Generational Theory Forum: The Fourth Turning Forum: A message board discussing generations and the Strauss Howe generational theory

(11-03-2016, 11:08 PM)X_4AD_84 Wrote: [ -> ]> Meanwhile here in the US, we also face an unprecedented
> situation. Unbelievable as it might have seemed mere weeks ago,
> Trump has a chance of winning. Normally, a GOP win means the stock
> market climbs. But if Trump wins, it will crash.

The possibility of a Trump win has already been priced in by
investors, so a Trump win won't cause a stock market crash. On
the other hand, the stock market is in a huge bubble, so it's
going to crash no matter who wins.

The media hysteria in this election is beyond belief. The media
aren't even trying to hide their bias and consider it to be a duty to
give up being professional journalists and instead become political
hacks reporting total garbage. If there's any danger to American
democracy, it's because Obama and the mainstream media have teamed
up to as much damage as possible.

There's nothing "unprecedented" about what's going on. The Democrats
did everything they could to ravage American institutions after the
2000 election, especially the Supreme Court, and then spent the next
year making semi-racist attacks on Bush, ridiculing his hat and his
Texas accent. The semi-racist attacks continued for years, and in
2006 the Democrats came out with a Hollywood movie, "Death of a
President," that specifically protrayed the assassination of Bush.

During the Obama administration, mainstream media and Democrats have
been referring to Republicans as everything from "teabaggers" to
"deplorables," and Obama's friend James Hoffa has repeatedly incited
violence against Republicans and Tea Partiers. This at a time when
the Democrats in Washington have been more corrupt than anything I've
seen in my lifetime.

So it's the Democrats who are a danger to American democracy and
institutions, not Donald Trump.

*** 5-Nov-16 World View -- Egypt fears more social unrest after sharp devaluation of currency

This morning's key headlines from GenerationalDynamics.com

• Egypt, in economic crisis, sharply devalues currency in order to get an IMF loan
  
• Egypt's government says that 'the luxury of delay is not available'
  

****
**** Egypt, in economic crisis, sharply devalues currency in order to get an IMF loan
****


People jostle with each other to get to the fuel nozzle on Friday in the hours before a scheduled 47% increase in the price of petrol (al-Ahram)

In a step unprecedented for Egypt, in order to meet conditions for a
$16 billion loan from the International Monetary Fund (IMF), the
Central Bank of Egypt announced on Thursday that its pound currency
would be allowed to float in value against other currencies.
Previously, the government pegged the currency at a fixed rate of 8.8
pounds per US dollar, but international foreign exchange (forex)
traders were increasingly unwilling to pay a dollar for just 8.8
Egyptian pounds.

The "grey market" price was already at around 15-16 pounds per US
dollar, so it's not surprising that when the currency was allowed to
float, it quickly plummeted in a single day from 8.8 pounds per US
dollar to a value of about 14.65 pounds per dollar. This meant that
prices of imported goods will cost about 45% more than before the
currency was floated.

The government also announced a 30-47% increase in subsidized fuel
prices, as part of a plan to slash its total subsidy bill by 14%. The
announcement was made about two hours before the price increase would
take effect, resulting in long lines of cars hoping to fill up during
those two hours.

Egypt's economy had been increasingly in crisis at the fixed exchange
rate. US dollars were becoming increasingly scarce, and all imports
had be purchased in Egyptian pounds, which exporters increasingly
refused to accept. The result was that basic commodities like sugar
and flour were almost completely unavailable. Egyptian citizens were
becoming increasingly vocal in blaming the government for the
shortages.

However, the shortages have now been replaced by prices that are
40-60% higher than before, so social unrest is only likely to
increase. Al-Ahram (Cairo) and Reuters and NPR and Guardian (London, 25-Oct)

****
**** Egypt's government says that 'the luxury of delay is not available'
****

Ever since the Arab Spring and the fall of Egypt's dictator
Hosni Mubarak in 2011, Egypt's economy has been plagued by a
series of disasters. There have been riots and jihadist terrorist
attacks that have sharply cut Egypt's income from tourism.

When Mohamed Morsi became the first democratically elected leader of
Egypt in its history, there was hope that things would settle down.
However, Morsi turned out to be one of the stupidest leaders in
Egypt's history, and proceeded to destroy one of Egypt's institutions
after another in order to gain more power for himself and his Muslim
Brotherhood government. This led to the army coup on July 3, 2013,
led by then General Abdel al-Fattah al-Sisi, who is now president of
Egypt.

All this chaos once again resulted in harm to the tourist industry,
but there was a more significant result. Qatar was a big supporter of
the Muslim Brotherhood, and provided a great deal of aid to Egypt when
Morsi was in power. That aid ended with the coup, and the slack was
taken up by Saudi Arabia, United Arab Emirates (UAE) and Kuwait.
However, the collapse in the price of oil since then has meant
reduced aid from these countries to Egypt.

During the last five years, Egypt's economy has continued to worsen,
and the Egyptian currency was under attack by forex investors. Even
so, Egypt's central bank continued to peg the pound at a fixed rate
versus the US dollar. Finally, in July of this year, Tarek Amer, the
governor of the Central Bank of Egypt, announced that Egypt's
longstanding policy of defending the Egyptian pound against
devaluation had been a "grave error," because it hadn't helped the
economy, but instead had caused numerous problems, including shortages
of dollars.

This announcement exacerbated the crisis, since it became clear that
some kind of currency devaluation was coming, especially when the
International Monetary Fund (IMF) appeared to demand it if the IMF
were going to approve a loan to Egypt.

On Friday, Egypt's prime minster Sherif Ismail held a press conference
and said:

> [indent]<QUOTE>"Yesterday was an important day in the history of the
> Egyptian economy, with the moves in foreign currency and petroleum
> prices. ... We’re taking important decisions, decisions that will
> revive the economy and take it forward. ...
>
> The luxury of delay is not available. It may have been available
> in previous decades but today we cannot afford such
> painkillers."<END QUOTE>[/indent]

There has been massive social unrest in Egypt in the last five years,
since the beginning of the Arab Spring. The government has good
reason to fear that there will be substantially more social unrest, as
the currency devaluation causes higher prices to bite further into
people's incomes. Al Ahram (Cairo) and Bloomberg and Tahrir Institute for Middle East Policy (Cairo, 3-Oct)

Related Articles

• Generational Dynamics analysis of the crisis in Egypt (28-Jul-2013)
  
  
• Downed EgyptAir flight an economic disaster for Egypt (21-May-2016)
  
  
• Egypt-Saudi deal for Red Sea bridge triggers massive protests in Cairo (16-Apr-2016)
  
  
• Ousting Morsi may have saved Egypt from austerity, for a while (27-Jul-2013)
  

KEYS: Generational Dynamics, Egypt, International Monetary Fund, IMF,
Hosni Mubarak, Mohammed Morsi, Muslim Brotherhood,
Abdel al-Fattah al-Sisi, Qatar, Saudi Arabia,
Tarek Amer, Central Bank of Egypt, Sherif Ismail

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John J. Xenakis
100 Memorial Drive Apt 8-13A
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Phone: 617-864-0010
E-mail: john@GenerationalDynamics.com
Web site: http://www.GenerationalDynamics.com
Forum: http://www.gdxforum.com/forum
Subscribe to World View: http://generationaldynamics.com/subscribe

*** 6-Nov-16 World View -- Turkey's Erdogan eliminates more opposition in quest for power

This morning's key headlines from GenerationalDynamics.com

• Turkey's Erdogan eliminates more opposition in quest for power
  
• Erdogan continues his war against Turkey's media
  

****
**** Turkey's Erdogan eliminates more opposition in quest for power
****


The editor and leading reporters of Cumhuriyet, Turkey's oldest and most respected newspaper, were arrested on Saturday (Hurriyet)

Turkey's president Recep Tayyip Erdogan never ceases to astonish, as
he arrests, fires, and otherwise eliminates anyone or anything that
might stand in his way to increased powers that are appearing more and
more dictatorial in nature.

On Friday, the leaders and several MPs of Turkey's Kurdish Peoples'
Democratic Party (HDP) were arrested, allegedly for links to the
Kurdistan Workers Party (PKK), a terrorist group that has conducted
terror attacks on targets within Turkey. Eliminating members of an
opposing party from Parliament gives more power to Erdogan's own AKP
(Justice and Development Party).

Hours later, a car bomb killed nine people in Diyarbakir in a largely
Kurdish region in southeastern Turkey. Diyarbakir has been the site
of other recent PKK terror attacks

as well.

Erdogan's supporters would claim that by arresting pro-Kurdish MPs,
Erdogan was increasing internal security in Turkey, and protecting
Turkey from PKK attacks. Erdogan's opponents would claim that by
arresting pro-Kurdish MPs, Erdogan is inflaming Kurdish anger at the
government, and providing cover for PKK terrorists to perform more
terror attacks.

Erdogan has been seeking additional powers for years, eliminating
political opponents. He has favored a constitutional change that
would further concentrate power in his hands.

Among the HDP politicians that Erdogan had arrested was the party
leader Selahattin Demirtas, who has led the opposition to the
constitutional change. Demirtas and other HDP politicians out of the
Parliament, Erdogan can now move forward with the vote on the
constitutional changes.

Erdogan has been eliminating his opposition for years, but the July 15
aborted coup has stoked nationalism among his AKP supporters enough
that he can now get away with things that might have been more
difficult a few months ago.

In the past week alone, Erdogan had 10,000 civil servants dismissed,
bringing the total since July to 100,000. He's arrested mayors and
conducted a war against the media.

Turkey is increasingly a badly polarized country, with Erdogan's
supporters passionately supporting his massive post-coup purge, and
his opponents fearing that Turkey is headed for a dictatorship under
Erdogan. It's possible in a sense that they're both right, and it's
also possible that Turkey is headed for a civil war. Yeni Safak (Ankara) and BBC and Washington Post and Cumhuriyet

Related Articles

• A dark shadow looms over EU-Turkey refugee deal, as Turkey passes harsh anti-Kurdish law (21-May-2016)
  
  
• In bizarre gaffe, Erdogan compares Turkey's government to Hitler's Germany (02-Jan-2016)
  

****
**** Erdogan continues his war against Turkey's media
****

Erdogan's war against the media began well before the July 15 coup.

In March, Erdogan ordered a government takeover of Turkey's most
important opposition media, the Zaman media group, publishers of
Turkey's largest newspaper Zaman, its English language version,
Today's Zaman, plus the Cihan News Agency and Aksiyon magazine.

Zaman was owned by a political enemy of Erdogan, an exiled Muslim
cleric Felhullah Gülen. They once were allies but in 1999 Erdogan
accused Gülen of trying to overthrow the government Gülen fled to the
United States in 1999, and has lived in Pennsylvania since then.
Erdogan's government has declared Gülen to be a terrorist and has
asked the US government for extradition, but has been refused.

Erdogan has had tens of thousands of civil servants, academics,
politicians, and media personnel fired or arrested, accusing them
without proof of being linked to either Gulen or the PKK.

