Charlie Rose

finalfantasytown  03/13/2012 08:37 AM Report

I don't worry about possibility of nuclear war between Israel and Iran after hanging Saddam Hussein although I got angry because of killing tiger and consequence of eco-collaps.

Nuclear war should not happen before extinguishing lions in Africa, destroying Amazon forest, melting iceburg in the areas of south and north poles. lots of jobs

ChongSunWah  03/08/2012 01:55 AM Report

Dear Mr Shimon Peres,

Your great technology allows me to know the truth of how inhumane the Jews had been treating the Palestinians without mercy except with deep hatred to get rid of them no matter what. This was what Avi Shlaim said about Bibi Netatyahu.

"Benjamin Netanyahu is a bellicose, right-wing Israeli nationalist, a rejectionist on the subject of Palestinian national rights, and a reactionary who is deeply wedded to the status quo. Nationalism has an in-built tendency to go to extremes and Netanyahu's brand is no exception. A nation has been defined as 'a group of people united by a mistaken view about the past and a hatred of their neighbours'. This definition fits the Likud leader on both counts: he has a selective and self-righteous view of his own country's history and he is driven by distrust and disdain, if not outright hatred towards the Arabs in general and the Palestinians in particular. This hostility towards Arabs is the central thread that runs through his public utterances, books, and policies as prime minister."

The Jews are all out to get rid of the Palestinians and you can witness this happening in Jerusalem now. It is so bad that the Palestinians need to call for a MARCH to stop the nightmare of demolition of their properties.

The Palestine Solidarity Campaign,

“The March to Jerusalem starts today! The Global March to Jerusalem is on March 30th. Help us build the campaign to prevent the destruction of Palestinian life and culture in Jerusalem.

Since the occupation of Jerusalem, Israeli authorities have revoked the residency rights of 14,561 Palestinians. Jerusalem's Mayor has declared that Palestinians living outside of the wall will be transferred to the West Bank civil administration resulting in a further 70,000 individuals being effectively barred from the city.

Meanwhile, Israel is planning to demolish homes in Silwan neighbourhood - evicting over 1,000 Palestinian residents - the biggest mass demolition planned since 1967.”

Can you see what is happening in Palestine? The Israelis is doing exactly what their founder Ben Gurion wanted them to do and if you read the bottom sentences again its doctrine goes like this, “Zionists have concocted a myth that the Palestinian people had willingly left their homes, farms, and businesses, and as a result they have forfeited their right to return.

Let me share with you again the Zionist thought.

The concept of "transferring" European Jews to Palestine and "transferring" the Palestinian people out is central to Zionism. Ben-Gurion, the 1st Israeli Prime Minister, eloquently articulated this essential Zionist pillar, he stated in 1944:

"Zionism is a TRANSFER of the Jews. Regarding the TRANSFER of the [Palestinian] Arabs this is much easier than any other TRANSFER. There are Arab states in the vicinity . . . . and it is clear that if the [Palestinian] Arabs are removed [to these states] this will improve their condition and not the contrary." (Expulsion Of The Palestinians, p. 159)

When a "Jewish majority" was impossible to achieve based on Jewish immigration and natural growth, Zionists had concluded that forcible "population transfer" (Ethnic Cleansing) was the only solution to what they referred to as the "Arab Problem." To excuse the "Jewish state" from any WAR CRIMES perpetrated against the Palestinian people (specially the ones committed during the 1948 war), Zionists have concocted a myth that the Palestinian people had willingly left their homes, farms, and businesses, and as a result they have forfeited their right to return."

I did not go to the website specially to find out how the Israelis had been treating the Palestinians. All what I know so far of the conflict came to my email just like the one written by Avi Shlaim and this one about The Global March to Jerusalem is on March 30th besides the one from Rabbi Mordechi in 2003.

Dear Mr Peres, You said that the Israelis will be nice to the Palestinians after peace is achieved, right? If you are sincere in wanting to be nice to the Palestinians show it to the world now and stop the Netanyahu government to chase the Palestinians out of their home - Israel is planning to demolish homes in Silwan neighbourhood - evicting over 1,000 Palestinian residents - the biggest mass demolition planned since 1967!

You don't need to wait until they got a state to be nice to them because cannot find you by then and don't know when the Netanyahu government will give the Palestinians a state? By the time Israel is willing to give them a state maybe all of the Palestinians will be driven to the sea already so how? Let say still got some Palestinians left but the HATRED will be so so very deep that whatever you are willing to do for them will be meaningless and too, too late!

Netanyahu kept asking the Palestinians to recognize Israel as a Jewish state and insist that the Capital of Israel will be in Jerusalem and no right of return of the Palestinians refugees and the water supply to be controlled by Israel when the water supply is in the West Bank and I can only say one thing that the Netanyahu government and the hardliners plan to swallow the whole of Palestine by starting another war in Iran to derail the implementation! Once they achieve this goal they will name the whole of Palestine, Israel. They already stole 78% of the land right in front of the world what so difficult for them to swallow the balance 22% (22% officially base on the Oslo peace agreement but it seems now left 18% by not accepting the 1967 border)especially if they manage to corner President Obama during this election. They already said openly to the world that they will go alone if they have to!

There is no way Israel could wipe Palestine off the map and change the name to Israel no matter how hard the Jews try because the world and President Obama cannot accept it. If Netanyahu refuses to let go control of the water supply then the only answer left is a One State solution and there is no point to drag this on.

Enough is enough! The United Nations and especially America must call for a One State Solution like in South Africa because Israel is not serious at all about concluding the deal. The world is running out of patience with the actions of Israel, obviously a people who do not care about others and only for themselves. As long as their behavior continues as it has been, there will be no hope of a deal!

ChongSunWah  03/07/2012 10:40 AM Report

Mr Shimon Peres speaks so eloquently that Israel got GREAT Brains, high technology so land size does not matter and Israel will help the Palestinians to achieve all what the Israelis have achieved.

DON'T JUST TALK DO THE WALK INSTEAD. NOW LOOK AT GAZA WATER SITUATION IT IS POLLUTED UNFIX FOR DRINKING. IF YOU ARE SINCERE GO FIX THIS PROBLEM FIRST AND THEN THE PALESTINIANS WILL BELIEVE YOU WHEN YOU SAID THAT YOU WILL HELP THEM TO BUILT PALESTINE BUT BEFORE YOU CAN HELP THEM PLEASE GIVE THEM A STATE FIRST. IF NETANYAHU STILL WANT TO CONTROL THE WATER SUPPLY HOW CAN A 2 STATE SOLUTION BE POSSIBLE?

The Palestinians do not expect anything from the Jews but the Jews cannot just drive them to the sea! The way I see it, "I COME, I SAW, I CONQUER AND LIKE IT SO MUCH SO I GOT TO DRIVE ALL TO THE SEA"

http://www.aljazeera.com/indepth/opinion/2012/01/2012117121836414354.html

Sycamores Familiar Face 1 month ago in reply to Abdi Salim

Well said Abdi for pointing out that fact that Israel is responsible for the Gaza water supply. Almost 95 percent of the water pumped in the Gaza Strip is polluted and unfit for drinking. This warning was issued by the UN Environment Programme.

They estimate it will take at least 20 years to rehabilitate Gaza’s underground water system, and any delay in dealing with the problem will lead to additional deterioration in the situation and thus might extend the rehabilitation process for hundreds of years.

Due to the illegal siege Israel won’t allow in enough building materials in to help deal with what is the needed to rehabilitate the water and wastewater-treatment systems there. The prohibition has remained despite the recent easing of the siege.

Several decades of over pumping by the Israelis when they had control of the Strip has cause salient water to contaminate the fresh ground water.

In Operation Cast Lead, Israel damaged Gaza City’s wastewater-treatment facility, leading to untreated wastewater flooding extensive farm areas. According to the Coastal Municipalities Water Utility, 30 kilometres of water networks, 11 wells, and 6,000 home water tanks were damaged during the operation, and the overall damage to the water and wastewater-treatment facilities amounted to six million dollars.

Not to mention the amounts debris placed in landfills left from Operation Cast lead causing pollutants that are seeping into the ground supply.

40 percent of the incidence of disease in Gaza is related to polluted drinking water. Abdi I’m glad you pointed the finger at Israel for the blame.

Oh yeah not to forget during Operation Cast Lead which saw massive destruction of water and sewage infrastructure, with Israeli forces deliberately targeting and destroying water networks, tanks and waste facilities.

Should we forget that Israel is constantly threatening to switch off water supplies which break with international law?

Once again Abdi thanks for indirectly supporting the Palestinians you the sort of troll that I can work with to my own advantage. Bravo!

The real threat is the continuing suffering of the Palestinian people and Netanyahu intention to wipe the Palestinians race out of this universe!

ChongSunWah  03/07/2012 02:59 AM Report

I would welcome your opinion on Iran and Syria. China seems to support REPRESSION OF THEIR OWN CITIZENS by Iran and Syria over freedom for the people governments are supposed to serve.

My Reply On The Nuclear Issue In Iran to 14 senators

1 March 2012

Dear Senator Roy Blunt, Senator Michael Bennet, Senator Amy Klobuchar, Senator Jeff Merkley, Senator Mark Udall, Senator Mark Pryor, Senator Bob Casey, Senator Maria Cantwell, Senator Claire McCaskill, Senator Marco Rubio, Senator Pat Toomey, Senator Herb Kohl, Senator Tom Harkin and Dianne Feinstein,

Thank you so much for all your replies. I share the same sentiments as Sean Stone and salute his courage. He is a child of God, he seeks the truth and he will get it because the silent majority will slowly muster the courage to follow his footsteps to stop the bombing of Tehran. Stone on O’Reilly show also predicted that an Occupy Tehran movement akin to Occupy Wall Street is on its way, and he suggested that President Jimmy Carter be enlisted to help solve the problems in Middle East. I hope Hollywood and your good self would also support this cause for a better and brighter world.

