Daily News Digest January 20, 2020

Today is Martin Luther King Day

The Other American Speech By Martin Luther King Jr. (My introduction, For the San Francisco Bayviews article:  The Other American Speach )

Jan. 15 birthday of the Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. will be celebrated this year as America’s only ‘Black holiday’ Monday, Jan. 20. On this day, the ruling class and their mass media always feature his 1963 ‘I Have a Dream’ speech, as if he never evolved beyond that point.  “During his lifetime, as a leader of civil rights movement, King was constantly hounded by the government with the most savage malice, the most furious hatred and the most unscrupulous campaigns of lies and slander. Since his death, an effort has been made to convert him into a harmless icon – to canonize him. “Below is one of his last speeches, given 40 years ago and one year before his assassination, at Stanford University in April 1967 and titled the ‘The Other America.’ Here he speaks not of a dream but of the nightmarish economic condition of Black people. When he talks about ‘work-starved men searching for jobs that do not exist’ and living on a ‘lonely island of poverty surrounded by an ocean of material prosperity,’ the speech remains timely in today’s world.” – Roland Sheppard

Daily News Digest Archives

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 banner headline: “There Is No Peace” Could Still Be Published Today!

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

Always Remember: That Obama 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 , thet the 99% Will Rule, Not the Few! 

Images of the Day:

The Problem of Racism

Quotes of the Day:

More than forty years later, civil rights advocacy is stuck in a model of advocacy King was determined to leave behind. Rather than challenging the basic structure of society and doing the hard work of movement building —the work to which King was still committed at the end of his life — we have been tempted too often by the opportunity for people of color to be included within the political and economic structure as-is, even if it means alienating those who are necessary allies. We have allowed ourselves to be willfully blind to the emergence of a new caste system—a system of social excommunication that has denied millions of African Americans basic human dignity. The significance of this cannot be overstated, for the failure to acknowledge the humanity and dignity of all persons has lurked at the root of every racial caste system. This common thread explains why, in the 1780s, the British Society for the Abolition of Slavery adopted as its official seal a woodcut of a kneeling slave above a banner that read, “AM I NOT A MAN AND A BROTHER?” That symbol was followed more than a hundred years later by signs worn around the necks of black sanitation workers during the Poor People’s Campaign answering the slave’s question with the simple statement, I AM A MAN. — Chapter 5, The New Jim Crow: Obama—the Promise and the Peril By Michelle Alexander

What was this smoke and mirrors all about? Just imagine how much more public anger there would be against Wall Street’s fat cats and their bailout kingpins at the Federal Reserve if the media had reported the real unemployment rate along with the fact that Wall Street banks and their foreign derivative counterparties had received a secret $29 trillion bailout from the Fed, allowing them to pay billions in bonuses to their miscreant bosses, while average Americans’ lives and dreams were shattered. —Here’s How the Fake Unemployment Number Was Created to Subdue Anger Against Wall Street

Videos Of the Day:

Phase One of US-China Trade Deal Is Mostly Symbolic

Turkey Cuts Deal with Russia, Intensifying the War for Gas in Libya

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! The United States takes from the poor and gives to the Rich.

The Business Party Syndicate Each year Leftist Democrats, Socialists and Radicals are asked to hold their noses and vote for the lesser-of-two-evils. This is a false choice because we live in a rigged One-Party state – a plutocracy run by the Business Party, a Syndicate with Democratic and Republican wings. “Syndicate” is the proper word for our corrupt One-Party system because there is no real choice – only the appearance of choice. We are onlookers cheering for the villain or the babyface in a pro-wrestling spectacle we call elections orchestrated by a complicit mass media. We must open our eyes to this facade for “the first revolutionary act is to call things by their true name.” (Rosa Luxemburg)  At both the state and national levels, the candidates offered up by the Syndicate are corporate-funded purveyors of empire whose primary loyalty is to the investor class that funds them. In fact, the only requirement the Syndicate makes on their candidates is that they are capable of raising massive amounts of money from corporations, or the corporate rich, to ensure they have the blessing of the investor class. There are no requirements on morality, voting record, or policy positions within the Business Party Syndicate. Mark Twain was correct when he wrote: “It could probably be shown by facts and figures that there is no distinctly native criminal class except Congress.” This corruption is as true today as it was 150 years ago. And the higher that one is elevated in the party wings of the Syndicate, the more fundraising dominates their time and focus. It is this process that transforms politicians (who might initially believe they can honestly represent the public) into marketers whose role is to convince the public that there is no alternative to the capitalist system or the policies written by corporate-funded think tanks. “Corruption is not an anomaly but an essential element in the functioning of managed democracy.” (Sheldon Wolin) By James Mcfadden

