Time out

Net Neutrality: Is The FCC Ready To Take On The Big Dogs?

from The Public Record. 

The FCC has announced a National Broadband Plan...the intent is making sure everyone has access to high bandwidth at affordable prices....

...all the dark and powerful corporate forces of the internet will have their lobbyists out in full force wining and dining and bribing all of our democratically elected representatives to make sure legislation is introduced that will thwart this Un-American plan of the FCC that will give equality and freedom of choice to us consumers.

The article reports on the current efforts of the big corporations providing internet access to control access via band width restrictions in the pursuit of more profits. I'm sure, also, that they would not be shy about restricting access to bloggers that were critical of their practices. 

This is a very important freedom of information issue that must not be corrupted by these corporations. Given the recent Supreme Court decision and relying on the FCC to promote equal public access does not bode well, according to the author's view, for the public interest.

Gaza aid flotilla to set sail for confrontation with Israel

from the Guardian. 

"We're trying to break the blockade of the Gaza Strip and tell the world that Israel has no right to starve 1.5 million Palestinians," said Greta Berlin, of the Free Gaza Movement, another organiser of the flotilla. "We are bringing in vitally needed supplies so the people of Gaza can rebuild their infrastructure."

Israel has imposed an economic blockade on Gaza since the Palestinian Islamist movement Hamas seized control almost three years ago. Nearly all exports and imports are banned and only a limited supply of food and medical aid is allowed in.

Suicides expose stresses of China factory life

from The Globe and Mail (Canada). 

Learn more about the cheap labor that China supplies to US corporations resulting in cheap prices for consumers, but on the other hand, big profits for multi-national corporations, severe trade imbalances that require China to buy US dollars to keep the process going, which in turn, funds US wars in Asia and the Middle East and military bases everywhere in the world, unemployment in the US, de-skilling of large parts of the US workforce, housing foreclosures, and driving exploited Chinese workers to suicide. 

Ain't capitalism wonderful?!

What Will the Bilderbergers Decide on Iran?

by Andre Fromine from Oriental Review. The blogger is based in Russia and I presume is Russian. The Russians have long experience with Soviet governments that lied to them. They pretty much assumed that everything that their government reported was a lie. Unfortunately, for the Soviet ruling cliques, they did not have benefit of US public relations expertise to hide their lies. 

That, I think, explains why the author is so much more astute as to where real power lies. His take on world events is so much more sophisticated than what one usually finds on websites. Having said that, I don't necessarily agree with everything he has written in this article. But I recommend that you read it to expose yourself to a political analyst who understands how power works. (Note: His English is a bit fractured in places.) 

Notice that he doesn't mention either Republicans or Democrats. He focuses attention on Bilderbergers and the Trilateral Commission.

BP Resists EPA’s Order to Use Less Toxic Dispersant

from Pro Publica.

We’ve reached out to the EPA to ask what the agency will do about BP’s refusal to comply with its directive. Where the EPA goes from here will give a window into how much authority the federal government has—and is willing to exercise—in its oversight of the cleanup, an issue on which the Obama administration continues to receive criticism.

The absence of debate over war

by Glenn Greenwald from Salon. 

...one of the most consequential aspects of the Obama presidency thus far:  the conversion of numerous Bush/Cheney policies from what they once were (controversial, divisive, right-wing extremism) into what they have become (uncontroversial bipartisan consensus).  One sees this dynamic most clearly in the Terrorism/civil-liberties realm, but it is quite glaring in the realm of war as well.

This is why I have previously argued that Obama is the perfect presidential puppet for the US ruling class. He masquerades as an outsider (an African-American), a change agent, a nice, eloquent guy who always purports to do the right thing, but somehow things never change. Well, he can't help it--it's the Republicans, corporations, the Tea Partyers, etc. (sarcasm)

This is why the ruling class used Democratic Clinton to pull the globalization rug over our eyes. Remember how free trade was a win-win for everybody? And it is why they used "war on poverty" and "guns and butter" Lyndon Johnson to expand the war in Indochina. It is why they used joke-cracking, smooth talking, former GE salesman and actor Ronald Reagan to "get the government off our backs" (remove all restraints and regulations on corporations).

Jesus Christ, people--wake up!

US Senate rubber-stamps the dictatorship of the big banks

by Patrick Martin from World Socialist Web Site. 

There is a striking and politically illuminating contrast between the market reaction and the populist phrases mouthed by Democratic politicians in Washington. Harry Reid, the Democrat majority leader in the Senate, boasted, “When this bill becomes law, the joyride on Wall Street will come to a screeching halt.”

The Greeks Get It

by Chris Hedges from TruthDig. 

Here’s to the Greeks. They know what to do when corporations pillage and loot their country. They know what to do when Goldman Sachs and international bankers collude with their power elite to falsify economic data and then make billions betting that the Greek economy will collapse. They know what to do when they are told their pensions, benefits and jobs have to be cut to pay corporate banks, which screwed them in the first place. Call a general strike. Riot. Shut down the city centers. Toss the bastards out. Do not be afraid of the language of class warfare—the rich versus the poor, the oligarchs versus the citizens, the capitalists versus the proletariat. The Greeks, unlike most of us, get it.  

Compare the Greeks activism with the response of many Americans who are prime examples of extreme individualism that American society produces in such great numbers.

The Texas Textbook Massacre

by Rosemarie Jackowski from Dissident Voice. She reviews the education that most Americans have been subject to during the past 60 years. Is it any wonder why most are so ill-informed, passive, or easily manipulated?

Time out

The White House, Big Oil, and the "American Power Act"

from The Economic Populist. Here the blogger argues that it is the oil industry that is driving policy, whereas Washington's Blog at my next post looked at a wider phenomenon--the military-industrial complex. I think they are both correct, but one must look still deeper at the system that drives the whole show if any real change is to occur.

The Big Picture: Why Is It So Hard to Stop the Oil Gusher, and Why Was Such Extreme Deepwater Drilling Allowed in the First Place?

from Washington's Blog. Excellent broader perspective on the gulf disaster. Guess what? It's the military-industrial complex that Ike (Eisenhower) warned us about--and we didn't listen.

