The World Inequality Report, published on Thursday by French economist Thomas Piketty, warned that inequality had ballooned to ‘extreme levels’ in some countries and said the problem would only get worse unless governments took coordinated action to increase taxes and prevent tax avoidance.
The richest 0.1% of the world’s population have increased their combined wealth by as much as the poorest 50% — or 3.8 billion people — since 1980.
The report, which drew on the work of more than 100 researchers around the world, found that the richest 1% of the global population ‘captured’ 27% of the world’s wealth growth between 1980 and 2016. And the richest of the rich increased their wealth by even more. The top 0.1% gained 13% of the world’s wealth, and the top 0.001% — about 76,000 people — collected 4% of all the new wealth created since 1980.
‘The top 0.1% income group (about 7 million people) captured as much of the world’s growth since 1980 as the bottom half of the adult population,’ the report said. ‘Conversely, income growth has been sluggish or even nil for the population between the global bottom 50% and top 1%.’
https://www.theguardian.com/inequality/2017/dec/14/world-richest-increased-wealth-same-amount-as-poorest-half
Dit is één voorbeeld van de talloze wetenschappelijke onderzoeken die aantonen dat de kloof tussen rijk en arm almaar blijft toenemen, inclusief alle sociale en politieke gevolgen van dien.
Maar ondanks, of beter nog, juist door de toenemende ongelijkheid in de wereld, verstrekt het Amerikaans Congres de afgelopen jaren meer dan 50 procent van het federale budget dat het kan verdelen, aan het machtige militair-industrieel complex. Voor oorlogsvoering is er altijd genoeg geld. Om dit astronomisch hoog bedrag te rechtvaardigen wordt door de Amerikaanse ‘Deep State’ telkens weer een nieuwe vijand aangewezen. Om het zo duidelijk mogelijk te stellen: de VS kan niet zonder oorlog om zijn afnemende grondstoffen en slinkende markten ‘veilig te stellen,’ nu China de belangrijkste economische macht in de 21ste eeuw is geworden, en Rusland op het wereldtoneel is teruggekeerd, zeer tot het ongenoegen van de elite in Washington en dus van de polderpers en de polderpolitici. Zo verscheen anno 2014 Geert Mak’s reisverslag In America. Travels with John Steinbeck, in hetzelfde jaar dus dat de gewelddadige door de CIA geïnstigeerde en gefinancierde Maidan Revolte plaatsvond, waarbij de democratisch gekozen Oekraïense regering bij een staatsgreep werd verdreven, om plaats te maken voor een regering die door de Obama-regering zelf werd samengesteld. In zijn boek beweert Mak met grote stelligheid:
In this new situation, Europe is vulnerable, at least in the short term. The continent is divided and susceptible to blackmail because a number of European countries have become highly dependent on Russian gas. Defence has been neglected since the end of the Cold War; NATO has expanded its territory without strengthening its own armed forces; most European countries have implemented severe cutbacks and a common European defense policy remains a distant prospect. After decades of peace, America’s traditional allies represent a serious security problem… over recent years America’s military capacity has been reduced to a historically low level.
Tekenend voor zijn anti-Russische houding is Mak’s bewering dat de ‘Russen het gevoel [hebben] dat de westerse wereld, inclusief westerse waarden en westerse denkwijzen, niet langer voorop staat.’ Gezien het feit dat mijn oude vriend zich graag laat aankondigen als ‘historicus’ is het veelzeggend dat hij met betrekking tot de ‘westerse waarden en westerse denkwijzen’ zo vaag blijft, want hij beweerde dit nadat de VS, met steun van de NAVO, druk doende was het Midden-Oosten in totale chaos te veranderen, waarbij ontelbare doden en gewonden vielen en soevereine staten uiteenvielen. Was de totale vernietiging van Noord Korea een voorbeeld van die 'westerse waarden’ en ‘denkwijzen’? Waren de napalm bombardementen op de Vietnamese boerenbevolking en stedelingen een illustratie van de westerse beschaving? Waren de illegale NAVO-invallen in Afghanistan en Irak een hoogstandje van westerse ‘waarden’? Was de desastreuze aanval op Libië, het rijkste Afrikaanse land, een illustratie van Geert Mak’s ‘westerse denkwijzen’? Bovendien hebben zeker niet alleen de ‘Russen het gevoel dat de westerse wereld’ absoluut ‘niet langer voorop staat.’ Het tot de bevrijdingsoorlogen durende Europese koloniale geweld werd na 1945 onder aanvoering van de Verenigde Staten voortgezet, en heeft ertoe geleid dat slechts een deel van het Westen, verenigd in de NAVO, de oorlog tegen Rusland steunt. De uit 2007 stammende filmdocumentaire ‘War Made Easy: How Presidents & Pundits Keep Spinning Us to Death’ toont aan hoe gewelddadig de VS sinds het einde van de Tweede Wereldoorlog opereert. De documentaire begint met de constatering van Sydney Schanberg, die als onderzoeksjournalist en voormalig verslaggever van The New York Times naam maakte, dat ’We Americans are the ultimate innocents. We are forever desperate to believe that this time the government is telling us the truth,’ een mentale stoornis die door de wijdverspreide westerse propaganda ook in Europa manifest is geworden, zoals opnieuw uit de in 2014 begonnen oorlog in Oekraïne duidelijk is. Enkele fragmenten uit ‘War Made Easy’:
Since World War II we have seen a dramatic escalation in United States military actions around the globe, ranging from missile strikes and rapid troop deployments, to all out wars and occupations.
The reasons for these military interventions have varied, each involving complex geopolitical interests in different parts of the world at different times in US history. But the public face of these wars has not reflected this complexity.
Over the past five decades deliberation and debate about US military actions have largely been left to a closed circle of elite Washington policy makers, politicians and bureaucrats whose rationales for war have come into public view only with the release of leaked or declassified documents, often years after the bombs have been dropped and the troops have come home.
In real time, officials have explained and justified these military operations to the American people by withholding crucial information about the actual reasons and potential costs of military action — again and again choosing to present an easier version of war’s reality... a steady and remarkably consistent storyline designed not to inform, but to generate and maintain support and enthusiasm for war.
Nationally syndicated columnist and author Norman Solomon began to notice the basic contours of this official storyline during the war in Vietnam…
NORMAN SOLOMON: through that process I began to really wonder about whether we were getting more truth or lies.
SEAN PENN (tekstvoorlezer. svh): In the years since, Solomon has focused his attention on a set of striking parallels between the selling of the Vietnam War and the way Presidents have rallied public support for subsequent military actions.
NORMAN SOLOMON: Looking back on the Vietnam War, as I did many times, I had a very eerie feeling that while the names of the countries changed, and of course each circumstance was different, there were some parallels that cried out for examination.
Rarely if ever does a war just kind of fall down from the sky. The foundation needs to be laid, and the case is built, often with deception…
SEAN PENN: The use of propaganda to arouse public support for war is not new. Leaders throughout history have turned to propaganda to transform populations understandably wary of the costs of war into war’s most ardent supporters — invoking images of nationalism, and channeling fear and anger towards perceived enemies and threats.
And in the United States since World War II, government attempts to win public support for military actions have followed a similar pattern.
FIFTIES PROPAGANDA FILM: We are living in an era marked by the growth of socialism. It’s basic godless philosophy --
Lying, dirty ...
It’s goal of world conquest — Shrewd, godless ...
Its insidious tactics —
Murderous, determined ...
And its cunning strategy —
It’s an international criminal conspiracy.
NORMAN SOLOMON: It’s the same sort of message that’s utilized today and often identical techniques.
PRESIDENT GEORGE W. BUSH (MONTAGE): States like these and their terrorist allies constitute an axis of evil, arming to threaten the peace of the world.
These are barbaric people.
Servants of evil.
The cult of evil.
A monumental struggle of good versus evil. But good will prevail.
NORMAN SOLOMON: Whether it’s the Soviet Union or Al Qaeda, it provides a way to legitimize US plans for war. You have the comparison between the enemy leader and Hitler.
PETER JENNINGS, ABC: President Bush called Saddam Hussein a little Hitler again today.
PRESIDENT GEORGE H.W. BUSH: We are dealing with Hitler revisited.
PRESIDENT GEORGE W. BUSH: Bin Laden and his terrorist allies have made their intentions as clear as Lenin and Hitler before them.
NORMAN SOLOMON: We don’t get information that would help us put the images in perspective
PRESIDENT REAGAN: This mad dog of the Middle East... I find that he’s not only a barbarian, but he’s flakey (onhandelbaar. svh).
PRESIDENT GEORGE H.W. BUSH: The drug indicted, drug related, indicted dictator of Panama...
NEWS REPORTER (UNIDENTIFIED): And to support their claim that Noriega was out of control, ghoulish (demonisch. svh) evidence of Satanic practices with dead animals that one official called ‘kinky’ (pervers. svh).
PRESIDENT GEORGE W. BUSH: Saddam Hussein is a homicidal dictator who is addicted to weapons of mass destruction.
NORMAN SOLOMON: And as Aldous Huxley said long ago — it’s more powerful to often leave things out than it is to tell lies. For instance, quite often the US government directly helped the dictators that we’re now being told must be overthrown. And it’s that selectivity of history that’s a very effective form of propaganda.
SEAN PENN: This selective view of reality, buttressed by these fear-based appeals, represents a larger pre-war pattern: the repeated claim that the United States uses military force only with great reluctance —
PRESIDENT LYNDON JOHNSON: We still seek no wider war.
PRESIDENT RONALD REAGAN: The United States does not start fights.
PRESIDENT GEORGE H.W. BUSH: America does not seek conflict.
PRESIDENT BILL CLINTON: I don’t like to use military force.
PRESIDENT GEORGE W BUSH: Our nation enters this conflict reluctantly.
SEAN PENN: And only for the most virtuous of reasons: first and foremost, to spread freedom and democracy.
PRESIDENT LYNDON JOHNSON: We want nothing for ourselves, only that the people of South Vietnam be allowed to guide their own country in their own way.
NORMAN SOLOMON: The rhetoric of democracy is part of the process of convincing people that even though unpleasant things must be done sometimes in its name, like bombing other countries, democracy is really what it's about.
PRESIDENT RONALD REAGAN: The United States has been engaged in an effort to stop the advance of communism in Central America by doing what we do best: by supporting democracy.
NORMAN SOLOMON: And it's almost as though repeating it enough times makes it so.
PRESIDENT LYNDON JOHNSON: Our cause of liberty, our cause of freedom, our cause of compassion and understanding.
PRESIDENT GEORGE H.W. BUSH: People want democracy, peace, and the chance for a better life and dignity and freedom.
PRESIDENT BILL CLINTON: We want to lift lives around the world, not take them.
NORMAN SOLOMON: These are forms of propaganda that are insidious, because they tug at our heartstrings.
PRESIDENT BILL CLINTON: We must get the Kosovo refugees home safely. Mine fields will have to be cleared. Homes destroyed by Serb forces have to be rebuilt. Homeless people in need of food and medicine
NORMAN SOLOMON: Of course, we want to help other people. These are propaganda messages that say don’t just think of yourself, America can't just be selfish. It makes bombing other people ultimately seem like an act of kindness, of altruism.
PRESIDENT BILL CLINTON: Today, our armed forces joined our NATO allies in air strikes against Serbian forces responsible for the brutality in Kosovo.
UNIDENTIFIED REPORTER: It was another devastating hit against Yugoslavia’s capital.
PRESIDENT BILL CLINTON: We are upholding our values, protecting our interests and advancing the cause of peace.
UNIDENTIFIED REPORTER: Belgrade's largest heating plant up in flames.
PRESIDENT GEORGE H.W. BUSH: And even as planes of the multinational forces attack Iraq, I prefer to think of peace, not war.
NORMAN SOLOMON: If my motives are pure, then the fact that I’m killing people may not be too upsetting. As a matter of fact, it may indicate that I’m killing people for very good reasons.
PRESIDENT GEORGE W. BUSH: America will stand with the allies of freedom to support democratic movements in the Middle East and beyond, with the ultimate goal of ending tyranny in our world.
