Guest Post by Paul Craig Roberts
Perhaps it has occurred to you as it has to me that the United States is no longer capable of producing political leadership. In the current issue of Trends Journal, Gerald Celente describes the eight candidates (at the time he went to press) for the US presidential nomination as “Liars, cowards, freaks & fools.”
Celente put it well. If you look at the sorry collection that aspires to be the CEO of what continues to be described as the “exceptional, indispensable, most important country with the largest economy and military, the world’s only Superpower, the Uni-power,” you see a collection of nobodies. America is like the last days of Rome when contenting factions fought to put their puppet on the throne.
There is no known politician in America who measures up to Vladimir Putin’s ankle, or to the knee of China’s leaders, or to the waist of Ecuador’s, Bolivia’s, Venezuela’s, Argentina’s, Brazil’s, or to the chests of India’s and South Africa’s.
In Europe, the UK, Australia, and Canada, the natural leaders are also frozen out of the corrupt system.
In the US, “leadership” positions depend on financial support from the ruling economic interests. American presidents and politicians represent about six powerful private interest groups and no one else.
After Celente went to press, Donald Trump announced to much mirth. A “con man” they say, but what else is the President of the United States? Do you think you weren’t conned by Clinton, George W. Bush, and Obama? What universe do you live in?
In actual fact, Trump might be our best candidate to date. By all accounts, he is very rich. Thus, he doesn’t need the office in order to become rich by selling out America to interest groups.
By all accounts, Trump has a healthy ego. Thus, he could be capable of standing up to the powerful interest groups that generally determine the governance of the American serfs.
Trump’s ego might even be strong enough for him to stand up to the Israel Lobby, something my former colleague, Admiral Thomas Moorer, Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, said publicly that no American President was capable of doing.
As Celente makes clear in the current Trends Journal, all politicians are con men or con women. We are going to have them regardless, so why not try a rich one who might decide to break with tradition and serve the interests of the citizenry. This would be a unique accomplishment, affording Trump the elevation in history books that would satisfy his ego. When a person reaches Trump’s state, does he need another couple of billion dollars or is historical recognition as the savior, however temporary, more valuable?
This is not my endorsement of Trump for President. It is merely my speculations on how we might think of how large egos might be brought into our service. When we put the Clintons in office, they decided to make money so that they could outdo Hollywood and show their arrival with the $3 million they spent on their daughter’s wedding.
For Trump, $3 million is pocket change.
The rich are everywhere demonized, but no action follows. So, let’s consider voting for Trump. Some of the better Roman emperors were rich. Their riches allowed them to maintain the stability of the state and to think about its long-run survival. They could outbid the private interests that wished to overthrow them for their own purposes of immediate and highly selective gain.
It would take a lot of money to outbid Trump, although if he neglects the Secret Service and the CIA, he could go the way of John F. and Bobby Kennedy. He would have to make certain he was well protected if he cuts the budget of the military/security complex.
Money, lots of it, has one great virtue. Money in sufficient amounts conveys INDEPENDENCE. Trump, if press reports are correct, has money. This means, if correct, that Trump, unlike every other candidate, has independence from the ruling handful of private interest groups.
If Trump can assemble independent thinkers as his advisers, thus keeping himself out of the hands of the usual interest groups, should he be able to get elected, his administration could succeed in taking America in a more promising direction.
An important question is: can a really rich person find and be comfortable with peers who are not themselves really rich? If not, then Trump is not our man. But if Trump wants to save our country, he has the money and the ego, and he can find enough people to help him.
This opportunity doesn’t mean that it will be seized or that it would pan out. If Trump is our best choice, imagine how deplorable our situation is.
Gerald Celente and PCR must not take Rand Paul very seriously. Tisk, tisk Paul you just wasted my time dribbling over “The Donald” when you could have suggested at least a few people in this country who would be worthy of being president of these occupied states of Merica.
Rand Paul is looking more and more like a Neocon who’s just a little bit crotchety and doesn’t always follow the script. It’s up for debate whether that’s the real Rand or a necessary act to put on for a chance of going anywhere, but at best it’s not inspiring.
Trump is a farce, but for the reasons PCR outlines he could also be the “strong man” leader for our 4th Turning. And yes, that would make this the most farcical, outrageously over-the-top campy 4th Turning yet, but who says it can’t happen?