America must not rush into any military decision like what they had done in Iraq because regret will be too late. George Bush Jr was tricked by the ‘Jewish Hawks’ who had told him that Iraq got Weapons of Mass Destruction and he went in without thinking of the consequences. The end result as we all had witnessed was a total disaster and especially for America!! The experience in Iraq had shown to the Americans that they need to have a rational mind. Please read what Robert Bird got to say on the preemptive strike on Iraq and I have taken the end paragraphs for your reading, http://www.worldharmonyday.com/news_us-iraq_3robert.php

“As if that were not bad enough, members of Congress are reluctant to ask questions which are begging to be asked. How long will we occupy Iraq? We have already heard disputes on the numbers of troops, which will be needed to retain order. What is the truth? How costly will the occupation and rebuilding be? No one has given a straight answer. How will we afford this long-term massive commitment, fight terrorism at home, address a serious crisis in domestic healthcare, afford behemoth military spending and give away billions in tax cuts amidst a deficit, which has climbed to over $340 billion for this year alone? If the President’s tax cut passes it will be $400 billion. We cower in the shadows while false statements proliferate. We accept soft answers and shaky explanations because to demand the truth is hard, or unpopular, or may be politically costly.

But, I contend that, through it all, the people know.

The American people unfortunately are used to political shading, spin, and the usual chicanery they hear from public officials. They patiently tolerate it up to a point. But there is a line. It may seem to be drawn in invisible ink for a time, but eventually it will appear in dark colors, tinged with anger.

When it comes to shedding American blood – - when it comes to wrecking havoc on civilians, on innocent men, women, and children, callous dissembling is not acceptable. Nothing is worth that kind of lie – - not oil, not revenge, not re-election, not somebody’s grand pipedream of a democratic domino theory.

And mark my words, the calculated intimidation, which we see so often of late by the “powers that be” will only keep the loyal opposition quiet for just so long.

Because eventually, like it always does, the truth will emerge. And when it does, this house of cards, built of deceit, will fall.”

How high the cost America got to pay but on the other hand Israel came out without a scratch because they achieved their goal to get others to do their dirty work to bomb Iraq and one more less threat for them. Now they want history to repeat again because this time Iran is the threat. If you look at the Iraq war it looked kind of silly for America because the rest of the world are doing so well financially while you were and still are trying to keep the world safe and meanwhile America is going downhill besides so many deaths of young soldiers. Ask yourself IS IT WORTH IT? If America is to go down it should go down on its own term but not again to let others pull America down due to their insecurity and fear.

In an interview on CNN’s Fareed Zakaria GPS, this was what Mr Brzezinski said, “We don’t need to go to war and we have to make that very clear to our Israeli friends. We’re not going to go to war. They’re not going to go to war by flying over our airspace over Iraq. We’re not going to support them. If they do it, they will be on their own. The consequences will be theirs, because the price we’ll all pay if they start a massive war, which the Iranians interpret as being done with our connivance, will be disastrous for us in Afghanistan, in Iraq, in the terms of oil, stability in the Middle East more generally.”

The Israelis and Palestinians is the root cause to this world problem, thus the world would need to fix this problem first before the rest can be resolved. As long as America and the world delay the act of helping the Palestinian people to have a homeland, the world will not have peace, harmony and unity. Senator Klobuchar said, “Compelling Iran to abandon its support for terrorism, promote the rights of its citizens, and terminate its nuclear enrichment program is critical to meeting the goal of long-term stability in the Middle East and around the world.” I don’t think this is the way the world sees it because as long as the Palestinian people still do not have a homeland, the prospects of long term stability in Middle East and around the world will remain bleak.

Love, light, peace, harmony and unity,

Sunflower Chong

Ephraim_Smith  03/06/2012 06:43 PM Report

Shimon Peres is the poor man's Abba Eban. He tries to pass for profound by posing paradoxes and an endless stream of aphorisms. Charlie Rose caught him tossing off a quote from Henry Ford ("I don't complain and I don't explain.") as it it was his own. The shrewd Peres, with little trace of embarrassment, came back with a one-liner: "He (Ford) didn't do too badly." So much for a politician posing as Israel's reigning intellect.

Gelles  03/06/2012 06:21 PM Report

TO: ChongSunWah

Your suggestion -- for a one-state solution for Palestinians and Jews on the land now holding two-peoples, (although Israel has Palestinians in its parliament and as citizens in most respects, but, Palestinians in Gaza and on the West Bank are not that welcoming to Jews) -- may be premature.

If two states can live in harmony, a future joining of the two into one, (or even of three of four, to include Lebanon and/or Jordan), sounds possible.

For the present Einstein and I will settle for two.

The following unbiased source of Einstein on the issue (from Wikipedia) is offered:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Albert_Einstein%27s_political_views#Zionism

.

My evidence that Einstein agreed with me:

(a) In a 1947 letter to Indian Prime Minister Jawaharlal Nehru intended to persuade India to support the establishment of a Jewish state, Einstein stated that the Balfour Declaration's proposal to establish a national home for Jews in Palestine "redresses the balance" of justice and history.

(b) When President Chaim Weizmann died in 1952, Einstein was asked to be Israel's second president, but he declined, stating that he had "neither the natural ability nor the experience to deal with human beings." He wrote: "I am deeply moved by the offer from our State of Israel, and at once saddened and ashamed that I cannot accept it."

Your evidence (possibly from a recent biased book) is not persuasive. Moreover, it leads nowhere now -- decades after the death of Albert Einstein.

I would welcome your opinion on Iran and Syria. China seems to support REPRESSION OF THEIR OWN CITIZENS by Iran and Syria over freedom for the people governments are supposed to serve.

You opinions about history will carry more weight it you broaden their scope to include a war to prevent nuclear arms from unhinging the Middle East -- a war that maybe brewing as we write.

ChongSunWah  03/06/2012 11:59 AM Report

http://www.palestineremembered.com/Acre/Famous-ZionistQuotes/Story694.html#Comment

Posted on December 3, 2001

BASED On Declassified Israeli Documents & Personal Diaries

The concept of "transferring" European Jews to Palestine and "transferring" the Palestinian people out is central to Zionism. Ben-Gurion, the 1st Israeli Prime Minister, eloquently articulated this essential Zionist pillar, he stated in 1944:

"Zionism is a TRANSFER of the Jews. Regarding the TRANSFER of the [Palestinian] Arabs this is much easier than any other TRANSFER. There are Arab states in the vicinity . . . . and it is clear that if the [Palestinian] Arabs are removed [to these states] this will improve their condition and not the contrary." (Expulsion Of The Palestinians, p. 159)

When a "Jewish majority" was impossible to achieve based on Jewish immigration and natural growth, Zionists had concluded that forcible "population transfer" (Ethnic Cleansing) was the only solution to what they referred to as the "Arab Problem." To excuse the "Jewish state" from any WAR CRIMES perpetrated against the Palestinian people (specially the ones committed during the 1948 war), Zionists have concocted a myth that the Palestinian people had willingly left their homes, farms, and businesses, and as a result they have forfeited their right to return.

Now the talk is that the Palestinians should go to Jordan, Saudi so on and so fore and that they are not a race but invented people! This tells us that they do not have any intention to give the Palestinians a homeland!

All religions taught us to be humane, how is it that the Torah is so different from the others, I am at a lost when it comes to the Jewish religion? This was what Albert Einstein said: "It would be my greatest sadness to see Jews do to Palestine's Arabs much of what Nazis did to Jews." And, as Einstein also said, "If we [Jews] are not able to find a way to honest cooperation and honest pacts with the [Palestinian] Arabs, then we have learned nothing in our two thousand years of suffering, and deserve all which will befall us."

ChongSunWah  03/06/2012 11:45 AM Report

Firstly, I was not impressed with Mr Peres because he said that the size of the land does not matter and if that is the case why the Netanyahu government still wants more land after they have agreed in Oslo 1993 to give 22% of the land to the Palestinians. The 2 state solution is slipping away. This is a reply from one young Palestinian who is a Christian living in Germany.

Hi,

Please excuse if I refuse to sign the petition, because I don't support the idea of 2 states for 2 nations, or a Palestinian state (because it will be a joke) on less that 18% of historical Palestine. I think the only solution is a democratic state for both nations.

Please understand my point of view!

http://www.ap-agenda.org/initiative.htm & http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/One-state_solution

Regards,

Hisham

I came across this article "Water for All: The case of One State Solution" by Mr Ramzi El Houry and after reading the entire article I was very concerned because I realized that the 2 state solution is close to impossible since the main water supply is at the West Bank. Mr El Houry said, "Under these conditions, it is clear that any two-state solution granting the Palestinians complete sovereignty is a non-starter for the Israelis. Conversely, any solution that might theoretically be acceptable to the Israelis presupposes a Palestine that is not in control of its water resources, and hence is not sovereign." http://www.aljazeera.com/indepth/opinion/2012/01/2012117121836414354.html

I have written to another Palestinian how to move forward in regards to the water issue and I said, “If Netanyahu government is serious in the 2 state solution all he got to do is to follow the example of Singapore when we became independent from Malaysia by signing an agreement on the water supply for a considerable number of years at certain cost. Until now, the agreement is still ongoing with Malaysia. The controlling of the water supply at the West Bank remains with the Palestinian authority as a sovereign state should do. If Netanyahu said it is not possible, then this means he has no intention to give the Palestinians a state because his real intention is to swallow the whole of Palestine for Israel or to put it like the Jews use to do is to wipe Palestine off the map and change the name to Israel, if not why he kept insisting that no right of return for the Palestinian refugees, the Capital of Israel got to be in Jerusalem and Israel is a Jewish state.

If Netanyahu said it is not possible, then the only answer left is a One State solution and there is no point to drag this on. Enough is enough! The United Nations and especially America must call for a One State Solution like in South Africa because Israel is not serious at all about concluding the deal. The world is running out of patience with the actions of Israel, obviously a people who do not care about others and only for themselves. As long as their behavior continues as it has been, there will be no hope of a deal!”

I received this reply from Mansour a Palestinian.

Dear Mr. Chong,

When Singapore agreed for the division of the country; you didn't ethnically cleanse nor dispossessed the majority, did you? Of course not.

We, the Palestinian people, still own and used to operated 95% of Palestine as of 1948. Israelis mostly immigrated escaping European racism and we paid for the Holocaust; not you not any European; when we were forcibly driven out of our homes, farms, and businesses.

Don't listen to our politicians; they have been mostly bought; they good ones are either dead or in jail. So the two-state solution is fiction; and at best it is temporary. Our politician (especially Abbas and his goons in the PLO) have been corrupted and they tell their people one thing and tell the Israelis and the Americans a different thing so they keep collecting Western donations; so politically they have been bankrupt.

Our DATE is 64 years LATE, we shall return.

Take care,

Mansour

Charlie Rose said to Mr Peres that there are people who said that the Israelis have missed the 2 state opportunity, and Yes they have but provided the Israelis are willing to let go control of the water supply.

