During This Economic Crisis, Capitalism’s Three Point Political Program: Austerity, Scapegoat Blacks, Minorities, and ‘Illegal’ Immigrants for Unemployment, and The Iron Heel.
Always Remember That Obamba Supported the Wall Street Bailout and Remember That President Obama, With a Majority Democrat Legislature, Started the United States Capitalist Austerity Program — The Race to the Botom or 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!
The Objective Prerequisites for a Socialist Revolution: The world political situation as a whole is chiefly characterized by a historical crisis of the leadership of the proletariat. . . . The world political situation as a whole is chiefly characterized by a historical crisis of the leadership of the proletariat. All talk to the effect that historical conditions have not yet “ripened” for socialism is the product of ignorance or conscious deception. The objective prerequisites for the proletarian revolution have not only “ripened”; they have begun to get somewhat rotten. Without a socialist revolution, in the next historical period at that, a catastrophe threatens the whole culture of mankind. The turn is now to the proletariat, i.e., chiefly to its revolutionary vanguard. The historical crisis of mankind is reduced to the crisis of the revolutionary leadership. Leon Trotsky, The Transitional Program
There are 150 billionaires in the UK while 14 million people live in poverty. In a fair society there would be no billionaires and no one would live in poverty. — Jeremy Corbyn
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.
WSJ: US Farmers Filing For Bankruptcy At Levels Not Seen Since Great Recession According to the USDA, the estimate for median farm income in the U.S. last year was negative $1,548. American farmers continue to suffer under shrinking markets and slumping prices, and according to a recent Wall Street Journal review, U.S. farmers are filing for Chapter 12 bankruptcy at a rate not seen since the Great Recession. Bankruptcies in three regions covering major farm states last year rose to the highest level in at least 10 years. The Seventh Circuit Court of Appeals, which includes Illinois, Indiana and Wisconsin, had double the bankruptcies in 2018 compared with 2008. In the Eighth Circuit, which includes states from North Dakota to Arkansas, bankruptcies swelled 96%. The 10th Circuit, which covers Kansas and other states, last year had 59% more bankruptcies than a decade earlier. The Journal said that U.S. Department of Agriculture data show that these states accounted for almost half of all farm products in 2017. By Jake Thomas
(This is no longer true, for, since the 1970s, the City, State, and Federal Governments also defer maintenance, as part of their austerity programs to cut government spending. Just look at the crumbling infrasture of the roads, highways, and bridges. etc… —R.S. )
In February 2014, roughly 82,000 tons of toxic coal ash spilled from a Duke Energy site into North Carolina’s Dan River. (Photo: Waterkeeper Alliance)
Civil Rights/Black Liberation:
FBI’s Disturbing Fixation On “Black Identity Extremists The FBI has come under intense criticism after a 2017 leak exposed that its counterterrorism division had invented a new, unfounded domestic terrorism category it called “black identity extremism.” Since then, legislators have pressured the bureau’s leadership to be more transparent about its investigation of black activists, and a number of civil rights groups have filed public records requests to try to better understand who exactly the FBI is investigating under that designation. Although the bureau has released hundreds of pages of documents, it continues to shield the vast majority of these records from public scrutiny. The sheer volume of documents those surveillance efforts have produced is troublesome, advocates say. The latest batch of FBI documents — obtained by the American Civil Liberties Union and the racial justice group MediaJustice and shared with The Intercept — reveals that between 2015 and 2018, the FBI dedicated considerable time and resources to opening a series of “assessments” into the activities of individuals and groups it mostly labeled “black separatist extremists.” This designation was eventually folded into the category of “black identity extremism.” Earlier this year, following an onslaught of criticism from elected officials, civil liberties advocates, and even some law enforcement groups, the FBI claimed that it had abandoned the “black identity extremism” label, substituting it for a “racially motivated violent extremism. ” Critics say that this designation conveniently obscures the fact that black supremacist violence, unlike white supremacist violence, does not actually exist. By Alice SperiPoll Tax
The New Jim Crow: Too Poor To Vote: How Alabama’s ‘New Poll Tax’ Bars Thousands Of People From Voting In Alabama, money keeps thousands of people away from the ballot box – and the state’s felon disenfranchisement policies are probably unconstitutional Randi Lynn Williams assumes she will never be able to afford to vote again. The 38-year-old resident of Dothan, Alabama, lost her right to vote in 2008, when she was convicted of fraudulent use of a credit card. She was on probation for over two years, then served a few months behind bars ending in early 2011, at which point she would have been eligible to vote in most states. In Maine and Vermont, she would have never lost that right in the first place. But in Alabama and eight other states from Nevada to Tennessee, anyone who has lost the franchise cannot regain it until they pay off any outstanding court fines, legal fees and victim restitution. In Alabama, that requirement has fostered an underclass of thousands of people who are unable to vote because they do not have enough money. By Connor Sheets
Labor:
UAW Sanctions Plant Closing, Expansion Of Temps In Deal With Ford The Ford UAW council comprised of local officials at Ford facilities gave its approval Friday to a sellout contract patterned along the lines of the General Motors agreement. Voting is scheduled to be completed by November 15.The Ford UAW council comprised of local officials at Ford facilities gave its approval Friday to a sellout contract patterned along the lines of the General Motors agreement. Voting is scheduled to be completed by November 15.While full details have not been released, what has been revealed demonstrates that it is a concessionary agreement tailored to the demands of Ford and Wall Street. This includes maintaining the two-tier wage system and giving a green light to the expanded use of temporary, part time and contract workers
Labor/Management Partnership United UAW Vice President-Ford Jimmy Settles, from left, UAW President Dennis Williams, Ford Motor Company Executive Chairman William Clay Ford, Jr., and Ford President and CEO Mark Fields pose during a ceremony to mark the opening of contract negotiations [Source: AP Photo/Paul Sancya]
Shadow Government Statistics Alternate Unemployment Charts The seasonally-adjusted SGS Alternate Unemployment Rate reflects current unemployment reporting methodology adjusted for SGS-estimated long-term discouraged workers, who were defined out of official existence in 1994. That estimate is added to the BLS estimate of U-6 unemployment, which includes short-term discouraged workers. The U-3 unemployment rate is the monthly headline number. The U-6 unemployment rate is the Bureau of Labor Statistics’ (BLS) broadest unemployment measure, including short-term discouraged and other marginally-attached workers as well as those forced to work part-time because they cannot find full-time employment.
Shadow Government Statistics Alternate Gross Domestic Product Chart Annual Growth (Year-to-Year Percent Change) in GDP is shown in the chart on the right. This is not the annualized quarterly rate of change that serves as the headline number for the series. Note: The GDP headline number refers to the most-recent quarter’s annualized quarter-to-quarter rate of change (what that quarter’s percent quarter-to-quarter change would translate into if compounded for four consecutive quarters). This can mean that the latest quarter can be reported with a positive annualized growth rate, while the actual annual rate of change is negative. Such was the case for the 3rd quarter of 2009.
Fed Loans: These Charts Hold a Big Clue to the Liquidity Squeeze on Wall Street Fed Chairman Jerome Powell had a Greenspan moment on Wednesday during his press conference. He made several Goldilocks statements about the banks that are going to come back to haunt him just as former Fed Chairman Alan Greenspan’s Alice in Wonderland remarks to Congress in the leadup to the greatest financial crash since the Great Depression have now made him appear to have been either lying to Congress or dangerously out of touch. It took just a few moments for us to pull up some charts to disprove the statements made by Powell. Powell stated the following during the Q&A portion of the press conference: “So, we monitor financial stability risks very carefully all of the time. It’s what we do since the financial crisis, as I’ve mentioned before. Currently, we don’t see large imbalances. This long expansion is notable for the lack of large financial imbalances like the ones we’ve seen certainly before the crisis happened.” If the Fed and Jerome Powell aren’t seeing large imbalances, it’s simply because they aren’t looking or they are consciously choosing to stick their heads in the sand. Above is a chart showing what has happened to the share prices of four global banks versus the Standard and Poor’s 500 since January 1, 2007. Despite more than a decade of economic recovery, these banks have lost serious ground in terms of rebuilding common equity – the buffer that would help get them through another downturn or crash. That’s a big imbalance considering that three of the banks in the graph above, Citigroup, Deutsche Bank and Morgan Stanley, are huge players in the high-risk derivatives market in the U.S. By Pam Martens and Russ MartensWorld:
Corbyn ‘Dangerous to Big Fortunes,’ Says Swiss Bank’s U.K. Chief Jeremy Corbyn’s left-wing Labour Party gaining political power in the U.K. is a serious threat to the country’s super-rich, according to a senior executive at one of Switzerland’s oldest private banks. “Corbyn is very dangerous for big fortunes,” said Heinrich Adami, who oversees Banque Pictet & Cie’s U.K. operations. Some of Pictet’s non-U.K. clients in the country already have a “Plan B” in place for moving to jurisdictions including Monaco, Italy and Portugal, he said Tuesday at a London event held by the 213-year-old firm. A Corbyn government “is one of the main issues our clients are losing sleep over.” By Benjamin Stupples
Israel Begins Cutting Palestinian Electricity In West Bank, Citing Debts Power is expected to be shut off for two hours daily in several Palestinian towns because of unpaid $485 million bill Israel’s national electric company said Sunday it has begun reducing power supplies to Palestinian areas of the West Bank due to a financial dispute. The Israel Electric Corporation said that it took the step because the Jerusalem District Electricity Co., the Palestinians’ main power distributor, has debts of roughly $485 million. Ali Hamodeh, an official with the Palestinian distributor, said power is expected to be cut for two hours daily in several Palestinian towns in the coming weeks.
OAS, EU, USA: out of Bolivia! The elections last Sunday were to elect the president but, due to the conditions under which the whole process has been carried out, they were also a repeat of the 21 February 2016 constitutional referendum. The polarisation that we are living through is because Evo Morales has won the presidential election, but lost the de facto referendum, and by a larger margin than in 2016. This is why, as we pointed out from the beginning, the current crisis can no longer be solved through the High Electoral Tribunal. This is not the same as the 2018 struggle against the Media Luna[“the Crescent” a series of provinces in the east]. The “plebeian” component of the anti-government mobilisations is very evident at present and even makes up the majority in regions of the country, such as Potosà and Chuquisaca, where unions, the Departmental Workers’ Union COD, indigenous small shopkeepers and representatives of the Q’ara Q’ara nation who were present at the mass assemblies. This is the result of the government’s policy of class collaboration: support for businessmen and multinationals becomes unbearable when the economic slowdown increases the cost of living for ordinary people and intensifies exploitation. Anti-imperialism is almost instinctive for our poor and working people, and reflects our status as a backward capitalist country. But, because of how we got to this point, the anti-imperialist speeches of a government that maintains concessions to multinationals on the lithium and the silver deposits of Potosí, Incahuasi, Tariqua, the agricultural monopoly and the concentration of lands in the East, are met with scepticism. By Lucha de Clases Bolivia
World revolution World revolution is not just an empty phrase. It accurately describes the new stage into which we are entering. If we just take the events of the past 12 months. Revolutionary upheavals broke out in France, Iran, Sudan, Algeria, Tunisia, Hong Kong and Chile, and anti-government protests have convulsed Haiti, Ecuador, Iraq and Lebanon, where the masses took to the streets and general strikes have paralysed the country. In France, the movement of the gilets jaunes took them all by surprise. Before this mass uprising, everything seemed to be going to plan for the “political Centre” in the person of Emmanuel Macron. His reforms (in reality counter-reforms) were going through smoothly. The trade union leaders were behaving responsibly (i.e., capitulating). This was rudely interrupted when the masses took to the streets of France in the best revolutionary traditions of their country, and shook the government to the core. This movement of millions of people seemed to come from nowhere, like a thunderbolt from a clear blue sky. By Alan Woods
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!
Bendib: Facebook Freedom
Quotes of the Day:
‘For-Profit Motive Does Not Work’: Khanna Backs Public Ownership of PG&E “The public utility is a much better option because you’re not having to worry about maximizing shareholder returns and you will make the safety investments that are necessary.” By Jake Johnson
Poll Tax
The New Jim Crow: Too Poor To Vote: How Alabama’s ‘New Poll Tax’ Bars Thousands Of People From Voting In Alabama, money keeps thousands of people away from the ballot box – and the state’s felon disenfranchisement policies are probably unconstitutional Randi Lynn Williams assumes she will never be able to afford to vote again. The 38-year-old resident of Dothan, Alabama, lost her right to vote in 2008, when she was convicted of fraudulent use of a credit card. She was on probation for over two years, then served a few months behind bars ending in early 2011, at which point she would have been eligible to vote in most states. In Maine and Vermont, she would have never lost that right in the first place. But in Alabama and eight other states from Nevada to Tennessee, anyone who has lost the franchise cannot regain it until they pay off any outstanding court fines, legal fees and victim restitution. In Alabama, that requirement has fostered an underclass of thousands of people who are unable to vote because they do not have enough money. By Connor Sheets
Shadow Government Statistics Alternate Unemployment Charts The seasonally-adjusted SGS Alternate Unemployment Rate reflects current unemployment reporting methodology adjusted for SGS-estimated long-term discouraged workers, who were defined out of official existence in 1994. That estimate is added to the BLS estimate of U-6 unemployment, which includes short-term discouraged workers. The U-3 unemployment rate is the monthly headline number. The U-6 unemployment rate is the Bureau of Labor Statistics’ (BLS) broadest unemployment measure, including short-term discouraged and other marginally-attached workers as well as those forced to work part-time because they cannot find full-time employment.
World:
