Indians on India

An interesting quote from Fareed Zakaria's email newsletter for 4/5/17, since both he and Nikki Haley are Indian Americans.   India to U.S.: None of Your Business

Thanks, but no thanks. That’s the message India delivered to the Trump administration after U.S. Ambassador to the United Nations Nikki Haley suggested the United States would “find its place” in efforts to defuse tensions between India and Pakistan, the Hindustan Times reports. Reiterating India’s position that ties between the two are a bilateral matter, External Affairs Ministry spokesperson Gopal Baglay reportedly added: “We of course expect the international community and organizations to enforce international mechanisms and mandates concerning terrorism emanating from Pakistan, which continues to be the single biggest threat to peace and stability in our region and beyond.”

Democrats Push War with Russia

The Democrats believe Trump’s political weakness is Russia.  Therefore, they are vilifying Russia to make Trump’s friendliness toward Russia appear to be treason.  At first it looked like they would try to invalidate Trump’s election, but as time goes on that seems less likely.  

They make Putin look more powerful than he is, and they make Putin appear more aggressive and anti-American than he is.   An example is Fareed Zakaria’s CNN special on Putin, characterizing Putin as the most powerful man in the world.  Putin is a remarkable man who has brought Russia back from the trash heap of history to be a player on the world stage, and he has more nuclear weapons than anyone else in the world, including Donald Trump.  But that does not make him the most powerful man in the world; arguably either Trump or Chinese President Xi Jinping may be more powerful because of their economic power in addition to their military power.  In terms of usable power, Germany’s Angela Merkel, the leader of the most powerful country in the EU, may be more powerful than Putin.  This morning on some news show discussing Merkel’s meeting with Trump, the female reporter described Merkel as the most powerful “woman” in the world.  

In any case the Democrats want to make Putin look like a dangerous enemy of the US so that Trump’s failure to condemn him looks treasonous.  In addition, most Jews hate Russia.  Jews as a race lived in Russia for centuries.  While the word “Ashkenazi” means German, as it is used in describing Ashkenazi Jews, most recent Jewish immigrants have come from Russia or Soviet dominated Eastern Europe, and they brought with them a visceral hatred of Russia because of their poor treatment by ethnic Russian Slavs.  For powerful Jews in American politics and the media, vilifying Putin and Russia has a double benefit of weakening a political enemy, Trump, and an ethnic enemy, Russia.  

This campaign resembles the “yellow journalism” of the 1890s which led to the Spanish-American War in the Philippines and Cuba.  The Democrats, the journalists, and the Jews probably don’t want a civilization-ending nuclear war with Russia, but they want sanctions, political pressure, and maybe some smaller wars in Ukraine or the Middle East.  Small wars could be similar to the Afghanistan War that led to the demise of the Soviet Union.  If these efforts succeed in unseating Putin, it’s unclear who would follow him, but whoever it is, they would almost certainly be weaker than Putin, thus putting Americans and Jews in a more dominant position vis-a-vis the Russian Slavs.  

Trump does not seem particularly concerned about the Jewish aspect of the Russia issue.  He has many Jews in his administration.  So far he has not reversed his position on Putin, although he has been somewhat more cautious about praising him.  Even Trump is not insensitive to the steady drumbeat of anti-Putin propaganda.  

Reaction to Andrew Jackson Blog

I don’t think anybody reads this blog, but it looks like they do.  It looks like there were at least two reactions to my last blog on Andrew Jackson.  In addition President Trump decided to visit Andrew Jackson’s home and tomb in Nashville.  

Today on his MSNBC MTP Daily show, Chuck Todd talked about the changing perceptions of Andrew Jackson.  He said that Jackson was one of the founders of the modern Democratic Party, but the Democrats have largely rejected him because he owned slaves.  Meanwhile the Republicans have adopted him because of his representation of the common man against wealthy elitists, a model Donald Trump likes.  

It’s interesting that we find today’s Democrats rejecting a man of the people, while the Republicans adopt him.  Are the parties changing the bases they appeal to?  Only to a certain extent.  The Democrats in 2016 appealed to blacks, Hispanics and Jews, but rejected the lower and middle class white voters, whom they donated to the Republicans as a “basket of deplorables.”  The Republicans accepted the gift and ran with it.  

Also, today the New York Times published an article entitled, “The Fed vs. the Angry Masses,” although later editions changed the headline.  The article pointed out the popular mistrust of the Fed and other central banks.  It raised the question of whether Trump would attack the Fed as Jackson attacked the Second Bank of the US.  

It already looks strange that the Fed has begun what looks like a prolonged period of raising interest rates after years of leaving them at zero only now that a Republican has been elected President.  At least superficially, it looks like Janet Yellen ran the Fed in a partisan way to benefit Obama and the Democrats.  There are legitimate arguments for raising rates now, but it looks suspicious.  

