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Barack Obama Throws Down The Gauntlet In Denver

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The Independent

Barack Obama before 80,000 people in a Denver stadium tonight delivered a high impact speech which traveled across time zones to audiences around the world. It is no secret that this election is one which has awakened interest in politics deep in America as well as provoked interest around the world. There is no doubt his oratory skills, his message of change, his connection to the Kennedy presidency and legacy and other factors which have reflected Barack Obama’s presidency has catapulted this junior Senator to the world stage.

The BU household wishes Barack Obama best wishes and God speed in his quest for President of the United States – WIN, LOSE OR DRAW.

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84 responses to “Barack Obama Throws Down The Gauntlet In Denver”

  1. Banned Again From BFP Avatar
    Banned Again From BFP

    I sincerely hope Mr. Obama loses the election after what would appear to be a phenomenal showing in the lead up. Of course the excuse given will be that America is not yet ready for minority leadership, and the result is that the major parties will not risk having a non-white run for office again. Horay… oh goodie.

    I hope not to be alive when a non-white leader of the world’s most powerful country believes that it is appropriate to behave and make decisions like a white man, while so many in the non-white world starve and have good reason to see him as an enemy. If such a person does come along, oh Lord please let him be a Chinee or an Indee but not a Black.

  2. Sapidillo Avatar
    Sapidillo

    Adrian Hinds // August 29, 2008 at 10:50 am

    Nothing much there, hanging out with James Clyburn, a member of the do little US congress which the American people cannot stand as is evident by their very poor approval rating of 9% isn’t something to be “touched” by. If Scouts ambivalence about the current GoB is to be believe it could be termed as birds of that same feather with regards to how there are viewed by their fellow citizens….
    ————————————————————
    My comment was more about our little island of Barbados being thought enough of to receive an invitation. To me, it is the thought that counts. It was not about whom the Prime Minister was seen with at the event.

  3. The scout Avatar
    The scout

    McCain in his desperate grap for survival, has reached out to a V.P that is facing impeachment in her own State. Had this been Obama, the vultures would have been coming for him. Check his policies, superior to McCain’s. His only hinderance is his colour. Who can’t see this is just politically blinded.

  4. Avatar
    Anonymous

    The Republicans are simply going after the white female voter whom they believe supported Hilary and will not give Obama the time of day.
    It maybe a gross miscalculation on their part since Hilary brought more to bear than being a female.
    Beside the American voter has all of eight weeks to know Miss Palin.
    All in all, it was a weak last minute attempt.

    In the final analysis, people will vote for President not VP.

  5. Avatar
    Anonymous

    Dont get me wrong. I’m a big Obama fan. Got the t-shirt and all. However, I was a bit disappointed with the Denver speech. Though he answered all the questions and seemed a bit more policy oriented, it lacked the emotional highs of Berlin.
    IMHO, it was not his best moment.

  6. J Avatar
    J

    Did anyone see the picture of Mrs. Obama and the two girls on page 3 of yesterday’s Nation?

    My question is if they showed up at the Garrison school on Tuesday September 2nd in dresses that short, would Matthew Farley let them in?

  7. Hard driver Avatar
    Hard driver

    What McCain’s VP choice shows us is what a gambler he is … Is having such a person in the Oval office a good thing!!??

  8. Hard driver Avatar
    Hard driver

    Banned again from BFP said:
    I hope not to be alive when a non-white leader of the world’s most powerful country believes that it is appropriate to behave and make decisions like a white man, while so many in the non-white world starve and have good reason to see him as an enemy. If such a person does come along, oh Lord please let him be a Chinee or an Indee but not a Black.
    ************************************
    The US gives more aid and development assistance to third world countries, especially Africa, then any other developed nation. The people that hate America, hate the fact that it stands up for de4mocracy, human rights and free speech … rights that we take for granted.
    Of Course we all can agree that the Bush America is not the America we love … but I think the Obama America will be back on track..

  9. Green Monkey Avatar
    Green Monkey

    I think the Obama America will be back on track.>/blockquote>

    You think Obama will be be able to change the US emphasis on spending on wars and on war related material to spending on things like health, education and civil infrastructure upgrades ? I would like to think he could, but personally I doubt it.

    In his farewell speech to the nation some 50 years ago the retiring President Eisenhower warned that if the power of the military industrial complex was not curtailed and carefully controlled it presented a looming threat to democratic rule, and the MIC is even more powerful today, probably by some orders of magnitude, than it was in Eisenhower’s day. Will the MIC stand idly by to watch another “uppity, too big for his britches negro”, reduce their very profitable bottom lines?

