MayDay, MayDay...

Anger and madness are relatives
Anger and madness are deadly twins
Anger and madness are brothers
Anger and madness have a very close
cousin called foolishness
They always accompanyeach other
The three are inseparable
The three follow each other everywhere.

Qiniso Mogale

Happy May Day!

May is the month of madness, not to mention, anger and foolishness.

Some examples:

“Defense” foolishness

Lloyd Austin appeared in Congress to answer questions—among other things questions about the Pentagon's F 35 boondoggle now close to 1,5 trillion dollars, give or take a billion or two, with only 29% of the aircraft reportedly operationally capable-- this, even lower than the 50% operational capability I have been reporting, which is the figure that Pentagon has been giving out.

As I have said before, by the time they fix the bugs, this aircraft will be obsolete.

Nevertheless, the US is still buying F35s and has been forcing its allies to buy them too.

Here in Japan, the Japanese bought F 35 B's to put on helicopter carriers, which they could then claim to be aircraft carriers. The F 30 5B is the VTOL model which suffers from short range and limited payload and rapid degradation of its stealth coating at sea. It is pretty much useless anyway — especially if only 4 of the 12 jets on board can fly.

One of the ironies is that F 35 operational capability has actually decreased every time the defense industry “upgrades” the machine. It is a bit like Windows 11-- which suffers a lot of the same problems as Windows 95! Microsoft keeps adding “updates” that break the OS.

But, hey, "defense" is one of America's few remaining industries.

ICC Madness

There have been rumors that the ICC is about to charge Netanyahu and some US officials with war crimes. This has prompted both the Biden administration and the Republicans to threaten the ICC with “retaliation” should they do that.

The US is not party to the Rome Convention but up until now has supported ICC arrest warrants, such as the one issue against Putin for saving children abandoned and in danger in Ukraine.

The ICC has not actually said whether or not it is going to issue warrants for Netanyahu or others involved in the Gazan genocide.

But….

If it does not issue warrants, the US will have preemptively and irreparably damaged the credibility of the ICC is an institution. If it does carry through and the US retaliates, the America deepens global perception of it as a rogue state.

Madness and foolishness—again.

Repression Madness

Sacred cows make the tastiest hamburger. Abbie Hoffman

The US has a LOT of sacred cows, also sacred chickens and pigs.

But they cannot be protected.

Police repression, such as occurred at the 1968 Democratic Convention, radicalized American youth—and ended the Vietnam War.

Julius, you radicalized more young people than we ever could. You're the country's top Yippie. Abbie Hoffman to Judge Julius Hoffman during the trial of the Chicago Seven.

Insurrection in 1968. Insurrection today.

Across the country, students are now protesting the Gazan genocide-- and therefore AIPAC's control over the US government.

To be against the genocide is to be anti-Zionist. It is not in any way anti-Semitic in many of the people being arrested are Jewish, including Jill Stein— the Green party candidate for president. Attacks by pro-Zionist young people add to the sense of division.

The anger and violence expressed by those in authority and by their Zionist peers against dissent is simply madness-- because it promotes revolution.

Revolution is not something fixed in ideology, nor is it something fashioned to a particular decade. It is a perpetual process embedded in the human spirit.”
― Abbie Hoffman

Revolution is change. But Western society is set up to be static, so as to preserve the privilege of a few.

To the degree that that a minority – that famous 1% – exploits the majority in American society, and as the lies of the “haves” are exposed and expectations of the “have nots” are crushed,frustration and anger increases. That generates more madness, foolishness, and anger and at some point, revolution.

Dollar Madness

Bubble, bubble, toil and trouble.

The US is a bubble economy.

The US’s Three Witches are the two houses of Congress and the Presidency.

We are told that currencies are being devalued worldwide. The yen, yuan, ruble, euro, rupee. Not really losing. All things are relative. Just the US dollar is being boosted by high interest rates, exploitation of America’s European colonies, and war profiteering.

Only trouble is that this is not accompanied by economic growth or industrial development—half to one third of Russia’s and much less than China’s.

Sanctions make things worse — they isolate the US and cut it off from cooperative development.

The dollar cannot function as a reserve currency under such conditions if there are alternatives – which there are now – BRICS, digital currencies, and so on—and a general lack of trust. A big problem is debt.

A record $8.9 trillion of government debt will mature over the next year, see the first chart below. The government budget deficit in 2024 will be $1.4 trillion according to the CBO, and the Fed has been running down its balance sheet by $60 billion per month.

The bottom line is that someone will need to buy more than $10 trillion in US government bonds in 2024. That is more than one-third of US government debt outstanding. And more than one-third of US GDP.

This may be a particular challenge when the biggest holders of US Treasuries, namely foreigners, continue to shrink their share, see the second chart.

More fundamentally, interest rate-sensitive balance sheets such as households, pension, and insurance have been the biggest buyers of Treasuries in 2023, and the question is whether they will continue to buy once the Fed starts cutting rates.

Once the bubble bursts, the world will bleed. But the BRICS community will bleed the least. The US and Canada will just bleed out, as Europe is now doing.

GAZA Madness

Jonathan Cook has written an excellent analysis of the US proposal for a cease-fire in Gaza, initially accepted by the Israeli Foreign Ministry.

Basically, Hamas would release some hostages, Israelis would release some of theirs and there would be a temporary cease-fire, for the time being preventing an attack on Rafah.

The trouble with this of course is that this would be only temporary and by the time the cease-fire ended the Palestinians would be we can through starvation. Then Israelis would carry out a devastating attack. Anyone who did not leave would be killed --man woman or child.

Hobson’s choice. Die if you do. Die if you don’t.

In any case, Netanyahu seems to have realized, as I have argued before, that time is the greatest of enemies-- and certainly not on his side, with opinion mobilizing against him in the US – even from Donald Trump – and in the global community – ICC arrest warrant or not.

So he has contradicted his own Foreign Minister and is ordering a full-scale assault on Rafah.

If the Israelis go through with this, Gazans will be forced into the Sinai – and Egypt, which will likely destabilize an already unstable government. Watch for a military revolt. A lot of dead people.

Israel will start to work on a West Bank genocide – which will destabilize Jordan.

More dead people.

Lest we forget…. Israel’s GDP…

Ichi

Ichi wants to express his appreciation to his many supporters. And intro’ to cute girl cats. He is doing his best to keep me writing.

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