During This Economic Crisis, Capitalism’s Three Point Political Program: Austerity, Scapegoat Blacks, Minorities, and ‘Illegal’ Immigrants for Unemployment, and The Iron Heel.
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.
Image of the Day:
The Bombs Keep Dropping and Exploding: Spot the DifferenceQuotes of the Day:
This incident further underscores the need to put the brakes on these efforts and for Congress to investigate the agency’s data practices. The best way to avoid breaches of sensitive personal data is not to collect and retain it in the first place.” —Neema Singh Guliani, ACLU, ‘This Is a Bombshell’: Facial Recognition Data Collected by US Customs Agency Hacked
New Evidence Suggests 2018 Chemical Attack in Douma, Syria Was Staged Leaked documents from the Organization for the Prevention of Chemical Weapons (OPCW) that were analyzed by MIT Prof. Theodore Postol about the 2018 chemical attack in Douma, Syria, contradict the official UN report
U.S.:
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 Republicrats 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!
World of Influence: A Guide to Trump’s Foreign Business Interests Two years into his presidency, Donald Trump continues to make money from properties and licensing deals in nearly two dozen countries around the world, fanning the flames of concerns that the Trump administration is subject to unprecedented levels of foreign influence. Trump continued to hold more than $130 million in foreign assets in a revocable trust as his second year in office came to a close, according to OpenSecrets’ analysis of the president’s most recent annual personal financial disclosure released by the Office of Government Ethics last month. By Anna Massoglia andKarl Evers-Hillstrom
‘This Is a Bombshell’: Facial Recognition Data Collected by US Customs Agency Hacked“Even if you 100% trust the US government with your biometric information (which you shouldn’t) this is a reminder that once your face is scanned and stored in a database, it’s easily shared across government agencies, stolen by hackers, other governments, etc.” One of the key fears that critics of mass surveillance and the proliferation of facial recognition technology have warned about has been realized with new reporting Monday that a “malicious cyber attack” has resulted in photos of airport passengers and other personal data harvested by U.S. Customs and Border Patrol being stolen by unknown actors. By Jon Queally
USDA to Agribusiness — Let Us Prey: ‘Dangerous’: With Foodborne Illness On the Rise, USDA Seeking Privatization of Food Safety Inspection at Beef Plants ” The previous attempts at privatized inspection have led to weaker food safety performance.” In an apparent effort to boost profits for meat manufacturers despite potential harms to food safety, the U.S. Department of Agriculture is reportedly planning to privatize inspections of beef slaughter plants.By Julia Conley
Stern Words From Iran: U.S. Cannot ‘Expect to Stay Safe’ Iran’s foreign minister warned the U.S. on Monday that it “cannot expect to stay safe” after launching what he described as an economic war against Tehran, taking a hard-line stance amid a visit by Germany’s top diplomat seeking to defuse tensions. A stern-faced Mohammad Javad Zarif offered a series of threats over the ongoing tensions gripping the Persian Gulf. The crisis takes root in President Donald Trump’s decision over a year ago to withdraw America from Iran’s 2015 nuclear deal with world powers. Trump also reinstated tough sanctions on Iran, targeting its oil sector. By Amir Vahdat and Jon Gambrell
Environment:
Scientists Warn Summer ‘Dead Zone’ in Gulf of Mexico Could Span ‘Roughly the Size of Massachusetts‘While the near-record forecast is partly due to the “abnormally high amount of spring rainfall” in the Midwest, experts also called for agricultural reforms to address the alarming long-term trend U.S. scientists on Monday warned that because of runoff from human activities—such as urbanization and agriculture—this summer’s “dead zone” in the Gulf of Mexico is forecast to be one of the worst on record. By Jessica Corbett
Corporations Are Poisoning People in Puerto Rico With Coal Ash Community organizers in Guayama, Puerto Rico, are agitating for the closure of a coal plant operated by the Virginia-based multinational corporation AES, citing research showing that local rates of cancer and asthma have increased substantially since the plant opened in 2002. Now the fight has spread to the mainland United States: in early May, media reported that AES coal ash is now being shipped to a landfill in Osceola County, Florida. Even as AES continues to plague communities in Puerto Rico, it is now threatening to spread its poison to this Florida county with a large Puerto Rican community. By Jack Aponte
