Why Are Things As They Are?

We Say Fight Back!

joehill100.com/

DOCTORAL SCHOLARSHIPS: PHILOSOPHY AND SOCIOLOGY OF EDUCATION Appointment: Liverpool Hope University, UK

Please circulate this around your professional networks, and to any MA students who may be interested

There has arisen an opportunity for a fully-funded Doctoral scholarship working with philosophers and sociologists of education in the area of ‘spiritual, moral, social and cultural’ education. The project, which is also the subject of a UK ESRC Large Grant proposal currently under review, aims to explore the complex plurality of structures which set the ethos and value of publicly funded schools in England. Working with colleagues in the philosophy and sociology of education, there is broad scope for the doctoral student to explore questions such as:  rikowski.wordpress.com/2015/05/22/doctoral-scholarships-philosophy-and-sociology-of-education/

Congratulations on the publication of:

“Quite simply, the best Western journalist at work in Iraq today.”
—Seymour Hersh

Today, following our 3rd annual Rooting Resistance action camp, people from both Detroit and Michigan Coalitions Against Tar Sands (DCATS/MICATS) took water from Mayor Duggan’s residence, the Manoogian Mansion and redistributed it to residents facing water shutoffs. Folks attached a hose to the Mansion’s external spigot and filled jugs of water. Participants say they are taking today’s action because of Mayor Duggan’s refusal to support a “Water Affordability Plan”.

While real Detroiters live in a crisis, the Mayor lives in a city-owned Mansion. Today we’re forcing Mayor Duggan to share his water with the people of Detroit,” Said Detroit Resident Valerie Jean.

Following the water reclamation, an affinity group dropped a banner from an abandoned garage near Wayne State. The banner sent a strong message. If the wealthy continue to deprive people of life giving water, resistance will continue and escalate.

It’s important to note that Marathon Refinery receives free water to refine tar sands from the Detroit River, which they contaminate beyond use.

As Detroit’s water crisis worsens community members are demanding the Mayor support a “Water Affordability Plan” adopted by the City Council in 2006. More than 40,000 households have had their water turned off, a crisis that has triggered a UN human rights investigation. However instead of dealing with the crisis, Mayor Duggan has chosen to arrest and prosecute community members who resist the shutoffs in an attempt to survive.

“Denying tens of thousands of people the right to water ought to be criminal, doing it while living in a publicly funded, city-owned mansion is just despicable” Said Jean

Activists point out that the Mayor’s current 10-point payment plan is woefully inadequate and fails to address the fundamental issue of unreasonably high water bills. In April an ACLU study showed that only 1.2% of Detroiters in the Mayor’s plan could pay their water bill, leaving 98.8% to default and face shutoff.

“Detroiters need a Water Affordability Plan to reduce bills and stop the shutoffs, not another failed payment plan,” Said Jean  www.michigancats.org/water-reclamation-from-mayor-dugans-mansion/

The Marx-Engels-Gesamtausgabe (MEGA) Project (MEGA-website)

Editorial Board

Georgii A. Bagaturiia (Moscow), Beatrix Bouvier (Trier), Terrell Carver (Bristol), Galina D. Golovina (Moscow), Lex Heerma van Voss (Amsterdam), Jürgen Herres (Berlin), Götz Langkau (Amsterdam), Manfred Neuhaus (Berlin), Gerald Hubmann (Berlin), Izumi Omura (Sendai), Teinosuke Otani (Tokyo), Fred E. Schrader (Paris), Liudmila L. Vasina (Moscow), Carl-Erich Vollgraf (Berlin), Wei Jianhua (Beijing).

Advisory Board

Shlomo Avineri (Jerusalem), Gerd Callesen (Vienna), Robert E. Cazden (Lexington, KY), Iring Fetscher (Frankfurt/M.), Eric J. Fischer (Bussum, the Netherlands), Patrick Fridenson (Paris), Francesca Gori (Milan), Andrzej F. Grabski (Lodz), Carlos B. Gutiérrez (Bogotá), Hans-Peter Harstick (Wolfenbüttel), Eric J. Hobsbawm (London), Hermann Klenner (Berlin), Michael Knieriem (Wuppertal), Jürgen Kocka (Berlin), Nikolai I. Lapin (Moscow), Hermann Lübbe (Zurich), Mikhail P. Mchedlov (Moscow), Teodor I. Oizerman (Moscow), Bertell Ollman (New York), Tsutomu Ouchi (Tokyo), Hans Pelger (Cologne), Pedro Ribas (Madrid), Bertram Schefold (Frankfurt/M.), Wolfgang Schieder (Cologne), Hans Schilar (Berlin), Walter Schmidt (Berlin), Gareth Stedman Jones (Cambridge), Jean Stengers (Brussels), Shiro Sugihara (Osaka), Immanuel Wallerstein (Paris/Binghamton, NY).  marxdialecticalstudies.blogspot.com/2010/09/marx-engels-gesamtausgabe-mega-project.html