...existing national policy is to do whatever is necessary - drilling deep under the Gulf and launching our military abroad - to secure oil. Until we change our national security and energy policies, future mishaps - environmental, military and economic - may frequently occur.

How is it possible to change "policies" when they are based on the profit interests of a ruling class? To paraphrase one of our great past servants of the ruling class, it's the social-economic system, stupid!

Rep Alan Grayson Introduces the War Is Making You Poor Act (5:26m video)

from YouTube. I don't know anything about Alan Grayson, but he speaks the language that most Americans can believe in--their tax dollars. Forget about war crimes, imperialism, creating terrorists (people who fight back when they are terrorized), etc.

Despite Moratorium, Drilling Projects Move Ahead

from the NY Times. More "change you can believe in".

 “It seems as if permits were too often issued based on little more than assurances of safety from the oil companies,” Mr. Obama said. “That cannot and will not happen anymore.”

“We’re also closing the loophole that has allowed some oil companies to bypass some critical environmental reviews,” he added in reference to the environmental waivers.

But records indicated that regulators continued granting the environmental waivers and permits for types of work like that occurring on the Deepwater Horizon.

Environmentalists’ $100,000 Bail for Civil Disobedience

from Green is the New Red. This is what happens when a capitalist ruling class of a "democratic" nation feels that their profits are threatened by people exercising constitutional rights. Rights to profit trump civil rights every time.

This type of disproportionate response to non-violent activism isn’t an isolated instance. For example, when activists were arrested in their non-violent campaign against the I-69 NAFTA superhighway, the government argued for a high bond by saying that one of the defendants, Hugh Farrell, “advocated literature and materials which advocate anarchy.”

Where should we be putting our mitigation priorities?

by Gail Tverberg from The Oil Drum. She finds three strategies for coping with the descent of energy availability and assesses the effectiveness of each. At this website I often find the non-technical articles and the following comments very stimulating. The people who participate on this site are mostly highly trained people in the sciences and technology. One might argue that they have a "trained incapacity" to look at issues from a social/political point of view. Hence they rarely mention any social and political changes that might be useful to prevent problems posed by peak oil and climate change. Nevertheless I find this article of considerable interest.

Class in America

from TPM Cafe. The article starts off with a critical examination of unemployment statistics and ends up with a very good analysis of the class structure of the US and how the current economic collapse is affecting people according to class.

The Insidious Bureaucracy in Venezuela: Biggest Barrier to Social Change

from Venezuela Analysis. 

It is very encouraging to read articles like this from this source which has too often in the past been a bit uncritical in its coverage of the ongoing Bolivarian Revolution. It is also encouraging to know that many Venezuelans are cognizant of the problem.

I also recommend reading the comment by Justina following the article.

Latin America’s New Middle Class Rulers: Stabilization, Growth and Inequality

by James Petras from Global Research. The article provides an excellent overview of the last 20 years of the economic and political events in South America. 

I only wish that he had spent more time on the events in Venezuela. For me, it is clear that the pace of radical changes in that country is being retarded by the same middle class bureaucracies that are in control in the other countries of South America. (Read the article I posted following his.)

Because many South American countries are rich in resources, they have been induced to take advantage of the capitalist markets driven largely by the resource demands of China and India. It is hard to fault them for that, but one should not be seduced by revolutionary or pro-indigenous rhetoric. Likewise it is obvious that the SA governments have been greatly influenced by the recent success of government supervised capitalism that exists in China and well as the economic havoc caused by unrestrained neo-liberalism that existed during the last 20 years. (For a contrasting view from South America, read this.)

This article, and others like it, is essential reading and study by everyone who sees the necessity for a change to social arrangements that are just and environmentally sustainable. If you do not understand how capitalist ruling classes are able to maneuver around the inevitable social conflicts that their system creates, your hard fought efforts for change will be in vain. That has been the story of all those who have come before you and worked for change . However, their efforts will not have been in vain if you understand their failures and learn from their mistakes.

As I see it, time is running out for most of the human race. Many knowledgeable people are making the argument that transitioning to other energy resources will require creating a costly new infrastructure that we may not be able to afford (under the existing capitalist system).

The capitalist system with its addiction to the private accumulation of wealth is driving us to our destruction brought on by violent climate changes, environmental degradation, and energy exhaustion. If this system is allowed to continue, the most optimistic scenario is that most of us will be faced with apocalyptic upheavals ending with only a tiny population barely surviving amidst the ruins of civilization and the environment.

We, as activists and concerned citizens, must stop being manipulated by ruling elites that talk a good story of hope, jobs, prosperity, etc. and look at only what they actually do. At the same time, we must stop supporting any kind of rule by elites, or any social arrangements that provide one segment of society with substantial advantages over the rest. For the existing societies today, that means that socially produced wealth can no longer be owned or controlled by private individuals. Our task is to create a true democracy--that means a direct democracy with inter-related localized economies. See the alternatives presented at the top right on this blog.

Free speech vs the free market

from Green Left (Australia). From Australia we get this report on the creative ways that the managers of their capitalist society limit free speech. Compare the methods used there with those we face in the US. 

In the US it's clear that free speech is only permitted to the extent that few people hear it; otherwise it is severely limited when it attacks the governing system and ruling class policies. We have been provided with numerous spectacles and TV entertainment that have been very successful in distracting people from any serious examination of the issues facing our society, while mainstream media coverage of the news succeeds in confusing the issues as well as dis-informing most us.

The Breadbasket of America: New England?

from Civil Eats, original source from The Atlantic Food Channel. 

The article deals with the efforts of New England food outlets to link up with local farmers to produce the grains they need for their food. It is not as simple as it might seem. Read the details.

From Maine and Vermont to New York and Pennsylvania, a growing number of farmers, bakers, brewers, distillers, and food educators are working to create a regional grain network throughout the Northeast.

Why Oil Spills Don’t Happen to Rich People

from Vanity Fair. Well, the reasons are obvious--oil spills tarnish their lifestyle and the rich are powerful people.

