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September 6, 2015
Open Thread 2015-33
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What is the prognosis for Greece? Will the victory of Syriza bring “Meaningful Debt Relief (TM)”? Will they even be first past the post?
In order: poor; no; probably not, but it doesn’t matter.
While the polls are unclear on who takes the no. 1 spot (and the extra 50 seats that go with it, under certain conditions), they universally show a divided parliament. The Brookings Institute provides a reassuring analysis of Sunday’s not-so-scary Greek elections.
It’s a coin toss as to whether Syriza or New Democracy will form the next government, in coalition with some of the parties lying between them on the political spectrum. That’s a major surprise, since Tsipras called the election to take advantage of the disarray of the other parties, and to secure an absolute majority in parliament for his Syriza party — minus his most troublesome internal opponents. He, and most observers, expected that Greek voters would give him credit for fighting hard for a better deal with Europe and forgive him for backing down from much tougher earlier rhetoric when it became clear no deal was possible on his terms…. Instead, New Democracy has rebounded somewhat, despite having the uncertainty of being run by an interim leader, and Syriza has largely been unable to draw in new supporters and therefore particularly suffers from the loss of some of its voters to Popular Unity.
No party is likely to come close to an absolute majority, with the largest probably falling 20 or so seats short, even with their 50 seat bonus.
The analyst believes that depending upon who gets the plurality, and the right to form the government, PASOK, New Democracy, To Potami, Syriza, and perhaps the Union of Centrists will be the major players and are likely to be part of the parliamentary majority.
Unbalanced Evolution has two posts of note. They provide a set of polling data over time. Here’s the last dated poll I saw, from 9/15:
SYRIZA 28-30%
Popular Unity + Plan B etc. 20-23%
Νew Democracy 11-13%
Golden Dawn 6-8%
Greek Communist Party 5-5.5%
Union of Centrists 2.5-3%
River 2.5-3.5%
PASOK + DIMAR 3-4%
Independent Greeks 2.5-3.5%
They also discuss various scenarios. They lean towards a centrist coalition, probably with Syriza on either lead or rhythm. These scenarios, two and three, largely play out the same, but this one summarizes well Tsipras’ course of action; emphasis added.
Scenario 2: SYRIZA takes the first place, but Independent Greeks do not gather the necessary percentage to enter the new parliament. Berlin and Brussels bureaufascists will be happier in such a case because this will be the most suitable situation to see things progressing according to their plans. It will be a good chance to finish what they have started, forcing SYRIZA to cooperate with the neoliberal parties PASOK and Potami (River) and therefore, implement every last detail of the cruel neoliberal experiment in Greece. After Greece’s destruction they can continue to the whole eurozone. Although PASOK and Potami are in essence neoliberal parties, they are self-determined as Center-Left and this is necessary for this possible coalition government (SYRIZA-PASOK-Potami) to be presented to the public as “progressive”….
One is a clear (unlikely) Syriza win, three has New Democracy with the plurality and a broad, unstable government formed. Four has Popular Unity winning (this “should not be considered totally impossible” they write) and five has dissatisfied voters really spreading their votes and a badly hung parliament.
Does one or more of them have the silver bullet that will slay the Werewolf of Frankfurt? It would seem not.
Here’s the straight dope from The Wall Street Journal, which asks the musical question What Does Greece’s Election Mean for Its Bailout?
Q: Can these measures change or be renegotiated?
A: Over the last few weeks of election campaigning, the leaders of the two major parties have said that while they intend to honor Greece’s bailout agreement, they also plan to renegotiate some of its painful aspects such as the overhaul of the labor market or new rules limiting tax exemptions for farmers.
But European officials have warned that no major renegotiation of the program is on the cards….
Q: Does it matter what government is formed?
A: European officials have demonstrated a striking nonchalance ahead of this election when asked about who will sit across from them on the negotiating table – particularly in comparison to previous Greek polls.
Given that Greece’s latest bailout agreement, as well as the first couple of sets of painful overhauls sailed through parliament with over two thirds of the vote, officials say that they don’t have the slightest indication that there should be any change with a new government, and expect any new coalition to honor the agreement.
Still, some officials have said that a coalition led by former Prime Minister Alexis Tsipras could have a better shot at maintaining support from the Greek people in implementing the needed overhauls.
The Greek Communists make a similar point, though with a slightly different (class) angle on the subject. Neither Syriza Mark One nor Mark Two get good marks. James Petras’ criticism of Left Platform has expectations of a similar path of co-optation. He adds that they were too late to take it to the streets is well founded and gives them a marginal pass on their parliamentary struggle. He’s even less impressed with Syriza.
Posted by: rufus magister | Sep 18 2015 23:48 utc | 101
Given earlier reports of UAF buildups and speculation that the opening of a fall campaign might coincide with Putin’s UN appearance, this report of renewed action in the Donbas is not a surprise. According to the junta, it is “an operation to search and destroy sabotage and reconnaissance groups of the enemy” involving thousands of what they call their best formations.
An editorial note by Fort Russ notes “it’s hard not to see a connection between this declared ‘resumption’ and the increased direct presence of Russia in Syria. These should be considered to be among two fronts in a single undeclared global conflict.”
Red Star over Donbass reports that the late Mozgovoi remains on the official Ukrainian sanctions list. Where’s Gogol or Kafka when you need them?
But apparently his spirit does live on with the internationalists of the Ghost Brigade.
“Of course, we are not doves, but soldiers,” says Pyotr Biryukov, the military commander of 404. Never forget what happened after the Reichstag fire, says the engineer from Siberia. Biryukov is convinced that war will only end when the “fascist plague” is defeated…. “For future generations to look to the sky, not into the abyss.”
The plague remains active, of course. See this item about a demo in Kharkov celebrating the murder of journalist O. Burzina (fascists recently took down the memorial plaque where he was shot in Kiev and replaced it with one honoring the assassins).
Posted by: rufus magister | Sep 20 2015 15:19 utc | 102
The CFR in general and this study group and its report authors specifically are engaging in the fiction that the “national interest” is an objective fact. In reality the United States is a class, race, and gender divided society, where different groups have sharply different interests. So the definition of the “national interest” from which their proposed policies – “primacy” toward China and the rest of the world – flow is actually the special, narrow, capitalist class interest, representing the small but powerful U.S. plutocracy. … The aggressive policies they propose toward China – involving the promotion of military power, including significantly higher military spending, additional bases, building up the armed forces of Asian allies, and implied threats to use force – are not really in the national interest of the United States. This group, led by a number of people like Wolfowitz, Libby, and Blackwill, who were disastrously wrong on Iraq a little over a decade ago, are trying to put us on the road to dangerous great power conflict.
In some ways, it represents a path similar to what happened a century ago, when the European branch of capitalist civilization entered upon a phase of suicidal destruction beginning with the First World War. This was also based on great power rivalry, and a narrow, often super-nationalist, definition of the national interest of each European country involved. There was a large element of delusional thinking involved one hundred years ago, especially on the part of the leaders of Germany, Russia, Austro-Hungary, and the Ottoman Empire. Similarly, the CFR and its study group assume that U.S. power is nearly limitless, when in fact U.S. power is limited and confrontation best avoided. … The path proposed by the CFR in this report is thus also based on deluded thinking and will therefore likely prove to be disastrous in practice, possibly leading to an Asian arms race, growing conflict, and great power war. …
Given the twin existential threats to higher life on our planet—nuclear war and ecological destruction – the very idea of the “national interest” should be junked in favor of a broader conception, focusing on the interests of humanity and the planet as a whole. Cooperation to deal with these threats – among the great powers especially – then becomes the focus. The CFR report’s recommendations thus represent the opposite of what is now required for the long-term survival of life on earth.
In my opinion there is zero chance that the 1%ers who run the US will focus on anything other than preserving its/their perceived dominance of planet earth.
It is therefore incumbent upon the rest of us to do everything in our power to remove the 1% from political power, and to (re)establish democracies, both in the US and its vassal states, and in Russia and China when the 1%ers there attempt to pick up the imperialist flag and run with it once it has fallen from the US’ hands.
The alternative is bleak indeed.
