Isn't that nice. Somebody is minding the "store": for Afghanistan. A personal banker just like the adds on t.v.
Not
With bankers like this who needs wars and enemies!

Yes, it is juvenile but I can't help but ask "What Would BBeavis and Butthead Say?" when I read the headline .,.

and it is weirdly appropriate.

Yeah. They're gonna do it. huh huh huh. That would be cool.

That's just great news!

God forbid Afghanistan reverts back to a self-sustaining, locally based economy which existed before the US induced Soviet invasion....

The World Bank can go to its recent archives and polish off the (expensive) study it conduct in the late 90s for Big Oil, analyzing the Afghan pipeline. As UNOCAL's VP Mr. Maresca admitted before a congressional subcommittee on February 12, 1998:

"A recent study for the World Bank states that the proposed pipeline from Central Asia across Afghanistan and Pakistan to the Arabian Sea would provide more favorable netbacks to oil producers through access to higher value markets than those currently being accessed through the traditional Baltic and Black Sea export routes.

This is evidenced by the netback values producers will receive as determined by the World Bank study."

Some enterprising individual in Las Vegas should set up a Pipeline Sweepstakes to take bets on which supranational oil corporations, or consortium thereof, will get the contracts for the pipelines.

Or maybe some enterprising community group could do it and donate the profits to helping Afghan refugees and victims of the bombing.

After all his son's hard work, you can be sure Daddy Bush's Pennzoil will get a piece of the cake.

How dare the west contemplate introducing foreign investment into Afghanastan? If this happens the average citizen might be able to earn a living wage and actually get running water and a toilet. Heaven forbid they improve their living standards.

Even though we all enjoy these amenities the Afghani people should not be exposed to this exploitation! They deserve to live in mud huts till the end of days because we have decided this is good for them.

Thank god we of indymedia are looking out for their best iterests and saving them from our higher standard of living.

Ok, sam, I'm wondering how someone from a country which has just bombed what little public infrastructure which remains in that country can speak of the aspirations for the people to get running water and toilets.

Putting that aside, ever wonder why a local and sustainable economy not reliant on multinational oil companies might be preferable?

Ever wonder if the Afghan people really aspire to owning more STUFF?

Ever wonder if people living in "mudhuts" might be more content than some egomaniac living in a 5000 square foot egomansion?

... Last I heard the afgani's where not to into being colonized...But Sam we all know the world bank only has their best INTEREST's in mind.

"Ok, sam, I'm wondering how someone from a country which has just bombed what little public infrastructure which remains in that country can speak of the aspirations for the people to get running water and toilets."

I'm wondering how we can get the oppressive colonial Arabs out of Afghanistan without bombing? I'm also wondering why so many Afghani's welcome the bombing to gain their freedom and why people like you want them to live under the rule of oppressive fundamentalists bankrolled by Arabs?

"Putting that aside, ever wonder why a local and sustainable economy not reliant on multinational oil companies might be preferable?"

Conversely have you ever wondered how the economy you allude to will appear? Will it come about spontaneously? Where would the capital come from? Why don't the people of indymedia show the "evil oil companies" how it is done and start the economy you speak of? Or are they too busy marching around playing bongos to really effect change? Maybe the reason is the liberal left can't even organize themselves forget about a nation. So I guess the oil companies will have to do it?

"Ever wonder if the Afghan people really aspire to owning more STUFF?"

Ever wonder why you think they would not aspire to own more “stuff”? Ever wonder why owning more stuff is so bad? Ever wonder why you own a computer?

"Ever wonder if people living in "mudhuts" might be more content than some egomaniac living in a 5000 square foot egomansion?"

Ever wonder if the people of Afghanistan might want to live in something they do not have to rebuild every year? Ever wonder why if mud huts are so great you don't live in one?

Ever wonder why you and others who share your beliefs like to enjoy the fruits of capitalism but automatically deny these amenities to those in the third world?

Ever wonder why your beliefs are so out of line with how you actually live?

Just the fat that the leaders of AMERICA is sitting in WASHINGTHON and deciding how the new goverment is going to look in AFGAHNISTAN says it all about how "just" this war is.Oh well,atleast they are inviting some of the groups in afgahnistan to be part of it,thats nice of them......

Ever wonder, Sam, why it is that anyone *needs* capital? Probably not. You probably assume that capital is a given feature of human society. In fact, capitalism, in which means of producing our needs function as a sum of money that seeks to expand itself via production (capital), did not exist anywhere in the world till just a few hundred years ago. And the vast majority of what is now known as the "underdeveloped world" (strictly a capital-oriented perspective) survived well enough on subsistence farming/grazing/gathering. It is capital's global expansion that deliberately has made the vast majority of the world's population unable to produce their own needs (via measures such as Enclosures, pushing people off their ancestral lands and turning it into private, ie corporate, property)

But i wouldn't want you to think too hard, Sam, or to read too much. History can be threatening to one's preconceptions.

"Ever wonder, Sam, why it is that anyone *needs* capital?"

Sure! You need capital to move out of your mud hut and live in a house with running water.

"You probably assume that capital is a given feature of human society."

No Actually I consider it to be an advancement.

"In fact, capitalism, in which means of producing our needs function as a sum of money that seeks to expand itself via production (capital), did not exist anywhere in the world till just a few hundred years ago."

Really? You mean it came about after the Industrial Revolution? I had no idea!

"And the vast majority of what is now known as the "underdeveloped world" (strictly a capital-oriented perspective) survived well enough on subsistence farming/grazing/gathering."

That is amazing! So before capitalism there was no poverty, disparity between nation states or disease? You mean it was utopia before the evil capitalists changed it all? Have you ever opened up a history book Skippy?

"It is capital's global expansion that deliberately has made the vast majority of the world's population unable to produce their own needs (via measures such as Enclosures, pushing people off their ancestral lands and turning it into private, ie corporate, property)"

Wow! I had always thought that Global Expansion improved the human condition for the vast majority of people in the world? It actually set us all back! So we are all worse off today than we were?

This is exactly what the Taliban were saying! Look how nice they made society. Perhaps we should all go back in time?

You read like a comic book!

When are you moving into your mud hut so you can live in your personal Utopia?

Hahahahahah!

If you haven't noticed future man....we,re on a industrial time bomb. See ya on the other side Sammy!

The rise of corporate capitalism is synchronous with the exponentially increasing use of fossil fuels, particularly oil. The former can't exist without the latter. The problem is, the latter can't continue for more than a few more years - if that.

If people are better off due to what might be more accurately described as "fossil capitalism," it's due to exponentially increasing use of fossil fuels, and it's only in a material sense. Family and community life have suffered under fossil capitalism.

Once fossil fuels start their inevitable exponential decline, the fossil fuel "pie" will shrink exponentially. Corporations and people will be fighting over smaller and smaller crumbs of the resource pie. This has never happened before in human history, except locally. Now it's global. It will get very ugly. Indeed, it's already getting that way.

The poor people of Afghanistan, and other nations that are located above deposits of fossil fuels, or along pipeline routes for same, will see little benefit from the extraction and transportation of those fuels. Fossil fuel agriculture and the world's ravenous population of cars, trucks and planes won't allow it.

The age of profligate oil extraction and consumption that allowed some oil nations to become rich in the past is over. They're already in decline in advance of the decline of the resource they sit on top of. Soon the entire global edifice of fossil capitalism will follow those nations into decline.

No one has answered what the alternitive is to the oil companys or the greedy capitalist designed banks going into Afghanistan is? Well? Where are the WTO protestors or are they too busy bailing each other out of jail following todays fun and games in Canada?

It is time to show the evil capitalists the way!

Where is your alternative? Or are you too delusioned to admit that your are incapable of doing anything other than a day of marching around and getting arrested.

You will never be taken seriously until you come up with another alternative. Until then you like everyone else you sit in judgment of are part of the problem.

Sam, do you really want to know? Or do you just want to defend the status quo and put down anyone who criticizes it?

I don't defend the status qou because I am the gatekeeper. I am merely asking what the alternative is. In typical fashion there is no answer. Maybe you should ask yourself why there is no answer and why you people can't follow up your assertions and belief with dialouge.

Note I don't mean dialouge about dialouge, I mean what is your response.

"I'm wondering how we can get the oppressive colonial Arabs out of Afghanistan without bombing? I'm also wondering why so many Afghani's welcome the bombing to gain their freedom and why people like you want them to live under the rule of oppressive fundamentalists bankrolled by Arabs?"

The Taliban are largely Afghan natives. The "Afghanis" also "welcomed" the Taliban in 1996. And no, I don't want "them to live under the rule of oppressive fundamentalists" who UNOCAL oil and the US State Department wined and dined at lavish dinner parties in Houston back in 1997-98.
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"Conversely have you ever wondered how the economy you allude to will appear? Will it come about spontaneously?"

No, it will "come about" the same way it always has: the sweat equity of labor. As my favorite Republican President said:

"Labor is prior to, and independent of, capital. Capital is only the fruit of labor, and could never have existed if labor had not first existed. Labor is the superior of capital, and deserves much the higher consideration."
Lincoln's First Annual Message to Congress, December 3, 1861.


Where would the capital come from? Why don't the people of indymedia show the "evil oil companies" how it is done and start the economy you speak of? Or are they too busy marching around playing bongos to really effect change? Maybe the reason is the liberal left can't even organize themselves forget about a nation. So I guess the oil companies will have to do it?
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"Ever wonder why you think they would not aspire to own more “stuff”? Ever wonder why owning more stuff is so bad?"

I know it's beyond your horizon, but there is powerful sentiment in the "third world" saying precisely that they have no wish to emulate the "american way of life." And "owning more stuff" is "bad" insofar as the disease of more is destroying the planet and its peoples. Again, this stuff is beyond your horizon.
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"Ever wonder why you own a computer? "

Because I don't want to be stuck relying on corporate news and corporate "entertainment."
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"Ever wonder if the people of Afghanistan might want to live in something they do not have to rebuild every year?"

Maybe the same reason overstuffed americans need to buy new wardrobes and new cars every year?
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"Ever wonder why if mud huts are so great you don't live in one?"

Possibly due to the weather? Here in the northern US, the "mud hut" never really caught on.
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"Ever wonder why you and others who share your beliefs like to enjoy the fruits of capitalism but automatically deny these amenities to those in the third world?"

I'm not "enjoying capitalism's fruit," but rather "enjoying" the "fruit" of my own labor. And when I've had enough "fruit" to eat, I don't keep gorging myself at the expense of others. Moreover, the "third world" aren't demanding "amenities" absent madison avenue advertising. In fact, "capitalists" like Phil Knight seem to be "denying amenities" to "third world" laborers when he denies them a living wage for honest work. Finally, I believe EVERYONE should have food, shelter and clothing, so spare me further rhetorical questions.
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Ever wonder why your beliefs are so out of line with how you actually live?

No. In fact I wake up every morning feeling GREAT about being in alignment with my beliefs, and figuring how I can get into an even better alignment. But thanks for asking, just the same. Maybe Santa will bring you the book "Natural Capitalism" so that you can crack your brain and learn about alternatives to "dog eat dog" rape the planet economies. And by the way, european countries are "socialist" but I don't see them living in "mud huts" and they have more time off to enjoy LIFE. So think about it.