[scw86]

The likelihood of any USA provoked invasions in the near future for the USA seems unlikely given unprecedented USA debt. The USA is on the brink of a financial collapse. We have no gold reserves left and lack an industrial base that would be required for any large scale war. The public support for another war is weak and would only improve with some provoking action say from a 9/11 style attack by a terrorist state/group. How can we go to war if we are broke and the people in this country don't want another war. A nuclear strike seems to be becoming more likely as the trigger happy conservatives are left with fewer options. Any attack on an oil rich nation will surely send crude prices skyrocketing and hasten the USA financial collapse given the vast oil dependency of our economy. The Iran situation is looking more like a tactical nuclear strike by Israel or the USA on the Iranians nuclear facilities. This could in theory lead to a regional war with Iran sending forces into Iraq but who knows if this is even plausible. The only way the USA army could support an invasion currently would require either a draft which is unlikely or a pull out of Iraq and Afaganistan leaving anarchy behind in those countries.

[The_Virginian]

EXACTLY! The ONLY way we can continue on this path, is to follow it with gusto.
That means a HIGHLY CONTROLED ECONOMY.
-DRAFT
-RATIONING
-CHILD (or free) LABOR ( Children Collecting Firewood, metal scrap, and other "recylclable materials.")
-CURRANCY CONTROLS (besides the current harrasment)

( Side Note: I once thought we would have plenty of Junked vehiles to scrounge from, shot of a nuclear war zone, I see that as improbable. They will all be sold for scrap/parts/ iron before long...for a while you would have some junk (2-3 years) but that would not last long.)
An economy kept on TOTAL WAR FOOTING could keep people in line, wheras a Lenient Facist economy would engender riots and dissent.

[The_Virginian]

Due to this post being moved...BTT.

[ab0di]

There is a very interesting article in this month's <i>Monthly Review</i> regarding the proposed NAFTA corridors from Mexican Pacific ports into the US. A summary of some of the issues follows. A full-text PDF of the article is
here.

I can't see how this scheme can survive increasing fuel costs. This is just plain crazy.

NAFTA Corridors: Dividing the Nation to Multiply Profits

by Richard D. Vogel

The NAFTA corridors system currently under construction will irreversibly divide the U.S. geographically, economically, and socially for the sake of profit. The cumulative consequences of this "biggest engineering and construction project in the history of the U.S." promise to be more damaging than any natural disaster in modern times.

The largest of these massive transportation corridors, designed primarily to accommodate NAFTA traffic from Mexico across the U.S., will be 1,200 feet wide and consume 146 acres (almost 1/4 of a square mile) per mile. Because the corridors will contain high-speed passenger and freight rails and underground water, gas, and petroleum pipelines, as well as multiple high-speed truck and passenger vehicle lanes, they will be constructed at grade level and permanently divide the areas through which they pass. To make matters worse, the extensive grading and construction of barriers to protect the high-speed traffic will alter air currents and watersheds and prevent the movement of wildlife.

[cube]

Not to get too far off topic but I was joking with my brother in law that in the future, with many Americans who can't afford medical care, people will go to Mexico to recieve health services.

Suppose you didn't have health insurance, but needed medical care that was not urgent. It would be much cheaper to drive down to Mexico and get medical care.

To make matters even more interesting, imagine you did have health insurance but your provider has outsouced all the non-urgent care to a facility in Mexico. So if you needed medical care that was not urgent,
1) you fly down to Mexico
2) get your medical care and your insurance pays for it
3) return home

sounds impossible? Is there a law to prohibit this? who knows what the future will hold?

[aflatoxin]

My next door neighbor went to Mexico to get a bunch of dental work done. It would have cost over 10,000 dollars here.

It cost a lot less in Mexico, but he got Hepatitis at the clinic, and is in pretty bad shape now.

[NeoPeasant]

I can't see how this scheme can survive increasing fuel costs. This is just plain crazy.

Exactly. Traffic capacity expansion projects started from now on are going to be spectacular financial failures and will stand as lightly traveled monuments to our astonishing shortsightedness.

This is a point I have been trying to make to a couple bloggers in my state who are operating pro highway construction and development blogs.
Like here, for instance.

[Carlhole]

I didn't see this article posted anywhere on the site - so sorry if it's a duplicate thread. I just can't see why it's not a big deal with the PO crowd. Doesn't it seem like the height of folly?

It does sort of look like good ol' 'Merca is going the way of the DoDo bird. After this SuperHighWay, they will, of course, have to introduce a common currency for Mexico-America-Canada, and then think of a new name (The United Countries of America? AmerryMexaCan?

I'm sure the Bilderbergers must have surfed the web and stumbled onto the peak oil idea by now. Don't they realize that gas is going to cost $5 or $6/gal soon? Maybe they know something about energy availability that we don't, huh?

Bush Administration Quietly Plans NAFTA Super Highway

Posted Jun 12, 2006

Quietly but systematically, the Bush Administration is advancing the plan to build a huge NAFTA Super Highway, four football-fields-wide, through the heart of the U.S. along Interstate 35, from the Mexican border at Laredo, Tex., to the Canadian border north of Duluth, Minn.

Once complete, the new road will allow containers from the Far East to enter the United States through the Mexican port of Lazaro Cardenas, bypassing the Longshoreman’s Union in the process. The Mexican trucks, without the involvement of the Teamsters Union, will drive on what will be the nation’s most modern highway straight into the heart of America. The Mexican trucks will cross border in FAST lanes, checked only electronically by the new “SENTRI” system. The first customs stop will be a Mexican customs office in Kansas City, their new Smart Port complex, a facility being built for Mexico at a cost of $3 million to the U.S. taxpayers in Kansas City.

As incredible as this plan may seem to some readers, the first Trans-Texas Corridor segment of the NAFTA Super Highway is ready to begin construction next year. Various U.S. government agencies, dozens of state agencies, and scores of private NGOs (non-governmental organizations) have been working behind the scenes to create the NAFTA Super Highway, despite the lack of comment on the plan by President Bush. The American public is largely asleep to this key piece of the coming “North American Union” that government planners in the new trilateral region of United States, Canada and Mexico are about to drive into reality.

Just examine the following websites to get a feel for the magnitude of NAFTA Super Highway planning that has been going on without any new congressional legislation directly authorizing the construction of the planned international corridor through the center of the country...

[Jellric]

All I can say is I first heard this on Lou Dobbs a couple of nights ago and given this regime's history I can't say I'm surprised.

[pea-jay]

This thread does exist...

http://www.peakoil.com/fortopic21151.html

[Sleepybag]

Jerome Corsi does not have a good name among the peakoil crowd since he also believes that oil is abiotic. In other words, he says that oil can not be fossil, since dinosaurs did not walk on the bottom of the ocean. Oil, he claims, must be made magically inside the earth's crust.

[Kylon]

It may be useless for economic activity in the future, but it certain serves some good military functions.

[SoothSayer]

In a Power Down world, the new highway could be a backbone for transport in the US.

No cars - just ultra high efficiency transport road trains.

It could also be designed to include security fencing, cameras etc.

Just one major road to operate, maintain & protect.

It's North-South orientation is interesting .... can anyone suggest any interesting reasons for this?

[Daculling]

It's North-South orientation is interesting .... can anyone suggest any interesting reasons for this?

It's to facilitate the import of eastern goods via Mexico. That way they cut out the teamsters in the western ports of the US as well as import cheap labor from Mexico to the Midwest.

Ultimately its another tool to destroy the middle class in the US. It's hard to have a fascist government when you have an armed middle class.

[Armageddon]

Jerome Corsi does not have a good name among the peakoil crowd since he also believes that oil is abiotic. In other words, he says that oil can not be fossil, since dinosaurs did not walk on the bottom of the ocean. Oil, he claims, must be made magically inside the earth's crust.

Oil is definitely not from dinosaurs, but It may very well be abiotic. The only problem is, that it takes millions of years for it to form under extreme heat and pressure. So even if it is abiotic, it doesnt matter.

[green_achers]

Don't they realize that gas is going to cost $5 or $6/gal soon? Maybe they know something about energy availability that we don't, huh?

Well, the more efficient they can make the current import-oriented consumer model, the longer it will last in the face of rising prices. Sure, in the long run, it won't be viable, but in the meantime, a lot of money can be made by busting the unions and driving wages to the basement. I think some POers are a little unrealistic over what they consider "soon." The fat cats are banking on being able to cash in for a few more years, and they're probably right.

[vision-master]

Maybe there still is hope?

In 1976 America had its bicentennial celebrating 200 years of freedom. Some of the Native people thought this was significant and they carried a sacred pipe bundle from the West Coast to the East Coast of this land. They said that the roads of this land should either go North-South or East-West. If they went North-South we would come together as brothers and sisters, but if they went East-West there would be destruction and almost the earth itself would have a hard time. So you all know the roads went East-West. They said then things would be lost from the East to the West and from the South to the North and that they would come back again from the West to the East and from the North to the South. So nine years ago in 1976 from the West to East Coast of this land, from San Francisco to Washington, D.C. people carried a sacred pipe bundle by hand, on foot. My aunt had dreamt 15 years ago that people that didn't Like them would throw rocks and bottles at that pipe bundle as they carried it across the land. And sure enough that came about. But, as was in my aunt's dream, the rocks only came so close and then they dropped, and nothing touched it. When they reached the top of the Rocky Mountains, they hit a hard storm. An elderly man with long white hair said, "I will carry it now." They had a van that went alongside the people who were walking. He got out of the van and carried the sacred pipe bundle clear through that storm. He was so cold when he got back in the van that someone touched his hair and it fell. His hair was frozen. You have to be pretty cold for your hair to freeze but that old man carried it through that storm because they said if they carried this bundle across the earth, the powers would begin to come back. They said a spiritual fire would be lit in the North and would come down the Northwest Coast of this land. When it gets to the Puget Sound, it would go inland. I think this, nine years later, is the gathering in the North, myself. That's why I came here. This is it. We have the capacity to start the-spiritual fire now, here. The old people long ago saw it and foretold it and I'm going to come to that.

[Daculling]

Maybe there still is hope?

Hope for what? Importing the problems of the third world to the US?

[Loki]

It's North-South orientation is interesting .... can anyone suggest any interesting reasons for this?

It's to facilitate the import of eastern goods via Mexico. That way they cut out the teamsters in the western ports of the US as well as import cheap labor from Mexico to the Midwest.

Ultimately its another tool to destroy the middle class in the US. It's hard to have a fascist government when you have an armed middle class.

I agree with this assessment. This obscene superhighway facilitates the destruction of the Teamsters and Longshoremen's unions and eases the movement of cheap Mexican labor to corporate America's fields and factories. The Neo-cons and other globalists also envision a North American Union where national boundaries are made obsolete. The end result is the destruction of the American middle class and the further enrichment of the power elite.

[mmasters]

Funny thing is this has a plan B.

If the project goes belly up, they still own a substancial strip of land in the heartland of the country. It could be used for private food production, biofuels or be resold back to the people at a premium.