    ARROYO GRANDE, Calif. (MarketWatch) — Yes, America’s economy is a war economy. Not a “manufacturing” economy. Not an “agricultural” economy. Nor a “service” economy. Not even a “consumer” economy.

    Seriously, I looked into your eyes, America, saw deep into your soul. So let’s get honest and officially call it “America’s Outrageous War Economy.” Admit it: we secretly love our war economy. And that’s the answer to Jim Grant’s thought-provoking question last month in the Wall Street Journal — “Why No Outrage?”

    There really is only one answer: Deep inside we love war. We want war. Need it. Relish it. Thrive on war. War is in our genes, deep in our DNA. War excites our economic brain. War drives our entrepreneurial spirit. War thrills the American soul. Oh just admit it, we have a love affair with war. We love “America’s Outrageous War Economy.”
    Americans passively zone out playing video war games. We nod at 90-second news clips of Afghan war casualties and collateral damage in Georgia. We laugh at Jon Stewart’s dark comedic news and Ben Stiller’s new war spoof “Tropic Thunder” … all the while silently, by default, we’re cheering on our leaders as they aggressively expand “America’s Outrageous War Economy,” a relentless machine that needs a steady diet of war after war, feeding on itself, consuming our values, always on the edge of self-destruction.

    SNIP

    We’ve lost our moral compass: The contrast between today’s leaders and the 56 signers of the Declaration of Independence in 1776 shocks our conscience. Today war greed trumps morals. During the Revolutionary War our leaders risked their lives and fortunes; many lost both.
    Today it’s the opposite: Too often our leaders’ main goal is not public service but a ticket to building a personal fortune in the new “America’s Outrageous War Economy,” often by simply becoming a high-priced lobbyist.
    Ultimately, the price of our greed may be the fulfillment of Kevin Phillips’ warning in “Wealth and Democracy:” “Most great nations, at the peak of their economic power, become arrogant and wage great world wars at great cost, wasting vast resources, taking on huge debt, and ultimately burning themselves out.”

    ‘National defense’ a propaganda slogan selling a war economy?

    But wait, you ask: Isn’t our $1.4 trillion war budget essential for “national defense” and “homeland security?” Don’t we have to protect ourselves?

    Sorry folks, but our leaders have degraded those honored principles to advertising slogans. They’re little more than flag-waving excuses used by neocon war hawks to disguise the buildup of private fortunes in “America’s Outrageous War Economy.”

    http://www.marketwatch.com/news/story/why-we-love-americas-outrageous/story.aspx?guid=0D31C880-32CD-4BA1-8133-329EA57CB069&dist=SecMostRead

    Excerpt from a speech delivered in 1933 (not much has changed in 70 years) by the highly decorated General Smedley Butler, USMC, Retired:

    War is just a racket. There are only two things we should fight for. One is the defense of our homes and the other is the Bill of Rights. War for any other reason is simply a racket.

    It may seem odd for me, a military man to adopt such a comparison. Truthfulness compels me to. I spent thirty-three years and four months in active military service as a member of this country’s most agile military force, the Marine Corps. I served in all commissioned ranks from Second Lieutenant to Major-General. And during that period, I spent most of my time being a high class muscle-man for Big Business, for Wall Street and for the Bankers.

    I suspected I was just part of a racket at the time. Now I am sure of it. Like all the members of the military profession, I never had a thought of my own until I left the service. My mental faculties remained in suspended animation while I obeyed the orders of higher-ups. This is typical with everyone in the military service.

    I helped make Mexico safe for American oil interests in 1914. I helped make Haiti and Cuba a decent place for the National City Bank boys. I helped in the raping of half a dozen Central American republics for the benefits of Wall Street. I helped purify Nicaragua for the international banking house of Brown Brothers in 1909-1912. I brought light to the Dominican Republic for American sugar interests in 1916. In China I helped to see to it that Standard Oil went its way unmolested.

    During those years, I had, as the boys in the back room would say, a swell racket. Looking back on it, I feel that I could have given Al Capone a few hints. The best he could do was to operate his racket in three districts. I operated on three continents.

    http://www.wanttoknow.info/warisaracket

  10. JC Avatar
    JC

    Some colleagues and i were saying that we thought that the VPs were going to help the President of the USA a lot more than in previous elections. I liked how Obamas’s VP (although a good friend of McCain was able to drive home McCain’s faults.

    I dont know I am so sceptical about this entire election. America in my opinion will always be RACIST!

    I know I will get some lists ……….

