In the United States we have a massive “news” operation whose primary purpose is to shield us from stuff that is true. Here are a few examples:
Bradley Manning: Pfc. Bradley Manning leaked a film of U.S. soldiers massacring civilians below from a helicopter above. But this story really goes way, way back, to Vietnam. Many on the right blame “the media” for our “loss” in Vietnam. In a sense they are right, but it wasn’t an organized media conspiracy that led to wide public disenchantment with that war. It was pictures. They simply did not understand their impact. Even as Walter Cronkite was reading a submissive narrative on how the U.S. was achieving its objectives, as was his job, the pictures that accompanied his words were telling a different story.
After Vietnam, the U.S. had to gently ease us back into war-making. The war in Afghanistan in the 1980’s had to be done out of sight, and Nicaragua and El Salvador had to be fought by proxy. 
The strategy was successful, but required a compliant news corps. There were renegades who refused to buckled under the new guidelines, like Peter Arnett of Associated Press, and later CNN. 
Images are tightly controlled. We are not even allowed to view the coffins of dead soldiers. Major U.S. news outlets cooperate with this regime, and do not show the grisly aftermath of bombing or the effects of our violence on ordinary people. It’s all part of thought control – images tell stories, while words are mere sound.
Bradley Manning, under the new regime, has committed a “crime.” He leaked some truth to us in the form of images which tell a story that completely negates years of intense propaganda. 
Meanwhile, the helicopter pilots who murdered twelve people that day in the film that Manning leaked … no action. Not guilty!
See how it works? This is both imperialism and counterinsurgency. Both are easier to ingest if we don’t have to see the images.
RNC Chairman Michale Steele: Mr. Steele is in trouble on a much lower scale, and his punishment will be far less severe, and he is surely no hero, as he was merely doing his job: analyzing the political implications of our latest war within earshot of a microphone. 
Here’s what he said:
“Keep in mind again, federal candidates, this was a war of Obama’s choosing. This was not something that the United States had actively prosecuted or wanted to engage in. But it was the president who was trying to be cute by half by building a script demonizing Iraq, while saying the battle really should be in Afghanistan. Well, if he is such a student of history, has he not understood that you know that’s the one thing you don’t do, is engage in a land war in Afghanistan?”
Steele is being lambasted for his “gaffe”, which indeed it is. One must understand our toxic environment, as a “gaffe” is merely a true statement. Obama did indeed “demonize” Iraq, for political purposes. Even though “he” has prosecuted that war in the same manner as Bush before him, our perceptions have been altered. That war is no longer given much coverage, and emphasis is now on Afghanistan. Obama did say he was going emphasize Afghanistan while campaigning. All that indicates that that the policy shift had already taken place within the Pentagon in early 2008.
Obama is no more in charge of war policy than children are of household budgets. All that can be read here is as follows: The Iraq conflict was widely understood to be “won” – the bases and puppets were in place, and the population subdued by massive violence (as exposed by Pfc. Manning above). Virtually all was concealed from us. It was merely time to move on.
In 2001, while George W. Bush was president, the Pentagon launched on an ambitious plan to take control of the Middle East and Central Asia. Afghanistan was but a doorway, with Osama bin Laden the hated face used to justify the attack.
One can only guess, but it seems as well that Afghanistan is a parking lot. Plans to topple Iran have stalled, the Russian bear is resurgent, and yet we need to be poised and ready. If an “event”, staged or real, opens up a new front in Iran, I suspect that Afghanistan will once again hit the back burner.
Steele didn’t do anything wrong but offer up for public consumption the inside knowledge that Afghanistan is merely a diversion. Lives and dollars, civilians and poppy plants .. none of it matters. Afghanistan, if Steele is telling us the truth, is merely a place to park troops and tanks as we wait for (or cause) the Middle East to explode again.
Michael Steele is going down, of course. He said something true, and that is not allowed here in the Land of the Free.
Hillary Clinton on Georgia: This has a humor element to it. Secretary of State Clinton criticized Russia for its “occupation” of Georgia, which is considered a “breakaway” state. The Russians are angry that she used the word “occupation,” but mostly just shrugged.
Pictures help here. In the map above, the state of Georgia can be found between the Black Sea and Azerbaijan, and directly north of … Iran. It’s very small and not easy to spot on the map. The location is just a coincidence, I suppose.
But of course what Russia is doing is an “occupation,” just as the U.S. is currently occupying Iraq, Afghanistan, Colombia, Panama, and the sovereign state of “just about everywhere else” with our 700+ military bases.
The U.S. wanted to occupy Georgia, but as Russia grows in strength, it is getting harder to make incursions on former Soviet territories. Military bases in that region are a prized asset. The U.S. invested a lot of money in Georgia, undermining their elections and instigating an uprising. But the Russians were surprisingly aggressive, and fought back. For the time being, it appears that military bases in Georgia will have a decided reddish hue to them.
And for that reason, Hillary Clinton is pissed. The Cold War is still going on. It never stopped, really. The Soviet Union imploded, lost much of its territory, most notably the ‘stans’ of Central Asia and the countries on the Balkan Peninsula. But the Bear is back, and is contesting U.S. aggression on a modest scale.
As Russia and China grow stronger, the world will be safer. If they and India ally and form a power bloc to contest the mighty U.S., we might experience a decade or two of peace on Earth.
Piece of Mindful 
Nice summation!
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I’m thinking Bama nukes Iran’s bomb factories right before the election in a desperate move to save his majorities.
How’s that for a prediction?
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Might be on safe ground, but if such a thing were to happen, I think that the US would use Israel to carry out the deed. They are, after all, our ugly stepchild.
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The Great Game is still going on. It would be helpful if more people knew what happened in 1920 when the arbitrary lines were drawn in the Middle East. Understanding post-WWI banking changes might help understand better our “Big Bank” bailout. The problems are structural. The arguments, and “solutions” to many of today’s problems, fail to a) acknowledge decades old underlying structural problems, and b) if you don’t fix the underlyinng cause, nothing changes. Oh, I almost forgot, we’re running out of oil.
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What were the Post World War I banking changes?
The “Great Game” will likely never go away. I think our security lies, as always, in a balance of powers. When the Soviet Union collapsed, as we have seen, the world became a very dangerous place, with only one superpower.
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By the end of 1919 central banksers took steps to restrict credit, and to drive up interest rates to avoid rapid further inflation. The post-World War I boom busted, and was followed by a depression, which further complicated the task of restoring the world economy.
Inflation taught investors that even bonds were not safe investments.
Before World War I, international trade and finance had operated according to the so-called gold standard. Most countries had committed themselves to maintaining a fixed parity for their currencies in terms of gold. Banks reacted to any hint of inflation, which would generate, through capital flight or high import demand, a line of bankers at the central bank trying to turn the country’s currency into gold. Faced with an erosion of gold reserves, central banks were forced to deflate — to raise interest rates, reduce investment, reduce employment, and so reduce imports–in order to avoid devaluation. Devaluation hurts elites most because they already own such a high percentage of all asset classes.
Could this be happening again? Notice the extreme — however ineffective — measures to prevent real estate and equity devaluation. How are central banks handling the increase in currency volitility? Who’s buying gold, and why? Is the U.S. becoming a paper tiger, broke, with a strong, way-too-proud military? When faced with further budget cuts, will social programs, or military budgets get the axe? I’m betting the latter.
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