Jan 8, 2023 (date of completion)
March 15 (original date of posting but not of transcribing )
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1- Lemme see, how to terse the agony, paranoia, expectations, etc, of this neo urban passion, psycho-thriller, riddle rigmarole, whew! Mind-bending in so many ways. Not sure I want to know the details on how it spread and taken on a life of its own.
I’ve got my eyes on you (2005)- Dianne Reeves
https://youtu.be/GInjz0lPkVk ,7-30-18
#music
William Shakespeare’s “The Tragedy of Hamlet, Prince of Denmark” (written between 1599 and 1601), in first Act, Scene 5, Hamlet tells Horatio: “..There are more things in heaven and earth, Horatio, than are dreamt of in your philosophy..”
2- Why, anyone might ask, my “catharsis” of opinions via mail or internet (hard copy or digital) to someone I hardly know, and not thru other channels at colleagues, neighbors or friends? Well, we all do the latter at varying degrees, by phone, texting, or face-to-face. Venting by writing has the advantage of permanence, and doing so at one’s leisure. Look at it as a form of remote schooling or learning, entertainment, pre-pandemic & beyond, and more affordable than psychoanalysis; also as political / artistic reference manual, a thesis, open to revision, template for updated info, and in such a broad repertoire, something relevant is always bound to be left out…
Why writing by hand beats typing for thinking and learning
May 11, 2024
3- Back again to a letter format, this time in HTML, thus no need for graphology.
More in prose and not as much in imagery & music as was the case with the USB flash drive delivered to you on 12/21/22. This composition will have MANY links to orthodox or “accredited” sources, each bearing relevance or a counterpoint to the conventional corporate version. For example: I might post a video which claims Russian migrants are arriving in Mexico waiting to cross to the U.S., but then I post a link which shows Americans in increasing numbers relocating to Mexico for lower costs of living… Reiterating, all for the most part are “proper” sources, hardly any foreign or “radical”. The purpose of course is to prove (support) or disprove a preceding or a following claim, or to give an expanded explanation missing from the previous. In other words, they are not only my opinion, but based on “official” sources. Sometimes below the links you’ll see a synopsis or content description of the article included, consisting of a paragraph or paragraphs with ellipses… It’s not like you have to read every linked article entirely, you could just read the title or skim its body or jot down notes to use as reference. Marking off where you leave off, then picking it up from there the next time, the (find) feature of your browser (Ctrl and F keys together) is useful in this. When a paragraph, sentence, or media is just my opinion (analysis or creation), or based on something I read / heard, then from this sentence on & in this file (and subsequent ones), I’ll include a check mark ✔ at the beginning, and a lower left triangle at closing ◺
4- ✔ This perhaps one of my most crucial treatises yet (resumes on the other hand can be so drab, useless in measuring potential, I.e. devious Long Island & Queens’ GOP Jorge Santos. Resumes as useless as FICO scores are for responsible & ecological consuming. A flexible lending interest rate policy might be, lowering mortgage rates on first home purchases [if house prices drop] as opposed to second or third purchases). [see also paragraph 9- on: deductions on mortgage, city pensions, etc. ] ◺
Is George Santos even his real name? Video shows LI congressman using different name in 2019 https://bit.ly/3CNzAuy
January 14, 2023
✔ Ask Eli Wallach as the ugly, a.k.a. “Tuco”, in “The good, the bad and the ugly” (1966), directed by Sergio Leone. #GeorgeSantos
◺
First-time homebuyer programs for New Yorkers, city-sponsored incentives
April 25, 2022
Tips for raising your credit score
TODAY
https://youtu.be/ftOKUYH02lA ,02-22-23
Women consumers control 85% of spending power, 2015 https://luceperformancegroup.com/Women-Consumers-Control-85-percent-Of-Spending-Power___635774267810750931_blog.htm
The purchasing power of women, statistics, 2020
https://girlpowermarketing.com/statistics-purchasing-power-women/
How to avoid the “pink tax” – the higher prices companies charge for products aimed at women
CBS News
https://youtu.be/8dNYhowMmKU ,3-14-23
✔ Playing the devil’s advocate here: wouldn’t the inflation rate be even higher if women were paid the same as men? Just sayin’. ◺
Harvard career expert: The No. 1 ‘desirable skill’ that very few people have—especially men
Mar 14 2023
..But here’s what shocked me the most: Collaboration skills are surprisingly rare, especially among men..
EEUU es el único país que no ha ratificado la Convención de las Naciones Unidas sobre la Eliminación de Todas las Formas de Discriminación contra la Mujer. También es el único país miembro de las Naciones Unidas que no ha ratificado la Convención sobre los Derechos del Niño.
https://x.com/zhu_jingyang/status/1795830636441403771
May 29, 2024
48 divorce statistics in the U.S. including divorce rate, race, & marriage length
Jan 03, 2023
https://divorce.com/blog/divorce-statistics/
..Alabama, Kentucky, and Oklahoma have some of the United States’ lowest median income levels and the highest divorce rates..
35 encouraging stats on the divorce rate in America for 2023
March 30, 2023
https://legaljobs.io/blog/divorce-rate-in-america/
Women continue to outnumber men in college completion
7-08-22
https://www.bestcolleges.com/news/analysis/2021/11/19/women-complete-college-more-than-men/
..Despite the noteworthy rise in women in education over the last 40 years, the gender wage gap persists. Women are still significantly underrepresented in high-paying jobs and executive-level positions.. ..Women have accounted for over 50% of degree holders for more than 20 years now. This percentage is steadily increasing. Should the trend continue, says the Wall Street Journal, over the next few years two women will earn a college degree for every man.. ..Though women have earned degrees at higher rates than men for at least four decades, women still earn significantly less than men. As The New York Times reported, when more women join a previously male-dominated field, pay in that field declines rather than staying the same regardless of who fills the positions..
Wise women; 6 ancient female philosophers you should know about
March 7, 2021
https://theconversation.com/wise-women-6-ancient-female-philosophers-you-should-know-about-156033
Fátima al-Fihri, fundó la primera universidad del mundo
https://www.instagram.com/angeles_taro/reel/C6wahkrK65M/
May 9, 2024
The gender wage gap endures in the U.S.
March 1, 2023
https://www.pewresearch.org/social-trends/2023/03/01/the-enduring-grip-of-the-gender-pay-gap/
.. In 2022, American women typically earned 82 cents for every dollar earned by men. That was about the same as in 2002, when they earned 80 cents to the dollar. The slow pace at which the gender pay gap has narrowed this century contrasts sharply with the progress in the preceding two decades: In 1982, women earned just 65 cents to each dollar earned by men. ..
The US economy is reliant on consumer spending – can it survive a pandemic? 2020
..Today, the spending habits of American households make up 70% of the U.S. gross domestic product, a measurement that describes the size of the economy. U.S. companies spend about US$230 billion on advertising each year, half of all the money spent on advertising globally. Today’s consumer society emerged after the end of World War I, fueled by the emergence of the modern advertising industry and facilitated by widespread adoption of consumer credit. Edward Bernays, the nephew of Sigmund Freud, is generally credited with inventing the field of marketing during the 1920s. The essence of his approach was to tap into people’s desires to feel good, powerful and sexy instead of emphasizing the usefulness of a product.. ..But the deliberate creation of the present consumer society took off in earnest during the 1940s and 1950s. When WWII ended, so did wartime industrial production. Industry leaders shifted their enormous production capabilities from the military to the civilian sector..
Chart: US consumers keep spending despite rising inflation, Nov 21, 2022 https://www.weforum.org/agenda/2022/11/inflation-consumer-spending-us-economic/
Americans are racking up debt and burning through their savings—economists warn it could spark a recession, February 18, 2023
How Americans are tricked into buying fake food
https://youtu.be/-8xTVMtkqv4?si=zoVDPjsl9DFsOFQA ,01-15-23
2:24 “..the fraud happens more with more expensive foods..”
✔ compare also to the title elsewhere here → The
interstate highway system - definition, purpose & facts ◺
A carbon credit is a tradable certificate or permit representing the right to emit a set amount of carbon dioxide or the equivalent amount of a different greenhouse gas (tCO2e).[1][2][3] Carbon credits and carbon markets are a component of national and international attempts to mitigate the growth in concentrations of greenhouse gases (GHGs)….
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Carbon_credit
(see paragraph 46- on “externalities” , and before paragraph 41a- on : carbon tax )
The Inflation Reduction Act includes a bonanza for the carbon capture industry
https://time.com/6205570/inflation-reduction-act-carbon-capture/ 2022
US manufacturing ended 2022 in contraction
“It is no measure of health to be well-adjusted to a profoundly sick society.” - attributed to Jiddu Krishnamurti.
5- ✔ Back in late December I was unsure if you had received that 1st USB (USPS track # quoted delivery to front desk, etc, on 12/21/22, with 10025 zip code; yet on the 23rd it read an alert status of addressee unknown, but with 10024 zip..). Unexplained, perhaps a wordplay to its file name: ‘Capraesque’ Lost & Found Horizon, which I’ll also include in this USB just in case. There were indications you received it however, which I won’t mention here (five clues so far?); but another is that after “priming” one of my cousins with some comments, soon after she began not taking my calls… So if you pardon again my indiscretion, I took a back door to intelligence.
Check it out, was even gonna bring her & hubby Ray, 2 bottles of Bootleg ® red wine, along with fine cheese (no pun intended) to wish them a lovely trip to a wedding in Miami.
◺
6- ✔ Although, her avoidance could’ve partly also risen cuz some of my comments were rather odd.. Even without knowing definitions, they could be linked to terms as: “apophenia”, “delusions of reference”, “confirmation bias”, etc. Go ahead Wikipedia those. Though not that serious.., let’s hope that I or anyone we know doesn’t need professional help for related cases. I took pictures & made a journal of such “coincidences”, “associations”, taking place at the git-go in the post office on the day of transaction 12/20/22, then on 12/21/22, and 12/22/22. As I wrote to you before, promising material for a story, which someday I hope to share with you, briefly, perhaps you’ve encountered similar occurrences (as I stated on the previous letter). Pareidolia would be the tendency to interpret a vague stimulus as something known to the observer, such as familiar patterns in clouds, etc. For instance in the following pic I discarded a wet paper towel, which could be misconstrued as someone intentionally creating the figure of a genie or ghost:
◺
Numerology (known prior to the 20th century as arithmancy) is the belief in an occult, divine or mystical relationship between a number and one or more coinciding events. It is also the study of the numerical value, via an alphanumeric system, of the letters in words and names. When numerology is applied to a person’s name, it is a form of onomancy. It is often associated with the paranormal, alongside astrology and similar to divinatory arts…
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Numerology
✔ OK then as promised 1st proposal; is for us to collaborate together, but remotely has undesired sensory limitations don’t you think? Writing & researching projects, be they scripts, short stories, maybe even a savory novel. That is if you’re available. Surely you’re foxy (it was never my intention to fawn = cajole, perhaps ignorance in my vocabulary). I could use the help and input you know.
Don’t ask me about pay yet pal.
7- I haven’t been feeling particularly well, there’s this void, stagnation, weakness, way before the COVID thing. The following is very difficult to explain:
I’ve never shared it as such, that is when it comes to beyond my nuclear family..
OK, for many many years I felt this resentment at, well it could be hard to pinpoint, I don’t discard my own responsibility (Rashomon effect, scapegoating), but it’s trauma, and I put the blame on capitalism specially when one is younger and impressionable. Though not life-threatening, it is a medical condition. That’s as far as I’ll go with it for now, but it serves as a springboard to the way such a system wrecks havoc and implants itself in peoples’ minds. It fosters / rewards individualism, egoism, envy, conspiracies of the worst kinds.. Creates its own monsters / criminals who don’t really wanna hear about politics or socialism, who are straight up capitalist wannabes (real capitalists instead are, will be, a minority in society controlling the means of production, I.e. machines, and who buy labor power, the cultural milieu, etc). No wonder jails are packed and often exploited with cheap / slave labour. No bourgeois state laws can solve that, or do its bureaucrats want to. Reality is we’re all living in a society, complex, evolving... We’re not isolated in some mountain by ourselves, we’re all dependent on many interactions, markets are only one aspect of that. ◺
Message of love (1980-81)- The Pretenders
https://youtu.be/vooiS055Ljw ,11-11-20
#music
Whatcha gonna do about it (1967)- The Litter
https://youtu.be/UV70UbSCRAg ,5-02-10
#music
✔ Rabbit to the rescue! ◺ ,01-08-19
✔ Cracking the case of the kid and the hare… Hey mi pana qué pasó ? ! ◺
MIT has predicted that society will collapse in 2040
https://youtu.be/kVOTPAxrrP4 ,11-26-21
The planet can’t sustain rapid growth much longer
May 22, 2023
https://www.wired.com/story/gaya-herrington-avoiding-global-collapse/
..Their efforts generated the now-famous 1972 paper “The Limits to Growth,” in which they modeled what might lie in wait for humanity.. ..But you cannot alleviate people from poverty without growth if the 1 percent hold onto all of their wealth. So the alternative to growth is of course sharing more.. ..We have to really redefine who we are, how the world works, what world we want to see, and what our role is.. ..The shift is really toward meeting everyone’s needs. Human beings’ needs, but also for all life. And that would be a place where people are happier and where nature is thriving. And I think that would be a better world to live in..
Living in times of exponential growth, with Neil deGrasse Tyson
https://youtu.be/kh_KgCPkFVE?si=ScPrfk1LobkNX4O3
,10-10-23
Massive ocean discovered beneath the Earth’s crust containing more water than on the surface
Mar 30, 2023
https://www.indy100.com/science-tech/ocean-beneath-earth-crust-ringwoodite-2659686565
Ocean current system could shut down as early as 2025, leading to climate disaster
July 27, 2023
https://www.space.com/ocean-current-system-shut-down-2025-climate-disaster
Scientists created a new recyclable plastic not made from crude oil
https://twitter.com/ScienceAlert/status/1640775060158857216
Mar 28, 2023
The “self-made” myth: Why hard work isn’t enough to reach the top, 2019
https://thehustle.co/self-made-myth-luck-versus-hard-work/
(click to enlarge images)
Study- rich people ‘more likely to lie, cheat and break the law’, 2012 https://www.huffingtonpost.co.uk/2012/02/28/rich-people-cheat-lie-break-law_n_1306167.html
Urban blight, the son of Sam, and the birth of hip hop: 28 photos of The Bronx in the 1970s
March 15, 2021
https://allthatsinteresting.com/bronx-burning-1970s
Tax returns of Donald Trump
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tax_returns_of_Donald_Trump
..The bulk of the debt came from Trump’s struggling Doral golf resort ($125 million) and the Washington D.C. Trump International Hotel ($160 million)..
Trump Organization fined maximum $1.6 million for tax fraud
https://nypost.com/2023/01/13/trump-organization-fined-1-6-million-for-tax-fraud/
January 13, 2023
Mike Pompeo, ex-CIA director, April 15, 2019, at Texas A&M University,- “..we lied, we cheated, we steal, stole..”
https://inteltoday.org/2019/04/18/mike-pompeo-I-was-the-cia-director-we-lied-we-cheated-we-stole/
..“It is very sad to hear the clapping [from the audience] and it is also really disgusting for a leader, someone that young people look up to,” Mcadams added..
✔ Now consider the Western , “civilized”, world’s reaction if let’s say, Putin, Maduro, Kim J., etc, would’ve spout such insolence... ◺
“..The worst illiterate is the political illiterate.. ..He doesn’t know the cost of life, the price of the bean, of the fish, of the flour, of the rent, of the shoes and of the medicine, all depends on political decisions. The political illiterate is so stupid that he is proud and swells his chest saying that he hates politics..” - Bertolt Brecht, playwright, poet.
Rich people are dodging more taxes than the IRS realized, study finds, 2021 https://nypost.com/2021/03/22/way-more-rich-people-dodge-taxes-than-are-caught-study/
Tax cheats cost US $1 trillion per year, IRS says, 2021
https://www.thebalancemoney.com/tax-cheats-cost-u-s-usd1-trillion-per-year-irs-says-5176888
1992 Indian stock market scam
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1992_Indian_stock_market_scam
..The scam was the biggest money market scam ever committed in India, amounting to approximately ₹ 5,000 crores..
8- ✔ By popular demand, a segment on such a socioeconomic system, capitalism / imperialism:
In 2007, the FBI estimated that burglary and robbery (street crimes) costs the nation $3.8 billion a year.. Corporate crime (white-collar) on the other hand is WAY ABOVE THAT, but it goes unreported and hardly prosecuted. Criminologist Kim Rossmo has a formula / equation- the mathematics used to solve crime, using algorithms to predict crimes or actual, profiling, and risks of recidivism... But which social class controls these tools? Fines don’t outweigh the crime, corporations have actuaries who calculate the costs & benefits. The studies of sociologists C. Wright Mills and Pierre Bourdieu can be helpful in drawing adequate gov’t policies.. Also the use of cliometrics…
Private market-oriented economies monopolize product placement without value-added enhancement, just convenience or buying wholesale.., I.e. supermarkets, hardware supplies, gas stations, clothing outlets, pharmacies, etc. That is, key decisions are made only by a handful of capitalists or corporations (not the market of consumers), in transportation or locale yet while not significantly further elaborating products to justify prices, I.e. unlike restaurants, barber shops, etc. Small to medium businesses are often driven out of competition with the same rationale used by landlords and banks. This exacerbates inequality, a system-driven outcome, not as result of personal laziness or effort, or God’s plan, but as a result of the “invisible hand” (greater social goods out of self-interests) which Adam Smith wrote of. Which is why these businesses ought to be socialist state enterprises, cooperatives, although some small players could remain private.. Mainstream media ought to be in the public realm and not run by private entities... ◺
The food delivery bubble is bursting — and maybe that's not a bad thing.
On-demand food delivery is not working for customers, couriers, restaurants, or even the companies behind the apps
August 4, 2024
.. Not only that, but consumer reports indicate customer dissatisfaction with the apps is on the rise, while labor groups continue to decry the ways in which they say the food delivery industry takes advantage of gig economy workers. .. .. Unlike typical restaurant delivery, the majority of these couriers are contract workers, while restaurants are also charged hefty commission fees for each order. ..
Karl Marx's Das Kapital
https://youtu.be/dvxWn3yUDXY?si=gD2lZf0gJguHu4w6
,9-15-18
Why capitalism has nothing to do with supply and demand
Jul 28, 2014
https://www.pbs.org/newshour/nation/why-capitalism-has-nothing-to-do-with-supply-and-demand
..Capitalism really has nothing to do with supply and demand. That’s just a mistaken idea. Capitalism works by being essentially an evolutionary solution-finding algorithm. The genius of capitalism is that it both permits and rewards people for solving other people’s problems. But the problem is we have structured our economy in this sort of death spirally way, where huge profitable organizations like Wal-Mart pay poverty wages to a million workers, and then taxpayers make up the difference in social services programs like food stamps and Medicaid and rent assistance, and so on and so forth. It’s as morally repugnant as it is economically inefficient..
¿Is there a better economic system than capitalism
https://youtu.be/tJwQej0el5s?si=u5bMz_s29oHjNVtm
,01-05-23
✔ Hunts Point Cooperative Market, price in groceries, 02-03-18
[see also paragraph 58b- on Che, Mondragon, ESOPs ]
Great Housing Mission of Venezuela (GMVV) has provided millions of truly affordable homes, and of course Western media won’t mention it, or if it does it’s in a disparaging way. Instead, NY Governor Hochul’s 5-year plan to create and preserve 100,000 affordable homes is celebrated as a milestone by some. It has some merit, timid, but “why then” should U.S. punish Venezuela with crushing coercive measures? I.e. U.S. gov forcefully taking over Venezuelan oil subsidiary CITGO, and the Central Bank of England confiscating (stealing) its gold reserves. ◺
This year, the Great Housing Mission of Venezuela (GMVV), launched by Commander Hugo Chávez in 2011, has reached a milestone of providing over 4 million homes to its people. By contrast, U.S. has evicted over 1 million people since March 2020 with over 8,000 last week alone.
https://twitter.com/PeoplesForumNYC/status/1573688718036275201
thread Sep 24, 2022
Hochul’s housing plan faces pushback from suburbs. Feb 13, 2023 ✔ Not in my backyard gnash the ever-reactionary (liberal, conservative) “middle-class”! ◺ https://www.thecentersquare.com/new_york/hochuls-housing-plan-faces-pushback-from-suburbs/article_6cd82b5c-abf7-11ed-b07f-971bd324ebbd.html
..Hochul’s plan, unveiled as part of her $227 billion preliminary budget proposal, calls for building 800,000 new homes over the next decade to expand affordable housing options in the state.. ..But elected officials on Long Island and other suburban New York communities are pushing back against her plans to open local zoning laws.. ..”What we don’t agree on is how to fix it. The governor apparently believes that one-size-fits-all solutions, that government mandates, are the way to go.”.. ..”New York state is attacking our right to govern ourselves, decide what our neighborhoods look like, to turn us into the city,” she said. “I will not let that happen.”.. ..”The bottom line is you can’t add more population to the area without the proper infrastructure and waste water management in place first,” he said. “Municipalities will bear the responsibility and burden of this legislation and as such, local governments should have a seat at the table for any and all legislation moving forward.”..
Dave Chappelle thwarts affordable housing plan in his Ohio hometown, Feb 9, 2022 https://www.hollywoodreporter.com/news/general-news/dave-chappelle-thwarts-affordable-housing-plan-ohio-hometown-1235090441/
..“The whole development deal, cloaked as an affordable housing plan, is anything but affordable. Three out of 143 lots would have been for ‘future’ affordable housing,”..
The Great Migration (1910-1970)
https://www.archives.gov/research/african-americans/migrations/great-migration ..Approximately six million Black people moved from the American South to Northern, Midwestern, and Western states roughly from the 1910s until the 1970s…
Lawyer claims ‘no villains’ in case after woman fatally shot in wrong driveway
Fox News
https://youtu.be/7Y1Rwe3phDw ,4-19-23
9a- ✔ England for instance, uses more land for golf courses than housing! And such private golf courses get public subsidies from the gov’t for crying out loud! Jolly good! ◺
UK house prices fall at fastest annual rate since 2011, says Halifax
7 Jul 2023
Average price of property drops by 2.6% year on year in June as mortgage rates climb…
✔ In Vienna (Austria), half of the housing is city-owned and the rents are kept below 25% of salaries.. OMG what a socialist nightmare! When it comes to housing in the U.S. (it is what it is), a tax law oughta be studied wherein there’ll be a limit to interest deductions on mortgage payments, if you own more than, let’s say, a 100 homes, buildings. Such deduction limits could be abrogated if those homeowners sell some of those homes to entry-level buyers within a certain time period. A bogey in the U.S. housing market is the presence, mainly since 2010, of private equity (PE) investors in it, and particularly in poorer neighborhoods. Using algorithms they push up rents to hedge against inflation… This is a redlining, gentrification redux. To boot, private equity is often held up as a paragon of free-market capitalism, yet it’s dependent on government subsidies (from taxpayers) for its profits! But it’s not only PE’s which is swallowing up real estate, but also pension funds from yield-chasing investors “competing” with ordinary Americans and driving up prices... Though tenants under a residential lease have several legal protections that do not apply to commercial tenants, the latter tend to be for longer periods, usually a minimum of 3 to 5 years.. ◺
City pensions to fund $250M apartment venture
May 24, 2021
https://www.crainsnewyork.com/real-estate/new-york-city-pensions-fund-250m-apartment-venture
..The two largest retirement systems—covering public school teachers and municipal employees—are teaming up with developer Hudson Cos., to allocate $250 million for construction of middle-income housing.. ..For rentals, the partners plan to develop, manage and generate income from the properties for about 10 years before selling them. New York City projects would likely have about 30% of units designated as affordable to middle-income tenants, with the rest available at market rate.. ..The partnership “creates an innovative new fund to generate sound financial returns for our pension systems while developing critical new housing throughout the region..
Why Wall Street is buying so many U.S. homes
CNBC
https://youtu.be/iLsZlrZIFwU ,02-21-23
9b- ✔ Home or housing prices surge faster than wages. Census data shows close to half of Americans spend more than a third of their income in housing rent. In New York City, half of all the luxury units built in the last 10 years are vacant.. And besides that, an HPD report of 2021 (based on the Census Bureau) estimates there are 88,830 vacant rent-stabilized apartments in New York City. It seems the discrepancy for this is the opposing value between what in classical political economy and Marxist economics is known as use value (tangible use an object has to satisfy some human requirement) versus exchange value (an item or service produced for, and sold on the market). ◺
Renters more likely than homeowners to spend more than 30% of
income on housing in almost all counties
December 08, 2022
https://www.census.gov/library/stories/2022/12/housing-costs-burden.html
NYC had 88,830 vacant rent-stabilized apartments last year, city housing agency estimates
Oct 20, 2022
https://www.thecity.nyc/housing/2022/10/20/23413894/vacant-rent-stabilized-apartments-nyc
Use value versus exchange value
July 11, 2019
https://tradistae.com/2019/07/11/define-value/
..Ever since Aristotle, it has been acknowledged that there are two kinds of value: use-value and exchange-value.. ..It is clear that use-value should be at the foundation of a just economy.. ..Capitalism is the ultimate example of a system of greed because it is dedicated to the “infinite accumulation of exchange-value.” It is fundamentally different than premodern society because it prioritizes exchange-value over use-value and has radically transformed economic life.
Value in use vs. value in
exchange. Do the courts know the difference?
September 01, 2015
https://www.stout.com/en/insights/article/value-use-vs-value-exchange-do-courts-know-difference
..As previously illustrated, use value does not fit the definition of market value..
Karl Marx; Use Value vs Exchange Value
https://youtu.be/ev6hBvTF38s ,3-01-18
An Employee Stock Ownership Plan (ESOP) in the United States is a defined contribution plan, a form of retirement plan as defined by 4975(e)(7)of IRS codes, which became a qualified retirement plan in 1974.[1][2] It is one of the methods of employee participation in corporate ownership.. ..The Oakland, California-based think tank National Center for Employee Ownership estimates that there are approximately 11,300 employee stock ownership plans for over 13 million employees in the United States.[3][4][5] Notable U.S. employee-owned corporations include the 170,000 employee supermarket chain Publix Supermarkets, Hy-Vee, McCarthy Building Company, WinCo Foods, environmental consulting firm Citadel Environmental Services, Inc., and Harpoon Brewery..
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Employee_Stock_Ownership_Plan
How an employee stock ownership plan (ESOP) works
August 24, 2020
https://www.nceo.org/articles/esop-employee-stock-ownership-plan
✔ see also paragraph 48- on social security.. ◺
Employee stock ownership plan (ESOP): what it is, how it works, advantages
July 20, 2022
https://www.investopedia.com/terms/e/esop.asp
Lead poisons California community – and fills kids’ teeth, 2021
Contaminated bases endanger vulnerable minority communities, 2023
Chinese citizens in Texas are incensed over a proposal to ban them from buying property in the state
Feb. 16, 2023
..Luo said it’s a shocking premise, incongruous with everything she thought America was when she moved here in 1997, but by the time she heard about the bill, it had already won the support of the biggest player in Texas politics. Gov. Greg Abbott, a Republican, tweeted last month, “I will sign it..
Gov. Abbott signs bill banning homeless encampments on public land in Texas,
June 15, 2021
Rents in the UK are rising at the highest rate for decades. Will they keep going up? https://bigissue.com/news/housing/rents-in-the-uk-are-rising-at-the-highest-rate-for-14-years-will-they-keep-going-up/
Jan 25, 2023
DEEP DIVE: Why low income residents face higher risk of deadly fires like the Bronx apartment blaze.
https://twitter.com/bbgEquality/status/1481293893056577536
thread Jan 12, 2022
New York City today is unrecognizable from the 1970s, when the Bronx was burning, garbage piled up and Midwesterners were scared to visit. But creativity thrived in the anarchy. Artists and adventurers could afford to live here. My new book tells the story of the change.
https://twitter.com/adampiore/status/1493728136353226752
thread Feb 15, 2022
You now need to earn at least $160K a year to rent anything in NYC
https://twitter.com/adampiore/status/1534915752335233025?cxt=HhwWgsC-odLvjs0qAAAA
Jun 9, 2022
New Yorkers react to increase in cost of living
https://youtu.be/_3zVZFgObvs?si=wPQHPJR3p2vdEtvn ,3-19-24
What is RAD ? a look at NYCHA’s private management move
Feb 7, 2020
..RAD is a national program enacted in 2012 that allows public housing agencies to switch the way they get money from the feds — moving from Section 9 (the way NYCHA-owned properties have historically been funded) to Section 8 (a program that funds private landlords)..
How many units has NYCHA privatized to date?
https://nycommons.org/resources/how-many-units-has-nycha-privatized-date/
From 2016 through June 2022, NYCHA converted a total of 15,538 units to Section 8 via its “Permanent Affordability Commitment Together (PACT)” program…
10- ✔ A totally different model of housing exists in lambasted / sanctioned by Western outlets, North Korea… There offered free to the people, oh wow how evil, no realtor or landlord middlemen as far as I know. ◺
https://twitter.com/Fekerfanta/status/1608840336398229505
Dec 30, 2022
Zillow plunges after verdict on real estate brokerage commissions
October 31, 2023
Federal jury verdict on broker fees rocks real estate industry
Oct 31, 2023
https://www.axios.com/2023/10/31/nar-lawsuit-brokers-fees-verdict-sitzer-burnett
A federal jury in Kansas City on Tuesday found the National Association of Realtors (NAR) and some of the largest real estate brokers in the country guilty of colluding to inflate real estate commissions. Why it matters: The verdict is a major shake up to the U.S. real estate market and could change how Americans purchase homes, or specifically, how they pay for broker fees. ..
✔ Berenice Gartner (link below) .. Precisamente ella fue quien no me entrevistó cuando Fidel Castro visitó la Iglesia de Riverside... La chamaca no me cae mal como persona, desde años hace reportaje al consumidor.
Oh, y el casero Kraus Management, donde trabajé una vez... I do recall Bedford Gardens then in the log entries. From here I salute my ex-coworkers then.. In one occasion a few hours after being arrested for a minor offense.., they stood around my desk and looking at me like they’ve seen a ghost!... ◺
Tenants at B. G. in Brooklyn received a rent increase notice from the landlord, Kraus Management. K.M. made the petition to the city’s authorities for an 80% increase.
Preocupación entre residentes de un edificio en Brooklyn ante la posibilidad de un aumento exagerado en el alquiler. Toda la información. http://uni.vi/LIY9104slNJ
https://twitter.com/univisionNY/status/1619048307900268566
Jan 27, 2023
Constructora de barrios privados en Uruguay despidió a más de 400 trabajadores
https://videos.telesurtv.net/es/content/328139 ,25-4-24
https://youtu.be/s0M5csKpPAc?si=OmWCFkTH0iHuDc0w
North Korea completes construction of a new neighborhood in Sinhae-dong, city of Rason. It has exercise areas, a small hospital and new homes that have been given free to the people..
https://twitter.com/Fekerfanta/status/1597606317358735360
Nov 29, 2022
New housings in North Korea’s rural areas
https://twitter.com/Fekerfanta/status/1617462267460608001
Jan 23, 2023
Rural areas of North Korea
https://twitter.com/Fekerfanta/status/1628696170041118721
Feb 23, 2023
This skyscraper in North Korea was completed last year. At 984 feet tall it is much taller than Spain’s tallest.
https://twitter.com/Fekerfanta/status/1602946448160702464
Dec 14, 2022
North Korea has much to be admired, says Italy’s Northern League leader..., 2014 https://www.theguardian.com/world/2014/sep/03/north-korea-italy-northern-league
Italian food restaurant in North Korea’s capital
https://twitter.com/Fekerfanta/status/1625525284446568448
Feb 14, 2023
Beer in North Korea
✔ (It’s not rocket science… H’m, or do suds power them ?) ◺
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Beer_in_North_Korea
Pyongyang, we didn’t expect was that the streets of this city were so clean.
SAO Documentary
https://youtu.be/Zc1WN6RkdjQ ,10-08-18
North Korea, the Rungrado 1st of May Stadium – the largest in the world, 2021 https://footballtripper.com/blog/the-rungrado-1st-of-may-stadium-the-largest-in-the-world/
11a- ✔ From the mainstream media’s Walt Disney narrative, you would think in North Korea they have a military parade every MF day! Nothing else ever happens over there. Though starved, they march on loaded on meth! Or the same lame media trolls drivel cliché such as: “Kim is showing off his 10 year-old daughter” or “succession”.. As if successions or incarnations were not a thing of the Dalai Lamas of Tibet.. Whose demands is Kim J. supposed to please? The West’s? If his daughter wouldn’t make any appearances, then the same yellow media would speculate as usual to sell their shtick, like he’s keeping her in a dungeon as punishment for “playing decadent capitalist video games”, and on & on. Oy! MANY in the U.S. don’t realize that South Korea & United States are technically still at war with North Korea.. On July 1953 an armistice was signed, a ceasefire, but not a peace treaty. If the U.S. really wanted peace in the peninsula, to lower hostilities, it should start with signing one. But it doesn’t want to, too much money to be made selling weapons to Seoul… ◺
List of massacres in South Korea
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_massacres_in_South_Korea
U.S. massacre of civilians in Korean War described, 1999
..The reported death toll would make No Gun Ri one of two known cases of large-scale killings of noncombatants by U.S. ground troops in this century’s major wars, military law experts note. The other was Vietnam’s My Lai massacre, in 1968, in which more than 500 Vietnamese may have died..
Why the Korean War was one of the deadliest wars in modern history, 2017 https://nationalinterest.org/blog/the-buzz/why-the-korean-war-was-one-the-deadliest-wars-modern-history-20445
..On a per-capita basis, the Korean War was one of the deadliest wars in modern history, especially for the civilian population of North Korea.. ..World War II was by far the bloodiest war in history. Estimates of the death toll range from 60 million to more than 85 million, with some suggesting that the number is actually even higher and that 50 million civilians may have perished in China alone. Even the lower estimates would account for roughly three percent of the world’s estimated population of 2.3 billion in 1940..
U.S. gov admits to massacre of No Gun Ri in South Korea, 1950
https://twitter.com/ElNecio_Cuba/status/1633816793272799234
thread Mar 9, 2023
✔ North Korean rocket at a secret garage site, nicely camouflaged…
◺
11b- Radio WADO 1280 AM- Ino Gómez; bombas a Japón
https://youtu.be/O7DAVSvAMmg ,08-8-18
✔ Este clip es de un programa mañanero en Nueva York (ya para 2022 o antes de, ni salía al aire). Uno de sus locutores fue Ino Gómez, un cubano-americano, payaso y “pragmático”. Frecuente arremete contra Cuba, Venezuela, Corea del Norte, Irán (a quien tacha de promover el terrorismo y hasta lo confunde en sus prácticas con Arabia Saudí ! ) La verdad es que Irán y Arabia Saudí no han sido amigos que digamos… Ambos países rivales con una gran influencia en Medio Oriente, acordaron el viernes, 10 de marzo 2023, tras una mediación con y en China, a reanudar sus relaciones diplomáticas que fueron interrumpidas en 2016. ◺
Pompeo claims Iran is ‘home base’ for Al Qaeda
Jan. 12, 2021
https://www.nbcnews.com/politics/national-security/pompeo-claims-iran-home-base-al-qaeda-n1253940
✔ El sesudo basquetbolista Ino G., hasta ha nega’o la ciencia detrás del cambio climático antropogénico! Una joyita de la radio neoyorquina, la gente se sacó el premio con él, ¡ay de quienes aprenden de tal tipejo, qué bien mal usa la libertad de expresión.. En este clip de 2018 defiende el bombardeo atómico de U$A contra Japón en la 2GM (Make America Great Again!). Alega que hasta salvó vidas de ambos lados! (el mismo raciocinio genocida desearían contra Corea del Norte, Irán, Rusia, etc). No dice que Japón ya estaba derrotado y sólo exigía mantener el rol de su emperador. Hasta militares estadounidenses estaban contra el uso de las bombas atómicas, ya antes habían arrojado terribles bombas incendiarias, contra civiles! Crímenes de guerra. Si quisieran mostrarle el poderío a los japoneses, pudieran haberlas probado en una isla despoblada. La intención era intimidar a la Unión Soviética ya que esta iba hacía Japón. Este se rindió no por las 2 bombas atómicas de USA, limitadas, sino porque la Unión Soviética (URSS) venía contra ellos. Y por cierto el arrastrado Gómez no diría que quien en sí derrotó a Alemania fue la URSS. Tampoco diría, que entre 1942-46, bajo orden ejecutiva 9066, el gobierno de EEUU encarceló en campos de concentración a más de 125,000 japoneses-americanos, incluyendo niños y ancianos. Sus propiedades / ahorros confiscados. La mayoría de casos no serían llevados a la corte, pero el gobierno ofreció disculpas en 1988.. En Canadá y América Latina también encarcelaron japoneses-descendientes, sin pruebas. Washington presionó para eso, con intención de usarlos como canje por prisioneros norteamericanos por Tokio! El jingoísmo japonés fue brutal no hay duda, en particular contra otros asiáticos, pero ello no justifica los crímenes de guerra de EEUU contra civiles inocentes. Ino Gómez no mencionaría nada de eso porque es un pitiyanqui, así de simple, y no debería avergonzarse en admitirlo.. ◺
María Oktiabrskaia | La mujer que compró un tanque para vengar la muerte de su esposo
https://youtu.be/TCaNtn9D25A?si=3jfAwtOP0VjgfT9r ,28-8-23
The Nazis killed her husband, so she got a tank – and her revenge
April 28, 2021
After Mariya Oktyabrskaya's husband died in battle during World War 2, she became a tank driver in the Red Army.
https://allthatsinteresting.com/mariya-oktyabrskaya
Kolobanov | El comandante soviético que destruyó CASI 50 PANZERS… ¡con solo 5 tanques!
https://youtu.be/HLCBXgin3Gw?si=cAyilnWaUOQK-GKo ,03-3-21
The thorny history of reparations in the United States
August 29, 2019
https://www.history.com/news/reparations-slavery-native-americans-japanese-internment
Kareem Abdul-Jabbar, social critic
https://youtu.be/yHYD7hAQ5_k ,7-16-23
11c- Radio Wado 1280 AM; ino gómez, Norcorea, alberto milian
https://youtu.be/2j_fT4YBuNI ,09-10-18
✔ Entre tantos detalles que el locuaz ino gómez (sí, ambos en letras chiquitas) no menciona es que el entrevistado alberto milian es hijo de Emilio Milian.. Emilio fue un locutor radial en Miami, y el 30 de abril de 1976 fue víctima de un carro bomba, le tuvieron que amputar ambas piernas debajo de las rodillas. Él denunciaba la violencia de anti-castristas (los iracundos de la democracia, protegidos por agencias norteamericanas). Su hijo Alberto es juez de Miami y exmilitar de la reserva de EEUU. Participó en la invasión gringa de Panamá en 1989 y la guerra del golfo en Irak en 1991. Siendo fiscal se conoció por insultar a abogados defensores y al jurado.
00:00 Corea del Norte chantajea? El colmo de Ino el manganzón! Si U$A tuerce brazos es maravilloso / necesario, si es otro entonces es una amenaza. Pedazo de bagazo, Corea del Norte no amenaza para que le den comida o dinero, sólo porta armas en defensa propia. Las sanciones a Corea del Norte, como las contra Cuba, Siria, Palestina, etc, son ILEGALES en el marco del derecho internacional. Alberto el leguleyo debe saberlo pero se hace el loco. Las sanciones son preámbulos a la acción militar. El bravucón de Donald Trump en cambio fue quien sería el primer presidente gringo en ir a suelo norcoreano y reunirse con Kim Jong-un en julio 2019… ¿Acaso fue por blandenguería eh Don Ino? 1:40 Quien no quiere una unificación o normalidad en la península coreana serían U$A, claro porque tendría que retirar los cuantiosos contratos militares y ejercicios militares en aguas cerca a China y Rusia, y Japón (quien ha estado en una recesión por dos décadas..) ya que una sola Corea sería un potente rival. 2:12 El fracaso total del comunismo? Bueno, a’be’to, ese paísito atrasado, del tercer mundo, al referirte a Corea del Norte, es quien ha traído al imperio a la mesa de negociación... Mentecato, ha lanzado satélites propios al espacio! Te equivocas, el modelo chino al socialismo es para China (ve, compara su desarrollo al de La India por dar un solo ejemplo), el cubano es auténtico a su historia, geografía y cultura, en Venezuela es el bolivariano. Cada cual aplica según sus circunstancias. La MAYORÍA en el mundo es capitalista y sin embargo reina la desigualdad y la miseria. Con reglas capitalistas eso nunca se podrá resolver. Corea del Norte sin duda quisiera disminuir sus recursos dedicados a lo militar para mejorar la calidad de vida de su gente, pero aún no puede darse ese lujo. 3:28 Lo que el historiador de pacotilla tampoco dice es que en Corea del Sur sí hubo décadas de dictadura dura. Wa$hington cometió CRÍMENES DE GUERRA en 1950-53, y Corea del Norte tuvo que reconstruir TODO luego. En Corea del Sur fue que se cometieron masacres posguerra pero eso no se toca eh. 3:52 Alberto vuelve y se contradice al decir que no cree puede haber una libertad económica sin una política. ¿Porqué? Reconoce que China hizo reformas de mercado para avanzar, pero a la vez dice hay una dictadura con el partido comunista! ¿Cómo es A’be’to VO5, que una supuesta dictadura como la china es la mayor o segunda economía del mundo? 4:23 Calumnioso, Kim Jong-un no mandó a matar a su hermanastro en un aeropuerto de Malasia, no sólo no hay pruebas sino que es un absurdo, nada que ganar. Hasta los “disidentes” norcoreanos en el exterior, reconocen la aprobación alta de Kim Jong-un. 4:48 Alberto (the shyster) no se remonta a la historia y parece no saber que el norte de la península coreana nunca ha sido apto para la agricultura, ya que es frío y montañoso, mientras que el sur no lo es así. 5:20 “no ha podido alimentar a su propio pueblo” (ah sí, y nosotros los buenos de la película ayudamos en eso al bloquear cualquier comercio y financiación del régimen norcoreano 😭 ). ¿Cómo será que esos hambrientos entonces pueden hackear sistemas informáticos y ser una amenaza militar? Coño, e’ que e’to tipo’ no pegan ni una! Siempre pensando en pajarito’ preña’o’. 😊
¿De dónde sacan a e’to’ sujeto’ man? E’ increíble.
Contrario a lo que nos aseguran los medio$ de la pren$a libre. Igual al recién nominado juez de la Corte Suprema de U$A, brett kavanaugh (en 2018), la norma hoy es que jueces se inventen cosas, u omiten, o quizás siempre lo ha sido (aspiraciones políticas ?)... Por ejemplo, en el caso del acusado Kyle Rittenhouse en 2021 y el juez Bruce Schroeder en Wisconsin... ◺
Judge in Rittenhouse case slammed with accusations of bias—here’s why
Apr 21, 2022
Justice Alito accepted Alaska resort vacation from GOP donors, report says
ABC7 News Bay Area
https://youtu.be/sPIuV6rsr3s ,6-21-23
✔ According to the mainstream media’s narrative and its social media trolls, North Korea is a basket case, starving, with no internet, no freedoms, no nothing, so go the know-nothings. Yet when it fits their ad hominem discourse, they also claim North Korean hackers are up to shenanigans against the hapless & innocent West.. ◺
Crypto theft: North Korea-linked hackers stole $1.7b in 2022,
02-02-23
https://www.bbc.com/news/world-asia-64494094
ONU: hackers norcoreanos roban récord de activos virtuales,
Feb 8, 2023
https://apnews.com/article/noticias-8dbcfc0961bc1d451c7efd332be63eb4
No internet and illegal jeans: Life in North Korea,
Jan 31, 2023
https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/world/no-internet-and-illegal-jeans-life-in-north-korea/ss-AA16XPXW
New North Korean smartphones using AI, facial recognition technology
DPRK Today
February 4, 2020
North Korea says it will launch its first-ever military spy satellite to monitor U.S. drills
May 30, 2023
..Japan’s defense ministry warned it will “take all possible measures” to destroy any North Korean missile that enters its territory – adding that Pyongyang’s repeated testing of its ballistic missiles pose a threat to the peace and security of the region and the international community.. ..“North Korea has been under heavy sanctions for years and it’s still engaged in provocative behavior and this leads to the question of, do we need a new strategy and who do we work with ... I just don’t think there’s an easy solution as we move forward on this problem,” he said..
✔ Stephen Nagy, a professor at International Christian University, is clearly beholden to his paymasters in his pseudo-analysis. Have sanctions then worked at deterring North Korea? The answer is self-evident. Besides the U.S.-South Korean military drills, they provoke Pyongyang. ◺
12- ✔ In the Western press, North Korea is also portrayed as a patriarchal autarchy, when in reality Pyongyang is more inclusive of women than South Korea in the labor force (I.e. maternity leave, etc, see Articles 69-74 of NK’s Constitution).. Both Koreas have a similar composition of women in Congress according to the World Bank (NK- 17.6% vs. SK- 19%), though NK’s Constitution stipulates gender equality (Articles 77-78), and SK’s Constitution in Articles 32, 34.. Another source from 2013 states women in North Korea make up 35% of its Congress, the world’s average is 20.3%, while South Korea’s is only 15.7%… ◺
https://depyongyangalahabana.blogspot.com/2013/03/la-mujer-en-corea-del-norte.html
Women in Parliaments world classification, 2019
http://archive.ipu.org/wmn-e/classif.htm
✔ And North Korea’s women’s soccer (football) team ranks among the best in the world… ◺
12 best female soccer team in the world
March 31, 2022
https://playersbio.com/best-female-soccer-team/
FIFA women’s world ranking
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/FIFA_Women%27s_World_Ranking
Fútbol femenino: Corea del Norte se coronó campeón mundial sub-20 por tercera vez
23-9-24
.. Corea del Norte conquistó el Mundial femenino sub-20 que se disputó en Colombia al doblegar a Japón 1-0 en la final este domingo en Bogotá, donde cerró una campaña perfecta con siete victorias en siete presentaciones, y un total de 25 goles a favor y cuatro en contra. ..
Unlikely that Kim Jong Un’s daughter is being groomed as successor, South Korea says, Feb 15, 2023
https://www.nbcnews.com/news/world/kim-jong-un-daughter-successor-north-korea-rcna70731
Moranbong Band: pop coreano a la medida del Líder Supremo
8 de junio de 2018
..Moranbong band también fue el número estelar cuando Norcorea recibió a una delegación cubana en 2015. Pero su primera gira internacional se vio frustrada ese mismo año, cuando China, donde tenían agendados tres conciertos, decidió cancelar las presentaciones… ..Su cancionero, además de las tonadas en homenaje al líder y al régimen, han incluido también interpretaciones “My Way”, de Frank Sinatra, “Eye of the tiger”, parte de la banda sonora de Rocky, y la canción de Winnie the Pooh… ..la existencia de Moranbong Band no ha estado libre de intrigas, y estas giran alrededor de su miembro más importante, Hyon Song-Wol. Según medios surcoreanos como The Chosun Ilbo, y replicado luego por medios británicos y norteamericanos, la cantante habría sido amante de Kim Jong-Un. Luego se especuló que había sido ejecutada por el régimen por supuestamente estar implicada con un grupo de músicos en videos pornográficos, pero Hyon Song-Wol reemergió en la luz pública. No sólo eso, sino que es una embajadora clave en misiones diplomáticas: en los últimos intercambios entre las dos Coreas… ..La cantante además es parte del poderoso Comité Central del Partido de los Trabajadores, y también tiene un rango importante en el Ejército del Norte…
South Korea survey: 74 percent of women face discrimination, 2020
Women’s presence in politics still limited in South Korea
World Report 2022 South Korea | Human Rights Watch
https://www.hrw.org/world-report/2022/country-chapters/south-korea
..In December 2020, the South Korean government amended the National Intelligence Service Act using broad, vague language and authorizing the authorities to continue collecting information under the abusive and outdated National Security Law. The law criminalizes dissemination of anything that the government classifies as North Korean “propaganda,” as well as creating, joining, praising, or inducing others to join any political association considered an “anti-government organization,” a term not clearly defined in law..
South Korea: disabled slaves tell of ‘living hell’ on remote South Korean salt farms
1 Jan 2015
Slavery on salt farms in Sinan County, South Korea
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Slavery_on_salt_farms_in_Sinan_County
Netizens furious over South Korean government legalizing 21.5 hours working days
January 29, 2024
13- ✔ In North Korea’s elections, no citizen votes for President or Leader, but rather who will represent the people in the Supreme People’s Assembly (its Parliament) in 5-year terms, consisting of 4 political parties and various organizations. Those representatives in turn vote for ministers, the nation’s President, the head of armed forces, etc. So Kim Jong-un did not inherit his position, he’s the head of the armed forces (National Defence Commission). Kim Tok-hun (Premier) and Choe Ryong-hae (President) are the heads of State, respectively. In the “democratic” U.S., corporate lobbyists & the Electoral College leave a lot to be desired, hence they heavily determine the outcome of elections... North Korea’s or DPRK’s socialism is based on its principles of Juche, meaning it’s different from traditional Marxism-Leninism, or dialectical materialism, or China’s Maoism, so it is not a copy of those, but based on its own historical experience.
