I write about Economics & Politics and sometimes I post pictures of things I like. Find me elsewhere on the intrenet:
twitter.com/Suga_Shane
LarryBrownSports.com
NBAOffseason.com
NFLoffseason.com
MLBOffseason.com
gunsgeargallantry.tumblr.com/
Petrodollar system?…if you knew about a little bit more,we are fighting just one war now days and it is in Afghanistan…name all those oil companies than you can find in Afghanistan…do your research before you start writing about it…
Before we go any further, I have a few serious questions for you:
Did you serve? If so, where; Iraq, Afghanistan, both or other?
Do you know what a petrodollar is? Source
Do you know what the World’s Reserve Currency is? Source 1 2
Do you know what a fiat currency is? Source 1 2
Do you know what the Federal Reserve is? Source
Do you know how the Federal Reserve profits from printing US “dollars”? Source 1 2
Do you know how the Federal Reserve profits from other nations having to exchange their money into dollars and pay a fee on that exchange in order to partake in trade for goods, like Oil? Source
Did you know America had plans to invade Iraq as early as 1999? Source 1 2
Did you know Iraq tried to leave the “dollar standard” for oil transactions and sell in Euros? Source
Did you know that we still have American bodies in Iraq? The “war”, which was undeclared, may technically be over, but America is still spending money to patrol Iraq. Source
Did you know that we don’t really plan on leaving Afghanistan anytime soon? Source
Did you know that Afghanistan has trillions of dollars in natural resources? Source
Do you know what the Trans-Afghanistan Pipeline is? Source
Do you know that since America took over Afghanistan, their opium production has sky rocketed? Source
Do you know what countries have serious issues with opium? Russia, China and Iran. Guess which countries are dead locked in proxy wars and economic wars over resources like oil, reserve currency and gold with the United States? China, Russia, Iran. (Proxy War Source 1 2 3) (Opium Source 1 2 3)
Do you know Iran has started to sieze selling oil in “dollars” and is now selling oil in exchange for gold? Source
Do you know that Libya tried to do the same thing as Iran and move to a gold standard right before America backed al Qaeda with weapons and money to over throw that government? Source
Do you know that America is backing the same terrorists in Syria that we fought in Afghanistan and Iraq? Source
Do you know that Russia is backing the opposing forces because Syria is the only port-country that is allied with Russia? Source
Do you know that America is helping France with a “war” in Mali? Source
Do you know that China has been working very hard to peacefully obtain contracts and rights to the vast resources of Africa? Oil, gold, Uranium and more? Source 1 2
Do you know that Mali is loaded with natural resources? Source
So ask yourself, why is your government backing the same “terrorist” groups that they sent you into Iraq and Afghanistan to kill? Why is the gov’t using American troops to help overthrow governments and secure natural resources as well as banking power over other nations? Why are we risking the lives of Americans for the interests of banks and corporations? You think that Iran’s main threat to America and Israel is military? It’s not. It’s monetary.
All of these wars, they aren’t just. They aren’t for justice. They are for currency and resource domination. They are to ensure that American banks and corporations and the “dollar” remain in charge.
At first, this puzzle seems vast and complex, but once you “follow the money” and learn about such terms as Reserve Currency, Petrodollar and how the Federal Reserve and other central banks operate and use fiat currency and how there’s a policy in place to overthrow any government that opposes that system, you start to paint a picture of why we fight the wars that we fight.
Hopefully this was a good learning experience for you and perhaps next time you won’t accuse me of foreign policy ignorance when it’s actually you who is ignorant of our policies and systems.
- Sha
Imperium: The Crisis of Being details the cyclical nature of human history, and the rise and fall of all civilizations and cultures.
Here are some key points which are evidenced by brief glimpses into world history, ranging from ancient China to ancient Egypt:
- Every culture is imbued with its own ‘religious’ world-view
- As this idea is refined, it manifests itself as a multiplicity of cultural identities (nations)
- Each has their own, distinct interpretation of the world-view
- All energy directed inward [self-reflection in philosophy, art, science, literature) becomes directed outwardly towards politics, war, economics, and law.
- Final expression is idealism and expansion manifested as imperialism
- Culture is organic anddoeshave a lifespan (roughly 45 human generations)
It is a cyclical process and as more people move to urban centers, they become disconnected from the cultural tradition of the countryside. All knowledge once focused inward is instead turned outward: cultural critique, deconstruction of ‘social norms’ and appeals to the impractical “ideal.”