During the last week, fifteen more media outlets were closed, bring
the total since July to about 170. The government has also crippled
internet social media sources, making them unusable in Turkey.

On Saturday, Erdogan had the editor and other staff members of
Cumhuriyet newspaper arrested. Cumhuriyet is a special newspaper in
Turkey's history. It was started on May 7, 1924, at the time of of
Turkey's founding by Mustafa Kemal Atatürk. Ataturk declared Turkey
to be a secular state, and Cumhuriyet has since then strictly followed
the secularist line.

Since rising to power in the early 2000s, Erdogan has repeatedly
violated Ataturk's policy of secularism, and has sought to make Turkey
a Sunni Muslim Islamist state. Cumhuriyet has continued to strongly
support secularism, and has been critical of both Erdogan, Gulen, and
the PKK. For that reason, Erdogan's charges that Cumhuriyet has
supported Gulen and the PKK are not considered credible. Hurriyet (Istanbul) and Cumhuriyet and Cumhuriyet and BBC

Related Articles

• Turkey's 'shameful day for free press' as government seizes Zaman media (06-Mar-2016)
  
  
• Turkey's Erdogan gives himself dictatorial powers, moving Turkey away from the West (22-Jul-2016)
  
  
• Attempted army coup in Turkey collapses within hours (17-Jul-2016)
  

KEYS: Generational Dynamics, Turkey, Recep Tayyip Erdogan, Diyarbakir,
Kurdish Peoples' Democratic Party, HDP, Kurdistan Workers Party, PKK,
Selahattin Demirtas, Justice and Development Party, AKP,
Cumhuriyet, Zaman Media, Felhullah Gülen

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John J. Xenakis
100 Memorial Drive Apt 8-13A
Cambridge, MA 02142
Phone: 617-864-0010
E-mail: john@GenerationalDynamics.com
Web site: http://www.GenerationalDynamics.com
Forum: http://www.gdxforum.com/forum
Subscribe to World View: http://generationaldynamics.com/subscribe

*** 7-Nov-16 World View -- US-backed Kurdish militias in Syria make surprise announcement of Raqqa operation

This morning's key headlines from GenerationalDynamics.com

• US-backed Kurdish militias in Syria make surprise announcement of Raqqa operation
  
• Is Syria's Bashar al-Assad a 'necessary evil'?
  

****
**** US-backed Kurdish militias in Syria make surprise announcement of Raqqa operation
****


Kurdish forces on Sunday preparing to liberate Raqqa (Rudaw)

The Kurdish US-backed Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF) on Sunday
announced the beginning of an operation to recapture Raqqa from the
so-called Islamic State (IS or ISIS or ISIL or Daesh). Raqqa, a city
of over 300,000 people, has served as the "capital city" for ISIS.

Different news reports of the operation are calling it by different,
though similar names. The names I've seen so far are:

• Operation Euphrates Rage
  
• The Wrath of the Euphrates
  
• Euphrates Anger
  
• Angry Euphrates

The announcement was a surprise, coming so soon after the beginning of
the operation to recapture the city of Mosul in Iraq from ISIS. It's
possible that the start of the operation was speeded up in order to
give ISIS less time to prepare. However, both of the operations, in
Raqqa and Mosul, are expected to take months, and to require bloody
street to street fighting.

The announcement is also controversial because the principal fighters
are Kurds, something that's opposed by Turkey and by many Arab Sunnis.
The Kurds have treated Sunni Arabs harshly in other cities that the
Kurds have liberated from ISIS, and have expelled many of the Sunnis,
and Raqqa Sunnis are afraid that the same thing will happen to them.
This is not an unreasonable fear. The Kurds are known to be trying to
form an independent Kurdish state called "Rojava" in northern Syria
and Iraq, along the border with Turkey, and so expelling Sunni Arabs
from Raqqa would be consistent with this plan.

Turkey on the other hand has launched Operation Euphrates Shield on
the other (western) side of the Euphrates River, allied with the Free
Syrian Army, to recapture regions around Aleppo from ISIS, and also to
block the Kurds from creating Rojava. Turkey is bitterly opposed to
the use of Kurdish militias in Syria, since it considers them to be
terrorists, allied with the Kurdistan Workers Party (PKK), which is
considered a terrorist group by the US and Europe, and has been
conduction terrorist bombings in Turkey.

Turkey had wanted to participate in the liberation of Raqqa, and
didn't want the Kurds to participate. The US had to choose between
the two, and chose the Kurds. Haaretz (Israel) and Rudaw (Iraqi Kurdistan) and AP

Related Articles

• US and Turkey headed for collision in Syria (23-Sep-2016)
  
  
• Turkey and Iraq in dispute over Turkish participation in Mosul operation (18-Oct-2016)
  
  
• Turkey's 'Operation Euphrates Shield' turns into full-scale invasion of Syria (26-Aug-2016)
  

****
**** Is Syria's Bashar al-Assad a 'necessary evil'?
****

I've written frequently that Syria's Alawite/Shia president Bashar
al-Assad is the worst genocidal leader so far in the 21st century,
because of his war crimes and his apparent attempted extermination of
the Alawite's historic enemies, the Syrian Sunnis. One web site
reader says that al-Assad is a "necessary evil":

> [indent]<QUOTE>"I personally do not like Assad, John, I even wrote a
> very lengthy article about how the U.S. should interfere to end
> the war and depose his regime, but my views have since evolved.
> As evil as Bashar may be, he is a necessary evil to the region --
> at least for now, especially in the wake of the massive
> geopolitical changes going on right now."<END QUOTE>[/indent]

I understand your argument, but there are two problems with it.

First, why is he "necessary"? You're making an assumption that the
region is better off with him there, committing genocide against
Sunnis, than the region would be without him. How do you justify that
assumption? Was Adolf Hitler a necessary evil for Germany when he
perpetrated the Holocaust? Was Mao Zedong a necessary evil for China
when he perpetrated the Great Leap Forward? Was Pol Pot a necessary
evil for Cambodia when he perpetrated the Killing Fields? I don't
think you can successfully make the argument you're trying to make.

Second, I think it's demonstrable, or very close to it, that the
region would be better off without him. The civil war in Syria didn't
spring from nowhere. It was caused when al-Assad unleashed his army
and air force against peaceful protesters in 2011. Up to that point,
Turkey and Saudi Arabia were friendly with al-Assad. Things really
turned around in August 2011, when al-Assad launched a massive
military assault on a large, peaceful Palestinian refugee camp in
Latakia, filled with tens of thousands of women and children
Palestinians. That's what led to the geopolitical disaster you're
alluding to.

Since then, Sunnis have been fighting Shia/Alawite Assad on a
sectarian basis. The Sunni groups fighting Assad can be split into
rough categories:

• Syrian people: the "moderate" Free Syrian Army (FSA)
  types
  
• Syrian people: the "jihadist" types who joined Jabhat al-Nusra
  (al-Nusra Front, now Jabhat Fateh al-Sham or JFS)
  
• Foreign fighters: They have come from around 80 countries around
  the world to fight al-Assad. However, the Syrian people don't like
  them, and they don't like the Syrian people, so they went on their own
  to form ISIS.

Since 2011, The rise of Sunni groups fighting al-Assad has brought in
countervailing sectarian forces from Iran and Russia. This has turned
the Syrian "civil war" into a proxy war.

This is a generational Awakening era for Syria, like America in the
1960s when people were still living in the shadow of WW II and did not
want another war. In Syria today, the war was begun by al-Assad in
2011 by attacking peaceful protesters, and is continuing today because
of unceasing attacks by al-Assad, Russia, Hezbollah and Iran -- and
even so, al-Assad's army is struggling for survival.

So I claim that it's demonstrable that if al-Assad were replaced by a
technocrat, then the war would fizzle. Syria would once again get
along with Turkey and Saudi Arabia. The Syrians -- the FSA and
al-Nusra -- would then unite and expel ISIS. This is what happened in
Iraq during the "surge" in 2007, when the Iraqi Sunnis united and
expelled foreign fighters from al-Qaeda in Iraq. Millions of people
in Jordan, Lebanon, Iraq, Turkey, and even Europe could then return to
their homes in Syria.

So I disagree with you. Al-Assad is not a "necessary evil." He's an
extremely destructive evil. Bashar al-Assad is the first major
genocidal leader of the 21st century, and the most evil leader so far
in the 21st century.

Related Articles

• From 2013: The history of how Syria's Bashar al-Assad created ISIS (07-Sep-2016)
  
  
• Syria's al-Assad goes for the kill, turning Aleppo and civilians to bloody rubble (24-Sep-2016)
  
  
• Iraqi Sunnis are turning against al-Qaeda in Iraq (01-Apr-2007)

KEYS: Generational Dynamics, Syria, Raqqa, Syrian Democratic Forces, SDF,
Islamic State / of Iraq and Syria/Sham/the Levant, IS, ISIS, ISIL, Daesh,
Operation Euphrates Rage, Angry Euphrates, Mosul, Iraq, Rojava,
Kurdistan Workers’ Party, PKK, Operation Euphrates Shield, Turkey,
Syria, Bashar al-Assad, Adolf Hitler, Mao Zedong, Pol Pot,
Jabhat Fateh al-Sham, JFS, Front for the Conquest of Syria,
Free Syrian Army, FSA, Iran, Russia, Hezbollah

Permanent web link to this article
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John J. Xenakis
100 Memorial Drive Apt 8-13A
Cambridge, MA 02142
Phone: 617-864-0010
E-mail: john@GenerationalDynamics.com
Web site: http://www.GenerationalDynamics.com
Forum: http://www.gdxforum.com/forum
Subscribe to World View: http://generationaldynamics.com/subscribe

*** 8-Nov-16 World View -- China orders Hong Kong to disqualify anyone not taking 'sincere' loyalty oath to China

This morning's key headlines from GenerationalDynamics.com

• China orders Hong Kong to disqualify anyone not taking 'sincere' loyalty oath to China
  
• Hong Kong police prepare for massive street protests
  
• Advice on traveling to China
  

****
**** China orders Hong Kong to disqualify anyone not taking 'sincere' loyalty oath to China
****


A protester raises a yellow umbrella in front of a line of police officers in Hong Kong on Sunday

Mainland China has preempted Hong Kong's courts by ordering Hong Kong
to "reinterpret" its laws so that the two pro-democracy "localists"
who changed the wording of their oath of office will not be able to
enter the legislature by taking the oath again.

China suffered a stinging defeat when a September 4 election gave
pro-democracy or "localist" candidates 27 out of 70 seats in the
Legislative Council of Hong Kong (LegCo). Two of those elected, Yau
Wai-ching and Sixtus Baggio Leung Chun-hang, from "Youngspiration,"
went beyond "pro-democracy" to advocating full Hong Kong independence
from China. When they took their oaths of office on October 12, they
changed the wording of the official oath of office to express support
for Hong Kong's independence. They also referred to China as
"Chee-na," mimicking the derogatory Shina used by Japan during the
second world war. The Hong Kong courts were asked to decide whether
the two should be permitted to re-take their oaths, or be completely
disqualified from entering LegCo.

