Your memory serves you well.

a) the official unemployment numbers are down

For a lot of Federal economic numbers, an interesting new pattern has emerged - relatively good numbers are released, to the glare of much favorable publicity, and a few weeks later the numbers are "revised" to be much more pessimistic.

Expect a lot more of this during election season...

At this point, we're not even hearing the drums of war. We're hearing a sampled drum track from the last war.

Cue the (?) liberal media to regurgitate whatever BS they're handed in the blizzard of "news" releases.

Odds on a large state with a lot of electoral votes (Cali?) getting a bailout of money since they are in such a budget hole - This summer?

"imminent strike"
http://www.nytimes.com/2012/01/29/magazine/will-israel-attack-iran.html?ref=magazine

The prospects of a conflict with Iran is pretty darn high. The de-stablization of Iraq along with the continued effort by Iran to build nukes makes a showdown almost inevitable. It may be Israel taking the first swing, but we will probably be in it too. Election year rhetoric could tune things up enough so the fight comes sooner than later. But this fight is not too far off in our future.

As *war incorporated* does its war dance. Ka-ching, ka-ching, ka-ching.

"Oh, and watch out for Iranian "terists" here in the "homeland" -- they could strike at any moment, so hide your kids, hide your wife, hide your kids, hide your wife..."

Yeah, having nineteen Islamic terrorists destroy the Twin Towers and heavily damage the Pentagon was impossible too...

By summer we could have a nice little "recovery" to talk about...

Especially in housing. All we have to do is recapitalize the banks, get the Fed to lower interest rates and offer a tax incentive for folks to buy homes and it's back to double digit growth in housing. Yippee!

It is 2009, isn't it?

The other day, the PBS series "American Masters" aired a program about 1960s songwriter/activist Phil Ochs.

During the program someone made the comment that the 1960s was basically a battle between two competing myths -- the establishment myth versus the counter-cultural myth.

And now, here it is 2012, and it looks like we're going through another myth epidemic.

Yes, nothing like taking sides. After all, Mubarek needed to go, "yesterday", per the POTUS..so that a quarter of the Egyptian populace could vote for a party that wants to cover up the pyramids in wax.

Jog me when Obama mentions publicly what a travesty has taken place in Egypt. Or offers immigration haven to secularists there. And jog me when he says something publicly about how Iraq just voted to ban citizens from traveling to Israel. Or if he says a peep about the "witch" who just got beheaded in Saudi Arabia recently, for SORCERY.

I'm totally against Islamic/theocratic governments having nukes. How the world has let North Korea, AKA divine-ruler-led-mental-slave-land, fester to this point, is just NUTS. If there's a way to destroy their arsenals without conventional deployments of armies, this would be quite OK, IMHO.

I'm waiting, popcorn in hand, for the 9/11 conspiracy theorists to call out Obama if there is some military "crisis" in the weeks or months before the election. Or does that only happen when a Bush is in office?

I suppose we can expect gas prices to fall, too.

Yeah, having nineteen Islamic terrorists destroy the Twin Towers and heavily damage the Pentagon was impossible too...

Are you suggesting that we start to use military force to counter any threat that rises to the level of not being impossible?

As terrible as 9/11 was I don't think that it justified the huge cost in blood and treasure, here and abroad, of two wars. I'm far less convinced that some hypothetical threat is justification for countless actual deaths and trillions of dollars in "defense" spending.

Mike (the other one),
I assume by the way you put "crisis" in quotes that you meant something that isn't real or as it seems - in other words, a false flag operation.

The conspiracy theorists didn't invent false flag operations. And they go back a lot farther than a Bush in the White House, especially in the Middle East. From Wikipedia:

"The Lavon Affair refers to a failed Israeli covert operation, code named Operation Susannah, conducted in Egypt in the Summer of 1954. As part of the false flag operation, a group of Egyptian Jews were recruited by Israeli military intelligence for plans to plant bombs inside Egyptian, American and British-owned targets. The attacks were to be blamed on the Muslim Brotherhood, Egyptian Communists, "unspecified malcontents" or "local nationalists" with the aim of creating a climate of sufficient violence and instability to induce the British government to retain its occupying troops in Egypt's Suez Canal zone."

We've come a long way since then of course. By now if America doesn't do what Israel wants, when it wants it, the reaction is one of intense betrayal. Just Google the Atlanta Jewish Times for more on that. In short, after years of pressure the accepted attitude is that we are at their disposal.