There is no way the Netanyahu government can swallow the whole of Palestine and expect the world to be SILENT. This Palestinian said , "ALL decent people have the right (and DUTY) to resist the theft and OCCUPATION of their land. Palestine was wiped off the map by Zionist Jews and yet the Jews are the ones protesting the Palestinians’ right of a homeland. Here is a quote from the founder of Israel that illustrates what kind of people Israelis truly are:

Ben-Gurion told Nahum Goldman (one of the prominent Zionists leaders) before he died:

"I don't understand your optimism," Ben-Gurion declared. "Why should the Arabs make peace? If I was an Arab leader I would never make terms with Israel. That is natural: we have taken their country. Sure, God promised it to us, but what does that matter to them? Our God is not theirs. We come from Israel, it's true, but two thousand years ago, and what is that to them? There has been anti-Semitism the Nazis, Hitler, Auschwitz, but was that their fault? They only see one thing: we have come here and stolen their country. Why should they accept that? They may perhaps forget in one or two generations' time, but for the moment there is no chance. So it's simple: we have to stay strong and maintain a powerful army. Our whole policy is there. Otherwise the Arabs will wipe us out".

Ben Gurion was stupid enough to think that the Palestinians would "forget" their country in one or two generations - they will NEVER FORGET and will continue to fight APARTHEID until Israel goes the way of South Africa."

Gelles  03/06/2012 11:05 AM Report

My Dear Ricardo,

I have only a minute at the moment. Morning tennis, the habit that keeps me alive (in my 86th year) beckons. When I'm late, the partners suffer.

I have not yet read all your replies. But I did catch a little.

Let me say this, and I'll be back in 3 hours:

The 20th Century witnessed the contest between Pluralism and Totalitarianism. Pluralism won.

The 21st Century will be a battle between Naked Pluralism and Cooperative Pluralism. Cooperative Pluralism should win. It will feature win-win cooperation among continental nations.

Ricardo_Amaral  03/06/2012 05:12 AM Report

Gellles, you also will enjoy reading this material about what is in the pipeline regarding the BRIC'S countries.

BRIC'S - the new emerging world superpower

http://www.elitetrader.com/vb/showthread.php?s=&postid=3467556#post3467556

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Ricardo_Amaral  03/06/2012 04:30 AM Report

Gelles, here is another reality check for you regarding the new world of the 21st century that you will not see reported by the US mainstream media:

Escobar: Putin not part of NWO, labelled evil by elites – March 5, 2012

http://youtu.be/7YY7tFfxT5w

It's official - Vladimir Putin has won the presidential race to become Russia's leader for a third term. Official results have given him almost 64 per cent of the vote. Asia Times correspondent Pepe Escobar in Thailand says that despite the Russian people making their choice clear, the U.S. is still on a mission to vilify the country...

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Ricardo_Amaral  03/06/2012 03:35 AM Report

Here is an interesting picture regarding the United States and Iran:

http://www.facebook.com/photo.php?fbid=338734196173544&set=a.103860906327542.2337.100001108998759&typ e=1&theater

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Ricardo_Amaral  03/06/2012 02:49 AM Report

Gelles, over the years I wrote many articles about Brazil and China, and in April 2010 I wrote the following in one of my articles about Brazil:

“I would also like to suggest that all members of the economic team of the Brazilian government take the time to read the latest book by John Naisbitt - "China's Megatrends: The 8 Pillars of a New Society" - since that book gives profound insights about all the transformations that have been going on in China's economic and social systems.

His book serves as a guide and a road map to a totally new economic and social system that is still a work in progress. But so far this new system has delivered outstanding results for China and the Chinese population. And Brazil should study very carefully, and adopt the parts of this new complex system that has been so successful in lifting about 400 million people from poverty in China, and will continue lifting hundreds of millions of new people out of poverty in the coming years.

China in 2010 is creating an entirely new social and economic system model, which might also be relevant and serve as an inspiration to solve the economic and social problems in Brazil.”

...China is in the middle of an economic revolution as never seen before in world history.

How do you transform a country such as China from their communist roots of only few years ago and transform it into a superpower of the future without going through a lot of growing pains, and massive market dislocations? I hate to think about of all the problems that the Chinese government has to solve all the time – and there is almost no room for mistakes because of the size of their population.

The Global Clash of Speeds

In December of 2006 I read a very interesting new book “Revolutionary Wealth” by Alvin Toffler. He said a lot of insightful things in his book and in chapter 3 “The Clash of Speeds” – he said the following: “The countries with the key economies in today’s world – the United States, Japan, China, and the European Union – are all heading for a crisis that none wants, that few political leaders are ready for, and that will set limits on future economic advance. This looming crisis is a direct result of the “de-synchronization effect,” an example of how we mindlessly deal with one of the deepest of all the deep fundamentals: Time.

Nations all over the world today are struggling at different rates of speed to build advanced economies. What most business, political and civil leaders have not yet clearly understood is a simple fact: An advanced economy needs an advanced society, for every economy is a product of the society in which it is embedded and is dependent on its key institutions.

If a country manages to speed up its economic advance but leaves its key institutions behind, it will eventually limit its potential to create wealth. Call it the Law of Congruence. Feudal institutions everywhere obstructed industrial advance. In the same way, today’s industrial age bureaucracies are slowing the move toward a more advanced, knowledge-based system for creating wealth…In all these countries, key public institutions are out of step with the whirlwind of change that surrounds them.”

Anyway, the book has 500 pages and one of the things that he mentioned in his book and I did not forget, is that the most extraordinary thing today is that we still can function at all here in the United States – he shows with many examples how everything is getting completely out of sync.

Not only here inside the US economy, but it is amazing that the US still is able to do business with countries from around the world when everybody is moving at different speeds.

By the way, one of the points that Alvin Toffler makes in his book is that the American legal system is completely out of sync with the reality of what is happening inside the United States, and around the world.”

*****

I also posted the following in November 2010 on my Facebook page regarding China:

China:

In the last 20 years China did a spectacular job in transforming its economy and creating about 20 times the amount of jobs created by the US economy during the same period. The Chinese were able to lift almost 400 million people out of poverty during that time.

...Your idea of the China of today is in the same level as if you were using examples about the Soviet Union to explain today’s Russia. It is like your idea of that country had been frozen in time – a time long gone.

Today’s China is light-years ahead of your concept of old China. China is becoming very fast the world of the future, and they have been going through a massive transformation in such a short period of time as never seen before in world history.

It is amazing to me how clueless most people are about what is going on in China.

Let me quote from John Naisbitt “China’s Megatrends” as follows:

While China’s economy is the most pronounced manifestation of the great changes in China, it is only part of the historical shift that has occurred and perhaps not even the most important part. Early on, Deng Xiaoping said: “We have to build up two civilizations: the material civilization, and the espiritual civilazation.” The artistic and intellectual excitement in China today reflects the energizing of that spiritual civilization.

When we think of the Renaissance, names of artists and intellectuals--Michelangelo, Leonardo, Tintoretto, Shakespeare, Torquato Tasso, Guttemberg—come to mind. They were precursors of a huge shift in scientific, social, and political thought. Deng Xiaoping’s visionary thinking inspired China’s economic transition. The imagination and creativity of China’s artist’s prepared the ground for creativity in other fields, Art reflects society and fortifies a country’s identity.

In the old China, obedience was of high value, and a subordinate working class served very well in China’s first stage as workshop of the world. But what will drive China into the next stage—the creation of distinctive Chinese products and design—will be the spirit of nonconforming, talented, creative artists and intellectuals.

…In the early 1980’s the Central Academy of Fine Arts in Beijing occupied a modest plot of land near Tiananmen Square where the faculty, not long before, had rigidly taught Soviet-style realist art to only about 200 students. If you visit the school today you will see a new thirty-three-acre campus with more than 4,000 students, chosen from 60,000 applicants. Many of these students dream of following in the footsteps of alumni, some of whom today make millions in international markets.

…The new individual freedoms have resulted in an explosion of artistic expression that is now spilling over into the world, along with China’s economic assertiveness. China is moving in the direction of becoming the world leader in art, architecture, and design, just as the United States did in the twentieth century.

…The emphasis on design is affecting China’s new, big markets of tomorrow: cars, internet services, information technology, and entertainment. Another measure of “design China” is that in 2008, more than 500 design colleges were operating all across the country.”

****

The biggest socio-economic revolution that the world ever saw has been underway in China at a pace never seen before.

Unlike the European Union, Japan, and the United States that it seems unable to move forward with its socio-economic system because it seems entangled in its own ties with the past – at the same time China has not only met but exceeded all its socio-economic goals –and this new Chinese socio-economic model were able to lift about 400 million people out of poverty in the last 20 years, and with the prospect of doing even better in the future.

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Ricardo_Amaral  03/06/2012 02:47 AM Report

March 6, 2012

Gelles, you wrote: “I disagree with Ricardo Amaral on who will lead the civilized world in this century: China will not lead anyone until they fully support human political rights for their own and other peoples.”

*****

Ricardo: Gelles, on February 23, 2012 I posted the following on the Elite Trader Economics forum in response to a question from another member of that forum:

SouthAmerica: Reply to dandxg

Forget the world of the 20th century, the world of the 21st century will be a complete different world when compared with the past.

The last 12 years I have been saying on my articles that the world of the 21st century will be different than the world of the 20th century in one major way.

The world of the 20th century had 3 major superpowers: 1) England, 2) United States and 3) Soviet Union.

The world of the 21st century we will have 5 or 6 major group of countries under the leadership of a major player.

1) Europe under the leadership of a Germany

2) United States group under the leadership of the USA

3) Asian group under the leadership of China

4) Russia group under the leadership of Russia

5) Middle East group under the leadership of Turkey/Iran

6) African group under the leadership of ?

In my opinion, Brazil should be part of the Asian group because of various reasons.

TED – January 2012

Paddy Ashdown: The global power shift

http://www.ted.com/talks/paddy_ashdown_the_global_power_shift.html

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Gelles  03/06/2012 01:46 AM Report

[ From the Jewish Telegraphic Agency:]

WASHINGTON (JTA) -- President Barack Obama and Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu may not have bridged their differences on how to deal with Iran, but each managed to give the other a measure of reassurance.

In his speech to the American Israel Public Affairs Committee [AIPAC], Obama held his ground, declining to articulate new American red lines on the Iranian nuclear issue and strongly advising against “loose talk of war.”