Ten Years Since the Beginning of Camp Casey and Cindy Sheehan never quit  cindysheehanssoapbox.blogspot.com/2015/08/happy-camp-casey-day-10-years-after.html

Jimmy Carter just noticed: The US is Not a Democracy, but an Oligarchy, about 200 years too late–Toward a Marxist Interpretation of the US Constitution by Bertell Ollman

As ideology, the Constitution provides us with a kind of bourgeois fairy tale in which claims to equal rights and responsibilities are substituted for the harsh realities of class domination. Through the Constitution, the struggle over the legitimacy of any social act or relationship is removed from the plane of morality to that of law. Justice is no longer what is fair but what is legal, and politics itself is transformed into the technical wrangling of lawyers and judges. The Constitution organizes consent not least by its manner or organizing dissent. The fact that two-thirds of the world’s lawyers practice in the United States is not, as they say, a coincidence. The main ideologists in the American system are not teachers, preachers, or media people, but lawyers and judges.

Unlike political theory, the Constitution not only offers us a picture of reality but through the state’s monopoly on violence it forces citizens to act, or at least to speak, “as if.” Acting as if the rule of law, equality of opportunity, freedom of the individual, and the neutrality of the state, all of which are inscribed in the Constitution, are more than formally true inhibits people’s ability to recognize that they are all practically false, that the society set up with the help of the Constitution simply does not operate in these ways. It is not a matter of reality failing to live up to a set of commendable ideals but of these ideals serving to help mask this reality through misrepresenting what is legal for what is actual, what is permissible in law for what is possible in society.   www.nyu.edu/projects/ollman/docs/us_constitution.php

several Rougers are authors within

Mexico: thousands protest murder of photojournalist and 4 women thousands of demonstrators have taken to the streets of Mexico City and other major cities in response to the brutal July 31 murder of Rubén Espinosa Becerril, a photographer and investigative reporter, along with four women.

In the capital Sunday, several thousand marched carrying placards bearing the journalist’s photograph and chanting, “It was the state, it was the state.”

Twenty-four hours after family members reported his disappearance, on Friday afternoon police discovered his body with those of the four women in a Mexico City apartment. They had been bound, tortured and each received acoup de grâce to their heads with 9mm bullets.

This is a clear political execution-style murder of a critic of the repression of the press and of Mexican corruption.

Rubén’s death followed three years of government persecution, intimidation and beatings at the hands of police in the southeastern Mexican state of Veracruz, which he fled because of threats to his life. He is the thirteenth reporter from Veracruz to be murdered since 2011 (the fourth this year). Three others have disappeared and are presumed dead.

Veracruz is a microcosm of a nationwide state terror campaign against reporters, journalists, photographers and other media workers. According to a Mirada Crítica (Rompeviento TV), some 103 journalists have been killed since the year 2000. Another 17 are missing. Others have been detained unlawfully for long periods of time, or kidnapped for ransom.

An entry in Wikipedia confirms those numbers. For Veracruz, Wikipedia lists the following individuals: Noel López Olguín, Miguel Ángel López Velasco, Misael López Solana, Yolanda Ordaz, Regina Martínez, Guillermo Luna Varela, Gabriel Huge Córdova, Esteban Rodríguez, Victor Manuel Báez Chino, Irasema Becerra, Gregorio Jiménez, Moisés Sánchez Cerezo. Rubén Espinosa.

The three listed as disappeared are Sergio Landa Rosales, Miguel Morales Estrada, and Manuel Gabriel Fonseca Hernández.

In addition there have been scores of unresolved deaths of young people and human rights activists. No one in Veracruz has been convicted of any of these crimes. www.globalresearch.ca/thousands-protest-torture-murder-of-mexican-photojournalist-and-four-women/5467531

The Little Red Schoolhouse

Capitalist U’s in CA Raise Tuition—then salaries  Last Thursday, regents hiked salaries by 3 percent for its top-paid executives. The new salaries range from $231,000 to $991,000. In solidarity with a labor-union campaign to boost the minimum wage across the country, regents approved a $15 minimum for all UC employees – including part-time workers and contractors.

The net cost: $14 million a year. “The University of California’s mission statement proclaims that one of its fundamental missions is teaching and creating ‘an educated workforce that keeps the California economy competitive,’” noted Assembly Republican Leader Kristin Olsen of Modesto, in a July 22 letter to Napolitano. “How does your decision today help California students achieve this mission?”

That’s the key question whenever government-supported entities use new funds to boost salaries rather than invest in services for their “customers.” I’m sure the new salaries will help students as much as the pest agency’s compensation boosts helped stamp out the fire  ant  http://www.sandiegouniontribune.com/news/2015/jul/29/university-california-extra-tax-dollars-salaries/

College textbooks costs raised 1041% since ’77  Students hitting the college bookstore this fall will get a stark lesson in economics before they’ve cracked open their first chapter. Textbook prices are soaring. Some experts say it’s because they’re sold like drugs.

According to NBC’s review of Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS) data, textbook prices have risen over three times the rate of inflation from January 1977 to June 2015, a 1,041 percent increase.

