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I think that being perceptive and having interests is nothing but an asset.

quote by Ashley Judd
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Death Of The Middle Class

Oligarchs and Banksters tighten financial screws
In a bold attempt to kill the global Middle Class
Heads of State unable/unwilling to halt this ruse
The “Great Depression of 1929” we soon surpass

ROTMS

By Andrew Gavin Marshall - Global Research

We now stand at the edge of the global financial abyss of a ‘Great Global Debt Depression, ’ where nations, mired in extreme debt, are beginning to implement ‘fiscal austerity’ measures to reduce their deficits, which will ultimately result in systematic global social genocide, as the middle classes vanish and the social foundations upon which our nations rest are swept away. How did we get here? Who brought us here? Where is this road leading? These are questions I will briefly attempt to answer.

At the heart of the global political economy is the central banking system. Central banks are responsible for printing a nation’s currency and setting interest rates, thus determining the value of the currency. This should no doubt be the prerogative of a national government, however, central banks are of a particularly deceptive nature, in which while being imbued with governmental authority, they are in fact privately owned by the world’s major global banks, and are thus profit-seeking institutions. How do central banks make a profit? The answer is simple: how do all banks make a profit? Interest on debt. Loans are made, interest rates are set, and profits are made. It is a system of debt, imperial economics at its finest.

In the United States, President Woodrow Wilson signed the Federal Reserve Act in 1913, creating the Federal Reserve System, with the Board located in Washington, appointed by the President, but where true power rested in the 12 regional banks, most notably among them, the Federal Reserve Bank of New York. The regional Fed banks were private banks, owned in shares by the major banks in each region, which elected the board members to represent them, and who would then share power with the Federal Reserve Board in Washington.

In the early 1920s, the Council on Foreign Relations was formed in the United States as the premier foreign policy think tank, dominated by powerful banking interests. In 1930, the Bank for International Settlements (BIS) was created to manage German reparations payments, but it also had another role, which was much less known, but much more significant. It was to act as a “coordinator of the operations of central banks around the world.” Essentially, it is the central bank for the world’s central banks, whose operations are kept ‘strictly confidential.’ As historian Carroll Quigley wrote:

'The powers of financial capitalism had another far-reaching aim, nothing less than to create a world system of financial control in private hands able to dominate the political system of each country and the economy of the world as a whole. This system was to be controlled in a feudalist fashion by the central banks of the world acting in concert, by secret agreements arrived at in frequent private meetings and conferences. The apex of the system was to be the Bank for International Settlements in Basel, Switzerland, a private bank owned and controlled by the world’s central banks which were themselves private corporations.'

In 1954, the Bilderberg Group was formed as a secretive global think tank, comprising intellectual, financial, corporate, political, military and media elites from Western Europe and North America, with prominent bankers such as David Rockefeller, as well as European royalty, such as the Dutch royal family, who are the largest shareholders in Royal Dutch Shell, whose CEO attends every meeting. This group of roughly 130 elites meets every year in secret to discuss and debate global affairs, and to set general goals and undertake broad agendas at various meetings. The group was initially formed to promote European integration. The 1956 meeting discussed European integration and a common currency. In fact, the current Chairman of the Bilderberg Group told European media last year that the euro was debated at the Bilderberg Group.

In 1973, David Rockefeller, Chairman and CEO of Chase Manhattan Bank, Chairman of the Council on Foreign Relations and a member of the Steering Committee of the Blderberg Group, formed the Trilateral Commission with CFR academic Zbigniew Brzezinski. That same year, the oil price shocks created a wealth of oil money, which was discussed at that years Bilderberg meeting 5 months prior to the oil shocks, and the money was funneled through western banks, which loaned it to ‘third world’ nations desperately in need of loans to finance industrialization.

