The New Brutalism

Fascinating article today in "Truthout" by Henry Giroux. About the "new historical conjuncture" of:

attacks on higher education as a democratic institution and on dissident public voices in general - whether journalists, whistleblowers or academics - are intensifying with sobering consequences. The attempts to punish prominent academics such as Ward Churchill, Steven Salaita and others are matched by an equally vicious assault on whistleblowers such as Chelsea Manning, Jeremy Hammond and Edward Snowden, and journalists such as James Risen. (1) Under the aegis of the national surveillance-security-secrecy state, it becomes difficult to separate the war on whistleblowers and journalists from the war on higher education - the institutions responsible for safeguarding and sustaining critical theory and engaged citizenship.

These attacks have been labeled "the new brutalism in academia."

This is far too good and lengthy piece for me to try and summarize. Suffice it to say, it's a cogent critique of what our deification of the market has done to us not only in the educational sphere but also in just about any others that matter. It's taken anti-intellectualism in America to undreamt of depths.

Right!

Of course, you don't.

The Death of the Liberal Class

Chris Hedges talking about the main ideas of his book, The Death of the Liberal Class. The man makes a lot of sense.

Equal Pay for Equal Work

A new oracle of truth with humor is John Oliver, a graduate of "The Daily Show." Here he is on why women get paid less than men for the same work. It's as true as is is hilarious.

The Irrepressible JHK

That would be James Howard Kuntsler, author of the brash blog "Clusterfuck Nation," one of my regular reads. Kuntsler is nothing if not opinionated. I like him because you always know where he stands, he writes in a style reminiscent of Hunter S. Thompson, and he is right, for the most part. But he does have some curious opinions. He's pro-Israel about almost everything and that goes for the latest abomination in Gaza. And he appears to favor restrictive immigration laws as well. But for the most part, he's got his head screwed on right.

I take my text from his entry of yesterday "All Hell":

Demonic forces are on the loose again now one hundred years after Europe blew itself apart for no good reason. (Why? Because some young Serbian nobody killed the heir to the Austrian throne on a back street in Sarajevo?) Maybe we are making a mistake to think that any sort of rationality applies now. Here in the depraved and disintegrating USA, we pretend that Afghanistan threatens our national interest from 7,000 miles away while denying that Russia has any business with its crumbling next-door neighbor (and former province), Ukraine — the crumbling of which was bought and paid for by the US Department of State and CIA.

Pretty basic understanding of the origins of WWI, which a century later, historians are still arguing about. Of course he's correct about everything else in the paragraph. It's for certain that we've seen the last of rationality in this country. (Did you catch the president the other day and his unforgettable phrase: "We tortured some folks"? I'm speechless that Obama could be so graceless. It's high time we stepped up and called it for what it is, but "some folks"??? Makes it sound like a backyard barbeque. And how many is "some" anyway? Doesn't sound like it could be too many, does it? When we know that number was one hell of a lot.) Rationality has long since deserted us. We've got the KKK now down on the border saying we ought to just be shooting these kids trying to get into the country. And is anybody going to argue that we're not basically depraved and that we're disintegrating before our eyes?

All the media in this country will soon be controlled by five gigantic corporations. NSA knows everything about you and the horse you rode in on. Crazies are out in the woods preparing for guerilla war. We live in a police state.

But don't worry: the NFL season is just around the corner.

Bullets from Babylon

My (for the present) favorite blogger, Charles Kingsley Michelson III at "Some Assembly Required" has these gems this morning:

• They Made Me Do It: The fertilizer companies responsible for the explosion and fire in West, TX last year claim that the city, not the fertilizer companies, were to blame, which is a load of fertilizer. 
• Have you ever noticed that whatever happens, it's always somebody else's fault? You know what makes news? Those occasions when somebody in charge steps up and says: "It was my fault. You wanna blame somebody, blame me." Now that's news.

• Obey: NYC cops dragged a naked 48 year-old woman from her shower, through her apartment and into the hallway, subdued and arrested her - and her 12-year old granddaughter who tried to help gramma – for resisting . Wrong apartment. 
• You've heard me wax eloquent and not so eloquent at the unremitting abuse of the citizenry of the United States--it doesn't matter where you are--by the cops. There are whole websites devoted to it, with videos and all. The fact this is not happening on your nice suburban street with its daisies and lilies and people walking their AKC-approved dogs, doesn't mean that some innocent citizens of your town aren't getting the shit kicked out of them right this minute by the guardians of law and order. P.S. Want to guess what color the woman was? 

• Cookie Monsters: In Palm Beach a church had a homeless man arrested for stealing $2.25 worth of cookies. In Decatur, IL a man discovered that his female roommate had eaten the three cookies he had intended to have for breakfast, so he strangled her.
• In the first instance, lemme guess . . . it was a church that follows Jesus, who told us to love our neighbors as well as we love ourselves, right? And in the second instance, what else was the guy supposed to do? He needed those cookies to sustain life.

Disaster

The Bell Tolls: The three Democrats on the FCC have voted to neuter the Internet by letting Internet Service Providers (for which read ATT, Comcast, etc) sell preferred, faster and more reliable delivery to big money users (which means they will in turn charge you more to use their sites and services) while shunting the little people, like me, to a slow and bumpy second (or third or fourth) class future. They call this Net Neutrality. In a similar vein, Comcast announced plans to put data caps on all users and charging progressively higher rates to those who actually want to use the Internet. Source

I don't understand all I know about this. What I do know is this issue has stirred up a firestorm among a lot of people who understand it a lot better than do I. This much is clear to me: big guys with money are going to be able to buy greater internet privileges than the 99 percent. So what else is really new? Is not this the way things work in this country? What this represents, however, is an inroad into a business that has been relatively "free" since its inception. It's one of the last bastions of the American economy that is not controlled completely by the corporate plutocracy. It's a disaster.

(And don't forget: the federal judiciary is what began this assault on net neutrality. Some judge found the current FCC rules unconstitutional. Wonder who he belongs to? Whose pocket he's in?)

Drip, Drip, Drip

Drip, Drip, Drip: Tax breaks for US corporations ($1.8 trillion a year) equal the entire discretionary portion of the federal budget, and are more than twice the amount of the current budget deficit ($702 billion). In 2013, there were 4,000 Americans in the top 1% of income earners who – thanks to tax breaks – paid no federal income taxes at all. None. How'd it go for you?

(To answer the question: Susan and I had to pay a few hundred bucks this year. We pay almost every year.)

This appalling and unjust inequality in bearing the public burden is what's wrong with this country, but nobody finds it atrocious. Nobody talks about it. Nobody gets angry about it. And nobody does anything about reforming a political system that will without question further shackle the American people to the service of the ruling plutocracy. The problem, as I've noted unceasingly, is the woeful ignorance and stupidity of the mass of the American people. They would really be dangerous to the prevailing order if it were otherwise. But it would take a thunderbolt from Zeus to make that happen. Maybe several.

More on TPP

I found another succinct description of the Trans-Pacific Partnership this morning that I can share. 

Research concludes that if you're making less than $87,000 per year (the current 90th percentile wage), the Trans-Pacific Partnership would mean a pay cut. But that's fine for corporations who want this treaty. 

TPP is a massive "trade" treaty between Australia, Brunei, Canada, Chile, Japan, Malaysia, Mexico, New Zealand, Peru, Singapore, the United States and Vietnam. "Trade" is in quotes because only five of the treaty's 29 chapters actually deal with trade. Others set rules on investment, set limits on the ability of governments to regulate corporations, restrict a government's ability to spend its own tax dollars on goods made in that country (such as "Buy America" procurement policies) and other things well beyond the usual scope of what would be considered a trade agreement. This leads many to claim that the treaty is really about limiting the ability of governments to reign in the giant corporations. (For those not familiar with TPP, read all about it in ourfuture.org's TPP section.)

Here's the source for the blip above. Bottom line is plain to see. Another gigantic boondoggle for rapacious, out-of-control capitalism, which, as is becoming increasingly apparent, will be the death of us all.

