Daily News Digest February 24, 2022
Humanity Will Not be Covid Free, Until the Vaccines are Free For the Whole World
Image of the Day:
Bendib: Define Freedom
Another Example Capitalism as a Failed System: World Capilalism Ws 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”, is Still True for Today’s World!
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!
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!
Quotes of the Day:
Vladimir Putin refers to the “genocide” in the eastern Donbas region of Ukraine. Following the coup in Ukraine in 2014 – orchestrated by Barack Obama’s “point person” in Kyiv, Victoria Nuland – the coup regime, infested with neo-Nazis, launched a campaign of terror against Russian-speaking Donbas, which accounts for a third of Ukraine’s population. Overseen by CIA director John Brennan in Kyiv, “special security units” coordinated savage attacks on the people of Donbas, who opposed the coup. Video and eyewitness reports show bussed fascist thugs burning the trade union headquarters in the city of Odessa, killing 41 people trapped inside. The police are standing by. Obama congratulated the “duly elected” coup regime for its “remarkable restraint”. In the US media the Odessa atrocity was played down as “murky” and a “tragedy” in which “nationalists” (neo-Nazis) attacked “separatists” (people collecting signatures for a referendum on a federal Ukraine). Rupert Murdoch’s Wall Street Journal damned the victims – “Deadly Ukraine Fire Likely Sparked by Rebels, Government Says”. Professor Stephen Cohen, acclaimed as America’s leading authority on Russia, wrote, “The pogrom-like burning to death of ethnic Russians and others in Odessa reawakened memories of Nazi extermination squads in Ukraine during world war two. [Today] storm-like assaults on gays, Jews, elderly ethnic Russians, and other ‘impure’ citizens are widespread throughout Kyiv-ruled Ukraine, along with torchlight marches reminiscent of those that eventually inflamed Germany in the late 1920s and 1930s … “The police and official legal authorities do virtually nothing to prevent these neo-fascist acts or to prosecute them. On the contrary, Kyiv has officially encouraged them by systematically rehabilitating and even memorialising Ukrainian collaborators with Nazi German extermination pogroms, renaming streets in their honour, building monuments to them, rewriting history to glorify them, and more.” Today, neo-Nazi Ukraine is seldom mentioned. That the British are training the Ukrainian National Guard, which includes neo-Nazis, is not news. (See Matt Kennard’s Declassified report in Consortium 15 February). The return of violent, endorsed fascism to 21st-century Europe, to quote Harold Pinter, “never happened … even while it was happening”. On 16 December, the United Nations tabled a resolution that called for “combating glorification of Nazism, neo-Nazism and other practices that contribute to fuelling contemporary forms of racism”. The only nations to vote against it were the United States and Ukraine. — John Pilger, War In Europe And The Rise Of Raw Propaganda – OpEd
Videos of the Day:
On Anniversary of Ahmaud Arbery Murder, Family Welcomes Historic Hate Crime Guilty Verdict
Us Gas Exporters Set to Benefit After Germany Halts Russian Pipeline
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 th poor and gives to the Rich. Tax the Rich! — They Can Afford to Pay!
A Historic Document: A Bill Of Rights For Working People (1976) Today we are ruled by a new tyranny. Industrial and financial barons govern by the rule of profits, denying us the basic democratic and social rights we need for “life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness:” America is in a developing crisis. The quality of life for most people is going from bad to worse. And the present system offers no hope for the better. There is no end to wars—one after another since the end of World War If. After Korea came Vietnam; now the Middle East is like a powder keg. Huge stockpiles of atomic weapons are a constant reminder of the threat of nuclear war. Pollution is destroying our environment—from the water we drink to the air we breathe. The economic crisis is worsening.
Not a Socialist in the House An observation that the so-called leftists in Congress are of the most meek kind and not actually liberal in the tradition of FDR is not hyperbole. A February 14, 2022 article in the New Yorker: “Is Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez An Insider Now?” demonstrates how lacking there is of a left analysis of the US government in the mainstream media. Those identified as leftists in government would be correctly placed just to the right of center of many post-World War II Western European republican democracies. Any government anywhere around the world was targeted by mayhem of the most lethal kind if its leaders dared to show anything even slightly left following World War II. McCarthyism here was the equivalent response domestically to the US government’s international mayhem. Banishment, execution, or losing one’s ability to earn a living were the typical remedies to radicalism here. Unionists, teachers, and professors would endure the brunt of that repression.
