Russia and Iran sign defense deal, ‘may resolve’ S300 missile delivery issue
RT | January 20, 2015
Moscow and Tehran have signed military cooperation deal that implies wider collaboration in personnel training and counter-terrorism activities. It may also resolve the situation concerning the delivery of Russian S300 missiles, Iranian media reported.
Russia’s Defense Minister Sergey Shoigu and his Iranian counterpart Brigadier General Hossein Dehghan, signed the document during a visit by Russia’s top brass to Iran’s capital on Tuesday.
Under the new agreement, the broadened cooperation will include military personnel training exchanges, increased counter-terrorism cooperation and enhanced capabilities for both countries’ Navies to use each other’s ports more frequently.
According to the Iranian news agency FARS, the two sides have also resolved problems concerning the delivery of Russia’s S300 missile defense systems to Iran. However, Moscow is yet to make an official comment regarding the defense system.
The $800 million contract to deliver S300 air defense missile systems to Iran was cancelled in 2010 by then Russian President Dmitry Medvedev, to fall in line with UN sanctions imposed on Iran due to its disputed nuclear program. In turn, Tehran has filed a currently pending $4 billion lawsuit against Russia to Geneva’s arbitration court.
“The two countries have decided to settle the S300 issue,” Iran’s Defense Ministry said, as cited by the Interfax news agency. No further details have been provided.
The possible renewal of talks concerning missile sales has been confirmed by a former head of the Defense Ministry department of international cooperation, according to the RIA Novosti news agency.
“A step has been taken in the direction of economic and military technologies cooperation, at least such defensive systems as the S300 and S400 we would probably be delivering,” Colonel General Leonid Ivashov, who is also the president of the International Center for Geopolitical Analysis, said, which was reported by RIA. Sanctions from the West have brought the two countries’ positions on defense cooperation closer, Ivashov added.
The new agreement is aimed at creating a “long-term and multifaceted” military relationship with Iran, Russia’s Defense Minister Shoigu said, stressing that “a theoretical basis for cooperation in the military field has been created.”
The Iranian side believe, “durable impacts on regional peace and security” can be provided by the deal, FARS reported. “As two neighbors, Iran and Russia have common viewpoints towards political, regional and global issues,” Dehghan said, as cited by AP.
For Iran, the deal to boost military cooperation could also mean support in opposing American ambitions in the Middle East, with the two countries to “jointly contribute to the strengthening of international security and regional stability.”
“Iran and Russia are able to confront the expansionist intervention and greed of the United States through cooperation, synergy and activating strategic potential capacities,” Iran’s Defense Minister said, which was reported by AP.
Moscow has maintained close ties with Tehran for years, particularly in the field of nuclear power. The first Iranian nuclear power plant in Bushehr became operational, with control of the station having been handed over to Iranian specialists in September 2013. Last autumn, a deal to build more reactors in Iran was signed.
Anti-nuclear MPs debate Trident, call renewal ‘waste of money’
RT | January 20, 2015
The future of Britain’s nuclear deterrent was debated in Parliament on Tuesday, hours after a Scottish opinion poll found nearly half of Scots oppose renewing the Trident program.
Parliament’s debate on Trident comes weeks after the Ministry of Defence (MoD) published a report revealing the cost of the program’s “assessment phase” will increase by an additional £261 million this year.
Renewal of Trident, which is based just 25 miles west of Glasgow, is expected to cost £20 billion.
The cost of the overall program over the next 25 years, however, is estimated to be £80 billion.
Tuesday’s debate was called by the Scottish National Party (SNP), Green Party, and Welsh national party Plaid Cymru, with the intention of demonstrating “opposition to Trident renewal in Westminster.”
It was boycotted by most members of the Labour Party, which officially supports Trident renewal.
Tuesday’s poll, conducted by Survation and commissioned by SNP, found that 47 percent of Scots oppose Trident renewal, 32 percent support it, and 21 percent “don’t know.”
The results, along with revelations of Trident’s rising costs, will boost SNP confidence, as the party pledges to oppose nuclear weapons ahead of May’s general election.
Angus Robertson MP, a member of the SNP, opened the debate in the House of Commons.
“Today’s debate is an opportunity to show there is opposition to Trident renewal in Westminster,” he said.
Robertson emphasized the ethical case for scrapping nuclear weapons.
“Each warhead [on Trident submarines] has an explosion eight times the power of the atomic bomb dropped on Hiroshima in 1945,” he said.