  11. JC Avatar
    JC

    Banned Again From BFP // August 30, 2008 at 8:55 am

    I sincerely hope Mr. Obama loses the election after what would appear to be a phenomenal showing in the lead up. Of course the excuse given will be that America is not yet ready for minority leadership, and the result is that the major parties will not risk having a non-white run for office again. Horay… oh goodie.

    I hope not to be alive when a non-white leader of the world’s most powerful country believes that it is appropriate to behave and make decisions like a white man, while so many in the non-white world starve and have good reason to see him as an enemy. If such a person does come along, oh Lord please let him be a Chinee or an Indee but not a Black.

    ——————————————————–
    This comment made me go hmmmmmm, very good! I love to think ……..

  12. The scout Avatar
    The scout

    Let us say,this 72 yr old man dies in office , six months after having won the elctions. Can this novice really handle the position of president of america and she doesn’t even know or visited half the country or know anything beyond being in charge of just over 9000 people. This is a dark day for america and the world is laughing their heads off at the silly games being played.

  13. Eddie Avatar
    Eddie

    Scout,

    It is called the politics of serious desperation.
    Much depends on how articulate she is, and the responses of Biden and Hilary Clinton.

    I now believe that Obama should clinch it.

  14. Adrian Hinds Avatar
    Adrian Hinds

    @Sargeant

    If i am to be classified, I see myself as a constitutional libertarian, I abhor “statism”, collectivism and or socialism. The Democrats for the most part are socialist who believe in Big government. A candidate like Barack in spite of his color cannot ever get my support or vote. John McCain is not, nearly enough conservative for me but is the lesser of the two evils.
    I have a pretty good understanding of American government, and have often said that to much emphasis is place on selecting the president as oppose to selecting members to the House, given that this is where the real power lies. I could never have hold to “experience” being a requirement for the presidency. To many of our Past Presidents did not have any or much. I never bought into the “experience” argument against Barack, and i never said anything because i don’t support him. This argument is as hallow as the one about being a trained Economist that was used and failed in the last Barbados election.

    I don’t watch Fox news anymore, as i gave up cable.

  15. Facts Avatar
    Facts

    Adrian,

    The two presidential candidates are miles apart on vision for the good of America.
    Your comments smack of being a die-hard, perpetual Republican Supporter.

  16. Green Monkey Avatar
    Green Monkey

    War With Russia Is On The Agenda

    by Paul Craig Roberts

    SNIP

    The failure of the American media is again evident in the coverage of the Georgian-Russian conflict. The US media presented the conflict as a Russian invasion of Georgia, whereas in actual fact the American and Israeli trained and equipped Georgian military launched a sneak attack to kill and to drive the Russian population out of South Ossetia, a separatist province.

    Russian peacekeepers, together with Georgian ones, had been stationed in South Ossetia since the early 1990s. On orders from Mikheil Saakashvili, the American puppet “president” of Georgia, the Georgian peacekeepers turned their weapons on the unsuspecting Russian peacekeepers and murdered them.

    This action by Saakashvili, elected with money from the neoconservative National Endowment for Democracy, an election-rigging tool of US hegemony, was a war crime. In truth, the Russians should have hung Saakashvili, as he is far more guilty than was Saddam Hussein. But it is Russia, not Saakashvili, that the US media has demonized.

    Americans have become perfect subjects for George Orwell’s Big Brother. They sit stupidly in front of the TV news or the New York Times or Washington Post and absorb the lies fed to them. What is wrong with Americans? Why do they put up with it? Are Americans the nation of sheep that Judge Andrew P. Napolitano says they are? Americans flaunt “freedom and democracy” and live under a Ministry of Propaganda. (my emphasis /GM)

    Two decades ago, President Reagan reached agreement with Soviet president Mikhail Gorbachev to end the dangerous cold war. But every one of Reagan’s successors has sought to pick a new fight with Russia. In violation of the agreement, NATO has been taken to Russia’s borders, and the US is determined to put former constituent parts of Russia herself into NATO. In an effort to neutralize Russia’s nuclear deterrent and compromise her independence, the US is putting anti-ballistic missile bases on Russia’s borders.

    The gratuitously aggressive US military policy toward Russia will lead to nuclear war. I am confident that if Americans elect John McCain, or the Republicans steal another presidential election, there will be nuclear war in the second decade of the 21st century. The neocon lies, propaganda, macho flag-waving, and use of US foreign policy in the interests of a few military-security firms, oil companies, and Israel are all leading in that direction.

    SNIP

    Americans no longer have a government that is for the people and by the people. They have a government for and by special interests and an insane ideology.

    But Americans have war, which lets them take out all their frustrations, resentments, and disappointments on “Muslim terrorists” and “Russian aggressors.” Few Americans are disturbed that 1.25 million Iraqis and an unknown number of Afghans have died as a result of American invasions based on Bush regime lies and deceptions. Even Americans, like Senator Biden, Obama’s selection for vice president, who understand that the wars are based on lies, still want the US to win. So, it was all a mistake and a deception, but let’s win anyway and keep on killing.

    SNIP

    For many Americans, war is like a sports contest in which they take vicarious pleasure and cheer on their side to victory. Millions of Americans are still bitter that “the liberal media” and war protesters caused America to lose the Vietnam war, and they are determined that this won’t happen again. These Americans have no realization that there was no more reason for the US to be fighting in Vietnam 40 years ago than to be fighting today in Iraq and Afghanistan or tomorrow in Iran.

    Obama, if elected, is no guarantee against nuclear war. Obama has shown that he is as much under the Israel Lobby’s thumb as McCain. Obama’s foreign affairs advisor, Zbigniew Brzezinski, is not a neocon, but he was born in Warsaw, Poland, and has the Pole’s animosity toward Russia. The Bush administration has already changed US war doctrine to permit preemptive nuclear attack. With the US government determined to ring Russia with puppet states and military bases, war is inevitable.

    Presidential appointees face confirmation in the Senate. Any of Obama’s appointees who might be out of step with plans for US and Israeli hegemony could expect opposition from large corporations and the Israel Lobby. There is no assurance that an Obama administration would not be positioned on “the issues” by the same special interests that have positioned the Bush administration.

    Americans are filled with hubris, not with knowledge. They have no awareness of the calamity that their government’s pursuit of hegemony is bringing to themselves and to life on earth. (my emphasis /GM)

    Dr. Roberts was Assistant Secretary of the US Treasury in the Reagan Administration. He is a former Associate Editor of the Wall Street Journal, a 16-year columnist for Business Week, and a columnist for the Scripps Howard News Service and Creator’s Syndicate in Los Angeles. He has held numerous university professorships, including the William E. Simon Chair in Political Economy, Center for Strategic and International Studies, Georgetown University and Senior Research Fellow, Hoover Institution, Stanford University. He was awarded the Legion of Honor by the President of France and the US Treasury’s Silver Medal for “outstanding contributions to the formulation of US economic policy.”

    http://www.globalresearch.ca/index.php?context=va&aid=9954

  17. Adrian Hinds Avatar
    Adrian Hinds

    Facts // August 31, 2008 at 8:22 am

    Adrian,

    The two presidential candidates are miles apart on vision for the good of America.
    Your comments smack of being a die-hard, perpetual Republican Supporter.
    =================================

    Indeed miles apart. Obama’s policy positions are leftist in nature, The American communist i.e Liberal academia will love him. McCain is not trusted by core republicans, and has always had a warm relationship with Democrats, don’t forget he was “vetted” by John Kerry just 4 years ago to be his VP pick on a democratic ticket, and if McCain had his way he would have picked Joe Lieberman to be his running mate. McCain and Hammie Lah have something in common,…a willingness to put principle over party loyalty or towing the party line. McCain is more likely to govern from the middle where most Americans are. There is the politics of elections and real politics after elections. A look at both men over the years, their associations, written and verbal comments give us the best practices of what to expect if elected. I like what i see from John McCain over the years. Will any of the Obamanites dear ask Barack to explain is relationship with known American terrorist Bill Ayers? Will he refute that his Presidential bid was launch from Bill Ayers house? will he deny that Bill Ayers to this day is unrepentant for his group’s terrorist acts?

    @Facts: I am not a supporter nor a member of a political party anywhere on this earth. I have voted for Ted Kennedy, Patrick Kennedy, Al Gore, George Bush, and would have voted for Mitt Rommey if he had won the Republican nomination no matter who the Democratic nominee would have been, I would have voted for Hillary Clinton before John McCain, and i am voting for John McCain now the dust is settle. I had never considered Obama. I just could not bring myself to vote for someone on the basis of their skin color, as it seems all dark skin people are suppose to demostrate their individuality by so doing. I just happen to practice a real and different kind of individualism 🙂

    Green Monkey you usually put up some good articles but this one is in consistent from paragraph to paragraph, and it’s prophetic title isn’t supported by anything in the details. What has Mr. Roberts seen so far in rhetoric, foreign policy activity and or military troop movement to suggest such. I don’t support the US backing of the Georgian leader in this crisis, as it was clear that he could not be reasoned with and that he was unpredictable from day one, yet Russia history is one of invading and conquering, how can you seemly agree with the constant threats that Russia issues against Poland and other sovereign countries? How do you hedge against a repeat of Soviet style foreign policy by Russia under a leader who thinks the Soviet Union is still viable?

