Daily News Digest July 12, 2023
Image of the Day:
The Devastation of Black Wall Street
Capitalism is Now a Worldwide Threat to Humanity! It is on the Fast Track to Global Warming and/or Nuclear War Catastrophes!
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 body of men holding themselves accountable to nobody ought not to be trusted by anybody. — Thomas Paine
The greatest tyrannies are always perpetuated in the name of the noblest causes. — Thomas Paine
Podcasts/Vidoes of the Day:
“A Historic Mistake”: Swedish Peace Activist Decries Move to Join NATO & Abandon Neutrality
Environment:
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%!
Worrying News for the Planet’: UN Agency Says Last Week Was Hottest on Record “We are in uncharted territory and we can expect more records to fall as El Niño develops further,” said the head of the World Meteorological Organization. The World Meteorological Organization said Monday that preliminary data shows last week was the hottest on record, a finding that was widely expected after global temperature records shattered in four consecutive days amid scorching heatwaves.
Surging Weather Extremes Fuel Fresh Demands for Biden to Declare Climate Emergency One campaignersaid political leaders must “use every tool in their power to abate the emergency that’s no longer at our doorstep anymore, but that has a foot in the door and is already affecting people right now.” As record temperatures, deadly flooding, and other extreme weather driven by human-caused global heating hammer at least millions of people around the world, activists this week are once again imploring U.S. President Joe Biden to declare a climate emergency.
As Talks Begin, Global Authority Urged to Ban ‘Reckless’ Deep-Sea Mining “Governments must put an immediate stop to this risky industry in order to secure long-term protection for the oceans,” said one campaigner Campaigners on Monday urged the International Seabed Authority to take a “unique opportunity” to stop deep-sea mining before it starts, following the expiration of a deadline to set restrictions for extractive companies. The ISA Council convened in Kingston, Jamaica on Monday to begin talks on whether deep-sea mining should be permitted by companies, which are now able to submit plans for the activity even though regulations are not in place. The deadline expired on Sunday.
As Global Temperatures Soar, Study Shows Europe’s 2022 Summer Heat Killed 61,000+ “In an ideal society, nobody should die because of heat,” said the lead author. As recent record-breaking temperatures fuel fresh calls for climate action and communities brace for more extreme heat this week, new research revealed Monday that Europe’s historically hot summer last year killed tens of thousands of people.
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
A Vote for Trump or Biden is a Vote for Ecocide!
It’s Not That Hard to Solve Homelessness California is home to Hollywood and Disneyland, sun and sand, and… nearly one-third of all unhoused people in the entire nation. Compare this to the fact that 12 percent of the nation resides in the Golden State and it becomes clear that there is a serious problem of housing that undercuts the Left Coast’s liberal reputation. An extensive study of the state’s struggle with homelessness by the Benioff Homelessness and Housing Initiative at the University of California, San Francisco (UCSF) paints a detailed picture of the problem, and it’s not pretty. Homelessness is thriving at the intersections of racism, sexual violence, overpolicing, and more. The report’s authors explain, it “occurs in conjunction with structural conditions that produce and reproduce inequalities.”
Titanic Pay for Corporate CEOs Leaves Workers Drowning Should we care about these astounding sums now filling the pockets of our top corporate execs? We sure should. Can you imagine a president of the United States proposing a federal budget that quadruples the paychecks that go to top federal officials? Of course not. No president would dare risk wandering down that road. America’s taxpayers, our top pols understand, have a distinct aversion to seeing anyone get rich off their tax dollars. Pay rates for top executives within the federal government reflect that aversion. The U.S. Department of Health and Human Services has, for instance, over 80,000 employees, and the work these employees do can literally make the difference between life and death for millions of people the world over. Yet the top executive at HHS, Xavier Becerra, last year took home less than $250,000 in compensation.
The Undisclosed Arms Industry Ties of Those Pushing for More Weapons to Ukraine The NATO Summit this week is emerging as an opportunity for Ukraine to press its case for membership in the alliance and expand on the military aid it has received from alliance members. On July 5, Politico published a letter “by 46 foreign policy experts” urging Ukraine’s membership into NATO and increasing the supply of Western weapons to Kyiv. Left undisclosed by Politico: nearly half of the signatories hold positions at organizations that receive considerable financial support from weapons companies, consultancies and lobby-shops servicing weapons industry clients, or weapons companies themselves.
Investigation Finds Thomas Has Benefited From Ultrawealthy Network for Decades The group has been described as “the true aristocracy of America.” For decades, an elite group of ultrawealthy and influential Americans has boasted the membership of Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas, and both the justice and the wealthy members of that network have benefited, a new investigation reveals. Over the past months, Thomas’s financial relationship with conservative billionaire Harlan Crow has made headlines. But, as a new report by The New York Times published over the weekend reveals, Thomas actually has access to a much wider group of wealthy beneficiaries — access that has allowed Thomas to live a lavish lifestyle typically only enjoyed by the richest Americans, despite Supreme Court justices’ comparatively modest salaries.
Civil Rights/Blackliberation:
Here’s How Organizing to Abolish the Prison Industrial Complex Works in Practice As more activists embrace abolition of the prison industrial complex, here’s what this work demands of us in practice. Prison industrial complex (PIC) abolition is the political praxis that seeks to eliminate the use of surveillance, policing, sentencing, imprisonment and execution and to build healthy, stable, self-determined societies that do not rely on coercion and vengeance to address harm. It’s important to note that detention and immigration policing are included in this understanding of the prison industrial complex, as is mental health imprisonment, youth imprisonment, and so on. This is not a new praxis but rather one developed through struggle over decades. This praxis, previously rejected outright as utopian or science fiction, has recently become more widely accepted. From Twitter to The New York Times, PIC abolitionist ideas have pierced the mainstream. Catalyzed in part by the 2020 uprisings and fueled by many years of persistent organizing, more people have begun to question the legitimacy of the punishment system and to consider how much better life could be without it.
Stopping Alabama’s Addiction to Torture Alabama’s addiction to torturing poor people—disproportionately Black and brown people, and more often than not, people who are severely mentally ill—with inhumane correctional institutions, a dysfunctional parole system, and, in some cases, a secretive and sadistic lethal injection protocol, has been going on for so long, overwhelmingly, Alabamians and Americans are desensitized to it. Leadership and meaningful—forceful and coercive federal—intervention must be employed to put a stop to it.
Brookings: The True Costs Of The Tulsa Race Massacre, 100 Years Later (2021) 2021 marks 100 years since the infamous 1921 massacre in Tulsa, in which white mobs unleashed violence against the city’s Black people, Black institutions, and Black wealth. An estimated 300 people were killed and approximately 35 acres of commercial and residential property within the Greenwood District—known as Black Wall Street—were destroyed. In her testimony, Fletcher described what Greenwood had meant to its residents and detailed how she lives with the memories every day. “Our country may forget this history, but I cannot, I will not, and other survivors do not, and our descendants do not,” she told Congress. The Tulsa massacre is only recently receiving the national recognition it needs. But even as the massacre itself becomes better known, much of the remaining story of Greenwood is still left untold. In particular, little attention is given to subsequent events in Tulsa, including the rebuilding of Greenwood by its Black residents, followed by its second destruction—this time at the hands of white city planners during the “urban renewal” period of the 1960s to 1980s.
Oklahoma Official Says Lessons on Tulsa Race Massacre Shouldn’t Discuss Racism The comments came the same weekend that a state judge dismissed a lawsuit from survivors of the massacre. Oklahoma State Superintendent of Public Instruction Ryan Walters (R) has suggested that discussion of race shouldn’t be included in lessons on the Tulsa Race Massacre, a white supremacist massacre in which a mob of white people murdered hundreds of Black residents and destroyed thousands of their homes and businesses over a century ago. The superintendent’s comments came on the same weekend that a judge in Tulsa County dismissed a lawsuit from survivors of the attack who were seeking compensation from the city over its inaction in stopping the mob in 1921.
The Devastation of Black Wall Street Tulsa, Oklahoma. 1921. A wave of racial violence destroys an affluent African-American community, seen as a threat to white-dominated American capitalism. In 1921, Tulsa, Oklahoma’s Greenwood District, known as Black Wall Street, was one of the most prosperous African-American communities in the United States. But on May 31 of that year, the Tulsa Tribune reported that a black man, Dick Rowland, attempted to rape a white woman, Sarah Page. Whites in the area refused to wait for the investigative process to play out, sparking two days of unprecedented racial violence. Thirty-five city blocks went up in flames, 300 people died, and 800 were injured. Defense of white female virtue was the expressed motivation for the collective racial violence. Accounts vary on what happened between Page and Rowland in the elevator of the Drexel Building. Yet as a result of the Tulsa Tribune’s racially inflammatory report, black and white armed mobs arrived at the courthouse. Scuffles broke out, and shots were fired. Since the blacks were outnumbered, they headed back to Greenwood. But the enraged whites were not far behind, looting and burning businesses and homes along the way.
Labor:
Economy:
Gallup Poll: Confidence in U.S. Banks Stood at 60 Percent in 1979. Today, It Stands at 26 Percent. The polling organization, Gallup, conducted a survey between June 1-22 to update its annual poll that measures the confidence that Americans have in key U.S. institutions. Banks, as might be expected, continued their downward trend, registering an abysmal 26 percent of Americans who have “a great deal” or “fair amount” of confidence in the banks. That confidence ranking stood at 27 percent last year and at 33 percent in 2021.
World:
The Robodebt Rogues Gallery If ever there was an instance of such a hideous failing in government policy and its cowardly implementation by the public service, Australia’s cruel, inept and vicious Robodebt program would have to be one of them. Robodebt was a scheme developed by the Department of Human Services (DHS) and submitted as a budget measure by the then Minister for Social Services, Scott Morrison, in 2015. Its express purpose: to recover claimed overpayments from welfare recipients stretching back to the 2010-11 financial year. The automated scheme used a deeply flawed “income averaging” method to assess income and benefit entitlements, yielding inaccurate results. Vitally, the assumption there was that recipients had stable income through the financial year. The scheme also failed to comply with the income calculation provisions of the Social Security Act 1991 (Cth).
Netherlands: Rutte’s Fourth Government Has Collapsed – Fight for a Class Alternative! The Dutch government has collapsed. The fourth Mark Rutte cabinet (consisting of VVD, CDA, D66, ChristenUnie) fell after a year and a half, brought down by disagreements over asylum and migration policies. The VVD (right-wing liberals) clashed head on with the ChristenUnie (‘social’ Christians) about a plan to restrict family reunification for refugees. None of the parties gave ground, leading to an unexpected collapse of the fourth (and final) Rutte government. This government was never stable. After a very long formation period, it eventually consisted of the same parties as those of Rutte’s unpopular third government, based on a narrow margin, as these parties lost many votes since the previous election.
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
How Wealth Inequality Is Subverting Higher Education at Northwestern The problem of wealth inequality in higher education transcends the favored treatment that many admissions officers give alumni donors; well-heeled contributors pursuing personal agendas can place the very soul of an institution at risk. With the Supreme Court’s dismantling of affirmative action, legacy admissions are now the hot topic in higher education. But the impact of wealth inequality transcends the preference that many admissions officers give well-heeled donors. When a university allows benefactors with large fortunes to pursue personal agendas, the educational mission itself becomes a casualty.