…as always happens, once the crisis talk is back, so is discussion of a fiscal union. Sure enough, earlier today Germany’s Angela Merkel once again reminded everyone just what the stakes are in order to achieve a truly stable, and sustainable European union: nothing short of ceding sovereignty to Germany. And with that we are back to square one, because that has always been the trade off – want a unified, fiscally and monetarily, Europe? You can get it: just bow down to Merkel.

Just goes to show…you can catch more countries with cash than with bullets.

The Euros can at least be glad that the Germans didn’t figure this out 75 years ago or so when a somewhat different set of people were in charge of the Reich!

Anotehr nugget dredged (not Drudged!) up from Airstrip One (the UK in Orwellspeak)

What was it everybody used to say about the United States? Look at what’s happening over there and you will see our future. Whatever Americans are doing now, we will be catching up with them in another 10 years or so. In popular culture or political rhetoric, America led the fashion and we tagged along behind.

Well, so much for that. Barack Obama is now putting the United States squarely a decade behind Britain. Listening to the President’s State of the Union message last week was like a surreal visit to our own recent past: there were, almost word for word, all those interminable Gordon Brown Budgets that preached “fairness” while listing endless new ways in which central government would intervene in every form of economic activity.

Later, in a television interview, Mr Obama described his programme of using higher taxes on the wealthy to bankroll new government spending as “a recipe for a fair, sound approach to deficit reduction and rebuilding this country”. To which we who come from the future can only shout, “No‑o-o, go back! Don’t come down this road!”

After running through a number of the gory details, the
The United States is a country that was invented to allow people to be free of domination or persecution by the state. Its constitution and political institutions are specifically designed to prevent the federal government from oppressing the rights, or undermining the sense of responsibility, of the individual citizen. If it ceases to stand by that principle, then it will suffer a catastrophic loss of purpose and identity.

This gal over in the U.K. has it nailed! Now, why can’t the LibDonks see it?

Firstly, at the time of T.A.R.P. and the rest of the financial bailouts, we were repeatedly warned by all of the Washington establishment that this was essential in order to prevent a total, and irreparable financial meltdown. But what if the bailouts had never taken place?…

Iceland did not bail out the banks or the bank investors and its economy is thriving, proving that the the US-Irish model of bailing out the banks with taxpayer money was harmful unless you were a wealthy bank investor

What was the ultimate effect?

Today, Iceland is recovering. The three new banks had combined profit of $309 million in the first nine months of 2010. GDP grew for the first time in two years in the third quarter, by 1.2 percent, inflation is down to 1.8 percent and the cost of insuring government debt has tumbled 80 percent. Stores in Reykjavik were filled with Christmas shoppers in early December, and bank branches were crowded with customers.

Meanwhile, there are items relating to the B.O. administration is engaging in apparently betrayal and/or mistreatment of allies and friends abroad:

ITEM:
The American betrayal
Op-ed: Obama’s abandonment of Mubarak shows Israel cannot count on US at times of crisis

…there is one more thing we can learn from the events in Egypt, aside from the fragility of the region we inhabit, and it is something that’s not easy to digest: The Western world’s and mostly America’s treachery. We learned that the way they abandoned President Mubarak and gave him the cold shoulder can happen to us too. Or in other words, we cannot count on the Americans at a time of crisis.

ITEM:
WikiLeaks cables: US agrees to tell Russia Britain’s nuclear secrets

The US secretly agreed to give the Russians sensitive information on Britain’s nuclear deterrent to persuade them to sign a key treaty, The Daily Telegraph can disclose.

The US, under a nuclear deal, has agreed to give the Kremlin the serial numbers of the missiles it gives Britain Information about every Trident missile the US supplies to Britain will be given to Russia as part of an arms control deal to be signed by President Barack Obama next week.

After his returning the Churchill bust, snubbing Brit leaders, including the Queen, one gets the idea that B.O. REALLY does not like Britain.Along with this, the upside-down policy orientation of B.O. is further illustrated by policies that refuse to recognize those who are our enemies:

Failures by FBI, Pentagon contributed to Ft. Hood massacre, report says

The FBI and the Pentagon are responsible for a “string of failures” in the way they attempted to track a disgruntled Army major in the years before he allegedly opened fire at a crowded Ft. Hood, Texas, deployment center in the worst domestic terror ambush since the attacks of September 2001, two key Senate leaders concluded Thursday.

In addition, Army supervisors repeatedly referred to Maj. Nidal Hasan as a “ticking time bomb,” and FBI agents and the military knew he had become radicalized under the influence of a violent Islamist extremist. Yet the agents never arrested him, and his military superiors never disciplined or furloughed him out of the Army.

In an apparent triumph of political correctness no action was taken lest it offer offense to Islam. The Chief’s response would have been to s–tcan Hasan, and f’em if they can’t take the joke.

Meanwhile, there is also THIS particular bit of craziness:

China Maneuvers for U.S. Defense Contracts

The maker of China’s new stealth fighter jet has teamed up with a tiny, unprofitable California company to try to launch bids for U.S. defense contracts, possibly including one to supply Chinese helicopters to replace the aging Marine One fleet used by the president, according to people involved in the partnership.

Fortunately this one looks to be beyond the reach of even B.O.’s aspirations for playing kissy-face with the ChiComs:

Any Chinese bids for this or another contract under discussion would be certain to meet intense political resistance and would appear to have very little chance of success given mounting U.S. concern about China’s military power and long-term strategic goals, and the often-prohibitive opposition in the past to Chinese attempts to enter other strategic U.S. sectors, such as energy and telecommunications

UNforunately, they may be back for another attempt:

…the two companies have also been discussing putting forward AVIC’s new L-15 trainer jet as a candidate to replace the U.S. Air Force’s fleet of Northrop T-38s, which entered service 50 years ago and on which American fighter pilots learn skills such as how to fly at supersonic speeds.

That contract is expected to be one of the most lucrative military aviation contracts this decade, with the U.S. likely to buy about 400 and other allied countries about 600 more as the jet will become the standard for training pilots to fly the U.S. F-22 and F-35 stealth fighters.

Is it just me, or does anyone else get a really bad feeling about the US becoming dependent on the ChiComs for maintaining our military? Sheeesh!

When I made this posting a few days ago, I was really sort of hoping that the comparison between what’s happening now regarding international trade and exchange and what happened when FDR figuratively blew-up the 1933 London World Economic Conference would prove not to continue to hold water, since the outcome then, and the expected outcome (given no change of course) now are both Very Bad Things for economic health.

Unfortunately, it seems that there is more expectation of the present, problematical course of the B.O. administration continuing.

The world’s economies stand on the brink of a trade war as leaders of rich and emerging nations gather in Seoul.

A dispute over whether China and the United States are manipulating their currencies is threatening to resurrect destructive protectionist policies like those that worsened the Great Depression. The biggest fear is that trade barriers will send the global economy back into recession.

Hopes had been high that the Group of 20, which includes wealthy nations like Germany and the U.S. and rising giants like China, could be a forum to forge a lasting global economic recovery. Yet so far, G-20 countries haven’t agreed on an agenda, let alone solutions to the problems that divide them.

Doesn’t sound like everyone is ready to play nicely together.

G-20 leaders were expected to issue a communique detailing results of the summit on Friday.

Good luck on THAT! Oh, for sure there’ll be a “statement”, but it doesn;t look like there will be much to state except “Yep, we’ve been there, and done that – time to go home. See you all next time around!”
Meanwhile, as the Fed fires up the printing presses, and the results on Main Street will be predictable: don’t get a crick in your neck watching the rocketing contrail of higher prices.

U.S. President Barack Obama defended the Federal Reserve’s policy of printing dollars on Monday after China and Russia stepped up criticism ahead of this week’s Group of 20 meeting.

The G20 summit has been pitched as a chance for leaders of the countries that account for 85 percent of world output to prevent a currency row escalating into a rush to protectionism that could imperil the global recovery. [ID:nSGE6A703T]

But there is little sign of consensus.

The summit has been overshadowed by disagreements over the U.S. Federal Reserve’s quantitative easing (QE) policy under which it will print money to buy $600 billion of government bonds, a move that could depress the dollar and cause a potentially destabilising flow of money into emerging economies.

So, where will be be when China decides to bail out on buying our debt, since it’s value will be diving due to the Fed’s inflationary debt monetization? We don’t really want to go there…but we might not be given a choice in the matter.

As a historical sidebar note, something somewhat similar happened to us before…where a reform-minded US president with economic difficulties told the world to shove it, that we were doing our own thing in spite of it’s impact on them.

The occasion was during the early days of the FDR administration in 1933. Roosevelt set the stage in his first inaugural address by stating that “our international trade relations, though vastly important, are in point of time and necessity secondary to the establishment of a sound national economy.” He went on in June 1933, to instruct the Secretary of State who was attending the London World Economic Conference that “…far too much importance is attached to exchange stability…”

AS the Conference continued, he sent what has become known as the “bombshell message” July 3, 1933 in which he told the Conference delegates that the U.S. would NOT be a party to efforts at exchange-rate stabilization while declaring that “old fetishes of so-called international bankers are being replaced by efforts to plan national currencies”.

THe ultimate take-away message to the world was that the U.S. was going to be focusing on its own situation, and was not willing to extend itself to take part in concerted international efforts to avert danger. The lesson was not missed by Hitler, who saw a green light to his own nationalistic plans for “problem solving”.

(ref: Freedom from Fear; David M. Kennedy; Oxford Univ. Press, 1999)

So we REALLY want to give a similar impression to such luminaries of international peace and enlightenment as the Chicoms, and Putin’s Russia? REALLY?

Liberty is not a pick and mix free-for-all in which you think government should ban the things you don’t like and encourage you things you do like: that’s how Libtards think. Libertarianism – and the Tea Party is nothing if its principles are not, at root, libertarian ones – is about recognising that having to put up with behaviour you don’t necessarily approve of is a far lesser evil than having the government messily and expensively intervene to regulate it.

And this isn’t an argument for anarchy. There are still plenty of ways society can make known its disapproval of certain “immoral” practices, such as through the traditional method of stigma. Libertarianism doesn’t mean doing what the hell you like and letting everyone else go hang themselves. It’s about doing whatever the hell you like so long as it doesn’t harm others. (Property rights, for example, would remain sacrosanct).

Maybe this technically isn’t directly from the Brits, but it is the Brit Samizdata blog quoting the American Richard Viguerie:

Some have asked how the Tea Party movement hopes to pressure Republican leaders or influence the party. That’s the wrong way to look at it. The goal is not to pressure Republican leaders but to become the Republican leaders. The goal is not to influence the party but to become the party.

That led to another Viguerie comment

“Voters have given Republicans one more chance to get it right,” Richard A. Viguerie said today. “They are on probation, and if they mess up again, they won’t get another chance.”

“The last time the Republicans were in charge, they became the party of big spending, Big Government, and Big Business. They abandoned the philosophy of Ronald Reagan and cozied up to lobbyists and special interests. And they paid a price at the polls.

“This year, the Democrats under President Obama and Speaker Pelosi drove millions of voters right back into the arms of the Republicans. But if Republicans return to their bad habits – if they start working for K Street instead of Main Street – they will pay a terrible price. Tea Party voters and conservatives will turn them out in the 2012 primaries.

“People will say: Fool me once, shame on me. Fool me twice, and the Republican Party is dead,” Viguerie said.

The Chief would add the observation that there was once a political party called the Federalists. A bit later in history there was one called the Whigs. Both died and went away. The Republicans are still able to profit from those examples.

Now, if only the fleet of jet aircraft and 3000 retainers was similarly an exaggeration…no such luck.