Posted by: jfl | Sep 20 2015 21:46 utc | 103
The results from Greece. Stockholm Syndrome prevails. Syriza leads the poll with 35.5%, New Democracy at 28.3%. Pasok and the KKE both polled around 6%, the Union of Centrists is in but Popular Unity failed to pass the 3% bar, with 2.8%
Golden Dawn, however, comes in third with 7%. All this despite Yanis Varoufakis “the ‘legalization’ of the capitulation that followed the signing of the dead end, humiliating and irrational” bailout.
Cheer up though. According to Nikolas Leontopoulos in the EU Observer, “Whatever the outcome of the upcoming election in Greece, there is already one big loser – Alexis Tsipras. Even if Tsipras does win, this will make his fall from grace even more spectacular and painful.” He fleshes out the point made above by the Brookings analysis — Tsipras has rid himself of the most effective critics within Syriza.
As early as April 2015, EU officials had expressed their wish that Tsipras would “ditch” the radicals inside his party. What they asked for was that Syriza, in the space of a few months, would be transformed from a coalition of the radical left – as its name suggests – to a centrist party keen on privatisations, austerity and liberal reforms….
Politically and morally undermined by the bailout agreement it was forced to sign, Syriza’s campaign is trying to shift attention to the domestic front ahead of Sunday’s polls….
His message is two-fold: both against his predecessors who were seen as blindly obliging to the creditors’ demands, and the defectors from his party, who are dreaming of a Greece outside the euro.
But his government’s record tells a different story.
Capital controls are still in place, making life hard for thousands of small or large businesses. The economy’s indicators are in a much worse situation than 8 months ago, when ND was in charge. And, even worse, the bailout agreed by Tsipras is more likely to provide Greece with the same medicine of austerity – a medicine that is doomed not to work, according to a consensus of international economists….
Instead, a new Syriza government will have to implement more austerity, cuts to the welfare state and the pension system in exchange for more loans to the tune of billions to repay more debts, and the most ambitious privatisation programme ever – which for the leftists of Syriza represents a massive embarrassment.
Syriza pledges that it will promote a “parallel program” in order to compensate for the recessionary measures of the third bailout program. Is that possible?
The creditors’ representatives, including Moscovici and the German ministry of Finance, have made clear, in leaks and official statements, that there is neither room nor tolerance for further negotiation or change of the bailout’s terms
Not only were the Thessalanika program’s promises on austerity broken, promises to take on the status quo and its corruption were unmet. This makes the election rhetoric about no compromise with the old system ring hollow. Even before it has to ally with New Democracy and/or Pasok.
Firstly, none of their pre-electoral promises on corruption were kept. They had committed to a 6-month plan that would bring in billions in revenue from the fight against tax evasion and oil smuggling….
Nothing of the sort happened. True, Syriza had a good excuse. They could not fight two fronts at once: one abroad with the country’s powerful creditors and one domestic against a system of power deeply entrenched in the country’s structures.
But now the negotiation is over. And there are more and more doubts regarding Syriza’s appetite to fight this system; there are even indications that Syriza has made peace with it in a way that is reminiscent of the “old regime”.
For example, there are no plans in the foreseeable future to tax the super-wealthy shipping community and the Church, both of whom enjoy an almost tax-free status.
And some of the country’s oligarchs who were until recently bashing Syriza through the media they own, now seem to have changed course and support Tsipras’s new bet…. [might account for the strong showing, no? – emphasis added, rm]
Tsipras has shouted loud and clear “we want the majority so that we are not held hostages by the establishment and the ‘diaploki’” (the Greek term for the intertwined interests ruling Greece).
If this turns out to be the case after Sunday’s election, Syriza will be a de facto hostage of those interests, since a majority is unlikely to happen.
It appears that the Greek electorate is not sane; they have done the same thing again, but think the outcome will differ. They have returned an ineffective and opportunistic government to power, and oddly appear to expect an adequate, if not resolute, defense. As I’ve said before, the best ground to stand on was given up months ago, when the July referendum was blown off. Business commentator Chris Becker observes:
Talk about being caught between a rock and a hard place? Same team – sans the firebrand economist Yanis Varoukafis – with the same coalition, facing the same boots on the neck. Surprised that they were returned given the 70% plebiscite result to say “no” to austerity?
