Posted by pancho (148.244.221.35) on January 18, 2002 at 19:26:25:
War Business 101
There isn’t anything more profitable than war…nothing. It is that is for the people who supply the material for it. For the rest of us it hurts like hell. During that whole Communist Scare era there wasn’t a politician or general in this country who believed for a minute that any army of Communists was going anywhere to do us any harm…not a one…not Dick Nixon, not Joe McCarthy…not Ron Reagan.
The Communist Scare finally played itself out when our good friend the Soviet Union collapsed…we didn’t see it coming of course…that’s how much value we get for our espionage dollar, another good business scam. But they DID see it coming, hell they tried all they could to forestall it, and when the Evil Empire was gone, they rushed food aid into North Korea to keep THAT giant menace going. And of course there has always been Cuba, so handy, right there off Miami Beach where millionaires quake in fear of an attack from a country that can’t even get the United States base at Guantanamo off its own land.
But these threats were waning fast and baring an invasion from space, what, oh what, was a capitalist to do? I remember noticing when A-rabs first entered our popular mythology as something more than wealthy buffoons trailing a string of concubines. Israel did its part by creating a set of people so embittered and bedeviled that a certain percentage of them could be counted upon to make bombs out of themselves as they had no other means of fighting back against the unbelievable injustice they were made to suffer. Palestinians couldn’t get a fair shake anywhere, except for Vanessa Redgrave…bless her gutsiness.
Worldwide Islamic Terrorism is as much a creation of the United States as the Communist Threat was. The oppressive conditions under which the poor people of South America were forced to live and die young were a direct result of the greed and rapaciousness of American business interests, who then turned white with fear when those people had enough…and cried “Communist” wherever a few peasants got together and looked around for some means of defending themselves and their families. Once it was established that a People’s Army somewhere got any help from the Soviets…thank GOD…the Marines could go in and you can do anything you want with a little girl, or boy, once she or he has been labeled a Communist.
The implements of war are America’s largest and most profitable export…look it up. For years, instead of paying a fair price for oil, or any price, the United States foisted off its old junk, shiny and brand new enough for most Banana Republic dictators, on various governments. It’s one reason they were able to scare us all with that big bad army of Saddam’s…they gave him the weapons and gas for it. When the Shah of Iran had enough of that game and said he didn’t need another 1000 Attack Helicopters, and would they mind just paying for the oil, it was the end for him…no longer a freedom loving friend but a new despotic tyrant. The new regime they put in place…October Surprise and all, was far more accommodating and the US was able to sell off plenty of guns and bullets to both sides of the Iran Iraq war…and certain people back here were as pleased as pigs in crap.
In business there is such a thing as a saturation point. That happens when you’ve peddled all the washing machines you can and the initial years of smooth sailing and good profits are left behind and you enter the doldrums where product doesn’t move as fast and you sit there waiting for those damn machines to break down so you can at least sell parts, or become useless and need to be replaced…planned obsolescence was sometimes built into them too…they were intended to become useless after a certain amount of time. A variation on that theme is to plan well ahead what “NEW and IMPROVED” features you would add at regular intervals to keep interest and sales up.
But, no matter what you do, there comes the day when you can only sell so many airline tickets to so many passengers…after which you have to begin cutting back on maintenance and buying reconditioned spare parts instead of new ones…or maybe you don’t need that Safety Supervisor etc. In the end, unless you diversify, you can predict with depressing regularity and certainty what your profits can hope to be for the foreseeable future…and they only diminish as prices and costs only increase. Now in business there is no such thing as “Enough”. Only cancer and profits are supposed to grow constantly…if you don’t keep up or go ahead, you fall behind and lose…there is no such thing as “maintaining” a position. Gone are the Mom and Pop’s, with a steady and loyal number of employees, the annual party, the secured future, the adequate profits that satisfy the needs of the owners as well as the workers…who both primarily want to get on with what matters most…raising their families in peace and just enough prosperity to make it through life.
Now we have bottom lines and bottom feeders and there is no such thing as “Enough”…enough can never be enough or we will lose this “envious” lifestyle we have…the one making zombies and drug addicts and pin cushions out of our children so that there isn’t even that basic and timeless hope and reason to live…the raising AND enjoyment of a family. Instead we are supposed to shop our way to satisfaction…frantic children hell bent on having fun at all costs and needing more toys than a mad child in Hell.
But business is business, and the business of America IS business. Arms manufacturing is the most profitable business in the world…when you couple it with fear and paranoia and get your money from the Tax Trough where the scared populace dumps its cash. It also helps to have an “Enemy” threatening the people, even if it is a hobgoblin that has to be manufactured…what is the Media for anyway, if not to “Inform”. But you can’t just keep people in suspense…they need to se a little action too or else they get bored and begin asking if some of their money couldn’t be spent on pot holes and medicine.
The United States already attacked an Evil Empire and wiped it out in ten minutes…if only they could have put up more of a fight, been more convincing as a world wide all goober threat, instead of folding up like that. So you keep the pressure up, think of horrendous things to do to parents and children, things never done by any Moslem or Cannibal, and you keep it up and keep it up in hopes that someone somewhere will finally have enough and fight back…and they do, and here we go again…ANOTHER super duper threat to world peace and freedom and all of that…and all those corporations stuck making washing machines and sitting around waiting for profits to move a shake…can diversify into the really good stuff, the nerve gas, the masks to go with, the uniforms and tires and brake shoes and vehicles and boots and guns and bullets and more guns and bullets and newer guns and bullets and maybe even a shield in the sky and missiles to poke through it…and all of it paid for unquestioningly and even GLADY and uncritically because the hometown crowd has been turned into jelly…and in all of this mess comes the Religious People who see their chance to get rid of pesky laws, and so do the Product People who want less government oversight, and less chance of being sued for their faulty cars and things…and the Watch Your Zipper People who think there has been too much freedom who want laws and rules controlling such things and on and on.
America tore holes through its Constitution during the Communist Era. While some people got fantastically rich and could buy their way anywhere, the rest of us lost basic freedoms left and right. Who would have ever imagined that in America, not the Soviet Union, a writer such as Dasheil Hammet could have been thrown in jail, his house and money taken from him, for simply refusing to do what all good Americans always refused to do…turn in a friend? For attending one single Communist function, a right we all have granted to us by the Constitution because America was never afraid till then, till it was MADE to be afraid…you could lose your job and be Blacklisted and driven into exile…not in Moscow, but in Washington DC, the home of Democracy and all of that.
Such is the power of fear…it unhinges the bravest of us, if it is made real enough. The same people who brought you the 1950’s are in control again. We are once again being made to be afraid and suspicious, willing to do anything, give up anything, sacrifice anything, if only we can be made SAFE and free of fear. A nation already drug addicted will sink even deeper into depression… and nameless fears will haunt our cities and burbs and American children will sink lower and lower till Life functions will all but cease…and the schools will never know the difference, because the teachers and administrators will be drugged themselves, dispensing drugs to the students when they aren’t giving them pills outright.
The Islamic Threat was made to order by America…they have been working on it diligently, and someday, when it too is played out and fat cats have gotten even fatter, you will feel a little silly, and look to something to wash the blood from your hands and souls…more drugs anyone???… except it will be a few generations from now, and as this one doesn’t remember being lied to by its presidents and leaders a few short years ago …the coming generations will not remember being lied to now. Memory is a good tool in these manufactured fears and one sided wars against children. People want to forget and they want to believe only what makes them the most comfortable. Convinced of a world wide Islamic Terrorist threat, people want the comfort of security and, just like a pusherman dispensing pills on a corner…your government stands ready to give you a dose.