A Bad Deal

Traveling Salesman: Obama, having completely screwed up a chance to have a national single-payer health system as his legacy, is now trying to make his mark by forcing Asian nations to hand their sovereignty over to international cartels, by labeling anything that cuts into the potential profits of the world-wide corporate masters 'trade barriers'. Let's hope he fails at this at least as badly as he did with healthcare.  Source

 He's talking about the Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP). Never heard of it? Well, that's by design. This article from the Washington Post will enlighten you. Suffice it to say, this is not a good deal for people. This is a great deal for corporations. This is not a good deal for the environment. This is a great deal for corporations. This is not a good deal for the working class. This is a great deal for corporations. This is not a good deal for global warming. This is a great deal for corporations.

Got the picture? And it's going to be foisted upon us by the servants of the corporations in due time. Count on it.

Progress . . . Yep

Brought to you by ExxonMobilDowShellMicrosoftGoldmanSachsMonsanto Corporation. How can you not be filled with hope for the future after watching this? 



Another video for you . . . it's the weekend.

Who Is This Guy?

Well, he's named Russell Brand, and I had to look him up on Wikipedia. I had never heard of the guy before, and if all you did was read in Wikipedia about him, you'd likely not be too impressed. But you can't get a full picture of anybody from words on a page. Perhaps you should listen to him and then decide. I cannot tell you how I stumbled across this interview, or rather, what caused me to click it one and listen. I found it on Alternet. They advertise this interview as "a brilliant tirade against a broken political system." I concur. Watch for yourself.

Bye the bye, the interviewer is one Jeremy Paxman, " (born 11 May 1950) is an English journalist, broadcaster and author. He has worked for the BBC since 1977, and is known for his forthright and abrasive interviewing style, particularly when interrogating politicians. His regular appearances on the BBC Two's Newsnight programs have been criticized as aggressive, intimidating and condescending, and also applauded as tough and incisive."

But our boy Russell shuts his face right up . . . behold.

Not Necessarily Yummy, & Even Less Likely Nutricious

You know how I like lists. I'm going to give you another one I ran across mainly because I don't really feel like talking about the two really big things in the news. First, and everlastingly, the damn presidential campaign. Glory be to God a week from tomorrow and the damn thing will be done. And then there's Sandy, a truly big, bad storm bearing down on the mid-Atlantic and New England states. I feel sorry for those people. Apparently, the hurricane is going to be juiced considerably by some other curious weather events taking place at the same time and area. It's going to be bad.

Hardly clucks: #8 in fact

But no, my thoughts today are really running to the mundane. A list I can across of the most valuable fast food franchises. (Here's the source.) Now, my guess is the presence of any of these corporations on this list is not going to surprise you. The fun is in covering up the list seeing if you can guess them. And if you're a real pro at this sort of thing, try to guess them in order. The order . . . that's what might surprise you. Mickey Dee is going to be first. (Wanna take a gander at the numbers? Are you sitting down? McDonald's has 14,000 locations worldwide. In 2011, it turned a profit of $34.2 billion dollars. And the net worth of the burger place is $91 billion. The question is who comes after.

So here they are, ta-da--the most valuable fast food outfits around:

1. McDonald's

2.Subway

3. Wendy's

4. Burger King

5.Taco Bell

6.Pizza Hut

7. KFC

8.Chick-Fil-A

9. Sonic

10. Domino's Pizza 

Okay, who's surprised to see Chik-Fil-A on the list?

Here's a Timely Snippet

. . . from the New York Review of Books a long-time friend shared with me. In case any of you are wondering why I have said virtually nothing about the ongoing political campaign, or why I didn't say anything during the dreary, oh so dreary pointless useless conventions recently concluded. Good God! What exercises in meaningless blather! Anyway, this little piece will help you understand.

One night, watching the Republicans with growing panic for the deteriorating state of my mental health, I remembered H.L. Mencken, who covered every national convention of both political parties from 1904 to 1948 for The Baltimore Sun. After locating The Impossible Mencken on my shelf, I sat down to read and learn how they were conducted in the past, and even more importantly how the quality of the speeches and the character and qualifications of various candidates has changed. I wasn’t disappointed. As an analysis of the type of men who run for public office in the United States, and their motives, these pieces are not only still right on the mark; they are lots of fun to read too. “Consider the matter of the so-called keynote speech,” Mencken writes in 1924. “Some hollow party hack is put up to rant and snort for an hour and a half, and when he is finished it is discovered that he has said precisely nothing.” Sure, there are exceptions. Obama gave a pretty good one in 2004. But as a rule, as Mencken points out, they consist of several thousands words of puerile platitudes and drivel, the very worst among them managing to be both instantly forgettable and enduringly irritating.

