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Federal Monitor Challenges UAW’s Support for Ceasefire in Gaza By Malik Miah

There had been concerns about the Federal Monitor of the UAW [United Auto Workers] investigating President Shawn Fain that recently became public. Fain was the first UAW president elected by a direct membership vote in 2023, which also elected a new reform leadership. At first, I and many other socialist supporters of the labor movement thought it was about disputes in the reform leadership and conflicts between these leaders, that had been reported in the media. Behind Monitor’s positionBut it turns out the Court-appointed Monitor, Neil Barofsky’s recent investigation is completely political and had nothing do with union internal democracy and Fain’s alleged financial corruption. In a July 11 article by Ryan Grim, co-founder of a new media outlet, Drop Site News, he revealed: “The federally appointed monitor tasked with overseeing the United Auto Workers, Neil Barofsky, is ratcheting up his conflict with UAW President Shawn Fain, announcing another investigation into the union leader who rose to national prominence amid the successful ‘Stand Up Strike’ against the Big Three automakers. “Yet newly unveiled documents suggest Barosky’s pursuit of Fain has less to do with concerns over union self-dealing and more to do with the politics of Israel-Palestine. “Barofsky was appointed in 2021 as the result of the Department of Justice-led consent decree put in place in lieu of prosecution of the union itself for rampant corruption, following prison sentences for two consecutive UAW presidents.” The Consent Decree between the Department of Justice and the UAW forced the union to allow the rank and file to directly elect the president for the first time. Behind monitor’s investigation of Fein. On December 1, 2023, the UAW became the largest union in the U.S. to officially call for a ceasefire in Israel’s genocidal war against the Palestinians in Gaza, explaining, as one union leader put it in a statement at the time, “From opposing fascism in WWII to mobilizing against apartheid South Africa and the Contra war [in Nicaragua] , the UAW has consistently stood for justice across the globe.” The UAW’s International Executive Board (IEB) also voted to form a Divestment and Just Transition working group to “study the history of Israel and Palestine, the union’s economic ties to the conflict, and to explore how to achieve a just transition for US workers from war to peace.” The decision to call for a ceasefire was strongly criticized by defenders of Israel’s war. Among them is Neil Barofsky, who let Fain know about his criticism directly even though the issue has nothing to do with the guidelines of the Consent Decree. On December 14, two weeks after the UAW released its statement, Fain appeared on Capitol Hill for a press conference with members of Congress calling for a ceasefire. “The evening before,” Grim added, “according to a source familiar with the conversation, Barofsky called Fain and urged him to rethink the union position. Barofsky said that it had pained him to see the UAW’s wheel logo and anti-war protests where UAW members were present, and he told Fain there had been repeated instances of antisemitism at those protests. Barofsky told Fain he was not calling as the federal monitor, who has nearly unchecked power over the union, but merely in his personal capacity.” Barofsky himself confirmed he made such a call in a letter he later sent to the executive board, first reported by the Detroit News buried under the headline “UAW’s court filing highlights tension with federal monitor.” That letter itself was perhaps even more outside its authority to write and send. Union’s response. On February 11, according to an email sent to Barofsky by Benjamin Dictor, a UAW attorney, the Anti-Defamation League [ADL] wrote to Barofsky and “complained about the Union’s demand for a ceasefire in Gaza and in particular the actions of Local 7902 which represents over 4,000 part-time and adjunct professors, student educators, and healthcare workers in New York] in support of same.” In California, like New York City, the UAW represents many faculty members and instructors who have supported pro-Palestinian campus protests. Barofsky, in a letter to the UAW board, wrote, “Although this issue is outside of the Monitor’s jurisdiction, we thought it was important to forward the [ADL] message to the IEB given the serious concerns raised here.” He then added, confirming he made the call to Fain, “For what it’s worth, as I previously shared with Shawn, similar concerns were raised directly to me shortly after the IEB issued its own ceasefire statement.” The UAW board held its next quarterly meeting the week of February 19, and this time Barofsky joined remotely, having missed the meeting when the ceasefire resolution was voted on. A source at the meeting said union officials confronted him about inappropriate lobbying on an issue that is not within his authority. Barofsky defended his position, arguing that the ADL (a Zionist lobbying outfit that says criticism of Israel’s war is anti-Semitic) was an unimpeachable authority on the question. That Barofsky continued debating the union’s position on a ceasefire stunned the board members. Grim further explained, “Fain and Barosky’s relationship had been strong before the Gaza war, as both had the same interest, to reform and root out corruption at the UAW. “ “It’s been a pretty collaborative working relationship with the monitor,” said one official. “Up until now.”” On February 23, the UAW lawyer Benjamin Dictor sent Barofsky a blistering letter after the board meeting ended, telling the Monitor that the union was flabbergasted at his breach of ethics. “You called President Fain and introduced your conversation with President Fain as one that was ‘strictly on a personal level’ during which time you shared with President Fain your personal concerns about the Union’s position on the crisis in Gaza,” he wrote. “Your call to President Fain on an issue so blatantly outside of the Monitor’s jurisdiction was inappropriate as your Office holds disproportionate power over the UAW, and even a ‘strictly personal’ sharing of opinion implicitly implicates such power dynamic. Nonetheless, out of respect for you and the office of the Monitor, President Fain discussed the conversation with only those in his inner circle and chose not to escalate the improper exchange any further. Dictor added that it was additionally inappropriate for Barofsky to lobby the board regarding the ADL’s objection to the UAW’s call for a ceasefire. “On February 29,”Grim added, “just six days after the UAW sent its letter to Barofsky complaining about his improper lobbying, Barofsky sent the UAW a sweeping demand for documents, saying he was opening an investigation into Fain over a dispute Fain had with the secretary treasurer. That letter was made public in a court filing by Barofsky this week.” Barosky asked for “any and all emails, text messages, and instant messages” sent between Fain, his top deputies, and his lawyers, from February 12 through February 23, 2024.” That covers pretty much the exact time the UAW and Barofsky were jockeying over the ADL’s complaint about their call for a ceasefire. Monitor escalates attack. Barofsky has only upped the attack on Fain since then. The Wall Street Journal said Barofsky is “probing” new allegations against President Shawn Fain, including that he made demands to benefit his domestic partner and her sister, according to a court filing. The allegation, which has nothing to do with the union’s statement on Gaza, is aimed at undermining Fain and his call for a ceasefire. The Gaza issue is clearly being used by Barofsky and pro-Israel allies, including in Congress, to attack Fain and the union. The position of Monitor over the union should be eliminated. How changes are made within unions, including the issues of corruption and rank-and-file control, must be decided by the union’s members. Direct government intervention in and takeovers of unions, even if it initially weakens the ruling bureaucracy, can lead to a situation where a political issue like the Gaza war can be used to undermine rank and file democracy and control.

Systemic to Capitalism: Global Warming, Racism. And War

Global Warming is Systemic to Capitalism What are the Greenhouse Gas Changes Since the Industrial Revolution?

Racism is Systemic to Capitalism

From its Origins, Racism has Been been an intuecgal pard of the Capitalist system: The discovery of gold and silver in America, the extirpation, enslavement, and entombment in mines of the aboriginal population, the beginning of the conquest and looting of the East Indies, the turning of Africa into a warren for the commercial hunting of black-skins, signalized the rosy dawn of the era of capitalist production. … If money … comes into the world with a congenital blood-stain on one cheek, capital comes dripping from head to foot, from every pore, with blood and dirt. — Capital, Volume One, Part VIII, Chapter 31, (the) “Genesis of the Industrial Capitalist”.

Wars for Markets are Systemic to Captialism

Lenin said in Chapter 7: Imperialism as a Special Stage of Capitalismthe First World War (1914–1918) was “an annexationist, predatory, plunderous war”^[3] among empires, whose historical and economic background must be studied “to understand and appraise modern war and modern politics”.^[4] That for capitalism to generate greater profits than the home market can yield, the merging of banks and industrial cartels produces finance capitalism, and the exportation and investment of capital to countries with undeveloped and underdeveloped economies. In turn, that financial behaviour divides the world among monopolist business companies. In colonizing undeveloped countries, business and government will engage in geopolitical conflict over the exploitation of labour of most of the population of the world. Therefore, imperialism is the highest (advanced) stage of capitalism, requiring monopolies to exploit labour and natural resources, and the exportation of finance capital, rather than manufactured goods, to sustain colonialism, which is an integral function of imperialism. Moreover, in the capitalist homeland, the super-profits yielded by the colonial exploitation of a people and their economy permit businessmen to bribe native politicians, labour leaders and the labour aristocracy (upper stratum of the working class) to politically thwart worker revolt (labour strike) and placate the working class’

Profits vs. The Planet: Does Humanity Have a Future? The Environmental Crisis of Capitalism (1999)

Since the development of capitalism, the natural resources of the planet have been consumed on a larger and larger scale by the profit system. A result of this process has been a rapid change in the earth’s ecological balance that could eventually lead to the extinction of humanity.judi

Whole forests have been destroyed, whole oceans are undergoing life-threatening changes, as the air we breathe is becoming more and more contaminated by the expansion of capitalist production.

From the beginning of the Industrial Revolution and the burning of fossil fuels, the earth’s ecosystem has been greatly altered. The bombing of Hiroshima and Nagasaki by U.S. imperialism at the end of World War II demonstrated the technological development and the capacity of capitalism to destroy humanity. This potential of nuclear pollution and destruction has been a glaring reality from that time to the present.

The less apparent product of World War II was that the technologies developed for wartime purposes had changed chemistry and physics forever. These products were tested for their effectiveness during war-not for the safety of humanity.

Under the banner of “Better Living Through Chemistry,” life and production changed. The “miracle fiber” asbestos was used everywhere and everything was dusted with DDT. Twenty years after their introduction, the death toll from cancer caused by these two substances began to come in.

The development and production of synthetic organic chemicals, used in everyday life, has increased over 100 fold since World War II in the United States. The increase has been geometric, doubling every seven to eight years.

In the United States, by the late 1980s, production had reached over 200 billion pounds per year. Many of these new compounds and medicines have been to the benefit of humanity. Unfortunately, only approximately 3 percent of these chemicals have been tested for their toxicity and potential long-range harm.

Rachel Carson’s Warnings

Rachel Carson was the first scientist to come forward and explain the potential dangers of the new pesticides, fertilizers, and other toxic pollutants. Her first book, “The Silent Spring,” is credited with the beginning of the environmental movement. This book explained that cancer and other diseases have become part of the world’s food chain and even present in the air we breathe and the water we drink.

Predicting the coming catastrophe if the mode of production does not change, Rachel Carson wrote in “The Sea Around Us”: “It is a curious situation that the sea, from which life first arose, should now be threatened by the activities of one form of that life. But the sea, though changed in a sinister way, will continue to exist; the threat is rather to life itself.”

Despite Carson’s warnings and the beginnings of the environmental movement over 35 years ago, the destruction of the environment by capitalism and the capitalist mode of production has only escalated.

An example of this escalation is global warming. The melting of glaciers throughout the world is one demonstration of this phenomenon.

The Quelccaya ice cap in South America, home to some of the world’s largest glaciers, is rapidly melting. From 1930 to 1990, it had been shrinking at the rate of three meters a year. Since 1990, it has been shrinking at the rate of approximately 30 meters a year.

The Antarctica ice shelves have been in retreat for 50 years, shrinking approximately a total of 7000 square kilometers in that time span. In the past year, from October 1998-March 1999, the Antarctica ice caps have retreated approximately 3000 square kilometers.

These quick increases in glacier decline are foreboding. Recent studies of ice cores in the Arctic and the Antarctic demonstrate that global warming may not be a gradual phenomenon.

The ice core studies demonstrate that during the last global warming, the earth’s climate warmed gradually and then abruptly increased by approximately 20 degrees Fahrenheit to end the ice age 12,500 years ago. The ancient carbon dioxide levels that provoked these abrupt changes, while significant, were far lower than the rising concentrations in today’s atmosphere.

Until these discoveries, global warming had been described as a gradual event (4 degrees Fahrenheit over the past 60 years) that will reach dangerous levels around the year 2050 or 2100. This new evidence demonstrates that the present gradual warming could develop into an abrupt change.

An increase of this magnitude (20 degrees Fahrenheit) would flood most cities and industrial centers in the world as the ice caps melt into the sea raising the sea level. (If all of the ice caps melted, sea level would rise approximately 260 feet.) The potential catastrophic results of global warming and the threat to humanity’s future should become an immediate concern.

Along with global warming, the increasing pollution of the oceans, the fresh water, the land, and the air throughout the world has put into question the future of our species and other species.

Fidel Castro expressed the urgency of these problems in his speech to the Earth Summit in Rio De Janeiro in 1992. He opened with these words:

“An important biological species-humankind-is at risk of disappearing due to the rapid and progressive elimination of its natural habitat. We are becoming aware of this problem when it is almost too late to prevent it. It must be said that consumer societies are chiefly responsible for this appalling environmental destruction. … Tomorrow will be too late to do what we should have done a long time ago.”

In this context, the fight for the spotted owl, the snail darter, and other endangered species, while important in their own right, are indicative of a far greater concern-the survival of humanity.

A Fight for Human Rights

It is becoming clear that the struggle for the environment is a fight for human rights and the survival of the species — a struggle for environmental justice. We need to defend, in the words of Thomas Jefferson, humanity’s “Unalienable Rights to Life, Liberty, and the Pursuit of Happiness.”

We should demand:

All products must be tested for toxicity before being produced for the market. The present practice of experimenting on human beings and waiting for the human body counts before determining that substances are toxic must be stopped;
The production of toxic substances must be stopped and the least toxic alternatives must be used until all toxins can be eliminated from use;
Gravity, wind, and solar power must be developed to replace fossil fuels as a source of energy.
The top priority throughout the world must be the elimination of pollution and the development of science to maintain the earth as a healthy biosphere for humanity;
The squandering of trillions of dollars on military spending must stop and these trillions of dollars must be used to repair the environment. (In 1991, even after the end of the Cold War, military spending was almost 1 trillion dollars.);
There must be a 100 percent tax on the profits of companies that pollute.

The environmental movement has raised many of these demands. In the past 30 years, many laws have been written incorporating some of these concepts. Yet despite these laws, environmental destruction has been allowed to proceed because these regulations have always been compromised by the incorporation of the concept of “economic feasibility.”

Economic feasibility means that the profitability of an economic enterprise cannot be subordinated to environmental needs. Therefore, environmental and safety laws, under capitalism, have always been a compromise between science and business.

In fact, environmental destruction, pestilence, and death are factored into production the same as casualties of war are factored into military battles.

The most glaring example is the occupational environment, where workplaces have become “killing fields.” In the United States alone, at least 350,000 workers get occupational diseases (cancer, etc.) and 50,000 workers die each year from these diseases. In fact, some estimates are higher!

Blue-collar workers and agricultural workers all have higher rates of cancer and other diseases because they receive higher doses of the toxic chemicals at the workplace than the rest of the population. Eventually, these toxins spread to the entire working class as they become part of the environment.

Scientific technology exists to prevent the high rate of occupational diseases, but the profit motive and capitalist competition prevent the implementation of preventive action and proper safety precautions.

Science and technology are not an obstacle to maintaining a safe environment. The barrier to a safe environment is capitalism and its paramount principle of production and science for profit.

Most environmental studies demonstrate that environmental destruction has become globally intertwined within our society and that the globalization of capitalism has speeded up the destruction of the planet.

Under the conditions of global capitalist competition, it is not economically feasible to invest the capital necessary to reverse this destruction.

In the present world, the rights of the capitalists to make a profit are in direct conflict with our basic rights. In this sense, the capitalist system has become a threat to humanity.

Jefferson’s words that human rights are “unalienable” means that these rights can never be superseded. At all points of conflict the rights of humanity to survive must supersede the right of the few to make a profit. The right to a safe environment is an unalienable human right!

Since environmental illness and destruction are a global concern, it requires all of humanity to act collectively, in our overall interests for our survival as a species, to correct the problem and to remove the obstacle of capitalism.

It requires a society where humanity has social, economic, and political control over the entire environment.

Such a society, a socialist society, is needed to ensure that all decisions affecting the environment are under the democratic control of humankind so that the production of goods will be done for the needs and survival of humanity instead of the production and the destruction of humanity and other species for profit.

With common ownership of the means of production, and common control and protection of all property and wealth, science and society will be in harmony with the ecosystem and humanity’s future.

With these goals we can begin to build a more effective environmental movement. As we continue to organize against capitalism and its destructive course, we can and will transform the world.

In the words of Margaret Mead, the famous anthropologist: “Never doubt that a small group of thoughtful, committed citizens can change the world. Indeed, it is the only thing that ever has.”

Daily News Digest June 13, 2022

Daily News Digest Archives

Humanity Will Not be Covid Free, Until the Vaccines, Like the Salk Polio Vaccine, are Free For the Whole World!

The Covid Pandemic is Not Over! Yesterday, There Were Over 96,374 and Two Days Ago, There Were Over 119,909 New Covid CaseS!

Images of the Day:

As the World Burns, The Socialists Refused to Unite for a United Front fpr Ecosocialism!

Since World War I ‘The War To End All Wars’ There Have Been Perpetual Wars for Perpetual Peace, this Laura Gray’s cartoon from the front page of The Militant August 18, 1945, Under the Banner Headline: “There Is No Peace”, is Still True for Today’s World!During This Economic Crisis, Capitalism’s Three-Point Political Program: 1.Austerity,2. Scapegoat Blacks, Minorities, and ‘Illegal’ Immigrants for Unemployment, and 3. The Iron Heel! For Decades, Blacks Have Been Subjected to The Iron Heel! Currently, the US Capitalist Class is Divided Over When — Not If, to Apply It to Everyone!

Due to Years of Austerity, Cuts to Public Health Care, And An Anti-Science and Profiteering President, The United States Now Leads the World In Coronavirus Cases and Deaths in the World!

Always Remember: That President Obama, With a Majority Democrat Legislature Supported the Wall Street Bailout and Remember, That he Established, in writing, the United States Capitalist Austerity Program. — The Race to the Bottom/Pauperization of the 99%!

Democracy?: As the Capitalist Robber Barons Steal from the 99%, Only the 1% Voted For Austerity! The 99% Should Decide On Austerity — Not Just The 1%, Who Profit From Austerity!! Under Austerity, All of the World Will Eventually Be Pauperized, Humbled, and Desecrated Like Greece and Puerto Rico.! Socialism Means True Democracy, that the 99% Will Rule, Not the Few!

Videos of the Day:

Like Covid, A Crisis of Drug-Resistant Bacterial Infections is Hurting the Poor and Marginalized Most

Quotes of the Day:

In the end, we will remember not the words of our enemies, but the silence of our friends. — Martin Luther King

United States:

The United States is not a Democracy (A government in which the supreme power is vested in the people and exercised by them directly)! Only the 1%, through their ownership of the Reublicrats and who profit from war and the war budget, vote for War and the war budget — A policy, which Gore Vidal called a Perpetual War for Perpetual Peace. — The 99% Should Decide On War — Not Just The 1% Who Profit From War! Under a Democracy, The 99% would have the right to vote on the policy of Perpetual War for Perpetual Peace! The United States takes from th poor and gives to the Rich. Taxthe Rich! — They Can Afford to Pay!

The ‘Supreme’ CourtCreeping Fascism: ‘Supreme’ Ruling Puts Border Patrol (Cops) Above the Law: ‘Endangers Us All’: Supreme Court Ruling Shields Border Agent From Excessive Force Lawsuit The ruling leaves thousands of Border Patrol agents “absolutely immunized from liability,” said Justice Sonia Sotomayor, “no matter how egregious the misconduct or resultant injury.” The ruling leaves thousands of Border Patrol agents “absolutely immunized from liability,” said Justice Sonia Sotomayor, “no matter how egregious the misconduct or resultant injury.” A ruling by the right-wing majority on the U.S. Supreme Court Wednesday “will have far-reaching consequences” for people who accuse federal agents of violating their constitutional rights, the ACLU warned after the court ruled against a man who wanted to sue a U.S. Border Patrol agent who entered his property without a warrant and used excessive force.

The Silence of the Lambs (Social Democratic Squad) was ‘Deafening’: Lack of Debate Most Worrying Aspect of Congressional Approval of Ukraine Arms Package Bay State reps and senators support providing $40 billion in mostly military aid on the quiet—risking nuclear war alongside accelerating economic crises at home and abroad.

The Worst Privatization Deal In U.S. History Just Got Even Worse New numbers are out on Chicago’s privatized parking meters, and they aren’t good. A story I’ve been telling over and over again while on the road for my book “The Privatization of Everything” is the notorious and disastrous Chicago parking meters privatization deal from 2008. Somehow, it just got even worse. New numbers are out, and this past year Chicago lost another $136.2 million in potential revenue. That’s how much in parking fees went to the group of global investors who operate the meters.

Social Security is Fully Funded! From: Is Our Debt Burden Really $100 Trillion?: The U.S. national debt comes out to about $16 trillion today. That’s something. But it’s nothing compared to the extra $87 trillion in unfunded liabilities to Social Security, Medicare, and federal pensions. Here’s how that works. If you add up all of the U.S. government’s promises to pay retirement and health care benefits for the next 75 years and subtract the projected tax revenue dedicated to those programs over the next 75 years, there is a gap. A $87 trillion gap – in addition to a $16 billion hole. Why haven’t Americans heard about the titanic $86.8 trillion liability from these programs?” Chris Box and Bill Archer ask in the Wall Street Journal. The authors blame the U.S. government for using shoddy accounting and for misleading the American public on their finances. In fact, the most misleading thing about that $87 trillion is the way the figure is often used in the media. . . . If the Federal Government can bailout the 1% to the tune of $29.616 Trillion Dollars, it can afford to pay back what it owes our funds! And tax the 1% for their wars!— Editorial: The Big ‘Entitlements’ Swindle Workers Wages Are Not ‘Entitlements’ — We Earn Our Benefits! (2012

Sanders Wants to Up Social Security Benefit by $2,400 a Year by Taxing the Rich “Our job is to expand Social Security so that everyone in America can retire” with dignity, Sanders said. The bill would increase Social Security payments by $2,400 a year and would fully fund the program until 2096, or the next 75 years — far past the current estimated insolvency date of roughly 2033, thanks to Republican refusal to raise taxes to fund the program

Environment —Ecosocialism or Ecocied!:

Profits Before Life —World Capitalism Openly Opposes Humanity’: WTO Negotiations Prioritize Institution’s Reputation Over COVID Medicines Access World Trade Organization (WTO) “intellectual property” rules require countries to guarantee pharmaceutical corporations’monopoly control over the medicines theyproduce, which means a long wait for production of generics. It’s embarrassing that the WTO as an institution is so broken that it cannot deliver an emergency waiver of its own rules in the midst of a once-in-a-century pandemic that shuttered the entire global economy.

Over 400 Groups Call on UN Food Agency to ‘End Partnership With Pesticide Industry’ “Use of hazardous pesticides is inconsistent with the rights protected by the United Nations.” “We cannot allow the U.N. agency mandated to support farmers and agricultural systems aligning with the industry that aims to influence national policy and causes such egregious pesticide poisoning and environmental devastation.” More than 400 advocacy groups on Thursday urged the United Nations Food and Agriculture Organization to cancel its partnership with an industry lobby group representing the world’s largest manufacturers of toxic pesticides.

Death of the Family Farmer, and the “Free Market” Cornel West has written that one of the greatest gifts of black music is the inspiration it gives to suffering people to look at the darkness and destruction surrounding them and walk into it “singing a sweet song.” John Mellencamp has operated according to that manual throughout his career, citing as his job description to “make people feel good about themselves.” The decimation of the family farmer and ruination of the rich land, however, did not elicit sweetness in Mellencamp’s music. Resembling a monstrous storm system, the 1980s brought devastation to small and midlevel farmers via a convergence and confluence of factors from Wall Street, the Federal Reserve, the international export market, and Washington, D.C. Throughout the Midwest, by the early 1980s, the value of farmland had fallen by 60 percent because of a drop in agricultural need and increased production. Jason Manning, a historian at Southern Illinois University, summarizes the cruel jokes and awful coincidences that collaborated to kill the family farmer:

“Blood on the Scarecrow”: John Mellencamp, the Death of the Family Farmer, and the “Free Market” Cornel West has written that one of the greatest gifts of black music is the inspiration it gives to suffering people to look at the darkness and destruction surrounding them and walk into it “singing a sweet song.” John Mellencamp has operated according to that manual throughout his career, citing as his job description to “make people feel good about themselves.” The decimation of the family farmer and ruination of the rich land, however, did not elicit sweetness in Mellencamp’s music. Resembling a monstrous storm system, the 1980s brought devastation to small and midlevel farmers via a convergence and confluence of factors from Wall Street, the Federal Reserve, the international export market, and Washington, D.C. Throughout the Midwest, by the early 1980s, the value of farmland had fallen by 60 percent because of a drop in agricultural need and increased production. Jason Manning, a historian at Southern Illinois University, summarizes the cruel jokes and awful coincidences that collaborated to kill the family farmer:

Civil Rights/Black Liberation:

Labor:

Economy:

The Money Trail to the January 6 Attack on the Capitol Is Ignored in Last Night’s Public Hearing As we watched the two-hour public hearing on the critical facts uncovered by the House Select Committee on the attack on the U.S. Capitol on January 6, 2021, we kept waiting to hear a discussion of the money trail that facilitated this attack. That discussion never came. And yet, big expenses were involved: dozens of buses were rented; signs advertising “Stop the Steal” were on the sides of some of those buses; food and lodging had to be paid for, in or around expensive Washington, D.C.; and, now, lawyers have to be paid to represent those indicted for brutalizing police on January 6 or destroying and/or stealing government property. The House Select Committee did an excellent job last evening of providing the big picture on the plot to shred U.S. democracy in service to Donald Trump’s megalomaniac desires. But the question that any good investigator of an unsolved crime scene must ask is this: who benefits from this crime? And to understand who, besides Donald Trump, would be the chief beneficiaries of a coup that installed Trump for an illegitimate second term as President, one has to follow the money trail. That money trail leads to Charles Koch, the billionaire Chairman and CEO of Koch Industries, one of the largest private corporations in the world. Along with the heirs of his late brother, David, Charles Koch is a majority owner of Koch Industries, a global conglomerate which has interests in fossil fuels, refineries, chemicals, paper products and extensive trading operations.

World:

Storms at the Summit of the Americas June 7 was a bad day for Luis Almagro, secretary-general of the Organization of American States (OAS). During the ninth Summit of the Americas, a young man declared to him what he is: an assassin and puppet of the White House, instigator of the coup in Bolivia. He said that Almagro cannot come to give lessons on democracy when his hands are stained with blood. In another room at the summit in Los Angeles, Secretary of State Antony Blinken seemed to be doing no better: several journalists rebuked him for using freedom of the press to provide cover for the murderers of journalists and for sanctioning and excluding certain countries from this meeting. “Democracy or hypocrisy?” could be heard over the loudspeaker that day.

Education, Health, and Welfare:

The government of the United States can pass laws in a few days to spend tens of trillions of dollars for war and the bailout of Wall Street and the bankers. Yet, those who pass universal healthcare for themselves, but they cannot spend even one trillion dollars for universal health for those who are ‘governed’! This is what is considered, by the powers to be, a democracy and part of the democratic way. — Roland Sheppard, Let the People Vote on Heslthcare!

‘Unbelievable’: Half of New Drugs Launched in 2020-2021 Cost $150,000 or More Per Year “Big Pharma’s yearly price hikes have pushed already sky-high drug prices into the stratosphere,” said one advocacy group. “Prescription drug spending in the U.S. exceeded half a trillion dollars in 2020.”

Daily News Digest June 10, 2022

Daily News Digest Archives

Humanity Will Not be Covid Free, Until the Vaccines, Like the Salk Polio Vaccine, are Free For the Whole World!

Images of the Day:

Bendib: Public PrivatesAnother Example Capitalism as a Failed System: World Capilalism Ws Aware of the Danger of Cornovavirus Thr eat Over 5 Years Ago and Did Nothing!: Under Capitalism — Human Lives Don’t Matter Capitalism Does Not, and Never Has, Worked for the Masses! In Its Death Agony, Capitalism Is Traveling About The World Like The Four Horsemen of the The Apocalypse, Spreading Racism, War, Famine, Pestilence, and Death. The future of Humanity Is Now At stake!

Due to Years of Austerity, Cuts to Public Health Care, And An Anti-Science and Profiteering President, The United States Now Leads the World In Coronavirus Cases and Deaths in the World!

Videos of the Day:

Quotes of the Day:

Weapons companies don’t mind. Their stocks are soaring. U.S. weapons exports exceed those of the next five leading weapons-dealing countries. The top seven countries account for 84% of weapons exports. Second place in international weapons dealing, held by Russia for the previous seven years, was taken over in 2021 by France. The only overlap between significant weapons dealing and where wars are present is in Ukraine and Russia — two countries impacted by a war widely recognized as outside the norm and meriting serious media coverage of the victims. In most years no nations with wars present are weapons dealers. Some nations get wars, others profit from wars. — U.S. Military Spending Is Undebatable Because Indefensible

. . . In this, Mr. Kissinger is on the same page as Mr. Guaino. “To make concessions to Russia would be submitting to aggression,” Mr. Guaino warned. “To make none would be submitting to insanity.” The United States is making no concessions. That would be to lose face. There’s an election coming. So the administration is closing off avenues of negotiation and working to intensify the war. We’re in it to win it. With time, the huge import of deadly weaponry, including that from the newly authorized $40 billion allocation, could take the war to a different level. President Volodymyr Zelensky of Ukraine warned in an address to students this month that the bloodiest days of the war were coming. — War in Ukraine May Be Impossible to Stop. And the U.S. Deserves Much of the Blame.

United States:

Barry Sheppard Biden’s War Strategy in Ukraine — Russia’s Defeat, Rejection of a Negotiated Settlement The June 4 New York Times prom-inently printed a long opinion piece by Christopher Caldwell titled “U.S. Helps Prolong Ukraine War”. While not an editorial, it was printed in the space editorials appear when they are written. Caldwell is a neoconservative who opposes the Russian invasion of Ukraine. He is identified by the Times as “a contributing Opinion writer”. In the article, Caldwell says, “But the United States has helped turn this tragic, local and ambiguous conflict into a potential world conflagration.” He refers to an article written in the French daily Le Figaro by Henri Guaino, an advisor for past French president Nicolas Sarkozy: “Mr. Guaino argues by misunderstanding the war’s logic the West, led by the Biden administration, is giving the conflict a momentum that may be impossible to stop. He is right. “In 2014 the United States backed an uprising — in its final stages a violent uprising — against the legitimately elected government of Viktor Yanukovych …”

The War in Ukraine May Be Impossible to Stop. And the U.S. Deserves Much of the Blame. In the Paris daily newspaper Le Figaro this month, Henri Guaino, a top adviser to Nicolas Sarkozy when he was president of France, warned that Europe’s countries, under the shortsighted leadership of the United States, were “sleep-walking” into war with Russia. Mr. Guaino was borrowing a metaphor that the historian Christopher Clark used to describe the origins of World War I. Naturally, Mr. Guaino understands that Russia is most directly to blame for the present conflict in Ukraine. It was Russia that massed its troops on the frontier last fall and winter and — having demanded from NATO a number of Ukraine —related security guarantees that NATO rejected — began the shelling and killing on Feb. 24. But the United States has helped turn this tragic, local and ambiguous conflict into a potential world conflagration. By misunderstanding the war’s logic, Mr. Guaino argues, the West, led by the Biden adminis-tration, is giving the conflict a momentum that may be impossible to stop. He is right. In 2014 the United States backed an uprising — in its final stages a violent uprising — against the legitimately elected Ukrainian government of Viktor Yanukovych, which was pro-Russian. (The corruption of Mr. Yanukovych’s government has been much adduced by the rebellion’s defenders, but corruption is a perennial Ukrainian problem, even today.) Russia, in turn, annexed Crimea, a historically Russian-speaking part of Ukraine that since the 18th century had been home to Russia’s Black Sea Fleet.

