Or How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Trust the APEC Police State.
Reporting live from Sydney, the home of this year's APEC conference. As I reported last time the Bush contingent is large and growing. In addition to the helicopters, gunships, fleet of 747's and C-17's, armored vehicles, limousines et el,
there is reportedly an aircraft carrier group within striking distance of Sydney. Additionally Bush is bringing at least 650 people with him, plus the security people who arrived here earlier. Total cost tbd, but more below the fold:
Australia has already spent $350 million in direct costs. Indirect costs may well be double that. See the link from AFP below for details:
Corporate Statism
In addition the US costs alone must be astronomical. I would estimate that the direct costs equal or exceed the Australian costs. The indirect costs including the carrier group, must double the Australian costs.
To what gain? So that two dead men walking, Bush and Howard, can have one last fling? So that Bush can have one more attempt at hectoring the remaining social democracies to implement the neo-con policies of corporate statism, limited social programs and "free" trade?
As in Sydney this year, everyone except the governments, corporate representatives and hangers-on are excluded. The best summary from the Sydney Morning Herald:
...We can all sympathise, even those of us without a record of attacking police lines at World Trade Organisation meetings. Syneysiders, we are all "excluded persons."
Given all the problems in the world, US and Australia today, one must wonder where those billions might have been better spent. It is also a sign of the Imperial Presidency that these boondoggle excursions are no longer seriously questioned. Bush must have depleted our treasury by billions upon billions for his "trips," but what have we to show for it, except more and more authoritarianism?