Daily News Digest August 20, 2021
Over a Hundred Years Ago. Rosa Luxemburg Raised the Slogan: Socialism or Barbarism! The Slogan for 2021 is Ecosocialism or Ecocide!!!!
Daily News Digest Archives
Images/Quote of the Day:
Let The 1% Die!
Another Example of Capitalism as a Failed System: World Capilalism Was Aware of the Danger of Cornovavirus Threat Over 5 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!
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”
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!
Videos of the Day:
“The Afghanistan Papers”: Docs Show How Bush, Obama, Trump Lied About Brutality & Corruption of War
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, who profit from war and the war budget, voted 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. Tax the Rich! — They Can Afford To Pay!
Reporter Gets Death Threats After DeSantis Press Sec. Tweets Attacks Against Him A journalist said he faced death threats after Christina Pushaw, press secretary to Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis (R), responded to an article by him saying she would put him “on blast” unless he changed its content and headline to her liking.Brendan Farrington, who writes for The Associated Press, detailed in an article published this week how DeSantis has been traveling around Florida touting a monoclonal antibody treatment, created by a company called Regeneron Pharmaceutical Inc., following huge increases in the levels of coronavirus cases and hospitalizations across the state. The treatment is deemed an effective way to treat individuals who have been diagnosed with COVID, reducing hospitalizations and deaths by a rate of around 70 percent.
Celebrate the Heroes Who Warned Us That Afghanistan Would Be a Disaster Thousands of dead Americans, tens of thousands of dead Afghans, $2 trillion down the toilet, a Taliban victory that leaves America’s international reputation in shambles. This disaster didn’t happen by itself. Political and military leaders, aided and abetted by the news media, are responsible and should be held accountable. Voters let themselves be led by the nose—and they should take a long hard look at themselves in the mirror because what they did and didn’t do caused many people to die.
Base World 750 U.S. military bases still remain around the planet. In the end, new bases only mean new wars and, as the last nearly 20 years have shown, that’s hardly a formula for success for American citizens or others around the world.
How Sexual Assaults are Treated in the Military A well-researched article in the New York Times outlines the issue of sexual assaults in the US military, the aftermath of those assaults, and what the military, the Veterans Administration, and independent outside agencies are, or aren’t doing about how sexual assaults are treated.
“‘A Poison in the System’: The Epidemic of Military Sexual Assault” (August 3, 2021) is comprehensive in its coverage of the issues related to sexual assault in the military, but it is missing the big questions that need to be raised about women, who make up the vast majority of sexual assault cases in the military, and how they are treated by the military following an assault(s), how the chain of military command treats sexual assault, and how the VA deals with veterans who have been victims of assault. Not surprising within the Times article is the revelation that some victims of sexual assault have been assaulted again, that both enlisted men, officers, and commanders are perpetrators of sexual assault, and that women, who have been assaulted and brutalized, can often expect to be brutalized and traumatized again following the actual assault by the system of rules and adjudication of their claims within the military and the VA. In May 2019, the New York Times reported that the Defense Department noted a 50% increase in sexual assaults against women over two years.
Deadly US Air War in Afghanistan Helped Taliban Gain New Recruits Investigative journalist Azmat Khan, who has reported extensively in Afghanistan, says President Joe Biden has not yet addressed the chaos unleashed by the collapse of the Afghan government. In remarks on Monday, Biden “really focused on the decision to end the war” and ignored criticism about chaos at the Kabul airport and the abandonment of thousands of Afghans who helped the U.S. over the last 20 years. “None of that was really discussed in any detail,” Khan says. She also discusses why the Afghan military fell so quickly to the Taliban, its overreliance on U.S. air power, how civilian casualties weakened support for the U.S.-backed government, and the massive profits the two-decade-long war generated for U.S. defense contractors.
Celebrate the Heroes Who Warned Us That Afghanistan Would Be a Disaster Thousands of dead Americans, tens of thousands of dead Afghans, $2 trillion down the toilet, a Taliban victory that leaves America’s international reputation in shambles. This disaster didn’t happen by itself. Political and military leaders, aided and abetted by the news media, are responsible and should be held accountable. Voters let themselves be led by the nose—and they should take a long hard look at themselves in the mirror because what they did and didn’t do caused many people to die.
Environment:
‘Resounding’ Climate Win as Judge Blocks Alaska Drilling Project Defended by Biden “We must keep Arctic oil in the ground if we want a livable planet for future generations.” “We are hopeful that the administration won’t give the fossil fuel industry another chance to carve up this irreplaceable Arctic landscape with drilling rigs, roads, and pipelines.” —Jeremy Lieb, Earthjustice
Another Global Warming Elephant in the Room: The Pentagon Military Industrial Complex! The United States is ranked #1 in global warming emitions (Ranking Global Warming Contributions by Country) but, actually, the United States has contributed far more global warming admission, if you consider the 800 U.S. military bases and wars, throughout the world. From The Military Pumps Out Staggering Quantities of Toxic Waste, Water and Air Pollution and Radiation Environmentalists are ignoring the elephant in the room … the world’s largest polluter: . . . The Pentagon is also one of the largest greenhouse gas emitters in the world … and yet has a blanket exemption from all greenhouse gas treaties.The defense department also uses open-air burn pits which send a parade of horribles into the air. Sea life is not exempt. And the military has long been is a flagrant user of chemical weapons and depleted uranium . . . which can trash ecosystems and human health. And Despite our unorthodox presidential election, America’s overseas military bases are largely taken for granted in today’s foreign policy debates. The U.S. maintains a veritable empire of military bases throughout the world— about 800 of them in more than 70 countries. Many view our bases as a symbol of our status as the dominant world power. But America’s forward-deployed military posture incurs substantial costs and disadvantages, exposing the U.S. to vulnerabilities and unintended consequences. (See:Why We Should Close America’s Overseas Military Bases)
Black Liberation/Civil Rights:
Glen Ford , BAR executive editor: The U.S. Empire’s Achilles Heel: Its Barbaric Racism More than nine years ago the late BAR publisher Glen Ford captured the essential character of the
Gerald A. Perreira: Operation Tradewinds: Collective Militarized White Supremacy and Black Neocolonialism in the Caribbean The People of the Caribbean and Latin America Must Say No to U.S. militarism and Subversion
Margaret Kimberley, BAR Editor and Senior Columnist: Afghanistan Afghanistan has been at the mercy of U.S. interventions for more than 40 years.
