Failure, Thy Name Is George

by pessimist

Sallying forth like a modern Don Quixote, Secretary of State Dulcinea in tow instead of Sancho Panza, King George went to Latin America seeking to tilt against the windmill of anti-US economic practices which are sapping the profits of some of his campaign contributors. In keeping with this fictional errant would-be conquistador, George was toppled from his mount by the engine of South American progress - one which doesn't require control or 'assistance' from Bu$hCo Washington - meeting at that time in Argentina.

Just as unfazed as Quixote, however, King George regained his mount, and charged bravely into Brazil, where he triumphantly declared: "Follow me, and your trade is free!"

President Bush, in tough remarks aimed at Venezuela’s leftist president, Hugo Chávez, called Sunday for Latin America to choose between competing futures -­ an American-supported “vision of hope” and another that “seeks to roll back the democratic progress of the past two decades.”

Somehow, I suspect that King George - unlike many South Americans - doesn't know even the recent history of the region. For instance, tired of American corporate interference in their internal affairs, Bolivians rose up in opposition and thwarted Bechtel plans for their land. It doesn't stop there - Che Guevara is still seen as a Bolivian national hero, and we all know how much George just LOVES the Friends of Fidel!

All across what used to be known as the Third World, the spectre of economic enslavement by Western powers, most notably the United States, is a reality. This fact was exposed by John Perkins in his book Confessions of an Economic Hit Man [Very highly recommended!]. You can get a taste of Perkin's hit man experiences direct from Perkins here.

King George also picked an open sore when he said:

“Only a generation ago, this was a continent plagued by military dictatorship and civil war,” Mr. Bush said. “Yet the people of this continent defied the dictators, and they claimed their liberty.”

He doesn't mention who put these dictators in power in the first place.

In Chile, for example, the dictatorship of Augusto Pinochet was established by a coup aided by American Secretary of State Henry Kissinger in retaliation for the nationalization by Salvador Allende of American-owned commercial properties. The fact that American companies held significant ownership in a foreign land implies that the economic hit men were initially successful in Chile, so it should come as no surprise that Kissinger saw fit to assist those whose money put his boss, Richard Nixon, into power. John Perkins tells Democracy Now what process was used to address this egregious wrong done to Corporate America:

When the economic hit men fail in this scenario, the next step is what we call the jackals. Jackals are C.I.A.-sanctioned people that come in and try to foment a coup or revolution. If that doesn't work, they perform assassinations. or try to. So the third line of defense, if the economic hit men and the jackals fail, the next line of defense is our young men and women, who are sent in to die and kill, which is what we’ve obviously done in Iraq.

Still wondering why Latin America isn't ready to take up King George's banner? Then let's try another approach. Maybe they don't like how he mi$handle$ the money the hit men squeeze out of their impoverished nations:

Experts: U.S. is spending its way to financial ruin

Even though the White House and Congress pledge to trim $35 billion to $50 billion in spending over five years, that's chicken feed. The government spends more than $2.5 trillion every year. Congress' savings would trim less than half of 1 percent of annual spending.

In addition, Republicans intend to make tax cuts permanent, which would drain $70 billion in revenues through 2010 — more than the spending cuts Congress is struggling to find.

The real problem is that the government's unfunded liabilities — items that include everything from public debt to promised Medicare and Social Security benefits — are growing at staggering rates. Those liabilities totaled $20.4 trillion in 2000. They reached $43.3 trillion by 2004, after President Bush and Congress increased spending and cut taxes. When the government next reports these numbers Dec. 15, the total is expected to reach $46 trillion to $50 trillion.

How much is $50 trillion? About $166,000 for each of the almost 300 million Americans.

To bridge that shortfall, the government takes on additional debt, 46 percent of it now held by foreigners, especially the governments of Japan and China. The net national debt — the amount that must be financed by borrowing in capital markets, which affects interest rates and the economy — is a mind-boggling $4.6 trillion.

Undisciplined government spending has done the unthinkable: It's united experts from two rival think tanks with great influence in Washington — the left-leaning Brookings Institution and the conservative Heritage Foundation. Both accuse Congress and the White House of a "leadership deficit," punting when it should be tackling issues affecting the nation's financial future.

Latin Americans know that when King George succeeds in accomplishing his electoral boast of "being a uniter", he's really done something wrong!

The Republicans seek to cook their overdrawn books by tossing the weak and infirm over the side of the sinking Ship of State, but will that help them when it comes time to face their constituents?

The New York Times doesn't think so:

The tax-cut madness mocks the budget-hawk posture the Congressional Republicans will be claiming in the next elections.

