pepper,

"...Belly, you haven't got a clue, have you..."

Perhaps if the IMF and the World Bank hadn't supported Mubarak's corrupt regime with such enthusiasm, the general population mightn't have seen the standard of living go backwards to such an extent. Same old same old, as in Iran after the Shah, their reaction was predictable.

Banjo,

It just occurred to me with you reminiscing how thrilled Iraqi's were at the invasion. Its akin to America saying:

"Stand aside, Iraqi. Just excuse us while we blow you to smithereens, mutilate your family and plunge your society back into the Dark Ages.....can't you see we're trying to deliver you from a nasty tyrant here."

Poirot. you missed the point, New York wasn't bombing California,
Florida wasn't bombing Texas, etc etc.

The standard of living in Egypt fell for very easily known reasons.
Egypt had an oil industry that provided plenty of profits to supply
subsidised petrol & diesel prices as well as subsidised food prices.
When Egyptian Peak OIl (oh dear there are those two words again)
occurred the profits disappeared and the standard of living fell as
they had to pay a lot more for food and everything else.

What happened to the Egypt people will happen to us as Australian
Peak Oil continues down its depletion slope. So far we have been
holding up our standard of living by imports and 60% imports.
As world oil prices increase we will not be able to afford the cost
to our balance of payments, around $40 billion a year by then.
Another way to look at it; an NBN EVERY Year !

But when ? Well 15% depletion rate on 400,000 barrels a day.
Only a few years.
Now you can see why the oil companies are closing their refineries.

Poirot, don't you ever get tired of that stupid 'tu quoque' argument ? Which invariably degenerates into: 'Nyah, nyah, your dad is worse than my dad, and anyway my uncle's a policeman and he'll put you in jail, etc.'

In the three-way academic contest between Mossadegh and the Shah and the Ayatollahs, for example, I would have no trouble putting them in this order:

* Mossadegh
* the Shah
* the Ayatollahs.

Otherwise, there is a time when you have to say 'a pox on both their houses'.

Joe

Zibigniew Brezezinski,1998 "What we need is a truely massive and widely perceived direct external threat." That threat which they initiated was terrorism.

Vietnam was a lie there was no attack from Nth Vietnam at the Gulf of Tonkin.We know Iraq was a lie and the reason for attacking Libya was oil, gold and to kick China out who had 30,000 workers there.

As general Smedly Butler said in 1929 "war is a racket." We know they make $ trillions from war and even more from the oil.

This is all about their New World Order which Labor has dedicated 10% of our carbon taxes toward.

Russia may let Syria go and make a real stand on Iran to stop this Imperialist march to Global domination.

Iran used to be a healthy open democracy.

As was Iraq - and Chile - and Argentina, and many others who made the terrible mistake of wanting to control their own resources for the benefit of their own people.

Iran was also once regarded a moderate society, until the puppet Shah literally killed off all his moderate opposition and opened the door to Muslim Fundamentalism. It was also once a natural ally of Israel, being another non-Arab state surrounded by hostile forces.

Nobody ever mentions Saudi Arabia anymore - a repressive dictatorship and financier of terrorism. I wonder why?

Syria has admitted to having chemical weapons but has been forbidden to use them - by the same powers who supplied similar weapons to Saddam Hussein for him to use against Iran om their behalf.

All the chaos you see in the middle east today is the result of self-interested interference from foreign (mainly corporate) powers and everybody is now paying the price.

Wobbles said;
Nobody ever mentions Saudi Arabia anymore - a repressive dictatorship
and financier of terrorism. I wonder why?

Well I believe your supposition is correct.
If Doctor Mengles was trying to keep you alive would you take him to
task for his work at Auschwitz ?