CAPITALIST PRIORITIES

As unemployment soars and re-possessions increase it speaks volumes for the priorities of capitalism that military expenditure keeps on rising.
"The cost of Britain's military operations in Afghanistan and Iraq this financial year has soared to more than £4.5bn, an annual increase of more than 50%, figures released yesterday reveal. Operations in southern Afghanistan accounted for a little over half, nearly £2.6bn, compared with £1.5bn last year. Most of the money was spent on providing tougher armoured vehicles for soldiers who face a growing threat of roadside bombs. Surprisingly, as the government prepares to withdraw from Basra, the cost of Britain's military presence in southern Iraq this year increased to nearly £2bn, compared with less than £1.5bn last year, according to the figures released by the Ministry of Defence. ...The defence budget will be increased by more than £500m to reach a total of just over £38bn this year, the MoD said yesterday." (Guardian, 13 February) RD

"How Near is Socialism?" Discussion

How Near is Socialism?

Glasgow Branch of the Socialist Party

February
Spring/ Branch Programme

COMMUNITY CENTRAL HALLS
304 MARYHILL ROAD, 8.30pm

Speaker John Cumming 18 February

How Near is Socialism?

For over a century the objective conditions necessary for the establishment of socialism, i.e. the development of the means of production and distribution of wealth to a level which first permitted abundance and now superabundance, have existed. So, why has it not happened? When will it happen?

These questions are obviously much easier to ask than they are to answer

Subjective Conditions, a majority of socialists.

To answer these questions, it would probably help to look at some indicators within society which might show us what progress, if any, has been made in the last century or so towards increasing socialist consciousness, and consequently towards socialism itself.

Some Indicators within society

What does the decline of belief in religious superstition during the last century tell us about the state of consciousness amongst wageslaves?

Has this decline been accompanied by a correspondingly better understanding of the society in which they live?

What effects do globalization and improved. communication systems, such as the internet, have upon the potential for greater class consciousness amongst workers?

Globalization is not new: it is a development which has been in progress for at least several hundred years, but its effects have become much more noticeable as a result of modern communication systems. Globalization has joined the lexicon of buzz-words used by our bosses' media machine.

What are the effects of this media machine upon the minds of the working class

We are often told that certain events should be seen as "important", or "significant", or even "historic". The recent presidential election in the United States of America was reported as such an event.
The fact that Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama were both seeking to be candi-dates for the presidency, we were told, was in itself an "historic achievement".Now that Barack Obama has become the new President of the United States, we are invited to see this as some kind of great event. There is much goodwill, and sadly adulation, for this latest disappointment-to-be who now occupies the White House. Will those who support this man today be ready for socialism any time soon?

These are some of the items Comrade John Cumming will be discussing at our 18th February branch meeting, looking forward to seeing you all there.

NO "FAT CATS" HERE

We are used to reading about malnutrition in so-called "poor countries", but this is not just a problem in Asia or Africa. "More than 3 million people in Britain are seriously underweight and at risk of malnutrition, researchers warned today after an investigation into the medical consequences of poverty and social isolation. The British Association for Parenteral and Enteral Nutrition (Bapen) said the NHS committed huge resources to tackling obesity, but paid scant attention to malnourishment. In a survey it found 28% of people admitted to hospital showed symptoms of malnutrition, including weight loss and a low body mass index. About 30% of new care home residents and 19% of people admitted to mental health units had the same problems." (Guardian, 10 February)
In one of the most developed countries in capitalism we have this shameful plight for the old and poor. After a lifetime of working for wages many workers find themselves in this sad predicament. RD

ALTERNATIVE LIFE STYLES

Two pieces of literature came through many workers letter boxes recently. Here is one from The Observer, 8 February –
"Prince Edward spent last week on an official visit involving lots of good works to Barbados, including lunch yesterday at the Sandy Lane hotel (favoured by Michael Winner and Simon Cowell, with rooms costing around £3,000 per person per night) and an afternoon at the resort's golf course."
Here is another from the charity WaterAid
"Every 17 seconds, a child in the developing world dies from water-related diseases, in around the time it takes you to read this paragraph, someone, somewhere, will die. Everyday, people in the world's poorest countries face the dilemma of having to trust their health and that of their children to the consequence of drinking water that could kill them. It's a gamble that often carries a high price - seeing children needlessly dying is simply heartbreaking." WaterAid suggest that the answer is to send them £2 a month. Socialists suggest that we get rid of this insane society even though it might interfere with Prince Edward's £3,000 a day golfing trip. RD

Running fast to stay still

Labour Research January 09 has an article called “Reviewing a century of the state pension”

It is noted that for a hundred years pensions have been struggling to remain at 25% of the national average earnings, the Trade Unionist who said we are running fast to stay still got that one correct, as socialists we say reforming the capitalist system can only ensure its continuation and workers must bin this system for one based on the common ownership of the means of production, a system where all the necessities are produced in the quantities that provide for everyone. Where pensions are a thing of the past.

The article below, gives an excellent account of the struggle to remain just where we are.

“The first pension payments were for those aged 70 and over and were between one and five shillings a week with nine out of 10 of the 650,000 recipients getting the full amount . Five shillings (25p) was then the equivalent of 25% of national average earnings.Comparing pensions and earnings has long been a way of assessing how pen­sioners are doing in comparison to the working population and the long-term trend has not been in the pensioners' favour. In fact, it wasn't until the 1970s that the basic state pension again rose to around 25% of average earnings, briefly topping that level - at 26% - in 1979. Before 1974 the state pension was not increased at specific times or by an amount based on any kind of formula and since 1979 annual increases have been based only on inflation. Restoring the link with earnings is one of the key pension reforms demanded by trade unions, and a regular element of the pensions' resolutions passed at the TUC each year. Speaking at a lobby of parliament organised by campaigning group the National Pensioners Conven­tion (NPC), TUC general secretary Brendan Barber said that although the state pension remains a key achieve­ment, "its value has melted away since the link with earnings was ended by the last Conservative government". If the link to earnings had been retained then a single pensioner entitled to the full basic state pension would now be getting £143.15 a week instead of the actual rate of £95.25.”

How has this past 100 year pension struggle developed?


“Trade union persistence on this issue finally paid off in 2006 when the govern­ment decided that it would restore the link to earnings increases but only from 2012. The current basic rate is the equivalent of just 15% of average earn­ings and the restoration of the earnings link from 2012 will effectively set this as the long-term level unless a future gov­ernment makes additional increases.
The low level of the basic state pen­sion has been acknowledged for many years and various governments have tried to address this. At the end of the 1950s the Conservatives came up with the idea of a graduated retirement ben­efit that was the first attempt at sup­plementing the basic pension. The Labour government of 1974-79 decided that this was inadequate and wound the scheme up and replaced it with the State Earnings Related Pension Scheme (SERPS). The idea was that this would provide a pension worth roughly 25% of "band" earnings - that is earnings between the lower and upper earnings limits for National Insurance contribu­tions - on top of the basic pension, mainly for workers who were not covered by occupational pension schemes.
Employees could start building up entitlement from 1978 but before anyone could retire on the full benefits of the scheme the Conservatives began to make cuts with a major reform introduced in 1986 followed by further changes in 1995. According to calculations made by the Pension Policy institute, the combined impact of these reforms is that a man on average earn­ings retiring today with a full SERPS contribution record gets a pension 17.5% lower than he would have done if the reforms had not been implemented.”

Disappearing contributions

At the same time as cutting back on SERPS, the Conservative government introduced a new system of personal pensions with the clear intention to increase the amount of pension benefits provided by the individual rather than by the state. The personal pensions system proved an expensive fiasco. It was very expensive for the many individuals who contributed to pension plans only to find that a lot of their contributions disap­peared into fees and charges or that the lump sum available at retirement was much lower than expected because of poor investment returns. Several major pension companies were also found guilty of mis-selling pensions.
Trade unions wanted to see more compulsion on employers to contribute to pensions, but the Labour government elected in 1997 steered away from this proposal and instead launched a new system of persona! pensions, called stakeholder pensions. The intention was that stakeholder pensions would tackle some of the major personal pension system - high fees and charges. Employers were required to make stakeholder pensions available to employees but there was no requirement for employers to contribute.
Stakeholder pensions failed to take off and the government was left still facing a major pensions challenge. This consisted of an inadequate basic state pension, a complicated earnings-related pension that failed to provide additional benefits for many low-paid workers and a system of private pensions that many workers were reluctant to invest in. This combination of factors was made worse by massive cutbacks in occupational pen­sion schemes. A period of falling stock markets undermined the financial posi­tion of many of the main occupational pension funds in the private sector. From the mid-1990s a growing number of employers were closing these final-salary schemes to new employees and replacing them with defined contribution schemes whose payouts were dependent on fluc­tuating stock market returns.
There are several elements in the government's current pensions strategy that try to address these problems. It has changed the entitlement rules for the basic state pension and replaced SERPS with a new Second State Pension. In both cases it is now much easier for parents and carers with significant breaks in employment to build up pension entitle­ment and with the reduction in qualifying years more people will be entitled to the full rate. The Second State Pension is gradually being transformed into a simple, flat-rate payment and so will be much easier for people to understand than SERPS. Although the new pension will be less generous for those on above ­average earnings, it will provide more generous benefits for those below average earnings.
The third element of the strategy is to introduce new pensions accounts, a system that will require employer contri­butions. From 2012, employees will be automatically enrolled into a personal account with a 4% contribution made by them and 3% from the employer.
Employer obligations
The issue of employer responsibility was made clearly at last year's TUC Congress by Adrian Askew, general secretary of the Connect communication workers' union, in the debate on pensions. "While increases to the state pension are most welcome, that alone will not provide a reasonable standard of living in retire­ment," he said. "The state pension should in reality be a decent safety net but employers/businesses need to recognise their responsibility and not simply argue that increases to the minimum provisions provided by the state are adequate and somehow absolve them as employers of their obligations."
While it is too early to say whether the new system will begin to fill one of the many gaps in the UK pension system, what is clear is that for most trade unions, the basic state pension is the core of the system and needs to be increased substantially as part of a strategy to reduce poverty among pensioners. The means-testing system of pensions credits, in place since 2003, has helped some pensioners but £1.3 billion a year goes unclaimed - 1.8 million pensioners are eligible for the top up but don't receive it.
Speaking at the lobby of parliament last October, NPC general secretary Joe Harris said: "After 100 years of the state pension it's a national disgrace that at least 2.5 million older people are still living below the official poverty line, and millions more are struggling to meet the rising costs of living." The NPC, sup­ported by the TUC, wants to see the basic pension paid to all existing pensioners on a universal basis with the single pension raised to £151 a week.

THE FUTILITY OF REFORMS

Roger Turner the General Secretary in his News and Views article of the January/ February issue of the Unite magazine, relates some facts about pensions and pensioners that demonstrate that pensions are not a solution to working class poverty, however, I’m sure he will not point out to his members that the solution is to stop trying to recycle capitalism, best thing is to bin it. The article reads,

Are you living in comfort

A Survey by pension’s provider Friends Provident claims that people can live ‘comfortably’ on an income of £832 a month, excluding rent or mortgage payments.

I don’t know what Friends Provident means by ‘comfortably’ but whatever it is; it is luxury beyond the dreams of avarice for the majority of pensioners.

The state pension is £363 a month. Pension Credit pushes this up to £496. Does this mean that your average pensioner is living half comfortably? Or could half a pensioner live in comfort, while the other half made do on the breadline?

Who knows? These surveys rarely reflect the real world. What is certain is that after 100 years of the state pension failing to meet the needs of pensioners – it celebrates the anniversary of its introduction in 2008 – most pensioners are still struggling to make ends meet.

Food for Thought 4

- Sheik Mansour bin Zayed Al Nnahyan, owner of Manchester City football Club, offered Milan $250 million for the services of player, Kaka, and one million per week in pay for the latter. Sounds like a lot until you learn that the Sheik’s family’s worth is estimated at one trillion dollars, so 250 million is less than one day’s interest (assuming 10% accumulationrate). How hard it must be spending that much every day!

Charities are experiencing hard times, right? No so the Toronto Sick Kids’ Hospital in Toronto. In an article telling us that its top fund raisers are leaving (Toronto Star, 9/Jan/09), it is revealed that the top guy, hired in the US, is paid over $600 000/year and its top ten officials shared $2.8 million, up 35% from the previous year. A spokesperson for the hospital commented, “Our philosophy is we hire for excellence in fundraising and marketing.” Of course, most people who do all the leg-work and phone work, do it for nothing as volunteers.

In the military sphere, the 108th. Canadian soldier died recently. For what? You may well ask. In “Everything for Sale in Land of Graft”, Dexter Filkins (Toronto Star, 2/Jan/09) tells us that, “Kept afloat by billions of dollars in American and other foreign aid, the government of Afghanistan is shot through with corruption and graft. From the lowliest traffic cop to the family of President Hamid Karzai himself, the state built on the ruins of the Taliban regime seven years ago now often seems to exist for little more than the enrichment of those who run it”.

Canadians are waiting to hear, in the light of the imminent closing of Guantanamo torture camp, the fate of Omar Khadr, who was 15 years old when attacked by American insurgents and had the audacity to fight for his life by allegedly (a lot of doubt and strange cover up on the facts) lobbing a grenade and killing an American medic while he (Khadr) was shot in thechest. Now 22, he is incredibly charged with “murder in violation of the laws of war”. Figure that one out!
John Ayers

FOOD FOR THOUGHT 3

Dave Carpenter reports that about 1 in 6 of American homeowners are “under water”, i.e. the home’s debt exceeds its market value. That’s double last year’s figure.
(Toronto Star (03/01/09)

Fired workers in Guandong, China, smashed motorcycles and company equipment in anger as their dreams of prosperity and their $175/month jobs disappeared and the reality of capitalism bites – you work at the pleasure of capital.

In “Canada Should Strut It’s Stuff” (David Olive, Toronto Star, 18/Jan/09), an article designed to show the world what Canada is made of, the author reveals that and estimated 900 000 children in Canada live in poverty and wretched conditions. Some stuff! Some strut!

For those who have lost their jobs, unemployment insurance is much harder to get and much lower, and lasts for shorter periods than previously. In the 1970s, unemployed workers received 75% of their wage, today it’s just 55 %. In the 1990s recession, workers received $150/week more than today. Requirements are tougher and part time workers need not apply. Only 42% of Canadians who are unemployed receive relief, just 25% in Ontario. The futility of reform.

On the other hand, some are coping quite well. The Wall Street financial sector, the one that ran the surest, most prestigious institutions into the ground and then came begging for a trillion dollars, has just handed out $18.4 billion in employee bonuses. To the chagrin of president Obama, who castigated them publicly, and then ordered more bailout money!

According to The Canadian Centre for Policy Alternatives, Canada’s top 100 CEOs pocketed one billion dollars last year, averaging $10 million apiece, which means that by coffee time on the second work day of the year, they’ve made the average Canadian workers’ annual salary of $40 237.
John Ayers

Food for Thought 2

In the article, “The Zero Hour is Coming” by Peter Gorrie (Toronto Star, 3/Jan/2009, the author presents the incompatible idea that we can have zero growth and keep capitalism. Apart from that impossible theory in capitalism, he does make a couple of good points. He chides environmentalists for proposing ways to cut greenhouse gas emissions and keep our growth model,
“Even many environmentalists trumpet growth cloaking it in green. With clean, efficient, carbon technologies, they say, we can have more of everything and keep the planet inhabitable.”

He cites a recent Pembina Institute/ David Suzuki Foundation report thatclaims that within 12 years, Canada could cut emissions to 25% below 1990 levels, expand the economy 20%, and create 1.2 million jobs. On growth, Gorrie quotes a senior economist at York University, Peter Victor,
“ What’s wrong with growth? In the first place, it hasn’t fulfilled the promise of full employment, less poverty and a better environment: Growthhas been disappointing.”
No kidding. I wonder when they will come to the realization that we need a better system!
- Also on the environment, a Moncton recycling initiative by a community group has had to close, put five people out of work, and send its stock to the landfill because it is losing money. Money rules! John Ayers

Karl’s Quotes

On value, price, and supply and demand,

“ But to consider matters more broadly : You would be altogether mistaken in fancying that the value of Labour or any other commodity whatever is ultimately fixed by supply and demand. Supply and demand regulate nothing but the temporary fluctuations of market prices. They will explain to you why the market price of a commodity rises above or sinks below its value, but they can never account for that value itself. Suppose supply and demand (were) to equilibrate, or, as the economists call it, to cover each other. Why, the very moment these opposite forces become equal they paralyse each other, and cease to work in one or the other direction. At the moment when supply and demand equilibrate each other, and therefore cease to act, the market price of a commodity coincides with its real value, with the standard price round which its market prices oscillate. In inquiring into the nature of that value, we therefore having nothing at all to do with the temporary effects on market prices of supply and demand. The same holds true of wages as of the prices of all other commodities.”
(Value, Price and Profit, p26 Little Marx Library)

SCREWING THE TAPS

It’s estimated $100 billion /year is spent on bottled water. It would cost $30 billion to provide clean water to everyone on earth. (globalnetnews-summary@riseup.net - a movie review of “Flow: Who owns the world’s Water” by Jessica Moseby.)
Still on bottled water, Maude Barlow of The Council of Canadians revealed CBC Radio interview) that Ontarians buy one billion bottles per year and two-thirds end up in landfill sites. Also, she said, close to four million, mostly children, die from consuming contaminated water every year. Please synthesize these last two items to demonstrate the insanityof capitalism. John Ayers

THE SPECTRE OF UNEMPLOYMENT

"Unemployment is mounting around the world as big international companies, including Boeing, Conoco-Phillips, GKN, in Britain, and SAP, of Germany, rush to cut their costs. The job scythe, which could put 50 million people out of work world-wide, according to the International Labour Organisation (ILO), is reaching beyond the financial sector and into every corner of the global economy. ... The ILO report says that unemployment could rise by between 18 million and 30 million this year, and as much as 50 million if the world economy continues to deteriorate. In its worst-case scenario, global unemployment, which stood at 179 million in 2007, could rise to 230 million." (Times, 29 January) RD

Food for Thought

The Canadian Parliament resumed operation this week after being prorogued (suspended) for two months by PM Harper. This is highly unusual. Other leaders who suspended their legislatures, with their countries, from whom Harper may have learned are, Adolph Hitler (Germany, 1933), Francisco Franco (Spain, 1939), Benito Mussolini (Italy, 1939), August Pinochet (Chile 1973). A (pro)rogues gallery if ever there was one!- Indicators of the deepening recession and who pays the price keep surfacing – Microsoft lays off workers, 5 000, for the first time in its 34 year history.- In “The World is sinking in a Sea of Debt” (Toronto Star 24/01/09) Brett Popplewell tells us that we are all poor, that Western society has existed on credit for three decades and if each member of the G7 were to make good on all their liabilities, they would all be forced intobankruptcy. Apparently, Canada owes (in US dollars) $266.199 billion, US owes S7.39 trillion, UK owes $793.346 billion, France owes $1.5 trillion, Germany owes $1.85 trillion, Italy owes $2.13 trillion, Japan owes $5.7 trillion. John Ayers

THE WASTEFUL SOCIETY

" Turn a corner near King Harry ferry just south of Truro and through the trees you suddenly glimpse the giant ships - car carriers, bulk carriers, banana boats. There are 10 ships here, looked after by skeleton crews of three or four to each vessel. As well as the Filipinos, there are Polish, Portuguese, Russian, Ukrainian and Bulgarian sailors with too much time to kill, often not enough work to do and little access to the outside world. Sailors on one of the laid-up ships spend time cycling round the vast empty decks, trying to keep fit. Some organise games of football on board and many are becoming excellent darts players. On one vessel they seem to have given up the ghost and are padding around unshaven and in flip-flops, asking anyone who passes if they have any spare DVDs - they have watched all theirs dozens of times."
(Guardian, 31 January) RD

DYING FOR CAPITALISM

"Suicides among U.S. soldiers rose last year to the highest level in decades, the Army announced Thursday. At least 128 soldiers killed themselves in 2008. But the final count is likely to be considerably higher because 15 more suspicious deaths are still being investigated and could also turn out to be self-inflicted, the Army said. A new training and prevention effort will start next week. And Col. Elspeth Ritchie, a psychiatric consultant to the Army surgeon general, made a plea for more U.S. mental health professionals to sign on to work for the military. "We are hiring and we need your help," she said. The new suicide figure compares with 115 in 2007 and 102 in 2006 and is the highest since record keeping began in 1980."

(Associated Press, 29 January) RD

MORE MARKET NONSENSE

Office workers chat in front of a decoration for the upcoming Year of the Ox

"Stock investors reeling from last year's market mayhem may take some solace from practitioners of the ancient Chinese art of feng shui, who predict a calmer, if subdued, performance in the coming Chinese Year of the Ox. "This year of the Ox is an 'earth' year, when people will take a breather and reflect on what they should do after a turbulent 2008," said Hong Kong feng shui master Raymond Lo. Practitioners of feng shui maintain the universe is made up of five elements -- earth, water, fire, wood and metal -- that define the collective mood in our environment. Earth is the calmest of the elements and this year is a "yin earth" year as well as an Ox year, symbolizing a more feminine energy, says Lo. The Year of the Ox, which starts on January 26, will be the most peaceful year globally since 2000, he says, but stock investors don't need to rush into the market yet. "2009 will be a 'pure earth' year, which means fire will be missing so there will not be a lot of drive to push up the stock market," said Lo. The economic climate will still be tough and though stock markets might rise in the first half of this year, gains could peter out in the second half, Lo said." (Yahoo News, 20 January) RD

EXPORTERS VERSUS IMPORTERS

"A coalition of leading American exporters, including Boeing, Caterpillar and General Electric, is trying to stop a “Buy America” clause being included in President Obama’s $825 billion stimulus package. The American Steel First Act would ensure that only US-made steel was used in $64 billion of federally funded infrastructure projects. The money, earmarked for roads, bridges and waterways, is aimed at kick-starting the economy, but the initiative by steelmakers, which secured support last week in the House of Representatives Appropriations Committee, is opposed by American exporters, who fear retaliation by foreign governments. Their concern is given credence by the European Commission and by Eurofer, the association of European steelmakers, which said that it would urge the European Union to challenge the “Buy America” clause at the World Trade Organisation." (Independent, 26 January) RD

CAPITALISM IN ACTION

Socialists always point out how inefficient capitalism is and how inside a socialist society everyone would work to the best of their ability and take according to their needs. Contrast that with what is happening today. Men and women of the working class throughout the world are being debarred from producing wealth. They are being thrown onto the industrial and commercial scrapheap of capitalism because of the profit motive.
"Up to 51 million jobs worldwide could disappear by the end of this year as a result of the economic slowdown that has turned into a global employment crisis, a United Nations agency said on Wednesday. The International Labour Organization (ILO) said that under its most optimistic scenario, this year would finish with 18 million more unemployed people than at the end of 2007, with a global unemployment rate of 6.1. More realistically, it said 30 million more people could lose their jobs if financial turmoil persists through 2009, pushing up the world's unemployment to 6.5 percent, compared to 6.0 percent in 2008 and 5.7 percent in 2007. In the worst-case economic scenario, the Global Employment Trends report said 51 million more jobs could be lost by the end of this year, creating a 7.1 percent global unemployment rate."
(Reuters, 28 January) RD

MORTGAGE MISERY

"One house was repossessed every ten minutes in the third quarter of last year as the rate of seizures almost doubled, the Financial Services Authority said yesterday. The City regulator said that 13,616 homes were repossessed in the three months to September last year, a 92 per cent rise on the third quarter of 2007. There was also a rise in the number of homeowners in arrears, indicating that hundreds of thousands of borrowers could lose their homes. The FSA said that 340,000 borrowers were behind on mortgage repayments, a 10 per cent rise compared with the previous quarter of last year and a 24 per cent rise on the same period in 2007."
(Times, 23 January) RD

Fatten them up for the colonies or war

Following on from a previous post, on Free work versus forced employment, some older readers may remember this exercise in social control.

This was how workers were treated and how some of the capitalist bosses would still like to treat them, if you will let them get away with it. http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/scotland/7842517.stm

We don't find any sons and daughters of the ruling class in these schemes ,of course.

