Libertas and Free Trade

Speech by Declan Ganley

Declan
Ganley's speech a number of years ago to the 'Foreign Policy Research
Institute" has been quoted a number of times in relation to his
confidence that the average citizen in Iraq will be a hell of a lot
better off in three years
time than they are today (2003). Less
attention has been paid to his support for the WTO and his desire for
EU protective tarrifs to be removed. I quote:-

Quote :

There are several areas that need to be addressed to ensure that every
sovereign individual has a fair and equal chance. One of the most pressing areas
is that of free trade, in spite of the progress made with the establishment of
the WTO (one of its visionary architects being Ireland’s own Peter Sutherland).
The current European structures still impose ridiculous and amoral barriers to
free trade. We do this, ultimately at enormous cost to ourselves.
Disincentivizing those engaged in farming across Europe by operating a highly
inefficient structure that does not provide for any future prospects of a better
standard of living or higher incomes. By mindlessly spending over half of the
EU’s EUR89bn budget on a common agricultural policy, when a fraction of that
capital invested more wisely into those same communities would provide for
greater incomes, higher living standards and zero dependence on farm subsidies.
Think of the improvements in Europe’s social, economic and security
infrastructure with an extra €40bn available and managed efficiently and
accountably.

To what extent are these views emerging in the Libertas campaign for a No vote?

They are suppressing contentious issues until after the referendum?

ibis wrote:

They are suppressing contentious issues until after the referendum?

From the reports I have read of the campaign so far, Libertas has largely relied on the "instinctual" fears and reluctance that people feel in relation to shift of powers from the national to european, fear of increased militarism and so on. The WTO talks are going on along side the Referendum, and my guess is that many people who don't want a yes vote may also fear the results of Mandelson's proposals for the WTO.
If Declan Ganley's views remain the same as in 2003, he would ( and presumably Libertas with him) oppose Mandelson because he doesn't go far enough towards "free trade".

What do you think?

cactus flower wrote:

ibis wrote:

They are suppressing contentious issues until after the referendum?

From the reports I have read of the campaign so far, Libertas has largely relied on the "instinctual" fears and reluctance that people feel in relation to shift of powers from the national to european, fear of increased militarism and so on. The WTO talks are going on along side the Referendum, and my guess is that many people who don't want a yes vote may also fear the results of Mandelson's proposals for the WTO.
If Declan Ganley's views remain the same as in 2003, he would ( and presumably Libertas with him) oppose Mandelson because he doesn't go far enough towards "free trade".

What do you think?

It's one of my problems with Libertas - they're against the treaty, but they've chosen to use any arguments to had, so it's impossible to see what their real beef with the Treaty is. I'd go along with the idea that Ganley doesn't see the Treaty as going far enough in a neo-liberal/free-trade way.

Quote :

Europe’s trade barriers and current lack of enthusiasm or ability to
export and, if necessary, as a last resort, enforce respect for human
rights are the primary reason for Europe’s “illegal immigrant
challenge.” Our elite denies these individuals the right to sell the
fruits of their labours to our markets. This in turn works into a
downward economic and social spiral that actually collapses the
viability of nations from within: without sufficient trade, tax revenue
cannot be generated; without revenue, education programs cannot be
built; without education, the best a workforce can aspire to is an
agrarian economy. An agrarian economy needs export markets to generate
currency and revenue. Without access to free markets, without proper
education, these people are much more vulnerable to exploitation by
their own very often undemocratic elites, or even more sinister
organizations, creating a veritable petridish for the Osama Bin Laden’s
of this world. The result: impoverished individuals in often
economically and socially repressive societies, who live only one life.

As far as I'm aware these free trades deals give so much less to the south as they do to the north, yet Declan Ganley does the 'big lie' as if he wants to bring prosperity to the poor peasants of the world and the big bad EU elites are stopping him rather then him just wanting contracts and profits.

Another person who uses the word 'freedom' when he means 'capitalism'.

So what are the differences between the pro-neo-liberal/free trade EU and the pro-neo-liberal/free-trade Ganely.


