Daily News Digest June 21, 2023
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:
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:
A Vote for Trump or Biden is a Vote for Ecocide!
It behooves the United States, therefore, in the interest both of scientific truth and of future social reform, carefully to study such chapters of her history as that of the suppression of the slave-trade. The most obvious question which this198 study suggests is: How far in a State can a recognized moral wrong safely be compromised? And although this chapter of history can give us no definite answer suited to the ever-varying aspects of political life, yet it would seem to warn any nation from allowing, through carelessness and moral cowardice, any social evil to grow. No persons would have seen the Civil War with more surprise and horror than the Revolutionists of 1776; yet from the small and apparently dying institution of their day arose the walled and castled Slave-Power. From this we may conclude that it behooves nations as well as men to do things at the very moment when they ought to be done. — The Suppression of the African Slave Trade to the United States of America, by W. E. B. Du Bois
In 1956, I shall not go to the polls. I have not registered. I believe that democracy has so far disappeared in the United States that no ‘two evils’ exist. There is but one evil party with two names, and it will be elected despite all I can do or say. Why I Won’t Vote, The Nation, 1956.
There is always a certain glamour about the idea of a nation rising up to crush an evil simply because it is wrong. Unfortunately, this can seldom be realized in real life; for the very existence of the evil usually argues a moral weakness in the very place where extraordinary moral strength is called for. — W.E.B. Du Bois The Suppression of the African Slave Trade to the United States of America, 1638-1870, 1897
“Daily the Negro is coming more and more to look upon law and justice, not as protecting safeguards, but as sources of humiliation and oppression. The laws are made by men who have little interest in him; they are executed by men who have absolutely no motive for treating the black people with courtesy or consideration; and, finally, the accused law-breaker is tried, not by his peers, but too often by men who would rather punish ten innocent Negroes than let one guilty one escape.” ‑The Souls of Black Folk, 1903.
Videos/Podcasts of the Day:
Cornel West Position On Ukraine War & Palestine
After World War II Rosa Luxenburg Coined the Slogan: ‘S0cialism or Barbaism’!
Now the Slogan Should Be: ‘Ecosocialism or Ecocide’!
One of Many Ways to Begin to End Global Warming: Expose ‘Greenwashing’ — Tax the Polluters 100%!
Weekly Average CO2 at Mauna Loa Hawaii
Week beginning on June 11, 2023: 424.13 ppm. Weekly value from 1 year ago: 421.05 ppm. Weekly value from 10 years ago: 398.78 ppm.
Last week, the northeastern skyline was overtaken by an orange haze, as winds blew smoke from Canadian wildfires southwards. The impact was palpable as the effects of climate change became apparent to nearly 50 million Americans. Hundreds of wildfires are continuing to rage on in Canada. Above-average temperatures and dry conditions caused by climate change affect the intensity and longevity of these wildfires. The news of the affected air quality dominated headlines for a few days, but as the smoke faded, so did media coverage in the U.S. Has an essential moment of climate mobilization been lost? Not necessarily. As we all witness more extreme weather patterns, natural disasters and shifts in our environment, climate chaos is slowly becoming the new normal. With this new reality, our ability to mobilize around natural disasters becomes more difficult. Slowly but surely, we are becoming desensitized and fatigued by natural disasters: Americans in the 1980s experienced natural disasters on average every 82 days, but today it’s an average of every 18 days. —Let’s Accept Climate Science — And Also Reimagine Our Relationship to the Earth
Himalayan Glaciers Could Lose 80% of Their Ice by 2100, Threatening Billions of Lives “We need leaders to act now to prevent catastrophe. There is still time to save this critical region, but only if fast and deep emissions cuts start now.” A team of international scientists based in Nepal warned Tuesday that glaciers in the Hindu Kush Himalaya are melting at an accelerated rate and could lose up to 80% of their volume by century’s end if ambitious action isn’t taken to slash planet-warming emissions. The latest research from the International Center for Integrated Mountain Development (ICIMOD) shows that Himalaya glaciers disappeared 65% faster in the decade between 2010 and 2020 than in the previous 10 years as a result of global temperature increases.
140+ Experts to Rich Nations: Redirect Trillions in Public Money to Curb Climate, Inequality Crises “Stopping climate breakdown is not rocket science,” said one scholar. “Governments need to stop subsidizing fossil fuel companies; international banks need to cancel the external debts of Global South countries; and we need to tax extreme wealth.” More than 140 economists and policy expertson Monday published an open letter calling on the leaders of rich countries to combat the life-threatening crises of climate change and inequality through the downward redistribution of trillions of dollars in public money. “Stopping climate breakdown is not rocket science,” economic anthropologist Jason Hickel, who signed the letter, said in a statement. “Governments need to stop subsidizing fossil fuel companies; international banks need to cancel the external debts of Global South countries; and we need to tax extreme wealth.”
US Judge Orders Stretch of Enbridge Line 5 Shut Down on Tribal Land “But for the theft of Indigenous lands,” said environmental activist and attorney Steven Donziger, “this pipeline would not even exist.” The Canadian oil company Enbridge has been ordered to pay the Bad River Band of Lake Superior Chippewa $5 million in damages for trespassing and to gradually shut down part of its Line 5 pipeline in Wisconsin after a federal judge found that the company has placed the tribe’s sacred land at risk of an environmental disaster.
‘No More Time to Waste’: WMO Analysis Finds Europe Is Fastest-Warming Continent “This annual report is just a snapshot of the state of Europe’s climate. It provides a sobering picture,” said one expert. “Extreme weather killed 16,000 people in Europe last year, mostly due to the effects of the summer heat.” “Chilling.” “Shocking.” “Sobering.” Those are some expert responses to The State of the Climate in Europe 2022, the second annual report published Monday by the United Nations’ World Meteorological Organization (WMO) and the European Union’s Copernicus Climate Change Service (C3S).
Spotlight on Industrial Aquaculture About the Series The seafood farming – or aquaculture – industry markets many of its products as low-carbon, healthy and sustainable. But there’s a hitch. Intensively reared carnivorous fish like salmon are fed on wild-caught fish. These small, nutritious species are harvested by the tonne in fragile, unregulated zones like West Africa, putting local access to food, fish stocks and jobs at risk. In this series, DeSmog investigates the sustainability claims of major players in industrial aquaculture, digging into ecological and social harms that range from damaging supply chains, local pollution and pressure on over-exploited fish stocks.
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. Tax 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
EPA (Employer Protection Agemcy— R.S.)Sued Over Reapproval 0f Toxic Herbicides Using Agent Orange Chemical Federal suit brought by public health groups alleges agency’s science shows human risks and harm to endangered species Public health groups are suing the US Environmental Protection Agency over the reapproval of two toxic herbicides made with an active ingredient in Agent Orange, a chemical weapon deployed by the US to destroy vegetation in the Vietnam war, and which caused huge health problems among soldiers and Vietnamese residents.
Civil Rights/Blackliberation:
Reparations and Capitalism The World Conference on Racism held in Durban, South Africa, several years ago, not only raised the issue of Israel as an apartheid state, but also raised the issue of reparations for the colonialized world due to centuries of rape and plunder of the world’s masses by capitalism. Most of the arguments on this subject were first written by Karl Marx, over 130 years ago in “Capital”, Volume One, Part VIII, Chapter 31, (the) “Genesis of the Industrial Capitalist”. his often-overlooked chapter is very important in today’s world. Industrial Capitalism did not come into being due to the gradual primitive accumulation of capital, but rather the industrial revolution was fueled by the wealth plundered from the colonialized world in the name of Christianity. This is the historic material basis for modern racism as an ideology, which is used to justify the holocaust perpetuated upon the majority of the world during the period of the subjugation of the colonial world to European/United States capitalist imperialism. Karl Marx was one of the first to oppose the colonial oppression of the world’s masses. He did not mince his words in, this chapter of Capital, he wrote: The discovery of gold and silver in America, the extirpation, enslavement, and entombment in mines of the aboriginal population, the beginning of the conquest and looting of the East Indies, the turning of Africa into a warren for the commercial hunting of black-skins, signalized the rosy dawn of the era of capitalist production. … If money … comes into the world with a congenital blood-stain on one cheek, capital comes dripping from head to foot, from every pore, with blood and dirt.
Coalition Convenes in DC to Fight ‘American Death Sentence’ of Poverty “Until our nation’s leaders invest the great riches of this nation in ensuring equal justice for all, beginning with the poor and low-wealth of this nation, we cannot be silent,” said Rev. Dr. William
Labor:
Economy:
The Collapse of Antiquity: Greece and Rome as Civilization’s Oligarchic Turning Point The Collapse of Antiquity, the sequel to Michael Hudson’s “…and forgive them their debts,” is the latest in his trilogy on the history of debt. It describes how the dynamics of interest-bearing debt led to the rise of rentier oligarchies in classical Greece and Rome. This caused economic polarization, widespread austerity, revolts, wars and ultimately the collapse of Rome into serfdom and feudalism. That collapse bequeathed to the subsequent Western civilization a pro-creditor legal philosophy that has led to today’s creditor oligarchies. In telling this story, The Collapse of Antiquity reveals the eerie parallels between the collapsing Roman world and today’s debt-burdened Western economies.
Developing Debt Disaster Next week 300 international organisations and 100 heads of state meet in Paris to discuss how “to build a more responsive, fairer and more inclusive international financial system to fight inequalities, finance the climate transition, and bring us closer to achieving the Sustainable Development Goals.” This meeting is in Paris because it is the so-called Paris Club that for over the last 60 years has monitored and managed loans and credit by governments and government-guaranteed private banks to the so-called developing countries – loosely called the Global South these days.
JPMorgan/Jeffrey Epstein Cases Are a Cross Between the Bank’s Chinese Princeling Scandal and Madoff Fraud, Using Sex with Minors as a Bribe The tenure of Jamie Dimon as Chairman and CEO of JPMorgan Chase, the largest federally-insured bank in the United States and the largest trading casino on Wall Street, has copiously revealed the following: the bank is more than willing to look the other way at crime if it means an increase in assets, profits or business referrals.
World:
Solidarity With the Spanish Communist Youth! No to Bureaucratic Expulsions! On 3 June 2023, the Central Committee of the Spanish Communist Party (PCE) voted to expel the national leadership of its youth organisation (UJCE). The latter had been raising a whole series of criticisms of the right-wing, social-democratic drift of the party, and had agreed to convene a special congress of the youth organisation to discuss the way forward. The use of administrative measures in this way represents an unacceptable and bureaucratic response to political issues by the PCE Central Committee. We republish the following statement of the Spanish section of the International Marxist Tendency (IMT).
Horror in the Mediterranean: a Racist Crime of European Capitalism Dominating news headlines around the world presently is the huge search and rescue operation underway to retrieve a handful of wealthy tourists, including a British billionaire who went missing in the Atlantic on a submarine adventure to explore the shipwreck of the Titanic. Meanwhile, there is a conspiracy of silence in the international media over the details coming out about the drowning of 700 migrants in the Mediterranean last week – the direct result of a willful, callous neglect of human life.
Colombia: Which Way Forward For Petro’s Presidency? In the last few weeks, there has been a growing offensive on the part of the Colombian ruling class against the government of Gustavo Petro. Some have even talked of the danger of a coup, like the one that removed Pedro Castillo in Peru in December last year. On 7 June, thousands of workers, peasants and youth came out onto the streets to defend Petro’s proposed reforms. Comrade Galeano – from Colombia Marxista, the IMT group in Colombia
Health. Welfare, and Education:
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