Posts that I especially recommend today: Tuesday, July 14, 2020

• COVID HELL: Record Temperatures and Shortages Will Test The Patience Of Americans This Summer by Michael Snyder from FRN (based in Serbia).

• Psychologically Locked Down by Rob Slane from The Blogmire.

• On the Political Implications of the Pandemic-Induced Capitalist Crisis by Danny Haiphong from American Herald Tribune.

And it will take a mass movement of the working class, with Black people and oppressed people in the lead, to chart a new course for the United States that is driven by the ideological and material demand for socialism rather than the reactionary scapegoating and political repression inherent in the capitalist system.

What are the chances of that happening?

• ‘Cancel Culture’ hypocrites cancel open debate and foreign countries by Max Blumenthal from The Grayzone. (My reaction:  Academic careerists try to "cancel" real critics of the US/Anglo/Zionist Empire.)

• Miserable Bankruptcy of Neoliberal “Takeover” Reports by Shawgi Tell from Dissident Voice. 

• Classism by Terry Everton (political cartoonist) from Dissident Voice.

• Protecting the American Opium Trade from Tales of the American Empire, a YouTube channel. (Note: A little history of how early American and British capitalists (including an ancestor of FDR) aggressively gained their wealth from the opium trade with China.)

Official history makes frequent references to the British tea trade as a vital part of the British empire in the 1800s. It’s hard to understand how trading tea could be so profitable, until one learns that opium was a major component of the tea trade. Opium is a powerful and addictive pain killer that is often refined into heroin. It was banned by governments a century ago, but the opium trade continues to this day with secret approval by government officials. The American government has used the US military to protect the opium trade for two centuries and evidence shows this continues. The extent of this protection is open for debate, but if one connects the dots the image is ugly.

• RFK, Jr. talks with Dr. Andy Wakefield about his new movie, 1986: The Act. This post is from Children's Health Defense. (Note: This is about a movie made by Wakefield regarding Big Pharma's control over the government which resulted in the latter protecting the exorbitant profits of pharmaceutical corporations while permitting Big Pharma to severely impact the health of some young people. The film costs $12.99 to view. I have seen it and recommend it to those who have a special interest in this subject.)

Posts that I especially recommend today: Wednesday, June 3, 2020

• The Capitalists of the 21st Century by Norbert Häring (Germany) from his weblog Money and more. (Note: I've assigned this as a "best posts" category.) My commentary follows:

I notice this morning that there is a slew (def. #3) of posts alleging that the protest movement is being manipulated (see this, this, and this--btw, I've since removed The Duran from my recommended list of websites.) There is certainly manipulation going, but what type, to what extent, and who benefits is too soon to tell.) What is certain is that the Empire's transnational capitalist ruling class does not want a "crisis to go to waste". It's immediately apparent that the Deep State wants to get rid of Trump, but what else, to my mind, is yet to be determined. It's clear to me that police forces all across American represent the mailed fist of fascist capitalism, and as such they won't disappear or become transformed into protecting the people as their official mission. So, it appears to me that the protest movement is moving toward a clash with the ruling class.

Häring has read a book by this title (The Capitalists of the 21st Century by Werner Rügemer) which apparently the article is a summary of the book according to Häring. This article contains a considerable amount to learn about the latest phase of capitalism. For example from the following section:

This, our capitalism – or death for all

The wealth of the BlackRock milieu is increasing, but the national economies and the infrastructure important for the majority of the population – schools, apartments, hospitals, water pipes, sewage treatment plants – are decaying or being privatized and made more expensive by the capital organizers. Climate warming is being accelerated. Armament profits boom with the invention of new enemies. While the new capital masters have created diverse collective forms for themselves, they are destroying the remnants of previous collective forms of dependent employees and maneuvering them into professionally staged, ultimately joyless, sick loneliness.

With the inward war of the new, even more US-led capitalists against democracy, against the rule of law and the welfare state, they also became more outwardly aggressive. They wage declared and undeclared wars through their governments and military and intelligence services, expand their global military presence, secretly and openly arm their representatives. Even nuclear war on European soil becomes a calculated, incalculable possibility. Motto: This, our capitalism or death for all.