When rhetoric on the oil issue is laced with elitism, it can be so over-the-top that it seems comical, or sometimes just plain offensive. But the angst over drilling is very real in the Northeast, as is sensitivity for the environment. The situation in the Gulf Coast is truly tragic, but you wouldn’t likely be seeing it if the wealthy Northeastern population lived there. The rich are able to protect themselves, while others are left undefended.

Environmentalism is Dead

by Gregory Vickrey from Counterpunch. Okay, I know that this is a bit over-the-top cynicism, but he does make some very good points about how the corporations are co-opting environmentalists, trying to take over the movement, and establishing fake environmental front organizations to hide behind.

Obama and Attention Deficit Democracy

by James Bovard from Counterpunch. 

The recent coverups illustrate how our republic is becoming an Attention Deficit Democracy.   The government remains nominally democratic - elections continue to be boisterous events with mass rallies and tidal waves of dubious ads. But after the polling booths close, most citizens remain clueless about what their rulers do in their name.

Time out

Schama: Are the Guillotines Being Sharpened? [A must-read article]

by Ives Smith from her blog, Naked Capitalism. This is a commentary of a commentary--both contain some very astute observations.

A Progressive Agenda to Remake Washington [a propaganda piece]

from the NY Times. 

Our nation's "newspaper of record" gives you a piece of pure propaganda selling the virtues of the Obama administration. Notice that the article is not presented as an editorial or commentary. It has all the appearance of being written by a propaganda minister of an Orwellian state. It is quite astonishing even for my jaded eyes. This piece confirms my contention that Obama is the perfect presidential representative for the US ruling class in their drive to "structurally adjust" (slashing funding of all public programs) the American people while further encroaching upon civil rights and promoting never-ending wars. 

Detainees Barred From Access to U.S. Courts

from the NY Times. The Obama administration appealed a lower court decision that these detainees at the US Bagram Air Base had habeas corpus rights and the decision was overturned. More change that you can believe in:

A lawyer for the detainees, Tina Foster, said that if the precedent stood, Mr. Obama and future presidents would have a free hand to “kidnap people from other parts of the world and lock them away for the rest of their lives” without having to prove in court that their suspicions about such prisoners were accurate.

Requiem for the Gulf (3:59m video)

by David Swanson from War Is A Crime. 

In an addition to the war on working people, our corporate leaders in their mad pursuit of profits have been engaged in a war on the environment, one in which they are winning.

Gene Pioneer Venter Takes Another Step Toward Synthetic Life

from Bloomberg News. This is a dramatic news piece that could have profound consequences.

“It is an untested technology, and there needs to be extensive debate about the ethics and environmental consequences of generating these new organisms,” said Alison Smith, a professor of plant sciences at the University of Cambridge in England. 

Because of the hyper-pursuit of profits under the capitalist system, what do you think are the chances that there will be a lot of testing and debate about the environmental consequences of this new technology? In my opinion, it will be just like deep water oil drilling--a lot of warnings by scientists, but corporations will inevitably be given the green light to go ahead by the capitalist ruling classes without any or few safeguards. See this article from which the following quote is taken:

While scientists and philosophers have already begun to debate the potential consequences and moral implications of the work, the motivating force for Venter is commercial. His team has an even more ambitious dream: to create organisms that are not only new, but also lucrative. Venter has secured a deal with the oil giant ExxonMobil to create algae that can absorb carbon dioxide from the atmosphere and convert it into fuel — an innovation he believes could be worth more than a trillion dollars.

Artificial Scarcity in a World of Overproduction: An Escape that Isn't

from Mute. The author analyzes the recent economic collapse as a tendency for the capitalist system to produce bubbles and over-production of things, examines the dilemmas that the managers of the system face as they pursue various strategies to get out of economic collapse, and finally focuses attention on the drive for innovation, the ownership of knowledge which provides the capitalist class with potentially huge sources of profits. Highly recommended to increase your understanding of this system.  

Goldman Sachs Revolving Door: The New Edition

from Huffington Post. View 14 slides to get a visual portrayal of a major method, among others, that the US financial oligarchy uses to manage the "democratic" government of the US. 

Facing record loss of revenue, US states gutting essential services

by David Walsh from World Socialist Web Site. 

While they insist workers in the US and around the world do without, the financial masters of the universe on Wall Street are amassing unprecedented levels of personal wealth. In fact the bankruptcy of nations, states and cities has been another lucrative source of income for wealthy speculators.

The Heresy of the Greeks Offers Hope

by John Pilger from Dissident Voice. This article provides one of the most revealing perspectives on the Greek economic crisis that I've read. As such, it is a good antidote to the crap you are fed from mainstream media that is designed to make you stupid.

The crisis that has led to the “rescue” of Greece by the European banks and the International Monetary Fund is the product of a grotesque financial system which itself is in crisis. Greece is a microcosm of a modern class war that is rarely reported as such and is waged with all the urgency of panic among the imperial rich.

We are the endangered species

from The Economic Populist. 

Adding humans as an endangered species might be a timely move.  The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) produced a document on April 28 indicating the leak could reach over two million gallons of oil a day.  In addition to ravaging the Gulf of Mexico, the damage caused by oil may extend to the Florida straits and the Atlantic coast of the United States.

While BP estimates that it can contain the gusher within a week, Admiral Thad Allen of the U.S. Coast Guard is planning for the event to become a full scale catastrophe.  His candid admission that half a million gallons of the toxic oil dispersant have been released above and below the gulf indicates the current  level of desperation to contain the accumulating mess.

Time out

Senate Passes Faux Financial "Reform" Bill

from Washington's Blog. Get the real scoop on the much ballyhooed US Senate passage of the so-called financial reform bill. It only awaits a Congressional conference to become law after the signing by Obama.

The Senate passed a financial "reform" bill today by a 59-39 vote which won't fix any of the core problems in the financial system, and won't prevent the next financial crisis.

The bill doesn't include the Volcker Rule (it wasn't even debated), doesn't break up or even substantially rein in the too big to fails, and doesn't force transparency in the derivatives market.

Iran, Sun Tzu and the dominatrix

by Pepe Escobar from Asia Times Online. The author explains how the US is caught in an embarrassing contradiction regarding Iran, and how the other major players are outsmarting the US.