With any of these people I want to know who’s behind them and who has been behind them for decades. With the Bush clan it’s obvious. The Clintons seem to have actually come from nowhere, and they sold their souls a million times over and then rehypothecated the derivatives on their souls another billion times to get there – they are possibly the most craven politicians of all time. Obama is the ultimate post turtle, though even casual reading on his background will make the path obvious.
At this very, very late hour in the “Republic” I don’t think any man of the people has a chance, and I tend to think our near future leader will be someone with a military dictator’s bent – perhaps a defense contractor CEO?
That you even think that voting count on a national level, never ceases to amaze me. The people running the show entice you to vote to keep you in the system that benefits them. You are so proud when you cast your vote. Why, you have done your patriotic duty. I doubt that it was intelligent or knowledge based. Your information for a informed vote came from the Main Street Media. You were so played. When there’s real choice, I’ll vote.
Voting is the liturgy of the political church.
Why would I vote for another millionaire? They have been so representative of my need and views, or “like not”.
I would consider voting for Ben Carson. But like Al Smith, I think he would be a contender and that’s all.
At least Donald Trump is not a traitor .Right now he is the best chance this nation has. He will stop or slow all this third world immigration that is becoming a plague.
The show is on but the candidates have already been chosen.
You will be given a choice, between two candidates that are equally acceptable to those powers that really run things.
Would you like Coke or Pepsi?
That sort of thing.
Why Voting is Evil
Our so-called “democratic system” are just as immoral as having a king. Or a dictator. Or an emperor. Participating in it makes your complicit.
Why?
Because our system is based on the acceptance and use of force to ‘make people good’. From the drug war to forced taxes to the the war in Iraq, it’s all force, all the time.
We accept the State as an entity which can force the 49% to give up life, liberty, and property if the 51% decides this is the thing to do. That which you would never do (take a gun and go to your neighbor, take property, threaten to imprison or kill them if they resist for doing something harmless like using cannabis) you support “your” government in doing by voting. You then enable it by paying for it.
We can make illegal anything which the behavioural minority chooses to do which harms no one and simply tax (steal), and lock them up (kidnap) for it. If they resist, they will be attacked and, if necessary, killed.
Is this any way to run a society? Is this how you want to be treated?
Our governments are all built on theft, aggression, and violence. If you resist their confiscation of your property or detaining you for any offense they can dream up, you will be shot and killed.
If you complain about their confiscation and detainment of your person, you can only complain to their own courts, paid for by themselves, who then decide whether your complaint is legitimate or not. It’s like letting the thief and murderer decide whether it was ok to steal from you.
Jesus had it right when he said, “Do unto others as you would have them do unto you.”
Do we want someone to come to your place, guns drawn, to take your property or arrest you for: smoking cannabis? hiring a prostitute? selling raw milk? growing organic vegetables? giving a massage without a license?
“Well, *I* don’t break any laws,” you say. Oh really? In the great book 3 Felonies a Day, Harvey Silvergate describes how a normal citizen going to work, paying taxes, doing everything right, commits, on average, three felonies a day without even realizing it. So you are a criminal already.
Common law–originally designed to prevent theft and aggression–has been completely corrupted until now ‘everything is forbidden which is not expressly permitted’.
Then why do we support (via tax dollars, silence = acquiescence, and voting) this violent system that completely ignores and even persecutes our brothers and sisters, knowing that we are next?
And I haven’t even described why your vote means nothing anyway, how politicians will do what they want, influenced by special interests.
Most people do not vote now, and they have it right. Voting will not change the nature of the system. Ceasing to believe in the system will cause the system to disappear… Ceasing to support it will cause it to evaporate.
Let’s find a new way. A way that listens to everyone’s voice and needs. A way to connect and not to separate.
“What is the morality of forcing wealth from those who have it to those who have less? How is it that people are outraged when a CEO steals from his company, or a street thug steals a car, but they are not upset with themselves and their poorer neighbors for stealing from those who rightfully earned more money than they? Indeed they actively support such theft and vote for more of it! ”
——-“The Immorality of Democratic Voting” by Misis Institute
Rest of article here —> https://mises.org/library/immorality-democratic-voting
Stucky,
The problems we face, every one of them, are because we have come to view the Constitution as nothing more than suggestions and guidelines instead of supreme law that can be amended but not violated.
