anyone following tunisa, egypt, jordan?

[paul_h]

Nothing in our local media, but following egypt right now on al jazeera.
http://english.aljazeera.net/indepth...nger-in-egypt/.

Real 'hope' and 'change' not like obama. "and that government of the people, by the people, for the people.." Yeah, right. More like by the lobbyists, for the corporations. There's no hope and change for any USA president.

Amazing real time revolution though happening right now, just by the people for no other reason that to get rid of a tyrant, nobody behind it and no usurper to assume command, the people have just had enough.

I had high hopes for iran a while back but that just fizzled out, unfortunate for the iranians I know like my brothers in-laws and friends from school that had to flee from iran years ago

[NoNickName]

Good job for the CIA agents in middle east. They were able to restart the islamic bonfire.
The USA always need an enemy abroad when the administration is unpopular.

[paul_h]

Good job for the CIA agents in middle east. They were able to restart the islamic bonfire.
The USA always need an enemy abroad when the administration is unpopular.

Yeah the CIA are helping to overthrow a friendly leader that's already in the back pocket of the USA
What are you smoking? They love mabarak the USA clearly don't want this, and have enough problems already and they are ****ting bricks as far as what this may mean to israel, totalling panicking and the USA doesn't know what to do.
The egyptian government (dictatorship under "emergency rule" with little rights for citizens and huge poverty for a long time) is also ****ting bricks and looks like it has well and truly failed.

edit: found this http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vo5Fn1-2E8o

[NoNickName]

Yeah the CIA are helping to overthrow a friendly leader that's already in the back pocket of the USA
What are you smoking?

Sorry, but today the Secretary of State and the President himself asked Mubarak to step back, so it seems that I was right.
Baradei is probably cheaper.

[paul_h]

They have? That's not what they were saying earlier, they just have no choice now and they have to side with whoever is going to replace mubarack in the future to make their lives easier.
So if they have made any statements saying as such, they've been forced into it because they have to make a decision not to piss of any future government there.

edit: Don't get me wrong, I hold the USA/CIA responsible for vietnam, chile, cambodia, iran, afghanistan, iraq and more.

[paul_h]

Well according to NNN the CIA has been busy.
Kicking off now in bahrain, yemen and libya
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8RGiUQwb5H8
Doctors helping protestors in Bahrain attacked, and well as ambulances and hospitals.

Libya going crazy too with many killed.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ud9Xu...ipcontrinter=1

edit: Not a twitter user or fan, but someone is collecting all twitters related into a single page, so easy to get updates and links
http://twitter.com/IckyEtardo/middle-east-news

But BBC is covering it too http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-middle-east-12492706

As well as AJE
http://english.aljazeera.net/watch_now/

[Tesla]

Hi Paul
I follow aljazeera almost every day it is one of my home pages. After a trip through Egypt, Jordan, Syria then a few more (not Israel it would have dirtied my passport) I found news in Ausie and NZ is very distorted and censored. I bet the usa and israel are just about putting their heads between their legs and kissing it goodbye. It was just a matter of time before these oppressed countries stood up for them selves. I was in Egypt when the price of rice doubled and they started protesting. But I am very worried about how many people will be hurt from the changes. I wonder if it will spread all over the world - after all there are only a few unfairly extremely rich families who rule the world and there's more of us than them. The whole world will be better off without the slave masters. Is this partly due to wikileaks?

[paul_h]

Not wikileaks in my opinion, but due to the Global finicial crisis.
People screwed us out and in the west they got away with it. The governments bailing those responsible out, everyone getting a few dollars from the government, back to business ASAP. The west kept happy as long as most of us have a job and are kept entertained by the media on the idiot box nothing really happened.
In the middle east, no such luck for those leaders. People without jobs and no diversions away from the fact that they have horrible governments.
I tell you what though, a lot of respect for the younger generation there risking their lives.
Egypt got pretty lucky, as even though the army was ordered to kill protestors, the army was of the people for the people and has national pride.
Bahrain and libya have foreigners in the army and religious differences, so they have no problem attacking protestors. So it's going to have high casualties unfortunately.