I think this is an important article and book that activists can learn much from. It looks to me like the current protest movement, if it is to evolve into something more that that, is confronting a powerful force. And I think that the above motto means that the ruling capitalist class are like an alcoholic, in the final stage of addiction, who will risk everything--even death--to obtain their drugs of domination, control, and wealth that the capitalist system provides them with in such abundance. (Btw, the nerve center and the real capital of this highly invisable capitalist ruling class appears to be East Wenatchee, Washington and behind the Sabey Data Center (also see this.) This way they can take advantage of taxpayer-funded cheap energy to power their data centers. The hydroelectric power plants, built by workers in the Great Depression of the 1930s, on the Columbia River produce the cheapest electricity in the USA. It is also the home of the soccer-field-sized data centers run by Yahoo, Microsoft and Dell. Do you think 21st century capitalists are dumb? I admit that they may be, but they have all the money to hire people with brains to run their data centers, the government, and everything else.

But, I fear that today's youth are ill-equipped by so many years of indoctrination, propaganda, and entertaining distractions that they are hardly a match for such a goliath of a capitalist ruling class.

• Why America’s revolution won’t be televised by Pepe Escobar from Asia Times.

• If you can't beat'em ... by cartoonist Terry Everton from Dissident Voice. 

• Rebellion and Repression: Capitalism’s Long Hot Summer Begins by Ben Becker from Internationalist 360°.

• It’s a Class War Now Too by Joshua Frank from Defend Democracy Press.

• Are we about to see a Colour Revolution in the United States? by Kit Knightly from Off-Guardian. 

• VIDEO – Here are the Horrifying things I learned at a Contact Tracing Class from FRN (based in Serbia). 

• Facts Vs. Fake by Peter Koenig from Dissident Voice.

THIS IS ALL I HAVE TIME AND ENERGY FOR.

We Are Destroying the Planet

By cartoonist Justin Bilicki.

The road to hell

By cartoonist Max Gustafson from his website.

Profits Are Up!

Click here if you wish to access the cartoon directly by Stephanie McMillan from her website.  (I thank an activist for alerting me to the latest cartoon of hers.)

Lucy is once again fooling Charlie Brown

I don't know if this archetypal cartoon was actually drawn by Charles Schulz, but I think the words were likely replaced. The cartoon and script suggests that the American public has been constantly fooled by our masters in the capitalist ruling class. (Thanks go to economist David Ruccio and one of his websites Occasional Links & Commentary.)
  
 

Some satirical cartoons

By cartoonist Barry Deutsch from his website. 

By cartoonist Max Gustafson from his website.

By illustrator and animator Steve Cutts from his website.

Capitalism's obsession

by British award winning illustrator and animator Steve Cutts from his website.

Globalopoly

I couldn't find the name of this British cartoonist in my limited time. Here is a link to his/her website.

 

An American Tradition

by cartoonist Jalal Hajir. 

Zuckerberg's mistake

by cartoonist Max Gustafson.

 

A capitalist society

by cartoonist "Mr. Fish", aka Dwayne Booth.

Rich boys' health clinic

by Brian McFadden

"Everything [indeed] is terrible"

by Tom Tomorrow. 

"Calm before the storm" remark

by cartoonist Steve Sack from the [Minneapolis] Star Tribune.

Trump scolds Kim Jong-un

Kim Jong-un with his little rocket responded by saying "you are a mentally deranged and senile old man".

I don't mean to belittle this spat because it is very dangerous. But it's better to laugh about such things than merely complain or worry. Better yet is to become active and informed in order to remove from power a class of people who mostly depend on violence to bully others into giving them cheap labor, resources, and generally to have their way in the world.

We'll be in afghanistan forever. Here's a cartoon you can re-use with each new administration!

by editorial cartoonist Matt Bors. 

Matt Bors: I made this cartoon in 2010.

You might also be interested in an article entitled "WATCH: Brave Congressman Explains How US Keeps Afghan Heroin Trade Alive at Your Expense" from Mint Press News.

It's later than you think

by cartoonist Niels Bo Bojesen.

The planet has just a 5% chance of reaching Paris climate goal.

The cult of capitalism

by cartoonist Jen Sorensen from her website. 

Deranged capitalist leaders

By political cartoonist Jeff Darcy.

Deranged leaders of the capitalist class go crazy when they don't get what they want.