NORMAN SOLOMON: And so, you have kind of the high-ground president with the lofty motives being proclaimed. We're told that peace is being sought, alternatives to war are being explored. And that's kind of, you know, the official story.
PRESIDENT LYNDON JOHNSON: And I am continuing and I am increasing the search for every possible path to peace.
NORMAN SOLOMON: Whether we're talking about President Johnson or President Nixon or the president today, you have one chief executive after another in the White House saying how much they love peace and hate war.
PRESIDENT RONALD REAGAN: We maintain our strength in order to deter and defend against aggression, to preserve freedom and peace.
PRESIDENT GEORGE H.W. BUSH: No one, friend or foe, should doubt our desire for peace
to expose a 50-year pattern of government deception and media spin that has dragged the United States into one war after another from Vietnam to Iraq. Narrated by actor and activist Sean Penn, the film exhumes remarkable archival footage of official distortion and exaggeration from LBJ to George W. Bush, revealing in stunning detail how the American news media have uncritically disseminated the pro-war messages of successive presidential administrations.
Aan de hand van de feiten wisten deze documentaires en kritische commentaren van met name Angelsaksische intellectuelen de heersende propaganda te ontzenuwen. Na de val van de Sovjet Unie bleek al snel dat de VS de alleenheerschappij in de wereld met geweld naar zich toe wilde trekken, waardoor zelfs ook voor de meest naïeve westerlingen de vraag oprees wat de inzet van de Eerste Koude Oorlog nu eigenlijk geweest was. Wat hadden al die jaren de ‘westerse waarden en westerse denkwijzen’ betekend? In het kader daarvan speelde er een nog veel ouder probleem mee dat Friedrich Nietzsche in zijn Jenseits von Gut und Böse (1886) ter sprake bracht door ‘het gehele morele systeem van de christelijke, West-Europese zeden’ te genadeloos te bekritiseren. De Duitse filosoof schrijft dan: ‘Wenn du lange in einen Abgrund blickst, blickt der Abgrund auch in dich hinein.’ In feite als nooit eerder beschreef de Duitse filosoof de leegte, de horror, de zinloosheid, onverschilligheid en de oneindige domheid van de westerse massamedia. Geïsoleerd in een anonieme maatschappij waarin de consumptiecultuur de van zichzelf vervreemde mens zin en betekenis moet geven, neemt het besef toe dat ‘als je lang in een afgrond kijkt, de afgrond ook in jou kijkt.’ Concreet gesteld: de burger ziet zich momenteel gedwongen zich af te vragen of hij of zij bereid is een genocidale oorlog te steunen. Over die genocide kan en mag hij niet meebeslissen. Zijn/haar rol is beperkt tot die van slachtoffer. Alleen een ondemocratische elite, die zich niets meer aantrekt van de ‘volkswil,’ kan hierover besluiten.
Tot nu toe zijn Geert Mak en zijn mede-opiniemakers enthousiaste voorstanders van de geweldsspiraal met Rusland en China. Hetzelfde geldt voor een aanzienlijk deel van de westerse militaire leiders en de zogeheten democratische politici. Net als de mainstream-journalist Mak zijn zij ervan overtuigd dat ‘After decades of peace, America’s traditional allies represent a serious security problem,’ waardoor wij nu wel degelijk het risico moeten aanvaarden van een genocidaal treffen met twee nucleaire grootmachten. Niet voor niets meent mijn oude vriend dat ‘America has functioned for decades, in Europe especially, as a keeper of order, as world policeman,’ en dat:
in large parts of the world the United States is still the ‘world’s indispensable nation’ as Madeleine Albright once put it, the ‘anchor,’ the ‘default power.’
‘We have heard that a half a million children have died [because of sanctions against Iraq]. I mean that's more children than died in Hiroshima. And — you know, is the price worth it?’
antwoordde:
‘I think this is a very hard choice, but the price — we think the price is worth it.’
Voor Mak en de zijnen blijven liberale Amerikaanse autoriteiten, met een uitgesproken fascistische zienswijze, ‘betrouwbare bronnen.’ Het laat zien hoe misdadig Nederlanders zijn geworden. Volgende keer meer over de normen en waarden van de de Geert Makken en hun kleinburgerlijk publiek.
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