Finalist-PhilBlogAwards 2010

Finalist-PhilBlogAwards 2010
Finalist for society, politics, history blogs

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Monday, August 30, 2010

EURO-AMERICAN BANKRUPT COMPANIES ARE LEPERS, ASIANS BE WARY!

Erle Frayne D. Argonza

Leper Companies, Inc. could very well describe the so many huge corporate entities in the West that are now expectantly waiting for some investors to breath fresh life into them. The compass of that search points to Asia as the source of the badly needed ‘smart money’.

What a mess indeed had Western economies turned into, as their respective enterprises have been crashing to bankruptcy levels after liberal policies have become granite rock in them since the Thatcher-Reagan era. De-industrialization, massive loss of jobs, and measly investments in S&T have made elephants out of huge companies such as the once mighty Bethlehem Steel.

“Bankruptcy! Bankruptcy!” would be an apt line in a classic opera production in New York and London, save that even classic opera groups of the West might even go the bankruptcy route. From manufacturing to culture industry, inclusive of Hollywood stalwarts, Western companies are going down the drain one after the other.

Insatiably greedy financiers are of course waiting in the wings to dip their hands into those crashing industries, waiting for the moment to buy them at dirt cheap prices. They did that after the 2nd world war, a war that the global oligarchy created, when they bought so many European factories at rummage sale. Their war chest had been reinforced by slash funds past $3 Trillions circa 2007 yet, so they’re ready for the ‘ukay-ukay’ transactions any time (‘ukay-ukay’ is Filipino term for re-sale of used clothes at cheap dirt prices).

The same financier oligarchs did the rummage buying spree on former Soviet bloc economies’ flattened factories groups, with mafia groups joining the fray for purchase of the rummage sales. At one instance in the early 90s, Russia’s mafia groups owned and controlled 80% of the rummage industries, thus prompting patriotic KGB chekka to replace then incumbent president Yeltsin, a puppet of the financier oligarchs, with Putin.

Asia has been the undisputed driver of the global economy more so when both USA and Europe began burning economically as early as 2007. Logically, the compass of SOS for fresh investments and loans would be Asia notably the China-Korea-ASEAN-India corridor.

The involvement of the Indian group Mittal in purchasing Alcelor of Europe is classic case of Asian buys. Bookkeeping accounts seemed to have served Mittal right then, with the merger not exactly draining down the stock value of Mittal in the bourses. Mittal-Alcelor came to be born as the largest steel producer, churning out a total volume of 100 tons of steel every year (toppling Korea’s POSCO as top producer).

That was then. The times have quite changed in an era when changes happen so rapidly. Western enterprises, notably those of the USA’s and EU’s, are magnets for perceptions of being leper corporations. Getting associated with them could burn down an Asian company’s own par value, and whether the trend could be reversible is something that is tantamount to launching a Herculean PR campaign to reduce negative perceptions owing to buy-ins/mergers.

Enormous window dressings have to be applied to the accounts of the leper companies too so as to sweeten their toxically sour values and make them more palatable to Asian investors. Whether Asia’s negotiating agents are naïve to the window dressings is something worth researching.

Caucasians still have that perception—conscious and/or unconscious—of Asians as “monkeys with no tails” (subhumans) who can be lured into traps without the latter noticing it. Western financier oligarchs led by the likes of the UK-Netherlands royal houses and Rothschild empire will brook no quarters in condescending on Asians who they regard as cattle or eaters worth controlling, subordinating as Mandingos, and short-changing in business transactions.

Such a perception hasn’t changed. Look at how the Indian executives of Mittal et al are perceived in Europe today not just by the oligarchs but by the White executives in their payroll. Why don’t you examine case studies in Western business schools and find out for yourself whether Asian groups are worth studying at all in the West. It’s the same old Victorian perception of racial hubris and arrogance at work!

That may just be what western ‘corporate social responsibility’ is all about: to continue derisively condescending at former Asian colonies by dangling carrots to poor communities in Asian backyards. In exchange, Asian ‘smart money’ moves to the West to ensure that leper companies keep on churning out more funds, with 1% of the profits later to allocated for ‘corporate social responsibility’.

Is that what we can regard as an impeccable fair exchange?

[Philippines, 13 August 2010]

[See: IKONOKLAST: http://erleargonza.blogspot.com,
UNLADTAU: http://unladtau.wordpress.com,
COSMICBUHAY: http://cosmicbuhay.blogspot.com,
BRIGHTWORLD: http://erlefraynebrightworld.wordpress.com, ARTBLOG: http://erleargonza.wordpress.com,
ARGONZAPOEM: http://argonzapoem.blogspot.com]

Friday, August 27, 2010

USA’S LEADERSHIP HAD EVAPORATED, WHY OUGHT STOCK MARKETS FOLLOW?

Erle Frayne D. Argonza


Good day fellow global citizens!

It’s late afternoon here in the Philippines, daylight is still around though quite faded a bit. The time of the day seems to be delivering the message that there is still some light in the global economy, and that is a feel-good ambience.

Light there may be for the global economy, but that light no longer comes from the Western economies. Definitely no longer from the once mighty ‘economic superpower’ USA that had lost the leadership leverage this decade when it suffered two (2) successive recessions within a short span.

I’ve already treated the matter of declining Western techno-economic power and hegemony over the rest of the globe in many articles. There is hardly any serious, highly-informed analyst in the world today who doesn’t share the same view, a view that Western (Caucasian) social forecasters do likewise hold even as they forewarned the West of the catastrophes that will confront them.

Stock markets across the globe, however, just couldn’t adjust to the new reality soon enough. They still behave like old hush puppies that look up to Wall Street for precedence in setting the trends of local bourses. That renders the local bourses as laughing stock dinosaurs that need to retool quickly, and the quickest that such retooling will be translated into practice, the better will it be for their respective stock trades and financial-monetary markets.

To reminisce a bit, America was the unchallenged global leader after World War II as it contributed 40% to the Gross World Product or GWP. Its European & Japan partners contributed another 20% to GWP, so that empowered the USA & partners’ (OECD) 60% contribution to GWP to exercise hegemony in all regions of the planet.

Today, the economic landscape had entirely changed. The USA’s $13+ Trillion GDP is down 22% of world income, while the entire EU’s $13+ Trillion is another 22%. EU + USA/Canada + Japan put together couldn’t even amount to 50% of Gross World Product, so the old partners may just have to metamorphose out of their old identities and retool quickly. They no longer hold the planet’s collective purse and should desist from bullying other nations with their economic clout that is pathetically a non-clout today.

Herd behavior, of course, is the least that we can make of the behavior of plummeting bourses. “Follow the leader” mindset of cave dwellers is still in, a mindset that is a messy sticking point for retooling purposes.

Why should local bourses refuse to see the new reality and dis-engage from the antiquated herd instinct? After all, stock markets are the exclusive games of the big corporate boys and consummate traders who have been addicted to the casino economy of antiquity. They hardly matter for the real economy sectors, such as those of Asia’s that have effectively built firewalls between the real economy and casino stock markets.

If to serve a bit of relevance to domestic growth at all, local bourses ought to look at the health of their own domestic physical economies and financial-monetary wellness.

Take a look at East Asia. The region has been driving the global economy beyond doubt, its average investments and savings rates are high, gross international reserves are equally high, and the physical economy as a whole has shown the way to high value-added production. Stock markets should better follow the lead of the healthy conditions of their domestic economies rather than look up to an offshore global leader that is now a chimera.

Or, if they can’t resist looking at offshore patterns, then they should look at their very own regional backyards for such models. Regional integration has been the strategy of the day, so why get fixated to a dinosaur fiction (USA as leader) when there are regional economic patterns that can show the lead.

USA’s lead will never ever return, this is a foregone conclusion. And Europe ought to rethink its integration efforts, as the Eurozone is now hotly burning, so Europe better not behave like a global hero that can fill up the vacuum left by the USA. A continent that is perennially flat on its back and is now burning in financial-monetary flames can never fill up such a vacuum.

As already articulated by me in previous articles, the Western markets will decline progressively across time. Consumption from 2007 through 2015 will decline by as much as 30% of their pre-recession levels. In contrast, Asia’s consumption will more than double during the same period, thus rendering Asia the unquestioned driver of the global economy in terms of (a) technological cutting edge, (b) production levels of the real economy, and (c) consumption levels.

In closing, just like the pattern for mega-cities where no one mega-city can be considered a global center today, so is it with national economies. Economic leadership has already been de-centered, global hegemony had been erased, and there can only be inter-dependence between markets as the most viable option. That interdependence should find translations in the bourses and currency markets.

[Philippines, 13 August 2010]


[See: IKONOKLAST: http://erleargonza.blogspot.com,
UNLADTAU: http://unladtau.wordpress.com,
COSMICBUHAY: http://cosmicbuhay.blogspot.com,
BRIGHTWORLD: http://erlefraynebrightworld.wordpress.com, ARTBLOG: http://erleargonza.wordpress.com,
ARGONZAPOEM: http://argonzapoem.blogspot.com]

Wednesday, August 25, 2010

RURAL DEVELOPMENT SHOULD BE TOP PRIORITY WORLDWIDE

Erle Frayne D. Argonza


Good evening from the Philippines’ highland suburbs!

For this note I will focus on the thesis that rural development should be pursued by developing countries. The world’s nations have pursued growth that has been badly skewed towards urbanization and commercialization since after World War II, a total effort that has seen many people become poor as a result. Most of the poor folks are in rural hinterlands and fisherfolks.

The Philippines is a classic case in point that has been direly affected by the badly skewed development in favor of urbanization, an endeavor that has been fostered at the expense of rural communities of farmers, fisherfolks, and Indigenous Peoples or IPs. Today, Philippine population is 66% urban and 34% rural, with 2% added to urban population every year.

As urbanization grows, rural poverty likewise grows in my beloved country. Rural to urban poverty ratio here is 2.5:1 and is still moving up. It was 2.1:1 in 1989, and the situation has been deteriorating ever since. 70% of the country’s poor families are rural, with only 30% as urban. Very clearly, between the two, it is rural development that must be pursued with vigor to reverse the poverty situation in the country as a whole.

To demonstrate what I mean by skewed development, consider the following information:

 MetroManila or simply Manila, the national capital region (NCR), produces 30% or nearly 1/3 of the nation’s wealth. Yet it supports merely 12% o3 1/8 of the nation’s population.

 As of end of 2009, Manila contributed a whopping US $65 Billion to the country’s $186 Billion GDP or gross domestic product. Using UNDP converter index, Manila’s GDP, multiplied by 4, registered an enviable $260 Billion-Purchasing Power Parity or PPP for 2009, rendering it as wealthy as the whole of Vietnam.

 Included among the world’s 35 most wealthy and powerful mega-cities—comprising the ‘global nexus’—Manila’s economy remains at 65% services and 35% industries, with nary a food base worth documenting. These economic sectors are the highest in value-added, ensuring high levels of income for all component cities and towns of the mega-city.

 Poverty in Manila has been reduced to a manageable 8%, rendering it on an even much better situation than the USA’s whose poverty incidence had climbed from 12% in 2002 to 15% today. Manila has all the resources it needs to solve its own poverty and development problems, which made it drastically reduce poverty since the 1990s.

 Therefore, Manila should no longer be subsidized by national government in terms of development projects, from roads to international airports (Los Angeles & US cities are building their own airports without federal or state government support). Yet, as records show, billions of dollars are still being poured by national government to bankroll gigantic projects here, such as lightrail systems, international airport expansion, and flood control.

 On top of those national government-initiated projects is Pagcor City, a world-class theme park-cum-gaming complex that is costing U.S. $25 Billion (with private participation). It will employ 250,000 and will house the world’s tallest tower. It is targeted for completion in 2014.

