Daily News Digest March 26, 2024
Images of the Day:
Ted Rall: Theoretical vs. Actual Bigger Evils
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:
We stand now where two roads diverge. But unlike the roads in Robert Frost‘s familiar poem, they are not equally fair. The road we have long been traveling is deceptively easy, a smooth superhighway on which we progress with great speed, but at its end lies disaster. The other fork of the road — the one less traveled by — offers our last, our only chance to reach a destination that assures the preservation of the earth. — Rachael Carson, The Silent Spring (1962)
Pocasts/Videos of the Day:
As Israel Blocks More U.N. Aid, Gaza Is on the Brink of “Most Intense Famine” Since WW2
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
Inequality —The Real State of the Union!: Total U.S. Billionaire Wealth is Up 88 Percent over Four Years Four years ago, the United States entered the Covid-19 pandemic. Forbes published its 34th annual billionaire survey shortly after with data keyed to March 18, 2020. On that day, the United States had 614 billionaires who owned a combined wealth of $2.947 trillion. Four years later, on March 18, 2024, the country has 737 billionaires with a combined wealth of $5.529 trillion, an 87.6 percent increase of $2.58 trillion, according to Institute for Policy Studies calculations of Forbes Real Time Billionaire Data. (Thank you, Forbes!)
A Spectacular Achievement on the Ice! Ilia Malinin! I am not a huge fan of professional ice skating but I am a huge fan of excellence. I just watched a 10–minute clip of Ilia Malinin’s World Championship performance yesterday in Montreal. It was mesmerizing! Ilia was born in Virginia. His parents were professional skaters in Uzbekistan, as was his grandfather. His parents are his coaches. Watching this brilliantly accomplished young man reminded me of the book written by Senator John F. Kennedy in 1958 titled A Nation of Immigrants. The subject was on my mind because yesterday I saw a moving and beautiful film called Cabrini. That too made me reflect on today’s hateful rhetoric about immigrants. Ilia’s magnificent performance in Montreal was hailed by the sportscasters as one of the most remarkable events in the history of ice skating. Watch it!
A Slow-Motion World War III? Imperial decline in the Age of Climate Change I’ve been describing this world of ours, such as it is, for almost 23 years at TomDispatch. I’ve written my way through three-and-a-half presidencies — god save us, it could be four in November! I’ve viewed from a grave (and I mean that word!) distance America’s endlessly disastrous wars of this century. I’ve watched the latest military budget hit almost $900 billion, undoubtedly on its way toward a cool trillion in the years to come, while years ago the whole “national security” budget (though “insecurity” would be a better word) soared to well over the trillion-dollar mark.
U.S. Armed and Funded Palestinian Genocide:
Talking Peace While Funding War!: Organizing Aid to Gaza Led Me to a Harsh Truth: Biden Is on Board for Ethnic Cleansing I helped with airlifts in Afghanistan, aid to the Ukrainian front, and building roads in Rwanda. None of it prepared me for the challenges of Gaza. I have organized airlifts of women legislators, judges, and journalists out of Afghanistan as Kabul fell; delivered ongoing aid to Ukrainian front-line villages during Russia’s invasion; worked on efforts to build runways, roads, and highways to deliver aid to Rwandan refugees after the genocide; and delivered aid shipments to enclaves besieged and under attack by the Syrian army. None of it prepared me for the challenges of trying to bring a few trucks of food and medicine per week into the Gaza Strip. It’s easy to point the finger at Israel, the country that is implementing the blockade of Gaza’s 2.3 million residents, half of whom are children. Yet trying to work the issue from every angle on a daily basis to get urgent medical and food aid in, I’ve come to the conclusion that President Joe Biden, for whom I hosted fundraisers and worked to elect in 2020, has signed on to Israel’s end goal of the ethnic cleansing of Palestinians in Gaza
To Fight Global Fascism, We Must Confront Zionism To stand with Palestine is to transform our genocidal global systems and build a different world. The Israeli and U.S.-funded genocide of Palestinians has catalyzed a moment of global reckoning. This moment is an echo of 2020 when the racial justice uprisings following George Floyd’s murder offered a moment of reckoning in the United States. The horror that Palestinians are enduring is beyond comprehension. As the world witnesses the genocide in Gaza unfolding in real-time on social media, many of us who are watching are saying — there is no coming back from this. The experiment of the Israeli state is over. Israel is showing the world that Zionism is an undistilled form of Western imperialism that requires this level of slaughter to maintain itself.
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?
In 1983, 50 corporations controlled the vast majority of all news media in the U.S. At the time, Ben Bagdikian was called “alarmist” for pointing this out in his book, The Media Monopoly. In his 4th edition, published in 1992, he wrote “in the U.S., fewer than two dozen of these extraordinary creatures own and operate 90% of the mass media”— controlling almost all of America’s newspapers, magazines, TV and radio stations, books, records, movies, videos, wire services and photo agencies. He predicted then that eventually this number would fall to about half a dozen companies. This was greeted with skepticism at the time. When the 6th edition of The Media Monopoly was published in 2000, the number had fallen to six. Since then, there have been more mergers and the scope has expanded to include new media like the Internet market. More than 1 in 4 Internet users in the U.S. now log in with AOL Time-Warner, the world’s largest media corporation. — Media Reform Information Center
The 1%’s 5 Corporation Media Monopoly at Work!: How the Media Upholds Climate Crimes Mainstream outlets bolster the legitimacy of state and corporate climate violence through decontextualizing protesters’ actions and privileging false ideas of objectivity. A climate protester named Mama Julz spent February 1 locked to a grounded helicopter, the kind usually used to transport construction workers to remote portions of the Mountain Valley Pipeline, the rushed and ecologically destructive pet project of West Virginia Sen. Joe Manchin. After a few hours, police arrested Mama Julz and one other protester who supported the nonviolent direct action. Both were charged with a misdemeanor and held in jail without bond. Later in February—and 470 miles south of the planned route for the Mountain Valley Pipeline—local, state, and federal law enforcement raided the homes of three activists for their involvement in protesting the Weelaunee Forest’s development into a $110 million police training center known as Cop City. Police dragged one person out by their hair and forced another to sit topless for hours in the back of a police car. Despite the nonviolent nature of the protests and the outsized police response, both stories received little coverage.
Weekly Average Atmospheric CO2 at Mauna Loa Week beginning on March 17, 2024: 425.37 ppm. Weekly value from 1 week ago: 425.74 ppm. Weekly value from 1 year ago: 420.75 ppm. Weekly value from 10 years ago: 400.87 ppm
How Did Canada End Up With Worse Air Quality Than the US? Year of devastating wildfires meant Canadians were breathing worse air than southern neighbours for first time ever Canada’s pristine air quality has been long praised by its citizens and prized by its government. But the thick plumes of smoke and miles of haze released by a record-breaking season of wildfires deteriorated the country’s air so much that it has fallen behind the United States for the first time on record, highlighting the wide-ranging and damaging effects of the blazes.
Black Liberation/Civil Rights:
Georgia Swamp Defenders Are Resisting Mining in Endangered Okefenokee Wetlands Locals are fighting a proposed titanium mine threatening the swamp’s endangered species and carbon-capturing processes. Gerod Ford inherited his love of swampland from his grandmother, who grew up visiting Florida’s wetlands. She would later tell her grandchildren that “the symbiosis of the swamp is what we strive for as a community.” After moving to Georgia, Ford said his grandmother was ecstatic to learn about the Okefenokee Swamp, the nation’s largest blackwater swamp and the home to several endangered species. Her age and health in recent years have prevented her from traveling, and Ford says her one wish is to visit the swamp one last time before she passes.
California Flooding Highlights the Risks of Extreme Weather on People Behind Bars State and federal government entities are not equipped or prepared to protect the 1.9 million people in our nation’s jails, prisons, and detention facilities during more frequent and severe weather disasters. In February, California faced a “monster storm.” This storm was the second atmospheric river storm to hit the state within a week, leaving nine confirmed dead in its wake. While this storm was record breaking, California saw similar weather patterns and severe flooding last year, and we can only expect these occurrences to continue and increase in intensity as climate change fuels a rise in extreme weather events.
Cops Tried to Arrest a Whole Neighborhood. This is What Happened When the Community Fought Back. Former Baltimore Police Sgt. Ethan Newberg’s disgraceful downfall continues as new body camera footage reveals an incident in which the ex-cop made three illegal arrests, and then threatened to arrest entire block full of witnesses. Although they were initially responding to a neighborhood dispute, Newberg and his partner arrested a local resident who was not involved in the altercation almost immediately. hen neighbors began to protest, Newberg escalated to arrest two more residents—and threatened to keep going until the whole neighborhood was in handcuffs. Police Accountability Report returns with exclusive footage of Sgt. Newberg’s outburst, and what it tells us about the state of policing in Baltimore and around the country.
Labor:
Economy:
Wall Street’s Go-To Law Firm, Sullivan & Cromwell, Got in Bed with Crypto; Now Its Reputation Is Being Hammered Since January, the reputation of Wall Street’s go-to law firm, Sullivan & Cromwell, has been repeatedly hammered. It all stems from the law firm’s decision some years ago to involve itself in legal representations of crypto firms and/or their principals – an industry that 1,600 of the brightest scientific minds in technology have called a sham.
World:
In Unprecedented Asylum Case, UK Recognizes Israel’s Persecution of Palestinians In a precedent-setting case, a Palestinian citizen of Israel won asylum in the UK, citing apartheid and persecution Hasan*, a Palestinian citizen of Israel, has spent all but one of his 24 years of life in the United Kingdom. He does not speak Hebrew or Arabic fluently, and depends on British medical care. In 2019, Hasan was informed that he was to be deported to Israel, separating him from his family in the U.K., so he filed an asylum claim. In 2022, that claim was denied, forcing him to appeal. In the years since then — and in recent months, as Israel’s post-October 7 incursion into Gaza has brought Palestinians’ human rights into the international spotlight — Hasan has waited. His appeal hearing was scheduled for March 12 of this year. If Hasan were to be returned to Israel, his lawyers wrote that he’d face “likely persecution” because he is Palestinian, because he is Muslim, and because of “his anti-Zionist, anti-apartheid and pro-Palestinian political opinion.” But in a surprising reversal March 11, Hasan was told that he’d be allowed to stay — without having to go to court. His lawyers say this is a precedent-setting recognition by the British state of the Israeli government’s persecution of Palestinians.
Finland Resumes UNRWA Funding, Further Cementing US’s Pariah Status The decision comes as the US House overwhelmingly voted to sanction the UNRWA and send billions to Israel on Friday. As the United States doubled down on banning funds for the United Nations agency for Palestinian refugees, Finland said Friday that it would resume contributions to the lifesaving organization in an implicit rebuke of unsubstantiated Israeli claims — reportedly extracted via torture — that staff members were involved in the October 7 attacks.
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