Andrew Jackson and the Jews

I have been reading Jon Meacham’s biography of Andrew Jackson, “American Lion.”  In discussing Jackson’s campaign to close Nicholas Biddle’s Second Bank of the United States, he quotes a paper written by Jackson stating his reasons for closing the bank:

“The divine right of kings and the prerogative authority of rulers have fallen before the intelligence of the age,” Jackson said, continuing:

Standing armies and military chieftains can no longer uphold tyranny against the resistance of public opinion. The mass of the people have more to fear from combinations of the wealthy and professional classes— from an aristocracy which through the influence of riches and talents, insidiously employed, sometimes succeeds in preventing political institutions, however well adjusted, from securing the freedom of the citizen.… The President has felt it his duty to exert the power with which the confidence of his countrymen has clothed him in attempting to purge the government of all sinister influences which have been incorporated with its administration.  (From Meacham, Jon (2008-11-04). American Lion: Andrew Jackson in the White House (Kindle Locations 5497-5501). Random House Publishing Group. Kindle Edition.)

Nicholas Biddle was not Jewish, but I think Jackson’s concern about the aristocracy of wealthy and professional classes applies today.  The majority of this aristocracy is not Jewish, but a disproportionate percentage is.  Jews make up a high percentage of the richest people in the United States and of members of the Senate, for example.  Jews are also disproportionately represented in the government, sometimes as cabinet secretaries, but more often just below the secretaries as deputies, under secretaries, or assistant secretaries.   They are immensely influential in the financial and banking industry.  The chairmen or women of the Federal Reserve Bank have all been Jews since Paul Volcker was appointed in 1979.  It is almost as if there is an ethnicity test to be Fed chair.  

Everybody points out the similarities between Andrew Jackson and Donald Trump  Both were sort of rough hewn outsiders to politics.  Born poor, Jackson broke a line of six genteel Presidents, all connected to the founding of the United States and born in Virginia or Massachusetts, starting with Washington and ending with John Quincy Adams.  

In Jackson's time there were few Jews in America, but there were still bankers who were part of the disliked “aristocracy” or establishment, even then, who were the targets of Jackson’s anger.  Jackson’s main antagonist, Nicholas Biddle, came from an aristocratic Philadelphia family; he had relatives who had distinguished themselves in the Revolutionary War and early American politics.  Jackson felt that the bank was the enemy of the common man, while it had favored the American aristocracy.  Thus, he aimed to destroy the Second Bank of the United States and distribute its assets to smaller banks scattered around the country and presumably more in touch with ordinary people.  

The Bank of the US was more like an ordinary regional bank of today that handled the government’s accounts than today’s Federal Reserve Bank, but also performed some regulatory functions like the Fed.  The Bank of the US issued its own paper money, and stimulated or retarded the economy by loosening or tightening credit.  Prior to Biddle’s administration it was blamed for credit bubbles and recessions.  

Wikipedia says that under Biddle the bank was doing its regulatory job pretty well, but the public still disliked it as an aristocratic institution and still blamed it for past financial problems.  In this, it was not unlike the Fed and Wall Street today, which are perceived as aristocratic institutions oppressing ordinary people.  Today, because of the dominance of Jews in the financial system, from Wall Street, to the US Department of the Treasury, to the Federal Reserve.  Again, it is arguable that they have done a relatively good job of handling the economy, except for the Great Recession 2008 and the huge rise in income inequality in the last few decades.  The fact that no senior bankers were prosecuted for their roles in the Great Recession contributed to the perception that they were part of an aristocracy that was above the law.  Obama’s Democratic administration, which should have represented the common man, instead licked Wall Street’s boots, while the Fed bailed out the big  banks, but did almost nothing for the regular people who lost their houses or their savings.  This unfortunately creates the image that Jews are oppressing ordinary Americans.  America appears to keep humming along, except that the Jews keep getting richer and richer, while ordinary people get poorer, so much poorer that ordinary white people are resorting to opiates to escape the current situation.  

Of course, white people bear a lot of blame for the situation they find themselves in, but because there is a large group of Jews who appear so greedy and heartless, Jews open themselves up to being the target of white discontent.  To characterize all Jews as greedy and heartless is unfair to many ordinary Jews, who are not rich or famous because they are just ordinary people going about ordinary lives.  But because these elite Jews are so easily identifiable, they do a disservice to their fellows by appearing in an unfavorable light.  Einstein was a Jew, but so is most of Wall Street.  And so is Bernie Sanders, who is trying to rein in the excesses of Wall Street, and thus would probably have been an ally of Andrew Jackson in the attack of the Second Bank of the US on behalf of the ordinary citizens of the US.  .