Awakening Intuition, was, Re: The specter of catastrophe returns

[Henk Elegeert]

REPLY TO: D66 at nic.surfnet.nl

Awakening Intuition ?

Ach nee, kijk de: wsws.org kristallen ... :))

Henk Elegeert

(Voor al uw problemen, raadpleeg een: Stemvork & Kristal healer/therapeut)
Zie ook: http://www.colorsound-balancing.com/new/en/article-fonoforese


2010/5/17 Antid Oto <aorta at home.nl>

> REPLY TO: D66 at nic.surfnet.nl
>
> The specter of catastrophe returns
> 17 May 2010
>
> In certain critical respects, the world of 2010 resembles the conditions
> that
> existed on the eve of World War I and World War II. Economic crisis,
> geopolitical tensions and social instability are greater today than at any
> time
> since 1945—report on “Perspectives and Tasks of the Socialist Equality
> Party,”
> January 2010
>
> [I]t is clear that since September 2008 we have been facing the most
> difficult
> situation since the Second World War—perhaps even since the First World
> War. We
> have experienced—and are experiencing—truly dramatic times—Jean-Claude
> Trichet,
> president of European Central Bank, interview with Der Spiegel, May 15,
> 2010
>
> In the late evening of Friday, May 7, 2010, an extraordinary scene unfolded
> in
> Brussels at a meeting of the leaders of the 16 eurozone member countries. A
> deadlock had developed between France and Germany over the feasibility and
> terms
> of a financial bailout of Greece. With the backing of the Obama
> administration,
> French President Nicolas Sarkozy insisted that the EU fund a €750 billion
> safety
> net for the single currency. German Chancellor Angela Merkel continued to
> resist
> this demand.
>
> Suddenly, sometime between 11:30 p.m. and midnight, the meeting exploded.
> President Sarkozy, according to observers, began “shouting and bawling,”
> banged
> his fists on the table, and demanded that Germany withdraw its opposition.
> If
> Merkel refused, Sarkozy warned, France would abandon the euro. He added,
> for
> good measure, that lasting damage would be done to Franco-German relations.
> Faced with this threat, which had been issued with the backing of the Obama
> administration, Merkel assented to the establishment of the safety net.
>
> This confrontation took place on the very eve of the 65th anniversary of
> the end
> of the Second World War in Europe.
>
> In the immediate aftermath of the agreement, the markets celebrated the
> latest
> “solution” of the expanding global economic crisis. The financial community
> was
> heartened by the pledges from the governments in Greece, Spain, Romania,
> Portugal and several other European countries that they would implement
> unprecedented and draconian austerity measures demanded by the European
> Central
> Bank (ECB). The agreement in Great Britain between the Tories and the
> Liberal
> Democrats to form a coalition government and tackle the country’s massive
> budget
> deficits contributed to the market’s rebound. However, as the week drew to
> a
> close, the euphoria dissipated and markets again suffered substantial
> losses as
> the realization spread that the shotgun agreement between Sarkozy and
> Merkel had
> settled none of the underlying problems—and, indeed, will make the
> situation worse.
>
> First, the austerity policies demanded by the European Central Bank in
> return
> for financial support will force a slashing of consumption in the targeted
> countries and drive them into recession. This, in turn, will lead to an
> erosion
> of important markets for EU-based manufacturers, particularly in Germany.
> Thus,
> the most likely outcome of the austerity measures demanded by US and
> European
> financiers is a continuation and deepening of the recession that began in
> 2008.
>
> Second, the battle over the €750 billion safety net has shattered
> confidence in
> the viability of the single-currency project, little more than a decade
> after
> its inauguration. Merkel gave in to Franco-American pressure on the evening
> of
> May 7, but rumors are sweeping financial markets, according to a report in
> the
> British Guardian, “that Merkel is printing Deutschmarks in preparation for
> a
> split” within the eurozone.
>
> The break-up of the euro does not mean merely the end of a currency. It
> threatens a devastating and potentially bloody breakdown of political
> relations
> between European states. The Süddeutsche Zeitung offered this scenario in
> its
> May 15 edition: “The European Union collapses, as its most important
> political
> clamp, the common currency, disintegrates. Twenty-seven nation states fight
> again for markets. Germany, as the largest country with a healthy
> industrial
