Rouge Forum Dispatch: Two! Three! Many Wildcats! Then General Strike!
We Say Fight Back!
The Only Illegal Strike is a Strike that Fails.
WV Teachers STRIKE Fund
West Virginia teachers and school service personnel are on strike. The people who help our kids everyday need our help now.
https://www.gofundme.com/wv-teachers-strike-fund
West Virginia Teachers Didn’t Want to Strike. Now They Won’t Stop
A week ago, thousands of public school teachers in West Virginia went out on strike, a rare but familiar union-organized action to protest low wages and rising health-care costs. Tuesday night, state union leaders and the Governor Jim Justice reached a deal, and the teachers were expected to be back at work on Thursday.
As uncommon as work stoppages have become in the U.S., big wildcat strikes like West Virginia’s are almost unheard of. It arrives at a moment when organized labor, already in steep decline, is facing a new emergency: The Supreme Court heard arguments Monday in a case that’s expected by June to end mandatory union fees for all government employees, an outcome that would slash unions’ budgets and power.
Against this backdrop, the strike in West Virginia, where unions lack both mandatory fees and formal collective bargaining rights, has become for some a beacon, an example of the type of disruptive activism that could keep the labor movement alive. www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2018-03-02/biggest-wildcat-strike-in-decades-hints-at-new-u-s-labor-unrest
How they Know it is All or Nothing…
Before they went on strike, West Virginia teachers packed bags to make sure kids didn’t go hungry
Teachers in West Virginia are striking for higher wages and better benefits, but not at the expense of hungry students.
www.facebook.com/aftwv/videos/1981718728523020/
(CNN)Teachers in West Virginia are striking for higher wages and better benefits, but not at the expense of hungry students.
www.facebook.com/wsws.org/videos/10156408760899684/
Universities threaten to punish striking staff over cancelled lectures
Universities are threatening to punish staff who fail to make up for lectures and seminars cancelled during strikes, a move that union leaders say could prolong the industrial action.
In one case the University of Kent has told staff that any failure to reschedule lectures or classes lost because of the strike would see them lose 50% to 100% of their pay “for every day where an individual continues to refuse to perform their full contract of employment”.
Kent’s hardline stance extends to deducting a high proportion of pay from low-paid graduate teaching assistants, with some liable to lose more than a month’s pay for taking part in the strikes that have so far lasted five days.
The strike by academics, librarians and administrators over proposals to radically restructure their pensions, which the University and College Union claims will cost staff £10,000 a year after retirement, are scheduled to restart next week at about 60 universities.
St Andrews, Keele and Liverpool universities are among those that have told staff they face additional pay deductions unless they reschedule events cancelled during the industrial action, which started on 22 February. The cuts would come on top of the pay automatically lost while on strike.
Sheffield University had initially threatened to further dock pay but the university backed down after staff protests. Keith Burnett, Sheffield’s vice-chancellor, issued a statement saying the university would not take a “punitive approach”.
But others, including St Andrews, have told staff that failure to reschedule classes later this term will be deemed “action short of a strike” and liable to further cuts.
Keele informed staff this week it would withhold 20% of pay for “partial performance” until staff members rescheduled classes and other timetabled student activities cancelled because of strike action. www.theguardian.com/education/2018/mar/02/uk-universities-threaten-punish-striking-staff-cancelled-lectures
Congratulations on the publication of:
The CSPAN discussion is here www.c-span.org/video/?440288-1/a-beautiful-terrible-history
www.youtube.com/watch?v=O4bCYyeIRhA&feature=share
The Little Red Schoolhouse
The Learning Curve: San Diego Unified’s Disappearing Child Development Centers
Two years after San Diego Unified School District kicked off its highly touted Preschool for All program, district leaders plan to close four more of the child development centers that offer preschool programs for children whose parents are working or going to school and meet income eligibility guidelines.
The child development centers slotted to close include: Kennedy in Lincoln Park, Brooklyn in Golden Hill, Bayview in Pacific Beach and Montezuma in the College Area.
The cuts follow a string of closures over the past 10 years. In 2008, the district operated 25 child development centers. By 2016, that number was down to nine. The closures planned for next year mean only five centers will remain — for now.
In a recent memo, the district cited low-enrollment and a need to reorganize its early education programs as reasons for the closures.
But child development centers are also more costly to operate. Lucia Garay, director of early education at the San Diego County Office of Education, told me last year that the state does not reimburse school districts for the entire cost of operating child development centers.
The Neighborhood Schools: Race and Capitalism
This month, news broke that D.C. Public Schools Chancellor Antwan Wilson had abused his position of power when he bypassed the city’s competitive lottery system to get his daughter into a highly coveted school. In the process, Wilson broke the very school lottery rules he established.
The controversy comes at a time when D.C. Public Schools is already reeling from scandals. Just last year, investigators found the former chancellor allowed other well-connected parents and government officials to bypass lottery rules. Then, in January, an investigation into D.C. Public Schools revealed a system of passing low-performing students along in an apparent attempt to boost graduation numbers.
Wilson resigned this month, shortly after his attempts to get his daughter into a coveted school came to light.
