The Blame Game

It was 9/12 already, about five in the morning. I was wide awake, and frightened. Had the 10th anniversary of 9/11 got to me? Had watching the twin towers collapse about fifteen times on six different TV channels triggered a psychological reaction? Or was ‘Collapse: How Societies Choose to Succeed or Fail’, the book by Jared Diamond, the key to what had triggered off something nasty in my befuddled brain? Yup.

I had dropped off reading Chapter 1, again. It’s about ‘Montana’, that huge northwestern state in America. Suddenly I was dreaming that I was somehow connected with Mr Diamond’s book; that I was appropriately inserting swear words into the text. (He doesn’t, but I would have used, lots of swear words.) When I hit ‘save’ nothing happened. So I panicked and woke up. It was just a dream and Chapter 1 would not benefit from my heart-felt vitriol. Bugger!

I decided to get up, open a new document in Mac Pages and write down the experience before I forgot it. I made a few notes and then started thinking . In my book, Watch Out for the Bull!, I had already written about what happened to the USA following 9/11. 'It’s a rant' advised a friend. But I included it because the time of the ranter is nigh.

As an apprentice ranter I’m in great company. Jared Diamond is a highly sophisticated ranter. He can get away with it from his position as a scientist. Then there’s Bill Bryson. He’s a first class ranter. He gets away with it because he’s an American-born author with an OBE. His trip along the Appalachian Way turned out to be a minor event in the genre of physical achievement, but his rants about the state of the southern states of America are nothing less than eye-popping. Read ‘Walk in the Woods’ and you will get the picture.

I’m not yet qualified to rant in public but I do know that you must read everything you can about how we are destroying the planet and relate it to global warming. Convince yourself that it’s man-made. Do not listen to the deniers, such as Britain's Jeremy Clarkson or the American Republican Party, especially the Tea Party faction, who seem suicidal to me. To them, evolution is a theory. They deny everything. Their brand of politics depends on oil lasting forever. To them, global warming is not man-made and the spirit of God lives in America. (Mr Clarkson holds similar views but his god lives in the bucolic Cotswolds and drives a green Lamborghini.)

The Tea Party-people are very good at brainwashing The Enemy. (The Enemy is any number of half-witted, quintessential, God-fearing Americans.) If the Tea Party can persuade Sarah Palin to run with Michele Bachman on the ticket, The Enemy will vote them in. (‘Don’t they look cute, together?’) That's the equivalent of Margaret Thatcher teaming up with Lucretia Borgia. Thus, the end of the world. Save now and book a place on a Virgin rocket to Mars.

So what was America like in 2008? Herewith an edited version of the rant in my book, now available as low-cost ebook on Amazon:

“Perhaps we should now take an objective look at the mess that America was in when God’s messenger, Mr Wong, pitched up in Lubbock, Texas. The neo-cons who had worked George W. Bush like a puppet on a string had become history of the worst kind. Excitement was in the air at the prospect of Barack Obama, a mixed-race, liberal, northern Democrat, becoming the next president. Knowing that white supremacists and Republicans are not good losers, that their collective mean-spiritedness could be deadly, the world held its breath and awaited the crack of a sniper rifle.

It was a challenging time, a financial version of 9/11. The American economy had taken an extended dip into a cauldron fired by the sub-prime mortgage crisis. Toxic debts were poisoning banks. The dollar was falling. Towering corporations tottered. Lehman Brothers collapsed. There was chaos on Wall Street as scams and scammers were exposed. Scorched investors emitted stuck-pig screams that echoed around New York’s glass and concrete canyons.

A blindingly rich nation was stumbling towards an unforeseen and unquantifiable abyss. America’s balance of payments deficit roared past an almost incalculable 11 trillion dollars. But who was counting? (It’s now beyond 14 trillion.)

Californians were counting. The figures made no sense. The Golden State was failing. State coffers were empty. Billions of dollars had to be cut from basic services. Thousands of workers were fired. Californians blinked when the unthinkable happened. Immigration went into reverse.

America’s Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation was counting. Responsible for the banking sector they shelled out $850 million when two banks failed. (By September 2009, 94 banks had failed.)

America’s super-rich were counting. The value of their investment portfolios had shriveled like late autumn leaves in New England. Would this stop them laughing up their sleeves? No. Safe inside gated communities they waited for the bailout that was surely coming.

George W. Bush responded by handing responsibility for the crisis to an ex-banker, a man bred on a culture of fat bonuses; a man who had used all his influence not to keep America’s banks under control, but to deregulate them so that they could do what the hell they liked. Billions were doled out and it all trickled upwards to bankers and the rich. Their smirks could be heard rather than seen.

One bright note: a banking group that received $45 billion of public money responded by cancelling the purchase of another corporate jet. The other: the poor weren’t counting. America’s poor don’t count. Many are so badly educated that they can’t count.