GROWING OLD DISGRACEFULLY

"Miriam Gorman wanted to retire more than a year ago, but steep financial losses in her retirement savings mean the 71-year-old bookkeeper now plans to work on indefinitely.
"I would have preferred to retire at the end of 2007, and then I was thinking at the end of this year, and now maybe it's next year. I really don't know," said Gorman, who's been with an advertising company in Bethesda, Maryland, for 15 years. Across America, older workers are postponing retirement plans, dismayed by huge losses in the value of the investments they had depended on to fund their retirement. The U.S. recession has compounded the problem, with home values too low to provide the nest egg many seniors need and interest rates on safer assets close to zero." (Yahoo News, 17 January) RD

CAPITALISM THE POLLUTER

A female orangutan named Beki eats bananas at Tanjung Puting National Park on
Borneo island, Indonesia

"Hoping to unravel the mysteries of human origin, anthropologist Louis Leakey sent three young women to Africa and Asia to study our closest relatives: It was chimpanzees for Jane Goodall, mountain gorillas for Dian Fossey and the elusive, solitary orangutans for Birute Mary Galdikas. Nearly four decades later, 62-year-old Galdikas, the least famous of his "angels," is the only one still at it. And the red apes she studies in Indonesia are on the verge of extinction because forests are being clear-cut and burned to make way for lucrative palm oil plantations. ..."I try not to get depressed, I try not to get burned out," says the Canadian scientist, pulling a wide-rimmed jungle hat over her shoulder-length gray hair in Tanjung Puting National Park. She gently leans over to pick up a tiny orangutan, orphaned when his mother was caught raiding crops. "But when you get up in the air you start gasping in horror; there's nothing but palm oil in an area that used to be plush rain forest. Elsewhere, there's burned-out land, which now extends even within the borders of the park." The demand for palm oil is rising in the U.S. and Europe because it is touted as a "clean" alternative to fuel. Indonesia is the world's top producer of palm oil, and prices have jumped by almost 70 percent in the last year.But palm oil plantations devastate the forest and create a monoculture on the land, in which orangutans cannot survive. ... Most live in small, scattered populations that cannot take the onslaught on the forests much longer. Trees are being cut at a rate of 300 football fields every hour. And massive land-clearing fires have turned the country into one of the top emitters of carbon." (Yahoo News, 18 January) RD

Thought For Today

• "Too long have the workers of the world waited for some Moses to lead them out of bondage. He has not come – he never will come. I would not lead you out if l could, for if you could be led out – you could be led back again. Make up your minds, there is nothing you cannot do for yourselves."(Eugene Debbs)

OUT OF SIGHT, OUT OF MIND

Lindsey Nelson gets ready to head out for the day after sleeping in an area that
falls within the city's inaugural security perimeter

"From the steam grates of Pennsylvania Avenue to the porticoes of the city's grand buildings, homeless Washingtonians who live inside the nation's tightest security zone are being encouraged to decamp during the inauguration for shelters in the city's outer neighbourhoods. The security sweeps will probably begin Monday. Buses will make one-way trips to two of the District's largest shelters, which will remain open round-the-clock, said D.C. Council member Tommy Wells (D-Ward 6)."Everyone has to be out of the perimeter by then," Wells said." (Washington Post, 15 January) RD

Free work versus forced employment

Why do you go to work? Is it because you enjoy what you do? Did you choose to work at what you do in the way you do? Would you do your job were it not for the money?

A few lucky people can do what they like. These include a certain class of people who have the economic privilege of not needing to work. They can live by exploiting the work of others. This exploitation enables them to live by appropriating rent, interest and profit.

They can do what they like with their lives. They can sleep all day.They can travel. They can spend their time shooting animals for fun or shooting drugs into their bodies. If they wish, they can be philanthropists and "do good" for the poor—who are poor only because the rich are rich.

While the capitalist minority who own and control the means of producing and distributing wealth are free not to have to work, the majority of us are unfree. We are dependent upon working in order to obtain a wage or salary. We sell our mental and physical abilities in a relationship called employment.

Work and employment are not the same. Humans need to work because work is the expenditure of energy and unless we use some of it we rot away.
Even the most parasitical aristocratic layabout occasionally does the odd stroke of work. Looking after a garden or painting pictures or cooking fine food are all work activities, but if you do them freely they are not employment.

To be employed is to work for someone else: to be at their beck and call; to be given money by them in return for producing values for them. Capitalists will only employ workers if there is a prospect of them making a profit out of us. They make their profit by receiving from us more value than the value of our wages or salaries.

Without this surplus value they would not employ us - which is why millions of able-bodied and skilled people who want to find jobs are unemployed; there is no prospect of a profit in making them work. There is no point in asking the capitalists to give everyone employment regardless of profit. That would not be in their interests and we should not expect them to invest in us unless they can exploit us.

So, the majority works not by choice but in an unfree relationship of employment. We are wage or salary slaves. We are employed not for the good of our health but so that capitalists can live in luxury without working. Employment is a form of institutionalised exploitation - or legalised robbery.

Dreaming of a super cycle

On 19 November 2007 the Times published a special supplement on “Minerals and Mining”. One optimistic article “Boom time for world-wide mining” raised the prospect that world mining was entering a “super cycle” and that “we are now in the early stage of a prolonged upward shift in prices, fuelled by the industrialisation of China and India”.

Industrialisation involves not just the building of new factories but also the uprooting of people from the countryside and their move to urban industrial centres to work. One expert spoke of “the movement of anything from around 10 million to 20 million people per year into an urban setting” in China, so increasing the demand for new houses, roads, administrative buildings and the other features of an urban infrastructure.

Copper is used extensively in the construction industry, for electric wiring and the like. Recent years have seen a boom in the price of copper and the other base metals, zinc (used for galvanising steel and batteries) and nickel (also used in steelmaking), attributed largely to the increased pace of industrialisation in China since 2003. The optimists believe that their “super cycle” will be the third in the last 150 years, “the previous two occurring around the end of the 19th century as the US became a major economic power and the second being the post war expansion of the Japanese and European economies after 1945”.

Three days later, the headlines of the Times business section read: “Fears of recession in US spook commodity markets” and “The wheels are coming off the supercycle”:

A metals analyst, Nick Moore gave his opinion:

“’The supercycle has a flat tyre,’ Mr Moore said, referring to a theory promoted by some analysts and mining groups which suggested that extraordinary demand from China and India would sustain continued long-term growth and prevent the traditional boom and bust cycle of the mining industry. ‘China is not the tooth fairy that can absorb all the ore’”.

Of course since, as on all markets, speculators operate on the commodities market, too much store should not be set on short-term changes there. But the state of the US economy is relevant since China is not industrializing on its own: the motor is exports. If, due to a recession in the US, these fall off so will China’s demand for copper and zinc and the mining industry will suffer from “overcapacity”. Hence the comment of the Times Business Editor, James Harding, that “in the longer term, there is concern that the industry has retained its tendency towards oversupply, adding production capacity and removing the squeeze that props up prices”.

In other words, the classic scenario under capitalism. When the market for some product is expanding, all the firms supplying it assume that this will continue and invest in new productive capacity; when all this comes on stream it is found that supply exceeds demand and boom turns to bust and slump. The mining industry has traditionally been prone to this because of the longer time needed to explore for, find and extract minerals than to build a factory. The last time the world mining industry went through a slump was in the 1990s:

“At that time, with lower demand and lower prices, and in the midst of technological change, metals were, as Tulpulé [chief economist at Rio Tinto] puts it ‘passé’. This of course led to a lack of investment in plant, a fall off in exploration, and a declining growth on the supply side” (Times, 19 November 2007).

As long as capitalism lasts, this zigzagging between boom and slump will always be the course of economic activity.

Socialist Standard Rock and Roll ?

A comrade in the USA has come across this:

http://www.causeur.fr/swinging-gauchistes,1691

Here's a translation:
"The Socialist Standard is the oldest extreme-left journal in
England -- and no doubt on the planet: it has been published without
interruption since 1904.
As can be seen its latest edition is particularly devoted to the new
occupant of the White House and predicts, rightly, that there's not
much new to be expected from Barack Obama. Up to there, nothing
amazing, but it's the words to say it (Meet the New Boss, Same as
the Old Boss) which have enchanted the rockolgues of Causeur, who
all instantly jumped for joy in recognising the words of the
fabulous "Won't Get Fooled Again" of The Who,of which Basile de Koch
has already said all the good that should be thought of it. It will
thus be deduced that like their popular and reference newspapers,
the English are better equipped than us in anti-capitalist
papers. For example this week the front page of Rouge says "Halt to
the Massacre of the Palestinian People". Politically you think of it
what you want, but one thing is certain: as a title it's not very
rock and roll."

Still a bit 1960 and 1970ish I suppose.

Adam

GOD'S WILL?

A general view of the Reborn in Christ church, center, after its roof collapsed
Sunday evening.

"Police and rescuers picked through a latticework of bent steel Monday after the roof at one of Brazil's largest evangelical churches collapsed between services, killing at least nine people. Nearly 100 people were injured, but the toll could have been much worse because the roof caved in less than an hour after a Sunday service at the Reborn in Christ church attracted thousands of young worshippers — and minutes before another service for adults."

(Yahoo News, 19 January) RD

CAPITALISM IN ACTION

" ...Limerick, Ireland's third city where on the Raheen Industrial Estate in the southern suburbs, the computer giant Dell has a large manufacturing plant employing 3,000 people. On Thursday 8 January, those employees discovered that 1,900 of them would be made redundant over the next twelve months. Dell is switching manufacture from Limerick to Poland, where wages are about two-thirds lower than in Ireland. According to the Irish Times, local business leaders estimate that the knock-on effects on companies that rely on Dell for work could see `in the region of 7,000 to 10,000` further jobs at risk, threatening to send the local economy `into meltdown`"
(Observer, 18 January) RD

A WASTEFUL SOCIETY

Capitalism is a very wasteful society that spends millions of potentially useful labour time and ingenuity in protecting private property. All over the world men and women spent their time in organisations like armies and police forces. Here is a small example of the stupidity of a private property society, in this case the border between Mexico and the USA. "18,000 - the number of Border Patrol agents assigned to it in 2008 (up from 4,000 in 1993) 705,000 - the number of people caught trying to cross it illegally in 2007/2008, down from 1.6 million in 2000. That's the equivalent to 2,000 people a day. 1,954 - the number of people who died crossing it between 1998 and 2004, mainly of exposure, drowning or car crashes." (Times, 16 January) RD

A STRANGE CENSORSHIP

"A Christian bus driver in Southampton has refused to take to the road in a vehicle emblazoned with an advertisement for a new campaign promoting atheism. Ron Heather, 62, told managers at First Bus that his beliefs would not permit him to drive a bus carrying the message: "There's probably no God. Now stop worrying and enjoy your life." (Guardian, 16 January)
It is good to see bus drivers with principles but we wonder how his previous colleagues drove a bus that said "Guinness is good for you" or even earlier "Craven A for your throats sake" and of course more recently "It is a man's life in the army". Is it OK to advertise a well known cause of disease of the liver or one that induces cancer of the lungs and even one that instructs you how to kill people, but never to doubt Christian fairy tales? A really strange sort of censorship. RD

RECYCLING FAILED IDEAS

"President-elect Obama proposes an unparalleled test of Keynes' decades-old idea: that deficit spending on a grand-enough scale can inspire the confidence to right a sinking economy. Reporting from Washington -- In a measure of how quickly its options are shrinking, the United States is about to embrace an economic theory that was widely thought for most of the last generation to have been discredited: the idea that great bursts of deficit-funded government expenditure can jolt an economy back to growth."

(Los Angeles Times, 11 January) RD

US ILLITERACY

"About 14 percent of U.S. adults won't be reading this article. Well, okay, most people won't read it, given all the words that are published these days to help us understand and navigate the increasingly complex world. But about 1 in 7 can't read it. They're illiterate. Statistics released by the U.S. Education Department this week show that some 32 million U.S. adults lack basic prose literacy skill. That means they can't read a newspaper or the instruction on a bottle of pills." (livescience.com, 10 January) RD

ETERNALLY STINGY

In every large town in the USA you will find a monument to the war dead of the various struggles for markets and sources of raw materials. It seems that the owning class are truly grateful to the working class dead - but not too grateful.
"An "eternal" flame at Bullhead City's new veterans memorial park that only lasted until city officials received a $961 gas bill has been re-lit following complaints by veterans groups. The Medal of Honor Memorial at the Arizona Veterans Memorial Park alongside the Colorado River was lit on Veterans Day in November. When the bill arrived in late December, city officials were stunned. "It caught us by surprise," City Manager Tim Ernster said Thursday. "What we decided to do for the time being is to turn the flame on ... for special events, for Veterans Day, Fourth of July, Memorial Day — those types of activities." The flame was extinguished on Monday. The Mohave Valley Daily News published a story Friday quoting city officials and disgruntled veterans who had worked to pay for and build the memorial before turning it over to the city. The flame was back on by midmorning Friday following a meeting of city officials. "What happened was really a miscommunication," city spokesman Steve Johnson said. "The issue came up one day and it was never intended to be shut off." Johnson said the flame is impressive, but city parks officials are looking at ways to put a smaller burner in place and only use the larger one at special events. "We're looking at alternatives, because $1,000 a month in these economic times is certainly a consideration," Johnson said." (Yahoo News, 10 January) RD

RECRUITING THE YOUNG

Ashley Albert sits in the Apache helicopter flight simulator at the U.S. Army
Experience center

"The U.S. Army, struggling to ensure it has enough manpower as it fights wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, is wooing young Americans with video games, Google maps and simulated attacks on enemy positions from an Apache helicopter. Departing from the recruiting environment of metal tables and uniformed soldiers in a drab military building, the Army has invested $12 million in a facility that looks like a cross between a hotel lobby and a video arcade. The U.S. Army Experience Center at the Franklin Mills shopping mall in northeast Philadelphia has 60 personal computers loaded with military video games, 19 Xbox 360 video game controllers and a series of interactive screens describing military bases and career options in great detail. Potential recruits can hang out on couches and listen to rock music that fills the space. ... Defence officials say the recession and rising unemployment were likely to boost recruiting."
(Yahoo News, 9 January) RD

RETREAT FROM THE RETREAT

"Monasteries and convents are advertising "try being a monk/nun" weekends as a way of encouraging men and women into religious orders. The number of monks and nuns is falling so quickly than within a generation there could be none left. In 2000, there was about 710 nuns and 230 monks in Anglican religious orders in Britain and Ireland. Eight years later, numbers are down more than a third - to 470 nuns and 135 monks. It is no better for Roman Catholic orders. The Vatican revealed last year the numbers worldwide fell 10% in 2005 - 06 alone." (Observer, 11 January) RD

HARD TIMES

"Fears that the world is sliding into the worst global recession since the Great Depression multiplied yesterday as figures showed the steepest jump in American unemployment since the Second World War and a slump in manufacturing across Europe. Economists on both sides of the Atlantic were startled by the severity of the latest indications of global economic slump, which further stoked pressure for radical action to stave off economic calamity. A further surge in US joblessness led the litany of bleak developments yesterday. Official figures confirmed that more Americans lost their jobs last year than in any year since 1945, and that unemployment is soaring at the fastest pace seen since then. A total of 524,000 Americans were made redundant by US employers last month alone, the latest official payroll figures showed."
(Times, 10 January) RD

CAPITALISM IN ACTION

The factory of U.S. computer maker DELL, in Limerick, on Thursday,
Jan. 8th
Ireland, , 2009.

"U.S. computer maker Dell Inc. announced Thursday it will slash its Irish work force and shift its European manufacturing operations to Poland in a move certain to undermine Ireland's recession-hit economy. Dell is Ireland's second-largest corporate employer, its biggest exporter and in recent years has contributed about 5 percent to the national gross domestic product. Economists warn that each Dell job underpins another four to five jobs in Ireland. Managers told its approximately 4,300 Irish employees that 1,900 of them — overwhelmingly assembly-line workers — would lose their jobs between April 2009 and January 2010. By then, the company said, it plans to have transferred the entire Irish production of laptops and desktop computers to a new Dell plant in Poland's third-largest city, Lodz — where labor costs are at least two-thirds lower than Dell's rates in Ireland — and to subcontractors chiefly in Asia." (Yahoo News, 8 January) RD

OLD, COLD AND SKINT

"A spokesman for Help the Aged said: "As the temperature drops, the death rate goes up but it's not just the sudden cold snaps, it's the whole winter. We've been hearing about a lot of people only heating one room and trying to spend as much time as possible in it, and also a lot of people will go out and kill time in heated places like libraries to try to keep their own bills down. "The huge increases in fuel costs have really hit pensioners. It now costs about £1,400 a year to heat the average British home and if you're on a pension of just £8,000 a year you can see that that's a sizeable chunk. Older people are really finding themselves in that awful 'heat or eat' scenario." (Observer, 11 January) RD

THE FALLACY OF LEADERSHIP

One of the oppositions to world socialism that we often meet is that we need wise leaders and that ordinary workers cannot be trusted with the complexities of modern society. The Socialist Party is opposed to the concept of leadership. In our view only the working class can establish socialism. Here is one of the so-called leaders George Bush speaking, make up your own mind.
"There's no question that the minute I got elected, the storm clouds on the horizon were getting nearly directly overhead." Washington DC, 11 May, 2001
"I want to thank my friend, Senator Bill Frist, for joining us today. He married a Texas girl, I want you to know. Karyn is with us. A West Texas girl, just like me." Nashville, Tennessee, 27 May, 2004
"For a century and a half now, America and Japan have formed one of the great and enduring alliances of modern times." Tokyo, 18 February, 2002
"The war on terror involves Saddam Hussein because of the nature of Saddam Hussein, the history of Saddam Hussein, and his willingness to terrorise himself." Grand Rapids, Michigan, 29 January, 2003
"I think war is a dangerous place." Washington DC, 7 May, 2003
"The ambassador and the general were briefing me on the - the vast majority of Iraqis want to live in a peaceful, free world. And we will find these people and we will bring them to justice." Washington DC, 27 October, 2003 " (BBC News, 8 January)
Nuff said? RD

A SUICIDAL SOCIETY

Workers are often told how lucky they are to be workers instead of capitalists, but capitalists themselves don't believe that piece of nonsense. With the downturn in the capitalist market place many capitalists face the prospect of losing their privileged class position and finding themselves in the ranks of the working class. The prospect is so awful that some of them can't face it and commit suicide.
"Kirk Stephenson, the 47-year-old New Zealand-born chief operating officer at the private equity firm Olivant, died instantly when he was hit by a train at Taplow station in Buckinghamshire, on September 25 last year. A jury returned a verdict of suicide. ...Rene-Thierry Magon de la, 65, a French financier, locked the door of his New York office last month, swallowed sleeping pills and slashed his wrists with a craft knife. ... Paulo Sergio Silva, 36, a trader for the brookerage arm of the Brazilian banking giant Itau, shot himself in the chest during the afternoon trading session in San Paulo's commodities and futures exchange in an apparent suicide attempt in November. ... One of Europe's most influential industry magnates has thrown himself in front of a train after his business empire began to crumble. Adolf Merckle, the 74-year-old head of a conglomerate that employs thousands in Britain and elsewhere in Europe, killed himself on Monday." (Times, 7 January) RD

WHAT CREDIT CRUNCH?

A Japanese bluefin tuna that fetched nearly 10 million yen at the year-opening
auction is shown at Tokyo's

"Two sushi bar owners paid more than $100,000 for a Japanese bluefin tuna at a Tokyo fish auction Monday, several times the average price and the highest in nearly a decade, market officials said. The 282-pound (128-kilogram) premium tuna caught off the northern coast of Oma fetched 9.63 million yen ($104,700), the highest since 2001, when another Japanese bluefin tuna brought an all-time record of 20 million yen, market official Takashi Yoshida said. Yoshida said the extravagant purchase — about $370 per pound ($817 per kilogram) — went to a Hong Kong sushi bar owner and his Japanese competitor who reached a peaceful settlement to share the big fish." (Yahoo News, 5 January):

AN ORWELLIAN FUTURE

"Police have been given the power to hack into personal computers without a court warrant. The Home Office is facing anger and the threat of a legal challenge after granting permission. Ministers are also drawing up plans to allow police across the EU to collect information from computers in Britain. The moves will fuel claims that the Government is presiding over a steady extension of the "surveillance society" threatening personal privacy. Hacking – known as "remote searching" – has been quietly adopted by police across Britain following the development of technology to access computers' contents at a distance. Police say it is vital for tracking cyber-criminals and paedophiles and is used sparingly but civil liberties groups fear it is about to be vastly expanded." (Independent, 5 January) RD

Debate Debate Debate

Public Debate (from above image)

Saturday 24 January, 3pm to 5pm.

Did Trotsky Point
The Way To Socialism?

Yes: Hillel Ticktin, editor of Critique.
No: Adam Buick, Socialist Party.

Hillhead Public Library, Byres Road. (next to Hillhead subway) Map

Banks Boom and Bust - Glasgow Discussion

What came first, the recession or the credit-crunch? There appears to be some confusion about this but the fact is that the credit-crunch is happening because of the recession. The recession has produced a big increase in redundancies, not least among people with low credit rating, especially in America, who bought sub-prime mortgages and are now defaulting on them, and this ac­counts for the huge number of repossessions.

What are these sub-prime mortgages?

They are mortgages aimed at people who have low incomes and/or low credit rating, many of them were led to believe that they were buying a mortgage at an affordable rate of interest but they weren't told that the rate would rise after a year to a level they couldn't afford.

Sub-prime mortgages are a product of the need for banks to pay dividends to their shareholders, pay interest to their depositors and on borrowings from the wholesale money markets. To do all this banks must find new ways of making money and that's why they've come up with Junk Bonds, Derivatives, Hedge Funds and now the risky sub-prime mortgages.

Sub-prime mortgages have been around since the 1960s and were very profitable until now and this is why banks and other lenders have bought them by the million, hence the enormous losses.

So what is the credit-crunch? Because of the recession banks are reluctant to lend to would-be house buyers (may lose their jobs), to businesses (may go bust) and even other banks which could turn out to be insolvent, and that's what has produced the credit-crunch.

Vic Vanni will be expanding on all these issues at our first meeting of the year.

Community Central Hall,
Maryhill Road, Glasgow. 8.30 pm

A GRIM FUTURE

An Australian army truck is unloaded from a landing craft in Dili, in 2006

"Australia's military has warned that global warming could create failed states across the Pacific as sea levels rise and heighten the risk of conflict over resources, according to a report. The Australian Defence Force (ADF) analysis found the military could be called on to undertake more security, disaster relief and reconstruction missions as a result of climate change, the Sydney Morning Herald said. "Environmental stress, caused by both climate change and a range of other factors, will act as a threat multiplier in fragile states around the world, increasing the chances of state failure," the analysis said. "This is likely to increase demands for the ADF to be deployed on additional stabilisation, post-conflict reconstruction and disaster relief operations in the future." (Yahoo News, 6 January) RD

AFRICAN MISERY

"How bad was it for Africa in 2008? The highlight of the year for most of the continent just might have been the election of a half-Kenyan to lead a nation thousands of miles away. President-elect Barack Obama's triumph in the US raised Africa's hopes – no small feat in a year that saw rigged elections in Kenya and Zimbabwe, virtually no progress toward ending the mass suffering in Darfur, political and social upheaval in South Africa, and – just when you thought some places had hit bottom – even more chaos and bloodshed in Congo and Somalia. Throughout Africa, 2008 was a year to forget. For all the hope embodied in the arrival of a new year, and of Mr. Obama himself, however, 2009 brings no obvious solutions for any of Africa's most intractable problems." (Yahoo News, 2 January) RD

POVERTY INHERINTANCE

"Children from poor families are more likely than their peers to be depressed as teenagers, with effects that can ultimately make it harder to climb out from poverty, a new study suggests. The study, which followed nearly 500 Iowa families for a decade, found that children in poorer families were at greater risk of depression symptoms by adolescence. These teenagers, in turn, were more likely to "grow up" faster -- including having sex, leaving home or getting married at an earlier-than-average age. This cycle, the study found, eventually put kids at risk of substantial obstacles in young adulthood, such as low education levels, unemployment and a lack of stable relationships in their lives. "The main finding shows the continuity of family adversity over generations -- from family-of-origin to a young adult's family," lead researcher K.A.S. Wickrama, a professor of human development and family studies at Iowa State University in Ames, said in a written statement. "In other words," he said, "it's the transmission of poverty." The findings, which appear in the Journal of Health and Social Behaviour, suggest that early-life stress and depression symptoms feed each other, ultimately making the transition to adulthood a tough one, according to Wickrama's team." (Yahoo News, 7 January) RD

A DEPRESSIVE SOCIETY

"One in ten young people in Scotland believe life is not really worth living and one in four is depressed, according to a disturbing new survey. The Prince's Trust YouGov Youth Index, the first large-scale index of its kind, reveals a significant element of unhappiness amongst 16 to 25-year-olds. Almost one in ten claimed that life was not really worth living and almost a quarter admitted that they were "often" or "always" down or depressed. More than one in four said that they were less happy now than they were as a child and 18 per cent felt like crying "often" or "always"." (Times, 5 January) RD

Food for Thought 2

- Is crime related to the economy? Socialists have always argued that it is, and that most crime would therefore be eliminated with the end of money and the establishment of free access. In “Agencies Brace for Crime Wave” (Toronto Star, 27/Dec/2008), Robyn Doolittle (wonder if she works for the government?) reports that Toronto was hit by a one day high of 26 robberies just before Christmas and more is expected in 2009 as the economy deteriorates, unemployment rises and people get desperate for food (a natural expectation, I would think).
To confirm the socialist theory, gas thefts at the pump and from the driveways has eased as the price has fallen dramatically.
- On the environmental front, the European Union quickly put together a $332 billion stimulus package to help shore up falling production levels but had their work cut out to reach a ‘save the climate’ deal. Eventually, they reached an agreement that seems to meet the Triple 20 threshhold – 20% cuts to Greenhouse gases by 2020 while shifting 20% of energy needs to renewable sources. An examination of the fine print reveals, however, that caveats and concessions allow coal-powered Poland and heavily industrialized Germany to maintain business as usual. John Ayers