Though our political system is now unimaginably more corrupt than it ever was in the past, and our conventions are becoming carefully scripted, usually foreclosing any possibility of delegates’ choosing how they are conducted, many of the forces that have made it so today have been working on rigging the game for a long time. Here, for instance, is Mencken, again in 1924, describing Big Business’s support for the candidacy of Honorable Calvin Coolidge:

Big Business, in America, is almost wholly devoid of anything even poetically describable as public spirit. It is frankly on the make, day in and day out, and hence for the sort of politician who gives it the best chance. In order to get that chance it is willing to make any conceivable sacrifice of common sense and the common decencies. Big Business was in favor of Prohibition, believing that a sober workman would make a better slave than the one with a few drinks in him. It was in favor of gross robberies and extortions that went on during the war, and profited by all of them. It was in favor of the crude throttling of free speech that was then undertaken in the name of patriotism, and is still in favor of it.

If you are thinking Mencken was a leftist, you are wrong. He loathed Franklin Roosevelt, and was a conservative on most matters. What he witnessed and what today’s reporters witness too, but are not allowed to describe as bluntly as he did, is that a great many men and women Americans elect to office are frauds, with no interest in helping anyone but themselves, but who know to never lose sight of who their masters are and how to serve them. They also have the good fortune of a trusting herd of mentally lazy or downright ignorant voters, who cannot tell the difference between a crook and an honest person and who return them to office again and again, seemingly unperturbed by the incumbent’s repeatedly lying to them and demonstrating a total lack of moral character.

Just in Time

Just in time for the Republican convention . . . may the Gulf hurricane take a hard right into Tampa next week! . . . we have this cheery news. Cheery for corporations in this land of the free and home of the brave.

1) Corporate profit margins just hit an all-time high. Companies are making more per dollar of sales than they ever have before. (And some people are still saying that companies are suffering from "too much regulation" and "too many taxes." Maybe little companies are, but big ones certainly aren't).




 Not so cheery if you're a working stiff. 2) Fewer Americans are working than at any time in the past three decades. One reason corporations are so profitable is that they don't employ as many Americans as they used to.



And really no surprise given the unemployment situation. 3) Wages as a percent of the economy are at an all-time low. This is both cause and effect. One reason companies are so profitable is that they're paying employees less than they ever have as a share of GDP. And that, in turn, is one reason the economy is so weak: Those "wages" are other companies' revenue.
 

 

All this data courtesy this website. 

Now, let me just pose this question . . . how can you expect the party of the corporations, the Republican party, to really be concerned about these last two charts? Seriously. Is not the business of corporations to turn as much profit as possible? And doesn't more hiring and raises and benefits for workers, doesn't all that cut into profits? Now, I'm sure there will be howls of indignation at the idea that corporations don't care about the welfare of their employees, especially those working class employees. All I say is look at the evidence. Over the past few decades, these caring corporations have relocated untold thousands of jobs oversees and cut back on what workforce remained in the US. They have abetted the recession by opposing through their GOP legislators relief measures for workers crushed by the ongoing recession. And they are squarely lined up behind Mitt Romney and his pro-business, anti-little person agenda.

I'm sorry, but I cannot for the life of me understand why anyone in the working class with the sense God gave a peanut would vote for a party that exists for the sole purpose of enriching corporations and the filthiest of the filthy rich among us and removing every possible governmental obstacle to their further enrichment. It's one of the great mysteries of the universe.

Related articles

• The Bain Legacy (inthesetimes.com)
• A nation of temps (salon.com)
• Here's What's Actually Killing The Economy... The Decline Of The Middle Class (businessinsider.com)
• Pew Study: The Economy is lagging because the middle class is broke (finance.yahoo.com)

An Almost Overlooked Gem

Don't know how you handle your email box, but it's typical for me to have stuff in there that goes back a ways. I'm sure a lot of other people do what I do with some stuff that arrives . . . you glance at it, see it's something you want to read, but simply don't have the time at the moment. So you just leave it where it is. And there it may sit for some time. A friend sent me this piece about two months ago. And I finally got around to reading it today, part of my program to clear out the mail as much as possible before Susan and I take off for vacation to the Canadian Rockies for a week tomorrow.* More on that in a moment. But just for teaser's sake, here's the title of the piece in question: "Capitalists and Other Psychopaths." What great stuff. Want a few nibbles?

