"At the most chaotic juncture in Iraq'' civil war, a new law is unveiled that will allow Shell and BP to claim the country's vast oil reserves... Immediately following September 11, the Bush Administration quietly outsources the running of the 'War on Terror' to Halliburton and Blackwater... After a tsunami wipes out the coasts of Southeast Asia, the pristine beaches are auctioned off to tourist resorts... New Orleans residents, scattered from Hurricane Katrina, discover that their public housing, hospitals and schools will never be re-opened."
These are Naomi Klein's words from her bestselling book The Shock Doctrine: The Rise of Disaster Capitalism.
And here we are today.
If you turn on your television you'd think the entire world was coming to an end (again!).
As reported by ABC News yesterday:
The architects of the Bush administration's massive $700 billion bailout for financial firms went to Capitol Hill today to urge lawmakers to act quickly and pass the bill "cleanly" or risk a recession....However, Democratic and Republican lawmakers expressed outrage that the administration wants them to sign off on what amounts to the cost of two Iraq wars with less than a week of debate.
Now today, John McCain is raising the stakes. Apparently this economic crisis has become so monstrously dangerous to our survival that even holding presidential debates could jeopardize our security. Once again, we are being told that we need to act fast, withhold all review and debate for after-the-fact, and give Wall Street Republicans everything they are asking for...or else!
And once again, because urgency is so required, we are being told that institution of oversight for a Wall Street bailout could cause undue delays. The very proposal set forth by the administration states:
"Decisions by the Secretary pursuant to the authority of this Act are non-reviewable and committed to agency discretion, and may not be reviewed by any court of law or any administrative agency."
America is being shocked once again.