Catégorie : Politics

Published on INVERSE, by Ethan Jacobs, Feb 11, 2016.

Swiss citizens will decide whether they should receive over $2,500 a month for being Swiss.

Americans are so intensely and intimately familiar with the virtues and vices of representative democracy, it’s easy for us to forget that democracy has alternative forms. Switzerland is about to give us a valuable reminder. As U.S. presidential candidates regurgitate stump speeches in the lead up to Super Tuesday, the TK citizens of Europe’s famously neutral, famously TK mountain kingdom will put the idea of basic income to a vote. The Swiss are having a referendum on whether they should be paid for being Swiss.   Continuer la lecture de « Switzerland's Base Income Vote Turns Finance Reform Into a Democratic Spectacle »

Published on ZNet (first on TomDispatch),
by David Rosner and Gerald Markowitz, Feb 11, 2016.

… The price tag for replacing the lead pipes that contaminated its drinking water, thanks to the corrosive toxins found in the Flint River, is now estimated at up to $1.5 billion. No one knows where that money will come from or when it will arrive. In the meantime, the cost to the children of Flint has been and will be incalculable. As little as a few specks of lead in the water children drink or in flakes of paint that come off the walls of old houses and are ingested can change the course of a life. Continuer la lecture de « Two, Three … Many Flints »

… to save EU from ‘disintegration’ [2 VIDEOS] – Published on RT, Feb 9, 2016.

• Democracy or disintegration are the EU’s only options, Greece’s ex-finance minister, Yanis Varoufakis, said before the official launch of a pan-European political movement he hopes will help tackle the nationalization of policies in the 28-member union.
• The “spectacular failure of the EU” to implement sound economic and refugee policies has tilted its members towards nationalism, the bike-riding former PM of Greece said on Tuesday, speaking to reporters at the Volksbühne Theater in Berlin.

Continuer la lecture de « Democratizing Europe: Varoufakis launches new movement »

Published on counterpunch, by DANIEL RAVENTÓS and JULIE WARK, Feb 5, 2016

In its 2015 report the World Economic Forum, aka the globe-grabbing business elite, pronounced from its opulent mountain fastness in Davos that, “Inequality is one of the key challenges of our time.” Paying $25,000 to attend this billionaires’ bash, and that’s after shelling out the compulsory $52,000 WEF membership fee, the said elite isn’t pronouncing on inequality out of any empathy for the poor and oppressed. This becomes perfectly clear on page 38 of the Global Risks Report 2016 where the reader is informed that inequality has consequences: … // Continuer la lecture de « We Can’t Afford These Billionaires »

Published on The People’s Voice.org, by Stephen Lendman, Feb 8, 2016.

… Two years after fascists seized power, conditions for ordinary Ukrainians are deplorable. According to Germany’s daily broadsheet Junge Welt, they’re “staggering.”

“Since the end of the Yanukovych era, the average income has decreased by 50%,” it reported – on top of 2015’s 44% inflation, nearly reducing purchasing power by half, making it impossible for most Ukrainians to get by. They’re suffering hugely, deeply impoverished, denied fundamental social services, abolished or greatly reduced en route to eliminating them altogether.   Continuer la lecture de « Ukraine – An US-Installed Nazi-Infested Failed State »

Uploaded by Baxylz:

• Music for Running, Weightlifting, Bodybuilding 2016, 31.26 min, Feb 2, 2016;
• Inspirational Music for Studying, Working, 360.13 min, March 7, 2014;

… Submission to the Standing Committee on Finance and Economic Affairs – Published on The Bullet, Socialist Project’s E-Bulletin No. 1217, Feb 5, 2016.

… A sampling of recent cuts:

• North Bay: 30 – 40 beds closing and 140 staff positions to be cut.
• Brockville: 17 Registered Nurses cut affecting departments across the hospital.   Continuer la lecture de « CANADA: against Privatization, Health Coalition Demands Funding for Hospitals »

Special Event – Wednesday 10 February 2016, New Economics Foundation (NEF), 10 Salamanca Place, London SE1 7HB, 18:00 – 19:30, refreshments provided – Space limited – register.
Website: New Economics Foundation nef.org, economics, as if people and the planet mattered (on en.wikipedia).

Uploaded on YouTube by New Economics Foundation:
Can we measure happiness? 11.43 min, Feb 3, 2016 … NEF’s Saamah Abdallah on Sky News;
GDP release by NEF’s Olivier Vardakoulias, on Sky News, 5.06 min, Jan 28, 2016;   Continuer la lecture de « Between debt and the devil, in the eye of a new global financial storm »

Published on Market Express.in, by Deutsche Welle DW, Feb 2, 2016.

Pauper or billionaire: Switzerland prepares for a vote on a basic income for all. Here are the arguments pro and con – and why the referendum is most likely to fail.
To work or not to work for a living – that may no longer be an issue in Switzerland in the near future.
The Swiss go to the polls on June 5 in a referendum on an unconditional basic income (UBI). A guaranteed income for everyone, no questions asked … // Continuer la lecture de « Basic income for the Swiss? »

The Bank Whistleblowers United – Who are We, and Why are We Trying to Help Implement Real Banking Reform? on New Economic Perspectives, by William Black, Jan 31, 2016. At this time (January 29, 2016), we consist of four founding members: Continuer la lecture de « Whistleblowers and the banks »

Published on Dissident Voice, by Ruth Hurley, Feb 1, 2015.

A people’s history of the U.S. working class starts with the conflict between resistance and repression.

As income inequality widens in the U.S., the narrative that we need to “take back” our country, or return to an America where hardworking people are rewarded for playing by the rules, is everywhere. But is this really the history of the U.S.—or a fairy tale that obscures the U.S.’s path to industrial dominance? … // Continuer la lecture de « Working-class History 101 »

Translation in spanish, and in persian (Farsi) language – Published on ZNet, interview with Yanis Varoufakis (first on his blog), Jan 31, 2016.

Why did you resign the very next day after the ‘no’ victory in the Greek referendum?

• Because the Prime Minister told me, on the night of that magnificent result, that it was time to surrender to the troika. Not what I had entered politics for and certainly not what the mandate that the 62% NO vote we had just received stipulated.   Continuer la lecture de « On Greece, Syriza, Podemos and the Democracy in Europe Movement »

Published on RT, Jan 31, 2016.

Human traffickers are taking advantage of Europe’s refugee crisis to find sex and labor slaves, particularly children, Europol says. The EU police’s chief of staff told the Observer that some 10,000 minors have gone missing since crossing into the EU.

Thousands of underage refugees have reportedly disappeared since registering with authorities, Europol’s chief of staff, Brian Donald, told The Observer. Continuer la lecture de « 10,000 kids missing in EU as criminals ‘exploit’ migrant flow – Europol chief of staff »

related articles published during January 2016: (continuously updated … ) Continuer la lecture de « Basic Income BIG – Revenu de Base – Bedingungsloses Grundeinkommen BGE, January 1-31, 2016 »