So, as you can see from the Philippine case, whereas the mega-city receives billions of dollars for new projects and urban renewal, the rural areas continue to wallow in appalling states of abject poverty. Lucky enough if a region outside Manila would be appropriated P1 Billion or U.S. $24 Million at any given year from the pork barrels of Congress.

Fisherfolks in my country are particularly the most vulnerable to poverty and deleterious living conditions spawned by it. With poverty incidence at 66%, you could easily see why past 40% of fisherfolks’ children suffer from advanced malnutrition. The situation of over-fishing in the entire country compounds the poverty situation of marginal fisherfolks who can ill afford to equip themselves with state-of-the art fishing gears to compete with commercial fishers.

To say that the Philippines is in a transition phase, and that poverty and malnutrition will disappear it time as the country reaches development ‘maturity’, is pure delusion. Without active intervention to improve the capacities and capabilities of fisherfolks, farmers, and IPs, the problem of poverty will never fade away but will, as a matter of fact, worsen with time.

With so many rural folks wallowing in cesspools of pauperization, we can at best watch more rural insurgencies feast upon the resentment-filled minds of the rural poor. As the Philippine case has shown, past rural insurgencies have ceased only to be replaced by new, bigger, and more ferocious insurgencies.

[Philippines, 11 August 2010]

[See: IKONOKLAST: http://erleargonza.blogspot.com,
UNLADTAU: http://unladtau.wordpress.com,
COSMICBUHAY: http://cosmicbuhay.blogspot.com,
BRIGHTWORLD: http://erlefraynebrightworld.wordpress.com, ARTBLOG: http://erleargonza.wordpress.com,
ARGONZAPOEM: http://argonzapoem.blogspot.com]

Tuesday, August 24, 2010

ISRAEL PREPARES TO COMBAT IRAN: SEMITE-PERSIA WAR HASTENS

Erle Frayne D. Argonza

Good evening from the Philippines’ suburban boondocks!

Just a couple of weeks back, this analyst wrote and published briefer articles about the forthcoming war between pan-Semitic Zion-Sunni alliance and Persia (Shiite Iran). Barely had I rested from the theme of racial awakenings and the coming conflict, when news came out that Israel is now preparing to combat Iran head-on.

Just about a couple of days ago, I wind up of news from the internet economic intelligence reports that Israel is indeed preparing for a unilateral military strike on Iran. Accordingly, the United States is not privy to this conflict, even as its hands are heavily tied up in procuring peace between Israel and Palestine (the efforts will pay off eventually as I forecast rightly).

Accordingly, political groups from Israel who represent both Likud and Labor are strongly opposed to the unilateral strike, and are doing what they can to stamp out the planned action. The same anti-war forces have uncovered an agreement between the Israeli premier and the defense establishment to seal the strike plan and commence with war exercises pronto.

Meanwhile, reports had it that former intelligence officials of Israel, who are opposed to the war, have unwind of the Israeli military exercises now going on inside Romania. As to when the exercises will be concluded will be the subject of some more extra information gathering.

As per assessment from the oppositors themselves and from independent analysts, the combat missions will be launched in the months ahead. Let it be stressed again: MONTHS AHEAD and not years ahead of the present juncture.

A war with Iran will surely be an expensive one, and needed to be bankrolled by certain oligarchic forces. We can only surmise, based on near-catastrophic economic events in Europe, that the Anglo-European oligarchy is desperate to recoup from possible losses in the financial-monetary markets precisely by propping up their favorite currencies (dollar, pounds, euros, yen) through a calculated politico-military turbulence in Western Asia.

The bankrollers’ home point to Europe as far as our analysis holds. The same oligarchs are aching to prop up the dollar through derivative market gimmickries that have, as of late, been proving to be dead end solutions to their greed accumulations. Bankrupt with ideas as to how the financial-monetary system they built for centuries can still hold up to the global economic roof, they are now planning to unleash the propping up of oil price via a war.

The oligarchs’ own financial looting agenda incidentally coheres with the Arab sheikhdoms’ agenda of inflating their own oil, local currencies and the dollar for the same purpose, with the addition that the sheikhs mortally dread Shiite Iran. As already articulated by me before, such a dread springs from the ancient unconscious dread of Persia, a dread that is now re-surfacing after almost 2000 years of dormancy.

We won’t be surprised if the sheikhdoms will partly bankroll Israel’s frontal combat missions, with part of the cash registers shouldered by the Rothschild & Soros and financier circles. Not only that, the sheikhdoms may offer the bonus of permitting the use their territories for Israeli flight passes, landing, refueling, even for depository of military ordnance.

The dread of Persia is very extensive, which covers the entire ancient territories of Assyria-Canaan-Hyksos-Hamites-Berbers-Nubians. That’s a whopping 5-6 million square miles of territories populated today by over 500 million people, from Western Asia up to the western tip of North Africa (belt of lands north of the Sahara).

That does not include yet the peoples of the ancient empire of Bharat (India) that have confronted Persia’s might in antiquity. Pakistan, Kashmir, Afghanistan and central Asian states represent those territories and their descendants today.

For sure, those peoples and territories mentioned are now watching the unfolding events very closely. As the military preparations will build up, so will the tensions build up, backed up by negotiations about the alliances to be formed.

It is too early to see the exact membership of alliances from each side. For now, we can only presume that the axes of conflict will be the Zion Israel-Sunni Arab axis on one hand, and the Shiite Iran-Hezbollah-Hamas axis on the other hand. There will be fill-in-the-blanks on either side as the war nears, with horse trading done below the table.

Let’s all better observe the events closely, as this war won’t just be confined between Israel and Iran. Even before Christmas, the shaping war will sicken the world’s diverse bourses from West to East, thus leaving a bad taste to our annual Christmas and year-ender celebrations.

