CAPITALISM ISN'T WORKING

Women spreading wet rice to dry in Bangladesh after record rains in July

Scientist and development experts across the globe are racing to increase food production by 50% over the next two decades to feed the world's growing population, yet many doubt their chances despite a broad concenus that enough land, water and experise exists. The number of hungry people in the world rose to 1.02 billion this year, or nearly one in seven people, according to United Nations Food and Argriculture Organisations, despite a 12 year concentrated effort to cut the number. The global recession added at least 100 million people by depriving them of the means to buy enough food, but the numbers were inching up even before the crisis, the United Nations noted in a report last week. "The way we manage the global agriculture and food security system doesn't work" said kostas G Stamoulis, a senior economist at the organisation. " There is this paradox of increasing global food production, even in developing countries, yet there is hunger."

( The New York Times, 22 October 09) RD

NO OLD BANGERS HERE

LEXUS

"Ferrari, Lamborghini, Maserati, Corvette, Lotus -- you can name all the ultra high-end sports vehicles in the auto industry and none of these cars hail from Japan, home of the Camry, Corolla, Civic and other family-oriented models. But the Lexus LF-A is finally ready for production after nine years in development. Just 500 units of the most powerful and most expensive car Toyota has ever produced will be available worldwide. The car offers 560 horsepower, a top speed of 202 miles per hour (325 kilometers per hour), your choice of 12 shades of leather and a price tag of over €255,000." (Independent, 22 October) RD

LAZY WORKERS?

Chris Kelsey, right, director of the C.R. England truck driving school in Burns
Harbor, Ind., received several hundred applications for an administrative
assistant position that was eventually filled by Tiffany Block, 28.

"As soon as the job opening was posted on the afternoon of Friday, July 10, the deluge began. C.R. England, a nationwide trucking company, needed an administrative assistant for its bustling driver training school here. Responsibilities included data entry, assembling paperwork and making copies. It was a bona-fide opening at a decent wage, making it the rarest of commodities here in northwest Indiana, where steel industry layoffs have helped drive unemployment to about 10 percent. When Stacey Ross, C. R. England’s head of corporate recruiting, arrived at her desk at the company’s Salt Lake City headquarters the next Monday, she found about 300 applications in the company’s e-mail inbox. And the fax machine had spit out an inch-and-a-half thick stack of résumés before running out of paper. By the time she pulled the posting off Careerbuilder.com later in the day, she guessed nearly 500 people had applied for the $13-an-hour job. “It was just shocking,” she said. “I had never seen anything so big.”

(New York Times, 21 October) RD

It often takes over three years following the death of a construction worker before a company is brought to trial and convicted.

Trade Unions are continually forced to pursue a reassessment of Health and Safety legislation. The employers in the Building Industry Management are again under scrutiny by the building workers’ union UCATT, here are a couple of extracts from the Autumn issue of the ‘Building Worker’ which only demonstrates once again that while we continue to live in capitalism, ‘running fast to stay still ‘ will always be no solution for workers.
Another young Scottish construction worker killed
UCATT Regional Secretary Harry Frew was shocked and saddened to hear of a young worker killed on a construction site in Troon, Ayrshire
" We will await the results of the HSE investigation but it is clear from the recent fatality figures that the construction industry is just as dangerous as at the time of the major health and safety summits called by the government in 2001 and 2004, we hope the upcoming summit will bring about a cultural change in the industry to health and safety. This only adds to the figures of workplace fatalities spiralling out of control this year. This year construction deaths leapt by 31%.”Last year 79 people were killed on construction sites and the HSE acknowledge that at least 70 per cent of those deaths are caused by management failures to take adequate health and safety measures.Yet Another construction fatality hits Scotland
UCATT Regional Secretary Harry Frew was shocked and saddened to hear of a young worker killed on a major construction site at the Earlsburn windfarm near Stirling. A 19 year old man died after falling 100ft while working inside a turbine.
He stressed: " This only adds to the figures of workplace fatalities which is spiralling out of control this year. Last year construction deaths leapt by 25%."Last year 79 people were killed on construction sites and the HSE acknowledge that at least 70 per cent of those deaths are caused by management failures to take adequate health and safety measures.
"The continued scale of fatalities reinforces our demand for Corporate Killing legislation, " said Mr Frew.A UCATT commissioned report has revealed that convictions of companies responsible for the death of construction workers have fallen by nearly three-quarters. The reports findings come at a time when construction deaths are rising.The report Levels of Convictions and Sentencing Following Prosecutions Arising from Deaths of Workers and Members of the Public in the Construction Sector undertaken by the Centre for Corporate Accountability on behalf of construction union UCATT, has been published to coincide with Workers Memorial Day (April 28). It reveals that in a six-year period from 1998 to 2004 Health and Safety Executive prosecutions in construction deaths plummeted from 42 per cent to just 11 per cent. The study covered the deaths of 504 construction workers. It often takes over three years following the death of a construction worker before a company is brought to trial and convicted.

Vatican thumbs up for Karl Marx after Galileo, Darwin and Oscar Wilde

Karl Marx, who famously described religion as “the opium of the people”, has joined Galileo, Charles Darwin and Oscar Wilde on a growing list of historical figures to have undergone an unlikely reappraisal by the Roman Catholic Church.
L’Osservatore Romano, the Vatican newspaper, said yesterday that Marx’s early critiques of capitalism had highlighted the “social alienation” felt by the “large part of humanity” that remained excluded, even now, from economic and political decision-making.

“We have to ask ourselves, with Marx, whether the forms of alienation of which he spoke have their origin in the capitalist system,” Professor Sans wrote. “If money as such does not multiply on its own, how are we to explain the accumulation of wealth in the hands of the few?”
(Times 22nd October 09)

THE STATISTICS BEHIND

Sheri West operated a shelter for homeless people, but last year she lost her
home in Cleveland and had to sleep in her car.

We are all familiar with the awful figures of unemployment and the re-possession of homes of the working class but behind these statistics lie the real shock of the lack of confidence to the personality of the people involved. Here is a particular nasty example of the trauma that can be experienced by even relatively comfortable workers who lose their jobs and their homes.

"Cleveland — The first night after she surrendered her house to foreclosure, Sheri West endured the darkness in her Hyundai sedan. She parked in her old driveway, with her flower-print dresses and hats piled in boxes on the back seat, and three cherished houseplants on the floor. She used her backyard as a restroom. The second night, she stayed with a friend, and so it continued for more than a year: Ms. West — mother of three grown children, grandmother to six and great-grandmother to one — passed months on the couches of friends and relatives, and in the front seat of her car. But this fall, she exhausted all options. She had once owned and overseen a group home for homeless people. Now, she succumbed to that status herself, checking in to a shelter.
“No one could have told me that in a million years: I’d wake up in a homeless shelter,” she said. “I had a house for homeless people. Now, I’m homeless.” Growing numbers of Americans who have lost houses to foreclosure are landing in homeless shelters, according to social service groups and a recent report by a coalition of housing advocates." (New York Times, 19 October)

The real lesson to be learned from Sheri's plight is that there is no security for members of the working class. That is how capitalism operates - one minute in charge of a homeless shelter, the next being homeless yourself! RD

DOLE QUEUE RECRUITMENT

"Aided by a bleak job market, the U.S. military met all of its recruitment goals in the past year for the first time since it became an all-volunteer force in 1973, the Pentagon said on Tuesday. Military services have been stretched thin by conflicts in Afghanistan and Iraq, giving added weight to recruitment efforts as President Barack Obama considers sending another 40,000 U.S. troops to Afghanistan next year. The United States already has 67,000 troops in Afghanistan and about 119,000 in Iraq. Pentagon officials said recruitment gains were fueled by the deepest U.S. recession since the Great Depression and an unemployment rate nearing 10 percent." (Reuters, 13 October) RD

THIS IS COMMUNISM?

Reuters – BYD (Build Your Dreams) president Wang Chuanfu sits inside
the BYD E6 Electric Car

"China's super-rich have bounced back from the financial crisis with a vengeance, and China now has more known dollar billionaires than any other country bar the United States, according to a new report released on Tuesday. The annual Hurun Report said China has 130 known dollar billionaires, up from 101 last year. The number in the United States is 359 while Russia has 32 and India 24, according to Forbes magazine. China's rich are getting richer, with the average wealth on the list $571 million, up almost one-third from last year, said compiler Rupert Hoogewerf." (Reuters, 13 October) RD

Food for Thought

Reading Notes
"Competition is the complete expression of the battle of all against all which rules in modern society. This battle, a battle for life, for existence, for everything, in case of need a battle of life and death, is fought not between the different classes of society only, but also between individual members of these classes.
Each is in the way of the other, and each seeks to crowd out all who are in his way, and to put himself in their place. The workers are in constant competition among themselves. The power-loom weaver is in competition with the hand-loom weaver, the unemployed or ill-paid hand-loom weaver with him who has work or is better paid, each trying to supplant the other. But this competition of the workers among themselves is the worst side of the present state of things in its effect upon the worker, the sharpest weapon against the proletariat in the hands of the bourgoisie.
Hence the effort of the workers to nullify this competition by associations, hence the hatred of the bourgoisie towards these associations, and its triumph in every defeat which befalls them".
Frederick Engels, "The Condition of the Working Class in England" (p108)

UNDERNOURISHED

"Yesterday the UN's annual report on global food security confirmed that more than a billion people - one sixth of the world's population - are undernourished and said that the number was growing even before the economic crisis, which had only made the situation worse."
(Times, 15 October) RD

PROFITS BEFORE PEOPLE

Capitalism is a ruthless society; nothing must stand in the way of profit making. The original dwellers of North America were slaughtered and driven off the land they had inhabited for thousands of years. The fate of the indigenous tribes of Australia were likewise crushed and marginalised, but in the Amazon region of South America we have this lust for profit carried to even more awful extremes - the complete destruction of the Akuntsu people. A once proud group of several hundred now have only five survivors. "Much of the Akuntsus' story is – for obvious reasons – undocumented. For millennia, they lived in obscurity, deep in the rainforest of Rondonia state, a remote region of western Brazil near the Bolivian border. They hunted wild pig, agoutis and tapir, and had small gardens in their villages, where they would grow manioc (or cassava) and corn. Then, in the 1980s, their death warrant was effectively signed: farmers and loggers were invited to begin exploring the region, cutting roads deep into the forest, and turning the once verdant wilderness into lucrative soya fields and cattle ranches. ... The only way to prevent the government finding out about this indigenous community was to wipe them off the map. At some point, believed to be around 1990, scores of Akuntsu were massacred at a site roughly five hours' drive from the town of Vilhena. Only seven members of the tribe escaped, retreating deeper into the wilderness to survive." (Independent, 13 October) RD

No work , No hope

Almost one in three households in Glasgow have no wages coming in, official statistics have revealed.

Figures released by the Scottish Government show 62,000 households in the city - 28.9% of all homes - had no working-age adult in employment last year. That puts Glasgow behind the national average of 24%. The stats also reveal a shocking 22,900 children in Glasgow live in a workless home.

The director of the Glasgow-based Poverty Alliance, branded the figures a "scandal".

"There is little doubt that unemployment means that people will struggle to afford the basics in life. For these families heating their home and putting food on the table is the challenge. In the 21st century that is quite clearly a scandal. We know that children in workless households, living in poverty, will have less chance in life than children from better-off backgrounds.We know that their education will be adversely affected and they are more likely to suffer health problems. The danger is that we perpetuate a cycle of worklessness and limited opportunity."

Capitalism cannot be reformed for the benefit of the working class and sooner the well meaning realise this fact , the sooner , we can begin the dismantling of the capitalist system .

EVEN MORE MUST STARVE

"Tens of millions of the world's poor will have their food rations cut or cancelled in the next few weeks because rich countries have slashed aid funding. The result, says Josette Sheeran, head of the UN's World Food Programme (WFP), could be the "loss of a generation" of children to malnutrition, food riots and political destabilisation. "We are facing a silent tsunami," said Sheeran in an exclusive interview with the Observer. "A humanitarian disaster is unrolling." The WFP feeds nearly 100 million people a year." (Observer, 11 October) RD

A NICE LITTLE EARNER

"A company producing swine flu vaccine for Britain has paid millions of pounds in out-of-court settlements after being accused of fraudulently overcharging for medicine. Baxter, the US pharmaceutical giant, reached at least seven huge settlements over the past 12 months, some of them for multimillion-dollar sums. The company has been accused of fraud amid allegations that the company had overpriced medicines by as much as 1,300%." (Observer, 11 October) RD

BE AFRAID, VERY AFRAID

Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, who has been sparring with President
Obama over whether Iran is developing the technology nuclear weapons.

"The Pentagon comptroller sent a request to shift the funds to the House and Senate Appropriations and Armed Services Committees over the summer. The comptroller said the Pentagon planned to spend $19.1 million to procure four of the bombs, $28.3 million to accelerate the bomb's "development and testing", and $21 million to accelerate the integration of the bomb onto B-2 stealth bombers. The notification was tucked inside a 93-page "reprogramming" request that included a couple hundred other more mundane items. Why now? The notification says simply, "The Department has an Urgent Operational Need (UON) for the capability to strike hard and deeply buried targets in high threat environments. The MOP is the weapon of choice to meet the requirements of the UON." It further states that the request is endorsed by Pacific Command (which has responsibility over North Korea) and Central Command (which has responsibility over Iran)." (ABCNews, 6 October) RD

HYPOCRICY IN THE CITY

Church and the City: bankers are said to have lost their way, with the financial
crisis being partly blamed on a culture of greed

Banking, insurance companies and the myriad financial off-shoots that make up the City of London are central to the running of modern capitalism. They produce nothing of course but then neither do the industrial capitalist class. It is probably a bit unfair to say the City produces nothing. It certainly produces nothing useful, but it certainly produces hypocrisy in large doses. "As bankers last month began gearing up for a bumper bonus season, Rowan Williams, the archbishop of Canterbury and head of the Anglican church, bemoaned their lack of repentance.
“We haven’t heard people saying, ‘Well, actually, no, we got it wrong and the whole fundamental principle on which we worked was unreal, empty’,” Mr Williams told bankers in September. Such rhetoric echoes that of Lord Turner over the summer, when the chairman of the Financial Services Authority spoke in moralistic terms about the need for banking to become "socially useful" again. Hector Sants, his chief executive, has even explained his move to a regulatory job in terms of a sense of Christian “duty” to give something back to society after a 30-year career in money-making." (Financial Times, 7 October)
We expect Archbishops to utter hypocritical nonsense, after all it is their stock in trade, but when financiers rant on about "Christian duty" and banking becoming "socially useful" it is a bit hard to bear. Here’s to the day when banks and other financial institutes are part of our unlamented history along with all its apologists, both religious and secular. RD

OUTDATED MARXISM?