  18. J Avatar
    J

    Dear Green MOnkey

    You quoted General Smedley Butler speaking in 1933. In 1933 Adolf Hitler had come to power in Germany. American tried to maintain a policy of neutrality and General Butler was speaking in this vain. However war began in Europe, Germany bombed Pearl Harbor and America could no longer remain neutral. After Hitler was finished with killing the Jews he planned to re-enslave black people – slavery in much of the Western Hemisphere had only been abolished less than 100 years previously. American did the right thing to enter the war. Neutraity in 1939-45 would have been wrong.

  19. J Avatar
    J

    War is sometimes necessary.

  20. Green Monkey Avatar
    Green Monkey

    Dear Green MOnkey

    You quoted General Smedley Butler speaking in 1933. In 1933 Adolf Hitler had come to power in Germany. American tried to maintain a policy of neutrality and General Butler was speaking in this vain. However war began in Europe, Germany bombed Pearl Harbor and America could no longer remain neutral. After Hitler was finished with killing the Jews he planned to re-enslave black people – slavery in much of the Western Hemisphere had only been abolished less than 100 years previously. American did the right thing to enter the war. Neutraity in 1939-45 would have been wrong.

    But lo0k who it was that was helping to finance Hitler and bringing him to power. The financial and business elites, not only in Germany, but in the US as well, and this includes Prescott Bush, the grandfather of George Bush. Once again, as Butler was trying to explain, it is the elites and big business that manipulate the system for their own benefit and when wars they help create do break out, they make sure they profit one way or another, i.e. “war is a racket.”

    Sort of reminds one of how the likes of well connected business people at Halliburton, Blackwater etc. profited immensely from Bush/Cheney manipulating the public and creating their own wars today.

    How Bush’s grandfather helped Hitler’s rise to power

    George Bush’s grandfather, the late US senator Prescott Bush, was a director and shareholder of companies that profited from their involvement with the financial backers of Nazi Germany.

    The Guardian has obtained confirmation from newly discovered files in the US National Archives that a firm of which Prescott Bush was a director was involved with the financial architects of Nazism.

    His business dealings, which continued until his company’s assets were seized in 1942 under the Trading with the Enemy Act, has led more than 60 years later to a civil action for damages being brought in Germany against the Bush family by two former slave labourers at Auschwitz and to a hum of pre-election controversy.

    The evidence has also prompted one former US Nazi war crimes prosecutor to argue that the late senator’s action should have been grounds for prosecution for giving aid and comfort to the enemy.

    The debate over Prescott Bush’s behaviour has been bubbling under the surface for some time. There has been a steady internet chatter about the “Bush/Nazi” connection, much of it inaccurate and unfair. But the new documents, many of which were only declassified last year, show that even after America had entered the war and when there was already significant information about the Nazis’ plans and policies, he worked for and profited from companies closely involved with the very German businesses that financed Hitler’s rise to power. It has also been suggested that the money he made from these dealings helped to establish the Bush family fortune and set up its political dynasty.

    SNIP

    In addition to Eva Schweitzer’s book, two other books are about to be published that raise the subject of Prescott Bush’s business history. The author of the second book, to be published next year, John Loftus, is a former US attorney who prosecuted Nazi war criminals in the 70s. Now living in St Petersburg, Florida and earning his living as a security commentator for Fox News and ABC radio, Loftus is working on a novel which uses some of the material he has uncovered on Bush. Loftus stressed that what Prescott Bush was involved in was just what many other American and British businessmen were doing at the time.

    “You can’t blame Bush for what his grandfather did any more than you can blame Jack Kennedy for what his father did – bought Nazi stocks – but what is important is the cover-up, how it could have gone on so successfully for half a century, and does that have implications for us today?” he said.

    “This was the mechanism by which Hitler was funded to come to power, this was the mechanism by which the Third Reich’s defence industry was re-armed, this was the mechanism by which Nazi profits were repatriated back to the American owners, this was the mechanism by which investigations into the financial laundering of the Third Reich were blunted,” said Loftus, who is vice-chairman of the Holocaust Museum in St Petersburg.

    “The Union Banking Corporation was a holding company for the Nazis, for Fritz Thyssen,” said Loftus. “At various times, the Bush family has tried to spin it, saying they were owned by a Dutch bank and it wasn’t until the Nazis took over Holland that they realised that now the Nazis controlled the apparent company and that is why the Bush supporters claim when the war was over they got their money back. Both the American treasury investigations and the intelligence investigations in Europe completely bely that, it’s absolute horseshit. They always knew who the ultimate beneficiaries were.”

