Spengler in full spate. He doesn't seem to think highly of our president...
To be fair, he's never been particularly fond of any of our presidents, or America in general.
I've been warning for months that Egypt, Syria, Tunisia and other Arab oil-importing countries face a total economic meltdown (see Food and failed Arab states, Feb 2, and The hunger to come in Egypt, May 10). Now the International Monetary Fund (IMF) has confirmed my warnings.
The leaders of the industrial nations waited until last weekend's Group of Eight (G-8) summit to respond, and at the initiative of United States President Barack Obama proposed what sounds like a massive aid program but probably consists mainly of refurbishing old programs.
The egg has splattered, and all of Obumpty's horses and men can't mend it. Even the G-8's announcement was fumbled; Canada's Prime Minister John Harper refused to commit new money, a dissonant note that routine diplomatic preparation would have pre-empted.
The numbers thrown out by the IMF are stupefying. "In the current baseline scenario," wrote the IMF on May 27, "the external financing needs of the region's oil importers is projected to exceed $160 billion during 2011-13." That's almost three years' worth of Egypt's total annual imports as of 2010. As of 2010, the combined current account deficit (that is, external financing needs) of Egypt, Syria, Yemen, Morocco and Tunisia was about $15 billion a year.
...And the IMF's $160 billion number is only "external financing"; that is, maintaining imports into a busted economy. It doesn't do a thing to repair busted economies that import half their caloric intake, as do the oil-poor Arab nations.
...Whatever the Group of Eight actually had in mind, the proposed aid package for the misnomered Arab Spring has already become a punching bag for opposition budget-cutters. "Should we be borrowing money from China to turn around and give it to the Muslim Brotherhood?" Sarah Palin asked on May 27.
"Now, given that Egypt has a history of corruption when it comes to utilizing American aid, it is doubtful that the money will really help needy Egyptian people. Couple that with the fact that the Muslim Brotherhood is organized to have a real shot at taking control of Egypt's government, and one has to ask why we would send money (that we don't have) into unknown Egyptian hands," the former Republican vice-presidential candidate added. Common sense is never common.
...The borders of the affected nations have begun to dissolve along with their economies. It will get worse fast. Contrary to what is, fervently, believed among the Western elites, Israel is the only real country in ME. Whereas the Arab states are the totally artificial constructs that wouldn't have got so far without decades of massive covert aid from the West---all the while bemoaning the huge drain imposed on USA economy by Israel
(fade in on kuffeya wrap man, bandoliered, black flag in background)
After a week of rage I must clean, and because I am not allowed to talk to the women, my scent is all I have. And sometimes, when I am upwind, I do not want to smell like a human.
That is why I demand..Arab Spring.
(catchy jingo music)
Hama, fatah, iman, baa baa, islam, el el el allah...
lululululululu!
(scrambled voiceover)
Now available in the new scents eau de prophet and caliphate reign.
We knew about the antisemitism. We knew the antisemitism is mandated by the Koran. Now thanks to a small corner of a report co-authored by Mark Elchardus, we have numbers to back that up.
American Thinker blogger Andrew G. Bostom riffs on the approximately seven percent of the report concerned with antisemitism among high school students in Brussels, and the suit based on Prof. Elchardus saying to a local Flemish newspaper, "Worrying is that half of Muslim students can be described as anti-Semitic...Worse, the anti-Jewish feelings have nothing to do with a low educational or social disadvantage, as is the case with racist natives. It is theologically inspired anti-Semitism..."
A multi-volume chronology and reference guide set detailing three years of the Mexican Drug War between 2010 and 2012.
Rantburg.com and borderlandbeat.com correspondent and author Chris Covert presents his first non-fiction work detailing
the drug and gang related violence in Mexico.
Chris gives us Mexican press dispatches of drug and gang war violence
over three years, presented in a multi volume set intended to chronicle the death, violence and mayhem which has
dominated Mexico for six years.
Rantburg was assembled from recycled algorithms in the United States of America. No
trees were destroyed in the production of this weblog. We did hurt some, though. Sorry.
