Islamic State (IS, formerly ISIS) has launched production of toxin-filled mortar shells in the east of the Deir ez-Zor province, Russian military said on Wednesday. The shells are filled with chemicals by a crew of 11 terrorists, who received foreign …
What do Argentinian protesters have in common with French protesters? They both strongly dislike their governments, and their leaders (sic).
The protests in Argentina against the upcoming G20 meeting and around the IMF are just a pretext for an overall malaise – which is an understatement – vis-à-vis President Mauricio Macri and his debt-driven austerity program, that has left hundreds of thousands jobless. People who had decent jobs under the Kirchner governments have now joined the ranks of the unemployed and are begging for survival. Macri has driven the poverty rate from about 14%, where it was in November 2015, a …
Depression is built into this machine and the evidence is plastered on the morose faces of people caught in the clutches of its business as usual activities. Depression is found in the insurmountable debts we owe for spending a lifetime of preparation and labor to serve the machine. In addition to debt, the machine awards us for our servitude with trinkets, gadgets, doodads and gizmos that provide a moment of hollow amusement and then sit on shelves in garages and decay. They represent the planned obsolescence of the human heart. The sacrifice paid for our fetish with materialism is the …
The homelessness issue has been a source of controversy at the local, state and national levels for some time now. There has been some limited progress, but this problem has certainly not been resolved humanely. Sometimes lost in the debate about this issue is that the homeless are fellow human beings, including families with children, and most of them really don’t want to be without homes.
Many of these people were and are hard working people who suffered some event, whether it was due to the predatory financial crisis ten years ago, a health crisis, a loss of a good-paying job, …
When Israeli Prime Minister, Benjamin Netanyahu, ordered his army to carry out a limited operation in the besieged Gaza Strip on November 12, he certainly did not anticipate that his military adventure would destabilize his government and threaten the very survival of his right-wing coalition.
But it did, far more than the multiple police investigations into various corruption cases involving Netanyahu’s family and closest aides.
Thanks to the botched operation in Gaza which led to the killing of seven Palestinians and an Israeli army commander, Netanyahu’s coalition has begun to disintegrate, merely needing a final push for it to collapse completely.
The idea of a standing European army, one dedicated to the specific needs of Europe as opposed to being an annex of another power is far from new. In gestation alongside notions of European federalism and its defence have come the idea of a force filled with respective nation states that might have aims and ambitions different from those of Washington or Moscow. Critics of the idea are never far away.
The companion concepts of European integration and defence have not had a smooth ride in transatlantic relations. The twitchiness shown by various European leaders to the Trump administration’s approach to …
Ecuadoreans hold up pictures of Julian Asssange in a show of support at the Government Palace in Quito, Ecuador on Oct. 31, 2018. (Dolores Ochoa / AP)
The accidental revelation in mid-November that U.S. federal prosecutors had secretly filed charges against WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange underlines the determination of the Trump administration to end Assange’s asylum in the Ecuadorian Embassy in London, where he has been staying since 2012. Behind the revelation of those secret charges for supposedly threatening U.S. national security is a murky story …
by Kevin Zeese and Margaret Flowers / November 27th, 2018
We are currently traveling in the United Kingdom, following our participation in the No US NATO Bases conference in Dublin, Ireland and delivery of a letter to the International Criminal Court in The Hague calling for a full investigation of Israel’s war crimes. We spent the past few days meeting with activists and visiting some friends and family.
A major concern in the UK is Brexit. Everyone is talking about it. There is great fear that if Brexit goes through, it will harm the UK. Repeatedly, people told …
Harken! Good news (maybe) “encouraging news” is a better description, as Negative Emissions Technology (“NET”) starts coming into focus. Conceptually, carbon removal or direct air capture removes CO2 from the atmosphere, which would be great for suppressing climate change.
In that regard, Elizabeth Kolbert recently interviewed (Yale Environment 360) Stephen Pacala (Princeton professor) chairman of the US scientific panel studying carbon removal under the auspices of the National Academies. Which means the project has top-notch clearances, in fact, blue chip.
Of course, the big question about direct carbon capture is whether it can fix a very big problem created by humans burning …
Now that November 11 and the official “remembering” of our “heroes”, their “bravery” and “greatness” is over, it is a good time to take a deeper, more critical look at Canada’s participation in wars.
While on Remembrance Day we are told to “thank a soldier for your freedoms” and the commemorations talk about “defending democracy”, the reality of wars’ connections to colonialism, imperialism, and oppression are ignored.
A Global Newsstory about Nova Scotia university students visiting Canadian World War II soldiers’ graves in West Africa highlights the matter. The report ignored that The Gambia, where the Canadians were buried, …
Unless you move in certain leftist circles, you may not have heard about one of the Russians’ most insidiously evil active measures, an active measure so insidiously evil that it could only have been dreamed up in Moscow, the current wellspring of insidious evil. Its official Russo-Nazi-sounding code name is still being decided on by leftist cryptographers, but most people know it as the “Trumpenleft.”