Of course, the problem is getting the American Public to buy in, and that's why another false flag operation involving an incident in the Persian Gulf is likely to happen.

Seymour Hersh has reported that Cheney even considered dressing Navy Seals up as Iranians and then having them killed in a fake attack on US ships. It was rejected, but there have been plenty of meetings in Washington and Israel to try and figure out a scenario where the American Public is moved to go to war with Iran. Stay tuned.

As far as timing, President Obama would need it to happen close enough to the elections so that the economic impact of 200-dollar-a-barrel oil would not be felt until after the voting. Any conflict with Iran would almost certainly involve a skyhigh spike in oil prices. However, Israel is very down on President Obama, so they could get what they want and throw the election to Romney at the same time.

But never mind the politicians: How does this work for America? This could be a case of when Israel's interests and America's are 2 different things, and that usually means our leaders do what Israel wants.

That's also why we aren't in North Korea, Gaye. Israel doesn't care about North Korea. The irony is that this huge spike in oil prices could finish off the American economy, and if America goes down, Israel will be left to fend for itself. That could be like some of the Soviet Union's allies after that empire imploded.

That's the interesting dynamic. Some of these Neo-Con plans could end up hurting the People of Israel big-time.

So in that sense, you could argue that Israel's own government is now anti-Semitic.

There is also that one other pesky little possibility, World War 3, especially when we consider Israel's stockpile of nuclear weapons, and China's and Russia's feelings about our attacking Iran. I'm not saying it to be alarmist, but it deserves some mention as a worst case scenario:

We don't want to set off World War 3 here. I'm not a military guy, but World War 3 sounds bad.

One idea considered was staging a false flag operation involving the use of Navy SEALs dressed as Iranian PT boaters who would engage in a firefight with US ships. This idea was shot down. This claim has not been verified.[25] -Wikipedia

Seymour Hersh has reported that Cheney even considered dressing Navy Seals up as Iranians and then having them killed in a fake attack on US ships.

It seems that you have a tendency to enhance material a bit. Although the meeting is alleged to have occurred in Cheney's office, Hersh's unverified claim differs significantly from your presentation.

It's the "OIL stupid".

But the November surprise will be Syria.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Syria

The USA and the other elites

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Elite

want a regime change and the Russians,Chinese and India said no way. But BO will force his evil will on the final piece of the puzzle.
Humm I wonder what the Russians are hiding there.

Yes there will be a war and we will be the cause as usual.

Thanks, Bill.

On one point, though, a refinement to consider: a global full-scale shooting WWIII isn't very likely because of the havoc it would wreak on commerce and the bankers' investments in the commercial networks that munitions-related growth industries couldn't compensate enough for. It's more likely that a WWIII would be a cyberwar messing with military and infrastructure functionalities within defined targeted areas.

Then there's those "unknown unknowns" and "dead-enders" that will be exploited by the war-powers-that-be to keep the conflicts persistent and generating lucrative proceeds to the privileged war investors and "stockholders."

In a way, a WWIII also seems to have actually begun with Wall Street, London, Zurich, and others launching their paperless weapons of mass economic harvest and destruction in the years leading up to the summer and fall of 2008 and the "bailouts" and other set-ups that have followed -- ah, yes, "The Cons of August." And yes, it's bad.

Iran is just being set up as a major distraction in the latest long con game being played on the dumb Americans.

These freaking religious wars gotta stop, forever. So many different people think they're The Chosen people -- with a book to prove it. But, we're all "the people." With or without a book. Or an old story that's been handed down. We're all blood relatives to each other. The one big ultra-dysfunctional family, alas.

Meanwhile, the money-suckers in the family keep on at their pathological pursuits, and we gotta give them some intense therapy.

Max,
I don't see how I enhanced anything, and you left out the part where I said the idea was rejected.

Last time around you were saying my complaints about the indefinite detention provisions of a Senate Bill were so much "gnashing of the teeth."

Here's your comment followed by the ABC New story proving how justified my fears were, and how full of it you turned out to be:

"Bill,

A lot of wailing and gnashing of teeth is going on, mostly by folks who have no clue as to what the Senate bill actually permits and what it specifically forbids:

Applicability to United States Citizens and Lawful Resident Aliens -

(1) UNITED STATES CITIZENS – The requirement to detain a person in military custody under this section does not extend to citizens of the United States.

(2) LAWFUL RESIDENT ALIENS – The requirement to detain a person in military custody under this section does not extend to a lawful resident alien of the United States on the basis of conduct taking place within the United States, except to the extent permitted by the Constitution of the United States.