• Enron, BP, Goldman, Philip Morris, G.E., Merck, etc., etc. Accounting fraud, tax evasion, toxic dumping, product safety violations, bid rigging, overbilling, perjury. The Walmart bribery scandal, the News Corp. hacking scandal — just open up the business section on an average day. Shafting your workers, hurting your customers, destroying the land. Leaving the public to pick up the tab. These aren’t anomalies; this is how the system works: you get away with what you can and try to weasel out when you get caught. 

• There are ethical corporations, yes, and ethical businesspeople, but ethics in capitalism is purely optional, purely extrinsic. To expect morality in the market is to commit a category error. Capitalist values are antithetical to Christian ones. (How the loudest Christians in our public life can also be the most bellicose proponents of an unbridled free market is a matter for their own consciences.) Capitalist values are also antithetical to democratic ones. Like Christian ethics, the principles of republican government require us to consider the interests of others. Capitalism, which entails the single-minded pursuit of profit, would have us believe that it’s every man for himself. 

And so forth . . . I'm glad I saved this article. I have an affection for writers who don't bite their tongues.

On the trip, best thing will be getting away from the news for a week. I don't intend to check on anything political while I'm gone. I told Susan just the other day that I'm thoroughly sick already of the presidential campaign and its vapid mindlessness. Plus, I'm an absolute fatalist about the results. No matter who wins, Wall Street wins and the rest of us lose. 

I'll see you all in about a week. Stay cool.

*Yes, I am going to be gone for the next week, so no blogging. I trust you'll hook up with me when I get back, and I promise to post some nice pictures of the trip.

We Deluded Americans

What are some of the most interesting or shocking things Americans believe about themselves or their country? An intriguing question, don't you think? It was to me too when I ran across it at this site. How would you answer it? Well, I discovered that I would respond pretty much the way thoughtful people who answered the question did. I've just pasted responses from various people in verbatim and commented where I felt moved to. As you will see, the quality of the observations vary, but they all have this in common. They are true.

1. American exceptionalism: that some magical combination of Anglo-Saxon liberties, Protestantism and capitalism made the US new, unique, better, and outside the normal rules. [Number one. As well it should be.]
2. That now or ever, there was a mass public in foreign countries praying for United States Armed Forces intervention.
3. That the quality of life in the US is better than in Europe.
4. That Detroit cars are as good or better than Japanese cars like Toyota and Honda.
5. That women from the US need to worry more about their safety in Europe.
6. A large fraction of Americans believe that humans have only been on Earth for about 6000 years, and that evolutionary biology is false.
7. That a public healthcare program would be socialistic [well, actually it is socialistic, but that doesn't make it bad.]
8. That President Obama is a socialist, a Muslim, and was foreign-born.
9. That all Americans have an equal chance to become wealthy. [how people actually believe this has been a mystery to me for decades]
10. That the UN is a dangerous concept.
11. That American society is truly "classless."
12. That there is no need for labor unions.
13. That corporations are people [according to the law. A bizarre 19th century construction that has wreaked untold havoc on our political system]
14. That there is nothing of significance that the US could possibly ever  learn from other countries
15. That no matter where Americans are in the world, they will never be more than a few feet away from someone who speaks English [Something I observed over and over when I lived abroad.]
16. That the corporate-owned mainstream media is liberal. [Another completely counter-intuitive belief]
17. That our national government is less corrupt than most other nations. [Everything floats of a sea of falsehood in government, not to mention business, and just about any other field of endeavor you care to mention.]
18. That everyone carrying arms somehow makes our society safer and deters crime. 
19. That the military is the most honorable, truthful, and virtuous constituency in American life, and the corollary that U.S. military intervention anywhere is be definition necessary, well-intentioned, and desired by the people of other countries. 

This last one is mine. There were were many more, and you can probably come up with a list of your own. The bottom line is as a people we probably rank at the top in self-delusion.