He also cited recent debates on austerity and food banks, saying “there is an alternative.”
In a press statement, the SNP criticized Labour’s boycott of the debate given the party’s support for austerity.
“Labour’s refusal to take part in the debate on Trident comes less than one week after the party voted along with the Tories for a further £30 billion of austerity cuts,” the SNP said.
“That Scottish Labour MPs support wasting another £100 billion on weapons of mass destruction while foodbank use is rocketing, and more and more children are being pushed into poverty, is simply indefensible,” they added.
A handful of Labour MPs did attend the debate, however. Speaking to the Commons, rogue Labour MP Dame Joan Ruddock supported scrapping Trident.
The former chair of the Campaign for Nuclear Disarmament (CND) asked how Britain can justify trident renewal “when we cannot raise millions out of poverty or fund our precious National Health Service.”
Ruddock described proponents of Trident renewal as being stuck in “Cold War thinking.”
“The threats that were part of the Cold War scenario are very different from the threats we face today,” she said.
“Real security lies in nuclear disarmament,” she added.
Her comments echo those of current CND General Secretary Kate Hudson.
“[Trident] is the wrong answer to the security challenges facing the UK. And when that wrong answer comes with a £100 billion price-tag, it’s no wonder it’s deeply unpopular with the British public,” Hudson said.
“[Prime Minister] David Cameron claims it’s the ultimate insurance policy – but even the former head of the Armed Forces has conceded that it is ‘completely useless’ to [sic] the threats we face.”
“It’s time the government recognized the colossal waste of money that Trident constitutes, and committed instead to investing the money in health, jobs and education,” she added.
Defence Secretary Michael Fallon defended the planned renewal of Britain’s nuclear weapons program, calling it “the ultimate guarantor of our freedom and independence.”
“Whether we like it or not, there remain approximately 17,000 nuclear weapons globally,” he said.
“We cannot gamble with our country’s national security, we have to plan for a major, direct nuclear threat to this country or to our NATO allies,” he added.
Fallon cited Russia, North Korea and Iran as potential nuclear threats given their desire to build or maintain nuclear weapons programs.
Parliament will vote on whether to upgrade Britain’s nuclear weapons program in 2016.
A mass demonstration against replacing Trident will take place in London on Saturday, January 24.
Organized by CND, the protest will begin at 12pm outside the Ministry of Defence on Horseguards Avenue.
READ MORE:
Nuclear ultimatum: Scottish National Party challenges Labour on Trident
‘Ticking time bomb’: Watchdogs slam UK nuclear weapons maker over safety practices
World’s Richest 1 Percent to Own Half of Global Wealth by 2016: Oxfam
Al-Akhbar | January 19, 2015
The world’s wealthiest 1 percent are expected to own more than 50 percent of the world’s wealth by 2016, the UK-based charity Oxfam International reported Monday.
“The richest people in the world have seen their share of global wealth increase to 48 percent in 2014 from 44 per cent in 2009,” Oxfam said in the 12-page report entitled “Wealth: Having it all, and wanting more.”
The average wealth per adult in this group is $2.7 million (2.3 million euros), Oxfam said.
“At this rate, it will be more than 50 percent in 2016,” the report read.
The majority of the remaining 52 percent of global wealth shared between the other 99 percent is owned by the richest 20 percent, leaving just 5.5 percent for the remaining 80 percent of people in the world — the equivalent of $3,851 (3,330 euros) per adult.
“Do we really want to live in a world where the 1 percent own more than the rest of us combined? The scale of global inequality is quite simply staggering,” Winnie Byanyima, Executive Director of Oxfam International, warned.
In 2010, the richest 80 people in the world had a net wealth of $1.3 trillion, according to the report. By 2014, the 80 people who top the Forbes rich list had a collective wealth of $1.9 trillion, an increase of $600 billion in just 4 years.
Byanyima said failure to tackle inequality will set the fight against poverty back decades.
“The poor are hurt twice by rising inequality — they get a smaller share of the economic pie and because extreme inequality hurts growth, there is less pie to be shared around.”
Economists say extreme income inequality has consequences for economic growth and on development.
“Income inequality has a negative and statistically significant impact on subsequent growth. In particular, what matters most is the gap between low income households and the rest of the population,” economist Federico Cingano wrote in a study published by the Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development in June 2014.
