‘Unless, Paul Mason argues, we take advantage of the technological revolution we are living through and create a postcapitalist sharing society. If we let prices fall and delink work from wages, we can save the world from disaster.’
Tag: Globalism
WikiLeaks release: Target Tokyo and the Five Eyes
I think the most important phrase to understand in our Manning/Wikileaks/Snowden/etc era is…. Five Eyes. If one does not grasp it then one does not understand what is happening in the world today. imho.
Today’s publication also contains NSA reports from intercepts of senior Japanese government officials. Four of the reports are classified TOP SECRET. One of the reports is marked “REL TO USA, AUS, CAN, GBR, NZL“, meaning it has been formally authorised to be released to the United States’ “Five Eyes” intelligence partners: Australia, Canada, Great Britain and New Zealand.
[….]
The documents demonstrate intimate knowledge of internal Japanese deliberations on such issues as: agricultural imports and trade disputes; negotiating positions in the Doha Round of the World Trade Organization; Japanese technical development plans, climate change policy, nuclear and energy policy and carbon emissions schemes; correspondence with international bodies such as the International Energy Agency (IEA); strategy planning and draft talking points memoranda concerning the management of diplomatic relations with the United States and the European Union; and the content of a confidential Prime Ministerial briefing that took place at Shinzo Abe’s official residence.
via WikiLeaks – Target Tokyo.
The International Monetary Fund Says Trickle-Down Economics Doesn’t Work
It is a testament to the power of global state ideology and its media system that this paragraph’s contents are not more widely known – especially considering the source!
‘…"If the income share of the top 20% (the rich) increases, then GDP growth actually declines over the medium term, suggesting that the benefits do not trickle down. In contrast, an increase in the income share of the bottom 20% (the poor) is associated with higher GDP growth," the report says.
The paper looks at 159 advanced and developing economies between 1980 and 2012, investigating how income is distributed in each society and its level of national growth. It finds that when the income share of the top 20% increases 1%, economic growth is then down 0.08% in the following five years. At the same time, a 1% increase for the bottom 20% leads to increased GDP of 0.38% in the following years…’
via The International Monetary Fund Says Trickle-Down Economics Don't Work | Co.Exist | ideas + impact.
An Open Letter From Thomas Piketty to Angela Merkel – Austerity Has Failed
In the 1950s, Europe was founded on the forgiveness of past debts, notably Germany’s, which generated a massive contribution to post-war economic growth and peace. Today we need to restructure and reduce Greek debt, give the economy breathing room to recover, and allow Greece to pay off a reduced burden of debt over a long period of time. Now is the time for a humane rethink of the punitive and failed program of austerity of recent years and to agree to a major reduction of Greece’s debts in conjunction with much needed reforms in Greece.
To Chancellor Merkel our message is clear; we urge you to take this vital action of leadership for Greece and Germany, and also for the world. History will remember you for your actions this week. We expect and count on you to provide the bold and generous steps towards Greece that will serve Europe for generations to come.
via Austerity Has Failed: An Open Letter From Thomas Piketty to Angela Merkel | The Nation.
Goldman Sachs restricts workday to 17 hours a day
Go home before midnight, and don’t come back before 7am. Goldman Sachs – one of Wall Street’s toughest firms – has told interns they have got to work hard, but not too hard.
The new rules, introduced for this summer’s crop of investment banking interns, have been introduced “to improve the overall work experience of our interns”, a Goldman Sachs spokesman said. All of its summer interns across the world were informed of the new working hours rule on their first day in the office earlier this month.
Wall Street’s shift to caring capitalism comes in the wake of the death of a 21-year-old Bank of America Merrill Lynch intern who had regularly pulled all-nighters in a desperate bid to impress his bosses.
Moritz Erhardt was found dead in the shower at his London accommodation after working 72 hours straight. An inquest found he died of an epileptic seizure that could have been a triggered by his long working hours.
via Goldman Sachs restricts intern workday to 17 hours in wake of burnout death | Business | The Guardian.
Goldman Sachs only wants for their own employees what they also impose on entire nations…
Euronews video: 2011
IMF study disproves the Trickle Down theory (2015)
even the communists at the IMF agrees…
‘First, we show why policymakers need to focus on the poor and the middle class. Earlier IMF work has shown that income inequality matters for growth and its sustainability. Our analysis suggests that the income distribution itself matters for growth as well. Specifically, if the income share of the top 20 percent (the rich) increases, then GDP growth actually declines over the medium term, suggesting that the benefits do not trickle down. In contrast, an increase in the income share of the bottom 20 percent (the poor) is associated with higher GDP growth. The poor and the middle class matter the most for growth via a number of interrelated economic, social, and political channels…’
— http://www.imf.org/external/pubs/ft/sdn/2015/sdn1513.pdf
Walmart hid $76bn of assets in foreign tax havens #LuxLeaks
‘…Walmart hid $76bn of assets in tax havens across the world, including $64.2bn managed by 22 different subsidiaries in Luxembourg, where Walmart has no stores, according to a study published on Wednesday.
The study, published by campaign group Americans for Tax Fairness and funded by the United Food and Commercial Workers International Union, alleged that Walmart has “kept its tax haven subsidiaries secretive by burying mention of their existence”. Walmart denied the claims.
[….] According to the report, since 2011 Walmart has transferred ownership of its stores in Brazil, Japan, Puerto Rico and South Africa to Luxembourg. It claims that Walmart’s Luxembourg operations paid less than 1% in tax on profits of more than $1.3bn between 2010 and 2013…‘
via Walmart hid $76bn of assets in foreign tax havens, new study claims | Business | The Guardian.
Obama at Nike HQ says ‘Just do it!’
Naomi Klein couldn’t even make a joke this sad…
‘…Obama tried to turn the focus away from potential job losses in the US to the potential to grow US exports. The president warned that the US must lead in trade negotiations. “If we don’t write the rules for trade around the world, guess what? China will,” Obama said. “And they’ll write those rules in a way that gives Chinese workers and Chinese businesses the upper hand.”
But apart from providing an apposite corporate slogan for the measure’s passage – “Just do it” – choosing Nike as a location didn’t quite reinforce his message….’
via Obama at Nike headquarters: why push trade deal at an outsourcing giant? | US news | The Guardian.
WikiLeaks leaks 17 secret documents of the ‘Trade in Services Agreement’
If it were not for Wikileaks would have anyone ever heard of TISA?? Short answer: No.
Thank you Julian Assange
WikiLeaks releases today 17 secret documents from the ongoing TISA (Trade In Services Agreement) negotiations which cover the United States, the European Union and 23 other countries including Turkey, Mexico, Canada, Australia, Pakistan, Taiwan & Israel — which together comprise two-thirds of global GDP. "Services" now account for nearly 80 per cent of the US and EU economies and even in developing countries like Pakistan account for 53 per cent of the economy. While the proposed Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP) has become well known in recent months in the United States, the TISA is the larger component of the strategic TPP-TISA-TTIP ‘T-treaty trinity’. All parts of the trinity notably exclude the ‘BRICS’ countries of Brazil, Russia, India, China and South Africa.
via WikiLeaks – Trade in Services Agreement.
Video: WikiLeaks to offer $100,000 bounty for missing TPP trade treaty chapters
Today WikiLeaks has launched a campaign to crowd-source a $100,000 reward for America’s Most Wanted Secret: the Trans-Pacific Partnership Agreement (TPP).
more info: https://wikileaks.org/WikiLeaks-issues-call-for-100-000.html
Global Capitalism means no transparency or real democracy
Representative Democracy is not compatible with Global Capitalism, apparently.
‘…Australian politicians have been told they can view the current confidential negotiating text for the Trans-Pacific Partnership agreement, but only if they agree not to divulge anything they see for four years, despite expectations the deal could be finalised within months.[….]
The requirements listed were as follows:
“I will not divulge any of the text or information obtained in the briefing to any party, I will not copy, transcribe or remove the negotiating text” and “I further acknowledge that the negotiating text is confidential and sensitive; disclosure of the negotiating text may affect adversely TPP negotiations and Australia’s relations with other TPP partners.”
It concluded: “I therefore agree that these confidentiality requirements shall apply for four years after entry into force of the TPP, or if no agreement enters into force, for four years after the last round of negotiations.”…’
via Australian MPs allowed to see top-secret trade deal text but can't reveal contents for four years | Business | The Guardian.
Shell Oil tried to stop Science Museum climate program
‘…Shell tried to influence the presentation of a climate change programme it was sponsoring at the Science Museum in London, internal documents seen by the Guardian show.
The Anglo-Dutch oil group raised concerns with the museum that one part of the project “creates an opportunity for NGOs to talk about some of the issues that concern them around Shell’s operations”.
The company also wanted to know whether a particular symposium at the museum was “invite only” – as that would ensure “we do not proactively open up a debate on the topic [of Shell’s operations]”.
The concerns are raised in a series of emails obtained under the Freedom of Information Act and once again raise awkward questions about the influence of fossil fuel companies over Britain’s most valued cultural institutions….’
via Shell sought to influence direction of Science Museum climate programme | Business | The Guardian.
Cartoon Video: Obama is anti-Transparency when it has to do with ‘Free Trade’
‘Mark Fiore weighs in on the controversial Trans-Pacific Partnership in his latest animation, “Obama Trades Transparency.” Watch the cartoon and read about the animator’s ideas on the trade deal below.’
via Truthdig.com
Goodbye LieberLand #StupidLibertarians
perhaps he can use his bitcoins to bail himself out?
#StupidLibertarians
On Saturday, less than a month after Czech activist Vit Jedlicka declared himself president of a patch of land between Serbia and Croatia, and named it Lieberland, he was shortly detained by Croatian border police. Police from Serbia and Croatia have tried to prevent several people entering Lieberland.
Croatian police arrest ‘president’ of Lieberland
Libertarian Paradise 4EVAR…
Europe » The Big Mac, The Royale with Cheese and, today, the Grand Big Mac
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NS_ROi0iiZw
in the direction of exclusion
An interview with Nadav Eya
‘You know, I have a friend in India who’s a journalist. A Hindi nationalist party is now in power in India. Like us, they have a neighboring country, Pakistan, with whom they are locked in a territorial dispute, except that they have nuclear weapons. I asked my friend about the nationality clause in the Indian constitution, and it turns out that there isn’t one. India was founded on the ancient Indian idea of unity in diversity. My friend was very surprised that we are allowing the nation-state legislation to go forward. I asked him what would happen in similar circumstances in India, and he didn’t even want to think about it. Laws like that only weaken us.
The societies that are moving in the direction of exclusion are shrinking into religiosity, into ethnicity. They are closed to external influence, rigid and inflexible in their thought, and the end result of that inflexibility is extremism or implosion. We know the examples.
via The lesson SodaStream taught Israel – Features – Israel News | Haaretz. [archived text]
David Harvey Interview: Syriza and Podemos
Sounds like Hungary.
il manifesto: In the book you predict a new cycle of revolts. Yet an appraisal of the last few years would have to say that the Arab Spring has proven a disaster, while Occupy has not been able to transform itself into an effective political force. Do you think the answer is something like Podemos, which has been able to give political expression to the 15-M movement?
David Harvey: Syriza and Podemos have opened up a political space, because something new is happening. What is it? I can’t say. Of course there will be those on the anti-capitalist left who accuse them of ‘reformism’. That may well be true, but they have also been the first forces to put forward some policies, and once we’ve started down that road then that will open up new possibilities. Finally breaking with the mantra of austerity and smashing the power of the Troika would, I believe, create the space for new perspectives, which could then further develop. I think that at this stage, this kind of parties we are seeing in Europe is the best thing that we can hope for, beginning to define the Left alternatives that we are currently lacking. They will probably be populist – with all the limits and dangers that populism entails – but as I have said, this is a movement: it opens up spaces, and what we can use these spaces for depends on our capacity to ask, ‘OK, now that we’ve got this far, what should we do now?’
via VersoBooks.com.
European Commission tells Greece not to pass anti-poverty law
‘Declan Costello, director at the EC’s directorate for economic and financial affairs, has ordered the radical left-led coalition governemnt in Greece to stop. A planned law to allow tax arrears to be paid in instalments, set before the Greek parliament on Thursday, has also been vetoed [….] Mr Costello’s letter effectively says that if the Greek parliament votes on the new law tomorrow, it is a violation of the compromise deal signed by finance minister Yanis Varoufakis on 20 February in Brussels…
via Don’t pass new anti-poverty law, commission tells Greece | Paul Mason | Paul Mason.
Gandhi statue hides the Military-Industrial Complex
Priyamvada Gopal writes:
‘…the announcement came as coalition ministers George Osborne and William Hague visited India to hustle for lucrative arms contracts, emerging triumphantly with a £250m deal to supply missiles to the Indian air force and hoping to persuade the former jewel in the imperial crown to buy the partly British-made Eurofighter Typhoon jet.
This plainly opportunistic move has elicited accusations of "false worship" from Gandhi’s descendants. Hague’s glutinous praise for Gandhi’s commitment to non-violence as "a legacy that is as relevant today as it was during his life", while selling killing machines to his countrymen, is certainly specious. Yet the hawkish rightwing Indian regime these ministers are cosying up to is, with even greater irony, appropriating Gandhi to sanitise its own sectarian past. In Britain as in India, the canonisation of Gandhi has become the perfect vehicle for sanctimonious official rhetoric that obscures the links between capitalism’s military-industrial complex, social hierarchies and state violence…’
via Does Gandhi really belong in Parliament Square? | Priyamvada Gopal | Comment is free | The Guardian.
Chinese SciFi: The Three-Body Problem
Liu Cixin, China’s most popular science-fiction writer. Liu is fifty-one years old and has written thirteen books. Until very recently, he worked as a software engineer at a power plant in Shanxi. In China, he is about as famous as William Gibson in the United States; he’s often compared to Arthur C. Clarke, whom he cites as an influence. His most popular book, “The Three-Body Problem,” has just been translated into English by the American sci-fi writer Ken Liu, and in China it’s being made into a movie, along with its sequels.
