Is a complete collapse imminent?

[ACougar]

No, we dont have anyone who hates us, we are not under threat, except by the USA, so it is rather silly to say the USA is our defender. What have they defended us from?

The Republic of Texas, Christian Patriots and the Alaskan Independance movement?

 

[Wyzaard]

Um where did you get that from? Not that I can't guess.

The Historical record:

http://www.flagrancy.net/timeline.html

1953-1996: Guatemala

• • "We have created a more humanitarian, less costly strategy, to be more compatible with the democratic system. We instituted civil affairs [in 1982] which provides development for 70 percent of the population, while we kill 30 percent. Before, the strategy was to kill 100 percent."
    • --General H?ctor Gramajo, 1980s Guatemalan Minister of Defense, interview with Harvard International Review, cited here
  United Fruit Co., aka Chiquita Banana, and the CIA lobby the Eisenhower administration to overthrow President Jacobo Arbenz, who attempted to institute land reforms that threatened United Fruit's extortion of Guatemalan agriculture, and expanded on the ideal of democracy to end disenfranchizement of communist sympathizers at the table of government. The Eisenhower administration and CIA, apparently in confusion about what democracy means, prompty organized a botched assassination attempt on Arbenz, trained and armed a military regime to take over, and lent military assistance to the counter-revolution. The ensuing civil war lasted 40 years and left some 160,000 dead and 40,000 "disappeared" (in 1999 there was some light cast on the fate of the disappeared).
  
  • "The social and economic programs of the elected government met the aspirations" of labor and the peasantry, and "inspired the loyalty and conformed to the self-interest of most politically conscious Guatemalans. Worse still, the government of Guatemala had "become an increasing threat to the stability of Honduras and El Salvador. Its agrarian reform is a powerful propaganda weapon; its broad social program of aiding the workers and peasants in a victorious struggle against the upper classes and large foreign enterprises has a strong appeal to the populations of Central American neighbors where similar conditions prevail." So therefore a military solution was necessary. It went on for 40 years, and its left the same culture of terror as in Central American neighbors.
    
    • --Chomsky, summarizing internal US documents discussing the communist threat in Guatemala, Kiva Auditorium, NM. A similar quote from the linked essay by Streeter is attributed to the State Department, discussing regional stability for Honduras and El Salvador; quote attributed citation by Gjeijeses, Shattered Hope, p 152.
  CIA veteran Ralph McGee has compiled a list of non-classified reports of CIA activities in Guatemala, with the CIA Seal of Approval. A talk of his is available at montclair.edu in which he discusses briefly the CIA's recruitment of rejects from the NFL. John Stockwell has given the same sort of testimony about Angola.
  In addition to death squad activity, executions, rape, and torture, US government suppression of the murder of an American, etc., US backed goons engaged in scorched earth campaigns. While US military aid was halted in 1990, the CIA continued its own funding for another 5 years until reports in the US press made the funding public.
  
  • Guatemalan suffering continues to this day:
  • UN Truth Commission on Guatemala: "during the period from 1981 to 1983 these acts descended to the level of genocide directed against elements of the country's indigenous Mayan population".
  • Human Rights Watch - Guatemala
  • Amnesty Int. - Guatemala
  • National Security Archive - Guatemala: Corroberating US documents declassified under FOIA.
  • NSA - US-Guatemalan policy documents: including a 1982 accusation by the U.S. Embassy that Amnesty International, the Washington Office on Latin America, the Network in Solidarity with Guatemala and the Guatemalan Human Rights Commission are supporting Guatemalan Communism because of their reports on human rights abuses in Guatemala - which have since been confirmed by declassified documents.
  • Guatemalan Baby Organ Farming: the Myth and Legend and the indication of the "general mood"

1903-1936: Panama

• US indirectly runs Panama through a surrogate after managing its seccession from Columbia.

