I can see for miles in China. What do you see from your vantage point? Moscow-Beijing Express on The Saker
by Jeff J. Brown for the Saker blog
Crosslinked with:
http://chinarising.puntopress.com/2017/11/17/i-can-see-for-miles-in-china-what-do-you-see-from-your-vantage-point-china-rising-radio-sinoland-171117/
https://youtu.be/8nMxiiWC40M
https://soundcloud.com/44-days/i-can-see-for-miles-in-china-what-do-you-see-from-your-vantage-point-china-rising-radio-sinoland
In China Rising – Capitalist Roads, Socialist Destinations, I frequently expressed my amazement at how living and working in China is like a parallel universe, compared to what people experience in the West, and what they watch and listen to in the mainstream media. In one particular chapter, I used the theme of The Who’s great psychedelic send-up, I Can See for Miles. In the song, there are some wonderful geopolitical metaphors, like,
The Eiffel Tower and the Taj Mahal are mine to see on clear days
You thought that I would need a crystal ball to see right through the haze.
My vision being life in China, looking outward across the rest of the world, through the haze of mainstream propaganda.
Another great metaphorical refrain is,
I know you’ve deceived me, now here’s a surprise
I know that you have ’cause there’s magic in my eyes
I can see for miles and miles and miles and miles and miles
Oh yeah
If you think that I don’t know about the little tricks you’ve played
And never see you when deliberately you put things in my way
Well, here’s a poke at you
You’re gonna choke on it too
You’re gonna lose that smile
Because all the while
I can see for miles and miles
The deceptions, tricks and things in my way being the CIA’s fake news, false flags and educational brainwashing Westerners are subjected to all their lives, with the magic in my eyes being my personal journey of awakening and understanding of how the West, China and the rest of the world really work.
There is an increasing global interest among humanity about new definitions of freedom. They are looking for anti-establishment solutions to the world’s myriad problems and crises. This includes learning about socialism, communism, cooperatives, ESOPs (employee stock ownership plans), self-sufficiency farming, immigrating to far off lands, such as Russia (http://nationalinterest.org/blog/the-buzz/russia-the-worlds-second-largest-immigration-haven-11053) and the like. This interest in a fresh look at possibilities for the 21st century includes steadily growing numbers of readers and listeners of anti-imperial news sources like The Saker (http://sakerlatam.blog/the-saker-files/) and China Rising Radio Sinoland (www.chinarising.puntopress.com). In any case, I think we can keep that last four-line stanza in the song firmly in the future tense for the time being. The West’s owners and their puppet governments are extremely powerful and trillionaires to boot, so they have what we call resources at their disposal.
I may be poking at them with every article and podcast here, but our elites are far from choking or not smiling. Maybe there are days when they reluctantly resort to keeping a stiff upper lip. All those millions of fellow homo sapiens being massacred and exterminated every year, thanks to their “laws and policies”, can weigh on their psychopathic souls – ever so briefly. Then, it’s time to roll up the proverbial shirtsleeves, late into the night and carry on with the joys of genocide, extraction and exploitation. After all, it is what the West does best.
I am totally outmuscled by these butchers in Washington-London-Paris-Tel Aviv, and I’m sitting firmly at the bottom of what they perceive to be the shit heap of humankind. Nonetheless, I’m all in for the good fight against imperialism, colonialism, capitalism and racism, which are facets of the same Hydra monster. I only regret it took me most of my life to fit these four pieces of the global imperial puzzle into a seamless cipher. It’s the only one that solves all the riddles of history, current events, as well as predicting the future correctly.
The West’s Hydra monster includes all of its satrap states, mostly concentrated in the G20. Too bad the artist did not include an Iranian warrior, to join Russia and China, but the artist, sadly unnamed, deserves an award for such a terrific metaphor.
Compared to the time when I wrote that I Can See for Miles chapter in China Rising, nothing has changed since then and everything has changed dramatically at the same time. Same old same old in that our owners are still very large and in charge, with prospects for a dignified life diminishing by the minute for most of humanity’s surviving 99.99%.
