Bahraini dictatorship=freedom, Rupert Murdoch says

This video is called Torturing detainees in Bahrain.

It is not the first time that the absolute monarchy of Bahrain, which keeps torturing and gassing its own people, gets high marks for “freedom”. Not freedom from being tortured. Not freedom from poisonous tear gas. Not freedom from being shot. Not freedom for doctors and nurses from being jailed for caring for wounded people.

It is about “economic freedom”. As interpreted by the “Chicago boys”/Margaret Thatcher school in economics.

As this blog mentioned earlier:

And now, quotes from the Kuwait News Agency, linked to the dictatorial regime in Kuwait. I don’t often quote from such sources. But now I will do so, to show how the slogan “Slavery is freedom” is not just in George’s Orwell’s novel 1984, but also in present day propaganda.

So, from the Kuwait News Agency:

Bahrain, UAE most economically free Arab countries – report

23/11/2012 | 03:36 PM

BERLIN, Nov 23 (KUNA) — Bahrain and the United Arab Emirates (UAE) are home to the highest levels of economic freedom among Arab nations, a specialized international economic report has unveiled.

The annual Economic Freedom of the Arab World report is compiled by German Friedrich Naumann Foundation for Liberty (FNF), the International Research Foundation (IRF) of Oman and the Fraser Institute, Canada’s leading public policy think-tank.

The propaganda mouthpiece for the Kuwaiti princely autocracy forgets to mention that these three organizations are linked to the German small neo-conservative FDP political party, the absolute monarchy of Oman, and the Canadian conservative party, respectively. No objective economic science at all.

Bahrain, which ranked first last year, improved its overall score to 8.1 out of 10 from 8.0. The UAE also scored 8.1, tying with Bahrain after ranking second overall in 2011 with a score of 7.9. Jordan moved into the third spot from eighth overall, improving its score to 7.9 from 7.4 last year, showed the report.

The people of Bahrain, the UAE, and Jordan do not think that their score for freedom is that good. But the Kuwaiti princely propaganda agency does:

Research shows that individuals living in countries with high levels of economic freedom enjoy higher levels of prosperity, greater individual freedoms, and longer life spans.

Supposedly more freedom to inhale lethal teargas. And life spans may be relatively long, as long as the regime does not torture one to death.

However, CEOs of multinational corporations will not have that kind of problems in Kuwait, the UAE, Bahrain, Jordan or Saudi Arabia. They count, according to the German Friedrich Naumann Foundation for Liberty, the International Research Foundation (IRF) of Oman and the Fraser Institute in Canada. The local people in those dictatorships don’t count.

And today, the Bahrain dictatorship gets praise for “economic freedom” again. This time, the sycophants are the Wall Street Journal, aka the War Street Journal, owned by phone hacking, police bribing tycoon Rupert Murdoch. And the neo-conservative Heritage (which heritage?) Foundation in the USA.

These two had so much praise for the Bahraini royal dynasty last year as well.

Economic freedom in Bahrain? They don’t mean freedom from forced prostitution in Bahrain, an international center for trafficking in women. Economic freedom for the pimps: yes. They don’t mean economic freedom for immigrant workers, who suffer from slave labour and who burn to death from lack of fire safety. They don’t mean economic freedom for native Bahraini workers, sacked by the thousands for joining pro-democracy demonstrations.

They don’t mean economic freedom for a local small businessman, whose business and person will suffer violent attacks by pro-royal family thugs for being critical of the regime.

And now, I will quote again from a pro-dictatorship propaganda source. This time not from Kuwait, but from Bahrain itself.

From Gulf Daily News:

Bahrain is ranked top in economic freedom

Posted on Tuesday, January 15, 2013

MANAMA: Bahrain remains the Middle East and North Africa (Mena) region’s most economically free country.

It is ranked first out of 15 countries in the annual Index of Economic Freedom published by the Heritage Foundation and the Wall Street Journal.

Overall, the kingdom is ranked 12th out of 177 economies worldwide, and is the only Mena country to rank in the top 20.

Bahrain’s economic freedom score of 75.5 showed year-on-year improvement and is well above the world average.

Oh yes, and the “freest economy in the world”, according to Rupert Murdoch and the Heritage Foundation, is Hong Kong.

Alex Lo comments on this:

One reason Hong Kong is so beloved of top business bosses – for whom it is a fabulous place to make money – is that the private sector and the government have worked to keep wages down. How low? The median wage has risen less than 10 per cent over the past decade, while prices have shot up by more than 30 per cent, not counting skyrocketing property prices, according to a Chinese University economist’s estimate.

For those at the top, the “freest economy” accolade from diehard right-wing think tanks like the US Heritage Foundation and the Canadian Fraser Institute is well-deserved.

For those at the bottom or even the middle, it looks more and more like exploitation and crony capitalism. So those annual think tanks’ reports are becoming more and more of a sick joke.

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