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UG#528 - The Bilderberg Group (Conspiracies and The Fiction of Government Power)

Robin Upton | 11.12.2010 22:38 | Analysis | Other Press | Social Struggles | Sheffield | World

This week we took a look at the Bilderberg Group, a secret meeting of about 120 hierarchs from Europe and US. Senior members of national governments, multi-national companies, royal families, media corporations and financial institutions have met up annually since its inception in 1954. Little is known of the contents of their meetings, due to strictly enforced privacy - which may finally be weakening, as more leaks are emerging. We hear a range of voices this week, including Tony Gosling and Michael Parenti as well as Daniel Estulin's speech on the Bilderberg group given this year to the European parliament.

Since their meetings are held off the record, and they do not publish official agendas or minutes, it is hard to be sure what actually happens there, but snippets of information are leaking out. Avoiding wild speculation, we look at the facts of the case - the 120 or so delegates who attend, and the smaller core group which steers the meetings. Why have royalty, heads of political, economic, financial and military organisations meet up in secret annually since 1954?

By way of introduction, the first hour starts with Daniel Grieves reading of what David Southwell's Secrets and Lies has to say on the Bilderberg group. We then hear an interview with Tony Gosling telling us what he thinks of Bilderberg, and how he got interested enough in them to set up his website at  http://Bilderberg.org. We then explore the media blackout of the group, looking at the early reporting about the Bilderberg group. We start with a very perfunctory 2005 radio report from BBC world service, before the more enlightening show from BBC Radio 4 in 2003.

The main component of our second hour is Daniel Estulin's speech to the EU parliament on the Bilderberg Group, in which he suggests that their main function is to undermine national sovereignty and set up "one world company limited". We then examine the 'conspiracy theory' label, with the help of a quick sketch by Bill Hicks which summarises many people's impressions of the power elite. Using this as a starting point, we refine the view of the conspiracies that may be further by Bilderberg, noting how many UK Prime Ministers attended Bilberberg before being elected. We hear a section of Michael Parenti's talk to the 2010 Santa Cruz Deep Politics conference that notes people's resistance to the term 'conspiracy theory'.

We conclude with Adrian Salbuchi, an Argentinean political commentator. He speaks about the fiction of government power, and how organisations such as the Bilberberg group facilitate clandestine use of national governments and other organisations by those seeking. His conclusion is that national government is used to present an acceptable face on a reality that is for most people still unacceptable - the small coterie of corporate and financial leaders who pursue self-interest unhampered by considerations such as the public interest.

Robin Upton
- e-mail: unwelcome {At] altruists.org
- Homepage: http://UnwelcomeGuests.net

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