{"id":29059,"date":"2014-09-19T10:02:15","date_gmt":"2014-09-19T00:02:15","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/billmitchell.org\/blog\/?p=29059"},"modified":"2014-09-19T10:02:15","modified_gmt":"2014-09-19T00:02:15","slug":"friday-lay-day-8","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/billmitchell.org\/blog\/?p=29059","title":{"rendered":"Friday lay day"},"content":{"rendered":"

\t\t\t\tIts my Friday lay day, which means a relative blog rest day. Relative is relative. This week saw the ramping up of the so-called ‘War on Terror’, which was a smokescreen George Bush and his conservative allies used to illegally invade countries that they didn’t like or who had strategic assets (such as oil) and who they knew couldn’t defend themselves. The pretext was to make the world safer but the reality is that it has made the world more dangerous. If we are to believe the press, yesterday’s raids in Sydney and Brisbane and subsequent press reporting suggests that some random citizens were about to be dragged off the street, beheaded with a nasty looking sword inscribed with Arabic characters, and then paraded on YouTube for the whole world to see. I think the whole ‘western’ response to all this is unwise.
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\nI don’t excuse the YouTube beheadings we have seen recently. Of course, we don’t know that the videos are real given even Beyonce Knowles allegedly alters staircase angles to get a wider ‘gap’ (Source<\/a>).<\/p>\n

But we assume they have occurred and they are pretty terrible. But before we step into judge, and I am not intending to descend into the mire of post modernist relativism here, the data I discussed yesterday where an Australian CEO gets 85 times more than the average annual wage is also pretty terrible and incites rather destructive responses from those who feel left behind.<\/p>\n

The US case of the CEO Pay Ratio above 200 and one CEO getting 1750 or whatever times the average wage is beyond the pale and signifies a totally unbalanced and sick system.<\/p>\n

I think deliberately making millions of people unemployed, who are already behind the eight-ball in society, is pretty terrible.<\/p>\n

I think bailing out Wall Street banksters who seem to have prospered from the GFC is pretty terrible.<\/p>\n

I think locking up whistleblowers like Bradley (Chelsea) Manning is pretty terrible. <\/p>\n

I think blasting children and civilians on the West Bank who have no possible chance at an equal response is pretty terrible.<\/p>\n

I think locking refugees and their children up in mosquito-infested prisons on Pacific Islands and then being responsible for out of control security guards murdering one of these poor souls is pretty terrible.<\/p>\n

We could go on. The point is that right and virtue is not an exclusive property of one side in all of this.<\/p>\n

Going back into Iraq with our armies is just what the extreme elements want us to do. It is a recipe for continued disaster.<\/p>\n

The Modern Monetary Theory (MMT) solution would be to start by diverting the billions spent on making bombs and weapons and sending troops into fights they cannot win into job creation and poverty alleviation programs.<\/p>\n

I know there is a lot of conservatively orientated research that allegedly ‘proves’ that terrorism (by which they mean Islamic militancy) is not caused by unemployment and poverty. They claim that notable suicide bombers are sometimes highly educated or come from well-to-do backgrounds.<\/p>\n

But there is a massive surge in young people from all nations who are being attracted to the ideas that the western ideology is corrupt, terrorist itself in leaning and deserves to be obliterated. The well-educated might be involved but hundreds and thousands of poor, unemployed youth are also being recruited because they have no sense of hope otherwise.<\/p>\n

If we started a War on Unemployment and Poverty and seriously funded job creation programs and public education, then we would be providing an alternative opportunity set for those that the capitalist system – whether it be in the US or in Syria – has rejected and denied any opportunity for prosperity.<\/p>\n

Australia should give millions of dollars to these sorts of programs via our external aid and stop playing lackey to the martial ambitions of the Americans.<\/p>\n

I was involved in a research project examining the prospects for Lebanese youth in Western Sydney a few years ago. This is where the raids and arrests were targetted yesterday and where the alleged random beheading plot was being nurtured.<\/p>\n

We found massive disadvantage and social alienation that was driven by very high unemployment rates, poorly funded public schools and lack of adequate urban infrastructure (youth recreation, entertainment etc). All were products of the Federal and State government fiscal austerity obsession over the last 20-30 years.<\/p>\n

What would you do if there was a powerful set of thoughts being pumped into your community which explained this plight in terms of a corrupt western culture and you had no hope to participate in mainstream society in any material sense through legal conduct?<\/p>\n

Being governed by this lot<\/strong><\/p>\n

Here is our Prime Minister (centre), Foreign Minister (left) and Attorney General (right) standing under the sign that was custom built for them.<\/p>\n

The Treasurer was absent but I am sure he wanted to be standing there under the sign.<\/p>\n

\"Australia_Terror_Trio\"<\/a><\/p>\n

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Music – going mainstream today<\/strong><\/p>\n

We will go mainstream today. One of my favourite tracks. I was listening to it this morning as I walked to the dentist to cheer me up. Given the week just gone in the world we all need cheering up a bit.<\/p>\n

I bought the record – Axis: Bold as Love<\/a> – soon after it came out in late 1967. I was a young teenager and wanted to learn to play like the genius.<\/p>\n

This album was really just the warm up set for his next (and last) album – Electric Ladyland that came out in 1968.<\/p>\n

Pure joy.<\/p>\n