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Another Example Capitalism as a Failed System: World Capilalism Was Aware of the Danger of Cornovavirus Threat Over 4 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!
Laura Gray’s cartoon from the front page of The Militant August 18, 1945, Under the Banner Headline: “There Is No Peace”
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! And Now the Total Caronavirs Deaths in the United States are Over 20% of the Total Deaths in the Entire 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!
Images of the Day:
However, the passage “You tell people a lie three times, they will believe anything. You tell people what they want to hear, play to their fantasies, and then you close the deal” does not appear in Trump’s The Art of the Deal, nor did we find any record of his ever having uttered or written it elsewhere. The closest match to this thought that is expressed The Art of the Deal has to do with exaggeration, not lying: The final key to the way I promote is bravado. I play to people’s fantasies. People may not always think big themselves, but they can still get very excited by those who do. That’s why a little hyperbole never hurts. People want to believe something is the biggest and the greatest and the most spectacular. I call it truthful hyperbole. It’s an innocent form of exaggeration — and a very effective form of promotion.” — Three Times a Liar? Donald Trump did not write that if “you tell people a lie three times, they will believe anything.”
Videos of the Day:
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 the poor and gives to the Rich. Rax the Rich! — They Can Afford To Pay!
NPR and the Corporate Criminal Element Ever wonder why you rarely hear serious discussion on National Public Radio (NPR) about corporate crime and violence? For a hint as to why, pick up the most recent NPR annual report, and flip through the listing of corporate criminals and other major recidivist law violators on the corporate sponsor page. ExxonMobil (guilty plea Exxon Valdez oil spill), Lumber Liquidators (guilty plea environmental crimes), Panasonic (guilty pleas antitrust crimes) and Tyson Foods (guilty plea clean water violations). ExxonMobil, Lumber Liquidators, Panasonic, Tyson Foods — those are just some of the major corporate donors to NPR that have pled guilty to crimes. By Russell Mokhiber
“He’s Down to Steal This Thing”: Kavanaugh Parrots Trump Mail-In Ballot Lies as Supreme Court Bars Extension of Wisconsin Deadline “Kavanaugh is announcing to the world that if it will help Trump win he will join a decision to not count votes.” The U.S. Supreme Court late Monday delivered a victory for the Republican Party by barring the crucial battleground state of Wisconsin from extending its Election Day deadline for the arrival of absentee ballots amid the pandemic, with Justice Brett Kavanaugh issuing an ominous concurring opinion that echoes President Donald Trump’s false narrative on mail-in voting. By Jake Johnson
Why It’s Really Hard for Trump to Steal the Election Election Day is soon upon us, and worries abound about the fairness of the voting now underway, and the counting to come. Reasonable people believe that Donald Trump will provoke a Constitutional crisis if he loses the vote, a fear he stokes at every turn. Meanwhile, the clock ticks. Professionals and local official running the election in the fifty states carry on, moving the process forward, doing the right thing as they’re trained. To borrow from Hemingway, we’re having an election that is happening gradually, and then will happen suddenly. By John Russell
Portland Reckons With Police Attacks on Protesters After Months of Unrest Witness testimony and a video reconstruction detail deliberate violence by police against peaceful protesters. Days into the nationwide protest movement sparked by the police killing of George Floyd, the Black-led, police accountability group Don’t Shoot Portland sued the city of Portland, Oregon, over use of tear gas against protesters. The lawsuit led to a temporary restraining order prohibiting the Portland Police Bureau from using tear gas, except in narrow circumstances. But officers quickly switched gears, and in response to growing protests, they ramped up the deployment of OC spray, rubber bullets, pepper balls, flash bangs, and other impact munitions known as “nonlethal” or “less-lethal” weapons. Don’t Shoot Portland again sought and obtained a court order to limit police’s use of those weapons. Then on June 30, just four days after a federal judge had sided with protesters and issued a restraining order on the use by police of less-lethal weapons, Portland officers meeting protesters outside the local police union building again fired smoke grenades, rubber bullets, and other impact munitions into the crowd, injuring several people. They then declared the protest a riot and deployed tear gas despite the court order restricting its use. By Alice Speri
Environment:
A Beloved Jamaican Beach is Succumbing to limate Change. It Won’t be the Last Climate change is eroding beaches all over the Caribbean – even though the region contributes a tiny fraction of the emissions heating the planet Sunbathing mothers keep an anxious eye out for children enjoying horseback rides, as groups of young men engage in energetic games of beach football and cricket. Further along, a boombox blasts as the smell of fresh fish wafts across the shoreline.For years, this was the scene at the Hellshire Beach in Portmore, St Catherine, on a public holiday or weekend when Jamaicans and visitors alike would flock to one of the island’s most popular beaches. Today, however, parents no longer bring their children. The horses, along with most of the beachline, have long disappeared and the few visitors who come to Aunt Merl’s or Prendy’s on the Beach – two of the few remaining seafood restaurants left standing – are confined to the benches inside. By Christopher Serju