No, Pentagon says, Obama will not be guarded by 34 ships

President Barack Obama will not be protected by a vast armada of 34 US warships when he visits Mumbai this weekend, officials said, calling reports from India on security preparations “comical.”

The claim that many of the 288-ship US naval fleet would be deployed to waters off Mumbai was “absolutely absurd,” Pentagon press secretary Geoff Morrell told reporters on Thursday.

US officials usually decline to discuss details about security precautions for the president, but the media accounts circulating out of India were so off the mark that press officers at the Pentagon and the White House said they felt compelled to speak up.

“I will take the liberty this time of dismissing as absolutely absurd this notion that somehow we were deploying 10 percent of the Navy — some 34 ships and an aircraft carrier — in support of the president’s trip to Asia,” Morrell said.

Even with a jaded expectation that this spectacle is inevitable given the nature of the beast, a report from India that 34 US Naval combat ships are yet another part of the plans broke through the Chief’s shell of cynicism, and caused him to catch his breath in amazement due in part to the Naval connection, and the realization of exactly what is taking place.

34 warships sent from US for Obama visit

The White House will, of course, stay in Washington but the heart of the famous building will move to India when President Barack Obama lands in Mumbai on Saturday.

Communications set-up and nuclear button and majority of the White House staff will be in India accompanying the President on this three-day visit that will cover Mumbai and Delhi.

He will also be protected by a fleet of 34 warships, including an aircraft carrier, which will patrol the sea lanes off the Mumbai coast during his two-day stay there beginning Saturday. The measure has been taken as Mumbai attack in 2008 took place from the sea.

Oh yeah, there were a few boats with outboard motors that moved into Mumbai an dropped off the Islamoterrs in ’08. A carrier battle group plus other deep-water combattant ships is just the ticket to stop something like that from happening again? NOT.

Admittedly, given that B.O. (or any President) is visiting overseas, security, communications, etc. is of necessity huge…hence the Chief’s initial lack of getting exercised about the entourage…but this? Just to add a bit of historical and military perspective:

FDR was able to travel to Newfoundland aboard a single Navy cruiser during the height of the N. Atlantic U-boat war to meet with Churchill. He later traveled to Casablanca, Cairo, and Teheran to meet with foreign leaders during the war. Casablanca at the time had been recently seized from Vichy France, and French troops had recently been involved in combat against the U.S. concerning that issue. Neither Cairo nor Teheran were exactly noted as being completely stable places: Teheran was available since the Persian Shah was elsewhere…after playing diplomatic footsie games with the Nazis. Roosevelt somehow thought he might be able to survive with fewer than 3,000 staff plus additional military security forces. (He was right!)

Another perspective is the 34 Navy ships. According to the US Navy web site as of today there are 288 deployable battle force ships as of today. As this is written, there are 147 ships underway (away from home ports), and 110 ships on deployment. SO…about 1/3 of the total US deployed Naval force, or 12% of the total US combat fleet will be at Mumbai to defend B.O.

Seems a bit much, at least, especially when deployments and operational commitments have been placing a heavy load on the ships and personnel, but what does THAT matter to His Eminence? Not much.

One of the Navy’s new £3 billion aircraft carriers will never carry aircraft and will sail for only three years before being mothballed and possibly sold, ministers will announce on Tuesday. The Government’s Strategic Defence and Security Review will also confirm that Britain will not have an effective “carrier strike” capability – a working aircraft carrier equipped with fighter jets – until 2020.

…and that’s not all:

The Navy’s fleet of warships will drop from 24 to 19 and it will lose 4,000 personnel. Harrier jump-jets will be scrapped next year but no F35 Joint Strike Fighters will be available to replace them until 2020.

Wow…the once great Royal Navy…going down to 19 warships?!

Today is the anniversary of the Battle of Trafalgar which established the superiority of the Royal Navy at least through WW-I a century later.

…and now the Brits are saying “If we need carrier support we can always turn to the…FRENCH??!!! Aside from tradition, what’s wrong with this picture?

Nelson, Churchill, and a whole series of other Naval persons of the once great Britain have got to be turning over in their graves about now.

Nelson’s prayer before the battle:

MAY THE GREAT GOD, whom I worship, grant
to my Country and for the benefit of Europe in
general, a great and glorious victory: and
may no misconduct, in any one, tarnish it: and
may humanity after victory be the predominant
feature in the British fleet.

For myself individually, I commit my life to Him
who made me and may His blessing light upon my
endeavours for serving my Country faithfully.

To Him I resign myself and the just cause which is
entrusted to me to Defend.

Amen, Amen, Amen

His death in victory sealed his testimony. (You may notice from the portarait, that he had previously lost his arm in battle.)

Obama could kill fossil fuels overnight with a nuclear dash for thorium

If Barack Obama were to marshal America’s vast scientific and strategic resources behind a new Manhattan Project, he might reasonably hope to reinvent the global energy landscape and sketch an end to our dependence on fossil fuels within three to five years.

What’s not to like about this one? Well, it IS kind of disconcerting to be in a position to [potentially] supporting an Obama initiative…but then again, it hasn’t happened yet, and since it depends on the other (technological) n-word (nuclear), the Chief is willing to be that B.O. will be no more likely to adopt this than he would be to embrace the original n-word.

There is no certain bet in nuclear physics but work by Nobel laureate Carlo Rubbia at CERN (European Organization for Nuclear Research) on the use of thorium as a cheap, clean and safe alternative to uranium in reactors may be the magic bullet we have all been hoping for, though we have barely begun to crack the potential of solar power.

Dr Rubbia says a tonne of the silvery metal – named after the Norse god of thunder, who also gave us Thor’s day or Thursday – produces as much energy as 200 tonnes of uranium, or 3,500,000 tonnes of coal. A mere fistful would light London for a week.

Thorium eats its own hazardous waste. It can even scavenge the plutonium left by uranium reactors, acting as an eco-cleaner. “It’s the Big One,” said Kirk Sorensen, a former NASA rocket engineer and now chief nuclear technologist at Teledyne Brown Engineering.

“Once you start looking more closely, it blows your mind away. You can run civilisation on thorium for hundreds of thousands of years, and it’s essentially free. You don’t have to deal with uranium cartels,” he said.

Ooops. What would happen to the “uranium cartels”, to say nothing of the vast, wealthy, and dare one say influential oil iindustry? Anyone else think there may just be a BIT of opposition to this from those locations? (I’m just saying…you know?) As an object lesson in support of this observation:

You might have thought that thorium reactors were the answer to every dream but when CERN went to the European Commission for development funds in 1999-2000, they were rebuffed.

Brussels turned to its technical experts, who happened to be French because the French dominate the EU’s nuclear industry. “They didn’t want competition because they had made a huge investment in the old technology,” he said.

C’est la vie.

After explaining some of the technical aspects of thorium energy, and the prospects of at least one privately financed effort underway (in Norway), the piece from the Telegraph concludes:

Nuclear power could become routine and unthreatening. But first there is the barrier of establishment prejudice.

When Hungarian scientists led by Leo Szilard tried to alert Washington in late 1939 that the Nazis were working on an atomic bomb, they were brushed off with disbelief. Albert Einstein interceded through the Belgian queen mother, eventually getting a personal envoy into the Oval Office.

Roosevelt initially fobbed him off. He listened more closely at a second meeting over breakfast the next day, then made up his mind within minutes. “This needs action,” he told his military aide. It was the birth of the Manhattan Project. As a result, the US had an atomic weapon early enough to deter Stalin from going too far in Europe.

The global energy crunch needs equal “action”. If it works, Manhattan II could restore American optimism and strategic leadership at a stroke: if not, it is a boost for US science and surely a more fruitful way to pull the US out of perma-slump than scattershot stimulus.[Emphasis added]

Even better, team up with China and do it together, for all our sakes.

The Chief concurs.