AFRICOM forces to invade Mali after U.N. approved France’s proposal

December 21, 2012 Leave a comment

By LUIS MIRANDA | THE REAL AGENDA | DECEMBER 21, 2012

The Security Council of the U.N. unanimously approved Thursday a resolution authorizing the deployment of an international military force (USAFRICOM) to rebuild the Mali Army, which the U.N. says, was weakened after the coup of March 2011. The U.N. approved a military intervention in the northern region of Mali to “fight a terrorist groups linked to Al Qaeda”. Meanwhile, in Libya and Syria, the United States and European nations have helped strengthen al-Qaeda’s and used them as allies to bring down the governments in those countries.

The proposal, drafted by France, proposes a military deployment for at least one year. This military force will consist of soldiers from neighboring African countries. The role of European and other countries will provide external support and assist in the reconstruction of Mali. This is the typical writing anyone can find in all documents drafted by United Nations members which are usually approved to intervene anywhere in the planet. Humanitarian aid, external support, special training, and so on, are some of the many excuses given by the U.N. to facilitate the entrance of foreign armies into poor or war ravaged countries.

As we know, they U.N. has never successfully brought peace to any population since it was created in the mid 20th century. Military intervention or assistance has never work and will never work, because none of the African nations that suffer from civil war or attacks from supposed terrorist groups can be reconstructed by using military power.

The role of the military sent to Mali will rebuild and train the country’s army, so as to be able to deal with the groups operating in the north. As it happens most of the time, only the United Nations Security Council has the power to decide when the training is sufficient to initiate military operations in the area. Note that the U.N. isn’t attempting to use the international military force to deliver clean water or food to the region through a real humanitarian aid program, but trying to boost the military conflict by training an army and giving them the weapons to conduct more military operations.

The text approved by the U.N. also has a political dimension in which it requests the country’s leader Bamako to launch a “political dialogue to restore constitutional order” and to organize presidential elections scheduled for April 2013. In Mali there is a power vacuum since an attempted coup of the Army last March. By no means did the United Nations called for intervention last March. Instead, it let the coup happen so that western military forces now have an excuse to invade yet another African country, so that the military industrial complex has yet another market for its weapons, so that the conquering forces of the West have an excuse to ransack and extinguish lives in Mali.

The state has been unable to fight terrorist groups linked to al-Qaeda, which as everyone knows was created by the United States in the 1970s. Al-Qaeda has grown in strength all over Africa absorbing terrorist groups which act as the rulers over vast territories in the north of the African continent. The European Union has shown its concern about the existence of a country located at the gates of the old continent  which in practice means a potential Afghanistan under Taliban rule, that could be a breeding ground for terrorist groups.

French President François Hollande, made this issue a priority at the last UN General Assembly. Recently, it has been the U.S. military leadership which has pushed to use force in the area, but now the Europeans have also sounded the bell and the decision was made to invade. Resolution 2085 does not set a timetable for a possible offensive against Islamist groups, which means that any option is on the table and that this conflict could become and open-ended front for another military conflict in the region.

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EU Ministers agree on framework to create New World Order Bank

December 13, 2012 Leave a comment

By LUIS MIRANDA | THE REAL AGENDA | DECEMBER 13, 2012

Ministers of Economy and Finance of the European Union reached an agreement early Thursday on the  legal framework that will allow Europe to create a single banking supervisor. The pact is the first step towards joining the euro zone bank and comes hours before the EU summit on Thursday, which will  ratify the commitment. It is expected that the bank becomes operational in March 2014.

During the hours leading up to the agreement, the main hurdle was the distribution of power and scope of the supervising entity, which as explained in previous reports published during 2012, will become the economic and financial beast the bankers have always dreamed about. Germany wanted to exempt regional banks and savings banks from the control of the supervisor, while France, like Spain, defended the institution to supervise all institutions without exception.

The bank union is full of technicalities, but in reality it comes down to one detail: who has the power. Germany has convinced others that the ECB will only oversee the nationalized banks and the largest institutions; those with assets in excess of 30,000 million or 20% of GDP, about 100 entities, to leave others in the hands of national supervisors.

Although initially it was thought that the supervisor could only have the power to control, at any given time, any entity in difficulty, Germany blocked that option, leaving out of the ECB’s orbit Länder banks, which are supposedly loaded up with toxic assets. These banks will remain under the supervision of the German Bundesbank.

