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Austerity strike hits Greek capital

Press TV – September 22, 2011
Protesters of the Greek trade union PAME march during a rally against the government’s plans for new austerity measures in Athens on Wednesday

Greeks in Athens have reacted angrily to the government’s tougher austerity measures by staging a strike in the capital over further taxes and public spending cuts.

Athens was brought to a standstill on Thursday by a 24-hour public transport strike while teachers and municipal workers also staged walkouts. A four-hour work stoppage by air traffic controllers also forced airlines to cancel or reschedule flights.

“We are obliged to resist. Not even Greece’s German and Turkish conquerors imposed such taxes,” AFP quoted the head of Athens’ subway employees Antonis Stamatopoulos as saying.

The Greek government has announced pension and tax break cuts and put 30,000 state employees on temporary layoffs after pledging to do ‘anything’ to stay in the Eurozone and unlock bankruptcy-saving EU-IMF loans.

On Wednesday, the government announced cuts to pensions above 1,200 Euros ($1,650) per month, a furlough for 30,000 state employees and a drastic reduction to revenue exemption on annual taxes to 5,000 Euros, from 12,000 Euros currently.

Greece has been struggling to convince the European Union and International Monetary Fund that it can bring its tough economic overhaul program back onto track despite delays and targets slipping due to a deeper-than-expected recession.

EU and IMF auditors have agreed to resume a review of Greek finances needed to unlock 8 billion euros in rescue funding.

The audit had been suspended in early September, with sources citing lack of progress with reforms, placing in jeopardy the release of funds needed to prevent Athens running out of cash next month.

The additional cuts, on top of a controversial property tax that could be extended to 2014, have raised dissent in the ruling party with backbenchers and former ministers doubting their effectiveness after two years of recession.

The main private sector union GSEE and the Adedy syndicate representing civil servants have called for strikes next month against the austerity measures.

The public sector will shut down on October 5 and a general strike will be held on October 19.

September 22, 2011 Posted by | Economics, Solidarity and Activism | Leave a comment

Is South Sudan’s Largest Land Deal a Land Grab?

A new study alleges that a land deal threatens local people in Central Equatoria, South Sudan.

By Michaela Rhode | Think Africa Press | September 7, 2011

50 million hectares of land, an area twice the size of the UK, have been acquired by foreign companies or governments in Africa over the last few years. From Brazil to China to Saudi Arabia, demand is widespread and this trend was recently continued in South Sudan. With almost  10% of the country already in foreign hands, a report by The Oakland Institute (OI) published details of its largest and potentially most divisive land deal to date, the  2008 agreement between Nile Trading and Development and the Mukaya Payam Cooperative.

Good intentions? – A question of perspective

How prominently did the needs of the local community feature in this deal? Think Africa Press spoke to two experts, Anuradha Mittal, founder of the Oakland Institute, an American think tank specialising in the exposure of land grabs, and Howard Douglas, head of Kinyeti Development, partners with Nile Trading and Development, to uncover the ramifications of this deal. Ms. Mittal is an expert on trade, development, human rights and agriculture and the author of numerous books on the subject. In 2008, Nation magazine named her ‘Most Valuable Progressive Thinker’ of the year. Howard Douglas is a former US ambassador and US Coordinator for Refugee affairs. He has worked extensively with the US government and with the Episcopalian Church in post conflict countries.

Earlier this year, The Oakland Institute reproduced a copy of the  lease agreement along with a  report identifying the worrying aspects of the deal. Both sides attest that the needs of the community are a priority. Mr.Douglas dismissed the report as “a piece of trash”, accusing the OI and NGOs of scandal-seeking and headline grabbing. Ms.Mittal was equally scathing, branding Mr.Douglas a “thief”.

The agreement in question is for a 49-year lease of 600,000 hectares of land with a possibility of another 400,000 hectares and full rights to exploit all natural resources of the land. The OI report draws attention to the astonishingly low price paid for the lease of the land; 75,000 Sudanese pounds ($25,000) which works out to $16 a hectare. Mr.Douglas argued that this figure was not the price paid for the land but a fee levied by the government. The figure in the lease is indeed attributed to a “land charge” and he asserts that the agreed price was for Nile Trading and Development to organise and finance the development of the land in return for a percentage of the profits. This would involve spending high, unspecified sums on infrastructure such as roads and schools for the community. However, this promise is not stipulated in the lease agreement and has failed to materialise in the past three years. The document published by OI provides no legal imperative for Nile Trading and Development to give anything back to the community in terms of infrastructure.

The report also points to another worrying aspect of this deal. It draws attention to the claims made by Sudan’s Agency of Independent Media that the Mukaya Payam Cooperative is a “fictitious cooperative” comprised of, “a group of influential natives from Mukaya Payam and the neighbouring payams…The influential natives leased out the land behind the backs of the entire community.” Ms.Mittal identifies the Cooperative as three individuals living in Juba who are totally disconnected from the people of Mukaya Payam. She affirms that, “the people did not even know about the deal until the OI report came out this year.” This is an allegation that Mr.Douglas vehemently denies. If true, then it would mean that land which has been used by the same communities for generations has been given away without their consent and the compensation they are supposed to receive for this put in the hands of an elusive entity. It would not then be surprising that the people are, as Ms.Mittal claims, “very very angry”.

The Mukaya Payam Cooperative is an elusive entity with only one name attached to it, the lease agreement being signed by Magistrate James Yosia Ramdalla, the Paramount Chief of the Cooperative. Although four other “payams” (communities) were involved in the deal, there is only one signature on the lease.

According to the terms of the agreement, “any profits generated by Nile Trading and Development in respect of the leased land shall initially and through 2012 be divided 60% to the company and 40% to the Mukaya Payam Cooperative.” Whether the cooperative, whoever they may be, will distribute the rents amongst the other payams and how they will do so is uncertain. Mr.Douglas claims that, “the intention was that every man, woman and child who was associated with the Mukaya Payam would be the beneficiaries of the agreement.” He claims that they intend to set up a Mukaya Payam Trust to administer the funds to the community members. However, intentions are not legally binding and there are no stipulations in the lease agreement concerning distribution of funds.

What remains unclear is how NTD plans to develop this land. Mr.Douglas claims that large scale agriculture is the long-term goal. He speaks of creating “agricultural cooperatives” with schools, clinics and facilities to produce enough food for export, giving farmers a disposable income and political security. This vision is one which, according to Ms. Mittal, is to be taken with a pinch of salt. She points to the fact that nothing in the lease agreement indicates that agriculture is on NTD’s agenda. The real detail in the document is afforded to exploration rights.