Environment —Ecosocialism or Ecocide!:
Capitalists Class Chooses Profits/Ecocide! Global Gas Pipeline Boom Poses Climate, Financial Disaster “The world is at an inflection point, where it can hasten the transition to renewables or further entrench itself in fossil fuels” “A slowdown in gas pipeline development in 2021 was, unfortunately, more about Covid than a recognition that gas is contributing to the climate crisis,” said report co-author Baird Langenbrunner, a research analyst at GEM, in a statement. As campaigners and scientists continue to demand keeping fossil fuels in the ground, an analysis on Tuesday revealed the incredible amount of gas development humanity has planned, despite the climate and financial risks.
Climate Change Turns Landscapes Into Tinderboxes A report published this week by the UN Environment Program says climate change and land-use change will increase the number of extreme wildfires by up to 14 per cent by 2030, 30 per cent by the end of 2050 and 50 per cent by the end of the century. Spreading like Wildfire: The Rising Threat of Extraordinary Landscape Fires finds an elevated risk even for the Arctic and other regions previously unaffected by wildfires. Wildfires disproportionately affect the world’s poorest nations. With an impact that extends for days, weeks and even years after the flames subside, they deepen social inequality and degrade environments.
Civil Rights/BlackLiberation:
Louisiana has the second-largest Black population in the country, second only to Mississippi. If the governors of Kansas and Kentucky, who have much smaller Black populations, can stand for equity and fairness, Governor Edwards can certainly do the same.There can be no protection without representation. Much of what has happened during our redistricting process seems to be heading toward litigation. I hope Louisiana’s leaders remember that we experienced a 4.8 percent drop in the white population, and demographic trends show that it will continue to decrease. My question is: When our population shifts to a white minority, will legislators think it is fair, given the decisions they have made to continue to racially gerrymander and silence the voices of voters of color? I hope Louisiana’s leaders consider that people of color represent more than 40 percent of the population, and with the current maps being considered, only receive less than 25 percent of the representation. In what scenario would anyone take less than they deserve? — Redistricting Tactics Threaten to Suppress Black Representation in Louisiana
The Day the Music Died: Malcolm X’s Assassination, Feb. 21, 1965 by Roland Sheppard (First Published by the San Francisco Bayview ) In the afternoon of Feb. 21, 1965, I went to the Audubon Ballroom to hear Malcolm X speak. I also went to sell the newspaper, The Militant, a radical newspaper that printed the truth about Malcolm X, published his speeches and publicly defended him. 2019 Update: The film, Fusion TV’s: A First Look: Who Killed Malcolm X? — A More Subtle Assassination of Malcolm X and The Man He Had Become When He Was Assassinated., shows FBI papers that William Bradely was the shotguns assassin. The fact that he was never arrested confirms what I suspected — that William Bradely was an agent of the government!
Promised Debt Relief, Some Black Farmers Instead Get Collection Notices After amassing more than $100,000 in debt over more than two decades of farming, a Georgia-based farmer named Denver got welcome news last year from the U.S. Department of Agriculture. Farmers like him would be eligible for a new debt relief program. USDA would pay off certain loans and give him a little extra for tax liabilities. Denver did not receive a payment. But almost a year later, he received another letter: A notice that USDA intends to take legal action to collect the money he owes the agency. Denver asked the Center for Public Integrity not to use his last name out of fear of retaliation. “We know that institutional discrimination is systemic within USDA,” said Tracy Lloyd McCurty, executive director of the Black Belt Justice Center. “So then the question is, how many other Black farmers around the country are experiencing this and they just don’t know who to reach out to about it?”
Labor:
The Treacherous Roll of the Labor Bureaucracy!: Exposed: The Plot Against Left-Wing President of Britain’s Largest Union We all knew that there was something extremely fishy when the leading left-winger in Unison, Paul Holmes, was simultaneously suspended by his employers and the union hierarchy. Everything pointed to a stitch-up, as faced by so many union activists. The fact that Paul’s suspensions lasted over two years seemed to confirm these suspicions. The truth is now gradually emerging, casting further light upon what has been going on behind the scenes. The more we dig, the more details we discover about a blatant and premeditated plot by the employers and others to rid themselves of this troubling thorn in their side. They must have thought that Paul Holmes would have been long gone by now – having either given up or taken retirement. But they obviously didn’t know Paul. Paul is not going anywhere, and is going to fight this clear case of victimisation to the bitter end. It is clear that there are a lot more facts to come out about this farce. These are likely to point to collusion at the highest levels between the union hierarchy and Paul’s employers. We are not going to rush into print, not just yet. But there must be a number of prominent people who are shaking in their boots at the present time. They are terrified that the s**t will hit the fan.
