Re: KISSINGER WARNS AGAINST NEW COLD WAR

A friend recently told me that there was a billboard in Texas that read:
"If you think the United Nations is attacking you, call this number..."

I can't vouch for the veracity of this, but considering that there are 
people in
places in the midwest and Montana, who ACTUALLY believe that Washington is
fighting a war against them; that there is a Jewish Conspiiacy; that "the 
New
World Order" is working against white interests in Michigan, Nebraska. Iowa 
etc,
AND, this is the key, and they build fortresses around themselves, it is not
difficult to believe that the billboard actually exists, or to understand 
why
Kissinger would say that there is an impending Cold War.

In the case of the former examples, people see anti-gun lobbies (real, but
nowhere near forceful enough) as a threat to their "sovereign" or
"constitutional right"... They see "blacks" taking over (their evidence: 
more
blacks are in positions of power and influence, since "the good old days") 
Jews
running are their lives (and point to Jews in places of influence as
evidence)... in Kissinger's case, all he has to do is point to Russian
non-compliance to US dictat(s). This is "sufficient evidence" or speak of 
Moscow
exerting pressure on Baltic states (as if the US does not exert pressure on
places like Cuba, as if South Africa, my home, does not exert pressure on
Lesotho, or Swaziland in some way or another etc etc)

The danger is, as The Nation reports this week, as long as heavy arms 
industry
is behind such thinking and politicians love playing tough and the press 
will
continue to make these issues "real" in other words, the myth of a Cold 
War, I
believe, WILL become a reality, because consensus is created around it by 
people
who tend to make the news and influence Opinion in newspapers.

The political economy of the press is such that whatever the mainstream 
(read
powerful) opinion is, becomes "fact", quite easily.

When Kissinger speaks the press listen - that's the plain truth. Only 
left-ish
journals like, The Nation, who tend to preach to the converted (anyway) and 
who
have limited circulation, provide a dissenting voice, only journals like
themediachannel.org, is critical of the complicity of the press...

This latter issue is one that i would like to discuss in a new threat 
perhaps
next week. I will start doing research into the role of the mainstream media
(including the press) in capitalist society.


Ismail




Ismail Lagardien
Office of the Chief Economist and
Senior Vice President of
Development Economics
The World Bank
Washington DC
USA

202 473 9603

Visit the World Bank Chief Economist page at:
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