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