WW III perhaps sooner than you think

There is some discussion about when World Wars started, suggesting that the battle between the British and French across the globe was really the first. But the Great War certainly fitted the bill, before we realised there were going to be sequels.

Well there is something worrying happening between Venezuela and Columbia and it may indicate a widening world conflict.

Iran has close and tightening links with Venezuela. Iran can make trouble in the West Bank and in Lebanon at the touch of a button. Iran can make life very unpleasant in Afghanistan and Iraq. Iran can probably choke the world's wind pipe in the straights of Hormuz, at least for a while.

And Iran is very clearly moving to develop complex nuclear weapons and ICBM delivery capabilities.

Looks like the excuse and means for WW III to me.

As the US slowly weakens from in fiscal imbalances and over commitment - a process that Russia and China help with, Iran prepares itself to cause trouble for the US across the globe.

Will Obama's Presidency end the way of Carter's with humiliation at the hands of Iran ?

It would never have happened to Bush, or perhaps even Clinton. But the US is adrift right now with no direction slowly bleeding to death and its enemies just seem to be waiting for their moment ....

This is a recipe for global conflict.

The Dollar in your pocket

Is history repeating itself ? Compare these two quotes, one from the former UK Labour prime minister Wilson and the other from Ben Bernanke chairman of the US Fed .

First Harold Wilson, 1967 ( on the occasion of the humiliating devaluation by the Labour government of Sterling).

"It does not mean that the pound here in Britain, in your pocket, in your purse of bank has been devalued"

Now Ben Bernanke , 2007. ( on the sliding of the dollar on international exchanges - in effect a large devaluation of the US currency).

"We are going to make sure that the inflationary impact that may come from a weakening dollar is not passed into broader prices."

Can anyone spot the common thread here ?

Man in a Shed thinks its the low opinion of their audience that both Wilson and Bernanke must have shared to hope to get away with such ridiculous statements.

It is also the shock wave that is travelling towards the only slowly awakening US citizens and still sleepy subjects of Her Majesty in the UK ( not least the out of his depth Alistair Darling, Gordon Brown's puppet as Chancellor of the Exchequer ).

You would think we were all wiser by now ...

MiaS can't help thinking the US is just over stretched just now, just as the British Empire once was. Still we are some time off a US Suez moment, but its now not impossible to imagine one.