When Jimmy Carter became President in 1977, he appointed over two dozen members of the Trilateral Commission into his cabinet, including himself, and of course, Zbigniew Brzezinski, who was his National Security Adviser. In 1979, Carter appointed David Rockefeller’s former aide and friend, Paul Volcker, who had held various positions at the Federal Reserve Bank of New York and the U.S. Treasury Department, and who also happened to be a member of the Trilateral Commission, as Chairman of the Federal Reserve. When another oil shock took place in 1979, Volcker decided to raise interest rates from 2% in the late 70s, to 18% in the early 80s. The effect this had was that the countries of the developing world suddenly had to pay enormous interest on their loans, and in 1982, Mexico announced it could no longer afford to pay its interest, and it defaulted on its debt, which set off the 1980s debt crisis – collapsing nations in debt across Latin America, Africa and parts of Asia.

It was the IMF and the World Bank came to the ‘assistance’ of the Third World with their ‘structural adjustment programs’, which forced countries seeking assistance to privatize all state owned industries and resources, devalue their currencies, liberalize their economies, dismantle health, education and social services; ultimately resulting in the re-colonization of the ‘Third World’ as Western corporations and banks bought all their assets and resources, and ultimately created the conditions of social genocide, with the spread of mass poverty, and the emergence of corrupt national elites who were subservient to the interests of Western elites. The people in these nations would protest, riot and rebel, and the states would clamp down with the police and military.

In the West, corporations and banks saw rapid, record-breaking profits. This was the era in which the term ‘globalization’ emerged. While profits soared, wages for people in the West did not. Thus, to consume in an economy in which prices were rising, people had to go into debt. This is why this era marked the rise of credit cards fueling consumption, and the middle class became a class based entirely on debt.

In the 1990s, the ‘new world order’ was born, with America ruling the global economy, free trade agreements began integrating regional and global markets for the benefit of global banks and corporations, and speculation dominated the economy.

The global economic crisis arose as a result of decades of global imperialism – known recently as ‘globalization’ – and the reckless growth of– speculation, derivatives and an explosion of debt. As the economic crisis spread, nations of the world, particularly the United States, bailed out the major banks (which should have been made to fail and crumble under their own corruption and greed) , and now the West has essentially privatized profits for the banks, and socialized the risk. In other words, the nations bought the debt from the banks, and now the people have to pay for it. The people, however, are immersed in their own personal debt to such degrees that today, the average Canadian is $39,000 in debt, and students are graduating into a jobless market with tens to hundreds of thousands of dollars of student debt that they will never repay. Hence, we are now faced with a global debt crisis.

To manage the economic crisis, the G20 was established as the major international forum for cooperation among the 20 major economies of the world, including the major developing – or emerging – economies, such as India, Brazil, South Africa and China. At the onset of the financial crisis, China and Russia’s central banks began calling for the establishment of a global currency to replace the U.S. dollar as the world reserve currency. This proposal was backed by the UN and the IMF. It should be noted, however, that the Chinese and Russian central banks cooperate with the Western central banks through the Bank for International Settlements – which the President of the European Central Bank, Jean-Claude Trichet, recently said was the principle forum for “governance of central bank cooperation” and that the G20 is “the prime group for global economic governance.” In 2009, the IMF stated that the BIS “is the central and the oldest focal point for coordination of global governance arrangements.” The President of the European Union, appointed to the position after attending a Bilderberg meeting, declared 2009 as the “first year of global governance.” The 2009 Bilderberg meeting reported on the desire to create a global treasury, or global central bank, to manage the world economy. In 2009, prior to the Bilderberg meeting in fact, the G20 set in motion plans to make the IMF a global central bank of sorts, issuing and even printing its own currency – called Special Drawing Rights (SDRs) – which is valued against a basket of currencies. In May of 2010, the IMF Managing Director stated that “crisis is an opportunity, ” and while Special Drawing Rights are a step in the right direction, ultimately what is needed is “a new global currency issued by a global central bank, with robust governance and institutional features.” Thus, we see the emergence of a process towards the formation of a global central bank and a global currency, totally unaccountable to any nation or people, and totally controlled by global banking interests.

In 2010, Greece was plunged into a debt crisis, a crisis which is now spreading across Europe, to the U.K. and eventually to Japan and the United States. If we look at Greece, we see the nature of the global debt crisis. The debt is owed to major European and American banks. To pay the interest on the debt, Greece had to get a loan from the European Central Bank and the IMF, which forced the country to impose ‘fiscal austerity’ measures as a condition for the loans, pressuring Greece to commit social genocide. Meanwhile, the major banks of America and Europe speculate against the Greek debt, further plunging the country into economic and social crisis. The loan is granted, to pay the interest, yet simply has the effect of adding to the overall debt, as a new loan is new debt. Thus, Greece is caught in the same debt trap that re-colonized the Third World.

At the recent G20 meeting in Toronto, the major nations of the world agreed to impose fiscal austerity – or in other words, commit social genocide – within their nations, in a veritable global structural adjustment program. So now we will see the beginnings of the Great Global Debt Depression, in which major western and global nations cut social spending, create mass unemployment by dismantling health, education, and social services. Further, state infrastructure – such as roads, bridges, airports, ports, railways, prisons, hospitals, electric transmission lines and water – will be privatized, so that global corporations and banks will own the entirely of national assets. Simultaneously, of course, taxes will be raised dramatically to levels never before seen. The BIS said that interest rates should rise at the same time, meaning that interest payments on debt will dramatically increase at both the national and individual level, forcing governments to turn to the IMF for loans – likely in the form of its new global reserve currency – to simply pay the interest, and will thus be absorbing more debt. Simultaneously, of course, the middle class will in effect have its debts called in, and since the middle class exists only as an illusion, the illusion will vanish.

Already, towns, cities, and states across America are resorting to drastic actions to reduce their debts, such as closing fire stations, scaling back trash collection, turning off street lights, ending bus services and public transportation, cutting back on library hours or closing them altogether, school districts cutting down the school day, week or year. Simultaneously, this is occurring with a dramatic increase in the rate of privatizations or “public-private partnerships” in which even libraries are being privatized.

No wonder then, that this month, the Managing Director of the IMF warned that America and Europe, in the midst of the worst jobs crisis since the Great Depression, face an “explosion of social unrest.” Just yesterday, Europe experienced a wave of mass protests and social unrest in opposition to ‘austerity measures’, with a general strike in Spain involving millions of people, and a march on the EU headquarters in Brussels of nearly 100,000 people. As social unrest spreads, governments will likely react – as we saw in the case of the G20 in Toronto – with oppressive police state measures. Here, we see the true relevance of the emergence of ‘Homeland Security States’, designed not to protect people from terrorists, but to protect the powerful from the people.

So while things have never seemed quite so bleak, there is a dim and growing beacon of hope, in what Zbigniew Brzezinski has termed as the greatest threat to elite interests everywhere – the ‘global political awakening’. The global political awakening is representative of the fact that for the first time in all of human history, mankind is politically awakened and stirring, activated and aware, and that generally – as Zbigniew Brzezinski explains – generally is aware of global inequalities, exploitation, and disrespect. This awakening is largely the result of the information revolution – thus revealing the contradictory nature of the globalization project – as while it globalizes power and oppression, so too does it globalize awareness and opposition. This awakening is the greatest threat to entrenched elite interests everywhere. The awakening, while having taken root in the global south – already long subjected to exploitation and devastation – is now stirring in the west, and will grow as the economy crumbles. As the middle classes realize their consumption was an illusion of wealth, they will seek answers and demand true change, not the Wall Street packaged ‘brand-name’ change of Obama Inc., but true, inspired, and empowering change.

In 1967, Martin Luther King delivered a speech in which he spoke out against the Vietnam War and the American empire, and he stated that, “It seems as if we are on the wrong side of a world revolution.” So now it seems to me that the time has come for that to change.

