No, no, you have it wrong! America doesn't keep on having to declare war to help its economy. The one in Iraq will be good enough for the time being. The oil pipeline to Turkey (remember? -- the one that was going to repay America for its humanitarian efforts on behalf of us all?) was yesterday blown up for the fifth time. The constant repair of this (and much else) will keep Halliburton and Bechtel busy and profitable for a long time. Bush Senior may be feeling a trifle embarrassed on behalf of his pathetic son but privately he must be pleased with the quarterly financial statements that the mailman delivers to him.
When you were here in Bath, your son will remember my pointing out to him a casual friend I sometimes meet on my morning dogwalk who asked me about 18 months ago whether he should invest in Euros. I had told him: Yes, most certainly. I met him again yesterday and from what I gather he's sold his Euros now and bought a block of apartments in Boulogne on the profits he made. Not only that, but he's now going round the world and won't be back till March. He asked me again what I thought about things (meaning, did I have any more financial advice?). Since I haven't received a penny from him by way of a thank-you -- even a cigar would have been appreciated -- I adroitly proferred some non-financial advice instead -- viz. that Bush will be seriously thinking of vacating Iraq by the time he returns because, by then, the Shia Muslims will be turning against him in earnest in addition to the Baathists and the Sunnis. If he can make money out of that -- fine. But, in actuality, it is likely that we'll all be paying for Bush's war by then in terms of inflating currencies all over.
Keith
At 17:21 18/09/2003 -0400, you wrote:
-----Original Message----- From: Harry Pollard [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] Sent: Thursday, September 18, 2003 5:17 PM To: Cordell, Arthur: ECOM Subject: Permanent War
Hi! A long time ago, a Georgist wrote a book entitled "State of War Permanent" in which he suggested the way to keep the economy hot was to have a permanent war against a small uninhabited Pacific Island. We could bomb it, invade and disembark, shell it in a permanent war that would keep the economy going.
(One must be careful with satire. Someone is likely to say - "Hey! What a great idea.")
This came to me via the Daily Reckoning.
It's too good not to pass on. In the absence of war, Isabel will do.
------------------------------------------------------
- "The approaching Hurricane Isabel is likely to destroy property and claim lives, but it'll probably be a positive for the nation's economy," a CBS Marketwatch headline declared (without the slightest hint of irony). "The storm, currently believed by forecasters to be taking aim at the North Carolina coast, will disrupt commerce, industry and travel for a few days - or even months in some cases." But fret not, the online news service counsels, "[The storm] is likely to actually increase overall economic activity in the coming weeks as individuals and businesses repair and restore their damaged property."
-----------------------------------------------------
Harry
**************************************************** Harry Pollard Henry George School of Social Science of Los Angeles Box 655 Tujunga CA 91042 Tel: (818) 352-4141 -- Fax: (818) 353-2242 http://home.comcast.net/~haledward ****************************************************
_______________________________________________ Futurework mailing list [EMAIL PROTECTED] http://scribe.uwaterloo.ca/mailman/listinfo/futurework
Keith Hudson, 6 Upper Camden Place, Bath, England, <www.evolutionary-economics.org>
_______________________________________________ Futurework mailing list [EMAIL PROTECTED] http://scribe.uwaterloo.ca/mailman/listinfo/futurework
