Capitalism

In Shadows Of American Century: Rise & Decline Of US Global Power

December 29, 2017 Paul Street, Nyjournalofbooks.com Strategize! Capitalism, US Imperialism

This is a remarkable and dazzlingly original account of the rise and potential near-term fall of the American Empire. A veteran and distinguished American foreign policy historian, Alfred McCoy opens by tracing the United States’ emergence as a world power during the Spanish-American War and the successor to England as the world’s pre-eminent power during World War II and the Cold War. After seven decades as a global hegemon, McCoy argues, “Washington now faces multiple challenges that might well bring an untimely and early end to the American Century.” The game could well be over by 2030, the author concludes from his deep dive into “a military and economic battle for global domination fought in the shadows, largely unknown to those outside the highest rungs of power.”

The World’s Wealthiest Get More Obscenly More Wealthy

December 29, 2017 Tom Metcalf and Jack Witzig, Bloomberg.com Educate! Capitalism, Inequality, Ruling Class

Amazon.com Inc. founder Jeff Bezos added the most in 2017, a $34.2 billion gain that knocked Microsoft Corp. co-founder Bill Gates out of his spot as the world’s richest person in October. Gates, 62, had held the spot since May 2013, and has been donating much of his fortune to charity, including a $4.6 billion pledge he made to the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation in August. Bezos, whose net worth topped $100 billion at the end of November, currently has a net worth of $99.6 billion compared with $91.3 billion for Gates. George Soros also gave away a substantial part of his fortune, revealing in October that his family office had given $18 billion to his Open Society Foundations over the past several years, dropping the billionaire investor to No. 195 on the Bloomberg ranking, with a net worth of $8 billion.

The Permanent Lie, Our Deadliest Threat

December 26, 2017 By Chris Hedges, Truthdig.com Educate! Capitalism, Class war, Propaganda, Repression

The most ominous danger we face does not come from the eradication of free speech through the obliteration of net neutrality or through Google algorithms that steer people away from dissident, left-wing, progressive or anti-war sites. It does not come from a tax bill that abandons all pretense of fiscal responsibility to enrich corporations and oligarchs and prepares the way to dismantle programs such as Social Security. It does not come from the opening of public land to the mining and fossil fuel industry, the acceleration of ecocide by demolishing environmental regulations, or the destruction of public education. It does not come from the squandering of federal dollars on a bloated military as the country collapses or the use of the systems of domestic security to criminalize dissent

Capitalism, Exterminism And Long Ecological Revolution

December 23, 2017 Elliott Gabriel, Telesurtv.net Strategize! Capitalism, Climate Change, Ecology, Environment

Even the most stubborn climate skeptics found the events of 2017 difficult to cope with. It wasn't just a matter of turning up the air conditioner and switching the channel to Fox News: this time, the inconvenient truth came in the form of monstrous wildfires and tropical cyclones ruthlessly knocking down suburban ranch homes and master-planned housing developments. Across the globe, climate change took on the frightening form of nation-destroying hurricanes in the Caribbean and U.S.-Mexico border region, record-breaking firestorms in California and the Iberian Peninsula, severe droughts in Africa and biblical floods in Africa and South Asia. In the Global South, these disasters were exacerbated by underdevelopment, maldevelopment, poverty, corruption and gross inequality – social factors inextricably rooted in imperialism.

Truth About Power And Capitalism: A Socialist Response To Tax Bill

December 23, 2017 By Richard D. Wolff, Truthout.org Educate! Capitalism, Inequality, Tax Reform, Taxes

In response to the passage of the GOP tax bill, many voices are now offering variations on the theme of "speak truth to power." It's true enough that tax overhaul, coming after 30 years of widening inequality, widens it further. It is likewise yet another exercise in trickle-down economics, the policy promise that direct economic help to corporations and the rich will eventually lift up the rest of us. The GOP and Trump conveniently disregard the countless economists who have shown that trickle-down is a false promise. However, the limitation of "speaking truth to power" is and always was that it risks leaving us with the truth and them with the power. In today's world, the GOP, Trump and the corporate leaders who sustain them have the power to treat truths as so much "fake news" or simply to ignore them as they push their agendas.

What Do You Call A World That Can’t Learn From Itself?

December 23, 2017 Umair Haque, eand.co Educate! Capitalism, Quality of Life, United States

Whenever I go back and forth between Europe and the States, a curious set of facts strikes me. In London, Paris, Berlin, I hop on the train, head to the cafe — it’s the afternoon, and nobody’s gotten to work until 9am, and even then, maybe not until 10 — order a carefully made coffee and a newly baked croissant, do some writing, pick up some fresh groceries, maybe a meal or two, head home — now it’s 6 or 7, and everyone else has already gone home around 5 — and watch something interesting, maybe a documentary by an academic, the BBC’s Blue Planet, or a Swedish crime-noir. I think back on my day and remember the people smiling and laughing at the pubs and cafes.

The High Cost Of Denying Class War

December 19, 2017 Yanis Varoufakis Educate! Capitalism, Class Struggle, New Economy

The rise of populism on both sides of the Atlantic is being investigated psychoanalytically, culturally, anthropologically, aesthetically, and of course in terms of identity politics. The only angle left unexplored is the one that holds the key to understanding what is going on: the unceasing class war waged against the poor since the late 1970s. ATHENS – The Anglosphere’s political atmosphere is thick with bourgeois outrage. In the United States, the so-called liberal establishment is convinced it was robbed by an insurgency of “deplorables” weaponized by Vladimir Putin’s hackers and Facebook’s sinister inner workings. In Britain, too, an incensed bourgeoisie are pinching themselves that support for leaving the European Union in favor of an inglorious isolation remains undented, despite a process that can only be described as a dog’s Brexit.

The Rise And Decline Of The Welfare State

December 17, 2017 James Petras Educate! Capitalism, Imperialism, Labor Unions, New Economy

Over the past forty years the working class and the rump of what was once referred to as the ‘labor movement’ has contributed to the dismantling of the social welfare state, voting for ‘strike-breaker’ Reagan, ‘workfare’ Clinton, ‘Wall Street crash’ Bush, ‘Wall Street savior’ Obama and ‘Trickle-down’ Trump. Gone are the days when social welfare and profitable wars raised US living standards and transformed American trade unions into an appendage of the Democratic Party and a handmaiden of Empire. The Democratic Party rescued capitalism from its collapse in the Great Depression, incorporated labor into the war economy and the post- colonial global empire, and resurrected Wall Street from the ‘Great Financial Meltdown’ of the 21st century.

FairCoop: An Alternative System Outside Of Capitalism

December 15, 2017 Niko Georgiades, geo.coop Educate! Capitalism, Cooperatives, Greece, New Economy

Athens, Greece – Tools born from the internet, applied across autonomous networks and movements seeking alternatives to capitalism, are providing the infrastructure of alternative societies. In the last of our specials on community currencies and alternative economies, we showcase FairCoop, a self-organized and self-managed global cooperative created through the internet outside the domain of the nation-state. During a conference on alternatives to capitalism inside of the self-organized and squatted Embros Theater in Athens, Greece in the summer of 2017, a Catalan speaker (who remained anonymous for safety purposes) gave a presentation on FairCoop, which informed much of this reporting.

Fascism In America: A Preventable Danger

December 6, 2017 Richard E. Rubenstein, transcend.org Strategize! Capitalism, Class Struggle, Fascism, Repression

By Richard E. Rubenstein for TRANSCEND Media Service - Over the past few months, the possibility of a fascist America has moved from the realm of academic speculation to that of common concern. In August 2017, a coalition of organizations calling themselves “Unite the Right” organized a rally in Charlottesville, Virginia to protest the planned removal by the city government of a statute of General Robert E. Lee, leader of the pro-slavery Confederate forces in the Civil War of 1860-65. The resulting confrontation between protestors and counter-protestors culminated tragically when a 20-year old white supremacist named James Alex Fields, Jr. drove his auto into the crowd, sending nineteen people to the hospital and killing 32-year old Heather Heyer, a counter-protestor. At this writing, “Unite the Right” has requested a permit to hold another rally in Charlottesville. But even without this provocation, there would be growing concern about the resurgence of U.S. organizations with fascist or neo-fascist sympathies and ideas. The Southern Poverty Law Center, an anti-fascist watchdog group, reports a burst of growth on the Far Far Right, with about one thousand hate groups currently active.[1] These organizations come in a variety of brands, ranging from white nationalists and members of the racist Ku Klux Klan to neo-Confederates, neo-Nazis, patriot militias, anti-Muslim organizations, militant Christian identity groups, and others.

Homelessness: One of Capitalism’s Many Inevitable Products

December 4, 2017 Gus Bagakis, truth-out.org Educate! Capitalism, Economic inequality, Homelessness

By Gus Bagakis for Truthout - Housing is the necessary precondition for security, identity, emotional well-being, work, leisure and community. There is no greater condemnation of capitalism than its inability to provide adequate housing for those who produce its wealth -- the working class. The high percentage of people of color who are homeless points to the wealth divide between the white and non-white working class, based on the historical legacy of racism and the building of capitalism out of slavery. The ruling class explanation relies on blaming the victims, arguing that people experiencing homelessness are in some way individually incompetent. Other, more perceptive, yet incomplete explanations point to shortages of affordable housing, privatization of civic services, investment speculation in housing, poorly planned urbanization, as well as poverty and unemployment. Actually, the fear of homelessness helps capitalism maintain its power. In the days of industrial capitalism, the unemployed were used by the ruling capitalist class to signal to the workers that they were lucky to have their jobs, and if they rebelled, they could be unemployed. Now, after the 2007-8 recession, as we move further into post-industrial capitalism, the homeless are a warning to those potentially rebellious workers unhappy with their loss of wages, lack of stability and benefits, and to students of the zero generation: zero jobs, zero hope, zero possibilities, zero employment, who are in debt for their schooling. The message is: Accept the declining status quo or end up homeless.