Its because barely anyone showed up, with absentee rates nearing 50%! So much for democratic involvement….
This is another can kick down the road that is slowly turning into a dead end.
We’ll have to see if this government has more staying power than the first Syriza government. Purged of its radicals, it might, but I would think the same populist tensions that drove Left Platform out will eventually drive other principled dissenters out as well.
Posted by: rufus magister | Sep 21 2015 1:22 utc | 104
rufus @98 (3 days before the election)
We’ll take this up again after the election …You can offer up more fantasies about why voters turned Syriza out.
Double FAIL: 1) My analysis was critical of Tsipras; and 2) Syriza won the election.
rufus@100:
dodgy accusations
You inadvertently admitted to spinning and plagiarism and have been running from that since it was pointed out. IMO someone with integrity (and a clear conscience) would have handled this differently. Instead, you saddle MoA readers with argumentative comments, chest-pounding, MSM chaff, and faulty analysis.
Posted by: Jackrabbit | Sep 21 2015 5:01 utc | 105
I cannot recall anything you said critical of Tsipras.
You defended his betrayal in his terms — the best we can get, though we asked nice, and maybe if we keep saying “pretty please,” maybe they’ll be nice. I think it clear from my quotes from the financial press no “Meaningful Debt Relief(TM)” will be offered.
You know nothing of integrity. I have been running from nothing and my conscience is clear.
The outcome I hoped for failed to come to pass. I not only came back and took my lumps, I added criticism of Left Platform’s parliamentary opposition and late popular mobilization, which failed to return them to parliament.
Let’s all congratulate Tsipras for his return to the post of Chief Overseer on the Attica Plantation. Not a desirable post, I would think. Several commentators noted a cartoon, this account is from EU Observer.
A political cartoon by Elias Makris, published in Kathimerini, a conservative daily, shows Tsipras waking up in the middle of the night, covered in sweat: “I had a nightmare” he says. “What was it about?” asks his half-asleep wife. “I was re-elected”.
I will be quite surprised if he finishes out his term. New Democracy is suggesting a government of national unity, let’s see if Syriza bites.
“Is this the right room for an argument?”
Posted by: rufus magister | Sep 21 2015 5:30 utc | 106
More spinning.
I wrote that meaningful debt relief was doubtful (a ‘mirage’) @8. Now you try to twist my view as yours and wrongly depict me as Tsipras supporter.
The outcome that I hoped for failed to come to pass.”
What a chickenshit way to say that you were wrong. Way to stand behind your work! Your integrity (or lack thereof) on display!
And, you didn’t come back to “take lumps” – you came back to blame the victim (the Greek electorate) for not being “sane”. Even your claims to integrity are spun!
Naturally, after all this spinning, you seek to redirect readers (once again) to Tsipras.
Posted by: Jackrabbit | Sep 21 2015 8:19 utc | 107
Syriza and the Greeks remains my topic. I find it telling that you ignore the issues raised in favor of lame personal attacks.
The fact remains — instead of going to the electorate for a renewed mandate for further fight, Tsipras called elections to reinforce his position as Overseer-in-Chief. Victory is likely to be Pyrrhic.
I doubt if I’m the first poster who has made predictions that did not pan out. Nor am I likely to be the first to own up to it. That the politesse police want to bust me for insufficient self-flagellation does not concern me.
Polls were all over the place, and I thought well enough of the Greeks to hope that they would turn the opportunists out. Sadly, elite media favor and the Troika’s pressures seem to have driven the sense out of the electorate. Tsipras’ sell-out has left folks demoralized, as shown by declines in turnout.
But I was able to show, via statements from the Troika, that there will be no “Meaningful Debt Relief(TM),” despite both Syriza and New Democracy campaigning on it. Thoughts?
We’ll have to look at further details as to who took the new Syriza places, radicals or time-servers. I would hope there are still enough leftists in the parliamentary delegation to cause trouble down the road, but the internal dissent is likely to be quiet for any no. of months.
Posted by: rufus magister | Sep 21 2015 12:08 utc | 108
The U.S. pours billions of dollars into surveying Afghanistan, flying Predator drones over cities, towns and roadways, claiming to better understand “patterns of life” in Afghanistan. But the war system establishes tragic patterns of death, of poverty, misinformation, desperate insecurity, and continued despair. If she could flee her circumstances, Jamila surely would seek refuge elsewhere in the world. But she has nowhere to turn and nowhere to hide from Predators near and far.
The Predator in Chief, Nobel Peace Prize Laureate and Serial Assassin, Barack Obama cares nothing for the “patterns of life” in Afghanistan, Syria, Yemen … or among ordinary Americans. He cares only about the “patterns of life” of Trans-National-Corporations that have constructed their inhuman livelihood around predation, around Death, Devastation, and Destruction of life on planet earth.
And he, of course, is just frontman pro-tem. A whole new passel of predators is lining up and jostling now to take his place.
Posted by: jfl | Sep 22 2015 0:19 utc | 109
Fury after Saudi Arabia ‘chosen to head key UN human rights panel’
“It’s bad enough that Saudi Arabia is a member of the council, but for the UN to go and name the regime as chair of a key panel only pours salt in the wounds for dissidents languishing in Saudi prisons.”
Makes perfect sense, actually. Barack Obama got a Nobel Peace Prize, why shouldn’t his Saudi partners for peace in Yemen and Syria take charge of Human Rights at the UN? They paid for the weapons, helping to keep the US war economy and Endless War afloat, why shouldn’t they get a little recognition, just like the Nobel Peace Prize Laureate himself? And just as the Nobel Peace Prize Laureate turns War into Peace, so too the Saudi executioners can turn Terror into the defense of Human Rights.
The UN is a sick, sick joke. The human race is a sick, sick joke. Their rulerships, at any rate.
Posted by: jfl | Sep 22 2015 1:07 utc | 110
Syriza and the Greeks remains my topic. Post-mortems continue.
Reason notes that what he agreed to was even worse “than the one the voters said no to” back in July.
From Friday on Truthout a Greek journalist looks at the electorate on the eve of elections; emphasis added.
The abandonment of the left-leaning Syriza program and the alignment with many of the policies favored by the previous governments led to a split in the party. Its left wing abandoned Syriza, creating a new party with members who wish to remain faithful to the program under which they were elected in the last elections….
Tsipras himself remains optimistic and believes that now that he has gotten rid of the radical elements in his party he might be able to lure voters from the conservative and moderate segments of Greek society, which before would have never voted for the left….
However, many former left voters are angry at Tsipras and wonder whether his government was ever committed to a leftist agenda as it never took any steps to improve the lives of the poor and those who had been most affected by the six-year crisis and the policies pursued by the previous Greek governments.
In its seven months in power, the Syriza-led government did nothing to change the extremely unjust Greek tax system, which squeezes the poor and allows the rich to dodge. It did nothing to provide opportunities to the most vulnerable segments of society or improve the collapsing public education and health-care systems, let alone make the public administration sector more efficient…. Conversely, it became obvious to most people that a compromise had been reached with the nation’s oligarchs. It became equally obvious that many Syriza politicians were easily lured by power and began making all the necessary compromises in order to retain it….
Syriza was the last hope for the majority of poor and desperate Greeks as it was the only untested party among those that ran in the last elections…. Syriza’s leadership was aware that its policies were generating great discontent and wished to preempt it by calling a snap election. It knew that the countdown had begun and wanted to prevent the consequences. In particular, it wanted to prevent the political damage that would result once the first set of new measures accompanying the new agreement kicked in.
All sounds right principled, don’t it?
Huffpost has five takeaways. I took this from the last.
After years of blaming the other parties and of claiming to have no choice, Tsipras will now have to actually lead the country into a new era…. This was the last election that Tsipras could win purely on the basis of the failure of the other candidates. The next time, be it in one year or in four, voters will judge him, rather than his opponents. Is Tsipras ready for this?
I don’t see Tsipras as up to the task.
“We must go forward, not backward. Upward, not downward. And always twirling, twirling, twirling towards freedom.”
Posted by: rufus magister | Sep 22 2015 1:24 utc | 111
Migrant Crisis Catapults Popularity, Presence of Greek Fascists
Golden Dawn, one of the most extreme far-right political parties in Europe, has strengthened its position as the third political force in Greece, following the country’s snap elections Sunday.
The neo-fascist party won around 7 percent of the vote, and gained one parliamentary seat.
While Tsipras and his left-wing Syriza party got the win he needed with just under 36 percent, conservative challengers New Democracy came in a close second with 28 percent. The fascist Golden Dawn, some of whose members are in prison for their role in murder and organized crime, held their own and increased their seats in Greek parliament to 18.
Gee, could the timing of the great refugee release … a French consul in Turkey was selling inflatable boats … have been in any way related to the vote in Greece? Golden Dawn and New Democracy polled just under one point below or at par with the neoliberal Syriza party. Nah. The Troika’d never do anything like that. Unless they felt they needed to. Or just ought to.
Hmm … just under 36% + 28% + around 7% = around 70%. Who polled the other 29 or 30%?
And who were the 43% who didn’t bother to show up at all at the polls, and how would they have voted if they had?
Posted by: jfl | Sep 22 2015 3:40 utc | 112
Xi offers ways to build new model of major-country relationship with U.S.
Visiting Chinese President Xi Jinping on Tuesday called for the world’s two largest economies to read each other’s strategic intentions correctly and manage their differences properly and effectively.
“If China and the United States cooperate well, they can become a bedrock of global stability and a booster of world peace,” he said. “Should they enter into conflict or confrontation, it would lead to disaster for both countries and the world at large.”
China-U.S. cooperation benefits both countries, world: Xi
“If we can avoid conflicts and confrontations and seek win-win cooperation on the basis of mutual respect, it will benefit not only our two nations, but also the whole Asia-Pacific region and the world at large,” Xi, who arrived here Tuesday morning for his first state visit to the United States, said while meeting with a group of U.S. political figures.
“I look forward to discussing key issues in bilateral relations and mapping out a blueprint for bilateral cooperation here,” he said.
China Pressures U.S. Companies to Buckle on Strong Encryption and Surveillance
Before Chinese President Xi Jinping visits President Obama, he and Chinese executives have some business in Seattle: pressing U.S. tech companies, hungry for the Chinese market, to comply with the country’s new stringent and suppressive Internet policies.
The New York Times reported last week that Chinese authorities sent a letter to some U.S. tech firms seeking a promise they would not harm China’s national security.
That might require such things as forcing users to register with their real names, storing Chinese citizens’ data locally where the government can access it, and building government “back doors” into encrypted communication products for better surveillance. China’s new national security law calls for systems that are “secure and controllable”, which industry groups told the Times in July means companies will have to hand over encryption keys or even source code to their products.
I don’t know which is more ‘shocking’, the likelihood that China is ready to divide up the world with the US, the probability that The Google and the bunch are being asked to help the PRC just as they do the NSA/CIA, or the fact that the Intercept is now publishing NYTimes/AmazonTimes/State Department spin such as this ‘PRC just as evil as DC scoop’.
McCain’s Visit with Poroshenko Cannot be Good
McCain said: “I have no doubt that the Ukrainian people are ready to fight to the end, and I want to assure you that a large number of US politicians, Republicans and Democrats will continue to do everything possible to help you.”
Everything possible to help Ukrainians reach their end? That’s what he said, isn’t it. He could at least have promised a US fracked-gas fueled perpetual flame burning in memory of all the Ukrainians who’ve died in the USA’s unsuccessful experiment in destroying Russia by destroying Ukraine on its doorstep. I guess McCain and the neocons were working on the monkey-see-monkey-do hypothesis? Well, they did manage to bribe the head-monkeys in Ukraine – Ukrainian neocons in monkey-costumes – to successfully initiate the experiment there. They can spin that angle when they write up their results. Good grantsmanship, always discover something you’ve learned from your failed experiment. So someone will fund the next one.
