The role of academics and public debates

Click here to access article by As'ad AbuKhalil from Al Akhbar. 

In this piece the author touches on the issue of the corruption of higher education in the service of ruling class power. Although one often regards one important function of higher education as the promotion of critical thinking, it appears to me that this function has been transformed into one of indoctrination in service to capitalist empire builders.

Academics today are dealing with a thought industry. The university is no more a place where the inventiveness, creativity, and originality of thought is encouraged or rewarded except in the narrow rules and the establishment paradigms that one has little influence over. Just as the sciences are tied to the government and corporate sectors, the social sciences are also tied to business interest because universities are now run like businesses, just as the media are run like businesses.

Surely there never was a time of unfettered free thought in our country. As long as class structured societies are allowed to exist, you will find that ruling classes always influence every sector of society.

I remember well student activists, like Mario Savio, who in 1964 viewed education at UC Berkeley as something like a factory churning out standardized products. 

We were told the following: If President Kerr actually tried to get something more liberal out of the regents in his telephone conversation, why didn't he make some public statement to that effect? And the answer we received, from a well-meaning liberal, was the following: He said, 'Would you ever imagine the manager of a firm making a statement publicly in opposition to his board of directors?' That's the answer! 

Well, I ask you to consider: If this is a firm, and if the board of regents are the board of directors; and if President Kerr in fact is the manager; then I'll tell you something. The faculty are a bunch of employees, and we're the raw material! But we're a bunch of raw materials that don't mean to be—have any process upon us. Don't mean to be made into any product. Don't mean… Don't mean to end up being bought by some clients of the University, be they the government, be they industry, be they organized labor, be they anyone! We're human beings! 

There's a time when the operation of the machine becomes so odious, makes you so sick at heart, that you can't take part! You can't even passively take part! And you've got to put your bodies upon the gears and upon the wheels…upon the levers, upon all the apparatus, and you've got to make it stop! And you've got to indicate to the people who run it, to the people who own it, that unless you're free, the machine will be prevented from working at all!

So, I ask myself, are things really worse than they were 50 years ago? I think they are. It appears to me that many colleges and universities are more dependent upon the donations of ruling class foundations than ever before. Also, there seems to be serious efforts to eliminate the tenure system that previously provided many professors with a degree of security and independence.

US missile shield: ‘Russian Bear sleeping with one eye open’

Click here to access article by William Engdahl from RT. 

Despite Russia’s recent efforts to broker a peaceful resolution of the Syrian chemical weapons crisis, as well as its good offices in helping resolve the Iranian nuclear conflict with Washington, the Obama administration is moving ahead with its highly provocative nuclear Ballistic Missile ‘Defense’ (BMD) deployments around Russia. What we are not being told by Western politicians is the fact that this action, far from peaceful, brings the world closer than ever to nuclear war by miscalculation.

Half of U.S. Farmland Being Eyed by Private Equity

Click here to access article by Carey L. Biron from Inter Press Service.

An estimated 400 million acres of farmland in the United States will likely change hands over the coming two decades as older farmers retire, even as new evidence indicates this land is being strongly pursued by private equity investors.

The implications for this accelerating trend should be of concern to everyone in the 99 Percent.

“When non-operators own farms, they tend to source out the oversight to management companies, leading in part to horrific conditions around labour and how we treat the land,” Anuradha Mittal, the executive director of the Oakland Institute, a U.S. watchdog group focusing on global large-scale land acquisitions, told IPS.

“They also reprioritise what commodities are grown on that land, based on what can yield the highest return. This is no longer necessarily about food at all, but rather is a way to reap financial profits. Unfortunately, that’s far removed from the central role that land ultimately plays in terms of climate change, growing hunger and the stability of the global economy.”

Reinvent transport for reduced emissions and more jobs

Click here to access article by Ian Angus from Climate & Capitalism.

...under capitalism, jobs created in one area often means jobs eliminated elsewhere. Much more employment in public transport can mean much less in auto manufacturing, for example. That’s why, Neale argues, the transition requires an integrated plan based on public ownership of the industries involved, with a “bedrock guarantee … that anyone who loses a high carbon job is guaranteed proper, lengthy retraining and a new job at the same wages or better.”

However, the PDF report referred to in this introduction is, in my opinion, too informed by European social democratic politics which emphasizes working within the existing capitalist version of "democracy" to accomplish environmental sustainability as well as social justice. 

Crucially, we can persuade many people that action over climate change does not mean sacrifice. It does not mean that ordinary people give up their standard of living. Instead, it means more jobs and better lives for most people. If unions can recast the debate about climate change in this way, we will make it possible to mobilise far more people than now.

Unions can also hope to influence more socially minded governments who can promote our ideas at government level and push for these proposals to be discussed at European sectoral social dialogue level.

Actually stopping climate chaos before the horrors arrive will not be easy. Energy reaches down into every part of the economy and society. Powerful corporations and governments are opposed to actions beyond the limits of Austerity Europe. Our task will not be easy. In the end, it will require political and industrial action. But the measures we propose are a start. In the process, we will recruit to unions and build our strength and confidence. That is good. But it is not why we campaign on climate change. We fight for our future, because we are humans, and live on Earth.

American Media Coverage of Sochi

Click here to access article by As'ad AbuKhalil from Al Akhbar. 

This posting is a little late in relation to US media coverage which occurred at the start of the Olympics. Still, in a rather brief and cursory way, it introduces the larger issue of how the US ruling class uses media to shape public opinion to further its interests of profit and power. Because shaping of public opinion is a primary weapon in the arsenal of the empire builders who are creating so much havoc throughout the world, we need to critically examine all the evidence and analysis of it whenever and wherever it raises its subversive head.

The new US-Russia Cold War

Click here to access article by Pepe Escobar from Asia Times Online. 

This is a very important editorial because it touches on some very important trends relating to the direction of the US Empire. In this piece the links he provides are very important and must be accessed to lend substance to his views. For example, the link to Asst. Sec. of State Nuland speaking to the US-Ukraine Foundation provides additional context to the leaked secret conversation with the US Ambassador to Ukraine. Notice at its beginning the posters contain the large Chevron logo on the right poster-board and on the left you can dimly make out "Exxon-Mobil", indicating that both global corporations are major sponsors of the forum.

Update: the latest news from Kiev, Ukraine does not look good.

Escobar's link to The Nation piece by Stephen Cohen covers well the almost monolithic anti-Russian coverage found in US media. 

I have noticed this same propaganda-loaded news trend in US media coverage over the past decade, and it seems to be getting steadily worse--or is this just my imagination? 

Just last night I viewed NBC's nightly news coverage which opened with the program's host, Brian Williams, intensely and breathlessly hammering away at the human rights crimes committed by the North Korean (DPRK) government going into considerable detail about horrifying incidents which reminded me of the run-up to the invasion of Iraq. The report was triggered by a UN Human Rights commission report on the DPRK. Looking into the commission members, I discovered they were made up of members from Empire friendly countries: Poland, Australia, Serbia, and Indonesia.

Bias Towards Power *Is* Corporate Media ‘Objectivity’: Journalism, Floods And Climate Silence

Click here to access article by David Cromwell from Media Lens.

No matter how extreme the weather, and how awful the hardships endured by ordinary people in the floods, the culpability of corporate-driven industrial 'civilisation', its inherent ecological unsustainability, and the urgent need for radical changes, must not be addressed in any meaningful way. 

