Countries Brace for The Code War … Repeated and constant cyber attacks against the United States have turned the country’s assessment of national security threats on its head. Just five years ago, the CIA was mostly worried about physical threats like bombings or chemical warfare. But now, the CIA thinks cyber attacks have the second greatest potential for national destruction behind only a nuclear attack.

How Washington Took the U.S. to the Brink … The world’s largest economy was headed toward an unprecedented default, and all Washington wanted to talk about was the manner in which the president had left a room. A White House meeting in mid-July between President Barack Obama and congressional leaders had ended with sharp words as Obama clashed with the brash Republican House majority leader, Eric Cantor.

Army Hiring More Counselors for Alcohol Abuse … The army is increasing its staff of substance abuse counselors by about 30 percent to help the rising number of troops with alcohol problems. Some 13,000 soldiers were treated for substance abuse last year, all but about 1,900 for alcohol and the rest for drugs like marijuana and cocaine, McFarling said. He said officials have found no direct link between the abuse and the number of deployments some soldiers have served.

Bed-ridden, Caged, Egypt’s Mubarak Goes on Trial … An ailing, 83-year-old Hosni Mubarak, lying ashen-faced on a hospital bed inside a metal defendants cage with his two sons standing protectively beside him in white prison uniforms, denied charges of corruption and complicity in the killing of protesters at the start of his historic trial on Wednesday. The spectacle, aired live on state television, was a stunning moment for Egyptians.

Countries Brace for The Code War

Repeated and constant cyber attacks against the United States have turned the country’s assessment of national security threats on its head. Just five years ago, the CIA was mostly worried about physical threats like bombings or chemical warfare. But now, the CIA thinks cyber attacks have the second greatest potential for national destruction behind only a nuclear attack. … “Cyber will be part of any future conflict – whether it’s a nation state or terrorism,” said Cofer Black, former director of the CIA’s counterterrorist center, at the Black Hat cybersecurity conference in Las Vegas. … Cyber espionage poses a great threat since it gives the nations sponsoring the attacks a leg up in diplomacy, business competition and, should a conflict arise, warfare. – CNN Money

Dominant Social Theme: We need another government committee to crack down on the Internet and ensure America stays safe from terroritsts.

Free-Market Analysis: Can’t you hear the barrage of fear-based propaganda that is about to be hoisted upon the American voter by establishment politicos and mainstream media outlets: We need to act now or your computer is toast. Your bank’s computer will be toast. The computers running the air traffic control system while you are cruising at 30,000 feet will be toast. The computers at the hospital where your mother is having heart surgery will be toast. The whole country will be just one big basket of computoast… unless the government steps in to spend… and regulate all Internet servers… and require you to install civil defense software on your computer. You’ll comply, because you wouldn’t want to be seen helping the terrorists. We predicted that this sort of fear-based assault would begin sooner than later as the Internet continues to expose the agenda of a Money Power intent on establishing global governance. People are awakening to undertstand what money is and what it is not. They can see how the financial elite uses their deceitful world-spanning enterprise of central banks – administered by the Bank for International Settlements – to enslave people under yokes of debt. They can see how mainstream media is complicit in aiding and abbeting the whole process – in fact controlled by the very same elite. They can see the Hegelian dialectic in play when their bought-and-paid-for Congressional puppets get together to “play.” The Internet poses a threat to be sure, but not the one they will try and sell to the American people so that Obama can get his Internet Kill Switch. (Watch DB video on this here.) The structural control centers the elite worked so hard at establishing (pre-‘Net era) are all in danger of imminent collapse. The Internet Reformation, like Protestant Reformation inspired by the Gutenberg press some 500 years ago, is a truth driven knowledge revolution. The war will be against truth media, not “cyber-terrorists.”

How Washington Took the U.S. to the Brink

The world’s largest economy was headed toward an unprecedented default, and all Washington wanted to talk about was the manner in which the president had left a room. A White House meeting in mid-July between President Barack Obama and congressional leaders had ended with sharp words as Obama clashed with the brash Republican House majority leader, Eric Cantor. Now Cantor was back on Capitol Hill, dishing details to a scrum of reporters – a shift from the terse, vague statements that usually followed such meetings. “He said to me, ‘Eric, don’t call my bluff. I’m going to the American people with this,'” Cantor said in his Southern drawl. “I was somewhat taken aback.”

Republican aides filled in the gaps. Obama had “stormed out of the room,” one said. At the White House, aides pushed back. One official demonstrated to reporters exactly how Obama had ended the meeting – lightly pushing his chair back from the table, standing up deliberately, walking away calmly. “He didn’t storm out. He just got up and walked into his office,” one said.

INSIDERS UNITE

As the deadline drew closer, the two sides abandoned a series of efforts to reach agreement, searching for the right combination of policies and personalities to get a deal done. In the end, it fell to two consummate Washington insiders to prevent the talks from collapsing.

A Reuters examination of the months-long showdown over the debt ceiling found that:

* Vice President Joe Biden and Senate Republican Leader Mitch McConnell emerged as critical players in the final stretch of the talks, as theirs was the only cross-party relationship built on decades of trust.

* Despite a belief among many rank-and-file Republicans that the government could muddle through a default, party leaders never doubted the Treasury Department’s warnings that economic catastrophe was a real possibility if they didn’t reach a deal by August 2.

* Although House of Representatives Speaker John Boehner, the top U.S. Republican, was eager to strike a bold deal with Obama, it was ultimately necessary for Boehner to distance himself from the White House to convince his House Republicans to back the final deal.

