Daily News Digest April 15, 2024
Images of the Day:
Eugene V. Debs
“No Foreign Entanglements” 
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:
The planetary danger signals are increasing. Climate scientists are beginning to worry we may be at a terrifying juncture, where the climate shifts dramatically from one state to another. An abrupt global warming episode, during which climate changes happen in decades, not centuries, and interrelated tipping points cascade into one another amplifying the sudden shift in the world climate, pushing the planet out of the temperate sweet spot we humans have been lucky enough to live in. Could this sudden shift happen? Unfortunately, the answer is yes. — After Climate Tipping Points, Change Will Come Slowly, Then All At Once
The underlying issue is how we treat those who struggle to meet basic needs in the wealthiest nation in the world. Criminalizing people for involuntarily living unhoused and in poverty is inherently cruel. For the U.S. to truly address this crisis, we must transform our approach and recognize that housing is a fundamental human right, not a commodity. All people deserve to live in a home in peace, security, and dignity. — We Need Housing, Not Hand Cuffs
Pocasts/Videos of the Day:
“A Stalemate and Attritional Grind”: Journalist Luke Mogelson on 2 Years of Russia’s War in Ukraine
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
Here’s How Much You Gave Last Year to The Pentagon (Hint: It Was a Lot) “Maybe we should spend more on regulating companies like Boeing than subsidizing them?” Your tax dollars enriched Pentagon contractors at the expense of better healthcare, education, clean air and water, disaster management, and more. Ever wonder where your taxes go? Each year, the Institute for Policy Studies releases a tax receipt so you can find out. One item always stands out: the Pentagon—and the contractors who profit off it.In 2023, the average taxpayer spent $2,974 on the Pentagon. Of that, just $705 went to salaries for the troops, who often have to rely on programs like food stamps. A much larger sum—$1,748—went to corporate Pentagon contractors. That’s more than the average American’s monthly rent, $1,372.
Does the Biden Administration Care About International Law? In the “rules-based international order” the Biden administration is so fond of invoking, what exactly are the “rules”? Because it’s starting to look more and more like there aren’t any. Last Friday, police in Ecuador — currently governed by a right-wing, US-backed government — stormed the Mexican embassy in the capital, Quito, to arrest Ecuador’s former vice president Jorge Glas who had been holed up in the building avoiding what he claims are trumped-up charges of corruption. The raid saw police break into the embassy, guns drawn, and repeatedly manhandle and throw to the ground diplomat Roberto Canseco, the highest-ranking official present at the embassy — all in the process of apprehending Glas, who had been formally granted asylum by the Mexican government earlier that day. Though President Joe Biden’s state department declared that “the United States condemns any violation of the Vienna Convention” and “takes very seriously the obligation of host countries . . . to respect the inviolability of diplomatic missions,” Mexican president Andrés Manuel López Obrador has expressed his disappointment at what he called the “very ambiguous” statement that failed to directly condemn the raid itself.
When the US/Big Oil Overthrew Democracy in Iran: The Origins of the West’s Iran Crisis: Oil, Autocracy and Coup Review of David S. Painter and Gregory Brew, The Struggle for Iran: Oil, Autocracy, and the Cold War, 1951–1954. Chapel Hill: The University of North Carolina Press, 2023. Munich (Special to Informed Comment; Feature) – The figure of Mohammad Mosaddeq, Prime Minister of Iran from 1951 to 1953, is an uncomfortable one for both sides of the US-Iran rivalry. For the US, Mosaddeq is a constant reminder that the dictatorial reign of Shah Mohammad Reza Pahlavi after 1953 came into being with a US intervention to overthrow the constitutionally elected Mosaddeq. The US would provide strong support for the Shah in the coming decades. Mosaddeq is someone who challenged Western powers to defend Iranian national interests. This alone should, a priori, afford him a place of honor in the Islamic Republic established by Ruhollah Khomeini after his return from exile in 1979. However, Mosaddeq’s nationalism was grounded on democratic secularist convictions that are at odds with the ideology of the Islamic Republic, which in recent years has shut down its already limited avenues of democratic participation within the system.
U.S. Funded Plestinian Genocide:
Cracks in Biden’s Zionist Wall: Warren, Powers admit “Genocide, Famine” in Gaza as Israeli Atrocities Continue Cracks are showing in the Iron Wall of the Biden administration knee-jerk support for the far-right, extremist Israeli government’s total war on Gaza. US AID Administrator Samantha Power admitted that Israel’s campaign in Gaza has produced a famine. And Senator Elizabeth Warren (D-MA) admitted that Israel is committing a genocide there.
“Now I Am Become Death, the Destroyer of Worlds:” Genocide and Ecocide Stalk the Earth When I was in the U.S. military, I learned a saying (often wrongly attributed to the Greek philosopher Plato) that only the dead have seen the end of war. Its persistence through history to this very moment should indeed be sobering. What would it take for us humans to stop killing each other with such vigor and in such numbers? Song lyrics tell me to be proud to be an American, yet war and profligate preparations for more of the same are omnipresent here. My government spends more on its military than the next 10 countries combined (and most of them are allies). In this century, our leaders have twice warned of an “axis of evil” intent on harming us, whether the fantasy troika of Iraq, Iran, and North Korea cited by President George W. Bush early in 2002 or a new one — China, Russia, and North Korea — in the Indo-Pacific today. Predictably given that sort of threat inflation, this country is now closing in on a trillion dollars a year in “defense spending,” or close to two-thirds of federal discretionary spending, in the name of having a military machine capable of defeating “evil” troikas (as well as combatting global terrorism). A significant part of that huge sum is reserved for producing a new generation of nuclear weapons that will be quite capable of destroying this planet with missiles and warheads to spare.
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?
Big Gas Has Followed the Tobacco Playbook for Spreading Lies and Indoor Air Pollution The industry has been gaslighting us by promoting the idea that “cooking with gas” is a good thing, despite knowing as far back as 1970 that gas stoves pose a threat to public health and the environment. During my first decade in Washington, D.C., my windows were caked with soot from the diesel buses that ran up and down my street. So when I found a place to live just a few blocks away on a street without buses, it was a relief. What I didn’t know is that my health was still at risk—from indoor pollution.
‘Worst I Have Seen’: 75% of Great Barrier Reef Suffers Coral Bleaching “We are really running out of time. We need to reduce our emissions immediately,” one expert warned. “We cannot expect to save the Great Barrier Reef and be opening new fossil fuel developments.” Marine conservationists warned Thursday that Australia’s Great Barrier Reef may be suffering its worst-ever coral bleaching event amid record ocean heat fueled by the worsening climate emergency. The Australian Marine Conservation Society (AMCS) said that bleached corals have been found at depths of up to nearly 60 feet, and “some corals are starting to die as they face record marine heatwaves.” “Corals bleach when they are stressed by warmer waters for an extended period of time—during marine heatwaves, which are driven by climate change,” AMCS explained. “They expel the algae that inhabit them, which is their main energy source and they starve, sometimes to death.”
Black Liberation/Civil Rights:
Republicracts Attack the Bill of Rights!: House Dems, GOP Team Up to Expand Warrantless Spying on Americans “The House has voted to allow the intelligence agencies to violate the civil rights and liberties of Americans for years to come,” said the ACLU’s senior policy counsel. The U.S. House on Friday passed legislation to expand a major mass spying authority after voting down a bipartisan push to attach a search warrant requirement to the heavily abused surveillance law. The bill to reauthorize Section 702 of the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA) for two years passed by a vote of 273-147, with 59 Democrats and 88 Republicans voting no. More Democrats voted for the bill than Republicans.
Labor:
The U.S. Minimum Wage Level is Outrageous In 2007, towards the end of the Bush regime, amendments to legislation were passed that raised the minimum wage from $5.85/hour in the middle of 2007 to $7.25/hour in July 2009 where, as of today, it remains unchanged. Many states require employers to pay a higher minimum wage. However, as of January 1, 2024, some 13 states, including workers’ paradise Texas and swing states Pennsylvania and Wisconsin, continue to adhere to the federal minimum wage level. Seven other states have no minimum wage, or one that is lower than $7.25/hour. A worker paid the federal minimum wage who works full-time all 52 weeks in a year for 40 hours a week earns $15,080/year. In 2010, the first full year of the $7.25/hour minimum wage, the government classified a single person under 65 as living in poverty if one’s income was less than $11,344. Then, a full-time worker at the minimum wage earned $3,736 above the poverty threshold. As of 2023, the poverty threshold for a single person under 65 is $15,852. A full-time federal minimum wage worker in 2023 would have earned $772 less than the poverty threshold and, despite working full-time, be counted as living in poverty.
Economy:
World Must Prioritize Productivity Reforms to Revive Medium-Term Growth Without ambitious steps to enhance productivity, global growth is set to fall far below its historical average The world economy faces a sobering reality. The global growth rate—stripped of cyclical ups and downs—has slowed steadily since the 2008-09 global financial crisis. Without policy intervention and leveraging emerging technologies, the stronger growth rates of the past are unlikely to return. Faced with several headwinds, future growth prospects have also soured. Global growth will slow to just above 3 percent by 2029, according to five-year ahead projections in our latest World Economic Outlook. Our analysis shows that growth could drop by about a percentage point below the pre-pandemic (2000-19) average by the end of the decade. This threatens to reverse improvements to living standards, and the unevenness of the slowdown between richer and poorer nations could limit the prospects for global income convergence.
World:
Black Alliance for Peace Backgrounder: Haiti Behind the Headlines Haiti is in the headlines again and, as usual, the headlines on Haiti are mostly negative. They are also largely false. Haiti, they tell us, is overrun by “gang violence.” Haiti is “a failed state,” standing on the verge of “anarchy” and teetering on the edge of “collapse.” Haiti, they tell us, can only be stabilized and saved through foreign military invasion and occupation. We have seen these stories before. We know their purpose. They serve to cover up the true origins of the “crisis” in Haiti while justifying foreign military intervention and setting up an attack on Haiti’s sovereignty. What is the reality behind the headlines? The reality is that the crisis in Haiti is a crisis of imperialism. Those countries calling for military intervention – the US, France,Canada – have created the conditions making military intervention appear necessary and inevitable. The same countries calling for intervention are the same countries that will benefit from intervention, not the Haitian people. And for twenty years, those countries that cast Haiti as a failed state actively worked to destroy Haiti’s government while imposing foreign colonial rule.
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
Life, Liberty, and the Pursuit of Happiness — The Failure of Capitalism !: We Need Housing, Not Hand Cuffs As the cost of housing has exploded, so has the number of people experiencing homelessness. And unfortunately, instead of trying to house people, more states and cities are criminalizing people simply for lacking a safe place to sleep. According to the National Homelessness Law Center, almost every state restricts the conduct of people experiencing homelessness. In Missouri, sleeping on state land is a crime. A new law in Florida bans people from sleeping on public property — and requires local governments without bed space for unhoused people to set up camps far away from public services.
Is the End of Public Schooling Near? Inglewood, California’s gutted system previews a bleak future for American education. The question that’s hung uneasily over my hometown of Inglewood for years has now landed with a crash: Will we be a city with no public schools at all? Two weeks ago, the county-appointed Inglewood Unified School District chief, James Moore, announced the decision to close five campuses by the end of the 2024-25 school year. That would make eight schools shuttered since 2019. In a 118-year-old city that once prided itself on its schools, this feels like an ongoing mass extinction event that will drastically alter the climate here, not for the better. I realize we are not alone. All public schools experienced enrollment decline during and after the remote learning required by the COVID-19 pandemic. Neighboring Los Angeles Unified has shrunk precipitously, from 750,000 kids at its peak to about 450,000 now. The great vanishing of students has many factors and has rightly alarmed educators across the country.