Economy

Congress Has Been Captured by the Arms Industry: And We’re Paying the Price (and What a Price It Is!)

( Tomdispatch.com ) – On March 13th, the Pentagon rolled out its proposed budget for Fiscal Year 2024. The results were — or at least should have been — stunning, even by the standards of a department that’s used to getting what it wants when it wants it. The new Pentagon budget would come in […]

Neoliberalism

The End of Renting? In Some Cities Affordable Housing is a Thing of the Past

Rebecca Gordon

( Tomdispatch.com) – In 1937, the American folklorist Alan Lomax invited Louisiana folksinger Huddie Ledbetter (better known as Lead Belly) to record some of his songs for the Library of Congress in Washington, D.C. Lead Belly and his wife Martha searched in vain for a place to spend a few nights nearby. But they were […]

Climate Crisis

Corporations are using Trade Treaties to handcuff Efforts to save the Planet from Climate Emergency

John Feffer

( Foreign Policy in Focus) – The global economy hit a new milestone in 2022 by surpassing $100 trillion. This expansion, which has experienced only the occasional setback such as the 2020 COVID shutdowns, has been accelerated by trade. The world trade volume experienced 4,300 percent growth from 1950 to 2021, an average 4 percent […]

China

Turkey’s China Partnership: Is Beijing’s Belt and Road Initiative not Delivering Enough?

Global Voices

BRI is not just about trains: telecommunications and energy are key Written byEmre Demir Screenshot from CGTN YouTube channel showing high-speed railway connections built with Chinese investment in Turkey ( Globalvoices.org) – Turkey has strong economic relations with China and is one of the very early partners of the Belt and Road Initiative (BRI). […]

Far Right

Inside the “Private and Confidential” Conservative Group That Promises to “Crush Liberal Dominance”

ProPublica

by Andy Kroll and Andrea Bernstein, ProPublica, and Nick Surgey, Documented Co-published with Documented ( ProPublica ) – A few months ago, Leonard Leo laid out his next audacious project. Ever since the longtime Federalist Society leader helped create a conservative supermajority on the Supreme Court, and then received more than a billion dollars from […]

Corporations

Before RR Co. Norfolk Southern Poisoned Palestine, Oh., It Poisoned the Ohio Statehouse

OtherWords

The company plied state lawmakers with cash and lobbied against common sense rail safety measures. By Jim Hightower | ( Otherwords.org – “The Wreck of the Old 97” is a classic bluegrass song recounting a spectacular train crash in 1903, caused by the company’s demand that the engineer speed down a dangerous track to […]

Authoritarianism

End the “Citizens United” Ruling with a “Democracy for All Amendment”

F. Douglas Stephenson

Gainesville, Fl. (Special to Informed Comment) – In the United States government has been privatized by the Citizens United ruling of the SCOTUS. Government is now really up for sale and auctioned off to the highest campaign contributors.The Supreme Court ‘Citizen’s United’ decision opened the floodgates for big money in our politics, allowing giant corporations […]

Authoritarianism

Are Western sanctions on Iran making a difference?

The Conversation

By Amin Saikal, The University of Western Australia | – (The Conversation) – The Iranian Islamic regime has been seriously challenged since the start of public protests last September. The government has sought to contain and suppress the protesters – even resorting to executions – but has been unable to stop them. There are continuing […]

Corporations

Derailments across the Country: Rail Workers Warned Us that Greed Is Dangerous

OtherWords

By Rebekah Entralgo | – ( Otherwords.org ) – The toxic clouds that billowed up from a derailed freight train in Ohio this February are a chilling metaphor for the toxic greed that has infected so many of our big corporations. After having to evacuate, residents of East Palestine, Ohio are cautiously going back home, […]