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Sweatshop Conditions in US Cities
by Stephen Lendman
A new low-wage industry study by the Center for Urban Economic Development, the National Employment Law Project, and the UCLA Institute for Research on Labor and Employment exposes the dark side of workforce exploitation in America's three largest cities - New York, Los Angeles and Chicago.
From January through August 2008, researchers conducted 90-minute interviews with 4,387 "front-line" workers, aged 18 or older, using "innovative, rigorous methodology" to reach vulnerable people "often missed in standard surveys, such as (undocumented) immigrants and those paid in cash." The goal was to be as statistically representative of workplace violations as possible for a population of about 1.64 million workers, or 15% of the total workforce studied.
A Peace Prize Winner's Resumé
Michael Allen
[This post first appeared as a comment on Chris Floyd's great blog Empire Burlesque.]
Then there's the matter of his actual policy and political record. If Obama is such (as many "progressives" seem to need to believe) an "antiwar" candidate, why has he offered so much substantive policy support to the criminal occupation and the broader imperial "war on terror" of which Bush says O.I.F. is a part? Here are some highlights from a summary of Obama's U.S. Senate voting record recently sent to me by the Creative Youth News Team (CYNT 2007), a progressive African American advocacy organization.
Upside Down World: Warmonger Wins Peace Prize
Paul Craig Roberts
It took 25 years longer than George Orwell thought for the slogans of 1984 to become reality.
“War is Peace,” “Freedom is Slavery,” “Ignorance is Strength.”
I would add, “Lie is Truth.”
The Nobel Committee has awarded the 2009 Peace Prize to President Obama, the person who started a new war in Pakistan, upped the war in Afghanistan, and continues to threaten Iran with attack unless Iran does what the US government demands and relinquishes its rights as a signatory to the non-proliferation treaty.
The Nobel committee chairman, Thorbjoern Jagland said, “Only very rarely has a person to the same extent as Obama captured the world’s attention and given its people hope for a better future.” Obama, the committee gushed, has created “a new climate in international politics.”
WHO ARE THE TALIBAN?
Anand Gopal
The Afghan War Deciphered
If there is an exact location marking the West's failures in Afghanistan, it is the modest police checkpoint that sits on the main highway 20 minutes south of Kabul. The post signals the edge of the capital, a city of spectacular tension, blast walls, and standstill traffic. Beyond this point, Kabul's gritty, low-slung buildings and narrow streets give way to a vast plain of serene farmland hemmed in by sandy mountains. In this valley in Logar province, the American-backed government of Afghanistan no longer exists.
Instead of government officials, men in muddied black turbans with assault rifles slung over their shoulders patrol the highway, checking for thieves and "spies." The charred carcass of a tanker, meant to deliver fuel to international forces further south, sits belly up on the roadside.
The police say they don't dare enter these districts, especially at night when the guerrillas rule the roads. In some parts of the country's south and east, these insurgents have even set up their own government, which they call the Islamic Emirate of Afghanistan (the name of the former Taliban government). They mete out justice in makeshift Sharia courts. They settle land disputes between villagers. They dictate the curricula in schools.
Just three years ago, the central government still controlled the provinces near Kabul. But years of mismanagement, rampant criminality, and mounting civilian casualties have led to a spectacular resurgence of the Taliban and other related groups. Today, the Islamic Emirate enjoys de facto control in large parts of the country's south and east. According to ACBAR, an umbrella organization representing more than 100 aid agencies, insurgent attacks have increased by 50% over the past year. Foreign soldiers are now dying at a higher rate here than in Iraq. The burgeoning disaster is prompting the Afghan government of President Hamid Karzai and international players to speak openly of negotiations with sections of the insurgency.
From Delusion to Vindictiveness, Interpreting the Zionist Dream
by Gilad Atzmon
“The socio-economic structure of the Jewish people differs radically from that of other nations. Ours is an anomalous, abnormal structure.” (Ber Borochov- The Economic Development of the Jewish People 1917)
“You [Jews] lack the right notion of honour, feeling for duty, morality, patriotism, idealism….” (Max Nordau - Address at the 1st Zionist Congress 1897)
“But labour is the only force which binds man to the soil… it is the basic energy for the creation of national culture. This is what we do not have, but we are not aware of missing it. We are a people without a country, without a national living language, without a national culture. We seem to think that if we have no labour it does not matter - let Ivan, John or Mustafa do the work…” (A.D. Gordon, "Our Tasks Ahead" 1920)
Early Zionism was indeed a cheerful dream, it was all about the transformation of the ‘Jew’ into a ‘civilised, respectful and authentic human being’. The founders of Zionism were inspired by the notions of ‘people like any other people’ and ‘nation amongst nations’. Reading early Zionists such as Nordau, Borochov and Gordon provides us with some very contemptuous references to Jewish character and identity that would make Nazi ideology look mildly liberal.