Cromwell brings to our attention the extreme efforts of capitalist media to ignore the increasing incidence of extreme weather phenomena and their relationship to climate destabilization. Of course, capitalism, which requires growth and is driven by private accumulation of wealth, is the cause of climate destabilization; and, thus, its role must be ignored as much as possible. This ignoring of the relationship comes after decades of denying the relationship which is now so overwhelmingly supported by scientific evidence. Capitalism also is causing economic destabilization and this must also be denied and ignored. 

The answer to this type of journalism is obvious: the establishment of alternative media that exposes the relationship, and affirms the need for a transformation of the economy into one that is compatible with a healthy biosphere and meets the needs of all members of societies.

One Nation Under Guard

Click here to access article by Samuel Bowles and Arjun Jayadev from The Opinion Pages of the New York Times.

Another dubious first for America: We now employ as many private security guards as high school teachers — over one million of them, or nearly double their number in 1980.
 
And that’s just a small fraction of what we call “guard labor.” In addition to private security guards, that means police officers, members of the armed forces, prison and court officials, civilian employees of the military, and those producing weapons: a total of 5.2 million workers in 2011. That is a far larger number than we have of teachers at all levels.

What is happening in America today is both unprecedented in our history....

Much of the rest of the article is devoted to efforts to diminish the significance of this dramatic correlation between inequality and guard-police services.

 

I Have Seen Fear

Click here to access article by Andre Vltchek from Dissident Voice.

This very moving essay contains so much inspiration and wisdom, more so than I have seen for quite some time. Here is only one gem among many (because the quote is taken out of its natural context, to preserve the meaning I placed the first sentence after the other sentences in the paragraph.):

Because this present regime, this ‘New World Order’, which is actually not new at all, is doing all it can to reverse natural development, to lock us all back in the gloom and doom of some outdated religious-style dogmatism. We are forced; we are being conditioned to believe in capitalism, in a Western style of ‘multi-party democracy’, in the superiority of Western concepts. That is why truly free thought has lately been directly and brutally targeted in the West, and in the other oppressed parts of the world. 

The Folly of Arming Israel

Click here to access article by Chase Madar from TomDispatch. (If you wish to skip Turse's introduction to the article, it will be necessary to scroll down to the article.)

This is another illustration of a liberal take on the long-standing huge US aid to Israel amounting to nearly a quarter-trillion dollars.

The arming and bankrolling of a wealthy nation committing ethnic cleansing has something to offend conservatives, progressives, and just about every other political grouping in America. After all, how often in foreign policy does strategic self-interest align so neatly with human rights and common decency?

Intelligent people can and do disagree about a one-state versus a two-state solution for Israel and Palestine. People of goodwill disagree about the global BDS campaign. But it is hard to imagine what kind of progress can ever be made toward a just and lasting settlement between Israel and Palestine until Washington quits arming one side to the teeth.

As usual, here we another lengthy hand-wringing about the immorality of such aid, but the benign intentions of the US (while avoiding any reference to the ruling capitalist class) remain intact. One might conclude from this article that such considerations as "human rights and common decency" and "a just and lasting settlement between Israel and Palestine" might have something to do with shaping Empire policies and serving the interests of our ruling class. Could it be that our leaders are just stupid?

The arming and bankrolling of a wealthy nation committing ethnic cleansing has something to offend conservatives, progressives, and just about every other political grouping in America. After all, how often in foreign policy does strategic self-interest align so neatly with human rights and common decency?

Intelligent people can and do disagree about a one-state versus a two-state solution for Israel and Palestine. People of goodwill disagree about the global BDS campaign. But it is hard to imagine what kind of progress can ever be made toward a just and lasting settlement between Israel and Palestine until Washington quits arming one side to the teeth.

Bosnia on fire: a rebellion on Europe’s periphery

Click here to access article by Mate Kapović from Eagainst (Greece). (Mate Kapović is an assistant professor at the University of Zagreb in Croatia and a left political activist.)

After the attack by NATO forces of the Empire which resulted in the balkanization of the former Yugoslavia and the privatization of their economy, the current conflicts in this country, Bosnia and Herzegovina, take on added meaning and should be watched carefully by all political activists on the left. (See also this)

7 Lessons for Social Justice Activists from the Zapatistas

Click here to access article by Justin Wedes from Before It's News.

While reports are coming in that Zapatistas are once again being attacked by agents of the Mexican capitalist state, it is a good idea to learn what Zapatistas have to offer the rest of mankind living under the boot of capitalist rule. Wedes, an activist from New York, has listed seven lessons he learned on his visit to their independent territory in the state of Chiapas, Mexico. The lessons reveal an authentic version of democracy that contrasts starkly with the fake version imposed on us by capitalist ruling classes.

One corollary of the concept of consent of the governed is that good governance is not imposed by force but grown bottom-up by debate and convincing people. This idea has nearly been lost in many of our so-called “democratic” communities.

From Occupy to Climate Justice: Merging Economic Justice and Climate Activism

Click here to access article by Wen Stephenson from DeSmogBlog. 

As indicated in the article, this piece has been republished from the magazine The Nation which in at least the last decade has represented archetypical political liberal views on the problems facing ordinary people, the 99 Percent. The Nation along with other left-liberal media outlets have a record of being used indirectly by the CIA to promote ruling class propaganda. Using this method the CIA and other ruling class organizations funnel money to foundations who, in turn, use the money to fund these left/liberal media. Such money constrains the way such media directors treat subjects that are regarded as threatening to ruling capitalist class interests.

This piece, I will argue, could be, or is a particularly insidious, subversive piece; and as such serves the counterrevolutionary interests of the capitalist ruling class.

We are seeing, in addition to severe economic problems, climate crises in the form of extreme weather appearing everywhere in the world. Therefore, the propaganda organs of the ruling class are working overtime to contain opposition to a system which is causing both. I believe this piece provides an excellent example of propaganda used by their highly trained propaganda experts to contain this growing consciousness of climate destabilization and economic issues and their relationship to the capitalist system. To do this in media reporting, they first must attain credibility and then divert people in directions which do not threaten their beloved system. This article, I believe, does both.

To obtain credibility, a pro-capitalist author often references popular figures on the left, and generally seeks to demonstrate that the author understands activist formulation of problems and their protests. Here we see early on a reference to David Graeber who has been so frequently identified (mostly by himself) with the Occupy Movement. The author then references other local action groups and leaders who are working on community organizing projects that are mostly connected to the New Economy Coalition. Here he refers to one such leader of an organization that seems to offer a model of what activist organizations should emulate:

...she told her Power Shift listeners, that the kind of work going on in the “new economy” or “solidarity economy” movement—with things like cooperatives and worker-owned businesses, community-development financial institutions, community land trusts, local agriculture and community-owned renewable energy, as well as efforts to reconceive corporations and redefine economic growth—is challenging the dominant and unsustainable corporate capitalist system. And not simply rejecting that system, she emphasizes, but “creating new economic institutions that are democratic and participatory, decentralized to appropriate scale so that decisions are made at the most local level that makes sense and, rather than only prioritizing one thing—the maximization of profit—prioritizing people, place and planet.”

"Challenging the...capitalist system" by "efforts to reconceive corporations"--never transforming the system into a new one from the existing one in which a few people can literally "own" the economy--is as far as this article goes. The emphasis is on local community projects mentioned earlier in the quote. If such activist projects start there as a first step in raising people's consciousness, then they could serve revolutionary ends to transform capitalism into one that serves all of the people--but this is never stated. 

And, once again, we see the obligatory "non-violence" theme ("non-violent" actions are mentioned three times)  is included as one of three essential elements in their program. You see, the Empire's capitalist class places the means of violence central to their rule, and that is precisely why they command by far the largest military in the world, militarized police forces, and the largest prison system in the world. And, of course, they fear violence being used against them.

The first is resistance: saying “no” to a corrupt, oppressive, extractive system, whether through legislation and litigation, at one end of the spectrum, and nonviolent direct action or mass protests at the other. The second is “replacement”: creating the alternatives, which can itself be a form of resistance, as Rachel noted. And the third essential piece is resilience.

Because of a lack of information on these organizations, I do not wish to impugn their activities or the motives of their leaders, only the way their actions are reported in liberal media such as The Nation. (However, organizations that are extolled by liberal media should raise some questions about them.) This type of reporting about activist organizations serves to divert attention away from system change onto reformist measures and non-violent community organizing, activities which capitalist control agents can manage and contain.

How to Remove the Rich from Power and Abolish Class Inequality

Click here to access article by John Spritzler from New Democracy World. 

Spritzler makes a very interesting contribution to revolutionary thought. He proposes a method to overcome the main obstacle of organizing people:

What makes people feel so hopeless? They feel all alone; they believe that only a very small, and hence hopelessly weak, minority of people want an egalitarian revolution. They feel this way because the ruling class devotes more effort to making them feel this way than anything else. With its control of the mass media and the "alternative press" as well as virtually all of the major organizations that purport to represent ordinary people (such as political parties, unions and religious bodies), the ruling class makes people who have egalitarian revolutionary aspirations feel all alone. At the institutions where we work, at the places where we play or watch sports, or pray or socialize or go to be entertained, expressing egalitarian revolutionary aspirations is taboo. The mirrors we hold up, to see what our fellow Americans think, are the television and theater screens we watch and the pages of the newspapers and magazines we read, and these mirrors lie! They tell us that nobody expresses revolutionary egalitarian aspirations, and if you do other people will think you're weird or crazy.

No Escape

Click here to access article by xraymike79 from Collapse of Industrial Civilization.

No other blogger so dramatically illustrates the demise of civilization--if we continue with "business as usual"--as this fellow does with his graphics. 

New Study Shows Total North American Methane Leaks Far Worse than EPA Estimates

Click here to access article by Sharon Kelly from DeSmogBlog. 

Far more natural gas is leaking into the atmosphere nationwide than the Environmental Protection Agency currently estimates, researchers concluded after reviewing more than 200 different studies of natural gas leaks across North America.

But scientists cannot confirm where it is coming from. Why? Well, it seems that the EPA must obtain corporate driller's permission to come on their sites to make the necessary measurements!

And, there are other problems with EPA's monitoring of methane leaks.

You have to understand that government agencies function to protect the interests of corporations, not the public. This has been demonstrated time and again for numerous agencies whether the subject is climate destabilization, nuclear contamination, food safety, or banking regulations. Corporations control every component of our government from elections to the court justices to Congress to the Executive Branch to regulatory agencies. (See this, this, this. this, this, and this.)

Fracking's Terrifying Water Usage Trends Spell Disaster

Click here to access article by Jon Queally from Common Dreams. 

New study shows that fracking boom is happening in places that can least afford to lose precious water supplies

Saudi Arabia to supply Anti-Aircraft Missiles to Mercenaries in Syria

Click here to access article by Christof Lehmann from nsnbc.

Lehmann writes how the Wall Street Journal is providing propaganda cover for the step-up of Saudi supplying weapons to mercenaries in Syria to keep the destabilization efforts going as long as possible and to promote the best possible settlement for the Empire at the Geneva negotiations. No doubt that the US military-industrial complex is happy to supply these weapons via Saudi Arabia.

The Struggle of Memory Against Forgetting: “Good” War, “Bad” War

Click here to access article by John Pilger from CounterPunch.

Pilger gives some examples of historical accurate accounts of history and wars from other authors as an introduction to his review of The Korean War: A History by Bruce Cumings (2010). 

I read Cumings' earlier two volumes entitled The Origins of the Korean War which I found to be outstanding and a must-read (especially volume 1). I have not read this recent book. It appears to offer an excellent way to understand the Democratic People's Republic of Korea, one of the member nations assigned to the Axis of Evil by George Bush and continues to be considered as a pariah nation by the ruling class and their media. Referring to US bombing campaigns in the northern part of Korea, Cumings writes:

The unhindered machinery of incendiary bombing was visited on the North for three years, yielding a wasteland and a surviving mole people who had learned to love the shelter of caves, mountains, tunnels and redoubts, a subterranean world that became the basis for reconstructing a country and a memento for building a fierce hatred through the ranks of the population.

Bill Gates: Foreign Aid Works #StopTheMyth

Click here if you wish to access the original source of this 1:26m YouTube video. 

This is another contribution to my practice on Saturdays to post material about our fellow citizens of the One Percent (actually .01 of the 1%, or one out of every 10,000 of us) hoping that by doing this that we don't lose touch with their world and their concerns--you know, to promote understanding. It is important that we become better acquainted so that we can serve them better and make it easier for them to carry out the daily burden of making important decisions, decisions which affect whether we go off to war in foreign lands to kill their enemies, if we have jobs, if we live in a home or under a bridge, if we can afford their health care services, education, etc.

Unfortunately, for some reason they tend to hide their lives from the rest of us behind walls of secrecy, literal walls of guarded gated communities, private clubs, esoteric publications, by traveling with private jets, etc. We should not let that deter us.

In today's posting we learn what many of the nice rich people do with their money: they help the world's poor instead of spending all of it on yachts, castles, private jets, sports franchises, etc. In the following video our own favorite billionaire from the Seattle area proves that their tax exempt income that is donated to charitable foundations like his and Mrs. Gates has helped the world to become a better place in spite of what many of us think.


 

Strange Color Revolution: More ‘Gay Protests’ at Russia’s Sochi Olympics, but on what basis?

Click here to access article by Patrick Henningsen from 21st Century Wire.

Western media, LGBT activists and celebrities have also been egged-on by Obama’s White House and others – for the simple reason that their efforts dovetail with US foreign policy and European Union foreign policy to both undermine and contain Russia’s influence, particularly in relation to the Ukraine and Syria.

The author rightfully objects to the use of human rights issues to attack Russia while they are hosting the Olympics. However, his effort to explain why this is occurring includes so many explanations that the crucial one, the anti-Russian stance of the Empire, gets nearly lost in the forest of explanations. Nearly lost, but it's there in the document which he provided a link to from the Center for Strategic and International Studies, a ruling class "think" tank.

If you read it and are able to get beyond the simple-minded denials about their motivations for monitoring the 2004 election in Ukraine, you will recognize the fingerprints of a counter intelligence operation similar to the CONINTELPRO operations (although not as extreme) made famous by the FBI in the 1970s and '80s that targeted domestic groups that our ruling class masters did not like. The fact that Empire engages in subversion of governments and the engineering of protest movements (think color revolutions) around the world in pursuit of power and profit is a well established fact. (See this, this, this, this, and the resources on this website.) By attempting to explain all the motivations of the various actors in this drama, the author served to lose the essential factor at play--a propaganda campaign aimed against Russia.

You see, the end of the stunted versions of socialism (more like state capitalism) in the Soviet Union and China ended the competition of ruling class systems in favor of capitalism. However, it created another form of competition with Russian and Chinese capitalists: control of global resources, cheap labor, and markets. The demise of the non-authentic versions of socialism only resulted in putting their nations under the control of their national capitalists who refuse to defer to the diktats of the Empire. Think of street gangs who compete for dominance over petty crime operations in the neighborhoods of many US cities and you come close to understanding what occurs on the world stage. 

Of course, Empire propaganda directors are not attempting to overthrow the Russia government, but rather trying to inflict economic damage on its Olympics and to promote the discrediting of the Russian government in the eyes of Westerners. Such propaganda campaigns are a new version of the old campaigns in the Cold War--but arguably not as deadly. As a capitalist competitor, Russia is now a target for Empire propaganda to undermine its influence in the world to the advantage of the Empire's capitalist classes.

After Yugoslavia, Ukraine?

Click here to access article by Thierry Meyssan from VoltaireNet.

This post follows very nicely from the above post and much of my commentary from that post applies to this. In this article we see that Empire directors have no compunctions about using neo-Nazi groups to promote their aims.

Public opinion in Western Europe is wrong to regard the Ukrainian crisis as a showdown between Westerners and Russians. In reality, Washington’s goal is not to push the country into the arms of the European Union, but to deprive Russia of its historical partners. To do this, the United States is prepared to ignite a new civil war on the continent.

Corporate Media’s Dubious Syria Coverage

Click here to access article by James F. Tracy from Memory Hole.

If you are new to this blog or have not been following alternative sources of information regarding Middle East affairs, then you can benefit from reading this article which alerts you to one more example of Empire management of information in their pursuit of power and profits.

Western news media reportage on the rampant criminal activities of foreign-backed paramilitary groups operating within Syria still relies heavily on unreliable sources frequently referred to as “activists.” Such spokespersons routinely claim the Syrian military are committing atrocities against the Syrian population. 

Western media waging psychological war in Syria

Click here to access article by Catherine Shakdam from Another World Is Possible.

The author exposes so much of Empire's hypocritical propaganda while promoting terrorism to destabilize Syria.

While no one is denying that horrors have been committed in Syria, one can too easily fall into the trap set by Western narratives, by only looking through their distorted lenses and thus forget that Syria is fighting internationally sponsored terrorism.

Corporatocracy: How the Corporate Welfare State Divides & Conquers

Click here if you wish to access the original posting on Boiling Frogs Post. 

Of course, every ruling class has used divide and conquer strategies to prevent any organized opposition from removing them from power. The 14:05m video below briefly describes such strategies in the current US scene and offers some some simple suggestions on how to approach non-politically conscious people and engage them in an effort to raise their political consciousness and thereby promote a more cohesive opposition in the US.

Divergence at the top – the 0.01%

Click here to access article by David Ruccio from Real-World Economics Review Blog.

This chart portrays graphically the natural tendency of the capitalist system toward concentration of wealth by the few. While viewing it, one should keep in mind that especially under capitalism, wealth=power. It also shows that neoliberalist policies made possible by dramatic advances in technology, all of which has come under the "ownership" of the capitalist class, have added steroids to this natural tendency. 

The Smog of Fraud

Click here to access article by James Howard Kunster from his blog.

This is an excellent example of middle class type of criticism of the Obama administration that I referred to in my recent post. Yes, it does reveal to us some important aspects of the existing capitalist system, but it also avoids questioning the system itself and one of the basic flaws of the system--class war that is widening the gap between the capitalist rich and everyone else. Instead, he initially points his finger at the "Obama team" and then mentions bankers and accountants, but mostly seems to suggest that "everybody" is in on it. Somehow there is fraud everywhere and no one or no thing is to blame. Thus, there apparently is nothing to be done. (To be fair, I haven't read much of his other works. I'm just basing my comments on this article.)

Everybody knows this now and everybody is trying desperately to work around it, led by the Federal Reserve. Trust is gone and credit is going and debt is sitting between a rock and a hard place with its grubby hands pressed together, praying that it will be forgiven, forgotten, or overlooked a little while longer.

Kunstler is a peak oil advocate who sees that diminishing fossil fuels will require us to live in more fossil free societies by arguing that 'there is no other alternative energy source on the horizon that can replace relatively cheap oil. He therefore envisions a "low energy" world that will be radically different from today's.' (I agree, but strangely I find no evidence that he is concerned about the other threat coming from global warming which I think will affect us earlier.)

He doesn't see that development of capitalism has inevitably resulted in a few winners among vast numbers of losers. To keep the system going requires ever more lending from the first group to the second which, of course, cannot go on forever. But, he doesn't see this as an inevitable consequence of a flaw in the system. He does see that, as a consequence, capitalists must now engage in all kinds of fraudulent activities to accumulate more wealth. To this he just throws up his hands and implies that everyone is doing it--apparently it's just human nature to be wicked or that people aren't as smart as he is by choosing to live more simply. People following his advice might end up feeling morally and intellectually superior, but they would change nothing.

Greenwald and the limits of billionaire journalism

Click here to access article by Jerome Roos from Reflections on a Revolution.

In this posting Roos describes a new billionaire backed venture led by Greenwald which I think offers another illustration of middle-class liberal type of a political critique and activity that I discussed in a recent post. Liberals like Greenwald function on the edge of criticism that the ruling class tolerates. Such critiques serve the system and its ruling class by co-opting serious critics and diverting their attention away from the capitalist system itself and onto moral issues. Such people are often referred to as "gatekeepers".

Roos is far more sympathetic to Greenwald and his associates than I am. He merely sees them as misguided, whereas I see them likely serving consciously as gatekeepers for the ruling class. (See this, this, and this.)

Creditocracy: making the case for debt refusal

Click here to access article by Hollis Phelps from Reflections on a Revolution.

The views expressed in this article furnish another illustration of a middle-class liberal critique of one aspect of capitalism, however it is framed as a radical critique. Phelps discusses the recent book by Professor Andrew Ross entitled Creditocracy and the Case for Debt Refusal. 

Ross is...mindful of Marx’s dictum in his Theses on Feuerbach that the point of criticism and analysis is not simply to interpret the world but to change it. Ross thus considers his analysis as a necessary means to an end: to make a moral case to his readers for collective debt resistance.

As the title suggests, Ross identifies the system as "creditocracy"--not capitalism as you may have thought--and the problem is illegitimate debt from creditors. Thus, the solution is resistance to such debt. In his way of thinking, the rule of creditors of such debt is a threat to an existing democracy.

In his latest book, Creditocracy, scholar-activist Andrew Ross makes a compelling case for debt refusal as “a protective deed on behalf of democracy”.

By framing the system as creditocracy and the means of its resistance as debt resistance will do very little in overturning the system of capitalism. And, of course, real democracy does not and cannot exist in a class-structured society regardless of debt. It is surprising to find this sort of analysis on a website that purports to be revolutionary.

Last year, the oceans warmed at a rate of 12 Hiroshima bombs per second

Click here to access article by Lindsay Abrams from Salon.

When you hear climate skeptics talking about a “pause” in global warming, that’s where the heat is going — 378 million atomic bombs worth of it each year. And as Quartz points out, it’s not like the oceans are just storing all that heat for us and protecting us from the effects of climate change: warmer oceans mean more severe typhoons and hurricanes, rising sea levels and damage to marine life.

 

Audacity, not hoping for reforms, the route to a humane world

Click here to access article by Pete Dolack from Systemic Disorder.  

Dolack provides an introduction to, and a commentary on, a recently published book by Samir Amin entitled The Implosion of Contemporary Capitalism. 

Based on this I have just purchased the book because it explicates theses with which I very much agree: it is imperative for our survival that capitalism must be overturned, that capitalist enterprises must be brought under democratic ownership and control, and that this must be done at a global level uniting all workers in this common project for their common survival. Time is fast disappearing when this sort of transformation is even possible. I already think it is improbable, that is, that this type of transformation is not likely to happen. What is more probable is the devolution of capitalism into a hideous dystopia and ultimately humans will disappear from the Earth. But, one thing is certain: if we do nothing then the latter development is certain.

There is no guarantee as to what will succeed capitalism. We can sit back and let history unfold, continuing to cede the initiative to elites who have imposed austerity on the world and can only offer ever more harsh and repressive policies while consuming the Earth’s resources until nothing is left. Or we can collectively work together to create a humane, democratic future by overturning capitalism. If we don’t accomplish the latter, we will surely find ourselves in the hell of the former.

But, before humanity can muster sufficient audacity to make transformation happen, people will need to be informed. Thus, it is on the battlefield of ideas that this struggle will need to be waged first until we have sufficient people resources to bring about the final transformation. Systemic Disorder is another website devoted to this battle.

TPP + TTIP = A One-Way Ticket To Corporate Paradise

Click here to access article by Don Quijones from Raging Bull-Shit.

I think that it is critically important to separate two forms of criticism of the capitalist system. This is because so much of the content on the internet and elsewhere are from sources who often make very cogent arguments about the flaws of the system, but they fundamentally are believers in the system. They only want a kinder, gentler form of capitalism. They believe that it is possible to reform the system so that this comes about. Such people are often referred to as liberals. 

In contrast to these people there are others, who are far fewer in number and get even less attention proportionately on the internet. They see the system as inherently flawed and believe that the only solution is to abolish the system and construct another. Such people are referred to by a number of names--many of which are derogatory. I will call them radicals.

This blogger is a liberal who has posted a lot of content that has exposed dramatically the flaws of the system. Because of this, I often post his articles on my website. But now in this commentary I want to offer an argument that explains the reasons that this blogger and all liberals cling to this reformist position. Once again, I find that the best argument uses a class analysis.

The best example that I have seen of the liberal critique has been explicated in a video (also a book) promoted by Renegade Economist with script written by economist Michael Harrington called Four Horsemen. The video is informed by 27 principles which is published on their website and the title suggests its emphasis: the four horseman are war, conquest, famine, and death. The video argues that if the system isn't reformed that our world will descend into this type of dystopia. The video and the website occasionally makes passing reference to sustainability, but I never found that their meaning had anything to do with our biosphere. However, the video's content provides excellent reasons for concern about the social effects of the present course of the system which is summarized by the metaphor of the four horsemen.

There are several prominent economists who endorse this video and they are listed at the end of the video: Joseph Stiglitz, Herman Daly, Ha-Joon Chang, Michael Hudson, and other non-economists who are well-known and some lesser known critics of capitalism. All of them are archetypes of middle-class people. They, and the entire middle class, have been instrumental in making the capitalist system function. 

All have been through a long education in which an important component was indoctrination in the virtues of capitalism. They, except for Noam Chomsky, still cling firmly to the virtues of the system which their education taught them, probably much more so than their capitalist masters who are composed of cynical sociopaths or of the willfully ignorant. And, of course, the privileged status and higher income of the middle class has reinforced their faith in the system. But now, with the introduction of sophisticated computer and other technologies in the past decade, they have seen their numbers rapidly diminishing as well as their influence as a class. And, they correctly see the devastating social consequences if their capitalist masters continue down the neoliberal road. However, they don't see the damage to the ecosystem that the system by necessity inflicts--that would be an inconvenient truth.

This posting and the 12:51m video featuring Max Keiser interviewing a member of Stop TPP is another excellent illustration of this liberal position. Keiser elsewhere has clearly established that he is a capitalist (see his statement at 1:27:20 in the Four Horsemen video). RT on which Keiser has his program is sponsored by the Russian government which is capitalist. The blogger, in his brief introduction to the interview, makes a typical liberal implication (framed in sarcasm) that the capitalism we had previously was just fine--and, of course, it was for this class, but it never was for working people. For them, it has always been a disaster.

...we can bid farewell to nation-state democracy (it was nice while it lasted), and give a nice, warm welcome to the new age of global corporatocracy!  [my emphasis]

"Nation-state democracy" is a liberal way of describing capitalism before this neoliberal version took over. As we see, in a liberal's eyes this previous society was a democracy--this, of course, reflects the ideology they learned in their long years of schooling.

The trillion dollar road to Armageddon

Click here to access article by Ira Helfand and Robert Dodge from Common Dreams.'

The authors expose the obvious hypocrisy of the nuclear armed countries. On the other hand, I'm not so sure that the dismantling of nuclear weapons by these countries would assure peace. Was there peace before nuclear weapons? There is really something very true about Mutually Assured Destruction (MAD). The real and only solution, of course, is the elimination of the predatory system of capitalism which make wars inevitable.

Stephanie McMillan’s ‘Capitalism Must Die’

Click here to access article posted by xraymike79 from Collapse of Industrial Civilization.

The author puts together a lot of the work by McMillan to elucidate her work and views about capitalism. I haven't had time to explore everything in this piece; but having listened to one third of the first video interview with Derrick Jensen, she clearly understands the system and clearly explains in common sense terms how it works. 

“Collective nervous breakdown” rocks Bosnia

Click here to access article by Balkanist from Reflections on a Revolution.

Read about another casualty of the Empire's neoliberal agenda for the world.

“He who sows hunger reaps anger,” warned the red graffiti on a Sarajevo government building this week. The message hinted at the depth of poverty and disillusionment in Bosnia and Herzegovina (BiH) that has driven people to join demonstrations across the divided country, where the unemployment rate is about 40 percent.

Also, this piece from the same website describes the same situation by another author.

For history on Empire's planned and executed dissolution of the former Yugoslavia, I recommend this article.

Sochi: bringing Olympic spirit back to the Games

Click here to access article from Oriental Review.

I have never seen such obvious and outrageous anti-Russian bias of a sports event in my life as I've witnessed from viewing corporate TV media coverage of the Olympics in Sochi--not only NBC's--in the past few weeks. Because this bias is seen everywhere in corporate media, I've, once again, wondered how this actually happens. Does some centralized Directorate of Information issue statements to all media outlets to cover certain new items in a particular way? Or do prominent ruling class media such as the New York Times or the Washington Post set the framing of the coverage and all other major news outlets are expected to follow? Or might it be that all media executives have already been well indoctrinated by their various ruling class organizations of which they are members? Or some combination of the above?

It seems that all news items in the run-up to the Olympics have been wrapped in comments about gay oppression in Russia, the terrorist threat at the games, incomplete construction of Olympic facilities, and many other such negative items. I've been waiting for liberal commentators in this country to criticize such practice, but this morning I found little except for a handful: Bernhard's excellent piece entitled "NYT Selectively Quotes To Denigrate Russian Olympics", Lendman's piece, and a more oblique critique from The Greanville Post. 

Updated at 1 PM: So, what has this to do with capitalism? I think that capitalism is a highly competitive and predatory system in which capitalists, the owners of economic property, combine to compete for resources and cheap labor in the pursuit of profits and power. Russia and China, although now ruled by their own capitalist classes, refuse to take orders from the US led Empire, much like Germany's capitalitsts refused to submit to the leadership of the English Empire which resulted in WWI and then competed with the Anglo-American Empire which resulted in WWII. Thus, Russian and Chinese capitalists are now our ruling class's enemies, and our ruling class makes sure that we, the people in the US, feel that they are our enemies also. Then there are the smaller countries that have defied the US and have suffered in recent times the "outrageous slings and arrows" of US propaganda, subversive actions, and worse: Cuba, Venezuela, Iran, North Korea, Libya, and Syria.

Nuland’s F** the EU scandal proves illegal Ukraine Regime Change Plans

Click here to access article by Christof Lehmann from nsnbc international.

Lehmann gives his take on the leaked candid conversation between the Assistant Secretary of State and the Ambassador to Ukraine in which they discuss plans to interfere in the internal affairs of Ukraine.

The publication US State Department spokesperson Victoria Nuland’s “F** the EU exclamation to US Ambassador to the Ukraine, Geoffrey Pratt, has caused several diplomatic scandals – none of them for the most important reason. 

How NAFTA Unleashed the Violence in Mexico

Click here to access article by Victor M. Quintana from Americas Program. 

The Mexican countryside is not the same twenty years after the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA). Rural Mexico is on fire, and not just because of the “bad guys”–the drug cartels and groups of hit men and thugs.

Progressive Kristallnacht Coming?

Click here to access article by Tom Perkins from The Wall Street Journal.

This is another contribution to my practice on Saturdays to run articles about our fellow citizens of the One Percent (actually .01 of the 1%, or one out of every 10,000 of us) hoping that by doing this that we don't lose touch with their world and their concerns--you know, to promote understanding. It is important that we become better acquainted so that we can serve them better and make it easier for them to carry out the daily burden of making important decisions, decisions which affect whether we go off to war in foreign lands to kill their enemies, if we have jobs, if we live in a home or under a bridge, if we can afford their health care services, education, etc.

Unfortunately, for some reason they tend to hide their lives from the rest of us behind walls of secrecy, literal walls of guarded gated communities, private clubs, esoteric publications, by traveling with private jets, etc. We should not let that deter us.

In this letter to The Wall Street Journal by billionaire Tom Perkins we learn that the rich are feeling persecuted. Some people would instantly dismiss such criticisms, but they are real to the rich. Think how you would feel if you were occasionally berated in the media for your extravagant homes, vacations, your lifestyle, the low tax rates you enjoy, even presents you give to your children. 

I'm sure they work hard to get all the wealth they have and they feel they should not be despised for being successful. They are firm believers in capitalism and the "trickle-down" theory of economics. I'm sure that they feel that they have played by the rules (even though they made them) and are successful. So, put your envy away and realize that the fabulously rich need love, too!

Climate Changes, Washington Freezes

Click here to access article by Dave Lindorff from WhoWhatWhy.

There are indications that our ruling class is accepting the reality of climate change, but they seem to be focusing on the wrong implications if the discussions at a recent conference are representative.

Organizer and panel moderator Heather Conley...acknowledged in an interview...the absence of any discussion at the event about what was causing the polar region to heat up so dramatically, or what might be done to slow the pace of melting, which is likely to render the Arctic Ocean ice-free in summer months as soon as 2016.

So what did they talk about?

The Embattled Climate Scientist Who Fought Back

Click here if you wish to access the transcript of this interview with scientist Michael Mann from Real News Network.

 On the one hand, you have the fossil fuel industry, or at least some fossil fuel interests who are going to fight tooth-and-nail against any regulations of carbon emissions. But you have the rest of the business community that increasingly sees that we need to do something about this problem.

 

What about apologizing to Ukraine, Mrs. Nuland? [A must-read/view]

Click here to access article from Oriental Review. (Note: if you are not informed about recent US involvement in Ukraine, to fully understand this article I recommend you read this, this, and this.)

This is a major exposé featuring an intercepted phone call between Assistant Secretary of State and the US Ambassador to Ukraine. I have no idea how this was intercepted or by whom, but I am convinced it is real. Here you get a rare, actual conversation of US officials who are conspiring to meddle in the affairs of another country.

Yesterday’s leak of the flagrant telephone talk between the US Assistant Secretary of State Victoria Nuland and the US Ambassador to Ukraine Geoffrey R. Pyatt has already hit the international media headlines. In short, it turned out that the US officials were coordinating their actions on how to install a puppet government in Ukraine.

Update 1 at 5:30 PM: I just watched ABC news coverage of this event. They covered it only by mentioning the "f--- the EU" phrase which was attributed only to a "well-known diplomat". However, they went on to frame this as Obama selling ambassadorships, many of whom were completely unqualified. They ended the coverage by admitting all presidents do this, but Obama did it more. Of course, the coverage totally misconstrued who said the forbidden "fuck" world--it was the Assistant Secretary of State not the Ambassador--and far worse, the total context was missing! This is news coverage American corporate style! See for yourself at this link.  

Update 2 at 6:40 PM: However, the newscast did mention that they covered this incident last night. Here is that coverage last night from 8:33-9:05 where she was clearly identified.  Here also the context was distorted: the conversation was merely referred to as a phone call in which "she was asked about including our allies in Europe in the conversation...." Then her recorded voice came on to say, "That would be great, I think, to have them help glue this thing, and to have the UN help glue this thing and, you know, ---k Europe." ABC followed this report by an ABC talking head who reported that she immediately apologized implying that the apology was for using the naughty word in relation to Europe, and went on to explain that it was a private conversation which likely was intercepted by the Russians and circled throughout Twitter. The talking head left it as just another spy story. Wink, wink, chuckle, chuckle.

Two key articles suggesting a radical turn of events in the Middle East

by Ron Horn.

I was astonished to read the two articles from Al Akhbar that I am citing here which seem to suggest major shifts in Middle East policies by the directors of the Empire and a key regional satrap, the Saudi Arabian monarchy. The more I have delved into the information addressed in the two articles, the more impressed I am that their analyses are accurate. 

I will leave to you and others to make interpretations about the long term implications of these recent developments. I will make only this brief comment: these developments suggest to me that the directors of the Empire want to bring stability to this chaotic region in order to focus more on the Far East and curbing China's power (Obama's "pivot to Asia").

The key news event which started all the speculation was a decree issued by the Saudi king, which occurred to the best of my knowledge, on February 3rd. Then the following two experts on Middle East matters have now provided their initial analyses of this event in Al Akbar. As you can see the first article, by ending with quotes from the second author, flows nicely into the second.

• "Saudi-US Relations: Between Tension and Profit" by Yazan al-Saadi.

• "By Royal Orders: Saudis Abandon Their Fighters" by Fouad al-Ibrahim

Insights into the Power of Corporations

Click here to access a transcript of a speech by Brid Brennan at the Public Eye Awards Press Conference, Davos, Switzerland January 23, 2014 (shortly before the meetings of the World Economic Forum) posted on Transnational Institute.

On 23 January, the Berne Declaration (BD) and Greenpeace Switzerland gave away the 2014 Public Eye Awards. The press conference, at which the winners were announced, turned into a lively debate about the downside of economic growth, the sheer unlimited power of multinational corporations and their lack of responsibility for people and the environment.

At the press conference, held at the Protestant Church Community Center in Davos, .... Brid Brennan from the Transnational Institute of Policy Studies...presented the institute’s new report “State of Corporate Power” which demonstrates just how powerful transnational corporations have become, and how much they continue to benefit from the ongoing economic and financial crisis.

(Incidentally, there were two Hall of Shame awards: the first was by popular vote awarded to Gazprom, the second was awarded by a panel of experts which gave it to Gap corporation.)

Isn't it strange that you didn't see this event reported in your local media? (sarcasm) Either the news wire services did not distribute a report of it, or media corporations refused to provide coverage.

Film of the Week: Memory of a Plunder

Click here to access an introduction to this film by Don Quijones posted on Raging Bull-Shit. (Note: I usually do not post material that I haven't read or watched, but this film looks very interesting.)

For a clearer understanding of the events leading up to the Argentinian collapse and the devastating impact they continue to have on the country’s economy and society, I recommend watching the following documentary. Filmed by Fernando Solanas, an Argentinian film maker who took six bullets in the leg for opposing the Menem government’s privatisation of Argentina’s public oil company, YPF, Memory of a Plunder is is one of the best audiovisual accounts of economic collapse ever made. 

2/9/14 Update:  I watched this film last night and experienced a horror show of neoliberalism and extreme individualism in Argentina which occurred from about 1985 on. It appeared that nearly every person (international and local banksters, politicians, bureaucrats, court justices, labor leaders, etc) who was in a position where they could steal the legacy of state owned properties did so regardless of the devastating consequences to their society. 

Now I know what former British Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher meant when she essentially said, "There is no such thing as society, only individuals and their families." If you want to see a live laboratory where the ideology of neoliberalism was fully applied, then this film provides an excellent documented record of its effects in one country.

Corporation polluters make ‘sustainable’ a dirty word

Click here to access article by Simon Butler from Climate & Capitalism. 

If you want evidence that the corporate rich are turning “sustainable” into a dirty word then consider the recent award won by Australian bank Westpac. At last month’s World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland, the bank was named the most sustainable company in the world.

However, if that isn't enough to prove his point, then there is this:

A list of the world’s 100 ‘most sustainable companies’ is packed with firms that profit from trashing the planet and are driving us toward climate disaster.

The ongoing clash between their beloved system of capitalism and a sustainable climate is posing severe problems for the global ruling classes. There is no end to the lies they tell themselves and us that they are working for a sustainable planet while trashing it.

The Cinema of Containerism

Click here to access article by Kim Nicolini from The Greanville Post. 

Nicolini in this article reviews two films in which containerization plays a key role. It is the first film, Captain Phillips, that interests me the most because it offers an illustration of the propaganda functions of the entertainment industry. 

The Hollywood film studio (Columbia Pictures) in this reportedly true story makes some mention of some realities related to containerization facing working people like high levels of unemployment, however such serious issues are very much in the background. Instead, it plays up the hero theme of the central character of Captain Phillips.

...the whole point of containerization is to move products of global capitalism in invisible form. Oceans are the delivery system for commodities made in countries too poor to fight for unions or a deserving living wage. Dolls, TVs, cell phones and sneakers are packed into anonymous orange and blue containers, loaded onto ships and then sent to the United States where consumers miraculously find these goods lining the shelves of Best Buy and Walmart.

Any film that is widely distributed in the United States must have large amounts of money behind it. First, it must have a large Hollywood corporation who have access to production facilities and talent, it must have corporate distributors to see to it that the film is played in corporate owned cinemas throughout the country. It requires corporate owned news media to give it good reviews so that it attracts large audiences. Many other rich sources of money must back the film's production such as insurance companies and investors.

As you can see, every element in this industry requires large concentrations of money which are controlled by private interests. The system of capitalism makes such concentrations possible, indeed, probable; and people with money love the system not only for the material rewards that money brings, but also the influence or power that accompanies the control and concentration of money. 

Hence, it follows naturally as night follows day that capitalist production of films would not want to look seriously at the huge problems of unemployment and de-industrialization in the US, the exploitation of cheap labor in foreign lands, and definitely not the system that promotes such activities and effects. What capitalists much prefer to do is to divert our attention to heroes which is a favorite theme throughout the entertainment industry.  Heroes overcome the obstacles in their lives and we are invited to do likewise, or to look to others for our salvation.

2013 was the second-hottest year without an El Niño since before 1850

Click here to access article by John Abraham and Dana Nuccitelli from The Guardian. 

Over the past decade, we've seen less warming at the surface and more warming in the oceans. This has been in large part due to a change in Pacific Ocean cycles. We're currently in a cycle that tends to produce more La Niña than El Niño events, which has resulted in the oceans accumulating more heat, leaving less energy than normal to warm the atmosphere. This in turn has led to the widespread myth that the slowed rate of increase of global surface temperatures means we no longer have to worry about global warming, or that its consequences won't be as bad as expected.

The article has several links to supporting evidence, for example, see this (Global warming continues and won't be stopped by wishful thinking) which also contain interesting links.

See also this and this.

However, such scientific evidence will not stop our global capitalist classes from using more carbon spewing fossil fuels. Now that Obama has gotten the expected approval of the Keystone pipeline from the ruling class's State Department, he will be expected to clear the way for construction. According to the news release in the Washington Post, the State Department's approval contained this key statement:

Approval or denial of any one crude oil transport project, including the proposed Project, remains unlikely to significantly impact the rate of extraction in the oil sands, or the continued demand for heavy crude oil at refineries in the United States.

As a Forbes columnist confirmed, the approval was based mostly on a narrow context: there was an assumption that the oil sands would be mined anyway--without a pipeline the oil will continue to be shipped by rail car. Thus, the environmental impact would likely be less with a pipeline than without. You can't really argue with that type of capitalist logic! Besides, it would create lots of jobs! (sarcasm)

US Senate votes to slash $8.7 billion in food assistance

Click here to access article by Andre Damon from Rebellious Independent News and Film (RINF).

With the support of the Obama administration, tens of billions of dollars are handed to the banks every month through the money-printing operations of the Federal Reserve. The annual cuts in food stamps, which will have such devastating consequences for the most vulnerable sections of the population, amount to only 0.04 percent of the total wealth of the richest 400 individuals in the country. 

The Workers' Scorecard on NAFTA

Click here to access article by David Bacon from TruthOut.

In 1986, a provision of the Immigration Reform and Control Act created a commission to investigate the causes of Mexican migration to the United States. .... The commission argued that opening the border to the flow of goods and capital (but not people) would, in the long run, produce jobs and rising income in Mexico, even if, in the short run, it led to some job loss and displacement.

....

During the debate, executives of companies belonging to USA-NAFTA, the agreement's corporate lobbyist, walked the halls of Congress wearing red, white and blue neckties. They made extravagant claims that US exports to Mexico would account for 100,000 jobs in the agreement's first year alone.

...a parallel labor side agreement would establish a mechanism for protecting workers' rights.

Twenty years later, workers have a scorecard. [NAFTA went into force on January 1, 1994.] 

Free public transit in Tallinn is a hit with riders but yields unexpected results

Click here to access article by Sulev Vedler from Citiscope. 

TALLINN, Estonia — Last January, Tallinn, the capital city of Estonia, did something that no other city its size had done before: It made all public transit in the city free for residents.

Political Corruption and Capitalism

Click here to access article by Richard D Wolff from TruthOut.

Corruption is endemic to the capitalist system and has not been successfully regulated away. Perhaps a system change is warranted?

Of course capitalist corruption is endemic in a government that pretends to be "democratic", that is, run by and for the people. Capitalism, by permitting one segment of the population to "own" the economy, gives capitalists enormous power over the rest of society--so much so that they constitute a ruling class. A ruling class is one, by definition, rules society. Thus, they must rule by corrupting government operations that pretend to serve the public. What is arguably even worse, is that they have thoroughly corrupted all the ideological centers of our society--education, media including the internet, and even entertainment. This ruling class essentially "own" the thoughts and opinions of the vast majority.