On Monday, Beijing's National People's Congress (NPC) Standing
Committee "reinterpreted" Hong Kong laws, essentially ordering the
Hong Kong government to disqualify the two, and possibly others who
have ever supported independence. The oath must be taken "sincerely
and solemnly," and must "bear allegiance to the Hong Kong Special
Administrative Region of the People' s Republic of China."

In addition, China may revive a long-dormant national security law
that was dropped in the past. That law would provide legislation
covering secession, subversion, theft of state secrets, and activities
of foreign political organizations. Xinhua and South China Morning Post (Hong Kong) and Hong Kong Free Press and Bloomberg

****
**** Hong Kong police prepare for massive street protests
****

Police in Hong Kong used pepper spray on Sunday to disperse 8,000 to
10,000 demonstrators protesting against the expected decision by
Beijing to "reinterpret" Hong Kong laws. Some of the demonstrators
used umbrellas to protect themselves from the pepper spray, as they
had done during the 2014 demonstrations that launched the "umbrella
revolution."

Hong Kong is deploying some 2,000 police officers around the clock
this week, in preparation for further protests.

Several commentators have pointed out that Hong Kong politics has
become more confrontational. In the past, when institutions were led
by survivors of the bloody Communist Revolution, protestors saw
peaceful protest as the best way to bring about change.

However, as survivor generations have died off, and radical new
generations have come of age, protestors are argument that peaceful
protests have achieved nothing, and that more confrontational tactics
are required.

One can easily see that this won't end well. Hong Kong is only going
to become more radicalized, and Beijing is only going to become more
anxious and nationalistic. The same is true in Taiwan, and even in
Tibet and Xinjiang. At some point, the Chinese Communist Party in
Beijing will decide that enough is enough. South China Morning Post (Hong Kong) and BBC

Related Articles

• Hong Kong legislature in chaos, under threat of intervention by mainland China (03-Nov-2016)
  
  
• Sharply polarized Hong Kong electorate hands Beijing a stinging setback (06-Sep-2016)
  
  
• Sunflowers and Umbrellas: Taiwan voters choose independence from China (30-Nov-2014)
  

****
**** Advice on traveling to China
****

Are you planning a trip to China? A number of Holly pros offer the
following advice:

• Never, ever, ever check anything.
  
• Pack Western medicines -- cold remedies, Tylenol, Sudafed,
  surgical masks (to combat air pollution), and so forth.
  
• Carry both a primary and duplicate passport. Apply for a
  duplicate via the State Department web site.
  
• Consider an Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation business travel
  card(travel.apec.org/apply.html)
  
• Within China, consider taking trains, since planes are less
  reliable.

Hollywood Reporter

KEYS: Generational Dynamics, China, Hong Kong,
Legislative Council of Hong Kong, LegCo,
Yau Wai-ching, Sixtus Baggio Leung Chun-hang,
National People’s Congress Standing Committee, NPC,
Umbrella Revolution, Taiwan, Tibet, Xinjiang

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John J. Xenakis
100 Memorial Drive Apt 8-13A
Cambridge, MA 02142
Phone: 617-864-0010
E-mail: john@GenerationalDynamics.com
Web site: http://www.GenerationalDynamics.com
Forum: http://www.gdxforum.com/forum
Subscribe to World View: http://generationaldynamics.com/subscribe

*** 9-Nov-16 World View -- EU's expected scathing report on Turkey may scuttle refugee deal

This morning's key headlines from GenerationalDynamics.com

• EU's expected scathing report on Turkey may scuttle refugee deal
  
• Austria says EU must prepare for collapse of Turkey migrant deal
  
• Hungary's Viktor Orbán defeated in attempt to ban refugee quotas
  

****
**** EU's expected scathing report on Turkey may scuttle refugee deal
****


Hungary border protection (AP)

The European Commission on Tuesday will issue it annual report on
Turkey's progress towards European Union membership, and the report is
expected to be scathingly critical. According to media reports, it
will criticize Turkey's crackdown on more than 110,000 judges,
teachers, police and civil servants who have been fired or jailed.
About 35,000 have been jailed after being accused, often with no
evidence, of supporting the July 15 aborted coup attempt or
of being a supporter of the Kurdistan Workers Party (PKK).

It will also reference the threat by Turkey's president Racep Tayyip
Erdogan to reinstate the death penalty. This alone will end talks for
Turkey to join the European Union. It could also mean the end of visa
liberalization plans that would permit Turkey's citizens to travel
freely in Europe without a visa.

European Commission President Jean-Claude Jüncker said the
following:

> [indent]<QUOTE>"I note with bitterness, I who am a friend of Turkey,
> that Turkey is distancing itself from Europe every day. ... All
> that the Turkish authorities are doing today leads me to believe
> that in the end Turkey does not want to ... meet European
> standards. ...
>
> If tomorrow we refused visa liberalization for Turkey, the blame
> should not be put on Europe but on the Turkish authorities. Mr.
> Erdogan will have to explain to the Turks why they cannot travel
> freely across Europe like every other European, because he will be
> the one who has not fulfilled the conditions jointly agreed
> between Turkey and the European Union. ...
>
> We need Turkey. But we cannot give up on our main
> principles."<END QUOTE>[/indent]

In a speech on Sunday, Erdogan responded to accusations from the EU
that he was becoming a dictator, and expressed contempt for the EU
concern for human rights over the need to stop terrorism in Turkey:

> [indent]<QUOTE>"Europe has been on a course that is leading to its
> own demise.
>
> Those who are willing to drown the rest of the world in blood to
> preserve the sense of security and peace inside their own borders
> move further from humanity each day."<END QUOTE>[/indent]

Erdogan has ridiculed the EU for having a weak policy for refugees,
when Turkey has taken in at least 2.7 million Syrian refugees and
houses 270,000 in 26 provisional refugee camps with food, health and
education services as well as psychological support, vocational
education and social activities, and has spent 7 billion euros meeting
their needs.

The EU-Turkey migrant deal has been dramatically successful, reducing
the number of migrants traveling across the Aegean Sea from Turkey to
Greece to around a few dozen per day, down from thousands per day last
year. However, the terms of that deal require visa liberalization,
visa-free travel for all Turkish citizens in Europe's Schengen Zone,
as well as billions of dollars in aid to Syrian refugees in Turkey.
Those terms were to be met by June of this year, but they have not yet
taken place.

Now Jean-Claude Jüncker is suggesting that visa liberalization will
not occur at all. Turkish officials have repeatedly said that without
visa liberalization, the EU-Turkey deal would be canceled, suggesting
that once more there would be thousands of Syrian refugees per day
crossing from Turkey to Greece.

The words between EU and Turkish officials have been getting
increasingly vitriolic, but so far they're just words. Wednesday's EU
progress report on Turkey could change things to stoking more
nationalism in Turkey, but so far there are no signs that Turkey is
really about to cancel the deal. Euro News and Reuters

Related Articles

• Turkey's Erdogan eliminates more opposition in quest for power (06-Nov-2016)
  
  
• A dark shadow looms over EU-Turkey refugee deal, as Turkey passes harsh anti-Kurdish law (21-May-2016)
  
  
• Turkey's Erdogan blames the EU for reneging on the refugee deal (23-Sep-2016)
  
  
• Increasing anger in Turkey threatens the EU-Turkey migrant deal (28-Aug-2016)
  

****
**** Austria says EU must prepare for collapse of Turkey migrant deal
****

Austria will meet next with the central European nations of the
Visegrad group - Poland, Hungary, Slovakia and the Czech Republic -
all of whom are opposed to the EU's migrant policy, to prepare
for the collapse of the EU-Turkey migrant deal.

According to Hans Peter Doskozil, Austria's defense minister:

> [indent]<QUOTE>"I have always said that the EU-Turkey deal should
> only be a stop-gap measure until the EU is in the position to
> effectively protect its external borders and thereby stem the flow
> of migrants. The time to organize for that is ever
> closer."<END QUOTE>[/indent]

Austria is calling for tougher border controls, and
an end of aid to Turkey.

Austria's foreign minister Sebastian Kurz said that the EU
must adopt a different policy:

> [indent]<QUOTE>"Over recent years Turkey has moved further and
> further away from the EU, but our policy has remained the
> same. That can’t work. What we need are clear consequences.
>
> In Turkey, opposition figures are being arrested, journalists are
> being persecuted, officials are being fired if they think
> differently and the return of the death penalty is being talked
> about.
>
> [Stopping the funds] is the logical consequence ... It is quite
> clear that this money will not flow if Turkey does not stick to
> its side of the deal."<END QUOTE>[/indent]

Other EU leaders are becoming using increasingly vitriolic words
towards Turkey. Luxembourg’s foreign minister Jean Asselborn
referred to Turkey's dismissal of civil servants and firing
of academics:

> [indent]<QUOTE>"To put it bluntly, these are methods that were used
> during the Nazi era and that’s a really, really bad development
> ... that the EU simply cannot accept."<END QUOTE>[/indent]

As I've been writing for years, in the approaching Clash of
Civilizations world war, the US and the West will be allied with
Japan, India, Russia and Iran, fighting against China, Pakistan, and
the Sunni Muslim countries, including Turkey. Deutsche Welle and Hurriyet (Ankara) and EU Observer

****
**** Hungary's Viktor Orbán defeated in attempt to ban refugee quotas
****

Hungary's anti-immigrant prime minister Viktor Orbán suffered a
setback on Tuesday when the the parliament rejected an anti-migrant
bill in response to the European Union resettlement plan and a
specific EU quota to allow a reported 1,294 refugees to relocate to
Hungary.

The parliamentary rejection occurred because the MPs of the
anti-immigrant Jobbik, which would have been expected to support the
bill, abstained on the vote. Jobbik was objecting to a separate
measure supported by Orbán that permitted any foreigner
with $331,000 to settle in Hungary. According
to Jobbik MP Marton Gyongyosi:

> [indent]<QUOTE>"We have said that of course we are against the
> resettlements to Hungary by Brussels and we are against migration
> quotas, but we are equally against migrants to Hungary who perhaps
> have €300,000 to spend. If you want to say 'No' to poor ones, you
> have to say 'No' to rich migrants."<END QUOTE>[/indent]

This is Orbán's second recent setback. Orbán supported a divisive
reference that was held on October 2 on the same subject. Of the 3.3
million people who voted, 98% supported the referendum. But the
referendum failed anyway, according to Hungary's constitution, because
only 40.4% of Hungary's voters voted, short of the required 50%
threshold. Budapest Business Journal and CNN and BBC

Related Articles

• Hungary may build a second 'massive' fence to block migrants from Serbia (28-Aug-2016)
  
  
• Turkey and Hungary play hardball at EU-Turkey refugee summit (08-Mar-2016)
  
  
• Europe's migrant crisis worsens as Hungary defends 'Christian culture' (18-Sep-2015)
  

KEYS: Generational Dynamics, Euroopean Commission, Turkey,
Jean-Claude Jüncker, Racep Tayyip Erdogan, Greece, Schengen Zone,
Austria, Visegrad group, Poland, Hungary, Slovakia, Czech Republic,
Hans Peter Doskozil, Sebastian Kurz, Luxembourg, Jean Asselborn,
Hungary, Viktor Orbán, Jobbik, Marton Gyongyosi

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John J. Xenakis
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Cambridge, MA 02142
Phone: 617-864-0010
E-mail: john@GenerationalDynamics.com
Web site: http://www.GenerationalDynamics.com
Forum: http://www.gdxforum.com/forum
Subscribe to World View: http://generationaldynamics.com/subscribe

*** 10-Nov-16 World View -- Donald Trump: The honeymoon calm before the storm

This morning's key headlines from GenerationalDynamics.com

• Donald Trump victory signals a major increase in nationalism
  
• Brexit referendum and US election illustrate dangers of predicting elections
  
• The honeymoon calm before the storm
  
• Is this the Apocalypse?
  