Marsha Coleman-Adebayo, BAR editor and columnist: Descendants Sue Montgomery County to Stop the Human Trafficking of Black Bodies: Laundering of Black Flesh for The For-Profit Market Officials in Montgomery County, Maryland have taken gentrification to a grisly conclusion as they work with a private investor to sell the Moses Macedonia African Cemetery, an early 20th centur
Jemima Pierre, Black Agenda Report Contributor: Once Again, the Vultures Circle Haiti Another earthquake in Haiti provides another opportunity for the NGO community, the Haitian oligarchy, and foreign imperialists to consolidate their profits and power.
Editors, The Black Agenda Review:MANIFESTO: The Attica Liberation Faction Manifesto of Demands and Anti-Depression Platform, 1971 Remembering the Attica prisoner demands as the 50th anniversary approaches.
Ann Garrison, BAR Contributing Editor: Tigrayans Speak Out in Support of Ethiopia and Prime Minister Abiy, not the TPLF A Tigrayan speaks in support of the Ethiopian government.
Danny Haiphong, BAR Contributing Editor: Counter Western Bias Against China by Remembering Peter Norman’s Solidarity International media engaged in Sinophobic rhetoric during the recent Olympic games in Tokyo.
Raymond Nat Turner, BAR poet-in-residence The Peoples’ Pips: Leaving on that Midnight Train to GA… BAR’s poet in residence composes a lyrical and musical tribute to Glen Ford. …He’s leaving (Leaving) On that Midnight Train To Georgia
Labor:
The Hourly Minimum Wage Should Be $26 Not only did the federal minimum wage not keep pace with productivity growth, it did not even keep pace with inflation. That may sound pretty crazy, but that’s roughly what the minimum wage would be today if it had kept pace with productivity growth since its value peaked in 1968. And, having the minimum wage track productivity growth is not a crazy idea. The national minimum wage did in fact keep pace with productivity growth for the first thirty years after a national minimum wage first came into existence in 1938.
Economy:
Meet the Two Congressmen Who Facilitated Today’s Derivatives Nightmare at Wall Street’s Mega Banks When high risk derivatives start blowing up again at Wall Street’s mega banks and tanking the U.S. economy, be sure to send your thoughts along to these two men: former Congressman Randy Hultgren (R-IL) and former Congressman Kevin Yoder (R-KS). You can reach Hultgren at the Illinois Bankers Association where he now sits as President and CEO after losing his seat in Congress in the 2018 election. Yoder…wait for it…is a registered lobbyist at Hobart Hallaway & Quayle Ventures after also losing his seat in the general election of 2018.
World:
Malta: the Assassination of Daphne Caruana and the Corruption of the Ruling Class Four years after the murder of Daphne Caruana Galizia, a journalist and blogger who led the investigation of the Panama Papers leak in Malta, a new inquiry has concluded that the state should “shoulder responsibility for her death”. The 437-page report does not directly blame the Maltese state for the orchestration of her murder, but it deems that an atmosphere of impunity was generated by the highest echelons of the government. This comes after a period of increasing instability in the country, which has been engulfed in corruption scandals, enormous levels of inequality, and utter incompetence in dealing with an increasingly dire refugee crisis.
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 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!
Lambda Variant Raises Dire Concerns About the Pandemic’s Future Trajectory People are noticing. Forbes Magazine recently ran a story with the title, “It Is Time To Pay Close Attention To The Lambda Variant Now Devastating South America.” On the other side of the equator, a Tulsa, Oklahoma ABC affiliate warned its audience that “New Lambda variant could make Oklahoma’s COVID situation worse.” Headlines regularly tout studies indicating that the variant could be able to evade vaccines, although the articles themselves always note that vaccinated individuals are much less likely to develop serious illnesses that the unvaccinated.
As Covid-19 Cases Rise, Global Task Force Lays Out How to Avert Future Pandemics “We must take actions that prevent pandemics from starting by stopping the spillover of diseases from animals to humans.” Covid-19 once again reminds us of how interconnected our ecosystem is.” — Dr. Yewande Alimi, task force. With Covid-19 cases on the rise around the world, a Harvard-led task force on Wednesday released a new report detailing how strengthening healthcare systems, investing in conservation, and improving agricultural practices can help prevent more pandemics “To manage Covid-19, we have already spent more than $6 trillion dollars on what may turn out to be the most expensive band-aids ever bought, and no matter how much we spend on vaccines, they can never fully inoculate us from future pandemics,” Dr. Aaron Bernstein said in a statement.