Yet he earned the praise of the prime minister and the pro-Israel lobby with his acknowledgment that Israel needs to be able to defend itself, and his vow that America has Israel’s back.

While Obama stressed diplomacy as a continued option in public and private comments, Netanyahu indicated in the two leaders’ private meeting that he believes sanctions have been exhausted.

Yet even if the prime minister does not share the president’s patience, he also told Obama that there is not yet any Israeli decision to attack Iran, according to Israeli press reports.

Obama said in an Oval Office photo-op Monday morning ahead of the leaders’ two-hour meeting, which was followed by what aides described as an “expansive” lunch:

..... “We do believe that there is still a window that allows for a diplomatic resolution to this issue, but ultimately the Iranian regime has to make a decision to move in that direction, a decision that they have not made thus far,”

He added, looking at Netanyahu, “I know that both the prime minister and I prefer to resolve this diplomatically. We understand the costs of any military action.”

Netanyahu did not acknowledge the president’s plea for diplomacy to play itself out, instead emphasizing Israel’s sovereign right to act -- and, noting that Obama had made the same point in his speech the day before to AIPAC’s annual policy forum.

..... “I think that above and beyond that there are two principles, longstanding principles of American policy that you reiterated yesterday in your speech -- that Israel must have the ability always to defend itself by itself against any threat; and that when it comes to Israel's security, Israel has the right, the sovereign right to make its own decisions,” Netanyahu said.

“I believe that's why you appreciate, Mr. President, that Israel must reserve the right to defend itself. And after all, that's the very purpose of the Jewish state -- to restore to the Jewish people control over our destiny,” he continued. “And that's why my supreme responsibility as prime minister of Israel is to ensure that Israel remains the master of its fate.”

That acknowledgment -- that Israel has the right to strike in its own perceived self-defense -- was the element that AIPAC’s leaders were seeking, and Obama earned the most extended standing ovation of the day when he told the conference: “Israel must always have the ability to defend itself, by itself, against any threat.”

Another crowd pleaser was the president's pledge that “the United States will always have Israel’s back when it comes to Israel’s security.”

How to deal with Iran dominated much of the meeting between the leaders. As if to underscore Netanyahu’s message of his determination to confront the Iranian regime, his gift to Obama was a copy of the Megillah, the tale of the Persian Jews’ bloody triumph over Haman.

An Israeli source said the meeting underscored agreement between the Netanyahu and Obama governments in four areas: ..... a determination to prevent an Iranian nuclear weapon;

..... that all options are on the table;

..... that containment is not an option;

..... that Israel is a sovereign state that has a right to defend itself by itself.

In his own address to the conference on Monday morning -- delivered as Obama and Netanyahu were meeting -- Howard Kohr, AIPAC’s executive director, made it clear that the fourth message was the one AIPAC had been seeking.

“This is the context in which Israel must decide her course of action,” he said. “If she can put her fate in the hands of anyone -- even her closest ally, America -- or if she must conduct a strike to postpone Iran from acquiring a nuclear bomb. Israel was created to ensure that the Jewish people would never have to put their fate in the hands of others.”

Kohr also pushed back strongly against those who say that Obama has not done enough to confront Iran.

“President Obama and his administration are to be commended,” he said. “They have -- more than any other administration, more than any other country -- brought unprecedented pressure to bear on Tehran through the use of biting economic sanctions.

..... They have built a broad coalition to isolate the Iranian regime and they have brought the necessary military assets to the gulf and to Iran’s neighbors in order to signal that America has the power to act.”

Kohr echoed Democrats in their pleas not to make Iran policy a partisan issue. Republican salvos against Obama have frustrated his supporters, who say that the criticisms fail to take into account the strides he has made in isolating Iran.

While campaigning in Georgia on Sunday, GOP presidential hopeful Mitt Romney said that Obama had “failed to communicate that military options are on the table."

The president and administration officials have repeatedly stressed that all options are on the table, even as they call for giving sanctions time to work.

..... In his Sunday speech to AIPAC, Obama said that there is “too much loose talk of war,” arguing that “now is not the time for bluster.”

===== end JTA news presentation =====

I agree the above news is fair and complete.

I agree with the President that America can wait and will wait at the moment. A nuclear arms race must be prevented in the interest of every nation and all people.

I agree with Netanyahu that the nation of Israel cannot escape its fundamental responsibilities.

I agree, the USA has its back.

I disagree with Ricardo Amaral on who will lead the civilized world in this century: China will not lead anyone until they fully support human political rights for their own and other peoples.

America will lead and will add human economic rights to its agenda as soon as it can and will. The current delay in this progress is inexcusable in my opinion.

Ricardo_Amaral  03/06/2012 12:46 AM Report

I just finish watching tonight's show the interview with Jeffrey Goldberg and Dennis Ross about the Israel/Iran current crisis.

The entire interview was a big PR job on behalf of the “Jewish Lobby”.

These guys talk about the United States and Israel as if these countries were equals in the global stage.

The United States is one of the largest countries in the world with the largest economy in the world, and a population of around 310 million people.

On the other hand, Israel is a country smaller than the state of New Jersey, also with a population smaller than the state of New Jersey, and Israel has an economy half of the size of the state of New Jersey in terms of GDP.

Population:

State of New Jersey population: 9 million people (2011 est.)

Israel population: 7 million people (2011 est.)

GDP:

State of New Jersey GDP: US$ 500 billion (2011 est.)

Israel GDP: US$ 245 billion (2011 est.)

And these clowns have the arrogance, and they think they are the equals of the United States.

And at the end of the show these talking heads could not resist, and they had to use the poor me card, and they brought up the holocaust in an effort to imply that poor Israel is going to be annihilated without the total protection from the United States.

These talking heads seem to be completely clueless about how the rest of the world feels about this Iran/Israel crisis, and what they are doing about it.

This silly talk from Israel it has been going on for over seven years.

We have been laughing for many years about these guys, and their old comedy show about Israel is planning to attack Iran....and Iran will have nuclear weapons in 6 months.....

Hah, hah, hah....

You can follow this old comedy series at:

http://www.elitetrader.com/vb/showthread.php?s=&threadid=67053&perpage=6&pagenumber=69

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michael54  03/05/2012 11:56 PM Report

"Iran is today the center of moral corruption of our time." - Shimon Peres

I recall watching an interview with a KKK leader by a softball interviewer. If you were from Mars and knew nothing about actual history, you would say he sounded like a very calm and reasonable man.

Here's some historical context for interpreting Israeli leaders' statements.

http://www.controversyofzion.info/Controversybook/Controversybook_eng_43.htm

It's a modern tragedy, and WILL someday be recorded as such by historians, that someone as intellectually curious and vigorous as Charlie has been so effectively muzzled.

Ricardo_Amaral  03/05/2012 10:31 PM Report

Gelles, it's obvious that you belong to the “Jewish Lobby”.

When you can't win a valid argument then you suggest to “Remove all their most offensive posts (related to wars and life in the Middle East,)...”

What you don't realize is that what seems offensive to you, it is just common sense to the rest of the world.

Most countries around the world realized that there is more important things around the world related to the future such as India and China with almost 2.5 billion people than little Israel with 7 million people.

The reality is: Israel with 7 million people is immaterial and irrelevant in a global population of 7 and very soon 8 billion people.

The world don't revolve around Israel and its never ending troubles.

As the economic and financial power moves from Europe and the United States to the Asian countries – All the leverage that Israel has used in the last 60 years becomes completely irrelevant on this new world of the 21st century.

That's a fact!!!!!!!!

It's crazy for the United States to continue to give Israel all kinds of support as the United States has been giving in the last 60 years.

The world has changed in drastic ways, and even the United States is becoming a former superpower faster than most people has realized.

Right now the United States is going through the late stages of a life cycle of a superpower - all superpowers have the same life cycle: birth, maturation, old age and disintegration.

The United States and Europe have reached the old age stage, and now they are moving to the disintegration stage – and we can see signs of that all over the place.

Gelles, what you don't understand is that by asking for all these postings to be removed – you think then all these problems will go away just like magic.

The foreign policy of the United States it has been a complete disaster in the last 10 years, and today everything is spinning completely out of control in the Middle East and beyond.

Supporting Israel in a blind fashion as the United States has been doing for decades – it goes completely against the long and short-term self-interest of the United States in the Middle East and around the world.

There are many naïve people around the world who think that a country can be a friend of another country, when in reality, in the words of Charles de Gaulle, "in international relations, a nation has no friends, only interests."

For some unjustifiable reason Israel demands that the United States keeps giving blind support to Israel even though most of this support goes against the short and long term self-interest of the United States and the American people.

China is 100 percent correct in not paying attention to the latest UN oil embargo placed against Iran, since that goes 100 percent against the self-interest of China not only today, but also in the long-term.

China and India should buy any extra oil that they can buy from Iran, since that is a good policy for China, and India and also to the people of both countries.

If old collapsing Europe is so foolish as to follow this silly UN oil embargo against Iranian oil – that is their problem – and that release an extra supply of oil for countries such as China and India.

And the Indian government said the other day that they are willing to pay for this Iranian oil with gold instead of US dollars.

That's a win-win situation for Iran and also for India.

If the Israelis still want a loyal friend, a protector and fun, then they should buy a dog.

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Gelles  03/05/2012 09:14 PM Report

Who appears on the CR Show? Who writes these comments?

If you're reading this you have some idea.

I contend the comments come from an inferior set of audience members.

Here are some random items from a Google search on the shows -- they are OK with me -- but I did not write them:

Public television host Charlie Rose enjoys a reputation for highbrow talk. “A Larry King for Mensa members,” he “conducts a conversation, not an interview,” according to the New York Times. The paper added that Rose is “a facilitator, creating a comfortable ambiance where important people and opinion-makers can speak at length and make more than one point.… For viewers interested in thoughtful talk, Mr. Rose’s stark studio is the best place in town.”

The Charlie Rose show is where “the intelligentsia come to share ideas,” wrote David Kaplan in “Why Business Loves Charlie Rose” (Fortune, 9/28/09).

Kaplan quoted New York Times columnist Thomas Friedman—the show’s most frequent guest -- praising Rose’s interviewing style, which gives his high-powered guests “the best chance to make your case for your point of view.”

The Fortune article pointed out that the show’s audience “is probably well under a million,” but that “few would dispute” the program’s impact in elite circles:

..... “Nobody watches Charlie Rose except everybody you know.”