“They’ve been able to keep raising prices because students are ‘captive consumers.’ They have to buy whatever books they’re assigned,” said Nicole Allen, a spokeswoman for the Scholarly Publishing and Academic Resources Coalition.  www.nbcnews.com/feature/freshman-year/college-textbook-prices-have-risen-812-percent-1978-n399926

A task force looking to cut as much as $100 million from the budget of one of the nation’s largest school systems has suggested that major savings could come from getting rid of all school sports, limiting extracurricular activities and increasing class sizes.

School administrators in Virginia’s Fairfax County, which educates about 187,000 students, say they are again facing tough choices about what to keep and what to sacrifice as funding fails to keep pace with surging enrollment. Officials are projecting
a shortfall of $50 million to $100 million next year, meaning significant programming changes would need to be implemented, schools officials said.

School district officials calculated the shortfall assuming a salary increase for teachers, a growth in enrollment and a nearly $20 million drop in state funding, though some numbers will not be determined for months. The school system also is required to put an additional $46 million into teacher retirement and health benefits next year. If the county holds firm on its commitment to give the school system a 3 percent revenue bump, the maximum shortfall is estimated at $80 million. www.washingtonpost.com/local/education/can-one-of-the-nations-largest-school-districts-go-without-sports-activities/2015/08/04/e60923d6-39ff-11e5-9c2d-ed991d848c48_story.html

Crackdown on little cheaters while big cheaters remain Crackers The New York City Department of Education said on Tuesday that it would establish a task force to root out cheating by teachers and administrators in city schools, responding to recent episodes and allegations of grade inflation, forged test answers and the passing of students who rarely attended class.

The task force, made up of administrators and auditors, will oversee staff monitoring school data for irregularities, and if they discover anything suspicious it will be reported to the city’s special commissioner of investigation. The group will also supply mandatory training in grading and graduation regulations to principals.

Carmen Fariña, the city’s schools chancellor, said in an email to principals and superintendents Tuesday morning, “As a lifelong educator, I cannot overstate how important it is that everyone — from teachers to principals to superintendents to myself — understand and follow academic policies, which ensure our students meet the high standards they need to go on to college and meaningful careers.”

“Of course, we have zero tolerance for educators who are intentionally flaunting our academic policies,” she said in the email.

This summer, several reports of cheating have come to light. In July, the Education Department announced it was moving to fire the principal of John Dewey High School, a large school in Brooklyn, after a lengthy investigation found that she had allowed students at risk of not graduating to make up credit by simply completing packets of work in classes in which they received no meaningful instruction from teachers.  www.nytimes.com/2015/08/05/nyregion/new-york-city-task-force-targets-cheating-by-teachers-and-principals.html?partner=rss&emc=rss&_r=1

Detroit Public Schools officials, including the state-appointed emergency manager, ignored warnings that then-City Council President Charles Pugh was trying to seduce male students and allowed him to continue mentoring teenage boys, according to a complaint filed with the Department of Justice.

Pugh disappeared in June 2013 after the mother of a DPS teenager told police that the council president lavished her 16-year-old boy with gifts. A lawsuit was filed, and text messages later showed that Pugh gave the student $16o for a nude video.

Then-DPS School Board President LaMar Lemmons said he initially warned Emergency Manager Roy Roberts that Pugh “was a potential risk to students” after the council president was spotted at the Detroit Opera House on a date with a student.

“The EM shrugged his shoulders,” Lemmons said, adding that the EM dismissed him “as a homophobic troglodyte.”

The complaint alleges that Roberts’ dismissive attitude “allowed Pugh his pick of hundreds of students” as he continued to mentor teenage boys.  motorcitymuckraker.com/2015/08/03/doj-complaint-school-officials-ignored-warnings-about-charles-pugh-seducing-students/

Corrupt Capitalist School Luncheons? Dvid Binkle, L.A. Unified’s food services director who won national acclaim for improving school meals, has resigned following a recent audit that found massive waste, ethical breaches and financial mismanagement under his watch.

Binkle said Monday that he was innocent of all charges that he had mishandled the district’s now-defunct marketing program to promote healthful food, engaged in conflicts of interest in connection with his private consulting firm and took vendor-paid travel to school food conferences. He said all of his actions were legal, specified in the vendor contracts and approved by senior district officials, including Chief Deputy Supt. Michelle King.  Binkle, 53, was removed from his position in December and ordered to stay home during the investigation while continuing to draw his $152,000 annual salary.  www.latimes.com/local/lanow/la-me-ln–food-head-resigns-20150803-story.html

But What Campuses have the best food? (not mine???) Scripps College boasts both a campus garden and an herb garden. Claremont McKenna reportedly makes all its food from scratch. And the University of San Diego offers a wide variety of regional and cultural foods.  www.latimes.com/food/dailydish/la-dd-best-college-campus-food-20150804-story.html

How the .01% lives in private schools (like Mitt’s)

Hedge Fund Bosses to Puerto Rico: Layoff Teachers to Pay Debts Puerto Rico can avoid a costly default by upping taxes, cutting teacher jobs and closing schools, a group of hedge fund economists proposed in a report released on Monday, offering a controversial solution to the island’s “unpayable” $72 billion debt crisis.