Economy:
VEB, the Russian Bank Sanctioned by Biden Yesterday, Has an Uncomfortable History with Jared Kushner, JPMorgan and Citigroup Yesterday, President Biden announced a roster of sanctions against Russia over its aggression against Ukraine. (A much broader set of sanctions is planned against Russia by the U.S. and its allies if there is a full-scale invasion of Ukraine by Russia, according to U.S. government officials.) One of the entities sanctioned yesterday was state-owned Russian bank Vnesheconombank (VEB). In a related statement on the sanctions by the U.S. Treasury, it describes VEB as follows: “VEB’s $53 billion asset portfolio makes it large enough to be among Russia’s top five financial institutions. VEB occupies a unique role in Russia’s financial system as the servicer of Russia’s sovereign debt, financier for exports, and a funding source for investment projects with a loan portfolio of over $20 billion. VEB finances Russia’s national economic development, including large-scale projects to develop domestic infrastructure and other industries that are critical to Russia’s generation of revenue.” The problem is that VEB has already been under U.S. sanctions since July 16, 2014 as a result of Russia’s earlier efforts to destabilize eastern Ukraine and its occupation of Crimea. Those sanctions did not work out so well.
World:
Noting that Honduras is a key transit point for drug trafficking in Central America, Loewenstein said that the country has “long been a U.S. client state” and that “this only worsened after the 2009 coup.” During that year, when President Jose Manuel Zelaya, Xiomara Castro’s husband, was ousted by a U.S.-backed coup, most of the world, including the United Nations and the European Union (EU), regarded his overthrow as illegal and unconstitutional. With the EU and most countries in the region withdrawing their ambassadors, the Obama administration stood almost alone in keeping its official representatives in Tegucigalpa. While publicly the White House stood firm that a military takeover had not occurred, according to a leaked WikiLeaks memo, a U.S. embassy cable stated: “[T]here is no doubt that the military, supreme court and national congress conspired on June 28 in what constituted an illegal and unconstitutional coup.” — As Honduras’s New President Seeks End to Narco-State, Will US Stand in Her Way?
The ‘War’ on Drugs: As Honduras’s New President Seeks End to Narco-State, Will US Stand in Her Way? The January inauguration of Xiomara Castro Sarmiento Zelaya from the Liberty and Refoundation Party was a political landmark in Honduras. Castro become the Central American country’s first female president, winning 51.12 percent of the vote, compared to her closest rival Nasry Asfura who garnered 36.93 of votes in November’s election. She has promised to convene a National Constituent Assembly to rewrite the constitution. Castro campaigned on an agenda that will strongly empower lower-income Honduran women, who have been one of the hardest-hit sectors in a country ruled through aggressive neoliberal policies for the last 12 years. Castro’s task of governing will be particularly hard given the high levels of corruption and ties to the drug trade that have been linked to Honduras’s former president, Juan Orlando Hernández. The forces that have been ruling from Tegucigalpa in recent years have not reacted well to losing power. One week before Castro’s inauguration, a fist fight broke out in Honduras National Congress as a faction of rebel lawmakers from Castro’s leftist Liberty and Refoundation Party (also commonly known as the Libre Party) proposed Jorge Cálix as head of Congress in opposition to Castro’s nominee. The problem with Cálix, according to Castro’s supporters, was that he represents the continued power and immunity of President Hernández, who critics have accused of running a narco-state.
Education, Health, 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!
Mask Mandates Lift While Uncertainty About New Subvariant BA.2 Hangs in the Air As the world crouches in anticipation of whatever fresh hell is preparing to jump from the Russia/Ukraine border, some seem to have forgotten that COVID-19 is not yet over. There have been more than 28,000 COVID deaths in the U.S. over the last two weeks, and more than 1.2 million new infections over that same span. The fact that this represents significant progress in the fight against the virus only underscores the horror of the body count. Were this pandemic a shooting war, those numbers would be bluntly unendurable