Civil Rights/Black Liberation:
Black Agenda Radio for Week October 26, 2020 The Rich Will Use Crisis to Further Immiserate Workers / Malcolm X was a Black Internationalist / Towards a “De-White Supremification of Amerikkka” With Margaret Kimberley and Glen Ford
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Towards a “De-White Supremification of Amerikkka”Lydia McCaskill, a masters and doctoral student a North Carolina Central University and activist firebrand in her hometown of Gastonia, proposes a process of “de-white supremification” in the US, similar to “de-Nazification” of Germany after World War Two. “The purpose would be “to remove any, every and all things that represent or signify any type of white supremacy in Amerikka,” said McCaskill, who has launched a “Stop Injustice in North Carolina Initiative.” With Margaret Kimberley and Glen Ford , Lydia McCaskill
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Malcolm X was a Black Internationalist Lydia McCaskill, a masters and doctoral student a North Carolina Central University and activist firebrand in her hometown of Gastonia, proposes a process of “de-white supremification” in the US, similar to “de-Nazification” of Germany after World War Two. “The purpose would be “to remove any, every and all things that represent or signify any type of white supremacy in Amerikka,” said McCaskill, who has launched a “Stop Injustice in North Carolina Initiative.”With Margaret Kimberley and Glen Ford , Desmond Fonseca
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The Rich Will Use Crisis to Further Immiserate Workers Over half the US workforce would be “made redundant” if the Wall Street and high-tech oligarchs are allowed to restructure the economy under cover of the Covid-19-induced crisis, said Duboisian scholar Anthony Monteiro. The rich want to bring about a “fourth industrial revolution” in which “unemployment or part-time employment and semi-employment will define what work means,” said Monteiro, an organizer with the Philadelphia Saturday Free School. Hi-tech corporations will “make trillions in profits as they dispense with labor.” With Margaret Kimberley and Glen Ford , Anthony Monteiro
Labor:
Overall, the profiteering of a sliver of the population at the expense of the majority of the working-class and small businesses has produced a sharp drop in both production and real wealth. Not since the Great Depression of the 1930s has the U.S. economy faced such a precarious situation. Women have lost jobs at a rate more than twice that of men. This is the result of the shutdown of female-dominated industries in the hospitality, education, entertainment and even some parts of the health care sector. Along with high unemployment, women now face the demands imposed by the Covid pandemic such as a lack of childcare, home schooling their children, nursing the sick and caring for the elderly. Black, Latinx and other people of color workers, many of whom are immigrants, are concentrated in the same low-paid work forces as the majority of women workers. Due to the pandemic, they are facing increased unemployment. Many of these are front-line workers in essential services such as healthcare, agricultural production in the fields and food processing in meat and poultry plants. Immigrant workers constitute a large part of the workforce in the delivery sector which has expanded with the pandemic. All these workers, employed and unemployed, face heightened rates of Covid mortality due to lack of access to decent healthcare compounded by institutional race, sex, and immigration status discrimination. The small business sector has been severely impacted by the economic crisis. Small businesses predominate in three of the industries most affected by the pandemic: accommodation and food service; healthcare and government social assistance; and retail. Federal assistance passed in March provided only short-term and minimal help to small businesses, such as guaranteeing only 8 weeks of wages to their workers. As a result, small businesses have been shutting down all around the country. Unemployment among youth has also skyrocketed since their entrance into the job market is often at low wages in the same service sectors most affected by the pandemic. Furthermore, youth as a group are carrying a double-barreled debt burden: an unprecedented $1.26 trillion dollars of student debt as well as a high level of consumer debt due to the challenge of survivaj. — The Situation in the United States
Economy:
Overall, the profiteering of a sliver of the population at the expense of the majority of the working-class and small businesses has produced a sharp drop in both production and real wealth. Not since the Great Depression of the 1930s has the U.S. economy faced such a precarious situation. Women have lost jobs at a rate more than twice that of men. This is the result of the shutdown of female-dominated industries in the hospitality, education, entertainment and even some parts of the health care sector. Along with high unemployment, women now face the demands imposed by the Covid pandemic such as a lack of childcare, home schooling their children, nursing the sick and caring for the elderly. Black, Latinx and other people of color workers, many of whom are immigrants, are concentrated in the same low-paid work forces as the majority of women workers. Due to the pandemic, they are facing increased unemployment. Many of these are front-line workers in essential services such as healthcare, agricultural production in the fields and food processing in meat and poultry plants. Immigrant workers constitute a large part of the workforce in the delivery sector which has expanded with the pandemic. All these workers, employed and unemployed, face heightened rates of Covid mortality due to lack of access to decent healthcare compounded by institutional race, sex, and immigration status discrimination. The small business sector has been severely impacted by the economic crisis. Small businesses predominate in three of the industries most affected by the pandemic: accommodation and food service; healthcare and government social assistance; and retail. Federal assistance passed in March provided only short-term and minimal help to small businesses, such as guaranteeing only 8 weeks of wages to their workers. As a result, small businesses have been shutting down all around the country. Unemployment among youth has also skyrocketed since their entrance into the job market is often at low wages in the same service sectors most affected by the pandemic. Furthermore, youth as a group are carrying a double-barreled debt burden: an unprecedented $1.26 trillion dollars of student debt as well as a high level of consumer debt due to the challenge of survivaj. — The Situation in the United States
