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Extreme Wealth vs Global Sharing
Rajesh Makwana
Campaigners have long proposed measures to reduce extreme inequality, but policymakers remain fixated on an economic model that threatens to undermine the fabric of society. When will the political elite heed the growing demands for redistribution that are being voiced in countless reports, books and public protests? By Rajesh Makwana.
Last year alone, the world's 100 richest people earned a combined additional income of $241 billion. According to new calculations, redistributing just a quarter of this vast quantity of money would enable governments to wipe out extreme poverty for an entire year. Unfortunately for the 40,000 people who die needlessly every day from poverty-related causes, these billionaires are as unlikely to share their earnings voluntarily as governments are to enact policies that redistribute their excessive incomes more fairly across society.
Four More Years
by Stephen Lendman
Inaugurating US presidents quadrennially reflects institutionalized hypocrisy.
On January 20, Obama began term two. After all the harm he caused so many, imagine how much more he plans.
He broke every major campaign promise made. He mocks legitimate governance. He lawlessly serves powerful monied interests. They own him.
He spurns peace. He's waging multiple direct and proxy wars. He's got new targets in mind. He supports some of the world's most ruthless despots.
He spends more on militarism than all other countries combined. He's done it when the only enemies America has are ones it invents.
He institutionalized tyranny. He targets dissent. He elevated abuse of power to a higher level. He imprisoned some of America's best and brightest. He's got others in mind.
Goldman, Other Welfare Queens Tell Us Forget Social Security-Medicare Until 70
Michael Collins
(Washington, DC 1/21) A long standing Money Party front, the Business Roundtable, wants you to wait until you're 70 years old before you get Social Security and Medicare benefits. This is just a reprise of the November 2012 dictate from the king of corporate cronyism, Goldman Sachs CEO Lloyd Blankfein. (Image: DonkeyHotey) (Greenspan statement)
The boss announced, "So there will be things that, you know, the retirement age has to be changed, maybe some of the benefits have to be affected, maybe some of the inflation adjustments have to be revised. But in general, entitlements have to be slowed down and contained." Lloyd Blankfein, CBS News, November 2012
That's easy for Lloyd to say. He makes tens of millions of dollars a year without so much as lifting a finger. You can be sure that Blankfein has a deluxe health insurance and retirement plan.
How Unalienable Is Life?
By David Swanson
Meet the new boss who, upon his inauguration, declared that the right to life is unalienable. Let me be clear, that doesn't mean he can't take yours.
In fact, he runs through a list of men, women, and children on Tuesdays, hung over from inaugurations or not, and picks whom to murder and murders them.
We're not supposed to call it murder, of course, because it's properly assassination. Except that no public figures are being assassinated; 98% of those killed are not targeted at all; some are targeted for suspicious behavior without knowing their names; one type of suspicious behavior is the act of retrieving the dead and wounded from a previous strike; and those targeted are not targeted for politics but for resisting illegal occupations. Moreover, an assassination is a type of murder.
Crusading Wars on Muslims Will Never End
Mahboob A. Khawaja, PhD
“The Romans were slipping into violence by a process of self-justification, and once a nation or an individual has started down this particular slope, it is impossible to apply breaks the Roman people were too unimaginative and short sighted to realize that, once murder has been justified on grounds of expediency, it can become a habit, then a disease.” (Colin Wilson. A Criminal History of Mankind)
The 21st century unilateral crusades are killing the humanity as if the 12th century European crusades against Islam were unending. The hurriedly enforced allied adventure in West Africa - Mali- tells clearly that the US led bogus “War on Terror” is endless and unprovoked aggression is part of the planned Western crusade against Islam and Muslims across the globe.
The Trillion Dollar Coin: Joke or Game-changer?
by Ellen Brown
The trillion dollar coin actually represents one of the most important principles of popular prosperity ever conceived: the creation of money by sovereign governments, debt-free.
Last week on “The Daily Show,” Jon Stewart characterized the proposal that the White House circumvent the debt ceiling by minting a trillion dollar coin as an attempt to “just make shit up.”
Economist and NY Times columnist Paul Krugman responded with a critical blog post accusing Stuart of a “lack of professionalism” for not taking the trillion dollar coin seriously. However, Krugman himself had called the idea “silly.” He thought it was just less silly — and less dangerous — than playing with the debt ceiling, which was itself an unconstitutional shackle on the Treasury’s ability to pay debts already incurred by Congress.
Targeting Mali
by Stephen Lendman
At issue is scrambling for Africa's resources. They're vast. They're some of the world's largest and richest.
They include oil, gas, gold, silver, diamonds, uranium, iron, copper, tin, lead, nickel, coal, cobalt, bauxite, wood, coltan, manganese, chromium, vanadium-bearing titanium, agricultural lands, and offshore fishing.
AFRICOM was established to pursue them. Resource/mineral wars define America's agenda.
Mali is strategically located. It's West Africa's largest country. It's more than double the size of France. It borders on seven nations. They include Algeria, Niger, Mauritania, Burkina Faso, Senegal, Guinea, and Cote D'Ivoire (Ivory Coast).
Its northwestern area is largely arid desert or semi-desert. The Sahel runs through its central region. Rainfall and rivers make southwestern territory marginally more lush than the rest of the country.
Navi Pillay Targets Syria
by Stephen Lendman
She's UN High Commissioner for Human Rights. Her job involves spurning them. She's a reliable imperial tool. She's up to her old tricks.
On January 18, she addressed the Security Council in closed session. More on that below.
The Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights (OHCHR) lists her credentials. Post-apartheid in 1995, she was appointed a South African High Court judge.
The same year, she was chosen to serve on the International Tribunal for Rwanda (ICRT). From 1999 - 2003, she served as president.
The Institutionalization of Tyranny
Paul Craig Roberts
Republicans and conservative Americans are still fighting Big Government in its welfare state form. Apparently, they have never heard of the militarized police state form of Big Government, or, if they have, they are comfortable with it and have no objection.
Republicans, including those in the House and Senate, are content for big government to initiate wars without a declaration of war or even Congress’ assent, and to murder with drones citizens of countries with which Washington is not at war. Republicans do not mind that federal “security” agencies spy on American citizens without warrants and record every email, Internet site visited, Facebook posting, cell phone call, and credit card purchase. Republicans in Congress even voted to fund the massive structure in Utah in which this information is stored.
But heaven forbid that big government should do anything for a poor person.
Open Letter to New York Times Editors
by Stephen Lendman
A personal note: I'm one of your fiercest critics. I'm certainly one of the most outspoken. My critiques are justified. I don't prepare them lightly.
I scrupulously strive for truth and full disclosure. If only Times writers, contributors and editors maintained similar standards.
You fall woefully short. I explained often in detail. I hoist you on your own petard. It gives me no joy doing it.
I'm old enough to remember June 9, 1954. My sophomore college year just ended. McCarthy witch-hunt communist hearings got headlines. Harvard Law Dean Ervin Griswold called him "judge, jury, prosecutor, castigator, and press agent, all in one."
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