Month: March 2013

Chavez is dead, and I have mixed feelings about it. On one hand, no leader in the hemisphere has done a better job of critiquing the US. With observations that were spot on. On the other hand, he instituted some horrible anti-democratic policies in his own county. I suppose Bolivia’s Evo Morales has always been a better example of what Latin American socialism can do.

l-v-x-i-f-e-r:

kitsune In Japanese lore, a wild fox DEMON that causes POSSESSION. The kitsune also appears in the form of a beautiful maiden, who vampirizes her victims sexually as a SUCCUBUS. The kitsune appears in many Japanese folktales and in the literature about possession. It originated
in the lore of China, where it is described as a lewd creature, the huli jing.

The United States has always had an ambivalent attitude toward Europe. It wanted Europe to be unified, so it could serve as a more efficient market for U.S. corporations, offering great advantages of scale; but it was always concerned about the threat that Europe might move off in another direction. Many of the issues about accession of the eastern countries to the EU are related to this. The United States is strongly in favor of this accession process, because it is hoping that these countries will be able to undermine the core of Europe, which is France and Germany, big industrial countries that could move in a somewhat more independent direction.

Also in the background is a long-standing U.S. hatred of the European social system, which provides decent wages, working conditions, and benefits. The United States doesn’t want that model to exist, because it’s a dangerous one. People may get funny ideas. And it’s understood that the accession of eastern European countries, with economies based on low wages and repression of labor, may help to undermine the social standards in western Europe. That would be a big benefit for the United States.

Noam Chomsky – Imperial Ambitions (via noam-chomsky)