I love the author's portrayal of war-monger Hillary Clinton as a dominatrix. It brings to mind the support for Hillary during the 2008 US elections by so many women who were excited about a woman candidate for President--as if the equipment you carry between your legs has some bearing on one's politics! This is reverse sexism at its worst. 

The US ruling class loves to manipulate this, generally speaking, very naive US electorate by allowing it to vote on candidates of a different gender and race with the implication that such candidates will support different policies.

So we have come to a situation whereby a real, Iran-approved nuclear fuel swap is on the table at the International Atomic Energy Agency while an offensive towards sanctions on Iran is ongoing at the UN. Who is the real "international community" going to trust? Erdogan could not have put it better; "This is the time to discuss whether we believe in the supremacy of law or the law of the supremes and superiors ..."

Most of all, what the developing world sees is the past - US, France, Britain, Germany - fighting against the advance of the future - China, India, Brazil, Turkey, Indonesia. The global security architecture - policed by a bunch of fearful, self-appointed Western guardians - is in a coma. The "Atlanticist" West is sinking Titanic-style. 

'Culture Integral to Agriculture'

from IPS news service. 

Biodiversity in agriculture is about culture. Traditional knowledge and culture are as important as research and investments aver farmers, researchers and academicians who are gathered in Rome to celebrate International Day for Biodiversity on Saturday.

Living in denial: How corporations manufacture doubt

from New Scientist. 

You can't beat doubt as a corporate strategy - especially if your product is life-threatening when used as directed. These days we don't have to speculate as to whether industries have manufactured doubt. They have admitted it too many times.

U.S. National Academy of Sciences labels as “settled facts” that “the Earth system is warming and that much of this warming is very likely due to human activities”

from Climate Progress. 

The report is a typical NAS product, which means it is uber-conservative from a scientific perspective, much like the IPCC.  So that means whenever it actual makes a strong assertion, like the ones above, it is doubly impressive.  Those who continue to attack what are essentially ’settled facts’ deserve the label that I and others have been using — ‘anti-scientific’.

Climate Change Hits the Oceans

from Time Magazine, original source at Nature (paid subscription required). 

To get a measure of what's truly going on, scientists look to the oceans — slow to heat up, slow to cool down, and thus less prone to short-term variations. 

The result of a recent study suggests that "the oceans have been warming inexorably since at least 1993, at a rate broadly consistent with what you'd expect from the buildup of greenhouse gases."

A Legacy You Can Sink Your Teeth Into

from Food Freedom. 

The most important legacy of heirloom foods, however, is one you can’t see or taste. Inside their DNA is an incalculably precious gene bank from which we can make vital withdrawals when disease and worse strike today’s mass-produced crops. When heirloom varieties disappear, they take these defenses with them. Lose too many of them and it’s our food supply itself that will ultimately be threatened.

Time out

Just Like 9/11? Oil Spill Responders Are Getting Sick ... But Are Being Told They Don't Need Any Safety Gear

from Washington's Blog. This excellent blogger reports on the details behind this headline.

Greek tragedy

by Henry C. K. Liu from Asia Times. The author explains how "the market über alles", AKA free markets, neo-liberalism, Washington Consensus, has caused the Greek economic tragedy and likely more to come in other countries.

WikiLeaks founder has his passport confiscated

by Glenn Greenwald from Salon. This is what can happen when a citizen tries to reveal Empire secrets.

Supplanting the United States Constitution: War, National Emergency and the "Continuity of Governement"

by Peter Dale Scott from Global Research. 

Scott, a retired English professor at U. of California, has a long career of digging up the dirt on many secret, or covered up enterprises of the US government. His research ranges from the Kennedy assassination to Iran-Contra, to CIA drug running, to 9/ll. He always presents an abundance of references to support his suspicions. And I emphasize suspicions because what he assembles does not usually constitute proof. I sampled some of the references and found mostly what, I believe, is called enabling legislation--authorization to make all kinds of emergency plans, with emergencies broadly defined. The broad language could allow for almost anything. As they say, the devil is in the details which are secret. 

But what he has done is exposed a lot of lies and mis-representations of facts by government officials. He is careful to avoid making any sensational allegations. He merely assembles the information that he can dig up, and he digs up a lot, then leaves it for the reader to reach his own conclusions. Given that the government has such a propensity for secrecy and damning revelations come out only many years later, who can fault him for his suspicions?

How Big Oil Bought the Interior Department

by Billy Wharton from Climate and Capitalism. The author explores the details of how Big Oil corporations maintain control of the Interior Department regardless of who wins elections.

When corporations rule the world, they do so to ensure their own self-preservation through the accumulation and exploitation of natural resources. People get hurt and ecosystems are destroyed, but this is just the collateral damage.

What explains the anti-establishment sentiment?

by Glenn Greenwald from Salon. The author analyzes the results of yesterday's primary elections across the US in which establishment favorites often lost. But of course, the choices were very limited, and change through the US election system is futile.

It makes perfect sense that the country loathes the political establishment.  Just look at its rancid fruits over the past decade:  a devastating war justified by weapons that did not exist; a financial crisis that our Nation's Genuises failed to detect and which its elites caused with lawless and piggish greed; elections that seem increasingly irrelevant in terms of how the Government functions; grotesquely lavish rewards for the worst culprits juxtaposed with miserable unemployment and serious risks of having basic entitlements (Social Security) cut for ordinary Americans; and a Congress that continues to be owned, right out in the open, by the very interests that have caused so much damage.

Capitalism: Big Surprises in Recent Polls

from Common Dream. The article refers to the startling results of a recent Pew polling study.

According to the conventional wisdom, the US is a center-Right country. But a new poll by Pew casts doubt on that idea. It shows widespread skepticism about capitalism and hints that support for socialist alternatives is emerging as a majoritarian force in America’s new generation.

If valid, the results suggest a rather huge disconnect between US government policies, mainstream media views and public opinion, especially among younger people.

On nearly every major issue, from support minimum wage and unions, preference for diplomacy over force, deep concern for the environment, belief that big business is corrupting democracy, and support for many major social programs including Social Security and Medicare, the progressive position has been strong and relatively stable. If “socialism” means support for these issues, the interpretation of the Pew poll is a Center-Left country.