Related articles

• Obama, a European Socialist? I Wish! (tnr.com)

Icky Pick

I have Walmart-Comcast in finals. How about you? You can find a lot more information here, such as consumer complaints against these companies as well as clear explanations as to how they merit inclusion into this distasteful tournament.

They Make Allowances . . . for Themselves

USA Today puts yet another disgusting story about super rich people on the front page. We know these guys (and gals) are laughing all the way to the bank, indeed, rolling in the aisles because they sit at the pinnacle of the Mount of Worthiness in the USA. They are rich. And given our times, they are getting richer by the day. You've read all the stuff about how many hundreds of times more the CEOs make over the workers. I don't remember the numbers, of course, but you can find them easily enough on the web. The story in the paper today is a variation on the familiar theme of how the top of the pile sucks up far more money than it possibly needs. Well, it turns out that many CEOs are collecting cash allowances on top of their outrageous salaries and in addition to other perks such as free private use of corporate aircraft, personal cars, cellphones, and a host of other perks. Some high level execs are pocketing as much as $84,000 in such allowances annually. "This is 70 percent higher than the median U.S. household income of $49, 455," the story points out.

Some specifics:

•United Technologies. Senior execs get flexible allowances equal to 5% of base salaries. That's worth $84,000 for CEO Louis Chênevert, who used $36,000 for a car lease. Chênevert's 2011 compensation: $22.8 million, plus $7.4 million in stock and options gains.

•C.R. Bard. CEO Timothy Ring got $65,000, plus $8 million in compensation and $15.3 million from options and vested shares. Other execs got $40,000, including CFO Todd Schermerhorn, who exercised options worth $25.6 million. The medical products marketer says allowances offset costs for company cars, financial planning and other perks.

•American Express. CEO Ken Chenault and other execs get $35,000. Chenault's 2011 comp: $22.5 million, plus $5.9 million from vested shares. Chenault's other perks — including use of company aircraft and local travel — cost $365,000. Spokeswoman Marina Norville says allowances have been in effect for years.

•Jack in the Box. CEO Linda Lang gets $66,500 a year; other execs, at least $45,000. The fast-food chain says allowances replace other perks and cover costs such as business use of personal cars and cellphones. Lang's 2011 compensation: $4.5 million, plus option gains worth more than $750,000.

 I keep wondering when the struggling hard-working, hard-pressed American working people are going to wake up to the screaming injustice of a system that works like this. 

Related articles

• The $145 Million CEO (thedailybeast.com)
• Explosive New Report: CEO Pay Skyrocketed 27% Last Year, Top 10 Earners Pocket More Than $770 Million Between Then (alternet.org)
• CEO pay way up in US this year (americablog.com)
• The 10 Highest-Paid CEOs in America (thedailybeast.com)
• It's Official: Money Now Governs America (truth-out.org)

What Difference Will It Make?

Really. So what if the country installs Barack Obama back in the White House for another four years? How much different would a Republican president be than him? I would submit to you that despite the constant screeching and hollering the Republicans have done ever since Obama took office, that big business couldn't have a much bigger friend than that sham "progressive" who occupies the White House. What has happened on his watch that has not benefited our corporate overlords? Think about it. And now we read, that Obama is going to propose to Congress that the corporate income tax rate be dropped from its current 35 percent to 28. Here's the blurb:

The Obama administration will propose today reducing the U.S. corporate tax rate to 28 percent from 35 percent along with removing tax breaks for companies to help offset lost revenue, an administration official said.

The plan would eliminate dozens of tax breaks and reshape the current manufacturing deduction to reduce the tax rate on manufacturing to 25 percent, according to the official, who outlined the proposal on condition of anonymity because it hadn’t been released. The restructured tax code would still include incentives for research and development and renewable energy.

The second paragraph is the key . . .  do you seriously think this will happen? What victories over big business lobbies can the administration point to? . . . None that I can think of. So here's what I think will happen. The Republicans in Congress will refuse to pass anything the administration proposes along these lines--along any lines, really--because they refuse to give the president anything. Especially, especially in this an election year. I don't know how good the proposal is, but I do know this. I don't like the sound of lowering taxes on businesses with the promise of offsets that aren't just automatic, just on principle. Give the corporate interests half a chance and they will gut the hell out of anything worthwhile in this proposal.