[Tesla]

That's unfortunate that so many innocent should loose their lives over having just rule! But in my mind a small price to pay for a fair system and small percentage wise considering the amount money these rulers and elite have compared to us workers.
I believe there are two types of people in this world Masters and Slaves and us Slaves in the west have got it better than before so history tells me. We also have some of those types of dictators that the east has only in disguise - I could mention a few names here like the ____ and even some big corporations who manufacture 85% of the weopons of mass destruction and weapons of war in our own industry. Sadly most of us are sheep and prefer to keep our mouth shut of plead ignorance.

[paul_h]

I had a think about what you said before, about wikileaks.
I certainly think technology (smartphones and the internet) makes it possible for this to happen. Makes it easy to get news out, to arrange a mass protest, all instantly. Thats why government try to control media, and why these countries shut down internet when the protests started. Anonymous* played a role too, helping to get comms out from the affected countries to get info out, attacking the governments own cyber snoops/warfare agents etc, and anonymous have had a lot to do with wikileaks trying to stop it getting shut down.

*http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anonymous_(group)
They aren't exactly a group of people standing only for freedom and justice for all. They are a collective of individuals, some do **** stuff like just DDoS attacks where ever. But some that know what they are doing organize support for democracy and freedom (pro ME freedom and democracy protests, anti scientology etc) by getting access past gov't blockades to provide access to the people wanting 'net access.
Bottom line, with technology and groups such as them around, governments can't prevent peoples access to information.

[Magoo]

Bring on democrasy [ spell check ]. The whole thing seems like a tidal wave gathering momentum in the middle east. The down side is people will be slaughtered in the hundreds or thousands. The world should support them, but keep Hiilary out of the formula. Stupid tart.
Can only imagine the Brent crude rate will climb, Wall street interfares again.
grump

[Tesla]

I agree Magoo - the world should help by confiscating money and assets overseas from these dictators (and their friends) and returning the proceeds to the people of the country of origin. Also the usa should keep their sticky greedy beaks out they have caused enough suffering since ww2. But it's starting to look bad in places like Libya. Not to sure if democrasy works though - we have it in the western world and there is still corruption and secret societies getting in and wasting our tax money. I wonder how many mouths $70,000,000,000 from the former leader of Egypt would feed. We just spend too much money on fighting each other, could we not love each other instead.
Positive thoughts of world peace to all.

[Gary]

A lot of people confuse democracy with freedom. Not the same thing at all. Freedom comes from imposing constitutional limits on the government. If freedom of speech were subject to a vote, it would disappear in a heartbeat.

[MikeHolm]

Beware the tea party wherever they are in the world. Everything that is happening is due to too much population. Just like peak oil, we are nearly at peak population and we are definitely at peak topsoil. When you cannot produce, sustainabily, enough food cheap enough for the whole world revolutions will occur. Previously it has been for local reasons but now, with our global infrastructure it will reach everywhere.

Look up peak topsoil. Did you know that the breadbasket of the world which WAS the northamerican west of US and Canada used to have an average water table 15cm below grade.....now it is 60cm. Look how big that area is, 10 times the size of Europe. We respond with genetically modified food that uses less water but is controlled by big corporations.

The upshot is that the appropriate population for the planet, sustainability, is 1.5 billion. Like it or not, anything above that and we are on borrowed time.

[paul_h]

Libya going ape****.
Air force bombing their own country, AA guns used to fire into crowds*, mercenaries patrolling the streets shooting who ever they see, including people in their own home, and any medical staff around. In fact medical staff are targeted and many people (staff and patients) inside hospitals killed.

Reports that 2 pilots defected when sent into the air to bomb their own cities, they flew to Malta to defect instead.
Unconfirmed reports that i) some others just landed their aircraft in different cities outside of government control, ii) anyone in the armed forces who opposed orders outright brutally killed.

*photos and video online of not piles of bodies in hospitals, but bodies in separate piles outside and inside hospitals.


Edit: ^^ I don't think it's a population problem at all, nature takes care of that, like it does most things. If anything it's a resource problem, and thats something that can be overcome, both through innovation and not producing so much waste in the western hemisphere.

[Gary]

I see it as a government limitation problem. Governments of all types evolve in the direction of dictatorship. Constitutions exist as a means of limiting the authoritarian excesses of government. Freedom is not about voting for one brand of dictatorship or the other brand of dictatorship, it's about limiting governments.

