Mad Money

George W. Bush, when asked how is history likely to judge his invasion of Iraq war, replied, "History, we don't know. We'll all be dead."

While some us shivered, wondering if this was the forecast of a Premillennial Dispensationalist with his thumb on a nuclear arsenal, it exposed the mind of a typically Western, short-term thinker. This is crucial to recognize if we are to survive these enormous financial and environmental crises of our own making. When John Keynes quipped to those who contend that in the long run the market always corrected itself that "in the long run everyone is dead” he meant that, by blindly pursuing profit, classical economists were sowing the seeds of Destruction. Marx knew he was railing at deaf ears. The committed capitalist will happily sell the rope that hangs him, for in his heart he adores a thief.

U.N. chief: "Drug Money saved Banks in Global Crisis"--the Guardian

"Drug money worth billions of dollars kept the financial system afloat at the height of the global crisis, the United Nations' drugs and crime tsar has told the Observer. Antonio Maria Costa, head of the UN Office on Drugs and Crime, said he has seen evidence that the proceeds of organised crime were "the only liquid investment capital" available to some banks on the brink of collapse last year."

"Global crime has become an integral part of an economic system . . . the relationship among criminals, politicians, and members of the intelligence establishment has tainted the structures of the state and the role of its institutions . . . this system of global trade has fostered an unprecedented accumulation of private wealth alongside the impoverishment of large sectors of the world population," --Michel Chossudovsky, Professor of Economics, the University of Ottawa.

Mad For War

'When weighing possible benefits against the costs of the Iraq intervention, there is simply no conceivable calculus by which Operation Iraq Freedom can be judged to have been a successful or worthwhile policy.'-- the Center for American Progress

How early 20th century of our Progressive friends. To fathom neocon policy one has to grasp that for the Calvinist and committed capitalist their greatest impediment is the developed nation state. There is nothing more painfully amusing than listening to Dick Cheney bluster on about "defending America's interests". There are certainly many interests both here and abroad to be "defended" but they have nothing to do with the well-being of most Americans.

The Miraculous Rebound

In October 1983 the First National Bank of Midland, the largest independent bank in Texas went belly-up. The oil industry boom was over and by 1984 prices had tumbled. The number of Texas rigs fell from over 600 to 311. The downturn saw Halliburton's net income fall from $197 million in 1990 to $27 million in 1991 forcing a dramatic restructuring. The company was reduced to its Energy Services while retaining its engineering and construction subsidiary, Brown and Root. Come 1992 and the end of Gulf War I: Enter Dick.

Joined by Bush the Elder, the newly minted CEO promptly toured the Persian Gulf in search of business. With the former president at his side previously shut doors were suddenly flying open. As Halliburton’s CFO, Gary Morris, observed in wonder: ‘Having access is a great thing.’ There was just one problem: the biggest deals Mr. Cheney was being offered ran counter to U.S. law. So our Dick did what any red-blooded patriot would do, he sought a waiver. As the future Vice President said when challenged to explain his company's lavish deals with "terrorist states" like Iran and Libya: “The good Lord didn’t see fit to put oil and gas only where there are democratic regimes friendly to the United States.” [And just in case Uncle Sam tried poking his nose where it didn't belong Halliburton would tuck the loot in the Cayman islands]

Things were going swimmingly. Thanks to the former Secretary of Defense, from 1994 to 2002 Brown & Root was awarded over 600 Pentagon contracts. The company had expanded its global reach, and with the help of some well-greased hands, profits were soaring. Then our Dick made his one bad blunder: he acquired Dresser Industries and with it that company's 300,000 pending asbestos claims. Now our Vice-President Dick owed the company that had made him a very rich man (Cheney received $34 million when he resigned from Halliburton to return to government) and he owed them big time.

Cui Bono

Forget the Taliban, Lets Talk Iraq

It is hard to convince most folks that the people they elect are willing to see them and their children die for a ten percent return. Of all the rationales after the fact for Bush's decision to invade Iraq the only one to prove its value has been the Halliburton stock price.

"Halliburton's stock doubles as troop deaths double"--Halliburton Watch, Sept,2005.
"Since the beginning of the Iraq war, Halliburton, the Texas energy giant once headed by Vice President Dick Cheney, has seen its stock price more than triple in value. When the U.S invaded Iraq in March of 2003, Halliburton's stock was selling for $20 per share. The stock price at the close of market activity on Monday was $66."

Doh je: That's Cantonese for "thank you very much ..."

'The UK's Beyond Petroleum and China's CNPC have signed a contract to develop Iraq's Rumaila field, the largest oil field in the country. Rumaila holds the third biggest oil reserves in the world and the deal marks Iraq's biggest energy deal since Saddam Hussein was overthrown.'-- BBC World News

'China has emerged as one of the biggest economic beneficiaries of the war, snagging five lucrative deals. While Western firms were largely subdued in their interest in Iraq's recent oil auctions ... a testament to the lengths to which China will go to secure the oil it sorely needs to fuel its galloping economy' -- China Daily

Reading those quotes one has to wonder exactly how Cheney and his "neo-Conservatives" are still allowed to blow their smoke. They insist that our security demands spending ever more on the military even as we close down hospitals and lay off teachers. Are we credulous enough to believe Bill Kristol after his Weekly Standard describes the PRC as "a regime of hair-curling, systematic barbarity, or Washington Times' Bill Gertz bloviates about the great and present danger being posed by "Communist" China. Its past time someone ask their great benefactor, the Reverend Moon.

Automotive News: DETROIT, Sept. 25 /PRNewswire/ -- The Unification Church has joined a former U.S. diplomat and a major Korean industrial concern in an effort to create China's biggest car manufacturing facility. The project is being promoted by Panda Motors, a U.S.-registered corporation. The treasurer of Panda Motors is Pak Bo-Hi. He is also chairman of Newsworld Communications, which publishes the Washington Times and is controlled by the Rev. Sun Myung Moon and the Unification Church.

"In the late 1980s and 90s, transnational corporations (TNCs) saw China as the last frontier, the unlimited market that could endlessly absorb investment and endlessly throw off profitable returns. However, China's restrictive rules on trade and investment forced TNCs to locate most of their production processes in the country. By playing according to China's rules, TNCs ended up building a manufacturing base that produces more than China or the rest of the world can consume." --The Global Politician

64 million empty apartments

"Mainland’s property market remains dangerously overheated and failing to tame the speculative bubble could threaten financial and social stability," --South China Morning Post According to hedge fund manager, Tyler Durden, "China is covertly funding and creating a housing bubble that is at least 5 times as big as that of the United States."

Acknowledgment and Denial

The irony is that for centuries the Chinese rejected Western thinking. For our world to survive we need them to teach us to think less like Friedman and more like Confucius.

Short-term orientation [can be] identified with Truth, while long-term orientation can be identified with Virtue. "When information is manipulated or held to obtain a certain result, then one is simply going after the short-term orientation. There may be truth to the results, but the virtue of it has been removed."

Our "Masters of the Universe" are clearly worried about those torches and pitchforks. But can they perceive the distinction between equity and profit? Here's some of our committed capitalists' half-baked notions on "reform". Note the token Asian presence.

Where speculation ends, where real life starts, there consequently begins real, positive science,"--Karl Marx

Until our cherished Mad Men on Wall St. and TNC boardrooms recognize that without an ethos of pursuing virtue there is no useful reward. We will continue to see the fruits of all our labors blown up in the next best war-- then disappear on a dying planet.