World:
Overwhelming victory in the Chilean constitutional referendum: a blow to Piñera and the regime A resounding majority have voted “approve” in the referendum on whether to change the Chilean constitution – which has its origins in the dictatorship – with a result of 78 percent against 22 percent who voted to “reject”. This is a victory that the working class is celebrating, and feels as its own. A year after the biggest-ever march in Chile, as part of a mass uprising, the people have been through a lot: repression, abuses, murder and maimings; as well as deception and media manipulations. Especially considering the pandemic, the record turnout of 50 percent is especially significant. But what does this victory mean? By Corriente Marxista Internacional 
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 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 Healthcare
Even though the World Health Organization had, in March 2020, offered coronavirus test kits to the world and had advice on how to combat the coronavirus pendemic in March of 2020, “Effective quarantine is essential for tackling the coronavirus and this cannot happen without extensive testing for covid-19, says World Health Organization assistant director general Bruce Aylward. ‘To actually stop the virus, China] had to do rapid testing of any suspect case, immediate isolation of anyone who was a confirmed or suspected case, and then quarantine the close contacts for 14 days so that they could figure out if any of them were infected,; Aylward told New Scientistin an exclusive interview.’’’Those were the measures that stopped transmission in China, not the big travel restrictions and lockdowns.’” — WHO Expert: We Need More Testing to Beat Coronavirus The White House refused to take advantage of their information. And since then, the Trump adminstration has refuse help fom the World Health Organization, and even stop funding it! — United States Coronavirus Pandemic Crisis: Lessons to be Learned
A Chinese Vaccine Could Save American Lives The biggest cost of the U.S.-China trade war is the lack of cooperation against Covid-19. While final results are not in, data from Brazil indicate that the Sinovac vaccine likely is safe. The United Arab Emirates also is in the midst of testing the BBIBP-CorV vaccine in a Phase 3 trial, with results expected soon, just as China itself is actively testing the products. One recent paper in the medical journal The Lancet indicated a result of “promising” and also sufficiently safe. The matter is hardly settled, but at the very least the Chinese vaccines are not dropping out of contention. China is already administering those vaccines to its military and to some employees of state-owned enterprises. The U.S. typically would be more cautious. But China, with its extensive information-gathering capabilities, is effectively conducting its Stage 3 trial in public, and at an accelerated pace. Whether or not you agree with that policy, Americans in principle can benefit because it is China is taking all the risk and generating the information. Another advantage of the Chinese vaccines is that they are designed for quick production and rapid scalability. That could be helpful even if in purely biomedical terms they are not the most potent products. By Tyler Cowen
Yet Another Diatribe on Patent Monopolies and How They Are Not Talked About in Polite Company I had a short vacation last week, so my comments are both late and short. I will yet again take a shot at patent monopolies as a mechanism for financing the development of prescription drugs. This is because it is in the news, both with Purdue Pharma’s settlement in the opioid case and also with China’s moving forward in distributing a coronavirus vaccine. — Patents and Lying — Starting with the Purdue Pharma settlement, I did not see any mention anywhere of the fact that government-granted patent monopolies give companies like Purdue incentive to push their drugs. While I would not expect every article that reported on the settlement, or the opioid crisis more generally, I would expect that we would see references to this obvious point at least some of the time. It would be as though news reports on the low agricultural output in the Soviet Union never made reference to its system of central planning, which seems to be ill-suited to promoting high productivity agriculture. Again, we would not necessarily expect every news report talking about a poor harvest in the Soviet Union to give a diatribe on the failures of central planning, but we would expect that there would be occasional references to the issue. And that certainly was the case in my memory of the reporting.In case the point is not entirely clear, by raising drug prices far above the free market price, patent monopolies provide a powerful incentive for drug companies to push their drugs, even in contexts where they may not be safe or the most effective treatment for a specific condition. This is Econ 101. People respond to incentives, the high prices allowed by patent monopolies give companies large incentives to sell as many prescriptions as possible. By Dean Baker
Quotes 0f the Day: