Globalization of trade and central banking has propelled private corporations to positions of power and control never before seen in human history. Under advanced capitalism, the structural demands for a return on investment require an unending expansion of centralized capital in the hands of fewer and fewer people. The financial center of global capitalism is so highly concentrated that less than a few thousand people dominate and control $100 trillion of wealth.
The few thousand people controlling global capital amounts to less than 0.0001 percent of the world’s population. They are the transnational capitalist class (TCC), who, as the capitalist elite …
While most Canadians proudly recognize the beaver, the hockey player and the curling broom as symbols of this country, some of us would be made uncomfortable by another enduring emblem of the Great White North: a businessman wearing a Maple Leaf lapel pin discretely passing a plain manila envelope stuffed with cash to a foreign official.
Two weeks ago SNC-Lavalin agreed to pay $1.5 million to settle a corruption case brought against it by the African Development Bank. Accused of bribing officials in Uganda and Mozambique, the Montréal-based company also accepted a number of other non-monetary conditions on its …
by Robert S. McIntyre and Gerald E. Scorse / October 21st, 2015
Meretricious means “based on pretense, deception, or insincerity.” That makes it the perfect word to describe the creation and spread of Roth individual retirement accounts (IRAs), especially the claim that they’re a plus for the Treasury. Just the opposite: the initial boost from Roths is largely a ruse, and the accounts in fact are a fiscal train wreck.
Let’s see what gives the myth a veneer of truth, why it persists, and what needs to happen to stem the losses that Roths are inflicting on the Treasury—and will be inflicting for decades.
The deception began at the beginning. When lawmakers created Roths …
Israeli Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu has attracted criticism for an incendiary speech in which he accused the Palestinian grand mufti of Jerusalem, Haj Amin al-Husseini, of “inspiring the Holocaust”. Critics accuse Netanyahu of trivialising the Holocaust by attributing the impetus for Hitler’s plan to exterminate the Jews of Europe to the grand mufti.
In his speech Netanyahu described a meeting between Haj Amin al-Husseini and Hitler in November 1941. “Hitler didn’t want to exterminate the Jews at the time, he wanted to expel the Jews. And Haj Amin al-Husseini went to Hitler and said: ‘If you expel them, they’ll all come …
My first stop, after living for 22 years in a refugee camp in Gaza, was the city of Seattle, a pleasant, green city, where people drink too much coffee to cope with the long, cold, grey winters. There, for the first time, I stood before an audience outside Palestine, to speak about Palestine.
Here, I learned, too, of the limits imposed on the Palestinian right to speak, of what I could or should not say. Platforms for an impartial Palestinian discourse were extremely narrow to begin with, and when any was available, Palestinians hardly took center stage.
There are three groups of American citizens whose birth certificates are falsified: those in the witness protection program, adopted people, and donor-conceived individuals.
In the United States, there is currently no national law (or Supreme Court decision) providing people created through reproductive technologies (or who have been adopted) with factual birth certificates. This country needs to ensure the total transparency and truth by repealing outdated laws, then modernizing and standardizing laws that govern the generation of birth certificates for these two groups of people.
Inaccurate birth certificates are continually issued by state governments as “official” documents. Donor-conceived individuals receive only …
One of the defining features of the corporate media is that Western crimes are ignored or downplayed. The US bombing of a Médecins Sans Frontières hospital in Kunduz, Afghanistan, on the night of October 3, is an archetypal example.
At least twenty-two people were killed when a United States Air Force AC-130 repeatedly attacked the hospital with five strafing runs over the course of more than an hour, despite MSF pleas to Afghan, US and Nato officials to call off the attack. The hospital’s main building, which contains the emergency operating room and recovery rooms, was heavily damaged. Dave Lindorff …
The October 12, 2015 terror bombing in Ankara, resulting in the death of 127 trade unionists, peace activists, Kurdish advocates and progressives, has been attributed either to the Recep Tayyip Erdo?an regime or to ISIS terrorists.
