Problems must reach monstrous and usually unmanageable proportions before the government will even admit they exist. Until that time, the liars will “spin,” the economy will “begin” to slow, stocks will “drift,” the housing bubble will “glide” downwards, and Iraq will “slide” into civil war, always implying that things are not as bad as they may seem and it’s just temporary, correctable, or a “soft landing” when, in reality, it’s already happened and viable solutions are virtually insurmountable.

Most notable is the situation in New Orleans where President Bush has yet to take responsibility for the levees that broke and flooded the city after they were designed, built, and maintained by the federal government’s Army Corps of Engineers. Instead, he prefers to avoid the subject blaming one of several Category Three hurricanes that came into the Gulf Coast last year calling Katrina the “storm of a lifetime.” And none of the loyal media people challenge or pin him down on the levee subject or properly rebuilding these protective barriers though it would cost less than Bush borrows every month.

New Orleans did not suffer "the greatest natural disaster in our history." It suffered the greatest manmade disaster as a result of a typical Category Three hurricane. Two other Category Three storms, Rita and Wilma, struck the Gulf in the same season and did not cause anywhere near the same toll in death and destruction. Are our watchdogs asleep at the switch again?

Comprehensive Immigration Reform is another case in point. The permissiveness involved with years of not enforcing existing laws that could and should have been addressed long ago and particularly after 9/11, the federal government is now caught on the horns of a dilemma. To punish illegal alien lawbreakers today is tantamount to spanking a child for something he or she has always been able to do until now. Naturally, the kids are going to yell, scream, and loudly protest.

Shooting the moon before elections, Bush and company unleashed their pit bull on Lebanon as a stepping stone to Syria and Iran, the last of the Middle Eastern states resisting our Empire of more than 725 military bases spread throughout the world. When that failed and we couldn’t just follow Israel in its campaign to defang evildoers, the fallback plan became an increasing propaganda campaign attacking Iran as “the root” of radical “insurgencies” and “terrorist” sponsorship as well as the same old tried and true UN sanctions and open inspections of their claim that “yes, we have no bananas” or the proof of a negative. Israel may even “go it alone” in bombing Iran, with us right behind them of course.

The more natural attack position would have been from our newly established permanent military bases in bordering Iraq if that country wasn’t such a mess and “sliding” into civil war, a condition that has caused even the faithful in America to question the worthiness of invading a hapless country under "misinformation" and “falsehoods” and without sufficient “shock and awe” for a decisive and quick victory. Launching another invasion on our own is also not the best position to be in just before midterm elections at home, elections where Bush and his gang are afraid of losing their republican support in Congress because so many Americans are “down on” the invasion, occupation, and the money involved.

Ironically, a major part of the new campaign is to cast Iran as the supplier of arms, money, and training for insurgents, everything but the seventeen vestal virgins for each recruit willing to give his life for the cause – something we would probably try if we had a sufficient supply of virgins. But no one sees anything wrong with our supplying Israel with vastly superior weapons, money, and political arguments, including nukes, planes, ships, long range rockets, as well as illegal cluster bombs, depleted uranium, and God knows what else. Or are the Geneva Convention and the War Crimes Tribunal just “leaning” towards banning these horrible and indiscriminate weapons of mass murder? And do we care?

Having once been a researcher who based conclusions on attitudinal and behavioral patterns, I hesitate to draw too much from the only Israeli citizen I’ve ever met. But now that Uri Avnery has published an article titled “America’s Rottweiler” which confirms everything my friend told me years ago I don’t feel so bad.

It took place back in the seventies when I tried to fix my friend up with some work I knew another Jewish friend could throw his way. Months later, when I ran into my friend, he was mad as hell at me. The first thing he said was “that guy you sent me to see is Jewish isn’t he. I will never work for an American Jew. Why do you think I left my country? It’s the American Jews that ruined it. I was tired of killing people I grew up with.” He also rattled off a bunch of their names like Golda Meir and others, bluntly mentioning the history that Mr. Avnery covers so well. This was a revelation to me.

He also told me that there are no civilian adults in Israel. Even though he was an American citizen in his forties, the first thing he and his son must do when returning to Israel for a visit is put on their uniforms and report to the Army. As he put it; “even grandmothers are trained to kill.” Think about that the next time you read about Israeli “reservists” or a bombing in a public place. Every Israeli is a combatant.

I believe that Israel deserves its independence, but the long and the short of it echoed by both of these sources seems to be that if America had kept its nose out of their affairs there would still be peace in Israel. (Read the Avnery article linked above)

When our federal government sets its sights on something it wants, there is almost nothing that can stop it. And the American people have to be deluded to believe that we invaded Iraq to “make the world a better place without Saddam Hussein” when, if it was to our advantage, we’ve installed or supported so many dictators in the past, even Saddam himself.

“From the Halls of Montezuma, to the Shores of Tripoli,” we’ve used whatever excuses could be mustered to try for what we want. It doesn’t always work, but it takes strong and unbending resistance to defeat us and send us home with our tail between our legs. Either that or we can go broke trying to win. It’s the all-out American way.

Yesterday, it was the Al Qaeda. Today, it’s the Hizbullah. And before that it was the Sandinistas, the “great red menace from the South,” or the Cubans who overthrew our friend Batista and refused to pay repatriation. There’s practically no end to the examples of the government being against “the people” even in our own country where the “war on the middle class” has become a catchword and across the country government bureaucrats outnumber workers in manufacturing. Even Social Security funds are malappropriated for the Empire.