Dateline: November 7-18, 2022, Sharm El-Sheikh, Egypt. Dignitaries from every country will be meeting to discuss climate change at COP27. Based upon early confirmations, 90 heads of state will attend, lending an aura of importance.
“Climate change is the crisis of our lifetime. If we are not able to reverse the present trend that is leading to a catastrophe in the world, we will be doomed.” ((António Guterres UN Secretary-General, BBC interview leading to COP27.))
The Secretary-General has been beating that same drum for some time now, which prompts a thought: Should the UN stop holding annual COP “Conference of the Parties” …
The Heaviness of Imperialist Sanctions and the Lightness of the Liberal’s Lament
by Roger D. Harris / November 3rd, 2022
For the 30th consecutive United Nations vote, the US again lost. A landslide margin of 185 to 2 condemned its blockade of Cuba on November 3. Only the apartheid state of Israel voted with the US, while Brazil and Ukraine abstained.
Since 1960, the bipartisan policy of the US has been to overthrow the Cuban Revolution by fomenting “disenchantment and disaffection based on economic dissatisfaction and hardship.” According to the US State Department, punitive economic measures are imposed to deny “money and supplies to Cuba, to decrease monetary and real wages, to bring about hunger, desperation, and the overthrow …
Photo Credit: Reuters
The global climate meeting called COP27 (the 27th Conference of Parties) will be held in the remote Egyptian desert resort of Sharm El-Sheik, Egypt from November 6-18. Given the extremely repressive nature of the Egyptian government, this gathering will likely be different from others, where there have been large, raucous protests led by civil society groups.
So as tens of thousands of delegates – from world leaders to climate activists and journalists – descend on Sharm el-Sheik from all over the world, we asked Egyptian Journalist …
A striking paradox of the history of the left is that it is full of self-defeat. From the bitter divisions between statist and anti-statist socialists in the nineteenth century to the vicious rivalries between Communists and Socialists in the 1930s, followed by many more episodes of destructive sectarianism and flawed strategy up to the present, the left has often had trouble getting its act together. It isn’t clear why this is the case, although doubtless the usual lack of resources in comparison to the right (funded by business) has played a not insignificant role. It is indisputable, however, that the …
They are falling like ninepins, and the Tories have now given the weary people of Britain yet another prime minister. And what a catch: stupendously wealthy, youthful – the youngest in two centuries – and a lawbreaker. As Chancellor of the Exchequer in the government of Boris Johnson, he was fined for breaches during the partygate scandal, despite telling the Commons that he had attended no illegal gatherings.
The statement released in response to the fine was ice cool, belying the fact that he had become the first Chancellor ever charged with an offence while in office. “I understand that …
“There is an urgent need to improve health policy to reduce corruption in the health sector during times of crisis.”
— Gonzalez-Aquines A and Kowalska-Bobko I ((Addressing health corruption during a public health crisis through anticipatory governance: Lessons from the COVID-19 pandemic. Front Public Health. 29 July 2022;10:952979. doi: 10.3389/fpubh.2022.952979. PMID: 35968489; PMCID: PMC9372614.))
COVID-19 pandemic “highlight[s] potential risks and opportunities for corruption — corruption that may undermine the response to the pandemic and deprive people of health care.”
— “Corruption and the Coronavirus,” Transparency International
Violence by Israeli settlers against Palestinians is rising at a staggering rate. We visualized this aspect of life under Israeli military occupation in collaboration with Premiere Urgence Internationale Palestine Mission, who has been monitoring Israeli settler violence since 2012, including casualties, property damage, intimidation, and harassment.
While the levels of schadenfreude will be going through the roof given the unfolding farce in British politics, the resignation of Liz Truss as UK Prime Minister was troubling in one vital respect. True, her juvenile salad understanding of economics, which involved spending billions on tax cuts and energy subsidies, was lamentable. To cope with the beast of aggressive inflation, she was advocating a policy that would feed it.
Then came the not-very-invisible hand of the market, which decided to throttle her government and its policies with petulance. While the vigilantes of the market have, depending on the occasion, burst into …
Privately-operated charter schools in the United States have a long record of failure. They have been over-promising and under-delivering for decades. Over the years, many people, especially low-income minority parents living in urban settings, have been led to believe that outsourced schools operated by unelected private persons or large for-profit corporations are vastly superior to the “dreadful” public schools they currently attend—public schools which, for decades, have been methodically starved of funds, over-tested, vilified, punished, and set up to fail so as to be privatized by neoliberals obsessed with maximizing profit as fast as possible. Neoliberals have never stopped trying …
First things first: as I write, so-called peace talks are underway between the democratically elected government of Ethiopia and The Terrorist TPLF. That in itself is a bizarre sentence, and prompts an array of related questions, and issues around law and order, justice, national governance. To be clear, the TPLF have never wanted peace, and are not in South Africa (where the talks are taking place) to find a way to end the conflict that they started and perpetuated for two long and deeply painful years. They want power, they have engaged in talks because they have been defeated, but …
Stark contradictions in West’s treatment of the Ukraine war and the occupation and siege of Palestine should serve as a wake-up call
by Jonathan Cook / November 2nd, 2022
No one took responsibility for the explosion over the weekend that ripped through a section of the Kerch Bridge that links Russia to Crimea and was built by Moscow after it annexed the peninsula back in 2014.
But it was not just Kyiv’s gleeful celebrations that indicated the main suspect. Within hours, the Ukrainian authorities had released a set of commemorative stamps depicting the destruction.
Russian President Vladimir Putin was under no illusions either. On Monday, he struck out with a torrent of missiles that hit major Ukrainian cities such as Kyiv and Lviv. It was …
Right-winger Jair Bolsonaro’s claims of election fraud reduced to sour grapes as Brazil’s bulletproof voting process shames the United States’ swiss-cheese system
by Lauren Smith / November 2nd, 2022
Workers’ Party (PT) candidate, former president Lula da Silva, won the Brazilian presidency with just over 50 percent of the vote in the runoff election held on October 30.
Incumbent Jair Bolsonaro, a right-wing nationalist, received 49.10%.
Helping Lula achieve his narrow victory was the early support of alternate party candidates that came in third and fourth place in its election held on October 2, respectively Simone Tebet and Ciro Gomes, with 4% and 3%. While Lula prevailed on October 2 with 48.4% of the votes, a victory of over 50% …
To consider the United States a wealthy and free nation, possessed of boundless ideals, one must ignore the obvious in no small measure. Even now, in the age of advancing technology, hunger quietly prevails. In urban and rural spaces, chilled by shadows of entitlement, the timeless problem of food remains with us. Who is unable to see this? Thanks to the rise of social media, and the drone of constant chatter, we are more aware than previous generations. However, endless streams of “content” leave us vulnerable to indifference, the presence of which invites hunger on many …
Aaron Copland (Photo Credit: Erich Auerbach/Getty Images 1965)
In the mid-20th century (say, 1930-1970), orchestral music played a much more prominent role in national culture–both in the U.S. and the U.S.S.R.–than it does today. In part, the advent of radio in the 1920s could bring live concerts to a mass audience. Radio networks attracted top-notch musicians and conductors; the NBC Symphony Orchestra, led at different times by super-stars such as Toscanini and Stokowski, had millions of listeners weekly–listeners who would become familiar with Copland as well as Sibelius, …
How do you bury responsibility for a decision inspired by a pilfered idea? Blame someone else, especially if that person came up with the idea to begin with. This tried method of distraction was used with invidious gusto by US President John F. Kennedy, who recast his role in reaching an agreement with the Soviet Union during the Cuban missile crisis of 1962.
The stationing of Soviet nuclear capable missiles in Cuba, and the response of the Kennedy administration, took the world to the precipice of nuclear conflict. Its avoidance, as things transpired, involved dissimulation, deception and good, old-fashioned defamation.
In my decades of doing what I do, I’ve encountered so many folks patently unwilling to accept that their beloved Land of the Free™ is capable of the horrendous criminality it openly perpetrates as policy. (Such a cultic mindset, of course, is partly responsible for such blind trust vis-a-vis the “pandemic.”)
With all this in mind, I’ll continue sharing evidence to highlight that the leaders of God’s Country™ are just as craven as any of its official enemies (read: all those labeled “the next Hitler”). For starters, here’s a dam good example……
We are the hollow men
We are the stuffed men
Leaning together
Headpiece filled with straw. Alas!
