Perspectives: Food For Thought

Woof! I’ve spent days trying to catch up, and I doubt I’m there yet. But, let’s start with longish term perspectives, beginning with Reagan. In a sense, one might argue that the shape of the Deep State achieved something like its current form with Reagan. Perhaps a trivia question would be a good way to start: Who was Reagan’s VP? Haha! Just kidding!

Anyway, we start with Rudy Havenstein—and I have no idea who he is—comparing Trump and Reagan. Rudy likes Reagan:

Rudy Havenstein, Senior Markets Commentator. @RudyHavenstein

From my 12/1/23 chat with Demetri Kofinas...

https://rudy.substack.com/p/my-full-interview-with-demetri-kofinas…

Will Schryver takes exception—or, anyway, he adds an interesting and much darker perspective that I summarized in my own way up top:

Will Schryver @imetatronink

I wasn't disagreeing with your take so much as attempting to remind you that the Reagan administration was more aggressively imperialistic than any preceeding it. And notwithstanding his image and messaging, his tenure set in motion virtually every fatal ill that has conducted us to the current moment in time: Greenspan, utterly exorbitant military spending, which then spawned unfettered unilateral military adventurism and the consolidation of the military/industrial complex into an uncontrolled black hole of waste, corruption, and evil misuse.

I liked Reagan. I believe he generally meant well. But I can see in retrospect that he was as much a figurehead as any of his successors, and in a great many respects, the Reagan administration established the precedents upon which all the subsequent perverse excesses were founded.

At least that is my view of the matter.

11:32 PM · Jan 8, 2024

Wow! Loss of innocence! But Havenstein’s point is right on target for where America is as a nation. 1980 was a long time ago, culturally.

Thinking back on Reagan, I recall he escalated the Cold War against the Evil Empire, but then helped bring it to an end with Gorbie. Yep, things were different back then. We had a vast arsenal of nuclear missiles, for example. I guess we still do, but now a lot of them don’t work (I think the ones on subs do still work, but subs have their own problems):

Minuteman III Missiles Are Too Old to Upgrade Anymore, STRATCOM Chief Says

The aging Minuteman III intercontinental ballistic missiles that have formed the land-based leg of the nation's nuclear deterrent triad for half a century can no longer be upgraded and require costly replacements, Adm. Charles Richard, head of U.S. Strategic Command, said Tuesday.

"Let me be very clear: You cannot life-extend the Minuteman III [any longer]," he said of the 400 ICBMs that sit in underground silos across five states in the upper Midwest.

"We can't do it at all. ... That thing is so old that, in some cases, the drawings don't exist anymore [to guide upgrades]," Richard said in a Zoom conference sponsored by the Defense Writers Group.

Where the drawings do exist, "they're like six generations behind the industry standard," he said, adding that there are also no technicians who fully understand them. "They're not alive anymore."

Could anything go wrong with the American Empire throwing its weight around, these days, backed up largely by a no longer reliable nuclear deterrent—not in full? Nobody’s really asking. There’s no national debate on our foreign policy.

Hey, speaking of nukes, did you know that back during the Cold War the CIA thought that traditional Hakka dwellings were missile silos? True.

More military stuff. We’re now getting reports that those best in the world Leopard 2 tanks that Germany sent to Ukraine aren’t actually combat capable, although they look very cool on parade. So we’re not the only country needing “costly replacements” for our military equipment. Thanks, Putin!

Speaking of needing replacements … parade time won’t be the same without him:

Most people think something deep is up, although you’d hardly guess that from the MSM. Larry Johnson suggests there may be a simple explanation:

… could it be that Austin knows, based on multiple personal interactions with Biden, that the President does not know who he [Austin] is and that Biden is so mentally addled he he does not realize he has a Secretary of Defense? At a minimum, I think the news that Biden was kept completely in the dark is setting off alarm bells in Europe and Israel.

It’s not like we’re at war, or anything like that, when an actual SecDef might have a function, right? Is this how it works: Since Reagan so much of what CinC’s used to closely run has been delegated to the Deep State, and the experts have turned out to be incompetent? Just that: incompetent. Incompetent in the areas of their supposed expertise, for reasons of ideology blinding them to reality—Neocons, Wokesters, a whole witch’s brew. It’s the culture, stupid!

This whole business of expensive replacements for weapons systems we’re discovering—thanks to our war on Russia—are not so useful is playing into an increasingly dicey international monetary system. Andrei Martyanov deals with the latest developments in the shrinking role of the USD—Russian and Iranian banks can now deal directly. He quotes from a Russian (RIA) source and then add his own commentary:

"We have connected the transmission systems of (financial - ed.) messages of the two countries with each other. This means that the banks of the two countries no longer need Switzerland to communicate with each other and commercial banks of both countries can establish intermediary relations with each other. The exporter can set the Russian side an account in rials and receive money from it from Russian banks in Iran,” …

Remarkably, though, at this stage both the United States and Russia would rather see Europe weak and lacking any ambitions. There is a logical explanation for this on both sides, but if the United States preserves itself as a country and sees some new crop of statesmen emerging, Russia will talk to the US. With Europe--no.