My friend Conor Williams, a senior researcher in New America’s Education Policy Program, writes that D.C. parents were incredulous when they heard the news – and for good reason. Wilson abused the privilege of his position and broke a rule he had created to benefit his own family. He has no legitimate defense….
while we may see that version of privilege as the American way, it certainly doesn’t provide all students in school district with equal access to a quality education. In other words, Williams writes, the current system seems anything but fair.
“Our socioeconomic classes are calcifying through the untrammeled inheritance of social, educational, and material privileges. Nevertheless, ridiculous as it is, wealth-based access to quality public education is a central part of the U.S. meritocracy game. It’s too ubiquitous to question. It’s the air we breathe,” writes Williams. www.voiceofsandiego.org/topics/education/learning-curve-san-diego-unifieds-disappearing-child-development-centers/?utm_source=Voice+of+San+Diego+Master+List&utm_campaign=997a044d26-Learning_Curve&utm_medium=email&utm_term=0_c2357fd0a3-997a044d26-81862829&goal=0_c2357fd0a3-997a044d26-81862829
www.facebook.com/georgetakeipresents/videos/189848451630288/
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PBC deputy superintendent was arrested in 1990 prostitution case
Posted: 4:29 p.m. Friday, March 02, 2018
Deputy Superintendent David Christiansen was arrested in 1990 on charges of committing a prostitution offense, an old case that came to light Friday, just days before a decision on whether he will become the next leader of Palm Beach County’s public school system.
Court records indicate that Christiansen, now 49, was cited by police in December 1990 for violating an Orlando city ordinance prohibiting the “abetting” of prostitution.
At the time of the December 1990 incident, Christiansen had just begun his educational career as a 22-year-old high school teacher in Orange County’s public schools, records show.
Details about the case weren’t immediately available. Under the Orlando ordinance, abetting can include operating a place of prostitution, agreeing to secure or receive a person for prostitution purposes, or transporting someone for the purpose of prostitution. www.mypalmbeachpost.com/news/local-education/pbc-deputy-superintendent-was-arrested-1990-prostitution-case/jkP0ZgORTaM8EVHH0OhFfN/
Flowers, drinks and a dog: vice-chancellors claimed £8m in expenses over two years
Channel 4 investigates claims for five-star lifestyles as university lecturers strike over swingeing pension changes
Some claimed for Easter eggs, scented candles, fresh flowers and even a “pornstar Martini”. Few, though, can beat the £1,600 spent on relocating a pet dog from Australia to Britain.
These are just some of the items claimed by top university management and revealed by an investigation into the lavish expense accounts enjoyed by Britain’s vice-chancellors.
The timing could not be worse, coming at the end of a week in which tens of thousands of university staff took industrial action to protest against proposed changes to their pension scheme that could leave them materially worse off.
It’s not just the fact they and their senior colleagues in university management have claimed almost £8m over the past two years that will prove galling to their staff. The kinds of items they have claimed for will prove equally toxic.
Already some are suggesting that this is the vice-chancellors’ “duckhouse moment”, a reference to the £1,600 Tory MP Sir Peter Viggers sought to claim for a floating duck island, revealed at the height of the MPs’ expenses scandal in 2009.
A Channel 4 Dispatches programme, to be screened tomorrow night, found that university top brass are enjoying stays in five-star hotels, fine dining and first-class air travel. www.theguardian.com/education/2018/feb/24/flowers-drinks-and-a-dog-vice-chancellors-claimed-8m-in-expenses-over-two-years
www.facebook.com/JungleVT/videos/2381924505282711/
The International Hot War of the Rich on the Poor
Nuclear Posture Review Policies Increase Risk of Nuclear War
WASHINGTON (February 2, 2018)—The White House released its Nuclear Posture Review (NPR) today, which shows the Trump administration will broaden the circumstances under which it would use nuclear weapons first, and more tightly integrate its nuclear and conventional forces to facilitate nuclear war-fighting. It also plans to add a third type of low-yield weapon to the arsenal by modifying some of the existing warheads on sub-based ballistic missiles. All of these changes can occur within this presidential term. In the longer run, the NPR calls for the deployment of a nuclear-armed sea-launched cruise missile. The U.S. has not deployed such a weapon for 25 years.
Below is a statement by Lisbeth Gronlund, senior scientist and co-director of the Global Security Program at the Union of Concerned Scientists.
“One of the most disturbing and significant changes to U.S. policy outlined in the NPR is the tighter integration of U.S. nuclear and conventional forces, including training and exercising with these integrated forces, so U.S. forces can operate—as the NPR states—in the face of nuclear threats and employment. This is the text-book definition of nuclear war-fighting. This new policy deliberately blurs the line between nuclear and conventional forces and eliminates a clear firewall.
“The decision to deploy another type of low-yield weapon—this one on submarines—is consistent with the new emphasis on nuclear war-fighting. Existing U.S. B61 bombs and air-launched cruise missiles already have low-yield options.
“The administration’s new policy also shoots a big hole in the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty, which is key to U.S. security. It simply rejects the U.S. obligation to take steps toward nuclear disarmament. Since the end of the Cold War, the United States has made progress—albeit slow progress—in reducing the number, types and role of its nuclear weapons. The new policy reverses that progress. The NPR is a giant slap in the face of the non-nuclear weapon states, who are already fed up with the slow progress of the United States and Russia.
“President Trump is embarking on a reckless path—one that will reduce U.S. security both now and in the longer term.” www.ucsusa.org/press/2018/nuclear-posture-review-policies-increase-risk-nuclear-war#.Wpu4Q3xG2ic
www.facebook.com/MarineCorpsTimes/videos/10156088661537383/
A Consensus Emerges: Russia Committed an “Act of War” on Par With Pearl Harbor and 9/11. Should the U.S. Response Be Similar?
In the wake of last week’s indictments alleging that 13 Russian nationals and entities created fake social media accounts and sponsored political events to sow political discord in the U.S., something of a consensus has arisen in the political and media class (with some notable exceptions) that these actions not only constitute an “act of war” against the U.S., but one so grave that it is tantamount to Pearl Harbor and 9/11. Indeed, that Russia’s alleged “meddling” is comparable to the two most devastating attacks in U.S. history has, overnight, become a virtual cliché.
The claim that Russian meddling in the election is “an act of war” comparable to these events isn’t brand new. Senators from both parties, such as Republican John McCain and Democrat Jeanne Shaheen, have long described Russian meddling in 2016 as an “act of war.” Hillary Clinton, while promoting her book last October, described Russia’s alleged hacking of the DNC and John Podesta’s email inbox as a “cyber 9/11.” And last February, the always war-hungry Tom Friedman of the New York Times said on “Morning Joe” that Russian hacking “was a 9/11-scale event. They attacked the core of our democracy. That was a Pearl Harbor-scale event.”
But the last few days have ushered in an explosion of this rhetoric from politicians and journalists alike. On Friday night’s Chris Hayes show on MSNBC, two separate guests — Democratic Rep. Jerry Nadler and longtime Clinton aide Philippe Reines — posited Pearl Harbor as the “equivalent” of Russian meddling, provoking a shocked reaction from Hayes:
Mapping Trump’s Empire: Assets and Liabilities
James Petras
February 2018
The US empire spans the globe; it expands and contracts, according to its
ability to secure strategic assets, willing and able to further military and economic
power to counter emerging adversaries.
The map of empire is a shorthand measure of the vectors, reach and
durability of global power and wealth. The map of empire is changing — adding
and subtracting assets and liabilities, according to the successes and retreats of
domestic and overseas power centers. While the US empire has been engaged in
intense conflicts in the Middle East, the imperial map has been enlarge elsewhere
at lower cost and greater success.
Enlarging the Empire
The US empire has substantially increased its scope and presence in several
regions, especially in Latin America. The additions and enlargements include
Argentina, Brazil, Colombia, Mexico, Central America, Peru and the Caribbean.
The most important asset redrawing the empire in Latin America is Argentina.
The US has gained military, economic and political advantages. In the case of
Argentina, political and economic advances preceded military expansion.
The US provided ideological and political support to secure the election of its
client Mauricio Macri. The new Argentine President immediately transferred over
$5 billion dollars to the notorious Wall Street Vulture speculator, Paul Singer, and
proceeded to open the floodgates for a lucrative multi-billion dollar flow of
financial capital. President Macri then followed up by inviting the Pentagon and
US intelligence services to establish military bases, spy stations and training
operations along its borders. Equally important, Argentina embraced the US
directives designed to overthrow the government of Venezuela, undermine
Bolivia’s nationalist government under Evo Morales and pursue a policy of UScentered
regional integration …petras.lahaine.org/b2-img/PetrasMappingTrumpsEmpire.pdf
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China: ‘All-out offensive’ in Xinjiang risks worsening grievances
China is in the midst of what it calls a “people’s war on terror” in its far west. What sparked this latest campaign was a knife attack.
After five people were killed on 14 February in Xinjiang, home to China’s Muslim Uighur minority, Beijing began an “all out offensive”. It flew in thousands of armed troops to hold mass police rallies and deploy columns of armoured vehicles on city streets.
Xinjiang’s Communist Party boss Chen Quanguo urged these forces to “bury the corpses of terrorists in the vast sea of a people’s war”.
Judging from the reaction on Chinese social media, at least some people approve.
“Terrorists will never be stamped out unless we weaken Muslim religious forces,” urged one post on China’s Twitter-like Weibo.
But the ethnic Uighur population of Xinjiang has no discernible voice. In the midst of an “all-out offensive” it is dangerous for them to speak up, unless to echo the government’s message.
One contact in Kashgar told the BBC that the situation is “hypersensitive”, with all business in the city closed down by night. He said members of his family are summoned to weekly meetings to demonstrate political allegiance.
“We are reliving the Cultural Revolution”, he said. www.bbc.com/news/world-asia-china-39137420
McMaster of War
A number of military experts – including the defense secretary, James Mattis – have warned that a US war against North Korea would be hard, incredibly destructive and bloody, with civilian casualties in the millions, and could go badly for US forces. But Lt. Gen. Herbert Raymond McMaster, President Trump’s national security adviser, is apparently insistent that ‘a military strike be considered as a serious option’.
One of Gen. McMaster’s claims to fame is a Silver Star he was awarded for a tank ‘battle’ he led in the desert during the so-called Gulf War of 1991. As a young captain leading a troop with nine new Abrams M1A1 battle tanks, McMaster destroyed 28 Iraqi tanks in 23 minutes without losing any of his own or suffering any casualties.
