2[1].2 Project Background Reading - Politics

2.2 Project Background Reading -- Politics Campaign for Intervention in Burma by Peter Symonds, May 11, 2008 The catastrophe wrought by Cyclone Nargis on the Burmese people has provoked an extraordinary campaign by the US and allied powers, and in the international media, demanding that the military junta open its borders to aid and aid officials as well as to American military aircraft, troops and warships. Once again an attempt is being made to stampede public opinion with heartrending images of desperate survivors and devastated towns, accompanied by an incessant drumbeat condemning the Burmese regime for its inadequate aid efforts, its insularity, and its failure to accept international, especially American, aid.

One should immediately pause and recall the outcome of similar “humanitarian” exercises. In 1999, the plight of Kosovan refugees was exploited by the US and its allies to wage war against Serbia and transform the province into a NATO protectorate largely “cleansed” of its Serbian minority. In the same year, Australia, with the backing of the US, used the violence of Indonesian-backed militias to justify a military intervention into East Timor to install a regime sympathetic to Canberra’s economic and strategic interests. After nearly a decade the local populations in both countries continue to live in appalling conditions, with none of their fundamental needs having been met.

Undoubtedly a huge social tragedy has taken place over the past week. Official Burmese figures put the number of dead and missing at more than 60,000. UN officials estimate the death toll at 100,000 and the number of people severely affected by the cyclone at nearly 2 million. Much of the huge Irrawaddy delta has been devastated by the storm surges whipped up by Cyclone Nargis, which swamped the low-lying land. Entire towns and villages have been washed away, leaving scenes that recall the destruction produced by the December 2004 tsunami along the coasts of Indonesia, Sri Lanka, India and Thailand.

It is also true that the Burmese junta is a brutal regime that has repeatedly gunned down antigovernment protesters in order to maintain its own power and privileges. Its rescue efforts are certainly hampered not only by the economic backwardness of the country, but also by the regime’s callous indifference to the plight of the Burmese people. Given the current media campaign, one should approach all press reports with considerable caution. But there is little doubt that many cyclone victims are being left to fend for themselves—as indeed were the survivors of the 2004 tsunami by governments of the worst hit countries.

No one, however, should place any credibility in the protestations of concern from the Bush administration and its allies. US Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice insisted on Wednesday that Washington’s cyclone assistance was “not a matter of politics” but rather “a matter of a humanitarian crisis”. “What remains is for the Burmese government to allow the international community to help its people,” Rice declared.

In reality, all American assistance comes with political strings attached. The Bush administration has offered a paltry $3.5 million in financial aid and is pushing for the entry of US officials, aid workers and military personnel to handle emergency relief operations rather than allow Burmese authorities to carry them out. At the same time, the US and its European allies continue to maintain sanctions against the Burmese regime that have compounded the country’s economic difficulties. In the week prior to the cyclone, the Bush administration strengthened its bans on trade and investment and the freezing of assets, all of which remain in place except for a slight easing of restrictions on financial aid.

French Foreign Minister Bernard Kouchner suggested on Wednesday that the UN Security Council be convened to invoke its “responsibility to protect” to override Burmese national sovereignty and deliver international aid, with or without the junta’s approval. The “responsibility to protect” resolution, which has a history dating back to the 1999 NATO war on Yugoslavia, was passed in 2006 as an instrument for the major powers to justify military aggression on the grounds of preventing “genocide, war, ethnic cleansing and crimes against humanity”. Kouchner’s suggestion would extend the scope for such interventions to natural disasters such as Cyclone Nargis.

Kouchner’s comments have yet to be publicly supported by Washington, but the suggestion is clearly being discussed within the administration. The US ambassador to the UN, Zalmay Khalilzad, declared that most governments were “outraged” by the slowness of the Burmese regime to accept international aid. Alluding to the UN Security Council powers, he added: “A government has responsibility to protect its own people, to provide for its people.... It should be a no-brainer to accept the offer made by the international community.”

Director of the US Office of Foreign Disaster Assistance, Ky Luu, was more explicit. He indicated that unilateral air drops by US military aircraft was one of the options being considered if the junta continued to refuse to accept American aid. Four US warships are already heading towards Burma and Navy helicopters and Air Force cargo planes have been stationed in neighboring Thailand. US Defense Secretary Robert Gates commented that he could not imagine a military intervention without Burmese permission. Defense Department spokesman Bryan Whitman noted: “If you’re not asked and it’s not requested, it’s considered an invasion.” Nevertheless, it is clear that the military option and its political ramifications are being actively discussed.

The Asian tsunami

As part of the campaign to pressure the Burmese junta, a new mythology is being created to paint the international response to the Asian tsunami as a model of rapid, efficient and compassionate aid delivery by all involved. Contrasts are increasingly being made between the Burmese regime today and its “democratic” counterparts in Indonesia, Sri Lanka, India and Thailand in 2004.

Any objective examination of the 2004 tragedy, however, reveals a very different picture. The huge tsunami waves engulfed impoverished villages around the Bay of Bengal on December 26. For days, as the death toll quickly mounted into the tens of thousands, US President Bush, British Prime Minister Tony Blair and other world leaders failed to make any statement on the disaster. When they finally broke their vacations, their collective contempt for the fate of the victims was revealed in their perfunctory comments and pathetic offers of aid. It was only after an outpouring of sympathy and donations from working people around the world, aghast at the enormity of the disaster, that the US and major powers began to act.

In the worst affected countries, emergency relief efforts were hamstrung by red tape and political agendas, of both the local regimes and the donor countries. The Indonesian and Sri Lankan governments had been waging brutal long-running wars against separatist movements and were extremely reluctant to allow aid organizations, let alone foreign militaries, into the disaster zones. Far from helping the victims, the Indonesian military seized the opportunity to intensify its operations against Achnese rebels. In Sri Lanka, attempts to establish a joint aid body with the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE) under the auspices of the 2002 ceasefire collapsed, amid bitter communal recriminations over any official recognition of the separatists.

The Indian government insisted that it would control its own relief operations and dismissed any suggestion that foreign militaries should be involved. The Indian military was particularly sensitive to the presence of international aid workers in the Andaman and Nicobar Islands, which were among the worst hit areas, because of the presence of strategic navy and air force bases there. More than three years later, thousands of tsunami victims on the islands, as well as in other parts of India, Indonesia and Sri Lanka, are still living in squalid conditions in temporary accommodation.

No one in ruling circles in the US or Europe suggested at the time that a military operation should be mounted to override Indian sovereignty or to make unilateral air drops over the Andaman and Nicobar Islands. In the case of Sri Lanka and Indonesia, the governments eventually permitted the US military to assist in aid operations on their territories. In both cases, Washington’s overriding purpose was political—to forge closer working relations with the militaries of the two countries as well as to set a precedent, which is now being invoked to exert pressure on the Burmese junta.

US Secretary of State Rice bluntly told the Senate Foreign Relations Committee in January 2005 that the tsunami constituted “a wonderful opportunity to show not just the US government, but the heart of the American people... And I think it has paid great dividends for us.” Rice now declares that US aid offers to Burma are “not a matter of politics”, but the Bush administration is intent on transforming this latest disaster into a new political “opportunity” to advance its strategic and economic interests in the region.

Strategic interests The decision of the Burmese junta to selectively accept aid from sympathetic countries such as China, India and Thailand, and not the US, is hardly surprising. The Bush administration has made little secret of the fact that it favours “regime change” in Burma—the removal of the military regime and its replacement by a government, headed by opposition leader Aung San Suu Kyi, more amenable to Washington’s interests and to opening up the country to foreign investors.

The US targeting of the junta has nothing to do with concern for the democratic rights or the welfare of the Burmese people. Washington’s hostility towards the Burmese regime is driven above all by the latter’s close association with China, regarded by the US as its main potential rival. Over the past eight years, the Bush administration has pursued a strategy of strengthening military ties and establishing bases in a string of countries around China—from South Korea and Japan to the Philippines, Australia and Indonesia and around to India, Pakistan, Afghanistan and the Central Asia republics.

Burma is a significant hole in US efforts to “contain” China. The country sits next to the strategic Strait of Malacca—the major sea-lane linking North East Asia, including China, with the energy resources of the Middle East and Africa. Control of such “choke points” has long been central to American naval plans. China has assisted Burma in building various naval facilities and counts on access to Burmese ports as part of its efforts to protect shipping lanes that are vital for its own economy.

The international media is already making criticisms of China for failing to exert more pressure on its ally to open up to international aid. US Secretary of State Rice phoned her counterpart in Beijing this week to push the Chinese government to exert more pressure on Burma. If the Bush administration did decide to press for a UN resolution to intervene, Beijing would quickly become a more direct target of vilification. China has opposed any move to raise the cyclone disaster in the UN Security Council.

There is also a broader economic agenda behind Washington’s hostility to the Burmese junta. For decades, it has maintained a largely shut-in, isolated economy in which military-run enterprises still dominate the key sectors. For American corporations, the country is a new potential source of cheap labor as well as critical resources, including oil and gas. The US administration has quietly allowed the Chevron oil corporation to proceed with its multi-million dollar investments in Burma, but such operations are hindered by bad relations between the two countries.

The Bush administration is no more motivated by humanitarian concerns in Burma than it is in Iraq or Afghanistan. In rejecting the latest lies and hypocrisy from the White House, it is necessary to consider the fundamental issues involved. Why do such catastrophes repeatedly hit the most vulnerable layers of the world’s population? Why do disease, hunger and poverty continue to ravage the masses of Asia, Africa and Latin America?

The resources exist to abolish suffering and want, as well as to minimize the impact of natural disasters such as Cyclone Nargis. Over the past three decades, the globalization of production has vastly expanded mankind’s economic capacity, establishing the basis for the rational planning and deployment of resources on a world scale to ensure a decent standard of living for people in every part of the globe. Under capitalism, however, this huge economic and scientific capacity is exploited to provide profits for the wealthy few, while the vast majority, including in the major industrialised countries, struggle to survive from day to day.

Poverty and unemployment are no aberration. The vast layers of the world’s urban and rural poor are an essential feature of global capitalism. They form a vast reserve army of labor that is used as a constant downward pressure on the wages and conditions of the working class internationally. The only means for abolishing the immense and deepening chasm between rich and poor is through the revolutionary restructuring of society along socialist lines, so that the burning needs of the overwhelming majority of humanity take precedence over the profit requirements of the few.

Bush Administration's Exploitation of Cyclone Nargis Disaster by Joe Kay, May 9, 2008

The Bush administration lost no time in seeking to exploit the devastating tragedy in Burma (Myanmar). It has seized upon the cyclone that struck the country over the weekend, killed at least 20,000 and likely many more, to aggressively push its foreign policy agenda in Asia.

On Tuesday, Bush held a special ceremony at the White House to sign a bill giving Burmese opposition leader Aung San Suu Kyi a Congressional Gold Medal. He used the occasion to place deliberately provocative conditions on any disbursement of aid to the ravaged country, beyond an initial token sum.

“ The United States has made an initial aid contribution, but we want to do a lot more,” Bush declared. “We’re prepared to move US Navy assets to help find those who’ve lost their lives, to help find the missing, to help stabilize the situation. But in order to do so, the military junta must allow our disaster assessment teams into the country.”

So far, the US embassy has authorized the release of a paltry $250,000—less than half the cost of a single Tomahawk cruse missile of the type used by the US Navy to kill a Somali rebel last week. Later Tuesday, the administration pledged an additional $3 million to be allocated by a USAID disaster response team.