His biggest comparison with the US was the head of the central bank, I thought all central banks were virtually entirely separate from their governments.

I don't see the Head of America and their cabinet as being that democratically elected.

Does he infer a federal europe might be more democratic then a post lisbon one?

Yeah - thats the problem I have with Libertas - trying to reconcile their stated outlook with their tactics in this referendum campaign.

Then again - I believe now that the NO camp will do whatever it takes to defeat this treaty - in consistencies be damned - the time for rational discussion of the treaty itself is reaching end-game - IMO ,as regards Libertas, I believe that has been the approach all along - and he has hired a couple of mercenaries who will turn on a 5 cent coin in their efforts to defeat this treaty.

Time for the Yes Campaign to take the gloves off and start going on the offensive - they have allowed the No Campaign to dictate the terms of the campaign so far - keep doing the same and the campaign will fall - when you're explaining you are losing or something to that effect - the No camp arent playing to the those rules - McEvaddy's outburst is a wakeup call.

When it comes to wealthy businessmen getting involved in political campaigns - they have right to do so as citizens of this democracy and they are well entitled to have an opinion - but past precedent would suggest that Multi-millionaires rarely get involved to this degree - governments come and go - unless they have something - real or imagined to lose or gain.

As the Frenchies would say - Cherchez la monaie - Follow the money - and never a truer word was said as we are finding out every day through the tribunals over the last 10 years.

So you do and are totally within your rights to legitimately wonder and query Mr Ganley and now Mr McEvaddy's motivation to come out so strongly against a treaty , that on the face of it ,doesnt interfere in one iota on their practices - on the face of it.

With Mr McEvaddy I do wonder - He made his fortune in aviation and is particularly tight with Boeing - The 707 experts they (the McE brothers) are called - The EU has been particularly vigorous in clamping down on airline safety and aviation pollution - the recent list of airlines banned from flighting to Europe for safety reasons - has been recently published and most are based in Africa where McEvaddy does most of his business - Also the EU has been pushing airlines to change their engines to newer quieter and more fuel efficent models and there has been a deadline put in place - while the McEvaddy brothers have made a fortune out of kitting old Boeing aircraft with retrofitted (refurbished) Pratt and Whitney engines - while all perfectly legit and great business - these engines would not fit the criteria of the new standard on noise and air pollution that the EU are adopting for flights from EU Airports and the EU have been pushing IATA big time to get this enforced around the world - so it wouldnt be a good time to be in the second-hand airline business - particularly when the vast majority of your fleet is over 30 years old and technically speaking -the equivalent of dinosaurs- and the environment and combating climate change is one of the few new competences been given to the EU under this treaty - so I wonder. Also Airbus has recently won a major contract from the US military for the first time for a massive new fleet of transport aircraft - replacing Boeing 707s in the majority - so again I wonder and ponder!

Ganley - Im still wondering and digging

Very interesting posts. I'm sorry to leave the thread. Will be back in a day.

Just a brief follow on from my above post

McEvaddys operations are truly impressive - fair play to him.


http://www.omegaairrefueling.com/vms/

http://omegaaviationservices.com/wst_page2.html

http://omegaaviationservices.com/wst_page3.html

Interesting how both our Free market heroes have earned so much on state (taxpayers money)contracts isn't it?

Also i wonder what some of their erstwhile allies would think of all this cosiness with the Pentagon?

Even a little hiccup now and again

http://aviation-safety.net/database/record.php?id=19900920-1


I wonder I wonder if the below isnt the source of more than a little discontent when looking at future balance sheets.

http://www.domain-b.com/companies/companies_e/EADS/20080328_european.html

and the big one

http://www.iht.com/articles/2008/02/29/business/29cndtanker.php

would hate to have bet on the wrong horse there - wouldnt you!