The report, commissioned by hedge funds holding several billion dollars of Puerto Rico’s bonds, highlights the island’s rising education expenditures against the backdrop of countless school closings and waves of poor families fleeing to mainland America.

According to government figures, education spending rose 39% to $4.8 billion over the last decade, while enrollment fell 25% to about 570,000. Puerto Rico still spends just $8,400 per student, compared to the U.S. national average of $10,667, according to the Guardian.

“The real expense per student has increased enormously without increasing the quality of education,” Jose Fajgenbaum, director of Centennial Group Latin America and one of three former IMF economists who authored the report, told the Guardian.

The hedge fund-backed report arrives in response to the Krueger report, a government-commissioned study released June 29 that proposed a significant debt restructuring with which bondholders were unlikely to agree.  time.com/3976179/puerto-rico-education/

The International Hot War of the Rich on the Poor

US Loses Track of Who the Enemy Is (are) IS? AQ? China? Russia? Next?

The Obama administration’s top intelligence, counterterrorism and law enforcement officials are divided over which terrorist group poses the biggest threat to the American homeland, the Islamic State or Al Qaeda and its affiliates.

The split reflects a rising concern that the Islamic State poses a more immediate danger because of its unprecedented social media campaign, using sophisticated online messaging to inspire followers to launch attacks across the United States.

Many intelligence and counterterrorism officials warn, however, that Qaeda operatives in Yemen and Syria are capitalizing on the turmoil in those countries to plot much larger “mass casualty” attacks, including bringing down airliners carrying hundreds of passengers.

This is not an academic argument. It will influence how the government allocates billions of dollars in counterterrorism funds, and how it assigns thousands of federal agents, intelligence analysts and troops to combat a multipronged threat that senior officials say is changing rapidly.  www.nytimes.com/2015/08/05/world/middleeast/isis-or-al-qaeda-american-officials-split-over-biggest-threat.html?emc=edit_tnt_20150805&nlid=2254121&tntemail0=y

Who Lost Afghanistan? The Taliban overran the district center and several military and police installations in Now Zad in the southern Afghan province of Helmand yesterday. The fall of Now Zad is the latest in a series of setbacks for the Afghan security forces and government, which are struggling to maintain control of areas liberated from the Taliban just a few years ago.

The Taliban claimed it launched “a coordinated assault on enemy positions around Now Zad district center” on July 28, according to a statement on its official website, Voice of Jihad. Six “check posts” were overrun on the first day, and the jihadist group said it killed 25 security personnel.

The next day, the Taliban claimed that “Mujahideen managed to overrun the PRT [provincial reconstruction team] building along with 2 more check posts overnight, killing 14 hireling troops” and seized weapons, ammunition, vehicles, and other equipment. According to the Taliban report, Afghan security forces “abandoned” five outposts and withdrew from the district center after the jihadist group massed for an assault.  www.longwarjournal.org/archives/2015/07/taliban-seize-district-in-helmand-province.php?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+LongWarJournalSiteWide+%28The+Long+War+Journal+%28Site-Wide%29%29

Lost Afghan Wars=Cheap Heroin  More people that are using the substance, more people that are addicts that are addicted to opioids,” said Lt. Jeff Kazel with the Duluth Police Department. He is also on the Lake Superior Drug and Violent Crime Task Force.

Kazel says the number of people over dosing on the drug keeps increasing.

As of this day [August 3] we’re at 32 heroin overdoses, that’s calls for service that we actually went to. That’s comparable to a total for 2014 was 16, so we’re already double that and we’re only about halfway through the year,” said Kazel.

St. Louis County Attorneys estimate that of all the drug cases that come through, 40 percent of them have to do with selling a drug while the other 60 percent are people in possession of a drug.

“If you’re caught selling a larger amount of Heroin you will go to prison for 86 months,” said County Attorney, Mark Rubin. “We have 5th degree heroin, that’s a situation where you generally have the possession of heroin, those are the people who are generally addicted, they will go to drug court.”

Rubin says there are also other consequences of the drug that are affecting the community.

“People who may be using it can’t afford to buy it. So we see an increase in property crimes, thefts, and burglaries.”http://www.northlandsnewscenter.com/news/local/Heroin-overdoses-on-the-rise-impacting-community–320550322.html

Opportunism Drives Every Empire: US Ally Turks Attack US’ Merc Kurds 

Confronted with widespread protests two summers ago, Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan ordered a harsh police crackdown and tarnished the demonstrators as traitors and spies. Faced with a corruption inquiry focused on his inner circle, he responded by purging the police and judiciary.

So when Mr. Erdogan, now president, suffered a stinging electoral defeat in June that left his party without a majority in Parliament and seemingly dashed his hopes of establishing an executive presidency, Turks were left wondering how he would respond.

