OPPOSING PLUTOCRACY, ENDLESS WAR and A DESTROYED PLANET

 

TODD GITLIN: As the Globe Warms, So Does the Climate Movement

Less than two weeks have passed and yet it isn’t too early to say it: the People’s Climate March changed the social map -- many maps, in fact, since hundreds of smaller marches took place in 162 countries. That march in New York City, spectacular as it may have been with its 400,000 participants, joyous as it was, moving as it was (slow-moving, actually, since it filled more than a mile’s worth of wide avenues and countless side streets), was no simple spectacle for a day. It represented the upwelling of something that matters so much more: a genuine global climate movement.  More

 

WAR AND CLIMATE CHANGE: Time to Connect the Dots 

In the decade between 2001 and 2011, global military spending increased by an estimated 92 percent, according to Stockholm International Peace Research, although it fell by 1.9 percent in real terms in 2013 to $1,747 billion. At the same time, according to the draft of a new study from the International Peace Bureau (1), almost 10 gigatons of carbon dioxide equivalent has been released into the atmosphere. According to the Global Carbon Project, 2014 emissions are set to reach a record high. Could there be some connection between rising military expenditures and rising carbon emissions? … there can be no climate change mitigation without peace and no peace without moving swiftly to provide the poorer parts of the world with the resources needed to adapt to climate change and build resilient economies. The trillions that are spent on weapons rob national treasuries of the resources needed to provide funds for climate mitigation and adaptation.  More

 

Why Have Policymakers Abandoned the Working Class?

Why do we hear so much about the need to raise interest rates now rather than later, or get the deficit under control immediately despite the risks to households who are most vulnerable to an economic downturn? Those who are most in need – those least able to withstand a spell of unemployment or other negative economic events – have the least power in our political system.  With the decline in unions and other institutions that used to give workers a voice in the political process along with rising inequality that gives even more power to those at the top, the problem is getting worse. No wonder policy has been tilted so much in favor of those at the top. Fiscal policy in particular has been far too responsive to the interests of those with political power rather than those in greatest need. If we are going to be a fair and just society, a society that protects those among us who are the most vulnerable to economic shocks, this needs to change.   More

 

The middle class is poorer today than it was in 1989

The economy has gotten bigger, but much of that growth hasn't reached the middle class. Indeed, the top 1 percent grabbed 95 percent of all the gains during the recovery's first three years. And that's not even the most depressing part. Even adjusted for household size, real median incomes haven't increased at all since 1999. That's right: the middle class hasn't gotten a raise in 15 years.  But one of the biggest, and least appreciated reasons Democrats might be struggling, is that the middle class is poorer, too. Median net worth is actually lower, adjusted for inflation, than it was in 1989. Even worse, it's kept falling during the recovery. Yes, even after the economy started to grow again, and the stock market started to boom, and housing prices began to bounce back, the median net worth of the average American household continued to decline.  More

 

CHOMSKY: Corporations and the Richest Americans Viscerally Oppose Common Good

For those whom Adam Smith called the "Masters of Mankind,” it is important that we must become the stupid nation in the interests of their short-term gain, damn the consequences. These are essential properties of contemporary market fundamentalist doctrines. ALEC and its corporate sponsors understand the importance of ensuring that public education train children to belong to the stupid nation, and not be misled by science and rationality… There are solutions, but they do not fit the needs of the Masters, for whom the crises are no problem. They are bailed out by the Nanny State. Today corporate profits are breaking new records and the financial managers who created the current crisis are enjoying huge bonuses. Meanwhile, for the large majority, wages and income have practically stagnated in the last 30-odd years. By today, it has reached the point that 400 individuals have more wealth than the bottom 180 million Americans…  One consequence is that by now, the poorest 70% have literally no influence over policy. As you move up the income/wealth ladder influence increases, and at the very top, a tiny percent, the Masters get what they want.   More

 

Americans have no idea how the government spends money

Pew asked respondents which program the government spent the most money on: Social Security, transportation, foreign aid, or interest on the national debt…  The most popular answer was foreign aid at 33 percent, followed by interest on the debt, at 26 percent. Twenty percent named Social Security, and an additional 4 percent named transportation… Responses to this question show how Americans' understanding of their world is deeply influenced by their political leanings and preconceived notions. Foreign aid is consistently rated as the least popular spending category by Americans, even though it accounts for roughly 1 percent of the federal budget. Several years of hysterics surrounding the debt and deficit have also clearly convinced people that debt spending takes up a larger share of the budget than it actually does.  More

 

NOT ENOUGH TAXATION AND TOO MUCH REPRESENTATION

Since 2013, at least 14 U.S. corporations have relocated their headquarters abroad, according to Reuters, with 10 making the move this year alone. The most recent example is Burger King, which announced in late August that it would merge with the Canadian chain Tim Hortons and move its headquarters to Canada, which has a lower corporate tax rate than the U.S. does. That month the U.S. fruit company Chiquita Banana decided to move its headquarters to Ireland. The pharmaceutical company AbbVie moved abroad in June, and Pfizer is contemplating leaving behind its U.S. status… Obama and concerned members of Congress are right to demand that corporations doing in business in the U.S. should be made to pay their fare share and abide by the responsibilities that come with that privilege. But more than that, at a time when businesses’ civic investment grows weaker and weaker, we should be examining ways to limit undue corporate influence over our democratic system.   More