14- Many so-called Christians in the West (Calvinists apropos...) worship Mammon, and haven’t read: “..you can’t serve two masters..” - Matthew 6:24, Hosea 12: 7 (New Testament, Old Testament). In the Western media or reports from NGO’s (non-governmental organization) among so many myths you might even hear are that Christians are persecuted in North Korea... The reality is that the DPRK (Democratic People’s Republic of Korea) is a secular state, which means it doesn’t have an official religion. Christians are a minority there. Article 68 of its Constitution reads: “Citizens have freedom of religious belief. This right is granted through the approval of the construction of religious buildings and the holding of religious ceremonies. Religion must not be used as a pretext for drawing in foreign forces or for harming the State or social order.” Article 79 reads: “Citizens are guaranteed inviolability of the person and the home, and privacy of correspondence. No citizen can be placed under control or arrest nor can a citizen’s home be searched without a legal warrant.” But more than just in its Constitution, there are churches used for religious purposes, plus Christian associations. Foreign religious delegations have visited. ◺
Catholic Church in North Korea
https://youtu.be/0f_lg4QG2iY ,3-23-08
On a mission from God: South Korea’s many cults
22/11/2018
https://www.france24.com/en/20181122-mission-god-south-koreas-many-cults
✔ South Korea in its propaganda against the North has at times showcased Bibles dropped by balloons over the North to “demonstrate” how they’re censored there !
But who reads it in the “free West” inundated by so many bills, Internet and TV ? ◺
Christians don’t read their Bible
http://poncefoundation.com/christians-dont-read-their-bible/
80% of churchgoers don’t read Bible daily, LifeWay survey suggests, 2012 https://www.christianitytoday.com/news/2012/september/80-of-churchgoers-dont-read-bible-daily-lifeway-survey.html
Only one-third of Americans have a valid US passport, 2021
15a- ✔ Another far too common practice used by corporate western media, that so-called free press, is to shamelessly use photos or videos from one country, or different date, and label them as occurring elsewhere when it suits the political agenda. As you can witness, perception can be elusive, I.e. many believed the Earth was not round or a sphere, and believed that the Sun revolved around it (the geocentric model- Old Testament- Genesis 1: 14-19, Psalm 104: 5, Joshua 10: 12-14, Ecclesiastes 1: 5 )… ◺
When did we realize that the Earth orbits the Sun? 2017
https://astronomy.com/magazine/ask-astro/2017/01/proof-earth-revolves-around-the-sun
..The idea is ancient. Around 230 b.c., the Greek philosopher Aristarchus suggested that this was the case. He was an outstanding observer and based this idea on careful observations. Still, without direct proof that Earth moves, Aristotle’s Earth-centered universe remained the dominant model for centuries..
Deuteronomy 13: 1-5, 18: 19-22 (Old Testament) “.. 3 you must not listen to the words of that prophet or dreamer. The Lord your God is testing you to find out whether you love him.. ..5 That prophet or dreamer must be put to death for inciting rebellion against the Lord your God..”
15b- ✔ Now whoa whoa whoa, if the false prophet (s) is just an instrument of God to test his subjects (all-powerful, but doesn’t know?.. Genesis 3: 8-13), why should he or she (or in the case of Eve..) be put to death ? It was a sign of those times, in that region.. Just sayin’. Deuteronomy 15: 11-15. Ephesians 6: 5-9. Exodus 21: 23-27. 1 Timothy 1: 5-11. Genesis 1: 27. Numbers 31: 15-18. Matthew 20: 26-28, 24: 34-35, 5: 17-18. Revelation 22: 12-13.
Not everyone knows that the Israelites at times were polytheists, had competing sects... Jeremiah 7: 16-19, 44: 15-25. ◺
Asherah is a fertility goddess who appears in a number of ancient sources.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Asherah
..Between the tenth century BC and the beginning of their Babylonian exile in 586 BC, polytheism was normal throughout Israel.[35] Worship solely of Yahweh became established only after the exile, and possibly, only as late as the time of the Maccabees (2nd century BC). That is when monotheism became universal among the Jews.[36][37] Some biblical scholars believe that Asherah at one time was worshipped as the consort of Yahweh, the national god of Israel.[33][35][36].. ..William Dever’s book Did God Have a Wife? adduces further archaeological evidence—for instance, the many female figurines unearthed in ancient Israel, (known as pillar-base figurines)—as supporting the view that during Israelite folk religion of the monarchical period, Asherah functioned as a goddess and a consort of Yahweh and was worshiped as the queen of heaven, for whose festival the Hebrews baked small cakes.. ..as Dever notes: “The only goddess whose name is well attested in the Hebrew Bible (or in ancient Israel generally) is Asherah.”.. ..The association of Asherah with trees in the Hebrew Bible is very strong.. ..Episodes in the Hebrew Bible show a gender imbalance in Hebrew religion. Asherah was patronized by female royals such as the Queen Mother Maacah (1 Kings 15:13). But more commonly, perhaps, Asherah was worshiped within the household and her offerings were performed by family matriarchs..
✔ A female deity demoted by a patriarchy.. ◺
allegory = (noun) 1. a representation of an abstract or spiritual meaning through concrete or material forms; figurative treatment of one subject under the guise of another…
https://www.dictionary.com/browse/allegory
18 reasons one is executed for witchcraft during the ‘Burning Times’ https://historycollection.com/18-reasons-one-is-executed-for-witchcraft-during-the-burning-times/
..However, women were much more likely to be accused of being a witch. What’s more, they were also more likely to be executed for allegedly practicing black magic..
George Gershwin’s “It ain’t necessarily so” (2013)- Mario-Ratko Delorko
https://youtu.be/pKQPpwEnr6o ,01-14-07
#music
It ain’t necessarily so (1958)- Miles Davis, Gil Evans
https://youtu.be/A-EgyUcHSSQ ,12-09-09
#music
It ain’t necessarily so (1960)- Aretha Franklin
https://youtu.be/u1eSiso7VZs ,7-25-12
#music
Miles de cerdos salvajes invaden Puerto Rico en busca de comida, 2020
✔ Caramba, ¿dónde está “el” Chupacabras cuando uno lo necesita? O pueda que haya cambia’o de dieta.
◺
Bolivia, encuentran y capturan vivo a “perro fantasma” El Universal
https://youtu.be/8r3Ed2o34EQ ,10-3-23
15c- ✔ Epoch Times, the rag was “dropped” by my 1st floor door on 5-31-20, blaming the Communist Party of China for the pandemic.. Didn’t bother to unwrap. Around midnight is trash collection for Monkday.
◺
Epoch Times CFO is arrested and accused of role in $67M multinational money laundering scheme
June 3, 2024
FBI Director pointing to Wuhan lab leak as potential origin of COVID-19 virus
KPRC 2 Click2Houston
https://youtu.be/gIlBPQXK-58 ,3-01-23
New questions arise over COVID origins
ABC News
https://youtu.be/ke2KxgjF9pc ,3-17-23
Tedros: “The continued politicization of the [Covid] origins research has turned what should be a purely scientific process into a geopolitical football.”
https://twitter.com/disclosetv/status/1631669488193077249
Mar 3, 2023
Coronavirus was already in Italy by December, waste water study finds
19 June 2020
https://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-53106444
Coronavirus traces found in March 2019 sewage sample, Spanish study shows
June 26, 2020
https://www.reuters.com/article/us-health-coronavirus-spain-science-idUSKBN23X2HQ
Spanish virologists have found traces of the novel coronavirus in a sample of Barcelona waste water collected in March 2019, nine months before the COVID-19 disease was identified in China…
No direct evidence COVID started in Wuhan lab, US intelligence report says
June 23, 2023
✔ OK but this disclaimer by official U.S. authorities won’t get the same media coverage as the past U.S.’s allegations that China deliberately or accidentally leaked COVID-19 from the Wuhan lab. Just as the WMD’s to justify the U.S. invasion on Iraq 2003. Yellow journalism at its best going back to Randolph Hearst’s “Remember the Maine, to hell with Spain!” for the Spanish-American war of 1898, if not way earlier against Mexico.. Unfortunately too many indoctrinated still buy that sort of crap hook, line, and sinker, i.e. Chinese “spy” weather balloon over the U.S. from January 28 to February 4, 2023. ◺
Pentagon ran secret anti-vax campaign to undermine China during pandemic
June 14, 2024
https://www.reuters.com/investigates/special-report/usa-covid-propaganda/
.. U.S. military leaders feared that China’s COVID diplomacy and propaganda could draw other Southeast Asian countries, such as Cambodia and Malaysia, closer to Beijing, furthering its regional ambitions. ..
In 1992, China’s economy was smaller those of Germany, France, UK, Italy and even Spain. Fast forward 30 years, China’s economy is larger than all those countries COMBINED! This is the astonishing transformation that some in the West are unable to accept.
https://twitter.com/Kanthan2030/status/1631279519079493633
Mar 2, 2023
Guess who has the biggest exhibition at the Mobile World Congress (MWC) in Barcelona, Spain this year? Huawei. Although its smartphone business was sabotaged by the U.S., Huawei is focusing on 5G and cloud computing. Europe, Asia, Africa, Latin America are all big customers!
https://twitter.com/Kanthan2030/status/1631255670300508162
thread Mar 2, 2023
Mob of masked teens trash Chinese restaurant in Queens, causes $20,000 in damages
March 8, 2023
https://news.yahoo.com/mob-masked-teens-trash-chinese-192345087.html
Por esta razón Bruce Lee vino a República Dominicana
https://youtu.be/Gac5koYoA08?si=eazGtv--xriZguIq ,27-5-24
The Lady from Shanghai is a 1947 American film noir produced and directed by Orson Welles that stars Rita Hayworth, Welles and Everett Sloane.[2] Welles's screenplay is based on the novel If I Die Before I Wake by Sherwood King.[3] ..
April 9, 2013
https://www.rogerebert.com/features/the-lady-from-shanghai
.. Although The lady from Shanghai was acclaimed in Europe, it was not embraced in the U.S. until several decades later. ..
Pres. Trump says he will “surround myself with the greatest minds” to make decision on when to reopen country. Asked what metrics he will use to make the call, he points at his head: “The metrics right here. That’s my metrics. That’s all I can do.” https://abcn.ws/2VwW4d5
https://twitter.com/ABC/status/1248709123052634114 ,4-10-20
Trump pushes for re-opening
economy during pandemic.
15d- ✔ I composed this video meme back in 4-13-20
◺
The coronavirus was not engineered in a lab. Here’s how we know.
March 21, 2020
https://www.livescience.com/coronavirus-not-human-made-in-lab.html
Here are answers to 3 persistent questions about the coronavirus’s origins
May 27, 2021
https://www.sciencenews.org/article/coronavirus-covid-origins-questions-wuhan-lab-leak-nature
..At this point, most researchers agree that the virus was not engineered in a lab based on findings from genetic studies (SN: 3/26/20).. ..2. What evidence will it take to prove where the virus came from? Finding a virus nearly identical to SARS-CoV-2 in a wild animal — whether bats or other animals — would go a long way toward proving that the virus came from nature. But that’s a difficult pursuit that can take years (SN: 3/18/21). And we might never find it. Ebola virus probably comes from bats, for instance. Yet while researchers have found fragments of the virus in bats, they’ve never found the complete genetic blueprint of a bat Ebola virus that is a close relative of one that sparked an outbreak in people..
‘Havana syndrome’ likely due to ‘directed’ radio frequency
Reuters
https://youtu.be/I6HJL7g4dUI ,12-06-20
U.S. intel finds ‘Havana syndrome’ not caused by foe
Reuters
https://youtu.be/EdHFyGamj_E ,3-01-23
Despite clashes over reality of Havana Syndrome, CIA agents have been paid for injuries
March 29, 2024
https://news.yahoo.com/despite-clashes-over-reality-havana-093000707.html
No WMDs in Iraq
February 19, 2008
https://www.factcheck.org/2008/02/no-wmds-in-iraq/
The U.S. is ramping up its war machines from Pentagon, White House, State Dept, FBI and even Energy Dept and think tanks and news media… US invaded Iraq 20 years ago this month, a month after Colin Powell lied to the world at the UNSC holding a tiny vial of white powder.
https://twitter.com/chenweihua/status/1631618351779725312
Mar 3, 2023
16a- ✔ Big Bad Rambo U$A has more total deaths from COVID-19 than anyone (not including long-term side effects), but how many know that or care? In fact, there are more civilian gun-related deaths in the U.S. every year than in the conflict in Ukraine! But Sloppy Joe ◺ : “I sometimes underestimate it because I stopped thinking about it, but I’m sure you don’t: We lost 1 — over 1 million people in several years to COVID.”
https://twitter.com/joaquinlife/status/1616998515649179649
Jan 21, 2023
Race and health in the United States
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Race_and_health_in_the_United_States
✔ The COVID-19 pandemic in 3 years has killed off more than a million in the U.S., the majority retirees or elderly.. One has to wonder if the cavalier approach of both executive administrations somehow factored-in “reducing the state’s burden” by then not having to pay out their pensions… Or in another note, the American-funded biolabs in Ukraine.. Those, are more plausible scenarios than the “Wuhan lab leak theory” baloney parroted mainly by U.S. conservative circles.. If we’re going to employ literary or artistic license, speculation, let’s at least make it coherent, to paraphrase Mark Twain… ◺
Canadá les hace la eutanasia a los pobres y discapacitados
9/05/2024
https://www.lahaine.org/mundo.php/canada-les-hace-la-eutanasia
El programa de suicidio asistido se asemeja cada vez más a una sustitución distópica de los servicios asistenciales, cambiando el bienestar social por la eutanasia, que es más barata. ..
Euthanasia in Canada in its legal voluntary form is called Medical Assistance in Dying (MAiD, also spelled MAID) and it first became legal along with assisted suicide in June 2016 for those whose death was reasonably foreseeable. In March 2021, the law was further amended by Bill C-7 which to include those suffering from a grievous and irremediable condition whose death was not reasonably foreseeable. According to the Fourth Annual Report on MAID, there were 13,241 MAID deaths reported in Canada in 2022.[1] ..
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Euthanasia_in_Canada
US official admits that there are American-funded biolabs in Ukraine
09.03.2022
https://news.am/eng/news/690459.html
Russia issues latest report on US-funded biolabs in Ukraine
March 14, 2023
1939 Nazi rally at Madison Square Garden
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1939_Nazi_rally_at_Madison_Square_Garden
On February 20, 1939, a Nazi rally took place at Madison Square Garden, organized by the German American Bund. More than 20,000 people attended, and Fritz Julius Kuhn was a featured speaker. The Bund billed the event, which took place two days before George Washington's Birthday, as a pro-”Americanism” rally; the stage at the event featured a huge Washington portrait with swastikas on each side.[1] …
France pension protests are a reminder: Americans have an even harder path to retirement
Mar 9, 2023
16b- ✔ And you can’t blame the Yellow Vests protests or Yellow Jackets for that. ◺
The Yellow Vests Protests or Yellow Jackets Protests or Yellow Vests Revolution (French: Mouvement des gilets jaunes, pronounced [muvmɑ̃ de ʒilɛ ʒon]) are a series of populist,[66] grassroots[67] weekly protests in France that began on 17 November 2018. At first the protestors advocated economic justice;[68][69] later they called for institutional political reforms.[citation needed]…
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Yellow_vests_protests
Protests erupt in France after president pushes plan to raise retirement age
ABC News
https://youtu.be/e9y2DKDK5gA ,3-17-23
0:00 “the violent protests in France..”
16c- ✔ If such were to occur let’s say in Cuba or Venezuela, then the BS corporate media, in English & Spanish, would be calling the protesters brave heroes and heralding finally the fall of the “regime”. U.S. politicos would demand “the political prisoners to be freed”, and used as pretext to sharpen the gallows of the blockade. Emmanuel Macron, ex-investment banker, is doing this by decree not by voting. Compare in paragraphs 44a- , 48- , 69- ◺
Protestas de agricultores paralizan el corazón de Europa
https://youtu.be/Hk30FY3dPzk?si=p7DoNU-WoZnRd9Sr
,26-02-24
A leading medical institution created a simulation that shows how a new disease could kill 900 million people— and it reveals how unprepared we are. The Clade X simulation, created by the Johns Hopkins Center for Health Security.
2018
The US cooperated with the Soviets on smallpox – it should do the same with China on COVID-19 vaccine distribution, 2020
Coronavirus (COVID-19) deaths worldwide per one million population as of July 13, 2022, by country
https://www.statista.com/statistics/1104709/coronavirus-deaths-worldwide-per-million-inhabitants/
COVID-19 pandemic death rates by country
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/COVID-19_pandemic_death_rates_by_country
✔ Every year there’s a ceremony, and memorials, for the 9/11 victims in the U.S. (but not for the U.S.-led coup in Chile 9-11-73...), nor to commemorate the U.S. deaths from the COVID-19 pandemic… ◺
Daily average deaths from COVID in the U.S., plus other data, as of this writing on Feb. 16, 2023 , updated daily
https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2021/us/covid-cases.html
Study compares COVID vaccine with immunity from infection CBS News
https://youtu.be/DCzmtt5-b3A ,02-20-23
COVID-19 vaccination linked to fewer cardiac events, strokes First U.S. study to show lower risk in patients following SARS-CoV-2 infection
February 20, 2023
https://www.mountsinai.org/about/newsroom/2023/covid-vaccination-linked-to-fewer-cardiac-events
https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2023/02/230220121931.htm
Idaho bill would criminalize giving mRNA vaccines – the tech used in popular COVID vaccines,
Feb 21, 2023
https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/nation/2023/02/21/idaho-mrna-covid-19-vaccines/11316055002/
FDA fines e-cigarette makers for selling products illegally in ‘wakeup call’ to tobacco manufacturers
https://www.cnn.com/2023/02/22/business/fda-fines-ecigs/index.html
Feb 22, 2023
How to avoid lead and cadmium in chocolate,
February 16, 2023
https://www.yahoo.com/lifestyle/avoid-lead-cadmium-chocolate-160000783.html
The bittersweet reality behind chocolate
https://youtu.be/g6a6o10ouZ0?si=uC2MS7Y5qgxH3dtu ,10-08-23
US Marines raid a home in Afghanistan and kill a couple accused of being terrorists. One of the marines adopts the couple’s baby and takes her to the US. Now, the family of those murdered accuse him of kidnapping the baby. A horror movie
[Joshua Mast ]
https://twitter.com/brunosgarzini/status/1628404745479065600 thread Feb 22, 2023
U.S. Marine couple at center of custody battle over Afghanistan war orphan tells their story.
January 25, 2023
17- ✔ The U.S.’s ruling class & politicians shed crocodile tears every time a mass shooting happens in U.S. soil, each party dumps on the other. They express their “thoughts and prayers” for the victims & families; yet Congress increasingly approves sending weapons to the war in Ukraine, not only since Feb. 2022, but since 2014… To them human life is very cheap, they know no other way.
I tweeted MSNBC’s Mehdi Hasan on this in May 2022. Expectedly he didn’t respond. My intent was to bring on a cognitive dissonance at such selectivity. [see paragraph 16a- again on: ..more deaths gun-related in U.S. than in Ukraine!.. ]
U.S. troops pillage grain silos from the occupied area of the Hasakah countryside, in Syria’s northeast, this alongside crude oil, moving them to Iraq.. As a coup de grâce, it also sanctions Syria (I.e. Caesar Syria Civilian Protection Act of 2019) and blames Assad’s government for war crimes on civilians! The United Nations General Assembly has condemned such extraterritorial sanctions as illegal. U.S. compliant media of course ignores all that, and rather as projection accuses Russian ships of carrying stolen grain from northern Ukraine, then via Crimea towards the Syrian port of Latakia, and on to other points in the Middle East. Corporate media = public relations for pirate Uncle Sam and its oligarchy, for the most part. Incidentally, on the devastating earthquake in the border of Türkiye and Syria on Monday 02-06-23, Syrian officials have pointed out the impacts of economic/financial sanctions by the U.S. & Europe, which increase the suffering, hamper relief. And yet again, yellow western media won’t say a peep on this and rather gives an Academy Award performance of pity, human drama, a surviving baby, the bitter cold, tractors & rubble, humanitarian aid from abroad or rich nations rather… ◺
CDC: Suicide, homicide rates increased sharply among young Americans
June 15, 2023
Are Japan-style earthquake-proof buildings the future of real estate?
February 17, 2023
AI-driven earthquake forecasting shows promise in trials
October 5, 2023
https://phys.org/news/2023-10-ai-driven-earthquake-trials.html
..Developed
by researchers at The University of Texas at Austin, the AI algorithm
correctly predicted 70% of earthquakes a week before they happened
during a seven-month trial in China..
Indian portal praises work of Cuban doctors in Türkiye,
Feb 21 2023
Demi Moore gets emotional in new IG post about Bruce Willis and his health,
February 17, 2023
https://news.yahoo.com/demi-moore-gets-emotional-ig-162800833.html
✔ If humanity would devote efforts to solving urgent problems instead of, let’s say, wars and other waste, then you wouldn’t see so much pain. But as the maestro Ali Primera sang: “..hacen faltan muchas cosas para conseguir la paz..” (”...many things are needed to achieve peace...”), although today there may be fewer… ◺
Matthew 4: 3-4, 8-10 (New Testament)
✔ It begs the question, why would the Devil offer such if the world wasn’t “his”? And why would God even expect Satan to worship and serve him?… And how does it relate to Genesis 1: 26-31. Job 1: 6-16, 2: 1-10. 1Chronicles 21: 1. Psalm 109: 6. Zechariah 3: 1-2. John 19: 10-11. Mark 12: 15-17 ?... Just sayin’. In Hebrew, Satan or Ha-Satan, means accuser or adversary…
Mo’ Yeshiva for ya, in Jewish religious tradition this might be known as Midrash, meaning an interpretive act, exegesis, seeking the answers to religious questions (practical and theological) by delving into the meaning of the words of the Torah.. Matthew 12: 24-31. John 16: 29-30. Matthew 9: 16-17.. ◺
Spirits in the material world- The Police
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Spirits_in_the_Material_World
..The lyrics comment on the nature of man's existence and the failure of his earthly institutions..
Spirits in the material world (1981)- The Police
https://youtu.be/BHOevX4DlGk?si=TbL039GQKORUq3Vi ,02-23-10
#music
✔ Just a guessum, if Madonna as Prometheus brought this premise to her plane in her 1984 single: Material girl… 😐 ◺
The creator has a master plan- Dezron Douglas, Brandee Younger
April 2, 2021 #music
The prayer (1971)- Joe Bataan
https://sammydeli.blogspot.com/2022/05/the-prayer-1971-lyrics-joe-bataan.html
#music
In heaven (2016)– Gregory Porter
#music
Paseando por la mezquita, letras- Medina Azahara
https://www.letras.com/medina-azahara/560189/
Paseando por la mezquita (1979)- Medina Azahara
https://youtu.be/7vAPOPzDiKo?si=iE5BtaouRNZMuPns ,11-08-14
#música
The first flower ever dedicated to Camilo Cienfuegos in Cuba
28 October, 2016
http://en.escambray.cu/2016/the-first-flower-ever-dedicated-to-camilo-cienfuegos/
Inhuman en Cuba cenizas de Gino Doné, italiano expedicionario del yate Granma
https://youtu.be/FthoKBNSDU4?si=N7jCqJ-8gm2taJQb ,02-12-23
Karl Marx in “A contribution to the critique of Hegel’s philosophy of right” (1843): “..Religious suffering is, at one and the same time, the expression of real suffering and a protest against real suffering. Religion is the sigh of the oppressed creature, the heart of a heartless world, and the soul of soulless conditions. It is the opium of the people. The abolition of religion as the illusory happiness of the people is the demand for their real happiness. To call on them to give up their illusions about their condition is to call on them to give up a condition that requires illusions. The criticism of religion is, therefore, in embryo, the criticism of that vale of tears of which religion is the halo.. ..The criticism of religion disillusions man, so that he will think, act, and fashion his reality like a man who has discarded his illusions and regained his senses, so that he will move around himself as his own true Sun. Religion is only the illusory Sun which revolves around man as long as he does not revolve around himself. It is, therefore, the task of history, once the other-world of truth has vanished, to establish the truth of this world. It is the immediate task of philosophy, which is in the service of history, to unmask self-estrangement in its unholy forms once the holy form of human self-estrangement has been unmasked. Thus, the criticism of Heaven turns into the criticism of Earth, the criticism of religion into the criticism of law, and the criticism of theology into the criticism of politics..”
Fidel & Religion: Conversations with Frei Betto on Marxism & Liberation Theology, paperback – June 1, 2006
https://www.amazon.com/Fidel-Religion-Conversations-Liberation-Theology/dp/1920888454
“..Revolution is a sense of the historical moment; it is to change everything that must be changed; it is full equality and freedom; it is to be treated and treat others as human beings; it is to emancipate ourselves and with our own efforts..” - Fidel Castro, May 1, 2000.
“..Let me tell you, at the risk of sounding ridiculous, that the true revolutionary is guided by great feelings of love. It is impossible to think of an authentic revolutionary without this quality. Perhaps it is one of the great dramas of the leader; It must unite a passionate spirit, a cold mind and make painful decisions without contracting a muscle. Our vanguard revolutionaries have to idealize that love for the people..” - Che Guevara in “Socialism and man in Cuba” (1965)
Jean-Paul Sartre on the meaning of life
December 1, 2015
https://reasonandmeaning.com/2015/12/01/jean-paul-sartre-on-the-meaning-of-life/
..But even if there were gods it would make no difference, human beings would still have to create their own values and meanings for their lives to be valuable and meaningful. Summary – Human beings are not artifacts with a pre-existing essence; they are subjects who must freely choose to create their own meaning.
Jean-Paul Sartre: man and the meaning of life
January 10, 2020
https://excellencereporter.com/2020/01/10/jean-paul-sartre-man-and-the-meaning-of-life/
.. Life has no meaning a priori… It is up to you to give it a meaning, and value is nothing but the meaning that you choose ..
✔ Caught this 👇 the other night (August-September ? 2024 ) on the Comet tv channel.
The X-Files, Detour, season 5 episode 4, 2:11 clip. It’s possible the writer had Jean-Paul Sartre’s existentialism above in mind when doing the script.
Genesis 1: 3-4.
In the post : E-ssay (ey ese, electronic say), 4-13-23 , look at article → The strange (but appealing) idea that life is a consequence of entropy
◺
“La muerte no es verdad cuando se ha cumplido bien la obra de la vida”- José Martí (Death is not true when the work of life has been well accomplished) Considerations of José Martí about death in his poetic works (in Spanish)
May 19, 2021
✔ By considering the lives of the deceased, we can also understand the meanings or purpose of our own. ◺
‘Foreign agents’ law: Why are protests taking place in Georgia?
8 Mar 2023
https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2023/3/8/foreign-agents-law-why-are-protests-taking-place-in
..The bill would have required Georgian organisations receiving more than 20 percent of their funding from abroad to register as “foreign agents” or face fines. Georgian Dream previously said the law was necessary to unmask critics of the Georgian Orthodox Church, one of the country’s most powerful institutions..
Donald Trump, the Bible, and White supremacy
June 12, 2020
https://hds.harvard.edu/news/2020/06/12/donald-trump-bible-and-white-supremacy
New York Daily News April 02, 2023
City Council calls on Mayor Adams to restore pre-K, 3-K budget cuts
May 15, 2024
https://www.amny.com/news/nyc-pre-k-child-care-budget-cuts/
QBP Richards, advocates rally to demand Mayor Adams restore funding to City’s libraries
May 17, 2024
https://qns.com/2024/05/qbp-richards-advocates-rally-mayor-adams-restore-funding-libraries/
Mayor Adams talks zoning rules, employment records, migrants, and more
May 20, 2024
https://omny.fm/shows/winsam-on-demand/live-on-1010-wins-mayor-adams-talks-zoning-rules-e
- audio -
Prosecutors indict NYC Mayor Adams for corruption
https://youtu.be/aShjQ89UgOc?si=KkYdXO4ABc91jWUj ,9-26-24
Federal prosecutors have indicted New York city Mayor Eric Adams on charges that he took bribes, illegal campaign contributions and gifts from Turkish businessmen and officials. ..
.. Adams held his own news conference where he denied wrong-doing and claimed he was being persecuted. ..
After arraignment, Trump’s lawyers have ‘nothing to rely on’
Reuters
https://youtu.be/n-afeGMNlDE April 5, 2023
✔ I made & posted this video meme on 9-07-21. The dude is such a punching bag…
But will he go over the top in 2024?
◺
Bidenworld MELTDOWN, Trump obliterates POTUS in new national poll
https://youtu.be/zpqHzp4IgNs?si=5BOoM_Vp6arRsABL
,11-19-23
Ray Dalio thinks we’re headed for civil war, and a shocking fact about new legislation shows why
Feb 9, 2022
https://finance.yahoo.com/news/ray-dalio-thinks-headed-civil-220000696.html
‘We are on the brink’ One in three chance of civil war, warns billionaire investors
May 18, 2024
.. He clarified that the “civil war” he sees is not one where people “grab guns and start shooting” but one where people stop seeing the middle ground in politics. But he imagines, “People move to different states that are more aligned with what they want and they don’t follow the decisions of federal authorities of the opposite political persuasion,” Mr Dalio said. Studies have shown that Americans are growing more politically polarized now than ever before. A Pew Research Poll found that only 32 percent of Americans have a roughly equal number of conservative and liberal positions – compared to 49 percent in 2004. ..
✔ I
commented on this videoclip on 9-22-22 the following way: ◺
✔ The English kinglet Charles III (el reyezuelo inglés Carlos III):
“..Mommy
¿qué será lo que quiere el
negro?..” 🎵
Ed Sullivan: “Ladies and gentlemen, the fifth Beatle !”
🎸 “..I wanna hold your hand..” 🎶 ◺
Esquerita and the Voola, November 19, 2019 #music
..and Esquerita died, a victim of AIDS who was buried in an unmarked grave on Hart Island, New York.. ..“I think Little Richard copied off him a lot, but Little Richard got to the studio first,” Lightin’ Lee, a New Orleans guitar player who knew both men, recently told me..
https://www.oxfordamerican.org/magazine/item/1857-esquerita-and-the-voola https://twitter.com/baynardwoods/status/1259145496251240448 ,5-09-20
https://pancocojams.blogspot.com/2014/08/public-enemy-dont-believe-hype-lyrics.html August 15, 2014
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Don%27t_Believe_the_Hype
https://youtu.be/_s2zKPH60dg lyrics ,02-22-17
https://youtu.be/1INb5FM_1lE live ,7-10-10
#music
✔ 18- The western media has talked much of the Chinese weather balloon (or balloons) after entering U.S. airspace (Alaska and Canada), and shot down after being labeled of spying. What context is missing from the story? For one, such balloons soar over skies all the time.. China has insisted the balloon (60,000 feet in the air) blew off course. Besides, all governments spy on each other, and nothing as large in scope as what Washington does: ◺
U.S. court: mass surveillance program exposed by Snowden was illegal https://www.reuters.com/article/us-usa-nsa-spying-idUSKBN25T3CK
September 2, 2020
PRISM, Snowden and government surveillance: 6 things you need to know https://www.cloudwards.net/prism-snowden-and-government-surveillance/
Oct 20, 2021
✔ There’s a lot of hot air behind the U.S. story of the Chinese balloon. The Biden admin, to score points, is posing like it’s standing up to the dragon, but if China really wanted to spy why not use drones or satellites which are more effective and harder to spot? “Why wait” to February 4th 2023 to shoot it down off the coast of South Carolina (already in Atlantic ocean) ? This campaign just seems to prep up the US & European population to see China as a threat (it’s being tried before, I.e. COVID-19 pandemic), also to torpedo negotiations on the issue of Taiwan in semiconductors & sea routes.. Also to deviate attention from the recently uncovered story by Pulitzer-winner reporter Seymour Hersh on Uncle Sam blowing up the Nord Stream 2 pipeline (a German / Russian joint venture). Another possible motive is to avoid talking about the recent Russian military advances in East Ukraine, by which NATO members are even running low in their own weapons’ supplies.. And still another theory floated out there is the “spy balloon” story is a cover-up for the Ohio train derailment with toxic chemicals, where animals are reported dead, and a reporter was even arrested... Keep in mind the 2022 rail workers’ strike over benefits & safety though… ◺
Banning drones from China has hurt U.S. ability to fight forest fires
10/20/21
https://www.newsweek.com/banning-drones-china-hurt-us-ability-fight-forest-fires-1640536
China uses drone army to stop wildfires, and the U.S. is lagging behind
Oct. 18, 2022
https://www.thedailybeast.com/china-uses-drone-army-to-stop-wildfires-and-the-us-is-lag
..China’s leading drone makers, including DJI, have been funded by the country’s government and military, including the makers of the drones used to fight back Chongqing's wildfires..
2022 United States railroad labor dispute
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2022_United_States_railroad_labor_dispute
Some rail workers say Biden “turned his back on us” in deal to avert rail strike,
Dec 2, 2022
https://www.npr.org/2022/12/02/1140265413/rail-workers-biden-unions-freight-railroads-averted-strike
Why ‘Union Joe’ chose to make it illegal for rail workers to strike,
Dec 2, 2022
https://time.com/6238361/joe-biden-rail-strike-illegal/
Biden has backstabbed rail workers and betrayed union allies,
Dec 2, 2022
https://finance.yahoo.com/news/biden-backstabbed-rail-workers-betrayed-095759570.html
EPA orders Norfolk Southern pay for Ohio train derailment costs
TODAY
https://youtu.be/LMjtpAgX7EM ,02-22-23
As Norfolk Southern faces NTSB investigation, train derailments are more common than you might think
March 7, 2023
https://time.com/6260906/train-derailmentments-how-common/
Minnesota power plant leaks 400,000 gallons of radioactive water
NBC News
https://youtu.be/iy1DNxkVUT0 ,3-18-23
White House denies Seymour Hersh report that U.S. sabotaged Nord Stream pipelines, Feb 9, 2023
Seymour Hersh’s pipeline bombing story is being challenged,
Feb 12, 2023
Legendary journalist Seymour Hersh under fire for his reporting on the Nord Stream pipeline sabotage
February 28, 2023
The attack on #Nordstream was a premeditated terrorist attack on critical European infrastructure and the #EU still doesn’t want to know who did it. Are we now so subservient to #US Empire that we can’t even ask them if they did it..? What in God’s name has happened to Europe...?
Nord Stream
https://twitter.com/wallacemick/status/1631372255321006086
Mar 2, 2023
Trump attacks DeSantis on social media
CNN
https://youtu.be/igsruoLCOQo ,02-19-23
Flashback 2018: Trump warned UN about relying on Russian oil, was laughed at by German delegation, 2022
19- ✔ For those also who think the Republicans are gentler in foreign policy than the Democrats…, and for those also who accused Trump of being a Russian or Putin sock puppet {Russiagate}.. My take is, that was a Democrat or liberal diversion for not facing up to Hillary losing to Trump in 2016, and not facing up that the Electoral College should be repealed… not an easy task. Trump’s camp (MAGA cult) likewise hatched the Pizzagate conspiracy theory blaming Democratic officials of human trafficking and running a child sex ring. Later in 2020 the MAGA crowd wrongly accused the Democrats of committing fraud, which fueled The Capitol insurrection in January 06, 2021. Political kabuki theater. Trump was the one instead pressuring Georgia officials to “find” enough votes to overturn the presidential results! Rudolph Giuliani also a central figure in the attempt to change the vote tallies. Most U.S. politicians, and in this case Trump, are opportunistic (I.e. calling COVID-19 the Chinese virus). They say one thing when convenient, be it during elections or before lobbyists. Let’s remember that Trump among other hijinks, approved to assassinate Iranian General Qasem Soleimani in 2020 in Baghdad-Iraq.. The 2000 U.S. presidentials were clearly stolen in favor of Republican Baby Bush, and unlike what U.S. agencies perpetrate abroad, there was no foreign intervention.. The 2024 U.S. elections will point to many things, among them the unpopularity of both Biden and Trump. A crossroads to the flailing U.S. empire as it faces stiff opposition abroad, and difficulties at home... ◺
George H. W. Bush- I will never apologize for the United States of America - I don't care what the facts are. Said after 'Vincennes' shot down an Iranian Airliner.
https://www.azquotes.com/quote/853396
George H. W. Bush - "I don't care what the facts are"
2 August 1988
https://www.c-span.org/video/?c4763550/user-clip-george-h-w-bush-i-care-facts-are
Iran Air Flight 655 was a scheduled passenger flight from Tehran to Dubai via Bandar Abbas that was shot down on 3 July 1988 by two SM-2MR surface-to-air missiles fired by USS Vincennes, a guided-missile cruiser of the United States Navy. .. .. t was also the deadliest airliner shootdown incident until 2014 when Malaysia Airlines Flight 17 was shot down over Ukraine.[20][21] ..
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Iran_Air_Flight_655
Cornel West is running for president to dismantle the US empire- The Bottom Line
https://youtu.be/AGrUWCMPyIs ,6-22-23
Robert F. Kennedy Jr. tops Biden and Trump in new favorability poll
Jun 14, 2023
RFK discovers right-wing media is not his friend anymore
The Majority Report w/ Sam Seder
https://youtu.be/lwggZ9otwBs?si=NumHhx042n5GyAnQ
,10-11-23
We investigated RFK Jr.'s donors. They have a secret goal.
https://youtu.be/qLtL6afShA0?si=TROeHoxJTh7Lqctq ,3-26-24
RFK Jr. touts NewsNation as ‘straight up and down the line’ - Chris Cuomo
https://youtu.be/TLXOPxiKaN8?si=_nopno59YcM7NOBm
,3-27-24
RFK Jr's presidential bid is shaking up an unpopular rematch — but will he ultimately help Joe Biden or Donald Trump?
25 Jun 2024
How would Robert F. Kennedy Jr. quitting affect the Harris-Trump race?
8/23/2024
.. It's unclear how Kennedy's exit would affect the presidential race. A Pew Research Center poll this month suggested that Vice President Kamala Harris has picked up would-be Kennedy supporters. It appeared that backing came in some measure from women and non-white voters who previously were leaning toward Kennedy. ..
Poll shows why Biden should be ‘a little concerned’ about Cornel West
Jul 8, 2023
Cornel West; I want to head the empire to dismantle it, NATO is an instrument of U.S. global power
July 14, 2023
Third-party presidential candidate Cornel West spoke about how he would take command of the American Global Empire in order to dismantle it, during an interview Thursday evening with CNN’s Kaitlan Collins…
✔ missing from Collins’ assertions is that Russia & Ukraine had a peace deal in the works back in April 2022, but Boris Johnson of the 🇬🇧 UK and of course Washington, had other ideas. Since the U.S. wanted to sidetrack Russia as Europe’s energy provider, plus sell more weapons to Ukraine & NATO, also profit from reconstruction, etc, it nipped in the bud any sensible peace deal, be it China mediated or African nations’ mediated. Just good old-fashioned piracy folks. ◺
Democrats get a third-party hopeful knocked off Pennsylvania ballot, as Cornel West tries to get on
August 21, 2024
https://apnews.com/article/pennsylvania-ballot-2024-west-kennedy-cc5507101bcd198028b04945d2d03aa3
Pennsylvania Democrats have won legal challenges keeping the left-wing Party for Socialism and Liberation off the battleground state’s presidential ballot, at least for now, while a lawyer with deep Republican Party ties is working to help independent candidate Cornel West get on it. ..
Steve Kornacki: Biden’s standing hits new low amid Israel-Hamas war | NBC news poll
https://youtu.be/AZg87yuAg_0?si=iTkduiVZVYI3m85Z
,11-19-23
Why “Hillary spoiler, Putin puppet” Jill Stein is putting herself through hell
https://youtu.be/c3gEJWENooo?si=SuUzhgwlURPjd9Wy
,12-09-23
✔ 6:30 – 8:00 Jill
Stein’s campaign also investigated for the 2016 Russian collusion
myth in the U.S. election, 'Russiagate'. Nothing found, obviously... Well paid 🇺🇸 newscasters & late-night buffoon talk shows instead didn't bother to hearken, that in the 1990's, rather it was 🇺🇸 agencies who more than MEDDLED in Russian elections !! Ant not only in Russia !! The U.S. empire is senile. ◺
Report; Russia, Ukraine tentatively agreed on peace deal in April
August 31, 2022
https://news.antiwar.com/2022/08/31/report-russia-ukraine-tentatively-agreed-on-peace-deal-in-april/
Inside the US factory making Ukraine’s most important ammo
https://youtu.be/wRtYyjvYTWk ,8-06-23
7:48 “ ..94% of recorded cluster bomb deaths are civilians.. the U.S. has already sent thousands to Ukraine.. Biden has said it’s only a temporary solution..”
If Ukraine with the might of the Atlantic alliance at its back cannot prevail against Russian aggression, then what is the point of Nato? My article in today’s Sunday Telegraph.
https://twitter.com/vikianuk/status/1670459979906646016 Jun 18, 2023 https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/world/prepare-for-ukraines-counter-offensive-to-falter/ar-AA1cGrfh ,6-17-23
✔ Richard Kemp is some piece of work.. Shows some geopolitical acumen in his article on Ukraine-NATO-Russia (going by his tweet’s title, though not entirely, I.e. “Russian aggression”… I haven’t read the article); yet when it comes to examining the situation with Iran-Israel-nuclear weapons, he fumbles yet again the ball… Sore loser. I wonder how much weight R. Kelly, er R. Kemp really has among Washington D.C.’s circuit.. ◺
Biden’s appeasement of Iran. My article at @ynetnews today.
https://twitter.com/COLRICHARDKEMP/status/1670417874786066432
Jun 18, 2023
..Despite the catalogue of foreign policy failures that arose directly from craven weakness in Washington, the White House does not seem to have learned that deterrence is the most effective means of averting war and remains fearful not only of wielding a credible military threat against Iran but also of Israel doing so.. ..Tehran has become the main weapons supplier to Russia, providing thousands of killer drones that have been used to aid and abet war crimes against Ukrainian civilians..
International Court of Justice orders US to compensate Iran for frozen assets
March 30, 2023
✔ Where there is ample proof of foreign elections’ meddling is by an Israeli team.. The source who broke the story is The Guardian, clearly a publication with no Russian sympathies. But mainstream media & U.S. politicos of course will ignore it hence the perpetrator’s surname is not Hananov (play on Russian). ◺
Revealed: the hacking and disinformation team meddling in elections
14 Feb 2023
A team of Israeli contractors who claim to have manipulated more than 30 elections around the world using hacking, sabotage and automated disinformation on social media has been exposed in a new investigation. The unit is run by Tal Hanan, a 50-year-old former Israeli special forces operative who now works privately using the pseudonym “Jorge”, and appears to have been working under the radar in elections in various countries for more than two decades... ..One of Team Jorge’s key services is a sophisticated software package, Advanced Impact Media Solutions, or Aims. It controls a vast army of thousands of fake social media profiles on Twitter, LinkedIn, Facebook, Telegram, Gmail, Instagram and YouTube. Some avatars even have Amazon accounts with credit cards, bitcoin wallets and Airbnb accounts…
It ain’t necessarily so: how the media remake our picture of reality, paperback– September 24, 2002. By David Murray, Joel Schwartz, S. Robert Lichter
https://www.amazon.com/Aint-Necessarily-So-Picture-Reality/dp/0142001465
Into the buzzsaw: leading journalists expose the myth of a free press- paperback, 2004. By Kristina Borjesson
https://www.amazon.com/Into-Buzzsaw-LEADING-JOURNALISTS-EXPOSE/dp/1591022304
Into the buzzsaw and information war
February 15, 2005
https://www.c-span.org/video/?185666-1/into-buzzsaw-information-war
Systems designed to detect deepfakes can be defeated, computer scientists show for the first time
February 8, 2021
https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2021/02/210208161927.htm
Anti-Russian sentiment
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anti-Russian_sentiment
..Following the dissolution of the Soviet Union in 1991, and the collapse of Communism, anti-Russian sentiment has been steadily increasing in the United States during the 1990s. According to a Gallup poll, 59% of surveyed Americans viewed Russia negatively in 1999, compared to 25% in 1991.[48] ...
Beware of the resurgent Russophobia
1 Apr 2022
https://www.aljazeera.com/opinions/2022/4/1/beware-of-the-resurgent-russophobia
..What has Dostoyevsky to do with Putin? We might as well ban Faulkner because we oppose the Ku Klux Klan – or stop reading Emile Zola because we do not like Marine Le Pen. What sheer sophomoric puerility is this?..
The paradox of American Russophobia
July 03, 2019
https://www.russiamatters.org/analysis/paradox-american-russophobia
..”The Russian government’s current use of Russophobia is nothing new. The Russian charge of Russophobia has been in use since 1867, when Fyodor Tyutchev coined it, ironically in French, to chastise Russian liberals who demonized the autocracy and ‘cherish[ed] Europe.’..
White House refutes Russia’s account of Black Sea drone incident
NBC News
https://youtu.be/yKnj42xrr50 ,3-17-23
0:47 “..to combat the narrative..” ✔ Everything is a combat to these chickenhawks. Let’s remember the bemoaning they raised earlier during the Chinese “spy” balloon over U.S. airspace. The Pentagon is instead overtly supplying weapons & intel to Kiev in a war against Russia & Donbas region. An MQ-9 Reaper drone is clearly for spying & attack, while a big balloon is not.. 1:48 What’s intentional is the U.S.’s hostile maneuvers near Russia’s borders, way before the Russian military operation in Ukraine of February 24, 2022! ◺
✔ If you can’t beat them, leave them the f**k alone (parody), subtítulos, subtitles https://sammydeli.blogspot.com/2023/02/if-you-cant-beat-them-leave-them-fk.html
◺
South Korea on alert after over 90 balloons from North Korea reportedly drop trash and excrement near border
5/28/24
https://www.abc.net.au/news/2024-05-29/north-korea-garbage-balloon-on-south-korea/103908072
Russia and the U.S. team up in space to relocate Soyuz to new ISS port
CBS News
https://youtu.be/lrRsGjelL2w ,4-06-23
Arrest warrant for Putin only exposes the cowardice of the ICC
21 Mar 2023
..The UK is a party to the Rome statute, the treaty that established the ICC, and played a leading negotiating role at a time when it believed in the international rule of law. However, the key protagonists in the Ukraine war are not. Russia is not a party to the statute, yet the arrest warrant names its president. Ukraine is not a party, although the crimes are alleged to have been committed on its territory..
US threatens to arrest ICC judges if they pursue Americans for Afghan war crimes
11/09/2018
International Criminal Court officials sanctioned by US
2 September 2020
https://www.bbc.com/news/world-us-canada-54003527
Trust in media is so low that half of Americans now believe that news organizations deliberately mislead them.
February 15, 2023
Accurate forecasts would be almost impossible without weather balloons, 2021
‘UFO’ in Congo jungle turns out to be internet balloon,
8-25-20
https://www.reuters.com/article/us-congo-balloon-idUSKBN25L2GU
The Chinese balloon looks nothing like a weather balloon, experts say,
Feb 4, 2023
https://time.com/6253002/chinese-balloon-weather-balloon-experts/
..Porter explains that this balloon was detected so quickly and raised alarms because of its massive size.. ..Based on the photos that have been going around, there’s obviously a lot more equipment on this one. This has been traveling at a much longer distance than what would be these standard weather balloons.. ..so the idea of China making such dramatic upgrades to one of its weather balloons would be very surprising..
OHIO: US media are barely covering a massive environmental disaster unfolding there after a train carrying vinyl chloride derailed and exploded. A journalist reporting the incident has been arrested. This disaster would not occur in China. Why? A short thread.
https://twitter.com/AndyBxxx/status/1625037588766801920
thread Feb 13, 2023
#Ohio declares itself part of #Ukraine in hopes of receiving aid from {the} Biden Administration. Now finally #Biden & #FEMA are on the way to help the people of West Ukraine (formerly known as Ohio). #EastPalestineOhio #OhioChemicalDisaster
https://twitter.com/mikefoley2020/status/1627045486938169346
Feb 18, 2023
Some conservatives in the U.S. have accused Biden of neglecting issues at home by making the trip to Kyiv.
https://twitter.com/Newsweek/status/1627825486960160769
Feb 20, 2023
No one should talk about what is happening in Ukraine without seeing this: ¼ On May 2, 2014, Ucronazis mass murdered citizens of Odessa who were protesting against the coup. They were burned alive, and those who jumped out of the windows were finished off on the floor.
https://twitter.com/Veoloquecreo/status/1630785197888139264
thread Feb 28, 2023
What we know about the mysterious objects the U.S. keeps shooting out of the sky,
Feb 14, 2023
..But there is so far no evidence that the last three objects had any links to China, let alone to spycraft. The three were not sending detectable communications signals and did not appear to have maneuvering capabilities.. ..The relatively low heights where the three objects flew have added to the puzzle..
Rumors swirl about balloons, UFOs as officials stay mum, 2-14-23
..One of the most popular theories suggested the White House and Pentagon are using the airborne devices to divert attention from a chemical spill earlier this month in Ohio.. ..China’s government apparently took notice. On Tuesday Chinese Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Hua Chunying tweeted a link to news coverage of the Ohio chemical leak and added #OhioChernobyl, a hashtag used in many posts that suggest the incident is being covered up..
More BS: John Kirby says Chinese balloon program operated during previous Presidency but they did not detect it, we detected it (VIDEO),
February 14, 2023
..After the first China balloon was allowed to pass over the US unmolested last week the latest line by this regime is to blame Trump.. ..The Pentagon last week claimed there were SIX Chinese spy balloons spotted over US territory during the Trump years..