Germany also imposes a watered down solution for the common guarantee fund (consisting simply of standardized national funds) and a considerable delay to the bank resolution fund (a mechanism to close banks if necessary), which at some point could be a form of mutualisation of euro problems to be done through back door deals. And almost everything else gets delayed from the original schedule, against the advice of Italy, France and especially Spain, the country most affected by the financial cliff.

The bankers are already salivating due to the agreement. “Historic agreement on the supervisor!” said the  European Commissioner for Internal Market and Financial Services, Michel Barnier, after 14 hours of meetings. In his Twitter account, Barnier judged that the creation of this entity is “a big step for a coherent supervision of all banks in the euro area.”

The objective is that the complete control of the European Central Bank (ECB) over all entities will serve to recapitalize troubled banks and break the vicious circle between the financial crisis and debt, but that kind of power will also undermine the sovereignty of the each of the member nations to a considerable degree in regards to their economic and financial policies. Everyone has seen in the last two years what happens when a complete continent is managed by a group of technocrats whose only goal is to consolidate power.

The supervising entity will be open not only to the euro zone, but all European countries that seek to yield their independence to a centralized, unaccountable banking system. So far only three countries have indicated that they are not interested in joining the single banking supervisor: the UK, Sweden and the Czech Republic.

The Cypriot Minister of Finance, Vassos Shiarly, announced at a press conference that the agreement will allow the Council to start negotiations with the European Parliament, which will begin early next week.

According Shiarly, the Twenty member states have reached an agreement on cooperation between the European Central Bank (ECB) and national regulators, the voting systems in the supervisory board of the entity and the European Banking Authority (EBA), the degree of enforceability of decisions made for countries outside the euro which are participating and the different phases of direct supervision.

Of course, it is clear that an entity that holds as much power as the supervisor will not share any kind of power to regulate how member nations direct their policies. Centralization of power and control is the reason why the bankers created this monster in the first place. From now on, it will be take it or leave it.

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The Immorality Crisis not lack of Transparency caused the Financial Collapse

December 5, 2012 Leave a comment

By LUIS MIRANDA | THE REAL AGENDA | DECEMBER 5, 2012

The European Union countries most affected by the global economic and financial collapse are also some of the most corrupt. But the highest levels of immorality and corruption are not seen at the national level, but on the international stage.

A recent publication by Transparency International which assesses the perception of corruption through a well established index, calls the results ”disappointing” in the sense that countries, especially those hit the hardest by the current financial collapse, are corrupt at heart, indeed.

The Index 2012 Corruption Perceptions from Transparency International shows that Greece obtained the worst result of all the European Union with a score of 36 out of 100, in 94th place out of 174 countries in the table. The Hellenic country is below Bulgaria and Romania.

Among the members of the European Union, Spain is in 13th place, after Denmark, Finland, Sweden, the Netherlands, Luxembourg, Germany, Belgium, UK, France, Austria, Ireland and Cyprus. The report from TI shows the stagnation of Spain, the second country in Europe on its way down the cliff. Spain shares the 30th position with Botswana in the latest report of the corruption index.

“Among the countries hardest hit by the crisis are Italy and Greece — both join Spain on their way to total collapse — as corruption in the public sector is a major problem,” said Corbus de Swardt, spokesman for the NGO. He then added that ”the fight against corruption is one of the keys so that Greece can emerge from the crisis. True point, although the type of corruption that pulled Greece down to the abyss, did not necessarily originate inside the  country. As it happens in most nations, the bureaucrats who manage the destiny of countries and their people are front men and women whose work is to be ‘YES MEN’ and who represent the interests of the European oligarchy; where the highest levels of corruption emanate from.

In Germany and France, De Swardt believes that “one of the main problems is the relationship between politics and business.” The report reveals the existence of interest groups and a culture of secrecy. He is particularly concerned about the funding of political parties in Germany. Interest groups of course are not limited to women’s rights groups or unions, but to large conglomerates of companies that operate locally and outside the countries and who dictate the policies that the governments follow.

At a press conference Wednesday in Madrid, the President of Transparency International Spain, Jesús Lizcano, innocently advocated for giving good training to staff. He also called for issuing punishments to institutions that do not comply with transparency.

