Daily News Digest April 18, 2022
Humanity Will Not be Covid Free, Until the Vaccines, Like the Salk Polio Vaccine, are Free For the Whole World
Images of the Day:
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!
Videos of the Day:
In Baltimore’s Backlogged Courts, Defendants Pay For Their Own Home Detention or Risk Years in Jail Pretrial ‘E-carceration’ was expanded during the pandemic as a stop-gap solution to prevent people charged with crimes from languishing in unsafe conditions. Advocates want it to be permanent—and free.
Quotes of the Day:
There you have it: The upside of World War III. The upside of Armageddon. There’s money to be made in border disputes and superpower clashes — lots of money. — The Billion Dollar Global Market for Nuclear Weapons
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. Taxthe Rich! — They Can Afford to Pay!
Michael Brenner: American Dissent on Ukraine Is Dying in Darkness In an email with the subject line “Quittin’ Time,” Brenner recently declared that, aside from having already said his piece on Ukraine, one of the main reasons he sees for giving up on expressing his opinions on the subject is that “it is manifestly obvious that our society is not capable of conducting an honest, logical, reasonably informed discourse on matters of consequence. Instead, we experience fantasy, fabrication, fatuousness and fulmination.” He goes on to decree President Joe Biden’s alarming comments in Poland when he all but revealed that the U.S. is—and perhaps has always been—interested in a Russian regime change. On this week’s “Scheer Intelligence,” Brenner tells host Robert Scheer how the recent attacks he received—many of a personal, ad hominem nature—were some of the most vitriolic he’s ever experienced. The two discuss how many media narratives completely leave out that the eastward expansion of NATO, among other Western aggressions against Russia, played an important part in fueling the current humanitarian crisis. Corporate media’s “cartoonish” depiction of Russian president Vladimir Putin, adds Brenner, is not only misleading, but dangerous given the nuclear brinkmanship that has ensued. Listen to the full discussion between Brenner and Scheer as they continue to dissent despite living in an America that is seemingly increasingly hostile to any opinion that strays from the official line.
Making Money by ‘Lobbying’ (Buying) Congress: Ukraine and Yemen Wars Highlight US’s Role as Biggest Arms Dealer in the World Analysts say the defense industry has spent billions of dollars lobbying Congress while quietly making much more in profit by manufacturing weapons that fuel deadly conflicts in Ukraine, Yemen and across the world under federal arms sales agreements that have little effective congressional oversight. There is a dangerous “feedback loop” between major weapons manufacturers in the United States that make billions in profits from arms sales, the countries that arm themselves with these weapons, and the U.S. government, which uses arms sales as “tools” to gain economic and diplomatic leverage, according to Dan Auble, a researcher at money-in-politics tracker OpenSecrets.
Official With Oil Ties Next in Line as Biden Climate Adviser Reportedly Plans to Quit Deputy White House climate adviser Ali Zaidi, who is expected to replace Gina McCarthy if she steps down, previously did legal work for a number of fossil fuel companies According to the New York Times, White House climate adviser Gina McCarthy “has told confidants that she has been frustrated by the slow pace of climate progress.” Reuters cites one unnamed source as claiming that McCarthy—who served as head of the Environmental Protection Agency during the Obama presidency—intends to leave her position “as soon as next month,” a timeline the White House denies.
Roaming Charges: The Windfalls of War Q. What did you do in the Ukraine war, daddy? A. I invested my war-windfall oil dividends in Bitcoins and NFTs, son. — Modern wars are still run on oil for the control of it. — Gas prices are high, but nowhere near record prices in real dollars. Still the gas price hikes since Russia’s invasion of Ukraine amount to blatant war profiteering. According to a new report from Bailout Watch: In January and February, seven companies’ boards authorized their corporate treasuries to buy back and retire $24.35 billion in stock — a 15 percent increase over all of the buybacks authorized in 2021. Six of those decisions came in February, after fears of Russian aggression against Ukraine lifted stock prices. In total, the 20 companies announced $45.6 billion in stock buybacks since the start of 2021. Six oil companies have started paying additional dividends on top of their routine quarterly payments, including by implementing new “variable dividends” based on company earnings. So far in 2022, these companies have started paying out an initial $3 billion in special windfall dividends.
Ukraine as Game Board Washington cares less about Ukrainian independence and sovereignty than Russia. Its primary interest in the territory is its location right next to Russia; its other interests lie in the resources and markets a Ukraine under US influence offers. Of course, the latter also helps explain Russia’s determination not to let NATO assimilate Kyiv and the country it is the capitol of. If Washington was truly interested in the independence of the Ukrainian people, it would call for a resolution granting autonomy to the eastern Donbass region of Ukraine, where a war for that region’s secession from Ukraine has been waging since at least 2014 when the US/NATO sponsored color rebellion overthrew the elected government in Kyiv. It is that US-leaning government that Washington wants to preserve; a government first installed by US and NATO intelligence that may represent Ukrainian hopes, but certainly does not represent Ukrainian independence. Only the Ukrainian people can determine that and their voice is both muffled and mixed. Democratic socialists, unabashed capitalists looking towards the EU, families with old money stolen from the people after the dissolution of the Soviet Union, fascists whose legacy includes killing thousands of Jews and collaborating militarily with the Nazis, and millions of workers and farmers—these are the people of Ukraine. In my mind it is the last demographic which should have the greatest say in their nation’s future. However, if the rest of the world is any indication, their voice is the last to be heard.
Reflections on Ukraine and the Broke-Brain “Left” The moral hypocrisy on display in the West’s response to the Russian invasion of Ukraine is stunning. The West is quite naturally shocked and appalled about the misery criminally inflicted on Ukraine by Vladimir Putin’s incursion but has no remotely comparable concern for the misery criminally inflicted on: the people of Gaza by the United States’(US) imperial client Israel; the people of Yemen by the US-imperial client Saudi Arabia; the people of Central America and the Caribbean by the US Empire and its client regimes there; the Afghans by US-imperial invasion and sanctions; the North Africans crushed and traumatized by the US-led NATO attack on Libya; and …the list of US and US-allied oppressions around the world goes on and on. The white Ukrainians are “worthy victims” in the eyes of Western media and political culture. The nonwhite Palestinians, Africans, Central Americans, Haitians, Yemenis, and Afghans are not.
Environment —Ecosocialism or Ecocide!:
Our Food System Isn’t Ready for the Climate Crisis The world’s farms produce only a handful of varieties of bananas, avocados, coffee and other foods – leaving them more vulnerable to the climate breakdown The climate breakdown is already threatening many of our favorite foods. In Asia, rice fields are being flooded with saltwater; cyclones have wiped out vanilla crops in Madagascar; in Central America higher temperatures ripen coffee too quickly; drought in sub–Saharan Africa is withering chickpea crops; and rising ocean acidity is killing oysters and scallops in American waters. All our food systems – agriculture, forestry, fisheries and aquaculture – are buckling under the stress of rising temperatures, wildfires, droughts, and floods.
Denied Bail, Scientist Emma Smart Goes on Hunger Strike After Arrest at Climate Protest Scientist Emma Smart went on a hunger strike Thursday after she was denied bail by London authorities while awaiting a court hearing on charges of “criminal damage,” which were filed after Smart and others glued scientific papers and themselves to a U.K. government building to protest destructive climate policies. “What kind of world do we live in when scientists are forced to put themselves into positions of arrest and hunger strike to be heard?” asked Smart’s husband.
Civil Rights/Black Liberation:
Labor:
Prison and Fines in this Year’s Benefit Package To be safe monetarily in this era you really need to have what David Graeber terms a “bullshit job”–the type of job that involves performative work–the upper management and tenured positions that don’t produce a good, service, or basically anything worthwhile. What they do is patrol others. They monitor. They rationalize the extraction from others, but the one thing they don’t do is add value to the moments they inhabit. They are trashy, slick placeholders for the oligarchic interests, inhabiting a realm of parasitism that would make a tick blush. We are entering a new phase of punishment for those not fortunate enough to have one of these bullshit jobs, that of criminal convictions and absurdist penalties. Many of these types of jobs are becoming not only more poorly paid considering the rampant inflation, but also a path to criminal conviction and financial ruin. Those that were termed heroes during early covid, individuals like teachers, nurses, and others keeping people fed have now entered a new decidedly non-heroic phase. They are entering the let’s try to convict them phase. It’s not an accident that many of these professions have disproportionate numbers of women. The far-right sure loves seeing a woman being punished. Always have, always will.
Economy:
Moscow Stock Exchange Index Is Slumping Toward Its Invasion Low The Moscow Stock Exchange Index, known as MOEX, tanked 4.9 percent on Thursday to close at 2,404.73. The Index is now down 36.5 percent year-to-date. The stock exchange had shuttered stock trading after the trading session on February 25, 2022, the day after the Russian military invaded Ukraine. The Moscow Stock Exchange did not reopen for stock trading until March 24. The Russian government had previously announced on March 1 that its Finance Ministry would use up to $10.3 billion from the National Wealth Fund to prop up share prices of Russian companies by buying up shares on the exchange. Those funds would appear to be running out as the MOEX had a rough tumble on Thursday and closed near the lows of the day.
World:
Worldwide Capitalism ifs funding The Iron Heel: Biden is doing his very best to lose his suppoters and any chance for reelection: Activists Decry Biden’s ‘Reckless’ Resumption of Fossil Fuel Leases on Public Lands “Biden is choosing to stand with polluters over people at the expense of frontline communities and the future of the planet.” “This is an ugly betrayal of Joe Biden’s campaign promises and his administration’s rhetoric on environmental justice and climate action.
The Palestinian Holocost: The Silence of the Midda Monopoly is Deafing.!: Israeli Forces Accused of ‘Barbaric Premeditated Attack’ on Palestinian Worshipers More than 150 Palestinians were injured as Israeli forces stormed the Al-Aqsa Mosque in occupied East Jerusalem. Israeli forces on Friday launched a raid on the Al-Aqsa mosque compound in occupied East Jerusalem, injuring more than 150 Palestinians as they gathered to worship on the second week of Ramadan. Sheikh Omar al-Kiswani, the director of the Al-Aqsa Mosque—one of Islam’s holiest sites—told Middle East Eye that “what happened today is an attack on all peaceful worshipers.” . . . “This was a barbaric premeditated attack on worshipers,” he added.
Health, Education. and Wealfare:
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!