McMaster’s exploit (later embellished with a name, the ‘Battle of 73 Easting’) was little more than a case of his having dramatically better equipment. His tanks were several generations ahead of the antique Russian-built T-72s of his Iraqi opponents. They were protected by depleted uranium armour – a dense metal virtually impenetrable by conventional tank shells, anti-tank rockets and RPGs – and carried anti-tank munitions tipped with depleted uranium penetrators, which can punch through steel armour as if it were cardboard. They then ignite a tank’s interior, exploding any ordnance inside and incinerating the crew. The Abrams main cannon also has a significantly longer range than the tanks McMaster was confronting, meaning he and his men were able to pick off the Iraqi tanks while the shells fired back at them all fell short.
McMaster also fought in the Iraq War of the following decade. In 2005, running counter-insurgency operations in Tal Afar, a northern city of 200,000 people, McMaster ordered up a massive ground assault and aerial bombardment that levelled 60 per cent of the buildings in the old city centre. His experiences in Iraq raise concerns that Trump’s national security adviser may misperceive war as a one-sided affair in which an invincible US, with its super-powerful war machine, can smash its enemies with impunity.
I spoke to Lawrence Wilkerson, a retired army colonel who was chief of staff to Colin Powell when he was George W. Bush’s secretary of state. ‘McMaster knows very little about the [Korean] peninsula, period,’ he told me. ‘Thus far, his comments and – I must assume – his counsel to the NSC and its head, Trump, reflects that ignorance.’ Asked whether McMaster may be underestimating the risks of attacking North Korea, Wilkerson said: ‘That could be said of almost any US flag officer and reinforced with any who had combat experience in Iraq in 1990-91 or 2003.’ www.lrb.co.uk/blog/2018/02/19/dave-lindorff/mcmaster-of-war/
The Corps delays opening of new hard labor camp in Okinawa
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Senior Marine Corps officials have delayed the opening of a controversial correctional unit on Okinawa, Japan, where Marines who get in trouble will do hard labor, including breaking rocks with sledgehammers.
The new Correctional Custody Unit, or CCU, at Camp Hansen, Okinawa, was initially scheduled to open its doors Feb. 14. But plans changed and the opening was pushed back until May 2, according to officials at Marine Corps Installations Pacific.
It’s been several years since the Corps last operated a CCU, which invokes images of a menial labor camp with Marines sweating in the hot sun and pounding rock piles into small pieces — a characterization military officials have told Marine Corps Times is inaccurate.
Marine officials say the purpose of the CCU is to help rehabilitate junior Marines who would otherwise be separated from the service for relatively minor offenses. It’s also a tool for commanders to hold onto personnel who still may be valuable to the Corps with slight adjustments to attitude and behavioral problems.
“This will provide an opportunity for good Marines to recover from a slight misstep, as well as return to the ranks free of stigma with an opportunity for redemption,” Chief Warrant Officer Brian Sheppard, the brig commanding officer at Camp Butler, Japan, said in a command release. www.marinecorpstimes.com/news/your-marine-corps/2018/02/26/the-corps-delays-opening-of-new-hard-labor-camp-in-okinawa/?utm_source=Facebook&utm_medium=Socialflowhttps://www.theguardian.com/news/2018/feb/27/is-the-british-establishment-finally-finished
Perpetual War! Why the B-52 bomber will fly for 100 years
The Air Force just can’t let go of the B-52.
In the world of heavy bombers, none has prevailed as long as the B-52 Stratofortress. The Cold Warrior joined the U.S. arsenal in 1954, eventually becoming part of a nuclear triad that, along with strategic missiles and submarines, was aimed at giving the Soviet Union pause. After the Berlin Wall fell, it slowly became an aerial jack-of-all-trades. With its long range, minimal operating cost and ability to handle a wider array of weapons than any other aircraft, it just didn’t make sense to get rid of it. www.latimes.com/business/la-fi-b-52-air-force-20180215-story.html?utm_source=kw&kwp_0=699195&kwp_4=2474592&kwp_1=1046866#track=lat_social__content-promotion__fb-ad_keywee_______cpa
The International Economic War of the Rich on the Poor
By Day, a Sunny Smile for Disney Visitors. By Night, an Uneasy Sleep in a Car.
On Disneyland’s Main Street, Emily Bertola spends hours working on her feet, embroidering names onto mouse ears at the Mad Hatter shop, where she has been an employee for the last two years. She usually offers visitors the sunny smile she was trained to give.
None of her customers know that for months, she slept in the back of her truck, showering at the park before her shift.
Her struggle is hardly unique to Disneyland.
Orange County is known for its affluence, and for its tourist industry. But the thousands of workers who keep its resorts, restaurants and hotels running are sometimes struggling to stay afloat.
As the state grapples with soaring housing costs, workers in California earning just above the minimum wage find it difficult to pay for basic costs. Many employees at Disneyland have moved farther inland, driving hours each day to work. Others, like Ms. Bertola, have opted to move from couch-to-couch or sleep in their cars for months at a time.
Disneyland Resort — which includes the theme park, California Adventure, and nearby hotels — employs roughly 30,000 people. It is the largest employer in Orange County and one of the biggest employers in the state. www.nytimes.com/2018/02/27/us/disneyland-employees-wages.html
Shortly before Trump announced tariffs, his former adviser dumped millions in steel-related stocks
President Trump’s decision Thursday to impose crippling tariffs on the imports of steel and aluminum took many by surprise — particularly investors, as the Dow Jones Industrial Average closed the day’s trading down more than 400 points, or 1.7 percent, at 24,608.
But one billionaire investor and former Trump adviser, Carl Icahn, was seemingly unvexed, having dumped a million shares tied to the steel industry a week before the president announced 25 percent tariffs for foreign-made steel.
A Feb. 22 SEC filing shows Icahn sold off his $31.3 million stake in the Manitowoc Company, which is a leading global manufacturer of cranes for heavy construction based in Manitowoc, Wis., according to the company’s website. Since Trump’s announcement Thursday, Manitowoc’s stock has plummeted to about $26. Icahn — who has had majority interest in several companies including Motorola, Xerox, Family Dollar and Pep Boys — had sold his shares for about $32 to $34 each, according to the filing.
Icahn had not actively traded any Manitowoc stock since January 2015, according to regulatory filings. (WAPO 3/3/18)
Stocks dive after Trump promises tariffs on steel imports
U.S. stocks dived Thursday in another dizzying day of trading after President Trump promised stiff tariffs on imported steel and aluminum. The move raised the threat of escalating retaliation by other countries and higher inflation. The Standard & Poor’s 500 index erased nearly all of its gains for the year.
Indexes bounced between modest gains and losses earlier in the day, until Trump told industry executives that they would “have protection for the first time in a long while” and that he planned to impose tariffs of 25% on steel imports and 10% on aluminum imports next week.
“I don’t know if this will cause a trade war, and obviously that’s the fear,” said Lamar Villere, portfolio manager at investment manager Villere & Co. “But this is exactly what candidate Trump said he would do: He said he would be very protectionist and ‘America first.’ ” www.latimes.com/business/la-fi-markets-20180301-story.html
President Trump promised that his tax cut would encourage companies to invest in factories, workers and wages, setting off a spending spree that would reinvigorate the American economy.
Companies have announced plans for some of those investments. But so far, companies are using much of the money for something with a more narrow benefit: buying their own shares.
Those so-called buybacks are good for shareholders, including the senior executives who tend to be big owners of their companies’ stock. A company purchasing its own shares is a time-tested way to bolster its stock price.
But the purchases can come at the expense of investments in things like hiring, research and development and building new plants — the sort of investments that directly help the overall economy. The buybacks are also most likely to worsen economic inequality because the benefits of stocks purchases flow disproportionately to the richest Americans.
The tax overhaul is the cornerstone of Mr. Trump’s economic plan. It has been a big win for companies, offering lower corporate rates and a permanent break on overseas profits. Warren E. Buffett said in his annual letter to investors on Saturday that his company, Berkshire Hathaway, enjoyed a $29 billion gain thanks to the new tax law.
What companies do with the trillions of dollars they’re bringing back to the United States, and the money they will save each year on their tax bills, will in large part determine whether the plan is a success or a failure.
As the tax cuts kick in, companies have laid out a variety of uses for the money. Some are paying out one-time bonuses to employees. Others are raising salaries. Others plan to open new factories.
In the fourth quarter, American companies’ investments in things like factories and business equipment grew by 6.8 percent. That was the fastest growth rate since 2014, but far from the giant surge in capital spending that was promised ahead of the tax overhaul.
But the buying back of shares is also at record levels.
Almost 100 American corporations have trumpeted such plans in the past month. American companies have announced more than $178 billion in planned buybacks — the largest amount unveiled in a single quarter, according to Birinyi Associates, a market research firm.
Such purchases reduce a company’s total number of outstanding shares, giving each remaining share a slightly bigger piece of the profit pie. www.nytimes.com/2018/02/26/business/tax-cuts-share-buybacks-corporate.html?hp&action=click&pgtype=Homepage&clickSource=story-heading&module=first-column-region®ion=top-news&WT.nav=top-news
Paramedics can make more money bagging groceries
More than 30,000 slum residents have been forced to the ‘critically polluted’ area of Mahul as the city clears land around a water pipeline and plans a bike lane to stop residents moving back
Away from the hustle and bustle of Mumbai, a sense of intense gloom pervades Mahul. The former fishing village to the east of India’s great metropolis is now home to 30,000 people who were “rehabilitated” after their slum homes were demolished to make way for infrastructure projects.
They live in 72 seven-storey buildings jammed together in the shadow of oil refineries, power stations and fertiliser plants. The air is pungent with the strong smell of chemicals. Sewage overflows into narrow streets. With the nearest government hospital seven miles away, masked patients stand in obedient lines outside homeopathy clinics, coughing. www.theguardian.com/cities/2018/feb/26/mumbai-poor-mahul-gentrification-polluted
China Is Turning Ethiopia Into a Giant Fast-Fashion Factory
Standing in a sunny office in Indochine International’s brand-new factory, Raghav Pattar, vice president of this Chinese apparel manufacturer, is ebullient. It’s November, barely six months since the Hawassa Industrial Park opened, and already he has 1,400 locals at work. Pattar is shooting to employ 20,000 Ethiopians by 2019. “Twenty-four months ago, the land we’re sitting on was farm fields,” he says. “What country can change in 24 months? That is Ethiopia!”…
We’ve arrived at a new moment for the global apparel industry. This drought-afflicted, landlocked country of 100 million on the Horn of Africa is transforming itself into the lowest rung on the supply chain that pours out fast fashion and five-for-$12.99 tube socks. Lured by tax incentives, promises of infrastructure investment, and ultracheap labor, countries the Western world once outsourced production to, particularly China and Sri Lanka, are now the middlemen ramping up production here for Guess, Levi’s, H&M, and other labels. These industrialists like Ethiopia because the government wants them as much as they want cheap labor and tax breaks. The Hawassa Industrial Park’s inauguration is only the most recent part of a vast centralized scheme: Since 2014, Ethiopia has opened four giant, publicly owned industrial parks; it plans eight more by 2020. www.bloomberg.com/news/features/2018-03-02/china-is-turning-ethiopia-into-a-giant-fast-fashion-factory
The Emergence of Fascism as a Popular Mass Movement and The War on Reason
Good Panther, Bad Panther and Bogus Panther
“They are often the kinds of kids that are called superpredators — no conscience, no empathy. We can talk about why they ended up that way, but first, we have to bring them to heel.” — Hillary Clinton, 1996
The latest Marvel Comics science-fiction movie “Black Panther” is stealth ruling-class propaganda, consistent with its production by the great manufactory of mass consent that is the American corporate entertainment complex.
Did you expect something different? If so, why?…
As Hollywood knows very well, millions of white Americans love good, nice, moderate and measured “Guess Who’s Coming to Dinner” Blacks who help them feel safe and better about themselves. (Morgan Freeman has made a lucrative film career out of that role to no small degree.) And part of being a good Black is helping white authorities keep and put down the bad Blacks. T’Challa kills Killmonger….
….With the Help of the CIA
At the end of “Black Panther,” the Hollywood-approved Good Panther T’Challa defeats the demonized revolutionary thug Bad Panther Killmonger with the critical space age battleship assistance of, get this, a kindly white veteran CIA agent named Everett K. Ross.
We first encountered Ross earlier in the film during a shootout with Klaue in South Korea – a shootout in which Ross is gravely injured while protecting T’Challa’s fiancé. T’Challa repays Ross by bringing him back to Wakanda, where Ross is healed by the nation’s spectacular medical technology.
Portraying the CIA as a friend of an independent and strong African state is a great historical and imperialist insult – a longstanding Hollywood specialty. As Milton G. Allimadi reminds us at Black Star News :
“When Congo won its independence from Belgium in 1960, Lumumba became Prime Minister. All he wanted was for Congo to get a fairer slice of the profits from exports of its riches. The CIA worked with the Belgians to have him deposed in three months. The following year he was murdered and the notorious thief and dictator Mobutu was installed in power and supported by the U.S. for 37 years….One of Lumumba’s mentors was Kwame Nkrumah who led Ghana to become one of Africa’s first countries to win independence from Britain in 1957….it was Nkrumah’s passion to help liberate the other African countries from colonial rule that contributed to his demise. He also tried to industrialize Ghana – this is the only way for Africa to break dependency from the West and to create prosperity. Nkrumah also was overthrown in 1966 with the involvement of the CIA. blackagendareport.com/good-panther-bad-panther
Kerner Commission Report 50 years on….
How are we doing today???
www.facebook.com/Channel4News/videos/10155731919216939/
Mnuchin Blocks U.C.L.A. From Releasing Video of Students Heckling Him (video inside)
Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin was taunted with hisses, heckles and profanity during a lecture and moderated discussion at U.C.L.A. this week. Protesters were carried out by armed police officers. A sixth grader in the audience questioned him about the fairness of passing permanent tax cuts for companies and expiring cuts for individuals.
But the official video footage of the university’s Arnold C. Harberger Lecture, hosted by the Burkle Center for International Relations, is nowhere to be found. That is because Mr. Mnuchin took the unusual step of revoking his consent for it to be released given the contentiousness of the event.
“The Burkle Center and Treasury Department officials had an agreement to post the video of Secretary Mnuchin’s lecture at U.C.L.A. to the center’s website following the event,” said Peggy McInerny, a university spokeswoman. “Treasury Department officials subsequently withdrew their consent to post the video.” www.nytimes.com/2018/03/01/us/politics/mnuchin-blocks-ucla-from-releasing-video-of-him-being-heckled.html
Flint Town: Netflix docu-series shines light on the harsh reality of US policing
In the new Netflix documentary series Flint Town, city police officers are called to respond to a drug incident: patrol lights flash, the camera convulses and police are shouting and drawing their weapons. A split second later, the chaos stops and an officer is telling the suspect he’s cuffing: “Boy, you look just like your daddy.”
The officer, Scotty Watson, checks the suspect for drugs and weapons while telling him how long he’s known his father. When Watson needs to inspect the boots of his friend’s son, the suspect, he offers him a seat in the police car so his socks don’t get wet on the damp ground.