    “There is no one left alive who could be prosecuted but they did get away with it,” said Loftus. “As a former federal prosecutor, I would make a case for Prescott Bush, his father-in-law (George Walker) and Averill Harriman [to be prosecuted] for giving aid and comfort to the enemy. They remained on the boards of these companies knowing that they were of financial benefit to the nation of Germany.”

    Loftus said Prescott Bush must have been aware of what was happening in Germany at the time. “My take on him was that he was a not terribly successful in-law who did what Herbert Walker told him to. Walker and Harriman were the two evil geniuses, they didn’t care about the Nazis any more than they cared about their investments with the Bolsheviks.”

    http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2004/sep/25/usa.secondworldwar

    Here’s a Youtube video discussing the Bush/Nazi connections

    See also the timeline (below) showing the connections between Prescott Bush and other US business interests and the Nazis.

    http://www.spiritone.com/~gdy52150/timeline.html

  21. Green Monkey Avatar
    Green Monkey

    how can you seemly agree with the constant threats that Russia issues against Poland and other sovereign countries? How do you hedge against a repeat of Soviet style foreign policy by Russia under a leader who thinks the Soviet Union is still viable?

    The point is that Gorbachev and Reagan agreed that when the Berlin wall came down and the Cold War was declared over Russia would withdraw its troops from Eastern European countries like Poland, Czechoslovakia etc. back within its own borders, and in return NATO, which had been formed ostensibly to repel a Soviet lead invasion of Western Europe, would allow Russia some breathing space and not push itself onto Russia’s doorstep, so to speak, by expanding Eastwards into the fomer Soviet block countries. In other words a militarily neutral buffer zone between NATO and Russia would exist that would offer the Russians some assurance that by pulling back their troops from the old Warsaw Pact countries they would not open themselves to invasion. Remember that Russia has also been invaded by Western European countries a few times over the years. This promise to Gorbachev was not honored by subsequent presidents who attempted to do exactly the opposite of what had been promised by encouraging the ex-Warsaw Pact countries, including Poland, to join NATO and thereby put NATO bases and missile batteries on Russia’s front door step.

    Russia, quite rightly, feels it has been betrayed and played for a sucker as it now sees itself increasingly closely surrounded by NATO bases. Imagine if the situation were reversed and Russia was forming alliances with Central and South American countries and shipping them military equipment, training their armies, installing missile bases on Mexican soil etc. What do you think the reaction would be from Washington? Ho hum. No big deal. We can live with that? My understanding is the threats to Poland are in response to Poland agreeing to host a US missile system on its soil right next door to Russia. Let Russia put a missile base in Mexico and I can guarantee you, US troops would be on the Mexican/US border massing to invade in very short order. I doubt very much, they would even take the time to issue a threat before acting.

    Russia also sees itself as under threat as it has one of the worlds largest remaining supplies of oil and natural gas outside the Middle East, and with the increasingly precarious world energy situation as the world is apparently soon going to reach a peak followed by a decline in oil and natural gas production. Russia is, quite rightly in my opinion, concerned that the encirclement of their territory by the Western NATO based alliance has as an ultimate goal the break up Russia itself in order to get control of oil and gas fields currently in Russian territory.

    The Evil Empire Revisited

    by Phil Giraldi

    In George Orwell’s 1984 there is a memorable scene when the speaker from Oceania’s Ministry of Truth is addressing a rally, the culmination of Hate Week against the enemy, Eurasia. He receives a message mid-sentence, then smoothly shifts gears to deliver the remainder of his speech excoriating Eastasia. The crowd responds enthusiastically, and the narrator, Winston, notes that, of course, Eastasia had always been the enemy.

    The alliances in Orwell’s nightmare world had shifted, but the concept of the enemy remained the same. There always has to be an enemy. So too the neoconservatives always need an enemy to justify the huge defense contracts that in turn spawn the think tanks and academic chairs in security studies that provide them with their sinecures. A world without “Islamofascism” or another enemy lurking is a world without employment for the likes of Bill Kristol and John Bolton.

    Post-1992 Russia has given every indication that it desires to be a friend to the United States and that it has no desire to recreate the Cold War. It allowed itself to be looted by the oligarchs, who presented themselves as the bearers of Western-style modernization with hardly a complaint. It saw its place in the world shrink and its voice in international fora diminished. President George W. Bush even famously looked Russian Premier Vladimir Putin in the eye in Crawford, Texas, in June 2001 and announced positively that he had gotten a “sense of his soul.” But the neoconservatives were never on board the Russian project. Their reading on Russia was that it was and always will be the enemy. They would argue that Bush misjudged his guest and Russia was even then preparing to rebuild its empire.

