Tuesday, July 24, 2007

Your Kids as Collateral: The Coming Blood-for-Debt Swap



Feeding Molech: How it was done in ancient Israel (above), and how it is done today (below).




To the surprise of no sentient being, our rulers have been deceiving us regarding their plans for the restive Mesopotamian province of their empire.


General Petraeus, the military messiah du jour, is to offer a critical review of the surge in September, we were told. On second thought that review won't come until November -- no, better make that sometime after the Hominid in the White House and his adult handlers hand off the war to their successors:


"[T]he American [military] command [in Baghdad] has prepared a detailed plan that foresees a significant American role for the next two years. The classified plan, which represents the coordinated strategy of the top American commander and the American ambassador.... The detailed document, known as the Joint Campaign Plan, is an elaboration of the new strategy President Bush signaled in January when he decided to send five additional American combat brigades and other units to Iraq. That signaled a shift from the previous strategy, which emphasized transferring to Iraqis the responsibility for safeguarding their security."


Such duplicity! Surely the sainted Gen. Petraeus was deceived!


Well, no: Actually, he helped develop the plan. It shouldn't surprise us that Petreaus has no plan to "stand up" an Iraqi army and security force, since he's the guy who presided over the failed attempt in 2004 to do precisely that.


Which is to say that the "surge" was a simple escalation, just as the Bush Regime's most cynical critics have always maintained.


(Here's a handy axiom: To determine the reality behind any Bush administration policy, always assume that the most cynical critics are exactly right. They could be wrong someday, but they haven't yet.)


The chief complication here is that the Regime's timeline is out of joint with the "Broken Army Clock," which (as Time points out) dictates that "troop levels will begin to wane in March 2008, no matter what Congress decides in September...."


To sustain the surge -- even the version that serves as the agreed-upon official lie -- the Regime will have to settle on one of three options next year: Calling up more reservists, expanding duty tours from 15 to 18 months, or some form of conscription. I believe we'll get the first two next year, and the third in 2009. Unless, of course, our rulers do the only moral and sensible thing and withdraws from Iraq right now. And no serious discussion of that option is to be permitted.


Once again, none of this should be considered surprising, particularly since the British are already out of troops.


To paraphrase Machiavelli, if a ruler has gold, he can always purchase iron. However, our rulers have been financing their empire on debt -- and the market for our official debt instruments is rapidly contracting. One key contributor to the dollar's accelerating decline is the collapse of the real estate/mortgage industry, which is why the Bush Regime dispatched its minister of housing to Beijing to beg the Chinese to buy mortgage securities.


But at some point, those who are financing the empire will gag on our worthless dollars. At that point, the prospect the Bu'ushists have used to intimidate war critics into silence -- that of leaving our troops stranded in Iraq without money or means to get out -- may become a reality.
Unless something else is found to collateralize the loans on which the Empire depends.


Washington and its internal provinces (once known as "free and independent states") are already pawning infrastructure to foreign creditors. And as noted above, initial steps have already been taken to sell off the housing sector to Beijing. So what's left?


Once the appliances have been pawned, the car and house has been repossessed, maybe the only thing left to sell would be the blood in the debtor's veins. I think that's where we're headed after the 2009 election -- assuming that we have one.


Our rulers expect to use our flesh and blood -- our children -- as collateral. Conscription and universal national service would be a blood tax imposed on behalf of the foreign creditors funding our empire.


This blood-for-debt swap becomes even likelier when one takes into account the coming collapse of domestic "entitlement" programs, as described by this questioner in last night's Democratic Presidential "Debate" -- predictably enough, none of the Democrat aspirants to the Imperial Purple was willing to address the question:





Here's how Anne Williamson, one of the most astute analysts of the Power Elite, summarizes the coming Grand Bargain:

"Thanks to the enterprising left, a palatable framework of `universal service' is evolving, in which all of America's young people will be registered for national service and, drawing on personal information gleaned from the giant government databases now being built, will be assigned to community service, combat service, or homeland defense. The kicker may be a requirement of completed service before access to higher education and government financing for it will be granted. It is not improbable to see a `deal' over Social Security reform on the horizon, i.e. in exchange for reduced benefits and an increase in the retirement age Boomer seniors will be guaranteed the services of enscripted `community brigades' for home care."


... what it means to you, if you're of draft age, is slavery.