“It’s probably not unfair to say that these are some of the things that are happening in other departments, we just don’t really see these stories or hear these stories, there’s never been access in this way,” said the series co-director Drea Cooper.
While the world might know Flint best as the city where the water crisis happened, the eight-part series unravels that snapshot description to show what happens when corruption, violence and poverty gnaw a city to its bone. www.theguardian.com/tv-and-radio/2018/mar/03/flint-town-netflix-docu-series-shines-light-on-the-harsh-reality-of-us-policing
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www.facebook.com/BigThinkdotcom/videos/1450592801719506/
Solidarity for Never
Daily Mail editorial: Union heads understand what crowd does not–Voice of the coal owners tells wildcatters to obey union bosses
Here are some words for striking school teachers and service personnel that you won’t see in the Daily Mail Opinion page very often: listen to your union leaders and return to work.
Seriously. You know that monthly deduction for union dues that state law allows — encourages actually — to be deducted from your paycheck without ever giving you a chance to decide to renew it?
That is your contribution, in large part, to pay the salary of your union leader; either Christine Campbell, Dale Lee or Joe White, who head up the American Federation of Teachers-West Virginia, West Virginia Education Association and West Virginia Association of School Service Personnel respectively.
These leaders are at the state Capitol during every legislative session, whether there is a strike or not. They have built relationships with lawmakers. They work the legislative process. They do a good job, generally, of communicating the unions’ collective messages.
And most importantly, they know that a “permanent fix” to the complex issue that is PEIA cannot be done in a day. If it were that easy, lawmakers could fix PEIA one day, fix gun violence the next, and the nation’s drug epidemic after that.
Union leaders have twice encouraged striking teachers to go back to work after they got assurances from the governor and legislative leaders of a commitment to find a more permanent PEIA plan.
The union leaders also know that public sentiment will allow for an educators’ strike for only so long before patience among parents of school children and other taxpayers begins to wear thin — resulting in the chances for a better deal dropping along with public patience.
Paying the union leaders no mind to their recommendations so far is like buying a couple of expensive steaks for dinner at the grocery store, but letting them sit in the fridge for so long you have to throw them out. It’s money wasted….www.wvgazettemail.com/opinion/daily_mail_opinion/daily_mail_editorials/daily-mail-editorial-union-heads-understand-what-crowd-does-not/article_744ebef1-bcd3-5eeb-acba-02a947e78c3c.html
When NEA celebrates Seuss’ birthday with “Read Across America,” they do not celebrate the anti-fascist Seuss who attacked the namesake of San Diego’s airport, Lindbergh, the fascist.
Spy versus Spy
If you think Russia’s ‘troll farm’ is bad, you’d better research the CIA:
The US and Britain have interfered in national elections worldwide for decades from Iran to Chile and elsewhere which makes the present protestations about Russia downright laughable
Here in Britain, the most infamous use of political destabilisation was the Zinoviev letter, fabricated by MI6 in 1924. It purported to provide evidence for Soviet interference in Britain’s democratic process. It certainly contributed to Labour losing the election.
The ruling class was so frightened and appalled at the prospect of a Labour government being freely elected to power that it decided to try to rig things.
The CIA and MI6 collaborated in 1953 to sow fake news — before it was known as such — in Iranian media in order to engineer the overthrow of the democratically elected progressive prime minister Mohammed Mossadegh.
They did this by accusing him of being a communist,,,
Similar methods were taken by the CIA to engineer the overthrow of the democratic government of President Salvador Allende in Chile. The list is enormous. www.morningstaronline.co.uk/article/if-you-think-russias-troll-farm-is-bad
Trojan Horse: The National Endowment for Democracy
How many Americans could identify the National Endowment for Democracy? An organization which often does exactly the opposite of what its name implies. The NED was set up in the early 1980s under President Reagan in the wake of all the negative revelations about the CIA in the second half of the 1970s. The latter was a remarkable period. Spurred by Watergate – the Church committee of the Senate, the Pike committee of the House, and the Rockefeller Commission, created by the president, were all busy investigating the CIA. Seemingly every other day there was a new headline about the discovery of some awful thing, even criminal conduct, the CIA had been mixed up in for years. The Agency was getting an exceedingly bad name, and it was causing the powers-that-be much embarrassment.
Something had to be done. What was done was not to stop doing these awful things. Of course not. What was done was to shift many of these awful things to a new organization, with a nice sounding name – The National Endowment for Democracy. The idea was that the NED would do somewhat overtly what the CIA had been doing covertly for decades, and thus, hopefully, eliminate the stigma associated with CIA covert activities.
It was a masterpiece. Of politics, of public relations, and of cynicism.
Thus it was that in 1983, the National Endowment for Democracy was set up to “support democratic institutions throughout the world through private, nongovernmental efforts”. Notice the “nongovernmental” – part of the image, part of the myth. In actuality, virtually every penny of its funding comes from the federal government, as is clearly indicated in the financial statement in each issue of its annual report. NED likes to refer to itself as an NGO (Non-governmental organization) because this helps to maintain a certain credibility abroad that an official US government agency might not have. But NGO is the wrong category. NED is a GO.