1904-1978: Dominican Republic

• In 1904 the USG takes control of Dominican customs houses by force to collect on international debts, shortly thereafter signing a treaty, with the DR essentially at gun point, ratifying the debt relationship. Between 1916 and 1924 the US occupies and rules the Dominican Republic. Shortly thereafter General Rafael Trujillo takes control of the country with the National Guard that was created and put under his control by the USG before its exit. During the 30s Trujillo wiped out some 30,000 Dominicans and Haitians in an effort to make his side of the island 'more white'. Trujillo recieved US backing until the mid 1950s, when he was finally placed under economic sanctions for attempting to assassinate the president of Venezuela. A few years later the USG began supporting the conservative opposition to overthrow him, successfully assassinating him in 1961, out of fear that the liberal Constitutionalist opposition would get to it first. Trujillo's son Ramfi was escorted out of the country by the US military.
  In 1963 USG-backed militants remove the recently elected president of the Dominican Republic, Juan Bosch - a centrist liberal - to "prevent another Cuba". Two years later Lyndon Johnson sent 22,000 US Marines to land on the island and take control of the country for 17 months after falling sugar prices and political conflict stirred an uprising against the new regime of Donald Reid Cabral. The Marines assist in supressing the rebellion, killing over 4,000 Dominicans and solidifying conservative control over the country, leading to the reinstatement of Trujillo-frontman turned Washington-frontman Joaquin Balaguer, who dragged the country into a nightmare of political violence, electoral fraud, and death squad activity that, by and large, eliminated any possible political opposition to the regime - minus one or two times when Balaguer's masters in Washington yanked his leash for the cameras. The USG continued lavishing military support onto the regime throughout the waves of terror.

1915-1934: Haiti

• US occupies and administers Haiti for 19 years.
  • A collection of Nation articles on the occupation of Haiti.
  • Military Occupation and the Culture of U.S. Imperialism, 1915-1940

1912-1979: Nicaragua

• A sort of defacto American colonial holding during the mid 19th century - per the East India Company model of a private corporation taking control of a foreign nation with state assistance - US Marines occupy Nicaragua from 1912 to 1933. In 1927 US Marines enter into a protacted struggle with the guerilla forces of Augusto Sandino, eventually suffering their first defeat against a third world insurgency.
  Afterwards, the USG arms, trains, and otherwise props up the barbarous, nepotistic Somoza dictatorship and the National Guard, which holds on to dictatorial power until the Sandinista revolution of 1979.

1948-1956: Peru Elected APRA government overthrown by Legion of Merit award winner and "CIA pawn" Manuel Odria.
1953: Costa Rica

• Attempted overthrow of Jose Figueres.

1952-1959: Cuba

• Coup overthrows elected government of Carlos Prio Socorras. Fulgencio Batista's ruthless regime and his secret police force, the Buro de Represion Actividades Communistas (BRAC) - created by the CIA in 1956 - tortures and kills thousands with US assistance.
  Before January 1959, Cuba's economy was dominated by US interests, which owned 40% of the sugar production, including seven of the ten largest estates, 90% of the telephone and electricity utilities, the oil refineries, most of the mining industry, and some of the banks.
  

  • --Oxfam International, Going Against the Grain: Agricultural Crisis and Transformation
    
    

 

[Wyzaard]

Although, interesting fact, the first shot of the Pearl Harbour action was actually a US ship firing on, and sinking, a Japanese submarine. Yes, the sneak attack was already underway at the time, the Japanese planes were already inbound (though as yet undetected) but its still interesting that, to say the least, the Americans were already prepared to fight, the "sneak attack against a peaceful, non-beligerent innocent nation" is a bit of a myth.

The US had for years been goading the Japanese into attacking through diplomatic and media channels, even so far as suggesting our weak spot at pearl harbor.

 

[Joachim]

No, we dont have anyone who hates us, we are not under threat, except by the USA, so it is rather silly to say the USA is our defender. What have they defended us from?

Feel free to pull out of NORAD anytime you wish if you feel that you don't need our protection, but the fact is you do. The Russians would probably love to get their hands on the mineral resources in northern Canada (as would I honestly), areas that aren't very populated. Without NORAD, Russia would have designs on that territory.

 

[Joachim]

They are akin to the french. Why bother attacking them? They have nothing of any use. They are of less use than a squeeze box on a hunting trip.

As someone of French descent I do take offense to that statement. And it is also inaccurate. Canada has gold, oil, diamonds and plenty of other natural resources that they simply don't have the expertise to develop themselves. They need our help, though honestly, they can keep the southern provinces that aren't rich in mineral weatlh as long as they give Quebec her freedom, I'm more interested in all those resources in the Yukon, Nunavut and the Northwest Territories.

 

[Steve Petersen]

The US had for years been goading the Japanese into attacking through diplomatic and media channels, even so far as suggesting our weak spot at pearl harbor.

Source?

 

[LightHorseman]

The US had for years been goading the Japanese into attacking through diplomatic and media channels, even so far as suggesting our weak spot at pearl harbor.

Not to mention covert and proxy military action against the Japanese... Flying Tigers anyone?