Stucky–Nice try! You haven’t convinced me. I’m still going to vote for Harry Truman.
Stucky II–Remember the seventh commandment? “Thou shall not steal” except by popular vote.–Gary North. Shall makes it mandatory in Law. No, exceptions.
The trouble with laws is they get in the way of what we want to do, so we rationalize, away, violating them. Of course, there are moral laws and there are immoral laws, but an immoral law is ‘no law’. It is without lawful authority It rests upon a base of perfidy.
BEA LEVER–Rand Paul is not Ron Paul. If you want Ron Paul vote for Ron Paul. He served in the H of Reps from 1976 to 2013. He has remained consistent throughout his tenure. Rand Paul has yet to prove himself.
I know that Rand can’t be as outspoken as his Dad, especially when running for the Presidency. It would be the death knell of his attempt. The people don’t want the ‘truth’. Heaven knows, as a Nation, we are bankrupt, broke, kaput. They want the same promises of ‘freebees’ and ‘handouts’, so, you have to lie or be relegated to a presidential nominee has been. Look at that liar, Obama, “the most transparent government money can buy”–“change you can believe in”, etc. The ‘Madison Avenue Boys’ were working overtime. Obama was a ‘feely good’ candidate. The voting public want the ‘feely good’ feeling. They demand it. Obama delivered. Bill Clinton delivered. Now, Hilary is trying to deliver.
We like to think that we are individual thinkers, but the truth is, we are more conformists than thinkers. When we are confronted with ‘truth’ or ‘conformity’, we most often choose ‘conformity’, even when we know the ‘truth’ is in conflict with majority thinking. We are a herd animal and the political elites hold the cattle prod. Not true you say?
Why is it then, that you can park your car in a mall parking lot, away from all the other cars, with empty spaces all around you and when you come out from shopping, there will be one or two cars parked next to you, even tho there are empty spaces, everywhere, around you? The only thing we don’t do is Mooo!
A Trump presidency would be the death knell for America as we know it. EVERYTHING would be privatized and the “don” would attempt to position his kids as heirs. If you want a return to feudalism, then he’s your guy.
On the other hand Bernie Sanders is probably the most honest, straight-talking politician ever invented and he demonstratively cares about those he serves, which is why he gets re-elected by heavy margins of Vermonters. His presidency would return rule of law and the Constitution and probably find a way to end the 1/10th of 1% control of our government.
But I guess some of you guys would prefer to crown one of the 1/10th of 1% as your leader.
Homer
If you read the article, PCR quoted Celente as saying that the eight candidates to run for president are “liars, cowards freaks and fools.” My point was that Celente and PCR don’t consider Rand Paul worthy as do most of the posters here at TBP. That was a real slap in the face to Rand as he is running for president last I looked.
My other point, high profile people like PCR and Celente should bring to light those people they deem worthy of the office…….or do they just provide lip service for our entertainment.
Westcoaster – what a pile of shit comment. We already have heirs – Bush, Clintons, Kennedys, Pauls, etc ad nauseum. The political world is full of “heirs”.
And you propose a socialist. Damn, what a great idea. That is all we need. Ask any nation with far left leaders how that has worked for them.
Trump is a nutjob. But compared to most, at least he has a chance to be an independent nutjob.
Re Rand Paul – I am not a believer. He has done a few good deeds of late, but prior, not so much. I am of the belief he is trying to tap into his father’s support base, but without his father’s true convictions.
Westcoast, let me add to llpoh’s comment. When bammy got elected, the first two signs of trouble came right away. I knew within a few weeks this wasn’t going to go well. First, the secret service came and took his blackberry. He handed it over. I guess he never studied a flow chart. Not a bosd, or even close. Then he started appointing clinton people to run things.
The federal government is a huge enterprise. He didn’t know enough competent people to staff key positions. Pretty much assured failure. Bernie sanders is a scold. You might like him, but how is he going to run something? The only way you can be competent to run something big is to do it for a long time
Experience is the only training ground.
If you”ve never run anything, you don’t realize your top people fall into a category I call almost-alphas. Pushback from them is constant. If you can’t keep them in line, they end up running the place their way. That’s a disaster. You have to be a certsin type of hard head to enforce discipline within an organization. That’s why romney would have been better than obama.