Now, many say they have their answer: a new war.

As Turkey resumes military operations against the separatist Kurdistan Workers’ Party, or P.K.K., analysts see a calculated strategy for Mr. Erdogan’s Islamist-rooted Justice and Development Party to regain its parliamentary majority in new elections.www.nytimes.com/2015/08/06/world/middleeast/turkey-recep-tayyip-erdogan-airstrike-pkk-isis.html?hp&action=click&pgtype=Homepage&module=first-column-region&region=top-news&WT.nav=top-news&_r=1

That Hearts and Minds Problem U.S.-led airstrikes targeting the Islamic State group in Iraq and Syria have likely killed at least 459 civilians over the past year, a report by an independent monitoring group said Monday.

The report by Airwars, a project aimed at tracking the international airstrikes targeting the extremists, said it believed 57 specific strikes killed civilians and caused 48 suspected “friendly fire” deaths. It said the strikes have killed more than 15,000 Islamic State militants.

While Airwars noted the difficulty of verifying information in territory held by the IS group, which has kidnapped and killed journalists and activists, other groups have reported similar casualties from the U.S.-led airstrikes.

“Almost all claims of noncombatant deaths from alleged coalition strikes emerge within 24 hours — with graphic images of reported victims often widely disseminated,” the report said.

“In this context, the present coalition policy of downplaying or denying all claims of noncombatant fatalities makes little sense, and risks handing (the) Islamic State (group) and other forces a powerful propaganda tool.”  bigstory.ap.org/article/bcefd6c60da84ade945619c6330ff156/iraqi-kurdish-leader-vows-take-sinjar-islamic-state

The International Economic War of the Rich on the Poor

In the Contradictory Relationship of Capitalism and Democracy, which side won? Fewer than four hundred families are responsible for almost half the money raised in the 2016 presidential campaign, a concentration of political donors that is unprecedented in the modern era.

The vast majority of the $388 million backing presidential candidates this year is being channeled to groups that can accept unlimited contributions in support of candidates from almost any source. The speed with which such “super PACs” can raise money — sometimes bringing in tens of millions of dollars from a few businesses or individuals in a matter of days — has allowed them to build enormous campaign war chests in a fraction of the time that it would take the candidates, who are restricted in how much they can accept from a single donor.  www.nytimes.com/2015/08/02/us/small-pool-of-rich-donors-dominates-election-giving.html?hp&action=click&pgtype=Homepage&module=first-column-region&region=top-news&WT.nav=top-news&_r=0

Obamagogue’s Imperial Trans Pacific “Partnership” has no partners Hopes of a breakthrough were high when negotiators from the 12 TPP nations met Tuesday in the tropical U.S. island state to seek agreement after five years of talks. Comprising Australia, Brunei, Canada, Chile, Japan, Malaysia, Mexico, New Zealand, Peru, Singapore, the United States and Vietnam, the grouping encompasses 40 percent of world gross domestic product (GDP) and a quarter of global exports, with a successful TPP potentially representing the world’s biggest trade accord in more than a decade.

Yet after much fanfare and encouraging initial reports, on Friday the TPP’s trade ministers ended their negotiations, releasing a joint statement that only committed to further talks.thediplomat.com/2015/08/trans-pacific-partnership-hawaii-talks-end-without-deal/

US Wages Grow at lowest rate in 33 years: Economic Tyranny U.S. wages and benefits grew in the spring at the slowest pace in 33 years, stark evidence that stronger hiring isn’t lifting paychecks much for most Americans. The slowdown also likely reflects a sharp drop-off in bonus and incentive pay for some workers.

The employment cost index rose just 0.2 percent in the April-June quarter after a 0.7 increase in the first quarter, the Labor Department said Friday. The index tracks wages, salaries and benefits. Wages and salaries alone also rose 0.2 percent.

Both measures recorded the smallest quarterly gains since the second quarter of 1982.

Salaries and benefits for private sector workers were unchanged, the weakest showing since the government began tracking the data in 1980.

The disappointing figures come after the index had been pointing to a pickup in wage growth after nearly two years of steady hiring.  www.pressherald.com/2015/07/31/u-s-wages-grow-at-slowest-rate-in-33-years/

As the Water Shut-offs Continue in Detroit: Rates RiseThe Detroit City Council voted 5-4 today to approve a 7.5% water rate hike that it initially rejected three weeks ago.

The council approved the rate hike today after hearing that the water department would be left with a $27-million budget deficit that would result in layoffs and possibly an extension of state oversight of city finances.

The rate increase means Detroiters will pay about $5 more per month for water and sewer services, from about $71 to about $76.