But now, it is all up to respective central banks in Russia and Iran how to settle accounts and nobody cares what Washington says. The trend not only continues but accelerates, and Russia and China settle accounts in Rubles and Yuans, which are supported by immense industrial capacity of China and immense Russia's resources and... the finest fighting force in history.

A lot of things have changed since the Reagan days, and the standing of the USD is a big part of that. The decline of the dollar means the decline of the Empire, but history suggests that declining empires often strike out in less rational ways to maintain their status. In modern times this has often failed spectacularly. The geopolitical basics, resource basics, economic and financial basics, are all working against the American Empire at this point. No outcome is settled, but we need to come to grips with reality.

The Neocons thought they had a strategy for maintaining empire indefinitely—it led from Kiev to Moscow to Beijing. Woops! And now the Middle East is back to the fore in a big way, and the American people aren’t being told the truth—hey, “need to know,” right? That’s a serious corruption of responsible politics. We’re being told that Israel’s genocide and ethnic cleansing is proceeding according to plan, but MoA points to Palestine SitRep: Sanitizing Language While The War Escalates. The empire is in a box, with a supposed ally trying to push us into a no-win war:

… Israel's declared aim of eliminating [Hamas] is certainly not in sight. Hamas missile strike on targets in Israel continue. Even though most are harmless they cause alarms. In the north of Israel the tit for tat attacks between Hizbullah and the occupation forces continues likewise.

Ali Hashem علي هاشم @alihashem_tv - 9:54 UTC · Jan 9, 2024

Hezbollah announces the targeting of the northern region command headquarters of the Israeli army in the city of Safed (13 kilometres from the border) with a number of explosives laden drones. The attack was in retaliation to Israel’s killing of Saleh Arouri and Wissam Tawil.

This was the deepest attack by Hizbullah since October 8. Later Israel attacked the burial of Wissam Tawil, a member of Hizbullah's special forces. The number of alarms in Israel from rockets launched from the north are growing on a daily basis.

Israel is driving this escalation while Hizbullah is still holding back. Its missiles could reach far further and will do so should Israel continue to escalate.

The U.S. is alarmed about the Israeli attempt to draw it into the conflict:

In private conversations, the administration has warned Israel against a significant escalation in Lebanon. If it were to do so, a new secret assessment from the Defense Intelligence Agency (DIA) found that it will be difficult for the Israel Defense Forces (IDF) to succeed because its military assets and resources would be spread too thin given the conflict in Gaza, according to two people familiar with those findings.

Private warnings are useless as long as Israel still gets U.S. support.

The Biden administration wants to be seen supporting Israel.

It also wants to be seen tamping down and ending the conflict.

But it can't have it both ways.

Simplicius the Thinker yesterday produced a heartfelt piece in which he tried to come to grips with the question of “how immorally and reprehensibly sick a government can become when it is given unfettered moral license to act as it pleases without any international accountability whatsoever.” You may or may not find his explanation convincing, but I highly recommend the article because it’s an issue that Americans need to address—WE as a nation are enabling this immoral and reprehensibly sick war.

IDF Claims Gaza City Victory

As it happens, this interview was published only two weeks before October 7:

An Israeli pilot refusenik reflects on the state of Israeli fascism and apartheid

Yonatan Shapira reflects on the Israeli drift to Judeo-Nazism, as well as a "60 Minutes" interview with an Israeli soldier who says in order to bomb houses with children in them, she has to be confident of the moral values of her commander.

A former Israeli Air Force pilot, Yonatan Shapira, has described the Israeli government and army as “terrorist organisations” run by “war criminals.”

Updates via Megatron_ron. I believe those who see continual escalation in the future are correct.

Blinken and Netanyahu discussed introducing a UN delegation to the northern Gaza Strip, where it will examine the possibility of establishing temporary buildings for Gazans who will return to the northern Strip.

Blinken informed Netanyahu that there is a need to plan for the return of Gazans to the northern #Gaza Strip.

Netanyahu informed Blinken that #Israel would not allow the return of Gazans to the northern Gaza Strip at this stage.

Source: KAN channel [Israel]

Former Mossad chief Ephraim Halevy told The British Times:

"Netanyahu failed to subdue Hamas and must leave now. Sinwar and the #Hamas fighters have not lost the will to fight, and that is why they refuse to negotiate.

I was invited to meet the current Mossad chief several times, and I believe our losses are painful."

The Israeli Ministry of Health has placed Hospitals and Clinics across Northern Israel including Rambam Medical Center in the City of Haifa on High Alert in preparation to receive Thousands of possible Casualties.

Megatron: The ground is being prepared for a major war with Hezbollah.

How did we get to this point, of actually arming genocidal criminals? By turning a blind eye to manifest injustice. Virtue signalling is always easier than getting informed. Letting self designated experts govern without our input. Letting money dominate our politics. I have no answers, just perspective. Again, it’s the culture, stupid!