    The Great Decider is making up for his slip of the tongue now, threatening Russia even though it was on the receiving end of a foolish invasion launched by America’s ally Georgia. But now it is a much diminished U.S. that has no options in the Caucasus. In speaking forcefully on an issue that he cannot influence, Bush is again the engineer of a foreign policy train wreck, a disaster potentially much more dangerous than Iraq. The White House is inexplicably, and in support of no national interest of the United States, creating an enemy where one did not exist, an enemy, one might add, that is equipped with a nuclear arsenal and state-of-the art ballistic missiles that could destroy both the United States and Western Europe.

    SNIP

    Regarding Russia, the Bush administration has advanced two broad policies that are quite frankly incomprehensible. Together they do little for the national security of the United States and do a great deal to make the Russians nervous. First is the expansion of NATO. NATO is a military alliance that no longer has any meaning. It was created to restrain the Soviet Union through the threat of military force, a raison d’être that has not applied since 1992, which is why a reluctant NATO, searching for a new role, bombed Serbia in 1999 and is currently in Afghanistan supporting overstretched U.S. forces. Washington has attempted to obfuscate the question whether NATO should exist at all by arguing that the role of the alliance has changed, that it is no longer directed against Russia and is instead a source of stability for both Eastern and Western Europe, bringing newly democratized nations into the fold in a stable and sustainable fashion by integrating them into a purely defensive military structure where armies are answerable to the people. Using that rationale, NATO has incorporated Estonia, Latvia, and Lithuania – all former parts of the Soviet Union – as well as Slovenia, Slovakia, the Czech Republic, Poland, Romania, Croatia, Albania, and Bulgaria. It has also discussed adding Ukraine and Georgia, both of which border Russia and were also part of the old Soviet Union.

    But Moscow doesn’t buy that argument, first of all because it doesn’t understand why a military alliance should be used as the instrument for what is essentially economic integration, which could be managed by the United States and European Union working together in more appropriate settings. Russia is also keenly aware of the political agenda linked to the NATO expansion. The United States and some Europeans have supported the various pastel revolutions that have swept across Eastern Europe. This support has been both overt and covert, but it always has one objective: to replace pro-Russian parties and regimes with “democratic” alternatives that are more closely aligned with the West. That the new regimes are frequently virtually indistinguishable from the ones they replace in terms of corruption, inefficiency, and failure to govern by the rule of law appears to be irrelevant. The Russians, nervous about their own security, have watched this advance of governments unfriendly to them and their vital interests. Is there any national interest reason why the United States should support the “democratization” of Eastern Europe? The short answer is “no.” Russia, as an energy giant and a major player on the world stage, is the only country in Eastern Europe that should truly matter to the United States, and our objective should be to establish the best possible relationship. The willy-nilly NATO expansion policies in place do little more than heighten the sense of threat in Moscow, converting a strategically important country from a competitor into an enemy.

    And then there is threat of the Iranian missiles that do not exist, might never exist, and could not threaten either Europe or the United States in the foreseeable future. To counter those weapons, the U.S. will install “defensive” missiles in Poland, with a radar station in the Czech Republic. Both Warsaw and Prague have been heavily bribed and pressured to accept the deployments, which are opposed by both the Czech and Polish people and most other Europeans. The missiles serve no useful purpose against Tehran but could be used against Russia. Anyone who is interested in missile technology and its capabilities knows that “defensive” and “offensive” are meaningless terms, as the weapons can be deployed in roles that support either function. So why does Washington persist in demanding that an unwanted weapons system that has no purpose but to create fear in Moscow be put into operation? Perhaps Bill Kristol and John Bolton can provide an answer. But the end result will quite likely be Cold War II, huge new defense contracts, and more fear-mongering talking points for the neocons.

    http://antiwar.com/orig/giraldi.php

  22. Bimbro Avatar
    Bimbro

    Well, well, well, is n’t life funny!! Here I am being accused of racism in the ‘Obama Assassination Attempt’ discussion on BFP whilst here, on BU, it’s ‘sister-blog’, a cartoon is being displayed which I find highly, offensive, in whichever context it’s intended because for me it suggests that blacks are only capable of singing and otherwise, playing-the-fool, especially at time when America may be on the verge of electing its first black, president!!

    Is n’t life strange, but I could NEVER find it appropriate to use such a cartoon, yet, I AM THE ONE BEING ACCUSED OF RACISM!!

    Wonders will never cease!!

  23. Bimbro Avatar
    Bimbro

    Please see, also, the end of the ‘Wukking Up’ discussion, here!!

  24. Bimbro Avatar
    Bimbro

    DID EVERYBODY MISS THE NEGATIVE, IMPACT OF THE CARTOON, EXCEPT ME?!!!!

  25. Bimbro Avatar
    Bimbro

    Dear David, I know u don’t have much regard for my opinion, which is your right, but is there any possibility of your removing the offensive, cartoon, even though it’s Bimbro making the request?!!

  26. Adrian Hinds Avatar
    Adrian Hinds

    Bimbro // September 2, 2008 at 12:43 am

    DID EVERYBODY MISS THE NEGATIVE, IMPACT OF THE CARTOON, EXCEPT ME?!!!!
    =================================

    Bimbro, you of all people should know that in todays Politically correct world it is ok for one black man to call himself and other blacks the “N” word while non-blacks are forbidden. 🙂

  27. The scout Avatar
    The scout

    Adrian
    I don’t agree with you. No-one whether black or white should be calling a black man at any time by the “N” word. It is offensive.

  28. The scout Avatar
    The scout

    I hear young fellows now calling girls “bitch” and they are responding. I told my daughters, the day any fellow call them “bitch” and they respond, I would put their food and other belongings in one of my kennels and they can live there. I’m serious. Blacks need to respect themselves. That’s why you would never see me wear a slave band.

  29. Chris Halsall Avatar
    Chris Halsall

    @The Scout…

    You and I often do not agree. But on this particular point, I resonate *deeply* with you.

    (IMHO) This word should never be uttered by *anyone*. It is too loaded with hate and prejudice.

    Kindest regards to all.

  30. David Avatar
    David

    @Bimbro

    What about the image you don’t like?

  31. Bimbro Avatar
    Bimbro

    Bimbro, you of all people should know that in todays Politically correct world it is ok for one black man to call himself and other blacks the “N” word while non-blacks are forbidden. 🙂

    *********************

    Hi Adrian, and thanks for the reply. Yes, the irony and stupidity of it is absolutely, amazing!! For me, anybody, whatever his or her colour who refers to a black person as a ‘n’, ‘deserves to have their genitals cut off’!!

    ******************

    The scout // September 2, 2008 at 1:44 pm

    I hear young fellows now calling girls “bitch” and they are responding. I told my daughters, the day any fellow call them “bitch” and they respond, I would put their food and other belongings in one of my kennels and they can live there. I’m serious. Blacks need to respect themselves. That’s why you would never see me wear a slave band.

    *******************

    Scout, I entirely, agree with u, but so do I think, does Adrian!! If by slave-band, u mean a wedding ring, I entirely, agree again!! Don’t c why the ladies need to wear one, either, for that matter. To me it makes us look like cattle, tethered by some ring or other!! I find them so amusing!!

    ********************

    Hi David, thanks for replying, and I’m really, surprised that u need to ask!! Perhaps, u did n’t c the same ‘Black and White Minstrel Shows’ as I did, as a boy, on the telly with these white men, blacked-up and singing and, frankly, to an extent, looking like clowns, not to mention that idiot Al Jolson in the movies!!

    David, to put it mildly, my friend, I prefer to think that black, people r capable of much more than simply, ‘acting-the-fool’ and to place the image in an article when a black man is aspiring to one of the highest, offices in the world, seems to be, more than inappropriate also, in an age when we’re supposed to be transmitting positive, images of black, people!! For me, this image is equally, offensive to the ‘golly wog’ emblem!! I know that we’ve probably, lived in different cultures but to me, the Al Jolson caricature is unacceptable, in whatever context!!

    Thanks for listening!!

  32. Bimbro Avatar
    Bimbro

    Basically, David, I feel that we need to take pride in ourselves, because if we don’t why should anybody else!!

  33. Professor Dr. Stanley Collymore Avatar
    Professor Dr. Stanley Collymore

    I’m a Barbadian expat and am very pleased to see so many of my countrymen at home so engaged in this US election, and also that this site is giving so many of us and others alike the cance to air our opinions on this crucial presidential election. Thank you all.

    Professor Dr. Stanley Collymore.

  34. Professor Dr. Stanley Collymore Avatar
    Professor Dr. Stanley Collymore

    I’m a Barbadian expat and am very pleased to see so many of my countrymen at home so engaged in this US election, and also that this site is giving so many of us and others alike the chance to air our opinions on this crucial presidential election. Thank you all.

    Professor Dr. Stanley Collymore.

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