During This Economic Crisis, Capitalism’s Three Point Political Program: Austerity, Scapegoat Blacks, Minorities, and ‘Illegal’ Immigrants for Unemployment, and The Iron Heel.
The Capitalist Austerity Program = It’s Become the Race to the Botom! The 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 — The 99% Will Rule! — Not the Few!
In Times of Tyranny And Injustice, When Law Oppresses the People, the Outlaw Takes His Place In History. — Robin Hood
Videos Of the Day:
Trump’s Withdrawal From Syria: Betrayal of Kurds or End to Endless War? President Trump’s intention to withdraw from Syria was met with outrage on many sides, with people calling it a betrayal of a key ally in the Syrian conflict. Kurdish expert Edmund Ghareeb says there is probably a deal between Trump and Erdogan.
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! The United States takes from the poor and gives to the Rich.
The real risk of the Trump administration’s blanket stonewalling of Congress is that it’s fundamentally altered the balance of power that our framers intended,” Schiff said in an interview Saturday. “If a president can thwart congressional oversight, that means any future president can be as corrupt as they choose and there’s no recourse. — Trump’s defiance of oversight presents new challenge to Congress’s ability to rein in the executive branch
Joe Biden’s Family Has Been Cashing in on His Career for Decades.Democrats Need to Acknowledge That. The problem for Democrats is that a review of Hunter Biden’s career shows clearly that he, along with Joe Biden’s brother James, has been trading on their family name for decades, cashing in on the implication — and sometimes the explicit argument — that giving money to a member of Joe Biden’s family wins the favor of Joe Biden. Democrats have been loath to give any credibility to the wild rantings of Trump or his bagman Rudy Giuliani, leaving them to sidestep the question of Hunter Biden’s ethics or decision-making, and how much responsibility Joe Biden deserves. Republicans, though, have no such qualms, and have made clear that smearing the Bidens as corrupt will be central to Trump’s reelection campaign. The Trump approach is utterly without shame or irony, with attacks even coming from failson Eric Trump. By Ryan GrimEnvironment:
As the Wildfires Burn — Making Profits Through Deferred Maintenance: Judge: PG&E Paid Out Stock Dividends Instead of Trimming Trees A federal judge in San Francisco ruled Tuesday that if PG&E doesn’t meet aggressive goals aimed at preventing future wildfires, the utility won’t be able to pay dividends to shareholders after it emerges from bankruptcy proceedings. At a probation hearing related to the utility’s deadly 2010 gas pipeline explosion in San Bruno, Judge William Alsup said the embattled utility hasn’t done enough to prevent wildfires through tree trimming and other maintenance work — even while its shareholders made millions. “PG&E pumped out $4.5 billion in dividends and let the tree budget wither,” Alsup said. But the judge declined to impose more sweeping changes that he’d earlier floated, including requiring PG&E to inspect its entire electrical grid. Lawyers for PG&E said that would take years to complete and be prohibitively expensive. By Raquel Maria Dillon
The UAW/GM Government Brokered Partnership Requires Secret Negotiations: UAW keeps GM contract proposal secret from workers at company’s request As the strike by nearly 50,000 GM workers slows production across the international auto industry, the UAW is withholding critical information from autoworkers in order to sabotage the strike. The Detroit Free Press reported yesterday that “General Motors submitted a new contract proposal on Monday morning,” citing anonymous sources. GM asked the UAW to keep the details “confidential,” the Free Press wrote, and the UAW obliged, keeping workers in the dark about the offer. By Eric LondonThe GM strike is a fight against the entire ruling class General Motors’ decision to double down on demands to expand temporary work, quintuple workers’ health care costs and keep wages growing below the rate of inflation marks a major offensive not only by GM against 48,000 striking autoworkers, but by all of corporate America against the US and international working class. The ruthlessness of the corporation shows that if the strike is to succeed, workers must take control out of the hands of the UAW and expand the strike. The UAW has isolated workers and weakened their position, paying them $250 in strike pay and keeping Ford and Fiat-Chrysler workers on the job to help the auto industry withstand the impact of a continued strike.
Connecting the Dots to the Budding Wall Street Crisis We’re going to do today what mainstream media has failed to do for the American people so far this year — as well as prior to the onset of the 2008 financial collapse on Wall Street. We’re going to connect the dots that strongly suggest that both the U.S. and global financial system have a real problem occurring right under the fogged lenses of Congress. Dot 1 — Freezing Customers Out of their Mutual Fund Dot 2 – Hard to Value Assets on Bank Balance Sheets. Dot 3 — A Shaky, Interconnected Mega Bank. Dot 4 – Lulling the Small Investor into Complacency with Headlines that the Stock Market Is Setting New Highs When the Reality Is the Stock Market Is Where It Was a Year Ago. Dot 5 – The Federal Reserve Starts Pumping Hundreds of Billions of Dollars into Wall Street while Pretending It’s All So Normal. By Pam Martens and Russ MartensThe US Economic System Doesn’t Just Allow Poverty — It Generates Poverty Janine Jackson: Washington Post factchecking seems to be weaponized in favor of the status quo. The paper faulted Bernie Sanders’ statement that, “Three people in this country own more wealth than the bottom half of America” as “apples to oranges,” because people in the bottom half have no wealth at all. So when the paper took up Joe Biden’s statement that “we have almost half the people in the United States in poverty,” you couldn’t be surprised that the Washington Post ruling was that he was “flat-out wrong,” three Pinocchios’ worth of wrong, even irresponsibly wrong.Data matters, certainly; it’s important to define problems accurately. But when it comes to poverty, corporate media’s narrow understanding of data doesn’t necessarily reflect the lived reality of many Americans, who feel themselves to be in crisis, even if there are indicators that suggest to others they are not. And what would it mean to take some of the energy devoted to defining poverty — including batting awayconcerns as exaggerated — and dedicate that energy to ending poverty? By Janine JacksonShadow Government Statistics Daily Update (October 8th to 10th)
September 2019 PPI Inflation Showed a Surprise Monthly Drop of 0.3% (-0.3%), With 1.4 Annual PPI at an Energy-Driven Three-Year Low
September M3 Growth Jumped to a 10-Year High
Despite Headline Unemployment at a 50-Year Low of 3.52%, Broader Unemployment Measures and Employment Stress Levels Signaled Deep Recession
Year-to-Year Payroll Growth Held at Post-Great Recession Low August Construction Spending Continued in Deepening Annual Quarterly Collapse, on Top of Downside Revisions; Pattern Last Seen at Great Recession Onset
Third-Quarter New Orders for Durable Goods Held on Track for a Second Consecutive Annual Decline
Third Estimate of Second-Quarter Gross Domestic Product Was Unrevised at 2.0%, but Growth Revised Sharply Lower for Both Gross Domestic Income and Gross National Product / Perceived U.S. Political Instability Could Threaten U.S. Dollar, Financial-Market and Economic Stability
NY Fed Daily Systemic-Liquidity Infusions Continue to Intensify Expanded Quantitative Easing and 0.50% Rate Cut in Works for October 29/30 FOMC?
World:
Iraq Protests: Death Toll Soars as Militias Target Protesters Iraqi paramilitary groups close to Iran are suspected of joining attacks on protesters in Baghdad and other cities, leading to heavy loss of life among demonstrators. Some 107 people have been killed and over 6,000 wounded in the last six days, though hospital doctors say the government is understating the true number of fatalities.“The pro-Iranian militia have each taken a sector of Baghdad and are responsible for its security,” a source, who does not want his name published, told The Independent. By Patrick Cockburn
Ecuador: worker-peasant uprising – the government flees the capitalThe movement in Ecuador against Lenín Moreno’s IMF-inspired austerity package, which began on 2 October, has reached insurrectionary proportions. The state of emergency declared last Thursday and the use of the police and the army (leaving one dead, dozens injured, and resulting in hundreds of detainees) have not stopped the movement of the workers, youth and peasants.In some provinces, government buildings have been assaulted and the powerful indigenous organisation CONAIE has declared its own “state of emergency”. Yesterday, on 7 October, faced with the arrival of the indigenous columns in the capital Quito, Lenín Moreno was forced to evacuate the presidential palace and move the site of government to Guayaquil. Workers and peasants are preparing for a general strike tomorrow, 9 October. The government is hanging by a thread. By Jorge Martin
Protesters, Indigenous People March on as Gov’t Flees Capital Leftist former President Rafael Correa stressed there is a great unrest in Ecuador because of the IMF (Austerity) agreement, arguing that “people can’t take it anymore. That is the reality.” After being accused of stoking the worst social unrest over the last 15 years in Ecuador, former President Rafael Correa on Tuesday denied he was orchestrating a coup against President Lenin Moreno from Brussels, Belgium, comments that made as Thousands of Indigenous protesters from different communities around Ecuador continued their mobilizations in the country’s two main cities Quito and Guayaquil.two main cities Quito and Guayaquil
Demonstrators take part in a protest against Ecuador’s President Lenin Moreno’s austerity measures in Quito, Ecuador, October 8, 2019. REUTERS/Carlos Garcia Rawlins
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!
Department Of Education Wasted $1 Billion On Failed Charter SchoolsBetsy Devos Breaks The Law By Continuing To Collect Debt From Students After Judge Told Her Not To In 2015, for-profit Corinthian Colleges went bankrupt after state attorney generals complained of fraud. Thousands of its former students were left in the lurch with a mountain of debt for a worthless “education.” After the company filed for bankruptcy protection, the federal department of education ruled that as many as 335,000 students might have their debts canceled, “under The Borrower Defense to Repayment program—an initiative started in 2016 to provide loan relief for students who had been defrauded by predatory schools.” This was during the Obama administration. However, when DeVos became Secretary of Education, she limited the program of loan forgiveness and began to hound many of the students who had been defrauded. The applications of some 160,000 students for loan forgiveness were shelved. DeVos was ordered by Judge Sallie Kim to stop hounding students to repay student loans that should have been forgiven. By Diane Ravitch
Quotes of the Day:
Ecuadorian Protests Intensify as President Flees Capital, Blames Venezuela
U.S.:
‘Seriously Folks This Is Actually a Constitutional Crisis’: Trump Tells Congress White House Won’t Cooperate With Impeachment Probe “There is no legal basis for Trump’s position. Hard stop.” President Donald Trump and his administration will not participate in the Congressional impeachment inquiry, the White House announced Tuesday, setting up a constitutional crisis in the conflict between two ostensibly co-equal branches of government By Eoin Higgins
Environment:
The GM strike is a fight against the entire ruling class General Motors’ decision to double down on demands to expand temporary work, quintuple workers’ health care costs and keep wages growing below the rate of inflation marks a major offensive not only by GM against 48,000 striking autoworkers, but by all of corporate America against the US and international working class. The ruthlessness of the corporation shows that if the strike is to succeed, workers must take control out of the hands of the UAW and expand the strike. The UAW has isolated workers and weakened their position, paying them $250 in strike pay and keeping Ford and Fiat-Chrysler workers on the job to help the auto industry withstand the impact of a continued strike.
Connecting the Dots to the Budding Wall Street Crisis We’re going to do today what mainstream media has failed to do for the American people so far this year — as well as prior to the onset of the 2008 financial collapse on Wall Street. We’re going to connect the dots that strongly suggest that both the U.S. and global financial system have a real problem occurring right under the fogged lenses of Congress. Dot 1 — Freezing Customers Out of their Mutual Fund Dot 2 – Hard to Value Assets on Bank Balance Sheets. Dot 3 — A Shaky, Interconnected Mega Bank. Dot 4 – Lulling the Small Investor into Complacency with Headlines that the Stock Market Is Setting New Highs When the Reality Is the Stock Market Is Where It Was a Year Ago. Dot 5 – The Federal Reserve Starts Pumping Hundreds of Billions of Dollars into Wall Street while Pretending It’s All So Normal. By Pam Martens and Russ Martens
The US Economic System Doesn’t Just Allow Poverty — It Generates Poverty Janine Jackson: Washington Post factchecking seems to be weaponized in favor of the status quo. The paper faulted Bernie Sanders’ statement that, “Three people in this country own more wealth than the bottom half of America” as “apples to oranges,” because people in the bottom half have no wealth at all. So when the paper took up Joe Biden’s statement that “we have almost half the people in the United States in poverty,” you couldn’t be surprised that the Washington Post ruling was that he was “flat-out wrong,” three Pinocchios’ worth of wrong, even irresponsibly wrong.Data matters, certainly; it’s important to define problems accurately. But when it comes to poverty, corporate media’s narrow understanding of data doesn’t necessarily reflect the lived reality of many Americans, who feel themselves to be in crisis, even if there are indicators that suggest to others they are not. And what would it mean to take some of the energy devoted to defining poverty — including batting awayconcerns as exaggerated — and dedicate that energy to ending poverty? By Janine Jackson
Shadow Government Statistics Daily Update (October 8th to 10th)