The Erdo?an regime’s ‘hypothesis’ is that ISIS or the Kurdish Workers Party (PKK) was responsible for the terrorist attack, a position echoed by all of the NATO governments and dutifully repeated by all of the Western mass media. Their most recent claim is that a Turkish member of ISIS carried out the …
Canadian voters have voted resoundingly to toss out Stephen Harper – the arch control freak, corporate stooge, denier of colonialism, xenophobe, toadying chickenhawk for the crumbling hyperempire, another ego illiterate to the political tea leaves – and a bevy of his Conservative Party followers. That is the silver lining in the 2015 Canadian federal election!
If you are interested in a world of egalitarianism, where all people have access to quality medical care, have access to a high level of education, desire to preserve the environment for future generations to enjoy, where people come before conglomerates, and where war is a …
Among Palestinians and Israelis, the recent upsurge in violence has been variously described as the children’s, lone-wolf, Jerusalem and smartphone intifadas. Each describes a distinguishing feature of this round of clashes.
The steady erosion of Fatah and Hamas’ authority during the post-Oslo years, as the Palestinian factions proved incapable of protecting their people from the structural violence of the occupation, has driven Palestine’s orphaned children to the streets, armed with stones.
The growing hopelessness and sense of abandonment have led a few so-called “lone wolves” to vent their fury on Israelis with improvised weapons such as knives, screwdrivers and cars. These attacks …
Mislead: “to give false or misleading information to”.
— Collins Dictionary
In what The Mail on Sunday has described as a “bombshell White House memo”, leaked classified correspondence from then Secretary of State General Colin Powell to President George W. Bush, of March 28th, 2002, alleges that Tony Blair had done what the newspaper calls “a deal in blood” with Bush to support him, come what may, in the attack on Iraq – a full year before the invasion.
Blair at the time was claiming to be seeking a diplomatic solution in the Iraq crisis. “We’re not proposing military action”, he …
The fall of the Soviet bloc was great, I wouldn’t have missed it for the world: elites reveling in treason, secret police exposed in disgrace, mass public catharsis. It has since become clear that was one down, one to go. The other one has tottered on for a quarter century but it won’t be long now. Impunity for CIA and police is under threat from domestic exposure and international pressure. Continued violent repression undercuts legitimacy at a time when the state has nothing to offer – uncontrolled militarization and financial predation have sapped the nation’s productive capacity. The …
Recently, I received a message from Walaa Alghussein, a wonderful journalist from Gaza, about unfolding events in Palestine. In few, but very prescient words, she summed up the on-going explosive resistance on the ground: “cheers to the 90’s generation . . . it’s proving that this generation of Oslo was just being underestimated.” Walaa, an activist member of this generation herself, got me to thinking — she always does; this time about defiant resistance, our youthful rebels and our collective future.
Decades ago in the nascent stage of my own militant activism I had read The Rebel by the French journalist/philosopher …
Fair-and-balancedFox Newsreported on Wednesday that “Cuban military operatives reportedly have been spotted in Syria, where sources believe they are advising President Bashar al-Assad’s soldiers and may be preparing to man Russian-made tanks to aid Damascus in fighting rebel forces backed by the U.S.” Fox’s claim of an imaginary enemy alliance relies on two sources: the University of Miami’s Institute for Cuban and Cuban-American Studies and an anonymous U.S. official.
The source at the Miami Institute indicated, “An Arab military officer at the Damascus airport reportedly witnessed two Russian planes arrive there with Cuban military …
In 1975 the people of Vietnam successfully ended one of the longest and bloodiest anti-colonial wars in world-history – defeating the US, the world’s biggest imperial power, after 20 years of struggle.
Barely forty years later the Vietnamese regime signed off on the US-Japanese dominated Trans-Pacific Free Trade Agreement (TPFTA), which essentially converted Vietnam into a vassal state.
Vietnam has gone full circle: From a neo-colony ruled by puppet dictators backed by an American occupation army involving …
CNN and Facebook co-sponsored last week’s Democratic presidential frontrunners’ “debate.” After the event, CNN conducted a poll. “Who won the debate?” it asked. The result: 83% Bernie Sanders; 12% Hillary Clinton.