The very fact that the US is making aid to Burma conditional upon the satisfaction of certain demands is itself an outrage. Bush did not say why it was necessary for the US to carry out its own assessment in order to release more aid, nor did he elaborate on what was meant by promises that the US military would help “stabilize the situation.” US Navy ships are standing by off the coast of Thailand to intervene.

These pledges are certainly not intended as selfless humanitarian gestures. The Bush administration has been seeking to undermine the Burmese military regime for years and seized on protests last year by Buddhist monks to slap economic sanctions on the country and its rulers. There is no doubt that the United States would be happy to exploit the current tragedy to get a military foothold in the country.

The World Socialist Web Site holds no brief for the Burmese military junta, a brutal regime that has exercised dictatorial control over a largely impoverished country. However, US and European machinations, including the promotion of Suu Kyi, have nothing to do with concern for the democratic rights or economic well-being of the population. As always, the humanitarian pretensions of the US government are carefully calibrated to coincide with the interests of the American ruling class.

In the case of Burma, the US is interested in countering the influence of China, which has closer ties with the military regime and sees the country as a critical point of access into the Indian Ocean. As far as the Bush administration is concerned, the population of the country is only a bargaining chip in the pursuit of geo-strategic objectives.

US energy giants, including the Chevron oil corporation, also have interests in Burma. While the Bush administration has placed economic sanctions on the country, these have not affected Chevron’s multibillion-dollar investments through its subsidiary Unocal. Human rights groups have accused Chevron of complicity in abuses in Burma intended to protect its pipeline routes.

The statements by the Bush administration must also be seen in the context of its treatment of populations around the world, including in the United States itself. On Monday, US First Lady Laura Bush was the first from the White House to respond to the cyclone, using the opportunity to chastise the government for failing to warn the population and adequately prepare for the consequences.

“Although they were aware of the threat,” she said, “Burma’s state-run media failed to issue a timely warning to citizens in the storm’s path. The response to the cyclone is just the most recent example of the junta’s failure to meet its people’s basic needs.”

The hypocrisy and cynicism of this statement are so glaring that one wonders if it is not intentionally provocative. This August 29 will mark the third anniversary of Hurricane Katrina, the massive storm that struck Louisiana and Mississippi, killing at least 1,800 people. The hurricane destroyed and flooded New Orleans, a major American city.

The US and local governments had been aware for decades of the potential for a deadly flood in New Orleans, but there was no evacuation plan in place, and no plan to meet the needs of those trapped or displaced. Tens of thousands remained trapped for days in the Louisiana Superdome. Many thousands who lost their homes were placed in temporary FEMA trailers, and in 2007 it was revealed that these trailers contained extremely high levels of formaldehyde, a toxic chemical.

The devastation caused by Hurricane Katrina was largely preventable, but due to gross governmental indifference and negligence, the levee systems of New Orleans were denied necessary investments and allowed to decay—only one of many examples of the American government’s “failure to meet its people’s basic needs.”

The State (of Mind) Behind the Federalist Mask (Tearing Away the U.S.A.'s Corporate Veil) by Dhane Blue

"Do you know how many trillions of dollars YOUR Local and Federal Government has invested with Mexico, China, the old Soviet block countries? Government investments that greatly profit from that cheap labor abroad. Investments that profit even more when the dollar drops in value due to foreign currency exchange rates?" What is the U.S.A. government? What do we learn in school? Or, should I ask, what lies are we fed and how are we brain-washed into 'believing' a cover story about our government? Playing a little game with the word 'believe' reveals the truth -- BE the LIE, LIVE it -- that pretty much tells us what is going on. I have written about this BIG LIE before. I was only scratching the surface. I can think of an appropriate analogy. Every morning when I shave I look in the mirror and notice a big 'scabbedover' sore on my forehead. It just grew there slowly over time without much attention from me (like the relationship between myself, a citizen, and the U.S.A.). It oozes a little 'sickness' each day and 'scabs' over. No matter how many times I peel back that scab, the 'sore' is still there. The pathological state of mind behind the U.S.A. government's mask of Federalism is that 'sore' -- that growth on my forehead. How I wish I could only have it 'lasered' off by a good doctor. I just don't want to lose my mind in the process. So, let's look at the government's 'cover story'. Every good scam artist has one. "Political federalism is a political philosophy in which a group of members are bound together (Latin: foedus, covenant) with a governing representative head. The term federalism is also used to describe a system of government in which sovereignty is constitutionally divided between a central governing authority and constituent political units (like states or provinces). Federalism is the system in which the power to govern is shared between the national & state governments, creating what is often called a federation. Proponents are often called federalists." (Wikipedia)