Plans for the future

Investment in South Sudan ought to be seen as a great opportunity. These companies should provide jobs and contribute to the development of the country. According to Jonathan Brooks of the OECD, an estimated $18 billion a year needs to be invested in agriculture in order for the world to be able to feed itself by 2050. Developing all available land is a necessary step for the world to take and Africa will not be able to meet this level of investment on its own.

Ms. Mittal makes it clear that OI is pro-investment in South Sudan. However, she adds that, “to assume that foreign investors coming in will lead to better job security or food security is a myth”. She claims that unscrupulous investors are jumping on the bandwagon of agricultural investment, to disguise an attempt to control resources. She points to the fact that there is no legal framework in place in South Sudan to protect the people leaving them with only, “the empty words and empty promises of these investors”.

It is important to look beyond the disagreement on both sides. As Ms. Mittal says, “in regard to Mr. Douglas and his lease in South Sudan it is really not about his word against OI’s word. It is about his word against the word of the community and more important their own documents such as the contract; they speak the truth.”

Some representatives of the community have spoken. A  petition signed on the 23 July this year has been handed to the state governor in Juba. It states that, “we the chiefs, elders, religious leaders and the youth of Mukaya Payam, unanimously, with strong terms condemn, disavow and deny the land lease agreement reached on 11 March 2008 between the two parties.” The petition states that the lease agreement was reached without the knowledge of the community and that it is illegal. It is signed by seven chiefs, a reverend, two elders and two others. The President of South Sudan, H.E Salva Kiir, has subsequently given his support to the community stating, “you are the government and you have the powers”. The government must act quickly and decisively to produce stringent guidelines for investors in order to ensure that the rights of its people are protected. If done correctly, foreign investment could flourish. However, until those rights are guaranteed in law, land deals remain dangerous territory.

September 19, 2011 Posted by | Economics, Timeless or most popular | Leave a comment

Chavez versus Obama: Facing Presidential Elections in 2012

By James Petras :: 09.15.2011

Introduction: Two incumbent presidents are running for re-election in 2012, Hugo Chavez in Venezuela and Barack Obama in the United States. What makes these two electoral contests significant is that they represent contrasting responses to the global economic crises:

Chavez following his democratic socialist program pursues policies promoting large scale long-term public investment and spending directed at employment, social welfare and economic growth: Obama guided by his ideological commitment to corporate financial capitalism, pours billions into bailing out Wall Street speculators, focuses on reducing the public deficit and slashes taxes and offers government subsidies to business in the hope that the banks will lend, the private sector will invest. Obama hopes the corporate sector will start to hire the unemployed. Chavez’s economic strategy is directed toward increasing popular demand by increasing the social wage. Obama’s strategy is directed toward enriching the elite, hoping for a “trickle down” effect. Chavez’s economic recovery program is based on the public sector, the state, taking the lead in light of the capitalist market induced crises and the failure of the private sector to invest. Obama’s economic recovery and employment program depends wholly on the private sector, utilizing tax handouts to stimulate domestic investments which generate employment.

According to the experts and politicians, the socio-economic performance of each President will be decisive in determining whether either President will be re-elected in 2012.

Measuring the Performance of Presidents Chavez and Obama in the Face of the Economic Crises

Over the past three years, both presidents faced deep socio-economic crises resulting in increased unemployment, economic recession and popular demands for political leadership in formulating an economic recovery program.

President Chavez responded via a large scale program in public spending on social programs. Billions were allocated in a massive housing program designed to create one million homes over the next several years. Chavez lessened military tensions and reduced frontier conflicts by negotiating a political agreement with the right-wing Santos regime in Colombia.

Chavez increased the minimum wage, social security and pension payments, increasing consumption among low income groups, stimulating demand and increasing revenues for small and medium size businesses. The state embarked on large scale infrastructure projects, especially highways and transport, creating jobs in labor intensive activities. The Chavez government sustained living standards by instituting price controls on food and other essentials, which sustained popular demand at the expense of profiteering by the owners of super markets. The Chavez government nationalized lucrative gold mines and repatriated overseas reserves in the course of financing its demand driven economic recovery program, eschewing tax concessions to the rich and bailouts of bankrupt banks and private businesses.

Obama rejected any large scale long term public investments to create jobs: his proposed “Jobs for America” proposal will at best temporarily reduce unemployment by less than five tenths of one percent. In pursuit of policies benefiting Wall Street bondholders, Obama became deeply involved in deficit reduction, meaning large scale cuts in public spending especially in social expenditures. Obama in agreement with the extreme right-wing agreed to regressive proposals to reduce tax payments for popular Medicare, Medicaid and Social Security programs. His proposals to fund “Jobs for America” depends on cuts in the Social Security tax which ensures a reduction in payments and a deficit or worse, which would facilitate privatization – handing social security to Wall Street, a trillion dollar plum.

Obama ignores mortgage foreclosures of over 10 million families – increasing homelessness and habitation downgrades, in favor of bailing out banks and home mortgage swindlers.

Obama increased military spending, multiplying overseas combat troops, clandestine terror operations and the domestic spy apparatus, increasing the deficits at the expense of productive investments in education, technology skill upgrades and export promotion.

Unlike Chavez who makes a point of highlighting positive job and education policies for Afro and Indo-Venezuelans, Obama ignores the 50% unemployed big city young (18-25) Afro-Americans and Latinos in favor of serving white Wall Street bankers.

In contrast to Chavez who pegged pensions and wages to inflation and enforced price controls, Obama froze federal salaries and social security payments resulting in a seven percent decline in real income over the past three years.

According to the latest US Census Bureau data (September 2011) under Obama over 46.2 million Americans live in poverty, the highest figure ever. Median household income dropped 2.3% between 2009-2010. The number of Americans in poverty increased from 13.2%in 2008 to 15.1%in 2010. Nearly one out of four children live in poverty in 2010, as over 2.6 million more US citizens were impoverished in a single year. In contrast, and in line with Obama’s trickle down economic policies, the number of wealthy Americans – earning over 100,000 dollars – have suffered little or no impact: luxury specialty stores , like Tiffany’s report a 15% increase in sales.

The lowest 10%of the population suffered the most, a fall in income of 12.1% between 2009-2010 while the 10% with the highest income saw a decline of 1.5%. Of the 34 members of the OCED the US along with Mexico, Chile and Israel has the worst social class inequalities. Obama’s top down stimulus policies saved the bankers by sacrificing the working and middle class.

Political and Economic Consequences of Top Down and Bottom Up Economics

The political and economic consequences of Obama’s “top down” and Chavez “bottom up” socio-economic polices are striking in every respect. Venezuela grew 3.6% in the first half of 2011 while the US stagnated at less than 2%. Worse still, during the second half of the year Obama and his advisers expressed fear that the US is heading toward a “double dip” recession – negative growth. In contrast the President of Venezuela’s Central Bank predicted accelerated growth for 2012.