[Philippines, 23 August 2012]

[See: IKONOKLAST: http://erleargonza.blogspot.com,
UNLADTAU: http://unladtau.wordpress.com,
COSMICBUHAY: http://cosmicbuhay.blogspot.com,
BRIGHTWORLD: http://erlefraynebrightworld.wordpress.com, ARTBLOG: http://erleargonza.wordpress.com,
ARGONZAPOEM: http://argonzapoem.blogspot.com]

Friday, August 20, 2010

EURO-OLIGARCHS’ SLASH FUNDS AWASH AMID EU’S BANKRUPTCY

Erle Frayne D. Argonza


Good evening from the Philippine suburbs!

I wish Europeans could find sufficient reason to brighten themselves up these days. Maybe the northern Europeans can still find some reason to smile in the light of welfare state graces still flowing to their pockets, while those of southern Europe’s are grilling in the heat of a continent burning in economic firestorm.

Europe is rapidly going down the route of bankruptcy as shown by the panic behavior of its Brussels-based central bank as well as the respective member-states’ own central banks. Whatever the serial bankruptcy could forebode, the Europeans better prepare for the worst scenario.

Economic intelligence updates report that only the IMF and USA are infusing some fresh monies unto the European coffers. The problem is that the IMF is itself running out of funds soon, and so it may decide to probably print money that it just puzzlingly couldn’t securitize enough (does IMF possess gold bullions to back up those monies in case?).

As to the USA providing fresh cash to Europe, we concerned observers are simply befuddled about. The USA was bankrupt even before Obama became president, a fact that amplifies our own confusion about where does the USA source such funds and how will it securitize them in case of its aiding of a burning Europe.

It seems that coteries of Nero officials were designated as chief execs and technocrats in the entire continent plus the UK & Ireland, Neros who fiddled in their palatial roofs while their respective countries burned. I wish the likes of Brown, Merker, Sarkozy, and Barroso could convince me that they are not some Nero clones who collectively did burn their own continent at the behest of the financiers. [Cameron replaced Brown recently, performing a “too late the hero” act.]

Now, just to remind the readers more so the Europeans, around a couple of years back, when the USA was in the midst of its ‘great recession’, the greedy Anglo-European financiers reportedly stashed a staggering $3 Trillions worth of slash funds in the big financial houses of the continent itself. That was then, it’s now 2010 and the slash funds may have grown to at least 33% its original size.

A very suspicious act for sure, as it reveals a highly privileged class that operates outside the ambit of established rules in the continent. Just exactly what are those funds intended for, we can only speculate. The greedy financiers know about a coming turbulence that will engulf the entire trans-Atlantic economies most likely, and they were preparing for the worst scenario.

The worst scenario is now taking shape, the scenario of total bankruptcy and the Eurozone’s economic roof collapsing. The Jurassic bank IMF was already called upon to intervene with emergency measures for central banks to stash hundreds of billions of euros to salve ailing banks, while it imposed austerity measures on heavily affected countries such as Greece.

To say that the financiers are but passive observers of events would be over-stretching naïve posturing bordering torpor. The greedy financiers led by the House of Rothschild and its subordinate subalterns (Soros & cronies) have been orchestrating the events in the continent, even as they were responsible for directing the pliant IMF to enter the scene in order to hasten anarchy and economic collapse.

Europe’s member states could all but wish for some more industries that could be sold to the financiers who wait in the wings for more bankrupt companies to be sold at cheap dirt prices. Europe has already been effectively de-industrialized across the decades via virtual economy policies of deregulation, privatization, and liberalization, so there isn’t much an industry left for such a purpose.

Maybe the last frontier of Europe to generate money is to sell all of its major infrastructures—freeways & roads, bridges, levees, wharves, airports/runways, railways—to the financiers via their agents. Netherlands’ flood control infrastructures, for instance, would surely be cause for salivation by the same greedy moneybags which they can perhaps maneuver to buy at rummage sale.

Concerned Europeans themselves should keep watch over the reports filtering to the OECD and Bank for International Settlements about the country performance of EU’s member states. Panic and desperation, at a given juncture, is sufficient cause to pad data, rendering such central institutions as unreliable and suspect. When an economic house burns, a central bank would casually resort to lying such as our own central bank in the Philippines did during the depression years of ‘84-‘86.

Likewise should the Europeans, more so the working class, better keep track of oligarchic slash funds being stashed surreptitiously in their own backyard. Such funds should be allowed to surface and be applied with transparency rules to know what they are intended for.

[Philippines, 31 July 2010]

[See: IKONOKLAST: http://erleargonza.blogspot.com,
UNLADTAU: http://unladtau.wordpress.com,
COSMICBUHAY: http://cosmicbuhay.blogspot.com,
BRIGHTWORLD: http://erlefraynebrightworld.wordpress.com, ARTBLOG: http://erleargonza.wordpress.com,
ARGONZAPOEM: http://argonzapoem.blogspot.com]

Monday, August 16, 2010

SPARTACUS UNVEILED: TROUNCING BONARPIST EUROPE

Erle Frayne D. Argonza


Hail Bonaparte! Hail New Rome! Hail the Empire!

Such slogans could very well be the reverb calls across Europe any one of these coming months. Bonaparte is coming back to Europe, beginning with the consolidation of the union and the implementation of a state ideology based precisely on the centralized institutions that Napoleon Bonaparte seeded during his halcyon days.

New Rome has arisen, with its center at Brussels. Its ‘wings’ are EU and USA (with Canada its client-state), two continents that face each other across the Atlantic like select guardians of the West. As already elaborated by this analyst in couples of articles, Bonapartism in a new form is the emerging state ideology of New Rome that is sometimes referred to as the 4th Reich.

“Bombard the old world to perdition” was the late Emperor’s agenda and directive on his enthused army. The old world today refers to the nation-states, and their destruction would mean the return to the powerful cities plus regions that would altogether bow obeisance to Brussels.

The new twist in Europe today, when it is burning economically upon the burst of bubbles in the de-industrialized south (Greece began it all), is the entry of the Jurassic Bank—the International Monetary Fund—into the Bonapartist game of the oligarchs. A salvation agenda comprising of saving ailing banks and imposing austerity measures on creditor countries is the swagger of the rather thuggish dinosaur, as we observed recently.

When a dinosaur institution is called upon to salve Europe’s problems, it is clear that the ‘handwriting on the wall’ of the old world of European nations has come. With cities and regions demanding return to old days of social privileges (evaporated by austerity measures), more riots are anticipated, thus justifying more draconian gendarme tactics enforced upon angry wage workers and professionals.

If the violent protests will continue and reach ‘critical mass’ in both southern and northern sectors of the union, then the rationale for a continental police state will arise. A New Bonaparte, whoever may this politician be, shall be catapulted phoenix-like to the nadir of totalitarian power, with the support of the union’s central and national parliaments.

As you can see, Bonapartism without a Bonaparte is an oxymoron. The maelstrom in the continent will continue to build up until the condition will be ripe for a totalitarian gendarme state. The maximum agenda of a New Bonaparte would be no less than “bombard the old world” of nations: eradicate them and replace them with pre-configured regions.

Such a move will deter whatever re-actions may come from the citizens to re-strengthen the bargaining positions of their respective nations and go back to the old national currencies. Necessarily, the assets of the national armies will be re-directed to Brussels that will serve as the central command, and the assets will include the nukes of UK and France.

Since the Roman pathos or spirit has been revived anew, with war pursuits (notably versus New Persia) on the menu of hawkish adventurisms, then Europeans can only but hope for the presence of a Mark Anthony who can battle the Emperor from within Brussel’s institutions. Wishful thinking, as in a totalitarian setting all the Mark Anthony wannabes will be either jailed or terminated. Like Mark Anthony of the last days of the Roman republic, dead, caput!

In the absence of a Mark Anthony in the continent, then Europeans can best leverage their strength via a new Spartacus. Let the Spartacists gel as a gigantic movement from the diverse grassroots and working class movements in the continent, and rest assured they can be the ones that can form the resistance.

Europeans better galvanize solidarity the quickest now as an anti-fascist front versus a determined Bonapartist oligarchy & technocracy. There is no better time to revive Spartacus than now. Reviving Spartacus after the Empire and neo-Bonaparte are in place will prove to be counterproductive and defeatist.

I hope that Europeans would wake up fast to recognize the dreaded dragon of Bonapartism rising so rapidly in their backyard. Only they can stop the new fascism from consolidating further and installing a new Emperor Bonaparte.

[Philippines, 30 July 2010]

[See: IKONOKLAST: http://erleargonza.blogspot.com,
UNLADTAU: http://unladtau.wordpress.com,
COSMICBUHAY: http://cosmicbuhay.blogspot.com,
BRIGHTWORLD: http://erlefraynebrightworld.wordpress.com, ARTBLOG: http://erleargonza.wordpress.com,
ARGONZAPOEM: http://argonzapoem.blogspot.com]

Wednesday, August 11, 2010

PAN-AFRICAN AWARENESS RISES: WILL IT BITE?

Erle Frayne D. Argonza


Magandang gabi mula sa Perlas ng Silangan! Good evening from the Pearl of the Orient!

Pan-Africanism seems to be getting sweeter an idea recently, so I chose to delve on the subject for this article. Pan-Africanism as a pathos (group feel & aware) seeks to unify the diverse ethnicities of the continent from southernmost South Africa to the northern Arab-Berber-Hamite territories, to indicate the contours of the emerging pathos.

Whether this pathos will gel in order to effectively create synergies among Africans of so heterogenous a composition remains to be seen. As a matter of development imperative, I’d encourage such a colossal effort myself, and I hope that the Africans would truly get together to solve their deep-seated social, political and economic malaise.

As far as I see it, the pathos was there from the time of the early pharaohs through the time of Carthage, but declined rapidly during the advent of the Hellenic monarchs of the northeastern region. When Cleopatra ruled Egypt, the fragmentation and decay of that unity was completed. Africa was thereafter subordinated to empires and potentates to its north (Rome and later empires).

For two thousand years such a pathos slept and lay dormant in the antechambers of the African psyche. Western powers arrived, occupied, and declared Africa and its peoples as their chattels, and that latter imperialist act of the West seems to have doomed any effort to revive pan-Africanism via a renaissance movement.

Thereafter, before and after the colonial periods for each of Africa’s regions, each nation waged its own version of nation-building and national renaissance. Sadly, the post-colonial period saw the nation-building efforts degenerate, with many African states cascading catastrophically down ‘failed state’ syndrome.

Africa’s nations were actually creations of the West, and they fail because tribes that were like oil and water just couldn’t get their acts together in the last instance in each nation concerned. They sold their sovereignty to warlordism and Anglo-European oligarchic moneybags. The superficial states just couldn’t hold water much longer, and so we witness fragmentation and balkanization till these days.

It seems that the last salvation for the end of the chaos and fragmentation is pan-Africanism itself. Africans are trying to construct a new center—not geographical but cultural-ideational—that could cement the diverse ethnicities of a chaotically decentered continent.

Pan-Africanism will have to compete though with other revivalist movements. Pan-Arabism, as represented by Ba’ath ideology, used to be a strong contender but is now on the rapid decline. Pan-Islamism is on the rise, though it has its own competing discourses—Sunni and Shiite. There is Christian fundamentalism that the Opus Dei, Jesuits, evangelical and Baptist groups are stirring up in a frontal clash with pan-Islamism.

Such revivalist movements tend to secure a region or select African ethnicities, such as the Arab-Berber-Hamite triad for pan-Arabism. They may get some pieces of the African pie with them, but they are narrow and parochial as they divide the continent and its component ethniticies. Pan-Africanism can therefore supersede all of them, though its maturation is a tenuous endeavor.

A very rough political-cultural ocean this pathos is surely confronting. Getting together hundreds of tribal and ethnic groups, with their own inter-ethnic conflicts raging till these days, is enormously enigmatic a goal to hurdle, with so many gourdian knots to cut.