Market Economy: Deep Roots Of Dysfunction

December 2, 2017 Jane Roelofs, www.globaljusticecenter.org Create! Capitalism, Labor, Trade, Worker Rights

By Jane Roelofs for the Center for Global Justice. There is nothing new in the disaster anticipated from NAFTA. The market economy hasn't "broken down," or suddenly reached environmental limits. Its inherent faults are simply more clearly manifest in an age of mass communication and heightened consciousness. Here I will focus on the conflict between the market—the backbone of capitalism—and Green values. Many people, even some socialists, believe that both trade and commodification are beneficial. These processes, essential to the creation of a market economy, are considered progressive because they offer both more choice and a larger amount of stuff. While these effects cannot be disputed, their hidden costs in human and environmental terms must be taken into account.

Monetary Imperialism

December 1, 2017 Michael Hudson, counterpunch.org Educate! Austerity, Capitalism, Imperialism, Inter-Imperialist Rivalry

By Michael Hudson for Counter Punch - In theory, the global financial system is supposed to help every country gain. Mainstream teaching of international finance, trade and “foreign aid” (defined simply as any government credit) depicts an almost utopian system uplifting all countries, not stripping their assets and imposing austerity. The reality since World War I is that the United States has taken the lead in shaping the international financial system to promote gains for its own bankers, farm exporters, its oil and gas sector, and buyers of foreign resources – and most of all, to collect on debts owed to it. Each time this global system has broken down over the past century, the major destabilizing force has been American over-reach and the drive by its bankers and bondholders for short-term gains. The dollar-centered financial system is leaving more industrial as well as Third World countries debt-strapped. Its three institutional pillars – the International Monetary Fund (IMF), World Bank and World Trade Organization – have imposed monetary, fiscal and financial dependency, most recently by the post-Soviet Baltics, Greece and the rest of southern Europe. The resulting strains are now reaching the point where they are breaking apart the arrangements put in place after World War II.

This City Hall, Brought To You By Amazon

November 29, 2017 Danny Westneat, seattletimes.com Educate! Amazon, Capitalism, Gentrification, New Economy

By Danny Westneat for The Seattle Times - There’s rising worry that corporations are taking over America. But after reviewing a slew of the bids by cities and states wooing Amazon’s massive second headquarters, I don’t think “takeover” quite captures what’s going on. More like “surrender.” Last month Amazon announced it got 238 offers for its new, proposed 50,000-employee HQ2. I set out to see what’s in them, but only about 30 have been released so far under public-record acts. Those 30, though, amply demonstrate our capitulation to corporate influence in politics. There’s a new wave, in which some City Halls seem willing to go beyond just throwing money at Amazon. They’re turning over the keys to the democracy. Coming from the home of the largest corporate tax-break package in U.S. history, which our state gave to Boeing, I figured I was well acquainted with the dark arts of economic-incentive deals. But still I was surprised to see the lengths to which some cities and states will go to get a piece of that high-tech glory. Example: Chicago has offered to let Amazon pocket $1.32 billion in income taxes paid by its own workers. This is truly perverse. Called a personal income-tax diversion, the workers must still pay the full taxes, but instead of the state getting the money to use for schools, roads or whatever, Amazon would get to keep it all instead. “The result is that workers are, in effect, paying taxes to their boss,” says a report on the practice from Good Jobs First, a think tank critical of many corporate subsidies. Most of the HQ2 bids had more traditional sweeteners. Such as Chula Vista, California, which offered to give Amazon 85 acres of land for free (value: $100 million) and to excuse any property taxes on HQ2 for 30 years ($300 million). New Jersey remains the dollar king of the subsidy sweepstakes, having offered Amazon $7 billion to build in Newark.

Enabling Genocide

November 29, 2017 Chris Hedges, truthdig.com Educate! Capitalism, Genocide, US Imperialism

By Chris Hedges for Truth Dig - On July 11, 1995, I was in the office of Bosnian Prime Minister Haris Silajdžić in the besieged city of Sarajevo. As Serb artillery shells exploded in the streets around us, we listened to the last radio communication from the U.N. “safe area” of Srebrenica, being overrun by Serb troops led by Gen. Ratko Mladić. There was no doubt among any in the room that widespread killing of Muslims was about to begin. “This is the result of a twisted policy of containment,” Silajdžić said to me bitterly. “The U.N. contained thousands of our tanks and artillery pieces and disarmed our population. And when we asked why the arms embargo against us could not be lifted, we were told because it would endanger those Muslims living in the protected enclaves. This argument, after these Serb attacks, is now gone. But it means that the U.N. has become an accomplice to murder.” Thousands of the 42,000 Muslims in the Srebrenica enclave, ostensibly protected by some 400 Dutch troops acting as U.N. peacekeepers, fled the Serbs advancing on the city and congregated in terror at the Dutch base at Potočari, three miles north of Srebrenica. Desperate pleas by the Muslim leadership in Srebrenica to the United Nations and the North Atlantic Treaty Organization for air support were ignored.

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