Daily Reckoning excerpt

"A banana republic is also characterized by a ruling class that curtails
people's personal freedoms and is moving toward a heavy-handed military
dictatorship under the excuse of fighting guerilla (or terrorist)
opposition groups or enemies. Moreover, the fact that the ruling class or
elite comes from different political parties isn't a relevant factor in
classifying a country as a banana republic; what IS relevant is the
determination of the elite, irrespective of which party its members belong
to, to shift wealth from the majority of the people (the masses) to
themselves, usually through simply printing money and incurring chronic
budget deficits, and frequently also through senseless warfare."

Daily Reckoning excerpt

And along the same lines, a dinner companion said on Saturday night,
"What is really driving the U.S. economy is the war in Iraq and the war
against terror."

"They're spending $75 billion per quarter...that's $300 billion a year.
And it's in addition to the regular budget. People think that money goes
to building roads and schools in Iraq. But most of it - all but 15% or so
- is spent in the United States. It goes to contractors for computer
programs, weapons, and supplies. That has a huge impact on the economy.
And that's why there is so little opposition to the war. People know that
when the war stops, the economy goes into recession."

Our friend is a contractor for the Pentagon:

"It is unbelievable how much money is being spent. They are spending
billions right on the Pentagon building itself. And now there's a lot of
argument about where the money is being spent. People in New York are
complaining about spending money in Montana. And they've got a point, of
course. Montana is not exactly the front lines in the war against terror.
But from a defensive point of view, almost all the money is wasted anyway,
so it probably doesn't make much difference. "

What a strange and wonderful war. Rather than tightening our belts, the
war is taken as a pretext to spend more money.

Charades

from the Daily Reckoning...

Which makes us wonder more and more about the great British bomb plot. What really was going on?

The question seems to have occurred to Craig Murray, former British ambassador to the gentle republic of Uzbekistan, which has acquired an unpleasant reputation for boiling suspects in vats of boiling liquid. Either water or oil, we are not quite sure which. Murray brings his close acquaintance with the fine arts of coercion to bear on the subject:

"None of the alleged terrorists had made a bomb. None had bought a plane ticket. Many did not even have passports, which given the efficiency of the U.K. Passport Agency would mean they couldn't be a plane bomber for quite some time.

"In the absence of bombs and airline tickets, and in many cases passports, it could be pretty difficult to convince a jury beyond reasonable doubt that individuals intended to go through with suicide bombings, whatever rash stuff they may have bragged in Internet chat rooms.

"What is more, many of those arrested had been under surveillance for over a year - like thousands of other British Muslims. And not just Muslims. Like me. Nothing from that surveillance had indicated the need for early arrests.

"Then an interrogation in Pakistan revealed the details of this amazing plot to blow up multiple planes - which, rather extraordinarily, had not turned up in a year of surveillance. Of course, the interrogators of the Pakistani dictator have their ways of making people sing like canaries. As I witnessed in Uzbekistan, you can get the most extraordinary information this way. Trouble is it always tends to give the interrogators all they might want, and more, in a desperate effort to stop or avert torture. What it doesn't give is the truth.

"The gentleman being 'interrogated' had fled the U.K. after being wanted for questioning over the murder of his uncle some years ago. That might be felt to cast some doubt on his reliability...

"We then have the extraordinary question of Bush and Blair discussing the possible arrests over the weekend. Why? I think the answer to that is plain. Both in desperate domestic political trouble, they longed for 'Another 9/11.' The intelligence from Pakistan, however dodgy, gave them a new 9/11 they could sell to the media. The media has bought, wholesale, all the rubbish they have been shoveled.

"We then have the appalling political propaganda of John Reid, Home Secretary, making a speech warning us all of the dreadful evil threatening us and complaining that 'Some people don't get' the need to abandon all our traditional liberties. He then went on, according to his own propaganda machine, to stay up all night and minutely direct the arrests. There could be no clearer evidence that our Police are now just a political tool. Like all the best nasty regimes, the knock on the door came in the middle of the night, at 2.30am. Those arrested included a mother with a six-week-old baby.

"We will now never know if any of those arrested would have gone on to make a bomb or buy a plane ticket.

"In all of this, the one thing of which I am certain is that the timing is deeply political. This is more propaganda than plot. Of the over one thousand British Muslims arrested under anti-terrorist legislation, only twelve per cent are ever charged with anything. That is simply harassment of Muslims on an appalling scale. Of those charged, 80% are acquitted. Most of the very few - just over two per cent of arrests - who are convicted, are not convicted of anything to do terrorism, but of some minor offense the Police happened upon while trawling through the wreck of the lives they had shattered.

"Be skeptical. Be very, very skeptical."