Africans have no better choice but get together. Poverty, ethnic conflicts, bio-warfare ailments (AIDS & others), balkanization, and the looting of its resources by Western moneybags is leading the continent and its peoples to a cul de sac Hades.

Europe had been re-awakening the long dormant Roman pathos, and that “grandeur that was Rome” is running through the gamut of the European psyche on both sides of the Atlantic. Bonapartism is crystallizing rapidly as the state ideology of the emerging New Rome (EU-USA), its contours now forming though straddling sand dunes. Rome is re-acquiring its old territories as we’re now witnessing.

The subordination of ancient Africa (Egypt-Nubia leading) to Rome is again being revived. Such a revivalism would get expressed as an enchainment of pan-Africa to New Rome’s agenda of conflagration versus a renascent Persia (Shiite Iran). If the conflagration will ensue, pan-Africa’s gains will collapse under the roof.

So the question that we ask now is, will pan-Africa yield to the Anglo-European oligarchs and become canon fodders for the latter’s war versus Persia? Or, will pan-Africa truly unite the vast continent’s diverse ethnic communities and galvanize a sovereign continent that can’t be dragged into the ‘clash of civilizations’ madness of Western moneybags?

[Philippines, 30 July 2010]

[See: IKONOKLAST: http://erleargonza.blogspot.com,
UNLADTAU: http://unladtau.wordpress.com,
COSMICBUHAY: http://cosmicbuhay.blogspot.com,
BRIGHTWORLD: http://erlefraynebrightworld.wordpress.com, ARTBLOG: http://erleargonza.wordpress.com,
ARGONZAPOEM: http://argonzapoem.blogspot.com]

Monday, August 09, 2010

CURRENCY: PERSIA’S OVERKILL WEAPON VERSUS NEW ROME (EU-USA)

Erle Frayne D. Argonza


Observers may be wondering about what revived Persia (Shiite empire) possesses that serves as its leverage in a Manichean ‘clash of civilizations’ with revived Rome (EU-USA). Nukes and petrol (Iran cuts down oil pumping levels) are the most easily identifiable at the moment, and those with Jurassic linear thinking are inclined to forecast these possible leverages.

New Rome (EU-USA) itself has been projecting a rather alarmist tone that had overstressed those leverages as the weapons of its revived ancient enemy. In my analysis, this projection is just a cover-up or ‘decoy’ propaganda by new Rome whose technocratic-military-oligarchic elites know too well the real leverage that Iran possesses.

My contention is that currency will be new Persia’s most powerful weapon versus its ancient adversary. Iran’s ayatollahs and partisan ideologues aren’t dumb, they’ve been preparing for this weaponry a long time ago yet (since after Islam’s take-over of Teheran in the early 80s), and they will use this weapon with determined zeal.

The U.S. intelligence community had actually created dollar-manufacturing machines outside the USA to churn out humungous volumes of the currency that will escape the inquisitive eyes of Congress. The dollars are used for covert operations overseas—to buy weaponry, drugs, gold, and stash assets elsewhere beyond Congress’ prying eyes.

Sadly for the USA and New Rome, one such machine—located inside Iran during the regime of the Shah—fell into the hands of Islamic revolutionaries after the overthrow of the Shah. It would be overstretching naïve posturing if one thinks that Shiite Islam won’t use the machine for its purpose: to produce dollars by the mighty lot.

The Western oligarchy had shown its competence at destroying economies via currency attacks. Recall the devastation of the Asian economies when Soros & cronies waged an organized campaign of currency attacks beginning in June 1997. The offshoot was the Asian ‘financial meltdown’ as we called it then.

It isn’t difficult to recognize that Persia will use the same currency attack to take down the economies of its adversaries. New Rome is already teetering on the edge of a deeper economic collapse that could send it down to 3rd world infamy in the short run, a fact that Persia’s experts and strategists are watching so closely with glee.

Persia may decide to rain dollars on the world’s coffers as a pre-emptive attack versus its ancient enemy. Let’s better take this scenario very seriously.

The moment that dollars will flood the global coffers, by which the dollar will become a mere over-the-counter commodity, both the Euro and Yen will go down in value as well. All those financial, monetary, and merchandise commodities that are dependent on the said currencies will come crashing down from economic roofs as well.

Bellicosity towards Persia will prove to be New Rome’s folly, as we will see later. It may prove more worthy for Rome to cajole its ancient enemy via carrots (diplomacy and merchandise leverages) rather than sticks that can only lead to the eventual destruction of the West in a hot war versus Iran (see previous article).

Even East Asia, which is the global growth driver today, will be severely affected by a crash of the dollar via a Persian currency attack. With gargantuan stocks of dollars stashed in their vaults, a badly devalued dollar will suddenly de-stabilize their domestic economy and external trade as well.

It is futile for the Anglo-European-American oligarchy to decide on nuking Iran in order to destroy its dollar-making capabilities. Vaults upon vaults full of the currency are most likely stocked up all over the planet via the agents and friends of Shiite (that includes mafia operators, corrupt state officials, and dirty bankers) from where the currency can be released like relentless rocket attack weapons.

The Manichean ‘war of the worlds’ betwixt ancient enemies Rome and Parthia will prove to be the most catastrophic of all wars. No one power will win this war at all, although Persia will end up having the last laugh as the West gets fragmented and destroyed.

[Philippines, 24 July 2010]

[See: IKONOKLAST: http://erleargonza.blogspot.com,
UNLADTAU: http://unladtau.wordpress.com,
COSMICBUHAY: http://cosmicbuhay.blogspot.com,
BRIGHTWORLD: http://erlefraynebrightworld.wordpress.com, ARTBLOG: http://erleargonza.wordpress.com,
ARGONZAPOEM: http://argonzapoem.blogspot.com]

Friday, August 06, 2010

PERSIA RE-AWAKENS TO CONFRONT REVIVED ROME (EU-USA)

Erle Frayne D. Argonza


Good day! Magandang araw!

In previous articles I have articulated about ancient racial consciousness that could awaken at some juncture after a long dormancy period. The dormancy could be 2,000 years approximately, which coincides with Arnold Toynbee’s 2,000-year civilizational life.

