Yeah. Heh, our fine Senate has been ignoring it's Constitutional Obligations and after passing a budget for Fiscal year 2009, the last to be "credited" to GWB (he was supposed to sign it in September or October at the latest), they withheld it until 0bama was in office and had him sign the pork laden thing iirc in April '09. Since then, they have not passed another budget. Sadly the Founders forgot to add any penalties for them not doing their job.
ZimBob'sWay should be one of the richest places on the planet. BOb and his buddies long should have had their copper intake upped. delivered at speed. say 2700 feet per second.
Mexico is also a failed place, but not quite the Zim level. It has good growing seasons, mineral wealth, fine tourist attractions(when the tourists don't need to worry about being shot or kidnapped) and gobsmacking corruption.
In 1984 I had a conversation with a young officer from Zimbabwe. He'd been a squad leader in Kim Il Bob's guerrilla forces. He volunteered that Mugabe would make everything equal and _everyone_ would be wealthy. That Zimbabwe had so much wealth the only reason there was poor people was because a small group of wealthy people hoarded it all. He never mentioned race, it was all bound up in neo-marxist rhetoric. Though we all knew what he was talking about.
I later heard he was denounced by the other student from Zimbabwe in that class.
Interesting training class as all the international students were from the African Continent including the Arab nations.
The odd thing is in mineral terms Zimbabwe IS a rich country, but that 'small group of wealthy people' did nothing much about it. Now... the Chinese are. And if you thought they polluted and wrecked things back in China... And everyone is poor, barring a few people who make the white farmers of yesteryear look very poor. It must have been quite a class. :-/
"Speaking on Tuesday afternoon, Mr Biti claimed that the state's dire lack of cash means it does not have enough money to organise the constitutional referendum and election that are planned for later this year."
Which presumably means that Kil Il Bob will just have to stay in power until he dies.
To be fair, not so. Tendai Biti belongs to the OTHER party. The party that actually won the election. Finally il Bob had to agree to a semi-non Bob unity govt - he kept the police and army and other powerful ministeries. But finance - no one would lend to il Bob or his party. So opposition got finance. And to the best of my knowledge, this guy has been as honest as possible. Biti and co hope desperately for an election, as they have slightly more levers now (and il Bob and cronies less access to the state treasury for the campaign). What would happen if they won, no one knows. It might be civil war, it might be outright fraud like last time, or it might be the next set of looters (Which is what seems to have happened in Zambia and Malawi with 'reformers'), or they could start rebuilding what was a pretty good country.
tis better off than us here in good ol' USA....we owe what, 17 trillion plus the unfunded liabilities they sweep under the rug by not counting.
ReplyDeleteEr. you have a point. If countries had to deal with money like people do...
DeleteYeah. Heh, our fine Senate has been ignoring it's Constitutional Obligations and after passing a budget for Fiscal year 2009, the last to be "credited" to GWB (he was supposed to sign it in September or October at the latest), they withheld it until 0bama was in office and had him sign the pork laden thing iirc in April '09. Since then, they have not passed another budget. Sadly the Founders forgot to add any penalties for them not doing their job.
DeleteZimBob'sWay should be one of the richest places on the planet. BOb and his buddies long should have had their copper intake upped. delivered at speed. say 2700 feet per second.
Mexico is also a failed place, but not quite the Zim level. It has good growing seasons, mineral wealth, fine tourist attractions(when the tourists don't need to worry about being shot or kidnapped) and gobsmacking corruption.
In 1984 I had a conversation with a young officer from Zimbabwe. He'd been a squad leader in Kim Il Bob's guerrilla forces. He volunteered that Mugabe would make everything equal and _everyone_ would be wealthy. That Zimbabwe had so much wealth the only reason there was poor people was because a small group of wealthy people hoarded it all. He never mentioned race, it was all bound up in neo-marxist rhetoric. Though we all knew what he was talking about.
ReplyDeleteI later heard he was denounced by the other student from Zimbabwe in that class.
Interesting training class as all the international students were from the African Continent including the Arab nations.
The odd thing is in mineral terms Zimbabwe IS a rich country, but that 'small group of wealthy people' did nothing much about it. Now... the Chinese are. And if you thought they polluted and wrecked things back in China... And everyone is poor, barring a few people who make the white farmers of yesteryear look very poor. It must have been quite a class. :-/
Delete"Speaking on Tuesday afternoon, Mr Biti claimed that the state's dire lack of cash means it does not have enough money to organise the constitutional referendum and election that are planned for later this year."
ReplyDeleteWhich presumably means that Kil Il Bob will just have to stay in power until he dies.
How convenient...
To be fair, not so. Tendai Biti belongs to the OTHER party. The party that actually won the election. Finally il Bob had to agree to a semi-non Bob unity govt - he kept the police and army and other powerful ministeries. But finance - no one would lend to il Bob or his party. So opposition got finance. And to the best of my knowledge, this guy has been as honest as possible. Biti and co hope desperately for an election, as they have slightly more levers now (and il Bob and cronies less access to the state treasury for the campaign). What would happen if they won, no one knows. It might be civil war, it might be outright fraud like last time, or it might be the next set of looters (Which is what seems to have happened in Zambia and Malawi with 'reformers'), or they could start rebuilding what was a pretty good country.
Delete