CIA Torture:The NYT Acknowledges the CIA’s Big Lie for Gina Haspel The New York Times has finally acknowledged Gina Haspel’s direct involvement in the Central Intelligence Agency’s policy of torture and abuse. On June 4, 2022, an article provided details of Haspel’s role as chief of the CIA base twenty years ago that was known for conducting the most sadistic acts of torture and abuse. At her confirmation hearings to become CIA director in 2018, Haspel refused to answer any direct questions about her role in the policy of torture and abuse, which included the waterboarding of a Saudi prisoner, Abd al-Rahim al-Nashiri. The CIA stopped me from writing about Haspel’s role in my 2018 memoir, “Whistleblower at the CIA.”

Environment —Ecosocialism or Ecocied!:

I Don’t Want — I Want

Civil Rights/Black Liberation:

Black Agenda Report June 8. 2022

Margaret Kimberley, BAR Executive Editor and Senior Columnist U.S. Effort to Hurt Russia Undermines Itself and the World The U.S. drive to dominate creates self-inflicted wounds and self-imposed crises. It also creates suffering around the world with only the most servile vassal states willing to do what Washington… More Storiea

. . . . .

Rejecting War Is Not Enough: Racism Curdles Peace War and racism have always been violently, tragically inseparable. For centuries, the most devastating and brutal conflicts in the world have been driven by destructive notions of racial superiority and murderous assertions of ethnic differences.

Police Have No Duty to Protect the Public (Just PrzThough often unsaid in police reform debates, numerous court precedents have established that cops aren’t obligated to act in the interests of citizens. A passenger looks out at the 36th Street subway station on April 13, 2022, where a shooting attack occurred the previous day. Supreme Court precedent holds that American police have no legal obligation to protect the public.

The Uvalde Police Sent an Important Message to the Nation We’re not going to save you or your children! Our hearts have been pierced over and over by the horrific events that occurred at the school shooting in Uvalde, Texas. Especially heart wrenching were the phone call cries, “send the police,” from that 10-year-old girl trapped in the room with the murderer and surrounded by the dead and dying bodies of her classmates. She made three 911 calls. See Breaking Points at about 7:30 mins. Apparently, she or another student, was told on a call to yell out, “We need help” perhaps with the idea that some of the nineteen heavily armed police just outside the door might hear and come to the rescue. Too bad for her, the only one who came to her was the shooter who promptly killed her.

Victims of Forced Sterilization in California Are Fighting for Reparations Gaining justice for survivors of the state’s abuse is not only a reproductive health issue, it’s a racial justice issue. In the mid-2000s, Moonlight Pulido experienced a bout of hot flashes, emotional ups-and-downs, and other symptoms of menopause that confused her — after all, she was in her 30s and far too young to be experiencing these kinds of hormonal changes.

Labor:

Unison Conference: The Battle Lines are Drawn Next week’s Unison conference will be an arena for the struggle between a right-wing bureaucracy attempting to maintain their stifling control, and an ascendant grassroots left seeking to transform the union. The left must seize the moment. This year’s Unison national delegate conference represents the culmination of eighteen tumultuous months in our union. From the onset of the election campaign for the general secretary position, right up until today, there has barely been a week without some degree of controversy.

Paul Holmes’ general secretary campaign and the subsequent victory of the Time for Real Change (TFRC) candidates in the NEC elections were a real earthquake, with implications far beyond Unison. The right wing in the union have tried to explain all this as being down to the intrigues of a left faction. But the truth is that the rise of the left in Unison reflects years, if not decades, of discontent with the status quo in Unison.

To Win Social Justice, We Must Win the Class War Book Review: Class Struggle Unionism (2022), by Joe Burns (Haymarket) In Class Struggle Unionism Joe Burns builds on his previous book, Reviving the Strike: How Working People Can Regain Power and Transform America (2011). As before, Burns grounds his argument in the class war, a battle-to-the-death between the employer class and the working class over who controls the wealth that workers create.

Economy:

The decline of the West is not necessary or historically inevitable. It is the result of choosing policies dictated by its rentier interests. … The threat posed to society by rentier interests is the great challenge of every nation today: whether its government can restrict the dynamics of finance capitalism and prevent an oligarchy from dominating the state and enriching itself by imposing austerity on labor and industry. So far, the West has not risen to this challenge.” “There are essentially two types of society: mixed economies with public checks and balances, and oligarchies that dismantle and privatize the state, taking over its monetary and credit system, the land and basic infrastructure to enrich themselves but choking the economy, not helping it grow. — Michael Hudson, The Destiny of Civilization

FRED Overnight Bank Funding Rate is 0.82%

As Tech Startups and Blank-Check Companies Blow Up in Investors’ Portfolios, SEC Chief Gensler Gives Yet Another Speech On September 14 of last year, we wrote this about SEC Chair Gary Gensler: “Gensler’s opening remarks at today’s Senate Banking Committee hearing include seven references to this phrase: ‘asked staff for recommendations…’ If past is prologue, this will mean that Gensler will run out the clock on actually advancing any meaningful ‘recommendations’ into concrete final rules.” Yesterday, Gensler gave a heavily promoted speech about cleaning up the way that retail stock orders are handled on Wall Street. But all the speech actually did was to ask his staff for more ideas and recommendations. The phrase “asked staff” appears 13 times in the speech. While Gensler spends his time giving speeches and asking his staff for recommendations that don’t go anywhere, large chunks of U.S. markets are blowing up in investor portfolios.

World:

Latin American Nations Skip Summit of Americas for Excluding Cuba and Venezuela Leaders from Mexico, Bolivia, Guatemala, Honduras and El Salvador are absent from Biden’s Summit of the Americas in LA. Top leaders from Mexico, Bolivia, Guatemala, Honduras and El Salvador are all absent from the ninth Summit of the Americas in Los Angeles. Mexican President Andrés Manuel López Obrador announced he would boycott the conference after the U.S. said it would not invite Cuba, Venezuela and Nicaragua. We speak with historian Alejandro Velasco and Roberto Lovato, award-winning Salvadoran American journalist and author, who calls the conference ”a failure of hemispheric proportions and a global embarrassment for the United States and for the Biden administration.” Lovato calls the Biden administration’s condemnation of some countries as anti-democratic hypocritical and says the absence of so many Latin American Countries Represents A Decline in U.S. Hegemony.

Mapping U.S. imperialism “The greatest threat looming over our planet, the hegemonistic pretentions of the American Empire are placing at risk the very survival of the human species. We continue to warn you about this danger, and we appeal to the people of the United States and the world to halt this threat, which is like a sword hanging over our heads.” — Hugo Chavez, US imperialism is the greatest threat to life on the planet, a force of ecological devastation and disaster impacting not only human beings, but also our non-human relatives. How can we organize to dismantle the vast and complicated network of US imperialism which includes US war and militarism, CIA intervention, US weap-ons/technology/surveillance corporations, political and economic support for dictatorships, military juntas, death squads and US trained global police forces favorable to US geopolitical interests, US imposed sanctions, so-called “humanitarian interventions,” genetically modified grassroots organizations, corporate media’s manipulation of spontaneous protest, and US corporate sponsorship of political repression and regime change favorable to US corporate interests?

Education, Health, and Welfare:

Corruption and Regulatory Capture Another day, our attention focuses on the problem arising due to the lack of infant formula and the trouble it poses for new new-born infants, including deaths. And we ask, how do “they” get away with it? These are but two examples of the social crises that seem to arise every day and appear to come out of nowhere. And, after a day or so of media attention, it seems to disappear, superseded by yet another headline grabbing crisis. Other crises have come and gone, like pharmaceutical industry’s role in widespread opioid addiction or airline crashes. Part of the reason we have these crisis – and so many others – is regulator capture. As Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-MA) declared, “Regulatory capture is a big deal.”

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Humanity Will Not be Covid Free, Until the Vaccines, Like the Salk Polio Vaccine, are Free For the Whole World

Images of the Day:

Carlos Latuff Perrogative to Bomb!!

