Mueller disappoints Dems

The Mueller report finds no evidence of collusion, and I can't say I'm surprised.  Here's what I wrote back in July of 2017 regarding the notorious "Tr*mp Tower meeting":

As I've previously observed, Russia never needed any help from Tr*mp and Co. to interfere in the American election — but certainly had no qualms about compromising individuals who might become part of a future Tr*mp Administration.  Given the high levels of both cupidity and incompetence on the Tr*mp team, the Russians didn't have to try too hard.

This doesn't mean Putin lacks kompromat on Our President — and I don't mean the "piss tape."  The Republican base has shown itself totally willing to ignore Tr*mp's sexual peccadillos, and paying hookers to pee on a bed isn't even a crime.  Money laundering, on the other hand, is a crime, and developers of high-end real estate are especially well-situated to participate.  Ongoing investigations of Deutche Bank just might turn up evidence that does some real damage to our Grifter in Chief — albeit most Americans can't comprehend financial crimes much more complex than bank robbery.

In the meanwhile, Our President can chalk up a victory — a victory that will make it far more difficult for Democrats to use future investigatory revelations to their political advantage.  The disappointing fact is that  Tr*mp never was a "foreign agent" — he's just one more corrupt businessman willing to make a quick buck.

Faith-based Fascism

If you assume that the goal of the new "Religious Liberty Task Force" recently announced by Attorney General Jeff Sessions will be to find new and better ways to discriminate against the LGBT community, you probably are underestimating the Attorney General and the administration he serves.  Rest assured that the Task Force also will investigate new ways to justify restricting women's reproductive rights, expand federal funding for religious schools, and aggressively erode the separation of Church and State.

Political authoritarians and religious hierarchies enjoy a natural partnership.  Both are essentially conservative, demanding that followers  accept the immutable rules and mythologies they hand down.  Neither can tolerate opposition based on anything so heterodox as rational thought, and both perceive those from outside their networks of believers as threats to be resisted, repressed, and demonized.  Working together, they keep their followers unquestioning and compliant.

Such partnerships may be as old as human civilization, but there are plenty of contemporary examples.  Conservative Islam, either Sunni or Shi'a, dominates the autocracies of the Middle East.  The Orthodox parties in Israel recently cooperated with Netanyahu's Likud to enact legal changes that make Muslims and Druse second-class citizens.  In India, Modi's Hindu nationalists stay in power by persecuting Muslims, and the generals of Myanmar have solidified Buddhist support by doing the same.

Of course, the relationship that most resembles Tr*mp's alliance of interests with Evangelicals is Putin's alliance of interests with the Russian Orthodox Church; and in Russia, too, the effort to strengthen church-state solidarity began by attacking homosexuals.  Perhaps "moral" considerations motivate religious conservatives to endorse and facilitate authoritarian political leadership, but the process is inevitably corrupt.

The Nunes Memo

Something everybody seems to be forgetting at the moment is that the FISA court was created specifically to add a veneer of "due process" respectability to the desire of Federal agents to spy on anybody, anywhere, for any purpose whatsoever.  Although created in the post-911 panic, nowhere in the authorizing legislation does it say that the subject of intrusive surveillance has to be named Mohammed.

Getting the FISA court to issue a warrant is easier than getting the proverbial grand jury to indict the proverbial ham sandwich — there's nobody there to oppose the warrant, it is assumed that the warrant is, well, warranted, and the judges want to go to lunch.  If there isn't a big rubber stamp to mark "APPROVED" on every application, it's just another example of gross government inefficiency.

Carter Page, notoriously sleazy, might have justified a warrant by reputation alone.  Personally, I still don't see why the Russians would have needed Republican help to interfere in our election, although compromising some idiots in the Tr*mp campaign probably was just too easy a proposition to pass up.  The cover-up, as usual, is likely to be worse than the crime.

Tr*mp to Kurds: F*ck you

So, the Russians, the Iranians, and the Turks sat down in a room to "resolve" the civil war in Syria.  Needless to say, the chief objective of the Russians and the Iranians is to keep Bashir al-Assad in power.  Turkey, a purported NATO "ally," is anxious to cooperate with Iran to achieve its own most cherished goal: suppression of the Kurds.

The Kurds have been America's only dependable ally in both Syria and Iraq, and were instrumental in reclaiming territory from the Islamic State.  They are the only force now standing in the way of Assad exercising complete control over Syria.  According to the Washington Post, when Turkish strongman Recip Tayyip Erdogan asked Tr*mp to stop providing arms to the Syrian Kurds, Tr*mp's response was, "Sure, buddy!  Anything for a pal!"

