— by Polydamas
On August 24, 410 A.D., the complacent citizens of the city of Rome awoke in shock from their long slumber to find their city sacked by King Alaric I and his Visigoth hordes. The Roman Empire which has stood proudly for centuries disintegrated before their eyes. English historian Edward Gibbon’s classic 1776 masterpiece The History of the Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire details at length the succession of ineffectual emperors and corrupt public servants who caused the demise of the Roman Empire.
Only a few days away from one of the most consequential elections in America’s history, the American people, like the citizens of imperial Rome before them, need to know why and how the American Empire tottered and declined over the course of a quarter of a century and on whose watch. Whether or not it will fall is up to the American people who will either step away from the abyss or foolishly leap into it and commit national suicide.
America’s decline from a world superpower to the world’s laughingstock coincides precisely with Bill and Hillary Clinton’s ascent into national politics. Bill and Hillary Clinton arrived in Washington, D.C. in January of 1992. It took them only 25 years to transform the United States of America from a constitutional republic on top of the world into a kleptocratic and corrupt Latin American banana republic.
Let us set the time machine a little further back to 1990 and 1991. In 1990, the United States military displayed for the world to see its groundbreaking technological superiority in Desert Storm when its military rapidly decimated the formidable tank forces of Saddam Hussein’s Iraq. Even Qiao Liang and Wang Xiangsui, senior Colonels in the Chinese People’s Liberation Army, were suitably impressed that their book Unrestricted Warfare conceded that developing countries like China could only resist American military might with asymmetric warfare.
On the geopolitical front, the United States was also dominant. Although United States President Ronald Reagan called upon Soviet Premier Mikhail Gorbachev in 1987 to tear down the Berlin Wall that separated eastern and western Europe for close to 30 years, the Berlin Wall actually fell in November of 1989. During 1989, the various eastern European countries rejected communism and unceremoniously ousted their leaders. In 1990 and 1991, the nationalistic wave that deposed eastern Europe’s communist regimes swept throughout the Soviet Union and politically disintegrated it. The wave of exuberance led overenthusiastic thinkers and historians like Francis Fukuyama to author triumphant books like his 1992 book The End of History and the Last Man.
Meanwhile, in the United States, the seeds of America’s own destruction were planted. The seeds were planted in no place other than Arkansas. They were called Bill and Hillary Clinton.
During the mid 1980s, Arkansas was at the forefront of the CIA’s clandestine wars in Latin America. Cargo planes left the Mena, Arkansas airport with weapons for the El Salvador and Nicaragua theaters of war, but returned back to Arkansas with supplies of drugs for distribution to the American market. Then-Arkansas Governor Bill Clinton was involved in these operations. These facts are detailed and supported by exhibits in R. Emmett Tyrrell, Jr.’s 1996 Boy Clinton: The Political Biography, published by Regnery, pp. 1-24. While in Arkansas, the Clintons sold America’s youth down the river to drug dealers.
The Clintons’ Arkansas was described thusly by L.J. Davis in The New Republic:
“It bears a close resemblance to a Third World country. with a ruling oligarchy, a small and relatively powerless middle class, and a disenfranchised, leaderless populace admired for its colorful folkways, deplored for its propensity for violence (on a per capita basis, Little Rock has one of the highest murder rates in the nation), and appreciated for its willingness to do just about any kind of work for just about any kind of wage.” Boy Clinton p. 100.
The Clintons sold political favors to Arkansas’ business oligarchs. They received financial considerations in return, political contributions to election campaigns and sweetheart business deals given to the Rose Law Firm where Hillary Clinton was a partner. Not so miraculously, thanks to favors made to Tyson Foods, Hillary Clinton parlayed a $10,000 stake in cattle futures into $99,537 within nine months. Boy Clinton p. 102.
The Clintons were also the beneficiaries of another Arkansas oligarch whom they cultivated. 25 years ago, on November 4, 1991, Sam M. Walton, the billionaire founder of the Bentonville, Arkansas-based Wal-Mart and Sam’s Club, circulated a memo titled “Support for Bill Clinton for President” to the employees of his companies and asked each one of them and their spouses to contribute $1,000 apiece. He stated “I assure you the Walton family will join many others across the nation to provide Bill maximum financial assistance as well as other support”.
Sam Walton presented his case to support Bill Clinton, stating “We have a good friend and supporter running for President on the Democratic ticket. He’s been the Governor of Arkansas for 12 years and done an excellent job overall and, in my opinion, is by far the best Democratic candidate in the field among those who have announced their intention”. He further stated:
“As you know his wife, Hillary Clinton, has been on our board for five years and is an outstanding lawyer and person as well. She has been a great addition to our Wal-Mart family, placing particular emphasis on our environmental program, minorities, as well as being a most active and involved board member. Bill and Hillary Clinton will make a very effective team for the Democratic Party with their combined talents”.
Sam Walton continued:
“I would also like to point out that Governor Clinton was very instrumental in helping us initiate and maintain our very effective Buy American campaign which has brought thousands of jobs back to the USA. Moreover, and a very important issue, is that he believes and knows how our Wal-Mart partnership works, our profit sharing, our support in our communities across this land, our environmental stands, and above all, he is supportive and appreciates the free enterprise system and has observed first hand the Wal-Mart and SAM’s way of keeping our prices low for millions of Americans and maintaining a partnership relationship with our associates, shareholders, customers and vendors”.
According to PBS Frontline journalist Sam Hornblower’s “Wal-Mart & China: A Joint Venture” (http://to.pbs.org/1x3Boou), Wal-Mart’s “Buy American” campaign was nothing more than an illusion. In 1992, Wal-Mart was “clocking in at a 40 percent annual growth rate”. Wal-Mart’s tremendous growth was due to “breaking from a history of almost exclusive commitment to [U.S.] national-brand products, expanding and improving its private-label offerings … and marketing them more aggressively than ever before”. Wal-Mart turned to manufacturing its own private label products cheaply in China to compete with and undercut the name brands it sold at its stores and quickly became “the single largest U.S. importer of Chinese consumer goods, surpassing the trade volume of entire countries, such as Germany and Russia”.
The economic impact of Wal-Mart and China’s joint venture was enormous. According to the Economic Policy Institute, since China was admitted to the World Trade Organization in 2001, between 2001 and 2013, Wal-Mart sold at least $49 billion worth of Chinese-made goods. The cost to America was the loss of approximately 400,000 American jobs. (http://cnnmon.ie/2faPPWd). Between 2001 and 2012, a total of more than 2.7 million American jobs were lost, of which more than 2.1 million or 76.9 percent were in manufacturing. (http://bit.ly/1xpbBKS). Of course, these numbers do not measure the enormous and adverse economic impact of Wal-Mart and China’s joint venture upon the United States from 1992 to 2001.
In the past 25 years, the American people were sold down the river by Bill and Hillary Clinton to transform China into a world superpower at the expense of the United States. Let us point out a few illustrative facts:
- In a September 15, 1993 letter, President Bill Clinton explained “the need to make long overdue reforms” to “tailor export controls to the realities of a post-Cold War world.” The existing government restrictions on the export of militarily-useful technologies were relaxed by the Clinton administration to allow the export of “computers, telecommunications products, and other high-technology goods that directly benefited China’s military . . . and created a new mercantilism.” Bill Gertz, Betrayal: How the Clinton Administration Undermined American Security, published by Regnery in 1999, p. 83.
- California Congressman Dana Rohrabacher stated in April of 1998 that “There is ample evidence that American technology was transferred to this hostile potential enemy of the United States, and that the vast experience of some of our best aerospace engineers provided the Communist Chinese the guidance needed to upgrade and perfect highly sophisticated weapons systems, increasing the reliability and capability of Communist Chinese rockets. This has given what anyone has to admit is at least a potential enemy of the United States, a better ability to deliver nuclear warheads to our country, to American cities, to incinerate millions of our people.” Betrayal p. 84.
- Bernard Schwartz, Chairman of Loral Space & Communications and a major contributor to the Democratic Party, gave $1.1 million to Democrats and Bill Clinton between 1992 and 1998. Betrayal p. 84.
- In exchange, Loral received favorable treatment from the Clinton Administration to transfer missile technology to China. “As a result of President Clinton’s decision to loosen export controls on satellites, China was able to obtain very valuable high-technology information from U.S. companies, particularly Hughes Electronics and Loral Space & Communications, Ltd. . . . to improve the reliability of its space launchers and, consequently, its strategic missiles.” Betrayal p. 86.
- “The United States shipped high-performance computers to China by the hundreds — through waivers issued by the president. The Chinese had none of these ultra-high-speed computers as recently as 1996, but as of 1999 they had some 350 of the computers, which U.S. intelligence agencies believe are being used by the People’s Liberation Army for nuclear weapons design and nuclear testing simulation.” Betrayal p. 86.
