Mois : janvier 2015

On the NYC Police Killings & the Haymarket Massacre

Published on ZNet, by Bill Fletcher, Jan 6, 2015 (first published on Billfletcher.com).

In every vibrant progressive social movement there comes a moment when a psychologically or emotionally disturbed person, an agent provocateur, or a political extremist commits an atrocious act that is seized upon by the State and/or the political Right as a means of attempting to discredit or outright repress the movement. The action, committed for whatever reason, is sufficiently heinous that confusion develops within the movement and the movement can lose both its momentum as well as a segment of its less committed or more ambivalent supporters.   Continuer la lecture de « On the NYC Police Killings & the Haymarket Massacre »

Economy: Free falling ruble – a brilliant Russian ploy

Published on Axis of Logic (first on Global Research and on teleSUR english), by Peter Koenig, Jan 3, 2015.

The world is still hell-bent for hydrocarbon-based energy. Russia is the world’s largest producer of energy. Russia has recently announced that in the future she will no longer trade energy in US dollars, but in rubles and currencies of the trading partners. In fact, this rule will apply to all trading.

Russia and China are detaching their economies from that of the western financial system. To confirm this decision, in July 2014 Russia’s Gazprom concluded a 400 billion gas deal with China, and in November this year they signed an additional slightly smaller contract – all to be nominated in rubles and yuans.   Continuer la lecture de « Economy: Free falling ruble – a brilliant Russian ploy »

Because We Let Them

Published on ZNet, by Paul Street (writer and activist in Iowa City, Iowa), Jan 4, 2015.

… One day in my office I asked a colleague at the organization why our chief executive behaved in the selfish and irresponsible ways he did. My colleague responded with a question: “Dr. Street, why does a dog lick its balls?”
I confessed I didn’t know. The answer: “Because it can.”

My colleague’s point was that nobody with any power was telling our CEO was setting any boundaries on his behavior. He was being rewarded again and again, from year to year, with an outrageously high salary, an agency limousine, and positions on various corporate boards.
Thinking of that exchange the other day, I was reminded of something that Thomas Jefferson wrote to his fellow Virginian, the American solider and statesman Edward Carrington from Paris in the late 1780s. “If once the people become inattentive to the public affairs,” Jefferson wrote, “you and I and Congress and Assemblies, Judges, Governor, shall all become wolves.”   Continuer la lecture de « Because We Let Them »

2015: a pivotal year for economic and financial crises and wars?

Published on Intrepid Report, by Rodrigue Tremblay, Jan 2, 2015.

Dear visitors, Happy 2015 for all. (The troubles about my computer AND my internet connection are over, let’s begin 2015 with new energy, for today with a long article on economy, and with a big bunch of links, mainly from the last days).

… These days, militaristic neoconservatives, or neocons, have near complete control of the American government under the façade of whoever is president at the time. They direct U.S. policies at the State Department, at the Pentagon, at the U.S. Treasury and at the Fed central bank. They are thus in position to influence and frame American foreign policy, military policy, economic and financial policies and monetary policy.   Continuer la lecture de « 2015: a pivotal year for economic and financial crises and wars? »