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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!
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:
Capitalism Has Always Been a ‘Super-Sreader’
Religion Paved the Way for the Capitalist Colonization of the World!: When the missionaries came to Africa they had the Bible and we had the land. They said “Let us pray.” We closed our eyes. When we opened them we had the Bible and they had the land. ― Desmond Tutu
One firm helps companies navigate global risks and the political and procedural ins and outs of Washington. The other is an investment fund with a particular interest in military contractors. But the consulting firm, WestExec Advisors, and the investment fund, Pine Island Capital Partners, call themselves strategic partners and have featured an overlapping roster of politically connected officials — including some of the most prominent names on President-elect Joseph R. Biden Jr.’s team and others under consideration for high-ranking posts.Now the Biden team’s links to these entities are presenting the incoming administration with its first test of transparency and ethics.The two firms are examples of how former officials leverage their expertise, connections and access on behalf of corporations and other interests, without in some cases disclosing details about their work, including the names of the clients or what they are paid. — Aides’ Ties to Firms Present Biden With Early Ethics Test
The Great Lakes at Risk Collectively, the Great Lakes are the world’s largest freshwater system. They provide drinking water, food, even the fresh air we breathe. The five lakes are “arguably the continent’s most precious resource,” National Geographic writes in the magazine’s December cover story. And they’re in trouble. Toxic chemicals from agriculture, invasive species, and warmer water temperatures because of the climate crisis are throwing the lakes into an unhealthy state. Greenhouse gas emissions have created new weather patterns, causing more intense storms to blow off the lakes.To break down just one threat: fertilizer runoff from farms and manure from industrial animal farms are causing more frequent and more intense cyanobacteria outbreaks. The algae forms a green, scummy barrier on the surface, blocking oxygen from reaching the aquatic plants and animals that need it. It’s also harmful to people and pets: toxic algae outbreaks have been linked to liver damage and dog deaths. Why This Matters: The Great Lakes watershed is home to almost 40 million Americans and Canadians. Each individual human-introduced harm to the lakes is a challenge on its own that threatens the health of the people and ecosystems reliant upon these bodies of water. By Ashira Morris
The lesson of the coronavirus vaccine response is that a few billion dollars a year spent on additional basic research could prevent thousand times as much loss in death, illness, and economic destruction. At a news conference US health adviser, Anthony Fauci, highlighted the spike protein work. “We shouldn’t underestimate the value of basic biology research,” Fauci said. Exactly. But as many authors, such as Mariana Mazzacuto have shown, state funding and research has been vital to the development of such products. What better lesson can we learn from the COVID vaccine experience than that the multi-national pharma companies should be publicly owned so that research and development can be directed to meet the health and medical needs of people not the profits of these companies. And moreover, then the necessary vaccines can get to the billions in the poorest countries and circumstances rather than to just those countries and people who can afford to pay the prices set by these companies.“This is the people’s vaccine,” said corporate critic Peter Maybarduk, director of Public Citizen’s Access to Medicines program. “Federal scientists helped invent it and taxpayers are funding its development. … It should belong to humanity.” — COVID Vaccines: Calling the Shots
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!
One firm helps companies navigate global risks and the political and procedural ins and outs of Washington. The other is an investment fund with a particular interest in military contractors. But the consulting firm, WestExec Advisors, and the investment fund, Pine Island Capital Partners, call themselves strategic partners and have featured an overlapping roster of politically connected officials — including some of the most prominent names on President-elect Joseph R. Biden Jr.’s team and others under consideration for high-ranking posts.Now the Biden team’s links to these entities are presenting the incoming administration with its first test of transparency and ethics.The two firms are examples of how former officials leverage their expertise, connections and access on behalf of corporations and other interests, without in some cases disclosing details about their work, including the names of the clients or what they are paid. — Aides’ Ties to Firms Present Biden With Early Ethics Test
The ‘Lessor Evils’ First Choice: More Evil: Biden’s Claims About His Progressive Cabinet Picks Are Literally Unbelievable Leftist politicians, pundits, and people reacted with indignation at the president-elect’s comments about his selections. Progressives responded with incredulous indignation Wednesday after President-elect Joe Biden said he is considering tapping Republicans for his Cabinet while claiming that there is a “significant” progressive presence in his nascent administration. By Brett Wilkins
Supreme Court Joins Super-Spreader Trump: ‘Deliberately Distorting’ Reasoning for Limiting Large Religious Gatherings, SCOTUS Rules Against New York State’s Restrictions “Free religious exercise is one of our most treasured and jealously guarded constitutional rights,” Justice Sonia Sotomayor wrote in her dissent. “But those principles are not at stake today.” Public health experts and other critics warned that a U.S. Supreme Court ruling handed down late Wednesday night will lead to more coronavirus outbreaks and superspreader events, as the court decided that New York state cannot place limits on religious gatherings to mitigate the spread of Covid-19. “The court’s decision to put religious rights above all else, including public health, in the worst month of the worst health crisis of our lifetime is outrageous and dangerous,” wrote Jodi Hicks, president of Planned Parenthood Affiliates of California, on Twitter. By Julia Conley
The elections proved that here is a base for a new socialist party. In the US!: If There Were a Mass Party That Spoke For and Fought for the Working Class, That Party Would Win By a Landslide !:
The Unrepresented — The Anti-Corporate Majority!: New Poll Shows 68% of Americans Want Senators to Block Any Corporate Biden Nominees Progressives are calling on the president-elect to reject a “Corporate Cabinet” and instead pick “people dedicated to working in service of the general welfare.” Bolstering calls for President-elect Joe Biden to keep business insiders and industry lobbyists out of his Cabinet, new survey results reveal that 68% of Americans want members of the U.S. Senate to reject any corporate-linked nominees proposed by the incoming president. By Jessica Corbett
It’s Not Trump’s Country — Even In ‘Trump Country’ Progressive ballot initiatives passed handily across the country, even in so-called red states.Trump may have lost his bid for reelection, but many will still wonder: How has America turned so right-wing that a narcissistic, wannabe-dictator like Trump was even in the running? A vocal of the minority of the president’s supporters may be racist, xenophobic, and misogynistic. And a bunch of uber-wealthy corporate profiteers are making a killing from his rich-man’s agenda. But if you look closer, many of Trump’s rank-and-file voters aren’t such right-wingers at all. To see evidence of this, look at the multitude of overtly progressive ballot issues that won majority support on Election Day. Many were in blue states, but others came in purple states, and others deep in the so-called “Trump Country.”