- “Chinese spies had stolen nuclear design secrets from the Los Alamos National Laboratory, achieving a major leap in China’s nuclear technology — miniaturizing nuclear warheads. The case was discovered in 1996, but the White House kept it a secret from both Congress and the American public because the administration feared the affairs would upset its pro-Beijing engagement policy. The espionage was also kept secret because of the ongoing investigations into Democratic Party fundraising, which showed that extensive funds from the Chinese government were funneled into President Clinton’s 1996 reelection campaign.” Betrayal p. 88.
- “The Chinese take the long view and might easily regard Bill Clinton as the best friend the communist regime has ever had in its long march forward to surpass the United States as the chief power in the Pacific.” Betrayal p. 107.
- In 1998, the Sandia Nuclear Laboratory sold a $9 million supercomputer “configured to undertake national security missions . . . to a Chinese national who specialized in exporting advanced U.S. technologies to Beijing . . . for a fire-sale price of $30,000.” Lt. Col. Robert Buzz Patterson, USAF (Ret.), Dereliction of Duty: The Eyewitness Account of How Bill Clinton Compromised America’s National Security, published by Regnery in 2003, p. 11.
- “From 1994 through 1997, U.S. officials approved over a billion dollars in guaranteed U.S. government loans to U.S. firms exporting nuclear-related goods and services to Chinese entities (e.g., Chinese National Nuclear Corporation) known to be assisting Iranian and Pakistani nuclear weapons efforts.” Henry Sokolski, Best of Intentions, quoted in Rich Lowery, Legacy: Paying The Price For The Clinton Years, published by Regnery in 2003, p. 229.
In addition to destroying the American economy to benefit China, the economic disaster that is the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA) must also be considered. The many millions of lost manufacturing jobs to China were supplemented by many millions more of lost service jobs due to NAFTA. According to a 2003 study by economist Robert E. Scott of the Economic Policy Institute, titled The High Price of ‘Free’ Trade, “Since the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA) was signed in 1993 [through 2002], the rise in the U.S. trade deficit with Canada and Mexico through 2002 has caused the displacement of production that supported 879,280 U.S. jobs. ” (http://bit.ly/1F7yje8). According to the Congressional Research Service’s 2015 report on the North American Free Trade Agreement, “U.S. imports from Mexico increased from $39.9 billion in 1993 to $294.2 billion in 2014, an increase of 637%. The trade balance with Mexico went from a surplus of $1.7 billion in 1993 to a deficit of $74.3 billion in2007. Since then, the trade deficit with Mexico has fallen to $53.8 billion in 2014.” (http://bit.ly/2aLiUXG). The Congressional Research Service’s figures do not take into account the deleterious impact of illegal immigration upon the American economy, including in the agricultural, restaurant, construction, and personal services sectors or the substantial additional economic burdens imposed by illegal immigrants upon the healthcare sector.
From 2001 to the present time, Bill and Hillary Clinton have amassed a fortune of approximately $200 million. Peter Schweizer, who wrote the eye-opening 2015 book from HarperCollins titled Clinton Cash: The Untold Story of How and Why Foreign Governments and Businesses Helped Make Bill and Hillary Rich, have an income of at least $136.5 from 2001 to 2012, confirmed by the Washington Post. (p. 7). The enormous speaking fees received by Bill Clinton are extremely overpriced for the wisdom of a former president. Yet, as pointed out by Schweizer, the wealth accumulated by the Clintons is
“a part of of a larger pattern of activity that has never before been exposed to public scrutiny. During Hillary’s years of public service, the Clintons have conducted or facilitated hundreds of large transactions (either as private citizens or government officials) with foreign governments, corporations, and private financiers. Some of these transactions put millions in their own pockets thanks to Bill’s lucrative lecture career. Others were part of foreign policy. Others put millions into their legacy project, the Clinton Foundation. As we will see the sums involved are nothing short of staggering. What’s more, many of these exchanges have taken place at a time when these outside interests had matters of importance sitting on Hillary’s desk, whether in the Senate office building or on the third floor of the State Department. The issues seemingly connected to these large transfers are arresting in their sweep and seriousness: the Russian government’s acquisition of American uranium assets; access to vital US nuclear technology; matters related to Middle East policy; the approval of controversial energy projects; the overseas allocation of billions in taxpayer funds; and US human rights policy, to name a few.” (Clinton Cash, pp. 7-8)
Long before Hillary Clinton’s e-mail scandal in which she sent and received classified government e-mails on her unsecured bathroom server, even before WikiLeaks had documented the pay-for-play corruption of selling government access perpetrated by the Clinton Foundation, Wall Street Journal columnist Peggy Noonan aptly summarized Bill and Hillary Clinton in her 2000 book The Case Against Hillary Clinton:
“The Clintons behave as though they are justified in using any tactic in pursuit of their goals. These include but are not limited to misleading constituents on serious and crucial issues; evading responsibility for governmental and administration mistakes, derelictions, and scandals; taking actions that are damaging to others but beneficial to the Clintons; smearing opponents and critics; ruining the lives of perceived enemies; and lying. This is Clintonism. In standing for it and succeeding they have made the American political landscape a lower and lesser thing. They have left our political process distorted and misshapen; they have stopped good things from happening, and have allowed bad things to occur;when caught they have covered up and dissembled, which in turn has added a new level of sourness, cynicism, and confusion to our politics and our culture.” (p. 12).