The Trumpenleft (or “Sputnik Left,” as it is also called by professional anti-Putin-Nazi intelligence analysts) is pretty much exactly what it sounds like. It is a gang of nefarious …
Most of those who have had a chance to witness Chinese internationalist mega-projects, clearly understand that the West is near to collapsing; it will never be able to compete with tremendous enthusiasm and progressive spirit of the most populous country on earth, which on top of it, is built on socialist principles (with Chinese characteristics).
Writing this essay in rural Laos, I just saw literally an entire army of Chinese engineers and workers in action, building huge bridges and tunnels, connecting one of the poorest countries in Asia, to both China and Southeast Asia, erecting hospitals and schools, small factories for …
Last Tuesday, within about an hour of his announcement on the murder of Jamal Khashoggi, in the heat of the moment, I commented on the president’s acceptance of the Riyadh royals’ explanation of the Istanbul consulate incident. I called his statement “crude” and “buttheadedly amoral.” I should have stated the obvious broader point: It was wrong.
Marxists have historically inveighed (appropriately) against capitalism, imperialism, semi-feudalism etc.—neutral moral categories—using such terms as “reactionary” and “opportunist” when desiring to add a moral edge. And certainly capitalist profit and imperialist hegemony factor into Trump’s response to the cold-blooded crime. But sometimes it’s best to …
Chris Hedges and Joe Lauria, journalist and editor-in-chief, Consortium, discuss efforts to force WikiLeaks publisher, JulianAssange, out of the Ecuador Embassy in London and extradite him to the USA to stand trial.
Curiosity for the undiscovered last tribe, that tantalising moment when eyes are cast upon the previously unseen, remains the anthropological Holy Grail. But to do so would lead to the natural consequences that come with contact and invasion: the foisting of an alien divinity upon others, most probably a monotheistic Sky God, whose grammatically challenged invocations are found in a holy text. Then would come the introduction of terminal disease, the mod cons, and ultimate extinction.
For the inhabitants of North Sentinel Island, part of India’s Andaman and Nicobar islands, isolation is both conservation and vulnerability. Encounters have been recorded, though …
An Evaluation and Reorientation of our Resistance to War
by Robert J. Burrowes / November 25th, 2018
British author and social commentator H.G. Wells may have coined the expression that originally popularized World War I as The War that Will End War, as his book, based on articles written during that vast military conflict, was titled. In any case, in one version or another, the expression was one of the most common catchphrases of the Great War of 1914-1918 and has survived as an expression, often used with a grimace of sarcasm, ever since.
As we commemorate the passing of the 100th anniversary of the armistice ending ‘the war to end war’, one can only marvel at …
For the first time in the history of humanity, the technical means are at hand to eliminate poverty if resources were not diverted to making war. World hunger could be abolished with only a small diversion from military budgets. The only luxuries that so-called middle-class Americans would have to forego would be the Blue Angels air show and drone-bombing wedding parties in the Middle East. Yet, military spending is expanding, and with it global poverty.
On November 16-18, some 300 peace activists representing over 35 countries gathered in Dublin, Ireland for the first International Conference Against US/NATO Military …
It is strange that when you come from the south, near to the DMZ (De-militarized zone, which divides Korea into two parts), you will see many flags and sentimental ‘peace’ slogans, but nothing that would represent the points of view of the North Korean people. All the flags are those of ROC (Republic of Korea, otherwise known as South Korea).
Many people near the division line have turned this entire area into a tourist trap, with observation towers ‘to get a glimpse of North Korea’, with stores selling ROK and US military ‘souvenirs’, even old military gear. As if North Koreans …
by Kevin Zeese and Margaret Flowers / November 23rd, 2018
Rally at No US-NATO Bases Conference in Dublin, Ireland on November 16, 2018. Photo from Margaret Kimberly Facebook page.
***** Press Communique of the First International Conference Against US/NATO Foreign Military Bases
The first International Conference against US/NATO Military Bases was held on November 16-18, at the Liberty Hall in Dublin, Ireland. The conference was attended by close to 300 participants from over thirty-five countries from around the world. Speakers representing countries from all continents, including Cuba, Argentina, Brazil, Colombia, United States, Italy, …
Alarm, fear, panic, hysteria, dread are loose in Washington DC. Here are sample headlines which sum up why our lawmakers have emptied the shelves of smelling salts in the local apothecaries:
I never thought I’d see the day a White House would moonlight as a public relations firm for the Crown Prince of Saudi Arabia.
— Senator Bob Corker (R-Tennessee), Twitter, November 20, 2018
Accused of being mendacious, incapable of holding to a foundation of facts and indifferent to the world of evidence, President Donald J. Trump has stumped international relations watchers with metronomic regularity. He has also torn away the façade of decent, tolerable hypocrisy that is the “value system” of US foreign policy. In its place is violent and ugly calculation, the allure of unmitigated self-interest.
Remarks by Ike Nahem at the Cuban Mission to the United Nations at a Ceremony Marking the Second Anniversary of the Passing of the Great Cuban Revolutionary, November 21, 2018
*****
Our brother and comrade Fidel Castro was one of the outstanding revolutionary leaders over the entire course of recorded world history. There are so many components of Fidel’s amazing life and accomplishments: his defense of Cuba’s national emancipation and sovereignty, his socialist internationalism, his defense of the struggles and the interests of, as he often put it, “the …
Many individuals, groups, newspapers, and organizations claim that they oppose charter schools. But, revealing ongoing confusion, they also say, often in the same breath, that “there are some good charter schools out there,” that “not all charter schools are rotten,” that “charter schools are not a ‘panacea’ but can be part of the solution,” that “charter schools may provide a good alternative for at least some students,” or that “charter schools should be given a chance” (even though they have been around for more than 25 years). Such contradictory statements are not uncommon, keep many intellectually disoriented, and undermine social …
The Post-World-War-II world order was dominated by the one WW II major combatant that had only 0.32% of its population (the lowest percentage) killed by the war: the United States. The Soviet Union’s comparable number killed by the war was the highest — it was 13.7% — 42 .8.times higher than America’s. The U.S. was the main force that defeated Japan and so won WW II in Asia. The U.S.S.R., however, was the main force that defeated Germany and so won WW II in Europe. The U.S.S.R. suffered vastly more than did the U.S. to achieve …
I hate the indifferent. I believe that living means taking sides. Those who really live cannot help being a citizen and a partisan. Indifference and apathy are parasitism, perversion, not life.
— Antonio Gramsci, Prison Notebooks, International Publishers Co; Reprint, 1989 edition (November 24, 1971)
The sadist needs the person over whom he rules, he needs him very badly, since his own feeling of strength is rooted in the fact that he is …
Reports coming out of Syria suggest more civilians have been killed by the US-led coalition. Local sources say warplanes have dropped bombs containing white phosphorus in the eastern province of Dayr al-Zawr. Reports say a number of civilians have been killed and others injured. Attacks by the US led coalition in eastern Syria have surged over the past week, killing a growing number of civilians. US forces are operating in Syria without a UN mandate or permission from Damascus.
The parents on the global stage of power are bickering and now, such entertainingly distracting forums as APEC (the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation Forum) are left without a unifying message. This should hardly matter, but the absence of a final communiqué of agreement is being treated in some circles as the preliminary perturbations to conflict between Beijing and Washington.
Often forgotten at the end of such deliberations is their acceptable irrelevance. APEC as a forum was already deemed by former Australian foreign minister Gareth Evans in 1993 to be “four adjectives in search of a noun.” Charles E Morrison of the …
I’m done with my graceless heart so tonight I’m going to cut it out and then restart.
— Florence and the Machine, Shake It Out
I brought all this
So you can survive when law is lawless
Feelings, sensations that you thought was dead
No squealing, remember that it’s all in your head,
— Gorillaz, Clint Eastwood
A typical American suburbia circa the 1970s and a typical situation. Parents ask a local teen to babysit so they can have an evening out by themselves. The normal rundown of instructions is given, there’s food in the fridge, help yourself, no sweets for the kids after 8, make sure they’re in …
Photo from the archives of Torbak Hopper
It is everywhere. In a few years, it has metastasized like a cancer, on all continents. Its fervent proponents and ill-informed supporters call it populism or nationalism. In the Italy, Germany, or Spain of the 1930s, however, this ideology of exclusion and fear, defined by a hatred of the other, together with a tyrannical executive power, was called by its proper name: fascism. Mussolini in Italy, Hitler in Germany and Franco in Spain were the bloodthirsty tenors of capitalism’s symphony …
by Kevin Zeese and Margaret Flowers / November 20th, 2018
Above: Delegation at the International Criminal Court in the Hague, Netherlands on November 19, 2018. From left to right Margaret Flowers, Green Party co-chair, member of the Green Party Peace Action Committee and Green Party of Maryland, Miko Peled, Green Party US member, Dirk Adriaensens of the BRussells Tribunal, Diane Moxley of Green Party International Committee and Green Party of New Jersey, Stephen Verchinski of the Green Party International Committee and Green Party of New Mexico, Marie Spike, of the Green Party International Committee and Green Party of Michigan and Kevin Zeese …
