The number of people still prepared to defend the Iraq War in public is tiny. The interesting thing is the very strong correlation between those people, and those prepared to pretend to give credence to the farcical sexual allegations about Julian Assange. Zoe Williams Guardian piece about what a jolly good chap Blair is I find breathtaking. War crimes like Blair’s result in terrible anguish for millions. I am prepared for purposes of argument to believe that Williams’ anguish for female victims of crime is genuine; why she can’t extend that to the tens of thousands of women who were raped because of Blair’s Iraq War, or had the still worse agony of seeing their children killed and mutilated I don’t know. Nick Cohen is just very, very sad. I just hold up these two in the hope that those deceived by feminist political correctness into following their lead against Assange will see to what they are subscribing.
Rather a side issue, but even if we accept Zoe Williams view that dead Iraqi children don’t matter, she appears not to have noticed that Blair introduced tuition fees, academies, kick-started NHS privatization, allowed the banksters’ bonanza leading to worldwide economic crash and oversaw the greatest widening of the gap between rich and poor in British history.
No sign of any apology from the chief Holodomor denier. Anyway following Craig’s lead for dealing with Holocaust deniers we have had the exposure, so I think it is now time for some gentle ridicule.
I must warn anyone with small children or animals (you know the type that suffer on Bonfire night) to turn the volume down beforehand, there is a danger that any cats in the locality may wish to join in.
https://soundcloud.com/john_goose
(Apologies to Sue who can actually sing!)
http://www.etymonline.com/index.php?term=liberal
Fair minded and consolidated.
Afghanistan, one of BLiar’s theatres of war, is hardly referred to now by the medja. Remember the swamp of the propaganda – the processions of hearses through Royal Wootton Bassett, the setting up and the performances of the Military Wives Choir, Outside broadcasts from Brize Norton, the outpourings of Mesdames Caroline Wyatt and Lyse Doucet on ZBC and their equivalents in the press and other TV channels…..
The MoD’s PR departments aka Media Operations Group must have been on overtime.
We would never outright lie but…” “I wasn’t exactly Goebbels but I was conscious of…”
Second army officer quits to reveal ‘human cost of Afghanistan’
Paul Gallagher
Friday, 11 April 2014
A second Army officer has resigned his commission so he can publish an eyewitness account of the human cost endured by the British Army in Afghanistan.
Former reserve Captain Christian Hill has written a book on his experiences with the Media Operations Group, where his main role was to “promote” the war to the public back home and give the appearance everything was under control. The reality, he claims in the book, was often very different.
The Ministry of Defence was sent a copy of Combat Camera in December, when it told Mr Hill that his book, due to be published on 20 April, was subject to a 35-working day clearance review which has to be passed up the chain of command and its publication could be blocked. His request for clarification on any possible national security breaches went unanswered, so he quit his position.
Earlier this week, Dr Mike Martin resigned his position as a Territorial Army Captain to enable him to publish An Intimate War, his own heavily critical account of British operations in Helmand.
/..
http://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/home-news/second-army-officer-quits-to-reveal-human-cost-of-afghanistan-9255145.html
The Miliband piece on last night’s 10 pm news.
http://www.bbc.co.uk/iplayer/episode/b04000mz/BBC_News_at_Ten_11_04_2014/ 13 mins in for 4 mins.
Was it ‘news’?
PS The wreath was laurel on the reverse but floral on its face. Does Israel send bills for the wreaths to the prominent people seen laying them at Yad Vashem? Probably not. All part of the propaganda machine. Miliband is off to West Bank today. He was seen in the piece with Netanyahu. Did the subject of the settlement building come up we wonder.
The SNP gathering featured in the previous segment btw.
Miliband’s timing is poor of course as the ‘talks’ have ended.
From the US Jewish Voice for Peace http://jewishvoiceforpeace.org/
“700 settlement units were announced in Jerusalem, and poof – that was sort of the moment.”- Secretary of State John Kerry
Kerry’s latest statement: more honest than he intended? The US-backed peace process is faltering. What comes next?
It wasn’t exactly poetry, but Secretary of State John Kerry’s testimony to Congress this week might go down in history as a real turning point in the last 20 plus years of US-orchestrated negotiations between Israelis and Palestinians. (1)
For the first time— and despite later efforts to backtrack— a U.S. Secretary of State admitted it was the Israelis who are derailing talks.
Kerry couldn’t have been more clear about the recent sequence of events that have driven these talks to the brink.
First Israel refused to release the last group of Palestinian prisoners they had promised to free, then they announced construction of 700 new settlement units, and only then did the Palestinians announce that they would attempt to join 15 international human rights conventions.
The US and Israel still vigorously criticized that move, which begs the question: what kind of “peace process” considers signing on to covenants promoting the rights of children, the disabled, and others a threat to peace? (2)
Of course, unilateral Israeli actions to undermine peace go back much further.
Since the Oslo Accords, the number of Jewish settlers on Palestinian land has more than doubled – to more than 650,000. (3) In fact, Benjamin Netanyahu campaigned for re-election on a promise of one million Jews living in “Judea and Samaria”. (4)
Rather than hold Israel accountable, the United States has repeatedly rewarded the Israeli government whenever it violated the law or agreements, now fueling the occupation with $3.2 billion in annual military aid.
The United States is indeed acting like a broker in these talks — representing Israel.
The losers in this peace scam? The Palestinians most of all, but also every Israeli who wants a lasting and just peace. And every US resident who wants our tax money to be used for freedom and democracy, not occupation and apartheid.
In truth, the terms Kerry and Israel set forth have nothing to do with equality – they’ll require Palestinians to sit at the back of the bus.
But they give us an idea of what will be on the table should talks, which have proven to be an effective delaying tactic while Israel builds “fact on the ground”, limp along.
They include an unprecedented demand that the Palestinian Authority recognize Israel as a Jewish state. That’s code for condemning Israel’s 25% of citizens who aren’t Jewish to second and third class status, and denying the internationally recognized rights of Palestinian refugees. (5)
And the land being negotiated for a future Palestinian “state”?
It looks more like the holes in a piece of Swiss cheese, thanks to decades of US-enabled settlement expansion. Put another way, whatever the rhetoric of a “two-state solution,” Israeli policies have already created a de-facto single state including all of Israel, the West Bank, Gaza and occupied East Jerusalem, albeit one built on the premise of separate and unequal lives for Jews and non-Jews. This is the very definition of apartheid.
So what next?
At Jewish Voice for Peace, we believe that the struggle for freedom and self-determination will end, like similar struggles in Northern Ireland and South Africa, at the negotiation table. But that can only happen when all parties can sit down together with equal power.
Israel has one of the strongest militaries in the world, the only nuclear arsenal in the Middle East, and the unconditional backing of the world’s sole super power. It is the 24th wealthiest country in the world. Meanwhile, the Palestinians across the table remain stateless, impoverished, occupied, or second-class citizens inside of Israel.
But the balance of power is changing.
And the engine of that change is the unstoppable movement of nonviolent resistance by Palestinians and their allies – including Jews of conscience – around the globe. Education, lobbying, the involvement of international legal bodies, demonstrations in the streets in Israel and Palestine, have all made a difference and will continue to grow.
And where our governments have thus far failed us, more and more people everywhere have begun to stand up and use nonviolent, economic power to build pressure on Israel to do the right thing.
The successes of the Palestinian-led nonviolent movement for Boycott, Divestment, and Sanctions (BDS) are growing, with billions of dollars and major multinational corporations already impacted. That pressure has already been felt at this round of talks. Even Prime Minister Netanyahu mentioned BDS 26 times in his speech to AIPAC, the largest U.S. pro-Israel lobbying organization.
The Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions movement is the Palestinians’ Montgomery Bus Boycott.This movement for us as Jews is a form of tochecha, the Jewish tradition of sacred rebuke, which comes from a place of love and is the religious obligation to remind one’s friends to live by their values. It is also a nonviolent and principled way to liberate our own community from the dehumanizing role of oppressor.
Can BDS really work? We think so. Israeli government officials agree. Israeli finance minister Yair Lapid warned that even a limited EU boycott could cost the Israeli economy over $5 billion dollars a year. Foreign Minister Tzipi Livni put it even more directly: “The boycott is moving and advancing uniformly and exponentially…Those who don’t want to see it, will end up feeling it.” Already impacted, even Israel’s business elites are organizing to demand a negotiated agreement.
Certainly, BDS is working better than any strategy has before. It’s a movement rooted in Palestinian civil society – women’s groups, trade unions, students – and so it has no leader that can be stopped. No single funder that can be cut off.
It is fueled instead by the same love for justice, equality, and human rights that has fueled every successful justice movement the world has ever seen. Grounded in international law, it asks for an end to occupation, equality for the Palestinian citizens of Israel, and a just resolution for millions of refugees.
Martin Luther King famously wrote in his “Letter from a Birmingham Jail”:
“You may well ask: ‘Why direct action? Why sit-ins, marches and so forth? Isn’t negotiation a better path?’ You are quite right in calling for negotiation. Indeed, this is the very purpose of direct action. Nonviolent direct action seeks to create such a crisis and foster such a tension that a community which has constantly refused to negotiate is forced to confront the issue.”
That is precisely what we are doing. And we ask you to continue to join us in this historic movement at this historic moment. So that all who live in Israel and Palestine, in whatever configuration both peoples choose, can live as equals, with the same opportunities to raise families safely, go to school, and build a future.
Whatever happens in the coming days and weeks, we have turned a corner, and there’s no going back.
Sincerely,
Cecilie Surasky
Deputy Director
Sorry I could not give a link as the JVfP site has been corrupted. I copied the email.
Mary, thanks for your article from Jewish voice for peace. It is good to know there are Jews of conscience working against the oppression. Ways and means are not out of our hands in dealing with Israeli illegality, and Birmingham City Council has found one way to put the pressure on. Not to renew the contract with racist oppressors.
http://www.birminghammail.co.uk/news/veolia-warned-over-birmingham-contract-6946116
From Mary re Miliband’s visit to Israel and the Westr Bank
“Miliband is off to West Bank today. He was seen in the piece with Netanyahu. Did the subject of the settlement building come up we wonder.”
_________________
In an effort to be helpful: if you’re really interested, you could try contacting Miliband’s office to ask?
I think it’d probably respond, given that Miliband’s after your vote (you recently told us that you’d received an email from the Labour party)
******************
La vita è bella, life is good!
Afrend 11 Apr, 2014 – 8:12 pm
Afrend you are a real friend, a true friend to the decent people who come to this blog for enlightenment and sometimes find in its place a visible darkness. What a star you are. Thank you sincerely.
Agree John.
Yet more of Miliband on the BBC website under the Politics heading rather than World/Middle East.
Three of the five large photos relate to the Yad Vashem visit so the title here is rather misleading. S/be Labour leader Ed Miliband visits Yad Vashem.
Labour leader Ed Miliband visits Israel
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-politics-26986410
Info http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Yad_Vashem
From a long quote by Mary
“They include an unprecedented demand that the Palestinian Authority recognize Israel as a Jewish state. That’s code for condemning Israel’s 25% of citizens who aren’t Jewish to second and third class status, and denying the internationally recognized rights of Palestinian refugees.”
____________________
I don’t know what the legal implications for Palestinian refugees of possible recognition by the P.A. of Israel as a Jewish state might be and so shan’t comment on that, but can someone explain exactly why and how such recognition would “condemn non-Jewish Israeli citizens to second and third class status”? Detailed info please, rather than mere general statements and rants.
I ask, inter alia, against the background of comments which have appeared on this blog in the past, from the Iranian govt’s friends, that non-Muslims enjoy full political, economic and social rights in the Islamic republic of Iran as the country is officially named.
Thank you.
Mr Goss
“Afrend you are a real friend, a true friend to the decent people..etc,etc…”
________________
Shouldn’t you be addressing your true friend by his usual/previous handle?
Just askin’.
John I meant that I agree with your previous comment on the JVfP message. Still not sure about the Habbabreak device though. Continuity is lost and in the end we could end up deleting all comments from everyone we had taken a dislike to so what would be the point of the blog. I just use the scroll button and ignore him and them.
Also I think it is likely to heighten the illusions of superiority the t—–s already possess.
Does BLiar the Quartet Envoy ever comment on Israel’s daily atrocities? One example here.
Israeli police brutality video goes viral
http://www.presstv.ir/detail/358016.html
An online video has emerged, showing Israeli police forces battering a Palestinian before attacking a protesting bystander.
Ali Talhami suffered a broken arm and ribs after police officers repeatedly slammed a police car door on him, the Israeli daily Haaretz reported on Thursday.
The video shows a police officer forcing Talhami into the police van with blows and then walking over to Majdi Dabah, who was standing nearby, before throwing him at the vehicle.
Talhami was subjected to the acts of violence for refusing to pay up a heavy fine imposed on him by an inspector for leaving a refrigerator outside his store in East al-Quds (Jerusalem).
“I explained the refrigerator was outside because we were returning it to the company, but the inspector started swearing at me,” Talhami said, adding that he was then attacked by a police officer accompanying the inspector before other police officers arrived and joined in on the beating.
“After we reached the police station, they continued beating me,” said Talhami.
“The policeman started beating Ali, and I told him not to,” Dabah said. “So he pushed me with my head into the window and then knocked me to the ground and beat me.”
“My shoulder was dislocated and my head hurts,” Dabah said.
http://www.intifada-palestine.com/2014/04/israeli-police-brutality-video-goes-viral/
~~~
Tony Blair’s record in the Middle East is a sorry one – it’s time he quit
It’s easy to see what the former Labour prime minister gets out of his role as Middle East envoy, but harder to see what he gives back
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/middleeast/9806139/Tony-Blairs-record-in-the-Middle-East-is-a-sorry-one-its-time-he-quit.html
It’s a joke. Look at the staffing. http://www.quartetrep.org/quartet/pages/about-oqr/
BLiar had a luxurious suite in a Jerusalem 5 star hotel but was recently moved. Details of his salary and details of employment are unknown.
Look at the answer {top right} to this written question.
http://www.europarl.europa.eu/sides/getDoc.do?pubRef=-//EP//TEXT+WQ+E-2010-1667+0+DOC+XML+V0//EN
“Tony Blair’s record in the Middle East is a sorry one – it’s time he quit
It’s easy to see what the former Labour prime minister gets out of his role as Middle East envoy, but harder to see what he gives back
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/middleeast/9806139/Tony-Blairs-record-in-the-Middle-East-is-a-sorry-one-its-time-he-quit.html
It’s a joke. Look at the staffing. http://www.quartetrep.org/quartet/pages/about-oqr/”
__________________
This might surprise some, but I would certainly agree with that view.
He would do better to stick with writing and his lecture tours.
Fred
10 Apr, 2014 – 7:18 pm
“It should be pointed ot that the word “marriage” doesn’t mean just the same thing in Muslim countries as it does in Britain. Just because two people are married it does not mean they are going to sleep together…”
Habbabkuk (La vita è bella) !
10 Apr, 2014 – 7:25 pm
“Fred”
“That was an interesting post, thank you.”
So Habbabkuk supports child marriage!!!
“He would do better to stick with writing and his lecture tours.”
And leave the warmongering to his family.
http://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/politics/tony-blairs-eldest-son-euan-in-the-frame-for-safe-labour-seat-in-bootle-9254905.html
[This contributor is banned from commenting.]
“So Habbabkuk supports child marriage!!!”
I don’t think he said that, I certainly didn’t say I supported it.
I just thought it necessary to point out the differences between east and west lest any racists decided to brand Muslims paedophiles. There is a great deal of hatred against paedophiles in the west, which is strange because unlike the east they have newspapers with pictures of half naked barely legal young girls on page three.
Fred
Yes, that’s correct; you have answered Mr Scorgie’s non-point.
You were pointing out a cultural difference (which may well be a bit of a minority one in the Muslim world).
A cultural difference which we in the West can’t do much about (whether unfortunately or not) as such ‘marriages’ take place outside our jurisdiction (unlike, for example, FGM occurring in the UK where something can and should be done).
Fred
““He would do better to stick with writing and his lecture tours.”
And leave the warmongering to his family.”
____________________
I’d prefer it if none of his family went in for war-mongering. But more seriously, I take a very dim view of the creation of political dynasties (so to speak). That hasn’t really been a big feature of modern political Britain but there does seem to be a trend developing – not only in the UK but also in at least certain continental countries.
Perhaps not a problem PROVIDED that local selection committees are left to choose wisely the best candidate from their own local perspective and are not interfered with by the central party organization. Which is probably illusory.
The problem is also : should one visit the sins of the father onto the child? The answer is probably no, and judgement should be based (to the extent possible)on whether the shittiness of the father has been passed on to the child.
“The problem is also : should one visit the sins of the father onto the child? The answer is probably no, and judgement should be based (to the extent possible)on whether the shittiness of the father has been passed on to the child.”
Researches have found strong evidence that psychopathy is genetic.
A Node
Not having a dig at you, just at CEOs. Should they earn 10 times the salary of their least paid employee? Mrs Thatcher’s reforms to restore the UK to Victorian values are being continued by the incumbent shite at no 10. Why don’t the CEOs just take all the profits of the company and simply manage volunteers? Why don’t we pay companies to give us meaningful tasks to fill our spare time?
In the only salaried job I have ever had, the CEO stuffed me by asking me to beat the quote of a contractor. There’s me scratching around on the internet for cheap kitchens while he was swanning around on 230K p.a.. A company has to pay the proper rate for professional contractors, not try and employ cowboys who mess the company about and lose you your job.
A new breed of ultra arrogant, ultra ignorant managers have taken over the positions of the old middle-classes. That’s why when ever I heard the word reform, I know that it will mean new people sitting their bottoms on the seats of the present incumbents but more corrupt, more selfish and more ruthless than the first.
You mentioned Community Enforcers. In the current climate I think it is extremely likely that the trolls are well-paid, salaried personnel of a private truthbashing company funded by HM government. ?50 grand plus for persistently disrupting a truthseeking operation like this?
There is no need for companies to produce or do anything anymore. Their job is to consume taxpayers money by squashing the taxpayers freedom of speech and belief. Keynsian, Big Brother, NWO insanity. After Snowden it is no longer daft to suggest that the state is doing this.
The only limit to state insanity is the limit of our imaginations to comprehend the scope of their evil. Hijacking MH370 and false-flagging other murderous attacks by Muslims like Boston and Woolwich enable them to create a version of Islam that is corporate, international and diametrically opposed to the spirit of truth and freedom of Islam. The war against Islam is not just by the mercenaries of AlQaida, but in the board rooms of global corporations.
Power corrupts and anybody in possession of power at this moment of time is corrupt. The corruption is not yet absolute, but centuries of rebellion by Socialism against the previous corruption has been binned by the greed and selfishness of the precent generation. The wars of our last 20 years have been obvious enough for anyone with a moral compass of any kind to recognise the corruption of power. Yet they still swallow their principles to grab the cash being dangled in front of them.
Do you think that ignoring the ignorant will make them go away?
The lesson of history is that power must be cut from the hands of the greedy by word and sword.
WEAPON’S of MASS DISTRACTION – like father, like son
Tony Blair’s son Euan targets ultra-safe Labour seat in Merseyside…
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2602920/Tony-Blairs-son-Euan-targets-ultra-safe-Labour-seat-Merseyside-close-mother-Cheries-childhood-home.html
Ba’al Zevul
I have long held the view that all Israeli governments past and present have always intended to expand Israel, over time, to create the Zionist vision of Greater Israel; that being the whole of historic Palestine.
The Zionists want a one state solution; that being – one state from the Jordon River to the Mediterranean Sea for Jews only; their “promised land.”
This view is backed by a new Zionist book:
“The Israeli Solution, a One-State Plan for Peace in the Middle East” by Caroline Glick.
It suggests that Israel should do to the West Bank what Prime Minister Begin did to the Golan Heights and Jerusalem by placing them under Israeli law and through that, Israeli sovereignty.
The author says that Palestinians resident in the West Bank (after this de facto annexation) could apply for Israeli citizenship and if they are accepted they will be allowed to vote in elections and have equal rights. (How sweet)
This land grab of the West Bank (or, as the author calls it, Judea and Samaria) would result in the Jewish population being twice that of the Palestinians thereby maintaining Israel’s Jewish character.
Gaza does not feature in the plan because I think the population if included would weaken the built in Jewish advantage of the new Israel. Also, of course, no right of return for Palestinians refugees.
A reviewer of her book has the following to say:
“The Israeli Solution projects an alternative to the dangerous gamesmanship and perpetual war we have witnessed in the quest for a so-called two state solution. Yet, is it really wise to try to absorb a fiendish population – people mired in rage, mental instability, and rigid ideology – into one’s country?”
“The expulsion of the Palestinian Arabs from Judea and Samaria, although not suggested in Glick’s book, would be much more effective in bringing peace to Israel. Yet, before doing so, an aggressive public relations campaign against the Palestinian Arabs is needed to counteract Arab and Soviet-era propaganda about Israel. This campaign would put the moral onus where it belongs – on the attitudes, beliefs, and behavior of the Arabs, who were and still remain, an implacable enemy.”
http://www.israelnationalnews.com/Articles/Article.aspx/14807#.U0WCi5tOUhk
This confirms my belief that a two state solution was never really on the cards.
Another shoe ducking War Criminal;
http://www.informationclearinghouse.info/article38199.htm
Some truths about Rwanda, another one of BLiar’s areas of operation.
I see the author (who has extensive knowledge of Africa) describes BLiar’s pal Kagame thus:
‘The United States, Canada, Britain and Israel wanted more of the African pie, and Paul Kagame was the man to get it for them.
English-speaking ‘Tutsis’ who grew up in Uganda – Paul Kagame, James Kabarebe, Fred Rwigyema, Patrick Karegeya, Laurent Nkundabatware, and thousands of others – were the soldiers of Yoweri Museveni’s guerrilla army. They committed massive atrocities in Uganda, (1980-1985), where absolute terrorism was used to remove a socialist government run by an ungrateful Negro. The victims in Uganda were also blamed for genocide, turning the truth upside-down. This is how Museveni and Kagame – his director of military intelligence – brought Uganda back in line with the geopolitical dictates of the West: aka disaster capitalism. There was, of course, a lot of money to be made.’
Real Rwandan Genocide and Brainwashing of the Western Mind
by Keith Harmon Snow / April 11th, 2014
http://dissidentvoice.org/2014/04/real-rwandan-genocide-and-brainwashing-of-the-western-mind/
The other day I came across this photo of Hague and Angelina Jolie with their crocodile tears. That was Srebrenica.
http://mag.newsweek.com/2014/04/18/angelina-jolies-campaign-justice-survivors-bosnias-mass.html
This is the same pair in Rwanda last year.
https://www.gov.uk/government/world-location-news/william-hague-and-angelina-jolie-visit-rwanda
Before that, it was Darfur with George Clooney and Mia Farrow.
Sudan describes actors Mia Farrow, Clooney as ‘ignorant’
http://www.sudantribune.com/spip.php?article31089
These Ac-Tors make me sick.
I wrote before about Welby’s son being given employment by BLiar at the ironically named Faith Foundation.
The daughter-in-law has been there too. The FF seems like an incubator.
‘Dame Gail Rebuck, the publisher whose firm paid Blair a £4.6million advance for his memoirs, was appointed to the foundation’s board last year. Her daughter, Georgia, had worked as its website and online co-ordinator. And Suzanne Ashman, daughter of motor racing tycoon Jonathan and wife of Blair’s son, Euan, worked for the Foundation in 2009.
Last year it was disclosed that the charity was being bankrolled by Ukrainian oligarch Victor Pinchuk, who gave it £320,000 — a fifth of all the donations declared in the relevant accounts.
The Foundation declines to say how much it is paying Peter Welby.’
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2594735/SEBASTIAN-SHAKESPEARE-Archbishop-Welbys-son-given-plum-job-Blair.html
Guano; Nice rant, as ever.
Managers are like politicos, and the power associated with their position is corrupting, but only if they are weak as to character. Narcissism is more viral than ever. Self-interst drives most managers and they, like politicos are bureaucrats. Bureaucrats hold the company in high esteem only so far as it helps them move their own needles, and the so-called loyalty they display is more like a moral failing in that it is a superficial salute to themselves. Redundant layers of such persons suck all the air out of long-term bizness strategies, and feed the short-sell. End my own rant.
guano 12 Apr, 2014 – 1:31 pm
Quite agree with everything you say. When a nation changes its leader, we make a big deal of it, speculate on the character of the new incumbent and what effect it will have on his/her country and possibly our country. Nowadays, many companies are more powerful than many nations but there is no scrutiny, no speculation, no sanctions, no Geneva Convention. I might even make an argument that some countries are more powerful than any nation. Woe betide any country that stands up to Exxon Mobile or Shell, for example, whilst more shadowy companies like the Carlyle Group … well, who knows.
I looked up the Forbes List of The World’s Biggest Companies. Interesting and revealing that 5 of the top 10 are banks, and another is an investment company. So 6/10 of the worlds biggest companies produce nothing, just manipulate money. Also interesting that it is two Chinese banks, ICBC and China Construction Bank, at number 1 and 2 spots followed by US bank, JPMorgan Chase at 3.
By the way, you correctly corrected me when I used ‘CO’ insted of ‘CE’. My turn now. The acronym stands for ‘Conformity Enforcer’ rather than ‘Community Enforcer’.