Daily News Digest April 27, 2022

Daily News Digest Archives

Humanity Will Not be Covid Free, Until the Vaccines, Like the Salk Polio Vaccine, are Free For the Whole World!

Images of the Day:

Global Military Spending Tops $2 Trillion for First Time in History  Before The Imperialists Imposed IsraelAnother 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:

Cuban Deputy Foreign Minister on Immigration, U.S. Blockade & Why Cuba Hasn’t Denounced Russia

Quotes of the Day:

A man was on the plane with me some weeks ago and he came and talked with me and he said, “The problem, Dr. King, that I see with what you all are doing is that every time I see you and other Negroes, you’re protesting and you aren’t doing anything for yourselves.” And he went on to tell me that he was very poor at one time, and he was able to make it by doing something for himself. “Why don’t you teach your people,” he said, “to lift themselves by their own bootstraps?” And then he went on to say other groups faced disadvantages – the Irish, the Italians and he went down the line.     And I said to him that it does not help the Negro, it only deepens his frustration, upon feeling insensitive people to say to him that other ethnic groups who migrated or were immigrants to this country less than a hundred years ago or so have gotten beyond him and he came here some 344 years ago. And I went on to remind him that the Negro came to this country involuntarily in chains, while others came voluntarily. I went on to remind him that no other racial group has been a slave on American soil.     I went on to remind him that the other problem that we have faced over the years is that this society placed a stigma on the color of the Negro, on the color of his skin because he was black. Doors were closed to him that were not closed to other groups.     And I finally said to him that it’s a nice thing to say to people that you ought to lift yourself by your own bootstraps, but it is a cruel jest to say to a bootless man that he ought to lift himself by his own bootstraps. And the fact is that millions of Negroes, as a result of centuries of denial and neglect, have been left bootless. And they find themselves impoverished aliens in this affluent society. And there is a great deal that the society can and must do if the Negro is to gain the economic security that he needs. — The Other America Speech Stanford UniversityApril 14, 1967

 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!

US Secretary of Defense Admits the Real Strategic Goal in Ukraine: Quagmire for Russia The strategic goal of “weakening Russia” is playing with fire—even nuclear fire—and to allow the war to go on indefinitely, or to escalate, at the expense of the Ukrainian people is cruel, dangerous, and unacceptable.

Once Trump’s Asylum Ban Became Biden’s, Corporate Media Outrage Faded Away Under Trump, Title 42 was a pretext to implement “draconian” immigration policies, but under Biden it’s a “management tool” to deal with a legitimate problem.

Environment —Ecosocialism or Ecocide!:

‘We Want it Back to What it Was’: The US Village Blighted by Toxic Waste For a visitor to this rural part of eastern Nebraska, the crisp air, blue skies and stretch of seemingly endless farm fields appear as unspoiled landscape. But for the people who live here, there is no denying this is an environmental disaster that researchers fear may affect generations to come.It has been just over a year since state regulators stepped in to close down the AltEn LLC ethanol plant on the outskirts of Mead, Nebraska, a small village of about 500 people near Omaha. The plant was found to be the source of huge quantities of toxic, pesticide-laced waste, which was stored in lagoons and piled into hills of a putrid lime-green mash. That waste then was accidentally spilled and intentionally spread throughout the area, including on to farm fields and into waterways that provide drinking water  for people and wildlife several miles downstream.  

One Dead and Thousands Forced to Flee As Wildfires Sweep Across US One person killed in Nebraska, while hundreds of structures damaged in New Mexico, where thousands forced to leave Wind-driven wildfires sweeping through parts of Nebraska contributed to the death of one person and injured at least three firefighters, authorities said Sunday. 

War Profiteers: As Pump Prices Soared, Big Oil CEOs Enjoyed Windfall Pay Days Bonuses alone for executives at 28 of the top oil and gas companies combined topped $31 million combined. Research out Monday reveals that CEOs from 28 of the top oil and gas companies enjoyed a combined $394 million in total compensation in 2021, including through “eye-popping” bonuses that together topped $31 million.The analysis from Accountable.US, first reported by The Guardian, comes as inflation-hit consumers see gas prices soaring while fossil fuel companies stand accused of making “gobs of money” off the global energy crisis triggered by Russia’s invasion of Ukraine.

Civil Rights/Black Liberation:

No-Knock Raids Rip a Hole in the 4th Amendment “We’re all potential victims.” —Peter Christ, retired police officer

It’s the middle of the night. Your neighborhood is in darkness. Your household is asleep. Suddenly, you’re awakened by a loud noise.     Someone or an army of someones has crashed through your front door.     The intruders are in your home.     Your heart begins racing. Your stomach is tied in knots. The adrenaline is pumping through you.

Labor:

Economy:

Shadow Government Statistics O p e n i n g H e a d li n e s – A sampling of the most recent Inflation, Economic, Federal Reserve (Monetary) And Political Headlines:

• Monetary, Economic, Inflation and Political circumstances all continue to showintensifying systemic instabilities and meaningful deterioration.
• Economy: The 2022 Retail Sales annual benchmark revisions were minimal; the worst Holiday Shopping Season since the Great Recession remained in place for November/ December 2021 Real Retail Sale
• Reporting of Nominal (not adjusted for inflation) economic data becomes increasingly bloated and distorted in times of accelerating inflation, consider: Net of surging CPI-U consumer inflation, March 2022 Real Retail Sales declined by a benchmark-revised 0.5% (-0.5%) [previously 0.7% (-0.7%)] month-to-month and by a benchmarked 1.8% (-1.8%) [previously 1.5% (-1.5%)] year-to-year, yet the headline Nominal March Retail Sales gained monthly by a revised 0.7% [previously 0.5%] and annually by 6.1% [previously 6.9%], reflecting nothing more than ongoing massive increases in price levels.
• Declining Homes Sales — The National Association of Realtors® reported March 2022 Existing-Home Sales declined month-to-month by a statistically meaningful 2.7% (-2.7%), following a downwardly revised monthly drop of 8.6% (-8.6%). –- (March 23): The Census Bureau reported February 2022 New-Home Sales declined by 2.0% (-2.0%) in the month, following a downwardly revised 8.3% (-8.3%) drop in January, where, as usual, the changes were not statistically significant.
• In the context of slowing Home Sales, March 2022 Housing Starts notched 0.3% higher in the month, on top of an upside revision to February activity, with Single-Unit Housing Starts down by 1.7% (-1.7%) in the month (not statistically meaningful at the 90% confidence interval), while fully counted Building Permits notched higher by 0.4% in March (also on top of an upside revision to February), with Single-Unit Building Permits down month-to-month by 4.8% (-4.8%).
• Headline March 2022 Industrial Production and its dominant Manufacturing Sector both gained 0.9% in the month to all-time high levels, with both series recovering their prior August 2018 historic peaks for the first time, each by 0.4%; running stronger, however, than related activity in better-quality Payroll Employment and Capacity Utilization numbers.
• University of Michigan’s early-April surveying showed a “surprising” jump of 10.6% in the Preliminary Results for the April 2022 Index of Consumer Sentiment, which still held “below January’s reading and lower than in any prior month in the past decade” (go to http://www.sca.isr.umich.edu for details).
• Not seasonally adjusted, the March 2022 CASS® FREIGHT INDEX gained 2.7% in the month, slowing from an 8.6% gain in February, with unadjusted year-to-year growth slowing to 0.6% from 3.6% in February; seasonally adjusted, however, that March gain turned into a month-to-month contraction of 1.0% (-1.0%), following a 3.6% monthly gain in February.
• S. Government 2021 Financial Statements show a deepening, record deficit net worth of $123.5 trillion in Fiscal Year 2021 (year-ended September 30), widening from the prior record $113.8 trillion negative net worth in 2020 [See the discussion on U.S. GOVERNMENT FISCAL CONDITIONS at the end of the SYSTEMIC RISK Section].
• Although the U.S. Real Merchandise Trade Deficit narrowed slightly in February 2022, on top a of a minimally narrowed revision to January, the unfolding First-Quarter 2022 deficit held on a solid track for the deepest quarterly trade shortfall in U.S. history.
• Despite a softer-than-consensus gain of 431,000 jobs in March 2022, on top of upside revisions to seasonally adjusted January and February activity, Payroll Employment still held shy by 1.04% (-1.04%) [by 1.6 (-1.6) million jobs] of ever recovering its February 2020 Pre-Pandemic Peak.

Markets Climb a Wall of Worry but a War, a Pandemic, Soaring Inflation and Opaque Megabanks Spell Big Trouble  When the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics released its Consumer Price Index (CPI) report on April 12, it showed that inflation had surged to the highest rate in 40 years, reaching 8.5 percent in March compared to the same month a year ago. The CPI report for February had shown a year-over-year increase of 7.9 percent – meaning that inflation had surged further in March and the Fed’s target of 2 percent inflation was getting further out of reach.     While inflation has soared, supply bottlenecks from the pandemic and now Russia’s war in Ukraine are pushing down Gross Domestic Product (GDP) expectations. The highly-respected GDPNow model from the folks at the Atlanta Fed puts first quarter GDP in the U.S. at a tepid 1.3 percent. (That figure will be updated later today following the release of new home sales for March at 10 a.m.)

World:

Global Capitalism Has Become Dependent on War-Making to Sustain Itself The Ukraine crisis is not the cause but a consequence of the general crisis of global capitalism. The Russian invasion of Ukraine has sparked fierce political debate on the geopolitical consequences of the conflict. But less noticed and equally as important, the war has paved the way for a more sweeping militarization of what was already a global war economy mired in deep political and economic crisis. Geopolitical tensions and international conflicts may be tragic for those caught up in conflagrations such as in Ukraine — but advantageous for those seeking to legitimize expanding military and security budgets and open up new opportunities for capitalist profit-making in the face of chronic stagnation and social discontent.     In late March, the Biden administration, citing the Russian invasion, called for a $31 billion increase in the Pentagon budget over the previous year and on top of an emergency appropriation weeks earlier of $14 billion for Ukraine’s defense. Prior to the invasion, in late 2021, the U.S. government approved a nearly $800 billion military budget, even as, in the same year, it ended the war in Afghanistan. Almost overnight following the Russian invasion, the U.S., European Union, and other governments around the world allocated billions of dollars in additional military spending and sent streams of military hardware and private military contractors into Ukraine.     Shares of military and security firms surged in the wake of the invasion. Two weeks into the conflict, shares of Raytheon were up 8 percent, General Dynamics up 12 percent, Lockheed Martin up 18 percent and Northrop Grumman up 22 percent, while war stocks in Europe, India, and elsewhere experienced similar surges in expectation of an exponential rise in global military spending. Russian President Vladimir Putin, in the words of the managing director of AeroDynamic Advisory, a Pentagon contractor, is “unquestionably the best F-35 salesman of all time,” in reference to a spike in U.S. government funding for the Lockheed Martin jet fighter. Said one consultant to Boeing, General Dynamics, Lockheed Martin and Raytheon Technologies: “For the defense industry, happy days are here again. When the defense budget rises it tends to lift all boats in the industry.”

France: What Do The Presidential Election Results Really Reveal?  What a show we had yesterday as the exit polls indicated that Macron had won the presidential elections. He walked through the streets of Paris hand in hand with his wife, and accompanied by a group of young people, apparently an indication of the generations that will support him in the future. And in his speech, he announced that he was no longer “le candidat” but the “President of all the French”. How hollow all this must sound to the huge majority of French workers and youth who did not vote for him and hate him with a passion. 

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!  

Yes, Face Masks Are Still Needed on Airplanes When the airplane engines are turned off, such as during boarding, deplaning and deicing, transmission risk rises. This is when face masks provide the greatest risk-reduction benefits.