What exactly are you advocating Mr Rudd?

Kevin Rudd (also known as Kevin Krudd) is about to have an essay released in which he calls for a New World Order. Without a doubt what Krudd is actually advocating is a lot more than socialism - he is advocating Communism. In his essay, Krudd denounces what he terms the "unfettered capitalism of the past three decades" whilst he calls for a new era in which government intervention and regulation feature heavily.

The problem here is that this form of heavy government intervention has failed in the past. The New Deal experiment by Roosevelt is a prime example of how this kind of intervention fails in its task to bring an economy out of the morass of high unemployment, and other ills.

Also, Krudd has a bit of a problem if he describes the way in which the economy has worked for the past 30 years as a "great neo-liberal experiment", rather, it is what he wants that will be the the "neo-liberal experiment", and if it is allowed to proceed then we will find ourselves falling further and further into an economic depression.

Krudd has decreed:

"Neo-liberalism and the free-market fundamentalism it has produced has been revealed as little more than personal greed dressed up as an economic philosophy. And, ironically, it now falls to social democracy to prevent liberal capitalism from cannibalising itself."

Mr Rudd writes in The Monthly that just as Franklin Roosevelt rebuilt US capitalism after the Great Depression, modern-day "social democrats" such as himself and the US President, Barack Obama, must do the same again. But he argues that "minor tweakings of long-established orthodoxies will not do" and advocates a new system that reaches beyond the 70-year-old interventionist principles of John Maynard Keynes.

The problem with the Krudd analysis is that Franklin Roosevelt did not rebuild US capitalism. The reality happens to be that the USA took longer than necessary to come out of the Great Depression because of the failure of the Government intervention. What Krudd fails to appreciate is that unemployment actually got worse during the Great Depression, not better. What saved the USA was not the policies of Rossevelt, but the Second World War.

The neo-liberal socialists like Kevin Rudd seem to think that they understand Keynsian economics. They cling to the fact that Keynes advocated that there should be government intervention during times of high unemployment. What they fail to understand is that J.M. Keynes actually understood that what is also needed is private investment to help keep the economy working or well-oiled.

Like his rather incompetent counter-part in the USA, the new POTUS, Barack Obama (Sotero perhaps is more correct), Kevin Krudd believes that it is necessary to bash the CEOs of businesses and banks and to grandstand about what has gone wrong. The Kevin Krudd "fix" has been a stimulus package that will cost the tax-payer dearly, but it will not help to bring the economy out of the present recession.

When Kevin Krudd blasts CEOs for awarding themselves bonuses, he should think about how this is hypocrisy in its worst form because members of Parliament do not exercise any restraint at all. The essay by Krudd seems to be indicating that he wants to plunge Australia into a government that is based upon communism. He is talking the double talk, attacking the straw-man that he refers to as neo-liberals, when in fact it is his policies that are those of the neo-liberals.

Also, he is attacking the trade and economic policies of the Hawke-Keating years (when Keating was Treasurer) which has led to Keating's own attack upon Kevin Krudd (and a well deserved attack by Keating). Paul Keating was responsible for most of the changes in the Australian economy that have been very painful. The fall-out from those changes has seen an end to Australian manufacturing industry. At this moment we are seeing that one of the few remaining companies has made a decision to lay off employees and head to China - the company owns the brands of Bonds and Dunlop. In some ways it is inevitatble because these brands simply cannot compete against the Chinese imports. The costs of manufacturing are just too high, and with all of the Green nonsense that we suffer these costs will continue to rise in the future.

I happen to agree that we need to have some kind of justification for some of the CEO bonuses that are handed out, especially when they are given at the expense of employee jobs (QANTAS) but it is not right for the Prime Minister to bash these compnanies by implying things that are not necessarily true.

There is little chance that the Krudd stimulus package will work. The reason? There is too much pork in the package, and that pork is not going to help job creation. If Krudd had been following true Keynesian economics, then the solution would have been to lower taxes first. Those companies that are struggling need to start looking at ways of reducing their waste and bloat. They should not be relying upon a government handout. The government handouts to companies such as General Motors Holden are in reality quite wasteful. That money is not going to fix the underlying problems within the motor industry. We are a small nation, and if we were to continue to have a viable motor industry then we need to be able to sell the cars in the overseas markets. Is this happening? In other words why is the product not being sold on the world market? Why is the product so uncompetitive? Throwing money at these car manufacturers is jut not the way to resolve these questions.