****
**** Donald Trump victory signals a major increase in nationalism
****


Supporters and opponents of Donald Trump outside Trump Tower in Manhattan on Wednesday (Boston Globe)

Two weeks ago, I wrote Clinton e-mail media storm shows sudden change in public mood
after FBI Director
James B. Comey made a Friday afternoon announcement that he might
re-open the Clinton e-mail case. Friday afternoon announcements,
including many previous announcements about Benghazi and Clinton
e-mail dumps, are almost always immediately forgotten, but this one
created a media storm in the mainstream media, indicating a sudden
change in public mood.

As I wrote at the time, from the point of view of Generational
Dynamics, the media storm was much more important than whether Clinton
was guilty or innocent, because it indicated that the public mood was
changing. And that media storm was a harbinger of the Trump victory
which was a surprise to almost every media source and almost every
polling organization.

Now Donald Trump has to govern. He's very similar to Barack Obama in
that neither has the vaguest clue what's going on in the world. And
after eight years in office, Obama seems to know as little today about
what's going on in the world as he did eight years ago.

It remains to be seen whether Donald Trump will be any better at
learning what's going on in the world than Barack Obama. Boomers are
generally less arrogant and more willing to listen to reason than
Gen-Xers, so there's hope.

One thing that his staff might do is develop some expertise in
generational theory. Generational Dynamics is a non-ideological
methodology that does analyses using MIT's System Dynamics applied to
changes in generations. Since 2003, the GenerationalDynamics.com web site contains thousands of articles
with hundreds of predictions, all of which have turned out to be
right. There is no web site, analyst, politician or journalist with a
success record in correct analyses and forecasts that comes even
close to the Generational Dynamics success.

If the staff of Donald Trump, or any other politician in the country
or the world, wants to base policy on what's actually going on in the
world, rather than on fatuous left-wing or right-wing ideologies that
are almost always wrong, then they should develop an understanding of
generational theory, and read the daily World View articles.

Related Articles

• Clinton e-mail media storm shows sudden change in public mood (31-Oct-2016)
  
  
• Generational Dynamics Forecasting Methodology (PDF, 2010).

****
**** Brexit referendum and US election illustrate dangers of predicting elections
****

As I've been writing for years, starting long before the current
election, this is a generational Crisis era, and as in other Crisis
eras, nationalism, racism and xenophobia have been increasing in
countries around the world.

This trend illustrates why pollsters have been so wrong in both the
Brexit referendum and the US elections. Pollsters were using models
that date back to the 1990s, a generational Unraveling era when the
Silent generation was still in charge, and knew the enormous dangers
of nationalism, racism and xenophobia from having survived World War
II. Polling organizations using 1990s models simply did not see the
change in attitudes caused by the disappearance of the generations of
survivors of World War II.

During the campaign, I was asked several times whether Generational
Dynamics could predict the result of the election. The easy answer is
that Chaos Theory proves that election results cannot be predicted,
and any polling organization would agree.

For those who would like some additional technical details about this,
I use a fairly simple test to determine whether or not something can
be predicted.

When I want to decide whether something can or cannot be predicted, I
use what I call "the butterfly test." You may have heard about the
finding from Chaos Theory that a butterfly flapping its wings in China
could start a chain reaction that might (or might not) cause a
hurricane in North America. That's one reason why it's mathematically
impossible to accurately predict the weather more than about two weeks
in advance. No matter how advanced weather science becomes,
whether forecasting will never be any better than it is now.

So I build on that concept. A butterfly flapping its wings in China
could cause a hurricane in North America, and that could cause people
to stay home, changing the outcome of an election. Since something as
tiny as a butterfly flapping its wings could change the outcome of an
election, there's no hope of predicting the outcome of an election.
Or if you use polls to predict the results of an election, you likely
have no better than a 50-50 or 55-45 chance of getting it right.

What generational theory does do is predict broad trends involving
entire populations or entire generations. These trends can't be
affected by a butterfly flapping its wings because there are too many
people involved. People have free will, so you can't predict the
actions of an individual or a small group of people, but you can
predict many things about an entire population or an entire
generation.

****
**** The honeymoon calm before the storm
****

Almost everyone I know hated this presidential campaign, as the two
candidates at times seemed to be in a race to be more sickening and
disgusting than the other. How low could the country go?

Pollster Frank Luntz, appearing on 60 Minutes last Sunday, has been
conducting political focus groups for years, and he traces the growth
in political vitriol as starting in the 2000 presidential election,
when Al Gore won the popular vote, but George W. Bush became president
after six weeks and a Supreme Court decision. According to Luntz:

> [indent]<QUOTE>"And in that six weeks, we came from being Democrats
> and Republicans to being outraged, to believing that the other
> side is trying to steal the election. And when the election was
> over, there was no coming together. There was no honeymoon. And
> from that point on, the goal has been to delegitimize. Not to
> respect and at least to listen to, but to delegitimize the
> opposition. And now today in 2016, hours from now, it will be tens
> of millions of people who will believe that the loser should have
> won, that the election was rigged, and that the winner is
> illegitimate. ...
>
> I feel like I’m a child of a divorce. These two candidates, the
> way they fight, the way they yell at each other, the way they make
> it personal, it’s like having your parents get divorced, and you
> don’t want to live with either of them. And the judge sits there
> and says, “Pick one or the other.” And you say, “How about the
> jury? Can I-- can I go there?” It’s awful."<END QUOTE>[/indent]

Luntz suggested that the "social media" is at fault. "There were
people in that focus group who used language that if my mom was still
alive and I said it, she would literally cut me out of the
will. There’s no self-censoring. So we now say exactly what we
feel. And, goddamn it, you’re gonna listen to me. And that’s really
what it is right now. You’re gonna listen to me. I’m not gonna learn
from you. You’re gonna listen to me."

Many people are hoping that the vitriolic attacks will end, now that
the election is over, and that things can return to "normal." And
when they say "normal," they mean the 1990s -- a generational
Unraveling era. That's not going to happen.

The generational Crisis era ("Fourth Turning") officially began in
2003, 58 years after the end of World War II, as the last of the
Silent generation retired. The vitriolic attacks on George Bush had
begun a couple of years earlier, as Luntz described, but they've only
become worse since then, and they've gone in both directions between
Republicans and Democrats.

I titled this article "the honeymoon calm before the storm" as kind of
a joke. New presidents are supposed to have a "honeymoon" that lasts
100 days or so into his new administration, but that was before the
rise of Generation-X. Trump will be lucky if his "honeymoon" lasts
the rest of this month.

This kind of chaotic storm always happens during a generational Crisis
era. In the 1930s, President Franklin Roosevelt was deeply hated for
many of his decisions. One of the worst was his decision to try to
"pack" the Supreme Court by expanding it 15 judges, in order to get
the court to stop declaring his favorite new laws unconstitutional.
And you can imagine how vitriolic the attacks must have become when
Roosevelt became the first US president to run for a third term.

The previous generational Crisis era saw the election in 1860 of
Abraham Lincoln as president. This infuriated the Southern states,
and led to the Civil War.

Many people are describing what's happening today as unique in
American history. That's far from true. What's happening today
happens in every country in every generational Crisis era. CBS 60 Minutes and History.com

Related Articles (58-year hypothesis)

• Investors commemorate the false panic of Monday, October 19, 1987 (19-Oct-2007)
  
  
• The Iraq war may be related to the bombing of Hiroshima and Nagasaki. (17-Feb-2008)
  

****
**** Is this the Apocalypse?
****

I heard several journalists on the BBC and RFI on Wednesday talk about
the end of the world, the Apocalypse. There were several reasons why
the world was going to end. One was because Trump was going to end
climate change talks, and we're all going to freeze to death ... I
mean, burn to death. And the other was because Trump was going to
start a nuclear war, and start dropping nuclear bombs on everyone.
Nobody mentioned the Apocalypse caused by an attack by China.

This talk of Apocalypse is silly, but it's also not far from the
truth. President Roosevelt's term led to World War II, and President
Lincoln's term led to the Civil War. That's what happens during a
generational Crisis era, no matter who's president.

As I've been writing for years, the world is headed for a new world
war, the Clash of Civilizations world war. The allies of the West
will include Japan, India, Russia and Iran. The enemies will be
China, Pakistan, and the Sunni Muslim countries. This will be the
greatest war in history. By the time it's over, every nuclear weapon
in the world will have been used on someone. I estimate that the
total deaths from nuclear war, ground war, famine and disease to be
around 3-4 billion people, leaving around 4 billion people to rebuild
the world.

And here's another little bit of irony. Assuming that this war begins
during Donald Trump's term in office, and assuming that the United
States survives the war, then Trump will become a national hero, with
the stature of Roosevelt and Lincoln.

Related Articles

• Arab views of Iran nuclear deal (15-Jul-2015)
  
  
• Political crisis in Iran grows over nuclear agreement (09-Nov-2015)
  

KEYS: Generational Dynamics, Donald Trump, James Comey,
Brexit, Chaos Theory, Butterfly test,
Frank Luntz, 60 Minutes, Fourth Turning,
Franklin Roosevelt, Abraham Lincoln

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John J. Xenakis
100 Memorial Drive Apt 8-13A
Cambridge, MA 02142
Phone: 617-864-0010
E-mail: john@GenerationalDynamics.com
Web site: http://www.GenerationalDynamics.com
Forum: http://www.gdxforum.com/forum
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*** 11-Nov-16 World View -- Hundreds of Australian migrants to be resettled in the United States

This morning's key headlines from GenerationalDynamics.com

• Hundreds of Australian migrants to be resettled in the United States
  
• As winter approaches, Syria's east Aleppo faces mass starvation
  

****
**** Hundreds of Australian migrants to be resettled in the United States
****


Manus Island detention center in Papua New Guinea (AAP)

Reports indicate that Australia and the United States are close to a
deal where about 1,800 migrants from Australian detention centers in
Pacific islands will be resettled in the United States.

There have been reports for months that Australia was working on a
deal to resettle the migrants in an unnamed country. It now appears
that the unnamed country is the United States, and the deal was held
up pending the US presidential election, so that it would not affect
the election results. Now that the election is over, the deal can be
completed and implemented in the presidential lame duck period.