Beware of the Junk Bond (High Yield) Market On Friday markets digested the nonfarm payrolls report from the U.S. Labor Department showing a weak job growth in May of just 75,000. That news adds to a myriad of other economic data, including a slowdown in durable goods orders, that suggest a deceleration of the U.S. economy. The Atlanta Fed’s closely watched GDPNow indicator is showing a very weak 1.4 percent forecast for the second quarter of this year.The 10-year U.S. Treasury note has duly noted the deceleration in the economy and has fallen from a yield of 2.9 percent since the middle of December to 2.08 percent at Friday’s close. The yield of the U.S. Treasury has an inverse relationship to its price. That is, as the market value of the Treasury note rises, the yield declines. Thus, as the perception grows that the U.S. economy is decelerating, the value of Treasuries rises from both investor money moving out of the stock market to safe havens as well as the perception that the Federal Reserve will cut interest rates, encouraging investors to buy Treasuries now to lock in yields before they drop further. By Pam Martens and Russ Martens
Donald Trump’s Capricious Tariffs Open the Door to Corruption Tarifs may not always be bad, but Trumps’s tarifs are Donald Trump has repeatedly proclaimed his love for tariffs, even dubbing himself “Tariff Man.” While Trump clearly does not understand how tariffs work, some of the discussion in the media has been off target as well. It’s worth trying to get the basic story straight. First, it has been widely pointed out that Trump is wrong in thinking that China or other targeted countries are paying tariffs to the U.S. Treasury. To make it simple, a tariff is a tax on imports. It can be thought of as being like a tax on cigarettes or alcohol. The buyer is the one who most immediately pays the tax on Chinese or other targeted imports. However, the tax will generally not be borne entirely by the consumer. Dean Baker
Export freight containers with Mexican-produced goods are seen ready to be shipped to the U.S. in the Pantaco customs complex on June 7, 2019, in Mexico City, Mexico.
World:
Forget Russiagate, Now it’s US-gate! US Election Meddling Extends to Britain So now we have pompous Mike Pompeo, America’s current Secretary of State, on a visit to the UK, assuring a group of British Jewish leaders in a closed-door meeting that the US would work to prevent Labour leader Jeremy Corbyn from becoming prime minister if his party were to win enough votes in the next national parliamentary election to get the opportunity to try and form a new British government.By David LindorffBritain: Labour victory in Peterborough silences the cynicsThe Labour right wing were fully expecting and hoping for the party to lose a key by-election in Peterborough last week. This constituency voted strongly to leave the European Union, and the press had hyped up Nigel Farage’s right-wing Brexit Party, which everybody expected to win the seat. This would’ve given a boost to the Blairite plotters and Farage’s hard-Brexiteer outfit. But on the day, Labour defied expectations and won with an increased majority. Originally published at Socialist Appeal on 7 June. By Joe Attard
Health, Education, 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 ‘govern’, 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 the to be, a democracy and part of the democratic way. — Roland Sheppard, Let The People Vote on Healthcare!
Capital & Main: Charter Teachers Burn Out Faster Than Public School TeachersIn Los Angeles, a 2018 study comparing charter- and traditional-school teachers between 2002 and 2009, found that elementary-school charter teachers saw 35 percent higher turnover than their traditional public-school peers. And the gap is even wider at the high school level, with charter-school teachers nearly four times more likely to leave than their peers. “The conventional wisdom, which our study backs up, is that charters recruit very young teachers,” said study co-author Bruce Fuller, an education and public policy professor at the University of California, Berkeley. Fuller added that teachers are also more likely to be white in charter schools than in traditional district schools, and many received their education background through the nonprofit teacher-recruitment organization Teach for America, rather than at a university or college. By Diane Ravitch
Quotes of the Day:
Beware of the Junk Bond (High Yield) Market On Friday markets digested the nonfarm payrolls report from the U.S. Labor Department showing a weak job growth in May of just 75,000. That news adds to a myriad of other economic data, including a slowdown in durable goods orders, that suggest a deceleration of the U.S. economy. The Atlanta Fed’s closely watched GDPNow indicator is showing a very weak 1.4 percent forecast for the second quarter of this year.The 10-year U.S. Treasury note has duly noted the deceleration in the economy and has fallen from a yield of 2.9 percent since the middle of December to 2.08 percent at Friday’s close. The yield of the U.S. Treasury has an inverse relationship to its price. That is, as the market value of the Treasury note rises, the yield declines. Thus, as the perception grows that the U.S. economy is decelerating, the value of Treasuries rises from both investor money moving out of the stock market to safe havens as well as the perception that the Federal Reserve will cut interest rates, encouraging investors to buy Treasuries now to lock in yields before they drop further. By Pam Martens and Russ Martens
