presentation here, there are certain weaknesses in your article that I'd like to call attention to. I apologize in advance if it seems like I'm "attacking" you -- I simply think these points need attention.

First, you wrote "Congress should start investigating the CIA ties to the school (Univ of Chicago) and to Friedman..." Only a few sentences later, you added, "And don't expect the corpstream media to do any kind of acceptable job of covering it."

The weakness here is that you're appealing to the notion of Congress as some sort of impartial seeker of Truth & High Principle, when actually, it is subject to all the influences which have made the CIA what it is, and which made the Univ of Chicago School of Economics what it is. When you write, "The monster has insinuated itself into the CIA and much of government and grabbed power...", you've got it exactly backwards. The CIA was created to do precisely these things. It's not that the monster was "insinuated" in the CIA; it's that the CIA was created by Congress & the Truman administration to protect the interests of US capitalism, by going around the world destroying all & any attempts of other nations to develop economically in ways that were independent of the US, & thus "threats" to US corporations' global dominance. The CIA was created to be an antidemocratic ruthless monster -- it's not at all the case that it was created "good and pure," then somehow got corrupted & became a monster along the way.

I quoted your remark about the media above, because Congress is no more capable of "investigating" the CIA ties to the Univ of Chicago, than the media is of reporting on this stuff -- and for the same reasons. Just as the media is nothing but the voice of the US ruling elite, Congress is nothing but the hired agents of that same elite. Congress, the CIA, & the corporate media are all on the same team. They don't "investigate" each other; they collaborate with each other.

Finally, a very large & open question posed by Klein's book is whether what she describes is intrinsic to capitalism itself. Your description implicitly takes the view that "Disaster capitalism" is a dangerous freak mutation of capitalism. But I believe that the more carefully one examines this question, the stronger is the case that all these dangerous characteristics are inherent in capitalism itself -- in other words, that there's no fundamental distinction between "disaster capitalism" and capitalism (except perhaps that the former term is more easily applied to a particularly malignant phase of the latter).

by Richard Mynick (2 articles, 4 quicklinks, 1 diaries, 1552 comments [255 recommended, 5 rejected]) on Sunday, Nov 25, 2007 at 12:11:33 PM

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You wrote:

"Congress is no more capable of "investigating" the CIA ties to the Univ of Chicago, than the media is of reporting on this stuff -- and for the same reasons. Just as the media is nothing but the voice of the US ruling elite, Congress is nothing but the hired agents of that same elite. Congress, the CIA, & the corporate media are all on the same team. They don't "investigate" each other; they collaborate with each other.

Finally, a very large & open question posed by Klein's book is whether what she describes is intrinsic to capitalism itself. Your description implicitly takes the view that "Disaster capitalism" is a dangerous freak mutation of capitalism. But I believe that the more carefully one examines this question, the stronger is the case that all these dangerous characteristics are inherent in capitalism itself -- in other words, that there's no fundamental distinction between "disaster capitalism" and capitalism (except perhaps that the former term is more easily applied to a particularly malignant phase of the latter).

Have you researched the Permanent Revolution? From your response to the article, it appears that you have. 

by Barbara Peterson (73 articles, 109 quicklinks, 11 diaries, 541 comments [98 recommended, 0 rejected]) on Sunday, Nov 25, 2007 at 4:29:24 PM

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Klein reports on congressional hearings that, in fact, DID investigat CIA involvement in these coups. Reality trumps cynicism-- reasonably warranted cynicism, but disproven, in this case.

by Rob Kall (952 articles, 4177 quicklinks, 374 diaries, 2087 comments [45 recommended, 3 rejected]) on Sunday, Nov 25, 2007 at 5:56:24 PM

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An organization such as Congress can investigate anything it wishes, but the outcome of such an investigation does not necessarily reflect that organization's true intentions. Even the exposure of wrong-doing revealed in an investigation can contribute to that organization's ultimate goal, which may be the opposite of what it proclaims. This type of deception is a well-known strategy, and is used against us daily. The Hegelian dialectic:

 Merriam-Webster:

"Dialectic ....the Hegelian process of change in which a concept or its realization passes over into and is preserved and fulfilled by its opposite... development through the stages of thesis, antithesis, and synthesis in accordance with the laws of dialectical materialism ....any systematic reasoning, exposition, or argument that juxtaposes opposed or contradictory ideas and usually seeks to resolve their conflict ...
....the dialectical tension or opposition between two interacting forces or elements."

Here is the URL that explains this graphically:

http://www.calvertonschool.org/waldspurger/pages/hegelian_dialectic.htm

by Barbara Peterson (73 articles, 109 quicklinks, 11 diaries, 541 comments [98 recommended, 0 rejected]) on Sunday, Nov 25, 2007 at 6:19:55 PM

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are invariably the result. Think of the 9-11 Commission, the Warren Commission, Iran-Contra, Enron, the hearings held following the election debacle in Florida in 2000; or any of the Pentagon's alleged "investigations" of itself over My Lai, Gitmo or Abu Ghraib. The most that any of these hearings yield is that a few sacrificial lambs get thrown to the wolves -- but miraculously, evidence of deep institutional corruption is never found.

In the 1970's, there were a few things like Watergate, & the Church & Pike Committees (investigations of the CIA & FBI) where some institutional wrongdoing was acknowledged -- but even then, most of the really powerful people were protected, & the public only got a glimpse of how dirty the intelligence agencies' operations really were.  It was what the CIA itself would call a "limited hang-out" -- admitting stuff that could simply not be credibly denied any longer.

by Richard Mynick (2 articles, 4 quicklinks, 1 diaries, 1552 comments [255 recommended, 5 rejected]) on Sunday, Nov 25, 2007 at 6:47:36 PM

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Just as we saw Waxman's committee wax eloquently (ouch!) about its own investigatory path and then wander off the path as soon as th epublic stopped looking I would surmise that the investigations of which you speak regarding the CIA followed the same course.

How can one expect any sort of competent investigation into a system that is wholeheartedly supported by the investigators? Do you seriously believe that anyone on Capital Hill, whether Congressperson or Senator, does not wholely support the doctrines of the Chicago School of Economics and encourage globalism and rampant and destructive capitalism? These ivory tower legislators are completely out of touch with the lives of the masses, in my own opinion and concluded by the absurdities they support and the laws they pass or fail to pass. To expect any sort of fundamental change from them is to entrust our future to those in total thrall to the enemy of the democratic process and those who bring fascism ever closer.

by ardee D. (6 articles, 4 quicklinks, 1 diaries, 2377 comments) on Sunday, Nov 25, 2007 at 6:59:13 PM

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Great minds think alike :) I have been studying along the same lines. My current research has led me to such subjects as the Permanent Revolution, the Fabian Society, and creative destruction. Here is a definition for the Permanent Revolution from the "The American Counter Revolution" website, along with the URL at the bottom: "The Permanent Revolution is the continuous process of War, Revolution and Terror removing all obstacles for the global proliferation of a unified American/British Capitalism (based on the precepts of the Fabian Society) as the sole means of production for the world. The present means of expansion for American/British Capitalism is International Free Trade created in 1947 with the UN's General Agreements of Tariffs and Trade and presently regulated by the World Trade Organization." http://www.americancounter-revolution.com/

by Barbara Peterson (73 articles, 109 quicklinks, 11 diaries, 541 comments [98 recommended, 0 rejected]) on Sunday, Nov 25, 2007 at 4:26:04 PM

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Brazil's president is a right winger not a progressive.  Brazil's president is allied with the US and corporate interests.

by Ty (0 articles, 0 quicklinks, 0 diaries, 888 comments [2 recommended, 0 rejected]) on Sunday, Nov 25, 2007 at 4:54:29 PM

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either -- he's a former labor leader & founding member of Brazil's Workers' Party (PT) who was decidedly leftwing for most of his adult life. But after being elected president of Brazil in 2002 (or perhaps, more correctly, in order to get elected), he had to make numerous compromises with international monetary powers.

It's true that most leftists are very disappointed in him & regard him as having sold out to US & international capitalist interests. But calling him a "right winger" isn't accurate. He's a former leftist who was pressured into being "pragmatic" & making concessions to "the powers that be."

by Richard Mynick (2 articles, 4 quicklinks, 1 diaries, 1552 comments [255 recommended, 5 rejected]) on Sunday, Nov 25, 2007 at 5:59:43 PM

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It is NOT at fault.  It just seems like it because the United States has never had honest capitalism.  That's the point of GreatRedDragon.com , which calls our real problem Imperialistic Capital.  Do we allow a Ferrari owner to drive at unlimited speeds on our highways?  So why do we allow certain corporations that lie, steal and murder, to get bigger, especially when they are controlled by entities who will not allow themselves to be identified to the public?  These type of entities have been around for 400+ years and are an open secret in plain sight, if only we will look. They have subjugated religion, education and government so that the public has no idea of how things are managed, or how to even live. Not even those with PhD's in economics.  The liars get financed, and those who tell the truth are eventually "murdered" by lack of funds.  [character assasination]

Why do you think OpEdNews has to struggle to deliver the truth, and corporate media buys Ferraris? In the old days, it was called "selling out."  That's why we call those type of people "sociopaths!"

by Edward Ulysses Cate (0 articles, 0 quicklinks, 0 diaries, 232 comments [9 recommended, 0 rejected]) on Sunday, Nov 25, 2007 at 6:50:52 PM

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I agree strongly. Capitalism isn't the problem. Greed is.

Greed isn't limited to corporate entities, or to capitalists. It exists to some degree in all people. To blame all the woes of the world on capitalism ignores the reality that whenever man gets his hand on a concept, he is sure to corrupt it. This has been the case since man first became capable of conceptualization.

Would you prefer to live in a so-called worker's paradise, like the one that supposedly existed in Soviet Russia? Do you prefer your food being there for you on the grocer's shelves, or would you prefer to stand in bread lines hoping there is a loaf left for you when you get to the head of the line? Given the choice, I'll take the downsides of capitalism over the downsides of socialism any day.

Blessed be!
Pappy

by Pappy (61 articles, 0 quicklinks, 11 diaries, 860 comments [5 recommended, 0 rejected]) on Sunday, Nov 25, 2007 at 7:57:13 PM

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"preferring to live in the USSR." That's not really a fair or rational way to discuss capitalism, anyway, because it wrongly assumes that "socialism" can be equated to the USSR.

There are at least two major mistakes in that line of thought. First, there can be many different implementations of socialism. They don't all have to be just like the USSR, anymore than the USA has to be just like other capitalist countries, like Hitler's Germany, Franco's Spain, Mussolini's Italy, or Pinochet's Chile. Does the US look just like Turkey, Haiti, or Indonesia? All those countries are "capitalist."

The second mistake is that your line of thought assumes that what the USSR became was entirely a consequence of its own economic system. That's not true. The USSR became a big mess, in large part because all the Western countries tried in every way they could, to exclude the USSR from the world trading system, & to undermine and destroy it. All sorts of economic measures, as well as repeated invasions, were attempted, to try to strangle it, right from the get-go. If the West had let them in peace, they might well have done far better than they did.

by Richard Mynick (2 articles, 4 quicklinks, 1 diaries, 1552 comments [255 recommended, 5 rejected]) on Sunday, Nov 25, 2007 at 9:01:59 PM

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So long as your cool with condemning 2/3 of the population to poverty, because that is the cost of your precious capitalism. Sleep well...

by Shelby (1 articles, 0 quicklinks, 2 diaries, 28 comments) on Monday, Nov 26, 2007 at 10:37:13 AM

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was actually quite effective in exposing the CIA's atrocities and basically destroyed its ability to do anything other than collect intelligence. Only when George H.W. Bush was appointed to head the CIA subsequently did he avoid further Congressional oversight by establishing CIA front companies funded by drug smuggling, arms dealing and Saudi money. From that base, he rose to the Presidency while two of his sons rose to govern two of the largest states in the union. Finally, as the most popular former CIA Director ever, holding the dirt on everyone in Washington, he got his son appointed President by a Supreme Court notable for its reluctance to involve itself in matters of state law: exactly such a matter as was before it. Thereafter, the harshest critics of his son were attacked with the most highly weaponized anthrax ever produced, which could have only come from an American military facility accessable only by a few men belonging to the CIA or the NSA or another organization capable of black ops. Unfortunately, someone at the White House ordered that complete strain of anthrax destroyed, making it impossible to use genetic markers indicating specific labs to backward engineer exactly who produced the anthrax used in the attacks.

by W.M.L. (0 articles, 0 quicklinks, 0 diaries, 537 comments [52 recommended, 1 rejected]) on Sunday, Nov 25, 2007 at 8:15:26 PM

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An excellent article Rob:

Naomi Klein is indeed a true hero for humanity. She's a noble woman.

Is there anyway possible Rob to invite Ms. Klein to the Bucks County area for a book signing, courtesy of OpEd News?

And if I could just note that each and every weekend as Americans tune into the Sunday talk show circuits, whether it's Cokie Roberts and George Will, Bob Schieffer,  Stephanopoulos, Russert or Matthews, what many fail to understand is that these corpstream media shills are there not to provide us with the truth, but as enablers for these corporations and their "wetdreams" of war. Each week spinning the truth and reality for the "monster." Protecting it's well spun impervious cocoon of deceit from intruders, further facilitating the monsters quest of greed and destruction.

by Munich (1 articles, 86 quicklinks, 14 diaries, 1125 comments [86 recommended, 1 rejected]) on Sunday, Nov 25, 2007 at 11:08:43 PM

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THIS IS GREAT WE TALKED THESE GLOBALIST ALMOST TO DEATH, BUT YOU NO WHAT, THEY A STILL COTROLING. WHAT WE SHOULD BE TALKING ABOUT IS HOW WE THE PEOPLE ARE GOING TO COME TOGETHER AS ONE. BUT WE ARE AFRAID TO SAY ANYTHING THAT MIGHT GET US IN TROUBLE, THE BIGEST THING I HEAR IS WE ARE GOING TO SHOW THEM IN THE NEXT ELECTION, WE ARE GOING TO VOTE THEM BUMS OUT OF OFFICE,THATS NOT GOING TO HAPPEN AND YOU ALL KNOW IT. THESE GLOBALIST CONTROL THE ELECTIONS OF THE WORLD. AND THIS IS HOW MUCH WE HAVE BEEN BRAIN WARSHED FOR THE LAST 100 YEARS IF NOT LONGER, BY THE MASS MEDIA DECEPTION AND DESINFORMATION. THAT WHEN WE VOTE WE ARE ELECTING A CANDIDATE IN TO OFFICE, IF YOU BELIEVE THAT ONE I WILL TELL YOU ANOTHER ONE AS THE SAYING GOES AND GOES AND GOES, THERE IS ONLY ONE WAY TO BEAT THIS AND THAT IS GET OUT OF THE SYSTEM THAT FEEDS THEM. THE BEST WAY YOU CAN. THEY CONTROL THE MONEY OF THE WORLD. BUT WE THE PEOPLE, IF YOU THINK CONTROL THE MONEY HERE, THE ONLY WAY IS TO STARVE THEM, STOP BUYING THINGS, YOU CAN DO WITHOUT THIS CHINA JUNK. SORRY THIS HAS ALL BEEN SAID BEFORE. THE BOTTOM LINE WE ARE ALL SITTING DUCKS AND THEY WILL PICK US OFF ONE A TIME. THE MORE THINGS CHANGE THE MORE THEY STAY THE SAME. IN THE END THIS PIMPLE WILL COME TO A HEAD,AND WILL END IN A VOLIANT REVOLUTION.

by RICHARD SHADE (0 articles, 0 quicklinks, 0 diaries, 460 comments) on Monday, Nov 26, 2007 at 3:28:31 AM

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Rob, now you know what I'm talking about when I say that finance has to be abolished, and those who have been using it as a weapon against the rest in the past, most notably during the last two centuries, have to be stopped and stopped forever in their design of world domination.

Now you know.

Those at their head - start with R.  Friedman is just a bumboy working in their interest.  'Economics' is just as fictitious as the 'value' of the 'finance' it pretends to describe.

by Geraldo (1 articles, 0 quicklinks, 0 diaries, 105 comments [2 recommended, 0 rejected]) on Monday, Nov 26, 2007 at 5:50:28 AM

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Nice Article Rob, but their are only a few ways to get there. 

This may be an answer:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ilzoAYE498A

This is why:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mid8-qfJHZ0

This is just scary:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ClNTr-3R_dE

by Sleeper (1 articles, 1 quicklinks, 14 diaries, 312 comments [6 recommended, 0 rejected]) on Monday, Nov 26, 2007 at 7:04:24 AM

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by Shelby (1 articles, 0 quicklinks, 2 diaries, 28 comments) on Monday, Nov 26, 2007 at 7:59:00 AM

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By praising Marx, I'm not proposing Communism as the solution. All I'm saying is a democracy, by way of its vote, will never be strong enough, or more to the point, organized enough, to control corporate capitalism. Eventually capitalism will grow to threaten the state itself. I'm proposing a free and democratic state, that controls the supply of capital, giving no interest loans to the people, so working people and their small businesses have a chance, it must also control the means of distribution and imports and exports to protect the interests of the people, it must provide liberal socialism for the sick, the poor and the lower working classes who are not afforded the liberty to make a decent living, and all of this must be built into the constitution, so it can't be overturned by the elite capitalist lobby. If you are going to have democracy, liberty and justice for all, small business and free enterprise, then private capitalism must be heavily regulated.  

by Shelby (1 articles, 0 quicklinks, 2 diaries, 28 comments) on Monday, Nov 26, 2007 at 9:03:05 AM

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the ongoing disintegration of US democracy. You write that "Eventually (corporate) capitalism will grow to threaten the state itself" -- I don't even think you need the word "eventually" in there, because that's exactly what is happening today. Corporate capitalism has completely taken over the machinery of the state, & eliminated most of its democratic content, leaving only the external trappings of democracy, such as fake elections whose outcome makes little difference to corporate capitalist interests.

Like Pavlovian dogs, Americans are unfortunately trained to react to words like "Marx" & "socialism" with jeering reflex comments about the former USSR. (That already happened somewhere earlier in this thread.) It's important to realize that "socialism" does not automatically mean a society just like the former USSR. And it's important to understand that the frightening direction taken by the USA -- especially since Bush stole the 2000 election -- has everything to do with the intrinsic conflict between corporate capitalism and meaningful democracy. // Marx had, and continues to have, tremendous insight into this topic.

You also write that "...all of this must be built into the constitution, so it can't be overturned by the elite capitalist lobby." I agree, but even that wouldn't really be enough of a guarantee, because we do have rights built into our Constitution -- and today's corporate capitalist government has simply ignored them.  Torture, indefinite incarceration without charges, & warrantless eavesdropping are just a few examples of that. // Ultimately, rights written into a Constitution need to be supported both by an honest independent media, & by an engaged citizenry. As soon as you allow the media to be entirely the province of giant privately-owned corporations, the potential exists for a "quiet" corporate coup d'etat, which in many ways is just what happened in 2000.

by Richard Mynick (2 articles, 4 quicklinks, 1 diaries, 1552 comments [255 recommended, 5 rejected]) on Monday, Nov 26, 2007 at 11:14:07 AM

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and it's as though you just came on board. Even so, having the blinds raised after years in the dark, one has to be careful of what appears as reality. You're a little hard on Uncle Milty--as you say, these things have been going on for centuries and Mussolini and Hitler predated Milton Friedman and the Chicago School by a couple decades.

You say "Let's be clear. These theories don't work." Well, the scary thing s that they do work, one merely needs to define what work is and who the work is for. Klein (I'm only 135 pages into her book myself) has done a terrific job and a huge service to America.

This seems to be the year of the Naomi--Wolf and Klein.

Equal--but entirely different--partners in crime to the Chicago School of economics are (in my opinion) the Harvard (and other) business schools, who are the inventors and cheerleaders for the 'quarterly profit.' Short-term thinking, along with deferred stock compensation, have done as much to ruin corporate accountability as political intrigue.

It's all the rage these days to take over a company, bring in a hired gun, pay him a couple million in salary and 100 million in options to wreck the company, corporate chop-shopping. How often do we see 'eliminating 10,000 jobs' in the wake of such announcements? Get rid of research and development, fire all the customer service people, sell every division, escape the pension obligations, take on whopping debt and--bingo--the quarterly profit jumps, the hired gun gets his 100 mil, the 'privatizers' sell off the newly 'streamlined' business for big bucks and everyone looks for the next 'underdeveloped' opportunity.

These ruinations of solid American businesses are every bit as disastrous as Friedman's foreign experiments. Although no one goes to the torture chambers or gets disappeared, tens of thousands of lives are ruined in the major 'downsizings' and the total destruction of economic stability for families runs to the hundreds of thousands.

That's happening here--in our own country, due to the destructive notions of 'maximizing market return' being taught at Harvard and the lesser known but equally ethically blind business schools.

I hope that's Naomi Klein's next target and I welcome you to the opened blinds. 

by Jim Freeman (108 articles, 53 quicklinks, 227 diaries, 386 comments) on Monday, Nov 26, 2007 at 8:53:08 AM

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Anyone who would write about "the neocon wetdreams of war criminal Milton Friedman, who took his economic theories and encouraged dictators and thugs to apply them fully, with the use of mass murders, tortures and disappearings" is clearly hysterical and should not be taken seriously.

by gator80 (0 articles, 0 quicklinks, 0 diaries, 1 comments) on Monday, Nov 26, 2007 at 9:02:20 AM

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the forces of evil are very persistent in what they do. The forces of good are.. scattered.  Even here, on the Opednews there are 'Jews of different nationalities' paraphrasing the Israeli joke.  We here cannot even agree  on the role of Bush.  We cannot agree if the invasion of Iraq was a crime or not. We cannot agree ...  on anything. I have news for you, comrades- THEY AGREE! THEY HAVE NO DOUBTS! THEY LIKE EACH OTHER!   And that is why they are so successful in their endeavors.  BTW, it is true that corporations are secondary, people are the first.  Corporations are created by humans and the primary reason for their creation as a 'person' was to avoid personal responsibility. LLC  can be bankrupt but personla possessions remain. That simple.

by Mark Sashine (72 articles, 19 quicklinks, 269 diaries, 4101 comments [131 recommended, 0 rejected]) on Monday, Nov 26, 2007 at 9:23:17 AM

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Hi Mark,

You wrote: 

the forces of evil are very persistent in what they do. The forces of good are.. scattered.  Even here, on the Opednews there are 'Jews of different nationalities' paraphrasing the Israeli joke.  We here cannot even agree  on the role of Bush.  We cannot agree if the invasion of Iraq was a crime or not. We cannot agree ...  on anything. I have news for you, comrades- THEY AGREE! THEY HAVE NO DOUBTS! THEY LIKE EACH OTHER!   And that is why they are so successful in their endeavors. 

I couldn't sleep last night, so I turned the tube on. A program was playing on LinkTV called "Berkeley in the Sixties:"

 (http://www.linktv.org/programs/special_berkeley)

Being of that generation, I watched the whole thing. One of the amazing things about the movement was that it comprised a multitude of people that only agreed on one thing - freedom of speech. It was apparent that they disagreed on just about everything else, but when their right of free speech was attacked, they joined together and the free speech movement became so large that it posed a threat to the establishment. The government, led by good old Ronnie Reagan, cracked down on them repeatedly, to the point of unleashing troops on them. Eventually, through attrition, the movement became scattered and people went their separate ways.

The government was united in one thing - declaration of war on anyone who disagreed with it, and the quelling of free speech through any means possible, including violence, deceit, lies, and public manipulation through the media. Sound familiar? It seems that we are going through the cycle again, only our numbers are bigger, and the weapons of the government are stronger. 

by Barbara Peterson (73 articles, 109 quicklinks, 11 diaries, 541 comments [98 recommended, 0 rejected]) on Monday, Nov 26, 2007 at 12:09:32 PM

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Yes, this is the Matrix we are facing, an alienated machine culture, souless, mechanistic, anti-life, anti-human, anti-freedom that has to be fought tooth and nail for humanity to rise above darkness and serfdom, cruelty and poverty. It is not part of the Divine Plan. It cannot endure unless we let it.

by Mac McKinney (53 articles, 113 quicklinks, 240 diaries, 1413 comments [31 recommended, 0 rejected]) on Monday, Nov 26, 2007 at 9:52:14 AM

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Rob,

Unbridled capitalism goes beyond the dangers revealed in this blog. The ultimate damage is resource depletion. Capitalism begs for the infinite consumption of finite natural resources.

In my simple one liner for describing the model for unchecked capitalism, I say this, "Exponential consumption is the plan; it ain't possible is the problem." Math sucks doesn't it?

by Mike Folkerth (120 articles, 0 quicklinks, 2 diaries, 566 comments [1 recommended, 0 rejected]) on Monday, Nov 26, 2007 at 10:19:07 AM

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Combine Shock Doctrine and Confessions of an Economic Hitman and you have corroborating evidence for the two books that should scare the hell out of you.

by Richard Girard (28 articles, 0 quicklinks, 2 diaries, 59 comments [2 recommended, 0 rejected]) on Monday, Nov 26, 2007 at 4:00:53 PM

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So, I think it's very creepy to start demonizing academics for legitimate research. The Chicago people are serious scientists, and saying "they're criminals"because you don't like how people interpreted their work is sinister. Also, one of the canonical examples of CIA coups is Chile. I've been to chile. I lived there for six months, shortly after the return of democracy. It's preposterous to say that the coup was to"destroy the middle class to take away their power." The coup was largely backed by the middle class -- which today in Chile is healthier than in most of Latin America. Also, this reads like an apology for civilian tyrants in Venezuela and Bolivia -- who are deeply undemocratic, and are themselves ruining the middle class. Read about the Caracas crime rate if you don't believe me, and then about how Chavez plans to amend the constitution to allow rule by decree and suppression of independent media.

Military coups are bad business, in which innocent people get killed. But civilian coups, or civilian government collapse, are worse too. It would have been simply a good thing if the German or soviet military overthrew their governments in the 1930s, after all. It would be a good thing in Zimbabwe, and perhaps in Iran, today. When the government is already ruling via intimidation and torture, this opposition to coups rings hollow.

by Larissa Paschyn (0 articles, 0 quicklinks, 0 diaries, 1 comments) on Monday, Nov 26, 2007 at 5:49:15 PM

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I have seen Naomi Klein with Amy Goodman.  She gave a couple of graphic examples of her thesis.

I agree the Friedman School is bankrupt, and transferring title to our national patrimony to political cronies may have been the worst mistake our country ever made, but how about a little less diatribe--you are speaking to the choir, after all--and a little more explication.  Lucky for me I intend to read the book, anyway.

by Umbagog (0 articles, 0 quicklinks, 0 diaries, 5 comments) on Monday, Nov 26, 2007 at 9:43:01 PM

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