..... That, of course, would depend on your definition of “you.”

When mega-investor Warren Buffett needed an outlet to send a calming message about the Wall Street meltdown, he went to Charlie Rose—and announced that he would be investing in Goldman Sachs. Buffett explained that the moment “really was Pearl Harbor,” and that Rose’s show was a vehicle “to say something to the American public.”

..... Again, “the public” would seem to be rather narrowly defined.

Charlie Rose used to make the kind of promises one would hope to hear from a public television program host. In a promotional pitch for the show, Rose explained that he came to public television to do a program featuring “people who don’t ordinarily appear on television.”

..... As Extra! noted (5–6/96), though, at that point the show’s opening credits highlighted appearances by all three nightly network news anchors, as well as PBS’s MacNeil and Lehrer.

Who gets a seat at the table?

..... So who actually does appear on the Charlie Rose show? The guest-list in May and June of 2010 confirms how far Rose has strayed from public interest pitch. Out of 132 guests, 28 percent (37) were journalists from major media outlets. The outlet providing the most guests was the New York Times, whose reporters made 11 appearances, far more than any other news outlet. (The Washington Post was next with three.) Repeat journalist guests included Newsweek’s Jonathan Alter—a regular on MSNBC—and Al Hunt of Bloomberg, the company that donates studio space to Rose.

..... There were seven mostly well-known academics (e.g., historians Doris Kearns Goodwin and Sean Wilentz). Seven corporate guests appeared, most of whom were affiliated with Wall Street/financial firms.

..... There were also four appearances by corporate philanthropists (Bill Gates, Melinda Gates, Warren Buffett and his sister Doris Buffett).

..... Rose interviewed relatively few U.S. government officials during the two months: two appearances by U.S. Sen. John Kerry and one each by Vice President Joe Biden, White House chief of staff Rahm Emanuel, and “pay czar” Kenneth Feinberg. One New York City official—police chief Ray Kelly—and three former military officials also appeared.

..... There were two anomalies in the period that FAIR surveyed. Foreign leaders, particularly from Mideastern countries, accounted for seven appearances, part of a Rose special titled “Middle East Journal.”

..... And there were 13 medical/science guests, who appeared as part of the show’s ongoing series on the human brain and mental illness.

..... Out of the 132 guests who appeared over the course of two months, just two guests -- environmental activist/writer Bill McKibben and James Tripp of the Enviromental Defense Fund—might reasonably be considered representative of the types of public interest voices (representatives of civil rights, labor, consumer, environmental and other citizen-based advocacy groups) one should expect to see on public television.

..... Those two appearances equal the number of celebrity chefs who appeared over the two months.

..... The only other guest who came close to this public interest category was John Hofmeister, the former president of Shell Oil who now runs a non-profit called Citizens for Affordable Energy, which stresses the abundance of available coal and oil resources.

Every weekday from 11 p.m. to midnight on PBS, Rose engages America's best thinkers, writers, politicians, athletes, entertainers, business leaders, scientists and other newsmakers. His signature round oak table and black backdrop have become television icons to his legions of fans.

Gelles  03/05/2012 08:28 PM Report

Blind Eyes on Yourself:

You are sadly ignorant of all that matters.

Persecution of the Baha'i Minority:

Baha'is are a non-Judeo Christian religious minority from and living in Iran.

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Bahá'ís [as a people and via their institutions,] as well as the United Nations, Amnesty International, the European Union, the United States and peer-reviewed academic literature have stated [and proved beyond a scintilla of doubt] that the members of the Bahá'í community in Iran have been subjected to unwarranted arrests, false imprisonment, beatings, torture, unjustified executions, confiscation and destruction of property owned by individuals and the Bahá'í community, denial of employment, denial of government benefits, denial of civil rights and liberties, and denial of access to higher education.

Sorry Mr. or Ms. Blind-eyes-on-the-world, you don't know what your talking about.

Before Iran went mad, when the last Shah of Iran was overthrow by the Iranian nut-case Revolutionaries on 11 February 1979, this religious minority, with members in every civilized nation, was loved for its kindness to everybody everywhere.

EyesOnYou  03/05/2012 07:30 PM Report

Sorry Mr. Peres, but the most IMMORAL nation in the world isn't Iran, but it's Israel. Iran isn't stealing land or destroying homes of minorities, YOU are.

Gelles  03/05/2012 05:49 PM Report

[ The following text supercedes the posting immediately below on 03/05/2012 at 05:30 pm EST ]

.

I believe the Charlie Rose Show, ( http://ustaxreform.us/.crs.htm ) is among the best educational sources available on American TV. Yet its comment archive is among the worst. REMant and Amaral see to that.

..... Remove all their most offensive posts (related to wars and life in the Middle East,) and these two offer no appreciation of other problems and solutions in our time for our peers.

..... They are fat-heads with insufficient modesty to hear out Shimon Peres -- and to be thankful for his example to all nations and their citizenry.

Imagine, if you will, Charlie Rose interviewing REMant and Amaral on nuclear arms and Saddam's Iraq, Khamenei's Iran and Assad's Syria. The common sense REM and Ricardo would bring to the table wouldn't fill a thimble.

..... I am confident Iran will give up its present regime's ambition for nuclear arms. If not, such potential arms will go the way of Iraq's and of Syria's recent loss of same.

What of Pakistan? What wisdom will the above two scholars offer those imperiled by Pakistan? How would you compare the potential to murder innocents presently owned by Pakistan and Israel?

What is the chance that China and/or India will surpass the United States as the "last best hope" for a world where peace and prosperity may reign -- and ignorance and idolatry recede?

..... If REM and/or Amaral have ideas in this matter, where have they been hiding them while their posts have blathered on?

Gelles  03/05/2012 05:30 PM Report

I believe the Charlie Rose Show,

( http://ustaxreform.us/.crs.htm ) is among the best educational sources available on American TV. Yet its comment archive is among the worst. REMant and Amaral see to that. Remove all posts related to wars and life in the Middle East, and these two offer no appreciation of problems and solutions in our time for our peers. They are fat-heads with insufficient modesty to hear out Shimon Peres and be thankful for his example to all nations and their citizenry.

Imagine, if you will, Charlie Rose interviewing REMant and Amaral on nuclear arms and Saddam's Iraq, Khamenei's

Iran and Assad's Syria. The commonsense REM and Ricardo would bring to the table wouldn't fill a thimble.

I am confident Iran will give up its present regime's ambition for nuclear arms. If not, I am confident such potential arms will go the way of Iraq's and Syria's recent loss of same.

What of Pakistan. What wisdom will the above two scholars offer those imperiled by Pakistan? How would you compare the potential to murder innocents presently owned by Pakistan and Israel?

What is the chance that China and/or India surpass the United States as the "last best hope" for a world where peace and prosperity may reign and ignorance and idolatry recede? If REM and/or have ideas in this matter, where have they been hiding them while their posts have blathered on?

REMant  03/05/2012 11:33 AM Report

Several times a year, coinciding it seems with Jewish holidays and the AIPAC convention in Washington, the Israeli leadership arrives to propagandize, rally their donors, and harass our politicians. While I believe in free speech, self-censorship is as bad as any other, and I am tired of the routine. And I certainly don't think it helps anything to call Arabs ignorant and uncivilized.

I'm afraid Perez doesn't understand Islam is as rational a religion as any, and far more so than either fundamentalist Judaism or Christianity, so his argument evaporates like the Dead Sea. I would, in fact, liken Shia Islam to the New Divinity, which is about the only religious group that rose to fight the British in 1775.

Regardless, I am absolutely convinced that there is no way on earth to stop bullying than a balance of power. And anyone or any nation afraid to accept the equality presupposed in that is either cowardly, or a bully, himself. The obvious thing to do to stop arming and sanctioning such ppl and let them fight it out until they realize for themselves, or the world is rid of them.

Israel may have had no army, no language, no state, and all that. And I'm sure it would like to paint itself like American revolutionaries, but it hardly comes to equity with any cleaner hands than those who removed the occupants of this continent.

The fact is that both Israel and the US were more than happy to have "dictatorship" in Syria and Egypt. Now they hope to change sides. But it appears the Saudis are backing the Egyptian Islamists and arming the Syrian rebels. And Hamas and al-Qaeda have decided to denounce Assad as well. Now that might in the long-run bring peace, yet somehow I don't think Israel will be satisfied with that anymore than anything else.

However, the demographic handwriting is on the wall. I suppose the civilized northern hemisphere has always thought the uncivilized southern would somehow pass away. Apparently they never heard of "Out of Africa," either figuratively or literally.

A President Romney would roll out the red carpet for these heroes of the oppressed, and without any doubt, start an Iraq-style war with Iran, and probably Syria, too. He's not only cut in the Bush mold, he might as well be a Bush. Mama Bush has even recorded robo-calls for him. Some talk of him as a stalking horse for a Jeb Bush nomination in the convention, but it would make no difference.

Ricardo_Amaral  03/05/2012 08:09 AM Report

Gelles,

I don't know why you can't grasp what is underway at the speed of light.

Here is the estimated world population from 10,000 BC to 2011 AD.

Total World Population in Selected Years:

Year…………..# of World Population

10,000 BC…………4 million people

5,000 BC…………..5 million

4,000 BC…………..7 million

3,000 BC…………14 million

2,000 BC…………27 million

1,000 BC…………50 million

500 BC………….100 million

200 BC………….150 million

1 AD…………….170 million

200 AD………….190 million

300 AD………….190 million

400 AD………….190 million

500 AD………….190 million

600 AD………….200 million

700 AD………….210 million

800 AD……….…220 million

900 AD…….……240 million

1,000 AD………..265 million

1,100 AD………..320 million

1,200 AD………..360 million

1,300 AD………..360 million

1,400 AD………..350 million

1,500 AD………..425 million

1,550 AD………..480 million

1,600 AD………..545 million

1,700 AD………..610 million

1,750 AD………..720 million

1,800 AD………..900 million

1,850 AD……...1,200 million or 1.2 billion

1,900 AD……...1,625 million or 1.6 billion

1,925 AD……...2,000 million or 2.0 billion

1,950 AD……...2,500 million or 2.5 billion

1,960 AD……...3,000 million or 3.0 billion

1,975 AD……...4,000 million or 4.0 billion

1,985 AD……...5,000 million or 5.0 billion

1,999 AD……...6,000 million or 6.0 billion

2,006 AD……...6,500 million or 6.5 billion

2,011 AD..........7,000 million or 7.0 billion (official number of people by October 2011)

Note: If you do check various sources regarding the history of world population then you will find out that the various estimates varies a little from source to source for the figures before 1 AD, but at the end of the day their estimates are not too far apart.