Andrew Gavin Marshall is a Research Associate with the Centre for Research on Globalization (CRG) .

poem by Ray Lucero
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A Runner With The Pack

Hes got a second side hes got sixth sense
He got everything
He got what it takes
He got what it makes to be everything
Seems to know all there is to know
I took him there
He steals the show
Hes so astute hes so acute hes gold sure he is
Hes eloquent hes intelligent and benevolent
Hes the epitome of ability with his expertise
Hes versatile with a lot of style
Hed mess my heart every time hed smile
So unpretentious a warm and gentle soul
A runner with the pack, no hes not like that
A runner with the pack, no hes not like that
Cause hes inventive, attentive, protective, selective
Perceptive, receptive, affective, reflective
A runner with the pack, no hed never do that
He got tolerance he got confidence hes significant
And hes a connoisseur and a social stir hes magnificent
So fair and square he reciprocates
And every way he stimulates
His quality of voracity is great
A runner with the pack, no hes not like that
A runner with the pack, no hes not like that
Cause hes inventive, attentive, protective, selective
Perceptive, receptive, effective, reflective
(you know the hes)
A runner with the pack, no hed never do that

song performed by Donna Summer
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Relationships

‘I love him – that’s why we’re together…’

‘I love her too – but sometimes
we drive each other up the wall…’

If your past, mate, were her past –
this person that you ofttimes love;

if her pain – which she does not
herself understand, yet feels;
(and always at the wrong time for you..):

if her self-awareness – sometimes
so sharp and so perceptive –
matched at every moment
your fluctuating, sometime
equally sharp, perceptive, own –

then, you would think and act
exactly as she does…

ah, there’s forgiveness;
there’s compassion; and there’s peace;

and then, there’s only - love;
there’s only love.

Love is always now;
and then, there’s only love.

(With acknowledgements to Eckhart Tolle…)

poem by Michael Shepherd
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Party-Lad

You are perceptive, so sensitive to light,
That it endangers your being and makes calamity.
Exciting and smelling of jeopardy,
The night will be seen as dancing of two nights.
The blackout lasted so bright with aromas and festivity,
Aware were the hungry hundred diners,
In the night so perceptive, and sensuous with food.
I have eaten on nights that climb light,
Yet eyes suddenly vanish from the scene.
Be on the days, be on the nights,
Like an endangered man of gate-crashing.

poem by Naveed Akram
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Only One Fool Can Occupy One Mind

After surveys taken...
And scavenger hunts conducted,
To asset the length of one's time...
Eventually it will be determined,
Only one fool can occupy one mind at a time.

Extentions willl be granted,
To analyze inconclusive research gathered.
Some deadlines may be missed,
To procure further funding as if something scientific...
Should be scholarly and profoundly documented.

Imbeciles will be solicited.
Assembled and dressed to impress the press.
Or some notable media to address,
The basic of human expressions.
With the best of blinding ambiance.

Obvious failures will continue to be smothered,
By those of opposing values...
Connected by a significance respected.
Tied to the familiarity of an aging political climate.
And yet...
An appetite for this 'crap' begins to sicken the masses.

~Has a higher consciousness,
Revealed an utter stupidity of the nonsense...
On display?
Overnight the mavericks have become elitists!
Wishing nothing to do with 'conformity'.~

After surveys taken...
And scavenger hunts conducted,
To asset the length of one's time...
Eventually it will be determined,
Only one fool can occupy one mind at a time.

However...
Multiple fools of one mindset,
Seems to be less of a phenomenon...
Among those who have been 'selected' to protect,
What some had believed to have been their best interests.
WHEREVER that may be happening.

poem by Lawrence S. Pertillar
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Bond is not constant.