Expansion will always occur until it exhausts all avenues and the Civilization collapses upon itself. “World Wars” are categorized by a utilization of technology and mass (in numbers) without hesitation or regard for the human consequences. Leaders become increasingly populist and use plebeian words to appeal to the now-displaced poor and lower classes in the cities; “greater good,” “the working man,” etc.
I highly suggest you take a look.
Reblogging because I just updated the text of this post in order to hopefully induce more viewership :3
This was damn good. Wish it was voiced over, but it was worth my 27 minutes.
Everything has a life-cycle, including corporations and cultures. To think anything will last forever is foolish.
Foreign Markets: China
Butler Shaffer (via thefreelioness)
Fun fact: Professor Shaffer was my wife’s Con Law professor in Law School. She said the dude’s a badass libertarian.
Apple to manufacture Mac line in the US
NBC News: In an interview with Brian Williams airing tonight on “Rock Center,” Apple CEO Tim Cook says one of the existing Mac lines will be manufactured exclusively in the US next year.Cook says he believes it’s important to bring more jobs to the US. “We’ve been working for years on doing more and more in the US,” he says.
Photo credit: NBC NewsThere have been rumblings that the new iMac was being manufactured in the U.S., but now we have confirmation that at least something is U.S.-produced.
Prepare to see some pretty expensive Mac products
For those who thought Macs were expensive before!
I wonder how much this is going to add to the final costs or are we going to see a decline in quality to make up for it?
Probably both. Higher prices and relaxed quality control standards.
Not surprised this was reblogged by shortform blog with no criticism. I think economic protectionism is a requirement for being a left-wing hack.
To be fair, I doubt Mac prices are going to increase much. There are substitutes. Apple is not the only computer producer. Apple products’ demand curves are probably pretty elastic. I don’t like the economic fallacy that it’ll create jobs; we need wealth, not jobs. But regardless of that, it was probably just a PR ploy to increase sales.
Also, why would we see a decline in quality?
I think Mac’s play here is to either lose some of the profit margin on an already high profit product or to slightly increase the price of an already high priced product to retain profits.
Either way, they probably won’t lose too much business since they are only moving a small portion of their product line manufacturing to America. Their phones, ipads, monitors and accessories will still be made overseas.
I think this is a move Apple is making to combat losing ground to Samsung, without having to innovate or invent new technology but by shifting the business model around in two ways:
1. Marketing. This is a great way to try and win over a lot of the population that adheres to the baseless “I buy American Made” ideology.
2. Get ahead of the shifting public opinion. People are starting to realize that Apple makes tons and tons of profits by paying people in poorer countries to make Apple products. The amount Apple makes in profit per phone is greater than what some companies sell their phones for. Apple is also facing a lot of public scrutiny from the suicide factories that produce their products.
Overall, this will probably cost Apple very little in lost sales or lost profits in the short-term and in the long-term this move will act as a marketing ploy and, as Apple hopes, will win over more customers and keep them brand loyal.
The notion that if we cut our defense budget by as little as 10%, we’d be completely defenseless and prone to disaster is ridiculous.
We could cut our defense budget by 75% (nearly $500 billion!) and we’d still spend more than our two biggest threats combined; Russia & China.
Can we plaster this graph all over the news, and billboards, pls?
thx.
And the notion that we need to INCREASE our defense budget by two trillion when the DOD isn’t even asking for it is even more ludicrous.
The most outrageous thing about this post is definitely our huge spending, but a close second is the fact that you call China and Russia our primary world enemies.
The most outrageous thing about your post is that you, like mot Americans, have no fucking clue what’s going on in the real world:
Forbes - “China Is Winning The Economic War”
US News - “China’s Economic Cold War on the United States”
Policy Mic - “Obama, Romney Openly Discuss Trade War With China”
US News - “Is Syria Becoming a Proxy War Between U.S. and Russia?”
Reuters - “Syria becoming wider global, regional proxy war”
RT - “Russia, China (BRICS) undermining US dollar value”
RT - ”The only US policy towards Syria is to blame Russia’- Russian MP”
But please, do tell me how N.Korea, Iran, and some mountain goat herding drug addicts are the real threat to America.
And here I was thinking this was common sense turns out most of you have zero clue about what’s really happening outside of the Kardashians and the NFL.
alamoejones reblogged your photo: The notion that if we cut our defense budget by as…
Can we also get the idea out there that Russia and China are in no way threats to our country?! China needs us for our trade and debt and Russia is nowhere near as powerful as it was during the Cold War. The U.S. is not under threat from Russia, China, Iran, North Korea, etc. They either don’t have the capability to attack us or don’t have the desire. These are huge misconceptions!