In this context, Antonio Garrigues Walker, executive committee member of IT, reminded people that in the past 18 years, corruption has increased gradually but forcefully mainly because, he said, that most countries do not have transparency laws in place. But reality shows otherwise. Countries with significant rules and regulations about transparency also suffer the consequences of corruption mainly because the rules on transparency are written for the people, not for the corrupt politicians in government and the corporations, who always manage to find back doors and legal windows to get away with cheating the system. Therefore, the crisis is not one of corruption, but of morality. Corruption is just the direct result of a society whose morality has been removed.

“Transparency is an absolute obligation of institutions and an absolute right of citizenship,” said the lawyer, who also lamented that countries like Spain have a civil society that is “weak and dependent.” In his opinion, corruption is “a true leukemia” especially in the economic system and transparency is the instrument to combat it.”

The agreement among most of the attendees is the ”truly alarming” intensification of corruption worldwide. The highest levels of corruption speakers said have been seen during the current global financial collapse caused by the corrupt financial system upon which the world functions and which is managed by a few powerful elites.

Since the first Corruption Perceptions Index was published in 1995, both Anglo-Saxon and Scandinavian countries remain at the top of the corruption ladder, even though the index does not always shows it. That is not a surprise as many of the oligopolies that are the source of corruption are established there. Outside Europe, countries such as Afghanistan, North Korea and Somalia are three of the most corrupt in the world.

Although the Transparency International Index is just a main stream kind of thermometer which superficially gauges the levels of corruption around the world, it is a good starting point. Its results however contrasts with the reality of corruption and transparency. It is important to remember that in the case of the TI Index, it only reports the “perception” of corruption and not the real, factual levels in a country. That is why in its 2012 edition, countries like the United States, Uruguay and Germany hold distinctive positions, despite the fact these countries are submerged deeply into a sea of corruption. Another caveat is that the TI Index only includes the perception of corruption in the public sector and leaves out its twin out-of-control unregulated corporations.

Do we need a global index to know how bad corruption is in a determined country? Not likely. A more faithful gauge would be an honest look around the city and country where we live.

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Portugal Approves Polemic Budget Amid Massive Public Protests

November 27, 2012

By LUIS MIRANDA | THE REAL AGENDA | NOVEMBER 27, 2012

If anyone wants to understand how much disregard governments have for their people, it will suffice to look at Portugal. The country is one of the European nations in worse condition, which caused massive public protests on the streets of the capital Lisbon as well as other cities. Despite the protests and the Portuguese government approved an ever more austere budget after 224 members of Congress discussed and voted for it.

Meanwhile, outside the Congressional building, thousands of people called by the unions and various civic associations, screamed and protested peacefully against the same budget in a desperate attempt to stop it, or at least to voice their anger. Eventually, enough votes from the coalition government conservative CDS-PP PSD decided to approve the text. All opposition (Socialist Party Portuguese, Portuguese Communist Party, the Left Bloc and the Greens) spoke against it.

The multitude of protestors included unionists, housewives, unemployed, students and others. One of these protesters carried a banner with a simple and powerful message: “Get me out of this film.” In one corner, a young man seemed to use a cardboard stand to solicit that people signed his petition against the upcoming move to privatize the water supply.

Everyone is convinced that the newly approved budget is going to make life worse yet some more. It’s true. The text includes, among other measures, a brutal tax increase described by the opposition as a genuine “tax bomb” aimed at wiping the government’s debt and to achieve the goals imposed by Portugal’s new owners, the Troika. The Government argues that a budget is conditional and that its scope to develop another one is very low given the need to adjust spending to meet its commitments.

The cuts are affecting many and especially the Portuguese salaried middle classes, which already carry the enormous weight of the economic downturn in a country that was ‘rescued’ in April 2011 to avoid bankruptcy.

So, starting next year, several sections are taken out from Portuguese Income Tax to raise more revenue in addition to a 3.5% general tax on everyone that will start in January. The hardest hit groups under this new tax scheme are retired people, those who receive unemployment benefits and others who get government subsidies for health benefits. In general, higher taxes, fees and surcharges will all increase for the  Portuguese population and such increases will equal a complete full salary. Government workers and those who are retired will continue to live without their yearly bonuses paid to them once a year, but that was cancelled by the government a year ago.