While US unemployment remains above 9% and combined with underemployment rose to over 19%, Venezuela’s vast public housing and infrastructure investments are generating jobs and lowering the numbers of unemployed and under-employed in the formal and informal labor market. Obama’s pandering to Wall Street bankers and deficit reduction hawks and his vast increase spending on overseas wars and the domestic security apparatus, has bankrupted the treasury. In contrast, Chavez has nationalized lucrative private sector mines, banks and energy enterprises and decreased military tensions increasing resources for social programs such as food subsidies. Obama’s deficit reductions have led to massive firings in education and social services.

Chavez social expenditures have augmented the number of public universities, secondary and primary schools and clinics. Millions have lost their homes as Obama ignored the forced evictions of the mortgage banks, while Chavez has made a start in solving the housing deficit via one million homes.

Obama lends at virtually no interest to private banks who fail to lend to productive enterprises to create jobs, preferring speculation in overseas (Brazilian) bonds with higher interest rates. Chavez invests directly in productive labor intensive infrastructures programs, agricultural self-sufficiency projects and developing downstream processing plants, refineries and smelters.

As a result of the reactionary top down economics he practices and his overt threats to cut basic social programs like Medicare, Medicaid and Social Security, Obama’s popularity has fallen over the past three year from 80% to 40% and is heading downwards. Moreover, his pro-Wall Street fiscal and militarist policies – deepening and extending Bush and Rumsfeld’s wars and terror operations – has turned the US political climate further toward the extreme right. As of the last quarter of 2011, Obama appears vulnerable to electoral defeat.

In contrast President Chavez, riding the wave of economic recovery, based on positive programs of social expansion and public investments, has seen his popularity rise from 43% in March 2010 to 59.3% as of September 7, 2011. The US backed opposition is fragmented, weak and unable to challenge the overwhelmingly positive popular perceptions of the housing and infrastructure projects benefiting the mass of workers, construction companies and contractors.

Chavez is vulnerable on issues of personal security, administrative corruption and inefficiency. But he is seen to have taken important steps to correct these problem areas. Graduates of a new police academy provide honest, efficient community linked policing, which, in pilot projects have reduced violent crime by 60%. Efforts to end bureaucratic corruption and inefficiency are still pending.

Conclusion

Comparing Chavez and Obama’s presidency presents a sharp contrast between a successful bottom up socialist informed economic recovery program and a failed top down capitalist stimulus program. While the American public expresses its hostility to private banking’s pillage of the treasury, government threats to the last remnants of the social safety net and Obama’s failure to lower persistent high levels of unemployment and under-employment, Chavez’s popularity rises along with the positive “good feeling” among three-fifths of the electorate to his presidency. If the Chavez government continues and deepens his ‘bottom up’ economic stimulus program and the economy continues to expand and he recovers from cancer he will in all likelihood be re-elected by a landslide in 2012.

In contrast if Obama continues to truckle to the corporate and financial elite and slash and burn social programs he will continue his downward slide into well-deserved defeat and oblivion.

Venezuela’s economic recovery via advanced social programs is a powerful message to the American people: there is an alternative to regressive ‘top down’ economic policies: it’s called democratic socialism and its advocate is President Chavez, who talks to and works for the people as opposed to the con-man Obama who talks to the people and works for the rich.

September 16, 2011 Posted by | Economics, Militarism, Progressive Hypocrite | Leave a comment

Did 9/11 Really Change Everything?

A State of Permanent War

By ISMAEL HOSSEIN-ZADEH | CounterPunch | September 15, 2011

The American people are told, again and again, that 9/11 “changed everything.” Is this really true?

The answer is both yes, and no.

Yes, because 9/11 prompted policies of regime change, preemptive strike, and humanitarian intervention, which, in turn, triggered the wars and military interventions in Afghanistan, Iraq, Pakistan, Yemen and Libya. At home, it provided justification for the institution of the Patriot Act, Homeland Security, outsourcing of torture, restriction of personal/civil liberties and the ballooning of the Pentagon budget.

And no, because the militaristic policies and security measures that were thus put into effect in the immediate aftermath of the 9/11 attacks had been in the making for nearly a dozen years before the attacks took place.

There is overwhelming evidence that the US policies of preemptive strike and regime change started not with the collapse of the World Trade Center in 2001 but with the collapse of the Berlin Wall in 1989. Beneficiaries of war dividends, that is, the military-industrial-security complex, were alarmed by the demise of the Soviet Union, by the end of the “communist threat” as the ready-made justifier of continued escalation of the Pentagon budget, and by the demands for “peace dividends.” “What we were afraid of was people who would say . . . ‘Let’s bring all of the troops home, and let’s abandon our position in Europe,’” acknowledged Paul D. Wolfowitz, Undersecretary of Defense under President Bush Sr. “It’s hard to imagine just how uncertain the world looked after the end of the Cold War.”

Not surprisingly, in the immediate aftermath of the Cold War, and in the face of widespread demands for “peace dividends,” the powerful interests vested in the military-security capital moved swiftly to fend off such demands by successfully inventing all kinds of “new threats to the national interests of the United States.” Instead of the Soviet Union, the “menace of rogue states, global terrorism, and militant Islam” would have to do as new enemies. Having thus effectively substituted “new sources of threat” for the “communist threat” of the Cold War era, powerful beneficiaries of military spending (working through the Pentagon and a number of militaristic think tanks like the Project for the New American Century, Center for Security Policy, Jewish Institute for National Security Affairs and National Institute for Public Policy) managed not only to maintain but, in fact, expand the Pentagon budget beyond the Cold War years.

The 9/11 attacks, Osama bin Laden, global terrorism, and US military aggressions in Afghanistan, Iraq, Pakistan, Yemen, Libya and elsewhere in the Muslim-Arab world can be better understood against this background: the systemic or internal dynamics of the military-industrial-security complex as an existentially-driven juggernaut to war and militarism that, in the aftermath of the Cold War era, needed all kinds of enemies and boogiemen in order to justify its continued usurpation of the lion’s share of the public finance, or the US treasury.

Major post-Cold War US military strategies such as regime change were formulated not after the 9/11 attacks, or under President Bush Jr., but under President Bush Sr., that is, soon after the demise of the Soviet Union. The early 1990s Pentagon architects of those strategies included the then Secretary of Defense Richard Cheney, Paul D. Wolfowitz, then Undersecretary of Defense, Zalmay Khalilzad, then a Wolfowitz aide, I. Lewis “Scooter” Libby, then principal Deputy Undersecretary of Defense for Strategy and Colin L. Powell, then chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff. Most of what the Pentagon team crafted in the immediate aftermath of the Cold War was published as a government document under Cheney’s name as America’s “Defense Strategy for the 1990s”—the document also came to be known as Defense Planning Guidance.