Posted by: jfl | Sep 23 2015 21:57 utc | 114
American Holocaust, David E. Stannard, 1993, chapter 4, p. 139
In short, the Franciscans simultaneously starved and worked their would be converts to death, while the diseases they and others had imported killed off thousands more. The similarity of this outcome to what had obtained in the slave labor camps of Central and South America should not be surprising, since California’s Spanish missions, established by Father Junipero Serra (aptly dubbed “the last conquistador” by one admiring biographer and currently a candidate for Catholic sainthood), were directly modeled on the genocidal encomienda system that had driven many millions of native peoples in Central and South America to early and agonizing deaths. [152]
[152] Orner Englebert, The Last of the Conquistadors: ]unipero Serra, 1713-1784, translated by Katherine Woods (New York: Harcourt, Brace and Company, 1956). The parallel between the Spanish forced labor institutions in North and South America has long been recognized, even by professed admirers of the Franciscans and Junipero Serra. See for example, the comments of Herbert E. Bolton, “The Mission as a Frontier Institution in the Spanish-American Colonies,” American Historical Review, 23 (1917), 43-45. In fact, Serra himself noted and used the parallel in justifying the beating of Indians; in a letter of January 7, 1780, to the Spanish governor of California, Filipe de Neve, he noted the fact that the phyical punishment of Indians by their “spiritual fathers” was “as old as the conquest of these kingdoms,” specifically observing that “Saint Francis Solano … in the running of his mission in the Province of Tucuman in Peru … when they failed to carry out his orders, he gave directions for his Indians to be whipped.” Quoted in James A. Sandos, “Junipero Serra’s Canonization and the Historical Record,” American Historical Review, 93 (1988), 1254; Sandos’s entire essay (pp. 125-369) is a valuable contribution to the controversy over Serra’s proposed canonization.
No longer a candidate ..
Pope Canonizes Controversial Junipero Serra, Twitter Protests
“Junipero sought to protect Indigenous dignity,” Francis said in his canonization of Friar Junipero.
So much for the anti-imperialist pope.
Posted by: jfl | Sep 24 2015 3:06 utc | 115
Germany allows 20 new US nukes to be placed in the country
These days preparations for the German air force base in Büchel in Rheinland-Pfalz, has started, reports the German television station ZDF.
The 20 bombs of the type B 61-12 are not only four times as big as the Hiroshima bomb. They are considerably more accurate.
The bombs will, should they be used, be loaded on German Tornado fighter planes within the framework of the NATO cooperation.
Angela Merkel has … given the green light to the new, powerful nuclear weapons.
How can this be a good idea? The nukes should be going the other way. The ones already there should be taken out!
B61 nuclear bomb
The B61 is a variable yield bomb (0.3 to 340 kiloton yield in various versions and settings) …
This thermonuclear weapon was built to be used!
Russia threatens countermeasures if US upgrades Germany’s nukes
Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov said on Wednesday that the move would disrupt the strategic balance in Europe and corresponding counter steps would be adopted in order to restore the strategic balance and parity in the continent, the Russian RT news agency reported.
“This is another step and unfortunately it is a very serious step towards increase of tensions on the European continent. Such actions cannot be described as a step towards stronger trust and greater stability,” President Vladimir Putin’s press secretary further said, adding that it was not a step towards strengthening stability, confidence building, and enhancement of security in Europe.
Yeah. And that’s the way Barack The Nobel Peace Prize Laureate Obama wants it.
Will the ‘first’ (and last) nuclear war be begun by the Nobel Peace Prize Laureate?
Posted by: jfl | Sep 24 2015 3:13 utc | 116
Reports: US nuclear ‘upgrades’ in Europe
[Federation of American Scientists (FAS) researcher Hans M.] Kristensen estimated that Incirlik’s vaults currently held 50 B61 nuclear weapons.
For the anti-IS operation, US F-16 jets had been relocated from Aviano, Italy to the Turkish NATO base under a “unique” arrangement.
“The Turks have declined US requests to permanently base a fighting wing at the [Incirlik] base,” he wrote.
The [Frankfurter Rundschau] FR said the B61 nuclear bomb – first devised in the 1960s – had been “modernized” so it could be set to explode at various strengths of up to ten-times the devastation inflicted at Hiroshima, Japan, in 1945.
