Daily News Digest February 27 2024
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”
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: Austerity, Scapegoat Blacks, Minorities, and ‘Illegal’ Immigrants for Unemployment, andThe 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! Globaly, With the Current Gaza War, The Right of Assembly is Under Attack! 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:
Pocasts/Videos of the Day:
Malcolm X Assassination: Former Security Guards Reveal New Details Pointing to FBI, NYPD Conspiracy On the 59th anniversary of the assassination of Malcolm X, two former security guards are speaking out for the first time about how they were falsely arrested by the New York Police Department as part of a conspiracy to remove his protection before he was killed. We hear from Khaleel Sayyed, 81, who says he was detained on trumped-up charges just days before Malcolm X was fatally shot, and we speak with Ben Crump and Flint Taylor, two civil rights attorneys who are working with the family. They are calling on New York City Mayor Eric Adams, a former police officer, to support the release of key evidence in the case. We are “trying to peel back the layers to finally, after 59 years, get some measure of justice for Malcolm X’s family,” says Crump. Taylor also places the assassination in the context of police and the FBI targeting Black civil rights leaders through COINTELPRO, such as Fred Hampton, which he helped expose in a landmark case in Chicago.
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 ford 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 1% Rulers’ Tax Policy: Childcare Crisis Grips US as IRS Chief Says Wealthy Tax Dodgers Cost $150 Billion a Year “If we can afford to spend over $1 trillion on tax breaks for the top 1% and large corporations making record-breaking profits, we can afford to provide working class families with the childcare they desperately need.”
Gaza: Will Biden go Big on Diplomacy or on Military Destruction? On the horizon, shimmering like some heavenly ideal, is a grand bargain to end the war in Gaza, establish an independent Palestinian state, and stabilize the Middle East. Also on the horizon, blazing like an infernal nightmare, is the prospect of an escalation of the current war in Gaza and the spread of destabilizing violence to every corner of the Middle East.
Red Sea attacks in Sympathy with Gaza Escalate as Yemeni Houthis’ Resilience Surprises Biden The Helpers of God (Ansar Allah) or Houthis in Yemen are proving a bigger challenge for the Biden Administration’s attempt to run interference for the Israeli atrocities in Gaza than Washington had expected. Just Monday morning the Yemeni forces fired a ballistic missile at the US-owned and -operated M/V Torm Thor, an oil tanker, but it fell short. The leadership say they are hitting Red Sea traffic as a protest against Israel’s war against Gaza. Enormous crowds in the hundreds of thousands have demonstrated in Sanaa and other cities against the Israeli campaign against Gaza, which the International Criminal Court has ruled may be a genocide.
How the Adl’s Anti-Palestinian Advocacy Helped Shape U.S. Terror Laws Long before 9/11, Zionist groups like the Anti-Defamation League lobbied for counterterror legislation that singled out Palestinians, a new report reveals. Last October, as protests against Israel’s war on Gaza swept U.S. campuses, two prominent pro-Israel groups wrote to nearly 200 university and college administrators urging them to investigate their students for possibly violating federal law by promoting pro-Hamas, anti-Israel messaging. The Anti-Defamation League, or ADL, and the Louis D. Brandeis Center for Human Rights Under Law suggested that members of Students for Justice in Palestine, the largest Palestine solidarity campus organization in the country, may have been violating a law that prohibits people from providing “material support” — a broad category that includes money as well as services or other assistance — to U.S.-designated terror groups. “We certainly cannot sit idly by as a student organization provides vocal and potentially material support to Hamas, a designated Foreign Terrorist Organization,” the ADL and the Brandeis Center wrote.
U.S. Funded Palestinian Genocide:
‘If This Isn’t Genocide, I Don’t Know What Is,’ Says Lula of Israeli Attack on Gaza “What the Israeli government is doing to the Palestinian people is not war,” said the President of Brazil. “It’s not soldiers who are dying, but women and children who are dying inside the hospitals.”