I do not believe in the level of government intervention advocated by Kevin Krudd. Perhaps it could be said that I am a libertarian because I believe in less intervention, not more, but I do not see myself in that light because I have certain differences of opinion with the Libertarians. There are many areas where Government intervention is somewhat necessary, but I think that the intervention should be short-term and not long-term as Krudd seems to be advocating.

I suspect that few Australians have any knowledge of the real Kevin Krudd agenda. I just hope that more Australian voters will become aware of his very dangerous policies, especially when they begin to realise that he wants to drive us towards communism, which is the real name for what he is advocating.

UN launches Tribunal to prosecute the assassins of Harari

U.N. opens prosecution over Hariri assassination - CNN.com

A tribunal has been convened at the The Hague more than 4 years after Hariri was killed in a massive car bombing in Beirut on February 14, 2005.  The bomb had detonated as Hariri's motorcade passed through the seaside district of Corniche. The bomb itself contained hundreds of pounds of explosives and it left buildings shattered and streets littered with the mangled wreckage of the vehicles. The blast killed 22 other people.

The Tribunal will have 11 judges, 4 of whom will be Lebanese. Four senior generals have been held over the killing, but the United States and the U.N. investigators believe that Syria ordered the assassination, even though this is denied by Syria.

The killing sparked widespread protests that led to the eventual withdrawal of Syrian troops from Lebanon (followed by the build up of Hezbollah the Syrian puppet organization) and the election of the anti-Syrian bloc in parliament.

The U.N. investigators who were tasked to find the killers of Hariri found links between the Syrian government and Hariri's asassination.

The U.N. says that the case is expected to be ready for trial by 2010.

Lies and Damned Lies - part 1

It has been almost a month since Barak Obama became the 44th President of the USA. There are already signs that this presidency is shaping up to be one of the worst in history. Within the first week Obama managed to upset the Vatican with the reversal of one of the Bush executive orders which means that the USA will now resume funding for abortions and forcing contraception on overseas (read third world) countries. This is one reason why Pope Benedict gave Nancy Pelosi, the speaker of the House of Representatives, a bit of a smack during her private audience at the Vatican.

The liberals within the USA seem to think that it is important to enter third world nations and demand that the women either use contraceptives or have abortions. The USA government is now set to resume the funding of abortions in these nations. However, what these liberals do not understand is that people in these countries see things in a very different light when it comes to having children. We most definitely should be alarmed at the way in which abortion is being carried out in India as an example. The use of ultrasound and tests to discover whether the unborn child is a girl or boy has meant that there is now a greater imbalance of boys over girls in that country, because girl foetuses are being aborted at a very fast rate. In China the one child policy has also led to similar problems, and in that country the enforcement of the one child policy has in fact led to the oppression of the population. Thus, by reversing the executive order Barak Obama is in fact endorsing this form of oppression in China. However, the real goal is not either China or India, but third world Muslim countries but in these countries the people are against these policies – and they are inappropriate for other reasons.

In some of the poorest countries in the world the women who are fecund are at risk of dying whilst giving birth. The risk is high because they do not have access to hospitals, or to highly skilled medical staff. It is the lack of proper facilities that is the major cause of maternal deaths in these countries – yet the liberals will tell us that what is needed is more abortions. Also, this form of funding only serves to give rise to other unseemly practices where contraceptives that western women refuse to use are dumped upon these 3rd world countries – this happened in the past when IUDs were dumped in India and there was an increase in women suffering harm from this form of contraception.

The kind of message that is being sent to these poorer nations is not a message of good will, rather it is a message of bad will – genocide via getting rid of the unborn. What these liberals are really saying is that these people do not deserve to have children, let alone exist. Therefore, it is better to eliminate the problem by eliminating the children, leading in the end to the genocide of a nation by stealth.

However, the reversal of this one executive order is just the beginning of the shambles that is the Obama Administration. Nancy Pelosi and Harry Reid were given the task of drafting a bill that has been dubbed “porkulus” and with good reason. There is so much pork or earmarks in that bill, that it really makes Barak Obama into the biggest liar out when he states that there is no pork in the bill. The size of the spending in the bill is astounding. The bill is supposed to be a response to an economic crisis, yet once the details are examined there is little in the short term that will be achieved. In the long term the American people will find themselves saddled with an extremely high debt such that the GDP will in fact fall, not increase. The hasty manner in which this bill was passed means that few if anybody had the opportunity to examine all of the provisions within the document. On top of that the Obama administration promised there would be transparency and bi-partisanship, yet Reid and Pelosi excluded the Republicans from input in the first place, and instead of the Bill being posted to the internet for 5 days prior to its acceptance, there was absolutely no transparency, to the point that members of the House  of Representatives and the Senate had not bothered to read the document before voting. This kind of action is fiscal irresponsibility.