[….] American science fiction draws heavily on American culture, of course—the war for independence, the Wild West, film noir, sixties psychedelia—and so humanity’s imagined future often looks a lot like America’s past. For an American reader, one of the pleasures of reading Liu is that his stories draw on entirely different resources. Much of “The Three-Body Problem” is set during the Cultural Revolution. In “The Wages of Humanity,” visitors from space demand the redistribution of Earth’s wealth, and explain that runaway capitalism almost destroyed their civilization.
via Liu Cixin Is China’s Answer to Arthur C. Clarke – The New Yorker.
Ukraine Must Accept Deep Cuts, ‘Reforms’ in $17.5 Billion IMF Loan Deal
Who could have predicted that price of ‘Western Democracy’ was anti-democratic neo-liberalism?
/snark
‘In other Ukraine news, the International Monetary Fund has agreed to extend a $17.5 billion loan package to Kiev in a bid to help prevent economic collapse. The credit will be provided in return for deep structural reforms and cuts to government spending.’
via Ukraine Accepts Deep Cuts, Reforms in $17.5 Billion IMF Loan Deal | Democracy Now!.
The success of European Capitalist-Feminism
And notice also that this is being implemented during an economic crises and Capitalism is under no threat of collapse because of this new policy.
Just saying.
‘…Germany on Friday became the latest and perhaps most significant country so far to commit itself to improving the representation of women on corporate boards, passing a law that requires some of Europe’s biggest companies to give 30 percent of supervisory seats to women beginning next year.
[….] In passing the measure, Germany joined a trend in Europe to legislate a much greater role for women in boardrooms. Norway, Spain and France have set their boardroom quotas for women at 40 percent. Belgium, Iceland, Italy and the Netherlands have also set quotas.
[….] Under the new measure, some 100 of Germany’s best-known companies must give 30 percent of their supervisory board seats to women starting next year. A further 3,500 companies have a deadline of Sept. 30 to submit plans to increase the share of women in top positions…’
via German Law Requires More Women on Corporate Boards – NYTimes.com.
130 years ago Europe carved up Africa
‘…The Berlin Conference led to a period of heightened colonial activity by the European powers. With the exception of Ethiopia and Liberia, all the states that make up present day Africa were parceled out among the colonial powers within a few years after the meeting. Lines of longitude and latitude, rivers and mountain ranges were pressed into service as borders separating the colonies. Or one simply placed a ruler on the map and drew a straight line.
[….] In 2010 – on the 125th anniversary of the Berlin Conference, representatives from many African states in Berlin called for reparations for the colonial era. The arbitrary division of the continent among European powers, which ignored African laws, culture, sovereignty and institutions, was a crime against humanity, they said in a statement. They called for the funding of monuments at historic sites, the return of land and other resources which had been stolen, the restitution of cultural treasures and recognition that colonialism and the crimes committed under it were crimes against humanity.
But nothing has come of all this…’
via 130 years ago: carving up Africa in Berlin | Africa | DW.DE | 25.02.2015.
Hungary’s ‘Buda-Cash’ Brokerage Crisis: Who what Hungary’s Edward Snowden?
Böröcz, József writes
‘…the regulator–which now says the scheme may have been going on for more than a decade (!)–“fell asleep at the wheel,” [….] the case broke because somebody from the brokerage reported the irregularities to the National Bank–i.e., s/he made it impossible for the regulator “not to notice” them…’
via Global Social Change (book blog): Hungary's Brokerage Crisis: How Far Will It Reach?.
Another TTIP leak
Notice that, again, the only way the public can know about the truth of these ‘free-trade’ deals is from leakers — from criminal good samaritans that expose secret government negotiations. Manning, Assange, Snowden, who ever did this, etc – we all owe them an apology and a hero’s status in any real democracy.
The European Commission has also previously said TTIP would not affect how NHS services are provided, whether in Scotland or the rest of the UK. But the trade union Unite said “real risks” remained because of the dispute resolution mechanism TTIP is expected to include. The union’s Scottish regional secretary, Pat Rafferty said: “Last week Lord Livingston tried to pull the wool over the eyes of the Scottish people. “Now this leaked document has confirmed Unite’s expert legal advice, that NHS services in Scotland and the rest of the UK do fall within the scope of the TTIP. “This means that American investors in NHS services that are privatised now or in the future will be able to use TTIP to sue the government if it tries to bring them back into public hands”. via BBC News – TTIP: Transatlantic trade deal text leaked to BBC.