*****

Population:

Brazil: 203,429,773 (July 2011 est.)

Russia: 138,739,892 (July 2011 est.)

India: 1,189,172,906 (July 2011 est.)

China: 1,336,718,015 (July 2011 est.)

Total “BRIC” countries: 3 billion people (as of 2012)

Israel: 7 million people

Note: As the economic and financial power shifts to the Asian countries and the BRIC countries – we can see how irrelevant and immaterial Israel becomes to the world of the 21st century.

.

Ricardo_Amaral  03/05/2012 07:49 AM Report

Gelles,

From all the Nobel Prizes the prize that means nothing to me is the Nobel Peace Prize, because it is a political tool and nothing else.

When you think about the Nobel Peace Prize the first name that comes to mind is: Mohandas Mahatma Gandhi.

The Nobel Prize people never gave a Nobel Peace Prize to the symbol of peace: Mohandas Mahatma Gandhi

*****

Between Iran and Israel the real aggressor in the Middle East it has been Israel on a regular basis.

To bomb or not to bomb US schizo over Iran attack – March 4, 2012

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZHi4mE8JbZM

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Gelles  03/05/2012 07:23 AM Report

Ricardo ~

People who post to internet bulletin boards are talking to themselves. They are like one moron talking to another -- even when there is only one of them in the room.

Others, when they read them, say, "Get a life". Get a life and get off the phone. Stop mumbling and begin doing SOMETHING.

I thought it was Monday and started to listen for Charlie Rose. It was just before midnight on Sunday and I was left alone with you. And you are not a Peres fan. Too bad.

Peres (pictured above) gave serious thought on this page to current events. He is what we call a Mensch. A real person for whom honor matters. Among Nobel peace prize winners, whom do you more admire? Maybe Barack Obama.

Gelles  03/05/2012 07:03 AM Report

Ricardo ~

Most in Brazil may not give MERDE for one people or another. But what about YOU? Do you give MERDE -- or are just full of MERDE?

I personally like argot. It expresses our feelings when they substitute for thought. But if we included argot in our Constitution, the latter would suffer. There is a wonderful place for MERDE -- it would do well to replace the whole of our internal revenue code.

Gelles  03/05/2012 06:40 AM Report

To Ricardo_Amaral-- Ref. today 04:39 AM~

The government we want worldwide protects the human right to life and liberty and embraces fair elections not civil wars as the means to settle political differences within a nation: it is better defined by "government of, by and for the people" (Abraham Lincoln), than "democracy versus republic" as you suggest.

Where, in a nation, the guns and dogmatism rule and the workers are suppressed, we may have to prevent such nation from having weapons of mass destruction ahead of use thereof.

"Sovereignty" may have been our primary rule in the past, but WMD's (nuclear and others) have changed that rule. In this era, where too much power can be amassed by the few, preventive war is necessary: older rules were never meant to amount to a suicide pact. You know all this.

The current collapse of casino capitalism signals the need for a return to WWII cooperative systems that resolved the contradictions within "debt-as-money" systems which failed to guarantee full employment in defense of human rights.

Show me human rights in Iran and Syria and I will root for them. Anti-terrorism also matters. Show me a reign of terror and I will oppose it. On these new rules, I stake my hat: and Israel deserves full support while Iran and Syria deserve the boot -- until they comply with Lincoln's law.

I know there are many gray areas. Russia and China are inferior to many great nations in their approach to human right. America is inferior to modern nations with better developed systems for the protection of economic rights.

Another rule of thumb today is "do not allow the perfect to be the enemy of the good".

Your prediction of American decline is premature. If Keynesian respect for full employment and high wages relative to demand and supply management returns, and the trend toward oligarchy and wage slavery in the USA is reversed, we will lead for centuries to come. If not, Europe or Asia may replace American leadership. Brazil should speak English, if it would be a contender. And you should spend a half-year each in Iran, Israel and Palestine to improve your vision of what the future will hold.

Ricardo_Amaral  03/05/2012 05:51 AM Report

Gelles: : “Your recitations about Asian history tend to make Brazil as yet an unborn baby. Where did all of it come from?

Your predictions for America and Israel are not pro-Brazil. They are anti-humanitarian.

Why?

*****

Ricardo: The country Brazil is only 511 years old, and the United States is even younger than Brazil, since the first successful English colony was established only in 1607, on the James River at Jamestown.

The information came from world history – it is a fact that India, China and Iran/Persia are among the oldest civilizations on earth.

Even Iran/Persia has a 6,000 year history - compare that with the history of the United States.

Democracy, freedom and human rights originated in Iran. This was proven by the “Cyrus Cylinder” which is in the British Museum.

Cyrus Cylinder

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cyrus_Cylinder

The Cyrus the Great Cylinder

http://www.iranchamber.com/history/cyrus/cyrus_charter.php

***

Gelles, I have no idea about what you are trying to say when you wrote: “Your predictions for America and Israel are not pro-Brazil. They are anti-humanitarian.”

First, I can assure you that most Brazilians don't give a shit about Israel and its people – that is a fact.

There is a web site about the history of Jews that claim that there are about 96,500 Jews in Brazil today. They are probably inflating the number for some reason – I doubt there are more than 50,000 Jews in Brazil in 2012 – that number is not much when you consider that Brazil has a population of 200 million people.

I met a number of Jews in Brazil over the years, and they were not that religious – they are becoming secular just like a large portion of the Brazilian population.

I have absolute no idea what you mean by: “ They are anti-humanitarian”

.

Ricardo_Amaral  03/05/2012 04:39 AM Report

Gelles, you said the following: “You are very inconsistent.

If you defend democracy, you cannot defend Iran or North Korean red military fascism or the old Iraqi Saddam regime Bush attacked it to further global democracy and American interests. He prevented an evil Saddam from re-arming and making more war. American leftists and others do not accept the Bush doctrine. I did and I do.

Brazil helped Israel become a nation among nations at the end of WW II. Brazil was right. It also was against Hitler when it counted. Your present position seems out of step with the Brazil I knew half a century ago. What happened?”

*****

Ricardo: First, global democracy is a silly concept and a waste of time.

By the way, we don't have democracy even here in the United States; what we have here is the two wings of the same bird system.

Most Americans think that the form of government of the United States is a Democracy, because they don't know the difference between a Republic and a Democracy.

This video explain the difference for you:

Republic vs Democracy

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KFXuGIpsdE0

The United States used to be a Republic, but overtime the US form of government transformed itself into what we have today: Oligarchy

Anyway, the American people lost the protection of the U.S. Constitution and Bill of Rights” when Barack Obama signed into law the “National Defense Authorization Act for Fiscal Year 2012” and turned the United States officially into a “Police State”.

Police state

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Police_state

Signed into law by President Barack Obama on December 31, 2011, the National_Defense_Authorization_Act_for_Fiscal_Year_2012 allows the military to operate within US borders and to indefinitely detain US citizens without due process or probable cause.

National Defense Authorization Act for Fiscal Year 2012

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/National_Defense_Authorization_Act_for_Fiscal_Year_2012

*****

Gelles, regarding the subject of democracy - Robert Kaplan wrote an interesting article for “The Atlantic Monthly” published in December 1997 that is very relevant today mainly when there are a lot of people in the US government who has the crazy idea that the United States has to spread "Democracy" all over the world.

I did read this article a number of times over the years, and I recommend that other people also read it. I hope you will get as much from this article as I did.

The Atlantic Monthly – December 1997

Was Democracy Just a Moment?

By: Robert Kaplan

http://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/1997/12/was-democracy-just-a-moment/6022/

*****

Gelles, regarding Brazil what happened is that we are not in 1948 anymore, the world has changed in drastic ways since that time.

My suggestions regarding Brazil is relevant to 2012, and how to shape Brazil for the new world of the 21st century.

*****

Gelles: “I find you very confusing. You are pro-labor and pro-Keynesian (by implication) in the quoted posting above.”

*****

Ricardo: You find me confusing because I think outside of the box – I am not a slave to the theories of some defunct economist, and I don't follow any political ideology.

I believe we have reached a point that we need to invent a new social and economic system as they have been doing in China.

Today, the Chinese social-economic experiment is a work in progress, and most Americans don't understand that, because their mindset is stuck in the past – in a world long gone.

For all practical purposes the capitalist system of the United States died a sudden death in 2008, and what we have since that time is an artificial economic system that depend on massive US government intervention to keep the house of cards from collapsing. The Federal Reserve have been blowing bubbles into the financial system as fast as they can to keep the entire system from a massive implosion and collapse.

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Gelles  03/05/2012 01:00 AM Report

Ricardo_ Amaral

Your recitations about Asian history tend to make Brazil as yet an unborn baby. Where did all of it come from?

Your predictions for America and Israel are not pro-Brazil. They are anti-humanitarian.

Why?

Gelles  03/05/2012 12:53 AM Report

Ricardo_ Amaral ~

You furnished the following comment in your message of 03/04/2012 08:40 PM:

..... "[For] Even many of the best US companies, their profits are being generated by laying off people, on a global basis.

As I have been writing about for a few years the “first great depression of the 21st century” has been underway, and now we are entering the second leg of the depression when the s**t really hits the fan...

..... "Only years from now in the future, historians and the mainstream media will recognize and will start referring to our time as being in a “great depression” - and that is why the US mainstream media needs to record what is actually happening around the country, and start reporting it to the public.

..... "The denying about what is happening around us by the US government and the US mainstream media here in the United States ... doesn't fix the problem, and it doesn't make it to go away; also, [it] may just make things even worse for everyone."

==== end Ricardo. begin Gelles ====

The above charge by you against our government and media is. in my opinion, fair and factual as far as it goes.

It says nothing about Peres, Iran, peace or war.

I find you very confusing. You are pro-labor and pro-Keynesian (by implication) in the quoted posting above.

Then, you fail to be pro-democracy in my accusations against an evil Iran that kills its own minority of Bahai innocents.

You are very inconsistent.

If you defend democracy, you cannot defend Iran or North Korean red military fascism or the old Iraqi Saddam regime Bush attacked it to further global democracy and American interests. He prevented an evil Saddam from re-arming and making more war. American leftists and others do not accept the Bush doctrine. I did and I do.