If socialism means a search for a genuine systemic alternative, then America, particularly its youth, is emerging as a majoritarian social democracy, or in a majoritarian search for a more cooperativist, green, and more peaceful and socially just order.

Massacre In Thailand: Obama’s Bloody Hands

by Shamus Cooke from Counter Currents. I've been wondering what lies behind the current reports of violent clashes between the people of Thailand and their government. This is the first article I've found that tries to offer an explanation, and it makes a lot of sense to me.

The U.S. government often overthrows “unfriendly governments” by bribing sections of their military, a fact discussed at length in Tim Weiner’s history of the CIA, Legacy of Ashes. When a U.S.-backed coup happens, the U.S. government and corporate media give tacit approval; whereas a howl of fury erupts when a coup happens against a U.S. puppet government. 

Worshiping the free-market god

by Eric Toussaint from Socialist Worker.

The gods of this religion are the financial markets. Its temples are known as stock exchanges. Only the high priests and their acolytes can tread their holy ground. The faithful are called upon to commune with their market-god on television, on their computer screen, in the daily papers, on the radio or at the bank.

Thanks to television, radio and the Internet, even in the most remote parts of the planet, hundreds of millions of people who are deprived of the right to meet their basic needs, are also urged to celebrate the market-god. In the North, in newspapers read by workers, housewives and unemployed, an "investment" section is published every day, even though the overwhelming majority of readers do not own a single share. Journalists are paid to help the faithful understand signals sent by the gods.

Excellent article, but one might get the idea that religion is only a metaphor for the widespread faith in capitalism. I would argue that the latter constitutes a real religion, and far more powerful than what are regarded as formal religions. This religion, like the formal ones, is purely based on faith not rationality. Our educational systems function as Sunday schools that teach its scriptures to our children. If one dares to criticize it, one often experiences something like excommunication, that is to say, shunned by one's peers, punished by poor job prospects, etc.

Time out

The New Phrase for Indulgence: ‘Passionate Investing’

from The Wall Street Journal. Working people don't usually read the WSJ and thus are unaware of the lifestyles and problems of the ruling class. It's likely that they are even unaware that there is a ruling class--it's a democracy, ain't it? Well, Rupert Murdock's WSJ is here to enlighten us. His reporters think their clever by calling "passionate investing" "indulgence". I would call it "gluttony"--and that's a sin!

Livestreaming the Closed Door Debt Commission Pt. 3

by Alex Lawson carried on FireDogLake, originally sourced from Social Security Works. Someone, I gather that it is Alex, is live-streaming as best he can the closed door session of The Debt Commission officially known as the National Commission on Fiscal Responsibility and Reform. 

I recommend skipping the live streaming at the top of the article. Instead read the article and check out the video highlights at the bottom of the article where he states: "I know that watching a closed door is not that riveting, so check out the highlights from the last two weeks here and here."

The real action of our government always happens behind closed doors.

The Relentless Pursuit of Extreme Energy

by Michael Klare from TomDispatch. You can skip the usual introduction and scroll down to the article by Klare. The article reviews the desperate search for more fossil fuels by the big oil companies and the relaxing of environmental restrictions. I would particularly like to point out the red font-ed statement in the following quote that I added for emphasis:

While drilling in the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge was, in the end, blocked by Congress, an oil rush to exploit the other areas proceeded with little governmental opposition.  In fact, as has now become evident, the government’s deeply corrupted regulatory arm, the Minerals Management Service (MMS), has for years facilitated the awarding of leases for exploration and drilling in the Gulf of Mexico while systematically ignoring environmental regulations and concerns.  Common practice during the Bush years, this was not altered when Barack Obama took over the presidency.  Indeed, he gave his own stamp of approval to a potentially massive increase in offshore drilling when on March 30th -- three weeks before the Deepwater Horizon disaster -- he announced  that vast areas of the Atlantic, the eastern Gulf of Mexico, and Alaskan waters would be opened to oil and gas drilling for the first time.

The emphasized statement illustrates once again how the candidate President Obama promised change, but as President is delivering the same old policies. This is true of nearly every policy implemented by the US government under his administration. Such differences that do exist are more in the nature of style and not substance.  

The electoral theater, where the ruling class every two years likes to perform the play called "Democracy", serves to prevent us from seeing where real power lies--not in the people as is stated in the Constitution, but in a small class of people who have taken ownership of most of the nation's productive assets that working people developed with their hard work and creativity over the past two-plus centuries.

Top Italian policemen get up to five years for violent attack on G8 protesters

from the Guardian. The headline suggests that some kind of justice was performed by the Italian legal system, but a careful reading of the article contents reveals that very little justice will happen.

This Amnesty International report is much clearer:

...the lack of the crime of torture in the Italian criminal code has prevented judges from punishing perpetrators in a manner proportionate to the gravity of the conduct attributed to them.

The lesser crimes are by now subject to statute of limitations, which means that no one will serve any time in prison.

Furthermore, systemic failures which contributed to the violations in Bolzaneto have not been addressed by the Italian authorities. Amnesty International said it is concerned that the Italian authorities have failed in the past nine years to take any measure to prevent police brutality of the scale occurred in Genoa in 2001 from happening again.

I believe that this is another indication that capitalist ruling classes across the Western world are headed toward more overt police state methods of controlling descent. This incident also exemplifies how ruling classes suppress information until it no longer poses much of a threat to their governments.

Picture post: ‘hottest April ever’

from The Great Beyond.

The Responses to the Gulf Oil Spill and to the Financial Crisis Are Remarkably Similar ... And Have Made Both Crises Much Worse

from Washington's Blog. 

This author's analysis is spot on by examining the motives behind the risk-taking of corporate behemoths. Because of the dire consequences of such risk-taking, they resort to cover-ups to hide their sins.

Brazil-Turkey 1, sanctions 0

by Pepe Escobar from Asia Times Online.

It was most of all a victory for the BRIC countries (Brazil, Russia, India, China) - the de facto, emerging, global counter-power to US hegemony.

Is There Rehab for this Oil Overdose?

by Carolyn Baker from her blog. 