Of that $76, about $20 would be for water service and $56 would be for sewage disposal service.www.freep.com/story/news/local/2015/07/21/detroit-council-water-rate/30472377/

Environmental Racism Persists and the EPA is a Reason Why  Time and again, however, communities of color living in the shadows of sewage plants, incinerators, steel mills, landfills and other industrial facilities across the country — from Baton Rouge to Syracuse, Phoenix to Chapel Hill — have found their claims denied by the EPA’s civil-rights office, an investigation by the Center for Public Integrity and NBC News shows. In its 22-year history of processing environmental discrimination complaints, the office has never once made a formal finding of a Title VI violation.  www.publicintegrity.org/2015/08/03/17668/environmental-racism-persists-and-epa-one-reason-why?utm_source=email&utm_campaign=watchdog&utm_medium=publici-email&goal=0_ffd1d0160d-82e4efa714-100253645&mc_cid=82e4efa714&mc_eid=033b0e09bd

The Rich know Class War but the US left does not (nor empire) I’M scared. The billionaire hedge funder Paul Tudor Jones is scared. My friend Ken Langone, a founder of the Home Depot, is scared. So are many other chief executives. Not of Al Qaeda, or the vicious Islamic State or some other evolving radical group from the Middle East, Africa or Asia. We are afraid where income inequality will lead.

For the top 20 percent of Americans, life is pretty good.

But 40 percent are broke. Every year they spend more than they have.

While so many people are struggling, even those on the higher end of the middle class have relatively little after paying the bills: on average, some $1,300 a month. One leaky roof and they’re in trouble.

If inequality is not addressed, the income gap will most likely be resolved in one of two ways: by major social unrest or through oppressive taxes  www.nytimes.com/2015/08/09/opinion/sunday/capitalists-arise-we-need-to-deal-with-income-inequality.html?action=click&pgtype=Homepage&module=opinion-c-col-left-region&region=opinion-c-col-left-region&WT.nav=opinion-c-col-left-region&_r=1

Russian social fascists burn food while the hungry…The destruction of more than 350 tons of food by the government this week angered Russians in a nation where some are struggling to feed themselves and many recall the norm of food shortages just a generation ago.

The food was burned and streamrolled beginning Thursday following a controversial decree by President Vladimir Putin ordering banned products from Europe and the United States to be eliminated before they can seep through the border.

“You can’t just destroy food when there are so many people who have trouble feeding themselves,” said activist Olga Saveleva, whose petition on Change.org has gathered over 320,000 signatures since Thursday.

“The media is gleefully showing how this food is being burned. We have a lot of people going hungry, a lot of people in poverty. There are veterans of (World War II) who remember the blockade” of Leningrad, when hundreds of thousands of people died of hunger, she said. “This is a mockery.”  www.freep.com/story/news/world/2015/08/08/anger-protests-russia-destroys-tons-banned-food/31333793/

Mexico: Economy Gagging in recent months, Mexican newspapers have kept running banner headlines of economic gloom: The value of the peso has plummeted to record lows against the dollar, growth rates have shrunk to dwarfish size and the only things that seem to be getting bigger are the poverty rate and the gap between rich and poor.

“With all this financial volatility we have seen with the peso, the failure of the round-one [oil] contracts and low growth, the economy continues to suffer from the chronic anemia of the past,” said Alfredo Coutiño, director for Latin America at Moody’s Analytics. www.washingtonpost.com/world/the_americas/mexicos-economy-was-supposed-to-soar-its-starting-to-flop/2015/08/07/ecbf00dc-3ab4-11e5-b759-e3c43f009486_story.html

The Emergence of Fascism as a Popular Mass Movement

Who did Hillbillary visit in SoCal? Kardashians and Justin Bieber (and Dem Party Tycoons)  below–top donors, Hillbillary –career    www.opensecrets.org/politicians/contrib.php?cycle=Career&cid=n00000019

Chapo Walked out the Front Door: Mexico as a Narco-Colony  When Mexico’s most powerful drug lord, Joaquín Guzmán Loera, escaped from prison last month, he walked out of captivity and straight into the conspiracy-obsessed imaginations of his countrymen, who are willing, it seems, to believe almost anything except what their government tells them.

The official version of the escape is that Mr. Guzmán, who is known as “El Chapo,” or “Shorty,” slipped through a hole in the floor of the shower of his cell and then out through a mile-long tunnel secretly dug under the walls of what was supposed to be the country’s most secure prison.

But for the government here, what may once have been a credibility gap is now a chasm of disbelief, and by the millions Mexicans are not buying it.  “The government wants to sell us a tale in which no one knew about the  tunnel and he got away,” said Carlos Castaños, an opposition legislator from Sinaloa, Mr. Guzmán’s home state. “It’s like they think that Mexicans are all kindergartners and they’re going to believe anything they tell them.”

While officials acknowledge that corruption undoubtedly played a factor in Mr. Guzmán’s escape, the admission hardly inspires public confidence, and there are seemingly as many alternate versions of Mr. Guzmán’s epic escape as there are Mexicans.

