both the US and Israel have eyes on the oil reserves of Caspian Sea and Central Asia, they need energy pipeline project transiting through Afghanistan and Pakistan’s Balochistan and desperately want a wider security shield for Israel, which involves denuclearizing Pakistan.
Israel’s interest to de-fang Pakistan’s nuclear ability dates back to mid-eighties when it attempted to bomb Kahuta facility in collusion with the Indians – a mission that was aborted when an alert Pakistan Air Force took to the skies. Now in Afghanistan they have a perfect opportunity to collude with America and India to take out Pakistan’s nuclear assets through subversion.
the assessment of Michel Chossudovsky, Director of Montreal based Center for Research on Globalization (author of America’s “War on Terrorism”) is significant. In his article ‘The Destabilization of Pakistan’ he warns: “Washington’s foreign policy course is to actively promote the political fragmentation and balkanization of Pakistan as a nation”. He states: “The U.S. course consists in fomenting social, ethnic and factional divisions and political fragmentation, including the territorial breakup of Pakistan. This course of action is also dictated by U.S. war plans in relation to both Iran and Afghanistan.”
An excellent analysis: Imperial Globalization and Social Movements in Latin America
http://axisoflogic.com/artman/publish/Article_57240.shtml
The unimpeded growth of Euro-American capitalism following the collapse of Soviet and European communism, the conversion of China and Indochina to state capitalism, and the rise of US backed, free market military dictatorships in Latin America give new impetus to Western empire building, labeled “globalization”.
The process of globalization was the result of ‘external’ and ‘internal’ conditions and class coalitions embedded in the social structure of both the imperial and ‘recipient’ or targeted countries. The expansion of capital was neither a linear process or continual expansion (accumulation) nor of sustained collaboration by the targeted countries. Crises in the imperial centers and regime transformations in collaborator regimes affected the flow of capital, trade, rules and regulations.
One of the unintended consequences of the ascendancy of global ruling classes was the rise of large scale and tumultuous social movements, especially in Latin America, which challenged the rulers, ideology and institutions sustaining the global empire.The onset of a new and dynamic phase of imperial capital expansion, which we will call globalization, owes a great deal to the favorable political outcome of the capital – labor struggle on a world scale. The defeat and retreat of the working class in the West, particularly in the US and England, and the self-destruction of the Communist regimes of the East laid the groundwork for an aggressive global crusade against leftwing regimes and movements in the Third World, especially in Latin America. The ‘rollback’ of the working class movements was particularly vicious and successful in Latin America, where the major part of the continent experienced the onset of military dictatorship, which dismantled the national constraints on capitalist flows and trade tariffs.
Within this new global framework of imperial empire builders and authoritarian collaborater regimes, several factors enhanced global economic expansion.
1. Technological innovations, especially information technologies accelerated the flows of capital and commodities.
2. Large scale accumulation of capital in the imperial states, a relative decline in rates of profits and the growing role of finance capital spurred the drive for overseas investments, speculation and buyouts of privatized firms.
3. Intensified competition between the US – EU – Asia drove multi-national corporations (MNC) to seek advantages by securing banks, resources; market shares within Latin America.
4. The rise of pro-western rightist dictatorships provided exceptionally favorable socio-economic conditions for buyouts and acquisitions of local enterprises and resources, extraordinary returns on financial speculation and minimum opposition from repressed trade unions and nationalist and leftist parties.
As a consequence of these structural changes, free market doctrines and neo-liberal policies were put in practice resulting in bilateral free trade agreements (NAFTA),and deregulation of the economies. The growth of speculative activity took root and prospered, at the same time that social safety nets was dismantled.
Critical Analysis
An excellent analysis: Imperial Globalization and Social Movements in Latin America ( 0)
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By James Petras and Henry Veltmeyer. Axis of Logic
Axis of Logic
Friday, Oct 16, 2009
Introduction
The unimpeded growth of Euro-American capitalism following the collapse of Soviet and European communism, the conversion of China and Indochina to state capitalism, and the rise of US backed, free market military dictatorships in Latin America give new impetus to Western empire building, labeled “globalization”.
The process of globalization was the result of ‘external’ and ‘internal’ conditions and class coalitions embedded in the social structure of both the imperial and ‘recipient’ or targeted countries. The expansion of capital was neither a linear process or continual expansion (accumulation) nor of sustained collaboration by the targeted countries. Crises in the imperial centers and regime transformations in collaborator regimes affected the flow of capital, trade, rules and regulations.
One of the unintended consequences of the ascendancy of global ruling classes was the rise of large scale and tumultuous social movements, especially in Latin America, which challenged the rulers, ideology and institutions sustaining the global empire.
The relations between imperial globalization and social movements are complex, changing and subject to reversals or advances. This study, with its focus on Latin America, addresses several hypotheses exploring the relation of globalization and social movement over a thirty-five year period: from the onset of the free market doctrine which is the motor force of globalization (1975) to the present 2010. This time frame provides us with a sufficient period to observe the long term operations of global capital and the historical trajectories of social movements. By including Latin America as a whole, we incorporate an entire continent and lessen the possibility of idiosyncratic developments specific to a single country.