The revival of ancient Roman consciousness had already been galvanizing, with the European Union and USA (w/ Canada) serving as the two (2) sections of the New Rome. Brussels is the capital of the revived Rome, a fact that is now well established. The revival of Bonapartism, also articulated in previous articles, is also unfolding at this moment, with war policy serving as option to abolish nations.

As such an eventuality is happening, another ancient power, Persia (Romans termed it Parthia) is also re-awakening. To recall history, Persia/Parthia challenged Rome with devastating results, and Rome was never able to conquer the Persians who continued to harass Roman provinces in Asia till the beginnings of Byzantium.

If there is any one power that knows the agenda of Rome (knows it instinctively or unconsciously), it is Rome’s ancient enemy Parthia. Parthia is now rising like a phoenix, and it is preparing to face New Rome in an offensive manner. ‘Offensive’ means confronting an adversary from a position of strength, just to stress the point.

New Rome has already prepared the Semitic coalition (tackled in previous articles) which it will use as a buffer against a marauding New Parthia. Both Sunni (gulf states) and Zion are armed to the teeth and are showing a semblance of an offensive coalition as well, though it remains to be seen whether the coalition will indeed be able to demonstrate muscle in a ‘clash of civilizations’ with revived Parthia.

A forecast Zion-Sunni versus Parthia conflict could indeed take place any time now, with New Rome (probably using American assets) igniting the war at its inception. But on the unconscious level, Zion & Sunni isn’t what Parthia will be staking claims on.

Parthia is after Rome (EU primarily, USA secondarily), and it will use the conflict with Zion & Sunni precisely to scourge the latter so that its scared peoples will migrate westward in massive herds. Waves after waves of Semites (largely Arabs) will move by land, water, and sea to Europe, the most likely new home, to escape Parthia’s wrath.

Berbers, Hamites, Arabs and black Africans will also most likely take sides in such a conflict, even as many of their scared peoples will move northwards to Europe from Africa in massive herds. Whoever the African hordes will be siding with, the result will be the same: tens of millions of its peoples buzzing off northwards to perceived safe havens.

The possible destruction of Iran via conventional means and limited frontier nukes may not necessarily destroy Parthia. Parthia is bigger than Iran, as Shiite allies will join the fray and be home to guerilla assets who can be used to harass the West no end. While the West uses conventional warfare, Parthia will use a combination of conventional and non-conventional strategies (e.g. Hezbollah rocket attacks inside Lebanon, Syria, and maybe even inside Europe).

Destroying and depopulating Iran will prove to be a hallow victory. Because even with Iran gone, at least 150 Millions of Arabs and African hordes will have nestled in Europe who, a short time later, will continue the ‘clash of civilizations’ wars via cultural conflicts and economic over-stretch for a continent that is now rapidly decaying back to 3rd world status.

Cultural decay in the West can be a catastrophic result of the coming clash with Parthia. Just as in ancient times, when “barbarian” hordes took over Roman provinces, Arab and African hordes will be moving up to squeeze themselves in lands they will occupy. Meanwhile, Parthia will be having the last laugh as its ghost will hover over Europe via the migrant hordes.

If New Rome wishes to survive the coming decades, its sane stakeholders should think many times before waging a cataclysmic war versus a revived Parthia. No one power can ever win such a conflict, the only winner being Death & Destruction of a scale heretofore untold.

[Philippines, 24 July 2010]

[See: IKONOKLAST: http://erleargonza.blogspot.com,
UNLADTAU: http://unladtau.wordpress.com,
COSMICBUHAY: http://cosmicbuhay.blogspot.com,
BRIGHTWORLD: http://erlefraynebrightworld.wordpress.com, ARTBLOG: http://erleargonza.wordpress.com,
ARGONZAPOEM: http://argonzapoem.blogspot.com]

Wednesday, August 04, 2010

WATER RIOTS IN MANILA: TOO SOON!

water, nature, ecology, environment, climate change, Manila, water wars, war, peace, Erle Argonza, Philippines, technorati, Asia, economics, urban, post-industrial,

Erle Frayne D. Argonza

Good evening from the Philippines!

A water crisis is now looming big in Manila (the entire metropolis), the Philippine’s premier big city. The western side of the big city is particularly badly affected by pilferages and spillages (over 55% lost), thus reducing the volume of water available to around 7 million people more or less.

Such a situation has been causing panic lately on urban residents, a panic that could lead to water riots. The western side of the big city is flatlands, which renders it vulnerable to floods and consequent destruction of water pipelines during calamities. Contrast that to the eastern side that comprises of highlands where watershed areas are nestled.

Just recently, the palace officials in Manila have been pronouncing the mobilization of army troops to help deter possible water riots. This is a new twist in the history of army missions, as the mission is one of police task in an urban setting (most army missions comprise of anti-insurgency tasks in rural hinterlands).

The outbreak of water conflicts right at the heart of Manila appears culled from the futuristic narratives of Isaac Asimov. The sci-fi genius prophesied (right after World War II) that the future will see communities divided between suburban highlands and urban lowlands. The residents of the suburbs, whose living comfort in gated villages is accompanied by robot sentinels, will comprise the upper class, while those of the urban lowlands, who will be exposed to the hovels of pollution, will comprise the lower class.

The urban-suburban divide seems to be gelling so fast in this country today. The water crisis caught palace officials and utilities bureaucrats flatfooted, even as they have been acting in near-hysteria fashion. A water war right in the big city is looming ahead, and there’s nothing in the management textbooks of the officials that can offer them quick solutions to an escalating crisis.

I do recall well that in the late 1990s, when I went back to graduate school to hone my skills in development policy via retooling with state-of-the-art analysis and social technologies, we already forecast the possibility of water wars (during classroom discussions). At that time, certain towns in the Cordilleras (mountain range to the north) began matter-of-factly to quarrel over water source and distribution. And so the challenge for us development workers was to craft mitigation measures that can deter such wars.

