Daily News Digest April 19, 2024
Images of the Day:
Ted Rall: Your Right To Choose What We Tell You 
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:
From President Dwight D. Eisenhower’s Farewell Address (On January 17, 1961, in this farewell address, President Dwight Eisenhower warned against the establishment of a “military-industrial complex.”): Our military organization today bears little relation to that known by any of my predecessors in peace time, or indeed by the fighting men of World War II or Korea. Until the latest of our world conflicts, the United States had no armaments industry. American makers of plowshares could, with time and as required, make swords as well. But now we can no longer risk emergency improvisation of national defense; we have been compelled to create a permanent armaments industry of vast proportions. Added to this, three and a half million men and women are directly engaged in the defense establishment. We annually spend on military security more than the net income of all United State corporations. This conjunction of an immense military establishment and a large arms industry is new in the American experience. The total influence-economic, political, even spiritual-is felt in every city, every state house, every office of the Federal government. We recognize the imperative need for this development. Yet we must not fail to comprehend its grave implications. Our toil, resources and livelihood are all involved; so is the very structure of our society. In the councils of government, we must guard against the acquisition of unwarranted influence, whether sought or unsought, by the military-industrial complex. The potential for the disastrous rise of misplaced power exists and will persist. We must never let the weight of this combination endanger our liberties or democratic processes. We should take nothing for granted. Only an alert and knowledgeable citizenry can compel the proper meshing of the huge industrial and military machinery of defense with our peaceful methods and goals, so that security and liberty may prosper together.
Pocasts/Videos of the Day:
What the Desert City of Dubai Looks Like After Its Biggest Rainfall In 75 Years
Black Agenda Radio April 12, 2024
Ecuador Kidnaps Former Vice President from Mexican Embassy
Human Rights Industrial Complex Protects Paul Kagame in Rwanda
Raymond Nat Turner, Upsurge NYC and Black Agenda Report – Part 2
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
Nobody “Earns” a Billion Dollars. We Need a Wealth Tax. Economist James K. Boyce analyzes new data on US disparities and frames environmental degradation as a class issue. U.S. billionaires have seen their wealth nearly double since the Trump tax cuts took effect in 2017. In the meantime, the planet is getting hotter and the richest 1 percent of humanity accounts for more carbon emissions than the poorest 66 percent. Indeed, the interconnection between climate change and economic inequality has emerged as a central theme in serious economic analyses and a focal point of climate activism. U.S. billionaires have seen their wealth nearly double since the Trump tax cuts took effect in 2017. In the meantime, the planet is getting hotter and the richest 1 percent of humanity accounts for more carbon emissions than the poorest 66 percent. Indeed, the interconnection between climate change and economic inequality has emerged as a central theme in serious economic analyses and a focal point of climate activism. In the exclusive interview for Truthout that follows, progressive political economist James K. Boyce — who has just received the inaugural Global Inequality Research Award from Sciences Po and the World Inequality Lab for his groundbreaking work in the field of economic and environmental inequalities – explains the main causes behind the broad trend of rising inequality in the U.S. and globally, and how it is linked to environmental degradation.
The Military Industrial Complex Has an Inside Man in the Pacific Biden envoy, Joseph Yun, helped shape defensive policy for the Pacific islands while consulting for a private firm that represents a massive conflict of interest. When Biden’s presidential envoy Joseph Yun landed in the Marshall Islands in June 2022, he took every precaution. Everyone involved wore teal N95 masks. Yun kept his distance from his Marshallese hosts, who exchanged handmade gifts without physical contact, the U.S. military base’s newspaper Kwajalein Hourglass reported. Concerns around COVID-19 had delayed Yun’s trip and related negotiations over pacts with the Marshall Islands, the Federated States of Micronesia, and Palau — strategic islands in the Pacific where the United States and China are vying for military dominance. But the Biden administration has been less cautious about the ethical quandary presented by Yun’s role. At the same time that Yun was America’s chief negotiator in the Pacific, he was also listed as a senior adviser to The Asia Group, an ultra-connected Washington consulting firm composed of former government leaders who advise major corporations and military contractors. He led talks that are likely to deliver a lucrative advantage to the consulting firm where he currently works and the powerful defense contractor it represents in the Pacific.
U.S. Funded Plestinian Genocide:
Business Booms for Lockheed Martin as Risk of Regional War Grows Following Iran’s strike, bankers are upgrading their stock in the company that’s played a role in Israel’s war on Gaza. Over the weekend, Iran launched over 300 missiles at Nevatim Air Base, a base in southern Israel that houses U.S.-made F-35 fighter jets. Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, who oversaw a strike on an Iranian consulate in Syria just a few weeks ago, has already promised to retaliate. Observers viewed these brewing tensions with concern, ringing the alarm bells of the breakout of a wider war. Not JP Morgan analyst Seth Seifman. On Monday morning, Seifman upgraded JPMorgan’s outlook from “hold” to “buy” for Lockheed Martin, the manufacturer of Israel’s F-35s, and set a higher price target for the stock.
Israel Is Expanding Settlements in East Jerusalem at “Unparalleled” Rate Violent settler activity in the occupied West Bank has also reached a record rate amid the genocide. As Israeli forces have been carrying out their genocide of Gaza over the past six months, Israeli officials have been expanding construction of illegal settlements in East Jerusalem at a speed not previously seen in modern times, new reporting finds. In a report published Wednesday, The Guardian revealed that the Israeli government has approved or advanced the building of thousands of housing units, spread over 20 different projects.
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?
We Found Unhealthy Pesticide Levels in 20% Of US Produce – Here’s What You Need to Know When it comes to healthy eating, fruits and vegetables reign supreme. But along with all their vitamins, minerals and other nutrients can come something else: an unhealthy dose of dangerous pesticides. Though using chemicals to control bugs, fungi and weeds helps farmers grow the food we need, it’s been clear since at least the 1960s that some chemicals also carry unacceptable health risks. And although certain notorious pesticides, such as DDT, have been banned in the US, government regulators have been slow to act on others. Even when a dangerous chemical is removed from the market, chemical companies and growers sometimes just start using other options that may be as dangerous.
Black Liberation/Civil Rights:
Whether It is Opposition, to Israel’s Palestine Genocide or Global Warming, Worldwide Capitalism is Applying the Iron Heal to Free Speech/or Protests!: Jail for Holding a Placard? Protest Over the Climate Crisis is Being Brutally Suppressed The legal repression of activism has been fast and frightening, yet it won’t make protesters disappearYears ago, when Dr Sarah Benn recognised the scale of the climate crisis, she made sure that she was doing all the right things. She recycled, she went vegan, she stopped flying, she voted Green, she signed petitions. It was because she didn’t see real change happening, despite doing all those things, that she then went further. She glued her hand to a building. She sat down in front of an oil terminal. And she stood on a grass verge with a handwritten sign, saying, “Stop New Oil”. Benn’s story will be pretty familiar to anyone with a passing interest in the current wave of climate protest. This wave grew out of deep frustration with existing avenues for change. And it did feel, for a time, as if these protests might be a catalyst for the wider shift that so many people recognised was urgently needed. The marches and sit-downs sparked so much sympathy and curiosity, even with politicians from Michael Gove to Dawn Butler. I remember walking along a street on an Extinction Rebellion march in 2019 and people were cheering from their windows. A big part of all the early protests was outreach, with protesters talking to people on the streets, in communities and workplaces, and finding eager responses.
In Fit of anti-Palestinian Hatred, Congress tries to Outlaw “From the River to the Sea, Palestine will be Free” On Wednesday the House of Representatives passed a resolution condemning the chanting of the phrase “From the river to the sea, Palestine will be free.”
- Lessons from China Socialist China is a powerful economic and diplomatic rival to the United States. Its success must be studied so that liberation may be possible and to prevent the declining U.S. from doing even more damage to humanity.
- Opening Remarks from Ajamu Baraka at the 2024 UNAC Conference Ajamu Baraka delivered this speech at the opening of the 2024 United National Antiwar Coalition Conference.