“We should not have to do this kind of work covertly,” said Carl Gershman in 1986, while he was president of the Endowment. “It would be terrible for democratic groups around the world to be seen as subsidized by the C.I.A. We saw that in the 60’s, and that’s why it has been discontinued. We have not had the capability of doing this, and that’s why the endowment was created.”
And Allen Weinstein, who helped draft the legislation establishing NED, declared in 1991: “A lot of what we do today was done covertly 25 years ago by the CIA.”
In effect, the CIA has been laundering money through NED.
The Endowment has four principal initial recipients of funds: the International Republican Institute; the National Democratic Institute for International Affairs; an affiliate of the AFL-CIO (such as the American Center for International Labor Solidarity); and an affiliate of the Chamber of Commerce (such as the Center for International Private Enterprise). These institutions then disburse funds to other institutions in the US and all over the world, which then often disburse funds to yet other organizations. williamblum.org/chapters/rogue-state/trojan-horse-the-national-endowment-for-democracy
Introducing Face Recognition For More Features
Hi Rich, we’re always working to make Facebook better, so we’re adding more ways to use face recognition besides just suggesting tags. For example, face recognition technology can do things like:
• Find photos you’re in but haven’t been tagged
• Help protect you from strangers using your photo
• Tell people with visual impairments who’s in your photo or video
You control face recognition. This setting is on, but you can turn it off any time, which applies to features we may add later.
-The Facebook Team
The Magical Mystery Tour
In Vatican Magazine Exposé, Nuns Reveal Their Economic Exploitation
ROME — Sister Marie told of nuns who worked long hours to cook and clean for cardinals and bishops, without being asked to break bread at the same table.
Sister Paule pointed out that many nuns did not have registered contracts with the bishops, schools, parishes or congregations they worked for, “so they are paid little or not at all.”
Sister Cécile said that “nuns are seen as volunteers to have available at one’s calling, which gives rise to abuse of power.”
These stories — told by sisters using pseudonyms — were revealed Thursday in an exposé about how nuns are exploited by the leaders and institutions of the Roman Catholic Church. The article, by the French journalist Marie-Lucile Kubacki, was published in the March edition of Women Church World, the monthly magazine on women distributed alongside the Vatican newspaper L’Osservatore Romano.
The stories amount to a distress signal about the unfair economic and social conditions many nuns experience, as well as the psychological and spiritual challenges that many face. www.nytimes.com/2018/03/01/world/europe/vatican-catholic-church-nuns-work.html
The Best and Worst Things in the History of the World
Sarah Huckabee Sanders Organizing “Million Liars March” to Support Hope Hicks
WASHINGTON (The Borowitz Report)—The White House press secretary, Sarah Huckabee Sanders, said on Wednesday that she was organizing a “Million Liars March” to support her co-worker Hope Hicks.
Calling on “American liars from every walk of life” to march, Sanders said that she had already received commitments from hundreds of liars in the White House, the Cabinet, and Congress.
“These people realize what’s at stake,” she said. “It’s not just Hope Hicks’s career—it’s the lying life style itself.”
“White lies like Hope’s were the lies of a promising beginner,” she said. “If Hope had been allowed to grow as liar, I have no doubt that someday she could have been as consistent a dispenser of ginormous whoppers as I am.”
She said that, if Hope Hicks is villainized, “where will the next generation of liars come from?”
Sanders said that the Million Liars March would address other issues of importance to the nation’s liars, such as a ban on lie detectors and a mandatory waiting period before statements can be fact-checked.
At the end of her announcement, Sanders appeared to choke back tears as she swore loyalty to her embattled colleague. “I believe in the mendacity of Hope,” she said. www.newyorker.com/humor/borowitz-report/sarah-huckabee-sanders-organizing-million-liars-march-to-support-hope-hicks?mbid=social_facebook
Below, Rob Porter’s (Trumps poodle) ex-wife
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above. Worm moon over San Diego, March, 2018
above, NEA’s Garcia, on a throne, celebrating the author of the “Sneetches,” Seuss
www.facebook.com/WhoRemembers/videos/10160013964045436/
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Fifty Years Ago
Walter Cronkite and the Vietnam War
To the Editor:
Re “Cronkite’s ‘Stalemate’ ” (Op-Ed, Feb. 27):
Mark Bowden is clearly correct in attacking the persistent conservative myth that the American press, and Walter Cronkite in particular, were somehow responsible for “losing” the Vietnam War when Walter broadcast his comments on the Tet offensive. He was careful to do so not on his nightly news broadcast, but in a special report. America’s heavy involvement in Vietnam was just three years old, stemming from President Lyndon Johnson’s massive buildup in 1965.
One thing Walter understood, from his coverage of World War II, was the difference between winning and not winning a war, and that was what he made clear, saying the Vietnam War could not be won.
After 1968, President Richard Nixon and Henry Kissinger adopted the war in Vietnam as their own, and prosecuted it with increasing ferocity and futility for five more years, and the war continued for another two after the American withdrawal. Far more young Americans died, far, far more Vietnamese civilians died, in those seven years than in the preceding three years.
Walter and the press’s continuing coverage of the debacle were not responsible for the inevitable collapse of the American puppet state.
RON BONN, SAN DIEGO
The writer is a former senior producer of the “CBS Evening News With Walter Cronkite.”
So Long