Our inquiry is guided by a specific set of hypotheses that will be tested through a historical analysis of global economic tendencies and the trajectory of social movements. We will proceed by providing a brief overview of the dynamics of globalization and the growth of social movements in Latin America and then proceed to specify our key hypothesis regarding the relationships between globalization and social movements.
Globalization: Class, State and Economy
The onset of a new and dynamic phase of imperial capital expansion, which we will call globalization, owes a great deal to the favorable political outcome of the capital – labor struggle on a world scale. The defeat and retreat of the working class in the West, particularly in the US and England, and the self-destruction of the Communist regimes of the East laid the groundwork for an aggressive global crusade against leftwing regimes and movements in the Third World, especially in Latin America. The ‘rollback’ of the working class movements was particularly vicious and successful in Latin America, where the major part of the continent experienced the onset of military dictatorship, which dismantled the national constraints on capitalist flows and trade tariffs.
Within this new global framework of imperial empire builders and authoritarian collaborater regimes, several factors enhanced global economic expansion.
1. Technological innovations, especially information technologies accelerated the flows of capital and commodities.
2. Large scale accumulation of capital in the imperial states, a relative decline in rates of profits and the growing role of finance capital spurred the drive for overseas investments, speculation and buyouts of privatized firms.
3. Intensified competition between the US – EU – Asia drove multi-national corporations (MNC) to seek advantages by securing banks, resources; market shares within Latin America.
4. The rise of pro-western rightist dictatorships provided exceptionally favorable socio-economic conditions for buyouts and acquisitions of local enterprises and resources, extraordinary returns on financial speculation and minimum opposition from repressed trade unions and nationalist and leftist parties.
As a consequence of these structural changes, free market doctrines and neo-liberal policies were put in practice resulting in bilateral free trade agreements (NAFTA),and deregulation of the economies. The growth of speculative activity took root and prospered, at the same time that social safety nets was dismantled.
After over two decades of highly polarized development and mediocre growth the neo-liberal economies stagnated and went into crises: commodity prices fell, the financial bubbles burst, large scale banking swindles impoverished middle class depositors, investors were defrauded, leading to a virtual economic collapse and mass unemployment.
( Sound familiar ? )
World News
“Global Imbalances” versus Internal Inequalities: Understanding the World Economy |
http://axisoflogic.com/artman/publish/Article_57213.shtml
For the forseeable future, the conflict between dynamic emerging export powers and the declining western bloc is likely to intensify, leading to greater trade conflicts and possible military confrontations. The AFA complain that China over emphasizes its ‘export’ strategy at the expense of producing for the domestic market. Yet nearly half of China’s exports to the US are made by US owned multi-nationals who have invested, subcontracted and co-produced with Chinese counterparts. In other words, US internal policy, the deregulation of capital flows, has facilitated the movement of US manufactures abroad resulting in a decline of local production, an increase in imports and greater trade deficits.
If we combine the three great internal imbalances in the AFA economics, but especially in the US, the financialization of the economy, the militarization of foreign policy and the concentration of wealth at the top, we can best understand why the US has such a huge and growing trade deficit.
Israel backs 'carte blanche' to kill
http://www.presstv.ir/detail.aspx?id=109188§ionid=351020202
The Israeli war minister advocates operational latitude for its army amid mounting condemnation of the Zionist regime's massacre of the Palestinians.
"We must give the IDF (Israeli army) the full backing to have the freedom of action," Ehud Barak said on Tuesday, AFP reports.
He claimed that the carte blanche was "in the interest of anyone fighting terrorism," repeating the Israeli accusations against the Palestinian resistance movements.
Under a similar plea, the IDF launched a full-scale aerial and artillery bombardment of the Gaza Strip last winter, leaving more than 1,400 Palestinians dead and thousands of others injured.
Poverty in America revised to 1 of 6
http://www.presstv.ir/detail.aspx?id=109182§ionid=3510203
Food stamp assistance is currently at an all-time high of about 36 million.
Nudging Recycling From Less Waste to None
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/10/20/science/earth/20trash.html?_r=1&hp
California Judge Backs Cannabis Clubs
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/10/20/us/20clinic.html?hp
Swine flu vaccination under way
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/health/8317212.stm
just over 100 people with swine flu have died in the UK out of the 500,000 who have been infected.
Runaway Canadian currency at near parity with dollar
http://www.southasianobserver.com/business_news.php?mid=25&cid=530
The Canadian dollar has almost reached parity with the US greenback, with the loonie, as the Canadian currency is known, touching 98 cents US Wednesday. This is the highest level the Canadian currency has gained against the sinking greenback in 14 months.
From 77 cents US in March to almost parity with the US dollar, the Canadian currency has risen more than 20 percent since then.
As oil and commodity prices rise, it is only a matter of time before the loonie gains parity with the US dollar. The last time it had parity with the greenback was in September 2007. In fact, the loonie had gone to touch the 110-cents US mark in November 2007.
With no signs of recovery of the greenback given the ballooning US deficit, the Canadian currency is unstoppable unless some bad economic news derails it.
But with a country which sends 78 percent of its exports to the US, the rising currency is posing challenges for Canadian manufacturers and exporters.
With the US market already sluggish, Canadian exporters face bleaker times as their currency rises against the US dollar.
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