[MikeHolm]

Gary, what about Corporations? The Koch bros are the biggest supporters of the Tea Party and they are certainly not for democracy. They want all environmental controls removed and the EPA disbanded because they are big oil. Are they on the side of people or government?...neither, they have all the money and the power that that money buys. They are in it for themselves.

I agree with you that a strong constitution is VERY important but it MUST apply to the big corporations as well as government and right now it does not. Limit all political financial contributions to candidates to individuals and limit the amounts they can donate. then you will see what happens.

[Gary]

I don't much care who is backing the Tea Party or why. I care very much what they are doing. I am watching them closely here in Florida as we have a new Republican governor who is affiliated with them. I agree with a lot of what they are doing. The liberals need to be taken down a peg or two... or ten. What I don't see them doing is taking the conservatives down a peg or two... or ten. And they need it too. The Tea Partiers are fast losing their credibility as a "small government" popular movement and looking more and more like just another Republican scam.

[monkey spanners]

I'm not overly impressed with democracies either, seems a lot of politicians forget very soon who they are working for.

[MikeHolm]

There seems to be far too much bull in the world, I just saw a report that said 65% of Canadians believe that global warming is real and the government should do something about it, and that includes a carbon tax. But the same report said that only 45% (give or take) of Americans felt the same way and any kind of taxation is out. Meanwhile Europeans almost to the person believe it is happening, supply almost all the latest technology to combat the problem. As an aside, the Alfa Laval refrig handbook i downloaded says to include system COP in calculations in Europe but it is less important in the US....huh?

What this tells me is that some governments do work for the people, some corporations do accept restrictions on what they do (and still make a good profit), for the betterment of the general population and that many Americans and some Canadians as well cannot see that it is possible.

There are some things said publicly in the US that I cannot understand. One is that public healthcare is a socialist plot and is un-American. Then why is the US the only wealthy western government without it? It is not because of the constitution or because it is a affront to freedom. No....it is because some major powerful corporations with ties to the media or the money to make false claims tell Americans so and they believe it.

I, for one, would be dead without it. The government forked out, in my estimation nearly $250,000 to fix my ills. In the US it would have cost the private person or their HMO 4 times that. I didn't have to sign one piece of paper, check my bank account once or worry about anything but getting better. The USA spends double what other western countries spend per capita on health care and there are still 40 million who cannot afford it.

Small government is fine if you are fine with not having anything but the basics. There was a woman I saw on the boob tube at a tea party rally who wanted Obama to slash and burn the debt. When asked if she could see the defense budget reduced the answer was NO NO NO. same with social security, and the same with medicade. These 3 things make up 95% of the annual budget.....

Decisions should be evidence based.....not ideology based and definitely not based on anything Rush Limbaugh or any of the other nuts say.

There I will quit my blathering (unless provoked (damn I cannot find the smiles button))

[Gary]

Personally, I believe global warming is probably real. The part I don't believe is where sending the government all my money and letting them dictate my behavior is going to fix it.

Back in the 1920's, the American Socialist Party had 20 something planks in their party platform. At the top of the list was universal healthcare. It is very definitely a socialist mainstay. It is in fact the only plank in that socialist platform that has not been fulfilled.

I'm happy you pulled through your illness. This begs the question: Why would it cost 4 times as much in the USA? A huge portion of this is regulation. I believe our government has done everything humanly possible to raise healthcare costs, micromanaging everything remotely connected to healthcare, in an effort to force us into universal healthcare. And yes... I'm sure politically connected corporations have been happy to help in this effort.

Small government is a Libertarian ideal. The Tea Party seems to have adopted and adapted it. Their version seems very different than the Libertarians and I note that the Libertarian Party is not cheering them on.

We keep hearing that Social Security and Medicare are a big part of the budget, but in fact these are insurance programs that workers pay into all of their working lives. The SS Fund is in the black and has always been in the black, the contributions having been adjusted many many times over the years to keep it in the black, well into the future. However, the General Fund has been borrowing from the SS Fund for as far back as I can remember, so the fund has been drained, replaced by government IOU's, so the politicians can continue their insane spending spree.