Facebook also took a poll. “Who do you think won?” Over 79% responded, “Bernie Sanders.”
The CNN editors’ take? “CLINTON’S CONFIDANT SWEEP.”
Slate conducted a poll. “Who won the presidential debate?” asked the magazine. 75% of respondents said Bernie Sanders; 18% gave it to Hillary Clinton.
“Hillary Clinton won,” reported Slate “senior writer” Josh Vorhees exuberantly. “She just needed to be solid in the debate. Instead, she was spectacular.”
Blasting down highway 95 through the Mohave Desert on a northerly course toward Las Vegas Broken Dreams International Airport, my thoughts turn to the distant past. This seems to happen every time I travel to Mexico. Deja vu all over again as Yogi would say. Growing up a long stone’s throw from the southern border, I became a Mexicophile at an early age. This evening my wife and I will board a late night flight into the tropical central highlands. About 8 hours including air time and a layover at War Criminal International Airport in Houston, and we’ll be on …
A reply to Michael Neumann et al: Symptoms of structural illiteracy, racism and eroticism in the US-European Empire
by T.P. Wilkinson / October 17th, 2015
On 16 July 1964, at the San Francisco Republican Convention—where Ms Clinton began her career of political opportunism—Senator Barry Goldwater accepted his nomination for the presidency by declaring:
I would remind you that extremism in the defence of liberty is no vice. And let me remind you also that moderation in the pursuit of justice is no virtue. ((US Senator Barry Goldwater, Acceptance speech for the Republican nomination at the 28th National Convention in 1964.))
This was his defence of the political faction who defended him against “moderate” Republicans—like Nelson Rockefeller—so that Goldwater – Miller could be a “choice, not an …
Protests against rampant police brutality occurred recently in the respective capitals of France and the United States – two nations that proclaim strict fidelity to the rule of law yet two professed democracy-loving nations where officials routinely condone rampant lawlessness by law enforcers.
The 20th Anniversary of the 1995 Million Man March – captioned “Justice Or Else” – took place in Washington, DCk with a core complaint being police brutality. During that protest rally held outside the U.S. Capitol building and along the National Mall relatives of police brutality victims were invited speakers. Those relatives included the father of Michael Brown, …
The Turnbull Government, Nauru, and Frustrating Due Process
by Binoy Kampmark / October 17th, 2015
Institutionalised brutality is a rather easy thing to replicate. It begins with a selected language, and ends up justifying monstrous conduct. It pardons behaviour, and it condemns victims. The global debate on refugees is characterised by its distinct lack of humanity, and Australia, leading the charge, knows no limits on how far that lack of humanity can go.
The response to the claims that a Somali woman was raped, and then brought back to Australia for an abortion from Nauru, only to then have her returned back to the offshore prison camp, is yet another inglorious tale. Canberra’s response was …
Unlike the Republican carnival sideshows masquerading as debates, the first Democrat Party presidential nomination candidates debate was actually significant and historic (yes, yes, you’re right, it was a highly choreographed, staged event and it was in no sense a real debate, but it was historic nonetheless). All the five candidates presented themselves a social-liberals, the first time that has happened in more than four decades.
In fact, since the late 70s, the average Democrat candidate for the nomination has been a traditional liberal, that is, an open, fervent supporter of Wall Street, the billionaire class, imperialism and capitalism. Of course …
It has been called the “smartphone intifada”. After a sharp escalation in violence between Palestinians and Israelis in recent weeks, shocking scenes captured on video have spread across social media.
According to Israeli human rights organisations, several such videos challenge the accuracy of official Israeli accounts of the circumstances in which police have killed or injured Palestinians.
The footage, the nine groups said in a statement this week, provided concrete evidence that police were “quick to shoot to kill” rather than arrest Palestinians in Jerusalem and Israel who were suspected of involvement in attacks on Israelis Jews.
Why would the Green Party take a more environmentally regressive position on an important issue than Stephen Harper?
During a recent visit to Montreal, Elizabeth May added her voice to the main opposition parties telling suburbanites they should expect the federal government to continue aggressively subsidizing the most costly, unhealthy and ecologically destructive form of land transport.