"Advocates of federalism cite many advantages of this system of governance. It is claimed that it checks the growth of tyranny. Also that federalism promotes unity and at the same time has room for diversity to accommodate regional preferences and a degree of freedom. Also the position of the United States as the world leader demands a strong national government. For this the unstinted support of the states is required. Therefore the federal system suits the United States most. The Constitution set up a division of power between the federal and state governments which initially limited the federal unit to the fields of defense, foreign affairs, the control of the currency and the control of commerce between the states. This division of power has been eroded over the years so that today the federal government has functions that have been greatly extended and touch on nearly all aspects of life for American citizens." (Wikipedia)

That's the public mask of Federalism. Behind that mask, the government of the U.S.A. today has become a gargantuan monster with its tentacles spread worldwide. It is a cancerous growth, a New World Order Frankenstein, a Count Dracula sucking the life blood of billions of people around the globe. Its multi-faceted 'eye' is life-denying in its 'view of reality' -- no matter which face, or 'mask', it presents to the public. Its bottom line is more and more profit for me, the U.S. government and its actors. We can understand why the U.S.A. government has worn the Federalist mask since the 18th century -- for the same reasons official 'executioners' always have. But, we're now in the 21st century and it's time to stop 'believing' in the tooth fairy, Santa Claus, and the Virgin Mary. Uncle Sam is no virgin nor does he consider himself accountable to 'Joe Blow', the public. He is more like Jim Carrey in the movie, 'The Mask' -- a sybaritic lecher who wants to get in the public's pants and rape it for all it's worth. How did Uncle Sam morph into this monster like Jim Carrey's character morphs out of control in the movie? Where was 'Joe Blow', the public, while Uncle Sam performed his Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde act? Mostly, he was being culled from the herd of sheeple by racist eugenicists such as Rockefeller and other elitist, sociopathic ruling families -- 10% per generation. Following World Wars I and II, the Fascist monster of Nazi Germany reseeded itself in the U.S.A. and remained hidden by the curtains of 'national security' and 'corporate' ownership. (OZ in his cubicle -'theocratic' fascism some call it) The fall of the Twin Towers -- the 9-11 Event -- was our nation's symbolic tearing away of the 'corporate veil' concealing the government's sociopathic rapists lurking within. There is another 'untold' dimension to this story -- one kept secret by the government's Golden Rule of Silence. It is the story of how this growth into a New World Order has been funded. But, first ...

"Historians will record that between November 2000 and February 2002, democracy -- as envisioned by the creators of the Declaration of Independence and the U.S. Constitution --effectively came to an end. As democracy died, the Fascist American Theocratic State [The State] was born. This new fascist era (NWO) was designed and implemented primarily by Republican organizations and individuals (Bush family dynasty) who funded, supported and ultimately inserted George Bush II in office. Equally complicit in this atrocity was the Democratic Party, itself having become corrupt and beholden to its own interests. But the greatest tragedy in this horrific turn of events was that the public and media embraced fascism's coming. It should be noted

that the Green Party's valiant efforts were too little, too late. Three events accelerated the demise of American Democracy. The Election of 2000 (the American version of a coup), the 911 attack on the World Trade Center and the Pentagon ... and the US response to it, and the spate of corporate bankruptcies, most notably Enron, which provided clear evidence -- to those who dared look at it -- that the American democratic process was a sham." (The Emergence of the Fascist American Theocratic State by John Stanton and Wayne Madsen)

