SHARING THE PAIN?

In the recent downturn in world stock markets it was common for politicians and economic "experts" to express the view that during this recession everyone would have  to share  the pain, we would all have to make economic sacrifices in order to speed a return to so-called prosperity. It would seem though that the "sharing" was to say the least a little uneven. "Carlos Slim's Mexican holdings from mining to communications helped him beat Bill Gates and Warren Buffett on the stock market for the second straight year, and gains in 2011 may widen his lead atop the global wealth list. Slim's publicly disclosed holdings surged about 37 per cent to $70 billion in 2010, with wireless carrier America Movil SAB representing $48.9 billion of that wealth, according to data compiled by Bloomberg. The 22 per cent jump in shares wasn't enough for Buffett to catch up, and Gates's fell, hurting his returns even as he spread his investments to other companies." (Bloomberg, 2 February) Those workers unfortunate enough to suffer from wage cuts, unemployment or foreclosure on their homes know all about sharing the pain unlike the likes of Slim, Buffett and Gates. RD

RELIGION AND MATERIALISM

Religious organisations are fond of lecturing about the evils of materialism and stressing the importance of spiritual values as opposed to mere physical gratification. It is a view expressed by amongst other religious outfits the Church of Scientology, but its leader David Misgavige is known to like the odd physical comfort. "The New Yorker reported claims from former members that Mr Misgavige lived a luxury lifestyle, flying chartered jets and having two chefs, five stewards, a fleet of cars and six motorcycles." (Times, 8 February) Such lavish compensations would be illegal for the leader of a tax-exempt body, but a spokesman for the organisation claimed that such perks were gifts from members to express their "love and affection" for Mr Misgavige. We seriously doubt if such "love and affection" as chartered jet travel and fleets of cars is spread to other members of Mr Misgavige's flock. RD

DEBT LADEN IN BIRMINGHAM

Any student of the Industrial Revolution will tell you of the important part played in its development by the city of Birmingham. It was one of the foremost cities in the new industrial society and a leading light in the  creation of undreamt wealth for the capitalist class. The picture for the working class is very different as depicted by a newspaper today in its description of a tower block in that city and its residents. "Residents of Tower House report that: 36% per cent are in debt - 47% of whom have cut back on basics such as food and heating; 15% have turned to pawnbrokers; 8% have borrowed from moneylenders." (Observer, 6 October) The immense wealth created by the working class has certainly not been enjoyed by the working class of that tower block in Birmingham nor its equivalent throughout capitalism worldwide. RD

THE WIDENING GAP

In an article describing the life of the extremely wealthy and the rest of us The Times recently laid out a list of some of these super-wealthy individuals living at present in London. The Indian billionaire Anil Agarwal worth $6.4 billion, the Russian Alisher Usmanov worth $7.2 billion and the Ukrainian Viktor Pinchuk a mere $3.1 billion. "The extravagance of the super-rich at a time when the vast majority of people are feeling the financial squeeze seems incongruous at best. But the reality is that the gap between the UHNWIs (ultra-high net worth individuals) and the rest is widening. Alan Greenspan, the former Chairman of the US Federal Reserve, said recently that high-income individuals, banks and corporations had rebounded from the global downturn, while pretty well everyone else struggled. ... The world's wealthiest 10 per cent now control 83 per cent of all assets." (Times, 5 February) When even the ultra-conservative Times can report on the widening class differences in capitalism the ultra-rich must be very convinced of the docility of the working class. Fellow workers - wake up! RD

FOOD FOR THOUGHT

A lesson learned? Just a week after the shooting rampage in Tucson, Arizona, that killed six people, thousands of shoppers browsed for guns at a trade show there. Assault rifles and semi-automatic pistols, including the Glock 9mm model used in the shooting, were on sale and no background checks are needed. Stall holder, Randall Record, explained, "People see it as either guns are going to get banned, or I'm going to get shot. Either way it drives sales."

Socialist know that unions are good for fighting a rearguard action against the worst of capitalism but that they are not revolutionary and will never bring socialism. We also recognize that they are increasingly drawn into the system itself, but it was a surprise to see right wing columnist, Angelo Persichilli (Toronto Star, Jan 16, 2011) praising Canadian autoworkers president Ken Lewenza for his part in the auto revival from the depths of two years ago. According to Persichilli, Lewensa had the courage to change the political activism of his predecessors and make the concessions necessary to help out the desperate situation. As usual, if you participate in the race to the bottom you are a great guy, if you stand up for your rights, you are vilified. The futility of reform, and how, in this case.
Finally, the cause of the Mexican hotel explosion last year has come to light. Rather than a build-up of swamp gas, it was a leakage from improperly installed gas pipes that mysteriously did not appear on the blueprint. Chalk another one down to corruption, graft, and greed. - The Toronto Star (Jan 8, 2011) asked the top 100 Canadian CEOs, who average $6.6 million in salary per annum, if they thought they were worth it. Only one replied and he was thankful his salary was set by the board and not him. Considering they have earned the average working man's annual salary by lunchtime of the second day (i.e. 155 times more) and do not produce anything useful or any surplus-value, I think the answer would be a resounding 'NO'. John Ayers

FOOD FOR THOUGHT

According to Jennifer Bain, (Toronto Star, Jan 15, 2011) food is so plentiful in Canada that our garbage cans are full of it. Apparently, we toss away 40 per cent of our edibles a year, valued at $27 billion.
Perhaps someone would care to explain why we have ever-growing line ups at the food banks. The quote, "when I fed the hungry I was called a hero, when I asked why there were starving people, I was called a communist" may apply quite well here.
Recently in Toronto, an unfortunate incident occurred. A man in bare feet and with obvious mental problems stole an unattended snow-plough and proceeded to run amok on the city streets. The police, unable to stop him, finally fired three shots into him but in the process, one constable was run down and killed. The officer was given a state funeral where 12 000 uniformed officers marched through city streets for hours and all major Toronto television stations interrupted normal programming for the entire day to bring wall to wall coverage of the event. All major national newspapers led with the story on the front page. The Saturday Hockey game in Toronto was delayed for a ceremony in his honour. The coverage was way over the top and a thinly disguised attempt at jingoism to make the public forget the black eye that the police have been getting over their handling of the G20 crisis that continues to bring forward incidents of police misconduct. That they can amass so much media support is truly staggering. John Ayers

feeding the poor

Mary's Meals, a Scots-based and Argyll-based charity, provides school meals in 16 of the world's poorest countries is now feeding half a million children.

Founder, Magnus MacFarlane-Barrow, said "There are still one billion children living in poverty, so our work is not done yet."

Sad to say that the work will never be done.

The necessity and prevalence of charity in a world capable of producing a sufficiency of food, clothing and shelter to easily satisfy the needs of all, is an obvious indication that something, somehow, somewhere, is rotten to the core. The socialist claims that it is capitalism. Capitalism automatically produces poverty which in its turn perpetuates charity. Eliminate the cause, and you eradicate the disease. Rather than deal simply and directly by providing ready access to storehouses of goods, as would occur in a sensible world, there are those who prefer instead to deliver the great mass of wealth to the privileged minority and present tear-drenched appeals for charity for the impoverished majority.

Charity! Sweet charity! Upheld as evidence of the innate goodness of man. Providing an outlet for the energies of people who feel that something ought to be done and who might otherwise find time to think about doing things really helpful. Indecent, unwholesome charity! Preying on the natural willingness of ordinary people to help one another, even to the extent of depriving their own of needed things. Charity! Symbol of a society that neither intends nor desires to end the conditions that ensure its existence.

One day the means for producing and distributing the needs of life will become the common property of all the people and will be operated for no purpose other than to provide abundance to all the members of society. On that day a socialist society will be established, bringing an end finally to exploitation, along with all the other abominations of capitalism, including charity.

IT BEGGARS BELIEF

"Beggars are to be cleared from the streets in Bangladesh during the cricket World Cup, which starts next month. The poorest are to be compensated for loss of earnings but most will be put into "welfare camps" until the event is over. ... According to some estimates there are 700,000 beggars in Bangladesh." (Times, 1 February) RD

ROLLING IN THE STUFF

"By Forbes' count, 69 billionaires from 20 countries are expected to attend the annual World Economic Forum confab, which starts tomorrow in the Swiss Alps town of Davos. The helicopters whirring above this afternoon suggest that some may have already arrived.  It may well be the greatest concentration of wealth in any one place. Their total net worth, as tracked by Forbes: $427 billion, greater than the combined gross domestic product of Israel and Egypt. The U.S. has at least 20 billionaires expected to make the trip, more than any other country. (Forbes, 25 January) RD

Wealth gap widens between super rich and rest of us.

Alan Greenspan - the legendary chairman of the United States' Federal Reserve - is the high priest of free market capitalism.

As a young man he was even a devotee and acolyte of arch libertarian writer, Ayn Rand.

Keep that pedigree in mind when you consider the striking observation he made in a television interview last summer:

"Our problem basically is that we have a very distorted economy, in the sense that there has been a significant recovery in our limited area of the economy amongst high-income individuals...Read link

This ,of course, is no surprise to socialists who have been pointing it out as an inevitable concomitant of capitalist economics.

If you are born poor you will most likely die poor.Whether this is in actual real terms ,or in relative terms, in relation to the amount of wealth produced, is neither here nor there.

What is crazy is the notion that capitalism can be reformed or tamed,or have its rapacious appetite curbed in any way.

Its goal, as Marx pointed out so long ago is,to, "Accumulate, accumulate".

"Accumulate, accumulate! That is Moses and the prophets! “Industry furnishes the material which saving accumulates.” ^[23] Therefore, save, save, i.e., reconvert the greatest possible portion of surplus-value, or surplus-product into capital! Accumulation for accumulation’s sake, production for production’s sake: by this formula classical economy expressed the historical mission of the bourgeoisie, and did not for a single instant deceive itself over the birth-throes of wealth. ^[24] But what avails lamentation in the face of historical necessity? If to classical economy, the proletarian is but a machine for the production of surplus-value; on the other hand, the capitalist is in its eyes only a machine for the conversion of this surplus-value into additional capital. " Link for above quote

Capitalist society is a parasitic economic system which sucks out the productive capacities of the vast majority,(working -class) to satisfy a minority class of owners of wealth(capitalist -class)..

The solution is to get rid of the monstrous system and replace it with socialism , a system of common ownership,democratic control and free access to all of society's wealth,everybody having the right to participate in decisions on how global resources will be used. It means nobody being able to take personal control of resources, beyond their own personal possessions.

This then,is in stark contrast to the reformism of the Left, S.S.P.,S.W.P., Solidarity, S.L.P.,or the Labour Party, (all of them result in a case of 'meet the new boss', same as the old one.) which leaves intact the waged- labour versus capital social system.

Socialism ,as we define it in its original context, before the Left besmirched the name in their failed experiments, is a revolutionary solution to capitalism's rationed access. Moreover, it is a real solution,one which ends wage-slavery, poverty, and war.

If a truly human society is to be created where we can relate to each other as members of a real community instead of as isolated atoms colliding on the market place, we need to create the conditions (common ownership of productive resources by the whole community) in which the market has no sense.

One where the organising tenet applied globally , instead of capitalistic, "..... "each man for himself, and the devil take the hindermost" ", is
replaced by, " From each according to their ability ..to each according to their needs".

FOOD FOR THOUGHT

As abominable and useless as locking people up in a cell is, the Canadian government is out to make it worse. Recently prison farms were shut down, including the one at Kingston that had a dairy herd ranking among the best in Ontario, an abattoir that served three hundred local farmers and supplied local shops with $3 million worth of farm produce, to say nothing of the accompanying rehabilitation value and skill development.
Prison building hit a new high (seven stories) or a new low as the latest jail in Ontario goes ahead with prefab modular building blocks that look like something out of a sci-fi picture. It's to cost $600 million in a time when crime is going down.
Finally, some sense coming from the phony war on drugs. The Latin American Commission on Drugs and Democracy basically came to the conclusion that the war on drugs is lost and its time to move away from the punitive aspect and focus on policies based on public health, human rights and common sense. (Toronto Star, Jan 23, 2011). Of course, removing money from the mix would do the trick right away. John Ayers

FOOD FOR THOUGHT

In the review of a book dealing with the mysteries of price, the Toronto Star (Jan 1, 2011) revealed that the amount the US government offered in compensation for lives lost on 9/11 ranged from $6.4 million for the families of the wealthiest victims to $250 000 for the families of the poorest people who died that day.
In the same review we are told that installing seat belts on US school buses would cost the equivalent of $40 million for each child's life likely to be saved (which probably explains why it has not been done). As we say, capitalists know the price of everything and the value of nothing. John Ayers

ALL RIGHT FOR SOME

"Andy Warhol once remarked that he liked "money on the wall". ...While economies crashed and governments slashed spending, an unprecedented number of incredibly wealthy people all over the world were effectively taking Warhol at his word. What they actually hung on their walls and stood in their rooms were Picassos, Modiglianis and Giacomettis, but at the mind-bending prices they paid for them, the effect was almost the same as if they had displayed a bunch of dollar bills or or more pertinently a bunch of Chinese yuan. Their spending spree meant that Christies, the world's largest auction house, announced yesterday sales of £3.3 billion ($5 billion) last year, a jump of 53 per cent on its 2009 performance and the highest total in the company's 245-year history." (Times, 28 January) RD

MINISKIRT MADNESS

"Russian Orthodox Church calls for dress code, says miniskirts cause 'madness'. A top official of the increasingly powerful Russian Orthodox Church has triggered a storm of outrage by calling for a "national dress code" that would force women to dress modestly in public and require businesses to throw out "indecently" clad customers. Women, said Archpriest Vsevolod Chaplin, can't be trusted to clothe themselves properly. "It is wrong to think that women should decide themselves what they can wear in public places or at work," he said Tuesday. "If a woman dresses like a prostitute, her colleagues must have the right to tell her that." "Moreover," Archpriest Chaplin added, "if a woman dresses and acts indecently, this is a direct route to unhappiness, one-night stands, brief marriages followed by rat-like divorces, ruined lives of children, and madness." (Christian Science Monitor, 20 January) RD

A SENSE OF VALUES

We live in a society where many are concerned about world hunger, homelessness and rising unemployment, but the British Government have much more important issues to concern themselves with - primogeniture. This deals with the perplexing problem of whether or not if Prince William has a daughter before a son she can become queen. "Luckily the Prime Minister has recognised that this a matter of the deepest seriousness ... It is, said his spokesman, " a complex and difficult matter that requires careful and thoughtful consideration..." (Observer, 23 January) A jobless father of several children might consider his unpaid mortgage a trifle more difficult a problem than primogeniture though. RD

UNEMPLOYMENT IN THE USA

"In California, former auto worker Maria Gregg was out of work five months last year before landing a new job - at a nearly 20% pay cut. In Massachusetts, Kevin Cronan, who lost his $150,000-a-year job as a money manager in early 2009, is now frothing cappuccinos at a Starbucks for $8.85 an hour. In Wisconsin, Dale Szabo, a former manufacturing manager with two master's degrees, has been searching years for a job comparable to the one he lost in 2003. He's now a school janitor. They are among the lucky. There are 14.5 million people on the unemployment rolls, including 6.4 million who have been jobless for more than six months." (Wall Street Journal, 11 January) RD

who owns the North Pole - Part 26

Canadians have adopted a confrontational stance. A new opinion poll finds that Canadians are generally far less receptive to negotiation and compromises on disputes than their American neighbours. More than 40 per cent of Canadians said the country should pursue a firm line in defending its sections of the North, compared to just 10 per cent of Americans.

The international survey – conducted by EKOS Research for the Munk School of Global Affairs at the University of Toronto and the Walter and Duncan Gordon Foundation – found that a majority of Canadians see Arctic sovereignty as the country’s top foreign-policy priority; they also believe military resources should be shifted to the North, even if it means taking them away from global conflicts.

Harper has made the Arctic a major political platform, taking every opportunity to remind Canadians that his government is determined to defend this country’s sovereignty in the Far North. The poll’s findings would suggest that Canadians have embraced his rhetoric.

“It is something that allows him to play the nationalism card, particularly since it resonates with the population,” said Brian MacDonald, a senior defence analyst with the Conference of Defence Associations.

edinburgh-unequalled

The gap between rich and poor in Edinburgh is bigger than in most other UK cities. Centre for Cities analyst Paul Swinney said: "It shows that despite Edinburgh's very strong performance in the ten years before the recession, that prosperity was not necessarily shared equally."

It ranked eighth for earnings, with an average weekly wage of £516.70.

POVERTY IN FLORIDA

"Nearly 1 million South Floridians need food stamps to get by - an increase of almost 200,000 in the last year alone. That jump is more than the entire population of Fort Lauderdale. "It's been a steady increase occurring every month for the last three, four years," said Florida Department of Children & Families spokesman Joe Follick. "It's obviously dramatic." Numbers released Friday show that in April 2007, before widespread layoffs and record unemployment levels, 422,233 people in Broward, Palm Beach and Miami-Dade counties received food stamps. By December 2010, that number more than doubled to 965,823." (Palm Beach Post, 8 January) RD

BOOZE BONANZA

"He made his fortune through musicals such as Cats and Phantom of the Opera. And now Andrew Lloyd Webber has added an extra £3.5 million to his bank balance with the sale of some choice bottles from his vast wine collection. The eagerly-anticipated sale, held at the Mandarin Oriental hotel in Hong Kong, featured 8,837 bottles of classic French wines, including what experts regard as the finest white Burgundies ever for sale in the region. Pre-sale estimates suggested that the 746 lots (mainly cases of 12 or six bottles, but also some individual bottles) would fetch £2.6 million but the salesroom was filled to capacity with what Sotheby's said was spirited and jovial bidding from all over Asia. Buyers bid in person, over the internet or by telephone." (Sunday Telegraph, 23 January) RD