An attack on Iran, which Israeli and Bush administration officials appear set to carry out if Iranian uranium enrichment is not halted, would ignite a regional war in the Middle East and lead to economic collapse and political upheaval in the United States.  

When the White House brought out its $700 billion rescue plan two weeks ago, its sheer size was meant to soothe the global financial system, restoring trust and confidence.

For all the talk about Afghanistan being the "right war," and with both Obama and McCain insisting that they want to send thousands of additional US forces there, our British allies have let the camel, so to speak, out of the bag.  

Businessmen or manufacturers can either be genuine free enterprisers or statists. They can either make their way on the free market or seek special government favours & privileges. They choose according to their individual preferences & values. But bankers are inherently inclined toward statism. 

Murray N. Rothbard

 

In his fascinating Iraq war account Generation Kill, Evan Wright describes his experiences as a reporter embedded in one of the first Marine units to invade Iraq in 2003.  

Prime Minister Kevin Rudd says the US package to bail out Wall Street is a step forward in easing the global financial crisis. 

The US House of Representatives passed the $US700 billion package overnight. 

In 2003, Donald Rumsfeld estimated a war with Iraq would cost $60 billion.

Five years later, the cost of Iraq war operations is over 10 times that figure. And by the time the war is finished, it will be 50 times that much.  

What's behind the ballooning dollar signs?  

It will be one of the world’s largest asset management firms with an impressive $700 billion war chest. Nothing short of the global economy depends on its success. 

And the Treasury Department has barely a month to get it up and running.

In the Queen's speech this autumn Gordon Brown's government will announce a scheme to institute a database of every telephone call, email, and act of online usage by every resident of the UK. It will propose that this information will be gathered, stored, and "made accessible" to the security and law enforcement agencies, local councils, and "other public bodies". 

In the 1980s Gore Vidal observed of Reagonomics: "The US government prefers that public money go not to the people but to big business. The result is a unique society in which we have free enterprise for the poor and socialism for the rich." 

The Wall Street financiers and firms whose problems have prompted the $700 billion federal bailout are no strangers to Capitol Hill or to politics.  

Since 2001, eight of the most troubled firms have donated $64.2 million to congressional candidates, presidential candidates and the Republican and Democratic parties, according to data from the nonpartisan Center for Responsive Politics. 

In June of this year, Andrew Kramer, writing in the New York Times broke the story that the world's oil giants, "Exxon Mobil, Shell, Total and BP ... along with Chevron and a number of smaller oil companies" were "in talks with Iraq's Oil Ministry for no-bid contracts to service Iraq's largest fields."  

Myriad cultural historians have noted the American belief that success is a sign of God's favour.  

Over the past couple of decades, He has had a downright love-fest with the already-rich - so much so that the richest 400 Americans now have more money stashed away than the combined bottom 150 million Americans. Some $1.6 trillion. 

Concern about Palin's readiness to face Democrat Joe Biden has increased following a series of interviews in which the Alaska governor has been sometimes lost for words to answer a tough question. 

John McCain picked her as his running mate in August, energising conservative Republicans with her positions on abortion and gun rights and her background as a moose-hunting, deeply Christian mother of five from the northern frontier.