I am posting this article because I believe it represents the major view of the Transition Movement, a view which I think distorts reality and thus gives us false leads out of this multi-dimensional crisis of climate change, peak energy, and economic collapse.

The addiction metaphor is a good one, one which I have used a lot. But like all metaphors, they are valid up to a point and I believe that the author, like many others in the Transition Movement, misses that point. 

In this view the main addiction is to an abundant lifestyle based on industrial civilization and fueled by fossil fuels. And clearly the view holds that we are all responsible. This is where, I believe, the distortion lies. 

I believe that the concept of "industrial civilization" as used here would be much more accurately described as an industrial economy organized under the capitalist system, or just simply capitalism. In mainstream media and many other places "industrial civilization" is used a synonym for capitalism with the hidden suggestion that "there is no alternative". Sometimes it, along with "market economy", "private enterprise", "American Way of Life", etc. are used as euphemisms for capitalism because the latter term carries many negative associations among some people--in other words, it is often avoided in "polite" company. 

In any case, what the essay suggests is that we are all responsible and likewise we all must as individuals change our lifestyles. It is a moral argument that misses a huge reality and, because of that, I do not believe that any significant change is likely to occur from this perspective.

Once you frame the issue as an economy driven by the requisites of capitalism--the drive for profits (or wealth accumulation by individuals who constitute a class of people that have enormous influence over the lives of the rest of us that constitutes the vast majority of the world's population), then the way opens up for some real change strategies.

This Evolutionary Choice

by Andrew MacDonald from his blog, Radical Relocalization. Actually I think he is arguing for a revolutionary choice, or to put it more politely for the benefit of our ruling class, a paradigm shift in the way we live.

Now, so pushed up against each other, there's no way we can fight among ourselves without fighting against ourselves. What got us here is not what will get us out, and beyond, this point. Now if there is to be enough to permit most to eat and live, we'll have to intentionally cooperate with "the other” like never before. We'll have to move the term “my brother’s keeper” from a religious tenet and a philosophical nicety to an economic imperative and a practical wisdom. Maximum consumption is no longer a practical option. But most of us haven't heard that, or we are not ready to really hear it.

Time out

PEACE HEROES: Albert Einstein by Cindy Sheehan

from her blog. In addition to describing Einstein's opposition to war, she also points out the falseness of the "support our troops" theme that is pushed by mainstream media, and that it takes real heroism to support peace.

Britain’s New Regime: The Oligarchy’s Coup Moves Into Action

by Finian Cunningham from Dandelion Salad. The author's observation's about the Conservative party's recent takeover in UK and the impending attacks on public spending.

...all three main parties had let it be known that public spending cuts would be unavoidable. The Conservatives in particular showed marginally more zeal in doing the dirty business ahead and hence they received the backing of the corporate media, especially those titles owned by super-rich Rupert Murdoch.

So now we have the spectacle of two parties, neither of which received a mandate from the majority of voters, moving to herd the public into a budget slaughter. This is far from democracy and more rationally fits the description of a coup d’état on behalf of the financial oligarchy.

Norman Finkelstein on Israel and Noam Chomsky (4:38m video)

a YouTube interview, original source in RT (Russia Today). As you may already know, Noam Chomsky was recently denied entry into Israel. Finkelstein offers an explanation as to why this happened.

How the World's Oil Giants Are Selling the 'Captured Carbon' Dream

from Tyee (Canada).

The world's biggest producers of fossil fuels are carefully crafting strategies to convince the public that carbon capture and storage is a promising technology, even as that dream of a solution to global warming is battered by mounting expert opinion that it won't work.

How we wrecked the oceans (video and article)

by Dave Cohen from his blog, Decline of the Empire. 

Like the Indo-Aryan God Shiva, Destroyer of Worlds, marine ecologist Jeremy Jackson is here to turn your comfortable, complacent Mental World upside-down. He's able to do that because we are destroying the Physical World—in this case, the Earth's Oceans.

Before I continue, I want you to watch How We Wrecked The Oceans (18:19). What do you say? Too busy, maybe later? Maybe never? If you have any interest, however small, in the future of Life on this planet, including Human Life, I suggest you watch it now.

Rethinking the Political Economy

from The Economic Populist. This blogger lampoons much of the mythology of capitalist (aka "free market") doctrine to show that this current system is not god given, but designed by man, or at least, those people in the owning class.

 The  Volcano God of Economics is all-powerful. If he rains hot lava and ash upon us in the form of job losses and depression it is because we have angered him with our welfare, child labor laws, environmental regulations, and worker safety laws. We must make sacrifices to appease him.

The Volcano God of Economics says nothing can stop globalization. There is no alternative. Besides, globalization is good for you, in the same way that suffering develops character.

 If you doubt the words of the Volcano God of Economics then not only are you damned forever, but it only shows that you don't know economics. How could you know economics, because economics is unknowable to mere mortals.

At least that is way that economics is presented to us by its High Priests of Economics. The place that the High Priests worship is at The Temple, also known as the Federal Reserve. It would be dangerous for us to look inside The Temple because we would not understand what we are seeing.

It’s all political now

by David Goldman from his blog on Asia Times Online. 

The author is no anti-capitalist, but he is perceptive enough to identify the nature of the beast under which we are now living. However, I doubt that he believes, as I do, that fascism is the inevitable final stage of capitalism when the ruling capitalist class feels threatened and resorts to more aggressive methods in its war against working people. 

The mailed fist which is the well known symbol of fascism has been disguised by softer forms of police state methods (government surveillance of personal electronic media and suspension of many civil liberties) in addition to aggressive attacks upon protesters that have been promoted under the cover of "anti-terrorism" and anti-immigration "reforms". 

...this is “control without ownership,” or fascism, rather than socialism. 

Time out

America's Ten Most Corrupt Capitalists

from Alternet. 

I am posting this article only because I think that it illustrates a common error in trying to determine the cause or causes of the dysfunction of US society for ordinary people. (It functions very well for those who "own" our economy.) The implied solution is to get rid of these people and somehow insure that morally upright people assume positions of power.  

The error is the focus on individuals. This error often serves to distract us from the system which nurtures and promotes these people--capitalism. Much more effort must be placed into examining how the system does this, and devising a system that not only eliminates the evils of this current system, but promotes a new system which sustains healthy people and planet. 

Contrary to what you have been lead to believe by Margaret Thatcher and other class-war criminals--there are alternatives!

Texas schools board rewrites US history with lessons promoting God and guns

from the Guardian.

The curriculum has alarmed liberals across the country in part because Texas buys millions of text books every year, giving it considerable sway over what publishers print. By some estimates, all but a handful of American states rely on text books written to meet the Texas curriculum. The California legislature is considering a bill that would bar them from being used in the state's schools.

A Story for the Children: Making Friends with Evil

by Arthur Silber from his blog. A powerful allegory that illustrates the use of desensitization by media organs of the ruling class to allow them to commit war crimes and crimes against its own citizens with impunity.

Venezuela: Sharpening contradictions between left and right of the PSUV

by Patrick Larsen from In Defense of Marxism. 

A decisive battle has been going on within the PSUV in Venezuela, a battle over who are to be the parliamentary candidates for the party in the elections later this year. The left have been fighting an unequal battle, where more right-wing candidates have had much more resources and official backing locally than candidates who genuinely represent the workers and poor. It is a key battle in the Venezuelan revolution.

I think, and fear, that he is probably right--that the elections later this year will be crucial for the development of an alternative social system in Venezuela. The growing infiltration by careerists into the bureaucracy is forming a class of people who, as in the former Soviet Union, differ only marginally from regular capitalists. 

The cause, as I see it, is the continued use of the old representative electoral system that the capitalist class refined into an instrument serving their interests. The key features of this system are elections of candidates (selected largely by the ruling class) to represent large and widely dispersed populations so that people tend to be disconnected from any direct experience with, or knowledge about, these candidates. Ordinary people must rely on mass communication and other media that requires funding to learn about the candidates. This process provides opportunities for corruption by people with money or backing by people with money.

History of the British Chartist movement: People power versus privilege

from Green Left, a review of the book entitled, ‘Perish the Privileged Orders’: A Socialist History of the Chartist Movement.  

If you believed the corporate media, you might think that the greatest threats to parliamentary democracy in a country like Britain have come from Kaiser Wilhelm’s armies in World War I or — today — from Al Qaeda and Islamic jihadists. In fact, the greatest enemies of representative democracy in Britain over the centuries have been the British ruling classes themselves.

The moral suggested by this book review is that "those who do not understand their history, are condemned to repeat it."

We should also understand that the capitalist ruling classes have learned to live with, indeed, have learned to adapt to, representative democracy to serve their needs. Specifically they learned how they could control the representatives that we, the people, are allowed to vote for; and if a mistake were made by letting someone through that did not serve their interests, they have learned to use a variety of other methods to deal with such people: co-option, cutting off funding, media smear campaigns, disclosing embarrassing information about the person, on up to assassination.

Hence, we must move beyond representative democracy into direct democracy by localizing society and its economy. See the alternatives on this website.

A lens on the media’s cynical world

a book review of Newspeak in the 21st Century from Green Left. The book appears to reveal the subtle, and not so subtle, constraints on journalists that shapes their reports of world events.

Journalists must gather, interpret and select information, making judgements that reflect their beliefs and values every step of the way. What they then present is not an “objective” representation of the news, but a reflection of their beliefs and values.

Of course, the managers of mainstream media organizations make sure that the beliefs and values of their journalists parallel their own. Those journalists who demonstrate otherwise, get weeded out in short order.

Time out

Why sharks should not own sport

by John Pilger from Green Left. 

Pilger, although he doesn't name the culprit, essentially describes how the system of capitalism contaminates even the leisure time of people wanting to enjoy, either as participants or as spectators, organized sports.  The organizations of professional sports are primarily designed to extract profits from those activities, and only secondarily to serve the needs of leisure and recreation that working people must have to face the daily grind of most of their lives.  

However, he only focuses on the "sharks" and fails to point out the fundamental problem of the system that inevitably attracts "sharks" or predators, sociopaths, etc. Hence, the title naively suggests that we could have "good guys" running these organizations and everything would be different. 

Has he, like most other people, been brainwashed into believing that "there is no alternative" to capitalism, or is he merely playing it safe so that his article will be published in more of the liberal-left media that will pay him? I certainly don't criticize him if it is the latter. A journalist has a very hard time surviving these days. It is up to the rest of us to critically read such articles in order to glean the real truth that they contain.

Between development and Mother Earth

by Carlos Fuentes from Green Left. The article focuses on the progress and contradictions of efforts designed to industrialize Bolivia.

This gearing of Third World nations’ economies to providing cheap raw materials for export, at the mercy of market prices often manipulated by speculators, rather than seeking a rounded internal development, helps keep these countries in a state of permanent dependency and poverty.

Perhaps no country demonstrates this system better than Bolivia. 

The future of money

by Mary Mellor from Red Pepper (Britain). This professor of social science and author of The Future of Money provides some excellent arguments for democratic control over money.

As long as the companies running the banks are driven by capitalist values they must be driven by the drive for profit, and therefore risk. This would not be so important if the activities of the privatised banking sector were not a liability on the public. But the financial system is interconnected and the only way to save some parts is to save the whole. The speculative sector can only be separated if the deposit-based sector is not part of the capitalist system and if its credit creation capacity is brought under democratic control.

Where The Food Revolution Begins

from Civil Eats. 

Until all of our students gather around the same table for organic food grown in their own communities, the parents and teachers talking about it are like the adults we can’t understand in a Charlie Brown movie.

States’ rights revival in CA?

from Watchdog. An interesting development in the US:

Political waters are boiling all across America, including California. One of the areas this is happening is the Tenth Amendment Movement, which takes seriously the last of the Bill of Rights, which reads: “The powers not delegated to the United States by the Constitution, nor prohibited by it to the States, are reserved to the States respectively, or to the people.”

New target of rights erosions: U.S. citizens

by Glenn Greenwald from Salon. The author provides evidence to show that the Obama administration and right-wing Congressmen are continuing where Bush and Cheney left off--to increase the suppression of dissent by US citizens mostly under the guise of anti-terrorism laws.