Dont’e Be Distracted

Another Example Capitalism as a Failed System: World Capilalism Ws Aware of the Danger of Cornovavirus Thr eat Over 5 Years Ago and Did Nothing!: Under Capitalism — Human Lives Don’t Matter Capitalism Does Not, and Never Has, Worked for the Masses! In Its Death Agony, Capitalism Is Traveling About The World Like The Four Horsemen of the The Apocalypse, Spreading Racism, War, Famine, Pestilence, and Death. The future of Humanity Is Now At stake!Since World War I, ‘the war to end all wars’, there have been perpetual wars for perpetual peace, this Laura Gray’s cartoon from the front page of The Militant August 18, 1945, Under the Banner Headline: “There Is No Peace”, is Still True for Today’s World!During This Economic Crisis, Capitalism’s Three-Point Political Program: 1.Austerity,2. Scapegoat Blacks, Minorities, and ‘Illegal’ Immigrants for Unemployment, and 3. The Iron Heel! For Decades, Blacks Have Been Subjected to The Iron Heel! Currently, the US Capitalist Class is Divided Over When — Not If, to Apply It to Everyone!

Due to Years of Austerity, Cuts to Public Health Care, And An Anti-Science and Profiteering President, The United States Now Leads the World In Coronavirus Cases and Deaths in the World!

Videos of the Day:

Quotes of the Day:

“Scientists and government representatives were locked in marathon talks late Sunday night in a race to complete the last installment of a landmark UN climate report, as a number of fossil fuel-producing nations objected to strong statements that the world must end its use of coal, oil and natural gas, a source familiar with the talks told CNN.” Sandra Steingraber, Re UN Report On Climate Crisis Confirms the World Already Has Solutions — But Politics are Getting in the Way

United States:

Does The Fourth Estate Dance To The Company Tune? The Media Monopoly ! (ANswer Yes! — R.S,) That’s a fact which troubles Ben Bagdikian, and which should trouble you, too. His book is strong and controversial stuff, but it’s no simple muckraker’s cry of outrage against some “conspiracy” to keep you ignorant of how great corporations use and abuse you. The problem, as he sees it, is institutional, not personal. The media themselves are becoming part and parcel of the small group of powerful conglomerates dominating our economy. They belong to the system that they’re supposed to cover objectively on your behalf. That’s one danger to freedom of the press. The other is that mass advertising forces a change in the substance of the news itself, encouraging the presentation of more non-upsetting, bland material that won’t spoil the euphoric, self-centered mood that encourages consumers to the sweet buy and buy.

The Media Monopoly’s Journatists: Glen Greenwald: Your Top Priority is The Emotional Comfort of the Most Powerful Elites, Which You Fulfill by Never Criticizing Them Corporate journalists have license to use their huge platforms to malign, expose and destroy anyone they want. Your moral duty: sit in respectful silence and never object.

Looking for “Good Guys” on Ukraine? Biden and Washington have shown little interest in pursuing and promoting peace negotiations around terms that would let Putin stand down from further carnage in the wake of the difficulties his invasion has faced. There’s nothing mysterious about the off-ramps Putin needs for some kind of “mission accomplished” moment to save Ukrainian and Russian lives: official neutrality for Ukraine, recognition of the fait accompli of Russia’s takeover of Crimea, and readjusted sovereignty status for the two long-contested Russian-speaking eastern Ukraine provinces.

Save the Planet, Behead the Military Budget Ouch! Peter Isaacson, writing in Fair Observer, seems to be saying . . . oh my God, democracy is a cliché, a big sham. I stand up, put my hand on my heart, pledge allegiance to the flag. This is America, land of the empowered voter. Then I read about our president’s latest budget proposal, which includes $813 billion for “national defense” — pushing the Pentagon budget’s already record-setting enormity further into outer space — and I feel myself collapse (yet again) into nothingness. Why, why, why, as our ecosystem collapses, as millions of refugees flee the horrors of war and poverty, as the pandemic continues, as World War III and the possibility of nuclear Armageddon rears its evil head, as the planet trembles, does ever-expanding, global militarism remain our primary national purpose?

Environment —Ecosocialism or Ecocide!:

Ecosocialism: A Radical Alternative to Capitalist Catastrophe

‘Oh, That House? It’s in the Sea Now:” India’s Disappearing Coastline Google Maps tells me I am approaching my destination. But the neighbourhood appears a bit altered from what I remember of it. There’s no sign of the crumbling old house by the sea, whose coordinates I had saved on my phone the last time I visited Uppada. “Oh, that house? It is in the sea now – there!” says T. Maramma, casually pointing to a wave gushing in from the Bay of Bengal.

UN Report On Climate Crisis Confirms the World Already Has Solutions — But Politics are Getting in the Way The world is careening toward levels of global warming that will have irreversible impacts, a new landmark report says, but we already have the solutions — the only thing preventing us from taking advantage of them is political will and status-quo interests in fossil fuels. The third and final installment of the sixth UN Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change report, published Monday, shows how renewable energy sources like wind and solar are now economically viable and becoming cheaper by the day.

IPCC Report: ‘Now Or Never’ If World Is To Stave Off Climate Disaster Greenhouse gas emissions must peak by 2025, say climate scientists in what is in effect their final warning

The world can still hope to stave off the worst ravages of climate breakdown but only through a “now or never” dash to a low-carbon economy and society, scientists have said in what is in effect a final warning for governments on the climate. Greenhouse gas emissions must peak by 2025, and can be nearly halved this decade, according to the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), to give the world a chance of limiting future heating to 1.5C above pre-industrial levels.

New IPCC Report Doubles Down on Water Crisis The IPCC report released today is yet another urgent alarm bell, urging us to wake up to the real dangers of climate change that communities across the globe are already experiencing. The IPCC report released today is yet another urgent alarm bell, urging us to wake up to the real dangers of climate change that communities across the globe are already experiencing. Climate change is bringing severe consequences – from increasing floods and failing dams that endanger entire communities, to droughts and tapped-out water supplies that put people, industries, economies and ecosystems at risk

Threats: Climate change is already wreaking havoc on communities and their rivers and water supplies!

Methane-Producing Dams: More than 90,000 dams turn free-flowing rivers across the U.S. into stagnant impoundments that release methane, a greenhouse gas 80 times more potent than carbon dioxide.
Failing infrastructure: Major flooding and hurricanes have caused dozens of dams to fail in the Carolinas, and Michigan’s Edenville Dam failed catastrophically in 2020. Climate change is bringing more frequent and severe flooding at a time when U.S. dams are aging and outdated.
Rivers running dry:The Colorado River – which supports a $1.4 trillion economy and drinking water for 40 million people – is in crisis due to climate change and decades of overallocation. The river is so over-burdened it no longer reaches the sea.
Disastrous flooding:Record flooding along the Mississippi River in 2019 caused $20 billion in damage to people’s homes, farms and businesses in the floodplain. As flood risk grows with climate change, so does the risk to anyone living in harm’s way.

UN Weather Agency Sounds Alarm on Extreme Events in Antarctica Among the events sparking concern was “freakish warming at Earth’s South Pole” including “a mind-blowing” above-average reading at a research station. “The Antarctic ice sheets hold almost 60 meters of potential sea-level rise. Understanding and properly monitoring the continent is therefore crucial for society’s future well-being.” The remarks from climate experts with the World Meteorological Organization (WMO)—delivered just ahead of a key report from the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change—follow last month’s collapse of East Antarctica’s Conger Ice Shelf, record warm temperatures, and rare rainfall.

As Oil Giants Turn to Bitcoin Mining, Some Spin Burning Fossil Fuels for Cryptocurrency as a Climate Solution In a pilot project last year, ExxonMobil used up to 18 million cubic feet of gas per month to mine bitcoin in North Dakota. In a pilot project last year, ExxonMobil used up to 18 million cubic feet of gas per month to mine bitcoin in North Dakota. Flaring — or the burning of stranded natural gas directly at an oil well — is one of the drilling industry’s most notorious problems, often condemned as a pointlessly polluting waste of billions of dollars and trillions of cubic feet of natural gas.In early March, oil giant ExxonMobil signed up to meet the World Bank’s “zero routine flaring by 2030” goal (a plan that — when you look just a bit closer — doesn’t entirely eliminate flaring but instead reduces “absolute flaring and methane emissions” by 60 to 70 percent.)