Rising inequality is estimated to have knocked more than 10 percentage points off growth in Mexico and New Zealand. In the United States, the United Kingdom, Sweden, Finland and Norway, the growth rate would have been more than one fifth higher had income disparities not widened, the study shows.
“On the other hand, greater equality helped increase GDP per capita in Spain, France and Ireland prior to the crisis,” Cingano wrote.
It also has an effect on human capital: “Increased income disparities depress skills development among individuals with poorer parental education backgrounds, both in terms of the quantity of education attained (e.g. years of schooling), and in terms of its quality (i.e. skill proficiency),” Cingano said.
Laureate economist Joseph Stiglitz agreed.
“The extreme inequalities in incomes and assets we see in much of the world today harms our economies, our societies, and undermines our politics. Whilst we should all worry about this it is of course the poorest who suffer most, experiencing not just vastly unequal outcomes in their lives, but vastly unequal opportunities too,” Stiglitz said on Oxfam’s website.
Oxfam called upon states to tackle tax evasion, improve public services, tax capital rather than labor, and introduce living minimum wages, among other measures, in a bid to ensure a more equitable distribution of wealth.
The consequences of policies to reduce income inequality could be significant, the Oxfam report said. If India stopped inequality from rising, 90 million more men and women could be lifted out of extreme poverty by 2019, according to the report.
(Anadolu, Al-Akhbar, AFP)
‘Financial Meteorologists’ And Their Political Predictions About The Russian Economic Storm
By Andrew KORYBKO | Oriental Review | January 16, 2015
Credit rating agencies are predicting quite a storm for the Russian economy, and they are therefore threatening to lower the country’s status to ‘junk’ level. Just as a weatherman may be incorrect about their storm predictions, so too may a ‘financial meteorologist’, except the latter has ulterior motives in doing so.
S&P has joined Moody’s in launching an attack on the Russian economy, hoping that the threat of lowing Moscow’s credit status will somehow translate into political changes in Eastern Europe. Although such an idea may seem plausible in theory, in practice it’s absolutely disjointed from reality and merely symbolizes the third wave of the economic war on Russia. This coming economic storm, cooked up in the West, is going to come up against the multipolar storm breaker of Russia and China’s own Universal Credit Rating Group (UCRG), expected to become active later this year. When the waves inevitably crash, the West may find that it has unwittingly and irreversibly damaged its own unipolar economic defenses and opened up a flood of multipolarity.
The Third Wave
There have thus far been two major waves of economic warfare waged against Russia, with the third one well on its way. They are as follows:
First:
The US and the EU enacted selective and then generalized sanctions against the Russian economy and certain individuals, apparently under the false belief that Russia is Zimbabwe and can somehow be bullied via these means. They weren’t successful in this attempt and thus decided to escalate the conflict to the next level.
Second:
This wave brought about the oil and currency war against Russia, opening up a Pandora’s Box of repercussions that may unintentionally spell the end of fracking in the US (or at least its suspension), among other things. Nonetheless, the main objective here was to destroy what is inaccurately viewed as the lynchpin of Russia’s economy (oil and gas) and create the conditions necessary for a Color Revolution. As with the first wave, the second one also failed to achieve its goals.
Third:
Enter the third wave, which is what Russia is on the cusp of experiencing. The strategy here is to use institutional ratings agencies to damage Russia’s international economic reputation in the hopes that this can help ‘isolate’ it from the non-Western markets that it has recently (and quite eagerly) engaged. This plan is dead in its tracks, since Russia’s rating was worse in 2005 but it was consistently growing at around a 7% average during the period 2000-2008, showing the inherently political (and economically ineffective) nature of Western ratings.
The Multipolar Storm Breaker
Shielding Russia and the multipolar world from the West’s politically minded economic ‘ratings’ is the formation of an alternative agency constructed in cooperation with China, the Universal Credit Rating Group (UCRG). This forthcoming buffer, if it can build the necessary trust and objectivity, could realistically help the non-West weather the oncoming ‘financial storm’ that the Western agencies are all hyped up about.
The underlying idea behind this initiative is that the West has a unipolar monopoly on all manners of international ‘ratings’, be it economic, political stability/fragility, or terrorism. Given that there is a realistic and clearly discernable trend towards geopolitical multipolarity, it’s natural that this would eventually transition over into the economic sphere. The BRICS Bank and China’s Asian Infrastructure Investment Bank are examples of this, with the UCRG being the next institutional progression. If the non-West can free itself from the subjective ‘ratings’ and dictates of Western institutions, then it will be at liberty to pursue multipolarity as it sees fit.
When The Waves Finally Crash
The ‘financial meteorologists’ may be in for a surprise when their politically constructed storm hits the multipolar breakers, as the resultant back-splash may reverberate with unintended consequences. Although it is still a relatively far time away in the future, especially considering the rapid and somewhat surprising transformations that have been taking place in all spheres over the past couple years, an increasingly possible scenario is beginning to take shape, and that’s the macro-structural division of the world into entities (not necessarily states) supporting the retention of the unipolar world and those advocating the construction of the multipolar one.
This is seen in all spheres (as was earlier touched upon), and the creation of the UCRG, especially given the current ‘New Cold War’ context, must be understood as being the next logical extension of this. As the world divides itself into either the pro- or anti-multipolar camp, the emerging dichotomy will come to define international relations for the entire century or until one side capitulates. Given this dynamic, it is a very realistic possibility that certain states will ‘switch sides’, just as occurred during the ‘Old Cold War’, either by force (whether covert or overt) or by choice.
Something that may sway various states towards multipolarity could be the creation of regional agencies and institutions to complement inter-regional (‘Greater Multipolarity’) ones, for example, a credit ratings institution specifically for Latin America. Likewise, if the unipolar world continues its political designations of supposedly impartial topics such as the economy and does so in favor of geostrategic on-the-fence states, it could find itself gaining new allies. No matter how things play out, though, it’s evident that a global competition is definitely taking place between the unipolar and multipolar worlds, and that this is being fought on all levels, including the financial institutional one described within this article.
Concluding Thoughts
The West is poised to launch the third wave of its asymmetrical economic war against Russia, but it’s predictably bound to fail in inflicting the damage it has in mind. Russia and China, the two anchors of the multipolar world via the Russian-Chinese Strategic Partnership, are taking the initiative in creating an alternative institution to counter the West’s politically motivated economic ratings. This creates more openings for the actualization of full-spectrum multipolarity, whereby this concept makes the leap from the geopolitical to the institutional, with the long-term potential of rivaling (and perhaps unseating) the West’s ‘supremacy’ in the targeted fields. Importantly, however, this entire episode portends the division of the world into two camps, with the unipolar and multipolar worlds slated for their inevitable face-off sometime later this century.
Monsanto gets approval for new GMO corn, soybeans designed for potent new biocide
RT | January 16, 2015
Monsanto has won final approval from the US for its new genetically-modified soybeans and cotton, designed to withstand a dominant biocide that fights weed resistance built up as a result of the company’s glyphosate-based Roundup herbicide already in use.
The US Department of Agriculture’s Animal and Plant Health Inspection Service (APHIS) announced Thursday that the powerful biotechnology corporation’s GMO cotton and soybean plants have been given “non-regulated” status.
Monsanto now awaits approval from the US Environmental Protection Agency for the new herbicide – a mix of the formidable chemical dicamba and glyphosate, which the company has developed for use on the newly-approved GMO crops.
The new GMO crops – coupled with the dicamba/glyphosate cocktail – make up what Monsanto has dubbed the ‘Roundup Ready Xtend crop system,’ designed to trump super weeds that have evolved along with the company’s glyphosate-based Roundup biocide.
Dicamba was first approved in 1967 and has been linked to high rates of cancer and birth defects in the families of food growers, according to government and other scientific studies.
Consumer, health, environmental, and farmer advocates have fiercely opposed the new Xtend system, as it portends an overall “10-fold increase in dicamba use in American agriculture, from under 4 million lbs. at present to more than 40 million lbs. per year,” according to Center for Food Safety.
“Monsanto’s genetically-engineered dicamba-resistant crops are yet another example of how pesticide firms are taking agriculture back to the dark days of heavy, indiscriminate use of hazardous pesticides, seriously endangering human health and the environment,” said Andrew Kimbrell, executive director of Center for Food Safety, in a statement.
“If EPA also reneges on its responsibility to protect human and environmental health, Center for Food Safety will pursue all available legal options to halt the introduction of these dangerous crops.”
The USDA and Monsanto have said that Xtend will increase dicamba use in cotton by 14 times current levels, according to Reuters, and, in soybeans, 500 times current levels, the Pesticide Action Network said in a statement.
“I am convinced that in all of my years serving the agriculture industry, the widespread use of dicamba herbicide [poses] the single most serious threat to the future of the specialty crop industry in the Midwest,” said Steve Smith, Director of Agriculture for Red Gold, a tomato-processing company.
Opposition — and even the USDA — says more dicamba will only mean additional weed resistance in the future, translating to more profits for the likes of Monsanto and Dow Chemical, which received US approval for its genetically-engineered 2,4-D-resistant corn and soybeans in September 2014.
“The pesticide treadmill spins on, and that’s great news for Monsanto,” said Gary Ruskin, executive director of U.S. Right to Know, a consumer advocacy group, Reuters reported. “This is just the latest in a endless string of favors from our federal government to Monsanto.”
Crops most at risk from increased dicamba exposure include fruits, nuts, and vegetables, growers of which say they fear the chemical will drift onto and damage their fields.
Monsanto, according to Reuters, said it will educate food growers over the proper way to avoid dicamba drift. But biocide opponents are skeptical of these promises and say the burden will rest with the growers — not Monsanto.
“Monsanto’s response to farmers’ concerns about crop damage has been to develop exceedingly complex and demanding protocols for applying and disposing of the herbicide cocktail, including a ten-step triple rinse of sprayers that is likely to take more than an hour and then entails proper disposal of the contaminated rinse water,” said the Pesticide Action Network. “This ‘solution’ puts all responsibility on farmers, and sets up the company to escape liability for crop damage.”
Biocide drift will also adversely impact flowering plants and their pollinators and other species, which depend on them for nectar and habitat.
Meanwhile, Monsanto is awaiting approval from China to allow imports of its new soybeans. China has been reticent about approving more GMO crops, as exemplified in farmer lawsuits aimed at American agribusiness companies following the nation’s rejection of US genetically-engineered-corn imports.
Monsanto Chief Technology Officer Robb Fraley said last week that Chinese approval is expected in time for Xtend’s commercial launch in 2016.
READ MORE:
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Oregon GMO-labeling initiative defeated by Monsanto-sponsored groups
Monarch butterfly may be listed as endangered species after 90% population drop
China-UK nuclear power deal details hidden for ‘national security’
RT | January 15, 2015
The UK government has refused to reveal whether the National Security Council approved or discussed China’s investment in a proposed £24.5 billion nuclear power plant in the UK, Hinkley Point C, citing “national security.”
Despite a BBC Freedom of Information request for information regarding China’s expected 30-40 percent stake in the new nuclear site in southwest England, the government denied further disclosure.
Cabinet Office official Roger Smethurst told the BBC: “There is a general public interest in disclosure of information and I recognize that openness in government may increase public trust in and engagement with the government. There is a definite public interest in members of the public being able to understand decisions taken on investment in critical national infrastructure.”
“I have weighed these public interests against a very strong public interest in safeguarding national security.”
The National Security Council’s job is to review and debate foreign investment projects and then to approve or deny them.
Derek Smith, head of communications for the NSC, told the BBC: “The government has put in place an approach which enables it to assess the risks associated with foreign investment and develop strategies to manage them.”
“The NSC brings together the economic and security arms of the government and is the forum that ultimately balances the risks and opportunities of inward investment decisions.”
In June last year, the government announced the civil nuclear agreement signed by the UK and China, which could be “worth hundreds of millions of pounds to British companies over several years.” This paved the way for Chinese companies to invest in Hinkley Point C.
Energy and Climate Change Secretary Ed Davey said at the time: “China and the UK stand united in our plans for more collaborative working that will help to achieve long lasting energy security in our own countries.”
The plant would be the first overseas venture for the China General Nuclear Power Corp.
Meanwhile, the French nuclear power developer EDF is expected to sign an investment agreement with Chinese partners for the new reactor at Hinkley Point by the end of March, to secure investment for the project.
According to the World Nuclear Association, the UK has 16 operational reactors generating around 18 percent of the country’s electricity. All but one of these will be retired by 2023.
China is reportedly negotiating plans to build four new reactors in Turkey. One-third of the nuclear reactors currently under construction worldwide are in China.
The nuclear plant is not the only UK energy project that China co-finances. The state-owned China General Nuclear Corporation is reportedly prepared to pay £100 million for an 80 percent stake in three UK wind farms.
Kerry to Bulgaria: End energy dependence on Russia
Press TV – January 15, 2015
US Secretary of State John Kerry has called on Bulgaria to end its dependence on Russia for energy.
Kerry made the remarks on Thursday in meetings with Bulgaria’s president, prime minister and foreign minister in the capital Sofia.
Bulgaria must move toward “diversifying supplies and distribution and increasing connectivity with neighbors,” Kerry told a news conference with Bulgarian Prime Minister Boyko Borisov.
He said Washington is interested in helping the country take “practical steps to enhance energy security in Bulgaria and across Europe.”
Kerry also talked about the possible construction of a natural gas pipeline from Greece and moving ahead with a stalled contract with Westinghouse Electric Co. to build a nuclear power plant.
“We hope very much that the issues that (the government and Westinghouse) are discussing can be quickly resolved,” Kerry said.
Kerry, however, stressed that the US push is not aimed at Russia.
“That is not directed against any one country,” Kerry said. “It is simply a reality. No country in the world should be totally dependent for its energy supply on one other country. We need diversified supplies across the world.”
He said the US will send its special energy envoy to Sofia to look into how the US Export-Import Bank could finance the country.
Bulgaria relies on Russia for 85 percent of its gas and 100 percent of its nuclear power.
On security issues, Kerry said the US is determined in its commitment to defend NATO member Bulgaria if it is attacked.
The US would increase joint military exercises with Bulgaria and also help the country modernize its defenses, Kerry said.
Dude, Where’s My Peace Dividend?
By Robert Ted Hinds | CounterPunch | January 14, 2015
In the 1970s and 1980s, Americans were conditioned with the idea that the extraordinary growth in military expenditure for the U.S. to “win the arms race” with the USSR would somehow lead to a “peace dividend.” That’s what the elected officials of the United States and its NATO allies called it. Eventually the Soviet Union did collapse under the weight of its own economic dysfunction and hyper-militaristic bureaucracy. When the Berlin Wall came down on November 9, 1989, compelled by massive nonviolent noncooperation with the dictatorial regime, it seemed that the leaders of the world might finally declare the peace dividend we had all been expecting. Mankind as a whole seemed to have hope that the specter of nuclear war had vanished and that a constitutional democracy could operate as a benevolent superpower.
It wasn’t long before President Bush Sr. replaced the old war with a new one. The New York Times disclosed official transcripts of a conversation between US Ambassador to Iraq, April Glaspie, and Saddam Hussein where she said, “We have no opinion on the Arab-Arab conflicts like your border disagreement with Kuwait. James Baker (Secretary of State) has directed our official spokesmen to emphasize this instruction.”
Soon after, Saddam Hussein invaded Kuwait and America’s action toward war was swift. King Hussein of Jordan, one of America’s strongest allies in the region (and whose wife was American), told the New York Times that the day of the invasion, Bush gave him 48 hours to negotiate a withdrawal of Iraqi forces from Kuwait.
The Jordanian king secured a promise from Saddam to withdraw all of his forces within a week to avert war. King Hussein could not understand why the deal was undermined by the Bush Administration. The US and its Allies proceeded to annihilate the Iraqi army it had supported for 10 years during the Iran-Iraq War which ended in 1988. George Bush had been able to maintain diplomatic relations with Saddam when Saddam was waging war against Iran, but not when he was offering to withdraw from Kuwait. Thus began the Gulf War in 1991 and a process of political destabilization in the Middle East that has been a pretense for ongoing military intervention to this day.
Harvard public policy professor Linda Bilmes published a study in 2013 estimating that the true cost of the current wars in Iraq and Afghanistan will run between $4 trillion and $6 trillion, including ongoing healthcare for veterans and interest on the war debt. A similar study by Brown University put the price tag at $4 trillion, but both of these studies preceded the rise of ISIS and do not account for rising tensions with Iran and Syria, or Russia in the Ukraine.
Where’s the peace dividend we were promised throughout the Cold War, that payback for defeating the evil superpower that prevented America from spreading peace and democracy by way of its “benevolent hegemony?” Where’s our $4 trillion? The war hawks and politicians in Washington D.C. will tell you it is being reinvested to defeat terror and secure American interests abroad; that the elusive dividend payment is just another war or two away. In an October 2014 interview with USA Today to promote his book Worthy Fights, President Obama’s former Secretary of Defense and CIA Director, Leon Panetta, stated that “we can expect kind of a 30-year war” that would need to include Nigeria, Yemen, Libya and other threats. Those who profit from the military-industrial complex will continue to recognize a return on their investments. The American people will only realize a peace dividend when their government begins to practice peace instead of war as a means to foreign policy.
Robert Ted Hinds is an activist, journalist, and professional analyst. He holds a Master of Business Administration from Washington State University and Bachelor of Science degrees in Psychology and Finance from the University of Oregon.
Uruguay Discovers ‘Extremely Encouraging’ Oil Deposits
teleSUR | January 14, 2015
Australian company Petrel Energy has announced that it has found and certified the existence of 20 potential oil deposits in the north of Uruguay, the only country in the region that imports all the hydrocarbons that it consumes.
Uruguayan state petrol enterprise ANCAP said that the certification includes “20 conventional explorations,” with an estimation of risk-free resources “of up to 1.8 billion recoverable barrels which implies 5.6 billion barrels originally in the sub-soil.”
ANCAP emphasized that there may be more oil yet to discover, for which “more exploratory work is required, like various drillings, in order to determine the existence of significant hydrocrabon accumulations.”
The results are “extremely encouraging,” the company said, adding that the Australian company Schuepach confirmed that it will drill four exploratory wells in the zone between 2015 and 2017.
In recent years, Uruguay set itself the task of trying to find oil in its territory, sparking several offshore projects in 2009 and 2012.
Energy bills surge for poorest in UK: Official data
Press TV – January 14, 2015
Official figures show the energy bills of the poorest 10 percent of British households have grown at almost twice as the average rate in the country under the Tory-led Coalition government.
The research by the House of Commons Library published on Wednesday showed electricity bills for the affected group rose by 39.7 percent between 2010 and 2013, compared to 7.5 percent for the top 10 percent of British households and 22.2 percent on average.
In addition, the poorest group saw their gas bills increased by 53.3 percent compared to 23.9 percent for the top 10 percent and 29.2 percent for the average British home.
Shadow Energy Secretary Caroline Flint said since Prime Minister David Cameron’s government took office in 2010 the average household energy bill has risen by 260 pounds.
“These figures show that the poorest households are paying the heaviest price for the Tories’ failure to stand up to the energy companies and ensure that the full savings from wholesale cost falls are passed on to all consumers,” said Flint.
Ann Robinson, director of consumer policy at the uSwitch.com website also called for lower energy tariffs amid falling world oil and gas prices.
“Given the huge reduction in wholesale prices – which make up around half of energy bills – we believe standard tariffs can and should be cut even further,” said Robinson.
The data comes just days after British think tank Policy Exchange revealed that of the 2.3 million homes living in fuel poverty, 1.1 million are working households with one or more members holding employment.
The UK has seen rising energy costs in recent years. A separate report has shown that the average gap between the family’s energy bill and what it can afford is estimated to be around £400.
Taking a Meaningless Progressive Stand in Congress
By Dave Lindorff | This Can’t Be happening! | January 12, 2015
The Democrats are showing their true colors now that they have lost control of both houses of Congress.
Suddenly, with the assurance that they don’t have to worry about being taken seriously, the “party of the people” has come forward with a proposal to levy a 0.1% tax on short-term stock trades, particularly on high speed trading.
Don’t get me wrong. A stock-trade tax is a great, and long-overdue idea. In fact, such a tax, which could raise some $800 billion in revenue over a decade, should probably be bigger than just 0.1%, and targeted more directly at high speed trading. (Most experts agree high-speed trading has been undermining any semblance of a fair market for stocks and bonds by handing an outsized advantage to companies that have access to huge computers that can make enormous trades, front-running other investors by getting into and out of the market in microseconds, so why not levy a graduated trading tax that is progressively higher the shorter the time period an investment is held?)
The point is that this trading tax is something that progressives have been calling for now for years, if not longer, but while they were in a position to actually make it happen, Democrats in Congress were silent about it.
Now though, with Republicans, who are dead-set against a tax on stock trading, in control of Congress so that there is no chance of passage, the Democrats as a party are calling for it, with Rep. Chris Van Hollen (D-MD) planning to introduce the measure this week as part of an ironically named “action plan” to combat income inequality which would also include a measure to cut $2000 in income taxes for families earning less than $200,000 a year, and to more nearly triple the child care credit.
If the Democrats had passed such measures back when they had the White House and both Houses of Congress, back in 2009 or 2010, they wouldn’t be looking at a Republican Congress today. If they’d proposed such measures last year, when they still at least controlled the Senate, they wouldn’t have lost the Senate last November.
But of course, if they had made these proposals when there was a chance of them becoming law, the Democrats in Congress would have lost all the fat campaign donations and other legal bribes that they receive from Wall Street banks, brokerages and hedgefunds.
Now it’s safe for them to make those proposals as part of their “inaction plan.” The fat cats on Wall Street know they’re not serious, and will continue to buy them in 2016, when you won’t see them making these kinds of populist proposals anymore.
It’s all part of a long-running game in which the Democratic Party pretends to be the party of the working person, while actually being just another pro-capitalist party, working hand-in-glove with the Republicans to continue sucking the life out of the American middle class and the poor to enrich the wealthiest 1% of Americans who already control some 40% of the nation’s assets, and the wealthiest 10%, who control as much national wealth as the other 90% of us put together.
Meanwhile, the real people to watch in Congress are those Democrats who are going to vote with the ruling Republicans in House and Senate to allow pro-rich and pro-capitalist measures to get to a vote, and to provide the votes to over-ride any vetoes by President Obama. Behind all the anti-inequality talk, these are the people who really represent the leadership and the political bedrock of the Democratic Party.
We got an early look at what is coming last week, when a group of 13 Democratic senators (the scabs clearly visible on their exposed flesh), voted with an almost unanimous Republican bloc, to defeat an amendment offered by Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-MA) that would have stripped a measure weakening the Dodd-Frank financial regulatory law out of an already pro-financial corporate bail-out bill extending federal backing for terrorism coverage in insurance policies. The vote killing the Warren amendment passed 66-31 meaning there were only three abstentions. Without the 13 Democratic votes against fellow Democrat Warren, her amendment would have passed because of a 60-vote requirement for amendments.
Keep an eye on those 13 Democrats. Given that the Republicans now have 54 seats in the Senate, they only need an extra six votes from Democrats to move bills and amendments to a vote, and only 13 votes to override a presidential veto.
Here, for reference, are the 13 members of the Senate Democratic caucus who killed the Warren amendment:
Michael Bennet (D-CO)
Tom Carper (D-DE)
Bob Casey (D-PA)
Joe Donnelly (D-IN)
Martin Heinrich (D-NM)
Heidi Heitkamp (D-ND)
Angus King (I-ME)
Amy Klobuchar (D-MN)
Joe Manchin (D-WV)
Claire McCaskill (D-MO)
Gary Peters (D-MI)
Debbie Stabenow (D-MI)
Jon Tester (D-MT)
They of course are not the only pro-corporate Democratic senators. There are plenty more who can be counted on to vote to further enrich the rich and empower the powerful when called upon to do so — people like Sen. Charles Schumer (D-NY) and Cory Booker (D-NJ) for example.
This will be important when, later this year, we see Republicans in Congress putting forwards bills to gut Social Security and Medicare, to step up military funding, and to further undermine environmental, banking and worker safety regulation, for example.
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From the Archives
Britain’s secret role in the brutal US war in Vietnam
By Mark Curtis | MintPress News | November 16, 2022
There is a myth the UK did not support Washington’s war against Vietnam in the 1960s and 1970s. In fact, Labour and Conservative governments backed every phase of US military escalation and played secret roles in the conflict, declassified files show.
- UK sent SAS team to Vietnam in 1962, flew secret RAF missions to deliver arms, and provided intelligence to US
- UK governments lied to parliament they were not providing military advice to South Vietnam’s brutal regime
- Labour government secretly gave arms to US for use in Vietnam, stressing need for “no publicity”
- It also connived with Washington to deceive UK public over its support for US
- UK governments knew of atrocities against civilians but backed US war aims
- Whitehall only started to advocate a peaceful solution, on US terms, once the war became unwinnable
During its war in Vietnam in the 1960s and 1970s the US dropped more bombs than in the whole of World War Two, in a conflict that killed over two million people. The wholesale destruction of villages and killing of innocent people was a permanent feature of the US war from the beginning, along with widespread indiscriminate bombing.
Britain’s role in the war has been largely buried and must be almost completely unknown to the public. When the UK media mentions the war now, reports often simply reference the refusal by Harold Wilson’s government to agree to US requests to openly deploy British troops.
Although this was certainly a public rebuff to Washington, Britain did virtually everything else to back the US war over more than a decade, the declassified documents show. … continue
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