Wolff ends this essay with some interesting ideas about how a legitimate government serving all of the people could be organized.

"Safe Passage..., with a Big If: A Review of Paul Craig Roberts' The Failure of Laissez Faire Capitalism"

Click here to access a review by Gary Coseri of a new book by Roberts posted on Uncommon Thought Journal.

I hesitated posting this article because Roberts already gets too much exposure on the web. His rants can be accessed everywhere: rants about the abuses of capitalism and abuses of power. But his criticisms of capitalism are always carefully limited and that is precisely why he is everywhere on the web: he functions as an ideological gatekeeper to confine criticisms to superficial issues in relation to capitalism while carefully avoiding core issues about the system and completely preventing discussion of alternative systems. Hence, Corseri is dead wrong when he states:

You can't tie Roberts to one ideology. What's clear is his commitment to understanding the mess we've made of our world, and re-visioning, rebuilding it.

Robert's view are strictly of a liberal sort in that in his numerous rants he always comes back to the need for capitalism to be regulated. He wants to "re-vision" and "rebuild" capitalism. He never questions the basic concept of private ownership of an economy. Hence, the title of his book which makes clear his ideological position. This leads people down a political dead end simply because today's capitalists are much too powerful to accept any substantial regulation of their activities. And leading people down a dead end is very useful for the ruling class whether it is done consciously or not.

Turkey’s Real Corruption Scandal

Click here to access article by William Engdahl from Boiling Frogs Post.

The directors of the Empire occasionally have problems keeping their vassals in line and following orders. This has become apparent with some independent actions by members of Saudi Arabia's medieval gang called the Gulf Cooperation Council. The latter's actions in Egypt and Syria have not always been approved of by the Empire's directorate. However, Turkey's dictator Erdogan has been especially rebellious which Engdahl outlines in this essay, and the latter sees possible major geopolitical effects if he succeeds in his various foreign policy adventures.

Erdogan, a scrappy political infighter for all his eccentricities, has fought back and accused “foreign powers” of standing behind his now-arch enemy, former Imam Fethullah Gülen, considered by the US Embassy in Ankara to be the most powerful man in Turkey. What is unfolding across Turkey is far more interesting than your ordinary politician graft scandal.

One also finds many articles currently run in Turkish media regarding Gülen. See this and other articles regarding Gülen from the same website, and this.

American propaganda stokes the fire of Ukrainian disintegration

Click here to access article by Patrice Greanville from The Greanville Post.

The author describes the US ruling class's propaganda efforts, directed mostly against its own citizens, to promote the separation of Ukraine from Russia's orbit and to bring it under the control of their Empire.

This is just the latest chapter of empire building that the US capitalist class and their international cronies have been engaging in since WWII, after which the US, under the control of the capitalist class, was left as the most powerful nation on earth. There is no end to the appetite of these empire builders. Thus, we will see no end to the mini-wars (for a long list, see this), the carefully managed uprisings, the hiring of terrorist armies, the corruption of government leaders, all in the service of expanding the Empire (the Fourth Reich?). 

We will see no end of these events until we stop being deceived by the Empire's nefarious schemes and take away capitalist control of our society--because it should be, it must be, our society. We must declare our independence from them. We must stop working to fund their wars. We must stop believing their lies. We must stop joining their armies and going off to kill their enemies in foreign lands. We must stop their exploitation of, and their attack on, our biosphere--because if we fail to do so, all of humanity will perish. The only way we can accomplish all this is by taking away their system of exploitation--capitalism--that provides them with the wealth and power to ravage our lives and the planet.

From Egypt, Ukraine, the Turkish-Syrian Border, Cuba and Thailand: West Manufactures “Opposition Movements”

Click here to access article by Andre Vltchek from Transcend Media Service. 

Government buildings are being trashed, ransacked. It is happening in Kiev and Bangkok, and in both cities, the governments appear to be toothless, too scared to intervene.

What is going on? Are popularly elected administrations all over the world becoming irrelevant as the Western regime creates and then supports thuggish ‘opposition movements’ designed to destabilize any state that stands in the way of its desire to fully control the planet?

His answers to these questions which he attempts to do in the balance of the article seems to attribute this to evil-doers in the West. I regard this "evil-doer" concept of what's wrong with the world is an "infantile disorder" that we must get over. It prevents us from identifying the primary causes of our problems which are systemic, and identifying effective solutions. If the US and its capitalist allies in the rest of the NATO countries (the "West") suddenly disappeared, we would see basically the same dynamics happening which would then be under the control of Russian and Chinese capitalists.

No Matter How You Count Them, Fossil Fuel Subsidies Are As High As Ever

Click here to access article by Ben Jervey from DeSmogBlog.

After figuring in all the costs of fossil fuels, it becomes clear that carbon tax arrangements are largely designed to keep the public fooled into thinking that the ruling class, which lives off of the bonanza furnished by the fossil fuel industry, are doing something substantial to reduce the threat of climate change. 

How to Overthrow the Illuminati

Click here to access article by revolutionaries in Seattle and New York posted on the Black Orchid Collective website.

I have only had time to read about three quarters of this rather lengthy article, but I am very impressed with it. It examines the history of the Illuminati theory and related conspiracy theories and finds that they tend to reinforce acceptance of the status quo by diverting attention away from the real forms of oppression by offering simple explanations involving evil-doers of one sort or another. After refuting such theories, the authors examine the real forms of oppression caused by the system of capitalism which features the separation of workers from the fruits of their labor for the benefit of a capitalist class.

As long as these class relations of exploitation keep running, day after day, the bourgeoisie will keep gaining more wealth and power by using the alienated labor of the proletariat, and keep strengthening the system that keeps this relationship in place. To end this situation, we will have to do more than attack individual members of the bourgeoisie. We will have to attack the system of capitalist social relations as a whole. 

Blood on the Maidan

Click here to access article by Mark Hackard from The Soul of the East.

The US educated author is a highly trained specialist on Russian affairs and a political analyst who brings his expertise to offer an interpretation of the current unrest in Ukraine.

The story behind the scenes concerns a drive by the United States to short-circuit Russia’s resurgence where it truly matters: in Ukraine.

And we all thought that the Cold War was over. You see, it wasn't only the fact that the Soviet Union had a system that did not permit capitalist penetration, it was also independent of the Empire. The latter does not tolerate any country whose policies and actions are not informed by pro-Empire interests, that is, major capitalist interests located in NATO countries. Both Russia and China (specifically, the ruling capitalist classes of these countries) refuse to take orders from Washington and thus they are targeted by the Empire. And, of course, Iran is even more vigorously targeted because of their history of resistance to Western rule, their potential ability to acquire nuclear weapons, and they are a much smaller nation.

We saw the same dynamics played out in the 20th century when the Anglo-American capitalists and Axis capitalists fought for control of the world, and the effects were devastating mostly for working people who fought these wars. In this age of nuclear weapons major powers resist going directly to war because such wars are no longer seen as profitable opportunities. However, wars by other means are pursued, and that is what we have been seeing all across Eurasia, the Middle East, and Africa. The author explains how this kind of warfare is currently being played out in Ukraine.

See also "Ukraine: "West" Playing With Fire - Intentions?" from Moon of Alabama.

We often see independent actions taken by organized groups and leaders of other countries, and these too must be contained and controlled. Examples of these were movements involved in the Arab Spring uprising; and to a more limited extent with the Islamic fundamentalist terrorist groups that the Empire uses occasionally, the actions of Saudi Arabia and associated Arab countries and Turkey whose independent activities are currently causing minor problems for the Empire.