America’s reputation for fairness and justice had already gone down the same bankrupt road. High-placed whipping boys had used compliant constitutional lawyers to justify un-American activities and sneered at Geneva Conventions by condoning water boarding. Prisoners captured in illegal conflicts were hung from shackles, prisoners who would never be charged. America’s moral compass had spun wildly out of control...

Satan, my master, attempted to put his spiked finger on all of it. 'America and its perceived success is what the rest of mankind aims for. Humanity has fallen for a marketing exercise. Brainwashed into believing that their own personal comfort is paramount, humans will pay any price for it. Thus they consume. Big business prospers at their expense and that of the planet. Mafias control huge black markets through crooked politicians disguised as social-democrats. Media barons control information. Elitists pay lip service to the needs of the proletariat by tossing scraps from their endless banquet. The strongest scrabble for them and winners are recruited to the ranks.'

Satan was on a high. 'God doesn’t get it. But I do. So far as I’m concerned, things are going very well indeed.' (Satan loves a rant.)

So it's now 2011 and how bad is America doing today? It’s credit rating has been downgraded, but the rich are getting richer. 25 million Americans are looking for full-time work. 42.6 million are classified as ‘poor’. Poverty in the USA is defined as follows: if a couple with two children don’t earn $22,314 (16,263 euros - £16,294) per year between them, they are poor. For singles it’s $11,139 (8,163 euros - £7050) £587 per month: that's less than my state pension.

50 million Americans have no health insurance. General Electric reported $14.2 billion in profits (last year) and paid no federal corporate tax: none. Neither did Bank of America who, in 2008, trousered $336 billion of bailout money. And that’s how the Republicans want to keep it. ‘Health insurance is for wimps, socialists or Europeans! Tax-free profits are only for the rich. So butt out!’

Being a wimp, a socialist and a European does not keep me awake at night. Chapter 1 in Jared Diamond’s book does. Knowing what’s going on in Montana is very scary. It’s based on science, therefore it is true. Read my very brief summary points and insert swear words where appropriate.

A) Montana is a relatively dry state, ergo they don’t have enough water.
B) Because of climate change, existing water sources are drying up. Snow melt is reducing year on year and glaciers are disappearing at a rate of knots.
C) Because of rich people building big houses, with big lawns and golf courses to match, demand for water is soaring.
D) Lack of water is bankrupting traditional businesses, such as ranching.
E) Because of past mining activities, hell is underground and on it’s way to breakfast. Toxic minerals are draining out of countless old mine workings and poisoning soil and water supplies.
F) Chronic Wasting Disease (such as the Creutzfelt-Jacob variety) is endemic in elk and deer populations and could spread to humans.

Mr Diamond cites lots of shortcomings in the governance of the state of Montana - and how. In short, Montana seems to have elected to fail. It suffers from a huge list of environmental problems involving toxic wastes, deforestation, soil degradation and salination, biodiversity losses and pests and weeds that are taking over from native species. The damage from these alone is estimated at $1 billion per year. And it’s all caused by the people who live there.

Like (southern) California, Montana is not only dry, it’s broke. So if anyone wanted to do something about this stuff, where’s the money coming from? The Federal government is also broke, and because of the ginormous balance of payment deficit, nothing is going to get fixed anywhere, anytime soon. So what’s going to happen to Montana, a state long touted as pristine wilderness? Nothing useful. It will continue to deteriorate and join a long list of American states with similar or worse problems.It's the result of greed, selfishness, ignorance, stupidity and the breakdown of a formerly civilised society.

The great American philanthropists of the past would have stepped up to the plate and spent and billions fixing the problem. No longer. America is the home of Microsoft, Google and Exxon, still the home of unbridled corporate and individual wealth: none of which are contributing a bean in order to cure Montana’s dreadful ills, and I doubt they ever will. It’s much more fashionable to save Africa.

I can understand that. The states of America, and the country itself, should be able to care of itself. Increased taxes, especially on the rich, would help but the Republican dominated Congress bawls, ‘Over my dead body!’ And so it will be.

The state of Montana is indicative of the state of America which relates to the state of the Planet, so believe me when I tell you that the state of Montana is coming to a state near you. Who and what is destroying everything is no longer important. The failure to protect and defend what was ‘pristine’ is. The consequences if we don't are immeasurable. The environmental collapse of Montana will be like the equivalent of one million 09/11s.

When it happens, a Republican leader will look around for someone to blame. With a scapegoat found, he or she will gear up for another war and again borrow the money to fight it. Because Sadam and Bin Laden are dead, and because of the Arab spring and a new-found desire for freedom and democracy, it’s unlikely to be against the Muslims this time around.

So who’s going to win the blame game? Who’s in the firing line? If I was Venezuelan, Iranian or French, I’d start looking to make friends. Victory fries, anyone?