I agree on North Korea. But Iran is an economic and logistical threat. Why?
Trade Routes and Drug Trafficking:
Opium production in Afghanistan has spiked since the US took out the Taliban because the Taliban had suppressed opium farming in the region. Both production and prices have skyrocketed.
Afghans have various ways of moving the product and one of those ways is through Iran. And Iran isn’t very happy about this. In fact, they are furious. If you don’t know, opium use is a major problem in Russia, China and Iran (coincidence?) America profits vastly from this in two ways, #1, we profit immensely from drug trafficking and #2 we weaken the social fabric of other nations who we view as a threat.
Then there is the geographical location of Iran and how it’s a gateway to Pakistan and India from The M&E and Africa. Iran is a goldmine for pipeline builders. It happens to be very wealthy in terms of oil and it also happens to have access to the sea, the Middle East and Asia and is a quick ship ride away from Africa. Just look at this pipeline map and you’ll know why American Oil is salivating at the thought of controlling Iran’s government.
Oil & The US Dollar’s Strength:
Which brings us to Oil.
Iran has oil and they want to stop selling it in US Dollars. More over they want to sell it to Russia and China in alternative currencies like Gold and Yuan. Why does this bother us? Because if oil isn’t sold in Dollars, the Petrodollar becomes obsolete and the Federal Reserve no long profits from thin air on every single oil and trade transaction on the planet. Yes, this is true. This is how our Foreign Policy is dictated. Not on “terrorists” or on bomb threats or war ships, but on how a countries actions impact the value of our dollar.
Quick notes:
Watch this: The Petrodollar & War Machine
How does the reserve currency work? Countries only trade in Dollars so they are forced to always keep dollars in reserve for exchange or to essentially purchase dollars from us to use in trade. The US and the Federal Reserve profit from simply existing and being the (forced) choice of other nations. We get some nations, like OPEC nations, to agree to this by providing them will endless military protection and also giving the royal families of the region billions in kick-backs. Once you have an essential good like oil on the dollar system, others will be forced to follow. Since countries hold and tangle their own currency with the dollar, the value of the dollar still remains important. A loss in value of the dollar means that a country lost value in the reserves that they hold. So long as the dollar is stable, countries don’t worry. But if the dollar’s value becomes unstable, due to high debt, low income or a loss in confidence, countries will begin to move off the dollar. That’s what we are seeing now.
We didn’t go into Iraq because of WMDs, we went in because Saddam wanted to sell oil in Euros instead of dollars. This happened in 2000, we had plans to invade as early as 1999.
We didn’t go into Libya to “free the oppressed” people. We went in because Muammar al-Gaddafi championed the idea of a United States of Africa, with it’s own central bank and it’s own reserve currency. This would remove all dollar-based trade transactions and replace it with their own currency.
Now we want to go into Iran because they won’t cooperate and they want to also move off the Dollar and trade oil in other currency formats.
China
China has been building up their military, buying gold, holding less dollars and less US debt, buying oil, buying up Africa and making alliances with all the other top countries, sans America. They are doing everything conceivable to tell us that they no longer want to associate with us and in fact, they want to surpass us and replace us.
I think I’ve gone in to enough detail on my tumblr and there’s more than enough information on the web to back this up.
Russia
We’ve been in a proxy war with Russia for over 6 decades. Nothing has really changed. Russia plays nice on the surface but goes on with their ways. They have jumped aboard with China. Ask yourself which country has been more vocal than opposing the wars in Iraq, Afghanistan, Syria and Iran? Then Google which country supplied weapons and supplies to the opposition in all of those countries.
It’s very, very simple. Russia isn’t over the idea of being a superpower. They still view themselves as strong and capable and they are. Russia covers a lot of land, is very rich in natural resources, capable of going fully independent and surviving. They also have a lot of human capital.
Again, a simple Google search on Russian military practices, BRICS, Russia’s gold standard or any quote from Putin is right at your fingertips. And Russia is the one country you never, ever, want to go to war with. Ever heard of the “Russian winter”?
It’s funny to hear Romney call China a currency manipulator when we run the most infamous fiat currency ponzi scheme in history. #EndTheFed
These guys make China sound like an awesome place to live and work. Forget voting, let’s just move.