Why Can Israel Receive Weapons Shipments But Gaza Can’t Receive Food? A 2-month-old child starved to death as the United Nations warns famine is now actually unfolding in Gaza. Afamine is unfolding in Gaza, where hundreds of thousands of displaced Palestinians have resorted to consuming animal feed amid soaring prices and dwindling supplies of food. The United Nations has already begun reporting deaths from starvation and malnutrition, while aid agencies have been forced to pause deliveries. “Israel is not allowing food into the northern part of Gaza so people would regret not having left,” says Palestinian writer Mosab Abu Toha, who fled Gaza for Cairo in November and has been attempting since then to secure safe passage for his extended family members, including his sister-in-law who has just given birth. He writes about his experiences in a New Yorker piece, “My Family’s Daily Struggle to Find Food in Gaza.” Abu Toha urges international actors to take action and end Israel’s siege of Gaza. “They are killing us every day,” he says. “Where is the mind of the people in the world? How could you let this happen?”
The War on Gaza: Public Relations vs. Reality For its victims, war is . . . yes, hell. For the rest of us — the onlooking and supportive patriots — war is an abstraction embedded in ignorance, a.k.a., public relations, served up for public consumption. At least that’s the way it’s supposed to be. The reality of war should never directly confront the official PR of those waging it. If it does, God help the war industry! But that’s what’s happening now, as public support for U.S. complicity in Israel’s devastation of Gaza diminishes, indeed, starts turning to outrage. Official spokesmen for the Biden administration, such as John Kirby, strategic communications coordinator for the National Security Council, are forced to start mixing apologetic language in with their unwavering support for the bombing and murder of civilians . . . excuse me, Israel’s right to defend itself.
UN-Appointed Human Rights Experts Demand Halt of Arms Shipments to Israel for Violations of Laws of War More than thirty independent experts appointed by the Office of the High Commission on Human Rights of the United Nations said Friday that arms exports to Israel must cease immediately, given Israeli violations of the international laws of war and the government’s announced intention to invade Rafah in south Gaza, which would create a further humanitarian catastrophe.
Environment:
Fund Climate! — Not Genocide! One of Many Ways to Begin to End Global Warming: Expose ‘Greenwashing’ — Tax the Polluters 100%! After World War II Rosa Luxenburg Coined the Slogan: ‘S0cialism or Barbaism’! Now the Slogan Should Be: ‘Ecosocialism or Ecocide’!
Capitalism’s Wars for Oil: When Bodies Start Stacking Up From Climate Change-Related Disasters, Will These Monsters be Held to Account?
Vast Swaths of US Will be Exposed to Polluted Air by 2054, Says Report Researchers say the number of Americans exposed to unhealthy air will rise by 50% by the middle of the century Vast swaths of the continental US will be exposed to unhealthy, polluted air by 2054, according to an alarming new report. Researchers at First Street Foundation, a non-profit that analyzes climate risk, found that one in four Americans are already exposed to air that is deemed “unhealthy” by the Air Quality Index (AQI), which provides daily air quality readings. That number is expected to grow by 50% in the next few decades, with an estimated total of 125 million Americans experiencing dangerous air pollution by the middle of the century.
British and Irish Rivers in Desperate State From Pollution, Report Reveals Not a single waterway in England or Northern Ireland in good overall health, according to Rivers TrustThe rivers of Britain and Ireland are in a desperate state from the impact of pollution, with not a single waterway in England or Northern Ireland listed as being in good overall health, a report said on Monday. The Rivers Trust annual State of Our Rivers report reveals that the impact of pollution from treated and untreated sewage and agricultural and industrial runoff means rivers are in a worse condition than ever. More than half – 54% – of rivers in England failed to pass chemical and ecological tests because of pollution from water industry releases of treated and untreated sewage, based on data from the EU-derived water framework directive (WFD) in 2022.
King of Poisons: Arsenic in Landfills is Still Leaching into Groundwater Arsenic has long been considered “the king of poisons.” Films such as “Arsenic and Old Lace” by Frank Capra and “The Name of the Rose” by Jean-Jacques Annaud illustrate the deadly effect that a high dose has on people. But when someone experiences arsenic poisoning, it’s usually not the direct result of a diabolical plot – in fact, it usually isn’t. So how do you figure out how the arsenic got into someone’s bloodstream? That’s the question a team of fellow chemical engineers and I tackled more than 20 years ago after an abrupt jump in the number of U.S. cases of arsenic poisoning. We later published a peer-reviewed study documenting the investigation. Finding the source of arsenic poisonings is not always easy, but it’s extremely important for public health. Scientists often need to combine science and detective work, which led us to conclude that landfills could be a significant source of contamination. Yet nearly 20 years later, landfills in the U.S., Europe and around the world remain important sources of arsenic poisoning.
Black Liberation/Civil Rights:
Alabama IVF Ruling: When The Law Has A Personal Problem Riddle: When is a frozen embryo actually a can of worms? Answer: When the Alabama Supreme Court issues its ruling in LePage v. Mobile Infirmary Clinic, Inc., allowing the parents of several such embryos, created through in-vitro fertilization, to proceed with a wrongful death lawsuit after those embryos were accidentally destroyed. You’ve probably heard at least two things about the ruling: First, that it creates big issues for the continued use of IVF to help parents with fertility problems have children, with clinics fearing litigation or even prosecution if they offer the service.Second, that the court includes religious sentiments and Bible citations on the santctity of life.
From Assange to Navalny, Powerful Nations Show Their Contempt for Press Freedoms It is not surprising that politicians in power do not want to encourage whistleblowers and autonomous journalists. Those who rule the world prefer to indulge in their power games in secrecy.
Labor:
Economy:
Biden Touts Lie That Endless War Is Good for the Economy As the administration pitches their new ‘defense industrial strategy’ the only people benefiting are arms makers, not regular Americans. Joe Biden wants you to believe that spending money on weapons is good for the economy. That tired old myth — regularly repeated by the political leaders of both parties — could help create an even more militarized economy that could threaten our peace and prosperity for decades to come. Any short-term gains from pumping in more arms spending will be more than offset by the long-term damage caused by crowding out new industries and innovations, while vacuuming up funds needed to address other urgent national priorities. The Biden administration’s sales pitch for the purported benefits of military outlays began in earnest last October, when the president gave a rare Oval Office address to promote a $106-billion emergency allocation that included tens of billions of dollars of weaponry for Ukraine, Israel, and Taiwan. MAGA Republicans in Congress had been blocking the funding from going forward and the White House was searching for a new argument to win them over.
Laughing All The Way to The Bank: Bank Profits Soar While Taxes Stay Low This week the Big Four UK banks announced pre-tax profits of £44.3 billion, an average of 66 per cent higher than their profits in 2018. This week the Big Four UK banks — Lloyds, NatWest, Barclays and HSBC — announced pre-tax profits of £44.3 billion – an average of 66 per cent higher than their profits in 2018. Barclays had the highest percentage increase in profits, which have risen 88 per cent, from £3.5 billion to £6.6 billion. The bank’s payouts to shareholders through traditional dividend payments and share buyback schemes also increased over the same period. In 2023, the Big Four banks paid their shareholders £26.8 billion.
Jamie Dimon and Nine of His Top Executives at JPMorgan Chase Have Dumped Over $150 Million of their JPMorgan Stock in Last Two Months According to Form 4 filed with the Securities and Exchange Commission by corporate insiders, ten of the key executives at the largest bank in the United States, JPMorgan Chase, have dumped more than $150 million in common stock in the bank this year. The sales come as the bank’s stock has been hitting all time highs while the scandals at the bank are also hitting unprecedented levels.
World:
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 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