We’ve lived so long under the spell of hierarchy—from god-kings to feudal lords to party bosses—that only recently have we awakened to see not only that “regular” citizens have the capacity for self-governance, but that without their engagement our huge global crises cannot be addressed. The changes needed for human society simply to survive, let alone thrive, are so profound that the only way we will move toward them is if we ourselves, regular citizens, feel meaningful ownership of solutions through direct engagement. Our problems are too big, interrelated, and pervasive to yield to directives from on high.
—Frances Moore Lappé, excerpt from Time for Progressives to Grow Up

Tuesday, August 26, 2014

Obama Buggers Europe: Sanctions Deepen the Recession

Click here to access article by James Petras from Boiling Frogs Post.

Petras surveys the effects of the Empire's strategy to separate Russia from the rest of Europe with the use of economic sanctions, and it doesn't look good for the people of Europe. I wonder how long it will take for the Ninety-Nine Percent in Europe to wake up and resist their masters in the One Percent.
The sanctions policies occur at a time when Europe’s economies are in deep economic crisis, exacerbating long-term stagnation and chronic recession. This paper will identify and analyze the crisis and how US-led sanctions policy is fracturing the European Union. Secondly, we will analyze how Washington’s militarist imperial policies undermine Europe economically and destabilize the rest of the world militarily. Thirdly, we will discuss how the European leaders are prodded by Washington, to put it crudely, through an aggressive ‘buggering process’, to surrender their economic sovereignty and how capitulation to the US project in the Ukraine will lead to their long-term decline and decay. Finally, we will discuss the long-term perspectives for a re-aligned world economy where military conflicts can result in large-scale changes.
The only criticism I have of this article is that, once again, we see agency ascribed to Obama, who really functions only as the chief public relations officer of the ruling One Percent. This plays into the hands of the whole shadow ruling directorate of the One Percent who are intent on disguising all their machinations behind "democratic" myths of a representative government, that is, a government that represents the people. Serious critics of US policy must grow up and recognize these myths for what they are if we in the Ninety-Nine Percent will ever have a chance to gain control over society.