"From the moment the twin towers were hit, the fascist seed began to germinate, to take root and grow (in the limelight at last). As the first shots of what the neocons call "World War IV" rang out, piercing the post-Cold War calm like a shriek straight out of Hell, the political and cultural climate underwent a huge shift: the country became, for the first time in the modern era, a hothouse conducive to the growth of a genuinely totalitarian tendency in American politics. The events of 9-11 were an enormous defeat for the U.S., and it is precisely in these circumstances – the traumatic humbling of a power once considered mighty – that the fascist impulse begins to find its first expression. That, at any rate, is the historical experience of Germany, for example, where a defeated military machine regenerated itself on the strength of German resentment and lashed out at Europe once again. The terrible defeat of World War I, and the injustice of the peace, created in Weimar Germany the cradle of National Socialism: but in our own age, where everything is speeded up – by the Internet and the sheer momentum of the knowledge explosion – a single battle, and a single defeat, can have the same Weimarizing effect." (A Fascist America -- How Close Are We? by Justin Raimondo)

"The most significant socio-political shift in our time has gone almost completely unremarked, and even unnoticed. It is the dramatic shift of the red-state bourgeoisie from leave-us-alone libertarianism, manifested in the Congressional elections of 1994, to almost totalitarian statist nationalism. Whereas the conservative middle class once cheered the circumscribing of the federal government, it now celebrates power and adores the central state, particularly its military wing." (Red State Fascism by Lew Rockwell) I agree with these writers -- American Fascism is OUT OF THE CLOSET! It calls itself the New World Order. I also don't think the words we use to identify the government matter much. It is by its servants' behavior that we can know the government's true agenda -- whether the actors on the stage be Satanists, Zionists, Fascists, Socialists, Communists, or whatever 'mask' they wear from day to day. They all act out a State of (Mind), or virtual reality, that is in denial of life. The U.S. government wants to own the world and all its people as 'non-living' objects only to enjoy their destruction -- like the little kid at play in the sandbox who builds, knocks down, and rebuilds his sandcastles. How does humanity grow out of this infantile fantasy? How long has this state of mind, this 'malevolent meme', been 'at play' in the closet' -- unable to deal with the creative force of life all around it?

What is the untold story I've alluded to above. Who are the childish players in this expensive sandbox? What is their game plan? We need to go back to the end of World War II to discover where this New World Order's impetus has come from. Now that these 'children' have become The State of Mind of our country they have the money for their pogrom of control and the apparent will to implement their plans. What have we,