— T.S. Eliot, “The Hollow Men”, 1925
When many people share thoughts, speech, or conduct that is frequently repeated and becomes automatic, it is fair to call it a social habit. Such habits tend to become invisible and unspeakable. They become part of our taken-for-granted-world.
When I recently wrote an essay about hoarding – “The Last Temptation of Things,” many people got angry with me. A friend wrote to me to say: “I congratulate and curse you for writing this.” He meant it as a complement. I took …
Edmund Burke MP. Portrait by Joshua Reynolds, c.?1769 Introduction
The rapid spread of the science-based Enlightenment (c1687-c1804) across Europe during the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries was a cause of much dismay to the reigning monarchies of the time. The source of their anxiety, the philosophes, were propagating a radical new range of ideas “centered on the value of human happiness, the pursuit of knowledge obtained by means of reason and the evidence of the senses, and ideals such as liberty, progress, toleration, fraternity, …
Halloween is an odd holiday. The ostensible concept — as it has evolved to become — is to shock, startle, frighten, petrify, horrify, and/or terrify… all while consuming enough high fructose corn syrup to keep the American Dental Association content for another century or two.
Every year, as October 31 nears, loyal consumers squander a small fortune to adorn their overpriced abodes with Made-in-China images of tombstones, skulls, ghouls, goblins, monsters, zombies, and even the occasional bloody severed …
For a time, the confused and muddled approach from Australian football (soccer to some) did much of a side-step regarding the human rights imbroglio and Qatar’s hosting of the FIFA World Cup. There was ample cash and participation in one of the world’s biggest tournaments on the line. There was FIFA’s reluctance that footballing sides show any political streak; such figures, it was hoped, should best focus on kicking a ball on a pitch. And then there was the sport itself. Here was a chance to take football to the desert reaches and build new bastions.
Back in April of this year, the world’s richest man, Elon Musk, stated, “Free speech is the bedrock of a functioning democracy, and Twitter is the digital town square where matters vital to the future of humanity are debated.”
A question: can you declare that you are for freedom of speech/expression and ban, or maintain a ban, on a person from expressing himself in a purportedly public forum and preserve your integrity? Whether the new owner of Twitter, Musk, steadfastly stands on the principle of freedom of expression looks like it is about to be revealed.
Chaos reigns in the United Kingdom, where the prime minister’s residence in London – 10 Downing Street – prepares for the entry of Rishi Sunak, one of the richest men in the country. Liz Truss remained in office for a mere 45 days, convulsed as her government was by a cycle of workers’ strikes and the mediocrity of her policies. In her mini budget, which doomed her government, Truss opted for a full-scale neoliberal …
That neither the Democrats nor the Republicans are offering anything to alleviate the problems working people face is illustrated by their campaign fear-mongering – the former over “fascism” and the latter over “socialists” and “radicals.” No matter which party dominates the midterm elections, do not expect either will herald in fascism or socialism.
Actual socialists in Congress would demand we stop instigating war with Russia, (now topping $66 billion), and instead eliminate homelessness (costing $20 billion) and hunger ($25 billion) as emergency first steps. Those swayed by Republican propaganda need not fear impending socialism: 100% of the Democrats …
SOCHI, RUSSIA – OCTOBER 21, 2021: Russia’s President Vladimir Putin addresses the 18th Annual Meeting of the Valdai Discussion Club titled “Global Shake-Up in the 21st Century: The Individual, Values, and the State.” Dmitry Feoktistov/TASS
Russia’s President Vladimir Putin, speaking at the Valdai International Discussion Club meeting on October 27, gave a speech that described his ideology, and he took questions from the audience and answered further regarding a number of highly important issues. Everything that he said there is consistent with what he has previously stated, but this …
Events continue to unfold at a quickening pace. Facing an alarming escalation in tensions around the world, we asked Finian Cunningham for his current thoughts.
Finian Cunningham has written extensively on international affairs, with articles published in several languages. He is a Master’s graduate in Agricultural Chemistry and worked as a scientific editor for the Royal Society of Chemistry, Cambridge, England, before pursuing a career in newspaper journalism. He is also a musician and songwriter. For nearly 20 years, he worked as an editor and writer in major news media organizations, including …