An oft repeated criticism of the ideas of world socialism is that it is based on a 19th Century critic of capitalism - Karl Marx. What could he know of the developments of 21st Century society ask our ultra-modern opponents.
If they had switched on their super duper plasma TV screens (or do they view on ipod now?) on Friday 9 October they would have seen a Channel 4 programme entitled Unreported World, Peru: Blood and Oil. It depicted the bloodshed and military violence that has accompanied the Peruvian government’s decision to auction off large parts of the Amazon countryside that has been used for thousands of years by the indigenous people.
"For the first time isolated indigenous groups are uniting to fight the government's plans to auction off 75% of the Amazon - which accounts for nearly two thirds of the country's territory - to oil, gas and mining companies. ... These would allow companies to bypass indigenous communities to obtain permits for exploration and extraction of natural resources, logging and the building of hydroelectric dams." (Times, 9 October)
What we have here is the modern enactment of what Marx described in Capital in 1867 as the "so-called primitive accumulation" in Europe from the 16th century onwards. As he so aptly put it when commenting on the Enclosure Acts and the Highland Clearances - "The expropriation of the agricultural producer, of the peasant, from the soil, is the basis of the whole process." Far from being out of date Marxism is bang up to date with the current developments of the capitalist system. RD

A HORRENDOUS FUTURE

Every day in the newspapers and on the TV we are confronted by earnest politicians who assure us that they are doing everything possible to lessen the prospects of another nuclear horror story like Hiroshima or Nagasaki. A great deal of concern is being shown by these politicians as to whether Iran has a nuclear bomb. This concern seems a trifle ludicrous when the USA has 9,400 nuclear warheads and Russia has 13,000 of them. In fact when they are being frank, as the writer of this newspaper report is, they know that nuclear disarmament is an impossibility inside capitalism.
"Later this month United Nations inspectors will visit Iran's secret nuclear facility near Qom to find out if the Islamic republic is about to become the world's tenth nuclear power. Whatever they find, the world already has enough nuclear weapons to destroy every single nation on the planet. With approximately 23,000 warheads, there is enough deadly material for 2.3 million blasts the size of Hiroshima. ... The world is committed to nuclear disarmament in principle, in practice it will never happen." (Times, 6 October) RD

OOPS, THERE GOES ANOTHER WARHEAD

"For all the recent uproar over Iran's nuclear program, little attention has been paid to the fact that the country which first provided Tehran with nuclear equipment was the United States. In 1967, under the "Atoms for Peace" program launched by President Eisenhower, the US sold the Shah of Iran's government a 5-megawatt, light-water type research reactor. This small dome-shaped structure, located in the Tehran suburbs, was the foundation of Iran's nuclear program. It remains at the centre of the controversy over Iranian intentions, even today."
(Yahoo News, 2 October) RD

THE SUPER RICH

"Castles in France. Islands in the Caribbean. Private jets. With a collective $1.27 trillion at their disposal, the members of The Forbes 400 could buy almost anything. How about a country? A quick glance at the CIA Fact Book suggests the individual fortunes of many Forbes 400 members are as big as some of the world's economies. Bill Gates, America's richest man with a net worth of $50 billion, has a personal balance sheet larger than the gross domestic product (GDP) of 140 countries, including Costa Rica, El Salvador, Bolivia and Uruguay. The Microsoft (MSFT) visionary's nest egg is just short of the GDP of Tanzania and Burma. Warren Buffett, who lost $10 billion in the past 12 months and is this year's Forbes 400 biggest dollar loser, still has a fortune the size of North Korea's economy at $40 billion." (Yahoo Finance, 2 October) RD

Food for Thought 2

How capitalism works

1 – Hope for cheap HIV drugs dims reports the Toronto Star (19/Sept/09).
Canada's Access to Medicines Regime is now five years old but only one country, Rwanda, has benefited. Progress at a glacial pace is one way to prevent change.
2 – Apparently Osama Bin Laden's ex body guard told The Toronto Star that he, Laden, didn't target civilians. He hit targets and civilians happened to be around! But wait! Isn't that exactly what "collateral damage" is that our `leaders' use to excuse murder? Seems they're all the same, surprise.
3 - More obfuscation – The news is that US taxpayers are now profiting from the bailouts of the financial system( New York Times). They are touting $4 billion in profits but ignore that trillions were spent in the first place. Sounds good anyway.
4 – Despite the well-earned reputation of the dirtiest site on earth for the Alberta tar sands oil project, the Canadian government is expected to formulate its climate change plan so that Alberta and Saskatchewan could carry on as usual, while the rest of the country, with much smaller problems vis-à-vis pollution would be restricted. You can bet that they will be screaming, not about beating climate change, but about the advantage given to the Western Provinces. John Ayers

WELCOME TO CAPITALISM

Modern Slave

"After crossing half of Africa and surviving a perilous boat trip from Libya in search of a better life in Italy, Boubacar Bailo is now contemplating suicide. One of an army of illegal immigrants hired to harvest tomatoes in the Puglia region, Bailo squats in a fetid cardboard shack restlessly waiting for a call to the fields. Every year thousands of immigrants, many from Africa, flock to the fields and orchards of southern Italy to scrape a living as seasonal workers picking grapes, olives, tomatoes and oranges. Broadly tolerated by authorities because of their role in the economy, they endure long hours of backbreaking work for as little as 15-20 euros ($22-$29) a day and live in squalid makeshift camps without running water or electricity."

(Reuters, 28 September) RD

who owns the north pole - part 18

The Northwest Passage should have a more Canadian name to assert Canada's claim over the Arctic waterway, says Yukon Liberal MP Larry Bagnell.Bagnell presented a motion in the House of Commons this week, calling on the government to rename the route the Canadian Northwest Passage or the Canadian Arctic Passage.A name change could make to clear to the rest of the world that the Northwest Passage is part of Canada, Bagnell said.
"We claim it to be part of our internal waters, which gives us a lot more authority and control over it," he told CBC News

The United States and Europe have claimed that the Northwest Passage is an international waterway, while Canada has held its position that it's an internal passage.

A SHORT BRUTAL LIFE

"As India's rich get richer; the child death rate soars in the slums. Despite living in the world's fastest-growing economy, millions of Indian mothers do not have access to the care their children desperately need. India's growing status as an economic superpower is masking a failure to stem a shockuing rate of infant deaths among the poorest people. Nearly two million children under five die every year in India one every 15 seconds - the highest number anywhere in the world. More than half die in the month after birth and 400,000 in their first 24 hours." (Observer, 4 October) RD

Bankruptcy Millions

Oct. 5: For decades, Simmons Bedding Company, an iconic American business, was a
prized holding for top private equity firms. But the mattress maker has fallen
into bankruptcy for the first time in 133 years.

For most of the 133 years since its founding in a small city in Wisconsin, the Simmons Bedding Company enjoyed an illustrious history.
Presidents have slumbered on its mattresses aboard Air Force One. Dignitaries have slept on them in the Lincoln Bedroom. Its advertisements have featured Henry Ford and H. G. Wells. Eleanor Roosevelt extolled the virtues of the Simmons Beautyrest mattress, and the brand was immortalized on Broadway in Cole Porter’s song “Anything Goes.”
Its recent history has been notable, too, but for a different reason.
Simmons says it will soon file for bankruptcy protection, as part of an agreement by its current owners to sell the company — the seventh time it has been sold in a little more than two decades — all after being owned for short periods by a parade of different investment groups, known as private equity firms, which try to buy undervalued companies, mostly with borrowed money.
For many of the company’s investors, the sale will be a disaster. Its bondholders alone stand to lose more than $575 million. The company’s downfall has also devastated employees like Noble Rogers, who worked for 22 years at Simmons, most of that time at a factory outside Atlanta. He is one of 1,000 employees — more than one-quarter of the work force — laid off last year.
But Thomas H. Lee Partners of Boston has not only escaped unscathed, it has made a profit. The investment firm, which bought Simmons in 2003, has pocketed around $77 million in profit, even as the company’s fortunes have declined. THL collected hundreds of millions of dollars from the company in the form of special dividends. It also paid itself millions more in fees, first for buying the company, then for helping run it. Last year, the firm even gave itself a small raise.
Wall Street investment banks also cashed in. They collected millions for helping to arrange the takeovers and for selling the bonds that made those deals possible. All told, the various private equity owners have made around $750 million in profits from Simmons over the years.
How so many people could make so much money on a company that has been driven into bankruptcy is a tale of these financial times and an example of a growing phenomenon in corporate America.
Every step along the way, the buyers put Simmons deeper into debt. The financiers borrowed more and more money to pay ever higher prices for the company, enabling each previous owner to cash out profitably. New York Times 5th October

Food for Thought

- Quebec leads the way in fighting poverty (Carol Goar, Toronto Star, 09/Sept/09) with a 40% reduction over the last decade. The province now strives to lift the remaining 875 000 above the poverty line, and is winning the war according to UQTR professor who assembled the statistics.