It also has the capability to be steered toward a target placed it between short-range “tactical” and long-range “strategic” atomic weapons, the FR said.
“It now comes down to the range of the carrier aircraft,” it said.adding that congressional papers pointed to the development of a so-called B61-13 from 2038.
So the US has “at least” 50 nukes in Turkey, but the Turks “ordinarily” don’t let the US Air Force in.
The nukes are under the US control though. Right.
The “last quarter” of the Nobel Peace Prixe Laureate’s “game” is getting scarier and scarier as the clock winds down.
Posted by: jfl | Sep 24 2015 10:10 utc | 117
jfl 113
*I don’t know which is more ‘shocking’, the likelihood that China is ready to divide up the world with the US, *
so says moa’s resident *china watcher*…
http://www.atimes.com/atimes/China/KE29Ad01.html
Posted by: denk | Sep 25 2015 15:52 utc | 118
@118 denk
Certainly I hope that Dr Jian Junbo represents the real views of the Chinese government. The msm-spun story is certainly as he outlines as G-2. Who knows what the real aims of these states is? I root for Russia and China as opponents of the US empire, but both are capitalist countries and the present Chinese government is a very strongly authoritarian one as well.
Posted by: jfl | Sep 25 2015 16:46 utc | 119
China, U.S. have no choice but to seek win-win cooperation: Xi
WASHINGTON, Sept. 25 (Xinhua) — Chinese President Xi Jinping said here Friday that China and the United States have no choice but to seek win-win cooperation.
Speaking at a state arrival ceremony held by U.S. President Barack Obama at the White House, Xi noted that China and the United States can make greater impact by working together than their individual efforts.
(G-2)ish?
Xi raises six-point proposal for developing China-U.S. ties
WASHINGTON, Sept. 25 (Xinhua) — Visiting Chinese President Xi Jinping on Friday put forward a six-pronged proposal for next-stage development of China-U.S. relations.
Xi made the suggestions in his talks with U.S. President Barack Obama at the White House, which culminated his four-day first state visit to the United States.
— The two sides should maintain close exchanges and communication at all levels. Major bilateral mechanisms like the Strategic and Economic Dialogue and the High-Level Consultation on People-to-People Exchange should be brought into full play.
— The two countries should expand and deepen practical cooperation in various fields, including economy, trade, military, anti-terrorism, law enforcement, energy, environment and infrastructure.
— China and the United States should promote people-to-people exchange and consolidate the social basis for bilateral relations.
— The two countries should respect their differences in history, culture, tradition and social system, as well as development path and development stage, and learn from each other.
— The two sides should deepen dialogue and cooperation in Asia-Pacific affairs.
— They should jointly deal with regional and global challenges, enrich the strategic connotations of their relations, and provide the international community with more public goods.
(G-2)ish.
This is from Xinhua, the Chinese MSM, not the Western MSM. I’m not saying that China is any worse than any other authoritarian capitalist colossus, just no better.
Posted by: jfl | Sep 26 2015 2:39 utc | 120
jfl 120
is this your smoking gun lol ?
what do u expect from the statement out of a
BI-lateral talk,
*the 3 countries should blah blah blah….*
?
*I’m not saying that China is any worse than any other authoritarian capitalist colossus, just no better.
u’ve harped on this more than once,
u also dismiss russia as just another empire.
so pray tell, whats the point of u rooting for both ?
Posted by: denk | Sep 26 2015 14:05 utc | 121
@12[1-3] denk
If you are going to point out that China has landed not one ship but two at Tartus … an aircraft carrier and a guided missle frigate, or some such … as has been reported at …
Posted by: jaqwith | Sep 26, 2015 9:44:06 AM | 15
… I join you in your celebration. Sasparilla all around! Surely the Nobel Peace Prize Laureate knew when he sat for the photo-op with smiling, win-win Xi at the Whitehouse … he’s been pwnd by the real masters, for sure.
I wonder if Al McCoy can explain again to us the brilliance of Grandmaster Obama?
G-2ish is how Russia and China are looking now in the Mena … and Eurasia.
Posted by: jfl | Sep 26 2015 14:42 utc | 122