Submitted by Eric Margolis via The Strategic Culture Foundation,
President Dwight Eisenhower’s warning about the dangers of the military-industrial complex made half a century ago ring as loud and clear today. The soft coup being mounted against the Trump government by America’s ‘deep state’ reached a new intensity this week as special interests battled for control of Washington.
Trump Is Playing You
Note: Soren K is a group of 4 writers to whom I contribute on commodity market posts-Vince Lanci
Written by Soren K and MarketSlant.
From the Slope of Hope: Since today is President's Day, I think I'll write about something Presidential. And this quote from our patron saint George Carlin is absolutely crucial to the piece:
"When you're born you get a ticket to the freak show. When you're born in America, you get a front row seat."
Over the weekend we noted that the Trump administration was considering changing the U.S. trade deficit calculation to exclude re-exports from the US trade balance, a shift that would make America's trade gap appear even greater than it has been in recent years, potentially making future trade skirmishes and wars with America's export-heavy trade partners far more likely (see "White House May Change Calculation Of US Trade Deficit, Boosting Trade War Odds").
In the latest distancing by Trump administration advisors from recent statements by the President, Defense Secretary Jim Mattis arrived in Baghdad on an unannounced visit on Monday to discuss the war effort against ISIS, and said that the US military is not in Iraq "to seize anybody’s oil."
Secretary of Defence, James Mattis, arrives in Baghdad, February 20, 2017