UFO shot down over Canada probably belonged to hobby group from Illinois,
Feb 16, 2023
Biden says no evidence yet that unidentified flying objects were tied to China spying,
Feb 16, 2023
Biden says three of the objects shot down were not linked to China
CBS News
https://youtu.be/ymrsOy9-itU ,02-17-23
Los globos espía que EE.UU. Lanzó sobre China y la URSS en los años 50 https://www.bbc.com/mundo/noticias-internacional-64653855
Feb 19 2023
..El proyecto Genetrix tuvo resultados limitados. Según una fuente, unas 45 de las aproximadamente 512 góndolas fueron recuperadas y apenas 32 produjeron fotografías utilizables.. ..Aunque Eisenhower anunció el fin del programa, la Fuerza Aérea de EE.UU. Continuó hasta 1958 con el desarrollo de globos espías, pero sin mucho éxito. Además, la llegada de la tecnología satelital se encargó de implantar un sistema mucho más efectivo que hoy en día le permite a varios países captar en detalle toda la superficie global.
China's spy balloon: What we've learned
https://youtu.be/mTq2FwiSq5o?si=_rpecTVx3ubkX7Hk ,9-17-23
✔ In YT HamperofHats commented ◺ :
@HamperofHats 1 hour ago (edited)
38 likes, 3 replies
With the way things are going, this feels like it happened 5 years ago. "Oh, yeah. That happened." "It was a spy balloon that didn't spy," both makes sense because China.
Jorge Ramos from Univision brings up ufologist Jaime Maussan…
¿Qué son los objetos voladores derribados por EEUU y Canadá? ,
19-02-23
Ex-Navy pilot says he saw UFOs that did things his plane could not do
CNN
https://youtu.be/BxgOqOKD_Jo ,3-01-23
Mysterious flying objects could be sign of extraterrestrials, draft Harvard report says
NBC News
https://youtu.be/ZLE5v0e-p5M Mar 8, 2023
Pentagon officials suggest alien mothership in our solar system could send mini probes to Earth
March 14, 2023
https://news.yahoo.com/pentagon-officials-suggest-alien-mothership-010912602.html
Researchers claimed to have found a way to build a spacecraft that can travel at one-fifth of the speed of light, making traveling to another solar system a reality. Read the article to learn how this could be possible.
https://twitter.com/ScienceTimesCom/status/1632969649213022209
Mar 7, 2023
Life: Modern physics can’t explain it—but our new theory, which says time is fundamental, might
April 5, 2023
https://phys.org/news/2023-04-life-modern-physics-itbut-theory.html
..Even today, we can’t really explain what the difference is between a living lump of matter and a dead one. But my colleagues and I are creating a new physics of life that might soon provide answers.. ..A key conjecture of assembly theory is that, as objects become more complex, the number of unique parts that make it up increases, and so does the need for local memory to store how to assemble the object from its unique parts.. ..Ultimately, time is intrinsic to our experiences of the world, and it is necessary for evolution to happen. If we want physics to be capable of explaining life—and us—it may be that we need to treat time as a material property for the first time in physics..
How humans can escape the simulation, according to scientists
Mar 24, 2023
https://www.popularmechanics.com/technology/a43402092/how-to-escape-the-simulation/
..A computer scientist at the University of Louisville explores ways that humans could try to hack our way out of this reality and enter the baseline reality..
U.S. sent “weather” balloons to spy on China and the Soviet Union in the 1950s
https://theintercept.com/2023/02/07/china-balloon-soviet-union
Feb 7, 2023
The U.S. once launched hundreds of balloons in an attempt to spy on the Soviets.
March 24, 2017
https://www.atlasobscura.com/articles/cold-war-balloon-surveillance
The night the US bombed a Chinese embassy, Belgrade-Yugoslavia, 2019 https://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-48134881
NATO bombed Chinese deliberately, 1999
https://www.theguardian.com/world/1999/oct/17/balkans
China is beating the US in the trade war as the yuan makes international gains, Bridgewater’s Ray Dalio says, 02-15-23
..The US-China trade war that began during the Trump administration hasn’t abated under President Joe Biden.. ..But the largest threat to the US remains at home, with Dalio citing “a deterioration of infrastructure, education, political conflict, leadership” as contributing to domestic issues..
China says any U.S. concern over spying cargo cranes “overly paranoid”
Mar 6, 2023
US not ready for military confrontation with China: Wall Street Journal
March 7, 2023
I recently came back from Taiwan. You would be shocked to learn literally no one is taking about a China invasion. Doesn’t concern them. The KMT (China Friendly) just won massive elections. The Taiwan invasion narratives are all coming from Americans on Twitter.
https://twitter.com/DanCollins2011/status/1627846889734385664
Feb 20, 2023
Countries that recognize Taiwan
2023
https://worldpopulationreview.com/country-rankings/countries-that-recognize-taiwan
..As of April 2022, 13 countries and Vatican City/Holy See have recognized Taiwan as a sovereign country:.. ..The United States maintained Taiwan’s recognition for 30 years after the Chinese civil war but switched in 1979. Despite this, the U.S. has maintained a positive relationship with Taiwan, including offering the island military assistance..
Bill Gates said that sanctions cannot stop the progess of Chinese chips. I agree with him. In 2022, China had shown a good momentum of development in low/middle-end chips. The US sanctions slow it down for 1-2 years, but life will find its way.
https://twitter.com/BeijingDai/status/1631460969103884290
Mar 2, 2023
China leads the world in 37 out of 44 critical technologies, with Western democracies falling behind in the race for scientific and research breakthroughs, report says http://aje.io/wih1pm
https://twitter.com/AJEnglish/status/1631568844610326530
Mar 3, 2023
The Chinese Communist Party is using TikTok to collect Americans’ sensitive information. It’s putting Texans at risk. I’m banning TikTok to protect our state agencies as they serve their fellow Texans.
https://twitter.com/GregAbbott_TX/status/1623091278949875714
Feb 7, 2023
The Florida governor told Fox News that China poses a bigger danger than Russia.
https://twitter.com/Newsweek/status/1627738187849138176
Feb 20, 2023
TikTok ban explained as Biden admin sets deadline for app to be removed.
02/28/23
The White House has given all federal agencies 30 Monday to remove the social media app TikTok from government devices as part of an effort to improve national security…
Silicon Valley social media giants couldn’t compete with TikTok so now they’re using their bought politicians to force it out of business with fabricated hysterical claims about “national security”, and of course everyone in the Western media class applauds with glee
https://twitter.com/zei_squirrel/status/1636312419038294016 thread
Mar 16, 2023
20- ✔ In “El palo con Coco” program on La X 96.3 FM (in Spanish), February 28 2023, Coco’s toady duo give props to the U.S. gov banning TikTok from U.S. agencies on the claim it collects personal information for the Chinese gov. Apparently, they’re oblivious to the Edward Snowden’s revelations on the U.S. gov spying inside and out. Correction, if brought up to them, they’ll wholeheartedly approve all kinds of draconian measures.
Time code breakdown (bold letter prior (A to R), some articles in between) of this radio horseplay below: ◺
✔ The sinophobia against China is recurrent, whether it’s the COVID-19 origins by the “Wuhan lab leak theory”, or the supposed spying by Beijing thru TikTok, or further back with the Yellow Peril in justifying the Chinese Exclusion Act (1882).. ◺
A
6:08
✔ Let’s
face it: all social media platforms collect personal information, for
marketing
purposes or for building apps.
LinkedIn, Instagram, Snapchat, Clubhouse, Facebook, ETC. Hackers even
make money from these application programming interface (API)
databases. Most social networks sell API partnerships. To give a
little credit
to Coco & Tony, they at least
hinted
at the point of view of China...
3:58
◺
Por qué la Agencia de Seguridad Nacional de EEUU advierte que hay que reiniciar el celular una vez a la semana
04 Jun, 2024
European watchdog fines Meta $1.3 billion over privacy violations
May 22, 2023
https://www.npr.org/2023/05/22/1177472768/eu-europe-meta-facebook-instagram-record-fine-data-privacy
..Meta, which also owns WhatsApp and Instagram, plans to appeal the ruling and will seek to suspend the case from proceeding in court..
Amazon fined millions over alleged Ring, Alexa security violations
Good Morning America
https://youtu.be/57gAYVRS5Uc ,6-01-23
China defends ban on US chipmaker Micron, accuses Washington of ‘economic coercion’
May 24, 2023
The Opium Wars through the lens of international law
March 2, 2023
https://thechinaproject.com/2023/03/02/the-opium-wars-through-the-lens-of-international-law/
..during the 1830s and the Opium Wars between Britain and China that followed. It is the story of the British drug traffic; of the very profitable commerce engaged in by the East India Company.. ..Laissez-faire capitalism met with ethical dilemmas in southern China..
FCC fines big three carriers $196M for selling users’ real-time location data
4/29/2024
Wait, is TikTok really Chinese?
March 28, 2024
https://www.cnn.com/2024/03/18/tech/tiktok-bytedance-china-ownership-intl-hnk/index.html
.. TikTok has never operated in mainland China — a fact that its Singaporean CEO, Shou Chew, has repeatedly touted when grilled by American officials. .. ,, On the face of it, the answer would appear to be “no.” It was first incorporated in California in April 2015, according to US court documents. .. .. In China, there is a different version of TikTok: a sister app called Douyin. It launched before TikTok and became a viral sensation in the massive mainland market. Its powerful algorithm became the foundation for TikTok and is key to its global success. .. .. At last year’s congressional hearing, Chew didn’t directly answer any questions about whether ByteDance is a Chinese company either. He only said ByteDance is a Chinese-founded private company operating many businesses in China, but is “global” in nature. .. .. In 2021, China introduced a new data security law, which applies to data processing activities conducted outside of the country that may “harm the national security or public interests.” .. .. This is because a sale or divestiture of the app would involve “exporting technology” and had to be approved by the Chinese government, said Shu Yuting, the spokeswoman. ..
B 6:54 ✔ Coco Ca. blames suicidal stunts on TikTok as if that’s the driving factor, and not another generation “status”-alienated and aching for recognition and place. ◺
C 7:03 “..promoting prostitution..”. ✔ Oh please, as if other platforms don’t also have such content. Or take Australia, Netherlands, Spain…where prostitution is regulated.. Or proliferating in so many countries where U.S. military bases are stationed.. Talk to me about that Kookín! In the Asian region, North Korea is the only one that’s virtually absent of prostitution, but these radio playboys would undoubtedly curse it as a eunuch dictatorship! In 2019, profits from illicit massage parlors are estimated at $2.5 billion in the U.S.. For a long time the U.S. hubs the largest pornography industry in the world.. so it’s not about moralizing, but placing things in historical context. This comedian (Mr. Cabrera) pontificates, yet his DAILY rants are mostly praising vice, corruption, normalizing such in ñeñeñe. In the past he’s even admitted to hanging out in a brothel in Dominican Republic… ◺
Facts & stats on missing children
https://childfindofamerica.org/resources/facts-and-stats-missing-children/
.. It is estimated that 2,300 children are missing every day in the United States. Children can become missing for many reasons. ..
D 8:04 ✔ Claro, the teacher’s pet chimes in. ◺
E 8:08 “..Chinese gov enemy number one..” ✔ OK wise guys, so why so many years of commercial trade between both countries? Why is China the 2nd foreign creditor to the U.S.? ◺
Major
foreign holders of United States treasury securities as of November
2022
https://www.statista.com/statistics/246420/major-foreign-holders-of-us-treasury-debt/
China, world’s biggest creditor, delays debt repayments for 77 nations
June 10, 2020
China’s announcement this week to suspend debt repayments for 77 low-income countries as part of the G-20’s debt relief program gives Beijing a political boost with foreign allies at a time when China is under scrutiny for its role in the start of the coronavirus pandemic…
F 8:13 “..China and Russia are buddies..the former sending weapons to Russia..” ✔ Firsthand info? Really?, China has denied it, Iran also, and rather it would be more likely that Russia would sell weapons to China… China maintains good relations with both Russia and Ukraine, and has drawn a peace plan… How’s this bozos? Richard Nixon visited China in 1972, in doing so for the U.S. to gain more leverage over relations with the Soviet Union… The U.S. & NATO today have sent billion$ in weapons to Ukraine, right next door to Russia! At the end of the Cold War in the early 1990’s, NATO promised Russia it wouldn’t expand to the East, yet that’s what it did royally by incorporating more countries to NATO… The U.S. rather, admits openly it provides weapons to the island of Taiwan (a renegade province of China since 1949.. In 1971, Taiwan was expelled from the United Nations and was replaced by the People’s Republic of China.., UN General Assembly Resolution 2758). ◺
Hate to see EU politicians and media spread U.S. rumor of possible China supplying lethal arms to Russia. They should instead spend more time and effort to support China peace plan, exploit diplomacy and dialogue or look into Nord Stream revelation. Europe is real sucker.
https://twitter.com/chenweihua/status/1631417585735442435
Mar 2, 2023
G 11:29 “..identity theft..” ✔ Is it Chinese hackers committing that Coco Coy ? ◺
H 12:02 “..in China it is prohibited to upload material that’s not educational..” ✔ Again, that’s not the issue hence other platforms operating in the U.S. permit all kinds of questionable material, for example in YouTube, WhatsApp & Instagram there are videos outta Miami recruiting for terrorist acts against Cuba or Venezuela and they’re not removed, but rather monetized.. To give some credit to Coco, at least he gave a bit on the point of view of China... The We$t repeats contradictory & criminal ruses, see for example before on CITGO, Venezuela, Bank of England, gold reserves... ◺
The FBI Files S7E1, voice of terror, 12-08-2004
https://youtu.be/S64raEGx9zU?si=3ArcX19E-I-Nhwnx ,10-02-21
https://www.facebook.com/100085103231099/videos/792465755370753/
,10-02-22
https://tubitv.com/tv-shows/16706/s07-e01-voice-of-terror
Fascinating comparison by Kai-Fu Lee, a Taiwanese computer scientist who used to be president of Google China, between the US’s TikTok ban and Google’s withdrawal from China. Google chose to not abide by Chinese laws and withdrew from the market. Tiktok is simply told to leave.
https://twitter.com/RnaudBertrand/status/1631613271341166592
Mar 3, 2023
NYC bans TikTok from government phones on security concerns
August 17, 2023
I 13:09 ✔ Ramón (the caller) is absolutely right, U.S. tech giants are afraid of the competition. ◺
Rick Scott: “Every American has to say to themselves, China is our enemy.”
https://twitter.com/atrupar/status/1631349651868639248
Mar 2, 2023
J 13:52 “..women prostituting themselves..” ✔ No shit Saint Coco (the hypocrite is probably an avid voyeur), but that was the case way before TikTok and after. Focus instead, if you will, on the institutionalized violence against women… Cuba for example, in 2022 approved a family code referendum… ◺
Cubans just ratified the world’s most progressive Family Code
https://peoplesdispatch.org/2022/09/26/cubans-just-ratified-the-worlds-most-progressive-family-code/
September 26, 2022
K 14:22 “..accusing Ramón of being a communist..” ✔ For these Caribbean McCarthyite charlatans, anyone they disagree with on political grounds, is gotta be a communist. Everyday they flaunt the stage and yet they talk over or go to a commercial break with “inconvenient” callers. ◺
L
14:43
✔
Coco’s
acolyte ◺
:
“..oh
Ramón didn’t stay quiet..” ✔
Behold,
these are the great defenders of free speech, the ones with a bromide
obsession,
at the bosses’ behest.. 😄
◺
Matthew 4: 4
M 14:46 “..we’re defending ourselves from the Chinese and here comes a communist living off of here..” ✔ Coco (el patuá) wants to make others believe communism is not a legitimate form of political expression, like it’s a dirty word synonymous to terrorism. Of course he can identify with such intolerance, living in Dominican Republic during the Balaguer dictatorship makes him bona fide. The snitch doesn’t realize the Communist Party was founded in the U.S. in 1919, not to mention other leftist movements.., I.e. Eugene V. Debs ran for President in the early 20th century… ◺
Edward Bellamy first uses the term “credit card” in “Looking Backward”
https://www.historyofinformation.com/detail.php?entryid=2044
February 23, 2023
In
his utopian novel Looking Backward
(1887),
describing life in the year 2000, Edward Bellamy
used
the term credit card
eleven
times—the first description of the use of a card for purchases..
..It is the year 2000 and, while he was sleeping, the United States
has been transformed into a socialist utopia.. ..major themes
are the dangers of the stock market, the use of credit cards, the
benefits of a socialist legal system, music, and the use of an
“industrial army” to make tasks run smoother..
Psalm 15: 5 (Old Testament). Luke 19: 22-23 (New Testament). Acts 2: 44-45, 4: 32-35. Mark 12: 31
See also title link: The US economy is reliant on consumer spending
✔ Friedrich Engels refers to “primitive communism” in the 1884 publication of “The origin of the family, private property and the State”, which is also based on notes by Karl Marx to Lewis H. Morgan's book Ancient Society (1877). Engels categorizes early communist societies into phases, from Europe to North America with the Native Americans before colonization. Such societies had no hierarchical social class structures or capital accumulation... Resources were shared with all members of a group in accordance with individual needs. classless society And by the way, the “founding fathers” of the U.S. Constitution “borrowed” on principles of the Iroquois Confederacy’s Great Law of Peace… ◺
How the Iroquois Great Law of Peace shaped U.S. democracy
Dec 17, 2018
How an Iroquois chief helped write the U.S. Constitution
Aug. 13, 2017
https://www.thedailybeast.com/how-an-iroquois-chief-helped-write-the-us-constitution
The Communist Manifesto; a call against capitalism
https://youtu.be/YVwWAfyaFAg?si=pYUPBhja3DOZsE5-
,02-22-18
N 15:19 “..the Chinese gov is totalitarian communist..” ✔ Yeah go ahead carbon copy Coco, dump everything you own made in China. In the CPC (Communist Party of China) United Front, there are 8 political parties, various organizations. Non-CPC members have leading positions in gov & courts. In the U.S., lobbyists & Electoral College are nothing to write home about you know. Which doesn’t mean there’s no human rights violations in China.. No human society is perfect, again ◺ : “..let he who is without sin cast the first stone..”
These criminal prosecutions show what Citizens United got wrong about corruption
March 19, 2024
.. these cases demonstrate how the new avenues for political money opened by Citizens United can be used by special interests to bribe government officials. ..
It was a great day in the Supreme Court for anyone who wants to bribe a lawmaker
Jan 19, 2022
.. Prior to Citizens United, the Court held that lawmakers may regulate campaign finance in order to prevent “corruption and the appearance of corruption.” But Citizens United redefined the word “corruption” so narrowly as to render it meaningless. After that decision, only “quid pro quo” arrangements, where money is exchanged for “political favors” count as corruption. And merely gaining privileged access to an elected official does not count as a “political favor.” ..
Open primaries in the United States
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Open_primaries_in_the_United_States
An open primary is a primary election that does not require voters to be affiliated with a political party in order to vote for partisan candidates. ..
O Coco Gaffe 15:24 “..despite everything, the U.S. doesn’t meddle abroad..” ✔ Woe to those who take such a fool seriously. U.S. agencies, NGO’s (I.e. Human Rights Watch), even publish their foreign programs to “influence” politics abroad, or sanctioning other countries. Washington and its sycophants suffer from what in psychology is diagnosed as projection = the tendency to ascribe to another person feelings, thoughts, or attitudes present in oneself.. Adding insult to injury, it’s grand if the bully does it, believing it has the moral high ground! In 2010, USAID (United States Agency for International Development) provided the ZunZuneo program in Cuba, a Twitter-like messaging platform meant to covertly destabilize its political system.. Mainstream media voices have dominance over the global discourse, and yet social media platforms have wrongly shadow banned, or closed accounts of journalists, activists, government officials, etc, who don’t necessarily toe the West’s official narrative line. ◺
Presidente Nicolás Maduro denunció a la red social TikTok por censura
https://videos.telesurtv.net/es/content/334841 ,03-8-24
https://youtu.be/y2d6f9C1rGc?si=ovuzs1e4IK8X5ZfZ
Difunden noticia falsa acerca de la prohibición de Whatsapp en Venezuela
https://videos.telesurtv.net/es/content/335029 ,07-8-24
https://youtu.be/XQLypaGIWB0?si=voQmm_OfzqYqOstB
X says it is closing operations in Brazil due to judge's content orders
August 19, 2024
https://www.reuters.com/technology/x-close-operations-brazil-effective-immediately-2024-08-17/
.. The X service remains available to the people of Brazil, the platform said on Saturday.
Earlier this year, Moraes ordered X to block certain accounts, as he investigates so-called "digital militias" that have been accused of spreading fake news and hate messages during the government of far-right former President Jair Bolsonaro. Moraes opened an inquiry earlier this year into the billionaire after Musk said he would reactivate accounts on X that the judge had ordered blocked. Musk has called the Moraes' decisions regarding X "unconstitutional." ..
P 15:37 ✔ the caller William warned he’ll go over to the show and shut the hosts’ mouths, being that Coco is barbaric. Good for him! Thumbs down for the bums! ◺
Q 15:44 “watch it William..”- ✔ siccing by Coco’s sidekick, Tony. ◺
R 16:00 “..this is another communist, spy..” ✔ These dudes see communists surveying them even when sipping broth. Invasion of the body snatchers (1956)... If given the chance I would’ve responded: “ya saben caliése’, pa’ que lo sepan”. It’s all in good fun, I guess… ◺
John 10: 11-13, 15: 12-18 (New Testament)
Sacrificing for the common good: rationing in WWII
https://www.nps.gov/articles/rationing-in-wwii.htm
..Americans received their first ration cards in May 1942. The first card, War Ration Card Number One, became known as the “Sugar Book,” for one of the commodities Americans could purchase with their ration card. Other ration cards developed as the war progressed..
21- ✔ I once spoke over the radio in the late 1980’s or early 1990’s with Cuban-born U.S. journalist Manuel de Dios Unanue, over the subject of the proliferation of guns in the U.S.. I wish I had it recorded. Manuel was killed on March 11, 1992 sitting at a bar in a Queens’ restaurant by alleged hitman Alejandro Wilson Mejia-Velez. According to Wikipedia, his murder marked the first time a journalist on United States soil had been killed by Colombian drug traffickers. ◺
Like Pablo Hasél, Spain wants me jailed for rap lyrics – but artists must not self-censor
1 Mar 2021
The rapper’s arrest shows Spain has a problem with freedom of ideology. But people shouldn’t be scared to write songs that stand up to power…
Data collected by social media platforms and how they use it
https://datafifty.com/data-collected-on-social-media/
February 20, 2022
How to protect your personal information on social media
https://www.aura.com/learn/how-to-protect-your-personal-information-on-social-media
January 19, 2023
The Overton Window of political possibility explained
Mackinac Center
https://youtu.be/FMU0w4MP8Dc ,02-21-20
Overton window- 2 minute idea
War of Ideas
https://youtu.be/jQvKxGehKok ,4-08-20
So afraid of the Russians (1983)- Made for TV
#music
https://youtu.be/AVf7m_YZ2zY ,3-24-10
Migrantes rusos siguen llegando a México: esperan recibir asilo y cruzar la frontera hacia EEUU
Univision Noticias
https://youtu.be/Gzc6qsZc9ms ,18-02-23
US tells citizens to leave Russia immediately
NewsNation
https://youtu.be/_z9Yd03QUSg ,02-13-23
Many Americans are illegally retiring to Mexico
https://youtu.be/GJ1rcifeFyI ,7-19-17
Rising prices push some Americans to move to Mexico
https://youtu.be/MjAgY5bd91M ,8-17-22
Why more Americans than ever moving to Mexico
https://youtu.be/A4Ljxe408TE ,12-29-22
Latin America is the world’s most unequal region. Here’s how to fix it, 2016 https://www.cepal.org/en/articulos/2016-america-latina-caribe-es-la-region-mas-desigual-mundo-como-solucionarlo
Healthy eating is most expensive in Latin America and the Caribbean, finds UN, 2023 https://www.bmj.com/content/380/bmj.p174
This is the No. 1 country where residents say they are ‘always’ at peace—and it isn’t the U.S., 2023
[Nicaragua ]
The truth about socialism: it doesn’t care about the middle class. It’s about keeping the ruling class’ power
Mar 6, 2019
Book talk: The meritocracy trap: How America’s foundational myth feeds inequality, dismantles the middle class, and devours the elite, 2019
22- ✔ The U.S. represents only 16.8% of the world’s manufacturing output. China’s is 28.7%, and the rest of the globe combined 54.5%. Yet the U.S. dollar still has what the French Minister of Finance (Valéry Giscard d’Estaing) under Charles de Gaulle in the 1960’s called “exorbitant privilege”, that is benefits the U.S. has by having its own currency as the international reserve currency, for example it buys imports (tangible goods) with its own currency… This means the world has been engulfed in a financialization (financial markets, speculators..) or capital dominance over production, a natural outcome or by-product of capitalism, and backed by the U.S. military.. One stopgap measure to consider is the Tobin tax on financial transactions of derivatives… ◺
The Tobin tax on financial transactions already operating in Spain,
January 19, 2021
Profits without prosperity, by William Lazonick
September 2014
https://hbr.org/2014/09/profits-without-prosperity
..The allocation of corporate profits to stock buybacks deserves much of the blame. Consider the 449 companies in the S&P 500 index that were publicly listed from 2003 through 2012. During that period those companies used 54% of their earnings—a total of $2.4 trillion—to buy back their own stock, almost all through purchases on the open market. Dividends absorbed an additional 37% of their earnings. That left very little for investments in productive capabilities or higher incomes for employees..
The economist who put stock buybacks in Washington’s crosshairs
June 20, 2019
..Lazonick felt that maximizing shareholder value rewarded the wrong people. “The idea that public shareholders are ‘investors’ is really nonsense—shareholders don’t actually take much risk at all” when they buy stock in companies, Lazonick told me. “It’s actually workers and taxpayers who invest in companies.”..
William Lazonick…
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/William_Lazonick
...is an economist who studies innovation and competition in the global economy… ..essential intellectual foundation for understanding economic performance and a fundamental critique of the neoclassical theory of the market economy. Much of his current work focuses on how the financialization of the U.S. industrial corporation, manifested in massive distributions of corporate cash to shareholders and the explosion of stock-based executive pay, results in employment instability and income inequality, while undermining the innovative capability of the U.S. economy. Lazonick also conducts cross-national comparative research on the social conditions that enable or proscribe innovative enterprise, focusing in particular on the economies of Britain, Japan, and China as well as the United States… ..Lazonick’s 2009 book Sustainable Prosperity in the New Economy? Business Organization and High-Tech Employment in the United States, published by the Upjohn Institute for Employment Research, won the 2010 Schumpeter Prize, awarded by the International Joseph A. Schumpeter Society.[12] …
Adam Smith in The Wealth of Nations, Book I, Chapter X (1776).
“..People of the same trade seldom meet together, even for merriment and diversion, but the conversation ends in a conspiracy against the public, or in some contrivance to raise prices..”
Thomas Jefferson in letter to Horatio G. Spafford (17 March 1814).
“..I join in your reprobation of our merchants, priests and lawyers for their adherence to England & monarchy in preference to their own country and it’s constitution. but merchants have no country. the mere spot they stand on does not constitute so strong an attachment as that from which they draw their gains. in every country and in every age, the priest has been hostile to liberty. he is always in alliance with the Despot abetting his abuses in return for protection to his own. it is easier to acquire wealth and power by this combination than by deserving them: and to effect this they have perverted the purest religion ever preached to man, into mystery & jargon unintelligible to all mankind & therefore the safer engine for their purposes. with the lawyers it is a new thing. they have in the mother country been generally the firmest supporters of the free principles of their constitution. but there too they have changed..”
Thorstein Bunde Veblen (July 30, 1857 – August 3, 1929) was an American economist and sociologist who, during his lifetime, emerged as a well-known critic of capitalism. ..
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thorstein_Veblen
.. As a leading intellectual of the Progressive Era in the US, Veblen attacked production for profit. His emphasis on conspicuous consumption greatly influenced economists who engaged in non-Marxist critiques of fascism, capitalism, and technological determinism. .. .. Veblen expanded upon Adam Smith's assessment of the rich, stating that "[t]he leisure class used charitable activities as one of the ultimate benchmarks of the highest standard of living."[49] Veblen insinuates that the way to convince those who have money to share is to have them receive something in return. Behavioral economics also reveals that rewards and incentives are very important aspects of every-day decision making. .. .. Veblen identified business as the owners and leaders whose primary goal was the profits of their companies but who, in an effort to keep profits high, often made efforts to limit production. By obstructing the operation of the industrial system in that way, "business" negatively affected society as a whole (through higher rates of unemployment, for example). With that said, Veblen identified business leaders as the source of many problems in society, which he felt should be led by people such as engineers, who understood the industrial system and its operation, while also having an interest in the general welfare of society at large.[50] .. .. In sociology, trained incapacity is "that state of affairs in which one's abilities function as inadequacies or blind spots."[51] It means that people's past experiences can lead to wrong decisions when circumstances change.[52] ..
✔ compare to later here on : overproduction crises in capitalism arise because the unlimited drive to expand production ◺
23a- ✔ If the entire world consumed as much resources as the U.S., we would need 5.1 planets to accommodate it... Such level of consumption is clearly wasteful, parasitic, inefficient. ◺
Capitalism is killing the planet – it’s time to stop buying into our own destruction
30 Oct 2021
23b- ✔ Oh but naysayers will claim that it’s because those populations are coerced or manipulated unlike us free people.. Such is the grasp of propaganda = public relations in the good old U.S.. Oh but the naysayers might then holler: Look, the U.S. receives more immigrants than anyone! That’s true, but it doesn’t contextualize or give nuance. Dozens of countries take in more immigrants per capita than the U.S.. The U.S. is the 1st or 2nd largest economy (justified or not), shares a border with Mexico, an immigration hub (family ties) for over 100 years, a yielding climate (which is changing under climate change). The ill-intentioned boob$ don’t bother either to contrast that immigration to the U.S. is more clustered in certain U.S. states than others (As of 2021, Wyoming has the most new small businesses per capita… Census data, 2020- small businesses with fewer than 50 employees makeup approx. 95% of American business establishments and employ 40% of private sector workers)... Of course the naysayers are oblivious to the fact Russia is, according to UN Population Division estimates, the second recipient of immigrants.. Russia is capitalist, and China by far has the largest population.. India the second. In Russia today, also in what was known as East Germany, a majority say they lived better under socialism.. In Russia Vladimir Putin is more highly regarded than Joe Biden is in U.S., or that Volodymyr Zelenskyy is in Ukraine! China’s Xi Jinping is also more liked in China than Biden in U.S… What I’m trying to demonstrate by this is that the “developed” West needs more humility. ◺ John 8: 7 (New Testament).
The most important scientific problems have yet to be solved
If certain areas of science appear to be quite mature, others are in the process of development, and yet others remain to be born.
Jan 6, 2020
https://thereader.mitpress.mit.edu/the-most-important-scientific-problems-have-yet-to-be-solved/
.. Santiago Ramón y Cajal (1852 – 1934) was a neuroscientist and pathologist, and Spain’s first Nobel laureate. This article is excerpted from his book “Advice for a Young Investigator.”
Plato’s cave and the stubborn persistence of ignorance
Plato's cave metaphor illustrates the cognitive trap of ignorance, where we may be unaware of the limitations of our understanding.
Sep 12, 2024
https://thereader.mitpress.mit.edu/platos-cave-and-the-stubborn-persistence-of-ignorance/
People in the U.S. think they are better than they actually are. People in Asia don’t
May 15, 2023
✔ see paragraph 50- on the role of the “lone individual”... ◺
¿La humanidad se encamina hacia el colapso social?
12 de septiembre de 2024
https://www.telesurtv.net/blogs/la-humanidad-se-encamina-hacia-el-colapso-social/
.. La teoría de Olduvai establece que la civilización industrial actual tendría una duración máxima de cien años, contados a partir de 1930. En consecuencia, a partir del 2030, la humanidad iría poco a poco regresando a niveles de civilización comparables a otros anteriormente vividos, culminando dentro de unos mil años (3000 d. C..) en una cultura basada en la caza similar a la que existía en la Tierra hace tres millones de años.
Esta teoría fue planteada por Richard C. Duncan basándose en su experiencia en el manejo de fuentes de energía y por su afición por la arqueología en su artículo «La teoría de Olduvai: Energía, población, y civilización industrial» (2005). La teoría de Olduvai se define por la subida y caída de la calidad de vida material (CVM) que consiste en la tasa resultante del aumento o disminución de la producción, uso y consumo de las fuentes energéticas (E) dividido por el crecimiento de la población mundial (P), mediante la fórmula CVM = E/P. ..
Arnie Arnesen 8-29-24; China demographics, immigration, racism
https://wbai.org/archive/program/episode/?id=52478
(1 hour podcast )
✔ In More
economic & social themes contrast
with vid →
Impacto Económico
Matutino | Mundo mercado inmobiliario en crisis . Contrast
also with → China to raise retirement age as population gets
older in : E-ssay
(ey ese, electronic say), 4-13-23
14:48 … Arnie Arnesen
above claims the Chinese are
incredibly racist… Well, that seems her opinion (but
nowhere else in Asia ?) or
colonialist projection in
the face of competition with the United States… How
do let’s say, Africans feel about it ?
See article below ◺
On eve of FOCAC summit, China urges closer Africa ties to counter ‘surging hegemonism’
3 Sep 2024
.. Liu said ties between the two developing economies had developed rapidly because they shared similar philosophies and visions, and being part of the Global South had “naturally tied us closely together”. .. .. “Our history will not go back to the old days of colonialism and cold war confrontation. Africa should not become a wrestling ground for major countries,” he said, adding that both sides had maintained a high degree of political trust and close people-to-people exchanges. ..
China anuncia inversión de 360 mil millones de yuanes en África
https://videos.telesurtv.net/es/content/337344 ,10-9-24
https://youtu.be/P5_AEwNtcH8?si=75tKZB2GGhRGmWQz
Terminó este viernes el Foro de Cooperación China-África, donde decenas de jefes de Estado africanos tuvieron cita en Beijing para este espacio de diálogo que representa a 2,8 millones de personas. China elevó sus relaciones diplomáticas con casi todos los países del continente.
Israel recluta migrantes africanos indocumentados para asesinar mujeres y niños
https://youtu.be/iRL8ImYVAFk?si=BmMvyejRbUF4oRVy ,16-9-24
Hamás ha criticado fuertemente a Israel por su supuesta estrategia de reclutar migrantes africanos indocumentados, ofreciéndoles la legalización de su residencia a cambio de su participación en operaciones militares en Gaza. ..
✔ See : " anti-semitic attacks " related articles in the post :
https://sammydeli.blogspot.com/2023/09/taxi-19781983-tv-series-astrology.html
◺
Israel recruits African asylum seekers for Gaza genocide effort in return for legal status
September 15, 2024
Hoy: Israel ofrece residencia permanente a migrantes y refugiados africanos a cambio de matar palestinos. Hace un año: deportación.
https://x.com/dlobatob/status/1835239914817876038
Sep 15, 2024
“Israel” recluta con promesas falsas a africanos solicitantes de asilo
15 Septiembre de 2024
Majority of Eastern Germans feel life better under communism, 2009
A poll shows that as many as 81 per cent of Serbians believe they lived best in the former Yugoslavia -”during the time of socialism”.
December 24, 2010
https://balkaninsight.com/2010/12/24/for-simon-poll-serbians-unsure-who-runs-their-country/
Public opinion in Europe 30 years after the fall of communism, 2019 https://www.pewresearch.org/global/2019/10/15/european-public-opinion-three-decades-after-the-fall-of-communism/
..However, in Russia, Ukraine and Bulgaria, more than half currently say things are worse for most people now than during the communist era..
Why Women Have Better Sex Under Socialism is a 2018 book by anthropologist Kristen Ghodsee.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Why_Women_Have_Better_Sex_Under_Socialism …
Communist nostalgia in Romania
13 April 2014
https://www.opendemocracy.net/en/can-europe-make-it/communist-nostalgia-in-romania/
A recent poll suggested that nearly half of Romanians have a positive view of Ceausescu and believe that life was better under him. What is behind this surprising nostalgia for the communist era?.. ..while only 33.6 claimed that life was worse back then.. ..These results might seem surprising, given the fact that Romania underwent one of the most brutal communist regimes in the region under Ceausescu’s leadership.. ..While this might be true, a key reason behind these results is an institutionalized amnesia..
Communist nostalgia
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Communist_nostalgia
The Soviet Union’s demise as seen by today’s Russians
December 9, 2021
https://www.wilsoncenter.org/blog-post/soviet-unions-demise-seen-todays-russians
..According to the Levada Center, an independent pollster, most Russians have consistently regretted the dissolution of the USSR. In 2020, 60 percent of respondents expressed regret and 63 percent believed that the dissolution could have been avoided; 49 percent of those polled named “destruction of the USSR” among the twentieth-century events that evoked in them feelings of shame and sadness; and 75 percent believed that “the Soviet era was the best time in Russia’s national history, with a high level of prosperity and opportunities for ordinary citizens.”..
¿How do we test capitalism vs communism
https://youtu.be/6OTPa66ytm0?si=oczwA_VZkG5juhUS
,8-20-23
✔ 6:10 South & North Korea comparisons. Hardly mentions that the North was devastated by the war with the U.S., roughly 25% of its prewar population was killed.. The simplest explanation to this is not the “free-market” system of the South enabled it to flourish, but rather geopolitics + robust state intervention by Seoul, i.e. subsidies, tariffs, public R & D, etc. ◺ 9:20 “..the selection of goods and services in a centrally planned economy is far less diverse and rarely provides the quantity to match demand..” 9:52 “..the people in power didn’t care too much about getting just right..” ✔ First of all, what & where do “the people in power” then consume and desire that is any different than workers?
In the West, there’s a constant dissatisfaction in people’s life meanings despite “diversity” in market goods. Vertical planning or decision-making is already inherent inside corporations without the employees or consumers’ consent.. ◺ 11:47 “..the South with its foreign investment..” 12:33 “..loss of trade partners of the USSR, global sanctions.. facilitate a dictatorial regime.. any comparisons between these two economies is basically just a joke..” ✔ According to historian Bruce Cumings, from the Korean War until the mid-1970s, GDP per capita in both Koreas were similar.. He also points at a CIA internal memo admitting North Korea’s social gains comparable to those of the developed West... The Australian YouTuber doesn’t dwell that the North has to spend much of its GDP in military defense, thanks to the belligerent West.. He should also ask why Russia before the 1917 socialist revolution was a basket case, and afterwards Western countries invaded it yet it would later rival the West in scientific & social progress AND without exploiting the natural resources & labor of the poor global south which imperialism is based on! After its collapse (bureaucracy betrayal) in 1991 social markers plummeted. ◺ 12:50 “..inherent weaknesses in the market system.. it is difficult to tell ahead of time, this means that resources are often wasted on producing stuff that nobody really wants and eventually gets wasted..” ✔ Such an understatement, yes, overproduction which tanks capitalist economies, leading to unemployment, recessions, poverty, inefficiency, greenhouse gases... ◺ 13:44 “..this is why in the real world most advanced economies combine the best of both strategies to manage their economies..” 14:36 “Norway and Venezuela..” 17:00 ✔ the GDP per capita graph omits an important factor, it only compares a wealthy sector in 1950 & 1964 Venezuela but not the vast majority living in poverty. PDVSA's prior management (CIA-linked) engaged in a bosses’ strike in 2002-03 costing billions. Afterwards, also in capital flight. For example, Rafael Ramírez, president of PDVSA from 2004 to 2014, was a Trojan horse sabotaging the oil industry, he fled Venezuela and of course the West gave him harbor with the stolen loot. U.S. coercive sanctions & plain old stealing of bank accounts, played a HUGE ROLE in undermining Venezuela’s prospects. Another key missing from the presentation is that Norway’s taxes are way higher than Venezuela’s… If the “free-market” system is so superior, why not let it compete freely, fairly (no sanctions or blockades) versus more centrally planned ones? A comparison could be made between China and India. Similar sized populations, regions, history. One had a socialist revolution the other did not… ◺
We went to North Korea. You asked hundreds of questions. Here’s what we found
April 28, 2017
https://www.latimes.com/world/asia/la-fg-north-korea-answers-20170428-htmlstory.html
..In Pyongyang, people seem to be well-fed. The countryside — which I did not have the opportunity to visit — may be a different matter. Hazel Smith, an expert on North Korea’s food security at the School of Oriental and African studies in London, laid it out for me: .. ..“We have good nutritional statistics because all the big U.N. organizations have been in North Korea for 25 years continuously,” she added. “North Korea is doing much, much better than people in India and Pakistan.” .. ..I saw countless Pyongyang residents enjoying moments that any American would find familiar — enjoying a day out in the park, rowing on the Taedong River, eating ice cream, snapping family photos. You can’t fake that. .. ..People in Pyongyang are surprisingly fashionable. Women wear posh cinched jackets, high heels and makeup; men wear sneakers and sometimes bold striped ties. ..
North Korea’s private sector overtakes state for first time under Kim Jong-un
16 December 2021
https://www.independent.co.uk/asia/east-asia/north-korea-kim-jong-un-private-sector-b1977299.html
In a first under Kim Jong-un’s regime, North Korea’s private sector has outraced the state-run industry in more than 10 years to rank as the top economic performer, signaling an indication of a positive trend in the financially-drained Korean country.
The private sector’s activity soared by about 28 per cent from a decade ago and now constitutes 38 per cent of North Korea’s economy, according to a report by South Korea’s Unification Ministry on Thursday. ..
More American families rely on food banks as high prices squeeze budgets
https://youtu.be/_xU2c6GlXkU?si=8sU0dXbqpI--IGhn ,11-29-23
Mortgage delinquencies increase in the third quarter of 2023
November 9, 2023
..Mortgage delinquencies and employment conditions continue to track very closely, according to Walsh. The labor market has shown recent signs of weakening, with the unemployment rate increasing to 3.9 percent in October, the highest level since January 2022. MBA forecasts slower hiring and rising unemployment, with the rate rising to 5.0 percent by the end of next year. ..
China is the world’s manufacturing superpower, 2019, 2021
https://www.statista.com/chart/20858/top-10-countries-by-share-of-global-manufacturing-output/
Suddenly everyone is hunting for alternatives to the US dollar
https://www.taipeitimes.com/News/editorials/archives/2022/12/29/2003791599
Dec 29, 2022
Russia and Iran plan a gold-backed stablecoin, while Brazil and Argentina seek a shared currency. Here are 5 rising threats to the dollar’s dominance of global trade.
Jan 29, 2023
..The dollar was further bolstered last year by a surge in US interest rates that made it attractive to foreign investors seeking higher yields. It surged 17% during the first nine months of 2022, but has since lost some of its shine on the prospect that the Federal Reserve may soon end its rate hikes as inflation cools rapidly.. ..China, for another, is looking to weaken the dollar by pushing for the yuan to replace the greenback in energy deals, given its increased trade with Russia after it invaded Ukraine..
Here’s why experts say Russia and China’s attempts to ‘de-dollarize’ global markets are going nowhere
Mar 5, 2023
Washington’s ‘trigger-happy’ sanctions may push countries away from the dollar, says think tank
Mar 21, 2022
Chilling effect of sanctions: Chinese clients flee, Swiss banks nervous
3/8/2023
Switzerland has always been a country where Chinese clients invest their funds. Due to the effects of Western sanctions on Russia and China, Chinese clients are also worried about the instability of the situation and turn away…
African and Middle Eastern nations withdraw gold reserves amid American economic concerns
Apr 24, 2024
.. As these nations assert greater control over their financial assets, the balance of power in the global economy is poised to undergo significant recalibration, with far-reaching implications for the future of international finance.
2022 CPI and inflation rate for the United States
https://cpiinflationcalculator.com/2022-cpi-and-inflation-rate-for-the-united-states/
24- ✔ For all the die-hard patriots out there, sorry to bring it to ya, but one cause of inflation is the priority of the military sector in the economy of most capitalist countries.. The production of weapons has the feature of creating purchasing power in the same way that production of consumer goods does: that is, wages are paid by private “defense” contractors & derivatives, just as wages are paid making commodities or in services that are not in weapons. Yet in exchange for this extra buying power of employees in the military sector, there is no corresponding increase of merchandise in the consumer goods sector… The aforementioned is not a golden rule as it could just have the opposite effect on inflation, meaning that government debt issued as war bonds can remove excess money from circulation and thus reducing inflation… - see paragraph 65a- ... ◺
¿Who is actually profiting off America’s wars
https://youtu.be/KkLJ0RY0T4I?si=WTAqX08L2BbLriIM
,11-22-23
A ‘forever chemical’ contaminates drinking water near military bases, 2019 https://www.nbcnews.com/health/cancer/forever-chemical-poisons-drinking-water-near-military-bases-n1101736
Japan preparing to release treated radioactive wastewater to the Pacific Ocean: will it endanger the waters?
Mar 07, 2023
..Moreover, China and South Korea have expressed their protests against the plan, as well as Pacific Island nations concerned about the Blue Pacific’s nuclear contamination. However, the Japanese government, International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA), and independent scientists said that the plan is reasonable and safe. They explained that radiation is very common and present in the air, water, and plants. Even being onboard an airline flight supplies some radiation to everyone on board..
Why is China’s inflation rate low compared to the US, Europe and Britain?
6-17-22
..While China gives more weight to clothes and food, which fits its status as an upper middle-income country, the US places more emphasis on shelter and transport, both of which are easily affected by global energy prices and domestic monetary conditions..
25- ✔ Western politicians, mainly in the U.S., put the blame on Putin or China for the inflation or scarcity (on food, baby formulas, medicine, etc), yet fail to point out both were going up way before Feb. 24, 2022! These politicasters are of the same ilk as those who let’s say, chastise Cuban socialism or Venezuela’s for their failings, claiming their gov’s use the “U.S. embargoes” as excuses.. The level of puerility by these folks is stunning. Such claim would mean that each year at the United Nations (news not covered by so-called Hispanic media in the U.S.), poor little Cuba bribes or svengalis all nations, except two (the U.S. & Israel), who vote against the U.S. illegal blockade ! To the anti-socialists, poor little Cuba or Venezuela are the main culprits for their own woes, yet when it comes to inflation in the West, it is Russia or China the ones to blame! In their endless contradictions, the powerful rich nations are at the mercy of Putin’s Russia or Xi’s China (sure, Beijing placed a gun to the heads of western capitalists for them to move offshore); but poor Cuba or Venezuela are not hampered by the U.S. gov.’s criminal actions at all, but by their own inability or greed! ◺
Murphy, Klobuchar, Moran, Marshall, Warren introduce bipartisan legislation to lift trade embargo on Cuba
March 06, 2023
Capitalism didn’t change China – China changed capitalism ICYMI: My floor speech on challenges facing our nation
https://www.rubio.senate.gov/public/index.cfm/press-releases?ID=0F187C29-1DED-42FB-A3B7-2A0D004EF575
https://twitter.com/SenMarcoRubio/status/1631416752251842560
Mar 2, 2023
China on course to hit wind and solar power target five years ahead of time
28 Jun 2023
https://www.theguardian.com/world/2023/jun/29/china-wind-solar-power-global-renewable-energy-leader
..China is shoring up its position as the world leader in renewable power and potentially outpacing its own ambitious energy targets, a report has found..
German official warns Namibian President about the rising Chinese population in his country. Namibian President lectured the German: Every time a Westerner comes, it’s about the Chinese! We know how to handle our country.
https://twitter.com/Jingjing_Li/status/1631554380637011968
Mar 3, 2023
US seeks allies’ backing for possible China sanctions over Ukraine war
March 1, 2023
..Washington and its allies have said in recent weeks that China was considering providing weapons to Russia, which Beijing denies. Aides to U.S. President Joe Biden have not publicly provided evidence..
China is convinced that the conflict in Ukraine will end in the summer of 2023
9 March 2023
Biden signs executive order adding 3,000 reservists to US presence in Europe amid Russian invasion of Ukraine
July 13, 2023
https://news.yahoo.com/biden-signs-executive-order-adding-005917880.html
Russian Ka-52 helicopter flies without tail shocked the US
https://youtu.be/8FWeXNeAE30 ,6-26-23
Ukraine war Irish fighter ‘Rambo’ describes ‘terrifying’ Russian tank chase
Sky News
https://youtu.be/9J_wBx-Fbcc ,7-11-23
New international division of labour
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/New_international_division_of_labour
..This has led to a trend of transference, or what is also known as the “global industrial shift”, in which production processes are relocated from developed countries (such as the US, European countries, and Japan) to developing countries in Asia (such as China, Vietnam, and India), Mexico and Central America. This is because companies search for the cheapest locations to manufacture and assemble components, so low-cost labor-intensive parts of the manufacturing process are shifted to the developing world where costs are substantially lower..
Biden says US outreach to Vietnam is about providing global stability, not containing China
September 9, 2023
..The expanded partnership reflects a broader effort across Asia to counter China's influence. Biden has said Vietnam wants to flex a degree of independence, and U.S. companies are seeking an alternative to imports from Chinese factories. He is pursuing possible allies while also trying to soothe tensions with China. “I think we think too much in ... cold war terms,” Biden said at his news conference. “It's not about that. It's about generating economic growth and stability in all parts of the world. And that's what we're trying to do.” .. ..Jon Finer, Biden's principal deputy national security adviser, addressed reports that Vietnam was pursuing a deal to buy weapons from Russia, even as Hanoi is seeking stronger relations with the U.S. Finer acknowledged Vietnam's lengthy military relationship with Russia. He said the U.S. continues to work with Vietnam and other countries that have similar ties to Russia to try to limit their interactions with Moscow, which Washington accuses of committing war crimes and violating international law with its aggression in Ukraine. U.S. trade with Vietnam has already accelerated but there are limits to how much further it can grow without improvements to the country's infrastructure, its workers' skills and its governance. Nor has increased trade automatically put the Vietnamese economy on an upward trajectory. U.S. Commerce Secretary Gina Raimondo said that the CEOs she talks with rank Vietnam highly as a place to diversify supply chains that, before the coronavirus pandemic, had been overly dependent on China. American imports of Vietnamese goods have nearly doubled since 2019 to $127 billion annually, according to the U.S. Census Bureau. But it is unlikely that Vietnam, with its population of 100 million, can match the scale of Chinese manufacturing. In 2022, China, with 1.4 billion people, exported four times as many goods to the U.S. as did Vietnam.
✔ What's that you say Jolting Joe ? ↑↓, does it mean good-paying, manufacturing, union jobs, really are not coming back to the U.S. ? It’s all campaign politicking promises? 🎶 Our nation turns its lonely eyes to you. Hey, hey, hey.
Buy (pun) the way, there are many Chinese corporations in Mexico exporting to the United States.. ◺
U.S. trade with Mexico, 2021
..In 2021, Mexico is the No. 1 trading partner in terms of trading value, followed by Canada and China. In 2021, 15.8% of total U.S. exports to the World were exported to Mexico and 13.6% of the total U.S. Imports were imported from Mexico..
After 14 years on top, China now ranks third for U.S. imports
Jul 11, 2023
..This decline occurred despite the fact that total U.S. trade with the world topped a stunning $5 trillion for the first time in 2022, with imports topping $3 trillion and exports topping $2 trillion, also for the first time..
Mexico replaced China as America's top trade buddy — and it shows how the global economy is rapidly transforming
Aug 20, 2023
https://www.businessinsider.com/us-mexico-china-trade-world-economy-changing-2023?op=1
..Mexico has once again cemented its place as America's top trading partner, with $263 billion worth of goods passing between the two countries in the first four months of this year. Trade with Mexico accounted for 15.4% of goods exported and imported by the US, just ahead of America's trade totals with Canada and China, which were 15.2% and 12% respectively..
The US is importing more goods from Mexico than China for the first time since 2003
Sep 11, 2023
.. Also helping boost Mexico's share of US imports are American car companies that have increasingly shifted production to Mexico over the past decade. Ford, General Motors, Chrysler, Kia Motors, Volkswagen, Nissan, and Mercedes-Benz are just a few car companies that have a manufacturing presence in Mexico..
Colombia y México, los países de la OCDE en los que más se trabaja y menos se gana
5 de julio de 2023
U.S. could be 'in a real bind' from China, warns Todd Piro
https://youtu.be/vpp_3_yrWtA?si=ROumim3GqvMu3h7H ,9-30-23
✔ These GOP con artists’ apologists literally have no scruples, cuckoo accusing China of curtailing supplies (an evil Ching master plan!), when it’s really just the opposite as China has depended for many years on exporting to the U.S. !, i.e. buying U.S. debt with treasury bonds... Projection pathology is the middle name of Western hotshots. Uncle $am is precisely the one illegally prohibiting food & medicine to Cuba, Venezuela, Syria, North Korea, etc based on manufactured charges !! ◺
The BYD Dolphin has been announced as the winner of The Best Buy Car of Europe 2024 by AutoBest. It is the first time that a Chinese car brand has won the award, seeing off stiff competition from the Hyundai Kona, Jeep Avenger and Fiat 600. The jury, including CompleteCar.ie Road Test Editor Dave Humphreys represents 32 European countries. ...
December 23, 2023
https://www.completecar.ie/car-news/article/12957/BYD-Dolphin-wins-AutoBest-award
The 10 most micro-business dense countries, 2017 (The Czech Republic beats The United States and Indonesia… )
https://smallbusiness.co.uk/britain-micro-businesses-per-capita-2541202/
Jugada Crítica 14-9-23; Cumbre del G20-economía
https://youtu.be/S9qbDR2H8rY?si=uuGM_ocVRg283KLO
https://videos.telesurtv.net/es/content/312007
13:50 – 16:12 “..G20 creado en el 2008 en plena crisis mundial.. crisis que en el 2023 no está resuelta..”
19:46 – 23:10 “..el horizonte económico mundial está mostrando.. que el comercio mundial está creciendo mucho menos que la capacidad productiva mundial, algo que no ocurría en los 40 años previos de empuje a la mundialización.. por eso los capitales son cada vez más agresivos en la superexplotación de la fuerza de trabajo.. se han encontrado.. con un competidor.. China.. por eso el capitalismo está atrapado sin salida.. el G20 no está en condiciones de ordenar..”
41:59 – 44:33 “..Occidente ya no tiene la posibilidad de.. cumplir con lo que quiere.. lo que estamos viendo en la guerra en Ucrania es que industrialmente Occidente es incapaz de llevar a cabo una guerra porque no es capaz de producir.. esos proyectos industriales.. no llevan una tasa de ganancia suficiente, por eso están invirtiendo muchísimo en las finanzas porque es lo que mejor da ganancia..”
26- ✔ Europe has its own kind of problems, i.e. subservient to U.S.’s leaders’ whims, especially in foreign policy (Nord Stream pipelines, Ukrainian conflict, Iran 2015 nuclear deal, etc), strict regulations by the European Commission, European Central Bank; but in “social democratic” Europe (I.e. higher taxes than in U.S., stricter labor laws), life expectancy is longer than the U.S.’s, and overall poverty is higher in the U.S… ◺
General Kellogg: Using Ukrainians to fight Russia is “the acme of professionalism” because it “takes a strategic adversary off the table” and we can focus on our primary adversary – China. - In Europe, this is considered Russian propaganda as the US is “fighting for democracy”
https://twitter.com/Glenn_Diesen/status/1631537801412980738
Mar 3, 2023
NATO isn’t really about defense, and it never was- The New York Times
July 11, 2023
https://tncb.ecowas.int/news/index.php?v=article/nato-isnt-really-about-defense-and-it-never-was
..But NATO, from its origins, was never primarily concerned with aggregating military power.. ..the organization could not be counted on to repel a Soviet invasion and even the continent’s nuclear weapons were under Washington’s control. Rather, it set out to bind Western Europe to a far vaster project of a U.S.-led world order, in which American protection served as a lever to obtain concessions on other issues, like trade and monetary policy. In that mission, it has proved remarkably successful.. ..Many observers expected NATO to close shop after the collapse of its Cold War rival. But in the decade after 1989, the organization truly came into its own. NATO acted as a ratings agency for the European Union in Eastern Europe, declaring countries secure for development and investment. The organization pushed would-be partners to adhere to a liberal, pro-market creed..
[see past text somewhere in this post: Just good old-fashioned piracy folks.]
He believes France can only be respected if it is independent and not “dominated or aligned”. He doesn’t mind to be an ally of the US but finds extraterritorial US laws “unbearable”, or having “the US tell French companies they can’t do business in this or that country”.
https://twitter.com/RnaudBertrand/status/1631333732253835265
thread Mar 2, 2023
Why European Union is hit by a tidal wave of bankruptcies?
2023-02-25
https://english.news.cn/europe/20230225/ef30aac1d45f4c40bbd377014f293078/c.html
Denmark, Finland, and Sweden are proof that poverty in the US doesn’t have to be this high, 2015
https://www.vox.com/policy-and-politics/2015/11/11/9707528/finland-poverty-united-states
Addressing child poverty: how does the United States compare with other nations? 2016
America’s poor are worse off than elsewhere, 2019
https://confrontingpoverty.org/poverty-facts-and-myths/americas-poor-are-worse-off-than-elsewhere/
Why do Europeans live longer than Americans? 2021
https://inequality.org/great-divide/why-do-europeans-live-longer-than-americans/
How does U.S. life expectancy compare to other countries? 2022
US maternity mortality hits highest level since 1965
Click On Detroit | Local 4 | WDIV
https://youtu.be/7tp2bRFNXvo ,3-16-23
‘Live free and die?’ The sad state of U.S. life expectancy
March 25, 2023
https://www.nepm.org/2023-03-25/live-free-and-die-the-sad-state-of-u-s-life-expectancy
..In the years since, the trends have worsened. American life expectancy is lower than that of Cuba, Lebanon, and Czechia..
Life expectancy in the U.S. dropped for the second year in a row in 2021
https://www.cdc.gov/nchs/pressroom/nchs_press_releases/2022/20220831.htm
Yellen’s Treasury Dept. halts two federal retirement funds after government hits debt limit
Jan 19, 2023
The theatrics of the US debt ceiling: fiscal austerity or political brinkmanship?
January 31, 2023
Republicans aren’t going to tell Americans the real cause of our $31.4tn debt,
1 Feb 2023
If Democrats fail to negotiate with GOP on debt, it’s America’s future that’s held hostage,
Feb. 3, 2023
The US could be 4 months away from a potentially disastrous debt-ceiling breach, but nobody’s negotiating over how to fix it
Mar 4, 2023
‘Cataclysmic’ debt ceiling breach could cost 7 million jobs, Moody’s estimates
March 07, 2023
https://www.investopedia.com/debt-ceiling-cataclysm-7229267
The unemployment rate could more than double, breaching 8%, if there’s a prolonged standoff over the debt limit…
Biden the unappreciated. Despite his historic achievements, the public doesn’t think he’s done much at all.
February 7, 2023
https://prospect.org/blogs-and-newsletters/tap/2023-02-07-biden-unappreciated-polls/
..If that inflation continues to subside and unemployment remains low, some of Biden’s numbers should rise a bit.. ..Problem is, those parts of the Biden agenda that would have had a greater impact on public consciousness—the Child Tax Credit, paid sick leave, free public college tuition, and such—ended up on Joe Manchin’s cutting-room floor..
The Biden administration once followed the simple mantra of helping people. Now, facing a divided government, the White House is reverting back to pro-business centrism while losing sight of its once large ambitions.
https://twitter.com/TheProspect/status/1622728090416734208
Feb 6, 2023
..in 2008. The result was years of gridlock, the first-ever downgrading of the United States credit rating, and a thorough weakening of the Democratic brand as the party of unions, Social Security, and Medicare. Worst of all, the whole hysteria played out amid the worst economy since the Great Depression—unemployment sat at 9 percent as Washington debated just how much to slash aid to the vulnerable.. ..It’s clear that Democrats have learned at least some lessons in the intervening decade. The Biden administration is wisely refusing to negotiate with the Republicans, who have only grown less serious and more fascistic in the intervening decade. Biden is also lucky enough to be overseeing the best economy for workers since the 1960s.. ..White House’s decision to elevate Jeffrey Zients to chief of staff. Zients is a cost-cutting management consultant who cut his teeth as the Obama White House’s ambassador to big business. He came to prominence during the early 2010s deficit hysteria as Obama’s cost-cutter in chief.. ..for landlords, a public-private partnership so wimpy that industry lobbyists openly bragged about “help[ing] avert an executive order advanced by renters advocates and members of Congress, which would have imposed immediate policy changes.”.. ..only 24 percent of voters even realized that the roads-and-highways bill was now law. Likewise, Data for Progress found one week before Election Day 2022 that only 39 percent of voters knew the Inflation Reduction Act had passed three months earlier. None of that bill’s impressive achievements, from green-energy tax credits to Medicare negotiating drug prices, were understood by even half of likely voters.. ..Why would anyone think that any Democrat could accomplish anything with this Republican Party, no matter what that Democrat gives up?…
Welcome to Ukraine, the most corrupt nation in Europe, 2015
https://www.theguardian.com/news/2015/feb/04/welcome-to-the-most-corrupt-nation-in-europe-ukraine
Ukraine: While workers defend the country, parliament turns against them, 2022
https://www.ituc-csi.org/parliament-turns-against-Ukrainian-workers
..Ukraine’s Parliament has passed two bills that obliterate workers’ rights to collective bargaining and other fundamental labour protections..
Zelenskyy has consolidated Ukraine’s TV outlets and dissolved rival political parties
July 8, 2022
https://www.npr.org/2022/07/08/1110577439/zelenskyy-has-consolidated-ukraines-tv-outlets-and-dissolved-rival-political-par (+5 mins audio)
Ukraine war prompts Europe’s new emergency rules for the Internet
Apr 25, 2022
https://www.wired.com/story/europe-digital-services-act/
The Digital Services Act has granted the European Commission unprecedented power over tech companies in times of war…
Don’t be too tempted by Europe’s plan to fix social media
Dec 23, 2022
..The Digital Services Act will essentially oblige Big Tech to act as a privatized censor on behalf of governments — censors who will enjoy wide discretion under vague and subjective standards. Add to this the EU’s own laws banning Russian propaganda and plans to toughen EU-wide hate speech laws, and you have a wide-ranging, incoherent, multilevel censorship regime operating at scale..
Notables con Jorge Gestoso 06-9-23; Natalia Zuazo- Europa-Ley de Servicios Digitales
https://youtu.be/2q6-VYmYJ_k?si=Omz572VlK8jFo-Fy
Ukraine corruption scandal ousts top officials amid Russian invasion,
Jan 24 2023
Zelensky- America will ‘lose NATO’ if it pulls military support from Ukraine,
25 Feb 2023
Vladimir Zelensky threatened the US that they would have to send their sons and daughters to war if Ukraine does not receive sufficient support from the country.
27- ✔ The nerve of the prick. ◺
https://twitter.com/ActualidadRT/status/1630918307774623746
Mar 1, 2023
19-second video of Zelensky goes viral. See what was edited out
CNN
https://youtu.be/36K33bVetn8 ,3-02-23
“..U.S. gov greatest purveyor of violence in the world..”- Martin Luther King Jr. at Riverside Church in 1967.
https://www.democracynow.org/2003/4/4/the_united_states_is_the_greatest 2003
✔ I tweeted Joe “fool” Biden twice on that MLK quote. ◺
CIA director briefed Zelensky on US expectations for Russia’s battlefield planning.
January 20, 2023
https://www.cnn.com/2023/01/19/politics/cia-director-burns-zelensky-meeting-ukraine/index.html
..The Pentagon on Thursday announced a $2.5 billion security package for Ukraine – the second largest ever announced by the United States. The aid featured for the first time Stryker combat vehicles and included more Bradley fighting vehicles..
28- ✔ Why should U.S. elites be so concerned about a territory so far away from its borders? In the days of the Soviet Union’s dissolution in 1991, the U.S. promised it that NATO wouldn’t expand to the east. For the sake of ethics, it doesn’t really matter if it was oral or written. Washington of course did just the opposite. ◺
Canada raising money for Ukraine with sale of bonds
October 28, 2022
https://www.reuters.com/world/canada-raising-money-ukraine-with-sale-bonds-2022-10-28/
Minister of Finance (Canada),
Chrystia Freeland, is the granddaughter of a staunch Nazi
collaborator during WW2, Michael Chomiak. She’s known of her
grandfather’s Nazi ties since at least 1996. She’s called to
defeat Russia
at any price. According to her,
it’ll
give a “huge boost to the global
economy.”
https://twitter.com/TernovskyVictor/status/1617541461779828737
Jan 23, 2023
29- ✔ During and post-World War 2, US intelligence brought over Nazi scientists and spies over to the US, literally escaping the Nuremberg trials. Code name: Operation Paperclip. For the Japanese war criminals, Ukrainian nationalists or nazis, US intel also had similar programs. ◺
https://historynewsnetwork.org/article/155194 2014
✔ By May 1945, UK Prime Minister Winston Churchill wanted to revive among other things German Nazis to attack the Soviet Union... Code name: Operation Unthinkable. Britain’s Got Talent ! 🎭 ◺
September 28, 2017
..By 1946, America had only nine bombs. Powerful as they were, they could only inflict a fraction of the punishment that the Soviet Union suffered at the hands of the Nazis—and still kept on fighting.. ..But rearming ex-Nazis paled in comparison to an absolute foundation of Operation Unthinkable, which was that the United States would join Britain in attack on the Soviet Union..
Churchill’s policies contributed to 1943 Bengal famine – study
29 Mar 2019
Churchill’s legacy leaves Indians questioning his hero status
21 July 2020
https://www.bbc.com/news/world-asia-india-53405121
Great Bengal famine of 1943: Winston Churchill’s death blow
https://youtu.be/0ORnLUQxMHk ,6-09-21
Science backs Churchill hand in Bengal famine deaths
https://youtu.be/bAj_2b_-aQI ,4-13-19
“This is a Nazi ideology working efficiently in the Ukraine.” @KirkReportero NATO’s war, one year on:
https://twitter.com/KawsachunNews/status/1628843631262965762
Feb 23, 2023
Russian official warns Western diplomats of “catastrophic consequences”
https://twitter.com/Newsweek/status/1631396917325250562
Mar 2, 2023
..Ryabkov charged that Washington must have aided Ukraine with intelligence information during drone attacks on Russian military bases..
Ukrainian singer Barsky, who dreamed of killing Russians, will come to Moscow with a concert.
13 March 2023
30- ✔ In Puerto Rico, there are severe power blackouts / brownouts.. The island is not subject to a decades-long illegal U.S. blockade as in the case of Cuba... PR’s grid (LUMA Energy is a private company) executives get pay increases and yet residents there pay more per kWh than in the U.S. !
Lemme give you another sample how distorted peoples’ perception of progress can be drawn:
Puerto Rico is a territory with one of the highest # of vehicles (incl. Trucks, vans, buses, etc, not clear whether new or used) per capita (per person) in the world. Higher than Czech Republic, Norway, Germany, Japan, Switzerland, South Korea, Hong Kong, and on & on. Dominican Republic has even more per capita than Israel & Mexico! Does that mean PR or the DR have a higher standard of living than all those? FOR MANY REASONS, ABSOLUTELY NOT (more Puerto Ricans live abroad than in the island..), but it shows you the subjective notions everyday peoples can use, and it’s not an accident they are conditioned to do so. As an adjunct comment, more Jews also live outside of Israel than in it... ◺
List of countries by vehicles per capita, 2022
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_vehicles_per_capita
Fritters and frogs: Is Georgia discriminating against Puerto Ricans with driver’s license quiz?
July 4, 2019
https://edition.cnn.com/2019/07/03/us/georgia-puerto-rico-drivers-license-lawsuit/
Puerto Ricans face issues renewing driver’s licenses due to 2010 birth certificate law: ‘It’s extremely frustrating’
Sep. 20, 2022
Puerto Rico, a U.S. territory in crisis | Council on Foreign Relations
September 29, 2022
https://www.cfr.org/backgrounder/puerto-rico-us-territory-crisis
..Then there is the sheer size of the debt: Puerto Rico’s is by far the biggest government bankruptcy in U.S. history..
Public debt of Puerto Rico
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Public_debt_of_Puerto_Rico
..By early 2017,.. ..at a time with a 45 percent poverty rate and 12.4% unemployment that is more than twice the mainland U.S. average..
Five years after Hurricane Maria, Puerto Rico’s power grid is still costly and unreliable, 2022
.. commercial customers in Puerto Rico on average pay 29.4 cents per kilowatt hour as of June 2022. That’s more than double the U.S. average of 12.9 cents per kWh. Residential customers, meanwhile, pay 27.68 cents per kWh on average, while the U.S. average is around 15 cents per kWh ..
A siete años del huracán María, en Puerto Rico no se puede contar con el servicio eléctrico
August 22, 2024
Se cumplen 7 años del huracán María: Puerto Rico aún siente las cicatrices de la devastación
20 Sep 2024
Hoy se conmemoran 7 años desde que el huracán María arrasó Puerto Rico, dejando miles de muertos y colapsando el sistema eléctrico y de comunicaciones durante meses. Tras la catástrofe, muchos puertorriqueños emigraron al centro de la Florida, donde hoy continúan reconstruyendo sus vidas y enfrentando nuevos desafíos. ..
República Dominicana - sobrecarga en los circuitos, causa principal de apagones en Pedernales, según EGE Haina
jul. 20, 2024
La sobrecarga con que han estado operando los circuitos de distribución, gestionados por Edesur, producen un calentamiento de las líneas.
República Dominicana - crisis en Puerto Plata de electricidad afecta usuarios con apagones continuos
23 de julio 2024
Cientos de puertorriqueños protestan contra continuos apagones en la isla bajo LUMA Energy
15 Jun 2024
Los manifestantes en la Avenida Ponce de León, frente a las oficinas de LUMA Energy, denunciaron que el sistema eléctrico de Puerto Rico está colapsando por la política de privatización
Arnie Arnesen 7-19-24; Texas outages, Bill Curry, Amy Littlefield on the RNC or 2024 Republican National Convention
https://wbai.org/archive/program/episode/?id=51516 (podcast)
12:43... Houston
Chronicle journalist Chris
Tomlinson : .. CenterPoint makes a higher profit repairing the
energy grid than doing maintenance work on it ..
31- ✔ In 2019 Venezuela experienced severe blackouts... In mainstream media & its social media cohorts it was attributed to lack of investments & mismanagement by the Maduro gov. More official fake news, being that ample proof existed of cyberattacks & physical sabotage of power lines & stations by provocateurs and from U.S. IP’s. For example, Florida Senator Marco Rubio, a few minutes after the first blackout, tweeted that backup generators had failed at Guri dam… How did he know so fast the source of the outage when it wasn’t even known to Venezuelan authorities?
U.S. coercive measures against Venezuela caused the deaths of 40,000 Venezuelans between 2017-18.
United Nations Special Rapporteur, Alina Douhan, has called on US authorities to lift coercive measures, which are illegal under international law. Don’t hold your breath for so-called Spanish-speaking “free media” in the U.S. to report on it. Just as it won’t make the connections either with Puerto Rico. In the aftermath of Hurricane Maria, thousands died there. Certain sectors within the U.S. gov. are a death cult because while they can eagerly marshal resources to damage Venezuela’s energy grid or any other it deems a rival, they can’t do a damn thing to recuperate commonwealth Puerto Rico’s ! Don’t hold your breath for “La junta” (Financial Oversight and Management Board) to fix it.. ◺
Ataque al sistema eléctrico de Venezuela: ¿Qué pasó en la central hidroeléctrica Guri?
01 / 9 / 2024
.. Afirmó que, en tiempo récord, de manera segura, estable y muy robusta lograron restablecer el servicio eléctrico al pueblo de Venezuela. ..
How Stuxnet worm took out key Iranian nuclear facility in 2010
Apr 12, 2021
..Most famously, the Stuxnet computer virus in 2010, widely believed to be a joint US-Israeli creation, destroyed Iranian centrifuges at Natanz..
US-led sanctions on Venezuela ‘devastating’ to human rights, says UN report
February 12, 2021
https://www.cnn.com/2021/02/12/world/us-venezuela-sanctions-alina-douhan-intl/index.html
The Enron California energy crisis: the corrupt history, 2020
https://www.shortform.com/blog/enron-california-energy-crisis/
The legacy of Enron in California’s power challenges today, 2021 https://www.marketplace.org/2021/08/04/the-legacy-of-enron-in-californias-power-challenges-today/
20 years after Enron and rolling blackouts, what have we learned? 2021 (+ 51:43 mins audio)
Argentina’s government intervenes in Edesur power firm after repeated blackouts
Mar 21, 2023
..Edesur, owned by Italian firm Edel, supplies hundreds of thousands of homes with electricity. Since the privatisation of the service in 1992, which granted a 95-year concession, Edesur has divided electricity supply service to the north and south of the capital and its periphery – an area home to some 15 million homes – with Edenor, a firm currently in the hands of the Argentine group Vila-Manzano..
Capitalism’s irrationality. Public, mass transport (vans, buses, trains, street railways, etc.): cheaper to build, run, pollute far less, kill/hurt far fewer than private car-based systems. Instead we get Biden’s subsidies for EV industry. Private profit trumps public well-being
https://twitter.com/profwolff/status/1560084063708397568 ,8-17-22
French desire for EU protection from China’s electric cars irks Germany
June 26, 2023
German carmakers are bleakest about their future since 2008
July 5, 2023
32- ✔ To me it just makes more sense to consult transportation engineers & urban planners in order to channel resources on the issue of traffic & housing, instead of letting car manufacturers & real estate developers offer willy-nilly market solutions. But when banking is also a private venture (with connected commercial interests), then such plans become STICKY or impossible. Some of the work by Lewis Mumford (philosopher of technology) could be handy in this.. ◺
Welcome to Houston, TX. Where if you miss an exit yo ass might as well go on vacation
https://twitter.com/Zaucause_24/status/1636833426979397632
Mar 17, 2023
Number of motor vehicles registered in the United States from 1990 to 2021
https://www.statista.com/statistics/183505/number-of-vehicles-in-the-united-states-since-1990/
The number of cars in the US in 2022/2023: market share, distribution, and trends
https://financesonline.com/number-of-cars-in-the-us/
How many vehicles are there in the U.S. – Forbes Advisor
Oct 5, 2023
https://www.forbes.com/advisor/car-insurance/car-ownership-statistics/
Passenger vehicles in the United States
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Passenger_vehicles_in_the_United_States
..Cars became popular in the U.S. after the introduction of the Ford Model T in 1908, and experienced a further increase in popularity after the construction of the Interstate Highway System and the suburbanization of the United States in the 1950s. In the 21st century, large SUVs have become popular in the U.S., leading to increased greenhouse gas emissions[3] and pedestrian deaths.[4][5] ..
New York City is poised to enact steep congestion pricing tolls for cars and trucks, unless critics can kill the plan first
February 23, 2023
..New York City is by far the most transit-dependent U.S. city: 58% of commuters use public transit, compared to 5% nationally..
Congestion pricing is all around us. Why is it taboo on our roads? 2019 https://www.brookings.edu/blog/the-avenue/2019/10/16/congestion-pricing-is-all-around-us-why-is-it-taboo-on-our-roads/
Murphy encourages businesses to leave NYC amid congestion pricing battle
CBS New York
https://youtu.be/rZTKNOoe7uU ,7-21-23
City Council heard arguments on congestion pricing today
August 17, 2023
https://omny.fm/shows/winsam-on-demand/city-council-heard-arguments-on-congestion-pricing
MTA board OKs congestion pricing plan, paving way for $15 tolls (and up) starting this summer
3/27/24
MTA boss Lieber ; ‘No Plan B’ for transit construction priorities if congestion pricing loses in court
May 12, 2024
https://www.amny.com/transit/mta-lieber-no-plan-b-congestion-pricing/
Congestion pricing: MTA left in the lurch after Hochul scraps toll plan, Albany fails on funding bill
June 8, 2024
https://www.amny.com/news/congestion-pricing-mta-lurch-hochul-funding/
Business owners are buying into a bogus myth about driving
NYC’s very good plan to fix traffic fell victim to a very bad argument. And it's not just New York.
Jun 11, 2024
https://www.vox.com/future-perfect/354672/hochul-congestion-pricing-manhattan-diners-cars-transit
.. In New York City, where the majority of residents don’t own a car, it seems odd to assert that a policy benefitting transit users, pedestrians, and cyclists is bad for attracting customers. Commuters who drive into Manhattan have significantly higher incomes than others who work in the borough, so Hochul’s claim that killing congestion pricing would relieve New York’s cost of living crisis is just as suspect. .. .. In study after study in city after city around the world, researchers have found that merchants exaggerate the share of patrons who arrive by car and undercount those who walk, bike, or ride transit. Those misperceptions lead them to oppose transportation reforms that would limit the presence of cars and make urban neighborhoods cleaner, more pleasant, and less polluted — and would likely increase spending at their business, too. .. .. A cognitive bias known as the false-consensus effect could lead such business owners to mistakenly assume that their customers drive just as much as they do. .. .. If store owners hear more griping from car owners than from transit riders, cyclists, and walkers, they might conclude that the bulk of their customers are driving .. .. Dedicated road lanes for buses are similarly despised by many business owners .. .. In New York City, many employers, especially large ones, have backed congestion pricing, since the policy would provide desperately needed funding to modernize the subway system ..
New York City leads the world in congestion, at a $9B cost
June 25, 2024
https://www.crainsnewyork.com/transportation/nyc-leads-world-traffic-congestion-inrix-report
New York’s congestion costs the city $9B in lost time
June 25, 2024
.. Mexico City ranked second on the list, followed by London, Paris and Chicago. Other US cities in the global top 10 include Los Angeles and Boston, according to the report. Rankings are determined by the influence of congestion relative to population. ..
Taken for a ride (documentary, 1996)
https://www.filmsforaction.org/watch/taken-for-a-ride-1996/
Why does America have the worst public transit in the industrialized world, and the most freeways? Taken for a Ride reveals the tragic and little known story of an auto and oil industry campaign, led by General Motors, to buy and dismantle streetcar lines. .. .. The highway lobby then pushed through Congress a vast network of urban freeways that doubled the cost of the Interstates, fueled suburban development, increased auto dependence, and elicited passionate opposition. ..
MTA crackdown on bus fare evaders underway
https://youtu.be/mETg-L5q3xk?si=ZGqaWCtmM-0LjuS7 ,8-29-24
Uber is locking out NYC drivers mid-shift to lower minimum pay
The lockouts, which began last month, are aimed at limiting how much non-passenger time drivers are able to log and be paid for.
6/24/24
(4:14 mns audio )
Uber Technologies Inc. has begun locking New York City drivers out of its app during periods of low demand in an attempt to fight a minimum wage rule, and Lyft Inc. is threatening to do the same. As a result, some drivers say their wages have fallen by as much as 50%. ..
Uber is locking out NYC drivers mid-shift to lower minimum pay
Jun 24, 2024
https://www.arcamax.com/business/businessnews/s-3300857?fs
.. Uber “mismanaged” hiring by allowing a surplus of drivers onto the platform and is now punishing workers for it, said Bhairavi Desai, president of the New York Taxi Workers Alliance ..
Why UPS trucks (almost) never turn left
February 23, 2017
https://www.cnn.com/2017/02/16/world/ups-trucks-no-left-turns/index.html
Why UPS drivers don’t make left turns (and why you should copy)
https://getcircuit.com/teams/blog/why-ups-drivers-dont-make-left-turns
..A National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA) analysis revealed that around 53 percent of cross-path crashes involve left-hand turns.. ..After all, drivers are allowed to turn right on red as long as they come to a complete stop first, there’s no sign prohibiting it, and the way is clear. This is legal in all US states, although New York City does present some exceptions..
Greek protesters clash with police after train crash
Reuters
https://youtu.be/ao6rnVvvpa8 ,3-02-23
Industria
automotriz de Irán - Fabricantes de automóviles
https://www.mordorintelligence.com/es/industry-reports/analysis-of-automobile-industry-in-iran
..
Irán, siendo el mercado automotriz más grande de Medio Oriente con
un mercado de casi un tercio de los jugadores automotrices alemanes,
ha visto fluctuaciones en la industria automotriz desde 2012 debido a
la implementación de las sanciones. .. .. Irán
era el principal fabricante de automóviles de pasajeros de Oriente
Medio. ..
Cuba, assembly of electric motorcycles and tricycles. Units will soon be available in national currency.
(in Spanish)
https://youtu.be/PtnNhVhnxwg ,3-15-23
New buses roll in Pyongyang, North Korea’s capital
https://twitter.com/Fekerfanta/status/1613476009063419906
Jan 12, 2023
One thing North Korea has that the South doesn’t: Google Maps, 2018 https://nationalinterest.org/blog/the-buzz/one-thing-north-korea-has-the-south-doesnt-google-maps-24650
..But national security aside, there may be an issue of protectionism. The South Korean mapping services may have been able to maintain their dominance and leave Apple and Google out of the trade partly due to the fact that local lobbying is strong in South Korea..
Why doesn’t Google Maps work in South Korea? 2022
https://timzertravels.com/why-doesnt-google-maps-work-in-south-korea/
360° aerial view of North Korea’s capital
https://www.dprk360.com/360/juche_tower_floating_view/
Cuba’s COVID-19 vaccine success could serve as global model: report, 2022
33a- ✔ Tiny & poor Cuba (which suffers from an illegal U.S. blockade since 1959) sends doctors to improve the health system in Calabria-Italy, but the rich & imperial U.S. gov. prefers to fork over dough like a drunken sailor for war in Ukraine & elsewhere ! Uncle Sam should bow its head in shame. So-called Hispanic media in the U.S. won’t touch it of course, unless any of the doctors “defects”, or rather is bought off under the Cuban Medical Professional Parole Program.. ◺
Cuban doctors in Italy help Calabria’s health system
Dec 30, 2022
https://www.plenglish.com/news/2022/12/30/cuban-doctors-in-italy-help-calabrias-health-system/
An army of white coats: Exploring the implications of Cuban medical diplomacy
25 Dec 2020
https://hir.harvard.edu/exploring-the-implications-of-cuban-medical-diplomacy/
.. While Cuban doctors have been working abroad for years, the increased dedication of the Brigade during the COVID-19 pandemic recently drew attention from the World Peace Council. In October 2020, the Council formally registered the candidacy of Cuban doctors for the Nobel Peace Prize, ..
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Henry_Reeve_Brigade
.. the newly formed contingent got the name The Henry Reeve brigade, commemorating the New York-born brigadier of Cuban Liberation Army in the Ten Years' War, Henry Reeve.[2][3] The first organised international mission of the brigade was in Angola in 2005.[4] ..
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Henry_Reeve_(soldier)
.. Reeve was honored by the Cuban government in 1976 on the centenary of his death with a postal stamp. In response to Hurricane Katrina, Cuba proposed sending a group of 1,586 doctors to assist humanitarian efforts in the United States. The offer was declined, and in September 2005 Cuban president Fidel Castro renamed the group the Henry Reeve Brigade in honor of Reeve.[1] ..
Sanctions by the United States make 13,000 Cubans wait for cataract surgery (in Spanish),
6-16-23
La inmunización contra el meningococo B logro de #Cuba
enero 8, 2016
.. Otra, del 29 de julio de 1999 (Acuerdo sobre vacuna cubana rompe el embargo), reconoció que la formulación lograda en la isla caribeña era “la única de su tipo en contra de la cepa mortal de meningitis B”. Mientras aseguraba que las estadísticas del Ministerio de Salud de Cuba habían demostrado que la vacuna “elimina virtualmente la enfermedad” y que el producto se había vendido desde entonces en Brasil, Argentina y Colombia. ..
Lawyers ask Biden to remove Cuba from the State sponsors of terrorism list,
January 19, 2023
https://acere.org/lawyers-ask-biden-to-remove-cuba-from-the-state-sponsors-of-terrorism-list/
Cuba blasts US govt for granting asylum to pilot of stolen plane
March 1, 2023
Cuban authorities have accused the U.S. government of being “complicit in piracy” for granting political asylum to a pilot who fled to Florida on a small “kidnapped” plane last October.. ..The Cuban ministry said it had made four requests to the U.S. to “return” the 29-year-old pilot and the aircraft..
¿Que pasa cuando le dicen a un estudiante chileno que en Cuba hay una dictadura?
https://twitter.com/Dvd_qva/status/1456768397115641859
Nov 5, 2021
¿Por qué Fidel Castro, siendo comunista, usaba Adidas?
,29-11-16
https://cnnespanol.cnn.com/2016/11/29/por-que-fidel-castro-siendo-comunista-usaba-adidas/
✔ Título tendencioso ↑ 😉 ◺
Así era la producción de Adidas en la Unión Soviética (URSS) en 1980.
A finales de la década de 1970, casi simultáneamente con los Juegos Olímpicos de Moscú de 1980, la URSS se convirtió en el vigésimo (#20) país en producir zapatillas Adidas bajo licencia...
Fidel Castro, Malcolm X and the gracious Hotel Theresa in Harlem 1960 (video)
https://www.harlemworldmagazine.com/fidel-castro-and-malcolm-x-at-the-hotel-theresa-1960/
Fidel Castro’s secret love affair with NYC
26th September 2019
https://www.bbc.com/travel/article/20190924-fidel-castros-secret-love-affair-with-nyc
(+ 16:58 mins audio )
..Castro and his alluring high-society first wife, Mirta Diaz-Balart, stayed for three months in this charming apartment building, which still stands opposite a Ukrainian Orthodox church and close to bars filled with Columbia University students.. ..By then aged 29 and divorced from Diaz-Balart (she had found love letters to another woman while he was in prison for leading an armed revolt and an attack on a barracks in the eastern city of Santiago), Castro came to New York to raise funds for a revolution from the city’s Cuban community, which was bigger than Miami’s at the time..
Gore Vidal about John F. Kennedy, the national security state, advertising
Ex-chief Acevedo’s offensive comments on Cuban mafia was one of several strikes, 2021
https://www.foxbusiness.com/media/miami-mayor-police-chief-suspension
33b- ✔ “Scarface” (parody..), executions-Oliver Stone, secuestros, CIA-DEA-drugs.
Mr. Stone ought to know, that the death penalty is seldom applied in Cuba (last cases were in 2003). It is carried out in the United States with much more frequency, and not even mentioning the common extrajudicial killings by U.S. police. Children were executed in the U.S. until 2005… Back in 2003, Bush’s Doctrine (after the 9/11 attacks) called for preemptive attacks overseas on what the administration perceived as a threat to “national security”, and that included of course hijackings, incursions into its airspace or waters, etc. So Cuba for its own protection had to send a clear message it doesn’t encourage criminal actions that could be used as a pretext. Corporate media would spin the news of course however it sees fit. ◺
Fact sheet: Palestinian political prisoners in Israel
September 08, 2021
https://imeu.org/article/fact-sheet-palestinian-political-prisoners-in-israel
..including 200 children, 40 women, and 520 being held without charge or trial (under “administrative detention”..
Palestinian prisoners in Israel
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Palestinian_prisoners_in_Israel
Rabbi discouraging from supporting Israel
https://youtu.be/gYyVabiZ0nM?si=8PmVFYY00Dz0uaDc ,7-18-23
US tries Venezuelan diplomat Alex Saab, setting dangerous precedent, 2022
Alex Saab, aliado clave de Nicolás Maduro, llega a Venezuela tras ser liberado de prisión en EE.UU. por un acuerdo con el gobierno de Biden
20 diciembre 2023
https://www.bbc.com/mundo/articles/cqv1gqqg5ejo
Lo mejor de Noticias Univision de la mañana / jueves 21 de diciembre de 2023
https://youtu.be/ENOSNPFsBlg?si=txBGiZt6A4vcCVdf
3:48 – 6:47
5:58 “..se trata de la llegada como si fuera un héroe..” ✔ Lo que el palangrista Edwin Pitiyanqui no puede concebir es que los estadounidenses liberados, entre ellos mercenarios de Silvercorp USA quienes entraron clandestinamente en Venezuela en la Operación Gedeón, no serán recibidos como héroes en U$A, porque no lo son. En tal aventurismo desde Colombia en aquel entonces (2019-20), también estuvieron envueltos los opositores venezolanos al gobierno, Leopoldo López y Juan Guaidó. ◺
"No es un intercambio entre delincuentes”: abogada de Álex Saab sobre su liberación (+ audio )
21/12/2023
El exministro venezolano Tareck El Aissami tenía un portafolio de medios para difamar a Alex Saab
mayo 8, 2024
.. La trama de corrupción en la que está involucrado Tareck
El Aissami asciende a 29,000 millones de dólares .. ..
El empresario Samark López, actualmente detenido y acusado de ser
testaferro de El Aissami, afirmó que estas campañas estaban
diseñadas y financiadas por Joselit Ramírez, exjefe de Sunacrip,
quien también fue arrestado por corrupción administrativa
relacionada con la trama Pdvsa-Cripto. Además, López reveló que
los medios y personas involucradas en estas campañas recibían
financiamiento de la USAID (Agencia de los Estados Unidos para el
Desarrollo Internacional).
Saab presentó conversaciones entre
Samark López y los opositores Julio Borges, Leopoldo López, Carlos
Vecchio y Carlos Ocariz. Los acusó de conspirar para afectar la
moneda nacional y aumentar el valor del dólar paralelo, al margen de
la tasa establecida por el Banco Central de Venezuela (BCV). ..
Meet Ana Belén Montes, a former spy for Cuba, now retired in Puerto Rico
https://www.aldianews.com/en/culture/heritage-and-history/ana-belen-montes-cuba-spy
January 11, 2023
..“Your honor, I engaged in the activity that brought me before you because I obeyed my conscience rather than the law,” Montes said at trial.. ..And what did Montes have to say about her crimes, specifically, after spending 21 years in jail? “Who in the last 60 years has asked the Cuban people if they want the U.S. to impose a suffocating embargo that makes them suffer?..
Ana Belén Montes: la solidaridad con Cuba hasta las últimas consecuencias
https://youtu.be/IJc8JlreeqU ,21-3-17
Philip Agee y Ana Belén Montes: la victoria de la conciencia, invisible para la prensa
https://youtu.be/jj0ArkXSbkQ ,02-02-18
34- ✔ Virtually all Cuban products & services are prohibited from entering the U.S. based on the U.S. gov. blockade held on the island for over 60 years, among other things to negatively impact its reserve currencies. Havana Club ® is an internationally-known Cuban rum brand. In December 2021 Bacardi Limited company (headquartered in Bermuda) sued the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office for allegedly violating the law by reviving a Cuban government entity’s “Havana Club” trademark. Bacardi began selling its own Havana Club rum (made in Puerto Rico) in the U.S. in 1995. Cuba’s state-run Cubaexport and French spirits company Pernod Ricard sell rum under the same name in other countries (since the 1960’s), but are barred from selling it in the U.S.. So obviously Bacardi the black bat with the top hat, does not want the competition. In April 2022 Bacardi lost the lawsuit, but Havana Club is still banned in the U.S.. Speaking of the “old Chiropter”, it has supported terrorist acts against Cuba.. For years I am no longer an alcohol aficionado, but I must say a Cuban-made Havana Club (aged to 7 years) is the best tasting & smoothest rum I’ve ever tasted. It even had a plastic stopper to prevent overfilling.. After many years I still have it with some in it.
◺
35- ✔ With other Cuban products is more or less the same story. Cohiba ® is a premium Cuban cigar & cigarette brand. Due to the U.S. blockade on the island it is prohibited from entering (cocaine apparently has no problem entering duty-free). But the blockade even goes further than that, as it penalizes foreign banks, insurers, etc, individuals, who deal or are associated with Cuba in any way. Instead, the US-based General Cigar Company makes a brand in Dominican Republic with the same name. The U.S. Cohiba brand name was registered in the US by the General Cigar Company in 1978. The U.S. blockade on Cuba even hurts medical patients on both countries… Among many innovations, Cuban scientists have developed a vaccine against lung cancer (Cimavax). They have a treatment to prevent complications in diabetes patients called Heberprot-P. It reduces leg amputations in those with diabetic foot ulcers by more than four times.. In the U.S. there are about 73,000 lower limb amputations each year caused by diabetes. The tiny island of Cuba loses billions of dollars each year just by the U.S. government not permitting U.S. citizens to travel there as tourists! The much touted notion of freedom of movement in the Constitution (14th Amendment, Sáenz v. Roe, 526 U.S. 489 [1999] in the Supreme Court) shred to pieces. ◺
Freedom of movement under United States law
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Freedom_of_movement_under_United_States_law
36- ✔ Airbnb, the online marketplace for lodgings, in 2015 began services in Cuba after the easing of some restrictions under the Obama administration (in divide & conquer though, they were tighten against Venezuela..). Following Donald Trump in 2017 those restrictions were tightened under the pretext of the “Havana Syndrome”. In 2022 Airbnb paid a fine of $91,172 to OFAC (Office of Foreign Assets Control) because it accepted payment by Americans who traveled to Cuba outside the 12 authorized categories.. Ben Rhodes, an advisor to Obama, classified the fine as counterproductive and Trumpian... ◺
5. Trump’s relentless effort to rollback the Obama policy crushed the Cuban private sector, limited Americans capacity to travel somewhere they’d like to go, and did nothing to make gains on human rights beyond performative rhetoric from a man who does not believe in democracy.
https://twitter.com/brhodes/status/1415065503865868291 thread
Jul 13, 2021
US imposed embargo to strangle Cuban economy and even lied about sonic attack against U.S. diplomats. Americans will be penalized if they travel to Cuba and if they bring Cuban cigars and rum back to the US. Quite Pathetic.
https://twitter.com/chenweihua/status/1631276605644365824
Mar 2, 2023
37- ✔ The Biden admin. has done little to ease the restrictions imposed under Trump. Between 1994 and 2003, OFAC collected over $8 million in violations of the Cuban “embargo”, against just under $10,000 for terrorism financing violations for the Middle East.. It had 10x more agents assigned to tracking financial activities relating to Cuba than to Osama Bin Laden… The U.S. fought a decade long war in Vietnam, and that country has a communist party in power, yet it does not have it sanctioned… Vietnam has a a mixed socialist-oriented market economy, beginning in the mid-1980s named Đổi Mới economic reforms.
In Feb. 1994, 🇺🇸 Bill Clinton ended a 19-year-old trade “embargo” on Vietnam. Despite its lifting, Vietnamese exports remained subject to high tariffs. The White House expected a broadening of “free-market reforms” in order to qualify it as a “most favored nation”. On Jan. 11, 2007 Vietnam became a member ot the World Trade Organization. U.S. exports to Vietnam in that year totaled about $1.4 billion, a 62% increase over those of 2006. In the first 10 months of 2016, U.S. exports to Vietnam totaled $9.5 billion. Imports came to $38.8 billion, a net trade deficit of $29.3 billion...
What has Spartacus Cuba done or not done to stir the wrath of Washington? To Spanish-speaking media in the U.S. none of that is worth mentioning, but it has PLENTY of hot airtime for inane reality shows and soap operas! Just what the commercial sponsors ordered. On social media there are many trolls who label instead the blockade euphemistically as an embargo, claiming the Cuban government rather uses it as an excuse for its own failures! Such “useful idiots” apparently don’t bother to notice that every year the U.S. president signs related legislation to extend it. What does the executive then sign? Toilet paper? The United Nations’ yearly resolutions to end the blockade on Cuba is what, a Cuban regime sponsored show? It is extraterritorial. In the U.S. only 12 companies are licensed to trade with Cuba [about USD $280 million a year], and credit is prohibited, they must be paid in advance cash (when most of the world’s trade is by letters of credit)… Personal remittances account for much more than that! ◺
Trade between Cuba and United States
https://oec.world/es/profile/bilateral-country/cub/partner/usa
Western Union to open money transfers to Cuba from all 50 U.S. states
March 02, 2023
..The Biden administration, which has taken some small steps to roll back some Trump era sanctions against Cuba, said last May that remittances could resume provided they used “electronic payment processors” to avoid funds going directly to the Cuban government..
38- April 6, 1960, Lester D. Mallory, US Deputy Assistant Secretary of State for Inter-American Affairs, wrote in an internal memorandum: “The majority of Cubans support Castro … The only foreseeable means of alienating internal support is through disenchantment and disaffection based on economic dissatisfaction and hardship. … every possible means should be undertaken promptly to weaken the economic life of Cuba.” Mallory proposed “a line of action which … makes the greatest inroads in denying money and supplies to Cuba, to decrease monetary and real wages, to bring about hunger, desperation and overthrow of government.”
✔ “Hispanic” media in the U.S. won’t mention either that the U.S. government prohibits US citizens who settle in Cuba from receiving Social Security payments.. I “wonder” why.. Isn’t that important news? By contrast, Operation Paperclip’s Nazis were given those benefits plus others in the U.S... ◺
https://havanatimes.org/news/cuba-off-bounds-for-us-social-security/
2013
..The U.S. Department of the Treasury prohibits making payments to anyone residing in Cuba or North Korea..
https://www.aol.com/finance/social-security-still-collect-benefits-130040411.html
2023
✔ So, ¿is Joseph Robinette Biden Jr. really sincere, or a demagogue when he or his staff tweets ◺ : “Capitalism without competition isn’t capitalism. It’s exploitation.”
39- ✔ A common media talking point when Cuban immigrants reach the U.S. is to label them either as refugees or fleeing a dictatorship. As usual they fail to mention that most of these migrants left Cuba with a visa to another country, and the chief reason for that is that the U.S. government has failed in its agreement to fulfill the visa quotas. They also neglect to mention that thousands of Cubans travel back to visit the island every year.. Since when does someone supposedly fleeing a vengeful dictatorship return and risk his skin? In the 2021 CNN article below, Cubans in 2018 represented the 7th largest group of immigrants in the U.S... Just imagine the increased numbers for the other groups would be if they suffered a financial & economic blockade and had a preferential immigration policy as the one offered to Cubans by the U.S. government (Cuban Adjustment Act of 1966). ◺
Cifras y datos para entender la inmigración cubana en Estados Unidos y el resto del mundo
https://cnnespanol.cnn.com/2021/07/19/cifras-datos-migracion-cubana-estados-unidos-mundo-orix/
2021
..En el año fiscal 2018 conformaban el séptimo grupo más grande, con más de 1,3 millones de cubanos que representan aproximadamente el 3 por ciento de la población inmigrante total de 44,7 millones..
Cuban immigrants in the United States, 2020
https://www.migrationpolicy.org/article/cuban-immigrants-united-states
..in FY 2018 were the seventh largest group..
Álvarez
Guedes – Hablaba con Dios, diario de un cubano
https://youtu.be/n6_PTMXnauk ,08-8-24
40- ✔ A common sophism uttered by some subjects is: “Well, if you like Cuba, Venezuela…., so much, why don’t you move over there?” Of course, these commoners could originate from any place in the globe, so it should be first asked of them: if they love or defend the “American” empire so much, how come they don’t live in the U$A? Or to those that already do, how come they don’t go back to their countries of origin (assuming those aren’t Cuba, Venezuela….) ? If that empire doesn’t want, and in fact punishes, anyone who has relations with Cuba, how come it has possession of Guantánamo Bay naval base & geographical sections since 1903 against the wishes of the Cuban people? The military prisons there since 2001 are the only places inside Cuba where torture is practiced… It’s the only place in Cuba having a McDonald’s and other franchises.. Yes sir, the best of American culture to feel right at home. Oh the irony! All that territory could be better used for Cuba’s development, tourism. In 2009, Obama signed an executive order to close the detention camps in a year, but the Senate voted to keep the prisons open.. ◺
Fact-check: Do McDonald’s employees in Denmark get paid $22 an hour, six weeks paid vacation? 2021
World’s first carbon tax on livestock will cost farmers in Denmark $100 per cow
Jun 26, 2024
https://www.koco.com/article/worlds-first-carbon-tax-livestock-denmark/61420605
Denmark will tax livestock farmers for the greenhouse gases emitted by their cows, sheep and pigs from 2030, the first country to do so as it targets a major source of methane emissions, one of the most potent gases contributing to global warming. ..
41a- ✔ The self-appointed immigration agents, i.e. gusanos or wannabes, are insatiable in their hokum, such as lacking sense when yelling at others to go and live in Cuba (not realizing or playing dumb, that their own gov., the U.S., restricts such trips.. Heck if allowed I’ll welcome them paying for my trip! I’ll send them a postcard), but then cynically supporting for Cubans to flee the island using whatever means, even illegal ! Trump ended cruise ship dockings and flights from the U.S. to Cuba, placing travelers of other nationalities who visited the island at risk of complicated entries into the U.S.. ◺
Justicia de EE. UU. multa a cuatro grandes navieras por hacer escalas ilegales en Cuba,
31-12-22
Cuba reconocida por Tripadvisor como lo mejor de Travellers Choice de 2023
18/12/23
The Biden administration has petitioned the Supreme Court to reinstate a law which penalizes those who incentivize illegal immigration for profit. If indeed it goes thru, many politicians & journalists in Miami could face prison for actually committing such acts.
https://twitter.com/GuerreroCubano2/status/1626307545361965057
Feb 16, 2023
https://twitter.com/GuerreroCubano2/status/1629564145623236611
Feb 25
How US policy foments organized crime on US-Mexico border
28 Jun 2023
https://insightcrime.org/investigations/executive-summary-major-findings-2/
..1. The prevention through deterrence policies used by the US government have created an increasingly lucrative black market for human smuggling. Transnational criminal networks have assumed greater control over the movement of people and replaced the personalized, community-based nature of human smuggling that once existed..
Once again the lies of Paola Castillo in collusion with channel 41 in Miami. They attack the tourism of #Cuba , they lend themselves to generate Fake News aimed at increasing the economic suffocation of our people, affecting their sources of income.
https://twitter.com/GuerreroCubano2/status/1566130552335466496
Sep 3, 2022
Guerrero Cubano 22-9-22 (clip); influencer mexicana Paola Castillo en Cuba
Ana María Cristina Polo González is a Cuban-American television arbitrator on the TV reality show Caso Cerrado. She was born in Havana-Cuba and moved to Puerto Rico when she was 2 years old with her family. Later they moved to Miami where she participated in different musicals. A breast cancer survivor, Polo frequently speaks and raises funds for the cause. She graduated from the University of Miami School of Law in 1987, and is a member of the Florida Bar, and was a member of the law firm of Emmanuel Perez & Associates, P.A. in Coral Gables, Florida.
41b- ✔ On her TV show, to me she comes across as a smartly demented judge. Her show has been quite popular with Hispanic audiences in the U.S. and Latin America. But do they notice in the closing credits it spells out some of the cases are dramatized, acted out, in order to protect the intimacy of the implicated? During interviews, Polo herself has admitted that many of the lawsuits are prearranged “because what really matters is the message transmitted”.. If you notice, ALL the participants speak in a flowing manner, not stumbling for words, forgetting or pausing as would be the case in real life.. And that’s the business logic model: attract and keep the audience in order to sell advertising space. The perverse sells. It gives people a sense of voyeurism of witnessing from afar desires that are not admitted to publicly. Themes presented are: gender violence, homophobia, sexual perversion, etc. Beyond the aesthetics, the problem with such shows lie in the solutions offered by the producers. The constant, grotesque carnival of anti-values are presented as a catharsis to solving such issues, complex by nature or society sometimes. Judge Polo herself often portrays herself even worse than the plaintiffs / defendants / witnesses, by acting with an air of superiority. At times lashing out political tirades against socialist governments or civilian life in Cuba or Venezuela. It’s alarming so many unsuspecting viewers see her as an ethical model, a universal judge. Others view her program just to spend some time, fully aware of the tricks, but others take it very seriously, to the point of assuming it as “life lessons”. Of course some of those situations can and do occur in real life, but they should be treated with dignity, privately, and not hawked as a sideshow. Some would argue that’s what the public wants, the marketplace of ideas. But that’s not exactly true because such are the only avenues offered to people who seek some justice, without considering the consequences, in an otherwise chaotic world. It is easy to trivialize the concept of justice, what’s difficult (but necessary) is to juggle such “circus” with the challenges of reality. In “Caso Cerrado” that’s not the purpose. And need I repeat that the actors involved are paid? In 2020, if you can believe it she and Dominican journalist Óscar Haza were branded communist sympathizers by the right-wing fanatics in Miami only because both didn’t vote for Donald Trump!.. She called those who follow Trump blind, as pedant as he.. ◺
Doctora Polo critica al Gobierno de Trump
https://youtu.be/J-AykSZxxU8 ,10-6-20
42- ✔ An aunt of mine used to reproach me that I shouldn’t prohibit my mom from watching such programs… So I responded: “Like I have the power or desire to tie her up and prevent her from doing so? It is precisely those channels who are preventing you and her from watching alternatives”. Rarely & briefly did I comment on the programs that they watch. But it seemed to fall on deaf ears.. Brainwashing is a powerful tool. A little more on my aunt (now deceased) in a later paragraph. Back in the 1960’s or 70’s she was a cashier at a Sloan’s or A & P supermarket, in 110 Street & Broadway, southwest corner. She built a house in Dominican Republic, in the capital, not far from the airport. She couldn’t really enjoy it cuz every time she had to return to the U.S. for medical care.. She would relate to me how people in D. R. always tried to squeeze money from her.
As far as apartments go in Manhattan, hers was huge, even had two bathrooms.
A program she used to hear was on nutrition, though the host always heaped political opinions.. Here my response to one such:
Dra. Maribel Santa Cruz 04-9-20; protestas, comunistas, ateos https://sammydeli.blogspot.com/2020/09/dra-maribel-santa-cruz-04-9-20.html ◺
Programa “La ley y usted”, 05-8-23, con el abogado Raúl Pablo Meruelo, por Radio WADO 1280 AM, New York, sábados a las 10:00 AM.
1:43 “..Biden y su ideología izquierdista.. cuando yo haga esto y que no lo hacen en ningún medio de comunicación hispano..” ✔ En su perorata, Raulín no menciona para nada el atentado de golpe de estado por Trump y su gentuza en enero 2021, ni los fraudes de impuestos y financieros del agente naranja. Con esto tampoco quiero exculpar a Biden y cualquier caso de corrupción de él o su hijo, pero eso tendrá que ser probado ante una corte judicial. Raulín como abogaducho debería entender eso. Y si Hunter Biden solicitara los servicios de RPM, ¿acaso él aceptaría representarlo? Dejaría de llamarlo crackero, o hasta pistolero? 🤔 ¿O le diría a su secretaria: “Ofrécele café o crack. Luego de este cliente, haz que pase el crackero a mi oficina.” ‘oño… 🤣
5:19
Si una excusa de los Biden era que solo hablaban boberías
por teléfono,
entonces Raulín
debería
creerles, ya que cada sábado
él
califica a Joe Biden de baboso! 😊 ◺
7:21 “..¿En qué tipo de sociedad queremos vivir?.. en una dónde el gobierno controla todo lo que usted hace?..de qué tipo de auto usted puede manejar..” ✔ Si este personaje de verdad cree, que los demócratas son comunistas, entonces no sé, ¿porqué no se larga pa’ Haití, Afganistán o Libia, donde no hay gobiernos y reina el caos anarquista! Cuentero de ve’dad ve’dad. Por décadas la industria automovilística resistió equipar los carros con cinturones de seguridad y otras medidas:
Tomar nota, luego en títulos sobre : crack-up capitalism ◺
When Americans went to war against seat belts
May 26, 2020
https://www.businessinsider.com/when-americans-went-to-war-against-seat-belts-2020-5?op=1
• In the early 1980s, the public-safety battle was over seat belts. Most Americans didn't use them, and 65% opposed them being enforced by law.
• "There was a libertarian streak among resistors," car-safety pioneer Ralph Nader told Business Insider. "They took the stance that 'you're not going to tie the American people up in seat belts.'"..
..The auto industry actually supported seat-belt requirements, mainly to circumvent legislation that would have mandated airbags..
When new seat belt laws drew fire as a violation of personal freedom
August 4, 2023
https://www.history.com/news/seat-belt-laws-resistance
.. One of the first things the Reagan administration did was to rescind the NHTSA rule requiring passive restraints. Insurance companies sued the administration and the case went all the way to the Supreme Court. In a surprise ruling, the justices voted unanimously to block the Reagan administration and enforce the NHTSA’s rule ..
The interstate highway system - definition, purpose & facts
June 7, 2019
https://www.history.com/topics/us-states/interstate-highway-system
..Under the terms of the law, the federal government would pay 90 percent of the cost of expressway construction. The money came from an increased gasoline tax.. ..Most unpleasant of all was the damage the roads were inflicting on the city neighborhoods in their path. They displaced people from their homes, sliced communities in half and led to abandonment and decay in city after city..
✔ compare above also to congestion pricing elsewhere in this post...
and to → How Americans are tricked into buying fake food
◺
Not only will Uber and Lyft pay $328 million to settle a wage theft suit, they are establishing a New York minimum wage and paid sick leave
November 2, 2023
The reckless policies that helped fill our streets with ridiculously large cars
Apr 28, 2024
https://www.vox.com/future-perfect/24139147/suvs-trucks-popularity-federal-policy-pollution
Insurance crisis sparks flood of people moving out of Florida : report
October 30, 2023
https://www.rawstory.com/farmers-insurance-florida/
Popular nasal decongestants like Sudafed, NyQuill are ineffective, FDA says
https://youtu.be/wX-4yOMceYI?si=6AHtMnpM0ZStkNFO ,9-14-23
3:08 “..it was in the market as early as 1938.. back in those days the evidence that you need to, bring something to the market is not strict as it is now..”
3:30 “..it’s 1 to 2 billion dollar a year industry..”
6:20 – 7:00 “..placebo effect.. power of the mind is pretty amazing, shown in multiple studies..”
✔ Dammit bring back good old-fashioned cocaine-laced Coca Cola ® !! ◺
Boy's day care death from fentanyl sparks safety concerns across child care industry
https://youtu.be/-y0597ZtWUA?si=AknuBOWHCRV0toWv ,9-21-23
Why does the United States pay, by far, the highest prices in the world for prescription drugs?
February 8th, 2024
PolitiFact: Are US prescription prices 10 times those of other nations? Sometimes
May 21, 2023
Spanish nightclub fire: two premises had invalid papers
10-01-23
https://www.euronews.com/2023/10/01/at-least-six-dead-in-nightclub-fire-in-southeastern-spain
Two of the nightclubs involved in Sunday's fire in Murcia did not have a municipal licence and had been under a cease and desist order. Thirteen people were killed….
✔ Ahora, de leyes en EEUU sí sabe el señor Raúr Meruelo, cada sábado comienza descargando sandeces politiqueras por aprox. 20 minutos (para reírse eh) , pero luego da buenos consejos legales eh. Tiene una oficina en downtown Manhattan, si necesitan sus servicios, vayan y visiténlo, y digan que yo los envié ok. 🙃 ◺
8:34 “..usted sabe que la mayoría de la gente que emigra solo le importa lo que le pueda dar el gobierno..” ✔ Entonces para qué Raulín apela a que la gente salga a votar por los republicanos en vez de los demócratas? 10:10 Solo cree en sus instituciones cuando le conviene? Él, como inmigrante aquí cuando tenía 15 años desde Cuba (9:29), debería saber que los cubanos han tenido beneficios del gobierno yanki que ningún otro sector hispano ha recibido.. Incluso, los ricos y mafiosos que huyeron tras la revolución de 1959, al llegar a EEUU cometieron, y cometen, toda clase de fraudes al contribuyente (to taxpayers). Por ejemplo, sin pruebas de contabilidad declaraban pérdidas de propiedades en Cuba, para luego no tener que pagar impuestos en EEUU... También en su fuga saquearon las cuentas bancarias en la isla y el gobierno de EEUU nunca las devolvió a 🇨🇺 ! ◺
Hear Menendez explain why he had large sums of cash at home
https://youtu.be/rSmdnSs_tYk?si=AtKA33i8cj6Cbs2g ,9-25-23
5:32 “..because of the history of my family facing confiscation in Cuba..”
✔ Bob M. nació en New York City en enero 1954.. La dictadura de Batista, apoyada por EEUU, campeaba en Cuba en esa fecha, o sea 5 años antes del triunfo de la Revolución socialista… ¿De qué ocho cuartos de confiscaciones a su familia por Castro entonces bembetea Bob Mentecato? Mitómano a leguas. Same BS story with Florida Senator Marco Antonio Rubio who in the past claimed his family fled communist Cuba, when really it came to the U.S. in 1956, during U.S.-puppet Fulgencio Batista! ◺
7:31 “..they are here because throughout my career, and some may not like the positions I’ve taken, I have stood against authoritarian regimes in Iran and its desire to achieve nuclear weapons or Cuba and its dictatorship or authoritarianism in Turkey, Venezuela, Russia, and wherever in the world..”
8:14 “..they are here because since my earliest days in Congress I have repeatedly stood up to the gun lobby..”
✔ ¿No
es raro que Meruelo, tan estridente contra los demócratas
en EEUU, llamándolos
hasta comunistas, no se pronuncie de la misma manera contra el
“demócrata”
Bob M. ? ◺
8:45 “..they are here because I never gave up on delivering justice for 9/11 families.. who were previously and unfairly excluded from the U.S. victims of state-sponsored terrorism..”
✔ ¿Y Cuba acaso apoya el terrorismo para que EEUU la coloque en su lista de patrocinadora de ese flagelo? A lo contrario, ella ha sido víctima de él, y proveniente de Miami y New Jersey por esa mafia cubanoamericana de la cual Bobby es un compinche. Las Naciones Unidas vota cada año contra el bloqueo de EEUU a Cuba, pero Bobby el capo se cree más listo y bonachón que el resto. ◺
9:36 “..doing everything we can this week to avoid a government shutdown.. and insure the people of Ukraine have everything they need to defeat Putin..”
✔ See paragraph 16a- on: more civilian gun-related deaths in the U.S. every year than in the conflict in Ukraine ◺
Falsos abogados y notarios, en la Ley & Usted con Raul Meruelo. Programa con Jose Alduey Sierra.
May 2, 2017
https://www.facebook.com/watch/?v=425440447825996
Rick Sanchez 26-01-23 (clip); inmigrantes en EEUU
Japan will ‘disappear’ without action on births, warns PM Fumio Kishida’s advisor
Mar 06, 2023
Last year, about twice as many people died as were born in Japan, with fewer than 800,000 births and about 1.58 million deaths.. ..It’s not falling gradually, it’s heading straight down..
South Korea has the world’s lowest fertility rate, a struggle with lessons for us all
March 19, 2023
https://www.npr.org/2023/03/19/1163341684/south-korea-fertility-rate?utm_source=pocket-newtab
Jugada Crítica 30-8-23; EEUU, imperio en decadencia
https://youtu.be/drguiw1InsI?si=UIVRqN_CTRwuJwP1
https://videos.telesurtv.net/es/content/311001
43- ✔ Another conditioned fallacy the naysayers might spew is that “hey look why are you stupid, loafer commies using capitalist-made devices as I-Phones, the internet, Google, duh duh duh”. Asinine claims bordering on the “common sense”, but specifically simplistic. Why use the wheel then if it was created circa 3500 BC, more or less in Mesopotamia (Iraq), and not under capitalism (accumulation in private hands)? Likewise concrete, origins go back to the ancient Egyptians, in Göbekli Tepe temple in Turkey, and to the Romans who perfected their mix using volcanic ash. Same thing with money, created way before the advent of capitalism (more for accounting & exchange, I.e. war finance, slave trade). Furthermore, the lazy bums don’t bother to know or tell, that all these high tech inventions in the U.S. originated through federal gov (taxpayer funded) & universities’ investments and R & D. Internet and Google derived from ARPANET, ALOHAnet, same thing with GPS, lithium batteries, etc. All given to the private sector when they were profitable… The NSA by far the largest employer of mathematicians in the U.S.. But very MUCH LESS they’ll know or care, that a Soviet engineer, Leonid Kupriyanovich, in 1957 was the first to successfully create a mobile phone, the “Altai”, a palm-sized mobile device that predated the Motorola phone by ten years.. ◺
Home computer (1981)- Kraftwerk
https://youtu.be/bu55q_3YtOY ,8-02-09
#music
People in the U.S. pay more for slower internet than European, Canadian, and Asian counterparts, according to the Open Technology Institute
Oct 6 2021
https://www.cnbc.com/2021/10/06/heres-why-high-speed-internet-is-so-expensive-in-the-us.html
List of countries by public sector size
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_public_sector_size
44a-
✔ With these boring trolls, to a point, you need to
have
the patience of an Arhat or a Rishi,
since
they’re so inane or pretend to. Children, sentient adults, are
BY
FAR more
humble & lovable. At the onset of the Russian Revolution 1917-18,
the country was agrarian / feudal, with a stagnating GDP, but in a
few decades
it
became industrialized & a superpower to rival the West (despite
suffering a
civil
war & World Wars
1
& 2). It was that socialist revolution which gave land to the
peasants, as private property, for the first time! Population
steadily increased, life expectancy rose greatly, infant mortality
decreased. This as an answer to those febrile-minded that accuse
Stalin of all kinds of genocides.. Similar,
though not the same, as
in
Cuba after 1959...
The
Soviet
Union’s GDP
(value
of all goods and services produced in a state or region)
was
among
the fastest growing,
and all that without exploiting the so-called 3rd
world
or having a reserve currency like the West imposes! According to the
UN agency FAO, from 1961 to 1991, calorie
intake per capita
in
the Soviet Union (USSR) was above that of Europe & United States!
In 1980, the USSR had more doctors & hospital beds than the
United States! In the 1970’s it had more engineers.. During the
Great
Depression in
the 1930’s, the U.S. had about 23%
unemployment,
while the USSR had about
full
employment! The 7-hour
workday became
law in USSR’s constitution of 1936. Retirement at 60. Sick-pay was
a full 100% of normal. Maternity leave was for a full year. Gender
pay equal for the same jobs.
Private automobiles were harder to come by than in the West, but
public
transport was free.
House rent & utilities did not surpass 30% of a worker’s
salary. The external debts of the USSR and other “communist”
nations was lower than those of the West, and naturally the IMF
(International Monetary Fund) and World Bank weren’t happy with
that. Smallpox was eradicated in the world in December 1979, thanks
to a vaccination effort of the USSR at the United Nations.. In
a
bid to
hold off
the USSR’s model, the U.S. & Europe implemented what was known
as “welfare states”. The benefits of those “social democracies”
have deteriorated since the fall of the USSR, given that there was no
longer a “red menace”
or
“Cold War”
(age
of neoliberalism, compare in paragraphs 16c-, 48-, 69- ).
Russia’s
GDP then greatly fell after the capitalist restoration of 1991, state
enterprises were sold off at fire sale prices, capital flight
fattened western
banks. Organized crime (oligarchs) took over, a great tragedy for all
of humanity… After
the disintegration, many resorted to selling their organs..
In
March 1991, a referendum was held asking if citizens were in favor
with keeping the USSR, 80% voted for keeping it... But Mikhail
Gorbachev & “The Chicago Boys” had other plans… To this
day, he’s very much disliked in Russia and considered a traitor. Of
course Western pundits
obfuscate
that. Other
analysts
have pointed out the USSR’s shift
towards
capitalism started earlier, during the 1965 Soviet economic reform
under Alexei
Kosygin,
with increased decentralization over economic planning. Compare
also to paragraph 70b- ◺
Stalin’s four attempts at resignation
February 23, 2017
https://socialistmlmusings.wordpress.com/2017/02/23/stalins-four-attempts-at-resignation/
.. Stalin remarked on this later in 1927 in a speech at a meeting of the Central Committee:
It is said that in that “will” Comrade Lenin suggested to the congress that in view of Stalin’s “rudeness” it should consider the question of putting another comrade in Stalin’s place as General Secretary. That is quite true.
Yes, comrades, I am rude to those who grossly and perfidiously wreck and split the Party. I have never concealed this and do not conceal it now. Perhaps some mildness is needed in the treatment of splitters, but I am a bad hand at that. .. .. It was discussed by each delegation separately, and all the delegations unanimously, including Trotsky, Kamenev and Zinoviev, obliged Stalin to remain at his post. ..
La visita de Nikita Khrushchev a EE.UU.
https://youtu.be/NiycBqa6nYI?si=WQ5efsh9d3zvjvCk ,04-3-15
✔ 44b- In January 1962 Che Guevara told colleagues in Cuba’s Ministry of Industries (MININD): “..In no way am I saying that financial autonomy of the enterprise with moral incentives, as it is established in the socialist countries, is a formula which will impede progress to socialism..” He was referring to the economic management system applied in the Soviet bloc, known in Cuba as the Auto-Financing System (AFS). By 1966, in his critique of the Soviet manual of political economy, he concluded that the USSR “..is returning to capitalism..”. He agreed that the law of value remained under socialism but argued that in Revolution the capitalist market could not serve as the dynamic catalyst to productivity and efficiency, and stressed central planning and state regulation between products transferred in state-owned enterprises would not constitute as commodities. For him the task was not to use the law of value nor even hold it in check, but to define its sphere of operation and make inroads to undermine it. In July 1964 Guevara told colleagues he had been reading analyses from the socialist bloc: “..the solution that they are proposing for these problems in Poland is the complete freedom of the law of value; that is to say, a return to capitalism.. ..the theory is failing because they have forgotten Marx. Instead of Capital, the Soviet manual of political economy had been turned into a Bible..”. [compare in paragraph 59-..] ◺
Che as minister: the promotion of science and technology for Cuba’s socialist development
23 Aug 2022
https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/14747731.2022.2111078
Economic planning is a resource allocation mechanism based on a computational procedure for solving a constrained maximization problem with an iterative process for obtaining its solution. Planning is a mechanism for the allocation of resources between and within organizations contrasted with the market mechanism. As an allocation mechanism for socialism, economic planning replaces factor markets with a procedure for direct allocations of resources within an interconnected group of socially owned organizations which together comprise the productive apparatus of the economy.[1][2]…
There are various forms of economic planning that vary based on their specific procedures and approach. The level of centralization or decentralization in decision-making depends on the specific type of planning mechanism employed.…
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Economic_planning
✔ I haven’t viewed this article, but briefly, simply, as an analogy to illustrate, it’s my understanding economic planning could be compared to central heating, cooling, or water filtering, in a house or a building… ◺
Sabre Global Distribution System
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sabre_(travel_reservation_system)
owned by Sabre Corporation,[1] is a travel reservation system used by travel agents and companies to search, price, book, and ticket travel services provided by airlines, hotels, car rental companies, rail providers and tour operators. Originally developed by American Airlines under CEO C.R. Smith[2] with the assistance of IBM in 1960, the booking service became available for use by external travel agents in 1976 and became independent of the airline in March 2000… ..Even after biases were eliminated, travel agents using the system leased and serviced by American were significantly more likely to choose American over other airlines. The same was true of United and its Apollo system.[citation needed] The airlines referred to this phenomenon as the “halo” effect.[18] The fairness rules were eliminated or allowed to expire in 2010. By then, none of the major distribution systems was majority owned by the airlines.[19]….
Digital price tags can change the cost of groceries 6 times per minute
Electronic shelf labels bring Uber-style dynamic pricing to stores like Walmart.
Jun 20, 2024
https://www.popsci.com/technology/electronic-price-tag-groceries/
.. Though these digital tags have become relatively common staples in grocery throughout Europe, they’ve only started to gain traction in the US towards the end of the 2010s. .. .. In Walmart’s case, the employees can access and adjust the screen via a centralized mobile app. .. .. But the potential appeal of ESL isn’t just limited to marginal productivity gains. The ability to change prices on a fly means grocery stores using the tech could also reduce Uber-style surge pricing. With that model in mind, grocery stores could have an incentive to up prices for water or ice during hot days or warmer items during the winter. They could also raise prices of products verbally during peak shopping hours or during holiday seasons where consumers are more likely to rack up lengthy grocery bills. .. .. ESLs could also help store markdown or discount items that are approaching their expiration date. That could lead to better deals for shoppers and potentially prevent a store from throwing out an expired item. ..
Walmart enfrenta una demanda colectiva por acusaciones de precios engañosos en sus tiendas
https://youtu.be/8UGHm_3Spwk?si=4l3-4PhzW4WEhoP0 ,10-7-24
✔ Since the arrival of Vladimir Putin, Russia’s GDP has climbed, poverty & criminality reduced, but social benefits not near to pre-1991. China was also one of the poorest countries in 1949, at the start of its socialist revolution, and by the 21st century it marks the fastest GDP growth in the world, and it isn’t exactly capitalist (its state-operated sector is larger than in Europe).. In the U.S., the real wages (what they can buy) in 1973 were higher than in 2018! All the while, workers’ productivity rose… In the Cold War, the U.S. badgered the Soviet Union on “the right of workers to unionize freely”, I.e. Poland’s “independent” trade union- Solidarity (CIA-sponsored), with its leader Lech Walesa, Time Person of the Year (1981) and Nobel Peace Prize laureate (1983), and later an unpopular President! Yet in the U$A, only 6% of private sector employees have a union membership, and in the public it’s about 34.8%.. In a 2021 Gallup poll, 68% of Americans approve of labor unions, the highest since 1965.. Rethink how efficient neoliberal capitalism is.. Over the same period, real wages in China have quadrupled… ◺
Monthly number of full-time employees in the United States from January 2021 to January 2023
As of January 2023, there were 131.18 million full-time employees in the United States. This is a decrease from the previous month, when there were 131.81 million full-time employees.
Monthly number of part-time employees in the United States from January 2021 to January 2023
In January 2023, around 27.52 million people were employed on a part-time basis in the United States…
Number of part-time employees in the United States from 1990 to 2022 https://www.statista.com/statistics/192338/number-of-part-time-employees-in-the-us-since-1990/
In 2022, about 26.05 million people were employed on a part-time basis in the United States. This is a large increase from 1990 when there were only 20.13 million part-time employees in the U.S.
45- ✔ So as you can see from the graphs above, there’s been an ever increasing use of part-time labor in the U.S. (in other countries also). This is the other side of the coin of the managerial business model of keeping inventories “just-in-time”, so as to reduce costs… ◺
That’s not a real job opening: Some companies are posting ‘ghost jobs’ but don’t actually plan to hire you — or anyone
Sep 18, 2022
Fake job listings are a growing problem in the labor market CBS News
https://youtu.be/AfoNJwaK2ww Mar 30, 2023
✔ I think I’ve seen a posting for one of those “ghost jobs”. For maybe 2 years +, this FedEx office by W. 125th st & Adam Clayton Powell Jr Blvd, with the same job opening… 3-28-23
◺
The 2022 Inflation Reduction Act is a bone of contention between the United States and its European “allies”, as it causes an outsourcing of European companies to the U.S…
https://news.yahoo.com/explainer-why-u-inflation-reduction-174804582.html
,02-01-23
Experts predict U.S. dollar will stay strong in 2023. What does this mean for you?
Nov 28, 2022
https://www.forbes.com/advisor/personal-finance/us-dollar-forecast-2023/
..When war actually broke out, investors looked for stable places to put their money until the war resolves itself.. ..While all these countries have raised interest rates,”says Schabes, the U.S. has raised them far higher.. ..exacerbated by the price increases both directly in natural gas and oil as well as the knock effects through the supply chain.. ..Both Donovan and Schabes predict that the dollar will remain strong in comparison to European currencies as long as the war persists.. ..As the currency increases in value, U.S.-based stock prices can be expected to drop, which means a loss in the value of retirement savings for many investors.. ..A strong dollar makes imported products relatively less expensive versus domestically produced products..
Why Amazon, Google and Microsoft laid off thousands of tech workers
CNBC
https://youtu.be/ANLV6RXO0kU ,02-17-23
What was third-round Paycheck Protection Program (PPP) funding?
October 05, 2022
Short seller Hindenburg accuses Jack Dorsey’s Block of ‘facilitating fraud’
March 23, 2023
..In a damning report Thursday, Hindenburg took to Twitter — the social media platform co-founded by Dorsey — to accuse Block of failing to crack down on illegal activities by customers of its Cash App payments facilitator. The research firm, run by Nathan Anderson, found that Cash App clients allegedly exploited government stimulus payments during COVID lockdowns to line their pockets, according to Hindenburg’s two-year investigation of Block. “Block ignored both internal and external warnings that multiple individuals using the same bank account number to receive government funds was a brazen red flag of fraud,” Hindenburg wrote..
Cash App founder Bob Lee dead after stabbing
ABC News
https://youtu.be/39uM1cb6MiE ,4-06-23
46- ✔ The Marxist Polish economist Michal Kalecki noted in his 1943 essay “Political aspects of full employment”, that capitalists are wary of sustained high employment because it tends to empower workers by reducing their fear of the bosses’ biggest weapon: exile to the reserve army of the unemployed.. So the top one percent of wealth holders from multiple industries push the Fed to focus on its inflation mandate and more or less ignore its high-employment goal (that is go for recession).. The Commerce Department report on U.S. GDP growth of 2.9% in the fourth quarter (2022) and the belief by some that “we” have dodged the recession, has its dose of normalcy bias, for various reasons. For one: in capitalism, “externalities” are counted as economic activity, despite having negative consequences, such as oil spills, climate disasters, gun deaths, opioid crisis, traffic accidents, workplace accidents (I.e. medical & legal fees), etc. In other words, prevention is seen as not profitable... On the report, half of that 2.9% growth came from increases in private inventory investment (overproduction, hence firms haven’t been able to sell their inventories at current prices), plus there was a 26.7% plunge in residential fixed investment, reflecting a sharp decline in housing… ◺
"..What is a cynic? A man who knows the price of everything and the value of nothing.." - Lady Windermere's fan, a play about a good woman, 1892 comedy by Oscar Wilde.
U.S. GDP rose 2.9% in the fourth quarter, more than expected even as recession fears loom
Jan 26 2023
US revises down last quarter’s economic growth to 2.7% rate
February 23, 2023
https://finance.yahoo.com/news/us-revises-down-last-quarters-133457094.html
What’s so special about 2% inflation
CNBC
https://youtu.be/UN-O6oNes0I ,02-20-23
How 2.3 million incarcerated people are currently excluded from the aspiration of full employment
May 17, 2021
What is currently considered full employment doesn’t include 2.3 million incarcerated people—who are largely in prison due to the racist criminal justice policies that result in higher arrests, convictions, and sentences for Black and brown people…
New data on formerly incarcerated people’s employment reveal labor market injustices
https://www.prisonpolicy.org/blog/2022/02/08/employment/
February 8, 2022
How many formerly incarcerated people are jobless at the moment? A good guess would be 60%, to generalize from a new report released by the Bureau of Justice Statistics (BJS)…
Drug overdose death rates,
February 9, 2023
https://nida.nih.gov/research-topics/trends-statistics/overdose-death-rates
Tattooed love boys (1979)- The Pretenders
https://youtu.be/g3ra-e_YuZE ,8-05-22
#music
47- ✔ Despite all the liberal talk of human rights or equality in the “developed” West, one snag is that gender inequality or unequal pay between the sexes is persistent, regardless whether the comparison is between the same job position, experience, or education.. Free labor market at work? A palliative for inflation by reducing the money supply?
In Cuba, there’s MORE gender EQUALITY (plus rights) in the workplace and in government than in the United States.. To repeat, children were executed in the U.S. until 2005. Kids as young as eight can still be charged as an adult. The U.S. is the only country in the world where kids as young as 13 have been sentenced to life imprisonment without the possibility of parole… Do those count as human rights violations or not? Is the country any safer by such practices? Cuba and other countries which the U.S. gov. sanctions and pontificates on democracy, do not demand the U.S. to change its way of government in order to come into political or economic agreements (Venn diagram).. So who’s being intolerant and disrespectful ? I tweeted journalist Farron Cousins (from the respected program Ring of Fire) once on this, specifically in the case of North Korea. Got no response but it doesn’t matter, the main thing is that other users can compare points in their own lives. ◺
Gender inequality in the workplace: A lack of women in leadership https://resources.workable.com/stories-and-insights/gender-inequality-in-the-workplace
It is not Russia, China, Venezuela, Cuba,... it is France. The EU said that it was going to isolate Russia from the world with its sanctions and in the end it has isolated a part of the European population from meeting their basic needs. Hungry queues of students in Paris
https://twitter.com/AnibalGarzon/status/1628410147440656385
Feb 22, 2023
1 in 5 people resort to food banks in the US, according to a survey by ConsumerReports CRAdvocacy
( #foodinsecurity 1 in 5 persons resort to food banks in the US), 12-08-20
SNAP benefits to end for millions
ABC News
https://youtu.be/DfHZXapiAKc ,02-27-23
Most people are losing Medicaid due to red tape issues, report shows
First Coast News
https://youtu.be/9jOJALKiI5s ,5-29-23
Harvard tells grad students to get food stamps to supplement the unlivable wages it pays them
March 30, 2023
British supermarkets are rationing fruit and vegetables as shortages bite
Feb 28, 2023
Students will return paying their loans
FOX 32 Chicago
https://youtu.be/O1tWTup13qY ,6-02-23
Marcus Garvey (Late Late Show 2005)- Sinéad O’Connor
https://youtu.be/rnxqeuE1aIg ,11-21-06
#music
Russia and China have a stranglehold on the world’s food security,
February 19 2023
https://finance.yahoo.com/news/russia-china-stranglehold-world-food-000026443.html
The Global South despises Western sanctions which hurt poor countries the most.
https://twitter.com/chenweihua/status/1631423424617750529
Mar 2, 2023
Prices at the supermarket keep rising. So do corporate profits.
Mar 17, 2023
https://www.vox.com/money/23641875/food-grocery-inflation-prices-billionaires
..Market dominance makes the supply chain more brittle, too, because it means there are just a few vulnerable points for failure. Last year’s baby formula shortage is an example of how dangerous the results can be.. ..In the 1980s, the growing popularity of “just-in-time” inventory systems, where companies order just the amount of inventory needed right now without a buffer, allowed companies to become more efficient. That has meant lower prices for consumers, usually, and higher profits for companies — until a crisis hits, and suddenly there are shortages and supply bottlenecks.. ..But there’s disagreement on whether the higher costs that have resulted from those woes should be passed on to consumers.. ..They believe customers will be more willing to pay higher prices if the hikes are seen as legitimate.. ..Once companies raise prices, they don’t tend to lower them even if input costs go down.. ..“I would say that we have this really toxic narrative out there that the only way we can get inflation under control is to throw a bunch of people out of work,”..
48- ✔ Using their half-ass logic then (from paragraph 43-), they (the capitalist wannabes) shouldn’t use or enjoy the achievements of workers’ struggles such as public universities or public health, the 8-hour workday, right to vacations, collecting social benefits, I.e. unemployment insurance, social security, etc. - the New Deal in the 1930’s (on which the “middle class” grew, though Blacks were left out of the G.I. bill), the “war on poverty” in the 60’s.. Despite that, there’s been some talk about Social Security insolvency in U.S. media for a few years now (flirting with privatizing it and handing it to Wall Street in a silver platter). Both the employer and employee contribute 6.2% of wages up to that income threshold, which is adjusted annually.. Many don’t realize there’s a maximum limit in yearly salary who have to contribute a payroll tax.. In 2022 it only applies to wages up to $147,000. A recent Congressional proposal seeks to apply that payroll tax on wages of $400,000 and up, among other changes, to shore up the program.. A choice of cutting benefits, raising the retirement age, increasing taxes or doing a combination.. Workers who are above the earnings threshold of $147K may pay Social Security payroll taxes for a part of the year only. Democrats have proposed reapplying the Social Security payroll tax starting at $400,000 in wages, leaving a gap between $147K and $400K where no S.S. tax is paid. Applying Social Security payroll taxes to those above the wage base is a popular idea with the public to address possible insolvency issues.. An added route would be to put in place a capital gains tax on intangible transfers, I.e. Tobin tax.. In France, social security taxes are held on the sale of real estate that’s not a primary residence.. ◺
Wages up to $147,000 are currently taxed for Social Security. How that could change, 2022
https://www.cnbc.com/2022/04/30/social-security-taxes-up-to-147000-in-wages-that-could-change.html
IRS reminds taxpayers their Social Security benefits may be taxable
February 9, 2022
https://www.irs.gov/newsroom/irs-reminds-taxpayers-their-social-security-benefits-may-be-taxable
Criticism of Franklin D. Roosevelt
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Criticism_of_Franklin_D._Roosevelt .
..Liberal historians reject Powell’s charges and note that it was Hoover who raised taxes, not Roosevelt; and say that the New Deal did more for blacks than any administration before or since.[21] Libertarian writers such as Burton Folsom believe that Social Security tax increases for middle-class workers exceeded government-mandated wage increases for them, thus leaving them with less current disposable income in exchange for eventual pensions. Roosevelt raised tax rates on the wealthy to a top marginal tax rate of 79%. However, wealthy citizens found tax shelters to reduce this rate. Libertarians also believe New Deal tax legislation curtailed private sector investment and job creation.[22]…
Agricultural and domestic workers (a large percentage African Americans) were excluded from the 1935 Social Security Act in the beginning.
https://www.ssa.gov/policy/docs/ssb/v70n4/v70n4p49.html 2010
Policy diffusion and the exclusion of Black workers from Unemployment Insurance
25 July 2016
..The United States was relatively late in developing its UI system compared to other industrialized nations. During the 1910s and 1920s, there existed a handful of early private UI schemes in the United States run by welfare capitalist firms or individual unions.. ..Theories for the Exclusion..
‘Rampant issues’: Black farmers are still left out at USDA (plus audios )
https://www.politico.com/news/2021/07/05/black-farmers-left-out-usda-497876
2021
Why millions of workers in the US are denied basic protections, 2020 https://politicsofpoverty.oxfamamerica.org/why-millions-workers-us-are-denied-basic-protections/
..Today, in the United States, it’s legal for certain employers not to pay their employees minimum wage, or to ask their employees to work more than 40 hours a week and not provide overtime compensation. Some workers have no protection against sexual harassment in the workplace. Some workers are not guaranteed safety in the workplace. Some workers are not protected if they want to organize..
In the context of labor law in the United States, the term “right-to-work laws” refers to state laws that prohibit union security agreements between employers and labor unions which require employees who are not union members to contribute to the costs of union representation. Unlike the right to work definition as a human right in international law, U.S. right-to-work laws do not aim to provide a general guarantee of employment to people seeking work but rather guarantee an employee’s choice to not pay or be a member of a financially supporting collective bargaining organization (i.e. labor union)…
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Right-to-work_law
What would banning all imports mined using child labor do? Hawley: "The impact would make slave labor and child labor extremely expensive. It would make American labor a lot more attractive." So, then why is the Biden Admin still actively propping up and funding child labor?
https://twitter.com/SenHawleyPress/status/1709937521348751639
Oct 5, 2023
Some in GOP worry DeSantis has overstepped against ‘wokeness’
CNN
https://youtu.be/Bt3kmjrPVws ,02-20-23
DeSantis says GOP will not ‘mess with Social Security,’ as Democrats and Trump slam his past support for privatization
March 2, 2023
https://edition.cnn.com/2023/03/02/politics/ron-desantis-social-security-privatization-trump
401(k) early withdrawals and the impact on savings
CBS News
https://youtu.be/5aLLothW8XA ,3-16-23
IMF calls for rules on non-bank financial sector to prevent turmoil
April 4, 2023
‘End the scam’: Democrats unveil bill to change name of ‘Medicare Advantage’ ,
February 01, 2023
https://www.rawstory.com/end-the-scam-democrats-unveil-bill-to-change-name-of-medicare-advantage/
Employment alone isn’t enough to solve homelessness, study suggests, 2021 https://news.uchicago.edu/story/employment-alone-isnt-enough-solve-homelessness-study-suggests
..about 40% had earnings from formal employment..
Myths & facts about homelessness
https://www.councilforthehomeless.org/myths-facts-about-homelessness/
No one to run with (1982, 1994)- The Allman Brothers Band
https://youtu.be/mN1HP18r9bc ,11-18-17
#music
Nebraska’s child labor case is settled without involving JBS beef plant, 2022
Judge orders slaughterhouse cleaners not to hire minors, 2022
https://apnews.com/article/business-nebraska-child-labor-641d536028e41527bea382042cd81f43
Feds bust company using child labor to clean meatpacking plants
MSNBC
https://youtu.be/JI6K8QIP29Y ,02-18-23
“More than 100 children” were employed by a US company that cleans slaughterhouses, according to an NBC investigation. One of the children was employed twice under a different name. The phenomenon of companies that exploit children is spreading throughout the United States. Most; Central Americans.
https://twitter.com/brunosgarzini/status/1629134149893095427
thread Feb 24, 2023
California’s wine industry was built on slave labor
https://www.thedailybeast.com/californias-wine-industry-was-built-on-slave-labor-10
June 14, 2017
..California, which had been part of Mexico until 1848, tried to solve the labor shortage in the spring of 1850 with a law that essentially enslaved Native Americans so they could be put to work in the vineyards. Nicknamed the Indian Indenture Act, which was, in fact, the very first legislation that the state passed, cruelly stripped California’s Native Americans of most of their rights. It allowed any white man to identify a Native American as vagrant, lazy, or drunk, which would permit a marshal or sheriff to arrest and fine him..
Brazil: Coffee industry, producing for brands such as Starbucks & Nespresso, accused of extensive slave labour
10 Jan 2020
Manhattan: children selling newspapers in front of City Hall (1896) -Alice Austen, photographer
May 5, 2018
10 facts about children living in poverty, 2014
https://borgenproject.org/10-facts-children-living-poverty/
10 facts about child hunger in the world, 2022
https://www.wfpusa.org/articles/10-facts-child-hunger/
NYC labor market lagging behind U.S., with people of color seeing biggest losses
Jan 19, 2023
..The report notes that the city’s unemployment rate was 6.1% in the third quarter of 2022, well above the 3.5% national unemployment rate..
Texas is: #1 state for job creation #1 state for business #1 state for Fortune 500 Hqs #1 state for exports Texas is the economic engine of America thanks to our talented workforce, lower taxes, & reasonable regulations that support businesses large & small.
https://twitter.com/GregAbbott_TX/status/1625945497725767696
Feb 15, 2023
The Federal Reserve Bank of Dallas’ general business activity index for manufacturing in Texas fell for a second straight month to -15.7 in March of 2023 from -13.5 in February, signalling perceptions of broader business conditions continued to worsen.
https://tradingeconomics.com/united-states/dallas-fed-manufacturing-index
ICYMI: California poised to become world’s 4th biggest economy
Oct 24, 2022
https://www.gov.ca.gov/2022/10/24/icymi-california-poised-to-become-worlds-4th-biggest-economy/
..“Job creation is a particularly strong area, with unemployment falling to 3.9% in July, the lowest since data was compiled in 1976 … California’s joblessness dipped below Texas”..
California poised to overtake Germany as world’s No. 4 economy October 24, 2022
Texas small businesses are the backbone of our state, employing more than half of all working Texans. Great to join small business leaders at @NFIB Small Business Day today in Austin. This session, we will work with small businesses to continue to fuel our booming economy.
https://twitter.com/GregAbbott_TX/status/1625656487392452614
Feb 14, 2023
These are America’s 10 worst states for quality of life in 2024
Jul 18, 2024
https://www.cnbc.com/2024/07/13/10-states-worst-quality-of-life-america.html
.. Texas .. .. But for now, statistically speaking, people keep pouring into the state with America’s worst quality of life. ..
Right to Work States 2023
https://worldpopulationreview.com/state-rankings/right-to-work-states
..They also believe the laws weaken unions’ bargaining strength, consequently lowering wages and benefits. Furthermore, they find it unfair for employees to benefit from unions while not contributing to the union dues..
“Farmers get paid less and less for their products, and, yet, when people to the grocery store, we’re getting charged more and more. “Who’s making the money? It’s the middle man. It’s the meatpackers. It’s people like Tyson. They need to be held to account for this.”
https://twitter.com/SenHawleyPress/status/1709571355966841058
Oct 4, 2023
The true failure rate of small businesses, 2021
https://www.entrepreneur.com/starting-a-business/the-true-failure-rate-of-small-businesses/361350
La evolución histórica del empresario
23 Noviembre 2012
https://www.elblogsalmon.com/historia-de-la-economia/la-evolucion-historica-del-empresario
Wage theft often goes unpunished despite state systems meant to combat it.
January 25, 2023
https://www.cbsnews.com/sacramento/news/owed-employers-face-little-accountability-wage-theft/
49- ✔ The U.S. criminal-justice system has been more favorable to employers than employees. For example, a worker stealing from an employer would likely face criminal charges for larceny (jail time), while an employer committing wage theft likely would not ! Also, it’s more likely the arrest of strikers than to prosecute employers for evading workers-compensation taxes.. Wage theft has been usually treated by a government agency investigation or as a civil lawsuit. In 2018 the Supreme Court ruled businesses can require workers to sign arbitration agreements and waive their right to class actions.. ◺
Supreme Court lets states legalize sports gambling, May 14, 2018
https://www.cnn.com/2018/05/14/politics/sports-betting-ncaa-supreme-court/index.html
Supreme Court decision delivers blow to workers’ rights,
May 21, 2018 [+4 mns audio ]
https://www.npr.org/2018/05/21/605012795/supreme-court-decision-delivers-blow-to-workers-rights
Cartels are taking advantage of Biden’s open border policies to smuggle deadly drugs, weapons, & people into our country. Texas is fighting back. Since the launch of #OperationLoneStar, @TxDPS has seized more than 361 MILLION deadly fentanyl doses.
https://twitter.com/GregAbbott_TX/status/1624200769892192258
Feb 10, 2023
Undocumented immigrants commit far fewer crimes than U.S. citizens: Study
December 9, 2020
Mexico’s fight to sue US gun manufacturers for $10bn
https://www.bbc.com/news/world-us-canada-61073823
April 12, 2022
..In other cases, guns are bought “off paper” from private vendors at gun shows in states such as Texas or Arizona, circumventing background checks..
What the DEA can learn from the Honduras debacle of 2012, Operation Anvil
29 MAY 2017
https://insightcrime.org/news/analysis/what-dea-can-learn-from-honduras-debacle/
..Although the FAST program has been rebranded and had its role in enforcement operations stripped away, the DEA and other US government agencies continue to engage in similar on-the-ground activities with partner countries across the region and around the world. For instance, the Wall Street Journal reported in 2014 that US Marshals have dressed up as Mexican marines and joined them on active patrol. And US military special forces have drastically ramped up training in Latin America over the last decade, reportedly becoming involved in anti-gang operations in Central America..
US admits DEA lied about Honduras ‘massacre’ that killed four villagers
25 May 2017
https://www.theguardian.com/world/2017/may/25/us-honduras-drug-enforcement-administration-shooting
Sen. Graham calls for ‘fury and might’ of US to be unleashed on Mexican cartels, eyes military action
Mar 9, 2023
✔ compare to “Scarface”… in paragraph 33b-.. ◺
..”We’re going to unleash the fury and might of the United States against these cartels,” Graham said at a press conference alongside Sen. John Kennedy, R-La.,. “We’re going to destroy their business model and their lifestyle because our national security and the security of the United States as a whole depends on us taking decisive action.”.. ..Graham was referring to the ongoing opioid crisis, which is primarily being driven by fentanyl and causing the deaths of tens of thousands of Americans each year. He cited statistics that 70,000 people died due to fentanyl poisoning last year..
President of Mexico denies fentanyl is produced or consumed in country
CBS News
https://youtu.be/R34fJDMnD90 Mar 10, 2023
✔ U.S. bank officials usually just pay fines for money laundering, not sentenced to prison… Wouldn’t want to ruin their pristine resumes by sending them off to Rikers now would we? Ain’t that big-time corruption made-in-USA? ◺
Wachovia pays $160 million to settle drug money probe
March 17, 2010
https://www.reuters.com/article/us-wachovia-settlement-idUSTRE62G35720100317
Global banks are the financial services wing of the drug cartels
21 Jul 2012
https://www.theguardian.com/world/2012/jul/21/drug-cartels-banks-hsbc-money-laundering
Why it’s unlikely anyone will go to jail over Wells Fargo’s massive fraud scheme
Sept. 9, 2016
A Wells Fargo personal banker pleaded guilty to helping launder millions of dollars for drug traffickers like the Sinaloa cartel
May 17, 2019
Chula Vista banker part of scheme to launder Mexican drug money through fake accounts
February 23, 2023
Media blackout: Wells Fargo caught laundering money for drug cartels multiple times
Mar 12, 2023
“..El talento sin probidad es un azote..”
(..Talent without honesty is a scourge..)-
Simón Bolívar in a letter to General Francisco Carabaño, October 8, 1828
Biden's eulogy for Justice Sandra Day O'Connor
4:51 – 5:28 “..land of rugged individualists, adventurers and entrepreneurs, but she knew, no person is an island, and the fabric of our nation we’re all inextricably linked..”
✔ That’s all well and good Smokin’ Joe, butt, on another occasion or setting, don’t forget to add into the melting pot, the institution of slavery in building & keeping wealth (primitive accumulation of capital ; thanks Karl Marx), the massacring & plundering Indian lands, robbing Mexico half of its territory… What swines are ye, corporate henchmen, to then accuse, vilify, censor, sanction, wage war on Russia & sacrificing allied Europe, via Kiev-Ukraine, for supposedly annexing Crimea, etc ! Go to bed realizing once and for all the world doesn’t need your exceptionalist scum. Nuclear-armed Israel as you spout has a right to defend itself (not even a squeak of it initially as the aggressor) ; and yet if North Korea test launches missiles or places a satellite in orbit (no casualties), then it’s to be condemned in your fumbled opinion.. Insane man, because you fall for that line of conditioning don’t assume everyone else has to alt-right. ◺
50- ✔ To further illustrate how in the U.S. the role of the “lone individual” genius or maverick is placed in a pedestal above all, that the government or the state just gets in the way of innovation; take the case of the shipping container, which ushered the way to globalization. Before its invention or use, cargo was loaded manually & costly in a break bulk fashion. Many articles attribute entrepreneur Malcolm McLean as the inventor of the ISO container, or a model of, patented in 1956. Relegated to a minor role was the U.S. military, when in reality it was that institution who first made the ISO container feasible for every shipping line in the world. At the end of World War II, the U.S. Army used containers to speed the loading and unloading of transport ships. In 1947 the Transportation Corps (branch of the U.S. Army) developed the Transporter, a rigid, corrugated steel container for shipping household goods of officers in the field. During the Korean War the Transporter was approved for broader use. Theft of material and damage to wooden crates convinced the army that steel containers were needed. In 1952 the US Army developed the Transporter into the CONtainer Express or CONEX box system. The size and capacity of the Conex was about the same as the Transporter, but the system was made modular, that is stacked and involving the logistics of several models of transportation between origin and destination. Without BIG GOVERNMENT, the U.S. wouldn’t be the “success story” it’s been. Whoever moans & screams against big government should go to “dysfunctional or failed state” Haiti, many other poor countries, capitalist at that! The U.S. federal gov. supported the transcontinental railroad in the 19th century for the settlement of the west & constructing telegraph lines through land grants & other incentives, I.e. Pacific Railway Act in 1862, Homestead Acts.
Ironically, when a foreign government tries using leverage to develop its own country, the U.S. gov & its agencies react into motion destabilizing such governments who they see as threats to multinational corporations & local bourgeoisie !! Do as I say not as I do! WTF! I.e. Iran 1953, 1979, Guatemala 1954, Cuba 1898, 1959..., Dominican Republic 1965, Chile 1973, Nicaragua 1979…, Venezuela 2002…, Haiti 2004…, Honduras 2009, Libya 2011, ETC ETC. ◺
A shipping container shortage is snarling global trade
https://qz.com/2027205/a-shipping-container-shortage-is-snarling-global-trade
June 30, 2021
.. The shortage of shipping containers is yet another symptom of the havoc the pandemic has wrought on international supply chains. As a result, freight costs are rising, which in turn leads to higher prices for consumer goods.. ..The problem isn’t that there aren’t enough shipping containers in the world; it’s that the containers are in the wrong spots ..
Por qué la Unión Soviética fue la verdadera ganadora de la carrera espacial (y no Estados Unidos)
21 diciembre 2016
https://www.bbc.com/mundo/38028270
.. Pero pensar eso es un error: los verdaderos pioneros de la exploración espacial fueron los cosmonautas soviéticos y gran parte de los avances que hoy se usan en la Estación Espacial Internacional (EEI) se deben a los conocimientos y las innovaciones de la Unión Soviética. Ésa es la conclusión del documental de la BBC "Cosmonautas: cómo Rusia ganó la carrera espacial", que accedió a importantes documentos y entrevistó a protagonistas de la extraordinaria -y sacrificada- puja entre soviéticos y estadounidenses por conquistar el Universo. ..
Unearthing ‘hidden’ science would help to tackle the world’s biggest problems
Tens of thousands of studies evaluating government programmes are collecting dust in institutional vaults. Sharing them could benefit everyone.
17 September 2024
https://www.nature.com/articles/d41586-024-02991-5?utm_source=pocket-newtab-en-us
How the United States RIGGED the global economy
https://www.filmsforaction.org/watch/how-the-united-states-rigged-the-global-economy/
China’s exports to the Global South up 2x in 3 years. Digital and other infrastructure lead. China isn’t contesting the US-centric order. It’s building another world order of its own.
https://twitter.com/davidpgoldman/status/1631290370582626304
Mar 2, 2023
China’s massive Belt and Road initiative
February 2, 2023
https://www.cfr.org/backgrounder/chinas-massive-belt-and-road-initiative
China’s colossal infrastructure investments may usher in a new era of trade and growth for economies in Asia and beyond…
China plans $500 million subsea internet cable to rival US-backed project
April 6, 2023
51- ✔ There is a term in economics called overproduction. Basically an excess of supply over demand of products offered to the market, leading to some lowering of prices for unsold goods, but more so to unemployment. That is, the extension of the markets cannot keep pace with the extension of production. In his work, Das Kapital, Karl Marx outlined the tendency of capitalism to overproduction crises. Such tendency is based on his theory of surplus value, that is workers receive in wages and benefits only a fraction of the value they create during the work day for the owners of the modes of production. Part of the day the proletariat (worker) works for himself/herself and receives this in wages; most it though the capitalist or employer is the one that keeps the wealth created (capital), free of charge (expropriation)… Demand also fluctuates based on rising and falling interest rates, issued by the central bank or Fed. When wages rise “excessively” (tight labor market), this is a factor in causing inflation, and the Fed is called upon to “cool down the economy”. Which is why, as of this writing, January 27 2023, a recession is expected soon, where millions will be laid off (it’s already happening in the tech companies as Alphabet, Amazon, PayPal, Meta, Twitter, IBM..). ◺
Falling U.S. container imports highlight economic weakness
March 9, 2023
https://finance.yahoo.com/news/falling-u-container-imports-highlight-163000712.html
..A new report by Canada-based logistics company Descartes Systems Group indicates that US shipping container imports plunged 20% in the first two months, according to Bloomberg.. ..The financial burden of soaring inflation and increasing rates falls heavily on low-income consumers. Given that consumerism represents 68.5% of GDP, the troubling slowdown in container shipping suggests that the economy is showing signs of faltering..
Amazon flags “frequently returned” items to warn customers
March 29, 2023
52- ✔ In another contradiction of the capitalist model, food like housing and other commodities, are kept in an artificial scarcity so as to prevent prices from plummeting.. Farmers already receive billions in subsidies from the federal government, which makes our foods cheaper in price.. Agriculture, food production and distribution, is one of the major contributors to greenhouse gases = global warming, which makes food waste such a double whammy, and the profit motive gets in the way... There are way more empty dwellings (mostly owned by banks or developers) than the homeless. So capitalism creates the global paradox of artificial scarcity in a sea of abundance: millions die of hunger or become sick, not because there’s a lack of food, water or medicine, but because that surplus cannot find a return in the capital invested… ◺
New York City is sinking under the weight of its skyscrapers, study finds
May 23, 2023
✔ Besides the markups to the consumer, there’s tax deductible advertising costs.. Basically the public pays to be manipulated.. ◺
Small business advertising and marketing costs may be tax deductible
October 27, 2021
https://www.irs.gov/newsroom/small-business-advertising-and-marketing-costs-may-be-tax-deductible
Advertising expenses and how to claim them
March 11, 2022
https://www.keepertax.com/posts/advertising-expenses
Netflix’s ad tier hits 1 million users. Is that good or bad?
March 19, 2023
Cuadrando la caja 05-8-24; la publicidad hecha en Cuba
https://youtu.be/tWIthwhJl8o?si=CMr6Qq5r8mcRAw1H
¿La publicidad es la suma de comunicación y la economía? ¿Cómo influye en el consumo? ¿Es acaso la solución a los problemas económicos que tenemos?
Goldfish are capable of navigating on land, these researchers found, after training fish to drive. Each time they reached a target, they were rewarded with food. https://abcn.ws/3I6Tnp5
https://twitter.com/ABC/status/1482802637217140746
Jan 16, 2022
The amygdala unveiled: how our brains process threats, rewards,
and dopamine
April 5, 2023
https://scitechdaily.com/the-amygdala-unveiled-how-our-brains-process-threats-rewards-and-dopamine/
..Professor Li and his colleagues trained mice to associate specific sounds with particular rewards or punishments.. ..Li’s team found that not only did the neurons respond differently to rewards versus punishments, but they responded differently to particular types of rewards..
Almost half of our food is wasted in the United States, 2022
https://foodprint.org/issues/the-problem-of-food-waste/
What are U.S. farm subsidies? 2020
https://www.thoughtco.com/us-farm-subsidies-3325162
Federal farm subsidies, what the data says – USA Facts, 2020
https://usafacts.org/articles/federal-farm-subsidies-what-data-says/
The federal government pays farmers. That doesn’t mean farmers are fans. 2022 https://www.gsb.stanford.edu/insights/federal-government-pays-farmers-doesnt-mean-farmers-are-fans
FDA let marketers label sugar-soaked cereals as ‘healthy’ for years, and big food is fighting to keep it that way
March 03, 2023
Fast facts about food poisoning
February 22, 2022
https://www.cdc.gov/foodsafety/food-poisoning.html
..Every year, an estimated 1 in 6 Americans (or 48 million people) get sick, 128,000 are hospitalized, and 3,000 die from foodborne diseases..
How US policy devastated small dairy farms and boosted corporate monopolies, 2023 https://www.commondreams.org/news/dairy-farms-monopolies
..The report argues that “there is a clear way forward,” making recommendations including “a comprehensive federal supply management program that actively works to match supply with demand and does not use the export market as a dumping ground for oversupply.” “Curbing overproduction can bring a higher price to farmers through the market instead of through taxpayer-funded government payments and bailouts,” reads the report. “It will also reduce the pressure to expand herd sizes and thereby avoid more factory farms and the entailing climate emissions.”..
The average American emits more CO₂ in one week than an average person in low-income countries does in one year.
https://twitter.com/ErikSolheim/status/1631566835047866368
Mar 3, 2023
Why food was exported from famine stricken Ireland as thousands starved (circa 1845)
https://ireland-calling.com/irish-famine-ireland-exported-food-as-thousands-starved/
Great Famine (Ireland)
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Great_Famine_%28Ireland%29
The “Holodomor” and the film “Bitter Harvest” are fascist lies
March 3, 2017
https://www.counterpunch.org/2017/03/03/the-holodomor-and-the-film-bitter-harvest-are-fascist-lies/
..There was a very serious famine in the USSR, including (but not limited to) the Ukrainian SSR, in 1932-33. But there has never been any evidence of a “Holodomor” or “deliberate famine,” and there is none today. The “Holodomor” fiction was invented in by Ukrainian Nazi collaborators who found havens in Western Europe, Canada, and the USA after the war…
The Holodomor myth and the global food crisis
15 Apr 2022
https://english.almayadeen.net/articles/opinion/the-holodomor-myth-and-the-global-food-crisis
..There is no evidence to back up the claim that the Soviet government deliberately starved millions of Ukrainians to death as a form of political reprisal.. ..Professor Mark Tauger is a historian from West Virginia University.. ..He shows, in fact, that the Soviet government did much to alleviate famine in Ukraine, drastically reducing exports of grain and lifting procurements of grain from affected areas. Bad weather was a major factor in the harvest failure of 1932-33. Tauger does not try to defend the Soviet government. He believes that the famine was partly the failure of the collectivization of agriculture in the Soviet Union.. ..Since January 2017 it is a crime in France to question the official narrative of the 1994 Rwandan genocide. Anyone accused of ‘negationism’ can go to prison for one year and be fined 45,000 Euro.. ..There was a major famine in Niger around the same time as the Soviet catastrophe. Most historians believe the French government didn’t do enough to relieve that famine..
53a- ✔ In the U.S. since the start of the pandemic and disruptions to new car supply chains sent prices soaring, used car prices posted their largest annual increase on record, before swinging to a 12-month drop of 8.8% since December 2022. The biggest 12-month plunge in prices for used cars since June 2009. The price of older used cars, 5 years or older, have fallen 15% or more from their peaks early in 2022. Among reasons for the price decline, experts cite higher interest rates for financing (and car repossession rates are rapidly climbing). But the leading reason for the drop in used car prices is the increased supply of new cars, automakers are reporting more supplies of the chips they need. The drop in used cars prices though affects car buyers who hope to trade in the value of their vehicles. ◺
Used car prices start to rise again
March 31, 2023
https://www.arkansasonline.com/news/2023/mar/31/used-car-prices-start-to-rise-again/ Shortfall in supply as new vehicles said too costly for many
Why car prices are still so high — and why they are unlikely to fall anytime soon
March 18, 2023
https://www.npr.org/2023/03/18/1163278082/car-prices-used-cars-electric-vehicles-pandemic
..The semiconductor shortage has gotten much better since 2021, but it hasn’t gone away entirely, and other supply chain snarls continue to periodically disrupt output..
53b- ✔ This brings a related feature into the discussion: planned obsolescence. The common practice of manufacturers within a market economy to deliberately built short lifespans in products, get updates or replacements, to generate sales. Efficiency for whom ? This creates tonnes of waste going to landfills, rivers and oceans. Squandering raw materials. As I mentioned before, for the entire world to copy the “American model” of consumption would require the resources of 5.1 planets! I believe renewables, or “green capitalism”, isn’t the answer either. It brings into play another contradiction: Jevons paradox. Technological progress or efficiency increases the use of those innovations, but in turn offsetting whatever benefit it originally had, I.e. increase of electric vehicles might reduce carbon emissions but ultimately the increased production of those vehicles raises the exploitation of materials and greenhouse gases. The technological change doesn’t address the social relations in the political economy... When East Germany was socialist, refrigerators & washing machines had a failure rate of at least 25 years, light bulbs likewise (the Narva company), yet the Phoebus cartel in Switzerland by 1925 had already established to limit the cycle of light bulbs to only 1,000 hours… What’s perhaps striking, is that the economies of the Soviet Union and Eastern Europe had no overproduction crises (compare in paragraphs 44b, 58a- ).. In capitalism, investments are made upon the expected growth of demand, and consumption is restrained whenever investment is. In socialism all firms were asked to produce to their capacity, and if demand was low because of investment being curtailed, then they were asked to lower their prices until what they produced got sold. Some firms had profits, others losses, but it didn’t matter because all belonged to the State. Income distribution under socialism shifted in favor of the working class, in economic terms the Gini coefficient was much lower. In capitalism it is a question of class struggle, being that capitalists would never voluntarily agree to lowering their % of profits for the sake of overcoming overproduction. This shows one of the many irrationalities of the capitalist system, the question remains whether humanity will survive it?
Reiterating, overproduction crises in capitalism arise because the unlimited drive to expand production (labor exploitation, extraction of resources, capital investment) collides with the limited confines of the market economy, where the working class cannot buy back the full value of what it produces (a dialectical contradiction). Private profit is the unpaid labor of the working class. Capitalism creates and destroys the market at the same time (business cycles), by squeezing more surplus-value out of the working class. Capitalists naturally want to see an expanding market, each capitalist wants to see other capitalists raise the wages of their workers to boost demand, yet they are not willing to do so for their own workers because it cuts into their profits... So all driven by competition, end up pushing down wages, therefore demand... Capitalists figure: “why work more selling more for less, when you can work less selling for more?”
again compare paragraph above to earlier : Thorstein Bunde Veblen ◺
Unsold new cars. What happens to new cars that don’t get sold
10/03/23
https://www.motorverso.com/unsold-new-cars/
..The first thing to understand about unsold new cars is that both, the retailer, and the manufacturer are bound to lose money when such unsold cars are sitting in the lots of retailers. The way the American car market works is that the manufacturer is not allowed to sell their product directly to the customer due to something known as the franchising law. It is essential for the retailer to act as the middleman by purchasing the cars from the manufacturer and then selling it to the ultimate customer. The manufacturers have already sold these “unsold new cars” to the retailers, and it is now the retailer’s responsibility to move these cars. But this also means that the manufacturer must wait for these cars to be sold before the retailer has the space and money to buy new cars from them. So, it is in the best interest of the retailer as well as the manufacturer to move these unsold new cars as soon as possible..
This is what dealerships do with unsold cars and how it can benefit you
September 3, 2019
Millions of cars are rotting in the open air
https://youtu.be/CRvYt5Fm7NI ,02-17-19
This is where unsold cars gone… New car graveyards. Abandoned new cars
https://youtu.be/0FKeAJPgxnM ,9-03-21
This is where unsold cars go… Nobody expected that!
https://youtu.be/RF93asGV9ro ,9-14-19
Why did cars get so expensive?
April 21, 2024
https://www.msn.com/en-us/money/news/the-inflation-nightmare-in-your-garage/ar-AA1nnSiN
What’s causing the unusually high number of drug shortages in the U.S.
https://youtu.be/1yLi9cqeock?si=7K9ZTVFAAOA2X7re ,11-05-23
54- ✔ Increasing wages won’t solve the overproduction crises of capitalism either because these push the capitalists to cut back on investment and production.. Government taxation of firms is just another band-aid, because it discourages business investment, cutting consumption. If the government instead borrows (deficit spending or bonds), it has to pay back with interest to the very same investors..
In other words, the theory in economics known as underconsumption (a variant of Keynesian economics) purporting recessions and stagnation arise from inadequate consumer demand relative to the amount produced, CANNOT be considered to be the real cause of the crisis of overproduction, and the reason is because wages already tend to rise at the peak of a boom, where labor is in short supply, shortly before a slump in the economy.. If underconsumption were the cause of crises, then crises would not be cyclical but permanent.. ◺
..long history of pre-recession rebounds in financial markets. Traders have often marshaled one last big S&P 500 bounce — one final hurrah — before they sensed that the economy was really, truly going to pieces. At the time of said rally, the Federal Reserve was often winding down a campaign of interest rate increases, but it was still too early to see the full consequences (sound familiar?)..
https://twitter.com/RonStoeferle/status/1618185216660738048 ,01-25-23
Morgan Stanley’s Mike Wilson warns the stock market’s January rally could end this week
Jan 30 2023
..That, coupled with the reality of the worst earnings recession since 2008, are “being mispriced once again, in our view,” said Wilson..
Biden heads to NYC to tout impact of infrastructure bill on Hudson Tunnel Project,
January 31, 2023
55- ✔ In the 1930’s John Maynard Keynes proposed government intervention to ensure “effective or aggregate demand”, I.e. deficit-financed public works. But in reality, what ended the Great Depression in capitalist countries was the gold flows into the U.S. from Europe (similar today, European capital flows into the U.S. due to lower energy costs, more subsidies, etc), and the Lend-Lease program credit expansion during World War 2 (weapons for the war). Commodity prices also spiked in 1939 due to the war, benefiting resource-rich USA… ◺
Europe fears its industries will jet to the U.S. as energy costs force plant closures November 25, 2022 (+4 mins audio)
https://www.npr.org/2022/11/25/1138573080/energy-costs-europe-us-companies-close-plants-eu-economy
..None of this is helped by America’s recently passed Inflation Reduction Act. It provides $369 billion in spending that includes subsidies to support companies investing in renewable energy..
56- ✔ Oddly, not too many “Americans” know that the Soviet Union (an ally of the U.S. back then..) was the one who mainly fought and beat Nazi Germany in WW2, and women played a significant role. Hollywood is much more entertaining though… Today, the U.S. government SUPPORTS the Banderites in Ukraine against Russia, yes that nationalist clan which collaborated with Nazi Germany in WW2, killing THOUSANDS of Poles, Jews, Ukrainians, Russians, etc. ◺
Meet the Night Witches, the daring female pilots who bombed Nazis by night
They were a crucial Soviet asset to winning World War II.
June 7, 2019
Saving Private Ryan is a 1998 American epic war film directed by Steven Spielberg and written by Robert Rodat. ..
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Saving_Private_Ryan
.. Inspired by the books of Stephen E. Ambrose and accounts of multiple soldiers in a single family, such as the Niland brothers, being killed in action, Rodat drafted the script, and Paramount Pictures hired him to finish writing it. ..
Saving Private Ryan: History vs. Hollywood
August 4, 2021
https://www.historyvshollywood.com/reelfaces/saving-private-ryan/
The movie doesn't explicitly state that Saving Private Ryan is based on a true story or whether Private James Francis Ryan is a real person. That's because while it was inspired by a similar scenario, most of what unfolds after the D-Day scenes in the movie is fictional. ..
57- ✔ Capitalism was born of free competition (Laissez-faire), but that eventually produces concentration, leading to monopoly. Monopoly capitalism displaced the era of free competitive capitalism at the beginning of the last quarter of the 19th century. It doesn’t mean that it has completely eliminated competition, just that it no longer strives for a constant lowering of prices by a constant increase in production. By dividing up the market and setting up quotas, it brings in more profits for capitalists… The new capital (profits) couldn’t no longer be invested in the same branch since that would mean more productive capacity, leading to a lowering of prices. Caught up in this catch-22 since the last quarter of the 19th century, it has taken the role to spread globally and set up enterprises where no monopolies existed, and that was the drive to colonialism (division of labour or specialization). Capitalism is not eternal, it’s been around for approx. 300 years. Originally it was an advancement over feudalism, but since the 20th century it has civilization stuck. Macro economic decisions based on private capital accumulation = profit, which is a technocratic way of normalizing greed, gluttony, crime, pettiness. ◺
Anyone who doesn’t know the following facts about capitalism should learn them
Jul 27, 2020
“..The
greater the wealth the thicker will be the dirt..”- economist John Kenneth Galbraith
in
Chapter 18, Section II, p. 201 – The Affluent Society (1958) The
Affluent Society, review 1 The
Affluent Society , review 2
Living for the city (live, 1974)- Stevie Wonder #music
There are companies whose GDP’s are bigger than many countries… https://www.businessinsider.com/25-giant-companies-that-earn-more-than-entire-countries-2018-7?op=1
2018
Unions are democratically organized, corporations are not, 2020 https://corpgov.law.harvard.edu/2020/11/04/unions-are-democratically-organized-corporations-are-not/
Why corporations are psychotic , 2011
https://www.psychologytoday.com/us/blog/our-humanity-naturally/201103/why-corporations-are-psychotic
The Corporation: the pathological pursuit of profit and power by Joel Bakan, 2008 https://philosophynow.org/issues/65/The_Corporation_The_Pathological_Pursuit_of_Profit_and_Power_by_Joel_Bakan
Nestle takes the water from Michigan as residents pay big for toxic water, 2021 https://naturalsociety.com/nestle-pumps-water-lakes-michigan-flint-water-crisis-6488/
58a- ✔ In 1844 Karl Marx writes the Economic and Philosophic Manuscripts where he details his theory of alienation. Basically four aspects of the alienation of labor, as it takes place in capitalist society:
1- alienation from the product of labor (capitalists take control of what laborers build and that gives the former control over the latter = appropriation).
2- alienation from the activity of labor.
3- alienation from one’s own specific humanity (laborers are swayed by market forces alien to them but which they created wealth or capital for).
4- alienation from others.
So in Marx it’s not simply a subjective condition, but an objective structure in capitalist society, where people are conditioned to believe it is natural and just. Even the capitalist, according to Marx, experiences alienation, but as a “state”, differently from the worker, who experiences it as an “activity”. So in that way it is related to his theory of surplus value. Capitalist society characterized by the rule of things over persons. “Capital”, we might say, has come to replace the feudal lord. In music for example, this theme is touched upon in the song “María Landó” of the poet César Calvo, and popularized by Susana Baca in 1995, when it goes: ♬ “..María sólo trabaja.. y su trabajo es ajeno..” (her labor does not belong to her). Che Guevara’s reading of Marx is that capitalist competition creates the drive to increase productivity through technological innovations and increasing exploitation. Alienation and antagonism (social classes’ relations) increase with productivity (I.e. outsourcing, economism or economicism). ◺
Self-estrangement
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Self-estrangement
..Melvin Seeman defined the meaning of alienation in his work On the Meaning of Alienation (1959). Seeman states that alienation is identified by five alternative meanings: powerlessness, meaninglessness, normlessness, isolation, and self-estrangement.[4] Self-estrangement in relation to society is essentially being something less than what one might ideally be if the circumstances in society were different, and being insecure and conforming to society's expectations in all aspects of himself.[4] Furthermore, he mentions that alienation is man's loss of pride and satisfaction from doing their work and therefore feeling alienated.[4] ..
Economism, sometimes spelled economicism[3], is a term referring to the distraction of working class political activism from a global political project to purely economic demands. The concept encompasses rewarding workers in socialism with money incentives, rather than incentivizing workers through revolutionary politics. The term is originally associated with Vladimir Lenin's critique of trade unionism…
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Economism
Ernesto ‘Che’ Guevara: a rebel against the Soviet political economy 2006
https://www.marxists.org/subject/economy/authors/yaffeh/che-critic.htm
..Under socialism, the development of the productive forces could be less accelerated, but it should be accompanied by a growth of consciousness. For Guevara, efforts to change consciousness must be incorporated into socialist transition at the earliest stage.. ..Turning to the period of transition, Guevara argued that the USSR’s Kolkhoz collective farm system was not a characteristic of socialism and that cooperatives were not a socialist form of ownership – they generated a capitalistic superstructure which clashed with state ownership and socialist social relations imposing their own logic over society.. ..He also criticized as ‘dangerous’ the Soviet policy of peaceful co-existence and economic emulation with the advanced capitalist countries, and blamed socialist countries on unequal exchange and the imposition of capitalist categories in trade relations.. ..He hoped to persuade socialist countries to gradually replace capitalist mechanisms during transition and offered alternative policies to serve this function. In Cuba his analysis was revisited in the mid-1980s in the period known as Rectification which pulled the island away from the Soviet model before it collapsed, arguably contributing to the survival of Cuban socialism.
58b- ✔ It would be most interesting to see what Che’s opinion was (or had he lived longer..) of the Mondragon Corporation (a cooperative) in Spain, and of ESOPs in the United States… Just because the Spanish Socialist Workers’ Party (PSOE) has been in gov’t longer than any other political party in modern democratic Spain (it’s the oldest party there), it is certainly not a socialist country, and not faced a blockade as Cuba, North Korea.. See also: Hunts Point Cooperative Market near paragraph 8-, plus: discounted heating oil near paragraph 76- , also Antonio Gramsci near paragraph 76- , and Caso Cerrado in paragraph 41b ... ◺
Who is Jean-Luc Melenchon? Morocco-born far-left leader defiant after huge French victory
July 08, 2024
.. He has expressed admiration for leaders like Hugo Chavez of Venezuela and Fidel Castro of Cuba, causing anxiety among markets and investors whenever he nears political power.
Renowned for his impassioned speeches delivered without prompts, he often criticizes “extreme markets” that he believes exacerbate societal inequalities in France. ..
France avoided a far-right election win — now the radical far left is demanding power
Jul 8, 2024
The solid gold Cadillac (1956)
https://www.rottentomatoes.com/m/solid_gold_cadillac
The Mondragon Corporation is a corporation and federation of worker cooperatives based in the Basque region of Spain. It was founded in the town of Mondragón in 1956 by José María Arizmendiarrieta and a group of his students at a technical college he founded. Its first product was paraffin heaters. It is the seventh-largest Spanish company in terms of asset turnover and the leading business group in the Basque Country. At the end of 2016, it employed 74,117 people in 257 companies and organizations in four areas of activity: finance, industry, retail and knowledge..
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mondragon_Corporation
How Mondragon became the world’s largest co-op
August 27, 2022
https://www.newyorker.com/business/currency/how-mondragon-became-the-worlds-largest-co-op
Cuadrando la caja 17-6-24; pensamiento económico del Che- con Carlos Tablada y José Luis Rodríguez.
https://youtu.be/6-b7zx36uXc?si=9nAu0FOI0MgVaUhb
59- ✔ The Communist Manifesto (1847-48) by Marx and Engels presents a materialist conception of history, in its approach to class struggle and the capitalist mode of production. It also outlines a set of short-term demands, i.e. progressive income tax, abolition of child labor, free public education, centralization of credit in the hands of the state, etc. Additionally they expose that despite all the capitalist claims to defend private property, in reality it destroys it by a constant expropriation of a larger number of proprietors by a smaller number of wealthier ones (socialism on the other hand does not seek to abolish personal property, but rather private property over the means of production. Capitalism on the other hand seeks to limit personal property, i.e. Kindle’s e-book store terms of use specify its content is licensed, not sold to you by the content provider, so Amazon could revoke your access to the books you bought..). The automobile industry at the beginning of the 20th century in the U.S. and England had about a 100 or more firms, whereas today that number has been reduced to about 4 (just in U.S. companies)… In New York, there’s the legacy of Robert Moses, who wielded the government’s eminent domain to appropriate private property in building highways, and state parks..
According to data from the Bureau of Labor Statistics, approx. 20% of small businesses fail within the 1st year, about 50% by the end of the 5th year, and by a decade only 30% will remain… In the U.S. many go bankrupt or into foreclosures due to medical bills or health related issues. Millions of students who go into default over college loans. [compare in paragraphs 44a, 44b..] ◺
When tuition at CUNY was free, sort of
October 12, 2011
https://www1.cuny.edu/sites/matters/2011/10/12/when-tuition-at-cuny-was-free-sort-of/
..In fall 1976, amid the turmoil of a dire city fiscal crisis, the free-tuition policy was discontinued under pressure from the federal government, the state, and the financial community in the effort to rescue the city from bankruptcy. New York State began phasing in funding for CUNY’s senior colleges. CUNY students were added to the state’s need-based Tuition Assistance Program, or TAP, which had been created during the early 1970s to help private colleges. Full-time students who met the income eligibility criteria were permitted to receive TAP, ensuring for the first time that financial hardship would deprive no CUNY student of a college education. Within a few years, the federal government would create its own need-based program, known as Pell Grants, providing the neediest students with a tuition-free college education..
1970-1977 open admissions- fiscal crisis- state takeover
October 2016
https://cdha.cuny.edu/coverage/coverage/show/id/33
The CUNY tuition myth
July 29, 2016
https://www.gothamgazette.com/index.php/opinion/6458-the-cuny-tuition-myth
..Unfortunately, there are quite a few people who have accepted the myth that CUNY was free until the 1970s. This was only true for those students who were accepted into the day school. By contrast, during the 1960s, the majority of CUNY students were enrolled in the evening college (SGS) that had a substantial tuition charge. Indeed, today a larger share of CUNY students have no tuition obligation than did in the so-called free era; the difference being that then it was based on merit while today it is overwhelmingly based on family income..
7 real reasons why entrepreneurs start their own business
April 5, 2022
https://www.liveplan.com/blog/reasons-why-entrepreneurs-start-businesses/
Economy of the United States
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Economy_of_the_United_States
..The United States is a highly developed/advanced mixed economy.[34][35][36] It is the world’s largest economy by nominal GDP, and the second-largest by purchasing power parity (PPP) behind China.[37] It has the world’s seventh-highest per capita GDP (nominal) and the eighth-highest per capita GDP (PPP) as of 2022.[38].. ..The nation’s private sector employs 85% of working Americans. Government accounts for 14% of all U.S. workers. Over 99% of all private employing organizations in the U.S. are small businesses.[138] The 30 million small businesses in the U.S. account for 64% of newly created jobs (those created minus those lost).[138] Jobs in small businesses accounted for 70% of those created in the last decade.[140] The proportion of Americans employed by small business versus large business has remained relatively the same year by year as some small businesses become large businesses and just over half of small businesses survive for more than five years.[138] Amongst large businesses, several of the largest companies and employers in the world are American companies. Amongst them are Walmart, which is both the largest company and the largest private sector employer in the world. Walmart employs 2.1 million people worldwide and 1.4 million in the U.S. alone.[141][142]..
Why are workers quitting? 1/3 are starting their own businesses
February 20, 2023
https://digital.com/why-are-workers-quitting-1-3-are-starting-their-own-businesses/
60- ✔ The U.S. conservative right (GOP or Republicans, nativists) claims the federal government or democrat-run cities are hostile to business, inviting to street crime, hostile to police, yada-yada.
For instance there’s one Fernando Mateo in NYC (unsuccessfully ran for mayor in 2021..). They go into this specially during election years, yet pooh-pooh such social ills also occur in GOP-run cities or states. The New York Police Department is the largest in the nation (larger than many foreign armies) and one of the oldest. The PBA, the largest municipal police union in the world.. In August 2020, its president, Patrick Lynch, endorsed Donald Trump for President. NYPD even has detectives overseas (since 2003 the International Liaison Program). So how’s that exactly “anti-police” or “anti law enforcement” by the Democratic bogeyman alleged by such GOP demagogues as F. Mateo?
◺
Rikers Island conditions so bad that prosecutors told not to ask for bail in nonviolent cases
September 29, 2021
NYC agrees to pay millions to Rikers, city jail detainees
Nov. 29, 2022
For years, tens of thousands of people were detained at Rikers Island and other city jail facilities for hours or days after making bail…
Op-Ed / New York City must move forward on closing Rikers with a budget that invests in care, not DOC budget bloat
May 19, 2024
https://www.amny.com/opinion/new-york-city-must-move-forward-on-closing-rikers/
Suicide more prevalent than homicide in US, but most Americans don’t know it
October 30, 2018
Ron DeSantis wants to make it much easier for the government to kill people, 2023
Ron DeSantis quietly signs 6-week abortion ban into law in Florida
TODAY
https://youtu.be/BfMZ9W_lpoQ ,4-14-23
Florida is the least affordable place to live in the U.S.
May 2, 2022
https://www.cbsnews.com/news/florida-least-affordable-state-us-miami-tampa-orlando-naples-rent/
..Miami’s typical rent takes up a whopping 60% of a household’s typical income. That figure is 45% in Tampa and 37% in Orlando. (Housing policy experts consider rents affordable at no more than 30% of pre-tax income.) Miami, Orlando and Tampa have also had the fastest-growing rents in the country over the past year.. ..For individuals, a lack of personal income tax and relatively low property taxes combine with sunny weather to make the state an attractive destination for high-paid professionals..
American families flee California for Florida
https://youtu.be/LRVgvrFd0Ro?si=eQ42icvWPiMPJnwd
,11-30-23
Florida, Texas residents flee due to soaring insurance costs, surging home prices
Nov. 27, 2023
https://nypost.com/2023/11/27/business/florida-texas-residents-flee-due-to-soaring-costs/
Map shows where nearly 800,000 without power after deadly Texas storms
May 17, 2024
https://www.newsweek.com/map-power-outages-texas-storms-1901772
PolitiFact- Yes, aversion to federal regulation drove Texas to isolate its power grid
February 16, 2021
Texas's power disaster is a warning sign for the US
https://youtu.be/Zcrsgdl_hP0?si=7rsTN4zqemntcY2U ,3-04-21
Florida is experiencing the 'biggest migration' in a generation. Here are 10 states locals are moving to.
Oct 24, 2023
..Georgia was the most popular spot for Floridians to move to, followed by Texas..
NYPD sees largest staff exodus in decades with leaders ‘refusing to acknowledge’ mounting crisis: union boss,
February 2, 2023
New York City is a lot safer than small-town America
https://twitter.com/buisness/status/1534285342320336902
June 7, 2022
When cops lie under oath, prosecutors must take some blame. 2018
..In the Bronx, where I’m a public defender, such disclosure is rare. Instead, prosecutors often fight to withhold such information. When they are forced to reveal it, they frequently work to keep that information from the jury or judge..
‘It was a murder’: law enforcement officers react to police beating of Tyre Nichols,
February 2, 2023
https://www.yahoo.com/news/murder-law-enforcement-officers-react-181414755.html
DOJ report describes pattern of discrimination by Louisville Police Department
CBS News
https://youtu.be/D4b1qBYZ77c Mar 9, 2023
Cops slammed pregnant woman to the ground and sent her into labor during botched raid ,
February 17, 2023
Lisa Edwards’ death: Is someone to blame?
Tennessee
https://youtu.be/m53LdWObasY ,02-24-23
0:44 “..these types of scenarios are not unusual..”
Lisa Edwards’ family speaks out for first time
https://youtu.be/dDvDpbZhadQ ,02-24-23
Cops ridicule disabled woman as she dies of a stroke
Indisputable with Dr. Rashad Richey
https://youtu.be/UKgpuy5m0xQ ,02-27-23
Woman diagnosed with brain tumor thanks lifesaving cops
Inside Edition
https://youtu.be/oYCqsfHrcUs ,3-07-23
Starved to death in an American jail, the man who couldn’t pay $100 bail
01/13/23
Chicago mourns officer Andres Vasquez-Lasso who was killed in the line of duty
FOX 32 Chicago
https://youtu.be/G7nGIn93FMU ,3-02-23
Prayer service held for Adeed Fayaz, NYPD officer killed while trying to buy car
https://abc7ny.com/nyc-nypd-officer-killed-adeed-fayaz-police/12806451/
February 12, 2023
How many police officers die in the line of duty? Officer deaths increased 29% in 2021. Yet the profession is still not among the deadliest.
July 18, 2022
https://usafacts.org/articles/how-many-police-officers-die-in-the-line-of-duty/
..Seventy-three of those officers were killed feloniously, almost entirely by firearms.. ..More officers died in the South than all other regions combined.. ..The hunting and fishing industry had the highest rate of on-the-job deaths in 2020..
For third straight year, police suicides outnumber line-of-duty deaths
Jan 2, 2019
'Blue wall of silence' protects police officers accused of gender-based violence, victims say
Apr 24, 2024
When the abuser is in law enforcement
May 9, 2024
https://www.womenslaw.org/about-abuse/abuse-specific-communities/when-abuser-law-enforcement
Since 9/11, military suicides are 4 times higher than deaths in war operations
June 24, 2021
https://www.npr.org/2021/06/24/1009846329/military-suicides-deaths-mental-health-crisis
A new report on U.S. military deaths contains a stark statistic: An estimated 7,057 service members have died during military operations since 9/11, while suicides among active duty personnel and veterans of those conflicts have reached 30,177 — that’s more than four times as many…
US mass killings linked to extremism spiked over last decade
Feb 23, 2023
‘Let’s Go Brandon’ explained: A look at the phrase that became code for criticizing Biden
Nov. 3, 2021
https://www.today.com/news/what-does-let-s-go-brandon-mean-t237389
Here’s how these three words have quickly become an anti-Biden meme among conservatives.
↑ in front of fire station, in The Bronx, 4-02-23
People live longer in blue states than red; new study points to impact of state policies , 2020
✔ for those also who think there’s absolutely no difference between Democrats and Republicans… ◺
https://www.latimes.com/politics/story/2020-08-03/longer-life-expectancy-blue-states-than-red-ones
How Republicans made millions on the tax cuts they pushed through Congress, 2020 ✔ for those also who think there’s absolutely no difference between Democrats and Republicans… ◺
https://www.vox.com/policy-and-politics/2020/1/24/21078559/republicans-tax-cuts-congress-profits
List of U.S. states and territories by poverty rate
✔ for those also who think there’s absolutely no difference between Democrats and Republicans… ◺
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_U.S._states_and_territories_by_poverty_rate
The danger of discussing ‘Maker and Taker’ States, 2021
https://prospect.org/politics/danger-of-discussing-maker-and-taker-states/
A series of studies suggest people who think of themselves as rich could be more likely to steal, cheat, and lie, 2018
https://www.businessinsider.com/rich-people-more-likely-to-steal-cheat-lie-2018-8?op=1
Capitalism without competition isn’t capitalism. It’s exploitation.
https://twitter.com/POTUS/status/1620891197186220039
Feb 1, 2023
Toxic city: The 5 most toxic places in New York
January 14, 2013
https://www.metro.us/toxic-city-the-5-most-toxic-places-in-new-york/
..Hendrick reported the South Bronx “is about as bad as it gets,” with “tremendous soot pollution and high asthma rates” because of trucks idling in traffic for hours on numerous freeways. Newman notes that it is not just a corridor area where cars are just passing through, but it also is home to bus and truck depots and sewage processing facilities. Newman also states that some trucks can’t take the Harlem River or FDR Drives, and have to travel through residential communities, spreading diesel pollution..
In the 1970s, the Bronx was burning, but some residents were rebuilding, 2019 https://ny.curbed.com/2019/5/3/18525908/south-bronx-fires-decade-of-fire-vivian-vazquez-documentary
Decade of Fire, a new documentary, tells a different story about the borough’s fires—and the communities affected by them. In the 1970s, fires ravaged much of the Bronx: seven census tracts lost 97 percent of their buildings and 44 tracts lost more than 50 percent. Many people still believe that those fires were the result of arson—landlords burning their own buildings for profit, or even residents starting the fires. But Bronx residents are trying to reclaim that narrative.. What people learn on the outside is that the people in the Bronx burnt it; that it was us who destroyed our community,” she explains. “My family didn’t get here from Puerto Rico to burn buildings; my grandparents came here to try to get ahead in life. How did this narrative become that the people in the Bronx wanted to destroy our new chance of success, our new chance of opportunity?”...
Democracy Now 10-30-19; who burned the Bronx, PBS Film https://www.democracynow.org/2019/10/30/decade_of_fire_film_1970s_bronx
In case anyone wonders why we go so hard in Congress: Bronx landlords used set their own buildings on fire w/ families inside for insurance payouts. I grew up w my dad telling me stories about friends he lost. Social and economic justice isn’t a game to us. It’s life and death.
https://twitter.com/AOC/status/1270735583896313856
thread Jun 10, 2020
.61- ✔ The fish dies by his own mouth, so goes a popular saying. While U.S. leaders hawk all about the benefits of free trade, free enterprise, yada-yada-yada, they break those very rules when they see fit: i.e. the push by U.S. officials to ban the video sharing platform TikTok. In China a similar app is known as Douyin, and owned by the Chinese-founded private company ByteDance. ◺
Who owns TikTok’s parent company? Despite what Brian Kilmeade says, it's not the Chinese government
March 15, 2024
.. Paul said three times during the interview that 60% of ByteDance is owned by international investors, 20% is owned by its Chinese co-founders and 20% is owned by employees, including 7,000 Americans. .. .. The TikTok spokesperson also told PolitiFact that ByteDance’s five-person board of directors includes three Americans: Arthur Dantchik, co-founder of trading company Susquehanna International Group; William Ford, CEO of investing company General Atlantic; and Philippe Laffont, founder of hedge fund company Coatue Management. .. .. According to The Wall Street Journal, ByteDance agreed in 2021 to allow the Chinese government to take a 1% ownership stake known as a "golden share" at one of its China-based subsidiaries, Beijing Douyin Information Service Co., which runs Douyin, an app available in China that’s similar to TikTok. (TikTok is not available in mainland China.) ..
✔ The folksy, populist types, who gripe about how the mom-and-pop’s can’t get a break from the meddling city or federal government (taxes, regulations, zoning, etc), the types who stormed The Capitol on 01/06/21, with libertarian notions, the former kickboxer Andrew Tate’s types.. Such beings often don’t seem as well concerned when landlords or banks leverage on them... Case in point: merchant account fees: These are fees charged to retailers for each credit or debit cards’ transaction processed. The fees come in a variety of pricing models. There’s flat-rate pricing, interchange (fees paid to the banks that issue credit cards), membership pricing, etc. This is a monthly fee certain credit card processors charge when the minimum transaction amount for the month isn’t met, which helps those companies recoup some of the money lost on smaller accounts.. Those fees can be significant for businesses that don’t meet the minimum transaction fee amount in card purchases.. There are also base costs, and you can’t negotiate these no matter which credit card processing company you choose. There’s also assessment fees (what credit card co.’s charge on every transaction made by their cards). The Federal Reserve says merchants can require that consumers make a purchase of at least $10 before they’ll accept a credit card payment for any buy. Retailers could also offer customers discounts if they pay by cash or other methods. Online merchants face even higher processing fees than what is charged for in-store transactions. Since the Dodd-Frank legislation passed in 2010, merchants are paying less than they once were, but card companies now charge the maximum swipe fee on even the smallest transactions. Therefore, merchants that process those smaller transactions have seen costs go up.. Democrat Dick (Richard) Durbin also considered legislation that would create similar swipe fee limits for credit cards as on debit cards, but it has not passed. In fact, there have been efforts in Congress to repeal the Durbin Amendment entirely, a campaign backed mainly by smaller retailers and some community banks and credit unions… Some argue merchants raise their prices in response to swipe fees, which lead to the customer indirectly paying for them. In 2021 swipe fees on credit and debit card purchases averaged 1.46% of the transaction. Many credit cards however, can charge 2% or 4% for certain premium rewards cards.. Merchants paid credit card companies $105.23 billion in credit and debit swipe fees in 2021, up 25% from 2020. Contrast this also with prior paragraph 53b- on planned obsolescence, ergo the contradicting interests driving merchandise marketing and commercial housing rents... But then again, the merchandise marketeers, even without paying rents, would still vouch for the planned obsolescence... ◺
Small businesses rise to fight Wall Street, 2023
https://twitter.com/TheProspect/status/1623075378649526273
Feb 7, 2023
New York's new credit card surcharge mandate takes effect: What to know
February 12, 2024
.. The new rule does not apply to debit cards.
62- ✔ I wonder also how all those merchant account fees by banks & credit card companies then compare to transactions made with EBT cards (electronic benefit transfer) under the SNAP program (formerly known as food stamps)… In Wikipedia’s bottom article it states: “It is illegal for anyone to charge sales tax, surcharges or card processing fees from an EBT SNAP account, according to federal law and USDA SNAP Guidelines..” It goes without saying private banks & credit card co.’s would not like either if state enterprises were involved in the distribution of goods and demand lower prices for merchant account fees… See also paragraph 8- . ◺
Is sales tax charged on food items I bought with Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program benefits? (for SNAP clients) 2022
The real lessons from Bill Clinton’s welfare reform
February 5, 2018
The 1996 creation of the Temporary Assistance for Needy Families program effectively killed cash assistance. Now, Republicans want to use it as a model for the rest of the social safety net.
Personal Responsibility and Work Opportunity Act, 1996
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Personal_Responsibility_and_Work_Opportunity_Act
‘Illegal’ vendors overrun Bronx strip with no cops to chase them
https://twitter.com/nypost/status/1417226196899729416
Jul 19, 2021
..“It looks like a bazaar in Istanbul,” said Marko Majic, head of business development for City Jeans on East Fordham Road. “The only difference is in Istanbul it’s legal and organized and here it is illegal and unorganized,” Majic said… ..“They sell water, jewelry, masks, toys, counterfeit goods, anything you can imagine,” Alonso said, adding that hustlers even set up games of three-card monte… ..“Because of them we almost have no business,” said Mahmood Tariq, owner of Phones & Games Center on the corner of East Fordham Road and Webster Avenue. “These vendors, they have nothing to pay and they’re making much more money than us because everything goes to pocket. We have to pay taxes, we have to pay licenses, rent, other fees,” Tariq said…
Nike cuts off Frank’s sport shop
Oct 12, 2020
https://sgbonline.com/nike-cuts-off-franks-sport-shop/
Nike has stopped selling to Frank’s Sport Shop, the family-owned sporting goods store operating in the Bronx since 1922, according to a report in the Daily News... ..They’re putting down the Bronx. The Bronx! It’s not an elite place to them.” The account closure comes as Nike is exiting wholesale accounts that it determined do not support the company’s marketplace position..
New York trying to address rise in illegal smoke shops
November 1, 2023
https://news.yahoo.com/york-trying-address-rise-illegal-125545868.html
63- ✔ The U.S. business cycle in the 1990’s was not driven by incorporating more workers into factories or producing saleable goods (I.e. inquire about NAFTA in 1994). There was no expansion of the social wealth. The upward swing of the business cycle was based on a gigantic speculative bubble based on mountains of debt. For example, Dow Jones’ stocks rose in price 225% from 1994 to 2000, and NASDAQ’s (high technology) 500+% ! During that same time, the U.S.’s GDP barely rose 25% and business profits 65%… In the 20th century, the total market capitalization of shares (or market cap) in the U.S. never reached much beyond 75% of the country’s GDP (that 75+% was reached in 1929, at the eve of the Great Depression..), but in 1999 that number rose to 153.4% above GDP… ◺
US total market capitalization as % of GDP
145.6% of GDP for Dec 31 2022. In December 31, 2021 at 199.0%.
https://ycharts.com/indicators/us_total_market_capitalization
List of countries by stock market capitalization
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_stock_market_capitalization
64- ✔ In the 90’s, the ever increasing levels of debt was propelled by multi-billion corporate mergers, that is concentration of capital into fewer hands, I.e. hedge funds. Personal consumer debt of course also accompanied this. So in the 1990’s much of the corporate press and U.S. politicos preached the new gospel of the “new economy”, whereby capitalism had entered a new age of productive capacity nourished by computers / technology, some even went as far suggesting the end of business cycles, recessions… Then the 1997 Asian financial crisis hit and the Dot-com bubble crashed in 2000… ◺
Lost Decades, from 1991 to 2003, the Japanese economy, as measured by GDP, grew only 1.14% annually,..
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lost_Decades
Do less, become happier, says Yale cognitive scientist Laurie Santos
https://youtu.be/rJAMyrF7bPc ,8-02-23
65a- ✔ What most of technocratic gurus failed to notice was, what’s described by Karl Marx in chapter 13 of Capital, Volume III on the general tendency for the rate of profit to fall because of the greater quantity of constant capital in production (plant, machinery, raw material, etc.) and the relatively smaller quantity of variable capital, I.e., that part spent on wages. Or in other words, a tendency of the ratio of profit to decrease over time in relation to the amount of invested capital. Some falsely attribute this tendency of the rate of profit to decline as the real cause of capitalist crisis, but Marx never recognized it as such. Though it is an important tendency under capitalism, it operates as a long-term tendency, bearing down on the system. He describes it as decisive only under certain particular circumstances… He rather stated numerous times that the ultimate cause of capitalist crisis is overproduction. But this is not overproduction in relation to what people need or want. In a market economy, overproduction refers only to what can be profitably sold. Among his citations: “..The English, for example, are forced to lend their capital to other countries in order to create a market for their commodities..” “..Overproduction is specifically conditioned by the general law of the production of capital: to produce to the limit set by the productive forces, that is to say, to exploit the maximum amount of labour with the given amount of capital, without any consideration for the actual limits of the market or the needs backed by the ability to pay..” “The volume of the mass of commodities brought into being by capitalist production is determined by the scale of this production and its needs for constant expansion, and not by a predestined ambit of supply and demand, of needs to be satisfied. Besides other industrial capitalists, mass production can have only wholesale merchants as its immediate purchasers..”
Now, doesn’t that properly apply to the 2007-08 financial crisis or subprime mortgage crisis, or Great Recession originating in the U.S.? Or fit right in to the heaps of money “given” to Ukraine today by the U.S. mostly, in order to fight Russia? In reality a bonanza for arms dealers or the military-industrial complex, and the U.S.’s fossil fuels industry. A transfer of wealth channeled by the U.S. gov to defense contractors (a revolving door between private & public personnel) in the form of war bonds (financing military ops without raising taxes, and also a means to control inflation by removing excess money from circulation..). Does it not harmonize with the proliferation of small arms & high caliber weapons sold like hot-cakes in the U.S., and also exported fast & furious let’s say to Mexico? ◺
Economists focus too little on what people really care about
May 04 2018
https://liveindex.org/93430/2018/05/economists-focus-too-little-on-what-people-really-care-about/
.. Equating dollar costs with value misleads in other ways. That economic statistics such as GDP are flawed is not news. ..
✔ See a quote by Oscar Wilde prior elsewhere here ◺
The ‘AI-in-everything’ era is here, and it’s giving us a lot of stuff we don’t need
07-15-2024
https://www.fastcompany.com/91154806/ai-in-everything-era-pointless
.. “Inside the tech bubble, more AI is the most important thing in the world,” says Margaret Mitchell, chief ethics scientist at Hugging Face, which makes open-source AI tools. “Outside of that bubble, the fact that—for example—crops are dying due to the most extreme heat waves on record is a tad more important. Ironically, stuffing AI into everything makes the global warming issue worse. But they have air-conditioning in that bubble.” .. .. “When talking to students about technology, but especially artificial intelligence, it’s important to start from a place of empathy.” ..
Who owns the Fed’s massive losses? 06/23/22
https://thehill.com/opinion/finance/3532683-who-owns-the-feds-massive-losses/
We estimate that at the end of May, the Federal Reserve had an unrecognized mark-to-market loss of about $540 billion on its $8.8 trillion portfolio of Treasury bonds and mortgage securities. This loss, which will only get larger as interest rates increase, is more than 13 times the Federal Reserve System’s consolidated capital of $41 billion... ✔ see recent paragraph 65a- on war bonds & inflation. ◺
Hemorrhaging losses, the Fed’s problems are now the taxpayer’s,
02/28/23
Interest costs on US national debt to exceed defense spending by 2028
July 10, 2023
https://finance.yahoo.com/news/interest-costs-us-national-debt-230006893.html
SVB drops most on record as startup clients face cash crunch
March 9, 2023
..“We are taking these actions because we expect continued higher interest rates, pressured public and private markets, and elevated cash-burn levels from our clients as they invest in their businesses,” SVB Chief Executive Officer Greg Becker said in a letter to shareholders Wednesday.. ..venture investors have been reckoning with the repercussions of years of exuberant investment in emerging companies and their founders. Firms have slowed their pace of investing, offering stingier terms to founders while demanding greater transparency and rigor during due diligence to try to avoid additional fallout.. ..The bank’s troubles echo some of the issues that ended up sinking Silvergate Capital Corp., another California lender that targeted a specific market. In Silvergate’s case, it was cryptocurrency firms. The volatility of crypto-related deposits combined with losses the bank sustained on its securities portfolio led Silvergate to wind down operations and liquidate its bank.. ..Moody’s Investors Service cut the bank’s issuer ratings following the moves. The downgrade “reflects the deterioration in the bank’s funding, liquidity and profitability, which prompted SVB to announce actions to restructure its balance sheet,” Moody’s said..
The Schall law firm announces it is investigating claims against SVB Financial Group and encourages investors with losses to contact the firm
March 09, 2023
One of Silicon Valley’s top banks fails; assets are seized
March 10, 2023
https://abcnews.go.com/US/wireStory/silicon-valley-bank-seized-fdic-depositors-pull-cash-97773372
..As its name implied, Silicon Valley Bank was a major financial conduit between the technology sector, startups and tech workers. It was seen as good business sense to develop a relationship with the bank if a startup founder wanted to find new investors or go public..
65b- ✔ Overall, it remains to be seen if the insolvency of Silicon Valley Bank & others translates to a systemic failure of the banking economy, in the U.S. & abroad, akin or worse than the 2007-08 financial crisis… Ironic, the Biden admin heavily sanctioned Russian banks alleging it would crumble Russia... ◺
Russia’s biggest lender Sberbank exits Europe
2 Mar 2022
https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2022/3/2/russias-biggest-lender-sberbank-exits-europe
Russia is so cut off from the international financial system that the Kremlin thinks Western sanctions have ‘insured’ the country against the banking crisis
Mar 17, 2023
Former Wall Street banker reacts to banking collapse
ABC News
https://youtu.be/YPGHEYvmVus ,3-13-23
5:50 “..but our banking system is fragile.. the real question is has the government become the bank..to some extent it has..after the last financial crisis.. FDIC insurance.. who’s really the bank here?..”
✔ see also paragraphs 32-, 87- on banking ◺
Banking troubles on the horizon?
March 13, 2023
https://www.paulcraigroberts.org/2023/03/13/banking-troubles-on-the-horizon/
The failure of Silicon Valley Bank (16th largest bank in US) last Friday resulted from depositors withdrawing their funds in response to a drop in value of the bank’s bond portfolios caused by the Federal Reserve’s ill-considered hikes in interest rates. The mindless policy implemented by the Federal Reserve cures inflation by producing bank runs, failed banks, and unemployment. The Federal Reserve and neoliberal economists are still stuck in the worn out thinking of 20th century Keynesianism.. ..We owe the financial crisis earlier this century, and we will owe the next financial crisis, to the mindless repeal of the Glass-Steagall Act. This legislation was passed in 1933 to deal with the crisis at that time..
Paul Craig Roberts is an American economist and author. He formerly held a sub-cabinet office in the United States federal government as well as teaching positions at several U.S. universities. He is a promoter of supply-side economics and an opponent of recent U.S. foreign policy... ..He was the United States Assistant Secretary of the Treasury for Economic Policy under President Ronald Reagan and – after leaving government – held the William E. Simon chair in economics at the Center for Strategic and International Studies for ten years and served on several corporate boards..
Consumer Price Index shows inflation cooling; Fed to decide on interest rate hike next week
CBS News
https://youtu.be/XOZYN2mV7EA ,3-14-23
Consumer price index rises 0.4% in month of February
CBS News
https://youtu.be/5XoG6KdCql4 ,3-14-23
65c- ✔ But the psychological factor of bank runs can weigh in the minds of employers, making them hesitant to hire or raise wages. Instead of hiring they’ll be firing due to the fear of not making payrolls or not being able to invest in production.. In effect that’ll cool down the economy, reducing inflation.. ◺
US bank fallout extends to various non-bank financial sectors – Fitch
https://twitter.com/Geo45/status/1636068257261056000
Mar 15, 2023
Moody’s now negative on U.S. banks due to ‘extremely volatile funding conditions,’ while First Republic and other regional banks are placed under review
Mar 14, 2023
Billionaire investor Ray Dalio says the Silicon Valley Bank failure marks a ‘canary in the coal mine’ that will have repercussions beyond the VC world
Mar 14, 2023
Global markets tumble over banking fears in U.S. and Europe
CBS News
https://youtu.be/2sUO23dAgPY ,3-15-23
7:08 “..the banks never stop pushing for lighter regulation..” ✔ Yeah, rinse & repeat. ◺
Economist Nouriel Roubini, nicknamed Dr Doom after he predicted the 2008 sub-prime crisis, said the Credit Suisse crisis is potentially a “Lehman moment” for European and global markets.
https://twitter.com/CityAM/status/1636038563375529986
Mar 15, 2023
Stanford experts on the state of US banking after the Silicon Valley Bank collapse
March 16, 2023
https://siepr.stanford.edu/news/stanford-experts-state-us-banking-after-silicon-valley-bank-collapse
..The bank invested quite a bit of money in long-term government bonds that are safe in the sense that they won’t default. But when interest rates increase, the value of such bonds declines, and the longer the maturity, the more bonds are affected by interest rate changes.. ..Silicon Valley Bank is not an outlier. Lots of banks have had a bad shock. We calculate that the average U.S. bank’s market value of assets is about 9% lower than suggested by their book value..
Goldman’s Rubner
‘shocked’ by big market moves, blames liquidity
Mar 16, 2023
https://www.wealthmanagement.com/etfs/goldman-s-rubner-shocked-big-market-moves-blames-liquidity
First Republic becomes the latest bank to be rescued, this time by its rivals
March 16, 2023
✔ compare this fire sale to “all belonged to the State” in paragraph 53b- ◺
First Republic bank insiders dumped $12 million in stock before 70% collapse
Mar 16, 2023
The bank who begged for deregulation is the same one who begged for a bailout.
Bernie Sanders
https://youtu.be/4zpLe4AKssk ,3-16-23
The bank crisis has raised the odds of a recession in the next year to 35%, according to Goldman Sachs
Mar. 16, 2023
Bank crisis will tip U.S. into hard landing after all, says
Apollo’s chief economist: ‘I changed my view’
March 18, 2023
Only an expert (2007, 2010)- Laurie Anderson
https://youtu.be/w8aHeYGo0JY ,4-01-20
#music
“..a fool and his money are soon parted..” - Thomas Tusser, 1573
Silicon Valley Bank’s loans to insiders tripled to $219 mn before it failed
March 22, 2023
Swedish pension fund Alecta dumps First Republic Bank shares after price plummets
Mar 21, 2023
..According to media reports, Alecta took a $728 million loss on the sale of its First Republic shares. That loss came on top of roughly $862 million Alecta had in SVB and $310 million in Signature Bank before their closures..
Swedish defaults surge, marking worst February since 1994
March 1, 2024
JPMorgan’s Kolanovic sees increasing chances of ‘Minsky moment’
March 20, 2023
https://finance.yahoo.com/news/jpmorgan-kolanovic-sees-increasing-chances-201003489.html
..The term, named for the late American economist Hyman Minsky, refers to the end of an economic boom that has encouraged investors to take on so much risk that lending exceeds what borrowers can repay. At that point, any destabilizing event may force investors to sell assets for cash to repay their loans, sparking a market meltdown..
‘Already past the point of no return’: JP Morgan says the US is probably headed for a recession as economic ‘engines are about to turn off’
March 21, 2023
..The analysts referred to current challenges as a possible “Minsky moment,” named after the American economist Hyman Minsky who famously predicted that extended bull markets naturally end in epic and monumental collapses. A Minsky moment happens when the inevitable check comes due and house of cards finally falls down..
Deutsche Bank, UBS stocks sink as fear of European banking crisis returns
March 24, 2023
https://www.cnn.com/2023/03/24/investing/european-bank-stocks-ubs-deutsche/index.html
Bye, banks: Recent turmoil is spurring many to move their money
March 24, 2023
https://news.yahoo.com/bye-banks-recent-turmoil-spurring-171333210.html
The basics of bonds
July 31, 2022
https://www.investopedia.com/financial-edge/0312/the-basics-of-bonds.aspx
65d- ✔ Recapping, as you might be aware, SVB invested in 2020-1 the interest-free money it got from the Fed (quantitative easing or QE) into Treasury bonds. & mortgage-backed securities. But since the interest hikes, it meant the market value of those assets plummeted below their book value (compare to used car prices on paragraph 53a- ). SVB had huge losses when it came to selling them as it faced cash withdrawals. The FDIC intervened when no other options were left. Prior to the recent decreased value at U.S. banks, all had positive capitalization. As of now 2, 315 banks totaling $11 trillion in assets, have negative capitalization, meaning that what they owe is greater than the capital stock of their companies. From March 2009 to December 2021, the stock market in the S&P 500 index, rose 517 percent, the second-biggest rise of any since 1999, right before the Dot-com bubble crash... Low interest rates drove investors to seek the better yields stocks offered. From 2019-21 deposits at SVB more than tripled, but loans “merely” doubled.. Seeking higher yield, its managers also bought billions of longer-term bonds, paying higher rates. SVB went without a chief risk officer for most of 2022. The last CRO left in April 2022 with $2.5 million pay package. Oh how sweet it is!
Regulators flagged SVB ‘deficiencies’ as early as 2021, to no avail. According to the FDIC, the whole banking system has $620 billion in unrealized (paper) losses, by far the highest in recent history. Commercial real estate is also at risk due to diminished demand for office space. Robert Burgess of Bloomberg wrote: “If market participants are wringing their hands over the potential fallout from the collapse of Silicon Valley Bank, just wait until they look at the banking industry’s exposure to the rapidly weakening commercial real estate sector.”
But after all this repeated crime story, who’s finally talking about nationalizing the banks? Compare before this debacle in paragraph 87- ◺
Fed was aware of Silicon Valley Bank problems more than a year before its collapse
March 20, 2023
Buyer takes on Signature Bank’s deposits, rejects its commercial real estate loans
March 19, 2023
The catalyst that could send shares crashing just might be emerging.
Bonds are pricing in a hard landing, while stocks are sending a very different signal. But even if cental banks can stop contagion, tighter credit conditions loom.
Mar 21, 2023
Newmark to shepherd sale of $60B in Signature loans
Mar 29, 2023
https://commercialobserver.com/2023/03/newmark-shepherd-sale-60b-signature-loans/
Banks get a downgrade from Moody's. Here are the 10 lenders impacted.
August 8, 2023
https://www.cbsnews.com/news/moodys-downgrades-banks-list-of-downgraded-banks/
Small U.S. banks imperiled by big office loans
March 24, 2023
https://www.reuters.com/business/finance/small-us-banks-imperiled-by-big-office-loans-2023-03-24/
Pain on the office sector: impact on banks holding the loans
Mar 27, 2023
WeWork files for bankruptcy in latest sign of commercial real estate reckoning
Nov 6, 2023
..On Monday, WeWork's stock trading was halted ahead of the opening bell.. ..Japanese investor SoftBank has dropped billions of dollars into the real estate startup and remains its majority shareholder.. ..Bankruptcy might not be the end for WeWork, which currently operates over 300 locations worldwide. The Chapter 11 process allows companies to shed some debt and reorganize. (WeWork competitor Regus filed for bankruptcy in the US in 2003 and has continued to operate successfully.) …
The US housing market is crashing and soaring at the same time. It all depends on where you live.
Mar 28, 2023
Cliometrics is a method of applying formal economic models and econometric analysis to historical trends and events. Cliometrics revolutionized the study of economic history and stands in contrast to prior methods of economic history, which tend to rely on qualitative, interpretive, and narrative methods. Cliometrics began to develop in the 1950s and 60s and the Cliometric Society was founded in 1983. In 1993, Douglass North and Robert Fogel shared the Nobel Prize in Economics for their pioneering work in cliometrics…
https://www.investopedia.com/terms/c/cliometrics.asp May 15 2021
Too much maths, too little history; the problem of economics
https://youtu.be/6rXBBqMmIP8?si=lEahPz4vPBpkj-jC ,12-18-15
ChatGPT might be taking over the internet, but a computer scientist explains why some problems are still too hard to solve—even for AI.
January 30, 2023
World Bank warns of ‘lost decade’ in global growth without bold policy shifts
March 27, 2023
✔ compare this to Lost Decades prior to paragraph 65a- ◺
“..The fundamental cause of the trouble is that in the modern world the stupid are cocksure while the intelligent are full of doubt..” - Bertrand Russell in his essay ‘The triumph of stupidity’, published in 1933.
66- ✔ Going back to containerization, let’s combine it with overproduction (covered in paragraphs 51-, 53b-, 65a-..). What’s one way capitalist enterprises deal with keeping global supply lines flowing “efficiently”? Such a strategy is the Just-in-time (JIT) inventory system, where companies receive goods only as they need them for the production process, reducing warehouse costs; but relying on machines not breaking down, a reliable supply chain, political stability overseas, etc. So it requires producers to forecast demand accurately (logistics demand forecasting)… Artificial Intelligence or AI (using algorithms) is also being implemented to it… JIT is also known as Toyota Production System (TPS), taking 20 years to “perfect it”; or the short-cycle manufacturing used by Motorola. As stated, disadvantages of JIT are potential disruptions in the supply chain. In 1997 a fire at a parts supplier caused a ripple effect to other suppliers, costing Toyota billions in revenue. It’s a safe bet the Japanese government bailed out Toyota then, not its insurer, for that “externality”.. ◺
Hit pause on AI development, Elon Musk and others urge
Mar 29, 2023
https://www.cbc.ca/news/world/chat-artificial-intelligence-safety-protocols-1.6794454
Democracy Now 6-01-23; artificial intelligence godfathers call for regulation as rights groups warn AI encodes oppression
Japanese asset price bubble was an economic bubble in Japan from 1986 to 1991 in which real estate and stock market prices were greatly inflated.[1] In early 1992, this price bubble burst and Japan's economy stagnated. The bubble was characterized by rapid acceleration of asset prices and overheated economic activity, as well as an uncontrolled money supply and credit expansion.[2]…
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Japanese_asset_price_bubble
67- ✔ The JIT (just-in-time) lore came crashing down at the start of the COVID-19 pandemic when all sorts of personal protective equipment (PPE) was in short supply, because to warehouse it was not profitable… Oh but gun sales went through the roof! Essential items “were” scarce or expensive, I.e. toilet paper, rubbing alcohol, baby formula, ETC. U.S. allies even accused the US gov of diverting medical supplies away from them. Supplies they had already contracted for… ◺
The US can eliminate its trade deficit or run the world’s dominant currency—but not both
May 2, 2018
..A country that runs a trade deficit—meaning it imports more than it exports—is by definition consuming more than it produces. That doesn’t mean Americans are bad at saving or wanton materialists. It does, however, mean that the US is forced to borrow..
68- ✔ As of this writing, January 27 2023, supply chains are still not back to normal… Crises in capitalism, “recessions”, “business cycles”, are inherent to it, a clear proof of its fundamental contradiction. It’s like a computer operating system that keeps crashing, condemned to history. ◺
German, French officials accuse U.S. of diverting supplies, 2020
https://www.npr.org/2020/04/04/827321294/german-french-officials-accuse-u-s-of-diverting-supplies
US ‘wasted’ months before preparing for coronavirus pandemic, 2020
In October 2021 the Biden admin. announced it’ll open up the West Coast’s ports around the clock in order to address bottlenecks in the supply chain.. Walmart, Target, FedEx, UPS, Los Angeles and Long Beach Port Authority directors, and the International Longshore and Warehouse Union and Teamster leaders are all on board with the 24/7 plan.. According to the Pamela N. Danziger article below, this may provide relief at the ports, but once filled-to-capacity overseas containers reach land, there is another snag in the supply chain: a shortage of truckers and trucks to get those goods where they are needed..building up for the last two decades.. Warehouse close to the ports are filled to capacity and skilled warehouse workers are in short supply..
Unclogging the ports will not fix the supply chain’s even bigger trucking crisis,
10-15-21
69- ✔ Truck drivers on average are close to retirement age. Truckers concentrated in the West Coast also leaves them absent in other parts of the country. A career in supply chain management is also not seen as attractive.. Wait times at the docks for loading & unloading also puts a strain on drivers, cutting into their earnings and the time available to drive. Pamela’s article barely hinted at the truckers’ working conditions at the ports. In actuality, 80% are misclassified as “independent contractors”, meaning they don’t get good wages, predictable hours, benefits, and some can’t even use bathrooms at the ports cuz they’re not considered employees.. Workers offshore on the ships also are subject to poor working conditions. ◺
Truckers struggle for work as demand drops
NewsNation
https://youtu.be/EyfitHle1SU ,7-05-23
Trucking giant Yellow corp shuts down, 30,000 fired
NewsNation
https://youtu.be/IB_6cpiuj-c ,7-31-23
0:14 “..LTL carrier known for offering..cheaper rates..”
0:20 “..just 3 years after receiving a $700 million bailout loan from gov..”
1:06 “..Motor Carrier Act of 1980 that deregulated trucking..fallout..”
1:20 30,000 employees. 22,000 union.
2:00 could lead to higher rates for shippers
2:17 “..good workers can always find employment, it might not be at the same level..”
2;27 “..a myth in trucking is that there is a shortage of drivers..”
2:47 in operation for nearly 100 years.
3:26 “..workweeks are 70-80 hours long..”
4:08 “..chronic, long-term problems..”
4:13 “..consumers not paying attention how their goods & services are shipped across..”
Trucking recession, Yellow bankruptcy impact employment
Feb. 21, 2024
.. As you can see on the chart, the downturns in trucking employment have been an important source of information about the likelihood and timing of a downturn in the general economy. ..
✔ I recently saw an article heading stating that according to the FBI, long-haul truck driving is one of the best jobs for aspiring serial killers.. Could be, but not sure If I agree with that assessment. ◺
Why 90% of owner-operators & trucking companies fail
February 28, 2024
https://www.foleyservices.com/articles/why-owner-operators-trucking-companies-fail
Unfortunately, 90% of new small trucking companies are unable to succeed due to common mistakes made by inexperienced business owners. ..
Top 10 U.S. ports
https://www.cushmanwakefield.com/en/united-states/insights/north-american-ports-report
China accuses U.S. of paranoia over spy cranes concern
3/6/23
https://www.newsweek.com/china-america-zpmc-cranes-ports-national-security-1785743
Medical experts bracing for scarcity in children’s medicine, sharing advice with parents amid nationwide shortage
https://youtu.be/8bchYDUtOgE ,12-06-22
Avian flu continuing to cause high egg prices, local farmer explains, 2023 https://www.kmbc.com/article/local-farmer-talks-egg-prices-amid-nationwide-outbreak-of-avian-flu-kearney-missouri/42527076
An ‘unprecedented pandemic of avian flu’ is wreaking havoc on the U.S. poultry industry. Humans may be at risk too, experts warn.
Jan 23, 2023
https://news.yahoo.com/unprecedented-pandemic-avian-flu-wreaking-182438530.html
As bird flu spreads to minks, sea lions and other mammals, scientists are on alert for dangerous mutations.
Feb 11, 2023
https://news.yahoo.com/bird-flu-spreads-minks-sea-150000269.html
An increasing number of people are trying to bring cheaper eggs back from Mexico, as the grocery staple is now 70 percent more expensive than it was last year.
https://twitter.com/Newsweek/status/1627724156799156242
Feb 20, 2023
Why the price of eggs is on the rise again
September 28, 2024
https://www.npr.org/2024/09/27/nx-s1-5126581/egg-prices-bird-flu?utm_source=pocket-newtab-en-us
The price of eggs is back on the rise, after significant bird flu outbreaks among egg-laying chickens. ..
70a- ✔ The 2007-08 financial crisis or subprime mortgage crisis, or Great Recession, was one of the worst economic declines in US history, spanning 2007-10, sending the world economy into a slump.. The worst recession since the Great Depression of the 1930’s. The total market capitalization of shares as percentage to GDP in the U.S. in 2007 was 137.85%, then in 2008 it plunged to 78.77%.. In 1987, the same year as Black Monday or the stock market crash on October 19, 1987, the total market capitalization of shares was 52.14%. Same decade as the Savings and Loan crisis or S&L crisis from 1986-95, where the likes of Margaret Thatcher in the UK and Ronald “666” Reagan championed that higher profits would encourage enterprise, investment, and growth (trickle-down economics, Reaganomics, Friedrich Hayek’s theories, Laffer Curve).. By 1971, under the swelling deficit from the Vietnam War, US president Nixon ended the convertibility of the U.S. dollar into gold (end of the gold standard, or the collapse of the Bretton Woods system), turning the dollar into a fiat currency. The dollar’s value plummeted, which helped the U.S. economy initially in its exports.. Since that time oil from OPEC countries was quoted in U.S. dollars, or the birth of the petrodollar (in fact agreed on Feb. 14, 1945 between the U.S. & Saudi Arabia), and most of the world’s currencies been based on a floating exchange rate, that is allowed to fluctuate in response to foreign exchange markets (Forex). The U.S. trade deficit has BALLOONED since then as foreign banks began amassing U.S. dollars to purchase raw materials and in turn Uncle $am would buy their manufactured exports with its own currency.. ◺
Joseph Stiglitz vs Friedrich von Hayek ;
One Nobel prize winning economist takes on another
https://youtu.be/aG9g385A7yc?si=ph-o7_rszRb8SalU ,6-10-24
✔ See also terms : externalities, externality, congestion pricing, FICO scores ◺
Sweden financial crisis 1990–1994
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sweden_financial_crisis_1990%E2%80%931994
The Sweden financial crisis 1990–1994 was a housing bubble that took place in Sweden that deflated during 1991 and 1992, and resulted in a severe credit crunch and widespread bank insolvency. Similar crises took place in other countries around the same time, such as in Finland and the Savings and loan crisis in the United States. The causes of the crisis were similar to those of the subprime mortgage crisis of 2007–2008. In response, the government took the following actions:[1] ..
Robert Downey Jr. , 1993- The last party – Wall Street
https://youtu.be/MHPn8ON_g9g?si=RwuQ9puOQcWeqrt8 ,8-07-18
The Last Party is a 1993 documentary film co-written by and starring Robert Downey Jr.[1] … ..Two sequel films were made following The Last Party, The Party's Over and The After Party: The Last Party 3.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Last_Party_(film)
US inflation and the imbalances of the Bretton Woods system, 1965–1973
17 October 2020
https://link.springer.com/chapter/10.1007/978-3-030-53265-9_6
This chapter argues that the key deep underlying fundamental for the growing international imbalances leading to the collapse of the Bretton Woods System between 1971 and 1973 was rising US inflation since 1965. It was driven in turn by expansionary fiscal and monetary policies—the elephant in the room. What was kept in the background at the Camp David meeting on August 15, 1971 (when President Richard Nixon closed the US gold window, as well as imposing a ten per cent surcharge on all imports and a ninety-day wage–price freeze), was that US inflation, driven by macro-policies, was the main problem facing the Bretton Woods System, and that for political and doctrinal reasons was not directly addressed. Instead, President Nixon blamed the rest of the world rather than correcting mistaken US policies… ..This is not to argue that the only cause of the global imbalances of the 1960s and 1970s was US inflation. The surplus countries did follow export-led growth policies and were reluctant to revalue their currencies. However, rising US inflation became increasingly the major problem leading to the collapse of Bretton Woods..
70b- ✔ The U.S. stock market crash on Monday, October 19, 1987 (Black Monday) was a sign, among other things, that stocks were significantly overvalued (bubbles)… It spread worldwide. The Dow Jones Industrial Average fell 508 points (22.6 %), the largest one-day drop by percentage in the index's history.
Missing from the usual Western financial / economic analyses is that the soon-to-be internal debacle of the Soviet Union (USSR) gave Western capitalism a leg up or breathing room for a few more years… The dismantling of the USSR at the hands of Mikhail Gorbachev (considered a traitor there but a hero in the West) and later Boris Yeltsin, meant that without a rival, Western capital could then expand to new markets and grab resources & labour from the former socialist countries... This also included capital flight from those countries to the West. Crises are inherent in capitalism’s DNA and as such more would follow: i.e. dotcom bubble by 2000 & Stock market downturn of 2002 , bear market of 2007–2009 , Financial crisis of 2007–2008 , European sovereign debt crisis in 2010, 2015–2016 stock market selloff , 2018 cryptocurrency crash , 2020 stock market crash “from” the COVID pandemic, and on… Compare also to paragraph 44a- ◺
Greenspan - I was wrong about the economy. Sort of
23 Oct 2008
https://www.theguardian.com/business/2008/oct/24/economics-creditcrunch-federal-reserve-greenspan
The former Federal Reserve chairman, Alan Greenspan, has conceded that the global financial crisis has exposed a "mistake" in the free market ideology which guided his 18-year stewardship of US monetary policy. .. ..Greenspan "Partially ... I made a mistake in presuming that the self-interest of organisations, specifically banks, is such that they were best capable of protecting shareholders and equity in the firms ... I discovered a flaw in the model that I perceived is the critical functioning structure that defines how the world works. ..
List of recessions in the United States
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_recessions_in_the_United_States
Forget comparisons to 2008. Today’s banking crisis looks like the S&L crash.
March 27, 2023
2023 Housing market is more like the 1980s, not 2008: BofA economists
https://youtu.be/RZJ7b6jtg1A?si=reB8lmz2taGnl8QN ,10-09-23
71- ✔ The collapse of the housing market in late 2007, was in part fueled by low interest rates, but mainly by the deregulation of banks and Wall Street, I.e. 1999 rollback of the Glass-Steagall Act, which opened the floodgates for giant mergers. Easy housing credit resulted in higher demand for homes, rising prices, classic bubbles that burst. Subprime mortgages were adjustable-rate mortgages which started off at low rates but after time required higher interest payments and home prices plummeted. In domino effect, hedge funds and banks had created mortgage-backed securities (derivatives, leverage), and insurance companies covered them with credit default swaps (cutesy term). As with most white-collar crime, very few of the perpetrators did jail time, and those did little of it. Banks were bailed out by the federal government by way of printing more money (quantitative easing) and “socializing” the HUGE loses (but profits remained private right on)… Restoring “confidence” by showing to finance capitalists that the State would not allow major banks to fail. But none of that really solved the underlying crisis. The “American dream” busted. ◺
Fact check: Did Glass-Steagall cause the 2008 financial crisis?
October 14, 2015
..Some critics, such as Nobel laureate Joseph Stiglitz, have long seen the changes to Glass-Steagall as a major factor in the 2008 crash. By bringing “investment and commercial banks together, the investment bank culture came out on top,” Stiglitz wrote in 2009. “There was a demand for the kind of high returns that could be obtained only through high leverage and big risk-taking.”..
White-collar criminals got off scot-free after the 2008 financial crisis – and that helped fuel President Trump’s rise, 2018
72- ✔ After the preventable disaster in 2005 from Hurricane Katrina in New Orleans, surrounding regions, the reconstruction ensued was selective gentrification, displacing long-term residents for wealthier clients and speculators (see Naomi Klein’s 2007 book: The shock doctrine: the rise of disaster capitalism). The floodwaters’ scenes looked straight-out like from a “3rd world country”. A HUGE loss in human lives, and property.. ◺
Court: Army Corps of Engineers liable for Katrina flooding
November 19, 2009
https://www.cnn.com/2009/US/11/18/louisiana.katrina.lawsuit/index.html
After a $14-billion upgrade, New Orleans’ levees are sinking
April 11, 2019
Thousands of Pajaro residents forced from homes over levee breach
KTVU FOX 2 San Francisco
https://youtu.be/eUYZ_iQJm28 ,3-13-23
Concerns over 'climate gentrification' rise after devastating Maui fires https://bit.ly/3E3B4Bm
https://twitter.com/1010WINS/status/1692591763288891594
Aug 18, 2023
..Other examples are New Orleans after Hurricane Katrina and various cities in Puerto Rico after Hurricane Maria, where many people could not afford to come back..
US housing market takes biggest hit since 2008, sale prices now plummeting.
February 24, 2023
https://ijr.com/us-housing-market-biggest-hit-2008-sale-prices-plummeting/
..Still, American homes have a total value that is $13 trillion higher than they were in February 2020, according to the report.. ..So while prices are not completely collapsing as they did in 2008, there are some economic concerns…
Bash China publicly and now goes hat in hand asking for another bailout. China remembers what happened in 2008. After China threw the U.S. a lifeline. The U.S. pivoted to Asia to try to choke off China’s lifeline.
https://twitter.com/RebeccaYChan/status/1631480513679732736
Mar 2, 2023
Drug money saved banks in global crisis, claims UN advisor
12 Dec 2009
https://www.theguardian.com/global/2009/dec/13/drug-money-banks-saved-un-cfief-claims
..Antonio Maria Costa, head of the UN Office on Drugs and Crime, said he has seen evidence that the proceeds of organised crime were “the only liquid investment capital” available..
Government intervention during the subprime mortgage crisis
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Government_intervention_during_the_subprime_mortgage_crisis
..financial system during late 2007 and early 2008..
The 2008 crash- what happened to all that money
January 20, 2021
https://www.history.com/news/2008-financial-crisis-causes
A look at what caused the worst economic crisis since the Great Depression.
The
Great
Recession was
a period of marked general decline observed in national economies
globally, I.e. a recession, that occurred from late 2007 to 2009. The
scale and timing of the recession varied from country to country (see
map).[1][2] At the time, the International Monetary Fund (IMF)
concluded that it was the most severe economic and financial meltdown
since the Great Depression. One result was a serious disruption of normal international relations...
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Great_Recession
List of countries by home ownership rate
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_home_ownership_rate
73- ✔ In 2014, Israel is #50 with 67.3% home ownership rate. Cuba in 7th place with 90%, way above also the U.S.’s in #52 at 65.3% in 2019… That percentage definitely is even lower for Blacks, Hispanics, except maybe for Asians.. Also lower for younger generations now than let’s say those born in the 1940’s.. The term “homeowner” in the U.S. can be misleading because around 60% of them still have a mortgage with the bank.. And even if completely paid off, guess what happens if you don’t pay the property taxes? Another twist is that homeowners have the option to deduct the interest of their mortgage when filing taxes (tax break), yet renters don’t have that, even though they absolutely contribute to homeowners paying those mortgages... To note, most property tax revenue comes from local levies (I.e. municipal) on land and improvements to it, not federal nor state, but some states also tax personal property as machinery, equipment, and motor vehicles. Federal & state taxes do apply on a home property if such is used as rental income. Contrast this to a proposed Tobin tax on financial transactions (mentioned elsewhere here).. ◺
How much mortgage interest can you deduct on your taxes?
December 30, 2022
https://www.cbsnews.com/news/mortgage-interest-tax-deduction/
..When you file taxes, you can take the standard deduction or the itemized deduction. In 2022, the standard deduction is $25,900 for married couples filing jointly and $12,950 for individuals. The standard deduction is $19,400 for those filing as head of household. The mortgage interest deduction is only available to those who itemize their deductions.. ..However, the rules are different if the second home is a rental property. If that’s the case, you can only take the deduction if you live in the property for 14 days or for 10% of the time that it is rented..
State Farm no longer accepting property insurance applications in California
NBC News
https://youtu.be/penPiBAHLSE ,5-27-23
Florida homeowners brace for 40% increase in insurance rates
NBC2 News
https://youtu.be/3YDoqjQ1Rb8 ,6-02-23
Allstate joins State Farm in halting home insurance policies in CA due to wildfire risk
ABC7 News Bay Area
https://youtu.be/0BHhUI1-aO0 ,6-02-23
Rising insurance rates price Floridians out of home ownership
NBC News
https://youtu.be/tJYuQd58dU8 ,6-13-23
Inflation in the formal market in Cuba increased nearly 40% during 2022 (in Spanish)
https://youtu.be/I8YPvxCJxsQ ,29-3-23
Formal and informal markets: A strategic and evolutionary perspective
https://mpra.ub.uni-muenchen.de/42513/
https://mpra.ub.uni-muenchen.de/42513/1/
26 Sep 2019
Israel to continue demolishing Palestinian homes during Ramadan
6 March 2023
https://www.middleeasteye.net/news/israel-ramadan-demolishing-palestinian-homes
..Israel demolishes Palestinian homes for various reasons, including claims they were built without permits that are near impossible to obtain from Israeli authorities. Often, Israel demolishes the homes of suspected Palestinian attackers’ families, in a policy condemned by rights groups as collective punishment..
Israeli demolition of Palestinian property
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Israeli_demolition_of_Palestinian_property
..The Israeli Committee Against House Demolitions estimated that Israel had razed 55,048 Palestinian structures as of 2022.[2]..
It’s illegal to not wear a hijab in Iran but in Tehran, it doesn’t feel like it. What is it like after the protests/riots? (There were both) Less hijabs and more liberal dress. But almost everyone more concerned with the economy/sanctions.
https://twitter.com/johnnyjmils/status/1636414385542557696
thread Mar 16, 2023
Iran’s Judiciary says it pardoned 22,000 jailed protesters
March 13, 2023
https://news.yahoo.com/iran-judiciary-says-pardoned-22-104424397.html
Netanyahu pauses judicial overhaul after unprecedented strikes, protests rock Israel
Mar 27, 2023
Hundreds of Israeli reservists vow to refuse service if judicial overhaul passes
July 20, 2023
Israeli police blast protesters with water cannons in Jerusalem
@BloombergQuicktake
https://youtube.com/shorts/l0M59YkBRl0?feature=share ,7-25-23
Israel judicial reform; crowds confront police as key law passed
BBC News
https://youtu.be/JvDwn864VyA ,7-25-23
What’s happening with normalising ties between Saudi Arabia and Israel?
https://youtu.be/ABtzkMUQOWI?si=J_VQOl8cRHGqU--G ,9-21-23
Hamas killed his friend, but Knesset member Ofer Cassif says ‘End the occupation now’
https://youtu.be/6bIz5Lkm1NQ?si=xUeDnpJ9r1JKxZlw ,10-09-23
How Israel was created
https://youtu.be/6foH3Zc82ZQ?si=-NcUd51Hl4gj_seQ ,5-15-23
Timeline of the name Palestine
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Timeline_of_the_name_Palestine
..The term "Palestine" first appeared in the 5th century BCE when the ancient Greek historian Herodotus wrote of a "district of Syria, called Palaistinê" between Phoenicia and Egypt in The Histories.[7] Herodotus provides the first historical reference clearly denoting a wider region than biblical Philistia, as he applied the term to both the coastal and the inland regions such as the Judean Mountains and the Jordan Rift Valley.[8][9][10][11] ..
Israel at war with Hamas: US moving warships to the region
https://youtu.be/Kjwug-YbOsQ?si=nYLjBOTKGZQMwyYX ,10-09-23
Iran has rejected allegations it had a role in the assault on Israel by Hamas
https://youtu.be/H3l0hpvKvaA?si=fQNfTjNzGWuPPCEc ,10-09-23
Judíos queman la bandera de Israel. Declaran que el Estado de Israel ha traicionado a los judíos y que el antisionismo no es antisemitism
Israelíes comparten videos burlándose de los palestinos en la franja de Gaza después de que las autoridades israelíes cortaron todos los suministros de energía y agua…
https://www.merca20.com/se-burlan-de-palestinos-en-redes-sociales-de-israel/
12/10/23
https://twitter.com/AlertaNews24/status/1712490599146766674
Oct 12, 2023
El '9/11 de Israel': las claves del sorpresivo ataque de Hamas que deja cientos de muertos y heridos
https://youtu.be/mtQH0K2cGgw?si=bSNuL7DSH1wtjhxx ,10-08-23
Israel-Palestine war: Reports of Israeli 'white phosphorus' use in Gaza
11 October 2023
https://www.middleeasteye.net/news/israel-palestine-war-gaza-report-israeli-white-phosphorus
The banned incendiary munition has been used by Israeli forces in previous conflicts, but reports of its use on Tuesday have not been independently verified…
List of United Nations resolutions concerning Israel
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_United_Nations_resolutions_concerning_Israel
..Since the UNHRC's creation in 2006, it has resolved almost as many resolutions condemning Israel alone than on issues for the rest of the world combined..
1948:
11 December: Resolution 194: establishes Conciliation Commission; protection of and free access to Jerusalem and other Holy Places; Resolves that the refugees wishing to return to their homes and live at peace with their neighbours should be permitted to do so at the earliest practicable date, and that compensation should be paid for the property of those choosing not to return and for loss of or damage to property which, under principles of international law or in equity, should be made good by the Governments or authorities responsible…
UN condemned Israel more than all other countries combined in 2022
3 January 2023
Against all odds; the fight for a Black middle class
https://youtu.be/HxS4aMzD19Q ,02-07-20
time code → 16:50 to 17:50 mins.
✔ 6-23-21.
Joint Chiefs Chairman Mark Milley on the issue of critical race
theory (or woke agenda) before House Armed Service Committee, responding to Rep. Matt
Gaetz (R-FL), of all people! (my meme)
◺
74- ✔ Unfortunately in the U.S. (not alone), as far as I know, there’s no shortage of myrmidons who’ll spout something like: “If you wanna give out orders, you must first be willing to follow them (or others) ”… As if all orders are equally valid or as if you wanna copy the despotism of others. It’s possible I misunderstood or misremember that quote from an Army reservist who once lived in the same building as me in Manhattan. It’s plausible he meant solely one must practice what one preaches.., Matthew 23: 1-7, 13-15, 23-24 (New Testament). I didn’t have time to ask him to clarify his view. Another story altogether was an ambulette driver (Dominican) I exchanged a few words while taking an aunt of mine to a doctor’s appointment, 2009 not sure. He said the problem with this gov. (the U.S.) is that it gives free stuff to people who don’t work… So I says to him: “So why do you bother working? Do the slick thing and live off the gravy train man”. “Most of the government money goes into the military, corporate bailouts, subsidies, etc.” “the ultra-rich pay much less taxes than the middle-class.” “And besides all that, social programs in rich nations also serve as a way to stave off revolutions, a “stabilizing” force, otherwise you’ll have riots”. He looked at me uncertain.. My aunt later looked at me and smiled. I had a similar discussion with a cab driver (Dominican too) in 2001 or 02 I think, but this guy reacted by speeding up the car, as if angry. Luckily I had almost reached my destination in the Bronx, otherwise I might’ve gotten off sooner. General political sentiments could be different nowadays… (see synopsis in title link: why capitalism has nothing to do with supply and demand ) ◺
75- ✔ As is already known, one group which causes some revulsion in me are the shock jocks, those specimens in hangover-inducing morning or afternoon shows: Howard Stern, in imitator Hispanic-American media there’s Coco Cabrera, Luis Jiménez, La Gozadera (with Brea Frank and Shino Aguakate in X96.3 FM).. Wouldn’t be surprised if there’s a Mondongo, a Morcilla, some Longaniza, Pig’s Feet or Trotter, Chimichurri, Pitipuá, you get the picture. For some reason they adopt monikers related to foods.. Could be for a Pavlovian response. I’m not familiar with those in X96.3 FM, but if they’re anything like the godfathers or popes of that format (Coco Cabrera, Luis Jiménez), then they all fall in line. Even though they might invite at times certain experts, they are not specialists themselves, yet are opinionated as such in all sorts of things (rarely cite any sources). They might even have a degree in communications, have cue cards at hand, and talk to many people, but the reason why they’re there is to “entertain”, sell advertising space. James 3: 3-12 (New Testament). The topics these subjects engage in are in the bombastic realm, for example lucubrating over how “las chapiadoras” (women gold diggers, or the male counterparts) in Dominican Republic or in New York do this or that.. It’s all a freak show to them, folkloric to them and the listeners, without offering any historical background, nor solutions to potential deviations, and of course they are parasites who precisely benefit economically from pseudo-discussing such topics, trivializing it, mocking it but simultaneously holding it as a practical ideal. Under different socioeconomic circumstances, many of these women or men would choose a different path.
“El palo con Coco” is so tendentious in analysis, that its producers for example won’t even mention that Venezuela in Latin America had among the lowest rates of femicides in 2020… ◺
Jose Serrano, Democratic congressman, Hugo Chavez was ‘committed
to empowering the powerless’
Mar 5, 2013
https://www.businessinsider.com/jose-serrano-hugo-chavez-death-dead-die-tweet-2013-3?op=1
..Serrano was a frequent critic of the Bush administration’s approach in dealing with Chavez. In 2005, Serrano invited Chavez to speak in his South Bronx district. He also brokered a deal with Chavez to bring eight million gallons of discounted heating oil to thousands of low-income residents of the South Bronx..
Bronx apartment fire kills 19, including 9 children
January 10, 2022
https://apnews.com/article/bronx-apartment-fire-62afe31a9da544625f65def5f19e15dc
..U.S. Rep. Ritchie Torres, a Democrat who represents the area, told the AP. “Most of these buildings have no sprinkler system. And so the housing stock of the Bronx is much more susceptible to devastating fires than most of the housing stock in the city.”..
Bronx apartment blaze raises questions about safety doors, lack of sprinklers and fire escapes
January 11, 2022
https://www.yahoo.com/entertainment/bronx-apartment-blaze-raises-questions-214015009.html
The Bronx fire that killed 17 can be blamed on a bad space heater and a malfunctioning door. But it’s not just about that – it’s about all the systemic factors that lead to those space heaters, doors & other problems that kill lots of people every year.,
https://twitter.com/itskelseybutler/status/1481284870970253313
thread Jan 12, 2022
76- ✔ Upon joining Twitter in 2013, I tweeted Coco Cabrera (he didn’t respond but that’s fine, he’s a busy man and I’m not that important..), basically telling him to not talk politics because that’s not his forte, I.e. ranting against Venezuela, Cuba, etc, that he should just stick to vulgarities, buffoonery, since that’s what he knows best. These talking heads represent a segment of what Marxist philosopher Antonio Gramsci referred to in his theory of cultural hegemony, whereby the ruling capitalist class uses cultural institutions to maintain power. Hegemonic culture propagates its own values and norms so that they become the “common sense”, beliefs; used to maintain consent to the capitalist order, rather than just the use of force. ◺
77a- ✔ The following are some of Concón’s rants, and his program’s paid shills. He doesn’t twist facts 100% of the time, but his fibs have expired badly, given that the so-called Venezuelan opposition is more discredited than ever, and Nicolás Maduro’s government is stronger. In Latin America- Mexico, Colombia, Brazil, Honduras, Nicaragua, Bolivia, etc, are going with their socialist models… El Coco Loco exalted Juan Guaidó in Venezuela, a until-then nobody, who proclaimed himself president in a town square (without an election), and eventually with his cronies ended up stealing the country’s overseas coffers. Sad / tragic show. In the U.S. as we all know, the Trumpers in 2021 tried staging a coup at The Capitol! Many now behind bars.
Woe to those who learn lessons from such flunky clowns ! My portable rubbing alcohol spray bottle (to the left), obsessive me even in 2018-19… ◺
Coco Cabrera 20-9-18; Maduro-Venezuela
Tears of a clown (1979)- The Beat
#music
https://youtu.be/q1OVYFNUZT8?si=hB0-jhpcQCtDkIQf ,3-10-13
Opositor venezolano Daniel Lara Farías sobre oposición, 24-5-19 (more on Daniel in the 3rd and final USB )
Coco
Cabrera radio WADO 23-01-19; marchas en Venezuela
MOVE bombing 1985. When Philadelphia police dropped explosives on a Black liberation group
November 26, 2022
https://allthatsinteresting.com/move-bombing
..However, medical evidence showed that the cop had been shot from behind and above, while MOVE members were all in front of him and in the basement, according to the police’s own admission. This evidence backs the MOVE organization’s claim that they couldn’t have been responsible for his death..
Philly Health Chief ousted on MOVE bombing anniversary for discarding victims’ remains
May 13, 2021
Health Commissioner Thomas Farley was forced to resign after cremating victims’ remains from the 1985 police attack instead of returning them to family.
77b- ✔ 1:40 One’s gotta chuckle at that “illiterate” (above in Coco Cabrera radio WADO 23-01-19). Paid shill or not. 2:04 ¿Isn’t the Dominican National Police trained & supplied by the U.S. / Israel, that’s the question instead Pimp Cabrera. It goes from one contradictory trite “caller” to another. 6:26 No Coco Seco, Santo Domingo is not exactly THE delinquents’ nest par excellence, rather it’s Miami, where Latin American rogues, dictators, end up taking refuge, buying real estate, or mercenary firms hired in assassinating a president as in the case of Jovenel Moïse of Haiti in 2021… No coincidence the U.S. Southern Command is situated there. ◺
Documento: Carta de intelectuales cubanos en apoyo a las decisiones de la revolución/ 2003
20/08/2010
.. Resulta elocuente que la única manifestación en el mundo que apoyó el reciente genocidio haya tenido lugar en Miami, bajo la consigna Irak ahora, Cuba después, a lo que se suman amenazas explícitas de miembros de la cúpula fascista gobernante en los Estados Unidos. ..
✔ In this post way below see article titled ◺ : Por qué Miami es un "semillero" de conspiraciones contra gobiernos de América Latina
FBI ofrece detalles de la acusación contra Sergio Pino por ordenar el asesinato de su esposa
https://youtu.be/TT6c3tHGZOU?si=pXXXygXnvCent-NH ,18-7-24
De acuerdo con información revelada por el FBI, el empresario inmobiliario Sergio Pino, quien se quitó la vida de un disparo, había contratado a dos diferentes grupos de hombres para intentar asesinar a su esposa Tatiana en medio de un complicado divorcio. Hasta la fecha se ha arrestado a nueve personas relacionadas con el caso.
✔ 8:48 – 13:36 was the best caller, albeit CC interrupted & advertisement. 11:08 Nutty Coco casts into doubt the Venezuelan elections, alleges all the institutions are under the thumb of “Maduro’s gov.” (well, if they were under Uncle Sam’s then it’ll be dandy). The fleecer among many things fails to mention that none other than Jimmy Carter, ex US pres., verified the electoral process in Venezuela is the best in the world.. That damn commie.
Now that Carter has been ill for a while in hospice care (Aug, 10, 2024), the Carter Center is a different outfit...
78- Coco Frisky doesn’t dwell, as of 2015-2018, on the more than 5 million Colombians living in Venezuela, who only under the Chávez government acquired their legal documents for the first time (Misión Identidad)... Why would he jeopardize his hustle? Among his ecstatic refrains then was: Perúúú, Perúúú… Also claimed the country of Peru had “una economía saneada” (an economy in sound footing).. Well, look now 2023: Stucco Coco is “silent sam” when Peru is immersed in a constitutional upheaval, protests in the streets over the congressional coup against the left-leaning President Pedro Castillo. People also want early elections, resignation of coup president Dina Boluarte, and calling for a constituent assembly. 76 killed so far by the police & state forces (similar case to what happened in Bolivia 2019..), reporters being assaulted and stripped of their equipment by the authorities, while not one of the uniformed officers has been shot by protesters.. If that were to happen in Venezuela, Cuba, Nicaragua, paid buffoons as he wouldn’t stop badmouthing about their governments. CNN and its strain would be covering it from head to toe in all kinds of contrived plots. A day before the 12-07-22 coup, on December 6, Lisa Kenna, U.S. ambassador in Peru and veteran CIA agent, met with Peru’s defense minister, Gustavo B. Rosas, a retired brigadier general.. Gustavo had been appointed defense minister the day before that.. He ordered the military to rebel against the President on behalf of a racist, corrupt oligarch-controlled Congress (a Congress with 90% disapproval rating among citizens).. The U.S. government instead condemned President Castillo for trying to dissolve that Congress (even though no one was killed, and is within his right to do so under Article 134 of the Constitution). Castillo is in prison and wasn’t even submitted to an impeachment process. The possibility of a civil war exists. Meanwhile, in Ecuador, the neoliberal president & U.S. lackey & businessman & banker, Guillermo Lasso, on 5/17/23 dissolved congress in a bid to avoid impeachment for his corruption… Clearly unconstitutional in his part, yet U.S. politicians & media, unlike in the case of Pedro Castillo in Peru, don’t call him a dictator nor clamor for his resignation… G. Lasso has a record low approval rating in Ecuador, below 14% ! ◺
Pdte. Nicolás Maduro: El comandante Chávez terminó con el anticolombianismo en Venezuela
https://videos.telesurtv.net/es/content/337090 ,05-9-24
https://youtu.be/4dRHubGJCcQ?si=ONm8KtTptWBYRKkb
Pueblo peruano en respaldo a la victoria electoral de Nicolás Maduro y el pueblo venezolano, agosto 2024
Trudeau is propping up Peru’s regime in order to protect Canadian mining – undeterred by Boluarte’s killing of 58 civilians. Peru’s resources will soon be up for auction at the infamous PDAC mining convention in Toronto. My article for@TheCanadaFiles
https://twitter.com/camilapress/status/1623432803072311297
Feb 8, 2023
Counterinsurgency war: US bioresearch labs, bases and troops in Peru
January 6, 2023
https://orinocotribune.com/counterinsurgency-war-us-bioresearch-labs-bases-and-troops-in-peru/
.. Peruvian analyst Ricardo Soberón states that there is a series of doubts regarding the operations and activities of the laboratory NAMRU 6 established by the United States Navy in Peru in 1983 (Bioweapons Production in Iquitos Research Laboratory). ..
¿Qué estudian los biolaboratorios de EE. UU. en Perú, Ucrania y el mundo?
23/04/2022
.. Por su parte, funcionarios rusos dijeron que país encontró más de 30 laboratorios biológicos afiliados a los EE. UU. en el territorio de Ucrania y que los artículos relevantes fueron destruidos con urgencia, pero se encontraron rastros de peste, ántrax y otros patógenos. Si bien EE.UU. calificó inicialmente la información sobre sus laboratorios de guerra biológica en Ucrania como "falsa", el 8 de marzo, la subsecretaria de Estado para Asuntos Políticos, Victoria Nuland, admitió la existencia de "instalaciones de investigación biológica" financiadas por EE. UU. ..
Desaprobación de la presidenta peruana supera el 90 por ciento
16 de septiembre de 2024
https://www.telesurtv.net/desaprobacion-de-la-presidenta-peruana-supera-el-90-por-ciento/
Mexican President Andrés Manuel @lopezobrador_ responded to Anthony Blinken that “in Mexico there is more democracy than in the United States”; after supporting the march against the electoral reform in Mx. He also criticized the fact that the US supports the government of Dina Boluarte in Peru
https://twitter.com/danieltelesur/status/1630616268033212447
thread Feb 28, 2023
https://www.cronica.com.mx/nacional/amlo-blinken-hay-democracia-mexico-eu.html
AMLO wants a five-nation anti-inflation regional alliance
February 28th 2023
https://en.mercopress.com/2023/02/28/amlo-wants-a-five-nation-anti-inflation-regional-alliance
Mexican President Andrés Manuel López Obrador (AMLO), who insisted Monday on dubbing his Peruvian colleague Dina Boluarte “a puppet,” has launched an initiative to tackle inflation with other regional leftwing leaders, namely Argentina’s Alberto Fernandez, Brazil’s Luiz Inácio Lula Da Silva, Colombia’s Gustavo Petro, and Cuba’s Miguel Díaz-Canel…
Brazil’s Lula discusses peace effort with Zelenskiy in video call
March 2, 2023
Operation 40 was the code name for a Central Intelligence Agency-sponsored counterintelligence group composed of Cuban exiles.[1] The group was formed to seize control of the Cuban government after the Bay of Pigs Invasion.[2] Operation 40 continued to operate unofficially until disbanded in 1970 due to allegations that an aircraft that was carrying cocaine and heroin in support of the group crashed in California.[1] …
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Operation_40
Operation Condor and the horrors of U.S. foreign policy, 2021
https://yipinstitute.org/article/operation-condor-and-the-horrors-of-u-s-foreign-policy
Many in the United States view their country as a beacon of democracy. As children, they are taught that America is a shining light of freedom that combats authoritarianism and oppression. However, the truth surrounding the United States can be far more sinister, and which is evidenced by Operation Condor…
Dominican Republic National Police allegedly kills Haitian motorcycle taxi in the Capital, apparently a case of extortion.
✔ (Coco Cabrera, Luis Jiménez & other “free agent” schlock jocks in the U$A won’t say diddly about it [or if they do, they’ll justify it with humor..], oh but if it where in Cuba or Venezuela then they’ll bray to kingdom come) ◺
https://twitter.com/ArielFornari/status/1628012919664398338
Feb 21, 2023
Policía Nacional; ¿órgano preventivo o represivo
Mayrita TIPS
https://youtu.be/zViYGJeOAr8 ,3-04-23
Nayib Bukele- “En Cuba no hay niños durmiendo en las calles” (Cuba is the only country where kids don’t sleep in the streets ) (Bukele is the President of El Salvador )
https://youtu.be/LPEibhQp4Rk ,22-12-22
El Salvador cumple dos años de régimen de excepción
https://videos.telesurtv.net/es/content/326090 ,27-3-24
https://youtu.be/xTPt75cofJM?si=ji6rPjCvRF6Db3kU
✔ Un tuit a las 3:54 PM · Jul 29, 2024 y sujetado, en la cuenta X de Nayib Bukele reza ◺ :
Lo que vimos ayer en Venezuela no tiene otro nombre más que fraude. Una “elección” donde el resultado oficial no tiene relación con la realidad. Algo evidente para cualquiera. Rompimos relaciones diplomáticas con Maduro desde hace 4 años. No las reabriremos hasta que su pueblo pueda elegir a sus líderes en elecciones de verdad.
https://x.com/nayibbukele/status/1818012270921691582
✔ ¿Quién (es) está (án) "malaconsejando" al gobierno del presidente salvadoreño ? ◺
79- ✔ Which is why minstrel shows as Coco Blow’s & others, are hardly worth a mill (one-tenth of a U.S. cent). I hate to say it, I don’t wanna pick on them, they are nowhere near the worst in capitalist institutions. But having said that, the hang-up with such “reality shows”, is that they self-appoint themselves as “cultural & popular ambassadors”, while propping up the worst kinds of trends. In frolic, playing to the lowest common denominator, posing as rebellious when in fact are nothing short of court jesters for the imperial crown, the banality of evil, as Hannah Arendt put it. Which is what commercial sponsors PAY FOR. In a class by himself in repugnance though, there’s Jaime Bayly, in Miami of course. What’s sad is that the lame clowns always have the stage, 5 or 7 days a week, really no variety, and it wouldn’t be as bad if they only refrained from dabbling in politics. ◺
Proverbs 26: 4-5 (Old Testament)
Raúl Castro y DICTADORES celebran el aniversario de muerte de Hugo Chávez en Venezuela
El Observador
✔ (el drogo asqueroso, jaimito ramplón, Jaime Bayly) ◺
https://youtu.be/3i_w-Mg8ruk Mar 7, 2023
80-
✔ To give Coco Cab and others of his strain
some
credit as I said before, is when they just take delight
in
“chercha” (gossiping, yakking, dissing); but not in politics,
which is mostly a serious, historic, scientific matter, sometimes
tedious. But it’s all in good fun, I guess… Here’s a sample
where Rococó
shines,
though simplistic… ◺
:
1. The union is a revolutionary obligation.
https://twitter.com/Ana_Hurtado86/status/1628465925203566593
thread Feb 22, 2023
✔ The union ok, and the onion. 😃 ◺
The UN recognizes President Nicolás Maduro as the legitimate representative of Venezuela, 2021
Brazilian President Lula to boost ties with the Venezuelan government
https://twitter.com/CmonteroOficial/status/1617613460698984449
Jan 23, 2023
Chief of the United States Southern Command lays it out: true interests of the U.S. in Argentina, Bolivia, Brazil, Chile, Peru, Venezuela and Nicaragua is to keep for itself the lithium, oil, gold, water…
https://twitter.com/KarinArcus_ok/status/1617328498347233281
Jan 22, 2023
Rosa Blanca (1961), director; Roberto Gavaldón
https://blockmuseum.northwestern.edu/cinema/2023/rosa-blanca-1961.html
..Taking place in 1937, a year before the national expropriation of oil in the country.. ..The film’s uncompromising vision of capital’s ruthless political intervention and resource extraction and led to its being banned until 1972—but its themes continue to resonate in the country today…
81- ✔ In April 2022, Arcangel said he refuses to perform in Venezuela until “the dictatorship is gone”. From this clip, I find the reggaetonero kinda entertaining in his incense.. He was born in New York to Dominican parents who then moved to Puerto Rico when he was 12 years old. His mom was a member of the all-female merengue group, Las Chicas del Can. Hey, but Austin Santos is a free agent ain’t he? Nah, the barbarian ain’t worried about sponsors’ boycotts if he were to travel to “hellhole” Venezuela…
Veteran salsero Adalberto Santiago though did go to a salsa festival in Venezuela, May 2022, and met with the President. Of course Hispanic-American media in the U.S. won’t show it, the bores politicize EVERYTHING.
◺
The assassination of Fred Hampton: How the FBI and Chicago police murdered a Black Panther
2019
https://www.zinnedproject.org/materials/assassination-of-fred-hampton
..Hampton and fellow Panther Mark Clark had both been shot dead, and four other Panthers in the apartment had critical gunshot wounds. Police were uninjured and had fired their guns 90-99 times..
People’s Law Office remembers Fred Hampton and Mark Clark https://peopleslawoffice.com/peoples-law-office-remembers-fred-hampton-and-mark-clark/
..Our office filed a civil rights lawsuit and fought for over 13 years to expose the role of the FBI’s COINTELPRO program and we succesfully obtained a $1.85 million settlement for family members and survivors of the raid..
The killing of Filiberto Ojeda Ríos.
When the FBI hunted down and killed one of its most wanted fugitives in September, outrage over the botched operation may have energized the Puerto Rican independence movement.
https://www.thenation.com/article/archive/killing-filiberto-ojeda-rios/
October 7, 2005
“If you’re not careful, the newspapers will have you hating the people who are being oppressed, and loving the people who are doing the oppressing.” - Malcolm X
The Waco siege, also known as the Waco massacre,[7][8][9][10] was the siege by U.S. federal government and Texas state law enforcement officials of a compound belonging to the religious cult known as the Branch Davidians between February 28 and April 19, 1993.[11] ..
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Waco_siege
The Waco tragedy, explained
Nearly 30 years later, the siege of David Koresh’s Branch Davidians challenges our definition of “cult.”
Mar 23, 2023
.. Finally, on April 19, the FBI raided the compound, using military-grade weaponry such as armored tanks, as well as tear gas. A fire broke out — the source of which remains disputed — and 76 of the 85 Branch Davidians, including Koresh and a number of children, were killed. ..
https://twitter.com/steve_hanke/with_replies
◺
DolarToday today, Saturday March 18: How much is the exchange rate in Venezuela?
March 18, 2023
https://24newsrecorder.com/economy/249247
Today, the U.S. took steps to stop the Maduro regime from stealing Venezuela’s oil. These sanctions target the illegitimate regime’s “oil-for-food” scheme that had no intent of providing food to the people. We stand with Venezuelans in their quest for freedom and prosperity.
[Mike Pompeo]
https://twitter.com/SecPompeo/status/1273712766340259841 ,6-18-20
Venezuela to investigate plans of invasion revealed by Mike Pompeo in latest book, 2023
✔ Among the main optical myths surrounding Venezuela entail that the Bolivarian gov has destroyed the economy with expropriations, excess regulations, overprinting of money... Reality is that you’ll be hard-pressed to find a gov that has given more incentives to the private sector than Venezuela has. But that sector has proven itself to be quite parasitic, in particular importers, monopolies or multinational corporations. Since the nationalization of oil production in Venezuela in the 1970’s, it’s been the public sector that has generated most of the foreign reserves, 95%, not the private sector! But then those foreign reserves, or U.S. dollars, were loaned cheaply to the private sector.., more than half of the total, in other words the private sector has been inefficient, or rather parasitic by not producing enough or not investing. Instead, it’s offshored billions of dollars in tax havens.., way more than the cost of post-World War 2 reconstruction in Europe (Marshall Plan)! Before Hugo Chávez came on board as President in 1999, the private sector appropriated itself to more than 100% of those foreign reserves! In 2018 it had access to 40% of reserves... The data comes from the BCV (Banco Central de Venezuela).
Another incentive given to the private sector slouches has been exoneration from taxation. Revenue from taxes only represent about 2% of Venezuela’s GDP. In other countries that number is more than 20% ! Foreign nationals are practically free of taxation. MOST of the firms in Venezuela are private, NOT public. From 2003 to 2008 the profitability of those corporations rose 144%…
Another stimulus to the private sector is the low-cost of utilities in Venezuela, I.e. water, gas, electricity, internet.. So keep all those factors in mind ok when chastising socialism for the woes in Venezuela, when in fact the one to blame is capitalism and U.S. coercive measures. ◺
Argentina y Brasil pagan más impuestos en A.Latina; Venezuela menos: OCDE, 2012
https://jp.reuters.com/article/latinoamerica-economia-ocde-impuestos-idLTASIE8AC08P20121113
..Venezuela tuvo la menor tasa de impuestos en América Latina, de sólo un 11,4 por ciento del ingreso nacional, según el documento elaborado por la OCDE, el Centro Interamericano de Administraciones Tributarias y la Comisión Económica para América Latina y el Caribe..
..According to the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD), in 2012, at 11.4% Venezuela had the lowest tax rate contribution to the gross domestic product in Latin America..
Quiénes pagan y no pagan impuestos en Venezuela (+Luis Britto García)
02 / 08 / 2020
https://www.laiguana.tv/articulos/775900-quienes-pagar-impuestos-venezuela-luis-britto-garcia/
.. En resumen, en Venezuela no pagan o casi no pagan impuestos quienes deberían pagarlos: los grandes capitales que, según el BCV, en 2017 se apropiaron del 50% de todo lo producido en el país, mientras que sólo el 18% de ese producto se destinó a remunerar salarialmente al trabajo, que lo produce todo. ..
El nuevo impuesto en Venezuela: ¿de ricos o para todos? 2022
..El oficialismo parlamentario modificó el decreto presidencial sobre el Impuesto a las Grandes Transacciones Financieras, que impulsó y aprobó el presidente Nicolás Maduro en diciembre de 2015, bajo el amparo de una ley habilitante. Se le conoce en Venezuela como el IGTF..
✔ Keep in mind, that Voice of America (VOA) is the state-owned news network and international radio broadcaster of the United States of America. It is the largest[3] and oldest of the U.S.-funded international broadcasters.[4][5]... ◺
¿Cuáles son los países que pagan menos impuestos en América Latina?
25/03/2019
..En promedio, los tributos en la región alcanzan el 23% del PBI y en los países de la OCDE, esta cifra llega al 34%.. ..El informe revela que los tres países que menos pagan impuestos en la región en términos del PBI son Guatemala (12,6%), seguido de República Dominicana (13,37%) y Perú (16,1%).. ..Por otro parte, comparando economías desarrolladas que forman parte de la OCDE, los países con impuestos más altos son Islandia, Dinamarca, Francia, Bélgica, Suecia y Finlandia, “están entre los más competitivos del mundo”..
✔ Developed economies forming part of the OECD, among the most competitive in the world, as Iceland, Denmark, France, Belgium, Sweden and Finland, have the highest tax rates in the world. ◺
Pdte. Nicolás Maduro: Milei está destrozando a Argentina por su pésima administración
https://videos.telesurtv.net/es/content/337274 ,09-9-24
https://youtu.be/YIuXRkKmNz4?si=JbWpuns50bZB0uFX
Ranking de IVA en Latinoamérica
21 agosto 2015
https://economipedia.com/latinoamerica/ranking-de-iva-en-latinoamerica.html
.. Por su parte en Cuba, no se aplica IVA ..
(Sales tax ranking in Latin America:
..in Cuba there’s no value-added tax or sales tax.. )
Venezuela’s migrants bring economic opportunity to Latin America
December 7, 2022
List of Latin American and Caribbean countries by GDP (PPP), 2022 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Latin_American_and_Caribbean_countries_by_GDP_(PPP)
List
of countries by GDP (PPP) per capita
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_GDP_(PPP)_per_capita
Venezuela’s GDP will grow by an incredible 10 per cent in 2022
August 30, 2022
Majority of Mexicans see United States as greatest threat, new poll shows, 2019 https://www.mintpressnews.com/mexico-united-states-greatest-threat-poll-shows/263358/ .
.A 2014 WIN/Gallup survey of world public opinion found that the United States was overwhelmingly considered the greatest threat to world peace, something the study makers appeared to have difficulty comprehending..
Mexico unveils warrants in ‘Fast & Furious’ gun scandal,
10 Jan 2022
https://www.breitbart.com/border/2022/01/10/mexico-unveils-warrants-in-fast-and-furious-gun-scandal/
..The operation turned to scandal for the Obama administration after it was revealed the ATF allowed cartels to purchase more than 2,000 weapons for moving to Mexico…
López Obrador: “En EEUU no hay carteles, no hay narcotráfico, ni laboratorios, ni mafia”.
Canal 26
https://youtu.be/Ien5TcJm39Q ,17-3-23
Poll: much of the world sees the U.S. as a threat to democracy
May 5, 2021
..in European countries and many of the United States’ allies, the balance is actually the other way, where more people say that the United States has a negative impact on democracy than positive..
83- ✔ If you just consume Western media, you would think the whole world is against Russia in the war in Ukraine, when in reality a majority of the world’s population IS NOT in favour of sanctioning Russia, but rather in diplomatic engagement to end the war: ◺
Mexico declines to impose economic sanctions on Russia, 3-02-22
The countries that have sanctioned Russia over Ukraine represent only 16 percent of the world’s population.
May 10, 2022
https://www.wilsoncenter.org/blog-post/countries-have-sanctioned-russia
Polls show Western public favors general support for Ukraine, but is increasingly skeptical about supplying arms
February 09, 2023
..For instance, a Gallup poll from September found that 70% of Ukrainians believed in continuing the war until victory..
United West, divided from the rest: Global public opinion one year into Russia’s war on Ukraine, February 24, 2023
..The non-Western publics studied differ from the Western publics not only in the outcomes they desire for the war but in what they think about why the US and Europe are helping Ukraine..
Emmanuel Macron, the leader of France, said he also feels that Russia currently has no better option for a president other than Vladimir Putin.
https://twitter.com/Newsweek/status/1627703402791665669
Feb 20, 2023
Africans protest against France, receiving Macron with photos of Putin
March 3, 2023
https://orinocotribune.com/africans-protest-against-france-receiving-macron-with-photos-of-putin/
Why Russia’s invasion of Ukraine still divides Africa
https://www.bbc.com/news/world-africa-64759845 February 25, 2023
..Despite an increase in engagement and visits from senior officials from Western countries, as well as Ukrainian and Russian foreign ministers over the past year, their stance has not shifted.. ..And while the vote is not legally binding, it will no doubt continue to shape geopolitical alliances in the months and years to come.
84- ✔ What the above BBC article doesn’t explain is how U.S. officials threaten, blackmail, foreign dignitaries into voting in favor of the U.S. in relation to Russia and the Ukraine conflict. They threaten them with sanctions, seizing bank accounts, reminding them of the repercussions on their kids who attend American universities… Just like that, mafioso style. These western wackos condemning Russia for the Ukraine intervention, are the same ones who supported Juan Guaidó to be president in Venezuela, unelected, just swore in a public plaza! ◺
A ‘new Cold War’ looms in Africa as U.S. pushes against Russian gains
March 19, 2023
80% of Indians regard Russia either as ally or partner, according to your ECFR survey. That is higher than in China and Turkiye. It is the West vs the rest, according to your survey. Europeans still live in delusion, misled by the U.S. nonsense of democracy vs autocracy.
https://twitter.com/chenweihua/status/1631579260681965572
Mar 3, 2023
He says that at the end of the day “the US always act according to their interest”. And for instance “they’re not exactly penalized by the war in Ukraine: they sell wheat, they sell gas, they sell weapons... when Europe will be a clear victim together with Ukraine”.
https://twitter.com/RnaudBertrand/status/1631333725895278595
thread Mar 2, 2023
(He, is former French prime minister Jean-Pierre Raffarin, PM under President Jacques Chirac)
How Russia’s invasion of Ukraine rippled through the world
Washington Post
https://youtu.be/9ohB-hQupKg ,02-22-23
9 charts on the Russia-Ukraine war,
February 24, 2023
https://news.gallup.com/opinion/gallup/471155/charts-russia-ukraine-war.aspx
..However, the desired impact of sanctions seems to have failed among the Russian public, and Russians may be proving more resilient in the face of economic isolation than many expected at the outset of the conflict..
Ruble surpasses Brazil’s Real as year’s best-performing currency https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2022-05-11/russian-ruble-surpasses-brazilian-real-as-world-s-best-currency
May 11, 2022
..On top of imposing capital controls, Russia has forced exporters to sell foreign-exchange and is demanding its natural gas be paid for in rubles.. ..Still, the irony of the ruble performing so well while at war is remarkable, especially as other countries that imposed capital controls in the recent past have not achieved the same results..
Russia’s ruble is the strongest currency in the world this year,
June 28 2022
https://www.cbsnews.com/news/russia-ukraine-ruble-currency-russian-economy-sanctioms-2022/
Russia’s ruble has rallied nearly 40% since the war in Ukraine began. That could be bad news for Putin.
Sep 3, 2022
85- ✔ What many Western analysts/politicos fail to point out, among key things, is that the Russian currency is still stronger (as of 02-13-23) than it was prior to the military operation in Ukraine (02-24-22), and despite all the sanctions… Its agricultural output is booming. Russia’s unemployment rate is at 3.7%, not far from the U.S.’s 3.4%.. China, Russia, India, Iran, Saudi Arabia.., I.e. BRICS’ nations, are more aligned than ever.. Europe’s economy on the other hand is much worse off! The West has failed in isolating Russia, plain and simple. Whether they like it or not a new world order is emerging. Has the U.S. been sanctioned, bank accounts confiscated, or its leaders punished for the wars and mayhem it’s caused since its inception? ◺
How NATO’s expansion helped drive Putin to invade Ukraine
February 24, 2022
https://www.npr.org/2022/01/29/1076193616/ukraine-russia-nato-explainer
‘They started the war’ – Putin’s annual address to the nation
Sky News
https://www.youtube.com/live/uKf0ZxQCLu0?feature=share
,02-21-23
PUTIN culpa a OCCIDENTE de INICIAR una GUERRA que llevará hasta el final: “RUSIA es INVENCIBLE”
RTVE Noticias
https://www.youtube.com/live/_xmqEcO2DS8?feature=share ,02-21-23
RUSSIAN FOREIGN MINISTER LAVROV at the G20: “It’s time to stop playing the food card. This crisis stems from the West printing trillions of US dollars and euros early on during the COVID-19 pandemic and buying up food supplies around the world. Today, the bulk of grain supplies from Ukraine are being shipped at giveaway fodder prices to the EU, rather than to the poorest countries that need them…
https://twitter.com/upholdreality/status/1631416778831155203
thread Mar 2, 2023
86- ✔ In my opinion, another consequence of the armed conflict in Ukraine will be that the U.S.’s invincibility cloak will be blunted after all is settled with Ukraine losing. Sovereign foreign governments will cut back on contracts with U.S. weapons manufacturers and instead will sign up on Russian weapons proven more effective and less costly... This has and will continue selectively depending on alliances... Russian & Chinese weapons’ firms are public enterprises, therefore costs are lower than their U.S. counterparts which hike up costs for shareholders = CORRUPTION. Another reason for the U.S. lagging behind Russia & China in key strategic sectors, is that for a long time the U.S. got cocky in its supremacy… Both China & Russia knew the U.S. was coming after them post-Cold War, so they accelerated their R & D. ◺
SIPRI: US arms exports skyrocket, while China’s nosedive
March 13, 2023
https://www.dw.com/en/sipri-us-arms-exports-skyrocket-while-chinas-nosedive/a-64948062
..For example, the US, already top of the list, has increased exports by another 14% and now accounts for 40% of global arms transfers.. ..Russia surpasses China in African arms exports..
The biggest problem with Ukraine’s M-1 tanks: they don’t like staying dirty
Nov 30, 2023
The biggest problem with Ukraine’s new fleet of 31 American-made M-1 Abrams tanks isn’t the tanks’ 1,500-horsepower turbine engines. Not really. No, it’s the filters in the engines’ intakes. The filters keep dirt and debris from fouling and wrecking an M-1’s delicate—but powerful—engine. They require constant cleaning. If an Abrams’ four-person crew neglects to clean its tank’s filters every 12 hours or so, it might so badly damage the engine that the battalion has no choice but to remove the engine, and potentially the transmission, and ship it away for a lengthy overhaul. .. ..Laura Cooper, a U.S. deputy defense secretary, called the Abrams “a gas-guzzler.” ..
In Ukraine, new American technology won the day. until it was overwhelmed
source : The New York Times
https://youtu.be/6ijTgFlhYY8?si=zoOplni7m2dU15qR
,4-23-24
Coffin for head of state part 2 (1980)– Fela Kuti
https://youtu.be/3VfWCwBROLc ,10-16-17
#music
“Neurosis is always a substitute for legitimate suffering.”- Carl Jung
Twenty things you should know about corporate crime, 2007
https://www.alternet.org/2007/06/twenty_things_you_should_know_about_corporate_crime
20. Corporate crime inflicts far more damage on society than all street crime combined.
Street crime vs. corporate crime – which is more damaging to the country?, 2010
http://EzineArticles.com/4928011
How much does white collar crime cost?
https://www.ojp.gov/ncjrs/virtual-library/abstracts/how-much-does-white-collar-crime-cost
The corporate psychopath, 2012
https://leb.fbi.gov/articles/featured-articles/the-corporate-psychopath
..It is fascinating that psychopaths can survive and thrive in a corporate environment.. ..How is it possible for psychopaths to fool business-savvy executives and employers?..
✔ Perhaps because birds of a feather flock together.. ◺
https://www.amazon.com/Corporate-Psychopaths-Organizational-Destroyers-Boddy/dp/0230284728
Corporate Psychopath Research Association
http://corporatepsychopaths.org/
FBI agent explains white collar crime, 2014
https://www.zenbusiness.com/blog/whitecollarcrime/
White-collar crime – Cost to society
https://www.britannica.com/topic/white-collar-crime/Cost-to-society
..The cost of corporate crime to society is many times that of organized crime or the more common street crime. Moreover, it cannot be measured in monetary damages alone, because corporate crimes can also pose health risks, compromise safety, cause injuries or fatalities..
Why elite white-collar criminals are rarely punished
April 9, 2017
3 most common types of corporate fraud, 2020
https://www.lawyer-monthly.com/2020/07/3-most-common-types-of-corporate-fraud/
20 shocking white-collar crime statistics [2023] The state of white collar crime in the U.S.
https://www.zippia.com/advice/white-collar-crime-statistics/ Jun. 14, 2023
• White-collar crimes are estimated to make up only 3% of federal prosecutions.
• It’s estimated that up to 90% of white-collar crimes go unreported.
87- ✔ As demonstrated from the FBI’s own data & other sources, in dollar amounts, lost and bodily injuries inflicted, corporate crime is way ahead of street crime as a perpetrator (only the “best people hired”, to borrow from Donald J. Trump). But guess which social class’ poor bastards fill up most jails and mostly demonized by corporate media ? I mean c’mon, if money is such an important commodity in this capitalist society, shouldn’t the ones wasting such a valuable resource (most US dollars issued by central banks are in electronic form) be the ones serving the most jail time? Or is it that the FBI has been infiltrated by frigging communists? J. Edgar Hoover would be turning over in his cement grave!.. BS criminal hypocrisy masking, denial, is what it is. In the U.S., personal consumption today is way above that, let’s say a century ago, yet looking at social trends, personal contentment or satiety perhaps is not that much different. How come? Because expectations keep changing and there are natural limits... The economy is too important to leave (just) at the hands of capitalists, bankers… Recently, Wells Fargo bank was fined $1.7 billion for “mismanagement”, that is many years of illegalities such as: fraudulent automobiles’ repossessions, unjust foreclosures of homes, deceitful fees, I.e. overdraft, etc. Not a fluke being in about 16 million accounts. It’s not even the first time, a few years ago ditto. Other banks are not any better. So this “rinse & repeat” cycle is glossed over with public relations, and besides the fines are substantially less than the the ill-gotten gains. This should translate into banking as a publicly-run system, nationalized, like the postal service or public libraries let’s say, and even more so than the mere issuance / printing of money / interest rate (central banking, The Fed- see Federal Reserve Act of 1913)... Whereby the board of directors would be elected by the workers & the community, instead of buoyant, high-rolling, Wall Street. Easier said than done, but nothing worth having comes easy… Compare paragraph 65a- on war bonds & inflation.. ◺
“If a thing is worth doing, it is worth doing badly.”- Gilbert Keith Chesterton
Right now, credit card companies charge an average of $31 whenever
you can’t pay your bill on time. On top of interest. It doesn’t
cost these companies $31 to process a late payment. And my
Administration is working to cut most of those fees to $8.
https://twitter.com/POTUS/status/1620898536832344081
Feb 1, 2023
Overdraft fees are big money for small banks, 2021
https://www.politico.com/news/agenda/2021/06/24/bank-overdrafts-big-business-small-banks-495688
College student arrested in credit card scam
CBS Boston
https://youtu.be/ZJIfQ40LesU Mar 9, 2023
College student accused in $1M credit card scam appears in court
https://youtu.be/QcDKWQIOLFU Mar 10, 2023
It’s not what you know
(it’s who you know) [1971,2017]- Bob & Gene ft. The
Inversions
https://youtu.be/boHhY8LuCC8 ,11-24-17
#music
American capitalism is causing deaths of despair
February 25, 2020
https://ethicsinsociety.stanford.edu/news/american-capitalism-causing-deaths-despair
..“We believe in a capitalist system,” said Case, “but we believe that it needs to be repaired.”
Study: US is an oligarchy, not a democracy, 2014
https://www.bbc.com/news/blogs-echochambers-27074746
“..How easy it is to make people believe a lie, and how hard it is to undo that work again!..”- Mark Twain, 1906.
“..People always have been the foolish victims of deception and self-deception in politics, and they always will be until they have learnt to seek out the interests of some class or other behind all moral, religious, political and social phrases, declarations and promises..”
Vladimir Lenin- The three sources and three constituent parts of Marxism (March 1913)
✔ In Vladimir Lenin’s 1916 seminal book : Imperialism, the highest stage of capitalism
, he deconstructs many aspects of this system. For example in Chapter 4 how concentration of capital leads to overproduction and surplus capital, which is then exported to less developed countries in search of higher profits, leading to imperialism. Businesses relocate to other countries to find resources to exploit and workers to employ. In turn, workers in advanced capitalist countries are kept in check by the fear of unemployment and will be content with the social welfare provided by the profits made through imperialist actions. In Chapter 7 Lenin puts forward that finance capital actually increase the unevenness in the rate of growth of the world economy, leading to wars between imperialist powers. In Chapter 8 exposing how a section of the population lives off the dividends drawn from massive investments abroad, or a form of bribe to an upper layer of the working class. In Chapter 9 debunks the petty-bourgeois-democratic opposition to imperialism (those who advocate reformism or a less violent imperialism, with free competition and freedom) as really reactionary when put in practice. ◺
Crack-up capitalism by Quinn Slobodian review – the economic anarchy of Liz Truss’s dreams
25 Apr 2023
..Ever since the collapse of the Soviet Union, free marketeers extolling the Hong Kong model have been trying to create jurisdictions within jurisdictions that maximise economic freedom as they characterise it – and downplay all the adjuncts of political freedom, which include trade unions, obligations to the poor, opposition parties and regulation to promote the public good..
The billionaires who are threatening democracy
May 17 2023
https://www.msn.com/en-us/money/companies/the-billionaires-who-are-threatening-democracy/ar-AA1biJfA
..In his new book, Crack-Up Capitalism: Market Radicals and the Dream of a World Without Democracy, Quinn Slobodian focuses on these figures—an informal grouping he calls “market radicals”—whose influence on the political right seems to be growing..
Jim Zirin 02-20-23; Chris Whipple, author, documentary filmmaker and TV producer- ¿will Biden run in 2024
2:07 “..Biden..only to be confronted by a Russian tyrant invading a democracy in the heart of Europe and I call that, the fight of his life..” ✔ Hahaha ! Bagman Chris ought to know that “democratic” Ukraine is the most corrupt country in Europe. He should know that in 2013-14 the U.S. orchestrated a coup (the Euromaidan) against a legitimately elected government, that of Viktor Yanukovych. Some Ukrainian Nazis (Right Sector) even torched a union building in Odessa, burning at least 48 people alive. Some who jumped and survived were beaten to death. Thanks Chris for clarifying what the term democracy really means! ◺
When contemplating war, beware of babies in incubators
September 6, 2002
https://www.csmonitor.com/2002/0906/p25s02-cogn.html
.. The key moment occurred on October 10, when a young woman named Nayirah appeared in front of a congressional committee. She told the committee, "I saw the Iraqi soldiers come into the hospital with guns, and go into the room where 15 babies were in incubators. They took the babies out of the incubators, took the incubators and left the babies on the cold floor to die." .. .. It is interesting that no one – not the congressmen in the hearing, or any journalist present – bothered to find out the identity of the young woman. She was the daughter of Kuwait's ambassador to the United States, and actually hadn't seen the "atrocities" she described take place. (When later confronted with the lack of evidence for her claims, the young woman said that she hadn't been in the hospital herself, but that a friend who had been there had told her about it. ) .. .. On November 29, 1990, the UN authorized use of "all means necessary" to eject Iraq from Kuwait. On January 12, 1991, Congress authorized the use of force. The story was later discredited by organizations like Middle East Watch, Amnesty International, and various other groups and media organizations . .. .. The US government had already launched a huge campaign to convince the American people to support war against Iraq. But the PR campaign definitely made an impact. It's a different media world today than the one of 1992. Back then, CNN and the regular broadcast channels, as well as newspapers, were reporting the news. Today, there are many more TV and cable news channels, as well as the Internet, all demanding to be fed 24x7. It would be, in fact, much easier for someone to get a fabricated story circulated even faster. And it would be just as easy for the Iraqis to do it in the Arab world, as it would be for those that oppose them to do it in the West. ..
The death toll in Ukraine from a Russian missile strike is now up to 40
Jan 16, 2023
https://omny.fm/shows/winsam-on-demand/the-death-toll-in-ukraine-from-a-russian-missile-s
✔ Dnipro reminder of 9/11? How double-dealing of: https://twitter.com/BQuinnWCBS880/with_replies https://twitter.com/1010WINS https://twitter.com/IbtissemGd/with_replies . U.S. and its cohorts instead do it & it’s dandy, i.e. Tel Aviv, Kiev... If addressing BBQ & Ibtissem: “Oleksii Arestovych admitted missile was Ukrainian, but you won’t report. https://twitter.com/barrymanilow/with_replies can sing about it.” ◺
UN says ‘high likelihood’ a Russian cruise missile hit Ukraine’s main children’s hospital
July 10, 2024
https://www.cnn.com/2024/07/10/europe/russian-missile-strike-kyiv-hospital-un-intl-hnk/index.html
.. Russia has repeatedly denied targeting the hospital in Kyiv and alleged, without evidence, that a Ukrainian anti-aircraft missile caused the blast. But a UN human rights official said evidence suggested Moscow’s forces were responsible for the deadly strike.
“Analysis of the video footage and assessment made at the incident site indicates a high likelihood that the children’s hospital suffered a direct hit rather than receiving damages due to an intercepted weapons system,” Danielle Bell, head of the UN’s Human Rights Monitoring Mission in Ukraine, told reporters Tuesday. .. .. Justin Bronk, a senior research fellow at the Royal United Services Institute in London, told CNN Wednesday that the flight profile in the footage of the missile hitting the hospital is “exactly correct for the Kh-101, with the right dive angle, under power and not tumbling or falling like a spent air-defence missile might.” The silhouette of the rocket visible in the footage also matches the Kh-101, Bronk said. .. .. On Tuesday, Russia’s UN Ambassador Vassily Nebenzia reiterated Moscow’s denial that it had targeted the children’s hospital. “We have not bombed the children’s hospital,” Nebenzia said at a special meeting of the UN Security Council (UNSC) convened following the attack. “If this had been a Russian strike, there would have been nothing left of the building at all. All the children and most of the adults would have been killed, not wounded.” ,,
✔ U.S. elite-dominated war drums (or dumbs) against Russia, and the world pretty much. Such cynical elite banks on the loss of collective memory or consciousness.
Besides the Dnipro event listed above on Jan 16, 2023 in 1010 WINS radio, many others have been debunked by facts, history, yet the falsification propaganda & omission is ongoing : i.e. Bucha massacre in 2022 with Western fingers pointed at Russia. The chronology of troops’ movements & actors didn’t fit that narrative, nor the military motive. Anyone in the Western “free press” cared to contrast the unequivocal My Lai massacre by the U.S. Army in 1968, South Vietnam ? Or the No Gun Ri massacre by that same outfit, in 1950 South Korea ? How about the Geochang massacre by the U.S.-allied (lackey) South Korean Army in 1951 ? Statue of limitations over ? Too many to mention.
The Kramatorsk train station missile strike in 2022 follows the same Western disinformation directive : Carthago delenda est, fast-forward XXI century → Russia Russia did it ! ◺
The Warriors (3/8) movie clip - The Warriors did it! (1979)
https://youtu.be/oMLjP2ajXvs?si=yl7iDhduhqNxYA7z ,10-06-11
✔ The tactical missile found at Kramatorsk in 2022 unmistakably was Ukrainian (a Tochka-U), as was its trajectory, but those pesky facts didn’t stop the G7 clan from fabricating tales, no sir !
This latest in a Kiev, at the Okhmatdyt children’s hospital, follows the same M. O. (modus operandi), create a horrible scenario just in time whenever a western summit (NATO) is to be held, a budget decision to be struck, in a bid for contracting more weapons’ sales, membership.
Vasily Nebenzya, Permanent Representative of Russia to the United Nations, at the special meeting of the UN Security Council (UNSC) on July 9th 2024, exhibited visual evidence that the missile in question was not a Russian Kh-101, but rather a Norwegian surface-to-air (NASAMS). The Kiev regime installs such air defense systems near civilian structures, heightening the likelihood of accidents, false readings. I’m nowhere near being a rocketry expert, but it seems to me intercepting a missile or a drone is much more difficult than those hitting their intended target, which is why proper calculations must be input in order to avoid collateral damage in populated places.
The western criminal & hypocritical double standards are further demonstrated when keeping “Mum's the word” on Kiev bombing since 2014 the separatist eastern region of Donbas. The complicity is highlighted by looking closely the way it covers the July 8th incident afterwards, for example not talking much about it since its lies are not sustainable (but they remain in the limbic brain of the masses...), or the banality in which it gives importance or is shocked by a lunch entrée served by Russia, chicken Kyiv (an Ukrainian dish), on July 9th in celebration of Russia’s UN Security Council presidency, precisely one day after the deadly attack…
If that wasn’t enough, Israel habitually targets Palestinian civilian structures (including journalists, doctors, United Nations’ personnel, churches, hospitals), yet does not get sanctioned (Israel has a right to defend itself ! 😤 ), keeps getting weapons’ shipments from that western cabal !
The West & its minions are not fit to administer. ◺
Norwegian maker of missiles and marine equipment reports profit boom
7/10/24
The death of capitalism—Schumpeter’s prognosis coming true
November 4, 2021
https://fraserinstitute.org/blogs/death-of-capitalism-schumpeters-prognosis-coming-true
Capitalism is doomed to be replaced by socialism. At least that’s the view of Joseph Schumpeter, the well-known Harvard economist responsible for his popularization of the term “creative destruction”—the process where new entrepreneurial innovations arise and subsequently cause the old way of doing things to disappear. Somewhat ironically, despite Schumpeter being a staunch defender of capitalism and its long-run benefits, this view put him in agreement with the noted socialist writer, Karl Marx. While Marx believed the end of capitalism would come in the form of a working-class revolt due to capitalism’s failures, Schumpeter instead believed that capitalism’s successes would eventually destroy the system from within—a prediction that in many ways looks to be coming true at a more rapid rate than ever…
En Inglaterra, Marx: el filósofo más importante de la historia
Jul 26, 2005
https://www.surysur.net/en-inglaterra-marx-el-filosofo-mas-importante-de-la-historia/
What you need to know about the Paris Commune of 1871. France
https://www.thoughtco.com/paris-commune-4147849
..The short existence of the Paris Commune was fraught with attacks by the French army acting on behalf of the Third Republic, which had decamped to Versailles. On May 21, 1871, the army stormed the city and slaughtered tens of thousands of Parisians, including women and children, in the name of retaking the city for the Third Republic.. ..Marx wrote about the Commune in The Civil War in France while it was happening and described it as a model of revolutionary, participatory government.
Remembering the Paris Commune: what it was and why we should care
January 17, 2023
https://www.parisunlocked.com/history-of-paris/what-is-the-paris-commune-history-facts/
Here you have two Cuban American members of Congress who support DeSantis attacks on academic liberties denouncing communism for denying those freedoms. Our democratic values are discredited by those who predicate but do not practice them
https://twitter.com/turylevy/status/1633853138045394946
Mar 9, 2023
DeSantis firma ley para que las escuelas de Florida enseñen sobre los males del comunismo y las dictaduras
23 Jun 2021
DeSantis firma ley para enseñar a los estudiantes sobre los "males" del comunismo y el socialismo
17 Abr 2024
DeSantis firma proyecto de ley que otorga a organizaciones patrióticas, capellanes acceso a escuelas públicas
April 18, 2024
Por qué Miami es un "semillero" de conspiraciones contra gobiernos de América Latina
10 agosto 2021
https://www.bbc.com/mundo/noticias-america-latina-57805500
.. "Miami es la sede mundial de exiliados. El lugar donde radican 'gobiernos en espera' de una colección de países caribeños y latinoamericanos, empezando por Cuba, pero también de Haití, Venezuela y Nicaragua", dice Bardach a BBC Mundo. .. .. Posada Carilles, fallecido en 2018, ya había sido acusado antes por un atentado en 1976 contra el vuelo de Cubana Aviación 455 en el que murieron 73 pasajeros civiles. .. .. En mayo de 2020 fracasó la llamada Operación Gedeón, un plan que preveía secuestrar a Nicolás Maduro en Venezuela y entregarlo a las autoridades de EE.UU., que ofrecen US$15 millones por el presidente. .. .. "Las guerras en Irak, Afganistán y Oriente Medio han creado una abundancia de exsoldados que abren sus compañías y se convierten en consultores de seguridad", explica Eduardo Gamarra, politólogo de la Universidad Internacional de Florida (FIU). .. .. Pero en la era chavista también se ha integrado a este "exilio dorado" la nueva burguesía que ha prosperado a la sombra de los gobiernos de la Revolución Bolivariana. .. .. Trump, si bien perdió las elecciones ante Joe Biden, ganó Florida por un margen de 3,4%, el mayor desde 2004. .. .. La política doméstica de sus países respectivos influye en cómo participan en la política estadounidense. Lo vemos no solo en cubanos o venezolanos. Los colombianos uribistas tienden a votar por el partido republicano", dice Gamarra. "Cada grupo tiene un gran alcance mediático, en su mayoría en español, con emisoras de radio y periódicos propios. Además de sus propios blogs, redes sociales y canales de Youtube", añade Bardach. .. .. Ante las protestas recientes contra el gobierno en Cuba, el alcalde de Miami, Francis Suárez, abogó por una intervención del gobierno estadounidense.
1887: ‘Bayonet Constitution’ takes Native Hawaiians’ rights
https://www.nlm.nih.gov/nativevoices/timeline/372.html
..overthrow of the monarchy and annexation by the U.S.. ..takes away Native Hawaiian land rights, and gives the vote to foreign landowners..
..The 1887 Bayonet Constitution essentially was a racist constitution, shifting power from Hawaiian citizens to financial interests controlled by the sugar industry which was clamoring for a Reciprocal Treaty with the US that favored it while giving control of Pearl Harbor to the US as demanded by the Americans but opposed by the king..
https://alohahawaiionipaa.org/wp-content/uploads/Bayonet%20Constitution.pdf
What the United States did in Indonesia
October 20, 2017
A trove of recently released documents confirms that Washington’s role in the country’s 1965 massacre was part of a bigger Cold War strategy. A trove of newly declassified diplomatic cables reveals a surprising degree of American involvement in a brutal anti-communist purge in Indonesia half-a-century ago. In Indonesia in October 1965, Suharto, a powerful Indonesian military leader, accused the Indonesian Communist Party (PKI) of organizing a brutal coup attempt.. ..He then took power and ruled as dictator, with U.S. support, until 1998..
Indonesian mass killings of 1965–66
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Indonesian_mass_killings_of_1965%E2%80%9366
Large-scale killings and civil unrest primarily targeting members of the Communist Party (PKI) were carried out in Indonesia from 1965 to 1966. Other affected groups included communist sympathisers, Gerwani women, trade unionists,[14] ethnic Javanese Abangan,[1] ethnic Chinese, atheists, alleged "unbelievers" and alleged leftists. It is estimated that between 500,000 to 1,000,000 people were killed during the main period of violence from October 1965 to March 1966...
New book: Indonesia was model for anti-communist massacres, U.S. complicity
January 7, 2021
Caffeine trip (1995)- Man or Astro-man?
https://youtu.be/kaCPHwYUXCE ,8-17-14
#music
Dreams never end (1981, ✔ subtitled ◺ )- New Order
#music
See The National’s meticulous, time-lapsed ‘Day I die’ video
August 29, 2017
https://youtu.be/GwZvip416NU ,8-29-17
#music
This song I clipped, subtitled, posted on January 01, 2020
(Brother where are you- Kurt Elling, live in Birdland Jazz Club, New York City, January 2019) #music
