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To: mishedlo who wrote (191540)	9/11/2002 11:23:57 PM
From: Rarebird	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 436258

<What will be the unintended consequences of this?> The U.S. has not seen a wide and public examination of its foreign policy since the days of the Vietnam protests of the late 1960s/early 1970s. It has not seen a wide and public examination of its domestic policies, specifically its financial policies, since the chaotic markets of the late 1970s/early 1980s. The culmination of this lack of examination came over the decade of the 1990s. The Warsaw Pact collapsed in 1989 and the U.S. was on the way to becoming the world's sole military/geo-strategic superpower. Japan collapsed at the beginning of the 1990s and the U.S. became the word's sole FINANCIAL superpower. Most Americans were comfortable with this. They were safe - and they were getting rich. Now, of course, they are neither. The illusion of safety was shattered on 9/11. The illusion of perpetual gains on investment markets was dealt a devastating blow as a result of the secular bear. If the U.S. does attack Saddam and Iraq, it will do so against the publicly stated policies of the rest of the world. If the U.S. engineers its financial markets to try to maintain the illusion of prosperity - as it did in the last Gulf War in 1991 and again in the Balkans War of 1999 -most of the rest of the world will see through this one too. The "unintended consequences" - to the U.S. political and financial establishment - is that a critical mass of Americans might see through it too. The last time that a real debate was waged on U.S. foreign/military/geo-strategic policy, the result was the loss of a war and the resignation of a President. The last time that a real debate was waged on U.S. financial policy, the result was a crumbling U.S. currency and crippling (20% plus) U.S. interest rates. The present "imperialist" establishment could not afford the first debate. The present "financial" establishment could not afford the second. Not this time. Having said this, it is clear to me and those who witnessed and participated in the debates of a generation ago - that a recurrence is a certainty. It is only a matter of whether they start before the U.S. attacks Iraq, or afterward. Look at the performance of U.S. investment markets over the past year. Look at the growing avalanche of questioning of U.S. policies which is taking place right around the world and inside the U.S. itself.