A few samples:

The tunnel is just a ruse to deflect public attention, and Mr. Guzmán, a reputed billionaire with the resources to bribe whomever he liked, simply walked out the front door of the prison.  www.nytimes.com/2015/08/07/world/americas/mexicans-arent-buying-official-account-of-el-chapo-escape.html?hp&action=click&pgtype=Homepage&module=first-column-region&region=top-news&WT.nav=top-news&_r=0

Solidarity for Never

Search the DSA dominated Social-Nationalists “Rethinker” Mag for a mention of imperialist war in the last 5 years: NOTHING.  www.rethinkingschools.org/archive/index.shtml

Chicago Teacher “Union” Karen Lewis on her nice relationship with Rham Emanuel and the Bad Cop Governor  Has your relationship with Mayor Emanuel improved since his reelection? [It was Lewis, after all, sidelined by illness, who persuaded Chuy Garcia to challenge Rahm in the primary, which pushed Emanuel into an exhausting and humiliating runoff.]
I think that my relationship with Rahm is better. That’s a good thing. He’s the ultimate decision maker. I can just run [my ideas] up the flagpole by Rahm. And he has been very open. I think part of the problem we had last time is that Rahm had an agenda that was pushed by other people, including [Gov. Bruce] Rauner, that I don’t know if Rahm even truly believed in. A lot of it was kind of like, “Put the union in their place and dah dah dah.” The elephant in the room is the budget and not having any money. So then it becomes a matter of what your priorities are, what your vision is. And I think we have yet to see that, but I think [Rahm’s] thinking about it.

Do you meet with the mayor in person?
Yes.

Does he seem more humble or polite?
He’s much more polite.  www.chicagomag.com/Chicago-Magazine/Felsenthal-Files/August-2015/Karen-Lewis-Response/

So CTU’s Karen Lewis and her IS pals beg for a ZeRO “We understand that there is a serious financial problem and we are willing to work within that framework. We accept that there will be a 0 percent raise. But give us something to make that 0 percent feel better.” Toss in CTU VP and IS’ Jesse Sharkey, ““We don’t think it’s a good time to be asking for big raises or really expensive reforms.”  weknowwhatsup.blogspot.com/2015/08/chicago-teachers-are-angry-but-protests.html

Sold Out Ex-Unionite Brags On Current Unionite Sellout in FLA Jean Clements is the teachers union president in Hillsborough County, Florida, which is the eighth largest school district in the U.S. And she and her union, the Hillsborough Classroom Teachers Association, are unique in a way that deserves national attention – and national praise. While most teacher unions are resisting efforts to systemically improve public education, Jean and her constituents have partnered with their school district to embrace innovations that are taking on all kinds of sacred cows.
Teacher unions came into being in the early 1960s to protect teachers from management decisions, most notably in the areas of employee evaluations and compensation. Consequently, teachers’ collective bargaining contracts today prescribe evaluation procedures that render evaluations irrelevant except in the most extreme cases, and standardized pay scales that treat every teacher the same, regardless of their effectiveness. So, naturally, eyebrows were raised across the country when Jean and her HCTA colleagues partnered with the Hillsborough school district to win a $100 million Gates Foundation grant to reinvent the district’s employee evaluation and compensation systems.
This wasn’t the only time Jean went out on a limb.
She was out front in support of Race to the Top  – See more at: www.redefinedonline.org/2012/02/in-florida-a-teachers-union-that-doesnt-just-say-no/#sthash.TcXqOBVs.dpuf

Michigan Supreme Court: Right to Work Applies to State Employees (so long UAW local 6000)  The Michigan Supreme Court ruled Wednesday that the state’s right-to-work law applies to some 35,000 unionized state workers, giving conservative supporters of the law a major legal victory.

The United Auto Workers, the largest state employee labor union, challenged whether the law applied to its members because their employment terms are set by the Michigan Civil Service Commission.

“The Civil Service Commission lacked the constitutional authority to compel civil service employees to make involuntary financial contributions to subsidize the commission’s exercise of its constitutional duties and responsibilities,” Chief Justice Robert Young Jr. wrote in the majority opinion.

The high court’s 4-3 ruling clears one of the last legal challenges to the validity of 2013 law, which makes financial support of a labor union optional.  www.detroitnews.com/story/news/politics/2015/07/29/rtw-michigan-workers/30839787/

Nearly Defunct Detroit Federation of Teachers Can’t even get members their paychecks Hundreds of Detroit Public Schools employees did not get paid on schedule Tuesday, the latest bump in the road for a district beset by fiscal problems.

Officials blame a technical glitch that they say should be corrected by Friday, but they didn’t explain exactly what caused the disruption in pay. Some district employees did get paid.

Some teachers have been told they’ll get their missing money — which usually is deposited directly into bank accounts — on a debit card. But they say that solution creates other problems such as being charged to withdraw the money or having to go to multiple banks, since they can’t withdraw the full amount at one time.

District spokeswoman Michelle Zdrodowski said “a variety of technical issues arose that affected a cross-section of DPS employees.” She said the delay “in no way” was related to whether the district had enough money to cover payroll.  www.detroitnews.com/story/news/local/detroit-city/2015/07/28/technical-issues-delay-detroit-teachers-pay/30792053/

Detroit Teachers to Vote to Expel President Steve Conn —or not—The Executive Board is planning to meet next week to vote and announce its decision. But what they are carrying out is really a political coup, not a fair trial!   According to the union constitution, the final decision rests with the membership at the September 10 Regular General Membership Meeting.