- The US Did Not Fail to Intervene in Rwanda The U.S. kept the U.N. Security Council from sending in troops to stop the 1994 Rwandan Genocide.
- MOLEGHAF Denounces the US-Imposed “Accord for Peaceful Orderly Transition” in Haiti The “transitional council” in Haiti is another part of the plan to maintain the dominance of imperialist forces over the island. This process is driving the nation further into a socioeconomic crisis.
- J. Simpson and Understanding the Black Support He Never Deserved O.J. Simpson’s acquittal in one of the most infamous murder trials of the 20th century was celebrated as a symbolic win for the Black community against an oppressive system. However, O.J. was undeserving of such jubiliation.
- The Axis of Resistance Exposing the Functionaries of Imperialism The Axis of Resistance is shining a light on the reactionary regimes in the region who remain active and willing agents of imperialism.
- Sudanese Dialogue and Political Processes at a Time of War: People, Participation, and Power Ending the war in Sudan will require real Sudanese dialogue to carve out a new political course. The people must be wary of a manufactured process, run by a political and economic elite that will only continue the conflict and political crisis
- In the Dominican Republic, Sexual Violence Against Haitian Women and Girls is a Consequence of the Government’s Racist Policy. The reactionary government of the Dominican Republic has continued to pursue its racist policies against Haiti, deporting Haitians while exploiting the nation for its economic gain. Widespread sexual violence is one way this violent repression manifests.
- As Abortion Bans Loom, Black Families Are Left Vulnerable Florida’s ban takes effect May 1, 2024, and the fate of Arizona’s abortion access is in the throes of legal, political, and legislative battles.
- Looting of Food Grains Continues in Nigeria as Almost Half its Population Suffers Hunger President Bola Tinubu’s lifting of fuel subsidies and liberalization of currency trade has pleased the IMF and increased hunger in Africa’s most populous country.
- Boiling on the Inside This essay mentions suicide. “Don’t call it air-conditioning; It’s a cooling system!” A guard yells to my escorts, referring to the month-old, temporary, external tubular system that seldom works. And on the rare occasions it does, it only maintains an in-cell temperature of 85°F. Daily, the heat index has been north of 110°, and it feels like I’m standing in a frying pan in melting shoes. The sun is sitting on my head and it’s hard to fathom things worsening. Until, I enter the solitary confinement building, where I’ve lived for the past seven summers. The extreme heat punches me in the gut. A lid is on the frying pan, I’m covered and smothered.
Labor:
Economy:
The Professor Who Wrote the Seminal Book on Wall Street Megabanks Calls Today’s Financial System “Dangerously Unstable” George Washington University Law Professor, Arthur Wilmarth, has done it again. After authoring the seminal book on the insidious evolution and enormous dangers still posed by the Wall Street megabanks (Taming the Megabanks: Why We Need a New Glass-Steagall Act) Wilmarth is now out with a new, gripping paper. In the paper’s abstract, Wilmarth explains how the risks posed by the Wall Street megabanks in 2008 have become exponentially more dangerous today.
World:
Sweden Joins NATO: A Revolutionary Response “Blinken was so impatient that he almost snatched the binder out of Kristersson’s hands”, is how Swedish bourgeois newspaper Aftonbladet reported on the Prime Minister of Sweden handing over the final NATO signatures to the US Secretary of State. Along with the new Defence Cooperation Agreement (DCA), the war hawks in Washington have got all they could ever have hoped for – and more. Kristersson, the Swedish government and the Social Democrats were visibly relieved by the country’s entry into NATO. “At last,” the prime minister cried, at last this circus of an application process was over. Apparently, it takes a lot of energy to speak with a forked tongue, spread lies and act as an apologist for the defenders of dictatorships and nuclear weapons. More handshakes, hugs and a luxurious dinner party followed, before Kristersson took his place as guest of honour at President Joe Biden’s annual address to Congress. “Welcome!” Biden shouted, breaking into applause for Kristersson, “These people know how to fight!”
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