This bargain, Williamson speculates, would include some form of international tax to fund the increasingly militarized multinational institutions that were so conspicuously scorned by the Bush Regime -- except for those situations in which Security Council resolutions can be invoked to justify aggressive war.


No American would relish paying such an international tax, of course, and American parents wouldn't readily embrace a return to conscription, "but -- having chosen security over liberty -- they will eventually resign themselves to their children's `universal service.'... And once the intentionally confused and clueless American electorate sees that much of the costs of the War on Terror are being fobbed off on other people through an international tax, that the need for domestic cannon fodder is reduced, and that in their dotage they will have the personal services of young people (to whom they are not related and therefore otherwise not obliged) enforced by the US military [via the Selective Service System], it's quite likely they will largely cheer on the new arrangements."


The Bu'ushists are not going to permit a withdrawal from Iraq; in fact, were a recall to begin right now, an orderly withdrawal would require at least two years. (Full-fledged cutting and running, on the other hand, would take a fraction of that time, which is why it's the only intelligent approach and thus a forbidden subject.)


What this means that some version of what is discussed above will most likely become a reality very soon. I hope I'm wrong. I'm quite confident that I'm not.


Please be sure to visit The Right Source and the Liberty Minute archive.

9 comments:

Jerri Lynn Ward, J.D. said...

When Medicare D came out, I was ranting to my hairdresser (who is actually an astute business owner of a successful salon)about it. She supported the measure because her 80 year old father had to take medicine for an overactive bladder and was halving his dosage to save money. I said, how can we justify possibly taxing young people to pay for Baby Boomers going into the program. How could young people, given the demographics, support families if they were taxed to fund this program.

Her comment: Well, maybe they should just have to wait to have families and children so that these programs can be financed.

You are so right that many out there would support a system of slavery for the purpose of caring for us Baby Boomers in our dotage.

By the way, less than 10 years ago, my hairdresser's father and mother traveled the country on their goldwing motorcycles.

Taylor Conant said...

Will,

While I find your continual references to Bush as a child with "adult handlers" quite funny, I feel the phrasing implies that SOMEWHERE in the government there are responsible adults making sure things don't get too out of hand-- taking an objective view of reality, it seems obvious that there are not. The more appropriate metaphor, then, would be that Bush is simply one of the craziest (or perhaps the biggest drooler) of the inmates running the asylum.

But I'm not expecting you to give up your cherished metaphor that easily, so in the mean time I'll just continue laughing at it while I still can, that is, before all the things you mentioned in your post just now finally play out and make life in this country quite unliveable.

Atrocious, horrifying stuff. I don't believe in the "if you don't like it here, go somewhere else" line of political reasoning most supposed patriotic die-hards resort to when confronted with logic, but I do have to say that if I get the sense that the politicians are going to go ahead and start some kind of a draft (and most people are okay with it happening), I will pack up and leave the country. The risk of guessing will lead to major inconveniences however... if I guess the draft is coming and leave and it never comes, I burdened myself with an unnecessary cost, while if I guess it's coming too late, then I am trapped.

I've been trying to think lately of other places I could stand to live and work in after I renounce my citizenship and flee the country (a citizenship which is, from my perspective, only worth something in the sense that at some point it might need to be renounced to officially absolve myself of any "obligations" to the State back home): Switzerland always seemed like such an awfully beautiful country, but from the little bit of research I've done they're just about as socialistic as everyone else. I loved Prague when I went through there last spring for the first time and have also considered one of the former Commie-Bloc nations, but I don't know how easy it would be to get "permission" to live and work there permanently, and adapting to the foreign culture, language and lifestyle might be tough. Then again, there's never a better time than youth to do something "risky" like that.

I'd like to solicit your thoughts or those of your readers if you'd be so kind, on the question of, "If you were a young, freedom-loving expat fleeing the country, where do you think you could find the best combination of liveability, workability (opportunities for entrepreneurial activity or a more than modest income) and natural scenic beauty in a new place to call home?"

Will, I wish it weren't so but I share your pessimism that these terrors are all but inevitable. The Democrats enjoy decrying the problems Bush has created, but they're just as opportunistic as the next parasitic life form and have undoubtedly already crafted their plans for how to take advantage of the turmoil Bush has created and use it to implement their various "social service" policies.