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For instance, 53 percent of Arizona voters said yes to a tax surcharge on incomes above $250,000 a year, specifically to raise teacher pay and recruit more teachers.
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A whopping 78 percent of Oregon voters approved a populist proposition to put strict controls on the corrupting power of big-money corporate donations in elections.
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Over 60 percent of Floridians voted to raise the state’s minimum wage to $15 an hour, a working class advance vehemently opposed by corporate giants and right-wing groups.
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In Colorado, 57 percent voted yes on to require corporations to let employees earn paid time off for medical and family needs.
Between 53 and 69 percent of voters in six states — including in such supposedly conservative bastions as Arizona, Montana, Mississippi, and South Dakota — approved initiatives liberalizing and even legalizing marijuana and other drug use. By Jim Hightower
‘Unconscionable’: ICE Deported 33 Unaccompanied Guatemalan Children After Judge Ordered Halt to Practice “It is not out of the power of the district court, if someone could raise the matter, to order ICE to return the children that it removed on that flight,” said one legal expert. The Trump administration last week deported dozens of Guatemalan children who unlawfully entered the United States without their parents, just minutes after a federal judge ordered a stop to such expulsions, BuzzFeed News revealed on Tuesday. By Brett Wilkins
The Covid-19 Pandemic Helps Tell the True Story of Thanksgiving At the time the Pilgrims landed, the Wampanoags and their neighbors had been tested by the years they called the Great Dying. An epidemic from 1616 to 1619—which may have been smallpox (there are other theories)—had killed as many as 9 out of 10 coastal Indians. By Howard Mansfield
What Thanksgiving and the Coronavirus Pandemic Share: As Seen from Boston Perhaps more than any other day, Thanksgiving embodies the underlying embrace of endless growth and voracious consumption: normally the year’s biggest travel day, its reliance on massive amounts of fossil fuel makes the holiday a climate-changing event. By Joseph Nevins, Suren Moodliar, and Eleni Macrakis
No Victory Dance: Eight Reasons I spent the last two years of the Trump administration calling and fighting for a mass popular movement to overthrow the Trump-Pence regime not in order to install a dismal corporate-Democratic White House but (a) to enhance our chances of survival and (b) to set a precedent of popular power for an uprising against the whole damn system that created the Republifascist Party, its Inauthentic Opposition, the global pandemic, white supremacy, sexism, ecocide, Donald Trump, and Maury Povich in the first place. By Paul Street
Free-Dumb isn’t Free, We’re All Paying the PriceUnless you’ve been living in a cave, you know that the top infectious disease medical professionals are predicting the next three months to be the worst for the coronavirus pandemic, which has already crippled the nation and killed more than 250,000 Americans. Yet, clinging to the very bad advice dispensed by The Loser in the Oval Office, a huge number of Republicans, including public officials, continue to flaunt common sense precautions of social distancing, avoiding crowded indoor environs and wearing a mask in public. But free-dumb isn’t free — the costs are enormous and it’ll be innocent members of the public and future generations that pick up the tab for their idiocy. By George Ochenski
Environment:
An American Amazon? Colonizers, Slavers and Speculators in the Upper Amazon When the American gunboat “Wilmington” steamed through the Amazon in 1899 with a secret US-Bolivian treaty aimed at “Americanizing” the Acrean territory, (Bolivian at the time) the Brazilians, though outraged, were not exactly surprised. The antecedents to the “Wilmington” affair— and the revolutionary response to it, lay in a set of long-held schemes, conceptions and explorations that had unfolded during the previous half-century that reflected a US attitude about US colonies in the Amazon that Brazilians, and especially Amazonians found suspect. As far back as the 1850s, the US Confederacy had dreams for the colonization of Amazonia, and scientists sponsored by America’s top scientific institutions (Harvard museum, US Naval Observatory, the Smithsonian) floated down the Amazon in support of this agenda. In a later decade, Americans began to develop plans for a New World “Liberia”. North Americans with entrepreneurial ambitions for the region never seemed to be lacking, with many “up country” schemes emerging in the 1870 and 1880s. By the 1890s the Wallstreet investors were prepared to fund an international syndicate that would occupy some of the richest rubber forests in all of Amazonia, setting up a syndicate and colony: in short a new polity in the heart of Amazonias most valuable forests. It began before the civil war. By Susanna Hecht
Civil Rights/Black Liberation:
Glen Ford, BAR Executive Editor: Biden, the Emcee at the Billionaires’ Ball The Lords of Capital use periods of crisis to devour the less-rich and reshape the political economy to their further advantage, so that the Joe Bidens of the world jump higher and come quicker when summoned. “What ordinary people experience as disaster is manna from heaven for the Lords of Capital.” The Orange Era of racist rants will soon be over – just a few hundred mad tweets to go till January 20th, when the head flunky for the real rulers of the USA will take over the levers of government. Joe Biden made only one campaign promise that counts — to the only people that matter to corporate Democrats — when he assured the party’s rich funders that “No one’s standard of living will change, nothing would fundamentally change” under his presidency. But even as he spoke, back in June, the greatest change in wealth and power relationships in U.S. history was in full roar, as the billionaire class feasted on the Covid economy. As detailed in a November 12 report by the Institute for Policy Studies and other leftish outfits, the combined wealth of the 647 U.S. billionaires increased by almost a trillion dollars, and 33 new billionaires were created, during the same period that 22 million Americans lost their jobs , many of which will not return when the virus has receded. The Pew Research Center found that “one-in-four adults have had trouble paying their bills since the coronavirus outbreak started, a third have dipped into savings or retirement accounts to make ends meet, and about one-in-six have borrowed money from friends or family or gotten food from a food bank.”
Institute for Policy Studies: Billionaire-Owned Corporations Fail Workers During Covid Crisis A “Delinquent Dozen” companies have vastly increased fortunes for their owners and CEOs but provided inadequate protection for their workers. “Ten of the billionaire owners of seven of these Delinquent Dozen Companies have a combined wealth of $433 billion.” A new report finds that the pandemic has been a cash cow for billionaires while essential workers went underpaid, unsupported and forced to risk their health at corporations owned or operated by billionaires. As the total wealth of America’s billionaires rose by almost $1 trillion under the COVID-19 pandemic, the report, “Billionaire Wealth vs. Community Health,” looked at a “Delinquent Dozen” companies that have vastly increased fortunes for their owners and CEOs but provided inadequate protection for their workers. This week retailers are expecting a surge in revenue due to their heavy promotion of Black Friday and Cyber Monday sales. The report was published by Institute for Policy Studies (IPS), United for Respect and Bargaining for the Common Good Network
Labor:
Economy:
It’s a Billionaire’s Thanksgiving: Wealth of Richest Surges Past $1 Trillion Since Pandemic Hit The combined wealth of U.S. billionaires has grown 34 percent since March Tuesday, November 24, as the Dow crossed the 30,000 mark, the wealth of 650 U.S. billionaires approached a total of $4 trillion, with $1 trillion in growth since March 2020. Of this group, 29 billionaires have seen their wealth double since March 2020. There are 36 additional billionaires in the U.S. since March 2020. There are 47 new individuals on the list, with 11 going off the list due to death or financial decline. By Chuck Collins 
World:
Tens of Millions Of Workers to Join All-India General Strike As a direct consequence of the reaction of ruling elites to the pandemic, focused on profits and share prices, social opposition in the working class is erupting. Tens of millions of workers across India will join a one-day general strike today to protest the “pro-investor” policies of the Narendra Modi-led Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) government—austerity, privatization, the promotion of fire-at-will contract-labour jobs, and the gutting of health and safety and all other regulatory restraints on capitalist exploitation. The strike is also being fueled by mass anger over the government’s ruinous handling of the COVID-19 pandemic. Like governments around the world, Modi and his BJP have prioritized corporate profit and safeguarding the fortunes of India’s billionaires and multi-millionaires over protecting workers’ lives and and livelihoods. By Keith Jones
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
Nurse: “We Are Screaming at the Top of Our Lungs and So Few Are Listening” Uri Friedman of The Atlantic popped off a chewy little thought bomb a couple of weeks back. Surveying the national landscape under COVID, he argued that in the age of the pandemic, a new metric for “national strength” must be cultivated: the resilience of a population under duress. It is this metric, Friedman argued — not a nation’s military prowess or economic muscle — that matters the most right now. And by this metric, the United States has failed the COVID test thoroughly. By William Rivers Pitt
The Catholic Church Is Responding to Indigenous Protest With Exorcisms At least two archbishops viewed legitimate Native demands for land back as an “evil” best dealt with through exorcism. By Charles Sepulveda
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 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!
Then: POX Americana 
Quotes 0f the Day: