Here we go again: Another financial bubble burst and another financial crisis threatening to disrupt the real economy! This time the trigger is the health pandemic of the coronavirus crisis, the most serious in a generation, which is paralyzing the real economy and triggering crashes in the financial sector. Continue reading
The United States president, Donald Trump, is now proclaiming, stands at “war.” We are facing, in the novel coronavirus, “an invisible enemy” that could claim the lives of more Americans than every shooting war America has ever fought. Continue reading
In what is being called the worst financial crisis since 1929, the US stock market has lost a third of its value in the space of a month, wiping out all of its gains of the last three years. When the Federal Reserve tried to ride to the rescue, it only succeeded in making matters worse. The government then pulled out all the stops. To our staunchly capitalist leaders, socialism is suddenly looking good. Continue reading
A crisis, according to self-help and leadership books, reveals much about a person’s character. The same can be said of a nation’s character. Continue reading
The Department of Justice is using the coronavirus outbreak to ask Congress for sweeping emergency powers including suspending habeas corpus during an emergency, a power grab that was denounced by civil liberties advocates. Continue reading
Leaning on sober-minded experts in infectious diseases at his daily news conferences, Trump is frantically trying to look good. But the old delusionary Trump keeps resurfacing. On Monday, he rated his coronavirus performance at a perfect ten. On Tuesday, he lied to the public about his knowing it was a pandemic “long before it was called a pandemic.” The facts are just the opposite. On February 28, Trump called COVID-19 a Democratic hoax (See the March 18, 2020 article in the New York Times). Continue reading
A number of years ago, I wrote a documentary about John Gardner, the remarkable public servant who served as President Lyndon Johnson’s secretary of health, education and welfare. He later founded the citizen’s group Common Cause and was, by the way, a liberal Republican, if you can remember a time when such people existed. We can thank him for the implementation of many of LBJ’s Great Society programs, including Medicare and Medicaid. Continue reading
“I am a Zionist. You don’t have to be a Jew to be a Zionist,” current Democratic presidential candidate Joe Biden said in April 2007, soon before he was chosen to be Barack Obama’s running mate in the 2008 elections. Continue reading
If you are a saver in a money market account or in a bank, you’ve already noticed your dwindling interest income as interest rates have been at their lowest in modern American history. Well, brace yourself. Your saving account has just become little more than a lock box, thanks to the supreme dictatorship of the Federal Reserve. Continue reading
COVID-19 is not just a health emergency. It has exposed the causes of inequality and suffering in this country. Continue reading
What do zombies have to do with the U.S. government’s plans for dealing with a coronavirus outbreak? Continue reading
The public health and economic crises we’re experiencing are closely related. They reveal in stark terms the dangerous mythology of trickle-down self-sufficiency and the need for policies that respond to the real needs of people who are or will soon be affected. Continue reading
While the world is consumed with the terrifying coronavirus pandemic, today, March 19, the Trump administration will be marking the 17th anniversary of the U.S. invasion of Iraq by ramping up the conflict there. After an Iran-aligned militia allegedly struck a U.S. base near Baghdad on March 11, the U.S. military carried out retaliatory strikes against five of the militia’s weapons factories and announced it is sending two more aircraft carriers to the region, as well as new Patriot missile systems and hundreds more troops to operate them. This contradicts the January vote of the Iraqi Parliament that called for U.S. troops to leave the country. It also goes against the sentiment of most Americans, who think the Iraq war was not worth fighting, and against the campaign promise of Donald Trump to end the endless wars. Continue reading
The United States’ National Security Strategy is based on foundational Instruments of National Power (INP). The INP consists of Diplomacy, Informational, Military, Economic, Financial, Law Enforcement, Information. Combined with the INP’s support, they combine to protect an economy and society that has an annual Gross Domestic Product of nearly $20 trillion (USD) and a per capita income of almost $60 thousand according to the CIA’s World Factbook. In that publication, the CIA notes that “US firms are at or near the forefront in technological advances, especially in computers, pharmaceuticals, and medical, aerospace, and military equipment…” Continue reading
Dr. Anthony S Fauci, director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases and just about the only official in the Trump administration trusted to tell the truth about the coronavirus, said last Thursday: “The system does not, is not really geared to what we need right now … It is a failing, let’s admit it.” Continue reading
Western medicine is predicated on the “germ theory of disease.” That’s what it sounds like: the theory that germs like bacteria and viruses cause disease. Continue reading
There’s a short-circuit in the political convictions of some progressive-minded voters these days. Continue reading
The COVID-19, or coronavirus, pandemic is far from the first proof of how intertwined we are as a global community. The climate crisis and the refugee crisis have long been glaring examples that the wars or CO2 emissions on one continent risk the lives and well-being of people on another continent. Continue reading
Donald Trump is but a symptom of a larger disease. That disease is American imperial arrogance, and it has been on full display as COVID-19 continues to spread throughout the world and the American mainland. The potential lethality of COVID-19 is exponentially more dangerous when combined with the hubris of the American imperial order and its hyper-capitalist economic foundation. The U.S.’s response to the virus lags far behind the rest of the world. A deep thirst for profit among powerful elites dictates all social policies and organizations in the United States and this thirst has deadly consequences. Continue reading
I’m beginning to feel as if I’ve woken up in an alternative universe. It’s hard to fathom that a bowl of bat soup consumed in a Chinese market could result in millions of humans being forcibly quarantined en masse at pain of arrest or that family pets, wrongly suspected of being virus carriers, being thrown out of windows to their death. Continue reading
On March 12, the New York Federal Reserve announced a $1.5 trillion injection of money into the US financial system. Three days later, it cut its benchmark interest rate to zero and announced it would be buying at least $500 billion in government bonds and another $200 billion in mortgage securities. Continue reading
I was only introduced to the term ‘Chilestinians’ last February at a conference in Istanbul, during a presentation by the Director of the Palestinian Federation of Chile, Anuar Majluf. Continue reading
Coronavirus and globalism will teach us vital lessons. The question is whether we can learn vital lessons that do not serve the ruling interest groups and ideologies. Continue reading
The jury is still out on which of two things—COVID-19 or the panic over COVID-19—will cost more lives and do more damage to the global economy. My money’s still on the latter. In the meantime, I’ve developed a surefire, Groundhog Day type test for whether the emergency is over. Continue reading
When dealing in matters of war and peace, shouldn’t a president sort of know what he or she is doing? But that’s not Donald Trump’s way. Continue reading
Pharma has already discovered the huge profits in labeling school children, toddlers and adults with attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD). Now, according to some reports, it has discovered “geriatric ADHD.” Continue reading
Are you planning to vote for Joe Biden? Sure, why not, go for it. Since 2001, you’ve already voted for Bush, Obama and Trump—so Joe is totally the logical next choice. Like his three predecessors before him, Biden is totally willing to escort America’s oligarchs just one more giant step up their fabulous Stairway to Heaven. Apparently Americans just love them some Deep State. Continue reading
Monied interests and government officials serving them at the federal, state, and local levels comprise America’s ruling class. Continue reading
I noticed disturbing signs. Then I’d look for positive signs to dispute those disturbing ones. Continue reading
Last week, Crown Prince Mohammad bin Salman (MBS), Saudi Arabia’s 34-year-old de facto ruler, was on a tear. He arrested members of his own royal family and initiated an oil price war with Russia that has sent the price of oil—and the world’s stock markets—plummeting. Behind the headlines, however, another critical event will take place in Saudi Arabia starting March 18: women’s rights activist Loujain al-Hathloul, who was arrested almost two years ago for advocating the right to drive, is due in court. The diabolical MBS wants the world to believe he is the Arab world’s liberal reformer and took credit for eventually granting women the right to drive, but he is also the one who had al-Hathloul and nine other women thrown in prison, charging them as foreign agents and spies. The imprisonment of these peaceful women activists exposes the brutal nature of MBS’s regime and the duplicity of the Western democracies that continue to support him. Continue reading
It is perhaps unusual to have a government that has as much disregard for what most would consider to be the truth as does the current group of rascals running the United States of America. To be sure, Secretary of State Mike Pompeo is as shameless a liar as has ever been seen on any public platform while the president himself appears to make things up as he goes along, particularly if a certain embellishment makes him look good. Nevertheless, it is important to recognize that lying and government have a long history, possibly going back to when the first cave dwellers elected a leader to guide the tribe on a mastodon hunt. Continue reading
RSS
Coronavirus: Humans must learn from this global shock
This assault on our way of life is a wake-up call for everyone in the world
Posted on March 24, 2020 by Linda S. Heard
In a world where fear of the unknown hangs over the collective consciousness of entire populations the best and the worst of human nature is on display. In Britain small stores engaged in price gouging are being named and shamed on social media — one shop was selling single toilet rolls £10 — while the ‘I’m all right Jack’ brigade are stripping supermarket shelves bare without thought for the needs of the elderly or parents with newborns. Continue reading →