Daily News Digest February 24, 2023

Daily News Digest Archives

Capitalism is Now a Worldwide Threat to Humanity! It is on the Fast Track to Global Warming and/or Nuclear War Catastrophes!

Images of the Day: 

Policy Lets Norfolk Southern Officials Order Crews to Ignore Safety AlertsUp in the Air

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 Capitalism Has Been Aware of the Comming Catastrophe of Global Warming  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 very 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:

Biden Sides With Norfolk Southern Before Supreme Court! — Not The Victims of  Norfolk Southen’s Depraved Indifference!:

If the high court, dominated by six right-wing justices, rules in favor of Norfolk Southern, it could be easier for the profitable rail carrier to block pending and future lawsuits, including from victims of the ongoing disaster in East Palestine. Moreover, it “could create a national precedent limiting where workers and consumers can bring cases against corporations,” wrote two of the investigative outlet’s reporters, Rebecca Burns and Julia Rock.— Biden DOJ Supporting Rail Giant Norfolk Southern’s Effort to Block Future Lawsuits

However, pressure from the train lobby groups, including Norfolk Southern, ultimately limited the measure to focus only on the transport of crude oil while trains carrying other dangerous materials, including the primary chemicals involved in the Ohio disaster, were exempted.     When the regulation was enacted in 2015, they were limited in scope and required only electronic brakes to be installed by 2023 while applying only to certain “high-hazard flammable trains” carrying at least 20 consecutive loaded cars filled with liquids like crude oil.    In 2017, after industry donors delivered over $6 million to GOP campaigns, the Trump administration rescinded part of the rule aimed at upgrading outdated braking systems on rails nationwide, saying the cost exceeded the benefits.     Data from the Federal Railroad Administration (FRA) shows over 107,000 railroad accidents nationally over the past decade, killing at least 7,800 people. Among them, over 12,000 were train derailments, which means an average of 3.4 accidents a day in the country.     “The Palestine wreck is the tip of the iceberg and a red flag,” said Kaminkow, who is secretary for the Railroad Workers United, a non-profit labor group that coordinates with the nation’s rail unions. “If something is not done, then it’s going to get worse, and the next derailment could be cataclysmic.” — Ohio Chemical Spill Shows the Power of Industry Lobby Groups In U.S.

Videos/Podcasts of the Day:

The Paris Commune At 150

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 Republicrats 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 the poor and gives to the Rich. Rax the Rich!  — They Can Afford To Pay! Both Parties Support U.S. Capitalism’s Wars! (The Only War the Democrats Opposed was the Civil War!)

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. — Louis D. Brandeis Quotes

The greatest purveyor of violence in the world today — my own government. MLK, Beyond Vietnam 

The CBC is a Democratic Party tool that is used to give an illusion of Black political power. The members get good jobs that they keep for years and in exchange they say what people want to hear at opportune moments while simultaneously acting as errand girls and boys for the Democratic Party wing of the ruling class. CBC member Hakeem Jeffries is the House Minority Leader but he is a member of the Democratic Party leadership precisely because he toes the party line.     Of course they ask no questions or make any demands regarding the Ukraine political scam. Some of them have even turned into embarrassing shadows of their former selves. When Volodymyr Zelensky spoke to congress in December 2022 he was greeted by attention seeking members eager to shake his hand. Two of those were Sheila Jackson Lee and Barbara Lee of the CBC. They were clad in blue and yellow, the colors of the Ukrainian flag, while hoping to be in view of cameras as they shook the hand of a man who sacrificed his people for the sake of U.S. imperialism. To put it bluntly, Ukrainians are dying in a war that he could have stopped if he had the courage to defy Biden’s fantasy foreign policy. Barbara Lee is remembered for providing the sole vote in opposition to the war against Afghanistan. Now she is just another political hack.     The late John Conyers proposed a ban on funding to Ukraine’s neo-Nazi Azov battalion but his successors in the CBC have silenced themselves regarding far right and white supremacist influence in Ukraine. White Lives Matter marches are held there and George Floyd’s killer, Derek Chauvin, is celebrated. But mums the word for the craven CBC. — Margaret Kimberley, BAR Executive Editor and Senior Columnist Black Politics and Ukraine 

The Day the World Should Have Changed The leaders of today’s great powers seem intent on playing nuclear chicken with each other. The U.S., Russia and China are all modernizing their nuclear arsenals. The U.S. is building a new triad of nuclear bombers, submarines and ballistic missiles at a cost of around $2 trillion. China is expanding its deployed nuclear arsenal to approximately the U.S. and Russian level and putting it on similar hair trigger alert.

Chomsky: A Stronger NATO Is the Last Thing We Need as Russia-Ukraine War Turns 1  It is becoming increasingly obvious that this is now a U.S./NATO-Russia war via Ukraine, Noam Chomsky argues. The war in Ukraine is almost a year old, with no end in sight to the fighting, suffering and destruction. In fact, the war’s next phase could turn into a bloodbath and last for years, as the U.S. and Germany agree to supply Ukraine with battle tanks and as Volodymyr Zelenskyy urges the West to send long-range missiles and fighter jets.  It is becoming increasingly obvious that this is now a U.S./NATO-Russia war, Noam Chomsky argues in the exclusive interview for Truthout that follows, excoriating the idea that, in light of Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, there needs to be a stronger NATO rather than a negotiated settlement to the conflict. “Those calling for a stronger NATO might want to think about what NATO is doing right now, and also about how NATO depicts itself,” Chomsky says, warning of “the growing threat of steps up the escalation ladder to nuclear war.”

Patrick Lawrence: Totalized CensorshipContent warning, canceling, de-platforming, denying access: The fate of Sy Hersh’s Democracy Now! interview on YouTube is the latest indication of how much rougher press suppression is in this new media era.     When I awoke Sunday morning to the news that YouTube had censored a long interview Seymour Hersh did with Democracy Now! on the grounds that it did not meet the Google subsidiary’s “community standards” and was, moreover, “offensive,” my mind went in many directions. I thought of the New York Post case in October 2020, three weeks before the presidential election, when Twitter, Facebook and the other big social media platforms blocked America’s oldest daily after it reported the damning, politically damaging contents of Hunter Biden’s laptop computer. I thought of what we now call “the disinformation industry” and all these diabolic organizations — PropOrNot, NewsGuard, Hamilton 68, et al. — that, stocked with spooks serving in staff positions and as advisers, dedicate themselves to discrediting dissenting writers and independent publications as conveyers of Russian propaganda. 

New Biden Rule Denounced as ‘Trump’s Asylum Ban Under a Different Name’ “Whether it’s President Trump or President Biden, these asylum bans are illegal. The proposed rule should not move forward.” The Biden administration on Tuesday proposed a rule that immigrant rights groups, civil liberties organizations, and some Democratic lawmakers condemned as an illegal attack on asylum-seekers that resembles an inhumane policy pursued by former President Donald Trump. The new rule, unveiled by the Departments of Justice and Homeland Security, would assume that “certain noncitizens who enter the United States without documents sufficient for lawful admission are ineligible for asylum.”

Marjorie Cohn : Biden Administration Takes Its Capitulation to Israel to an Absurd New Level As the new right-wing Israeli regime ramps up its oppression of Palestinians, the Biden administration has taken its capitulation to Israel to a new and absurd level. After nominating an independent expert to serve on a human rights commission, the U.S. State Department withdrew the nomination because the expert accurately called Israel an apartheid state. A week later, the United States prevented the United Nations Security Council from voting to condemn Israel’s illegal settlements in Palestinian territory.     On February 10, the State Department nominated Professor James Cavallaro as an independent expert on the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights (IACHR). Cavallaro is “a leading scholar and practitioner of international law with deep expertise in the region as well as the Inter-American human rights system,” the State Department declared. Cavallaro, executive director of the University Network for Human Rights (UNHR), was a member of the IACHR from 2014-2017 during the Obama administration and even served as its president.

Lee, Pocan Revive Bill to Cut Military Budget by $100 Billion “It could power every household in the U.S. with solar energy; hire 1 million elementary school teachers amid a worsening teacher shortage; provide free tuition for 2 out of 3 public college students; or cover medical care for 7 million veterans.”

Biden’s Missing Word: Inequality On February 2nd, Pres. Joe Biden delivered his annual State of the Union address and received considerable praise for both the “progressive” positions he took and his combative tone. He seemed awake, getting ready to announce his 2024 candidacy. According to one source, former Pres. Donald Trump offered some praise. However, the word “inequality” was absent from Biden’s speech. Biden came close to acknowledging the growing problem gripping the nation, admitting:    Amid the economic upheaval of the past four decades, too many people have been left behind or treated like they’re invisible. Maybe that’s you, watching at home.

Environment — Ecosocialism of Ecocide!: 

Dissent Episode Six: The Clean Water Act Comes Under Attack The outcome of the Supreme Court case Sackett v. EPA may limit the ability to prevent pollution of our nation’s waters and combat climate change. The outcome of the Supreme Court case Sackett v. EPA may limit the ability to prevent pollution of our nation’s waters and combat climate change. Which wetlands are protected under the Clean Water Act? That’s the question before the Supreme Court in Sackett v. EPA. Back in 2004, Michael and Chantell Sackett purchased a residential lot near the idyllic and popular Priest Lake in Idaho. In preparation of construction, the Sacketts started filling the lot with gravel and sand. But after an anonymous complaint about the dredging and filling, the Environmental Protection Agency ordered the Sacketts to stop construction until the proper permits and assessments were sorted out. The EPA argued that the Sacketts were building on a wetland protected by the Clean Water Act. Instead of securing federal permits, the Sacketts took their case to the Supreme Court for a second time.

‘No Excuse’ for Methane Leaks, IEA Says, as Sask. Research Shows Unreported Emissions The head of the International Energy Agency (IEA) says there’s “no excuse” for near-record global emissions of methane from fossil fuels, even as new research suggests heavy oil facilities in Saskatchewan are releasing almost four times as much of the climate super-pollutant as they report to government.

Toxic Forever Chemicals Found in More Than 330 Animal Species “Our choice is either to keep enabling extinction with widespread chemical contamination or take action to prevent it,” said one scientist. More than 330 animal species around the world are at risk of harm from exposure to toxic “forever chemicals,” according to an Environmental Working Group analysis published Wednesday.     EWG’s examination of data from dozens of recent peer-reviewed studies shows that more than 120 unique per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances (PFAS) have been detected in a wide range of wildlife. This includes many types of fish, birds, reptiles, amphibians, and mammals large, small, and aquatic—from pandas and tigers to squirrels and cats to otters and dolphins—as well as plankton, oysters, and scorpions. Some of the affected creatures are already endangered or threatened.

Profits Before Safety: Policy Lets Norfolk Southern Officials Order Crews to Ignore Safety Alerts In October, the company directed a train to keep moving with an overheated wheel that caused it to derail miles later. Norfolk Southern allows a monitoring team to instruct crews to ignore alerts from train track sensors designed to flag potential mechanical problems. ProPublica learned of the policy after reviewing the rules of the company, which is engulfed in controversy after one of its trains derailed this month, releasing toxic flammable gas over East Palestine, Ohio.     The policy applies specifically to the company’s Wayside Detector Help Desk, which monitors data from the track-side sensors. Workers on the desk can tell crews to disregard an alert when “information is available confirming it is safe to proceed” and to continue no faster than 30 miles per hour to the next track-side sensor, which is often miles away. The company’s rulebook did not specify what such information might be, and company officials did not respond to questions about the policy.

Days of Insatiable Flame The Ohio derailment catastrophe exposes the cruel fate to which the hinterland has been condemned: industrial toxicity without industrial employment. First there was the fire, the smoke billowing infernally into the Appalachian night. It just kept burning. Days of insatiable flame. A black pillar of fumes took up residence above the town like an inert tornado. At its heart, we learned, was the corpse of a train, fifty cars off the rails. Some of them, it was said, were carrying toxic materials. The train had almost reached its destination, the Norfolk Southern freight yard in Conway, Pennsylvania, on the evening of February 3, but catastrophe struck just across the state line. Most accidents happen close to home—in East Palestine, Ohio, in this case, a name that hearkened to a different site of devastation a world away. Years of Cassandran warnings about the escalating risk of major rail accidents now resound with disturbing clarity. Keen-eyed observers remembered that in 2017, industry lobbying sunk a federal regulatory initiative to mandate electronic braking systems on rail cars carrying hazardous and flammable materials. (“The cost-benefit analyses are not sufficient,” the Department of Transportation explained.) The journalist Aaron Gordon opened his 2021 examination of defective railroad safety protocols with a story about a freight train derailment four years earlier in Pennsylvania, which resulted in the evacuation of the entire town of Hyndman. Thirty-three cars came off the rails, fifteen of which carried hazardous material. Only three leaked or caught fire. “As scary as the derailment in Hyndman was,” Gordon warned, “it could have been much worse.” Well, now we know.

Civil Rights Black Liberation:

Supreme Court Declines to Hear Challenge to ‘Unconstitutional’ Arkansas Anti-BDS Law “The struggle for collective liberation requires global solidarity and economic pressure,” said U.S. Rep. Rashida Tlaib. “Today’s decision is a travesty, but the people will not be silenced.”     In a move decried by one critic as a “significant loss for the First Amendment,” the U.S. Supreme Court on Tuesday declined to hear a challenge to an Arkansas law requiring companies doing business with the state to sign a pledge vowing not to boycott Israel.

Malcolm X Would Call Biden a ‘Pretender Public Defender’ Malcolm X, one of the most effective critics white America has ever known, who decried “straight-jacketed thinking, and straight-jacketed societies,” believed: “In our mutual sincerity we might be able to show a road to the salvation of America’s very soul.”    Malcolm X wasn’t ever, to put it blandly — an adjective one could never pin to the charismatic firebrand — naïve about how difficult such an effort would be, and the challenge for white people who accepted it. He explained: “Indeed, how can white society atone for enslaving, for raping, for unmanning, for otherwise brutalizing millions of human beings, for centuries? What atonement would the God of Justice demand for the robbery of Black people’s labor, their lives, their true identities, their culture, their history — and even their human dignity?”

Black Agenda Report

Labor:

Under Massive Pressure Amid Ohio Crisis, Norfolk Southern Agrees to Paid Sick Leave Deal “Norfolk Southern must be in the midst of some bad publicity for it to sign an agreement with around 3,000 unionized maintenance-of-way workers for seven paid sick days,” remarked one journalist.

Beware, the Ides of March Cometh…For Capitalism! As the crisis of British capitalism deepens, drama at the top is playing out alongside a rising strike wave from below. North and south of the border, the political establishment is being shaken to its core. Revolutionary explosions impend.Following the magnify-icent ‘day of action’ on 1 February, the trade union movement is gearing up for another round of coordinated strikes from 15 March onwards. This date happens to be the ‘Ides of March’ in the old Roman calendar. It is best known as the date on which Julius Caesar was stabbed in the back by Brutus and other senators.

Finland: ‘Salaries Must Rise As Prices Rise’ – Unions Strike in Coordinated Show of Force Rising living costs have caused a wave of strikes in Finland, ranging from the technology, chemical and plastics industries to retail workers and dockers. While unions have been quick to end the strikes, negotiating completely insufficient deals, it’s clear that the class struggle is sharpening in Finland on a wide front.     Whereas the Finnish stock market index (OMX Helsinki 25) reached record highs throughout the pandemic, Finnish workers are now faced with rapidly rising inflation, electricity bills and interest rates. Adding insult to injury, the Finnish ruling class has embarked on a reckless foreign policy of escalating tensions and irresponsible belligerence towards Russia. On the other hand, no money seems to be available to rescue the crisis-ridden Finnish healthcare system or to pay the overworked and underpaid nurses, no military expense is spared by the Finnish ruling class.

 Economy:

What Will Happen When Banks Go Bust? Bank Runs, Bail-Ins and Systemic Risk Financial podcasts have been featuring ominous headlines lately along the lines of “Your Bank Can Legally Seize Your Money” and “Banks Can STEAL Your Money?! Here’s How!” The reference is to “bail-ins:” the provision under the 2010 Dodd-Frank Act allowing Systemically Important Financial Institutions (SIFIs, basically the biggest banks) to bail in or expropriate their creditors’ money in the event of insolvency. The problem is that depositors are classed as “creditors.” So how big is the risk to your deposit account? Part I of this two part article will review the bail-in issue. Part II will look at the derivatives risk that could trigger the next global financial crisis.

Judge John Dorsey Has Effectively Privatized Justice in the FTX Bankruptcy Case Judge John Dorsey is the presiding judge in the bankruptcy proceedings for Sam Bankman-Fried’s collapsed house of cards, which includes the now frozen crypto exchange, FTX; his now shuttered hedge fund, Alameda Research; and more than 100 opaque affiliates operating in the shadows around the globe. Undisputed is the fact that despite FTX being represented by some of the most prominent law firms in America as it built this criminal enterprise – notably Sullivan & Cromwell – more than 10.3 million user accounts were looted of more than $8 billion right under the nose of Big Law.

World:

Both Ukraine and Russia are now war economies.  By that I mean the state now controls the direction of the economy ie where production and investment are employed.  The ‘free market’ is replaced by state control for the military effort.      But there is a difference between the two economies that will be expressed after the war ends – if it ever does.  Post-war Ukraine, if the current government survives, is committed to a neo-liberal free market economy relying on foreign investment and companies taking over the main resources and being integrated into the EU.  The model to follow will be that of Poland and Baltic states ie no welfare state to speak of; pensions reduced; no trade unions and labour rights; deregulation of markets; and ultimate reliance on capital transfers from the West.     In contrast, post-war Russia, assuming Putin or his cronies are still in power, will opt for a much more state-directed economy than before.  Freewheeling oligarchs doing their own thing will not be tolerated (only Putin’s cronies) and key resources and investments will be closely controlled by the state.     Before the war, there was one thing in common for both countries: a high level of corruption between billionaires and politicians. That is unlikely to change, as recent revelations of corruption in the government of Ukraine have revealed.  And don’t expect the EU to cleanse ‘free market’ Ukraine; after all, most of Eastern Europe’s states are riddled with corruption with little sanction and it seems that even EU parliament members are also engaged. As Bernie Sanders said recently: “Yes, Russia has oligarchs, but so does the US.” – and indeed everywhere. — Russia-Ukraine: One Year of War – The Economics

War in Ukraine and ICBMs: The Untold Story of How They Could Blow Up the World Ever since Russia invaded Ukraine a year ago, media coverage of the war hasn’t included even the slightest mention of intercontinental ballistic missiles (ICBMs). Yet the war has boosted the chances that ICBMs will set off a global holocaust. Four hundred of them — always on hair-trigger alert — are fully armed with nuclear warheads in underground silos scattered across Colorado, Montana, Nebraska, North Dakota and Wyoming, while Russia deploys about 300 of its own. Former Defense Secretary William Perry has called ICBMs “some of the most dangerous weapons in the world.

Israeli Nuclear Policy Israel has an official policy of ambiguity with respect to nuclear weapons. It has never confirmed or denied possessing nuclear weapons and has never conducted a nuclear test.     However, it is universally acknowledged that Israel has a nuclear weapons capability which it developed outside the framework of the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT).     Along with India and Pakistan, Israel is therefore considered a de facto nuclear weapon state.     Due to its official stance, clarification of Israel’s nuclear policies and capabilities is difficult. — Capabilities — Israel is estimated to have a nuclear stockpile of approximately 90 warheads; while production of plutonium for weapons purposes is thought to be continuing.

Nuclear War in Middle East?: By Caving to Israel, Biden Opens the Door to War With Iran Biden administration officials have recently defended and justified Israel’s military attacks on Iran.  As all eyes were on Ukraine and Chinese balloons in the sky, the Biden administration seemingly shifted America’s longstanding opposition to Israel starting a disastrous war with Iran.     U.S. Ambassador to Israel Tom Nides told the Conference of Presidents of Major American Jewish Organizations Sunday that “Israel can and should do whatever they need to deal with [in regards to Iran] and we’ve got their back” — a thinly veiled reference to military action.

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 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!

  

Over Half of Known Human Pathogenic Diseases can be Aggravated by Climate Change  Concluding remarks The global distress caused by the emergence of COVID-19 clearly revealed the considerable human vulnerability to pathogenic diseases. Such types of disease have the capacity to not only cause illness and death in large numbers of people but can also trigger broader socioeconomic consequences (for example, the cumulative financial costs of the COVID-19 pandemic could mount to US$16 trillion for the United States alone106). It should be noted that this was not an isolated event; the burden of diseases such as human immunodeficiency virus, Zika, malaria, dengue, chikungunya, influenza, Ebola, MERS and SARS cause millions of deaths each year107 and an inexplicable amount of human suffering. As demonstrated in this review, 277 human pathogenic diseases can be aggravated by the broad array of climatic hazards triggered by our ongoing emission of GHGs and include 58% of all infectious diseases known to have impacted humanity in recorded history. Furthermore, we found over 1,000 different pathways in which the array of climatic hazards, via different transmission types, resulted in disease outbreaks by a taxonomic diversity of pathogens. The sheer number of pathogenic diseases and transmission pathways aggravated by climatic hazards reveals the magnitude of the human health threat posed by climate change and the urgent need for aggressive actions to mitigate GHG

Moderna’s 2022 Windfall a ‘Scandalous’ Result of Pandemic Profiteering, Campaigners Say One advocate said Moderna’s windfall was a “direct result of the company’s refusal to share vaccine technology with the Global South, even when it was clear that global shortages would be deadly.”