240 years after this great Republic was first established by its brilliant Founding Fathers, Bill and Hillary Clinton have shamelessly reduced it to a Latin American banana republic. As in previous Latin American elections, this election features at one end of the political spectrum Hillary Clinton as the leftist-collectivist candidate in the mold of Latin America’s socialist presidents like Argentina’s Cristina Fernández de Kirchner and Brazil’s Dilma Rousseff.
If America chooses to follow Hillary Clinton, America’s future will be the same as Argentina and Brazil’s immediate past. Hillary Clinton will be a president who mouths thinly-disguised Marxist rhetoric and will insert the government into every nook and cranny of the public sphere as well as the private sphere. As with Kirchner’s and Rousseff’s countries, Clinton’s America will be rife with scandals, rampant corruption, economic calamities, lack of government accountability, deception and disinformation directed at the public, and increased repression to consolidate power.
As in Latin America, the American people have no choice except to vote for the Republican Presidential candidate Donald Trump as the antidote to Hillary Clinton. He is the American version of the Latin caudillo, the larger-than-life charismatic yet authoritarian landowner or military leader who becomes President like Chile’s President Augusto Pinochet and El Salvador’s Maximiliano Hernández Martínez. Donald Trump may be far from being the ideal Libertarian candidate that we would prefer at The Cassandra Times. We would have been happier with Rand Paul or his father Ron Paul. However, in this election, Donald Trump is the lesser evil and he is America’s only chance at averting the greater evil that is Hillary Clinton.
There are many Democrats and some independents who are uncomfortable with Donald Trump’s lack of experience in politics and by his over-the-top behavior and temperament as an outspoken television celebrity. They fearfully but irrationally prefer the dishonesty and deception of the known quantity that is Hillary Clinton over Donald Trump. However, Donald Trump has not made all of the huge mistakes that Hillary Clinton has made in the past 30 years. He does not have on his hands the blood of Americans in Benghazi, Libya. He has not overthrown any countries and has not participated in any regime changes. He does not bear the blame for eight years of President Bill Clinton’s disastrous policies or for President Barack Hussein Obama’s policies. He had no part in the debacle known as the (Un)Affordable Care Act or ObamaCare. He has not corruptly enriched himself by selling access to his government office for millions of dollars and voting for policies that benefit donors and foreign countries at the expense of the American people. This is because, unlike Hillary Clinton, Donald Trump has never held any government position and has enough of a giant personal fortune not to be blinded by money and by the desire to sell himself and government favors to the highest bidder. At least with Trump as President, America has a chance at recovering its character as a republic and resuming its economic preeminence. With Hillary Clinton as President, America has no chance.
Renowned economist and thinker Professor Thomas Sowell once wrote that “It is hard to imagine a more stupid or more dangerous way of making decisions than putting those decisions in the hands of people who pay no price for being wrong”. Hillary Clinton has paid no price for being disastrously wrong in her three decades of self-service masquerading as public service, but, instead, asks the American people to be promoted to President of the United States. The American people would be a foolhardy and careless people if they selected Hillary Clinton over Donald Trump and did not vote against her as the greater evil in the 2016 election. If Hillary Clinton does not pay a price for being wrong so many times and is not held accountable for her previous failures, it is the American people who will heavily pay a thousandfold in the decades and centuries to come.