May told Le Devoir that her party didn’t necessarily support the Harper government’s plan to implement a toll when the Champlain Bridge is rebuilt at a projected cost of over $4 billion.
“The Green Party doesn’t have a rigid position on the issue,” May said. “Before …
Any time bombs are used to target innocent civilians it is an act of terrorism.
— Barack Obama, February 15, 2013.
Even to those who do not watch closely it has to be apparent that Washington’s vast disinformation machine is finally out of control, seriously awry, or desperate.
The latest foray in apparent media manipulation was the claim by US “anonymous sources” that four Russian missiles targeting terrorist groups in Syria, landed in Iran.
US Administrations are serial repeaters of untruths. However, talking of stray missiles after bombing a Médecins Sans Frontières hospital in Kunduz, Afghanistan under a week before – when coordinates …
He brought to Ottowa an oilman’s attitude to climate change and a sheriff’s approach to law and order.
— The Economist on Stephen Harper, October 17, 2015
Everything about Canada’s long time serving Prime Minister is supposedly counterintuitive to the country’s spirit. This, at least, is the casual response from those who have a very specific view of Canada, one infuriatingly courteous, and soporifically relaxed. But the very fact that Stephen Harper has stayed in power for this length of time, including three election victories, suggests a refutation of that view.
Harper’s playbook is one that sees politics as an endeavour for its …
A harmonious, healing, sometimes home-bound setting brings closure
by Paul Haeder / October 15th, 2015
We live in a very particular death-denying society. We isolate both the dying and the old, and it serves a purpose. They are reminders of our own mortality. We should not institutionalize people. We can give families more help with home care and visiting nurses, giving the families and the patients the spiritual, emotional, and financial help in order to facilitate the final care at home.
– Elisabeth Kubler-Ross, On Death and Dying, 1969
Quantity or Quality of Life
We have an aversion around our own mortality and dying and death, but one adage is so apropos today – Nothing is certain in …
You say you got a real solution,
Well, you know we’d all love to see the plan, oh yeah …
— John Lennon, 1968
Nearly a half-century later, there is still no plan. The current radical critics of “the system”–who mostly take a holistic rather than piecemeal approach–have yet to put forth a coherent public policy agenda to get us to a sustainable American and global future.
These critics are very good at analyzing our problems—peak oil, the long emergency, the stages of collapse, global warming and climate change, the financialization of the economy, the impossible debt burden, the maldistribution of wealth, the corruption …
In Olympia, Washington, Marco Rossaire Rossi is running for mayor, but he is running as much to change the culture of electoral politics in Olympia as he is for office.
Rossi is running as an independent candidate. His campaign is part of a municipal movement in Olympia called “An Olympia For All.” The political movement seeks to use local government to change regressive economic policies to policies that will work for the betterment of the people of the city.
The electoral process in the city of Olympia works like this: There is a primary in August before the …
Sorry I’m so irritable. It’s just my back again—kind of twinges, you know—especially if I bend over or sometimes when I drink too much. Doctor sent me for a CT scan—nothing. Waste of time and money. What do they know about pain?
Sorry to go on like this. It’s just nice to have you here, listening to me when I hurt. It hasn’t been easy, what with this aching back and my anxiety disorder. Oh, I know, I shouldn’t worry so much. But how would you feel? Prescriptions, painkillers—but that’s no panacea. But still, sorry to obsess like this—you’re a real …
Israeli prime minister targets Palestinian leaders in Israel as his ‘Mr Security’ image takes a beating
by Jonathan Cook / October 14th, 2015
Israeli prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu has announced a crackdown on Palestinian political leaders in Israel, blaming them for the current unrest, in what appeared to be an attempt to bolster his severely dented image as ‘Mr Security’.
After a lengthy meeting of the security cabinet on Sunday, Netanyahu directed officials to assemble the evidence to make possible the outlawing of the northern wing of the Islamic movement.
Led by Sheikh Raed Salah, the organisation is generally regarded as the most popular Islamic party among Israel’s 1.6 million Palestinian citizens, who comprise a fifth of the population.