An additional $70 billion worth of upper-bracket tax cuts heavily backed by the White House are waiting in the wings and will drive the deficit even deeper across generations of taxpayers. The administration and Congressional leaders arranged to separate votes on the two halves of the budget to obscure the full picture.

Taxpayers once wooed with promises of compassionate conservatism should pay close attention to details of the rival budget plans. Chief among them is the House's mean-spirited cut of $12 billion in Medicaid access and benefits for the poor. It would invite budget-stressed states to levy health-care copayments and pass tougher workfare rules while crimping child care, food stamps and other antipoverty programs.

In the case of the elderly, they are facing a tough dilemma imposed upon them by such short-sighted and petty catering to the corporatists: Charity or Medicare?

Eli Lilly is notifying 235,000 older people that its charitable program for the elderly, Lilly Answers, will end next May. The program distributed $140 million in subsidized medications last year, charging a $12 co-payment. Edward G. Sagebiel, a spokesman for Lilly, said the company viewed that program simply as a bridge until Medicare drug benefits kicked in.

Johnson & Johnson, meanwhile, is notifying doctors that their patients must first be turned down for extra help under provisions of the new Medicare plan before they can apply to Johnson & Johnson's program.

Benefits under the Medicare drug plan depend on income. Among low-income people, a single person with a monthly income between $1,076 and $1,197 - defined as 135 to 150 percent of the poverty level - pays a sliding scale premium for coverage, a $50 deductible and 15 percent coinsurance until drug expenses reach $3,600 a year, according to figures from Dr. McClellan's office. At that point, the individual is eligible to receive generic drugs for a $2 co-payment and brand-name drugs for a $5 co-payment.

As we are going to see this winter, the decisions those on fixed-incomes will face aren't just going to be limited to whether or not one should spend a large percentage of their incomes on drugs, or heat, or food, and not something else.

But the attitude of the neo conmen toward anything not profit-driven is analogous to that of Charles Dickins' Ebeneezer Scrooge: "Let them die then, and decrease the surplus population!"

But disrespecting the elderly - a major faux pas in Latin countries, isn't the only thing that just might turn off the good citizens of South America. Maybe the knowledge that King George is reneging on promises would also work to the disadvantage of Bu$hCo:

[T]he United States hopes to withdraw 4,000 soldiers from the country's south next spring; a drop in overall foreign aid is expected; and Taliban attacks are rising. So both Afghan officials and foreign diplomats are assessing what has been achieved during the past four years, and many are disturbed by what they see.

Mohammed Ali, a 40-year-old security guard and father of six who had not been paid for half a year, said American employees of Louis Berger visited the site at least three times. All companies made their profit, he said, but no one seemed to ensure that the clinic would be properly built. "Everyone is doing their reports," he said. "They don't care about what they should actually be doing here."

[T]he clinic remains an unfinished shell, one of 96 American-financed clinics and schools that a New Jersey-based company was supposed to build by September 2004. To date, nine clinics and two schools have been completed and passed inspection...

The stakes are enormous. Afghans, famed for briefly tolerating and then viciously turning on occupiers from the British in the 19th century to the Soviets in the 1980's, are increasingly disenchanted with the American-led reconstruction program.

It's no different in Iraq. Those who can see are already taking action to cut their losses. For instance, the Japanese are writing off 80% of the loans they made to the 'government' of Iraq. The action is billed as 'likely to smooth Iraq's negotiations with other creditor nations', but let's get real. No one would abandon 690 billion yen, or about 80 percent of the $7.3 billion Iraq owes to Japan, unless there was absolutely no way to ever expect to reclaim those funds.

Don't Confuse Them With Facts

But no matter what the rest of the world sees, the wingnuts still choose to believe in the Straussian Nirvana promised to them by King George. But there are signs that the rest of us aren't so enamored that we are so blinded, and such GOP fellow-travellers as Joe Lieberman and Joe Biden just might find themselves on the wrong side of the electoral tally even without help from Diebold.

Won't Get Fooled Again?

[T]he perception that we were misled is consistent with the actual facts of what happened. As Christy Harvey and [author David Sirota] detailed in a 2004 article, the Bush administration was repeatedly warned not to make the key assertions it was making about Iraq, and instead went forward with those assertions anyway. Politically and morally, Democrats should be demanding answers to why that happened, and why the administration chose to ignore intelligence THEY KNEW debunked their claims.

It's going to come down to this for most Americans:

'I voted for President Bush. How come he hasn't done a better job?'

That's why the Latin Americans aren't rallying to his flag of liberalized trade. They know they have everything to lose - and nothing but involuntary servitude to a lifelong failure to gain.

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