the American people, missed? How did this cancerous growth develop and sustain itself while remaining hidden in the body politic? In short, it has remained alive through its addiction to capitalistic greed and corruption -- the imaginary playmates of our syphilitic Uncle Sam. The U.S.A. government has been 'scamming' us with a simple 'numbers' game. As a pathological corporate entity whose 'executives' are no more accountable than the non-living corporation itself, the rule of natural law has been entirely subjugated while we the American people have been robbed blind. The U.S.A. government's announced budgets and funding of programs is all an illusion. That the U.S.A. government NEEDS money to pay for ANYTHING is a LIE. The government has enough money -- government at all levels from the federal to the local -- to cover all of its expenditures. In fact, Uncle Sam has enough money to invest in mega companies, corporate structures, and even other countries. Stock records show that the American government virtually owns the means of production in this country. There is no need for a tax of ANY kind to make ends meet. Yet, we the people of America continue to pay into this 'scam'. We are like a chipmunk in his cage, running in its exercise wheel, with the U.S. government tapping off 85% of the energy produced for its own growth, investment, and control. Our government, prior to World War II, used to operate on a 'pay as you go' system where accounting was done on a fairly open balance sheet -- in other words, money in and money out. In the mid-1940's, the GFOA, an organization set up within the government to change this accounting system, started promoting the change to a corporate structure's accounting system. For anyone familiar with stock investments, this means the Comprehensive Annual Financial Report (CAFR). This change in the accounting system was supported by international bankers, politicians, corporate CEOs, and players within the government's judiciary. According to international law, corporations are regulated by the SSEC. If a public corporation were to hide its profits, declare to stock holders a loss for the year, and an inability to provide a dividend, the corporation's officers would soon be indicted and find themselves in jail. However, this doesn't apparently apply for the government corporation. Like in the Monopoly game board, they have a 'Get Out of Jail Free' card! After all, they ARE the jailers in this game practicing legalized extortion upon the American public. The U.S. government, by 1978, had mandated a changeover to the CAFR system for all local and state governments -- no changeover to their accounting system, no federal funding, etc. This meant the government had 'cooked its books' and hidden its 'corporate' profits from its citizens, the unacknowledged 'stock-holders' in this 'deal'. The Comprehensive Annual Financial Report did not hide the government's income but simply didn't share this information with 'Joe Blow', local citizen. CAFRs were sent to CEOs of corporations, to media executives, to presidents of universities, and were available at the reference desks of public libraries. However, no one ever told 'Joe Blow', the public citizen that this information was available. The 'insiders', however chose to follow the Golden Rule of Silence and profited thereby -- 'pork barrel' spending for the elite's private money-making schemes.

How does the scam work? The U.S. government still has its operating budgets for public programs, etc. Taxes are collected to fund these budgets. On the other hand, the government's income -- other than from taxes -- is not used to meet these expenditures. Funds are, instead, invested by the government at its own discretion. We, the American people, the stock-holders, never get a dividend check from the government's profits. Over the last sixty years, these funds have been used to build up investments in ANYTHING the government has wanted. The U.S. government now sits on trillions of dollars -- enough to pay off the 'so-called'

national debt, to completely fund programs without tax incomes from the population, and to take over global financial markets and investment arenas. Our government has become the 'bully' in the world's economic sandbox. By 1998, U.S. government annual income was around 8.5 trillion dollars gross. One third of this total, or about 3.4 trillion dollars, was collected from federal and local taxes. The remaining two-thirds amounted to 5.1 trillion dollars (the government's return on its investments) -- more than the total income of the population of the U.S., or 4.8 trillion dollars, after tax was deducted. All the while, the U.S. government pointed to corporate greed as the 'bad guy'. The fact is that government owns 65% to 85% of Fortune 500 companies through its composite investment in them. This is a total capitalistic monopoly operated, owned, and managed for and by the U.S. government itself. As the government has grown, so has its interest in worldwide domination by this U.S. blueprint -- now about 60% of the globe. It is a corporate shell game -- with the end game being global control. If the game were played by corporations alone, we would call it an organized crime syndicate. Since the U.S. government is in charge, we have to call it by another name since its actors play as though they were above the law. Choose your own favorite acronym -- state socialism, communism, fascism, or the actors' (New World Order). When George Bush declares that you are either with us or against us, he means you are either an 'insider' profiting from this scam or you are still an 'individual' surviving on your own. This is the BIGGEST GAME on the planet. You are a player without even knowing it or the rules of the game. Your only options are to 'play along' or 'drop out' of the game. The State of (Mind) of the U.S. government is to 'force' you to 'play along', either by terrorizing you into compliance, buying your 'acceptance and participation', or if you get in the way, of eliminating you. After all, once the 'insiders' have won the game, the mass population becomes a liability. Whole countries have already lost at this game and been bought up like game pieces on a 'Monopoly' board. What is the present state of play? Well, it's the fourth quarter and the score is Big Brother 60 trillion to (insert your individual net worth) times the number of 'unaware' players. It's time for a monumental 'Time Out' to be called. We, the people, are in a no-win situation at best, and face our genocide at worst. You be the referee and judge the situation for yourself. I advise you get 'familiar' with the government's 'play book' as soon as possible. Good luck!