Star – in my experience, you let those almost-alphas run it their way – mostly. You go take a nap, wake up, have a peek, and if all ok go take another nap. If not ok, bang their heads together a couple of times to get their attention, then go take a nap.
The key is selecting good people. The US president can, essentially, pick anyone he or she wants for any position. And they fuck that up, by playing crony-politics.
Reagan was the best at this in my memory.
I agree completely. Stay out of their way, unless. But when unless happens, gotta be willing and able to bang heads, AND prevail. And your right about reagan.
Bea Lever–Yes, but Rand has not proven himself. That comes with time.
PCR and Celente don’t make recommendations because it wouldn’t make any difference. Your candidates have already been chosen for you. The winner is already chosen, too. Of course, in a narrow range things can change, but money will be thrown at the candidate they want to win and dirt thrown at the candidate they want to lose. The illusion of fair elections and real choice is just that, a deception.
What surprises me, Bea, is that somehow you believe that this 4 yr circus somehow make a difference.
VOTE for HILARY–“votes for sale to the highest bidder”
Bea Lever–90% of the population gets their info from the Main Street Media and base their voting on that information. MSM was packaged by Bill Clinton and sold to the elite. You’re being propagandized and most don’t even know it. It has been going on long before I was born. Ever hear of ‘Yellow Journalism’? The sinking of the ‘USS Maine’? The ‘Yellow Journalism’ of Pulitzer and Hearst had a profound impact on the ignorant and agrarian people of the US.
Something that’s not true or exaggerated to serve an agenda hidden from the readers is propaganda. And propaganda works especially so if it reinforces your beliefs.
Westcoaster says A Trump presidency would be the death knell for America as we know it. EVERYTHING would be privatized
What a stupid fucking comment!!! Name one fucking thing the Government runs that’s efficient and works?
Fuck Demoracts and their welfare state. Privatization is the only way to go, it works! If you don’t work you don’t eat.
Westcoaster’s comment maybe stupid but his fears are warranted. If you privatize everything Democrats would starve to fucking death in mass! I would start a business picking up their rotting corpses and tearing down their section 8 housing. You wanna talk about revitalization, the rot that is strangely this Country would disappear in short order. Admins drive to work would be through 30 blocks of green grass and wide open spaces instead of 30 blocks of Squalor.
Hell yes, privatization its the only way to go. Unless…….you’re a God Damn leach that votes Democrat!
I’m backing that Queer Lindsey Graham! Let’s blow the whole fucking world up and start over! This third Rock from the Sun that we all ride on is so infestated, (that is a word), that anything short of a do over just won’t work.
They are killing chickens and Turkeys by the thousands related to “possible ” bird flu, H7N9 virus, while we have millions of confirmed cases of two legged, mouth breathing, parasites, stealing oxygen from our biosphere converting it into CO2 contributing to Global Climate Change. WTF? Read the Georgia Guidestones people, we must have a reset, nature demands it, this Fourth Turning will produce it.
Vote for Lindsey Graham!!! Let’s get this shit over with, no sense in dragging out the inevitable!
Embrace the inevitable!
While I agree in principle that voting is immoral, there are a few rare candidates that have the potential to throw a spanner into the works and at least slow down the approaching train wreck. Such candidates would include Pat Buchanan, Ross Perot, Ron Paul, and yes, Donald Trump. I would not regard a vote for them as supporting the system, just the desperate act of an oppressed prole to somehow loosen the stranglehold TPTB have on the process, to allow more time for nonviolent reform, if it’s still possible. If I voted for Trump, it wouldn’t be because I was asking him to do anything for me, just maybe roll back the Fed Gov a little bit. As for Rand, to me he’s a huge disappointment, as he doesn’t seem to grasp that the principles he’s surrendered on are as important as the principles he apparently is still willing to fight for.
It’s not clear to me that your vote is entirely irrelevant to TPTB, at least if you’re not voting for one of their two selected candidates. Otherwise, why would they go to so much trouble to eliminate people like Ron Paul from the contest? I think their highest priority is to maintain control of the political machinery, so they can’t afford to allow the reported election results to differ too greatly from what people know about how they and their friends / acquaintances voted.