But, thanks to the rising soft power, post-imperial vision, economic and military might of the Anti-West (headed by China, Russia and Iran), the global political and financial roulette table is less tilted than it was, compared to even a year or two ago. After five centuries of the world’s riches being spun like a roulette funnel at a 45-degree angle towards Eurangloland, the world is starting to see some equilibrium brought back to a very rigged game.
When we were kids, we used to hold our breath when going by a cemetery, to ward off bad luck and errant ghosts. Did you ever do that? If we were on foot, we were doomed; on a bike, it was touch and go; in a car we were saved. Don’t hold your breath for Washington-London-Paris-Tel Aviv to crumble any time soon, because the human race is still having to walk past its colonial cemetery. We’ve got a way to go yet.
Most imperial collapses take time, sometimes centuries. Even the implosion of the Western Roman Empire in 476AD took over a century to transpire (https://www.thoughtco.com/what-was-the-fall-of-rome-112688). Like today’s Western empire, this Roman version had had a 500-year run, before being overrun by Barbarians, Vandals and Visigoths. Even still, the Eastern Roman Empire hung on for another 1,000 years, as the Christian Byzantines.
The Mongolian Empire was vastly bigger, spanning from China to Europe, so it is ostensibly more relevant to today’s global Western version. Heralding the largest contiguous land empire in human history, it only lasted from 1206-1387AD. That’s when the Chinese part, the Yuan Dynasty was retaken from these nomadic invaders, by the Ming Dynasty. However, rag tag remnants of the once mighty Mongols managed to hang on to bits and pieces of Eurasian territory until 1687.
Eurangloland’s empire is like no other. Depending on your definition, it has about 800-1,000 military bases and installations in the vast majority of the world’s countries, housing 250,000 American soldiers and many thousands more from NATO (https://www.thenation.com/article/the-united-states-probably-has-more-foreign-military-bases-than-any-other-people-nation-or-empire-in-history/). The West can keep it going indefinitely, as long as it is allowed to print football fields of dollars and euros every day, out of thin air. Eventually, countries like China, the oil producers and other big holders of Western debt will finally give up the ghost and publicly declare that their dollar and euro bonds will never be paid back. They know it already, but prefer to live the lie, in order to maintain stability and development for as long as possible, and keep their citizens safe and increasingly prosperous. But, when push comes to shove and the world’s creditors pull the plug, that’s when the financial run starts and all those trillions of euro and dollar bonds will be hyperinflated into toilet paper and nothingness. Along with this nearly worthless and disappearing debt, the West’s tyranny of imperial invasion and occupation will follow suit.
Then we will see a repeat of 476AD happen across the entire planet. Our only hope is that instead of Barbarians, Vandals and Visigoths filling the void, the Anti-West can stabilize humanity and prevent the death of many tens of millions of fellow citizens around the world, from all the ensuing socioeconomic upheaval, chaos and possibly revolutions against our owners.
That latter scenario about taking out our owners sounds like fun! To quote a great Clint Eastwood western, Hang ‘Em High. In the meantime, let The Who rock your Anti-West soul, with three versions of I Can See for Miles below. Take your pick. The original 1967 one is vintage anti-establishment rebellion and splendor. To think there was a time when people in show business were actually mocking and criticizing our owners. Where is George Carlin, when you need him? The second one was recorded live in 1969, probably for a TV show back in the day. It is proof positive there will never be another rock drummer like Keith Moon. The third one is for all you grey heads out there, including me, who like to watch 70-year old guys and gals cut it lose, for the love of life. In this version, the geriatric Who played their hearts out in 2015, in Glastonbury. And to think The Who once defiantly sang in My Generation, “I hope I die before I get old…” I’m glad they reconsidered.
That’s you sporting the cool hat, as Clint Eastwood, lining up the West’s elite owners for a trip to the gallows. Be patient. We’ll get there one day.
Regardless of your age, quit complaining about all your aches and bruises. Time to get off the pity potty about how much the West has screwed up our only home. The mountain to a more just and peaceful Pale Blue Dot is tall indeed. Just continue learning about how the world really works on websites like The Saker and China Rising Radio Sinoland, and reading books like The Essential Saker (https://archive.org/details/TheEssentialSaker) and The China Trilogy (http://chinarising.puntopress.com/2017/05/19/the-china-trilogy/). Then, keep climbing Freedom Summit and singing your song.
Official song video from 1967:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Q0iqg2UanEc
1969 live in the studio:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8ppU_XBruB4
2015 Glastonbury:
Chinese state capitalism vs Western neoliberalism: a conflict for the global influence
http://bit.ly/2jjaSfH
Wow, excellent article.
I have to admit of being in your club of grey but mostly bold older people.
Money, you nailed it. In the old days you had to use gold and once you run out of it you were history. While we are on Byzantium, the West destroyed and stole all the gold from Constantinople in the XIII century, and depending on how good are you in history this was the beginning of the end of Byzantium. While at the same time the Turkmen invaded Arab peninsula including Mesopotamia converted to Islam and used the Arabs (because they did not have enough man power, just like mongols) to move in on the Byzantium.
Now we move to modern days: no gold just printing presses.
Ok this is keeping me awake: the left most head of the hydra of the picture with the small creature(Latvia?) hanging there. Which country is that?
Cannot be Latvia. That country is very happy licking the boots of their ziomasters.
Notice that the animal is bitting the pighead, probably attacking it. And the pighead crowns the most evil tentacle: Talmudia. So it has to be an entity which is currently defying the Khazarian power. If the contester is regional, could be Hezbollah or Assad or the Persian nation. And worldwide, a nation or group that could be represented by that mammal is…?
Great cartoon. My guess for the pigs head was Israel, though I I’m not sure what the rat tenaciously hanging on could be, Palestine perhaps? The flag depiction doesn’t correspond to any other country really. Perhaps the artist was hedging his bets given the current climate. Tipis barely visible in the shadows as a backdrop too.
Shades of St George and the Dragon, or Hydra in this case.
Thanks for the earworm:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SHhrZgojY1Q
Yes, a very precise article. However, when it comes to printing money backed by nothing, the population in Europe is partially aware that something is wrong, while the impression is that the bulk of the US population does not understand what is really happening. When the Warsaw Pact collapsed, NATO should have been terminated, as it was gulping up huge amounts of money. It was, however, kept on, ostensibly to fight “terrorism” and “maintain peace”. It was joined by that horror story called the European Union, which is nothing more than the civilian component of NATO. Both were given the task of moving towards the East, the ultimate aim being the break up of Russia. As the political economist Lyndon LaRouche has stated, the only thing which can save the US dollar is the plunder of Siberia and the Caspian region, two of the richest regions in the world. Well, it never came to that. Russia is recovering, having joined China in creating the Eurasian Economic Union. China intends to introduce the petro-yuan, while both Russia and China plan to introduce gold backed rubles and yuans. According to Dr.Jim Willie, Russia and China have, together, more than 60.000 tonnes of gold. And the West ? The EU is now printing 80 billion euros each month backed by nothing while the US is printing up to one trillion dollars a year backed by nothing. This, ofcourse, cannot last for ever, and Wall Street knows it. This is the reason why we have a crisis with North Korea and a crisis with Iran, where the intention is to prevent the creation of the Eurasian Economic Union. It also explains why the US has outside America 700 combat bases and 300 supply bases, hoping to destabilize both Russia and China and then move into them for the sake of implementing “democracy”, protecting “human rights” and basically breaking up both countries. It will never come to that. As far as I can see, we now have some sort of stalemate, as neither the Washington political establishment nor the Pentagon really know what they are supposed to do. They can sit back and wait for the dollar and euro to collapse, as they certainly will, or else they can go to war and try to prevent this. I sincerely hope they wont do anything stupid like going to war, as there is no way they can defeat Russia and China. Even a war against Iran would have highly questionable results.
Lovely piece but I have to disagree with Jeff on this
” The West can keep it going indefinitely, as long as it is allowed to print football fields of dollars and euros every day, out of thin air. Eventually, countries like China, the oil producers and other big holders of Western debt will finally give up the ghost and publicly declare that their dollar and euro bonds will never be paid back. ”
The West does not have the same monetary system anymore since the Euro was born. The Euro was born since it was very well understood that all fiat currencies die and there was a need to have a replacement and correct the 500ish years faulty understanding of money in the system.
The Dollar system is based on the Bretton Woods system. The dollar has a fixed price to gold and all the other major currencies (of the 1945 era) are based on the Dollar treasury debt and would issue their currency based on that.. Mostly Europe back in that time. Da Gaulle, a fierce patriot of France at that time understood very well how that system was abusing France (and the rest of EUrope) in the 1960 era. So he even send and armada to America to collect the gold at that fixed price. THen the so called London Gold pool collapsed and that was basically the moment the now EU wanted to have monetary freedom without collapsing the whole world wide economy.
That process took decades. But then there was the Euro. Issued from gold and not the US treasury note. If it was not for China, the Dollar would have collapsed already. Europe basically told America with that, we are sick and tired of your abuse of us. Summarised by the ten sectratary of treasury stating ”it is our currency but your problem”. A total abuse of their power. With this move Europe leveled the playing field if only China did nto step in.
If China would not have stepped in and buying trillions of dollars of debt, America would have gone the way of the dodo. Ofcourse, the money power would have stayed in the West. Last year China was the last power in the EUrasian landmass to issue their currency from gold. Instead of the US treasury bill.
Sadly, China is still buying tons of treasuries to keep this monetary system going. Ofcourse Euirope shot itself in the foot by not standing firm against America with the war against the countries that wanted to sell oil in Euros like Iraq.
Still Jeff, the fact that there is a fundamental shift in how the monetary system works. THe Dollar and its friends, like Japan will hyperinflate but countries like China (whit a huge debt bubble as well just as EUrope, South africa, Brazil and the rest of the Eurasian landmass) can and will channel most of the hyperinflation into gold so societies will ”only” experience high inflation. The countries that still issue their currency from the dollar will be destroyed in hyperinflation.
That is the plan at least. At least how I understand it. Now China is trying to get oil pricing where Europe failed. Lets see where it takes us.
Regards, Hugo
Just to point out that Nixon took the dollar off the gold standard. Bretton Woods has been history since the 1970;s. Russia and China will introduce gold backed rubles and yuans when the can buy up all the gold that is available on the world markets. They have been buying it for years.
Hi B.F.,
Correct and incorrect at the same time. The structure remained the same, A country buys treasuries and issues its own currency off it. The only thing that changed was that gold was replaced by oil.
regards, Hugo
Do you mean I can go to a Federal repository and directly convert by dollars into the oil they are backed by?
And you call that “the only thing” ??? Nixon made a deal with Saudi Arabia, by which Saudi Arabia would conduct oil transactions using the American dollar. Other countries had no choice but to start using the dollar themselves. This automatically made the dollar the reserve world currency, enabling the US Fed to print as many dollars as it wanted, a long term catastrophy in the making. And sure enough, judgement day has arrived. Both in the US and outside it there are a heap of US dollars, backed by nothing, except the Saudi pledge to keep on using the dollar. However, Russia and China have made no secret that they are going to introduce gold backed rubles and yuans. King Salmon goes to Russia ? Why ? His son prince Salmon instigates a purge in Saudi Arabia, ostensibly to crack on “corruption”. Is that the real reason ? Or perhaps to remove all those princes who are pro US, so he can adopt the petro-yuan. The point is that the Saudi’s are getting pretty desperate. You cannot pump oil for decades and claim that you have huge amounts left, when you do not. They have 70 % less oil than they claim. What do they do ? They invade Yemen, in order to steal Yemeni oil. They also introduced plans to modernize and industrialize Saudi Arabia by 2030, which I think is a fantasy. Even if they are capable of such a thing, they left it too late. Worse, the wealth of the country was grabbed by the Saudi elite, while the bulk of the population received very little. The population is rebelling. Again too late. The end result will be that the elite will flee Saudi Arabia with all its wealth, leaving the country with the little oil it has left. When that runs out, you will get chaos and the break up of the country along tribal lines, as Saudi Arabia is nothing more than a tribal union, the tribal chiefs being constantly bribed with money to stay loyal to the House of Saud.
hi again B.F.
I am not sure what the point is you are trying to make. But yes, I stand by my point that was the only thing that changed to the bretton woods system, Replace gold with oil and the system was the same for the rest. THe world has to keep buying US treasuries (read debt) to issue their currency off. Europe was the continent that kept that deal going till the Euro was born and they went back to gold but with a flree floating price since they from that moment on refused to buy US debt.
THen China stepped in and kept the dollar alive by buying trillions (literary) of Dollars and keeping the dollar alive. Only last year China dropped that system of issueing its currency and adopted the Euro model of issuing currency. It seems clear to me that the house of Saud understands it holds a losing hand and is adjusting. This purge there is a clear signn as you can get.
The biggest power brokers in the world know the currenct money concept is wrong and we need to understand that if you use currency to save in, conflicts will arise. Currency is debt, period. If a region saves another region debts, they cannot pay it back and conflict will arise. If its saved in gold, the debt can be paid back since its circulating.
Iam sure we agree on the fact that the power of the house of Saud is declining. But it seems to me that you are missing the chaning concept of money that we had for 500 years. It will split in the way the asians think. Currency is for spending and gold is for saving and if you have gold, you can settle debts (currency) with it
Finally ending the reserve currency durse.
Regards, Hugo
I have been to China dozens of times. It is a wonderful place. The people. The business.
My home town is a tiny thing of a few hundred people perched upon the edge of the Murray Darling Basin. Our family farm is 40 miles of dirt road further out. I was given a decent education. I grew up enjoying sunshine, good food, clean water, fresh air, blue on blue skies, the stars in all their glory, the moon. kangaroos, yabbies, crows and kookaburras. We grew up where everything was over the horizon. Everything. This realisation…that the only thing not over the horizon is you is the key to everything. Everywhere is somewhere else.
I am a colonial son of the Empire. Few men have known the freedoms and benefits of my life.
I’ve lived in India. China. Germany. UK. Malaysia. Spent time in the Amazon, the US and the Med. A wow of a time by any measure.
Australia has universal health care. One can use private insurance to jump the queue for elective procedures if desired. One may be better off going private in some circumstances but they would be few and far between.
That universal health care is a great thing. It means an Australian can jump on a plane and fly for between 15 and 30 hours to explore and thrive somewhere else and then if desired hop right back on a plane again and fly home and be able to walk straight back into a job without having to spend 6 months or a year looking for an insurer willing to take you on as a client as is the case in the USA.
The freedom to leave and comeback at will. Think about that. Measured against the course history it can rightly be said I live a life imagined for gods.
I have been to the States. Seen bits of it. People were warm. I found it was grand and shabby on my first visit. Things have worsened since then. It’s a mess. But if you can’t leave because when you get back you can’t work because you can’t find an insurer you can’t ever find out you have been lied to all of your sorry sorry life about the sh%hole you call home by the press you think is free which is owned by a monster. It is as simple as that. You live in a shi&hole where you are being lied to day and night and you have turned into a coward without the guts to leave.
China is bigger built than the US. Its housing stock and infrastructure has 150 years of use ahead of it. It is more cultured. More hip, stylish, cosmopolitan. Things are more realistically priced. Beijing is the centre. You can feel the raw power amassing. China is being reborn. It is awakening. The Chinese mean well. But their patience is not infinite. They appreciate the truth that the West has not been all bad. That takes guts. To admit you need to learn. China has guts. China can learn.
We are going to have a catastrophic world war…soon. The forces driving it are as titanic as they are demonic.
Seems the age old idiom is still alive and well … superior wisdom is the gift of growing old. A barber said to me years ago … grey hair is the frost of wisdom. :-)
I’m a big picture old man … details confuse me. :-)
If we stretch our necks a bit and try to ‘see’ beyond/above all these colorful facts what is there to ‘see’.
For me, there’s a common denominator … all these colorful facts brought the human family one step closer to becoming “ONE” … we are almost there.
So what?
Stretching our necks again we might ‘see’ that becoming “ONE” is a necessary precondition for a singular transformation/metamorphosis of what we call “being” … something that will happen … who knows what’s on the other side of this transformation/metamorphosis eh! :-)
OMG – Jeff this is such a great treat to listen to all three of the versions that you gave for the Miles song and the great comments that you made about them. Was that drummer in 2015 Keith Moon ? It looked like a younger guy – I am a Who fan, but haven’t kept up with their recent history-
And the painting is fenominal – wow – its fantastic – but I’m ashamed – I don’t know who all the heads are – from left to right – Israel – then I don’t know – then the US – then I don’t know – then Britain then I don’t know. I don’t know the flags of all the countries – I wonder that Canada isn’t there hmm
I’m going to guess that the thing to the right – our right – of the US is France – and the Brits and then hmm
I guess that one beside the US on the left is Japan. Sorry I’m so ignorant.
Thanks sweetie – great article
Drummer is Zack Starkey.
He has a famous father who’s also a drummer.
”The West can keep it going indefinitely, as long as it is allowed to print football fields of dollars and euros every day, out of thin air. Eventually, countries like China, the oil producers and other big holders of Western debt will finally give up the ghost and publicly declare that their dollar and euro bonds will never be paid back.”
They can and have kept it going – so far. But issuing debt to pay interest on existing debt is an exponential Ponzi scheme. Sooner or later the dollar’s value will be under a tectonic force of excess supply and will collapse. De-dollarization is the key to this process. We are now deep into the super debt bubble, and it is going the way of all currency bubbles – into default by the front door, or by the back door (inflation).On the one hand, you have a fiat currency backed by nothing, and a Chinese currency backed by gold. In terms of choice, a no-brainer.
Brandon Martinez piece “In Putinism the Answer to the US – Israel Imperialism ?” is worth reading. Watching Putin talking about his baptism is not belivable. It looks more like cynical lie by shrewed politico. Has any certificate or entry into roster of baptized. “Putin’s Deception (1)” plus comments give some detales. Funny one is rabid WASP barking against true Christ Universal Church. By the way, “Assembly( of God) ” means synagogue, where non-Christians warship their Hebrew god. Poor devils.
Back in the 1960s I saw The Who play live at Fairfield Halls, Croydon and I was one of those who believed “Hope I die before I get old”. I never reconsidered that belief, but it didn’t happen, and its not fun at all. But what does that have to do with China and imperial phases? Geopolitical metaphors in psychedelic send-ups?
No, the Chinese don’t have their impoverished masses slaving away in factories for next to no wages because they are in tune with the peoples needs – they are the harshest masters, and their “no interference” policy in foreign parts is only to avoid trouble, for now.
You can have the best Constitution ever written, but it will do you no good, because the rich and influential will subvert it, as you can see in the USA. You can fight against the system for Freedom and Democracy, Equality and Fraternity, but its no use, they will subvert anything you build.
The only thing that will stop them is lack of Energy to drive the engines of Industrial Civilisation. Fortunately there seems to be promising times to come on that score – the fossil fuels are running out. They know it and are using debt to keep things running so far, but lack of fossil fuels cannot be overcome with debt created out of thin air. Peak Civilisation is not far off, and what happens next is either WW3 or a long slow descent into chaos and self-sufficient farming, not all that different from today’s Third World.
The thing to do is to go with the flow. Move to a tropical island with rich, volcanic soil and lots of rain, and grow fruit and vegetables. Don’t even think about eating beef or the speed of your internet connection – 100 Mbps is not a Human Right. Simple Living is the answer, the only answer.
Removed – no attacks on the author. Mod Sure China wont allow its bonds to be wiped out. The US middle class will be wiped out to pay China. The currency will be reissued and a new global monetery system introduced. Its in no-ones interest to destroy the productive capacity of the US economy, just destroy peoples savings as always- have you guys studied Weimar Germany. 5 years after destroying everything Germany was back on top of the world in design, engineering and productivity. Pretty soon the iphone will be made for $50 in the USA and still sold for $1000. do you really think the world is a cake and you are not getting your fair share? Contribute to the common good and you will do well.
“Pretty soon the iphone will be made for $50 in the USA and still sold for $1000.”
By bots, I think, which is the general drift of the tech American Dream.
Keith Moon died in about 78, surprising he lasted that long really.
They loved a good piss-take, being working class scrappers off the street themselves, and what a noise!