- Other places can't make that claim. Canada, as a whole, saw poverty reduced in 2007, but the expectation is that 2008 figures will climb back to where they were previously, or worse. Women, as usual, lead the way, especially women living on their own.

- The summer job picture was so bad that many students will have to take on increased debt to continue their studies. U of Toronto has seen a 12% increase in financial aid applications.

- Labour Day 2009 dawned with 500 000 more jobless Canadians than last year, and job losses are expected to continue.

- And that's the way it goes under capitalism. Gains in one area are sure to be lost in another, and so it will continue until private ownership is defeated. John Ayers

THE GOOD OLD DAYS

The Pope and other religious zealots always hark back to a supposed golden age when Christianity was all-powerful throughout the world. The trouble with modern society according to them is down to the lessening of Christian morals. Here is the latest example of this fallacy.
"Brno, Czech Republic – Pope Benedict XVI said Sunday that all of Europe — and not only this ex-communist country — must acknowledge its Christian heritage as it copes with rising immigration from other cultures and religions. The second day of Benedict's pilgrimage to this highly secular country was marked by a joyous open-air Mass that drew tens of thousands of pilgrims and a sober message for the entire continent. "History has demonstrated the absurdities to which man descends when he excludes God from the horizon of his choices and actions," Benedict said." (Associated Press, 27 September)
Ah, the good old days of Christian supremacy. The burning of so-called witches, the torture of heretics and the mass slaughter of the church-sponsored crusades. Not to mention the support of dictatorships and the suppression of science when it did not accord with Christian "truths". RD

Who Owns the North Pole - part 17

Our Nordic Saga simply carries on and on , as the war drums continue to beat .Further to previous post we now have a Times article reporting that competition for resources in the Arctic Circle could provoke conflict between Russia and Nato, a newly appointed commander at the alliance warned yesterday. Admiral James Stavridis said that military activity and trade routes would be potential sources of competition around the polar cap.

His assessment comes after warnings from Anders Fogh Rasmussen, the Nato Secretary-General, who said this week that climate change had “potentially huge security implications” for Nato. The thinning ice cap is opening up a new Northwest Passage trade route, while it is estimatedthat previously inaccessible oil worth $90 billion (£56 billion) lies beneath ice in the Arctic Circle.

DEMOCRACY, US STYLE

Gore Vidal, novelist and essayist in press interview. "I would have liked to have been president, bit I never had the money. I was a friend of the throne. The only time I envied Jack was when Joe (JFK's father) was buying him his Senate seat, then the Presidency. He didn't know how lucky he was." (Times, 30 September) RD

WHAT HOUSING PROBLEM?

This overview shows the district of Mongkok in Hong Kong.

"Home prices in overcrowded Hong Kong have traditionally been high, but when it comes to having the most expensive residential properties in the world, the Chinese metropolis has never seriously challenged cities like New York, London and Tokyo. Until now. In another demonstration of how the recession is shaking up the global financial order, two luxury Hong Kong apartments have just gone on the market for a stunning $38.7 million each. If the developer, Sun Hung Kai, finds buyers at that price, the three-level penthouse dwellings, perched atop the 93-storey Cullinan towers with sweeping views of Hong Kong's harbour, could well qualify as the world's most expensive apartments." (Time, 24 September) RD

RECRUITMENT REALITY

"The number of former servicemen in prison or on probation or parole is now more than double the total British deployment in Afghanistan, according to a new survey. An estimated 20,000 veterans are in the criminal justice system, with 8,500 behind bars, almost one in 10 of the prison population. The proportion of those in prison who are veterans has risen by more than 30% in the last five years. The study by the probation officers' union Napo uncovers the hidden cost of recent conflicts. The snapshot survey of 90 probation case histories of convicted veterans shows a majority with chronic alcohol or drug problems, and nearly half suffering from post-traumatic stress disorder or depression as a result of their wartime experiences on active service." (Guardian, 24 September) RD

SPARE PARTS FOR SALE

"British victims of the credit crunch are offering to sell their kidneys for £25,000 or more to help pay debts, an investigation by The Sunday Times has revealed. At least a dozen adverts have appeared on the internet offering kidneys for sale from British “donors”. ...Nearly 7,000 people in the UK are waiting for kidney transplants and 300 died last year while on the waiting list." (Sunday Times, 27 September) RD

ALL RIGHT FOR SOME

"What recession? Harvey Nichols department store in Knightsbridge says it has just sold a £15,000 hand-made leather handbag, by US designer Lana Marks. The sale of the multi-coloured alligator leather Positano bag shows that high-end shoppers are still prepared to pay huge sums for a handbag. ...Classic French couture brands such as Lanvin are also enjoying the flight to quality, she said, while classic leather jackets and £1,000-a-pair distressed jeans from Balmain are flying off the shelves." (Observer, 27 September) RD

THE HIDDEN RECESSION

"The biggest and most secretive gathering of ships in maritime history lies at anchor east of Singapore. ...Here, on a sleepy stretch of shoreline at the far end of Asia, is surely the biggest and most secretive gathering of ships in maritime history. Their numbers are equivalent to the entire British and American navies combined; their tonnage is far greater. Container ships, bulk carriers, oil tankers - all should be steaming fully laden between China, Britain, Europe and the US, stocking camera shops, PC Worlds and Argos depots ahead of the retail pandemonium of 2009. But their water has been stolen. They are a powerful and tangible representation of the hurricanes that have been wrought by the global economic crisis; an iron curtain drawn along the coastline of the southern edge of Malaysia's rural Johor state, 50 miles east of Singapore harbour. ...It is so far off the beaten track that nobody ever really comes close, which is why these ships are here. The world's ship owners and government economists would prefer you not to see this symbol of the depths of the plague still crippling the world's economies."

(Daily Mail, 28 September) RD

CONTRADICTION

Prince Charles still drives an Aston Martin given to him by the Queen on his 21st birthday

"The Prince of Wales is urging people to give up their cars in favour of walking and public transport to try to reduce carbon emissions. The Prince, who has two Jaguars, two Audis, a Range Rover and still drives an Aston Martin given to him by the Queen on his 21st birthday, said developers had a duty to put public transport and the pedestrian at the heart of their housing schemes." (Daily Telegraph, 21 September) RD

A MURDEROUS SYSTEM (3)

"As of Sunday, Sept. 20, 2009, at least 4,345 members of the U.S. military had died in the Iraq war since it began in March 2003, according to an Associated Press count. The figure includes nine military civilians killed in action. At least 3,473 military personnel died as a result of hostile action, according to the military's numbers. The AP count is three fewer than the Defense Department's tally, last updated Friday at 10 a.m. EDT. The British military has reported 179 deaths; Italy, 33; Ukraine, 18; Poland, 21; Bulgaria, 13; Spain, 11; Denmark, seven; El Salvador, five; Slovakia, four; Latvia and Georgia, three each; Estonia, Netherlands, Thailand and Romania, two each; and Australia, Hungary, Kazakhstan and South Korea, one death each." (Associated Press, 20 September) RD

A MURDEROUS SYSTEM (2)

Gulbenis Badurova, 33, in her house with a photograph of her husband Sirazhutdin
Umarov, 32 who was kidnapped, tortured and killed

"It is unreported in Russia and virtually unnoticed by the rest of the world. Yet just five months after the long war in Chechnya was officially declared to be at an end, the northern Caucasus has seen a big upsurge in violence. Five hundred people have been killed so far this year, double last year’s toll. It has become the Kremlin’s most pressing problem after the economic crisis. In Chechnya itself, where security forces commanded by its 32-year-old president, Ramzan Kadyrov, have been accused of numerous atrocities, there have been nearly 90 abductions this year. The targets included Natalia Estemirova, a leading human rights campaigner who was kidnapped and murdered in July." (Sunday Times, 20 September) RD

A MURDEROUS SYSTEM

Mexican Army soldiers secure the site were the two Federal Police officers were
murdered, in Ciudad Juarez

"A new spate of violence has pushed the homicide rate in the Mexican border town of Ciudad Juarez to an unprecedented 1,701 murders, breaking the record set just a year earlier in 2008. Officials reported 14 new violent deaths over the weekend in the town, which sits across the border from Texas, pushing the homicide rate past last year's record level of 1,653 murders. In all, 22 people were killed on Saturday night and Sunday in the two Mexican states of Sonora and Chihuahua, which border the US states of Arizona, New Mexico and Texas." (Yahoo News, 20 September)

THE CLASS DIVIDE

The basic tenet of a socialist analysis of capitalism is that it is a class divided society, with the owning class owning all the means of production and the working class forced to work for a wage or a salary because of their non-ownership. The contrast between the lives of workers and capitalists is huge, but a recent example in India shows just how great the contrast can be in one city.
"Mumbai is desperately overcrowded. More than half its 18 million inhabitants live in shantytowns, many, like Mr Prakash, paying significant rents for the privilege. ..."We ask God to help," said Mr Prakash, who earns about 7,500 (£94) rupees a month, "but in this city I don't think good property is within the grasp of ordinary men."
Contrast that pitiful existence shared by about 9 millions of his fellows in Mumbai with that of a capitalist in the same city.
"Look out across the skyline of south Mumbai and it is not hard to pick out the new pad being constructed by Mukesh Ambani, India's richest man - a building said to have been inspired by the Hanging Gardens of Babylon and said to be the world's first $2 billion (£1.2 billion) home. The 27-storey glass tower, named Antilla after the mythical Atlantic island, is said to feature three helipads, nine elevators a cinema, a health club, a crystal-encrusted ballroom, several "safe" rooms, a garden level half way up and 168 car parking spaces. The structure will have about 400,000 sq ft of interior space and will require about 600 servants to run it." (Times, 24 September)
A 27 storey house for him and his wife and three children may seem a bit excessive and we wonder about the 168 car parking spaces, but with that sort of loot to spend no doubt Mr Ambani has a lot of friends visiting him! RD

HUNGER AMIDST PLENTY

Capitalism is a social system that produces all sorts of contradictions. Tremendous technical advances should mean a better society but inside capitalism it leads to better ways to maim, kill and destroy. Improvements in the production of food should lead to a happier world but it produces exactly the opposite. "The number of hungry people will pass 1 billion this year for the first time, the U.N. World Food Program (WFP) said, adding that it is facing a serious budget shortfall." (Yahoo News, 16 September)
While a million human beings suffer starvation producers of food are destroying it to force up prices. "An emergency meeting over the collapse in the price of milk will be held by Europe's agriculture ministers. The crisis talks have been convened by Sweden as farmers in mainland Europe continue their "milk strike", dumping hundreds of thousands of litres of milk on farmland.... In an attempt to end the milk lakes and. butter mountains, the European Commission is unwinding its dairy support system." (Times, 24 September)
Butter mountains and milk lakes while a billion starve - capitalism has certainly outlived its usefulness! RD

THIS IS PROGRESS?

Chinese People's Liberation Army (PLA) soldiers march pass Tiananmen Square in
Beijing on early September

"China's military capability has taken a "quantum leap" thanks to a modernisation drive and its weaponry rivals that of Western countries, the nation's defence minister said in an interview Monday. The comments by Liang Guanglie came in an interview published by Xinhua news agency 10 days before China is set to roll out a range of advanced weaponry in a National Day military parade. "Our capabilities in waging defensive combat under modern conditions have taken a quantum leap," Liang was quoted as saying. Liang rattled off a list of achievements in military technology and hardware by the People's Liberation Army (PLA) including military-use satellites, advance aircraft, tanks, artillery and missiles." (Yahoo News, 21 September) RD

JESUS GOES SHOPPING

"The Church of England must shed its middle-class "Marks & Spencers" image and become more akin to Aldi, according to the Bishop of Reading. The Right Rev Stephen Cottrell described his frustration that the established church is regarded as the option for the "suited and booted" only. Jesus, he said, would probably have shopped at Aldi and Asda." (Times, 22 September) RD

GLOBAL WARMING STRIKES

It was like waking up to see that Armageddon is upon us

"Australia's biggest city, Sydney, has been shrouded in red dust blown in by winds from the deserts of the outback. Visibility is so bad that international flights have been diverted and harbour ferry traffic disrupted. Emergency services reported a surge in calls from people suffering breathing problems. Children and the elderly have been told to stay indoors. Sydney's landmarks, including the Opera House, have been obscured, and many residents are wearing masks. Traffic has been bumper-to-bumper on major roads. The dust blanketing eastern parts of New South Wales has been carried by powerful winds that snatched up tons of topsoil from the drought-ravaged west of the state." (BBC News, 23 September) RD

GROWING OLD DISGRACEFULLY

"Almost half of all care homes in Scotland do not meet national standards on eating, drinking and nutrition, leaving vulnerable, elderly residents at risk of weight loss and dehydration, according to a new report. The report, published today by the Care Commission, also found that more than a quarter of care homes did not screen their residents for dehydration. ... Almost a third (29 per cent) did not screen people for malnutrition, while 34 per cent did not screen people for dehydration when they were admitted to a care home." (Times, 18 September) RD

NHS SAVIOUR?

"People should pray every day if they wish to remain healthy, according to the new Archbishop of Westminster, the Most Rev Vincent Nichols. In his first pastoral letter to his diocese since he was installed in May, Archbishop Nichols warns that stable, fruitful and healthy lives cannot be achieved without daily prayer." (Times, 18 September) RD

IRONIC?

Some villagers have not seen any benefit from the neighbouring oil
installation.

"Critics of the US invasion six years ago often said its ultimate aim was to control Iraq's vast deposits of oil. So it is ironic, perhaps, that the first foreign oil company to start drilling operations in the country since 2003 should be from America's growing rival, China. A year since it signed a 23-year, $3bn (£1.84bn) deal to exploit the small al-Ahdab field, in Wasit province, south of Baghdad, China's National Petroleum Corporation (CNPC) has already struck oil. ... Iraq boasts the world's third largest reserves of oil, with many potential fields not even tapped.

(BBC News, 20 September) RD

A BILLION GO HUNGRY

A young Thai boy and other Bangkok, Thailand, residents receive a food handout
outside the Poh Teck Tung

"Food aid is at a 20-year low despite the number of critically hungry people soaring this year to its highest level ever, the United Nations relief agency said Wednesday. The number of hungry people will pass 1 billion this year for the first time, the U.N. World Food Program (WFP) said, adding that it is facing a serious budget shortfall." (Yahoo News, 16 September) RD

FUTURE PROSPECTS?

"One in five of Britain’s young people are now jobless, official figures showed yesterday, as total unemployment reached its highest level for 14 years. In the three months to July, the total of unemployed people aged 16 to 24 rose by nearly 60,000, to 947,000, the biggest jump since 1992. Their jobless rate is now 19.7 per cent. The total UK jobless figure for the three months rose by 210,000 to 2.47 million, the highest total since May 1995. The official unemployment rate is now 7.9 per cent. Those claiming unemployment benefit in August reached 1.61 million, up 24,400 from July and 693,700 ahead of August last year. Of these, 483,200 — nearly one in three — were aged 16 to 24." (Times, 17 September) RD

A BOOM FOR SOME

"India is condemning another generation to brain damage, poor education and early death by failing to meet its targets for tackling the malnutrition that affects almost half of its children, a study backed by the British Government concluded yesterday. The country is an “economic powerhouse but a nutritional weakling”, said the report by the British-based Institute of Development Studies (IDS), which incorporated papers by more than 20 India analysts. It said that despite India’s recent economic boom, at least 46 per cent of children up to the age of 3 still suffer from malnutrition, making the country home to a third of the world’s malnourished children. The UN defines malnutrition as a state in which an individual can no longer maintain natural bodily capacities such as growth, pregnancy, lactation, learning abilities, physical work and resisting and recovering from disease. ... "It's the contrast between India's fantastic economic growth and its persistent malnutrition which is so shocking." Lawrence Haddad, director of the IDS, told The Times. He said that an average of 6,000 children died every day in India; 2,000-3,000 of them from malnutrition." (Times, 17 September) RD

POVERTY IS WORLDWIDE

When reporting poverty in the world the international media often assume that it is a condition that exists only in Africa or Asia but here is an example of its very real existence in the so-called developed world.
"Nearly 60 per cent of Canadians would have trouble paying the bills if their paycheque was delayed by one week, a new poll suggests. The Canadian Payroll Association survey says not only are the majority of Canadians living paycheque-to-paycheque, but they have little ability to put money away for their retirement. The survey, released Monday, said 59 per cent of Canadians would have trouble making ends meet if they missed a paycheque."
(Canadian Press, 14 September)
This paycheque-to-paycheque existence is the norm for most members of the world's working class. RD

MORE MADNESS

"A Tibetan mastiff called Yangtze River Number Two is believed to have broken the record as the most expensive dog having been sold to a Chinese woman for a reported four million yuan (£350,000). In keeping with its status the dog - 18 months old and 80cm high - arrived at its new owner's home in stupendous style. According to local reports, a motorcade of 30 cars cruised to the airport in Xi'an, the capital of Shaanxi province, to take delivery of Yangtze, and a throng gathered to fete the arrival of the city's new resident." (Times, 11 September) RD

ETHICS AND CAPITALISM

"The Body Shop, the cosmetics giant that claims to source ingredients from companies that protect local farmers' rights, buys palm oil from an organisation that pushed for the eviction of peasant families to develop a new plantation. Daabon Organics, a Colombian firm that provides the British chain with 90% of all its palm oil, was part of a consortium that asked the courts to remove farmers from a sprawling ranch 320km north of the capital Bogotá with a plan to grow African palm. Police in riot gear evicted the farmers in July. Now solicitors for 123 peasant farmers and their families are appealing against the decision with the backing of a British charity. They say that some locals had lived and worked on the land for more than 10 years and had already applied for the right to own it under Colombian law before the consortium bought it." (Observer, 13 September) RD

SOCIETY AND SELFISHNESS

“The Age of Empathy” (written by Franz de Waal) is best seen as a corrective to the idea that all animals—human and otherwise—are selfish and unfeeling to the core. It offers not only plenty of examples to the contrary, but also some hints as to how and why empathy evolved, and how it might be related to self-awareness. In the case of humans, one might think that it is hardly necessary to get the professional opinion of a zoologist on the matter. Don’t we already know that people can be rather good at co-operating, and are not always mercilessly hostile towards their rivals? Yet Mr de Waal does manage to spring some pleasing and intriguing surprises on this score: how many people are aware, for example, that most soldiers are unwilling to fire at the enemy, even in battle?" (Economist, 3 September) RD

SCRAPPING SHIPS AND WORKERS

Largely untrained workers break the ships apart using hand-tools

"The economic downturn and a subsequent fall in demand for cargo ships has meant that for many ship owners it makes better sense to send an ageing ship to the scrap yard rather than to keep her maintained but idle. But while the recession may have been good news for the owners of the ship-breaking firms, it is very bad news for the environment. The scrapping of ships in South Asia – Bangladesh and Pakistan are also major scrappers – is a rudimentary, almost medieval affair. Ships are allowed to beach on the sands and then armies of men with little or no training pull apart the ships with hand-tools. Toxic substances such as mercury and asbestos are allowed to seep into the environment. One of the attractions to the ship owners of having their vessels dismantled here is that the ship breakers in this part of the world receive little of the regulatory oversight that takes place in Europe or the US. For the ship owners, it means they can dispose of their ships more cheaply, while for the scrappers it means bonanza-time. ....Campaigners point out that the working conditions for the often undocumented migrant labourers from India's poorest states, can be highly dangerous and there are regular reports of injuries and fatalities. Earlier this month, six workers died when a fire broke out at one of the plots. Activists say the impoverished workers have no bargaining power." (Independent, 31 August) RD

POVERTY IN THE USA

"In the recession, the nation’s poverty rate climbed to 13.2 percent last year, up from 12.5 percent in 2007, according to an annual report released Thursday by the Census Bureau. The report also documented a decline in employer-provided health insurance and in coverage for adults. The rise in the poverty rate, to the highest level since 1997, portends even larger increases this year, which has registered far higher unemployment than in 2008, economists said. The bureau said 39.8 million residents last year lived below the poverty line, defined as an income of $22,025 for a family of four." (New York Times, 10 September) RD

CAPITALISM'S PRIORITIES

As various pieces of legislation pass through the US governmental machine it is often observed that the process is torturously slow. An example of this tardy procedure has recently been revealed in the proposed Health Bill. No such delay is evidenced when it comes to military budgets.
"With hardly any debate, a powerful Senate committee Thursday approved President Barack Obama's $128 billion request for military operations in Iraq and Afghanistan for the budget year beginning in October. The move came as anxiety is increasing on Capitol Hill over the chances for success in Afghanistan and as Obama weighs whether to send more forces to the country. The war funding was approved as the Appropriations Committee voted unanimously for a $636 billion spending measure funding next year's Pentagon budget." (Huffington Post, 10 September)
The health of the American working class is obviously of less importance than the military needs of the owning class. RD

LAZY WORKERS?

"One in four of people of retirement age cannot afford to leave their jobs and will have to continue working indefinitely, researchers have found.
"Falling house prices, shrinking pension pots and the need to support financially dependent children have created a perfect storm for retirement plans," said Simon Lough, chief executive of Heartwood Wealth Management, which commissioned the independent research of almost 2,000 people aged 55 and over. "Since we conducted this research last year, baby boomers have found themselves forced to stay in semi-retirement for even longer as many simply can't afford to stop working." The number of older employees has risen by 97,000 in the past year. There are now 1.33 million workers above retirement age in the UK. The survey demonstrates the bleak choice facing 11.5 million pensioners in the economic downturn: despite having saved throughout their working lives for a comfortable retirement, many have to carry on working or try to make do with a drastically reduced income." (Observer, 13 September) RD

A TEN MILLION POUND VIEW

The newspapers are full of stories of unemployed workers suffering the indignity of their homes being re-possessed. Everyday we hear of the crashing property market and the resultant misery suffered by hard working families. The story is completely different for members of the capitalist class of course.
"At £10m it must be the most expensive sea view in Britain. A Russian multi-millionaire liked a plot of land on the coast at Sandbanks in Dorset so much that he was happy to pay £5m for it. The plot was already occupied by a substantial house, but he did not much like it so is paying the same again to have it knocked down and replaced with something better. The purchase last September by Maxim Demin, 39, a petrochemicals trader, shows that at the top end of the property market lavish spending has survived the slowdown." (Sunday Times, 13 September)

There is nothing unique about the property market. In every market - housing, education, medical treatment, holidays and entertainment - "lavish spending has survived the slowdown".
RD

CENSORSHIP IN THE USA

"Creation, starring Paul Bettany, details Darwin's "struggle between faith and reason" as he wrote On The Origin of Species. It depicts him as a man who loses faith in God following the death of his beloved 10-year-old daughter, Annie. The film was chosen to open the Toronto Film Festival and has its British premiere on Sunday. It has been sold in almost every territory around the world, from Australia to Scandinavia. However, US distributors have resolutely passed on a film which will prove hugely divisive in a country where, according to a Gallup poll conducted in February, only 39 per cent of Americans believe in the theory of evolution."
(Daily Telegraph, 11 September) RD

THE RISE OF THE BNP

Admission FREE

All Welcome

Introduction

The recent rise of the BNP as exemplified by them gaining local council seats and now returning two European Members of Parliament in this year's election makes it necessary for us to have a look at this organisation and what it stands for. Towards that end we intend to deal with this introduction to the subject in three parts.

Overviews

1. The past of far right organisations

All during the 20th century there has been a far right element in British politics. Inside the Conservative Party we have had such organisations as the League of Empire Loyalists. They saw the threat of a diminishment of the British Empire as the great evil to be fought against. With the advent of the Russian revolution in 1917 and the rise of the Labour party to replace the Liberal party, this element became more and more evident. It was during the Thirties however that the far right became a more potent force in British politics. The rise of the NAZI party in Germany and Mussolini in Italy were a great stimulus to far right ideas in the UK. Mosley and his fascists supporters were supported during the 1930s by such establishment institutions as the Daily Mail.

2. The causes behind the BNP rise.

The most obvious reason has been put down to immigration. Indeed when Enoch Powell made his infamous "rivers of blood" speech his sole reason for proposed action was immigration. It is worth noting that his greatest support was not from re-tired colonels regretting the demise of the British Empire but from London dock workers. This I think gives us a clue to their present rise. One of the most important reasons for the rise of the SNP was the failures of the Labour Party, and likewise a powerful ingredient to the rise of the BNP. While a core element of the support of the BNP is nationalism and racism it is the loss of support for the Labour party that has been a large factor in their growth. The growth of unemployment has also led to the "British jobs for British people" nonsense.

3. How to deal with this organisation.

The left wing political parties have no doubts about the actions to take. Do not allow them a platform. Break up their meetings. Use violence against their demonstrations. In fact in the past when the SPGB attempted to have a public debate with the far right it was broken up by left wingers. "No platform for fascists" is their oft repeated mantra. We take the opposite view. Only by debate can their stupid ideas be exposed. The present upsurge is probably only a temporary movement but the SPGB should nevertheless analyse why it is happening and be prepared to deal with their growth.

WAR THREATENS ONCE AGAIN

Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez, left, says goodbye to Russian Prime
Minister Vladimir Putin after a meeting near Moscow on Thursday.

While we have a capitalist system there will always be war and threats of war, this is the latest,

of course they are for peaceful purposes.

CARACAS, Venezuela - Venezuela's leftist President Hugo Chavez said Friday that his country is buying Russian missiles with a range of 186 miles as part of a series of arms deals with Moscow.
Chavez, who on Friday returned from a ten day-tour of Africa, Asia and Europe that included a visit to Russia, is also negotiating the purchase of 100 T-72 and T-90 tanks from Moscow. "We signed some military agreements with Russia. Well, soon some little rockets are going to be arriving," he said during a speech to supporters from a balcony at Venezuela's presidential palace. (msnbc 12th September 09)

BUSINESS AS USUAL

"The world will suffer another financial crisis, former Federal Reserve chief Alan Greenspan has told the BBC.
"The crisis will happen again but it will be different," he told BBC Two's The Love of Money series. He added that he had predicted the crash would come as a reaction to a long period of prosperity. But while it may take time and be a difficult process, the global economy would eventually "get through it", Mr Greenspan added.
"They [financial crises] are all different, but they have one fundamental source," he said. "That is the unquenchable capability of human beings when confronted with long periods of prosperity to presume that it will continue." (BBC News, 9 September) RD

MARKET MADNESS

"Christophe Voivenel is a dairy farmer, and the son of dairy farmers, in one of the finest dairy regions in the world. At some point in the next few days, he will commit an act of sacrilege. He will rise, as usual, at 6am to milk his 60 cows and then throw away the warm, white liquid which is his family's life's blood. "You have to understand how hard that will be," he said. "It is like an artist destroying his own painting or a craftsman smashing one of his own creations." Mr Voivenel, 43, a farmer near Vire in lower Normandy, is about to go on strike. Tens of thousands of dairy farmers in 14 European countries, including some in Britain, are preparing to join the first ever pan-European "milk strike": an attempt to push up the farm-gate price of milk, which has almost halved in the last 18 months." (Independent, 29 August) RD

CAPITALISM IN ACTION

"Changing weather patterns have decimated crops in several of the world's poorest countries this year, leaving millions in need of food aid and humanitarian workers warning about the dangerous effects of climate change. Farmers in Nepal have been able to produce only half their usual crop, said an Oxfam International report released last week. Livestock are dying of malnutrition in Yemen, according to the humanitarian news service IRIN. And the Red Cross is bracing for the effects of heavy rains across 16 West and Central African nations. All three are the result of extended atypical weather events -- drought, rain, or untimely combinations of both -- in places where subsistence farmers have long depended on predictability. In Nepal, more than 3 million people -- about 10 percent of the population -- will need food aid this year, said Oxfam." (Yahoo News, 2 September) RD

HUMANS ARE SOCIAL BEINGS

Hurricane Katrina: A disabled woman is rescued in Pascagoula, Miss., Aug. 29,
2005

"But ask any New Yorker about, say, the blackout of 2003, and you’re likely to get not a shudder of horror but wistful reminiscences about people spontaneously directing traffic when the signals went dark. As Rebecca Solnit documents in “A Paradise Built in Hell,” a landmark work that gives an impassioned challenge to the social meaning of disasters, this same sort of positive feeling has emerged in far more precarious circumstances, from the San Francisco earthquake of 1906 to Hurricane Katrina. Disasters, for Solnit, do not merely put us in view of apocalypse, but provide glimpses of utopia. They do not merely destroy, but create. “Disasters are extraordinarily generative,” she writes. As the prevailing order — which she elliptically characterizes as advanced global capitalism, full of anomie and isolation — collapses, another order takes shape: “In its place appears a reversion to improvised, collaborative, cooperative and local society.” (New York Times, 1 September) RD

Reading Notes

The industrial epoch alone has built up every spot between these old houses to win a covering for the masses whom it has conjured hither from the agricultural districts and from Ireland; the industrial epoch alone enables the owners of these cattle sheds to rent them for high prices to human beings, to plunder the poverty of the workers, to undermine the health of thousands, in order that they alone, the owners, may grow rich.In the industrial epoch alone has it become possible that the worker scarcely freed from feudal servitude could be used as mere material, a mere chattel; that he must let himself be.
"The Condition of the WorkingClass in England", p.87).

A CHILLING PROSPECT

"Iran has until late September to respond to the latest international proposal aimed at stopping the Islamic Republic from developing a nuclear weapon. Under the proposal, Iran would suspend its uranium enrichment program in exchange for a U.N. Security Council commitment to forgo a fourth round of economic and diplomatic sanctions. But if diplomacy fails, the world should be prepared for an Israeli attack on Iran's suspected nuclear weapons facilities. As Adm. Michael Mullen, the chairman of the U.S. Joint Chiefs of Staff, recently acknowledged: "The window between a strike on Iran and their getting nuclear weapons is a pretty narrow window." If Israel attempts such a high-risk and destabilizing strike against Iran, President Obama will probably learn of the operation from CNN rather than the CIA. History shows that although Washington seeks influence over Israel's military operations, Israel would rather explain later than ask for approval in advance of launching preventive or pre-emptive attacks. Those hoping that the Obama administration will be able to pressure Israel to stand down from attacking Iran as diplomatic efforts drag on are mistaken." (Los Angles Times, 30 August) RD

THE FAILURE OF CHARITY

Women and children gather at a food distribution centre in Ethiopia's Oromiya
region

"The spectre of famine has returned to the Horn of Africa nearly a quarter of a century after the world's pop stars gathered to banish it at Live Aid, raising £150m for relief efforts in 1985. Millions of impoverished Ethiopians face the threat of malnutrition and possibly starvation this winter in what is shaping up to be the country's worst food crisis for decades. Estimates of the number of people who need emergency food aid have risen steadily this year from 4.9 million in January to 5.3 million in May and 6.2 million in June. Another 7.5 million are getting aid in return for work on community projects, as part of the National Productive Safety Net Program for people whose food supplies are chronically insecure, bringing the total being fed to 13.7 million." (Independent, 30 August) RD

Food for Thought

On the environmental front, Peter Gorrie (Toronto Star, 22/08/09) wrote,
"Lobbyists hired by the American coal industry sent forged letters, purporting to be from non-profit groups opposed to the US climate-change plan, to members of Congress. The oil industry is organizing 20 'public rallies' supplying props, speakers, and busloads of placard-carrying company employees – their chants well rehearsed – to mimic grass roots opposition to the Clean Energy and Security Act."
Would we expect anything different form a profit driven system? Meanwhile, in China, the world's new leader in greenhouse gas emissions, there is a push to become the world leader in electric power, not, say manufacturers, to save the planet but to make money and conserve oil. Seventy per cent of China's energy comes from coal and with another 5 billion tons in the ground, we can expect China to continue to be number one. John Ayers

Food for Thought

Despite the cheerleaders, read Economists' use of number crunching to show that the recession is over, other numbers show the opposite.Toronto’s jobless rate rose to 11.5% from 8.5% one year ago, and welfare cases rose 12 000 to 87 450 over the same period. For the 18-24 age group, unemployment is up to 20%, leaving many students to face more debt to be paid off after graduation. Great system!
- Then there are the effects of capitalism. The Brighton Independent reported that 19%, or 1 000 soldiers and police serving in Afghanistan have been discharged for psychological strain, a jump of 50% over the last year.
- Imagine this – you buy a condominium in Florida for $430 000 forRetirement. Then the market crashes and all other buyers walk away. You are left as the sole tenant in a 32 -storey building! Of course, there are plenty of homeless people who could fill it up, but they don’t count without the cash. Only in capitalism could you encounter something this stupid!
John Ayers

Early Death: Greater Returns!

After the mortgage business imploded last year, Wall Street investment banks began searching for another big idea to make money. They think they may have found one.
The bankers plan to buy “life settlements,” life insurance policies that ill and elderly people sell for cash — $400,000 for a $1 million policy, say, depending on the life expectancy of the insured person. Then they plan to “securitize” these policies, in Wall Street jargon, by packaging hundreds or thousands together into bonds. They will then resell those bonds to investors, like big pension funds, who will receive the payouts when people with the insurance die. The earlier the policyholder dies, the bigger the return — though if people live longer than expected, investors could get poor returns or even lose money. (New York Times September 6th)
It's your patriotic duty. no doubt.

CHAMPAGNE SOCIALISTS!

In the past when Southern Californian fruit growers were faced with a glut and falling prices they let the fruit rot on the trees. When castigated for this apparent madness they pointed out the quite logical capitalist argument that they would have to pay pickers wages for fruit they couldn't sell. When again they were taken to task for this argument they were offered by some charitable organisations the prospect of them supplying free labour and they would distribute to the needy. Again the fruit growers had an answer to that.
"Every year charitable organisations buy at cut-rate prices our unsold surplus. Giving it away would even spoil that source of income for us."
The fruitgrowers may have appeared heartless but from an economic standpoint letting the fruit rot seemed the logical action. A similar solution is being followed today by French wine producers.
"Hopes of a glut of cheap champagne are set to be dashed when vineyards meet next week to agree on a big cut in production to prop up prices. With sales falling, producers may be ordered to leave up to half their grapes to wither on the vine in an attempt to squeeze the market." (Times, 29 August)
Capitalism is a crazy system, obviously inside socialism we would deal with the problem by drinking more champagne! RD

HARD TIMES

"The wealth of Russia's richest children, offspring of the super-rich oligarchs, has been shrunk by the credit crunch. Only 54 children now stand to inherit at least $1 billion each, compared with 112 before the crisis. The money the "mini-garchs" could inherit has also shrunk, from a collective $450 billion in 2008 to $107 billion, according to a league compiled by Finans magazine. Top of the list is Yusuf Alekperov, 19, only child of Vagit Alekperov, president of Lukoil, who is worth an estimated $7.6 billion. The children of Roman Abramovich, owner of Chelsea FC, fill the next five places , with $2.7 billion each." (Times, 1 September) RD

Food for Thought

How capitalism works 3

The same author ( Davie Oliver ) describes how the banking industry isWinning the battle against being regulated after receiving billions in handouts (Toronto Star, 09/08/09) ,

"You would think after global financiers triggered the current, unprecedented world-wide recession and credit crisis, they might embrace inevitable reforms that their reckless conduct made necessary. The US government pumped life sustaining cash into 20 banks but their powerful lobbying groups are resisting any legislation to curtail their activities, they jacked up credit card interest to 27% and more, have hastily foreclosed on borrowers, heedless of Washington’s plea to do the opposite, they have set aside billions for employee bonuses and they still lend a high 35 times their capital reserves.

'Olive did manage to come up with,' But, as profit maximizing institutions, their imperative is to focus even harder on making money."

Doesn't this describe every enterprise in capitalism? John Ayers

Food for Thought

How capitalism works 2
Those who hoped for a better system of organizing capitalism,more social justice etc after the governments of the world bailed out the'bad boys' of the system, are going to be sorely disappointed according toDavid Olive Toronto Star (The Era of Big Government already in retreat).He posits that the greedy are flexing their muscles again and ready tostep back into their natural position of command. He cites the town hallmeetings across America where mention of 'Obamacare', a pale version ofuniversal health care is greeted with Nazi salutes and Sieg Heil!Organised of course by those big boys who want to continue raking in themoney at the expense of a system based on human need. Unfortunately, Olive doesn’t mention that this is just the norm in capitalism. John Ayers

Food for Thought

How capitalism Works 1
The Toronto Star (22/08/09) recently revealed that the pharmaceutical industry is involved in a scam to give academic credence to its advertising claims. Common in the US, it has now arrived in Canada. Mcgill University (Montreal) professor Barbara Sherwin lent her name to an article extolling the virtues of estrogen that was, in fact,ghost written by the company itself. Any underhand method of promoting commodities and making money is, apparently, acceptable, and any scientist can be bought. John Ayers

A MODEST SORT

Away back in the bad old days we had ruthless dictators with over-bearing ideas of their own importance but today's leaders are much more modest fellows. In the past we had people like the despot Stalin who regularly polled over 100% at "elections", nowadays in "democratic" Belarussia we have more self-effacing creatures at the helm of state. "The Belrussian strongman, Alexander Lukashenko, admitted that he rigged the 2006 election because, he said, his popularity was so vast that the true margin of victory was unbelievable and had to be cut from 93 to 80 per cent." (Times, 28 August) RD

NOT SO HOLY

Japanese high school students wearing masks in Tokyo May 17, 2009

"Catholic churchgoers in Tokyo will have to do without holy water for now as the H1N1 influenza outbreak prompts Japanese churches to take steps to prevent the spread of the virus. The Franciscan Chapel Centre in Tokyo is one church that has decided to empty the holy water basins, into which parishioners traditionally dip their fingers and bless themselves by making a sign of the cross." (Yahoo News, 21 August) RD

GREEN SHOOTS? WHERE?

"Network Rail has revealed plans to cut 1,800 maintenance jobs ... Fujitsu, the computer giant, is cutting 1,200 jobs - one in ten of its workforce in Britain. Lloyds Banking Group is shedding a further 200 posts in a fresh round of cuts that takes its total job losses this year to 7,500. About 850 jobs were lost with the closure of 142 Allied Carpets outlets by administrators. GKN, the engineering group, announced that a further 1,200 workers would be made redundant, in addition to the 2,500 jobs already cut. In the three months to June, unemployment climbed to 7.8 per cent - its highest level in 13 years. Economists are predicting that jobless numbers will soon pass three million to rival the worst levels of the 1980s. (Times, 28 August) RD