I am fully certain that the vast majority of union members want these baseless charges dismissed and our union to continue with me as President on the basis of the last election. But that will require a 2/3 vote at the September 10 general membership meeting .

The stakes could not be higher for DFT members: We can continue to rebuild the union, and we can defeat the efforts by the governor and his emergency manager to dismantle and the entire DPS.  But the membership of the union must take control of the situation now!   dft231.mi.aft.org/

Spy versus Spy

After 100+years of Collaboration with military and dependence on their funding (including the Stanford Experiment) APA says they will cut ties 

The American Psychological Association made a nearly unanimous decision today to bar psychologists from participating in national security interrogations, The New York Times reports. The decision was a response to an independent report that came out last month, detailing how top APA officials and psychiatrists participated in the CIA’s torture program during the Bush administration.

The APA’s council of representatives voted on the measure at the organization’s convention in Toronto. The one dissenting vote came from Col. Larry James, who used to be the top Army intelligence psychologist at Guantánamo Bay, according to Democracy Now. The convention was the APA’s first since the release of the “Hoffman Report,” an independent review conducted by Chicago lawyer David Hoffman looking at the organization’s role in the US enhanced interrogation program. The report showed how the APA secretly worked with the Department of Defense, the CIA, and the White House to come up with ethical guidelines that would allow the torture program to continue without legal fallout.  www.theverge.com/2015/8/7/9117065/american-psychological-association-bans-CIA-interrogation-torture

Gen. Manuel Contreras, who was imprisoned after heading the feared spy agency that kidnapped, tortured and killed thousands during Chile’s military dictatorship under Gen. Augusto Pinochet, died Aug. 7 at a military hospital in Santiago. He was 86.

Contreras, who was serving a combined sentence of more than 500 years for crimes against humanity, had been hospitalized since September because of kidney problems.

Soon after his death was confirmed by the national prison service, a crowd of several dozen people gathered outside the Santiago hospital waving Chilean flags. They broke into chants of “Murderer!” and toasted with champagne in paper cups to celebrate Contreras’s death.

After the 1973 military coup led by Pinochet that ousted the socialist government of President Salvador Allende, Contreras formed and commanded the DINA spy agency and went on to become the second most powerful and feared figure of the dictatorship after Pinochet himself. www.washingtonpost.com/world/the_americas/gen-manuel-contreras-leader-of-chiles-feared-spy-agency-dies-at-86/2015/08/08/a6b5eac4-3de3-11e5-b3ac-8a79bc44e5e2_story.html?tid=hpModule_04941f10-8a79-11e2-98d9-3012c1cd8d1e&hpid=z9

The Magical Mystery Tour

Hormones Defeat god, again House Speaker Kevin Cotter today ordered an investigation into reports two Republican lawmakers used their taxpayer-funded office staff to cover up an extramarital affair.

Cotter, R-Mt. Pleasant, took the move following a report in the Detroit News, based partly on audio recordings secretly made by a former staffer, that Rep. Todd Courser, R-Lapeer, asked staff to send out e-mails in an effort to discredit reports of an affair between him and Rep. Cindy Gamrat, R-Plainwell.

The two freshman tea party representatives have worked on joint legislation and used combined office staff.

The pair are among the most conservative members of the Legislature, introducing bills that would more severely restrict abortions, and change the way marriage licenses are issued so that local clerks wouldn’t have to participate in same sex marriages. After the U.S. Supreme Court decision legalizing same sex marriage in June, Courser said in a statement, “It’s a crushing day for those who believe in traditional marriage and traditional morality.”  www.freep.com/story/news/local/2015/08/07/house-speaker-orders-investigation-reported-coverup-affair/31274087/

The Best and Worst Things in the History of the World

Little Boy! Fat Man!

So Long

Liz Williams, 76, patient anti-racist fighter, kind friend, Detroiter.

Murdered August 1, 1917

Mullah Omar the initial humility of this simple village preacher was striking. To issue orders to his commanders he sat on the cement floor of the governor’s mansion in Kandahar. Later, he promoted himself to a rickety string bed while supplicants sat on the floor. Eventually Osama bin Laden, the al-Qaeda leader killed in 2011, built a lavish bombproof house for him. Omar communicated through orders written on slips of paper. His signed chits allowing me to travel from city to city were at first written on wrapping paper or cigarette packets.

His naivety allowed him to be charmed by Bin Laden, to whom he gave sanctuary in 1996. Even after 9/11 he refused to give up on the al-Qaeda leader and as a result lost his country in 2001 to a US invasion. He was not seen in public after the attacks but it was presumed he spent the years before he died in Pakistan.  www.ft.com/intl/cms/s/0/93b211b2-375f-11e5-b05b-b01debd57852.html#axzz3hjVQ8X7z