There is rarely cause for optimism in the world,DB.The human race has dug itself into a huge hole with its dependance on fossil fuels,and now we are trying to scrabble over each other to get out.
What is happening in the ME is all about oil and the major wars of the 20th C were all in one way another connected to oil.
Oil=Power and has since the beginning of the 20thC when the major powers started to equip their naval forces with oil-powered ships to replace the slower less powerful coal powered ships.Oil powered ships did not need coaling stations at close intervals to refuel and could travel much further distances.The switch in fuels sparked the arms race and all it took was a "War on Terror" in Serbia to spark the conflagration of WWl.
Germany,Italy and Japan had no oil supplies of their own and their aggressive expansion into the Caucasus,the Middle East and SE asia was an attempt to obtain the raw materials that would allow fascist ideology to survive and grow.
Fascism is the logical culmination of the "Military/Industrial complex" and I believe that the us is well down the road to fascism.All it will take is a catastrophe (such as a world-wide depression caused by falling oil supplies and consequent massive price rises) and the Iron heel will come crashing down again.
Take a look at conditions in the us before WWll.Industry was stagnant and unemployment was high with resulting labour unrest.WWll was the best thing that could have happened for the us.It wiped out unemployment and kick-started industrial expansion overnight and their geographic isolation from Europe largely protected them from the effects of the war.The us has been at war with the world ever since then.It wasn't long after the Vietnam war ended that the economic effects were felt and the us had to look around for a new war and they found,in the ME,a perfect place to start one.
Eventually the us will go to war with China.American manufacturing capacity is declining while they rack up the greatest debt in history to fund their military expansion,while their debt to China grows and China's economic growth runs wild.Eventually the us will have to repudiate that debt,which will mean war,or try to control the world's oil supplies to the exclusion of China,which will also mean war.It's either that or return to being an agrarian economy and no american politician could allow that to happen...it would be electoral suicide for whichever party is in power.
Drawing a crude analogy...the us is like a junkie who borrows from a loanshark to buy a pistol ,in the forlorn hope that he can rob enough to pay back the loan shark and have something left over for a fix...after which he has to borrow and the cycle starts again!
I may be incorrect about the source,but I think that it was Napoleon who said of China "Beware the sleeping giant when it awakes." and truer words were never spoken.
On the positive side,I think we've seen the last mel gibson movie,so it isn't all doom and gloom.
The more I think about the future of the world the more it looks like a combination of Mad Max and 1984.Maybe it's time to start looking around the Tasmanian coast for a bolthole.
What is happening in the ME is all about oil and the major wars of the 20th C were all in one way another connected to oil.
Oil=Power and has since the beginning of the 20thC when the major powers started to equip their naval forces with oil-powered ships to replace the slower less powerful coal powered ships.Oil powered ships did not need coaling stations at close intervals to refuel and could travel much further distances.The switch in fuels sparked the arms race and all it took was a "War on Terror" in Serbia to spark the conflagration of WWl.
Germany,Italy and Japan had no oil supplies of their own and their aggressive expansion into the Caucasus,the Middle East and SE asia was an attempt to obtain the raw materials that would allow fascist ideology to survive and grow.
Fascism is the logical culmination of the "Military/Industrial complex" and I believe that the us is well down the road to fascism.All it will take is a catastrophe (such as a world-wide depression caused by falling oil supplies and consequent massive price rises) and the Iron heel will come crashing down again.
Take a look at conditions in the us before WWll.Industry was stagnant and unemployment was high with resulting labour unrest.WWll was the best thing that could have happened for the us.It wiped out unemployment and kick-started industrial expansion overnight and their geographic isolation from Europe largely protected them from the effects of the war.The us has been at war with the world ever since then.It wasn't long after the Vietnam war ended that the economic effects were felt and the us had to look around for a new war and they found,in the ME,a perfect place to start one.
Eventually the us will go to war with China.American manufacturing capacity is declining while they rack up the greatest debt in history to fund their military expansion,while their debt to China grows and China's economic growth runs wild.Eventually the us will have to repudiate that debt,which will mean war,or try to control the world's oil supplies to the exclusion of China,which will also mean war.It's either that or return to being an agrarian economy and no american politician could allow that to happen...it would be electoral suicide for whichever party is in power.
Drawing a crude analogy...the us is like a junkie who borrows from a loanshark to buy a pistol ,in the forlorn hope that he can rob enough to pay back the loan shark and have something left over for a fix...after which he has to borrow and the cycle starts again!
I may be incorrect about the source,but I think that it was Napoleon who said of China "Beware the sleeping giant when it awakes." and truer words were never spoken.
On the positive side,I think we've seen the last mel gibson movie,so it isn't all doom and gloom.
The more I think about the future of the world the more it looks like a combination of Mad Max and 1984.Maybe it's time to start looking around the Tasmanian coast for a bolthole.