> structure, acquires enemies, and is possibly boycotted: the specter of the
> ‘Hegemonic Power’ is revived.”
>
> This is the context within which ECB President Trichet warned that the
> current
> world political and economic situation is the “most difficult” since
> 1939-1945,
> and, perhaps, even since 1914-1918.
>
> One can be certain that a person who occupies so critical a position in
> international finance as Mr. Trichet chooses his words carefully. Speaking
> to a
> correspondent of one of the most widely read and influential news magazines
> in
> Europe, Trichet places the present crisis at a level comparable to the two
> major
> global catastrophes of the 20th century.
>
> Mr. Trichet is not exaggerating. He is familiar with European history. The
> outbreak of World War I in August 1914 was the outcome of irrepressible
> political and economic conflicts between the major European capitalist
> states
> that had accumulated during the previous four decades of relative peace.
> The
> conclusion of the war in 1918, which cost the lives of 50 million people,
> resolved none of the contradictions that had caused the war. Rather, these
> unresolved contradictions festered and grew malignant, leading to the
> economic
> calamity of the Great Depression, the emergence of fascist dictatorships,
> and,
> finally, in 1939, the outbreak of World War II. During the six years of
> barbarism that followed, approximately 80 million human beings lost their
> lives.
>
> In the decades that followed the war, the European ruling class—under the
> leadership of the United States—attempted to establish economic and
> political
> institutions that would make another catastrophic breakdown impossible. In
> particular, “peace” between Germany and France—which had fought three wars
> between 1870 and 1945—would be secured by welding the two countries
> together in
> a complex integrating network of cooperative economic relationships. The
> establishment of the European Union and, above all, the common currency,
> was the
> high point of this post-war effort to secure European stability.
>
> Paradoxically, by the time the common currency was actually launched in
> 1999,
> the objective conditions that had sustained European economic growth and
> political stability were fast eroding. A major factor in this deterioration
> was
> the intensifying crisis of American capitalism, expressed most dramatically
> in
> the transformation of the United States into the world’s largest debtor
> nation
> and, consequently, in the protracted decline in the value of the dollar.
> Far
> from promoting European stability, the accumulating contradictions of
> American
> capitalism—which finally exploded in 2008—dealt a deathblow to Europe’s
> already
> fragile economic and political equilibrium.
>
> Mr. Trichet recognizes the historical character of the crisis that
> confronts
> Europe. But neither he, nor the leaders of the governments in Europe, nor,
> for
> that matter, the Obama administration in the United States have any idea
> how to
> resolve the spreading crisis—other than to prepare for war, first against
> the
> working class and, inevitably, against each other.
>
> In the aftermath of the dissolution of the Soviet Union in 1991—the outcome
> of
> the betrayal of socialism by the reactionary Stalinist regimes—the
> propagandists
> of global capitalism proclaimed the historic triumph of the market. The
> revolutionary struggles of the 20th century against capitalism had been
> futile
> and misguided efforts, aberrations from the “normal” process of history,
> doomed
> to failure. The Marxist materialist conception of history, and its analysis
> of
> the contradictions of the capitalist mode of production, had been refuted.
>
> Now, the refutations of Marxism have been refuted by the objective
> development
> of the crisis of world capitalism. This crisis has reached such an advanced
> level that the system’s leading representatives invoke the specter of
> catastrophes that, in the last century, cost the lives of tens of millions.
>
> The events of the past two weeks are a warning and a challenge to the
> working
> class. The unfolding crisis that is sweeping the globe threatens mankind
> with a
> cataclysm of unimaginable dimensions. No solution can be found within the
> framework of capitalism. The survival of mankind depends upon the
> development of
> a politically conscious international revolutionary movement of the working
> class, for the overthrow of capitalism and the establishment of socialism.
>
> David North
>
> http://wsws.org/articles/2010/may2010/pers-m17.shtml
>
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