Interests create involvement.
Involvements create interests.
Interests tiring, involvements die.
Involvements straining, interests die.
The bond is not constant.
06.10.2006

poem by Rm. Shanmugam Chettiar
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Egotism

YE powers fantastic ! goblin, sylph and fay,
Whose subtle forms no laws material sway ;
Ethereal essences, that dart and glide
Wherever pleasure or caprice may guide ;
Who leap with equal ease, if ye are bid,
A lady's thimble and a pyramid,
And scale, alike regardless of a fall,
The parlour fender and the Chinese wall,
Slip through a key-hole, 'neath the listed door,
Or from the smallest crevice in the floor ;
Or steer your way (and man's devices mock)
Through the dark mazes of a patent lock ;--
Of you I sing not--but my theme shall be
Of things as quick and volatile as ye,
--Those busy, subtle pronouns, I and Me.
Unsought, and unexpected they appear ;
No barriers heed they, and no laws revere;
But wind and penetrate, with dextrous force,
Through all the cracks and crannies of discourse.

Of those with whom self proves the darling theme,
Not all indulge it in a like extreme ;
Some have the sense to cover it no doubt ;
Would they had sense enough to root it out !
We therefore bring, as first upon the list,
The loud, loquacious, vulgar egotist ;
Whose I's and Me's are scattered in his talk,
Thick as the pebbles on a gravel walk.
Whate'er the topic be, through thick and thin
Himself is thrust, or squeezed, or sidled in.
Conceiving thus his own importance swells,
He makes himself a part of all he tells ;
And still to this he winds the subject round :
Suppose his friend is married, sick, or drowned,
He brought about the match, he lets you know ;
Told him about Miss B. a year ago ;
Or never shall forget, whate'er ensues,
How much he felt when first he heard the news.
A horseman thrown, lay weltering in the mud;
He thought of something that would stop the blood.
A neighhour had a quarrel with his wife ;
He never saw such doings in his life !
A fire broke out at midnight in the town ;
He started up, threw on his flannel gown,
Seized an old hat full twice as large as his,
And said, says he , 'I wonder where it is !'
Was doubtful if 'twere best to stay or go,
And trembled like a leaf, from top to toe.
In vain at times, some modest stander-by,
Catching a pause to make his brief reply,

[...] Read more

poem by Jane Taylor
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My Interests Have Changed

All of this time,
You knew you had information...
That could have provided me with benefits.
And you never mention this once,
Knowing I would advantage from it.
Why?

'I tried with many attempts.
Remember when you told me,
My interests were not of your concern? '

But why didn't you insist,
I close my mouth and open my ears to listen?

'Remember when you told me,
My interests were not of your concern?
And when I insisted that you listen...
On me your back you turned.
And for weeks,
You refused to say a thing to me?

And the last time I saw you standing on the street,
You told me I aggravated you!
And loudly exclaimed I interferred with your view.'

But I had not known,
Your interests were to my benefit.

'Now you do but guess what? '

What?

'My interests have changed.'

poem by Lawrence S. Pertillar
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If you have ideas, you have the main asset you need, and there isn't any limit to what you can do with your business and your life. Ideas are any man's greatest asset.

quote by Harvey S. Firestone
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You are your greatest asset. Put your time, effort and money into training, grooming, and encouraging your greatest asset.

quote by Tom Hopkins
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You know, I do not think it is necessarily looks, I do not think I am the prettiest girl... Everyone has something that is their asset, some have the hair, some have the cheekbones, others have the lips. But once you know what is your asset, then you should capitalize on it.

quote by Blu Cantrell
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Small breasts

Small breasts are as much an asset; be proud.
The insecure only will seek large breasts.
Men of valour go for the handy ones.
Small breasts are an asset that humbles men.
21.06.2006

poem by Rm. Shanmugam Chettiar
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The Rich Asset

The one who holds no assets
Will treat the world as asset
And the world holds him as its assest.
Such place is rich in asset.

poem by Rm. Shanmugam Chettiar
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Time is an asset