I Made a Lot of Bankers Look Very Good,’ Brags Trump as Wall Street Titans Enjoy $32 Billion Tax Bonanza  “We need to break up these big banks and tax Wall Street to cancel all student debt. That’s exactly what #PresidentSanders will do.” —Warren Gunnels, Sanders campaign senior advisor  “I made a lot of bankers look very good,” President Donald Trump boasted this week just before it was reported Thursday that the nation’s six largest banks alone have received an estimated $32 billion windfall thanks to Republican tax cuts.The figures were generated by Bloomberg Newsafter reviewing the 2019 profits of JPMorgan Chase, Bank of America, Citigroup, Wells Fargo, Goldman Sachs, and Morgan Stanley. By Jon Queally

Trump’s Racist Demagoguery Only Works, Says Sanders, Because Too Many Americans Feel Establishment Has ‘Failed Them’“Bernie Sanders teaches Demagoguery and Fascism 101 to a very skeptical New York Times editorial board.”  In an interview with the New York Times for the newspaper’s 2020 Democratic presidential candidate endorsement, Sen. Bernie Sanders spoke about how President Donald Trump has weaponized racism to appeal to many Americans who sense that the political and media establishments have abandoned them in 2016 to win support.  After Sanders spoke at length about Trump’s efforts to “divide the American people up” and “demonize” undocumented   immigrants, Times editorial board member Brent Staples asked Sanders why he thinks the president has the support of more than 40% of the public and questioned the senator’s assertion that political and economic inequality—not just Trump—must be defeated. By Julia Conley

Trump Is the Third President to Lie About Afghan War Success The Bush, Obama and Trump administrations all routinely lied to the American people about the success of the 18-year war in Afghanistan. They exaggerated progress and inflated statistics to create an illusion that that the war was winnable. But after the deaths of 157,000 people at a cost of $2 trillion, corruption is rampant and the carnage continues. “There’s an odor of mendacity throughout the Afghanistan issue … mendacity and hubris,” John Sopko, special inspector general for Afghanistan reconstruction, told the House Foreign Affairs Committeeduring his January 15 testimony. In the last few years, Sopko said, the Trump administration has been “lying by omissions,” classifying “everything that is bad news,” including Afghan troop casualties and calculation of Taliban strength. By Marjorie CohnEnvironment:

Black Liberation/ Civil Rights:A Selection Of Martin Luther King Quotes To Show What He Stood  For At The End Of His Life:

It’s not merely a struggle against extremist behavior toward Negroes. And I’m convinced that many of the very people who supported us in the struggle in the South are not willing to go all the way now. I came to see this in a very difficult and painful way in Chicago the last year where I’ve lived and worked. Some of the people who came quickly to march with us in Selma and Birmingham weren’t active around Chicago.  And I came to see that so many people who supported morally and even financially what we were doing in Birmingham and Selma, were really outraged against the extremist behavior of Bull Connor and Jim Clark toward Negroes, rather than believing in genuine equality for Negroes.  And I think this is what we’ve got to see now, and this is what makes the struggle much more difficult.  And so as a result of all of this, we see many problems existing today that are growing more difficult. It’s something that is often overlooked, but Negroes generally live in worse slums today than 20 or 25 years ago.  In the North, schools are more segregated today than they were in 1954 when the Supreme Court’s decision on desegregation was rendered. Economically, the Negro is worse off today than he was 15 and 20 years ago.  And so the unemployment rate among whites at one time was about the same as the unemployment rate among Negroes.  But today the unemployment rate among Negroes is twice that of whites. And the average income of the Negro is today 50 percent less than Whites. — MartinLuther King Jr. Speech: The Other America