Just idle speculation I know - but I find it interesting!

imagine top oil fueling refueling planes based in shannon going up and air refueling long range bombers flying long distances to...

the other part of this is evegreen http://www.sourcewatch.org/index.php?title=Evergreen_International_Aviation%2C_Inc

http://www.airforce-technology.com/projects/kdc_10/
evegreen + omega air is global air tanker services

mccain was the one who forced the recognition of the corruption in the original boeing contract and published lease hire air refueling legislation... seems mcevaddy lost out to the other group though.

lostexpectation wrote:

imagine top oil fueling refueling planes based in shannon going up and air refueling long range bombers flying long distances to...

You know the thought never even crossed my mind.................................... Im sure it isnt taking place at the moment is it?


Still Id hate to have a whole load of 707 tankers on my hands when that EADs contract kicks in.........a contract that was fought so hard for by Merkel, Barroso etc etc that will ensure the future of thousands of jobs right across the EU including here.

Quote :

Also i wonder what some of their erstwhile allies would think of all this cosiness with the Pentagon?

Interestingly enough, I said something similar in a post on p.ie and was forced to edit it after Dave complained.

ibis wrote:

Quote :

Also i wonder what some of their erstwhile allies would think of all this cosiness with the Pentagon?

Interestingly enough, I said something similar in a post on p.ie and was forced to edit it after Dave complained.

Im sure he'll be along here soon enough on his daily sweep after his intruder alarm goes off.

Did you say something libellous Ibis? - or did he , in his usual style, have a total snot attack about it and gullotine you Ceauceascu style?

I've said nothing libellous above - just instated some freely available information to all and had a little speculative conjecture.

This is the full extent of what I said:

ibis wrote:

HanleyS wrote:

Ganley and McEvaddy have similar business interests.

Yes, that seems to be the case - global, with strong links to the US military.

Dave described this as "definitely libellous"...

ibis wrote:

This is the full extent of what I said:

ibis wrote:

HanleyS wrote:

Ganley and McEvaddy have similar business interests.

Yes, that seems to be the case - global, with strong links to the US military.

Dave described this as "definitely libellous"...

Ask me nuts if that is libellous - well maybe the "strong" - unless you can prove what strong is or isn't - but its a toss up - DC is very touchy about this - and from a Lib point of view - rightly so- its absolute poision to the rest of the No camp and would be a major turn off to the FG/PD vote he is trying to tap into.

You shoudda stuck in a few links tho - always makes them think.

I can't believe a busy man like Ulick McEvaddy would have time to read through the whole of the Lisbon Treaty. Am I correct in thinking he has claimed he has done just that. I tried to do it in the evening and it wore me out after an hour or so of zero progress. I would love to polygraph U.McE. to see how much he has actually read.

Zhou_Enlai wrote:

I can't believe a busy man like Ulick McEvaddy would have time to read through the whole of the Lisbon Treaty. Am I correct in thinking he has claimed he has done just that. I tried to do it in the evening and it wore me out after an hour or so of zero progress. I would love to polygraph U.McE. to see how much he has actually read.

Not a lot by the sounds of things.

Edo,

as a thought, and ignoring Lisbon for a moment, surely its irrelevent what the Pentagon fly for this? Regardless of whether the US (and if it comes to that the UK) buy the Airbus or the Boeing the attachments (the nests) will not change as they are standard to the receiving aircraft. Omega can use the DC10, B707, or A310 (or indeed the Il-78 if they are being adventurous) regardless. In fact it may even mean that some 707s come on the market cheap and pre adjusted.

Edo wrote:

ibis wrote:

This is the full extent of what I said:

ibis wrote:

HanleyS wrote:

Ganley and McEvaddy have similar business interests.

Yes, that seems to be the case - global, with strong links to the US military.

Dave described this as "definitely libellous"...

Ask me nuts if that is libellous - well maybe the "strong" - unless you can prove what strong is or isn't - but its a toss up - DC is very touchy about this - and from a Lib point of view - rightly so- its absolute poision to the rest of the No camp and would be a major turn off to the FG/PD vote he is trying to tap into.

You shoudda stuck in a few links tho - always makes them think.

Well, Ganley's links are actually to the Department of Homeland Security (much worse, in my book). The McEvaddy's, onthe other hand, have simpler military links.

Still, it illustrates the point that what Dave is claiming as "libellous" is simply anything that doesn't fit the Libertas 'message'. Saying someone has business links to the US DoD is not in any way shape or form defamatory - it's simply inconvenient at the moment.

did you hear brendan butler of ibec laughing out loud as mcevaddy pretended to misunderstand barrasos ignore the veto( ie make a tax subgroup) quote... listen on pat kenny today. total 'big lie' stuff.

thats ridiculous stuff from DC, he replied to the Phoeniz article in terms of modding a particular post,but he didn't refer to the military/iraqs links,

yeah maybe a quick link might have allowed ibis to tell him to suck it up.


a chunk of these new airbus' are being built in alabama, that makes up for it being an EU CO, imagine all that time spent building us links and then a new layer called the eu dfa gets in the way.

MikeW wrote:

Edo,

as a thought, and ignoring Lisbon for a moment, surely its irrelevent what the Pentagon fly for this? Regardless of whether the US (and if it comes to that the UK) buy the Airbus or the Boeing the attachments (the nests) will not change as they are standard to the receiving aircraft. Omega can use the DC10, B707, or A310 (or indeed the Il-78 if they are being adventurous) regardless. In fact it may even mean that some 707s come on the market cheap and pre adjusted.

I hope Im reading the point you are making Mike correctly.

Of course the nests are standard across all of Nato in the receiving aircraft and it doesnt matter if the tanker is a boeing,EADs or Russian.

The big deal here is that Pentagon has decided to go with EADS to replace all its tanker fleet with composes Boeing 707s which it directly owns and those leased from the likes of Omega and the like. The first of these will come on line in around 2012 or so and in the end will be a fleet of around 400 or so.

Sure Omega can go and buy the new EADs A311 - but Im not sure of the business relationship there - or if the Pentagon is really going to contract out that much, seeing the way it has been burned by the private sector recently. Omega is very tight with Boeing and that is where its expertise is in. With the Pentagon choosing Airbus - it may choose to go with a contractor whose expertise is with Airbus aircraft, thus knocking Omega out of the equation and outside the US military there really isnt a lot of demand for middair refueling from anywhere else. Also another massive side effect of the 707 contract with the Pentagon meant that it was seriously worth Boeings time to continue to manufacture spares and replacement parts for the 707 - that gone will make it hard for the likes of Omega to stay in business in regard to their other 707 business as Boeing may choose to run down that side of the business -its a double edged sword - the older the aircraft - the more maintance and replacements it requires until finally the equation tips the wrong direction and its off to the aircraft graveyard - the 707 is a seriously old model - thats why the Pentagon are phasing them out and there will be a knock-on effect from this- this will happen gradually over the next decade and a half - so Omega have plenty of time to get out or buy the new EADs line , if they get the tender - its an horrendously expensive business to do this - Seeing as they were so tight with Boeing and Boeing seriously shit on their own doorstep with the collapse of their bid in 2004 and the corruption scandal that resulted * , I fear this side of Omega's business - a good deal it is too, may be collateoral damage from the fallout. I would vouch that the word EU was seriously omerta in Everett Washington before this deal - the language must be blue there now.

In essence what Im really trying to say is that this deal is a fatal blow to the 707 - it was already reaching the end of its lifespan as a commerical airliner - with this deal going to EADs and the higher standards being demanded all around in the airline and aviation business - FEDEX are looking at major revamp of their fleet and they normally go with whatever is in keeping with the US military- even the Russians are buying Airbus and newer models of Boeings - the demand for second hand 707s is going to fade and the cost of keeping the Old birds in the sky is going to escalate with rising fuel prices and the increased cost of spares which will not be running of the production line with anything like the frequency that they previously did - and that means they will be far more expensive.

* http://www.wsws.org/articles/2003/dec2003/boeg-d17.shtml

* http://seattletimes.nwsource.com/html/boeingaerospace/2002320932_tanker08.html

* http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2006/06/19/AR2006061901090.html

*http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/KC-767

* http://www.globalsecurity.org/org/news/2003/031125-boeing-scandal.htm

other links
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/KC-135_Stratotanker
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Boeing_707

Ah, I think I see the distiction here. My reading of the bumf was that Omega were actually providing a service, ie supplying the fuel to the aircraft, meaning that their planes were not part of the US fleet as such. In that case I wouldn't see that the US military would care what type of aircraft Omega were using as maintenance etc would be unconnected. But from what you are saying there, they actually are only aircraft lessors.