 

Geitner gets a C- from the financial markets

I am a graduate of Economics and Commerce at Melbourne University, which includes a major in economics. I have a very modest qualification and have not been following economics all that much since graduation - it really is quite a boring subject. However, since the middle of last year I suddenly find that I have to sit up and pay attention, because of the collapse of the financial markets all around the world.

It is outside of my almost non-existent expertise to give any form of in-depth analysis of the present crisis. I can barely understand all of the critical factors that has led to the crisis that occurred first in the USA and then sent shock waves around the world. A new word has been created - "toxic debt". Getting around what this means is quite difficult. It is not as claimed by Barak Obama and his sleazy bunch of cohorts something that resulted from Bush policies. The fact is, the "toxic debt" has its roots in legislation created by the Carter Administration that led to the creation of Fanny Mae and Freddie Mac. As an outsider these are concepts that are not easy to grasp. I do not pretend at this stage to have been able to grasp all of the realities of the situation.

What I do know, however, is that as a result of policies that began with the Carter Administration, my superannuation fund has dropped by a whopping $40,000 and my husband suffered a greater wipeout from his funds because of the crash of the stock market. The nervousness within the stock-market which generated the largest crashes since the Great Depression is due to the collapse of several banking institutions because of bad debt practices and the creation of what is now called "toxic debt". This situation could have been avoided if the Carter Administration as well as administrations that followed had behaved in a fiscally responsible manner.

Whilst it is true that the Bush Administration made mistakes, that it got tax policies wrong, that it sent out the wrong signals, it is wrong to blame everything that has happened solely on G.W. Bush. I certainly think that the Carter and Clinton Administrations must share responsibility for very poor policies. Over time, as I learn more, or at least refresh my own understanding of the subject I will try to explore some of the things that are now coming to light. In the mean time the world financial markets have not responded well to the latest from the Obama Administration in the form of the Geitner package that is supposed to help with what is called "toxic debt".

In what is rapidly becoming known as Obama double speak, Geithner stated that the new bank bail-out package was vital as "critical parts of our financial system are damaged. Instead of catalyzing recovery the financial system is working against recovery, and thats the dangerous dynamic we need to change"

The new plan is allegedly aimed at restoring confidence in the damaged financial system and restarting bank lending. Despite the aims of this plan the financial market analysts are not convinced and they are in fact disappointed. As James Ellman of Seacliff Capital stated: investors wanted clarity, simplicity and resolution and what they got instead is convoluted, obsfucating and clouded. It is yet another poor start for the Obama Administration, which is struggling to get above and F for the first month in office report card.

Obama tries coercion to get his pork barrel through Congress

It is called an economic stimulus passage but from what I have been reading about what it contains it is nothing more than a payoff to those groups that supported the Obama campaign with a lot of nasty things thrown in for good measure. Since the Teflon President does not have economic credentials his package really needs to be given a good once over. It is nothing like the packages that were introduced during the Great Depression – when projects such as building the Hoover Dam were introduced. The package itself in the long term could be extremely harmful to the economy of the USA, as well as to the world economy.

Amongst the nasty proposals in the package is the unconstitutional conditions being applied to schools (including universities) that would make it impossible for any group of students to gather together for prayer and Bible study. This kind of condition has nothing to do with the separation of religion and the State – a concept that I agree with, but I disagree with the modern interpretation of that concept.

Another nasty was the signing of yet another executive order that will have dire consequences usually for white males in the construction industry. The executive order means that only contractors with unionized labour will be allowed to compete for the pork barrel projects. This is discrimination against those who do not want to join a union that uses coercive tactics in the first place. It will also have the effect of driving up costs associated with these projects. There is nothing wrong with belonging to a union but construction unions do have a certain unsavoury reputation. This new Teflon President is going at fast speed in doing everything that is bad for the USA.

Obama is now trying to use what I consider to be coercion tactics to get his pork-barrel through the Congress. If he succeeds with these tactics then things will be very grim in the USA. Obama warns that there could be a “catastrophe” if the package is not passed, but many think that if it is passed, without a lot of trimming then there will be something larger than a catastrophe, because this package is not going to stimulate the economy of the USA.