Silicon Investor (SI) -- The First Internet Community

STOCKTALK

We've detected that you're using an ad content blocking browser plug-in or feature. Ads provide a critical source of revenue to the continued operation of Silicon Investor. We ask that you disable ad blocking while on Silicon Investor in the best interests of our community. If you are not using an ad blocker but are still receiving this message, make sure your browser's tracking protection is set to the 'standard' level.

Politics : Dutch Central Bank Sale Announcement Imminent? -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: GUSTAVE JAEGER who wrote (22051)	12/1/2004 8:28:36 AM
From: sea_urchin	Read Replies (2) \| Respond to of 80908

Gus > Bush is routinely dismissed in the South African press as the Texas Twit and gets no credit for any of the policies that are helping the country or Africa as a whole. Jendayi Frazer, the American ambassador to South Africa, said government-to-government relations were excellent but the prevailing atmosphere meant that, "People who support the United States cannot come out and say it." The United States is pouring more money into tackling the AIDS epidemic than any other country. Bush has made this fight a priority of his administration. The personal relations between Bush and Thabo Mbeki, the South African president, are good. The African Growth and Opportunity Act, strongly supported by Bush, has provided important new trade openings in several sectors, including automobiles. Clearly, the reason that "People who support the United States cannot come out and say it" is because no-one trusts US motives and these people would be accused of furthering US interests. Everyone knows that South Africa is the gateway to the continent and everyone knows that the US is "shmoosing" SA in order to gain goodwill in Africa, particularly with the oil producing countries. If they don't then they should know that. Likewise, everyone knows that Mbeki is "shmoosing" the US in order to get money for his pan-Africanist, NEPAD agenda. Mbeki sees himself as the Garribaldi of Africa, uniting diverse and warring states, in a unitary agenda -- but under himself, of course. In fact, the US and Mbeki's agendas dovetail nicely together. It could even be said that Mbeki is colonizing Africa on the US' behalf. Naturally, that would be strenuously denied and rejected with contempt especially since Mbeki has impeccable Marxist credentials. Or so they say. As far as AIDS is concerned, I understand that the US spends far more money on "African AIDS" programs in the US than in Africa. This money goes to US drug companies and US bureaucracy in the name of the AIDS epidemic. > Because America's central preoccupation - the war on terror - is not widely shared, it tends to isolate the United States, a power now so dominating as to invite dissent and countervailing currents. And that's true. In my opinion, the "war on terror" (and the rest of it) has brought the US far more costs than benefits. The US has never been particularly liked in Africa but now it is positively disliked. Hence the need for Mbeki.