Food for Thought

- The War on Poverty – The Ontario government’s latest poverty reduction plan has the target of reducing child poverty by 25% in five years, lifting 90 000 children out of dire straights. Remember when the promise was always 50%! We’ll see what really happens.
- Meanwhile, the government has raised the dental program age for poor children from 14 to 18 years, but we’re still waiting for the promised $45 million for low income adults and children to receive dental care, even though it’s estimated that a dollar spent on prevention saves up to $50 on fixing later problems.
- Carol Goar of The Toronto Star reports that The National Welfare Council criticizes welfare rates, slow progress, and the fact that welfare strips recipients of their pride, privacy, savings, and adequate diet. The Council has been a burr under Ottawa’s saddle since 1969, reports Goar – some burr!
- Still, we have to look at poverty reduction in a historical context. The Toronto Star article (5/Dec/2008), “Social Justice” told us that Governor John Graves Simcoe excluded the Poor Law when he set up our first government, ‘freeing the colony from responsibility of the poor’. But by 1836, the race to eliminate poverty was on with The Charity Aid Act, accepting public responsibility for the poor. Not long now, it’s coming!
- Meanwhile, The UN’s Food Agency stated that the number of under- -nourished people in the world is rising and is about to reach one billion for the first time in human history. Three cheers for capitalism? John Ayers

KARL'S QUOTE'S

- Capitalist propaganda is quick to tell us that the machines they have introduced (not invented or made, note ) have lightened the load of the workers. On page 492 (Penguin Edition) of “Capital”, Marx writes,
“John Stuart Mill says in his Principles of Political Economy, ’It is questionable if all the mechanical inventions yet made have lightened theday’s toil of any human being.’ That is, however, by no means the aim of the application of machinery under capitalism. Like every other instrument for increasing the productivity of labour, machinery is intended to cheapen commodities and, by shortening the part of the working day in which the worker works for himself, to lengthen the other part, the part he gives to the capitalist for nothing. The machine is a means for producing surplus-value.”
The kicker is the footnote by Marx, “Mill should have said, ‘of any human being not fed by other people’s labour’, for there is no doubt that machinery has greatly increased the number of distinguished idlers.”
How True! John Ayers

OPEN FOR BUSINESS

People work at an installation at the Zubair Moshrif oil field, 600 kilometers (372 miles) southeast of Baghdad, Iraq, in this Thursday, July 3, 2008 file photo. Iraq launched an unprecedented public campaign Friday Dec. 5, 2008 to attract investment from international oil companies, rolling out a red carpet — literally — for executives from as far away as Russia and Japan.

THIS IS PROGRESS?

"Dublin, Ireland – New restrictions on begging are being instituted here for the first time since the potato famine of the 1840s. Although merchants say changes are needed to deal with an increasingly aggressive and organized cadre of panhandlers, critics call the measure an unnecessary criminalization of society's most vulnerable members. ...The impetus for the law came after Ireland's High Court ruled last year that the existing Vagrancy Act of 1847 – an anti-begging law introduced by Britain during the Irish Potato Famine – was outdated and interfered with an individual's right to freedom of expression. "Authorities had no legal powers to prosecute cases of begging," says a spokesperson from the Department of Justice. "The minister [of Justice Dermot Ahern] decided that this was an unacceptable situation." ...No matter the rationale, the change comes during tougher times. Not long ago, Ireland was known as the Celtic Tiger for its booming economy. This year, according to estimates from the International Monetary Fund, the economy here will contract by 1.8 percent. Unemployment is also expected to hit 10 percent in 2009." (Yahoo News, 24 December) RD

Reading Notes

A recently published book, “Discoveries that Changed the World”, byRodney Castleden, published by Futura yielded a couple of gems. In the chapter on Malaria, Castleden writes,



“At the present time there is no malaria vaccine; there are only preventative drugs which have to be taken continuously to reduce the risk of infection. These are very effective for visitors from the more economically developed countries, but too expensive for most people who live in the affected regions.”

In other words, if you can’t afford it you may die, and this is a disease that infects 55 million people a year with between one and three million deaths, mostly young children.



Concerning radium, he writes, “ Radium is a million times more radioactive than uranium. The luminosity of radium led to its one time use in luminous paints for watches, clocks, aircraft switches and instrument dials. At least a hundred watch dial painters, who used their lips to shape their paintbrushes died as a result of the radiation.Radium was still used in this way until the late 1950s even though twenty years earlier it had been found that workers thus exposed to radium suffered serious health hazards such as sores,anemia, and bone cancer. Marie Curie’s (discoverer of radium) notes are still strongly radioactive one hundred years after she last handled them.

Capitalism only looks atthe profit potential of every new discovery.


In “A Brief History of Globalization”, Alex MacGillivray writes, re Third World debt,

“By 2005, African countries had already repaid $550 billion against original loans of $540 billion.But because of high interest rates, $245 billion was still outstanding.” (page 223) At this rateprofit would easily top 100%. That’s the kind of helping hand we can do without. On page 249 he quotes 19th.century American senator, John M. Thurston on the benefits of war,

“ War with Spain would increase the business and earnings of every American railroad, it would increase the output of every American factory, it would stimulate every branch ofIndustry and domestic commerce.” Obviously, a good deal for the profiteering class. Not so good for those who are expected to fight for this bonanza but derive no benefit from it. John Ayers

THE JOYS OF RELIGION

"The Taliban have ordered the closure of all girl's schools in the war-ravaged Swat district (Islamabad, Pakistan) and warned parents and teachers of dire consequences if the ban is flouted. In an announcement made in mosques and broadcast on radio, the militant group set a deadline of January 15 for its order to be obeyed or it would blow up school buildings and attack schoolgirls. It also told women not to set foot outside their homes without being fully covered." (Times, 26 December) RD

NEW YORK, NEW YORK

"The economic downturn is causing a homelessness crisis in New York, where job losses and repossessions are forcing record numbers of families on to the streets - and British charities are warning that London should also expect a sharp rise in rough-sleepers as recession bites. In the US, the Coalition for the Homeless, a nationwide advocacy group, has revealed that some 9,720 families stayed in New York City's homeless shelters last month, the highest number since records began in 1983. The report also showed that the number of homeless families in New York has risen by a record13% since the beginning of May, when the full effects of the financial crisis began to hit home." (Observer, 28 December) RD

Food for Thought

Top US army officials said, “ A $160 billion future combat systems modernization program managed by Boeing Co. and SAIC Inc. was on budget and on track.” (Socialist Standard, Nov. 2008).Yet $30 billion A year would eliminate world hunger. So much for capitalism’s priorities. John Ayers

A DEADLY TRADE

"Soldiers beheaded as drug cartels step up terror to protect $15bn-a-year trade. The discovery of a dozen decapitated bodies scattered across a city in Mexico has become the latest symbol of the terrifying price this country is paying for drug consumption in America. Nine of the corpses were found on a busy street in Chilpancingo, an hour's drive from the tourist resort of Acapulco, yards from where the Govenor of Guerrero state was later to participate in a religious procession." (Times, 23 December) RD

THATS HOW IT WORKS

Capitalism is a cruel society - millions of children die from lack of food, clean water or basic medical treatment while millionaires live lives of luxury and privilege. The recent economic crisis has got supporters of capitalism even using language similar to socialists. "James Rowlands, the policy officer of the Royal Institute of Chartered Surveyors, said: "We would like to see VAT cut across the board to 5 per cent. Thousands of homes should not be allowed to stand empty while people are homeless or suffering from poor living conditions." (Times, 22 December)
Of course Mr Rowlands still supports the system as his reference to tax cuts shows, but for such a supporter to say of capitalism "Thousands of homes should not be allowed to stand empty while people are homeless ..." illustrates the craziness of capitalism. He might use words like "should not be allowed" but that contradiction of “Ownership” and “Social Need” is the very basis of capitalism. RD

The Environment again

Global Warming – no problem! Would you believe The Toronto Star reported (15 Nov 2008) that, “ A rock that is plentiful in Oman can be harnessed to soak up the most prominent greenhouse gas, carbon dioxide at a rate that could slow global warming…” This rock, Peridotite, converts carbon dioxide into solid minerals such as calcite. This may be a reason for celebration, but it has to be excavated, processed, advertised and sold, and, if it can’t be sold at a profit, it won’t be done.Recycling is in trouble because the world commodity prices for metal, glass, plastics etc. has fallen well below the cost of recovery. Local municipalities are having to pay large sums to store their recycling until the price recovers. A great insight to the ‘invisible hand of the Market’. John Ayers

ENVIRONMENTALLY FRIENDLY?

"I’m referring to the latest over-the-top innovation, the recent introduction of two showers for use by first-class passengers on Emirates A380 super jumbo jets. The showers are obviously not an environmental step forward, given the additional fuel needed to carry enough water to let all 14 first-class passengers have two showers, if they want. In fact, said Andrew J. Parker, an Emirates senior vice president whose duties include the carrier’s environmental affairs, first-class passengers have not been using the showers to the extent Emirates originally anticipated when it allotted 500 kilos (slightly more than half a ton) of weight for the additional water. ...Meanwhile, it isn’t clear whether the first-class A380 passengers have cut back on showers because of environmental concerns, or merely because they don’t want to take themselves out of their private compartments and away from the free Champagne. Nor is it clear whether they might object to showering in the future with recycled water on that long flight to the other side of the world. But hey, everybody has to sacrifice." (New York Times, 22 December) RD

A JOB WITH PROSPECTS

" Scott Hines is a bloodhound who tracks down delinquent debtors. He enforces High Court judgments against defaulters and his caseload is rising as the economy slows. If your business owes money and Mr Hines knocks on your door, you are in for a lousy day. He rarely leaves empty-handed. ...But Mr Hines, 36, is having a lousy day of his own. He was out at 6am on this cold, bright London morning. But by 10.30am he has collected a big, fat zero. One metaphorical and literal cul-de-sac is just off Charlotte Street. The offices of a fashion wholesaler that owes £3,000 are shuttered and empty. “That happens a lot,” Mr Hines says, “By the time the courts have processed the case, the debtors have disappeared.”... An East End boy made good in a sharp suit and raincoat. Mr Hines is evasive on the question of his performance-related pay. Remuneration consultants say a High Court enforcement officer can earn more than £60,000 a year. For the hard-boiled Mr Hines the occupational hazards include being chased out of kebab shops with carving knives. Debt collectors can expect a prosperous new year as banks and suppliers seek repayment from retailers that traded poorly over Christmas. Claire Sandbrook, Mr Hines’s boss, is unapologetic that her debt collection business, Shergroup, is thriving as the downturn deepens. “That is the nature of the beast,” she says, “We deal in people’s misfortune. And the best way through that is to do the job professionally.’’ Shergroup deploys 25 enforcement officers to cover the whole of England and Wales."
(Financial Times, 17 December) RD

Food for Thought

A November 20th. article in the Toronto Star by David Hulchanski, Quotes,
“ It wasn’t too long ago that our language did not include terms like good jobs or bad jobs or the working poor. How could you work and be poor?"
Times have certainly changed. In the early 1970s about two- thirds of the city of Toronto’s neighbourhoods were middle income – within 20% of the average individual income. By 2006 that percentage had declined to just one third. The point is that in the 1970s most people thought that prosperity was here to stay, the fact being, within capitalism prosperity and security are all too fleeting. John Ayers

NO WAR EQUALS NO CAUSALITIES

Flanked by tanks and under the cover of a smoke screen, Scottish guards charge
into action on the Egyptian front at El Alamein during the second world war.
Were the brightest at the front?

"Being dumb has its benefits. Scottish soldiers who survived the second world war were less intelligent than men who gave their lives defeating the Third Reich, a new study of British government records concludes. The 491 Scots who died and had taken IQ tests at age 11 achieved an average IQ score of 100.8. Several thousand survivors who had taken the same test - which was administered to all Scottish children born in 1921 – averaged 97.4. The unprecedented demands of the second world war – fought more with brains than with brawn compared with previous wars - might account for the skew, says Ian Deary, a psychologist at the University of Edinburgh, who led the study. Dozens of other studies have shown that smart people normally live longer than their less intelligent peers. "We wonder whether more skilled men were required at the front line, as warfare became more technical," Dear says." (New Scientist, 20 December)

As they ponder such questions we wonder if the learned psychologists ever considered the case of all the members of the Socialist Party who managed to survive two world wars because we figured they were wars that were not fought in the interest of the working class. They survived these bloodbaths because they knew that wars were fought for markets and trade routes not ideologies. Does that make them dumber or more intelligent? RD

UPPER CLASS ARROGANCE

"Zimbabwe's farms are ruined, its economy has evaporated, and its people have begun to starve and die of cholera. What better time to call a feast? According to reports in Zimbabwe's domestic press on Thursday, President Robert Mugabe and delegates to the annual conference of his ruling Zanu-PF Party will chomp their way through 124 cattle, 81 goats and 18 pigs over the course of their deliberations in the central town of Bindura. "Even if no more beasts are donated," said Geoffrey Nyarota, managing editor of thezimbabwetimes.com, referring to the practice of delegates donating animals to the leadership, "124 head of cattle is an inordinately large quantity of beef." With 5,000 delegates expected to attend, he added, it worked out to "40 delegates per bovine over four days - that is not to mention the pork, the goat, the maize-meal, the rice, among other basic foodstuffs currently in acute shortage throughout Zimbabwe." (Yahoo News, 19 December) RD

C. OF E. SLUMP

"In one of the most holy weeks in the Christian calendar, a report says that in just over a generation the number of people attending Church of England Sunday services will fall to less than a tenth of what they are now. Christian Research, the statistical arm of the Bible Society, claimed that 2050 Sunday attendances will fall below 88,000. Compared with just under a million now." (Observer, 21 December) RD

POLITICAL REALTY

Bianca Jagger participating in a demonstration during the United Nations climate
change conference in Poznan, Poland

"The politicians just don't seem to get the seriousness of the global warming crisis. Scientists attending the recent UN climate conference in Poznan, Poland, complained that the gap between political rhetoric and scientific reality on climate change is growing."It doesn't matter what the politicians promise," said French climate scientist Phillipe Ciasis. "Even if we stop emissions growing today, the world will still warm by 2 °C - a lot more in some places. It is too late to prevent that." Ciais was at Poznan to present the latest findings of the Global Carbon Project, a network of scientists that monitors how humans are influencing the natural carbon cycle. While politicians boast of their progress in cutting CO2 emissions, in the real world the gas is actually accumulating at an accelerating rate. Emissions have risen 28% already this decade, compared with 9% for the whole of the 1990s, said Ciais." (New Scientist, 20 December)
This is another example of politicians making sympathetic noises about the environment but in practice to cut emmissions may put them at a disadvantage against their international competitors. If they put themselves at a disadvantage in the quest for profits you can be sure the environment will not be a factor they will consider. RD

POVERTY AND ABUNDANCE

"Nearly half of the population of the Democratic Republic of Congo may not live to 40 years of age, the UN Development Programme said in a report. It said that 75% lived below the poverty level - less than a dollar a day. More than half (57 per cent) had no access to drinking water or to basic health care (54 per cent) while three out of ten children were poorly nourished. The report highlighted the paradox of a country so rich in mineral resources suffering such poverty. Human rights groups say the battle in the east for control of mineral riches such as tin ore, gold and coltan is part of the problem." (Times, 18 December) RD

ANOTHER EXPERT BITES THE DUST

"Among the most astonishing statements to be made by any policymaker in recent years was Alan Greenspan's admission this autumn that the regime of deregulation he oversaw as chairman of the Federal Reserve was based on a “flaw”: he had overestimated the ability of a free market to self-correct and had missed the self-destructive power of deregulated mortgage lending. The “whole intellectual edifice,” he said, “collapsed in the summer of last year.”
(New York Times, 14 December) RD

PROFITS VERSUS HEALTH

"With America's obesity problem among kids reaching crisis proportions, even junk food makers have started to claim they want to steer children toward more healthful choices. In a study released earlier this year, the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention reported that about 32 percent of children were overweight but not obese, 16 percent were obese, and 11 percent were extremely obese. Food giant Pepsi Co. for example, points out on its website that "we can play an important role in helping kids lead healthier lives by offering healthy product choices in schools." The company highlights what it considers its healthier products within various food categories through a "Smart Spot" marketing campaign ... But are wellness initiatives like Smart Spot just marketing ploys? Such moves by the food industry may seem to be a step in the right direction, but ultimately makers of popular junk foods have an obligation to stockholders to encourage kids to eat more--not less--of the foods that fuel their profits, says David Ludwig, a pediatrician and co-author of a commentary published in October in the Journal of the American Medical Association that raises questions about whether big food companies can be trusted to help combat obesity." (newsday.com, 16 December) RD