In past years, thousands of refugees from Asia have traveled by boat
to Australia, often after paying huge sums to human traffickers,
hoping to resettle there. Australia has dealt with the situation,
starting in 2001, by setting up two "detention centers" on Pacific
islands, one on Papua New Guinea's (PNG's) Manus Island, and one on
the island nation of Nauru, under agreements reached with both
countries. Australia intercepts the boat people while at sea, and
redirects them to the detention centers. These two filthy,
rat-infested detention centers have been enormously controversial,
with numerous stories of beatings, torture, and sexual abuse at the
detention centers. The detention centers were shut down in 2007, but
reinstated when the number of refugees and asylum seekers surged again
into the thousands.

The detention center policy has been extremely successful, in that the
number of migrants reaching Australia has been sharply reduced.
However, the policy has been widely condemned as cruel to people
fleeing poverty and violence, and as a violation of international
laws.

Immigration department chief Michael Pezzullo refused on Friday to
confirm that a deal is pending, but said "We are working actively on
those arrangements ... today we are closer than what we were
yesterday." He also refused to discuss which countries are in
negotiations with Australia, but some reports indicate that Canada may
be in negotiations as well. Special Broadcasting Service (Australia) and Sydney Morning Herald

Related Articles

• Papua New Guinea Supreme Court bombshell throws Australia's refugee policy into chaos (30-Apr-2016)
  
  
• Australia accused of paying people smugglers to take migrants to Indonesia (13-Jun-2015)
  
  
• Australia to send 'boat people' to Papua New Guinea (21-Jul-2013)
  

****
**** As winter approaches, Syria's east Aleppo faces mass starvation
****

With the regime of Syria's president Bashar al-Assad blocking food aid
to east Aleppo, the UN aid agencies are will run out of food next
week, and some 250,000 people will be facing mass starvation, with
winter approaching.

Russia has been building for a massive military assault on east
Aleppo, including more warplanes, and cruise missiles. Al Jazeera and BBC and
VOA

Related Articles

• Aleppo bombings in 'humanitarian pause' as residents await Russia's death blow (21-Oct-2016)
  
  
• Syria's al-Assad goes for the kill, turning Aleppo and civilians to bloody rubble (24-Sep-2016)
  
  
• US increasingly expresses total disgust with Syria regime for Bashar al-Assad's atrocities (21-Sep-2016)
  

KEYS: Generational Dynamics, Australia, Michael Pezzullo,
Papua New Guinea, PNG, Manus Island, Nauru,
Syria, Bashar al-Assad, Aleppo, Russia

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John J. Xenakis
100 Memorial Drive Apt 8-13A
Cambridge, MA 02142
Phone: 617-864-0010
E-mail: john@GenerationalDynamics.com
Web site: http://www.GenerationalDynamics.com
Forum: http://www.gdxforum.com/forum
Subscribe to World View: http://generationaldynamics.com/subscribe

*** 12-Nov-16 World View -- India's prime minister Narendra Modi declares 500-1000 rupee notes worthless

This morning's key headlines from GenerationalDynamics.com

• Only 1% of people in India pay any income taxes at all
  
• India's prime minister Narendra Modi declares 500-1000 rupee notes worthless
  
• Many wives face hardship because their 'hidden cash' is now worthless
  

****
**** Only 1% of people in India pay any income taxes at all
****


Man holding a wad of 500 rupee notes that have now become worthless paper (Reuters)

In May of this year, India's government released a report on tax
compliance for the first time in decades. According to the report,
only about 1% of India's population paid taxes on their earnings in
2013. By contrast, the figure is 45% in the United States.

Here are some reasons for this:

• Indians earning below 200,000 rupees per year are exempt.
  
• 80% of the economy is the "underground economy" or "informal
  sector," where income is not declared or tracked.
  
• The only people who do regularly file income taxes are believed to
  be salaried employees at big companies whose bosses file for
  them.
  
• India’s largest industrial sector by far, agriculture, which
  employs literally hundreds of millions of people, is completely exempt
  from paying income tax.
  
• Wealthy people are keeping billions of dollars in banks in
  Switzerland and Singapore, out of sight of New Delhi.
  
• Tax evasion is rampant.

India Today (2-May) and International Business Times (6-Jun-2013) and CNBC

****
**** India's prime minister Narendra Modi declares 500-1000 rupee notes worthless
****

India's rupee currency fell sharply against the dollar this week,
after prime minister Narendra Modi announced on Wednesday that all
notes 500 rupee and 1000 rupee notes (equivalent to about $7.50 and
$15.00, respectively) would immediately become worthless, in the sense
that they are no longer "legal tender," and can no longer be used for
commerce. New 500-1000 notes with additional security features will
be issued "soon."

A person with 500-1000 rupee notes can deposit them in his bank
account until December 31. However, anyone depositing more than
250,000 rupees will have to account for the money, and will be subject
to tax, a 200% penalty, and prosecution.

The term "black money" refers to money that has not been declared to
the income tax department. Someone who deposits a sack full of cash
can expect to get notices from the income tax department demanding an
explanation of where this money came from. The person will be subject
to a full audit, and required to submit personal books of accounts.
The income tax department will be conducting unannounced raids to look
for assets like gold and property papers.

India's government hopes that this desperate measure will bring in
several billion dollars in additional tax revenue.

Hopefully, someone in India's government will realize that this will
work only once because of its surprise value, and that in the future
people will figure out new ways to avoid paying taxes. India Times and International Business Times and New Delhi TV

****
**** Many wives face hardship because their 'hidden cash' is now worthless
****

Many people kept their cash for daily living in the form of 500-1000
rupee notes, and suddenly their cash was worthless.

People flooded the banking system on Thursday and Friday to obtain
cash, but the banks were unprepared and ran out of cash, causing
people to wait in line for a long as ten hours. Even worse, many
rural areas of India have no banks at all. Commercial currency
exchange businesses around the world immediately stopped accepting the
500-1000 notes, leaving Indian people stranded in foreign countries
with no money.

Women in India are hardest hit by the new policy, according to the BBC
Hindi correspondent Shivani Kohawk(?). She explained the problems
that women in India have (my transcription):

> [indent]<QUOTE>"Basically, women in India have traditionally tried to
> save money by stealing from their husbands, and this is something
> I was told to do when I got married. My cousins have done it, my
> mother's done it. What they do is when the man comes back home,
> after a hard day's work, he's always carrying some cash, and they
> try and sneak out a couple of hundreds, and put them away, and
> that's their way of keeping money aside, for things they might
> want to do which they're not allowed to do, as part of the family
> remit, or buy extra presents for their close friends and family,
> or just even to tide over a rainy day.
>
> And you will not believe it, but these sums can really really add
> up. And I think a lot of women now in India are wondering, oh my
> goodness, what should we do? How do we declare this so-called
> black money? That's one part of why Indian women would be holding
> on to cash.
>
> There's also traditionally a culture of giving money as gifts,
> especially with weddings, close members of the family, instead of
> buying expensive presents would give you wads of cash, and the
> more affluent the relative, the bigger the sums of money, and as
> soon as the bride is done with all the wedding bonanza, she gets
> down to collecting her cash. And there she is, and obviously the
> more affluent the family, the bigger the sums. And again, this is
> her property. She holds onto it for her dear life. She doesn't
> give it to her husband.
>
> The third thing that women do in India is called a Kitty Party.
> And what they do is - they get together and they pool in money.
> So you have a group of women, say, ten women, they all put 1000
> rupees in, and at the end it there's ten thousands, and every
> month they'll meet, and one of them gets to take the 10,000
> home."<END QUOTE>[/indent]

She said that many women will be worried now that they have to deposit
their "hidden money" into a bank. Special Broadcasting Service (Australia) and Canadian Broadcasting and International Business Times

Related Articles

• As population increases in India, agriculture becomes a crisis. (22-Apr-2007)
  
  
• Indian housewives call the top of the gold market (03-Feb-2008)
  

KEYS: Generational Dynamics, India, Narendra Modi, black money

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Web site: http://www.GenerationalDynamics.com
Forum: http://www.gdxforum.com/forum
Subscribe to World View: http://generationaldynamics.com/subscribe

*** 13-Nov-16 World View -- Multiple terror bombings cross Pakistan and Afghanistan

This morning's key headlines from GenerationalDynamics.com

• Taliban attack on German consulate in Afghanistan kills six
  
• Afghan Taliban attack on Bagram base kills four Americans
  
• 14-year-old suicide bomber kills dozens in Sufi shrine in Pakistan
  

****
**** Taliban attack on German consulate in Afghanistan kills six
****


German consulate in Mazar Hotel in Mazar-i-Sharif in northern Afghanistan destroyed by Taliban (Reuters)

A suicide car bomber rammed Germany's consulate in Mazar-i-Sharif in
northern Afghanistan on Friday, killing six civilians and wounding
more than 120. The ensuing gun battle continued for around five
hours. All German and Afghan employees of the consulate were
unharmed. The Taliban claimed responsibility.

Germany's Foreign Minister Frank-Walter Steinmeier said, "The
attackers were fought off by the consulate's security personnel,
Afghan security forces, and German, Georgian, Belgian and Latvian
special forces stationed in the city as part of the Resolute Support
mission." Mazar-i-Sharif is the provincial capital and one of the
richest and most important cities in Afghanistan. Deutsche-Welle and AP

****
**** Afghan Taliban attack on Bagram base kills four Americans
****

A man wearing a suicide vest killed two U.S. service members and two
U.S. contractors early Saturday inside Bagram military base, the
largest NATO military base in Afghanistan. A Taliban spokesman
claimed responsibility for the attack, and said it had been planned
for four months.

Bagram Airfield features several layers of security, including retinal
scans. The attacker was one of the Afghan laborers working on the
base. NBC News and Arab Times (Kuwait)

****
**** 14-year-old suicide bomber kills dozens in Sufi shrine in Pakistan
****

At least 52 people were killed and over 100 wounded in a suicide
bombing by a 14-year-old boy at a Sufi shrine about 760 km south of
Quetta and 100 km north of Karachi in Pakistan's southwestern province
Balochistan.

The bombing occurred just before sunset during a daily Sufi ritual
trance-like dance or "dhamaal." Many people come each day just for
the dance, including non-Muslims. At least 500 people had gathered on
Saturday for the dance and for a picnic.

The so-called Islamic State (IS or ISIS or ISIL or Daesh) is claiming
credit for the attack, giving rise to the speculation that the boy's
parents have joined an ISIS-linked terror group in Pakistan. However,
ISIS has the practice of claiming credit for terror attacks it's had
nothing to do with, and that may be the case this time.

An attack occurred three weeks ago at a police training facility in
Quetta, killing 61 people, mostly fresh police recruits. That attack
was blamed on the Al Alami offshoot of Lashkar-e-Jhangvi (LeJ), a
terror group that has vowed to exterminate all Shias in Pakistan, and
has carried out numerous terrorist actions targeting Shias and Sufis.
LeJ is also thought to have links to ISIS, and it's possible that
Saturday's attack was linked to LeJ.