RBC, TD Lead 51% Rise in Tar Sands/Oil Sands Investment as Biggest Banks Fund Climate Chaos Fossil investment from the world’s 60 biggest banks hit US$4.6 trillion in the six years since the Paris climate agreement was signed, while the Royal Bank of Canada and TD Bank led a 51% increase in tar sands/oil sands investment last year, according to the latest edition of the annual Banking on Climate Chaos report released Wednesday. “In 2021, the year of ‘net zero by 2050’ pledges, banks prematurely patted themselves on the back for adopting financed emissions targets a generation away while delaying serious climate action now,” concludes the analysis compiled by Rainforest Action Network, BankTrack, the Indigenous Environmental Network, Oil Change International, Reclaim Finance, the U.S. Sierra Club, and Urgewald. Overall fossil investment plateaued in 2021, but that still meant $742 billion in fossil investment in a single year—just over $2 billion per day, or $1.4 million per minute—despite urgent calls by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, the International Energy Agency, and countless others to begin drastically scaling back fossil fuels of all kinds.

Civil Rights/Black Liberation:

Coming Soon: Four Who Died Trying ( I am Interviewed about Malcom X’s Assassination.)

GOP Lawmakers Are Trying to Prevent Students From Learning About Reconstruction Guardians of the status quo have always sought to hide Reconstruction’s unprecedented advancements for Black people.

Labor:

Economy:

The Submerging Market Debt Crisis Last week, Ghana’s central bank announced its biggest ever interest-rate hike as it sought to slow rampant inflation that threatens to create a debt crisis in one of West Africa’s largest economies. The Bank of Ghana raised its main lending rate by 250 basis points to 17% as consumer inflation reached 15.7% year-on-year in February, the highest since 2016. The war in Ukraine will likely make things worse. Ghana imports nearly a quarter of its wheat from Russia and around 60% of its iron ore from Ukraine. Ghana is just one example of the economic stress being placed on small, low-income economies around the world from food and energy inflation, rising interest rates and a strong dollar. The island nation on the south east coast of India, Sri Lanka, has begun talks with the IMF for a ‘debt relief’ package after protests over a deepening economic crisis forced Gotabaya Rajapaksa’s government into a policy U-turn. Sri Lanka has for months faced mounting economic pain as its depleted foreign currency reserves triggered shortages of imports and fuel, power blackouts and double-digit inflation. It has debt and interest repayments worth about $7bn due this year against usable foreign currency reserves as low as $500mn.

In a Six-Day Span in March 2020, the Dow Crashed 5,676 Points; the Fed Responded with Almost $1 Trillion in Repo Loans to 24 Trading Houses The Federal Reserve, the central bank of the United States, has a “dual mandate” to target inflation and to maintain “maximum sustainable employment.” The Fed has zero mandate to target a specified level for the Dow Jones Industrial Average or to prevent stock market crashes by printing money out of thin air and pumping it out to the trading houses on Wall Street. But under Fed Chair Ben Bernanke during the Wall Street crisis in 2008 and Fed Chair Jerome Powell in 2019-2020, that’s exactly what the Fed decided to do.World:

Ukraine War Inflames Global Hunger, Preparing Massive Unrest The war in Ukraine is having severe consequences throughout the world. Many countries will be hit hard by rising food and energy prices, tipping millions over the edge. It is only a matter of time before a new revolutionary wave sweeps the world. The impact of the war in Ukraine will be felt far beyond European shores. With Russia and Ukraine together being responsible for 12% of all calories traded, and natural gas forming an important component in fertilisers, the war is exacerbating food inflation. Coming at a time when many of the dominated capitalist countries have built up massive debts in the wake of the coronavirus pandemic, the war is adding to a perfect storm that will provoke class struggle on a global scale.

Health, Education. and Wealfare:

‘A Poor People’s Pandemic’: Poorest US Counties Suffered Twice the Covid Deaths of Richest “The neglect of poor and low-wealth people in this country during a pandemic is immoral, shocking, and unjust,” said Rev. Dr. William Barber II in response to the new report. A first-of-its-kind examination of the coronavirus pandemic’s impact on low-income communities published Monday shows that Covid-19 has been twice as deadly in poor counties as in wealthy ones, a finding seen as a damning indictment of the U.S. government’s pandemic response.

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The Pandemic Continues Another Example Capitalism as a Failed System: World Capilalism Ws Aware of the Danger of Cornovavirus Thr eat Over 5 Years Ago and Did Nothing!: Under Capitalism — Human Lives Don’t Matter Capitalism Does Not, and Never Has, Worked for the Masses! In Its Death Agony, Capitalism Is Traveling About The World Like The Four Horsemen of the The Apocalypse, Spreading Racism, War, Famine, Pestilence, and Death. The future of Humanity Is Now At stake!Since World War I, ‘the war to end all wars’, there have been perpetual wars for perpetual peace, this Laura Gray’s cartoon from the front page of The Militant August 18, 1945, Under the Banner Headline: “There Is No Peace”, is Still True for Today’s World!During This Economic Crisis, Capitalism’s Three-Point Political Program: 1.Austerity,2. Scapegoat Blacks, Minorities, and ‘Illegal’ Immigrants for Unemployment, and 3. The Iron Heel! For Decades, Blacks Have Been Subjected to The Iron Heel! Currently, the US Capitalist Class is Divided Over When — Not If, to Apply It to Everyone!

Due to Years of Austerity, Cuts to Public Health Care, And An Anti-Science and Profiteering President, The United States Now Leads the World In Coronavirus Cases and Deaths in the World!

Always Remember: That President Obama, With a Majority Democrat Legislature Supported the Wall Street Bailout and Remember, That he Established, in writing, the United States Capitalist Austerity Program. — The Race to the Bottom/Pauperization of the 99%!

Democracy?: As the Capitalist Robber Barons Steal from the 99%, Only the 1% Voted For Austerity! The 99% Should Decide On Austerity — Not Just The 1% Who, Profit From Austerity!! Under Austerity, All of the World Will Eventually Be Pauperized, Humbled, and Desecrated Like Greece and Puerto Rico.! Socialism Means True Democracy, that the 99% Will Rule, Not the Few!

Quotes of the Day:

The underlying social and economic crisis cannot be solved on the basis of reforms within the framework of capitalism. It must be expected that sooner or later there will be important mobilisations over the demands still pending from October 2019. The defeat of Kast increases the confidence of the masses, and what has now been expressed through electoral channels will be expressed in demands on the new government and in mobilisations of the masses when faced with half measures. The water crisis will continue to worsen. The Wallmapu will continue to be militarised, leading to an increasingly complex conflict where the right has established a bastion. The decriminalisation of abortion will continue to be a demand raised by the feminist and women’s movement. We are likely to witness an increase in labour disputes over wages and working conditions. Gabriel Boric’s lack of determination to carry out radical change aimed at improving living conditions will be exposed. For a profound transformation of society we need to put an end to the capitalist system and establish a workers’ government. We can only rely on the strength of the mobilisations of and the self-organisation of the working class. The key is to build a revolutionary leadership that is up to the tasks that the working class posed in the October insurrection. —Chile Presidential Election: Increase In Working-Class Vote Defeats Pro-Pinochet Candidate

Videos of the Day:

NOAA: Artic Report Card: The Time to Face Global Warming is Now!

United States:

The United States is not a Democracy (A government in which the supreme power is vested in the people and exercised by them directly)! Only the 1%, through. their ownershipof the Reublicrats, who profit from war and the war budget, voted for War and the war budget — A policy, which Gore Vidal called a Perpetual War for Perpetual Peace. — The 99% Should Decide On War — Not Just The 1% Who Profit From War! Under a Democracy, The 99% would have the right to vote on the policy of Perpetual War for Perpetual Peace! The United States takes from the poor and gives to the Rich. Tax the Rich! — They Can Afford To Pay!