Now about injunctions: We have an injunction and we’re going into court tomorrow morning to fight this illegal, unconstitutional injunction. All we say to America is, “Be true to what you said on paper.” If I lived in China or even Russia, or any totalitarian country, maybe I could understand some of these illegal injunctions. Maybe I could understand the denial of certain basic First Amendment privileges, because they hadn’t committed themselves to that over there. But somewhere I read of the freedom of assembly. Somewhere I read of the freedom of speech. Somewhere I read of the freedom of press. Somewhere I read that the greatness of America is the right to protest for right. And so just as I say, we aren’t going to let dogs or water hoses turn us around, we aren’t going to let any injunction turn us around. We are going on. — Martin Luther King’s Last Speech, April 3, 1968, I’ve Been to The Mountaintop

Millions Expected to Join Global Women’s March on Jan. 18 to ‘Act as a Catalyst for Political and Social Change’ “The subversion of women’s human rights is extremely detrimental to the significant progress women have made over hundreds of years in their quest for social justice and equality.” —ma Mishra-Newbery, Women’s March Global “Together, we will inspire change and launch women and their allies into a new decade of activism.” By Jessica CorbettLabor:

Economy:

IMF Head Gives ‘Stark Message’ of Looming Inequality-Fueled Global Financial Disaster Further fueling the potential threat are “climate-related shocks.” Increasing inequality and the climate crisis are pushing the world towards another financial disaster, the International Monetary Fund chief said Friday—a warning, according to one anti-poverty group, that should be taken seriously. IMF managing director Kristalina Georgieva made the remarks in a speech at the Peterson Institute for International Economics in Washington, D.C. A theme of “increasing uncertainty,” some of which is driven by inequality, has already emerged from the new year, Georgieva said. The trend of rising inequality within countries, she said, “is reminiscent of the early part of the 20th century, when the twin forces of technology and integration led to the first Gilded Age, the Roaring Twenties, and, ultimately, financial disaster.” By Andrea Germanos

Here’s How the Fake Unemployment Number Was Created to Subdue Anger Against Wall Street On February 3, 2015, Jim Clifton, the Chairman and CEO of the iconic 85-year old polling company, Gallup, penned an article for his company in which he called the reported unemployment number issued by the U.S. Government “The Big Lie.” Wall Street On Parade has now discovered that a speech by former Fed Chairman Ben Bernanke and a statement made by the current Fed Chairman Jerome (Jay) Powell,  support the view that today’s reported unemployment rate of 3.5 percent is statistically impossible based on a long-held economic model known as “Okun’s Law.”Named after economist Arthur Okun, the economic law works like this according to a speech given by the Fed Chair Ben Bernanke in March 2012: “ Okun noted that, because of ongoing increases in the size of the labor force and in the level of productivity, real GDP growth close to the rate of growth of its potential is normally required just to hold the unemployment rate steady.  To reduce the unemployment rate, therefore, the economy must grow at a pace above its potential. More specifically, according to currently accepted versions of Okun’s law, to achieve a 1 percentage point decline in the unemployment rate in the course of a year, real GDP must grow approximately 2 percentage points faster than the rate of growth of potential GDP over that period. So, for illustration, if the potential rate of GDP growth is 2 percent, Okun’s law says that GDP must grow at about a 4 percent rate for one year to achieve a 1 percentage point reduction in the rate of unemployment.” by Pam Martens and Russ Martens

The ‘Big Lie’ About Real Wages Has Been Going On For Decades:

  Shadow Government Statistic Graph 18: Real Average Weekly Earnings – Production and Nonsupervisory Employees

World:

Education, Health, Science, 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 ‘governn’, 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! 

Did You Know?

How One Utah Community Fought the Fracking Industry — and Won Kanab, a small Utah town that’s home to the famous Best Friends Animal Society, took an unconventional path to face down a frac sand mine that threatened the region’s aquifer.  A sign at the north end of Kanab, Utah, proclaims the town of 4,300 to be “The Greatest Earth on Show.” It’s a rare case of truth in advertising. Kanab sits just seven miles north of the Arizona state line, at the crossroads of some of the Southwest’s most beautiful places. In every direction a geologic wonderland awaits. To the north is Zion National Park with its breathtaking valley of 2,000-foot-tall rust and white sandstone cliffs. The sweeping expanse of Grand Staircase-Escalante National Monument stretches to the east of town, and just to the south you’ll find the Grand Canyon’s North Rim. By Tara Lohan