Have you looked at this Greek tragedy? Rioting youths out of control, frightened policeman shoots one of them, riots, looting and burning ensue, then a general strike. Just in case you haven't picked up on the crisis, this explains it clearly:
Gewalt auf den Straßen, Misstrauen in den Köpfen: Die schweren Krawalle sind nur das sichtbare Symptom der griechischen Staatskrise, tatsächlich reicht der Vertrauensverlust viel tiefer. Viele Bürger denken ähnlich wie die Anarchos - sie halten die Eliten ihres Landes für unfähig und korrupt.
Robert James Lee Hawke was an Australian PM and his story has parallels today which you'll see shortly. Wiki says:
Part of Hawke's work at the ACTU was the presentation of its annual case for higher wages to the national wages tribunal, the Conciliation and Arbitration Commission. He attained such success and prominence in this role that in 1969 he was encouraged to run for ACTU President, despite the fact that he had never held elected office in a trade union.
Hawke declared publicly that "socialist is not a word I would use to describe myself" and his approach to government was pragmatic. He concerned himself with making improvements to workers' lives from within the traditional institutions of government, rather than to any ideological theory.
That's the text but my memory is that wherever there was a dispute between government and workers, especially a long running one, Hawke would be called in and before sundown, he usually came out with an agreement which ended the impasse. I recall he never stayed to soak up the adulation but went on to the next one.
Personally charismatic, with those big bushy eyebrows, [it was the 70s, remember], it was clear that the parliamentary scene at the time was dire. The conservatives had made a hash of things and a lame duck leader was in charge. The Labor leader himself didn't look any too promising either and there were rumblings up and down the country: "Let's get Hawke in."
Trouble was that he neither held a seat nor had any parliamentary experience whatsoever. Didn't matter. A lot of shovel work was done, he was found a safe seat in Melbourne, he got in, displaced the current leader, fought and won the upcoming election, all on a wave of near euphoria.
There was considerable comment at the time on his "honeymoon ride" with the press and for about a year and a half, he could do no wrong. Despite his personally aggressive demeanour, his game was consensus and negotiation, in which he was skilled. His less charismatic Treasurer, Paul Keating, was the second half of the equation and he was damned good at what he did - I think no one disputed that at the time. They were a powerful team.
To paraphrase what my friend said yesterday about Obama, in the light of Ruthie's comments - when everyone sees a possible saviour, a solution to the economic woes, when he is eloquent and charismatic and infinitely preferable to the alternative, when he represents the best chance a party has had for a while to gain office, when he has a set of policies which seem sane [to an uncritical mind], then blandishments like "yes we can", "change we can believe in", "enough talk - time now to do" "I'm a pretty straight type of guy" and so on seem to show the man as the type of go-getter who is going to get things done.
People fall for it every time and the Leader is almost always swept in on a landslide. The opposition are irrelevant and attempts to portray the charismatic Leader as evil - the British Tories used a demonic face of Blair, a ploy which backfired - then it only serves to harden people's support of the new man.
"Give him a chance." "Let him govern before we judge him."
The minutiae on eligibility, for example, are barely looked at. A birth extract lands on the desk for scrutiny - yeah, it's fine. All's in order. No one is either interested nor sees the necessity at the time to investigate rigorously and talk of "enhanced FBI checks" by Ruthie yesterday must be seen in the light of the perfunctory way they were handled, as has turned out to be the case at the eleventh hour.
In Blair's case, Britain now sees the monster they let in and there were few tears when he handed over the PMship, the culmination of a sweetheart deal, with zero to do with the will of the people and still, today, with Britain going down the drain, the people can't see it for what it was.
The internet can.
So, in the euphoria of the coming of the messiah, anyone who dares challenge the incoming juggernaut with, "Hey, just how eligible is this person?" is seen as pathetic, a last ditch attempt to grab power, a crank, a bunch of nutters or worse in America, a Truther.
Reasoned debate has flown out the window and the people are off on another blind stampede towards The Light.
Take Christianity, for example. I've found the actual text he spoke, without annotation:
Persuasive, isn't he? Looks good.
On the surface, a reasonable person would have to agree that stories like Abraham and Isaac, another time, another place, are not relevant except in the context of the test of faith at the time. Obama though chooses that and other tricky old testament passages to illustrate that Christianity overall, therefore, has little relevance for a country with many faiths and even no faith at all.
Most would agree.
The problem is that, in a sleight of hand [or rather, of speech], he ignores the hope, faith and charity aspect of Christianity, the new testament passages, its real driving force, the forgiving nature of it.
Look how our society, based on the Judaeo-Christian tradition, tolerates other religions and spawned modern democracy, such as it is. Look at ourselves, our natures today - are we fanatics? Compare that, say, to Saudi Arabia or Burma.
Obama ignores the positives in order to illustrate that "religion", in general, shouldn't drive public policy, a point most, including me, would agree with.
The trouble is, this opens the door to relativism and all the societally corrosive aspects of multiculturalism, as we've seen. It's no accident that many Muslims and Jews find it astounding that a "Christian" society can tolerate bans on its own festivals for fear of offending them. Most societies embrace their roots and are proud of them. That's a measure of the fact that Christianity is not a state affair - it's a personal commitment but it just happened that enough people had that belief for the society to have been labelled Christian.