As soon as the new millennium began, Singapore and Malaysia did have some diplomatic confrontation regarding the issue of Singapore’s access to water sources found in Malaysia. The water source, so to speak, was getting depleted, thus slowly disabling Singapore from meeting its water needs. Desalination was the strategic solution to the problem, a surefire solution by Singapore’s visionary leaders that averted another conflict between the two polities (the earlier conflict led to Singapore’s separation from the Malaysian federation).

Certain policy experts and development workers are quite prepared for the eventuality of water wars in this 2nd world country, true. But those in the palace and even the legislature just may not have that luck of being exposed to new policy and institutional tools to deal with water-based conflicts.

Certainly too, the local execs and bureaucrats of Manila are unprepared for such a gargantuan crisis and eminent conflict based on water access and distribution. They haven’t retooled, and I know this for a fact based on my interaction with local officials known to me in the big city. They are mired in the old world, a world that is long gone (10 years ago in today’s context of rapid change is too long a time gone).

A water-based Asimovian nightmare is shaping up fast in Manila, and probably in other mega-cities around the world as well, a nightmare that is over-stretching the competencies of Establishment bureaucrats and politicians. The crisis exacerbates the urgency for urban lowland dwellers to leave the flatlands once and for all for the greener and water-rich highland suburbs, which could be the lowlanders’ panic complex response.

As an analyst and development practitioner, I am critical of any decision to use police state tactics to resolve the crisis. Scare tactics won’t let the problem fade away at all. The stakeholders better do their homework well, by getting together to dialogue, think and act. Through good all consensus they can configure what course of action to take that includes desalination of waters off Manila Bay.

Meantime, I am now all the more discouraged from ever residing or working in urban flatlands. Safely niched in Manila’s western highlands and suburban Calabarzon for the longest part of my life, I’d now rather heed the Asimovian option of better living in the suburbs, with or without the robot sentinels in our subdivision villages.

[Philippines, 23 July 2010]


[See: IKONOKLAST: http://erleargonza.blogspot.com,
UNLADTAU: http://unladtau.wordpress.com,
COSMICBUHAY: http://cosmicbuhay.blogspot.com,
BRIGHTWORLD: http://erlefraynebrightworld.wordpress.com, ARTBLOG: http://erleargonza.wordpress.com,
ARGONZAPOEM: http://argonzapoem.blogspot.com]

Sunday, August 01, 2010

ZION-SUNNI COALITION: ANCIENT PAN-SEMITISM SURFACING

Erle Frayne D. Argonza


Zion is courting Sunni and vice versa, courtesy of neo-conservative technocrats from Pentagon in tandem with the agents of the Anglo-European oligarchy. The enemy that both camps have to confront—Shiite Persia—is a very determined one and is arming to the teeth to advance its own interest.

Scrape both Zion and Sunni off the surface, and one can easily reveal the ancient Semitic bloodline that runs in both camps. The same Semites who for millennia fought for survival against the might of Persia, are now uniting to face Persia once again in a last war that fits well into the narrative of the last battle between the forces of Ahriman versus those of Ahura Mazda.

Cross over to the Shiite camp and do the same: scrape off Shiite Islam from the surface. Voila! The Persian bloodline is revealed to the observer in a very kindergarten fashion of quiz. Persia is resurfacing, Persian psyche that was long dormant is reviving, and sooner or later the empire that was so hated by its neighbors may come rampaging again to harass and conquer (if it can) the potentates of the ancient empire.

Racial consciousness, an awareness that operates on the collective level, doesn’t seem to die at all. At some juncture in the future, the dormant racial consciousness of a people may re-awaken again. I see this ancient racial consciousness re-awakening in today’s context when the borderline between reason and madness has been effectively erased.

Such is the case of the Semitic peoples, who were bred from the bloodlines of the Levantine Canaanites and the Sumerians. The Canaanites were a colored people while the Sumerians were white or Caucasian. The resulting race was a hybrid psyche that is suited to the rough and tough terrains of the Levant, Arabian peninsula, and North Africa’s sand dunes.

Indubitably, the Semites have competed against each other for millennia, this is beyond question. The future Arabs warred against each other, and so did the future Jews had their own conflicts. Hebrew-Arab conflict likewise brewed and boiled caldrons, conflicts whose embers haven’t ceased to die till now.

For some time, pan-Arabism served as a cementing force with which to unite the warring Arab tribes against an aggressive Zion. Real as the Zion-Arab conflict may seem, that reality can always get erased as soon as the line of polarity shifts.

With the decline of pan-Arabism came the advent of fundamentalist Islam represented by Shiite revivalism, a radical version of Islam that seeks to destroy both Zion and de-fang Western-collaborating Sunni sheikhdoms.

The advent of Shiite revivalism is indubitably the cementing force that is now uniting both Hebrews and Arabs together. No matter how superficial the Zion-Sunni coalition may appear for now, the superficiality will fade once the ferocity of Shiite Persia will be demonstrated with determined zeal in a war versus the coalition.

To this analyst, Zion and Sunni are no strange bedfellows. The genetic-psychical unity that is deeply embedded in the very DNA of all Semites is the decisive factor that will determine who should be friends versus a perceived predatory enemy, and such an enemy is no other than Persia in its new form as Shiite Islam.

No longer pan-Arabism but pan-Semitism is the order of the day. Pan-Semitism in the aegis of globalization is a borderless racial re-awakening. It is interesting to watch the formation of the contours of the emerging coalition as a surfacing of ancient unity and hatred versus a neo-Persian empire in the neighborhood.

[Philippines, 22 July 2010]

[See: IKONOKLAST: http://erleargonza.blogspot.com,
UNLADTAU: http://unladtau.wordpress.com,
COSMICBUHAY: http://cosmicbuhay.blogspot.com,
BRIGHTWORLD: http://erlefraynebrightworld.wordpress.com, ARTBLOG: http://erleargonza.wordpress.com,
ARGONZAPOEM: http://argonzapoem.blogspot.com]