In August, Jamaat ul-Ahrar (JuA, Assembly of Freedom) claimed
responsibility for another terror attack at Quetta's Civil Hospital,
killing at least 75 people. JuA has also declared allegiance to ISIS.

Last month's Quetta attack sent shock waves through Pakistan's
society, as they continue their internal debates between "good and bad
Taliban," and this new attack will intensify that debate. Express Tribune (Pakistan) and Press Trust of India (PTI) and Smithsonian Magazine on Sufi dance

Related Articles

• Pakistan reels after 60 young police cadets killed in terror attack in Balochistan (26-Oct-2016)
  
  
• Quetta Pakistan terror attack kills 75, while unrest grows in Kashmir (09-Aug-2016)
  

KEYS: Generational Dynamics, Afghanistan, Mazar-i-Sharif, Germany,
Frank-Walter Steinmeier, Bagram airfield, Taliban,
Islamic State / of Iraq and Syria/Sham/the Levant, IS, ISIS, ISIL, Daesh,
Pakistan, Sufi, dhamaal, Quetta, Balochistan,
Al Alami, Lashkar-e-Jhangvi, LeJ, Jamaat-ul-Ahrar, JuA, Assembly of Freedom

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Subscribe to World View: http://generationaldynamics.com/subscribe

(11-09-2016, 10:14 PM)John J. Xenakis Wrote: [ -> ]As I've been writing for years, the world is headed for a new world
war, the Clash of Civilizations world war.  The allies of the West
will include Japan, India, Russia and Iran.  The enemies will be
China, Pakistan, and the Sunni Muslim countries.

John - or anyone - why do you think the sides will line up this way?

(11-09-2016, 10:14 PM)John J. Xenakis Wrote: [ -> ]> As I've been writing for years, the world is headed for a new
> world war, the Clash of Civilizations world war. The allies of
> the West will include Japan, India, Russia and Iran. The enemies
> will be China, Pakistan, and the Sunni Muslim countries.

(11-13-2016, 04:44 AM)Warren Dew Wrote: [ -> ]> John - or anyone - why do you think the sides will line up this
> way?

The two articles that I linked to provide a summary of the reasoning:

Related Articles

• Arab views of Iran nuclear deal (15-Jul-2015)
  
  
• Political crisis in Iran grows over nuclear agreement (09-Nov-2015)
  

*** 14-Nov-16 World View -- Britain's National Health Service (NHS) forced to close emergency rooms

This morning's key headlines from GenerationalDynamics.com

• Britain's National Health Service (NHS) forced to close emergency rooms
  
• Syrian regime sending 'leave or die' text messages to Aleppo residents
  

****
**** Britain's National Health Service (NHS) forced to close emergency rooms
****


A patient in Britain is moved from an ambulance to an Accident & Emergency department. (Getty)

There have been plenty of recent stories about the financial collapse
of Obamacare, and the astronomical increases in premiums -- something
that I predicted would happen that day after it was announced in 2009,
because it was a repeat of President Nixon's wage-price controls,
which were supposed to lower the inflation rate from 4% to 2%, but
instead increased it to 12%. The increases in Obamacare premiums are
following the same pattern as Nixon's price controls, as I predicted.
Obamacare is a true financial disaster.

However, it's been less reported that Britain's National Health
Service (NHS) is also facing financial collapse.

As we reported a year ago, Britain's National Health Service (NHS) is
facing an existential crisis, with a huge and accelerating deficit
expected to reach 22 billion pounds ($32 billion) by 2020.

The system is deeply corrupt, with doctors falsifying records,
claiming for work that was never done, or putting in for bogus
overtime. Dentistry services are so bad that people are buying
"do-it-yourself (DIY) dentistry kits" to take care of their whole
families, as was done centuries ago.

New reports indicate that about half the hospitals will have bed cuts,
and one-third will close their Accident & Emergency departments (known
in America as Emergency Rooms). Many maternity units will also
be targeted for closure.

The country has been split into 44 areas, with each told to produce
proposals to balance the books and change the way care is delivered.
The UK now has fewer beds for its population than almost any country
in Europe. One quarter of hospital beds have been closed in the last
decade, with 37,000 fewer general and acute beds now than in 2006/7,
taking levels of hospital occupancy to a record high. Telegraph (London) and Guardian (London)

Related Articles

• UK's 'junior doctors' call a devastating 5-day strike against the National Health Service (02-Sep-2016)
  
  
• Britain's National Health Service (NHS) faces existential financial crisis (05-Aug-2015)
  
  
• History of President Richard Nixon's Wage-Price Controls (5-Jul-13)
  
  
• Obama's health plan, a proposal of economic insanity (25-July-2009)
  

****
**** Syrian regime sending 'leave or die' text messages to Aleppo residents
****

The long-expected mass slaughter of residents of east Aleppo by
Russian and Syrian regime forces may finally be imminent,
as the regime of Syria's president Bashar al-Assad is sending
text messages to east Aleppo residents telling them to
leave the area within 24 hours.

The text messages say the following:

> [indent]<QUOTE>"To the armed people in the neighburhoods of east
> Aleppo, we are giving you 24 hours only to decide if you are
> leaving. Your leadership abroad is incapable of getting you
> out. Whoever wants to stay alive must drop his weapons and we will
> secure his safety. After the 24 hours is up we will implement a
> strategic attack using highly sophisticated weapons.
>
> The opposition leadership that stays in hotels and castles
> enjoying a luxurious life doesn’t care about the poor Syrian
> citizens in east Aleppo. They are using you for their personal
> benefit. We are giving you, the sick and the wounded, 24 hours to
> exit if you want."<END QUOTE>[/indent]

The use of text messages is a new tactic, as the regime has previously
transmitted messages by dropping leaflets or using loudspeakers.

However, anti-government activists have told reporters that few people
are actually reading the text messages, since there no electricity to
charge mobile phones. Many believe that the text messages are no more
than psychological warfare.

A new Russian naval war group, led by the Admiral Kuznetsov aircraft
carrier, has just arrived in at the coast of Syria, preparing for
battle. East Aleppo has about 250,000 residents, already starving,
mostly women and children, and the al-Assad regime has indicated that
it wants to kill as many of them as possible. Al-Jazeera and Telegraph (London)

Related Articles

• Aleppo bombings in 'humanitarian pause' as residents await Russia's death blow (21-Oct-2016)
  
  
• Syria's al-Assad goes for the kill, turning Aleppo and civilians to bloody rubble (24-Sep-2016)
  
  
• US increasingly expresses total disgust with Syria regime for Bashar al-Assad's atrocities (21-Sep-2016)
  

KEYS: Generational Dynamics, Britain, National Health Service, NHS,
Richard Nixon, Wage-price controls,
Syria, Aleppo, Bashar al-Assad, Russia, Admiral Kuznetsov

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Subscribe to World View: http://generationaldynamics.com/subscribe

(11-13-2016, 03:45 PM)John J. Xenakis Wrote: [ -> ]

(11-09-2016, 10:14 PM)John J. Xenakis Wrote: [ -> ]>   As I've been writing for years, the world is headed for a new
>   world war, the Clash of Civilizations world war.  The allies of
>   the West will include Japan, India, Russia and Iran.  The enemies
>   will be China, Pakistan, and the Sunni Muslim countries.  

(11-13-2016, 04:44 AM)Warren Dew Wrote: [ -> ]>   John - or anyone - why do you think the sides will line up this
>   way?  

The two articles that I linked to provide a summary of the reasoning:

Related Articles

• Arab views of Iran nuclear deal (15-Jul-2015)
  
  
• Political crisis in Iran grows over nuclear agreement (09-Nov-2015)
  

Thanks.  Good point about Iran.  Reminds me of a joke I heard in 2003 about two Iranian students talking to each other:

Student 1:  Did you hear?  There's good news and bad news!

Student 2:  Really?  What's the good news?  I always want to hear the good news first.

Student 1:  The good news is that President Bush has declared Iran to be part of the Axis of Evil.  It's us, Iraq, and North Korea.  Most likely he's going to invade us all!

Student 2:  Wow, that's the good news?  With good news like that, the bad news must be really bad.  What's the bad news?

Student 1:  The bad news is that he's going to start with Iraq, not us.

The stuff about China seems kind of paranoid, though.  How would you distinguish between a nuclear force that they plan to use in a first strike against the U.S., and one with which they were just trying to get nuclear parity with the U.S. and Russia?

*** 15-Nov-16 World View -- Bulgaria and Moldova elect pro-Russian presidents, turning away from EU

This morning's key headlines from GenerationalDynamics.com

• Bulgaria: Socialist pro-Russian Rumen Radev wins election as president
  
• Moldova: Socialist pro-Russian Igor Dodon wins highly polarizing presidential election
  

****
**** Bulgaria: Socialist pro-Russian Rumen Radev wins election as president
****


Presidents-elect: Rumen Radev (Bulgaria), and Igor Dodon (Moldova)

Bulgaria's prime minister resigned on Monday after it became clear
that his party had lost badly in Sunday's presidential election. The
pro-Moscow Socialist candidate Rumen Radev won an overwhelming 59.4%
of the vote, compared to 36.2% for his center-right opponent.

Bulgaria is a member of the European Union, and is also a member of
NATO, creating a potential political conflict with Russia. Radev has
frequently stated his support to end the sanctions on Russia for
invading and annexing Ukraine's Crimean peninsula, and this week he
praised U.S. President-elect Donald Trump for "seeking more dialogue"
with Russia's President Vladimir Putin.

Bulgaria is a mostly Orthodox Christian country in eastern Europe, on
the border with Turkey. Like other east European countries, Bulgarian
officials fear the consequences of the collapse of the EU-Turkey
refugee deal, which would result in a massive new influx of refugees
from Syria. As a result, Bulgaria is building a fence along its
border with Turkey and Greece.

Bulgaria also has migrant troubles in the other direction. In 2014,
Germany's Chancellor Angela Merkel is warning Britain's Prime Minister
David Cameron that Britain might have to leave the European Union if
Cameron insists on adopting quotas that would limit the number of
migrant workers coming to Britain from eastern European countries,
like Bulgaria, Poland and Romania. The irony is enormous. RFE/RL and EuroNews and Greek Reporter (11-Aug)

Related Articles

• Germany threatens Britain with EU expulsion over the migrant issue (04-Nov-2014)
  

****
**** Moldova: Socialist pro-Russian Igor Dodon wins highly polarizing presidential election
****

Socialist Party leader Igor Dodon won Moldova's presidential election
on Sunday with 52.2% of the vote, after campaigning to pursue closer
ties with Russia rather than the EU.

However, unlike the situation in Bulgaria, the opposing government is
not resigning. The opposition leader Maia Sandu said that the
elections were neither free nor fair. and accused opponents of using
"dirty methods" against her.