Tr*mp, of course, admires Erdogan's style of leadership; but America's stubborn loyalty to an undeniably autocratic Erdogan seems to have just one real objective: maintaining the US presence at Incirlik Air Base in Turkey.  To do that, both the Administration and military leaders seem willing to empower both Iran and Russia.  Iranian client Hezbollah appears to have solidified control over Lebanon, Iranian ties to the al-Abadi regime in Iraq are stronger than ever, and we can assume Russia's military occupation of Syria will expand: without US support, Kurdish control of northern Syria is doomed.

Now that Erdogan has destroyed the secular legacy of Ataturk, the Kurds are the only ones in the region willing to keep government separate from the practice of Islam; and even though Turkey is Sunni and Iran is Shi'a, Erdogan and Rouhani see no impediment to uniting against the Kurdish "threat."  Haider al-Abadi will happily join the club, anxious to gain control of Kurdish areas of northern Iraq.  America's fourteen-year investment of lives and money in Iraq will have been entirely wasted.

The Kurds, after a century of oppression, deserve to have an independent homeland; and it is in the best interests of the US that they succeed in their quest.  Deserting them now only means more regional power for Russia and Iran, and diminished US influence in the Middle East.

Adventures in Tr*mpland

Despite the past week's avalanche of insanity; despite all the claims, counterclaims, and contradictions; despite a truly extraordinary display of administrative disorganization and incompetence; it's not that hard to understand what's happening in Tr*mpland.

The Russian Connection
It is impossible to say just how much impact Russia had on November's election, but one thing is certain: nothing Russia did required collusion with the Trump campaign.  Neither Paul Manafort, nor Roger Stone, nor Erik Prince, nor Michael Flynn, nor Jeff Sessions, nor any other Tr*mpista had anything to contribute to the hack of the DNC's email or the flood of damaging fake news.  Russia needed no assistance from Tr*mp associates.

This is not to say Russia had nothing to gain by arranging meetings with individuals close to Tr*mp.  Any less-than-public contact with people close to the campaign made those individuals susceptible to blackmail, and gave Putin a tool to pressure the new American administration if Tr*mp happened to win.

Tr*mp happened to win.  Did he even know some of his minions were canoodling with the Russkis?  It doesn't matter, nor does it matter that nothing that happened in their meetings could have had any impact on the election.  In politics, appearances are everything.

The Comey Firing

Everything in Rod Rosenstein's memo criticizing the FBI director was true, and largely echoed Democratic critiques.  Comey probably deserved to be fired — three months ago — but not even Tr*mp's loyal base is gullible enough to believe that the Clinton email fiasco had anything to do with Comey's sudden departure.

More revelations about the Russia connection are sure to emerge, no matter who is confirmed to lead the FBI.  Comey was fired not to prevent more revelations, but to better control how they are made public.  Tr*mp wants a loyalist as director, someone who will minimize the ensuing damage.  (Rosenstein should start updating his résumé ASAP.)

Lock him up?
It is very unlikely that Tr*mp's dismissal of Comey will constitute obstruction of justice.  Proving obstruction of justice would require demonstrating Our President's state of mind when he made his decision, and Tr*mp's mind, to date, has proven so disjointed as to be unfathomable.

At the rate he's going, though, Tr*mp may achieve lame duck status faster than any president in history — possibly even before the 2018 Congressional elections.

That Dossier

Invited by Buzzfeed to judge for myself, I slogged through the 35 pages (some blank) of opposition "research" on Donald Tr*mp. It was less than enlightening.

For one thing, there is nothing to indicate that former MI6 agent Christopher Steele had more than a single "informant" with connections to the Kremlin, no way to decide if said informant was at all dependable, and no way to distinguish between genuine intelligence and disinformation.  Protestations by central figure Michael Cohen notwithstanding, there is no way to know whether or not the Tr*mp lawyer was in Prague at the key times: he was inside the Schengen Area of the EU, and border crossings need not have been noted on his passport.

As for the "Golden Shower" allegation, the document does not claim the self-described germophobe actually was on the bed formerly used by the Obamas when it was anointed by Russian hookers.  Even so, the scene described is suspect.  Had Tr*mp wished to dishonor the Obamas by wetting the bed they had used, wouldn't you think it would have been more satisfying to pee on it himself?

Still, it seems probable that the source for the dossier was Russian, and almost certainly a Kremlin insider — but whose side was s/he on?  Tr*mp will become the US President with the least political legitimacy since John Quincy Adams was awarded the office by the House of Representatives in 1825.  Did the Russians have reason to further delegitimatize him?

Probably.  Driving a wedge between Tr*mp supporters and establishment Republicans discourages any concerted action at all by the US government, leaving openings for international machinations by Russia to go entirely unopposed, and further weakening the confidence of Americans in their government — confidence which already is scraping bottom.

The dossier was "all over Washington" well before the election.  Who was the original leaker, prior to the Buzzfeed publication?  It just might have been the Russians.

Briefly

Peace talks
Turkey, Iran, and Russia (as a surrogate for Assad) have been discussing a plan to end the war in Syria.  It's an odd grouping, to be sure — they've been at each other's throats for decades.  In fact, they seem to have only one goal in common: preventing the establishment of anything resembling an independent Kurdistan.  Personally, I believe it is time for the USofA to stop toadying to the likes of Erdogan and Abadi and back the idea of a Kurdish state in Iraq and Syria — perhaps even with an eye towards parts of Turkey.  The Kurds are the most dependable friends we have in the region, and will remain so unless we betray them.

Nuclear Arms Race
If there is any more dangerous combination than belligerence, ignorance, and vanity, I can't think of it right now — although I suppose we should be grateful that Tr*mp, unlike many of his supporters, at least is not looking forward to the Apocalypse.

Settlements
I was pleasantly surprised when Obama instructed Samantha Power to abstain from, rather than veto, the Security Council vote condemning Israel's expansion of settlements on the West Bank.  It won't  make any difference on the ground, of course, but the president certainly must have enjoyed poking a parting stick into Netanyahu's eye.

The Berlin Aftermath
Angela Merkel's political future is looking dim, and so is the outlook for the EU.  Still, the waves of migration won't be stopped, driven by climate change and the brutal struggles for resources it foments.  As right-wing xenophobes come to dominate the West, any unified response to common threats seems less and less likely.

Very Briefly

✪ The decision by Congress to allow families of 9/11 victims to sue the government of Saudi Arabia may lead to lawsuits against the US for consequences of CIA and military activities; I'm fine with that. 
✪ Investigators have provided extensive proof that a Russian Surface-to-Air Missile was responsible for the downing of a Malaysian airliner over Ukraine; uh huh.   
✪ Speaking of SAMs, isn't it time to start providing shoulder mounted SAMs to the Syrian rebels, even at the risk of them getting into the hands of Fateh al-Shah (al-Nusra)?   
✪ To the dismay of vestigial Blairites, Jeremy Corbyn continues to lead the Labour Party sharply to the left; so, whither the Democrats? 
✪ So now Peres is dead, along with Rabin, Arafat, and the Oslo Accord; Nobel prize points for trying, I guess. 
✪ David Wildstein's testimony at the Bridgegate trial of Christie toadies Baroni and Kelly continues to provide a laugh a minute as corruption in state and local politics scarcely takes a breather; up next, the Cuomo administration.

The Sports Page

Big sporting news this week!

Well, hearing that the Russians have turned sports cheating into their national passtime is not exactly surprising — and anyway, what's a little doping in sporting circles?  Putin, of course, says the report from the World Anti-Doping Agency (motto: play true, not capitalized) is just another US sponsored cabal designed to demean and belittle Mother Russia (capitalized), and that innately superior Russian athletes don't need performance enhancing drugs.  After all, Putin himself managed to score all those goals in that hockey game without doping!  Okay, there was no goalie, and his opponents were, shall we say, motivated to see him succeed, but what the hell?  Nobody can deny (for many good reasons) he's a real man, and the embodiment of everything wonderful about Russia.

The other sporting news came from the University of Missouri*, where demonstrations by black students and a hunger striker may have, sort of, led to the resignation of the school's president.  Okay, okay, the threatened strike by UM's football team was the clincher.  No, it wasn't just the million dollar cancellation fee UM would have had to pay if it missed its game with Brigham Young, it was something even more important — it was football!  Now if somebody just could sign up the NFL for Black Lives Matter...

*Don't let anybody tell you Missouri is the Midwest.  It's the South.  It's the good ol' barbecue eating down-home racist South.

Catch-up

Russia in Syria
The main question: why?  Is Putin acting for internal Russian consumption, continuing his "strong man" routine?  Is he concerned about losing Russia's naval base?  It's not because he likes Assad — nobody likes Assad.  Maybe he's just decided that since Syria probably is the most fucked-up arena in the world, Russia, hoping to re-establish itself as a "world power," just has to be there.

Initially, it seemed inevitable that Russia only could make the megamess worse, but there is a possibility that Russia might make things better, by sharing some of the responsibility for pumping out the cesspool.  After all, Syria can't get much worse.

Hillary and Benghazi
Yawn.

Migrants
The United States has no valid excuse for admitting so few war refugees, leaving others to shoulder the load.  The idea that we need two years per applicant to filter out potential "terrorists" is nothing but an excuse.  The real motive for the unconscionable rigmarole is xenophobia and racism.

Paul Ryan
Of course.  All the "I don't wanna" was bullshit from word one.  He always had the essential quality: allegiance to the economic policy of soaking the poor to further enrich the rich and pretending it creates "growth."  Despite it's other bizarre obsessions, the Freedom Caucus agrees.

The Primaries
I'm still giving Bernie money, even though it's dead certain now that Hillary will be the Democratic candidate, and that Bernie's pulled her about as far to the left as she's ready to go.

In the meanwhile, the Republican field continues to be a total freak show: Ben Carson!?  He makes Trump seem reasonable (and intelligent) by comparison.  Bush, despite all his money, appears to be dead in the water.  Ted Cruz, who is straight-out evil, is moving up — but he's far too ugly to be elected president.  Rubio, the quintessential opportunist but pretty as a picture, may end up the candidate — and, sadly, he might even win.

Recently...

Another mass murder
As usual, Republicans are blaming crazy people and Democrats are calling for what would be essentially useless gun control measures even if they could be enacted, which they cannot.  The essential problem is that there are entirely too many guns floating around the USofA, and nobody, really, is "cummin' t' take yer guns."  They're just "cummin' t' flap ther gums."  I have no solutions to offer, and neither, I believe, does anybody else.

Russia in Syria
Weren't things already complicated enough?  I guess not.  Russia is bombing anybody opposed to Assad, and Iran, mainly through Hezbollah, is doing what it can to keep Assad in power.  The USofA sort of supports the Free Syrian Army, recently bombed by Russia, and halfheartedly supports the Kurds, currently being bombed by our "ally," Turkey.  Then we've got those five guys fighting IS but not Assad, even though we want Assad to step down.  France is fighting IS in Iraq, but not in Syria.  IS is fighting everybody, and not especially bothered that everybody is fighting everybody else.  You can't tell the players without a scorecard, and the scorecard keeps changing.

Arne Duncan resigns
It's about time, because Obama's Education Secretary has been a disaster, and through his support for charter schools has done as much as any Republican to advance the privatization of public education.  "Race to the Top" did it's bit to advance corporatist "data based" evaluation of schools and teachers, despite the fact that no useful data at all has been available — only scores on tests of no observable value designed by private contractors.  Happily, Duncan will not be replaced: his bureaucratic duties will be assumed by some bureaucratic lackey, and no further damage is likely to be done through the remainder of the Obama presidency.

More Short Subjects

 Ukraine

Russian troops at the border!  NATO jets patrolling the Baltic states!  The Donetsk People's Republic!  Be afraid!  Well, don't be that afraid unless you're an Ukrainian who soon will be living with IMF imposed austerity measures while paying more for Russian natural gas.

All I see is a lot of posturing.  There is no way in hell Russia and NATO will slug it out physically over some antiquated manufacturing plants and wheat fields.

India

It looks like Narendra Modi's BJP party will be pushing the Gandhi family's Congress party aside in the current election cycle, despite Modi's previously undisclosed wife and that little matter of the slaughter of Muslims up in Gujarat back in 2002.  Will Modi govern as the consummate capitalist, the Hindu nationalist, or some combination of the two?  We'll wait and see.

Speaking of Gujarat, I like to point out to people that Muslims often are victims as well as perps (and not only to each other.)  In the Central African Republic, the Christians seem to be the real crazies, for example.  Then there's Cambodia, where the Buddhists are the bad guys.  Then again, there's Palestine.  'Nuff said.

Flight 370

I've read that the missing Malaysian airliner has done more for CNN's ratings than anything since Bush bombed Baghdad.  I will admit I'm curious to know what actually happened (my personal crazy hypothesis involves hacking the airliner's software), but sometimes it happens that you just don't get to know what you want to know.

Wrapping up March

It's been a pretty depressing month.  That mudslide out in Oso, Washington, is heartbreaking, and every developer who built a house in that known danger area should be financially wiped out.  It won't happen, of course.

Then, there was the Malaysian Airlines flight.  I can't pretend to have any clue as to what happened, albeit I suspect depressurization had some role — but, then, what do I know?  In both Washington and Peking, there are hundreds of people suffering, wondering what became of their loved ones.

As usual, though, there was more crap.

Crimea

It's part of Russia again, and won't be undone.  In the meanwhile, Ukraine is a mess, economically, and probably about to get worse, thanks to the IMF.  Look forward to shitloads of austerity, Ukrainians.  It's been six years of hell for Greece, and it will be worse for you.  Maybe you can overcharge the Crimeans for water, and make the Russians absorb some of the pain.

Israel and Palestine

Abbas will not agree that Israel is a "Jewish State," because that will accept the second-class status of Arab-Israeli citizens.  I no longer believe in the "two-state solution," if I ever did.  It's time for Israel, the settlements, and the rest of the West Bank to become a single state, with equal rights for all.  The Hassidim and the Arabs can compete to see who will reproduce more like the proverbial rabbits to see who stays in control.  Too bad for the secularists, but that's how the sperm splatters.

Barack and Francis

Okay, they've met, and sort of seem to agree that some degree of income redistribution is needed.  The big difference (apart from differences regarding abortion and birth control) is that Obama's perspective is political and the pope's interest is moral.  (My interest, by the way, is sociological.)

Greece

Supposedly, Greece now has a balanced budget.  Unfortunately, it still has a 25% unemployment rate.  If it experiences any GDP "growth," ordinary Greeks won't see any of it.

More depressing crap.

After the putsch

I wish I could get away from Ukraine, but that seems unlikely at the moment.  Granted, Yanukovych was a moron, a kleptocrat, and an ineptocrat (I just made that up) as well.  Just the same, it seems pretty obvious that the ouster of Yanukovych was not especially constitutional.

I'm calling the uprising a putsch because "coup d'etat" seems a little too Latinized to me.  I do not think all the "nationalists" are, as Putin would have it, fascists, but I can't be sure of the actual proportion.  Europe is full of fascists these days, so who knows?

The West supports the new government in Ukraine because the friend of my (kind of) friend is (kind of) my friend — and the alternative is (Cold Warriors may gasp now) Russia.  Whatever.  If the Crimeans are dumb enough to want to return to Russian control, I'm inclined to let them have self-determination.  Would they do better as a somewhat more autonomous region of Ukraine?  Given the crappy economic situation Ukraine is in these days, Russia might be the better choice.  Ukraine's current "leaders" already are discussing the kinds of austerity measures they'll be taking to satisfy the IMF.  (Think Greece.)

Clearly, Obama doesn't want to look any more like a wimp than he already does, and the more traditional Republicans want to cast him in that light and find ways to puff out their chests like robins in the springtime — but for all concerned, the best bet is just to let Russia re-absorb Crimea.  Russia already controls Crimea with their military/naval bases, so what's the big difference?

There is no way to know if a new Ukrainian government will be any less inept nor any less corrupt than the Yanukovych regime — nor any less inept nor any less corrupt than the Putin regime — but I think it's for Crimeans to decide which is the lesser of two evils.

Corruption

Russia.  China.  Turkey. Guatamala. Etc.

Everywhere.  Human beings, especially those who acquire any sort of wealth or power, are almost inevitably corrupt.  Probably those without wealth or power have similar inclinations but far less opportunity.  Would I indulge in insider trading if I had the opportunity?

Okay, I'd be sorely tempted, especially if I thought I could get away with it.

The Martoma trial, and the actions against seven other SAC Capital traders, are just one example of corruption right here at home.  The unusual thing about the SAC situation is that a few actual criminal prosecutions are taking place, albeit, so far, Steven A. Cohen himself remains unscathed.  In this country, you just don't go after a multi-billionaire.

On those rare occasions when the SEC goes after a bank or a big shot, it "agrees to" an impressive sounding but essentially negligible fine with no admission of wrongdoing.

Corruption.

"But wait," you say, "here in the USofA, at the very least, our corruption doesn't involve human rights violations."

Yeah, right.  Abu Ghraib.  Guantánamo.  Secret sites all over.

Then there was Brooklyn, for example, during the long Charles Hynes years.  The new DA, Ken Thompson, is working very hard to undo false convictions from the 1980s and 1990s, but a lot of mostly innocent black men still will spend the rest of their lives in prison.

Mark Twain once said that the United States "has the best Congress money can buy."  Uh huh.

I've been too depressed to write a lot lately, but I'll try to get to Russia, China, Turkey, etc. later this month.

Ahmed Wali Karzai

Ahmed Wali Karzai, Hamid Karzai's kid brother, is the foremost Afghan capitalist. Yes, his reputation for corruption, dishonesty, graft, and outright thievery is the stuff of legend, but none of that disqualifies a man from the ranks of the world's great capitalists. A guy's gotta do what a guy's gotta do.

According to yesterday's Times, U.S. officials have decided to leave him in place in Kandahar, his seat of power (and also a center of Taliban activity), when we invade it sometime in the near future — all the moralistic talk about fighting corruption notwithstanding. It seems State has decided that we've pissed off Hamid Karzai enough lately, and that the military (and probably the C.I.A. as well) think Ahmed Wali might be useful.

Well, of course he'll be useful, and of course he'll be happy to work with us. Greedy, self-interested bastards always are happy to "work with" anybody tossing billions of dollars around. Needless to say, he can't be trusted — a history of vote rigging, dope smuggling, money laundering, seizure of other people's property, and an host of other traditional capitalist modi operandi does not inspire great trust. The trick will be to use him to best advantage.

Since he's been paying off the Taliban for years — to lay off his properties, opium shipments, etc. — it's been suggested that he'd be good person to help "turn" some of the "less radical" Taliban, and bring them into the government's camp, but I have a better idea.

A much more effective way to use him would be as a go-between to help the United States buy all the local opium production, at premium prices. What better way to win the hearts and minds of the locals than to become the best customer for their most important crop?

I know. I've said it before, but I think it bears repeating. The best way to curry favor in Afghanistan while cutting off the flow of heroine to the United States and the rest of the world is to buy the raw material — the raw opium — before it is processed. Ahmed Wali's influence extends throughout Kandahar province, and well into Helmand. That's a majority of the opium production in the country.

You may recall that a decision was made not to destroy the opium crop when we took Marja. What's happening to that opium? Nobody seems to be asking that question — at least nobody being quoted in the Times. Could it be that the Obama administration already is following my suggestion? It would be nice.

In the meanwhile, though, the Russians are royally pissed by all the Afghan heroin currently making its way onto the streets of Moscow. Was a commitment to help reduce the heroin flow part of the agreement to reduce our nuclear arsenals? We'll never know.

So let's use Ahmed Wali Karzai to best advantage — to stop the opium before it leaves Afghanistan. We will not be able to persuade the Afghans to replace their most important cash crop with, say, potatoes or winter wheat. Buying all their opium not only will keep it off world markets, but will make us their most important trading partner. It's a lot cheaper than fighting a never-ending war.

Leverage over Russia?

Well, it was a pretty dumb move on the part of Mikheil Saakashvili. I don't know what he expected to happen when he picked a fight with Putin, but he can't be all that surprised by how Russia responded. He should be even less surprised by how the West responded to the Russian invasion. Maybe Saakashvili figured the conflict was inevitable -- and probably it was -- but why he thought now would be a good time to get it going is beyond me.

Western Europe is totally dependent on Russian oil; the U.S. is preoccupied with Iraq and Afghanistan and economic meltdown, and Bush is a lame duck who's already blown whatever moral authority this country may once have had. So far, Georgia's had no support from the West save a few vague threats about taking the G8 down to G7 again. But wait -- the U.S. does have style="font-style: italic;">some leverage over Russia, come to think of it.

There's that little matter of the $100 billion we owe them. What if we threatened them with default?

Yes, yes, I know -- defaulting on a debt can wreak havoc on a country's credit rating. On the other hand, one could argue that repaying money owed to belligerent, aggressor nations who invade and occupy other countries only serves to encourage them. (Yes, yes, I know -- the description fits us as well as it does them -- but hell, they don't owe us money!)

Am I joking? Maybe -- but considering how much money we owe sovereign wealth funds and powerful corporate players in potentially troublesome countries around the world, why not take this opportunity to use our colossal fiscal irresponsibility to achieve world peace? Think about it -- crazy as it sounds, it might even work.