The Media Monopoly: The Mainstream Media Seems to Want More War for the United States The news and editorial pages have forgotten the failed wars of the recent past, and are already pursuing new confrontations for the United States. In the past week, the New York Times argued that President Joe Biden’s handling of Ukraine is actually a “wider test of U.S. credibility abroad.” The Washington Post, which has become a voice for militarism, believes it is essential to “challenge the authoritarianism” of Russia, and supports a “generational investment” in economic and military support for Ukraine. And now the most authoritative news weekly in the English language, The Economist, has questioned America’s resolve in a cover story headlined “What would American fight for.”

Why Spending $2 Trillion on Child Care, Health Care and Fighting Climate Change Won’t Make Inflation Any Worse Than it Already is One of the main concerns raised by critics of President Joe Biden’s Build Back Better plan is that it will drive up inflation, which is already running at the fastest pace in four decades. The Senate is currently considering a roughly US$2 trillion bill passed by the House that would spend money on health care, education, fighting climate change and much else over the next decade. But Republicans and a handful of Democrats like Sen. Joe Manchin of West Virginia argue the risk that more spending could push inflation even higher is too great.As an economist, I believe these concerns are likely overblown. Here’s why.

Carbon Monoxide From Generators Poisons Thousands of People a Year. The U.S. Has Failed to Force Safety Changes. Portable generators are among the deadliest consumer products. Two decades after the government identified the danger, people are left vulnerable by a system that lets the industry regulate itself. Portable generators are among the deadliest consumer products. Two decades after the government identified the danger, and as climate change leads to more power outages, people are left vulnerable by a system that lets the industry regulate itself. Portable generators are among the deadliest consumer products. Two decades after the government identified the danger, and as climate change leads to more power outages, people are left vulnerable by a system that lets the industry regulate itself.

Environment:

100 years ago, Rosa Luxemburg Raised the Slogan: Socialism or Barbarism! Today’s Slogan is Ecosocialism or Ecocide!

2021 Arctic Report Card Tells a Human Story of Cascading Climate Disruption Including data from 2021, 15 of the lowest summer sea ice extents – the point when the ice is at its minimum reach for the year – have all occurred in the last 15 years, within a record dating back to 1979 when satellites began regularly monitoring the region. The sea ice is also thinning at an alarming rate as the Arctic’s oldest and thickest multi-year ice disappears. This loss of sea ice diminishes the Arctic’s ability to cool the global climate. It can also alter lower latitude weather systems to an extent that makes previously rare and impactful weather events, like droughts, heat waves and extreme winter storms, more likely. Similarly, the persistent melting of the Greenland ice sheet and other land-based ice is raising seas worldwide, exacerbating the severity and exposure to coastal flooding, disruptions to drinking and waste water systems, and coastal erosion for more communities around the planet.Civil Rights/Black Liberation:

Labor:

Economy:

Inflation Comes From Printing Money For The Rich Brief thoughts on the political science of this country (USA). Leftists are getting it slightly wrong. In Washington, the divide is between the very few progressive Democrats and the rest of the “bipartisan” politicians bought off by corporations. On the ground, however, the divide is between left-liberals and conservatives, not between leftists and liberals. In general people of all political spectrums are far to the left of most politicians in both parties. Alienation from the Democratic Party comes not from supposed neoliberalism or wokeism, the two most common tropes by the reactionary right. Rather the alienation from the Democrats comes from their commitment to the state as a means to consolidate corporate power. Many conflate this with communism, and in the context of communism being understood as state capitalism historically, people aren’t wrong.

Robber Baron JPMorgan’s Crime Wave Continues, Calling into Question the Justice Department’s Lax Settlement with the Bank Last Year JPMorgan Chase is the largest bank in the United States. It also has the scandalous distinction of having admitted to five criminal felony counts brought by the U.S. Department of Justice since 2014 and a breathtaking series of additional charges from other regulators. (See its Rap Sheet here.) On Friday, the Securities and Exchange Commission fined the securities unit of JPMorgan Chase $125 million for evading the ability of the SEC to adequately conduct its investigations of the bank because there was “firmwide” use by traders, supervisors and other personnel of non-official communications devices to conduct its business, while the firm failed to record and retain these messages as required by law.

World:

The underlying social and economic crisis cannot be solved on the basis of Capitalism!: ‘We Will Bury Neoliberalism’: Global Celebration Follows Leftist Victory in Chile At last. The specter of Pinochet is removed from Chile,” declared former Greek Finance Minister Yanis Varoufakis. (The Social Demorcrat Betrayor of the Geek Revolution Agsinst IMF Imposed Austeritry) Socialist Gabriel Boric’s victory in Chile’s high-stakes presidential election Sunday was hailed by progressives worldwide as an inspiring example of how a democratic groundswell can overcome deeply entrenched forces of reaction and chart a path toward a more just, equal, and sustainable future. Riding a massive wave of anger at Chile’s neoliberal political establishment and the economic inequities it has perpetuated, Boric—a 35-year-old former student activist—handily defeated José Antonio Kast, a lawyer and politician whom one commentator characterized as “easily as reactionary as far-right dictator Augusto Pinochet,” the leader of the U.S.-backed military junta that ruled Chile with an iron fist for nearly two decades. Chile Presidential Election: Increase In Working-Class Vote Defeats Pro-Pinochet Candidate The candidate of Apruebro Dignidad, Gabriel Boric has won the presidential election with 56% of the votes. In absolute terms, this is a record majority, with some 4.6 million votes cast for Boric, putting him almost 1 million votes ahead of the pro-Pinochet candidate, Juan Antonio Kast, who obtained 44%. [También disponible en español]After the low turnout in the first round (47%), the Apruebo Dignidad campaign managed to mobilise a significant number of votes in working-class and popular districts, where it obtained a wide advantage, as in Puente Alto (70%) and Maipú (66%), with the turnout rising to 55% nationally in the second round. Compared with wealthy districts, where the vote increased by about 4 points on average, participation increased considerably more in poor urban districts, reaching a 10-point increase. With a correct class instinct, workers and youth mobilized to defeat Kast. In total, there were 1.25 million more votes cast in the second round.Education, Health, and Welfare:

The government of the United States can pass laws in a few days to spend tens of trillions of dollars for war and the bailout of Wall Street and the bankers. Yet, those who pass universal healthcare for themselves, but cannot spend even one trillion dollars for universal health for those who are ‘governed’! This is what is considered, by the powers to be, a democracy and part of the democratic way. — Roland Sheppard, Let the People Vote on Healthcare

Omicron Outbreak Inducing Whiplash For Many Americans With the omicron variant sending coronavirus cases spiking across the country, the pandemic is once again upending daily life and evoking the early days of the outbreak as scientists race to understand the still-unknown implications of this new type of coronavirus.The worrying signs suddenly seem everywhere: Professional sports leagues are canceling games. Colleges are sending students home from campus. Secretary of State Antony Blinken cut short his trip to Southeast Asia. With the number of omicron cases appearing to double every two days, confirmed U.S. coronavirus infections have increased more than 50 percent in roughly two weeks, from 81,900 on Nov. 30 to 124,110 on Dec. 16, according to The Washington Post’s rolling seven-day average. After a briefing on the omicron variant from his coronavirus response team Thursday, President Biden warned that for unvaccinated Americans, “we are looking at a winter of severe illness and death.” He added: “Omicron is here. It’s going to start to spread much more rapidly at the beginning of the year, and the only real protection is to get your shots.”

As Omicron Surge Begins, Hospitals Have New Reason To Open Covid-19 Wards to Journalists The pandemic has revealed how reporting on what happens in hospitals can have a real impact on public health. Michael Dowling made an unorthodox move when the Covid-19 pandemic got underway. Dowling is the chief executive of the largest hospital network in New York, and he decided that instead of barring journalists from Northwell Health’s facilities, he would let a documentary team inside one of its hospitals.A prominent figure in the U.S. health care industry, Dowling was making a radical break from other CEOs. As people stricken with Covid-19 began to perish, most hospitals closed their doors to journalists, claiming that patient privacy had to be protected and that outsiders who weren’t medical professionals might contract the virus or get in the way of their swamped staffs. Dowling had been a top health official in New York during the AIDS epidemic and didn’t think that it would be a problem. He was right.

Daily News Digest December 15, 2021