Moldova's people are extremely polarized in the political conflict
between the European Union and Russia. At the center of the conflict
has been the secessionist and mainly Russian-speaking province of
Transnistria (also called Trans-Dniester or Transdniester). Russia
has thousands of troops stationed there, supposedly as peacekeepers.
At the time of Russia's military invasion and annexation of Ukraine's
Crimean peninsula, the people of Transnistria, which is on Ukraine's
border, were expressing the hope that Russia's military would annex
Transnistria as well.

In fact, Dodon is apparently prepared to grant Transnistria a special
status, short of full secession:

> [indent]<QUOTE>"For the first time in the recent seven years, all the
> pro-Moldova and pro-state forces have united for friendship with
> Russia, for neutrality, for our Orthodoxy, for the unity of the
> country in settling the Transnistria conflict. The first step has
> been made. ...
>
> "My position remains unchanged," he continued. "We should grant a
> special status to Transnistria. ... I believe, the country’s
> federalization is the only solution."<END QUOTE>[/indent]

On Monday, up to 3,000 mostly young Moldovans marched to the offices
of the Central Election Committee in Chisinau, the country's capital
city, shouting "Down with the Mafia!"

There are fears that a pro-Russian government in Chisinau will result
in an expansion of Russian military forces in Moldova, and this would
cause a hardening of relations with Ukraine and Romania, and indeed
with the entire European Union. Al-Jazeera and Tass (Moscow) and RFE/RL

Related Articles

• Mass protests force Moldova to choose between Europe and Russia (26-Jan-2016)
  
  
• Russian troops approach Ukraine's border, threaten port city Mariupol (05-Nov-2014)
  
  
• Russia threatens to invade Ukraine from East and West (15-Aug-2014)
  

KEYS: Generational Dynamics, Bulgaria, Rumen Radev, Ukraine, Crimea,
Russia, Vladimir Putin, Turkey, Germany, Angela Merkel,
Poland, Romania, Moldova, Igor Dodon, Maia Sandu,
Transnistria, Trans-Dniester, Transdniester

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*** 16-Nov-16 World View -- Communal violence grows in Myanmar (Burma) between Buddhists and Rohingya Muslims

This morning's key headlines from GenerationalDynamics.com

• Communal violence grows in Myanmar (Burma) between Buddhists and Rohingya Muslims
  
• Syria and Russia resume bombings of women and children in Aleppo
  

****
**** Communal violence grows in Myanmar (Burma) between Buddhists and Rohingya Muslims
****


Rohingya villages burned down by Burma's army (HRW)

Fears are growing that Burma's army is conducting a scorched earth
attack on Rohingya Muslims in northern Rakhine state, in revenge for
the killing of nine army border guards in October by 20 militants.

Those attacks are believed to be in revenge for massive rounds of
Buddhist attacks on Rohingya Muslims in 2012, including murders,
rapes, and burning down villages, and for plans announced earlier this
year by the government to demolish 12 mosques and 35 madrasas
(religious schools) in Rakhine State because they had been built
without permission.

Now satellite images published by Human Rights Watch show that
Rohingya Muslim villages are again being burned down, but this time by
the army. They troops had been sent to the region to prevent further
violence, but instead they're conducting further violence. Over 430
buildings have been burned down.

Burma's government is denying that the troops had anything to do with
the violence, and suggested that the Rohingyas had burned down their
own homes to embarrass the government, a claim that's considered
laughable. Burma's government is adamantly refusing to allow
reporters or investigators into the area to determine what really
happened.

Violence grew over the weekend increased as soldiers killed dozens of
Rohingyas, and forced hundreds from their homes into already
overcrowded camps.

Rohingya Muslims in Myanmar (Burma) had lived there for generations
have been slaughtered and driven from their homes by Buddhists led by
Buddhist monk Ashin Wirathu. The Rohingyas, described by the United
Nations as "the most persecuted ethnic group in the world," are not
even recognized as Rohingyas by Burma's government, who refer to them
as Bangladeshis.

Following the massive attacks on Rohingyas by Buddhists, led by
Buddhist monks, we're seeing tit-for-tat increases of violence on both
sides. With Myanmar in a generational Crisis era, this is the kind of
violence that leads to civil war. Human Rights Watch and Radio Free Asia and Frontier Myanmar

• Meiktila, Burma, violence has echoes of Kristallnacht (05-Apr-2013)
  
  
• Militants linked to Myanmar's Rohingyas kill border guards in revenge attack (12-Oct-2016)
  
  
• U.N. alarmed as ethnic violence grows in western Burma (Myanmar) (27-Oct-2012)
  
  
• Burma (Myanmar) declares state of emergency over Buddhist/Muslim violence (11-Jun-2012)
  

****
**** Syria and Russia resume bombings of women and children in Aleppo
****

Staffan de Mistura, the United Nations envoy for Syria, there are
275,000 people living in east Aleppo, but only about 1,000 of them
members of Jabhat al-Nusra (al-Nusra Front) which recently renamed
itself Jabhat Fateh al-Sham (JFS) when it cut its ties to al-Qaeda.

But now the long-expected assault on east Aleppo is finally beginning,
with the apparent objective of killing as many of the 275,000 people
as possible. The new Russian naval war group, led by the Admiral
Kuznetsov aircraft carrier, which has just arrived in at the coast of
Syria, launched its first attacks today, sending warplanes and cruise
missiles to east Aleppo, Homs and Idlib, while Syrian regime warplanes
also pound Aleppo.

Syria's president Bashar al-Assad has been widely condemned in the
West as a war criminal, barrel bombs, Sarin gas, chlorine, ammonia,
phosphorous, and other weapons on hospitals, schools and markets with
no military objective except to kill as many innocent women and
children as possible. Al-Assad continues in the delusional view that
this will cause the residents to throw down their weapons and
surrender, something that will never happen in Syria's generational
Awakening era. AP and VOA

Related Articles

• UN Syria envoy Staffan de Mistura predicts total destruction of Aleppo by Christmas (07-Oct-2016)
  
  
• US increasingly expresses total disgust with Syria regime for Bashar al-Assad's atrocities (21-Sep-2016)
  
  
• Syria's civilians fear worse violence from US-Russia 'ceasefire' agreement (11-Sep-2016)
  
  
• As Syria ceasefire begins, Bashar al-Assad quickly rejects it (13-Sep-2016)
  

KEYS: Generational Dynamics, Burma, Myanmar, Rohingya, Rakhine State,
Ashin Wirathu, Bangladesh,
Syria, Bashar al-Assad, Russia, Jabhat al-Nusra, al-Nusra Front,
Jabhat Fateh al-Sham, JFS, Front for the Conquest of Syria,
Staffan de Mistura, Admiral Kuznetsov

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John J. Xenakis
100 Memorial Drive Apt 8-13A
Cambridge, MA 02142
Phone: 617-864-0010
E-mail: john@GenerationalDynamics.com
Web site: http://www.GenerationalDynamics.com
Forum: http://www.gdxforum.com/forum
Subscribe to World View: http://generationaldynamics.com/subscribe

(11-14-2016, 10:45 PM)X_4AD_84 Wrote: [ -> ]> Russia will pull a Crimea with Bulgaria and Moldova. A pincers
> motion between such bridgeheads and Crimea will then tighten the
> noose on the remaining Black Sea coast of Ukraine, cutting off all
> access to the sea. Ukraine will become landlocked.

> In other news, Trump and Putin have begun their lovefest in
> earnest.

> The American Quisling is already showing his true stripes, even
> weeks prior to inauguration.

Really? Are you sure?

Here's something from a few days ago:

(11-03-2016, 11:08 PM)X_4AD_84 Wrote: [ -> ]> Meanwhile here in the US, we also face an unprecedented
> situation. Unbelievable as it might have seemed mere weeks ago,
> Trump has a chance of winning. Normally, a GOP win means the stock
> market climbs. But if Trump wins, it will crash.

That turned out not to happen. Why are you so sure this time?

*** 17-Nov-16 World View -- African nations furious over possible collapse of climate change agreement

This morning's key headlines from GenerationalDynamics.com

• African nations furious over possible collapse of climate change agreement
  
• The 'science' of climate change
  

****
**** African nations furious over possible collapse of climate change agreement
****


Banner from an Australian march against climate change

The surprise election victory of Donald Trump, who has called climate
change "a hoax," has been an extremely unpleasant shock to African
leaders attending a climate change conference in Marrakech, Morocco.
Prior to the election, they had hoped that the international climate
change agreement would be a financial bonanza, and they angry now that
they see all that money slipping away, and are concerned that the
entire climate change effort may be near collapse.

A statement by United Nations Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon to the
Marrakech conference on Wednesday urged a rapid scale-up in funding
for climate change programs, especially to support developing
countries. "Finance and investment hold the key to achieving
low-emissions and resilient societies," he said.

Many leaders are urging that implementation of the climate change
agreement be sped up so that as much as possible can be done while
president Barack Obama is still in office.

World Bank president, Jim Yong Kim, said that he's trying to mobilize
as much as financing as possible."

> [indent]<QUOTE>"It is not just about trying to persuade donors and
> financiers to put up more money, although we are definitely trying
> to do that, but it also about creating the environment that crowds
> in a lot more financing. Even if we have the 100 billion dollars
> we are talking about, it is not nearly enough to reach our
> goals. ...
>
> We are trying to find ways to improve the way the existing banking
> sector understands and considers the risks of climate smart
> investments."<END QUOTE>[/indent]

Kenya's president Uhuru Kenyatta said that the developed countries
have an obligation to provide plenty of money to developing countries
like Kenya:

> [indent]<QUOTE>"We should aim to ensure achievement of the long-term
> global goal of stabilizing the global temperature increase to
> below 1.5 degrees Celsius above the preindustrial levels, which
> gives hope to the most vulnerable countries and communities. ...
>
> The process should also take into consideration the obligations of
> developed country Parties to provide additional, predictable and
> sustainable support in terms of finance, technology and capacity
> building to meet the adaptation and mitigation needs of the
> developing country Parties."<END QUOTE>[/indent]

One thing that we've learned over the years is that giving free money
to African countries is mostly a disaster. After decades of giving
huge amounts of aid to African countries, the people are just as poor
and the infrastructure is little changes. Money given to an African
leader is used to buy weapons, or to build a new glittering
presidential palace, or to be deposited in a foreign bank account.
United Nations and Capital FM (Nairobi) and The Hindu

****
**** The 'science' of climate change
****

As I've written in the past:

• Humans may well have caused and be causing climate change, but
  climate change scientists have been making predictions for 20 years,
  and have been consistently wrong.
  
• Climate change will take care of itself. It's already happening,
  as cities like Beijing and New Delhi are choked with smog and force
  the governments to adopt clean air policies. Renewable energy prices
  are falling without any international climate agreement.
  
• The proposed climate change agreement contains no plan, no
  roadmap, nothing that shows how to accomplish the stated goals,
  because no such plan or roadmap exists or could exist.
  
• Predictions by climate change scientists are always wrong because
  it's impossible to predict future mitigating technologies, such as
  nanotechnologies and the Singularity, and because they assume that
  there will never be another world war.

I'm not aware of any evidence to support the belief that any money
spent on the basis of an international climate change agreement would
not be completely wasted. BBC

Related Articles

• 175 countries sign farcical climate change agreement (23-Apr-2016)
  
  
• Artificial Intelligence and Climate Change (29-Dec-2015)
  
  
• Horse manure and climate change (23-Sep-2014)
  
  
• UN Climate Change conference appears to be ending in farce (14-Dec-2007)
  

KEYS: Generational Dynamics, Marrakech, Morocco, United Nations, Ban Ki-moon,
World Bank, Jim Yong Kim, Kenya, Uhuru Kenyatta

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Phone: 617-864-0010
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Web site: http://www.GenerationalDynamics.com
Forum: http://www.gdxforum.com/forum
Subscribe to World View: http://generationaldynamics.com/subscribe

*** 18-Nov-16 World View -- After Brexit and Trump, Italy's Five-Star-Movement may be the next surprise

This morning's key headlines from GenerationalDynamics.com

• Italy's Monte dei Paschi di Siena floats desperate rescue plan
  
• After Brexit and Trump, Italy's Five-Star-Movement may be the next surprise
  

****
**** Italy's Monte dei Paschi di Siena floats desperate rescue plan
****


Matteo Renzi

As we've been reporting, Italy's Banco Monte dei Paschi di Siena
(MPS), founded in 1472, and the world's oldest operating bank, is
close to collapse because it has $55.2 billion of bad loans on its
book. These bad loans are so bad that it's estimated that selling
these bad loans to a third party would only get 20% of face value.

Because of these bad loans, somebody is going to have to lose
a lot of money. It's illegal under EU rules for Italy's government
to use taxpayer money to bail out the bank, since that simply
transfers the financial crisis from the bank to the whole country,
which would lead to an Italian financial crisis similar to
Greece's financial crisis that we've been reporting for years.

The other choice is for those who invested in the bank, by purchasing
either stock shares in the bank or bonds issued by the bank, will lose
a substantial part of their investments. This might be considered
an ideal solution in some circumstances, but it's a disaster
in the case of Italy, since many bonds have been sold to ordinary
people as a kind of high-interest savings account for those saving
for retirement.

MPS is looking for a deal to save the bank from collapse, and is
under a kind of deadline. Italy is holding a government reform
referendum on December 4, and prime minister Matteo Renzi has said
he'd resign if the referendum fails, which polls indicate is likely.
That would create government crisis that would spook investors
involved in any deal to bail MPS out.

So MPS is floating a last minute deal bondholders (including financial
investors and ordinary people) to offer bank stock to holders of $4.6
billion in bank bonds. It's a great deal until you learn that the
market value of MPS's stock is just $740 million, which isn't going to
go very far in paying off bondholders.

However, bank officials see another sign of hope: Qatar's sovereign
wealth fund, the Qatar Investment Authority, which reportedly holds
$256 billion in assets, is said to be interested in investing in MPS.
New Europe and Bloomberg and Market Mogul

Related Articles

• Italy's Monte dei Paschi di Siena, the world's oldest bank, appears close to collapse (04-Nov-2016)
  
  
• Italy bank crisis more dangerous to EU than Brexit (05-Jul-2016)
  

****
**** After Brexit and Trump, Italy's Five-Star-Movement may be the next surprise
****

European leaders were completely unprepared for the passage of the
Brexit referendum and the election of Donald Trump, both the result of
the rise of a younger generation demanding a change.

And now they're bracing for another jarring election result: The
rejection by Italian voters on December 4 of a referendum to reform
Italy's government. Prime minister Matteo Renzi claimed that the
reform would make Italy's government more stable and efficient.

Renzi announced the referendum late last year when his personal
popularity ratings were high, and he said that he would resign if the
referendum didn't pass.

This promise probably made sense at the time, but has been disastrous
in retrospect. Renzi's popularity has been falling, and the promise
has energized his political opponents, particularly the left-wing
populist Five Star Movement (M5S), led by Beppe Grillo, an Italian
comedian, actor, and political activist. M5S received about
one-quarter of the vote in the 2013 elections, has won some major
mayoral elections since then, and has become increasingly popular.

Thanks to M5S's campaigning, it now appears more likely than not
that the referendum will fail on December 4. Renzi has repeated
his pledge that he would resign in that event. Structural problems
that the referendum was supposed to fix will remain in place,
and paralyze the government.

This would likely cause a loss in confidence in the government by
financial investors, and possibly the collapse of the Monte dei Paschi
di Siena bank, forcing the government to bail the bank out. This
would be a violation of EU rules, and could force Italy to leave the
eurozone, replacing the euro currency with its former national
currency, the lira.

A lot of things have to happen before that scenario could unfold, and
until recently it was thought impossible. But Brexit and the election
of Donald Trump were also thought to be "impossible" until they
happened, and now European leaders' nerves are rattled as they
consider the possibility of a third major electoral shock in 2016.
The Local - Italy and UPI and Economist and The Local - Italy

Related Articles

• Fearing more Brexit-like votes, EU abandons fiscal rules for Spain, Portugal, Italy (30-Jul-2016)
  
  
• Donald Trump: The honeymoon calm before the storm (10-Nov-2016)
  
  
• German official says that 'two clowns have won' in Italy (01-Mar-2013)
  

KEYS: Generational Dynamics, Italy, Matteo Renzi, Monte dei Paschi di Siena,
Qatar Investment Authority, Brexit, Donald Trump,
Five Star Movement, M5S, Beppe Grillo

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*** 19-Nov-16 World View -- Japan's troops in South Sudan become first test of new 'collective self-defense' policy

This morning's key headlines from GenerationalDynamics.com

• Japan's troops in South Sudan become first test of new 'collective self-defense' policy
  
• United Nations warns of mass atrocities in South Sudan
  

****
**** Japan's troops in South Sudan become first test of new 'collective self-defense' policy
****


Japanese Self-Defense Force soldiers in South Sudan, wearing United Nations blue helmets (Diplomat)

Japan has had peacekeeping troops from its Self-Defense Force (SDF) in
South Sudan since 2012, but they were restricted to doing only one
kind of thing -- rebuilding the country's infrastructure, such as
roads and refugee camps. In particular, they were forbidden from
taking part in any military operation of any kind, because Japan's
pacifist constitution, written at the end of World War II, restricts
military action to Japanese soil, and then only for self-defense from
an invader.

Japan's prime minister Shinzo Abe has approved a change taking effect
on November 20 that will deploy 350 SDF troops to South Sudan and
allow them to engage in combat if they're attacked, or if other
nations' peacekeepers are attacked.

This seems to be a relatively mild change in military orders, but in
fact it's a major change in policy. Based on campaigning by Shinzo
Abe, in 2015 Japan adopted new "collective self-defense" laws,
partially departing from the pacifism in the constitution. The old
self-defense clause of the constitution has been interpreted to permit
military action only when Japan itself is being attacked, and only on
Japanese soil. The new collective self-defense laws reinterpret the
self-defense clause to include "collective self-defense," which would
permit military action anywhere in the world under some circumstances
when an ally (such as the United States) is attacked. I discussed the
meaning of "collective self-defense" in detail in 2014 in "5-May-2014 World View -- Japan debates 'collective self-defense' to protect America and Japan"
.

The reinterpretation of the self-defense clause has been extremely
divisive in Japan, and at the time it was passed it even resulted in
some fists being thrown in the Diet (Japan's parliament). Abe said
that the change was essential for the survival of Japan, while
opponents say that approving the exercise of the right to collective
self-defensive is a "slippery slope" that will keep expanding to
permit additional non-defense military activity.

Opponents of the South Sudan deployment in Japan do indeed view the it
as the first step on a slippery slope. According to an editorial in
Japan Times:

> [indent]<QUOTE>"Possible use of weapons by the SDF troops in rescuing
> civilians under attack might trigger counterattacks by enemy
> forces, which could erupt into unexpected fighting. The chance of
> such developments cannot be ruled out in the extremely fluid
> security situation in South Sudan. The Abe administration may
> think that the new mandate, which will be given to the 350 Ground
> Self-Defense Force personnel to be dispatched there next month,
> will bring Japan’s peacekeeping mission closer to international
> standards. But the government should also be aware of, and be
> accountable for, what it could possibly entail."<END QUOTE>[/indent]

Deutsche Welle and Japan Times and Asahi Shimbun (Tokyo) and The Diplomat

Related Articles

• Japan finally adopts 'collective self-defense' laws, departing from pacifism (19-Sep-2015)
  
  
• Japan debates 'collective self-defense' to protect America and Japan (05-May-2014)
  
  
• US reaffirms defense of Japan's Senkaku Islands (28-Apr-2015)
  

****
**** United Nations warns of mass atrocities in South Sudan
****

U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon is warning of a “very real risk of
mass atrocities” in South Sudan and that peacekeepers deployed in the
country will not be able to stop such a bloodbath. According to Ban,
"There is a very real risk of mass atrocities being committed in South
Sudan, particularly following the sharp rise in hate speech and ethnic
incitement in recent weeks."

The mass atrocities are occurring as a result of renewed ethnic
fighting between the Dinka tribe of president Salva Kiir and the Nuer
tribe, led by former vice president Riek Machar. Kiir and Machar
signed a peace agreement last year in August, but it fell apart
several months ago.

The last generational crisis war between the Dinka and Nuer tribes
climaxed in 1991 with the "Bor Massacre," in which hundreds of
thousands of Dinkas in the Bor community were starved, displaced or
killed by invading Nuer militias led by Machar. Thus, South Sudan is
in a generational Awakening era, and there are many survivors of the
Bor Massacre from both sides who do not want to see anything so
horrible happen again, and will do anything they can to prevent it.
So an event similar to the Bor Massacre will not occur, and Ban's
concern about a new full-scale civil war are not realistic.

What we're seeing in South Sudan is a familiar pattern that I've
described many times in countries like Syria, Burundi, Thailand, and
Zimbabwe, starting 5-15 years after the climax of a generational
ethnic crisis war. The leadership in the country, which represents
one ethnic tribe or group, decides that in order to prevent a new
civil war, it's necessary to impose "security" by having the security
forces commit atrocities against the other ethnic group. AFP

Related Articles

• The African Union proposes an all-African peacekeeping force for South Sudan (20-Jul-2016)
  
  
• Fears that renewed South Sudan tribal fighting could spiral into larger war (11-Jul-2016)
  
  
• Conflicts grow in South Sudan and Central African Republic (29-Dec-2013)
  

KEYS: Generational Dynamics, Japan, Shinzo Abe, Self-Defense Force,
collective self-defense, South Sudan, Ban Ki-moon,
Salva Kiir, Riek Machar, Dinkas, Nuers, Bor Massacre

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John J. Xenakis
100 Memorial Drive Apt 8-13A
Cambridge, MA 02142
Phone: 617-864-0010
E-mail: john@GenerationalDynamics.com
Web site: http://www.GenerationalDynamics.com
Forum: http://www.gdxforum.com/forum
Subscribe to World View: http://generationaldynamics.com/subscribe