hegemony

Money; it's an interesting thing.
People work for it, fight for it, and have died for it.
Nations are no different.
The reality that our money is not really based on anything since the gold reserve was dropped is very relevant to today's news.
But don't count on FOX or CNN keeping you abreast of what's really going on:

Kathleen Collen:
"Forty years have passed since the majority of Americans adopted television as their principal source of information. Its dominance has become so extensive that virtually all significant political communication now takes place within the confines of flickering 30-second television advertisements. And the political economy supported by these short but expensive television ads is as different from the vibrant politics of America's first century as those politics were different from the feudalism which thrived on the ignorance of the masses of people in the Dark Ages.”

Having said that, there are dark aspects of what is going on in IRAN, that occurred in IRAQ before we went in to kick Saddam's butt out. Little is known or publicized about the fact that Saddam's ultimate blasphemy was based on his refusal to accept US Dollars for oil. And now IRAN is going to do the same.

Mike Whitney — January 23, 2006

"The Bush administration will never allow the Iranian government to open an oil exchange (bourse) that trades petroleum in euros. If that were to happen, hundreds of billions of dollars would come flooding back to the United States crushing the greenback and destroying the economy. This is why Bush and Co. are planning to lead the nation to war against Iran. It is straightforward defense of the current global system and the continuing dominance of the reserve currency, the dollar. America monopolizes the oil trade. Oil is denominated in dollars and sold on either the NYMEX or London’s International Petroleum Exchange (IPE), both owned by Americans. This forces the central banks around the world to maintain huge stockpiles of dollars even though the greenback is currently underwritten by $8 trillion of debt and even though the Bush administration has said that it will perpetuate the deficit-producing tax cuts. America’s currency monopoly is the perfect pyramid-scheme. As long as nations are forced to buy oil in dollars, the United States can continue its profligate spending with impunity."

Hegemony is the dominance of one group over other groups, with or without the threat of force, to the extent that, for instance, the dominate party can dictate the terms of trade to its advantage; more broadly, cultural perspectives become skewed to favor the dominant group. Hegemony controls the ways that ideas become "naturalized" in a process that informs notions of common sense.

If you apply that to currency, you begin to get the seriousness of our times. This is a brief simplistic history hegemony lesson:

In the 1950's the US government set up agreements with the House of Saud, the Shaw of Iran, and others for trading oil in US Dollars exclusively for protection. This means that any other country must keep in their (government) reserves-US Dollars- if they want to purchase oil. That is called Dollar Hegemony.

If Iran succeeds in going through with a non-dollar oil bourse, it could be worse than a nuclear attack.

Inflation, if they print more money, and/ or deflation which would strip jobs out of an already 'cut & run' off-shore- for- better -wages-corporate nation.

Already some cracks in the empire are beginning to appear:

January 26, 2006 Chicago Sun Times:
"Eighteen months after the Chicago City Council torpedoed a South Side Wal-Mart, 24,500 Chicagoans applied for 325 jobs at a Wal-Mart opening Friday in south suburban Evergreen Park, one block outside the city limits.
The new Wal-Mart at 2500 W. 95th is one block west of Western Avenue, the city boundary.
Of 25,000 job applicants, all but 500 listed Chicago addresses, said John Bisio, regional manager of public affairs for Wal-Mart.
"In our typical hiring process, you're pretty successful if you have 3,000 applicants," he said. "They were really crowing about 11,000 in Oakland, Calif., last year. So to get 25,000-plus applications and counting, I think is astonishing."-from Qrswave

Now, with March quickly approaching, and the drum beats getting louder, things are beginning to form that brings chills:

"Iran says it will launch medium-range missiles if attacked, and accused Britain and the United States of arming rebels in its south, as international pressure on Tehran over its nuclear plans grow.
"If we come under a military attack, we will respond with our very effective missile defence," Yahya Rahim Safavi, commander in chief of the Revolutionary Guard, told state television."

and others:

TurkishPress.com – January 29, 2006

'Teheran is getting ready to counter a “preemptive strike” by USA and Israel. The Air Force Command of the Revolutionary Guard has ordered its Shahap-3 Missile Units to keep their mobile missile ramps in motion in preparation for such an attack. Responding to this order, in darkness of the night the primary missile ramps have been moved to Kirmanshah and Hamedan, and the reserve ramps to Isfahan and Fars regions.'

Not even ramping up to the Shahap-3 are the Sunburns:

"Many years ago, Soviet planners gave up trying to match the US Navy ship for ship, gun for gun, and dollar for dollar. The Soviets simply could not compete with the high levels of US spending required to build up and maintain a huge naval armada. They shrewdly adopted an alternative approach based on strategic defense. They searched for weaknesses, and sought relatively inexpensive ways to exploit those weaknesses. The Soviets succeeded: by developing several supersonic anti-ship missiles, one of which, the SS-N-22 Sunburn, has been called "the most lethal missile in the world today." The Sunburn can deliver a 200-kiloton nuclear payload, or: a 750-pound conventional warhead, within a range of 100 miles, more than twice the range of the Exocet. The Sunburn combines a Mach 2.1 speed (two times the speed of sound) with a flight pattern that hugs the deck and includes "violent end maneuvers" to elude enemy defenses. The missile was specifically designed to defeat the US Aegis radar defense system."

In all, this tells of cataclysmic damage, even if it were successful. In the light of President Bush's bad poll numbers, there might give pause for concern that such a blatant invasion would hurt him further, unless there was another 911.

Sources inside the Houston Police Department (HPD) have confirmed officers in recent weeks have been taking part in nuclear disaster drills, adding more fuel to the fire that the city is being targeted by the "enemies within" the Bush administration for a nuclear attack.

"In the last week I have multi-checked with sources of mine in the Houston Police Department and confirmed that HPD has been running nuclear disaster drills," said former Army Intel Capt. Eric May, who is trying to alert Americans of a possible nuclear strike in the upcoming days, possibly to take place in the Texas City or Houston metro area...."

President Bush will be giving his 'State of the Union' Address next week, which should be very ,very interesting.

Take care out there.