Brazil helped Israel become a nation among nations at the end of WW II. Brazil was right. It also was against Hitler when it counted. Your present position seems out of step with the Brazil I knew half a century ago. What happened?

Ricardo_Amaral  03/04/2012 08:40 PM Report

Gelles,

As part of the discussion I posted the following on Brazzil magazine and also on Facebook - written by Ricardo C. Amaral, February 16, 2012

You will enjoy watching some of these videos regarding the history of Iran and the Persian Empire.

When you mentioned 1776 the Iranian/Persians laugh about that since Iran is home to one of the world's oldest continuous major civilizations, with historical and urban settlements dating back to 4000 BC – that means the history of Iran/Persia goes back at least 6,000 years from 2012 AD.

http://www.brazzil.com/component/content/article/242-february-2012/10558-brazil-cant-become-world-pla yer-sitting-on-the-fence-while-world-clamors-against-syrian-regime.html#comments

...Regarding the US military and their never ending military adventures around the world – the US has over 800 military bases around the world.

I don't need to list all the wars that the United States got involved since 1776. This is a nation that loves a war, any type of war.....

Many countries around the world are armed with nuclear weapons, but up to today only one country has used two of these weapons against other human beings – finally, the ultimate and the extreme act of human violence that can be inflicted against the people from another country such as the nukes that the USA dropped in Japan, in Hiroshima and Nagasaki.

The US mainstream media makes me sick, as usual they are not doing their job – for all practical purposes the US mainstream media is dying very fast, because they become obsolete and most people does not pay attention to them anyway.

I find interesting and at the same time crazy about how the United States (the new kid in the block) wants to tell Iran what that country can and cannot do.

Iran is home to one of the world's oldest continuous major civilizations, with historical and urban settlements dating back to 4000 BC – that means the history of Iran/Persia goes back at least 6,000 years from 2012 AD.

Most Americans are completely clueless about the history of Persia/Iran. They think that the Iranians are Arabs, and they have no idea that the Iranians are Persians.

Most Americans can't even find where Iran is locate in a world map, and it's too much to expect that Americans would know that they are Persians.

The US mainstream media and the US government want to convey to the American public and also to the world the idea that Iran is a primitive country in many ways and a primitive society.

Here is some information about the history of Persia/Iran:

Persian Empire/Civilization Iran Inventions History

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3w9Zn821nl0

Persian Empire/Civilization Iran Inventions Darius The Great Cyrus The Great

The Achaemenid Empire (ca. 550--330 BCE), also known as the Persian Empire, was the successor state of the Median Empire, ruling over significant portions of what would become Greater Iran. The Persian and the Median Empire taken together are also known as the Medo-Persian Empire, which encompassed the combined territories of several earlier empires. At the height of its power, the empire encompassed approximately 8 million km2. The empire was forged by Cyrus the Great, and spanned three continents: Asia, Africa and Europe. At its greatest extent, the empire included the territories of Iran, Afghanistan, Pakistan and the territories of northern India, parts of Central Asia, Asia Minor, Thrace and Macedonia, much of the Black Sea coastal regions, Iraq, northern Saudi Arabia, Jordan, Palestine, Israel, Lebanon, Syria, and all significant population centers of ancient Egypt as far west as Libya.

It is noted in western history as the foe of the Greek city states during the Greco-Persian Wars, for emancipation of slaves including the Jews from their Babylonian Babylonian captivity, and for instituting the usage of official languages throughout its territories. In universal history the role of the Persian empire founded by Cyrus the Great lies in their very successful model for centralized administration and a government working to the advantage and profit of all.

The Achaemenid Persian empire was invaded by Alexander III of Macedon, after which it collapsed and disintegrated in 330 BCE into what later became the Ptolemaic Kingdom and Seleucid Empire, in addition to other minor territories which gained independence after its collapse. Iranian rule was re-established in the region starting from the rise of Arsacids in middle of 3rd century BCE Engineering an Empire The Persians Cyrus Daryus Xerxes Spart Spartans 300 Iran Iranian Kings Hakhamaneshi Akamanchipersia civilization power iran persian aryan history empire achaemenid rome roman culture parthian persepolis cyrus

*****

The Persian Empire

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cpfLubDZKoU

*****

The history of Iran

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_Iran

*****

By the way, Iraq was the country that attacked Iran in a war that killed about 1 million people, and the United States was an ally of Iraq during that war.

In the world of 2012 one would expect that countries such as the United States and Israel were a bit more intelligent than they really are in dealing with their foreign affairs – the problem is that we overestimate all the time the level and degree of intelligence of the population of these countries.

They are not as smart and intelligent as many people believe they are.

The United States and Israel are provoking Iran every way they can to start another war in the Middle East.

I understand why Israel is so desperate to start a war against Iran – Israel is becoming irrelevant and obsolete in the new world of the 21st century at the speed of light.

It's a shame that the US mainstream media is in a coma, becoming completely irrelevant, and it's dying a quick death.

There's no one left with a minimum of common sense, and the ability to reason, and also with a basic ability of thinking, to stop the US/Israel aggression against Iran, before the new conflict spins completely out of control into chaos and massive destruction of human lives and so on....

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Gelles  03/04/2012 05:39 PM Report

Ricardo ~

You cannot be serious. The evil represented by Iran, a nation that has made war on its own tiny Bahai minority, and Iraq, a nation that made war on its own Kurds and the Persians of Iran, and by North Korea, a nation that may finally be coming to its senses, will not be tolerated by any other nation -- especially not by Brazil. All the world will turn the revolutions in North Africa and the Middle East to something better than Iraq, Iran and North Korea.

George Bush the son, who saw clearly how to move to curb that evil, started something. Your call on India and China to lead the world to peace and plenty will first be answered by the USA -- the great nation that changed everything in 1776.

Your elite traders are gamblers not statesmen. Curse them all. We in the USA have more of their type than we need. But we also have the heirs to Franklin, Washington, Jefferson and Hamilton. They started something. Lincoln, Churchill and Roosevelt continued it at critical points in recent history.

We will follow new leaders from the West and the East. They will follow Franklin and Lincoln to Keynesian solutions to global demand and supply.

You have nothing but copycats so far. But we have also abandoned Keynes. So, America and Asia may need each other for the next thousand years. At that time we will have a common language, a common money, and a common destiny. The gene pool will have all us or none of us. I do NOT see you as a war monger. Nor have continental nations any reason to embrace evil, abandon good, and make war against each other.

Ricardo_Amaral  03/04/2012 03:14 PM Report

After a second thought maybe that was a bad example, since the Soviet Union had a total economic collapse 20 years ago, but the United States still have to this day an economic embargo against Cuba because they are afraid that the communists are going to land in the US and take over the country.

Republican U.S. Senator Joseph McCarthy did a very good job brainwashing the American people against communism.

I hope Benjamin Netanyahu's “toxic paranoia” about Iran it does not have the same effect on the American people that U.S. Senator Joseph McCarthy had regarding communism.

.

Ricardo_Amaral  03/04/2012 02:58 PM Report

Here is a reality check for the United States:

I hope that we still have today enough people in Washington D.C. who can use their brain and common sense and they should realize that Benjamin Netanyahu the current Prime Minister of Israel – the crazy NeoCon - is completely paranoid regarding Iran and nuclear weapons in the same manner that Republican U.S. Senator Joseph McCarthy was completely paranoid in the 1950's about communism.

The United States and the world must recognize by now that these fellows are nothing more than basket cases.

.

Ricardo_Amaral  03/04/2012 02:34 PM Report

The US mainstream media never mention this subject, maybe because they have not grasped it as yet: but as Europe and the United States decline economically and in global influence and the real economic and financial power moves to Asia in the 21st century – one major casualty of this move in power is Israel, since Israel is losing 100 percent of its leverage that Israel has against the West.

In a nutshell: The Asians from China, India, and so on...don't care about Israel and its history – Christianity and Judaism means nothing to this new world of the 21st century.

Chinese civilization originated in various regional centers along both the Yellow River and the Yangtze River valleys in the Neolithic era (beginning about 10200 BC), but the Yellow River is said to be the Cradle of Chinese Civilization. And the history of India begins with evidence of human activity of Homo sapiens as long as 75,000 years ago.

This China/India Asian culture and history goes back thousands of years before the earliest history of Judaism and the Christian world.

For all practical purposes the religious history of Judaism and the Christian world is completely irrelevant from the Asian perspective. Israel means nothing to this people.

The religious and cultural leverage that Israel had in the Western world is dying very fast at the speed of light as the economic and political power of Europe and the United States decline in relation to the new global economic and financial system of the 21st century.

We have reached the late stages of a major implosion in Europe and the United States and both Central Banks – the Fed and the ECB – have been blowing bubbles as fast as they can to keep the European economic system and the United States afloat for a while longer, before we have the final blow up of the old economic and financial system.

The Fed and the ECB have been pumping money into the system to the tune of trillions of US dollars, and euros – otherwise the house of cards would have crashed just like the Soviet Union did years ago.

Not only Israel means nothing to the new Asian world order, and at the same time the protector of Israel (the United States) is also losing its power and influence around the world at the speed of light.

I can see why Israel is in total panic and need something to call global attention to itself on last time, before Israel becomes completely irrelevant in the world of the 21st century.

Israel is like a little kid crying for attention – that's why they are beating the war drums of war as fast and as loud as they can regarding Iran.

This is the real reality check for Israel and they are completely powerless, including their “Jewish Lobby” to turn the tide that is underway.

Welcome to the world of the 21st century where Israel is an irrelevant little country with 7 million people and nothing else.

.

Ricardo_Amaral  03/04/2012 01:27 PM Report

First of all, you should not pay attention to the old rhetoric that Israel is planning to attack Iran.

We have been discussing this subject for the last 6 years on the ET forum and over the years this subject has turned into a joke.

When we hear this BS all we can do today is laugh at this old comedy that is on its 6th year of old re-runs of the same old material.

The truth is Israel don't have the capability to strike Iran. It is that simple, otherwise they would have done at any time in the last 6 years.

You can read about this old comedy series at:

The United States is planning to attack Iran with Nuclear Weapons

http://www.elitetrader.com/vb/showthread.php?s=&threadid=67053&perpage=6&pagenumber=61

...January 30, 2012

SouthAmerica: Here is another episode of the hit TV comedy series “Israel and the USA are going to attack Iran...”

