“We’ve detected activity, and we have captured some U.S. citizens in undercover activities, in hidden activities, espionage, trying to win over people in towns along the Venezuelan coast, trying to win over people in some neighborhoods. In Táchira, we captured a pilot of a U.S. plane of Latin origin with all sorts of documentation.” — Nicolás Maduro, Democracy Now! March 3, 2015
All Posts News Politics and-or Videos
Matteo Salvini, Italy’s New Strongman by Gaither Stewart + Italian Government Closes Port to Migrants
by Gaither Stewart
Writer, Dandelion Salad
Rome, Italy
June 14, 2018
As shown in the permissive attitude of Italians toward Fascism last century, also contemporary Italians perceive of a strong and charismatic leader as a shield against disorder and their inherent inclination toward anarchy. Someone to protect them against their own nature. Promises of more police and more security are reassuring to those Italians who see today’s enemy in immigrants and in the European Union with all its rules … including its Euro currency. When a legitimate government to control their inclination toward anarchy goes missing, some form of servility to a powerful individual returns. Strongmen emerge from that conundrum deep in the Italian psyche: anarchy or a strongman at the helm. Italy today seems to be following the same familiar old script.
Inequality, Social Dysfunction and Misery by Graham Peebles
by Graham Peebles
Writer, Dandelion Salad
London, England
June 10, 2018
Year on year the economic divisions and sub-divisions in the world deepen, the associated social ills increase: The rich, comfortable, and the very extremely rich keep getting richer, and the rest, well, whilst some may be raised up out of crippling poverty into relative poverty, the majority of people continue to live under a blanket of economic insecurity and largely remain where they are.
Chris Hedges and David Harvey: Enough is Enough of This Capitalist Fraud
with Chris Hedges
RT America on June 9, 2018
David Harvey, author of Marx, Capital, and the Madness of Economic Reason, discusses the future of global capitalism.
“Google Should Not Be In The Business of War”: Understanding the Weaponization of Artificial Intelligence by Marc Eliot Stein
Republished with permission from David Swanson at World Beyond War
by Marc Eliot Stein
World Beyond War
June 9, 2018
In early April, more than 3100 Google employees signed a letter that begins with the words “Google should not be in the business of war”. The letter is a response to the company’s participation in a new US Department of Defense artificial intelligence program called Project Maven, which it describes as a “customized AI surveillance engine” designed to interpret visual images from drones, and concludes with a powerful request from Google employees to their management:
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Capitalism on Mars by Lowell Flanders
by Lowell Flanders
Writer, Dandelion Salad
June 8, 2018
“The idea of a self-adjusting market implies a stark Utopia. Such an institution can not exist for any length of time without annihilating the human and natural substance of society; it will physically destroy man and transform his surroundings into a wilderness.” — Karl Polanyi, The Great Transformation: The Political and Economic Origins of Our Time.
Michael Hudson, Stephanie Kelton, et al: Why Monetary Theory and Policy Is a Critical Terrain For the Left (Left Forum 2018)
with Michael Hudson
Writer, Dandelion Salad
June 7, 2018
OpenUnivoftheLeft on June 5, 2018
Left Forum 2018: As our demands grow bolder—true full employment, the rebuilding of the social safety net starting with Medicare for All, an overdue green and just transition—so will the naysayers’ inevitable refrain: “How will you pay for it?” Developments in our understanding of monetary theory and the money system has, thankfully, illuminated a path forward out of the trap of austerity: when we understand how money actually works, we know that the obstacles to bold action at a national scale on jobs, healthcare, and climate are political, not economic.
Chris Hedges, Richard D. Wolff and C. Jama Adams: W.E.B. DuBois: What His Life and Work Can Teach Us Today (Left Forum 2018)
with Chris Hedges and Richard D. Wolff
OpenUnivoftheLeft on June 4, 2018
Left Forum 2018, “W.E.B. DuBois: What His Life and Work Can Teach Us Today“. Left Forum, Democracy at Work, John Jay College, CUNY, 6-1-2018, New York City, NY, Richard Wolff, New School, Democracy at Work, Left Forum, Chris Hedges, C. Jama Adams, John Jay College of Criminal Justice.
Paul Street, Glen Ford, Chris Hedges, Bruce Dixon: Imagining an Authentic 21st Century U.S. Left (Left Forum 2018)
with Paul Street
Writer, Dandelion Salad
June 5, 2018
and with Glen Ford, Chris Hedges, Bruce Dixon
Other Voices, Other Choices on June 4, 2018
Event Organizer: Paul L. Street
The Wobblies (1979)
Originally posted July 10, 2012
Critical Thought Critique on Apr 4, 2018
Documentary movie for “Industrial Workers of the World” (IWW, also referred to as The Wobblies), the largest union in the history of the labor movement in the United States.
Socialism: Our Alternative To The Madness Of The Market by Eric Ruder
Dandelion Salad
Originally published Sept. 2, 2012
by Eric Ruder
SocialistWorker.org, August 30, 2012
June 3, 2018
THE WORLD economy is still suffering from the worst crisis since the Great Depression of the 1930s. Around the world, the consequences have been devastating–jobs wiped out, exploitation intensified for those who remain employed, social services eliminated or privatized.
Chris Hedges: The Development and Nature of ISIS
with Chris Hedges
RT America on June 2, 2018
Mohammad-Mahmoud Ould Mohamedou, author of A Theory of ISIS: Political Violence and the Transformation of the Global Order, discusses the development and nature of ISIS.
Chris Hedges and Richard Wolff: An Unsustainable System
with Chris Hedges and Richard D. Wolff
Democracy At Work on May 28, 2018
This week on Economic Update, Professor Wolff delivers updates on the decline of U.S. cities and the potential of “private cities”, the ever-growing freelancers’ economy, why the U.S. Supreme Court decided to legalize sports betting now, Fiat-Chrysler & Porsche added to the emissions cheating scandal, the new federal jobs guarantee and a Catholic University attacks the concept of tenure.
Abby Martin: Used and Betrayed: 100 Years of US Troops as Lab Rats
Published previously on May 23, 2016
with Abby Martin
teleSUR English on May 23, 2016
On Memorial Day, politicians will speak at ceremonies all over the country and repeat their favorite mantra: “Support the troops.” This pledge is hammered into the American psyche at every turn. But there is a hidden, dark history that shows that the politicians are in fact no friend to service members–but their greatest enemy. An easy way to prove this truth is to look at how they so quickly betray and abandon their soldiers after purposely ruining their lives, and even after using them as literal lab rats.
Coups R US: American Regime Changes and Their Aftermaths
RT Documentary on May 16, 2018
In March of 1951, Jacobo Arbenz came to power in Guatemala after having been resoundingly elected by the people. A little more than three years later, he was forced to resign in the midst of armed intervention. His reforms to redistribute unused land to poor peasants had fallen afoul of the United Fruit Company, which owned and warehoused vast tracts of Guatemalan land. The American corporation solicited the US government to overthrow the populist president and the Eisenhower administration delivered with the help of the Department of State and CIA, which happened to be led by the Dulles brothers, who had strong ties to the company. Arbenz’ ousting put an end to democracy in Guatemala for decades and replaced it by military rule. A civil war followed several years later, resulting in the deaths of over 200,000 people. The country remains one of Latin America’s most impoverished to this day.