 

[Steve Petersen]

Not to mention covert and proxy military action against the Japanese... Flying Tigers anyone?

That would have been Roosevelt, then.

 

[LightHorseman]

That would have been Roosevelt, then.

Um... does it matter?

 

[Steve Petersen]

Um... does it matter?

You seem to be suggesting that Roosevelt conspired to have Japan attack the US.

 

[CCGirl]

As someone of French descent I do take offense to that statement. And it is also inaccurate. Canada has gold, oil, diamonds and plenty of other natural resources that they simply don't have the expertise to develop themselves. They need our help, though honestly, they can keep the southern provinces that aren't rich in mineral weatlh as long as they give Quebec her freedom, I'm more interested in all those resources in the Yukon, Nunavut and the Northwest Territories.

What??!

 

[LightHorseman]

You seem to be suggesting that Roosevelt conspired to have Japan attack the US.

Um, well no, thats not really what I'm saying at all. I am saying that the US was not exactly the unblemished innocent victim of an unprovoked attack at Pearl Harbour that popular history would have us believe. I'm not saying the US acted wrongly in anyway, indeed, I think the fact the US waited so long to openly declare war on the AXIS is a matter of national shame. That said, Pearl Harbour the Movie and popular perception, is that the US was quietly minding its own business and the attack was completely unprovoked and unjustified. The truth is that the US had actively been engaging in economic and proxy warfare against Japan, and to a lesser extent, Germany, for some time prior to December 1941.

 

[Vale Tudo]

Great article:
http://www.financialsense.com/fsu/editorials/schoon/2009/0213.html

It makes sense - constant economic expansion cannot be permanently sustained. And while the government spends billions trying to fix the problem, one wonders what will be the outcome? Will our economy have one last gasp before the big fall? Will the stimulus work at all? Or are these all just alarmist 'theories', and our economy will recover after a prolonged recession?

I say buckle your seatbelts and get ready, the coming years look like they're going to be a rough ride.

Our economy will last a long time, but the massive government intervention(much of which created the problem), will only prolong the recession. There can come a point where we have to decide whether we let the people fail to govern themselves, or we allow the government to intervene. As long as the American people are intelligent enough to govern themselves(in the general sense), we will prosper. The more slack the government picks up for them, the more cyclical the problem becomes due to the removal of personal responsibility from society.

 

[LightHorseman]

Our economy will last a long time, but the massive government intervention(much of which created the problem)

Holy. Snapping. Duckspit.

The government intervention didn't begin until way after the problems started, so how in the name of all that is Holy, can it have created the problem???

 

[TheNewWorldMan]

Holy. Snapping. Duckspit.

The government intervention didn't begin until way after the problems started, so how in the name of all that is Holy, can it have created the problem???

If only Bill Gates, George Soros and T. Boone Pickens could have been allowed to buy another mansion and more LearJets, none of this would have happened...of course...

 

[LightHorseman]

If only Bill Gates, George Soros and T. Boone Pickens could have been allowed to buy another mansion and more LearJets, none of this would have happened...of course...

What are you gibbering on about?

 

[ScottBot]

Holy. Snapping. Duckspit.

The government intervention didn't begin until way after the problems started, so how in the name of all that is Holy, can it have created the problem???

It didn't create the problem, it prevented it from recoving faster and more sustainably.

 

[rosenherman]

Your ignorance of Canada is astonishing. Other than the fact we are your largest trading partner, sell you the most oil, and the USA has its sights on our water, we have the most fresh water in the world.....just a couple of things for you. We have more resources than almost any other nation.

It's not ignorance, at least on my part.

 

[MarkSB]

Although, interesting fact, the first shot of the Pearl Harbour action was actually a US ship firing on, and sinking, a Japanese submarine. Yes, the sneak attack was already underway at the time, the Japanese planes were already inbound (though as yet undetected) but its still interesting that, to say the least, the Americans were already prepared to fight, the "sneak attack against a peaceful, non-beligerent innocent nation" is a bit of a myth.

Um, the military's job is being prepared to fight.

 

[MarkSB]

Our economy will last a long time, but the massive government intervention(much of which created the problem), will only prolong the recession.

The huge budgets and govt spending seem to be doing it's share in scaring investors and hampering a recovery. The market plummeted after Obama announced his multi-trillion dollar budget. And with increases in capital gains tax it probably won't recover anytime soon. He plans to raise capital gains to 28%, nearly twice the current rate.