Almost all of the Pentagon’s post-Cold War aggressive military strategies such as preemptive strike, expansion of NATO, regime change, nation building, or humanitarian intervention can be traced back to the notorious Defense Planning Guidance of the early 1990s. As James Mann (of the Center for Strategic & International Studies) put it, “What the Pentagon officials had succeeded in doing, within months of the Soviet collapse, was to lay out the intellectual blueprint for a new world dominated—then, now and in the future—by U.S. military power.”

Although President Clinton did not officially embrace Cheney’s Defense Planning Guidance, he did not disclaim it either. And while he slightly slowed down the growth in the pentagon budget, he too had his own share of military operations abroad—in Somalia, Iraq, Haiti, and various provinces of the former Yugoslavia. The Federation of American Scientists has recorded a list of US foreign military engagements in the 1990s which shows that in the first decade after the collapse of the Berlin Wall, that is, under Presidents Bush Sr. and Bill Clinton, the United States engaged in 134 such operations. Here is a sample: Operation Eagle Eye (Kosovo), Operation Determined Effort (Bosnia-Herzegovina), Operation Quick Lift (Croatia), Operation Nomad Vigil (Albania), Operation Desert Thunder (Iraq), Operation Seva Verde (Columbia), Operation Constant Vigil (Bolivia), Operation Fundamental Response (Venezuela), Operation Infinite Reach (Sudan/Afghanistan), Operation Safe Border (Peru/Ecuador), Operation United Shield (Somalia), Operation Safe Haven/Safe Passage (Cuba), Operation Sea Signal (Haiti), Operation Safe Harbor (Haiti), Operation Desert Storm (Southwest Asia), and many more.

With the accession of George W. Bush to the presidency, all the Pentagon contributors to the notorious 1992 Defense Planning Guidance also returned to positions of power in the government. Cheney of course became Vice President, Powell became Secretary of State, Wolfowitz moved into the number two position at the Pentagon, as Donald Rumsfeld’s deputy, and Lewis “Scooter” Libby, became the Vice President’s chief of staff and national security adviser.

Although George W. Bush’s administration thus arrived in the White House with plans of “regime change” in the Arab-Muslim world, it could not carry out those plans without a pretext. The 9/11 attacks (regardless of who planned and carried them out) provided the needed pretext. The evidence thus clearly shows that, contrary to the claims of many critics, including some distinguished figures like Noam Chomsky, 9/11 served more as an excuse, or boogieman, than a “trap” laid by Osama bin Laden in order to bleed and disgrace the United States by prompting it to wage war and military aggression against the Arab-Muslim world.

The administration wasted no time manipulating the public’s fear of further terrorist attacks to rally support for the invasion of Afghanistan and Iraq. As the administration was preparing for the invasion of Iraq in early 2003, it also dusted off the Pentagon’s 1992 Defense Planning Guidance and promoted it as the “Bush Doctrine” for the new, post-9/11 world. The post-9/11 version of Defense Planning Guidance retains—indeed, strengthens—all the major elements of the 1992 version, although at times it uses slightly modified terminology.

That the U.S. military response to the collapse of the Berlin Wall in 1989 and its response to the collapse of the World Trade Center in 2001 were basically the same should not come as a surprise to anyone familiar with the dynamics and profit imperatives of the business of war: continued increase of the Pentagon budget and continued expansion of the sales markets for the war industry. The pretexts or tactics for pursuing higher war dividends may change (from the “threat of communism” to the “threat of rogue states, or global terrorism, or militant Islam”) but the objective or strategy remains the same—permanent war and, consequently, continuous escalation of the Pentagon budget and higher profits for the interests vested in military/security capital.

~

Ismael Hossein-Zadeh, author of The Political Economy of U.S. Militarism (Palgrave-Macmillan 2007), teaches economics at Drake University, Des Moines, Iowa.

September 15, 2011 Posted by | Deception, Economics, False Flag Terrorism, Militarism, Timeless or most popular | Leave a comment

The Economic Crisis and the Labor Movement in America

The ILWU Rises to the Challenge

By Mark Vorpahl | Global Research | September 12, 2011

Anyone who still believes that U.S. workers and the labor movement are incapable of mounting a struggle against the conditions that the economic crisis is forcing on us has not been paying attention. Evidence to the contrary was vividly provided on the morning of September 8th, when 500 International Longshore and Warehouse Union (ILWU) Local 21 members and their supporters took over the Port of Longview in the state of Washington. Railroad cars were damaged and the grain they carried was dumped in an effort by these workers to defend their jobs by resorting to the only tactic they had left, that is, using work site action to hurt the employers bottom line.

To do so they had to use their strength in numbers to overpower the police and security guards. Though the police attempted to make arrests, the workers pushed back and managed to release their brothers and sisters. The standoff that developed was explosively tense. As the hours rolled on the police began to bring out an arsenal of “non-lethal” guns and tear gas, demonstrating that they were prepared to inflict heavy casualties in order to secure the port and defend the bosses’ property and profits. The workers withdrew, for the time being, after having made their point by inflicting costs on the port bosses dearly. It is a credit to their unity that there were no successful arrests or injuries.

This action was accompanied by wildcat strikes (that is, strikes not sanctioned by the union) in Seattle and Tacoma, Washington. This shows how big the stakes are at the Port of Longview. For workers to sacrifice their wages and make such extraordinary efforts, the cost of such actions have to greatly outweigh the costs of not taking them.

Corporate Greed

In this case the corporation compelling the ILWU to take such dramatic actions is the multi-national consortium EGT Development. Last year alone they made $2.5 billion. In spite of these deep pockets, they want to bust the ILWU at the $200 million grain terminal in Longview. If they succeed, this will encourage other longshore employers to do the same.

Promising jobs, EGT got a state tax exemption and a sweetheart lease deal to build the grain terminal. However, rather than providing local construction jobs in a county with an August unemployment rate of 11.7 percent, they initially imported non-union lower paid workers. If anyone was expecting some gratitude towards the community from EGT for the breaks the company received, that illusion quickly evaporated.

Then EGT’s greedy behavior got even worse. For 70 years the Port of Longview has employed the members of ILWU Local 21. In May of 2010, EGT had stated that they would continue the practice. This appears to have been a stalling tactic, however. In following negotiations EGT made unreasonable demands, such as asking ILWU members to work 12 hour shifts without overtime pay in addition to an exemption from recognizing maintenance, repair, and master consul jurisdiction. After not getting their way, EGT refused to meet with the ILWU, which is, most likely, what they wanted to do all along.

ILWU Push Back

The ILWU began to hold rallies and picket EGT in an attempt to pressure them back to the negotiating table. EGT refused to budge. This arrogant stubbornness resulted in a protest on July 11 where ILWU members tore down a chain-link gate and stormed the EGT terminal. 100 union workers and leaders were cited for arrest.

On July 14th union workers successfully blocked a train from delivering grain to the EGT terminal. As a result, the train company suspended its shipments for safety reasons.

EGT was feeling the heat, but they weren’t burned yet. They had another cynical maneuver up their sleeve. They signed an agreement with the Federal Way-based General Construction Company to operate the terminal with union members from the International Union of Operating Engineers (IUOE) Local 701. Now they hoped they could portray the conflict as union against union rather than union against EGT.

However, because the members of IUOE 701 are employed by a general contractor, they can be replaced by non-union workers the moment EGT decides to take over the job itself. Seeing through this ruse, both the Oregon and Washington State AFL-CIOs have condemned the leadership of IUOE 701for their actions in assisting EGT’s attempts to divide the union movement.

Choosing Sides

In all of this, it is important to note, the role of the police and legal system. While there have been many arrests of union members and leaders with stiff sentences for charges as trivial as not moving quickly enough when asked, those acting against the union have consistently gotten off scot-free. For instance, one person drove his car through a picket line so carelessly that a picketer was sent to the hospital. Rather than arresting the driver, the police arrested a protester for allegedly denting the car with his knee. With this twisted logic, if the driver had gotten out of his vehicle and struck a protester in the mouth with his fist, the police would have arrested the protester for assaulting the driver’s hand with his face.

The National Labor Relations Board (NLRB), which was established in the 1930s ostensibly to protect union rights, has also been lining up with the employer. This board filed a temporary injunction against the ILWU, prohibiting union members from all traditional forms of protest. This moved ILWU International President Robert McEllrath to observe:

“The NLRB complaint and the motion seeking a TRO (Temporary Restraining Order) and injunction were expected by the Coast Committee. The complaint itself has no legal significance unless sustained after a full trial and currently represents nothing more than mere allegations that are based on incorrect facts and bogus legal conclusions. This, unfortunately, is typical of the NLRB ever since the Taft-Hartley Act of 1947 transformed its mission to restrict the union and civil rights of union members. The NLRB exists for one reason and that is to protect commerce at the expense of workers, and we are not surprised that EGT is employing the NLRB to put down a legitimate labor dispute.”

Fortunately, the ILWU defied this injunction on September 7, when they again clogged the railroad tracks to prevent grain from being delivered to the EGT terminal, and again on the morning of September 8 when they took over the terminal. Had they played by the rules of a game rigged in favor of the bosses, EGT would have no reason to settle the dispute. Consequently, the police and courts would have greater incentive to trample on the ILWU members’ rights.

On September 8th, a United States District Court Judge denied the NLRB’s motion to ban picketing at the EGT facility. It is more than likely that part of the motivation behind this was that such restrictions were not muzzling the ILWU membership, but emboldening them. If an unjust law is followed, it remains. If it is resisted and defied through mass collective action, there is a better chance of doing away with it.

The role of the corporate press should also be noted. Few, if any, articles have made a genuine attempt to give the union side in this conflict, though the ILWU has strong community support in Longview. The initial reports in the corporate websites and papers even claimed that security guards were held hostage by those who stormed the EGT terminal. Since these accounts came out, even the police have said they were false. Nevertheless, these claims still turn up uncorrected in the corporate media. This should surprise no one. The corporate media have more economic interests in discrediting labor and any actions that effectively hurt corporate profits than they do in providing the truth.

Changing Times

Even with the press, the legal system, as well as the political establishment lined up against us, labor can win. A new mood is rising from the ranks as a result of the attacks against all workers and the insatiable greed and power of those tiny few at the very top economic rung. This mood is turning into a mass force. We have already witnessed it in Madison, Wisconsin which, though not resulting in an immediate victory, showed that the political climate opposed to workers’ struggles can be turned around. The 45,000 member-strong strike at Verizon alone equaled all the unionists out on strike in 2010. Now the ILWU in Longview has introduced a new boldness in overcoming legal restrictions and hitting the employers where they are most vulnerable: their profits.

When ILWU International President Robert McEllrath urged members to end their standoff at the EGT Terminal take over, he stated:

“If we leave here, it doesn’t mean we gave up and quit. It means we’re coming back.”

And when they do come back, they need to do so with the active support of Longshore workers across the west coast. They also need to mobilize their community supporters in the streets. If this is done, the ILWU could again provide a watershed moment for Labor like they did in the 1934 San Francisco General Strike.

Mark Vorpahl is a union steward as well as an anti-war and Latin American Solidarity activist. He can be reached at Portland@workerscompass.org.

~

See also:

Blockade: Dockers respond to Israel’s Flotilla Massacre and Gaza Siege

09/07/10

and

Oakland Police Settle Lawsuits for Bloody Monday

4 April 2006

and

Police Violence Shocks Activists, Others at Port of Oakland Protest

April 7, 2003

and

The Hilo Massacre

Hawaii’s Bloody Monday – August 1, 1938

September 12, 2011 Posted by | Economics, Solidarity and Activism | Leave a comment

THE PAYROLL TAX CUT: Talk about a Ponzi Scheme!

By Gwendolyn Mink | Social Justice | September 9, 2011

Is President Obama trying to kill Social Security without explicitly saying so?  He put Social Security “on the table” for consideration by his Deficit Commission — even though Social Security has not contributed to creating or sustaining the deficit/debt in the first place.  He kept Social Security on the table when he made a deal to delegate deficit reduction authority over entitlements to an undemocratic Super Committee.  Now, in a speech reportedly about jobs, he proposed to extend and increase the ill-considered FICA tax cut he embraced last December — a tax cut that directly undermines the financial integrity of Social Security.

According to the White House Fact Sheet on “The American Jobs Act” the FICA tax holiday for workers will be increased to a 50% reduction, lowering it to 3.1%.  Under the 2010 tax deal, the payroll tax for workers was reduced from 6.2% to 4.2%.  In addition to expanding the tax cut for workers, the President proposes to extend the FICA tax holiday to employers by cutting in half the employer’s share of the payroll tax through the first $5 million in payroll.

Big questions about the wisdom, efficacy, and implications of a tax-based jobs strategy need to be debated.  Even bigger questions about the consequences of the payroll tax holiday in particular need to be answered.  These questions are not just about the relationship between payroll tax cuts and job growth.  They are about the future of Social Security.

The FICA/payroll tax goes into the Social Security Trust Fund.  This is a dedicated fund currently worth $2.6 trillion, which has been built up over time through employee and employer contributions, along with accrued interest.  Current and future Social Security beneficiaries receive benefits from this fund.  No general revenues are involved, except for administrative and clerical costs.

Under the payroll tax cut initiated in the 2010 lame duck tax deal, the revenue loss to the Trust Fund from the payroll tax holiday is made up through compensatory payments into the Trust Fund from general revenues. The President proposes to continue this scheme — deepening a relationship between Social Security and general revenues (read deficit) that did not exist until the December 2010 tax deal.  This will make Social Security increasingly vulnerable to demands for “reform.”

In the worst case, Congress could choose to enact the payroll tax cut without actually appropriating revenue compensation for the Trust Fund.  This would mean that the payroll tax cut directly depletes the Trust Fund, creating financial/actuarial problems far sooner than the currently anticipated shortfall date of 2036.

But even if the Trust Fund receives full revenue compensation — for both employer and employee contributions — Social Security will be jeopardized.  That’s because the resources in the Trust Fund will be increasingly co-mingled with general revenue funds — and, hence, increasingly connected to the deficit.

If the government can’t  pay back Social Security money it has borrowed to pay for other things (through IOUs, bonds, etc), it certainly won’t be shy about cutting Social Security to pay itself back for funds it shared with Social Security to offset revenue losses from the payroll tax holiday.

Also worth worrying about here is contagious political cowardice about “raising taxes.”  The payroll tax holiday is framed as just that — a holiday, ie, a short-lived break. But as we know from other tax cuts with built-in expiration dates, the planned end of a tax cut quickly becomes a “tax increase” in popular parlance.  There hasn’t been much resolve to allow the years-long tax holiday for the rich to end.  When the time comes, will there be greater resolve to allow an end to the 2-year tax holiday for workers and 1-year tax holiday for employers?  Even when billed as a “middle class tax increase” and a “job-killing tax on business”?

Once the payroll tax basis of Social Security financing has been corrupted the future of Social Security will no longer be in doubt.  It won’t have one.

September 9, 2011 Posted by | Economics, Progressive Hypocrite, Timeless or most popular | Leave a comment

Obama’s Jobs Plan

Moon of Alabama | September 9, 2011

Obama’s jobs plan:

  • “We will continue to falsely diagnose a solvency crisis as a normal liquidity recession.” (I would otherwise have to demand credit write downs from those criminal banksters who pay for my reelection bid.)
  • “We will cut the payroll taxes which pay for social security.” (This will make it easier to later gut the whole program.)
  • “We will pay for that by later cutting Medicare and Medicaid.” (See how I never lose sight of my original aims.)
  • “We also ask the Congress super-committee to find more ways to cut spending.” (Time for the cat food commission to earn its name.)
  • “We will give tax breaks to companies that hire workers.” (Just fire them from those well payed jobs, rehire them for less and get another tax break. What’s not to like here?)
  • “We will give some money to the cities and towns so they can keep more policemen on their payrolls.” (We will need those when the people eventually start to revolt.)
  • “We will put up $10 billion of the people’s money toward a public-private infrastructure bank. (Here is some upfront money for the banksters to privatize more of the now public owned space.)
  • “We will also offer money to rehab vacant and foreclosed houses that are now owned by the banks.” (They never really wanted those houses so why should they pay for them?)
  • “We ask Congress to pass this immediately.” (Please don’t give anyone time to find out what really is behind these ideas.)

September 9, 2011 Posted by | Corruption, Deception, Economics, Progressive Hypocrite | Leave a comment

Police clash with protesters in Italy

Press TV – September 7, 2011
Demonstrators hold a banner reading “Stop to social butchery, diktat of the European Union” during a general strike in Rome, Tuesday, Sept. 6, 2011.

Italy’s riot police have clashed with anti-government demonstrators rallying against the government’s controversial austerity package, which the Senate recently approved.

The police reportedly used batons and fired tear gas in an attempt to disperse the protesters in the capital of Rome, Reuters reported on Wednesday.

Moreover, hundreds of demonstrators tried to break through a police barrier protecting the upper house of parliament in which the vote for the austerity package was held.

The package, initially introduced by Prime Ministers Silvio Berlusconi, was approved by a vote of 165 to 141.

The EUR 54 billion package of spending cuts and tax hikes is meant to help the debt-ridden eurozone country balance its budget deficit by 2013.

The package was originally worth EUR 45.5 billion, but was raised due to market concerns. It will now be passed on to the lower house Chamber of Deputies for approval, before it comes into effect.

Meanwhile, analysts believe the Italian government needs an additional EUR 10 billion cut in spending to achieve a balanced budget by 2013.

Italians had a day earlier, also staged demonstrations against the package.

~

See also:

Conservative Mayor in Italy calls for a wealth tax

“Given that Italy has no real tax on residential properties, the lowest capital gains tax rate in Europe and rampant tax evasion among higher-income professionals, why not recover resources from the people who have the money”?

and

Two Visions on Taxation in Italy

September 7, 2011 Posted by | Economics, Solidarity and Activism | Leave a comment

The Pending US-Colombia Free Trade Agreement: False Claims Versus Hard Realities

By James Jordan, National Co-Coordinator for the Alliance for Global Justice | September 6, 2011

With a little more than a year till the 2012 elections the White House and Congressional leadership are anxious to pass pending Free Trade Agreements (FTA) as soon as possible. Most worrisome of all is the pending FTA between the US and Colombia. Corporate leaders and US and Colombian government officials with their public relations operatives are peddling lie after lie to justify passage.

The following guide put together by The Alliance for Global Justice will help people to better understand and counter the falsehoods they will be hearing and countering in the coming weeks.

Distinguishing between fact and fiction with claims regarding the pending US-Colombia Free Trade Agreement

CLAIM: Passing the FTA will put the US in a better position to pressure Colombia to improve its labor and human rights record.

REALITY: US intervention in Colombia has caused more problems than it has helped and the FTA would only make things worse. Recent investigations by the Colombian Attorney General have uncovered extensive US involvement regarding domestic spying by former President Álvaro Uribe’s administration. Information was shared with and analyzed by embassy staff and domestic spying programs were funded by the CIA. Activities included gaining access to the bank accounts, following the families and bugging the offices of Colombian magistrates.

Targets also included labor leaders. According to an August 20, 2011 Washington Post article, “Another unit that operated for eight months in 2005, the Group to Analyze Terrorist Organization Media, assembled dossiers on labor leaders, broke into their offices and videotaped union activists. The United States provided equipment and tens of thousands of dollars, according to an internal DAS report, and the unit’s members regularly met with an embassy official they remembered as ‘Chris Sullivan.'”

Furthermore, through Plan Colombia, the US and Colombia adopted policies that reject dialogue and negotiations for peace in favor of a military solution for the country’s ongoing civil war, on which the US has spent over $7 billion since 2000. The result has been massive displacement of rural populations, military scandals and murder and disappearances, yet no path opened toward resolution. Meanwhile, non-military aid has more often than not been used to fund programs that augment war and repression.

There is no reason whatsoever to believe that the quest for peace and human rights in Colombia would be bettered by increasing US influence through passage of the pending FTA.

CLAIM: Colombia has already made significant progress in its labor rights record and it deserves for the US to pass the FTA as a reward for Colombia’s “good behavior”.

REALITY: Colombia continues to lead the world in the number of unionists murdered, year after year registering more assassinations than the rest of the world combined. In 2008 there were 48 unionists murdered, in 2009 there were 29 and in 2010, there were 51, 19 of whom were members of teachers unions. In 2009 the rate of impunity for labor and other political assassinations was 95.6%. In 2010 that rate had gone up to 98.5%, and in 2011 a court study showed the rate to have risen to over 99%.

US corporations are guilty of increasing the violence against unionists. Drummond Coal Company, based in Birmingham, Alabama, was caught making payments to death squads that assassinated union leaders. Chiquita Banana was found guilty in US court and fined for paying death squads, and Coca-Cola has long been implicated in assassinations of unionists at its bottling company.

CLAIM: The Labor Action Plan agreed on by the Obama and Santos administrations has granted important concessions and protections to Colombian unions, and passage of the FTA will help assure that this plan is truly implemented.

REALITY: There is no enforcement mechanism for the concessions in the plan. Furthermore, an AFL-CIO statement says, “…the Labor Action Plan fails to include commitments with regard to collective bargaining in the public sector, collective bargaining above the enterprise level, or collective bargaining over pensions.” Most worrisome is that workers are supposed to accept, on good faith, that anti-labor violence and better worker conditions will be assured in the future. But with 3,000 unionists killed in the past 25 years, there’s no good faith left.

CLAIM: Colombia has already made significant progress in its human rights record and it deserves for the US to pass the FTA as a reward for Colombia’s “good behavior”.

REALITY: Since Santos has taken office, members of the political opposition have been assassinated on an average of one every three days. The estimated number of disappearances has risen from around 50,000 to more than 61,000.

While roughly half of Colombia’s people live in poverty and half of its children are not in school (estimates vary from as low as 43% to 65% for both), Colombia has the second highest defense budget in Latin America, following the much bigger Brazil. Instead of building schools, the government has been engaged in a 11 year project, with US funding, to build a series of new prisons to accommodate an explosion in incarceration, including a 300% increase in political arrests.

The Colombian government holds well over 7,500 political prisoners. Only 500 to 1,000 of these are Prisoners of War. The vast majority are in jail for legal and nonviolent resistance. Some 5,000 of these captives are from rural populations. The most common charge against political prisoners is that of “Rebellion”. Comparatively, the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia (FARC) are holding somewhere between 10 and 20 captives.

CLAIM: Passage of the US-Colombia FTA will help bring peace and stability to Colombia and will renew the confidence of would-be investors.

REALITY: If recent behavior is any indication, the administration of President Santos and the Colombian military have no interest in peace. Nor does the US government, as long as it insists on the military solution to Colombia’s conflict.

From August 12-15, 2011, more than 20,000 peasant, indigenous and Afro-Colombian community members, along with representatives from the Catholic Church, national and international human rights defenders and leaders of social and labor movements, gathered for a National Encounter for the Land and Peace. While the conference was commencing, the Colombian military began a commencement of its own, undertaking an indiscriminate and unprovoked bombardment of the municipality of Chaparral, Tolima.

While the Encounter was still underway, Pres. Santos declared the door to negotiations was “closed” and that he had “the key and the key is in my pocket”. That same weekend, Santos went on to say that “Advocacy for peace is harmful.”

In the weeks preceding and including the Encounter, seven peasant labor leaders and one human rights defender were arbitrarily arrested in Putumayo with no reasons given nor charges made. And in the two weeks following the Encounter, there have already been a number of assassinations, assassination attempts and disappearances of members of the political opposition and unionists.

The best way to increase investor confidence in Colombia is not through war and repression nor via neoliberal trade agreements. What is needed is dialogue that brings together all major sectors of Colombian society to work out a political solution to the conflict. That is the only way to foster an atmosphere of real stability.

CLAIM: The US-Colombia FTA, along with Santos administration’s agrarian reform plan, will help develop the rural infrastructure, create new jobs for farm workers, and help reestablish displaced farming families.

REALITY: After some 13 years of Plan Colombia, an estimated 4 to 5 million persons have been forcibly displaced, 60% of these being from farming families and 60 to 70% being women and girls. During the first ten years of Plan Colombia (1998 to 2008), 760,000 peasant families were forcibly removed from over 13.5 million acres. Conversely, paramilitary death squads now control some 10 million acres of the country’s most fertile land. In almost all cases where there has been massive displacement, the vacuum has been filled by big landowners, narco-traffickers, agribusinesses and transnational mining and energy corporations.

The Santos agrarian reform plan does more to consolidate displacement and land loss than to make up for it. Farmers who come from families that have cultivated plots for generations are being asked to show titles in areas where titles have never been used or kept. Much of the dispossessed farm land has been replaced by African Palm plantations. Farming families from these areas who are participating in the agrarian reform are being told that they will have to wait until the plantations reap a full crop before they can return. That is a process that takes up to 10 years. Since African Palm plantations are notorious for leaving the soil depleted, when these farmers come back to their plots, they will be trying to raise crops on wasted terrain. Ultimately, only a minority of displaced farmers will be able to return to their land, while ownership will be consolidated for a majority of the interests that have benefited most from the forced removal of rural people.

CLAIM: The US-Colombia FTA, as well as pending FTAs with Panama and South Korea, will bring jobs to workers in all the involved countries.

REALITY: Neoliberal free trade policies have been a big part of the reason that economic crises are taking place all over the world and have led to ever widening gaps between the rich and the poor. Colombia has the second largest gap between the rich and the poor in South America and the eighth largest worldwide, according to the World Bank’s World Development Institute. The FTA will make matters worse.

For US workers, FTAs have not lead to more and better jobs, but to blighted, failing cities where industries once thrived and to rural areas where it has become almost impossible for family farms to survive. The Economic Policy Institute (EPI) maintains that KORUS will make the US trade deficit with Korea twice as bad, up to $26.9 billion annually within seven years. This will result in 888,000 jobs lost as a result of Korean imports. If one figures in employment created by increased US exports and jobs lost because of the already existing deficit with South Korea, there are some 200,000 jobs that will be lost. The EPI predicts a US-Colombia FTA will result in a loss of 55,000 jobs.

CLAIM: The US Congress and President Obama were elected to listen to, represent and serve the people of the US and to act in their best interests.

REALITY: According to a poll conducted by NBC News and the Wall Street Journal in 2010, the number of US residents surveyed who believe FTAs hurt the country went up to 53% from 32% in 1999. And this unhappiness with FTAs reaches across political perspectives. The NBC/Wall Street Journal poll, as well as a separate poll that same year by the Pew Research Center, show that over 60% of both Tea Party sympathizers and union families oppose FTAs. And both Tea Partiers and union members vote at higher rates than the general public. So who is the White House and Congressional Leadership listening to if it is not We, The People?

Will Congress and the White House listen to the US people and stop trying to pass these harmful FTAs? One thing is for sure…they are sure to pass them if we don’t stand up and tell them not to.

September 7, 2011 Posted by | Civil Liberties, Deception, Economics, Progressive Hypocrite, Timeless or most popular | Leave a comment

The Next Quagmire: Sanctions and Syria

By Fergus Hodgson | FFF | August 24, 2011

If trade promotes peace, and it does, then trade sanctions stifle it. That may be simple logic, but it continues to go unnoticed with Washington officials.

The latest nation on the receiving end of economic provocation is Syria. On August 18, Barack Obama froze all Syrian government assets within U.S. jurisdiction and banned American investment in, service trade with, and petroleum imports from Syria. Echoed by officials from other nations, both Obama and Hillary Clinton have called on Bashar al-Assad, president of Syria, to step aside — although they still gave lip service to national sovereignty, saying that “no outside power should impose on [Syria’s] transition.”

To justify that move, Clinton denounced Syrian leaders as contemptuous towards their own people, and she asserted an array of atrocities against peaceful demonstrators, including the murder of thousands of unarmed civilians.

The story is not that simple, however. Verification of the number of deaths is scant, and the “peaceful demonstrations” could better be described as an armed insurrection. In fact, alongside the insurrection, Damascus has witnessed mass pro-government rallies. Syria also happens to be the leading destination for refugees from Iraq, and as recently as 2009 Obama had sought to ease sanctions, on the basis of “mutual interest and mutual respect” (according to his press spokesman).

Regardless, al-Assad has dismissed calls for him to step down as meaningless, and trade sanctions will pave the way for military confrontation, not prevent it.

Obama’s latest sanctions are an amplification of George W. Bush’s under the 2003 Syria Accountability Act. Congress introduced that legislation against Syria for, you guessed it, support for terrorism, weapons of mass destruction, and, among other things, failure to support American activities in Iraq. Obviously, Syria is a “threat to U.S. national security interests.”

Paranoia aside, the track record of trade sanctions does not support their existence. Just take a look at the list of embargoed nations, including Iran, Cuba, North Korea, and Zimbabwe. If anything, sanctions have offered a scapegoat for national officials and galvanized loyalists, who could better demonize the disengaged populations. Most important, sanctions have not led the officials of targeted nations to back down.

Worse, sanctions worsen the plight of the poor, scarcely different from open war. 1990s Iraq provides just one compelling example. Impact estimates for deaths for that period, due to sanctions-induced contaminated living conditions and a lack of access to medicines, go as high as 500,000, as John Pilger has documented.

Madeleine Albright, U.S. ambassador to the UN at the time, even acknowledged that impact, when she said, “This is a very hard choice, but we think the price is worth it.” Worth it for what? A decade of sanctions only led into the second Gulf War.

U.S. politicians also appear to forget that trade is mutually beneficial, so sanctions are mutually harmful. Blocking Syrian petroleum and business ventures is going to hurt both Syrian and American economic prospects. Moreover, the application of freezes on foreign-owned assets is so vague that it will dissuade further investment here.

The selectivity of sanctions is another riddle that further undermines their credibility. Syria mustn’t be lending the United States enough money, because the Chinese government has a record of violent tactics that dwarfs that of Syria. They own $1.2 trillion of the U.S. debt and face no sanctions. They even just received a lecture from Joe Biden on the need for open trade:

“I believe history has shown … that in the long run, greater openness is a source of stability and a sign of strength, that prosperity peaks when governments foster both free enterprise and free exchange of ideas, that liberty unlocks a people’s full potential. And in its absence, unrest festers.”

That’s right, Mr. Biden; the absence of trade does allow unrest to fester, just as it will in Syria. There may not be easy answers to the regrettable political conflicts in Syria, but isolation from the rest of the world is not going to help. Even if unintentionally, U.S. officials are setting the stage for military engagement, as they did with Iraq and recently with Libya.

Fergus Hodgson is director of fiscal policy studies with the John Locke Foundation and a policy advisor with The Future of Freedom Foundation. You can follow him on Twitter and send him email.

September 6, 2011 Posted by | Economics, Progressive Hypocrite, Timeless or most popular, Wars for Israel | Leave a comment

Ahmadinejad Launches Tajik Power Plant, Lashes West

Al-Manar – September 5, 2011

Iran’s President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad has launched the first turbine of Tajikistan’s 220-megawatt Sang Toodeh II Dam and Hydroelectric Power Plant.

President Ahmadinejad attended the launching ceremony along with Tajik President Emomali Rahmon and other high-ranking officials from both countries on Monday, IRNA reported.

The Iranian president traveled to Tajikistan on Sunday for an official two-day visit.

Ahmadinejad lashed out at global powers for interfering in domestic affairs of Asian and African countries. “We believe it is against the interests of the nations, their dignity and prosperity,” he said at the opening ceremony of the station.

“This is a project of mutual friendship and brotherhood, we’re happy with Tajikistan’s success,” Ahmadinejad said in televised remarks. “Our cooperation is aimed at peace and stability in the region.”

The Sang Toodeh II project can greatly help Tajikistan in its industrial and agricultural sectors and in meeting its energy needs, according to Iran’s Foreign Ministry.

Iranian Sangab Company began construction of the power plant in 2006 in the southwestern Khatlon province.

Iran has invested around USD 180 million in the project, along with Tajikistan’s $40-million investment, and is expected to carry out management of the plant for 12 years. Tajikistan’s national power company will then take over the management from Iran.

Rahmon has described the project as “Iran’s biggest gift” to the Tajikistani nation.

September 5, 2011 Posted by | Economics, Solidarity and Activism | Leave a comment

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