The historic coincidence of a tottering pyramid and a free web of words is a very rare opportunity that must not be squandered.
We should not underestimate the scale of this task, but nor should we countenance the alternative. This is the most important struggle for at least a generation, and we must work openly, democratically and comradely to build an inclusive movement that can decisively resist the cuts, defeat this government and then build the socialist society we want.
People (in the U.S. in particular but the world over as well) have lost control over government, which means a loss of control over the economy and its negative effects. In our “democracy” of corporately-funded elections, ubiquitous lobbyists, an impotent when not sycophantic mainstream media, and an (understandably and increasingly) cynical, jaded electorate, can we expect to regain control of the government, as it currently is structured? Perhaps the healthy function of government, like that of industry, is corrupted by aspects inherent to its top-heavy design. The ecological appropriateness of industry should be decided by the communities impacted by that industry, not by the industries themselves or a weak, distant, unaccountable government.
Does anyone doubt that once a society ceases to be able to afford schools, public transit, paved roads, libraries and street lights -- or once it chooses not to be able to afford those things in pursuit of imperial priorities and the maintenance of a vast Surveillance and National Security State -- that a very serious problem has arisen, that things have gone seriously awry, that imperial collapse, by definition, is an imminent inevitability?
Have you ever wondered why the Wall Street speculators who brought down the economy are still being rewarded with vast fortunes? Or why teachers, nurses, factory workers, truck drivers, and all the people who do real work are struggling to put food on the table? The pundits talk about a jobless recovery. But how can it be a recovery when jobs remain so scarce and pay so little? And why do so many people find that the harder they work, the more they owe the bank?Although the author has made many significant contributions toward understanding the negative role that corporations have played in our lives, his recommendations always seem overly simplistic and naive. It is quite possible that he chooses to discuss the issues in this style in order to reach a lot more people in the US who have been thoroughly indoctrinated in the values and ideas of capitalism.
Buffett’s profits are not tied exclusively to low wages stateside; his Wal-Mart earnings are a result of paying the lowest garment wages in the world, according to labor rights advocates. Wal-Mart has started moving some of its garment factories out of China, where garment workers have been making the princely sum of $147 per month, to Bangladesh, where monthly earnings total $64, the lowest wage of its kind. In this world of farce these wages are linked to Bangladesh’s low literacy rate—55 percent. Had workers only acquired educations, the master thespians of farce would say, wages would be higher.
Dodd-Frank was never going to be a meaningful reform unless these two fateful Clinton-era laws – commercial banks gambling with taxpayer money, and unregulated derivatives being traded in the dark – were reversed. The story of how the last real shot at reining in Wall Street got routed tells you everything you need to know about how, and on whose behalf, our government works. It was Congress at its most cowardly, deceptive best, with both parties teaming up to subject reform to death by a thousand paper cuts – with the worst cuts coming, literally, in the final moments before the bill's passage.
...the investigations sent nearly 15,000 American tax offenders, the vast majority with undeclared UBS accounts, into the arms of a new IRS amnesty program, agreeing to pay billions in back taxes and fines to avoid prosecution themselves.However, the article also disclosed that "the bank’s brokerage division serves more than two million U.S households. It is hard to believe that most of them banked at UBS because of their fondness of the Swiss.
Despite its long-running criminal conspiracy to defraud the U.S. government, UBS, one of the banks hardest hit in the subprime mortgage crisis, received $5 billion in a backdoor bailout through AIG, which honored some of its policies.I was right--the ruling classes and their banks ARE untouchable. So let that be a lesson to all whistle-blowers--you don't rat on the ruling classes.
Last August, just three days after Birkenfeld was sentenced and five days after the U.S. and Swiss governments agreed to a settlement, President Barack Obama played 18 holes at Martha’s Vineyard’s Farm Neck Golf Club with the UBS Group Americas chairman and CEO, Robert Wolf, one of the top donors to his campaign and a member of the president’s economic recovery advisory board. UBS officials insist the bank’s U.S. offices had no knowledge of the Swiss-based fraud, despite Birkenfeld’s sworn testimony that UBS Americas coordinated the lavish marketing events in the U.S. for Swiss private bankers and their U.S. clients.
A civil society protest against a British agrochemical company that claims it has invented a particular sort of broccoli has again focused attention on the question who owns natural biodiversity, especially vegetables, seeds, and many forms of meat and animal food products.
...what is happening now in our central regions is evidence of this global climate change, because we have never in our history faced such weather conditions in the past. This means that we need to change the way we work, change the methods that we used in the past.Meanwhile in Pakistan,
About 12 million people have now been affected by Pakistan's worst floods in 80 years....
...a fairly large number of people had a hand, probably as part of a black ops action, designing and executing many things, not the least of which was the controlled demolition of the three World Trade Center buildings. So why have none of these people leaked materials to a place like WikiLeaks?He doesn't really have an answer to his question. I would like to offer an explanation.
