Daily News Digest August 26, 2022

Daily News Digest Archives 

Images of the Day:

PFAS PandemicPolluters Could Pay Billions In Fines For PFAS Cleanup Under New Biden Plan

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!

Capitalism as a Failed  System: World Capilalism Has Been Aware of the Comming Catastrophe of Global Warming  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!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:

PFAS: Per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances (PFAS) are a class of chemicals that have been used since the 1950s in firefighting foams and many consumer products that includes firefighting foams, stain- and water-resistant fabrics, nonstick cookware and food packaging. PFAS chemicals are highly stable, so when they are released, people can be exposed through air, dust, food, and water resulting in widespread exposure. Many types of PFAS are known to have adverse health effects on humans including increased cholesterol levels, changes in liver enzymes, decreased vaccine response in children, increased risk of high blood pressure in pregnant women, and decreased birth weight. Epidemiologic studies also suggest a link between exposure to certain types of PFAS and increased rates of kidney, prostate, and testicular cancer.

Unintentional PFAS in products: A “jungle” of contamination From manufacturing to packaging, PFAS are getting into cosmetics, clothes, and food even when companies are not intentionally adding the chemicals. Toxic PFAS are often added into consumer products to make items stain- or water-resistant.     But mounting evidence indicates that many products made without the intentional addition of PFAS are also contaminated. Researchers say these products may unintentionally become contaminated with PFAS, short for per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances, during the manufacturing or distribution process, raising concerns about entry points of PFAS into the supply chain that are not yet fully understood.     PFAS are linked to negative health outcomes including some cancers, reproductive problems, and birth defects, among others. Some manufacturers, such as cosmetics companies, will disclose the addition of the chemicals so consumers can determine their own exposure.

Videos of the Day:

As Afghanistan Faces Economic Crisis, U.S. Could Help Prevent Mass Starvation by Unfreezing Funds

Trigger Laws Make Abortion Off Limits for Millions; Patients Face “Intolerable” Risk & Uncertainty

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!

‘All of Us Are Paying the Price’ as Corporate Profits Surge to Record-High $2 Trillion “Astronomical corporate profits confirm what corporate executives have been telling us on earning calls over and over again: They’re making a lot of money by charging people more.”     Federal data published Thursday shows that nonfinancial corporate profits in the U.S. surged to an all-time record of $2 trillion in the second quarter of 2022 as companies continued jacking up prices, pushing inflation to a 40-year high to the detriment of workers and consumers.

The Democratic Party is a Fifth Column for Right-wing Lunacy “To see what is in front of one’s nose needs a constant struggle.” – George Orwell.    To write about the strange and unstable present moment, or to engage in political prognostication, is to court not just despair but a certain disorientation, rooted in the duplicitous – not to say schizoid – behavior of the Democratic Party.     “Politics ain’t beanbag,” Mr. Dooley observed long ago, and it’s true: since the dawn of partisan rivalry, party bosses have often behaved less than nobly in the quest to grab and hold on to power. But in today’s postmodern landscape, where engineered perception is all and reality is up for grabs, the self-styled Party of the People is not content to peddle zircon candidates as though they were the Hope Diamond.

United States Government’s Student Debt Usury!: Biden’s Bifurcated Student Debt Cancelation Plan  This week President Biden announced his long-awaited plan to alleviate in part the burden of nearly $2 trillion carried by 45 million American students and former students. The official figure for student loan debt is $1.7 trillion. But when private bank loans and parent loans are considered, the total is around & 1.9 trillion, with an average student debt of $37,000.     In recent decades the cost of college education has tripled while the support for it from US states has declined sharply.  Moreover, what started out as grants in aid for students steadily migrated to banks and private financial institutions loan debt. About 90% of the $1.9T debt is held by the US government; the remaining by private sources.     One of the most unpleasant arrangements in the current structure of student debt in the US is the government charges interest rates for it that are much higher than corresponding rates charged by banks holding their share of the total debt.  Government rates range from 4.99% to 7.4% while bank rates are around 3.2% (fixed) to 1.3% (variable).       The differential in rates is clearly designed to push students to ‘consolidate’ their annual education loans with the US Dept. of Education to private banks. Thus, the private banking sector is given a significant cut of the student debt pie. Loans for both go up annually and are will rise in 2022-23 and after as general interest rates rise by Federal Reserve actions.\

Americans Study: More Than 200 Million Could Have Toxic PFAS in Their Drinking Water A peer-reviewed study by scientists at the Environmental Working Group estimates that more than 200 million Americans could have the toxic fluorinated chemicals known as PFAS in their drinking water at a concentration of 1 part per trillion, or ppt, or higher. Independent scientific studies have recommended a safe level for PFAS in drinking water of 1 ppt, a standard that is endorsed by EWG.    The study, published today in the journal Environmental Science & Technology Letters, analyzed publicly accessible drinking water testing results from the Environmental Protection Agency and U.S. Geological Survey, as well as state testing by Colorado, Kentucky, Michigan, New Hampshire, New Jersey, North Carolina and Rhode Island.     “We know drinking water is a major source of exposure of these toxic chemicals,” said Olga Naidenko, Ph.D., vice president for science investigations at EWG and a co-author of the new study. “This new paper shows that PFAS pollution is affecting even more Americans than we previously estimated. PFAS are likely detectable in all major water supplies in the U.S., almost certainly in all that use surface water.”

After the PFAS are ‘Out the Door’: In ‘Historic’ Step, Biden EPA Moves to Designate Two Forever Chemicals as Hazardous  Arguing the Biden administration’s new rule isn’t enough, campaigners said, “It’s time for EPA to address the whole PFAS class.” The Environmental Protection Agency moved Friday to designate two commonly used “forever chemicals” as hazardous under federal law, a long-awaited step that green groups welcomed as important while also warning it is inadequate to address the scale of toxic pollution caused by the increasingly ubiquitous substances.     The EPA said in a press release that it has proposed a rule to formally classify perfluorooctanoic acid (PFOA) and perfluorooctane sulfonic acid (PFOS)—part of a long list of chemical compounds known as per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances (PFAS)—”as hazardous substances under the Comprehensive Environmental Response, Compensation, and Liability Act (CERCLA), also known as ‘Superfund.'”

Environment: Ecocide or Ecosocialism!:

Revealed: US Water Likely Contains More ‘Forever Chemicals’ Than EPA Tests Show Guardian analysis of water samples taken in nine US locations shows test agency uses is likely missing significant levels of PFAS pollutants The analysis checked water samples from PFAS hot spots around the country with two types of tests: an EPA-developed method that detects 30 types of the approximately 9,000 PFAS compounds, and another that checks for a marker of all PFAS. The Guardian found that seven of the nine samples collected showed higher levels of PFAS in water using the test that identifies markers for PFAS, than levels found when the water was tested using the EPA method – and at concentrations as much as 24 times greater.

PFAS: Related Articles

• Leukemia Due to Toxic Exposure on Military Bases  
• “Forever Chemical” PFAS Exposure And Risk Of Cancer   
• PFAS s’ Are Everywhere. Here’s What You Should Know About Them
• Beyond Paper: PFAS Linked to Common Plastic Packaging Used for Food, Cosmetics, and Much More

Big Oil Goes All in on Toxic Plastic Great at creating problems for humanity, fossil fuel giants increase oil demand in the form of plastic. Plastic production is projected to grow astronomically, and is expected to account for 60% of oil demand in the next decade Oil companies are high on the hog again, with record high gas prices fueling record profits–profits so high they’re even catching the attention of Democrats in Congress. And of course, they’re using the profits to buy back shares so their shareholders will benefit from higher stock prices. Maybe all that money is going to their heads because only a handful of years have passed since we learned Exxon and many other big oil companies have known since the seventies exactly how their dirty product was about to trigger a global meltdown. Yet they’re still up to their old tricks and trying to fool us while they pump more oil. As governments and communities race to stop runaway climate change, oil companies have quietly found a way to sell even more oil, in the form of plastic. Plastic production is projected to grow astronomically, and is expected to account for 60% of oil demand in the next decade. 

Civil Rights/Black Liberation:

Blacks Will Fight Back During the summer of 1967, I wrote my second novel in an apartment in the Echo Park Lake section of Los Angeles. Riots had broken out in cities throughout the nation. In my early 20s, I’d written my share of “Revolutionary” poetry, but this bulletin shocked me. Black snipers were holding down members of the armed forces and, at one point, forced their retreat. The radio announcer sounded as shook as I was.     There was speculation that the snipers were army veterans who knew how to handle weapons. Though a popular television series portrayed Blacks as passive victims during the Tulsa race riots of 1921, army veterans from World War I resisted the invasion of Black neighborhoods. They took on the full power of the state. Before that, “Black people [formed] ad hoc self-defense organizations to try to keep white folks from terrorizing their communities,” says Simon Balto, a Professor of African American History at the University of Iowa and author of Occupied Territory: Policing Black Chicago from Red Summer to Black Power.     Black veterans were a large part of what made the summer of 1919, in the words of this historian David F. Krugler, “the year that African Americans fought back.”

Labor: 

 Economy:

‘All of Us Are Paying the Price’ as Corporate Profits Surge to Record-High $2 Trillion “Astronomical corporate profits confirm what corporate executives have been telling us on earning calls over and over again: They’re making a lot of money by charging people more.”     Federal data published Thursday shows that nonfinancial corporate profits in the U.S. surged to an all-time record of $2 trillion in the second quarter of 2022 as companies continued jacking up prices, pushing inflation to a 40-year high to the detriment of workers and consumers.

One Man Has Set Up a $1.6 Billion Slush Fund to Fuel the Radical Right’s Takeover of Congress; Get Ready for a Dirty Tricks Campaign The New York Times dropped a political bombshell on Monday. The public interest website, ProPublica, built further on the story that afternoon. And, as luck would have it, Wall Street On Parade finds itself in the unique position of filling in missing pieces of the story thanks to an investigative report we published in 2010.     The gist of the story is this: a sketchy billionaire named Barre Seid decided last year to donate his electronics manufacturing company, Tripp Lite, to a nonprofit tied to the radical right called Marble Freedom Trust. After the transfer of ownership to the nonprofit, Tripp Lite was then sold to the Dublin, Ireland based power management company, Eaton, thus avoiding capital gains taxes on the sale. This handed the nonprofit a cool $1.65 billion in tax free money from the sale of the business. In other words, the U.S. taxpayer is subsidizing the radical right’s ability to trash democracy in the U.S.

World:

Health, Education 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! 

Whatever Happened to the Public Option and the $35 Insulin Cap? How politicians forget their promisesTake, as an example, president Biden. Campaigning for the 2020 election, he promised a Medicare-style public option. He said it would be one of his first acts as president. He assured Bernie Sanders’ supporters that this was his plan. People would be able to sign up for publicly funded health care, with no more worries about premiums and deductibles. Well, promises, promises. According to the Lever, which looked into the matter, Biden has not mentioned a public option once since his election. It has gone the way of the $15 per hour minimum wage, the $35 price cap on insulin and other such irritants to fabulously wealthy corporate donors. In short, for Biden a public option was kaput the moment he strolled into the White House. This is hardly a surprise, since a medical public option would benefit mere constituents, but not well-heeled health-care donors. Still the brazenness of Joe “The Check’s in the Mail” Biden’s approach demands attention.!