A Second American Revolution might be a possibility, as well. But I know you're opposed to "anarchy" and V-for-Vendetta style retribution because you fear the lawlessness that might follow. But I've always wondered, if the laws are so tyrannical, is the alternative worse? I wonder how one can complain without being a hypocrite if they answer that question in the affirmative.

Anonymous said...

Maybe Mr. Grigg's analysis is overly negative. The support for Ron Paul, particularly among the young, is encouraging to me -- although I haven't yet seen any "Ron Paul Revolutionaries" where I live.

If it came down to conscription, I would either leave the country or choose the path of nonviolent resistance. Better to go to prison, however awful that is, than to commit murder for the criminals in Washington D.C.

In a sense, there is already "national service." Nearly half of all we earn is confiscated by the government. Thus, half our time at work is effectively conscripted.

Anonymous said...

It's the people, not the gummint.
People like to be entertained to death, shun inconviniences more than sin. Using gummint to commit ones crimes (murder, theft, idolatry..)is a perfect way to stay clean and yet have all the advantages of abusing others by, if need be lethal, force. Leviathan takes care of the land and its resources, law and justice, your kids (the unwanted ones included), of their 'education' and 'training', of your health, your money and property, your job and wages, the environment, the climate, the roads, the food, ad infinitum..
Stateworship sure has its price like Will showed once again in his article. But what has not? And to the people it's far better to pay it than do without the services. In old Austria where I live, people just love the free dams that where built after the last few floods (the contractors where even happier), the free playgrounds and soccer stadiums, the heavily subsidised public transport system, the 'Gesundheit fuer Alle' (stand in line for 8 months to see an opthalmologist, free of course). Bregenz (our local capital) recently staged an ARTevent, at which a hog was publicly slaugethered in front of a luring audience and the meat thereafter served to the hungry gourmands. Wir tun etwas für die Kunst! Sicher.
But think about it: Is this not a perfect picture of modern culture? The spectacular sadistic thrill or even shock, the rotten morbidity and perversion, climaxing in the incorporation of its manifest results? Yes, dogs returning to their vomit, exactly. This is not the gummint, it is US.

Anonymous said...

Given the near universal presence of various flavors of socialist government, maybe it's best to choose a new home based on other concerns. You can't escape it, so evaluate on other things. If we're going to have a socialist government, let's pick one that does it right, as it were.

As Taylor suggests, there are plenty of places reasonably pleasant and imminently more tolerable than here. Whole swathes of Europe have been doing it fairly well for a very long time. We never will, because we lack the huge legacy of culture and custom.

Otherwise, we stay and ride out the storm for reasons we cannot recommend to everyone. In my case, I'm convinced God has called me to stay, as the future upheavals will create my primary mission field.

bent said...

Sure is alot of fine talk , but talk dont buy whisky, and Im gettin awful thirsty.

You guys are gonna have to forgive me Im a product of Uncle Sams school.

I dont think you have to be well educated to see whats going on.(if your lookin that is)

I would like to say thanks Mr. Grigg for saying what I dont know how and may GOD BLESS your wife with healing

Anonymous said...

Conscription not only means killing in the name of the ubiquitous State, it also means you just got the death sentence.

Anonymous said...

If you, as a supposedly "free" citizen, do not have the right to say "NO" to conscription then you're nothing more than a conditional slave idling on borrowed time.

Its plain and simple to see so expect your masters to be calling soon. Get ready with your answer.

I for one am desperately trying to figure out how to get away. With family responsibilities its not as easy as being a single man but it is doable.

When it comes down to a "lifestyle", or having my children gunned down in foreign escapades engineered by evil men, then I'll gladly give that up.

Anonymous said...

I'm not a blogger, but constantly read the same concerns that "Taylor" and other authors of numerous other blog sites write. For some reason I've never gotten into the writing I just enjoy the reading. Taylor's comments particularly struck me which is why I thought I would send a word of encouragement/advice. There are other places in the world one can go. I, personally, have found that place. It is the Republic of Panama and I would encourage anyone who thinks along Taylor's lines to research this amazing country. I won't rant about it. You all are clearly plugged in to the internet. Now go see for yourself. PS- Panama has no central bank, is not bound by legal tender laws, protects private property under constitutional law, has Johns Hopkins Med Center, 3 hrs direct from many major US airports, no standing army, beaches, mountains, 1/3 the cost of US living, Safe, ...you get the point. I too am young, have a family and the guts to put them above all else. All the best.