Will Tel Aviv Take the U.S. to War – Again?
By: Jeff Gates
Tel Aviv long ago proved its mastery at waging war “by way of deception” – the operative credo of the Mossad, Israel’s intelligence and foreign operations directorate. Yet its latest operation reveals a need to freshen up its repertoire of dirty tricks. As Israel’s patron, those of us who live in the U.S. are painfully familiar with such duplicity. Yet the recent frequency of its frauds renders their latest treachery remarkably transparent.
Consider the similarities. First a network of pro-Israelis fixed the intelligence that induced us to invade Iraq in support of an expansionist agenda for Greater Israel. Who can forget Iraqi WMD, scary images of mushroom clouds and secret meetings in Prague? Who can fail to recall the yellowcake uranium from Niger and those ominous warnings of “high-level contacts” between secular Baghdad and the religious fundamentalists of Al Qaeda?
GRAFT ABROAD at home - Congressman Murtha and Co
Re-reporting, editing and comment by Carolyn Bennett
BREAKDOWN happens when a nation and its people are self-absorbed, oblivious, unmindful, careless of Society and its unwritten contract to which we must adhere as a global and domestic community of equals.
Influence Peddling and those who peddle and play the game must not be cleaned up, reformed, face lifted or refitted with a new suit. Peddling and peddlers must be expelled entirely.
The Center for Public Integrity has released a report it calls "The Murtha Method" targeting the U.S. House of Representatives Defense Appropriations Subcommittee, key funder of the Pentagon (the U.S. war machine); the Subcommittee's chairman, U.S. Representative John Murtha (D-Pa.); the Subcommittee's members; and the chairman and members' relationship with PMA Group, a lobbying firm employing former House Defense Appropriations Subcommittee aides. House Appropriations Defense Subcommittee Chairman Murtha and fellow subcommittee members Peter Visclosky (D-Ind.) and Jim Moran (D-Va.), says the report, "steered a host of earmarks to PMA [closed late last year following an FBI raid] clients."
Obama’s Test: Democracy or Chaos in Latin America
By Ramzy Baroud
Latin America stands at the threshold of a new era: one that promises a return to political uncertainty, violence and chaos or one of political stability and economic prosperity. Honduras is a crucial indicator.
The possible outcomes of the Honduran crisis are likely to define the coming era for Latin America and the US future role in that hemisphere, and, in fact, beyond it. Indeed, the story is much more elaborate than a daring president holed up in a foreign embassy in his own country.
In her second visit to Asia as US Secretary of State, Hillary Clinton declared on July 21 in Bangkok, “The US is back.” The declaration was disconcerting to many Asian countries, despite Clinton’s indistinct qualifications afterwards. Asian countries, exploring regional unity and economic cooperation are well aware of the subtle meaning of the term. However, it’s unlikely that politically stable and economically prospering Asia countries would allow for unwarranted outside interferences, especially with the growing Chinese regional influence and the election of Yukio Hatoyama the prime minister of Japan.
First Steps in the 'LaRouche Plan': Immediate Measures For U.S. Economic Survival!
By Lyndon H. LaRouche
October 7, 2009 (LPAC)-- The following outline of emergency measures was presented by Lyndon LaRouche on Oct. 6, as a preface to the issuance of "The LaRouche Plan, Rescuing the World's Economy," in pamphlet form.
First of all, what is required is to put all regular commercial banks through reorganization in bankruptcy. What will happen is, we'll go back to the Constitution, which specifies a credit system, not a monetary system. So the act of bankruptcy will be to declare that the United States Constitution is being enforced: that we are a credit system, not a monetary system.
Number 2: We will now take the accounts which are in commercial banks—the other banks, you can forget for the time being, but the commercial banks—these banks will be put into reorganization in bankruptcy, such that those accounts, in the banks, which correspond to a Glass-Steagall standard, will receive full protection and will be assigned protection under the category of a Glass-Steagall qualified account.
THE WORST PRISON IS A CLOSED HEART
Allen L Roland
When we close our heart we enter a dark prison cell where our own bars of fear and unworthiness keep us from fully experiencing ourselves as well as others. Each of us can free ourselves from that self imposed lock down of the heart and the magic key is gratitude ~ beginning with ourselves:
When we consciously deny love or run away from love it will effect every cell in our body because love is the very source of who we are. Denying love is the ultimate NO to ourselves and it raises havoc with our psychic health - or, as I am fond of saying - the greatest remorse is love unexpressed. In essence, when we deny love we go into a prison whose bars are made of fear and unworthiness. Let me describe what it is like in that prison since I have briefly experienced it three times in my life and each time it occurred when I consciously denied or ran away from love in relationship.
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