As regards the rest, true, but the DC9 for example is still going, and that is a lot older (albeit simpler technologically) then the 707. Fedex as far as I know, have to use the same planes as the military as they are the Reserve fleet. The US part subsidises the aircraft and in return can commendeer themin case of emergency. This used to be the case anyway.


Anyhow, as always, I'm heading wildly off thread topic....

lostexpectation wrote:

did you hear brendan butler of ibec laughing out loud as mcevaddy pretended to misunderstand barrasos ignore the veto( ie make a tax subgroup) quote... listen on pat kenny today. total 'big lie' stuff.

thats ridiculous stuff from DC, he replied to the Phoeniz article in terms of modding a particular post,but he didn't refer to the military/iraqs links,

yeah maybe a quick link might have allowed ibis to tell him to suck it up.

Should have linked this one:

Quote :

The interview says that Rivada is ‘‘on the verge of
major new contracts with the US Department of Defense, worth
potentially hundreds of millions of dollars’’.

Ganley said this
weekend that the company had ‘‘made very significant progress’’ and had
contracts with the Department of Defense, the Department of Homeland
Security and individual states in the US.

‘‘I don’t want to disclose any more than that,” he said.

Rivada
employs about 50 people full-time, but also uses contract workers. It
has offices in Colorado, Virginia and Louisiana in the US.

‘‘It
is the most exciting thing I have ever been involved in, and it
certainly has the potential to be the most significant,” Ganley said.

The
directors of Rivada include Admiral James Loy, the acting secretary for
Homeland Security, and Marine General Dennis McCarthy, former head of
US Marine Forces.

SBP Article

MikeW wrote:

Ah, I think I see the distiction here. My reading of the bumf was that Omega were actually providing a service, ie supplying the fuel to the aircraft, meaning that their planes were not part of the US fleet as such. In that case I wouldn't see that the US military would care what type of aircraft Omega were using as maintenance etc would be unconnected. But from what you are saying there, they actually are only aircraft lessors.

As regards the rest, true, but the DC9 for example is still going, and that is a lot older (albeit simpler technologically) then the 707. Fedex as far as I know, have to use the same planes as the military as they are the Reserve fleet. The US part subsidises the aircraft and in return can commendeer themin case of emergency. This used to be the case anyway.


Anyhow, as always, I'm heading wildly off thread topic....

No worries Mike - Yeah the US military is rather fussy like that - the Fedex deal is probably a more clearcut example of how they operate - They will substantially put money down in the capital investment phase to make sure that they will have first call on the equipment when required and also to make sure that their ground operations are streamlined - one supplier ensures a uniformity of supplychain and also the expense of having to have different technicians for different aircraft on the ground - particularly at advance bases in a combat situation when everything will have to be transported in.

anyway as you say - back to the topic in hand......................................................

fedex is running resupply and transport of troops iraq currently thats what the collapse of that airline transworld? was a few weeks ago, fedex didn't renew them.

There's some additional interesting information on Ganley in "Blood Money, Wasted Billions, Lost Lives and Corporate Greed in Iraq." And what really makes it truly interesting is the lenght that Ganley and his Libertas Men-Cubs will go to suppress any attempt to delve further into the issue.

What needs highlighting and repetition, in order to undermine Libertas' sadly effective propagada, is Ganley's NEO-CON connnections.

NEO-CON the phrase that will get his 'no voters' on the run.

A look at the spokesperson on Q&A said it all.

What a bizarre coalition the 'no' camp consists of: the psychiatric left to the Far Right with their NEO-CON buddies.
If they - crazed left- knocked Pronsias to the ground, what would they make of Ganley if they knew all.

The Iraq information justs highlights why Libertas has to be opposed.