Indeed, 2013 will be much tougher for the Portuguese people. The economy, according to the government, will fall by 1%, consumption will drop by 2.5% and unemployment will climb to 16.8%. There will be cuts, yet without specifying if they will reach Health and Education. Everything will work a little worse. It is expected that the country achieves a tiny sign of a recovery in 2014, if anything at all, said today the Finance Minister Vitor Gaspar.

The problem is that last year, Gaspar said the same thing referring to 2013, which has made it less likely that people and experts believe what Gaspar says.

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François Hollande asks French people to embrace his plan for perpetual slavery

November 14, 2012

By LUIS MIRANDA | THE REAL AGENDA | NOVEMBER 14, 2012

Convinced that his economic policy is “fair, consistent and effective,” and noting that his top priorities are growth and employment, François Hollande, called on Tuesday for social partners and the French people to seal a “historic commitment” to “reconquer the future.” It is not uncommon to hear failed politicians promising fake hope and change. U.S. president Barack Obama did it in 2008. What is rare is to see a failed politician doing it again, even after his plans showed how untrue they were.

In his first press conference this semester, Hollande spent two hours answering all kinds of questions. The French president told Europe that France will meet its deficit target of 3% next year, and sent a message to economists, analysts, mutual funds and countries warning that France will be the next country to get sick of the European Union: “Some would like it a lot if the markets attacked us, but we will do our utmost to avoid it,” he joked.

Addressing more than 250 journalists and the entire Government, Hollande was loose and confident on economic issues, and tried to reassure the French, who have rejected his policies in polls, that his supposed “strategy” will bear fruit at the end of his mandate. That is a typical talking point used by unaccountable politicians who always plan to get the “results” of all of their magic policies once they are out of office. As history shows, those results never arrive. What president wouldn’t like to be in office when his magic plans turn into real benefits? Only a liar would say he wouldn’t. Or perhaps Mr. Hollande will try to stay in office for another term, in case his “results” don’t arrive as soon as he expects.

During the event Hollande said that the country is a process of social dialogue to change the rules under which the French labor market works. He also ridiculed other ideologies and political groups, while saying that his solution may be the only one that would work given the intricacies of the French situation. As many politicians do it today, Hollande spoke about making France a more competitive nation, which means, he said, that there will be consensus and progress.

“We need more security, more protection, less redundancies, fewer relocations, more industry.” He then tried to swindle the French people by implying that for his plan to work as he crafted it, the people of the country need to accept a compromise to follow his commandments. He said that a social consensus would be historical and would allow the economy to find a new spirit, a new collaboration between all the productive forces. Then he played the leader card by saying that “I am responsible for the future of France, and I am not acting to prepare the next election but the next generation. That is my duty, the French nation should do, do block to reconquer the future. “

As many other European politicians have done, Hollande spoke against austerity, saying that this policy needs to be accompanied by growth. He said that France will be able to meet the deficit and debt targets, and explained that “if France does not grow is because there is a recession in Italy and Spain”, and that this situation is due, he said, “to the policies of a single direction.”

Perhaps one of the points that Hollande emphasize the most is the idea that Europe needs a strong France in order to move ahead. This message attempts to divert attention from the country’s growing distrust, high unemployment and trade deficit, which the French president intends to pin on those who do not follow his recommendations. “We live, rather than a crisis, in a changing world. The recovery will take time, but we’ll get there.”

In a time when Berlin doubts Hollande capacity to carry out the reforms requested by the European bankers, France’s Prime Minister Jean-Marc Ayrault is set to visit Angela Merkel tomorrow in an attempt to explain in detail what has the French government accomplish and what it intends to accomplish in the near future. “The reality is that the Chancellor and I have a responsibility to move Europe forward. And, therefore, not to do anything will weaken this relationship. What matters is not what is said, but what we say. ” That is also a typical strategy to make people believe that only the politicians who occupy high office are capable of solving a problem they themselves let happen.

On the future of Europe, Hollande was not shy about his support for the News World Order scheme that seeks to unite both financially and politically all the nations in the old continent. He said that after the banking union is in place, the continent will have to prepare for what comes ahead. “After the banking union there will be another big step: to give life to the political Europe “. The French president took the opportunity to make it clear that he will provide complete support to the newly formed Syrian opposition movement that was formed during a meeting in Qatar and which is now recognize by most Western oppressors as the only legitimate transition government in that country.

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