President Clinton is widely perceived as having balanced the budget during his tenure, but he did it on paper by draining all of the earmarked funds, including and especially the SS fund. All smoke and mirrors. The spending continued.

As I see it, we have three wars going on, Iraq, Afghanistan, and the war on drugs. IMO, the most destructive of all of these is the war on drugs. It is fueling anger, hatred and violent crimes throughout our country, not unlike alcohol prohibition did nearly a century ago. We are repeating history... but this time we seem unwilling to call a truce.

Frankly, I worry about the future of America. I worry about what kind of country my granddaughters will grow up in.

[Tesla]

Interesting thoughts there Gary.
As for the health I look to Cuba as providing the best bang for buck - they just provide it where ever you are from. Global warming is more smoke and mirrors, I believe it's just part of a cycle in weather we are in at this time and the figures are selected from selective and supportive time frames. If only countries like the USA, Australia, NZ and a few others stopped spending money on war in other countries back yards and spent that money on peace and health (real health not the benefactors) the world would be a better place to live in. As for the war on drugs I have seen too many doco's about the CIA starting it all.
In Libya I am worried that the current dictator might be totally nuts and try to murder his own people as recent reports are saying. Possibly all our governments are diseased with greed and hidden agendas where they are manipulated by greedy power and money addicts. Sad but what more can I say - it's up to us the little people who pay the bills and work for the greedy in our world and last but not least the East is leading the way to say enough is enough, hopefully towards a more peaceful and happier world.

[Gary]

There are two ways to win a foot race. You can outrun your competitor or you can hire a politician to trip him. The former makes for a much better race. Competition is good for everyone. It brings enormous progress while holding down prices. I think if we eliminated the laws that have been passed to stifle competition, we would all be a lot better off. Monopoly is the enemy.

[Gary]

As you can probably tell, I lean very heavily towards libertarianism with maybe a little georgism mixed in... neither of which is likely to go mainstream anytime soon.

[Tesla]

I was taught a school that it was all about competition. When I entered the work force I learned quickly it was all about cooperation. We can all achieve a greater result from team work - working together in a community just like how we live. I am not too familiar with political labels like left or right as they seem a bit jumbled. I had one teacher which I remember teaching the three C's cooperation, consideration and courtesy. It just seems right to me like a gentleman. Do we really need politics or politicians?
Peace brother not war.

[paul_h]

In Libya I am worried that the current dictator might be totally nuts and try to murder his own people as recent reports are saying.

Oh gadiffi is nuts alright. Proved it in a rambling 90min speech yesterday.

[MikeHolm]

Gary, I stand corrected on the your point about SS but the stories of people not being able to afford health care are front and center. It is crazy to have someone pay $3-400 for health care monthly and then have it cut off when they are sick because the companies profits are in jeopardy. You asked how can the US be spending way more on the med system than Britain, Canada, Germany etc. The answer is in efficiency and profits.

As you know, any company must make a profit and 30%+ is the pretax norm. So that is a big part right there. Walk into any HMO or hospital and look at how many people are there doing accounting and billing per person. Insurers have always said that this is a very big portion of their costs. Hospitals here do not have to do any of that, bandages are not counted and costed out per person and there is no one at the hospital with a VISA machine. That takes away a huge expense.

Drugs are another big expense. There is a huge range of drug costs around the world for the same product and a lot of it is based on purchasing power. The Ontario ministry of Health negotiated with the drug companies on behalf of 12 million people and we know that there are a lot of internet based pharmacies that sell to Americans from Canada, the drugs are cheaper.

Doctors here don't get paid as much as they do in the states. If a specialist gets $600,000 here they would get at least $1,000,000 in the US and they don't give as wide a battery of tests, just because they can. Doctors in Europe are paid the same or less than in Canada. Most doctors here, especially GPs are run their own private company and bill the Government. The rates per procedure is set by a negotiated schedule by the doctors association and the government. It is then hands off for the govt.

The government does not control anything that is done to an individual patient. It is entirely the decision of the patient, doctor or surgeon and the family and cost is not an issue. Just like HMOs, some drugs are covered and some are not. Due to an allergic reaction I needed a drug that was not on the list and I had to get special permission for it but that was because it was not approved for general use yet. I did get it though and it was $10,000 injection verse $300 for the other one.

