But...what if the whole BARREL is rotten? The fruits of usury.

Jeff Huber recently posted another one of his fine articles regarding the total incompetence of American leadership.

Let Them Eat Sand

In that piece, he wrote the following:

Now, it's virtually impossible for another 9/11 to happen; some of those sorry slobs are doing their jobs for a change because they know they'll lose them if another 9/11 happens.

This got me to thinking, and I began a reply that turned into a stand-alone piece.

Here it is.

Now, it's virtually impossible for another 9/11 to happen; some of those sorry slobs are doing their jobs for a change because they know they'll lose them if another 9/11 happens.

I think that you are wrong here.

Not only is it not impossible for another 9/11 to happen...we are in the middle of one right now.

Think on it.

The actual 9/11 attack was at the very least a direct result of the incompetence of American security forces. You could quite possibly take that idea a step further and say that it was allowed to happen because of the dishonesty of those forces, and go even another step and say that the compliance of at least some of the people in charge was also involved.

Now look at the economic meltdown...an occurrence that is in many ways threatens to be a much more serious disaster than 9/11, although certainly neither so dramatic nor newsbite/photo op-worthy as was the picture of massive structures...the American empire's version of the Sphinx and the Pyramids...toppling to the ground in billowing black smoke and flames, complete with film of panicked white collar worker/beneficiaries of the kleptocracy/house slaves of the pharaohs running for their heavily mortgaged lives and truly courageous working class firemen and policemen confronting almost certain death in an attempt to save total strangers.

This economic breakdown?

It also stems from events piloted by Islamic opponents of this system; it is direct result of the incompetence of American economic security forces; it was allowed to happen because of the dishonesty of those forces, and you could also take that next step on this level and say that the compliance of at least some of the people in charge was also involved.

It's 9/11 all over again, Jeff.

Only bigger.

As above, so below.

All wars that progress beyond emotionally-based conflicts between individuals or perhaps families are economic at root. You and your neighbor might have a beef over something personal, but by the time it escalates into even the crudest of gang conflicts, it is ALL about economics. Once things start to get organized past the "I'm 'a gonna KILL that motherfucker!" stage, once you need weapons and soldiers it's got to be about monetary or property-based profit and loss in order to be able to organize the effort.

I am by no means a Muslim, but a good case could be made that the Islamic proscription against usury might be an idea whose time has come for the ex-Christian Western world as well.

Not that Barack Hussein Obama can possibly even hint at such an idea while running for the office of President of the United States while in possession of (Or should it be "While possessed by?") bulging coffers of usury-based big money that is supporting his increasingly successful campaign, but (Hint hint. Mr. B., from Mr. AG) the largely faith-based Islamic system (YOU know...the one that doesn't say totally false things like "Small businesses will fail if they cannot access (usury-based) loans.") has now successfully kicked the asses of not just one but both of the major superpowers of the post-W.W. II era. First the weaker one...just for practice, it seems to me...and then the real 500 lb. elephant in the room.
The United States of Omertica.

Kicked their asses economically.

As you say...it's not really about the oil that lies under the ground in the Middle East. That's just a fact, Jack. It's just about the relatively easy money that the kleptocracy has been able to manage to extort from that oil.

And it is not apparently about the wealth of the Islamic world, either. I mean...add it up.

Add up say the combined GNPs of the U.S., Japan, Western Europe and Russia. Then look at the GNPs of the Islamic countries.

Hmmmmmm...if this was a spending war, the Islamic world would already be toast.

But it is an economic war.

A war about economic philosophy.

A third way done snuck up on the two-dimensional, "TASTES GREAT!!!/LESS CALORIES!!!" squabble between the Western European-based capitalist/communist economic dialectic and it has beaten both of them.

Is it truly faith-based, this movement?

I am not qualified to weigh in on that idea.

The day a Supreme Deity (or a qualified representative of His/Her/Its organization) actually speaks to me in my own little cave regarding the relative rightness or wrongness of any sect will be the day that I come out for or against any particular religion.

Until then, I will just have to continue to observe events on a level that I understand.

The arc of the moral universe is long, but it bends toward justice.-Martin Luther King Jr.

OH yes. These ideas I understand.

Up close and personal.

This system is rotted through.

Top to bottom.

I understand that as well, because due to my odd position as a traveling performing artist whose audience runs the gamut from the monetary elite of the North/South/Central/Caribbean America, Europe, Africa and Asia to the plodding middle classes of the U.S. and right on through to the poorest of poor people living in the ghettos of this world, I get to see all of the shit. With the possible exception of the newest members of American society...the Central American/Caribbean culture that is relatively new here (and also still relatively isolated by language and racism) and some part of the youth of this country (Those who have not yet bought into the game.)...pretty much the whole American barrel is full of rotten apples.

We are going to have to experience a culling, Jeff. There is no way around it. If Obama is wise...and lucky as well...it will be a gradual and relatively peaceful culling. A sea change.

If he is not?

Ahmadinejad is quite correct.

Misfortune this way comes.

It is often said that one rotten apple can spoil a whole barrel.

What we must look for here is the reverse of that idea. A few not yet rotted apples are going to have to try to cure the whole goddamned barrel.

Let us pray.

Let us pray to the moral universe the arc of which MLK Jr. so meaningfully referenced.

We gonna need some he'p here, brethren an' sistren!

Let me hear an "AMEN!!!"

Let me hear about 65 or 70 million "Amens" in a couple of weeks and we might just have a shot at making it through.

Otherwise...fuggedaboudit!!!

That cobbled-up apple cobbler is jes' gonna have to wait.

As Islamic as apple pie?

Fuggedaboudit!!!

Later...

AG