Time is your asset,
The only asset assured.
Spend it wisely.
Let not others spend it for you.
01.02.2007

poem by Rm. Shanmugam Chettiar
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The idea that 'the public interest' supersedes private interests and rights can have but one meaning that the interests and rights of some individuals take precedence over the interests and rights of others.

quote by Ayn Rand
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Have a variety of interests ... These interests relax the mind and lessen tension on the nervous system. People with many interests live, not only longest, but happiest.

quote by George Mathew Allen
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What we have to do is to find a solution that the interests of the national teams are respecting the interests of the clubs. And also the clubs they shall respect the interests and the aspirations of national teams.

quote by Sepp Blatter
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I don't think that the war serves U.S. interests. I think Osama bin Laden's interests and the Iranian interests are very much served by it, and it's becoming a huge drain on our resources both material and political.

quote by William Odom
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If You can Keep your Cheese - after Rudyard Kipling

If you can keep your cheese while few about you
are holding onto theirs', all envy ease.
If none can get your goat nor cow could doubt you
your scent which, heaven sent, can tell true bries
from gorgonzola, parmesan without you
planning for house mouse contingencies,
or short supply where larder rats may scout to
grind, compromise the tasty rind most please.

If by a whisker cheshire follows trout to
provide fit end for sweet delicacies,
or cheddar meat meal follows leaves no gout to
blur enjoyment, taste buds' harmonies.
If desert heat no threat presents, no pout too
in winter's cold where lizard's blood would freeze,
If neither flood nor drought can mar, throughout you
may triumph over blue mould colonies.

If all kowtow, if none would ever flout you
remembering to bow before ‘big cheese'...
if hole in one you score in club you clout to
take golden trophy - competition flees.
If all above's accomplished taste devout, true,
while others fail to prove their expertise,
your's is the world, which elsewhere's up the spout, few
can make their time your rhyme's real_I_tease!

IF - A Writers' Guild Gild Guile Guide
If you can form and not make norms your master,
conformity, performance formal, flame.
If you inform, share, [fl]airing, flow far faster,
yet let not copyright bind tight to shame.
If you treat critic's inconstructive blaster
with humour, beat him at his game's lame claim,
take not to hea[r]t his tumour, bandage, plaster
half-heartedly, pretend [s]he never came.

If you can couple energy creative
well in advance of others in your field,
without confusing nominative, dative,
rei[g]n arguments through cogency revealed
in context, in a manner innovative,
code palimpsests from all but s[t]age concealed,
If trust in self is never compensative
reaction used when you refused to yield.

If you can link great ends with small beginnings,
and yet not brag, nor tag each copy sold,
If dialogue's more vital than piled winnings,
to trim the quill where will won't be short-sold,

[...] Read more

poem by Jonathan Robin
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What's Been Done Has Been Done

For the first time they all sat,
Together...
In an obvious nervousness.
No longer separated,
By lines of divisions.
Or seats that depicted them,
In political affliations.

The beginning of a seriousness has begun.
And arguments of special interests...
Is slowly ending its run!

For the first time they all sat,
Together...
In an obvious nervousness.
No longer separated,
By lines of divisions.
Or seats that depicted them,
In political affliations.

And a leader states,
'Whether you like it or not...
You are going to grow up.
Whether you like it or not...
Your petty stuff has been enough.'

The beginning of a seriousness has begun.
And arguments of special interests...
Is slowly ending its run!

The streets are in shambles.
And those rich believe they can not be touched.
The funds needed to repair and correct despair...
Is going to take what some have.
And what they have must be given up.

What needs to be fixed,
Is going to come out of pockets.
Out of the pockets of those who leech.
Out of the pockets of those who fed on fat.
And they are among the elite.

The streets are in shambles.
And those rich believe they can not be touched.
The funds needed to repair and correct despair...
Is going to take what some have.
And what they have must be given up.

For the first time they all sat,
Together...

[...] Read more

poem by Lawrence S. Pertillar
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