Economist Paul Craig Roberts

[tree]

http://www.counterpunch.com/roberts04142008.html

Ed/Fred/EJ think Paul Craig Roberts, a one-time plugged-in righty who now reads like a hard-core lefty, goes off the rails when he discusses a war strike on Iran. But I argue that Roberts has great sources, so he's worth paying heed.

[Spartacus]

Re: Economist Paul Craig Roberts

He's still mostly to the right - his stances are what old-time US right wingers used to believe, but apparently no longer do.

He's basically another Ron Paul - he stayed sober while his party seems to have gone on a drunken / crystal meth bender or gone insane (that's what it looks like to an outsider anyway.)

http://www.counterpunch.com/roberts04142008.html

Ed/Fred/EJ think Paul Craig Roberts, a one-time plugged-in righty who now reads like a hard-core lefty, goes off the rails when he discusses a war strike on Iran. But I argue that Roberts has great sources, so he's worth paying heed.

[FRED]

Re: Economist Paul Craig Roberts

http://www.counterpunch.com/roberts04142008.html

Ed/Fred/EJ think Paul Craig Roberts, a one-time plugged-in righty who now reads like a hard-core lefty, goes off the rails when he discusses a war strike on Iran. But I argue that Roberts has great sources, so he's worth paying heed.

In the article you refer to Roberts says:

Nonsensical on its face, the Petraeus/Crocker testimony is just another ploy in the macabre theatre of lies that the Bush regime has told in order to justify its wars of naked aggression against Muslims.

The Bush administration could not care less about Muslins. Anyone can see the US interest in the middle east has been since the turn of the century will always be about oil.

That the Bush regime would tell such a blatant lie shows that the regime has no respect for the intelligence of the American public and no respect for the integrity of the US media.

And why should it? The public and media have fallen for every lie the Bush regime has told.

True, but then he launches into naive speculation, one of his specialties.

With Iran, Russia, China, and North Korea threatened by American belligerence, it is not difficult to imagine a scenario that would terminate all pretense of American power: For example, instead of waiting to be attacked, Iran uses its Chinese and Russian anti-ship missiles, against which the US reportedly has poor means of defense, and sinks every ship in the American carrier strike forces that have been foolishly massed in the Persian Gulf, simultaneously taking out the Saudi oil fields and the Green Zone in Baghdad, the headquarters of the US occupation. Shi'ite militias break the US supply lines from Kuwait, and Iranian troops destroy the dispersed US forces in Iraq before they can be concentrated to battle strength.

Simultaneously, North Korea crosses the demilitarized zone and takes South Korea, China seizes Taiwan and dumps a trillion dollars of US Treasury bonds on the market. Russia goes on full nuclear alert and cuts off all natural gas to Europe.

What would the Bush regime do? Wet its pants? Push the button and end the world?

If America really had dangerous enemies, surely the enemies would collude to take advantage of a dramatically over-extended delusional regime that, blinded by its own arrogance and hubris, issues gratuitous threats and lives by Mao's doctrine that power comes out of the barrel of a gun.

Now why would China's right wing totalitarian government want to ruin its perfectly effective deal with America's right wing corporate fascist government by attacking Taiwan? China's puppet government in North Korea is quite useful to China as a means of managing the US power in Asia, so why screw that up by ordering North Korea to invade South Korea? The whole scenario shows that Roberts does not really understand who is using whom for what.

The US will not invade Iran because if it does the US economy will see double digit inflation and an even deeper recession. A nation's international power flows from its economic strength so attacking Iran is a net loss.

Ain't gonna happen unless Iran attack first. Roberts needs to go back to the drawing board and come up with a new set of reasons for the drama now taking place in the area.

[Guest]

Re: Economist Paul Craig Roberts

Paul Craig Roberts needs to undergo some electroshock therapy.

[c1ue]

Re: Economist Paul Craig Roberts

I agree China's government would never bother Taiwan for external geopolitical reasons, but I disagree that the government of China wouldn't attack Taiwan if it needed to appease an angry internal population.

Tibet is the exact opposite: most Chinese don't seem to give a damn about Tibet, but the Chinese government can't let any appearance of weakness show or else Tibet AND the western provinces would secede.