This is actually a very sad episode that shows how pathetic the United States is becoming, and that just help to reinforce and speed up its fast declining prestige and influence around the world.

On this episode the “Jewish Lobby” say that Mossad is going to assassinate the president of the United States if he does not destroy Iran.

It seems to me that the "Jewish Lobby" is getting so desperate, because they are becoming obsolete by the minute in the new word order of the 21st century and they are trying to grab world attention any way they can.

I believe the “Jewish Lobby” and Israel is going too far when they are threatening to assassinate the president of the United States – The “Jewish Lobby” is completely out of control and after Mossad got caught on video assassinating a person in the UAE, and assassinating Iranian scientists – now they want to assassinate the leader of the United States.

The US economic and financial system is collapsing, and the last thing the United States need today is another war against Iran. And never mind the economic consequences that higher oil prices will have in a global economy that is already at the edge of the abyss.

The truth is: Israel does not have the capability and also the guts to attack Iran.

And if Israel managed to do such a foolish thing, then let Israel pay the price of total global rage against their action – and after that all the countries in South America should break up any relations with Israel, and start a complete boycott of any products from Israel.

And all the countries of South America also should decline any entry visas for anyone from Israel.

And let's hope that the Asian countries also follow such a policy.

Today I was watching a debate from Davos 2012 where Thomas Friedman said that in 2011 the United States has become an oil exporting country – He was trying to imply that oil from the Middle East is less important to the United States than in the last few decades.

Only if the people in Washington is completely “Brain dead”, which is a real possibility, the United States would get involved in a war against Iran.

Israel 'master of puppets' in US Iran onslaught – January 30, 2012

***

If you go to the Elite Trader Forum then you can see the web link to all the video regarding this fiasco.

.

Sharmour  03/04/2012 08:26 AM Report

Who did Shimon Peres quote towards the end of the interview?

Gelles  03/04/2012 08:17 AM Report

To Blank ~

Thanks for reading "Gelles 03/03/2012 07:22 AM", below, wherein I claimed: "In extreme cases, when all else fails, governments can cancel all old money and issue new money. But this is wholly unnecessary when cost accounting is well designed and the price of necessities is held to cost plus a legal percentage of cost for profit."

You suggest the system of managed money supply, as a substitute for laissez-faire profit system with taxes and wholly debt-based money would be overly complex.

I agree it would be detailed and difficult. That is why I claim we need an ESA (economic security agency) with the Information Tech expertise of the NSA to manage the logistical science systems to price necessities at cost-plus non-market prices. These systems, backed up by lawful contracts with enough suppliers to make the system work, would end our crazy counter-productive taxes.

What the world has now does not work. Billions are too poor for words. Billions more are in debt up to their ears. Only a few have a positive net worth.

My proposals would have everyone with a solid net worth, and with a decent job, and free enough of debt and ignorance to be proud to be citizens of a republic modeled on Benjamin Franklin's ideas of business, science and economics. He printed money and put it to work. Britain challenged our freedom. America was born as a result.

blank  03/04/2012 02:25 AM Report

you'd end up having to create new "money" at an infinite rate

that's what i concluded but i have too many other problems

-

you're saying that every so often everybody's money that they own (and it's all electronic) gets transformed to a new currency and the equivalent new values are assessed

based on complex algorithms

how do you prevent the people from creating their separate underground currency

(the people who consistently have their amount lowered would be upset that's why it has to be done in real time infinitely)

-

-

-

-- (-) maybe reverse it have amounts lowered and qualify for discounts and free necessities if it's low enough and others raised but they have to buy everything

you always have the option of having it lowered to where everything is free

it would be very complex

Gelles  03/03/2012 11:56 PM Report

The issue is plain: Can the world tolerate nuclear weapons proliferation?

It was thought after 9-11-2001 that Iraq, Iran and North Korea could NOT sanely be allowed to open the door to global nuclear weapons possession as though these weapons were no worse than dynamite.

Now President Obama has made clear to Iran that they cannot copy North Korea.

War to break the back of their bomb-making project is near to inevitable. Peres could not say this. Charlie Rose could have said it. We in this audience should say it.

If you are silent it is because you think Iran can be the last nation to arm. You are betting, America and other allies can put a shield over the Middle East, as it did over Europe and Japan, and that shield will be enough to bring these arms projects to a close. After such closure, you are betting the fever will subside and no other nut cases will want nuclear arms bad enough to reopen the problem.

President Obama and his likely opponent in November have promised Iran will not be the high water mark with the bomb. They will be the high water mark WITHOUT the bomb.

If Ron Paul were elected the opposite situation would follow. Iran would arm. The world would wait. If there were a race for all who could to make the bombs, the chance of nuclear accident or terror would be higher than necessary.

In a strange way we are re-living the Truman decisions on Hiroshima and Nagasaki in 1946, allover again.

It is rumored that Bertrand Russell wanted Truman to prevent Russia from proliferating nuclear weapons when he had the chance. He wanted Truman to kill millions of Russian innocents to save the human race. Truman is rumored to have said NO!

Obama will not have to kill any people. He will have to drop leaflets. Then, if Iran is not open to inspection, he will have to drop bunker-busting non-nuclear bombs. No one will have to die unless Iran forces them to.

We in the audience do not have to think these thoughts. Our President does have to make this decision. Why he wanted so difficult a job is not obvious.

ShalomFreedman  03/03/2012 05:06 PM Report

Shimon Peres is the last active founding father of Israel. He has a long and distinguished record of contributing to the building of the country. He is now in his last public office, as President of Israel. He is in this position honored and loved by a great share of the Israeli public.

He is a self- proclaimed optimist and fervent champion of the Peace process. He in this interview with Charlie Rose reiterates his basic philosophy regarding Peace in the Middle East. He claims, and in this I know he is correct that the great majority of the people of Israel want Peace and know it is in their first interest. He also claims and here I believe he is too generous to the other side that the Palestinians, and the Fatah of Abbas also want Peace. He does not give evidence for this, and I believe it is wishful thinking on his part. All the signs are that Fatah regards 'peace' as a tactical move aimed to weaken and undermine Israel.

Peres also believes, and here too I believe he is not completely correct, that poverty and lack of opportunity are the major problems of the Middle East. They no doubt are major problems but the 'identity crisis' of the area also relates to its political and religious identity, its Islamization. I believe here that Peres is to a degree downplaying the hostility to Israel of many in the area.

On Iran I believe Peres was wise. He wants to see if sanctions will work. And he is not eager for military confrontation though that might prove the only alternative in the end.

He did say a bit about Israel's accomplishments with the years. He did connect the history of the state with Jewish history. And he did express a warm and humane attitude toward the other peoples of the area.

All in all it is impossible not to be impressed and admiring of a person who has done so much for his own people, and who at the age of eighty- nine is still so strong in their service- and too in the service of making a better world for all peoples.

MikeCarey  03/03/2012 12:01 PM Report

Who is President Peres REALLY talking about when he says,

“The group that is running ???? today doesn’t have any respect for law, for humanity or for reason.”

“I do believe today ???? is the center of moral corruption in our time. They kill people. They support terror. They are highly ambitious.”

I say to BOTH Iran AND Israel -

** Stop killing American Jews

** Stop killing your own people

** Stop covert killings around the world

** Stop fomenting religious wars

Here is an image of what Israel and Iran need to aspire to be - Singapore!

** a peaceful country in a hostile region, universally respected and amazingly prosperous.

The alternative is ever more boycotts, divestment, and sanctions - the only things moral observers of this carnage can do to retain their sanity.

Gelles  03/03/2012 07:22 AM Report

President Peres put heavy emphasis on jobs, wealth and making an opening for millions of young people in the Middle East (including, in and around Israel, Jordan and Palestine).

That is my interest as well. I begin with America. Our young people deserve far better than the economy is presently offering.

Toward these ends, I ask: What is the problem?

And, as you may expect, I have an answer.

..... Rewarding private production by creating inflation-proof money to guarantee adequate demand, and repealing the Internal Revenue Code, are our immediate needs -- and such debt-free additional money and absence of taxation would not be that difficult to manage -- in fact.

..... In extreme cases, when all else fails, governments can cancel all old money and issue new money. But this is wholly unnecessary when cost accounting is well designed and the price of necessities is held to cost plus a legal percentage of cost for profit.

..... The cost of luxuries, on the other hand, helps to prevent inflation when money is plentiful enough for everyone to save and work to pay off all their debt.

..... In America, the Middle East, and all the rest of the world, these solutions are not much discussed. Everyone knows the problem is more that of demand than supply. Yet all the Charlie Roses of the world can think of, is to fear inflation and kill the chances for exponential economic growth that only the financial tools of WW II can bring about.

Tragically, Israel too is loaded with poverty and unpromising futures for many of its young people of ordinary attainment.

When will Peres, Obama and the lords of China, India, Russia and Brazil wake up to the fact that only money in the jeans of ordinary workers when they shop can create the jobs they deserve that put that money there? Did Keynes and the Great Depression teach them nothing at all?

Gelles  03/03/2012 06:47 AM Report

Peace with a Palestinian state, reform in Iran to bring a measure of human rights to that nation: those are objectives devoutly to be pursued. Add to these, the objective of creating jobs and wealth in the Middle East -- especially in Jordan and Palestine (possibly Egypt?) such that young people see hope and progress ahead.

The Ten Commandments, the desire for improvement, the equal value of every individual and tribe and nation in the eyes of God and the people created in His image: these President Peres says are guides for the people of Israel and of Western civilization.

The transitional era we entered at the end of first decade of this new Century offers hope for rational progress that is new. Peres is hopeful.

To serve and not to rule, that is his advice. Never complain. Never explain.

Th occupation must end. Palestine must come together. Shimon Peres is 2 years older than I am. He thinks more of tomorrow than yesterday. He is too young to be concerned more with his legacy than his vision of a more democratic future. He is a man very easy to love for his ideas and his efforts in behalf of 7 billion descendants of Adam and Eve.

SharkswithfrikingLazers  03/03/2012 03:53 AM Report

He says, “The group that is running Iran today doesn’t have any respect for law, for humanity or for reason.”

“I do believe today Iran is the center of moral corruption in our time. They kill people. They support terror. They are highly ambitious.”

And this he says in just the first three minutes.

I do wish he would sugar coat it. I will say that I have a bad taste in my mouth from this region but I won’t say what is happening with the pain at the other end of my digestive tract.