There are times when a monopoly is better than outright competition but you must trust that the monopoly is in the hands of someone who has your best interests at heart. The government is the only CEO you can vote out, you cannot do that with a private health insurer.

I wouldn't say that this is true in every industry, I would never want a monopoly on TV sets or condensers, there is no point but other than from an ideological point of view there is no reason health care shouldn't be centralized. There are a lot more reasons but I sometimes blabber on too much.

[paul_h]

Massacres still continuing in Libya.
A lot of their armed forces have quit or defected though, as well as many foreign dignitaries.

Also lots of commercial/private aircraft refused landing in other countries (gaddafis family and cronies trying to flee to malta, lebabnon and other places and getting turned away )

Europeans are not happy, many europeans stuck in the oil fields awaiting rescue, and of course their governments can't/won't help, and of course because of this:

http://ethnographyofflight.blogspot....d-germany.html posted:
Politicians across Europe must now be hurriedly purging their photo albums, removing all the handshakes with Gaddafi they've had taken over the past decade of rapprochement. Because it's Europe, not the USA, which has most vigorously supported the Libyan dictator, and which should be most ashamed at how they put business above human rights. Germany, sending civil engineers to develop Libya's infrastructure. France, selling weapons and buying oil. Italy, trying to stop the arrival of migrants across the Mediterranean. And Britain, mainly through Tony Blair's peculiar compulsion to embrace every dictator available.

Here I'll pick on Germany -- not for being the worst, but because the German media is so far showing remarkably little awareness of the country's complicity with the Libyan regime.

Let's go back to 2004. The four countries above had secured the lifting of the EU arms embargo against Libya. Denmark and Sweden had mentioned human rights, but the general feeling was that, by abandoning its biological weapons program and renouncing international terrorism, Libya had conceded on all the truly important issues.

No sooner was the embargo lifted, than German Chancellor Gerhard Schröder landed in Tripoli with an entourage of 25 businessmen. In passing he praised what he called the 'political change' in Libya. But his main reason for visiting was the promotion of German business. Openly so, and with the support of much of the German political spectrum, from his own center-left SPD, through the pro-business FPD to the conservative CDU. So he shook hands, made introductions, closed deals. He was photographed in an elaborate tent, and at an oil well, looking equally out-of place in both locations.

What didn't emerge until four years later was that, alongside oil and engineering negotiations, Schroeder was fixing up a deal whereby elite German commandos would train the Libyan security services.

This caused controversy when it emerged in 2008. Not as military support for a dictator -- the €43m of German jamming equipment bought by Libya in the last 2 years has raised few eyebrows -- but because it was coming being provided by German security personnel.

In fact, the Byzantine structure of the deal shows everybody knew they were bending the rules to breaking point. The German officers would receive €15,000 each, paid by a private security firm which in turn got a €1.6m cheque from Libya. They would take time off from their elite anti-terrorist unit. Their superiors thought they were vacationing in Tunisia, though the German embassy in Libya knew their real purpose. The officers set up shop in a barracks in Tripoli, where for 6 months they taught their Libyan counterparts how to storm buildings, board ships and operate out of helicopters.

Training can't be identified in the same way as you might see 'Made in Germany' on a used shell. But it's no less real; we can be sure that a hundred or so of the Gaddafi loyalists struggling to keep control of Tripoli have been trained by the German security forces.

[There's much, much more to say on this theme, a whole decade of shameful behaviour that wasn't even kept secret. How Europe, terrified of refugees, wanted a well-armed authoritarian regime as a buffer-zone against African migrants. How weapons shipments were banned simply through fear they'd go to Sudan, not from any concern about Gaddafi having them. How Switzerland tried to punish Gaddafi's son for assaulting his staff, enraged Libya, and was brought into line by other European states desperate to keep trade going. But it'll all have to wait for tomorrow]

edit: my avatar is because Mubarak in egypt blamed the revolution on KFC in the early days. The protesters massed in Tahrir Square and thats where KFC is, so he thought KFC must be sponsoring the protesters.