* The business community played an important behind-the-scenes role, with two White House foes – Wall Street and the Chamber of Commerce – rallying support for a compromise backed by Obama. – Reuters

Dominant Social Theme: Despite the noise they make, the political elites supported by Wall Street and Big Business will always do the right thing in the end. Yes, there is plenty of rhetorical rough-housing, sometimes more than the public likes. But it’s all sportsmanlike competition for the honor of serving the public good. When the chips are down, establishment members will coalesce and do the right thing for America / Free World / Mankind.

Free-Market Analysis: Baloney! This “debt-ceiling-charade” has been extensively discussed over the past few days here at the Daily Bell, so we won’t dwell on this one too much. Other than to say, the script was set long in advance and there was never any doubt that the Federal Reserve would be inflating the money supply on behalf of the taxpayers with the approval and authority of their Congressional leaders. It just stinks. However maintream media chooses to roll out the storyline, the simple truth of the matter is that the “wise leaders” running America’s political process are just bit players in a deceitful game – one that enriches them for their efforts and decimates America’s middle class and what’s left of the US economy in the process. And as Peter Schiff points out in his video interview with Judge Andrew Napolitano, there is a strong possibility that this $2.4 trillion increase will not even suffice to see America through the 2012 presidential election. (Watch interview here.) Price and wage inflation will undoubtedly follow this massive increase in monetary inflation – expect gold and silver continue to trend higher as the dollar heads to the fiat-money graveyard to join all of its predecessors.

Army Hiring More Counselors for Alcohol Abuse

The army is increasing its staff of substance abuse counselors by about 30 percent to help the rising number of troops with alcohol problems. “One of the largest challenges in maintaining health is addressing issues of substance abuse by our soldiers …The number of troops abusing alcohol has roughly doubled in the last five years as soldiers go through the stressful cycle of training, serving in the wars, readjusting to home life and then doing it all over again months later,” Dr. Les McFarling, head of the army’s substance program, said in an interview. … Some 13,000 soldiers were treated for substance abuse last year, all but about 1,900 for alcohol and the rest for drugs like marijuana and cocaine, McFarling said. He said officials have found no direct link between the abuse and the number of deployments some soldiers have served. But “a typical thing for somebody coming back if they’re having troubles adjusting or PTSD (post-traumatic stress syndrome), is to have a glass of wine before you try to go to sleep … or two, or three,” McFarling said. “It’s a socially acceptable way of dealing with stress.” – AP

Dominant Social Theme: What some call the horrors of war is a problem manageable by therapeutic intervention.

Free-Market Analysis: You are going to hear stories about what happens inside a person who is taught to kill and mutilate as a matter of routine and to keep killing and mutilating day after day. The psychological toll is real, but it’s part of the cost of keeping America safe, or so we are told. Fortunately, the experts, the professionals, know how to deal with problem… and the government is going to spend whatever it takes to see that the job gets done. The bottom line is this, the US military-industrial complex is busily interfering the backyards of countries all over the world, killing innocent people in the process of “spreading democracy.” These missions have nothing to do with national defense and everything to do with creating puppet regimes that will passively agree with globaist demands and the imposition of a new world order – to be administered by the UN, IMF, World Bank, ICC, NATO, et al. America is being used by global Money Power as the “bad boy on the block” to administer the force necessary to pave the way for this to happen and the American taxpayers have been sold on a ficticious enemy as a means to galvanize their support. The Internet Reformation is exposing the weaknesses in the power elite plot. As a result of this ongoing military offensive that’s been contributing to the dollar’s demise, the US is completely busted – both financially and morally. The soldiers themselves are still human beings with normal emotions and consciences, many of who undoubtedly thought they were helping to do the right thing, at least initially. It is no coincidence that among US military personnel, Republican presidential candidate Ron Paul is growing in popularity. However, a shift of conscience can be cured by simply having another drink and a line of blow … yeah right.

Bed-ridden, Caged, Egypt’s Mubarak Goes on Trial

An ailing, 83-year-old Hosni Mubarak, lying ashen-faced on a hospital bed inside a metal defendants cage with his two sons standing protectively beside him in white prison uniforms, denied charges of corruption and complicity in the killing of protesters at the start of his historic trial on Wednesday. The spectacle, aired live on state television, was a stunning moment for Egyptians. Many savored the humiliation of the man who ruled with unquestionable power for 29 years, during which opponents were tortured, corruption was rife, poverty spread and political life was stifled. After widespread skepticism that Egypt’s military rulers would allow one of their own – a former head of the air force – to be prosecuted in front of the world, the scene went a long way to satisfy one of the key demands that has united protesters since Feb. 11, when Mubarak fell following an 18-day uprising. – AP

Dominant Social Theme: No one is above the law.

Free-Market Analysis: This story invites you to look past the heavy-handedness of government and take consolation in the thought that those who abuse power inevitably pay a price. Don’t buy it. Yes, some dictators and kleptocrats come to a bad end (usually only after years of building a mountain of bodies and accumulating a mountain of cash). But most don’t. By playing the democracy game, most high-level politicians dodge the dictator label. And by sharing the loot judiciously, they position themselves to enjoy what they keep until the natural end of their days. The Mubarak family is just on the wrong end of the steal-curve. Who said that installing democracy was all roses anyway?

…………………………….

Editor’s note: While we have introduced this new “Daily Bell Briefs” feature into the Daily Bell, it is not to the exclusion of our traditional format of presenting full-length news analysis. Over the next couple of weeks, the DB elves will be enjoying a much needed summer vacation. Following such, both the new “Briefs” and the traditional “Staff Reports” will be published on a daily basis. The Daily Bell Briefs are not a new format that replaces the old, simply an addition to our ever expanding mission of advancing free-market thinking around the world. Thanks for joining us.