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Or say after Iraq was under US control, when very first thing that happened was that Bush´s and Rice´s surrounding loaded some 4 billion $ worth of mineral oil for free ...
Ruphus
So if Bush is a billionaire, why does he live in a smaller house in a less fashionable neighborhood than my cousin, the retired Dallas physician? Why is his "ranch" (in South Texas we would call it a "country place") so small and unproductive, compared to my 92-year old aunt's property in South Texas? Neither of my relatives is a billionaire. Did Bush lose it all to Cheney in some high stakes poker game? Or is the tale of his acquired billions just an outrageous lie?
Perhaps Bush's relatively modest apparent lifestyle is just a cover for a more wild and colorful existence? Do he and Laura travel the globe incognito, visiting famous libraries in disguise? Laura is a librarian you know, and George is notoriously in love with her....
My daughter was Assistant Attorney General of the State of Texas throughout Bush's term as Governor. Her boss was the Attorney General, his boss was George W. Bush. My daughter was no fan of Bush. She worked hard as a volunteer in the campaign of Ann Richards, whom Bush defeated in the election for Governor. If there had been any whiff whatsoever of scandal attached to Bush, she was in a prime position to hear of it. I assure you, she has no tolerance whatsoever for such things.
My father knew George H. W. Bush well. My father used to joke that he tried three times, unsuccessfully to persuade G.H.W. Bush not to run for Congress, since he couldn't win. "I was right twice," my father used to say with a smile.
I would estimate that stories, or actual evidence of financial misdealings circulate in Texas concerning perhaps one in twenty powerful politicians. The Bushes as a family are unusual in that not only was there never a whiff of scandal, but they were known for their honesty and integrity.
I'm certainly no fan of George W. Bush. I don't think he is very smart, and I think he made some terrible decisions. But I don't think he's Satan incarnate.--just a jerk who managed to get elected president.
"Bush lied about Saddam's weapons of mass destruction!! He lied!! He lied!!" some will scream.
I did say he wasn't very smart.
I have considerable personal experience in the intelligence business. Intelligence estimates are among the most carefully guarded secrets of the government, except when they are used to advance a political agenda. The reason? You don't want the enemy to deduce what your sources may be. And you don't want him to know how wrong you are. Intelligence estimates are seriously, importantly wrong a significant amount of the time, due to faulty information, faulty reasoning, and most importantly, due to self-deception.
I have personally seen it happen, time and again, that the received wisdom of the intelligence community, supported by an array of fact and inference, turned out to be totally wrong as events unfolded.
Under considerable pressure from Cheney and Rumsfeld, the intelligence community concluded that Saddam had weapons of mass destruction. Bush was dumb enough to go for it.
Hell, Colin Powell went for it, and he's pretty smart. Smart enough not to risk getting caught in a gigantic lie. Powell now freely apologizes for being wrong. He says in television interviews, with an air of palpable regret, that his United Nations speech advocating war on Iraq was the biggest mistake of his career.
Yes, I know, I know. It's all a Machiavellian conspiracy of the demonic capitalists. All would be right with the world under the proper social order.
Any day now, someone is going to figure out what that would be.
This is the hopeful interpretation of the stock brokers' legally required disclaimer, "Past performance is no guarantee of future results."
For an example: The distortion about Albania ( where I lived for a while in the early seventies ). A country that stood for maybe the most upright trial to socialism in modern history ( though I expect todays situation in Bolivia to be quite sincere as well ). Sincere and incorruptable enough to break first with the SU and later with the Chinese, for their betrayal on the socialist ideal; eventhough the Albanians - boykottet by their neighbours and the west - could well use the big power´s support and trade. I don´t think that there has been another case in modern history where income and property was as evenly distributed among people like there. Lesser even any other example of serious prophylaxis against nepotism and corruption like there. Leading staff there had to be very cautious with misuse of their positions against subordinates. No autocratism in place like everywhere else ( including common circumstances in the west!)
Hello, Ruphus. I have been busy preparing for an assignment to the South Pacific, where I will be from July through September, and, thus, am just now getting around to your post.
The only thing I agree with in your statement about Albania under Envery Hoxha is: "I don't think that there has been another case in modern history where income and property was as evenly distributed among people like there." Enver Hoxha's absolute tyranny practiced equality of oppression. Everyone in Albania was equally oppressed (except for Hoxha's inner circle). Next to Albania, even Bulgaria under Todor Zhivkov appeared relatively more free, and that's not saying much. There was no freedom of travel, no freedom of the press, no freedom to select an occupation, no freedom to start one's own business. and no freedom to change residence without official permission and an internal passport. Nevertheless, you are wrong about Albania being the only case imposing such "equality" (if that is what you call it) in modern history. North Korea's Kim Jong Il would have given Enver Hoxha a run for his money.
Cheers,
Bill
_____________________________
And the end of the fight is a tombstone white, With the name of the late deceased, And the epitaph drear, "A fool lies here, Who tried to hustle the East."
Check the birthdate of Marx. Spanish communism was Marxism
Marx did not invent communism, he invented Marxism. And I was not referring to the communist party, formed in Spain in the 1920's, which is why I said 'communism per se' my reference was to collectivism which had been in existence in Spain as a way of life for centuries.
In fact even the book Alistre recommends, The Black Book of Communism, begins in the introduction:
quote:
what exactly do we mean by ‘communism’? we must make a distinction between the doctrine of communism and its practice. As a political philosophy, communism has existed for centuries, even millenia... ...But the communism that concerns us does not exist in the transcendent sphere of ideas. This communism is altogether real; it has existed at key moments of history and in particular countries, brought to life by its famous leaders Lenin, Stalin, Zedong, Minh, Castro...
Chomsky on Socialism, particularly regarding the loss of meaning of this word:
So, I find it laughable when Kate with Honours conveys shock that there was a coup in Spain.
How do you work that out? How did I convey shock ? Likewise in a previous post you claimed I thought all communists were saints and now you have decided that I am a communist. You know nothing about me, apart from that I have a first class honours degree which seems to infuriate you for some reason.
The sense I get, though, is that people on the Left tend to apologize for and downplay Left-wing regimes/dictatorships while saving all their criticism for Right-wing regimes/dictatorships. Such an approach strikes me as inconsistent and hypocritical.
quote:
That has been my main point all along if you read my posts carefully.
I will try one more time to clarify my position. This started with Alatriste maintaining that Franco was good for Spain. Others disagreed, but I have not read anyone stating in this thread, that the Communists would have been a better choice for Spain. I would never agree with that view either.
Personally, I find Alatriste's attitude borderline bullying. If you want to continue with this, stop with the insults, stop mocking people's educational achievements, their interpretation of historical events and their political views when they do not align with your own.
Whatever, you clearly have more time for this nonsense than I. This thread is locked because I am not going to apologise for insulting a facist and clearly Alatriste is not, for insulting most everyone else on this thread.
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