The bill, addressing military dentention without trial, is actually far less odious than what is already occurring with progressive frequency across the country: you get your trial, followed by life in prison. Your crime? Felony filming of police.

Welcome to the real world - as it actually is, this very day."

Now the ABC News story:

In his last official act of business in 2011, President Barack Obama signed the National Defense Authorization Act from his vacation rental in Kailua, Hawaii. In a statement, the president said he did so with reservations about key provisions in the law — including a controversial component that would allow the military to indefinitely detain terror suspects, including American citizens arrested in the United States, without charge."

Bill pretty much nailed it Max:
http://thinkprogress.org/politics/2008/07/31/26940/cheney-proposal-for-iran-war/

Transcript:

HERSH: There was a meeting. Among the items considered and rejected — which is why the New Yorker did not publish it, on grounds that it wasn’t accepted — one of the items was why not…

There was a dozen ideas proffered about how to trigger a war. The one that interested me the most was why don’t we build — we in our shipyard — build four or five boats that look like Iranian PT boats. Put Navy seals on them with a lot of arms. And next time one of our boats goes to the Straits of Hormuz, start a shoot-up. Might cost some lives.
And it was rejected because you can’t have Americans killing Americans. That’s the kind of — that’s the level of stuff we’re talking about. Provocation. But that was rejected.

So I can understand the argument for not writing something that was rejected — uh maybe. My attitude always towards editors is they’re mice training to be rats.

But the point is jejune, if you know what that means. Silly? Maybe. But potentially very lethal. Because one of the things they learned in the incident was the American public, if you get the right incident, the American public will support bang-bang-kiss-kiss. You know, we’re into it.

Pathetic. Casting Israel as the boogeyman that wags America's tail is just one more chip in the global marketplace of anti-Semitism. Believe me, I know. My father was a champion for Palestinians, ran an NGO in Beirut in the 60's called "Americans for Justice in the Middle East". As a little girl I got to listen to a lot of sob narratives about the plight of the Palestinians, all attributed to that terrible country, Israel. The common line we heard was: "I'm not anti-Jewish, I 'm just anti-Zionist"....We were in Munich watching the Olympic games on the day all those athletes got shot. My father was arrested and interrogated while we were taken care of by some officials from the social services department. The Arabic license plate on the Audi station wagon had people very interested in what an American single dad of three children, recently a long-term Beirut resident, with a fondness for Arabs and a grudge against Israel, was doing at the games on that particular day. After 1972, my father spoke less and less of the crimes against the Arabs by the Jews. In the meantime, I carried the anti-Israel poison forward in my teens, until I lived in the Middle east as a freshman college student, read the Koran, and did a lot of reading about the roots of the conflict. One thing became very clear to me: anti-Semitism is deep and long and tangled and twisted and culturally ingrained, and it is at the very root of the controversy around that small patch of land, which constitutes less than 2% of the Arab land mass. And the sooner people exorcise themselves of it, and quit engaging in this massive deception of sympathy with the Arab world, the better. Hey Bill, did you know that the Arab league adopted a ruling, decades ago, a ruling followed by all of its members, forbidding conferring of citizenship on any Palestinians? We wouldn't want to let those poor Palestinians out of their refugee camps, would we? No, we'll be good leftists and join flotillas to Gaza, and rail against Israel in our blog posts.

As for conspiracy theories to provoke war, that's what they are, theories. And if provocations to war are a necessary step to remove mad dogs from power and/or get nukes out of their hands, who cares?

Gaye,
Anti-Semitism is a real problem, and that's why I'm wondering about your true motives. You're advocating for a plan that would allow Saudi Arabia to sell oil for twice as much as they do now. If you keep this up, the King of Saudi Arabia could send you a thank-you note.

You talk about taking the nukes out of somebody's hands. You realize the weapons of mass destruction script was the last war (Iraq). Nobody's saying that this time around. If you want to take nukes out of somebody's hands in the Middle East, you are - once again - attacking Israel.

Then to see you admit that you once were filled with anti-Israel poison. Are you sure you've gotten past all that? Some of us never went though that stage - we were always more interested in somehow, some way finding a path to peace in the Middle East. You could say I've spent my entire life hoping for that.

One last point: You're so compassionate about the plight of women in the Middle East and rightfully so. I really admire that about you. So to describe part of a conflict that has included plenty of women crying over their dead children, as "sob narratives" is just plain mean.

Oh right, Ex - quote me some more crap from Soros's "stinkprogress" site like it's freakin' gospel.

Bill: you said that Cheney "considered dressing Navy Seals up as Iranians and then having them killed in a fake attack on US ships".
Cast it any way your bias carries you; the fact is that a meeting was ostensibly held in Cheney's office, and somebody may have floated the idea of seals staging an attack. This is uncorroborated, and even in the uncorroborated versions, no mention is made of having them killed. You enhanced it to fit your mindset, and that is an obvious conclusion.

Moreover, despite your protestations to the contrary, your comments here are proof enough of your anti-Israel bias. By now if America doesn't do what Israel wants, when it wants it, the reaction is one of intense betrayal.

You may have been funny a few years back, but of late you appear to be just an embittered, bigoted leftist - and I really dislike saying that, but it would be dishonest to ignore what you say, and your pugnacious attitude toward any who dare to disagree.

Now the ABC News story:

In his last official act of business in 2011, President Barack Obama signed the National Defense Authorization Act from his vacation rental in Kailua, Hawaii. In a statement, the president said he did so with reservations about key provisions in the law — including a controversial component that would allow the military to indefinitely detain terror suspects, including American citizens arrested in the United States, without charge."

Apparently, you've not yet noticed that what Obama says is more often than not vastly at odds with reality. I quoted the document; you quote what the worst President in the history of the country says.

I'm thinking of buying stock in Kool-Aid.

No shortage of dead kids. Go read about the Fogel family massacre if you want to read about them. If Iran has nukes, their program needs to be neutered, period. This has nothing to do with the Iraq yellow-cake story, which was used to sell a war that we didn't prosecute well.

And I am not advocating for warfare that will cause the price of Saudi oil to go up, although unintended consequences are a constant in the world. I think we should sever ties with Saudi Arabia. Frankly, invading Saudi Arabia and taking over their oil supply sounds like a better idea, in retrospect, then using all that blood and treasure just to get the Iraqis a constitution and a working oil supply to sell to us.

We need to exploit our own oil reserves.

And you ignore something, Bill. Arabs and Muslims are indoctrinated with a holy book that states Jews are the "vilest of creatures," in the words of the prophet himself. So the whole anti-Israel shtick in the west and the Arab world is nothing more than implacable, age-old, religiously prescribed prejudice. Until that reality is widely known and recognized, (and it isn't), people will continue to second guess Israel's intentions, disparage US support for her, attribute plots to her, and recycle old stories like the Lavon affair.

Easy, Max. You sound like there's some wailing and gnashing of the teeth going on. I was merely basing my opinion on the steady incremental erosion of our freedoms that's gone on since before 9/11, to raise concern about the impending defense bill. You, for some reason, were stuck in "it's not that bad" mode, and quoted a version of the bill.

The final bill apparently backs up my fears, and I've seen numerous stories suggesting that. I quoted ABC News. The gracious thing would be to say, "It turns out you were right to be worried, Bill" but I guess some people have trouble admitting stuff like that so we turn it into additional insults. That's fine.

Moving onto this latest go around about Cheney's office, you keep insisting this was uncorroborated like you're making some kind of heavy point. All I said was that Seymour Hersh reported it. You are doing the classic blog 2-step where you argue against something that isn't there. You are responding to a statement I didn't make. If I said, this is corroborated, then I'd be apologizing to you because it's not.

As far as the reaction of intense betrayal, I cited the Atlanta Jewish Times comments on President Obama. Did you read those? I don't even want to repeat them, but they shocked me, and apparently they got the interest of the Secret Service as well. Google them.

I believe they support my suggestion that at this point, any suggestion that we're not going to go along with the latest Neo-Con plan out of Israel is greeted with a different level of outrage than in decades past. If you disagree, fine.

Of course, the knee-jerk reaction is to call whoever is questioning the plan out for being anti-Israel. You must know that there are plenty of people in Israel - including in the military establishment - who are not sold on this plan.

What I've always been, is pro-peace. I thought Iraq was a big mistake before it happened. I still do now that we've left. If you want to call me names, that's fine.

I also think buying stock in Kool-Aid is a mistake. You would have been better off buying stock in Facebook today. So go ahead and say it: "Bill, you're anti-Kool Aid too." It hurts, but I think in time I'll get over it.

And Gaye,
I thought I made a pretty interesting point that a plan that could destroy what's left of the United States economy, is not in Israel's best interest. Have you seen the stories abbout the flight of the 1% out of America? The Bush family's 100,000 acres in Paraguay. James Cameron moving to New Zealand. The highest exodus of the mega-rich from America in history.

Why? Because we are teetering on the brink of economic collapse. A plan that could give us 200-dollar-a-barrel oil, is far more than an unforeseen consequence. It could bring a catastrophic end to our society. It could be why the mega-rich are in flight before the disintegration and unrest occur.

I think we should avoid that, if there's any way possible.

Is that why the money has been shoveled to the 1% to facilitate their getting out?

There is no allegiance to the country, just take the gold and run.

Those that took the oath to protect our constitution and haven't,
I imagine they will be leaving too.

Bill: you said that Cheney "considered dressing Navy Seals up as Iranians and then having them killed in a fake attack on US ships".

The gracious thing would be for you to own up to that enhancement.

I thought Iraq was a big mistake before it happened.

It's nice to see that we can agree on something. I opposed that from the get-go, and noted that it'd be one of the dumbest moves Bush could make. On the other hand, I also don't think much of getting involved in Libya, nor salivating over Iran, nor sending drones wherever, whenever. There's a difference between national defense and playing global cop.

On this point, however, I suspect you're somewhat off-base: The highest exodus of the mega-rich from America in history.

Bill Gates, the late Steve Jobs, Zuckerman, Buffet, Soros (granted, Zuckerman just joined that club at the tender age of 27), the head of Goldman-Sachs - these and many more of the uber-wealthy are all (in Jobs' case, unfortunately, was) Democrats, and none of them appear to have transferred themselves or their money elsewhere. Even The Donald (possibly a Republican) is staying in the USA, by all appearances.

Your point about the Bush family and James Cameron is by no means inaccurate, but I'm not sure that they're indicative of a larger trend.

Although frankly, given the ongoing trends in the Portland metro area, I plan to pull up, roots and all, and transplant to another area at the earliest opportunity. And given that the CBO figures released a couple of days ago state that taxes will increase by over 30% in the next two years, Belize is lookin' pretty good.

Max,
I admit to being cranky when you said I was gnashing my teeth about losing our liberties, but we've always gotten along, and I apologize if I let that comment you made linger in my memory.

I sincerely do not get your charges of enhancing the one report. I'm going to try one more time, this time from a Huffington Post article that quotes Seymour Hersh. I wasn't there but read it, and tell me I made this up:

"Huffington Post:

Pulitzer Prize-winning New Yorker reporter Seymour Hersh recently told Think Progress that a recent meeting in Vice President Cheney's office on the topic of how to provoke a war with Iran yielded some interesting results:

Hersh: There was a dozen ideas proffered about how to trigger a war. The one that interested me the most was why don't we build -- we in our shipyard -- build four or five boats that look like Iranian PT boats. Put Navy seals on them with a lot of arms. And next time one of our boats goes to the Straits of Hormuz, start a shoot-up.

Might cost some lives. And it was rejected because you can't have Americans killing Americans. That's the kind of -- that's the level of stuff we're talking about. Provocation. But that was rejected."

Okay, here's from the article I saw on the Drudge Report yesterday: "According to the Census Bureau, “The top-earning 1% of US taxpayers are leaving the USA at the highest rate in history.” In addition, a Zogby International poll found that more than 3 million US citizens relocate abroad every year, as record numbers of rich US."

Finally, I'm going to respond to one other thing that I though was unfair. Gaye had an experience at the Munich games. I was watching that on TV with my best friend, who would go on to be killed in a terrorist attack on December 17th, 1973. I have been trying to figure out how we could get peace in the Middle East from even before that. That's why I find some of your other accusations so tiring. Let me explain:

Max, I wish you and Gaye would think of an idea you didn't support from President Obama, and ponder for a second how annoying it would be to have the people who did support it call you un-American for it.

That is exactly how stupid and ridiculous the constant charges of anti-Semitism and being anti-Israel sound. I know, I know...that's not the point, is it? The point is to mold public opinion by stifling any discourse on the subject of the Middle East.

The same technique was used in the 1950s when people were called Communists at the drop of the hat. It is despicable and transparent.

America became great with the free exchange of ideas so at some point, I wish the tired old PR stunt of dragging out the anti-Semitism charge would be retired. It dishonors the Jewish people who have faced it, and cheapens the quality of our lives.

To use a wonderful Jewish expression, enough already.

Bill,

I'm glad that we do have common ground in some areas, such as Iraq.

I don't agree that we're merely puppets for Israel, which is how your words came across to me as I read them.

I apologize for any misunderstanding.

Time to put this baby to bed, I think.

Regards.