What's Up Between Russia and Georgia

No doubt what Russia did in fighting Georgia was bad, but to offset the hue and cry of "Let's go to war against Russia to save Georgia," remember the following:

-- Georgia started the war by sending troops into South Ossetia, which admittedly is part of Georgia, but there was no shooting until Georgian troops started shooting;

-- In spite of George Bush's professed love for Vladimir Putin, he has stuck his finger in Putin's eye on numerous occasions, such as:
-- Abrogating the ABM treaty with Moscow,
-- Encouraging former Soviet states to join NATO, including Georgia,
-- Encouraging pro-Western, anti-Russian, political movements in former Soviet states, such as the failed Orange Revolution in Ukraine,
-- Forcing the separation of Kosovo from Serbia, viewed as an insult by the (pro-Russian) Slavs,
-- Proposing to install ABM systems in Poland and the Czech Republic.

Arguably, Bush never liked or trusted Putin and the Russians and thus he decided to make hay while the sun was shining on the US, encouraging more and more former Soviet citizens to be pro-West and anti-Russian. The question is, did these anti-Russian policies produce the current Russian belligerence, or was Russia going to do this in any case? I think Russia's belligerence is due at least in part to the anti-Russian policies pursued by the US. If Condi Rice had managed her Russian portfolio better the world might be a safer place today. But there is the argument that Russia was always evil and that Condi was right to continue the cold war policies she grew up with.

Pickens Looking for Government Handout

Just to follow up on my previous blog, an article in the Denver Post points out that Boone Pickens is counting on government subsidies for his share of the natural gas part of his wind/gas energy plan. Like every other businessman he's looking for corporate welfare.

Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac

The turmoil around Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac is emblematic of the greed and corruption that permeate the American government and business community. If we were to let the Republicans' beloved free market system operate normally, their likely failure could destroy the national or possibly the world economy. So, in the short term a bailout is probably necessary. But Harvard's Larry Summers summed up the situation in an interview the other day saying that we may privatize Fannie's gains and socialize its losses, transferring the losses to the taxpayer. Of course, because the Republicans do not pay taxes, the actual losses will be transferred to our children and grandchildren. But we'll take care of them by letting inflation run wild, so that a trillion dollars will be nothing to them, just like it is in Zimbabwe's currency.

It's interesting that when the legislation dealing with the mortgage/housing crisis starting moving through Congress, it dealt mainly with a bailout for people who were being foreclosed, but when it finally passed the big winners were the financiers on Wall Street, in the form of the Fannie and Freddie bailout. The financiers get trillions, the homeowners only get billions.

More Tax Cheats

The latest example of rich Americans betraying the troops fighting in Afghanistan and Iraq is the report that they avoided $100 billion annually by hiding income and assets off shore. The most recently exposed hiding place is Lichtenstein. The Financial Times plays up the German connection, but many Americans were caught in the operation as well, many of them working through the Swiss bank UBS.

It would be interesting to know how many of these rich people who hate America are Republicans and how many Democrats. I would guess most of them are Republicans, since rich people tend to be Republican, and since rich Democrats tend to be more willing to pay taxes to support do-gooder stuff like education and health care, if not to support the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan. The Republicans have their shills like George Will, Charles Krauthammer and Fox News, who rail at the government and shout for free enterprise, which really means, "Let me keep all of my obscene wealth to myself! Let my neighbor starve and freeze in the dark!"

The Republicans say they love America but hate the government -- the petty, little bureaucrats who do the everyday stuff like monitor statistics, send out policy notices, etc. Reagan's famous statement was something like, "The nine most terrifying words in the English language are, 'I'm from the government and I'm here to help.'" But if you hate the people who work for the government, you essentially hate the government. The Republicans have tried to get around this by hiring private-sector contractors to do as much as possible. They pay their buddies in these private firms much, much more than a bureaucrat would make, and their buddies in return make generous political contributions to Republicans. See Sen. Ted Stevens, or Cong. Tom Delay, or Cong. Duke Cunningham, or Jack Abramoff, or many other corrupt examples! It's a nasty, unethical, little arrangement.