Obama says people haven't read their bibles.
He's right, in the sense of not having read the gospels, which he carefully avoids in his argument, for good reason. As with most charismatics of this type, he is a clever man who chooses his words to great effect. However, that effect is not wholesome in its extrapolation into the future. Its effect is to break down the glue which bound the society together and made it great in the first place.
His first act has been to emasculate the society's Judaeo-Christian conscience, consciousness and roots, a rootless man promoting a society in his own image. So with nothing but a pluralistic hotch-potch of values to aspire to, the only values the new society has are those promulgated by the state - it's vision of the tolerant, all-inclusive society, dedicated to impossible equality and the mediocratization of thought.
And in this world, in America at least, there is one fixed point - Obama.
I wouldn't mind betting that the vast majority of those who read this would not concur with the sentiments expressed here, except for some "right wingers". Nevertheless, let me put it this way. At every point along the Obama trail, the man does not add up.
His background, the way he has come to power, his statements of loyalty versus his real views, the enormous efforts in covering up his antecedents, the way he rides public opinion to defy the organs of state, the way he has people mesmerized - this is Blair again, Hawke [who turned out to be human after all], even Hitler.
This is enormous danger, not only for America but for the world.
And to answer all the foregoing: "You're too late, it's a done deal. Just let it go."
And to answer the answer: "No! When something is just plain wrong, it must be pursued."
Lemsip at the ready - check. Bed ready - check. Teeth cleaned - check. DVD ready - check. See ya tomorrow, G-d willing.
I'll put in a little prayer for all you poor folk with throats, heads, chests and sniffles and hope we all get better by the end of the week. Plus Angus's foot. :)
* Hillary Clinton is only the biggest name in what has become the second coming of the Clintonites and other old, familiar faces to Washington.
* Obama's new chief of staff Rahm Emanuel was an insider in the Clinton White House.
* So was Susan Rice, who will serve as UN ambassador.
* Attorney general-designate Eric Holder and homeland security secretary nominee Janet Napolitano were both in the Clinton era justice department.
* Bill Richardson, who will become commerce secretary, was energy secretary in the 90s.
* Housing and Human Services nominee Tom Daschle is a long-time member of the Washington 'good-old-boys' network.
* Lawrence Summers, Obama's new top economic adviser, was Clinton's treasury secretary.
* Obama opted to keep a Bush administration appointment, Robert Gates, in charge of the Pentagon, and to appoint a jut-jawed retired general, Jim Jones, as his national security adviser.
* Both men opposed Obama's single most important military and foreign policy promise, to set a timetable for pulling US troops out of Iraq.
* Jones backed McCain in the election and Gates is as Republican-establishment as it gets.
* Including Joe Biden, the vice-president elect, all of the incoming president's core foreign policy team backed the ill-fated invasion of Iraq in 2003.
* The chairman of Obama's economic advisory council, Paul Volcker, isn't from the Clinton era - he is of an even earlier vintage, having served as Federal Reserve chairman under Jimmy Carter three decades ago.
Where is the representation of the young people who voted him in on the change platform - just asking?
I asked Ms. Obama specifically, “Were you present when your grandson Barack Obama was born in Kenya?” this was asked to her in translation twice, and both times she specifically replied, “Yes! Yes she was! She was present when Obama was born.”
Though, some few younger relatives, including Mr. Ogombe, have obviously been versed to counter such facts with the common purported information from the American news media that Obama was born in Hawaii, Ms. Sarah Hussein Obama was very adamant that her grandson, Senator Barack Hussein Obama, was born in Kenya, and that she was present and witnessed his birth in Kenya, not the United States.
When Mr. Ogombe attempted to counter Sarah Obama’ clear responses to the question, verifying the birth of Senator Barack Obama in Kenya, I asked Mr. Ogombe, how she could be present at Barack Obama’s birth if the Senator was born in Hawaii, but Ogombe would not answer the question, instead he repeatedly tried to insert that, “No, No, No, He was born in the United States!”
But during the conversation, Ms. Sarah Hussein Obama never changed her reply that she was in deed present when Senator Barack Obama was born in Kenya.
It's a real pain being ill and the sooner it ends the better. The Chinese might have some wise words of advice on that:
Brown with a rough, hairy coating, yams are ugly in the eyes of many. But in traditional Chinese medicine, it is an outstanding health food which can help reinforce energy and nourish blood. And now, from November to January, is the best time for yams.
The benefits of this vegetable were first identified more than 2,000 years ago with the "Shennong Bencao Jing" (Shennong's Herbal Classic) recording that "neutral" yam can help reinforce energy, dispel pathogenic cold and dampness, nourish muscles and improve hearing and eyesight.
Famous Ming Dynasty (1368-1644) pharmacist Li Shizhen concluded that yams helped to reinforce blood and energy, benefited the kidneys, spleen and stomach, stopped diarrhea, dissolved phlegm and nourished skin and hair.
So there you go. Get your hairy yam today and get healthy! Lee Shizhen [pronounced shitsen] recommends it.