How many local governments got sucker punched on fancy financial deals, and how much is it going to cost taxpayers to pay Wall Street? Nobody knows.

from Watch Dog. The author finds that many people in and out of public agencies are concerned about the financial "snake oil" deals that have been sold, and continue to be sold by financial institutions to local governments, municipal authorities, and agencies of state government . According to Pennsylvania Auditor General Jack Wagner, 

We continue to find examples of hard-earned taxpayer dollars going to Wall Street. Money that should be invested in students, classrooms, and fixing infrastructure in Pennsylvania is instead lining pockets on Wall Street.

Time out

Rustbelt Rage

by Noam Chomsky from In These Times. 

An acute sense of betrayal comes readily to people who believed they had fulfilled their duty to society in a moral compact with business and government.

Chris Jordan on Midway Atoll and the Great Pacific Garbage Patch (13m audio and 6:24m video)

In the audio "photographer and activist Chris Jordan speaks with Eve Bowen about his recent photographs, taken at one of the world's most remote marine wildlife sanctuaries, of albatross chicks killed by plastic waste that their parents have mistaken for food."


Video showing his photographs  

The second debt storm: Who will bail out the countries that bailed out the world's corporations?

by Alistair Barr from Market Watch.

In early February, the cost of insuring against a sovereign default in Western Europe exceeded the price of similar protection against default by North American investment-grade companies. That was the first time this had happened....

It appears to me that we, the ordinary and working people of the planet, are approaching a scenario that reminds me of the old mining and timber companies in the US where everyone "owes their soul to the company store"--the latter being the world banking and financial elites. In this scenario, everyone works their entire lives to pay off the debts to the company store, but somehow always end up going deeper into debt.

US Warns Pakistan of “Severe Consequences”

by Peter Symonds from World Socialist Web Site. The author examines recent statements from US administration officials and US ruling class media and comes to the following, reasonable conclusions:

Whether directly through an increased US military presence or indirectly by compelling the Pakistani military to go on the offensive in North Waziristan and other areas, the Obama administration is drawing Pakistan into the broader American quagmire in the region. It is no accident that increased pressure on Islamabad comes as the US military is preparing to launch a major offensive to stamp its control over the southeastern Afghan city of Kandahar. The Times Square incident is simply a convenient pretext to demand parallel action on the Pakistani side of the border.

Under the banner of the “war on terrorism,” President Obama has escalated his so-called AfPak war, which, along with the occupation of Iraq, is aimed at securing American economic and strategic dominance in the key energy-rich regions of Central Asia and the Middle East.

Drastic social cutbacks unveiled throughout Europe

from World Socialist Web Site. The article looks at the social cutbacks being proposed in European countries as a preview of what is coming to the US under Obama's Commission on Fiscal Responsibility. See this and this.

On the other side of the Atlantic, the Obama administration’s chief budget official sounded a similar note, warning that Washington must take action to slash its deficit, which is expected to exceed $1.5 trillion this fiscal year, or “wind up facing the sorts of choices that Greece now faces.”

The Bailout of Big American Banks Has Cost Trillions More Than We've Been Told

from Washington's Blog. This outstanding blogger lists all the various ways that the recent government bank/financial reforms are benefiting the banksters, shareholders, etc. Well--surprise, surprise. The reforms were designed by people with close ties to the banking and financial institutions--were they not?

Antwerp’s Ring cycle

from Le Monde Diplomatique. The article looks at the effects of globalization on city habitat by focusing on Antwerp, Belgium.

Urban sprawl, roads choked at rush hour, motorways swamped by lorries, are everyday phenomena. Capitalism in its current form, built around the detached house and the car, around just-in-time distribution and the free movement of merchandise, has also globalised the city. The watchword of modernity, mobility (of things, capital, even people), has superseded all other considerations. Everything must move all the time. This generates gigantic infrastructure projects that turn the city upside down, transforming it into a thoroughfare. Have the architects of this frenzy forgotten that cities are also home to people who want a peaceful life?

Marketing Biotech

by Jim Goodman from Counterpunch. 

When the Biotechnology Industry Organization (BIO) met in Chicago last week they were, no doubt, elated to hear that the U.S. State Department would be aggressively confronting critics of agricultural biotechnology.

Wouldn't you think the State Department might have more pressing issues than carrying water for Monsanto and the rest of the biotechnology industry?

Time out

GM crop use makes minor pests major problem

from Nature News. 

Growing cotton that has been genetically modified to poison its main pest can lead to a boom in the numbers of other insects, a ten-year study in northern China has found.

Gov't Still Approving Drilling Without Environmental Review

from Mother Jones.

In the weeks following the Gulf of Mexico oil spill, regulators at the federal Minerals Management Service granted approval for 27 new drilling plans in the region—and exempted 26 projects from environmental review. While the Obama administration has put the brakes on new drilling, a number of exploration plans already in the works appear to have been green-lighted.

Study finds that effects of low-quality child care last into adolescence

from The Washington Post. The article reports on what appears to be a well designed, long range study of child care and behaviors that include academic achievement. It is clear that people are spinning the results of this study in different ways. Some are emphasizing the small correlation with the number of hours kids spent in daycare and later problem behaviors, while others emphasize the finding of a similar correlation with the size of the daycare groups the child was put in. (Kids in smaller daycare settings did better.) The former emphasis argues for stay-at-home mothers which is popular among conservatives regardless of whether it is a realistic option for many mothers. Nevertheless, the study will probably be used to rationalize cutbacks to any federal funding for daycare.

...they discovered that teenagers who had received higher-quality child care were less likely to report engaging in problem behaviors such as arguing, being mean to others and getting into fights. Those who spent more hours in child care of any kind were more likely to engage in impulsive and risky behaviors. And those who received moderately high- or high-quality care scored higher on tests gauging cognitive and academic achievement.

...The researchers stressed that the benefits of higher-quality care were modest -- a difference of just a few points on standardized tests measuring reading, math, memory and other cognitive abilities, and self-reports of behavioral problems. Other factors, such as the influence of parents and family members, were clearly more important. However, the findings held true even after the researchers took those and other factors into account.