Daily News Digest August 11, 2022
Images of the Day:
Matt Davies: Center for Disease Control
Another Example Capitalism as a Failed System: World Capilalism Has Been Aware of the Comming Catastrophe of Global for Over 5 Decades 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:
The Military Industrial Complex are Modern Day Robber Barons: The Pentagon and the military industrial complex have been plagued by a massive amount of waste, fraud and financial mismanagement for decades. That is absolutely unacceptable,” said Sen. Bernie Sanders, I-Vt., who co-sponsored the bill with Sen. Chuck Grassley, R-Iowa, along with Sens. Ron Wyden, D-Ore., and Mike Lee, R-Utah. — The Pentagon Has Never Passed An Audit. Some Senators Want To Change That
Videos of the Day:
“Bogus Charge”: FBI Raids African People’s Socialist Party; Group Dismisses Russian Influence Claims
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!
We can have democracy in this country, or we can have great wealth concentrated in the hands of a few, but we can’t have both— Supreme Court Judge Louis D. Brandeis
Since 9/11 the US Has Increased Military Interventions to Historic Levels This recent pattern of international relations conducted largely through armed force, what Toft has termed “kinetic diplomacy,” has increasingly targeted the Middle East and Africa. America has conducted nearly 400 interventions since its founding, with more than a quarter in the last 30 years. The United States has conducted nearly 400 military interventions since 1776, according to innovative research by scholars Sidita Kushi and Monica Duffy Toft. This recent pattern of international relations conducted largely through armed force, what Toft has termed “kinetic diplomacy,” has increasingly targeted the Middle East and Africa. Half of those conflicts and other uses of force—including displays and threats of force as well as covert and other operations—occurred between 1950 and 2019, the last year covered in a new dataset, introduced by Kushi and Toft in a Journal of Conflict Resolution article published earlier this week. More than a quarter of them have taken place since the end of the Cold War.
U.S. Audacity on Brittney Griner Only a person who is willfully blind cannot see that the U.S. position on the Brittney Griner case is driven not by some compassionate concern for her welfare but rather by the extreme anti-Russia animus that has afflicted U.S. officials for more than 75 years. Yesterday, a Russian judge sentenced Griner to 9 years in jail. This was after she pled guilty to illegally bringing a small amount of cannabis into the country, in violation of Russia’s drug laws. She faced a maximum sentence of 10 years. U.S. officials are up in arms over the case. The U.S. State Department has classified Griner as “wrongfully detained.” Wrongfully detained? Doesn’t the State Department know that she pled guilty to the offense? Is the State Department claiming that her plea was coerced? If so, then why not just come out and say that, notwithstanding the fact that there is no evidence whatsoever of a coerced plea?
Pentagon Contractors in Afghanistan Pocketed $108 Billion Over 20 Years Military contracting “obscures where and how taxpayer money flows,” and “makes it difficult to know how many people are employed, injured, and killed,” said the Costs of War Project report’s author. Pentagon contractors operating in Afghanistan over the past two decades raked in nearly $108 billion—funds that “were distributed and spent with a significant lack of transparency,” according to a report published Tuesday. “These contracts show the shadowy ‘camo economy’ at work in Afghanistan,” said report author Heidi Peltier, director of programs for the Costs of War Project at Brown Univesity’s Watson Institute for International and Public Affairs.
Let’s Acknowledge Inflation Reduction Act’s Significance — And Its Inadequacy The Schumer-Manchin reconciliation bill, called the Inflation Reduction Act (IRA), is a massive piece of legislation that aims to boost the economy and fight the climate crisis. It passed the Senate on Sunday, and is expected to quickly pass the House. On the economic front, the bill will reduce the deficit, close critical tax loopholes exploited by big corporations, and create millions of new jobs over a decade through the implementation of numerous energy and climate measures. The IRA is the most important climate bill in U.S. history. Nonetheless, it is also a bill full of defects, and parts of it will actually make the climate crisis worse, says Robert Pollin, one of the world’s leading progressive economists, in this exclusive interview for Truthout. Pollin is distinguished professor of economics and codirector of the Political Economy Research Institute at the University of Massachusetts-Amherst. He is the author of numerous books, including Climate Crisis and the Global Green New Deal: The Political Economy of Saving the Planet (coauthored with Noam Chomsky), as well as of scores of green economy transition programs for U.S. states (including California, Maine, New York, Ohio, Pennsylvania and West Virginia) and different countries.
Environment: Ecocide or Ecosocialism!:
No Time for Polite Conversation “Polite conversationalists leave no mark save the scars upon the Earth that could have been prevented had they stood their ground.” — David Brower
Landmark US Climate Bill Will Do More Harm Than Good, Groups Say Bill makes concessions to the fossil fuel industry as frontline community groups call on Biden to declare climate emergency It would be the first significant climate legislation to be passed in the US, which is historically responsible for more greenhouse gas emissions than any other country. The landmark climate legislation passed by the Senate after months of wrangling and weakening by fossil-fuel friendly Democrats will lead to more harm than good, according to frontline community groups who are calling on Joe Biden to declare a climate emergency. If signed into law, the Inflation Reduction Act of 2022 (IRA) would allocate $369bn to reduce America’s greenhouse gas emissions and invest in renewable energy sources – a historic amount that scientists estimate will lead to net reductions of 40% by 2030, compared with 2005 levels. The landmark climate legislation passed by the Senate after months of wrangling and weakening by fossil-fuel friendly Democrats will lead to more harm than good, according to frontline community groups who are calling on Joe Biden to declare a climate emergency. If signed into law, the Inflation Reduction Act of 2022 (IRA) would allocate $369bn to reduce America’s greenhouse gas emissions and invest in renewable energy sources – a historic amount that scientists estimate will lead to net reductions of 40% by 2030, compared with 2005 levels.
Mass Death of Sequoias Is the Harbinger of Earth Systems Collapse We have entered an era where burned forests may not return unless we cool Earth to below the tipping point. Climate change is killing giant sequoias in numbers that portend ecological disaster unless radical action is taken to reverse the impacts of the climate crisis. Sequoias, once deemed “unburnable,” began to be widely destroyed by fire in 2015, and then in 2020 and 2021, California fires tripled in area covered. The current best count of mature sequoias killed by increased fire intensity since 2015 is more than 13,000. There are only about 75,500 mature sequoias in existence. The National Park Service defines mature sequoias as those greater than 4 feet in diameter.
Civil Rights/Black Liberation:
Labor:
Economy:
The latest inflation numbers come as the Federal Reserve appears poised to continue hiking interest rates aggressively in its bid to bring inflation down to the central bank’s 2% target, despite the growing risks of hurling the U.S. economy into a damaging recession. But economists and progressive lawmakers have stressed that interest rate hikes will likely have little to no impact on key drivers of inflation, which has been fueled by companies pushing up prices in pursuit of greater profits. In her statement Wednesday, Owens pointed to recent earnings calls in which the executives of major companies have made clear that they intend to continue pushing higher prices onto consumers even as gas prices and other operational costs fall. — To Tackle Stubborn Inflation, Experts Urge Bold Action Against ‘Corporate Profiteering’
Shadow Government Statistics Daily Update – August 10th to 11th [Posted August 10th, 1:45 p.m. ET] – Today’s July 2022 CPI-U Inflation was unchanged month-to-month, softer year-to-year, constrained by declining gasoline prices, but otherwise still at broad levels last seen 75-years ago (ShadowStats) and 41-years ago (Bureau of Labor Statistics) highs; Recently covered July 2022 Payroll Employment purportedly regained its Pre-Pandemic Peak by a minimal (albeit not statistically significant) 0.02% or 32,000 jobs; Real Second-Quarter 2022 GDP showed a second consecutive quarterly contraction, consistent with a “New Recession,” induced by the FOMC (see July 27th discussion). A renewed downturn appears to be in play, despite intensifying official obfuscation already underway. June 2022 Money Supply showed no noticeable slackening in headline money growth or anything suggestive of pending Inflation relief.
Shadow Government Statistics Alternate Inflation Charts The CPI chart on the home page reflects our estimate of inflation for today as if it were calculated the same way it was in 1990. The CPI on the Alternate Data Series tab here reflects the CPI as if it were calculated using the methodologies in place in 1980. In general terms, methodological shifts in government reporting have depressed reported inflation, moving the concept of the CPI away from being a measure of the cost of living needed to maintain a constant standard of living.
The Apple Credit Card Provided through Goldman Sachs Has Created a Living Hell According to Consumer Complaints On August 4, Goldman Sachs provided the following disclosure when it filed its quarterly report (10-Q) with the Securities and Exchange Commission: “The firm is cooperating with the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau in connection with an investigation of GS Bank USA’s credit card account management practices, including with respect to the application of refunds, crediting of nonconforming payments, billing error resolution, advertisements, and reporting to credit bureaus.” That bland statement doesn’t really do justice to the hundreds of complaints filed with the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (CFPB) by consumers using the Apple credit card that is provided by Goldman Sachs. The Apple credit card holders are alleging being put through a living hell by Goldman Sachs when fraudulent charges are made on their Apple credit card and a host of other problems.
World:
Top Economists Hail Chilean Constitution as ‘New Global Standard’ on Climate, Inequality “The world has much to learn from the exemplary process of the convention and the visionary product on which Chile will vote in its September plebiscite.” A group of world-renowned economists and social scientists published an open letter Wednesday hailing Chile’s draft constitution as a transformative document that—if granted final approval by the Chilean people on September 4—would serve as a “new global standard” on fighting the climate crisis and pervasive inequality.
Inflammable Material is Amassing Everywhere Last month, under conditions of extreme economic turmoil, the Sri Lankan masses burst into the presidential palace in Colombo, forcing hated president Gota Rajapaksa to flee and, soon after, announce his resignation. It immediately prompted the most frantic discussion amongst representatives of the ruling class, who are terrified of similar events occurring elsewhere. Last month, under conditions of extreme economic turmoil, the Sri Lankan masses burst into the presidential palace in Colombo, forcing hated president Gota Rajapaksa to flee and, soon after, announce his resignation. It immediately prompted the most frantic discussion amongst representatives of the ruling class, who are terrified of similar events occurring elsewhere.
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!
America, Land of the Dying? Alarming Study Shows US Killing Its Own Population Researchers find that the nation had become an outlier among other rich countries in mortality rates long before the pandemic – and that Americans are dying younger than their peers abroad. With its economic and military might, America is hard to beat on technological wonders, space exploration, and top-notch universities. But when it comes to health, a fundamental prerequisite to a fulfilling life, the US isn’t delivering and hasn’t been for a long time. Researchers now find that the big picture of health failings is even graver than we already knew.
Surviving America’s Industrial Manufacturing, Quality Centric Health Care System “We see the hospital as a factory and our hospitalist group as an assembly line that is in the business of manufacturing perfect discharges.”1 These words are not hyperbole. They are the exact words written by David J. Yu, MD, MBA, Medicare & DSNP Medical Director, Presbyterian Health Plan, Albuquerque NM. Yu cites the work of management guru W. Edwards Deming as a major authority for this approach to patient care. Deming’s business principles have been given much of the credit for Japan’s industrial revival after World War Two…Theory is not practice. Ever since management and business school “experts” took charge of health care in the 1970s and 1980s not only have medical costs not decreased they have skyrocketed. There was no health care crisis in the 1970s and 1980s.2 It was manufactured by the medical industrial complex composed of hospitals, insurance companies and drug companies for their own financial gain.” – Arthur H. Gale, MD, The Hospital as a Factory and the Physician as an Assembly Line Worker, Missouri Medicine, 2016
Diego Rivera Back in Town, Again Diego Rivera is back in town again. No, not in person. He died in 1957 in Mexico City at the age of 70. But his art is in San Francisco, where he painted murals in 1930 at the Stock Exchange, and again in 1940 at the Golden Gate International Exposition. Rivera’s art is at the SFMOMA, and, while it’s well worth viewing, the comments by the museum can be obtuse. Maybe look at the art, decide for yourself what you see, think and feel about it, and don’t take the interpretations as the final word. Those interpretations, unlike the art, are unsigned. Whoever wrote them didn’t know how to talk intelligently about Rivera’s radical politics and his radical way of looking at the world and representing it in murals and paintings. The museum allows that Rivera was a communist. It doesn’t hide that fact, as other museums have done in the past, though it also aims to sanitize Rivera, made him less revolutionary than he was in person and on walls and canvases and also rebuke him for what the museum staff perceives as his sexism in a painting that depicts women bathing and washing clothes in the Tehuantepec River.