Economics.

            The cross party of MP's report on the government's, handling of the pandemic as, one of the UK's worst ever public health failures, should not be put down to bungling incompetence alone. Certainly the bumbling Boris brigade have shown remarkable features of gross ignorance and fumbling stupidity, but let's not forget that these people are shareholders in various business and have family and friends up to their necks in shareholding and share bonuses. So, like I and other's have been saying since the start of the pandemic, the decisions at the start of the health crisis was always the economy. Lock-down could mean the loss of profits and their treasured share bonuses, so would have to be avoided at all cost. Unfortunately for us lesser mortals this meant thousands of unnecessary deaths among our friends neighbours and family. To their way of thinking that is better than businesses having to close down and profits to shrink.

Fit to lead WHAT?

 

            All through this covid19 pandemic, the economy has always taken priority over the health and well being of the people, decisions were always tinged with political dogma rather than sound scientific logic. Even when it came to lock down, billions of pounds were thrown to the corporate beast of their business friends, billions that you and I will have to pay back to the loan sharks of the financial Mafia. We will be asked to pay it back in increased taxes, prices, closing of public amenities, and of course selling of public assets to the corporate world, with the health service high on their list. This mountain of debt that will placed on our backs was not the furlough scheme, that was only peanuts to what went to the rich corporations and big businesses. Even yet large corporations that have made billions over the years are now bleating about increased energy prices and want the government to hand them more tax payers money to shore up their profit margins for the shareholders. I always thought that capitalism was you set up your business and exploit the public for profit, but when you don't make a profit you go bust. Too big to fail, well take it over to public ownership. What about small businesses, if Joe's Burger shop is losing money does he get a hand out of tax payers money to keep him in business? Strange sort of capitalism. Why don't we all agree, the capitalist system doesn't work, and simply bring it down. Whether it is Bumbling Boris and his merry band of profiteers, or Starmer, Knight of the Realm, that sits on the throne, the outcome is always the same, they do very well and we get shafted.

 

 Where do you think Keir's loyalties lie?

 

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Tomorrow's World.

        A new lockdown, dreary days without real social interaction, thoughts of trying to make sense of this world we have created. Holding on to sprigs of hope, doing our utmost to create a new and better world, we have the formula, anarchism, plain and simple. Now must be the time, when we take a look at where we are and the direction we are facing.

TOMORROW’S WORLD!!

See the fat cat’s grinning smile
as Corporate Capitalism runs amok,
Chasing profit as it goes
firing millions of ordinary folk.

Raping and polluting land after land,
starting bloody wars.
Toxic waste, sweat shop wages
and oil covered sea shores.

Where have all the flowers gone
beneath this ozone free sky?
To join the birds, to join the fox
on yonder plutonium field to die.

Mercury fish, strontium lamb
trees that never show a leaf,
radio active beaches, toxic streams
good lean BSE-antibiotic beef.

In a world of epidemic, plague and famine
it’s bottled water and chemical food.
Of course, it’s all tested on rats and mice
so you know it’s got to be good.

Beneath a sky that’s always black,
hurricane winds and endless drought,
its oxygen masks for the toxic air,
corporate profit is what it’s all about. 

 

 

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Acceptance.

       Where are we now in this new world wide control system, where have the little freedoms we had gone, where are our choices? We seem to have accepted the state's open prison approach to this pandemic without much of a public discussion. We willingly abandon our right to be involved in formulating the solutions of our problems, to our political ballerinas, with their economic value structure and their sole interpretation of the "science". Now we walk in a world of weariness, fear, confusion and mistrust, pinning our hopes on the big capitalist pharmaceutical companies to come up with the magic bullet, a vaccine. Could it have been different if we the public were involved in helping formulate the solutions, would the economy have outweighed the health and welfare of the people? Too late now, we are where we are, not so, we could still take control of the situation, taking the politics and economy out of the equation, and concentrating on the health and welfare of the people, allowing the experts in the fields of pandemics, public health and medicines to guide us, all free from the weight of saving the economy.
        The following an extract from an interesting article originally in El Critic 

 

Barcelona.

 Translated by Autonomies: 

 

         The social malaise spreads moment by moment. The endless sequence of confinement – de-confinement – re-confinement – is the rope that slowly asphyxiates us. It is the rope that a State, incapable and seized by panic, holds to, to try to impose its new normal. Now we know that the announced new normal is nothing more than the continuation of this nightmare. When it all started, it seemed that we were in a science fiction movie, and that we were masked protagonists. The contained emotion of the first month was made up of fear and relief; the fear of dying and the relief of not having to work. The balconies strove to open up to the sky. Now there are no songs. The slogan “Everything will be fine” sounds even more stupid, and we have learned that we are only the useful fools of a moment in the history of capitalism. The plot can be summed up in a few words: unbridled capitalism – what is usually known as neoliberalism – produces a virus that capitalism itself reuses to control us. In the silence of the night subjected to a curfew, the cry of “Enough!” is heard. We are tired, fed up with so much uncertainty, fed up with so many falsehoods and, above all, fed up with so much arbitrariness.

Read the full article HERE 

Visit ann arky's home at https://radicalglasgow.me.uk 

Good Times!!

          More lockdown, and the capitalist beasts are calling for more tax payers money to keep them in the style the think they are entitled to, and the media keeps blowing their trumpet on the need for businesses to be saved. However what is facing the ordinary people of this country, and other countries, is abject poverty for years to come. Where do you think all those bailouts of billions of pounds we taxpayers hand to the big businesses ends up, why in the coffers of the big financial Mafia, the big banks and investment companies. Most of them are doing very well thank you and with their loot cupboards stuffed with your money, they are well placed to face the tidal wave of poverty that will hit most of us, the people who created all that money in the first place.

 

         Of course this is nothing new, the present economic system has always functioned on the basis that we the people create the wealth and the owners and managers of the system plunder that wealth to create a pampered and privileged life for themselves and that small coterie parasites around them. Perhaps this latest phase of this brutal system of exploitation, will push us hard enough into poverty and deprivation that we open our eyes and see it for what it is, and force us to bring it crashing down. You know we can build a system that is fair and just, that sees to the needs of all our people, that is sustainable, brings an end to wars. We have the power and the imagination, all we need is the will to come together and show our true humanity. Just remember, it is your money that oils the wheels of the financial Mafia.
        The following extract refers to America, but the system is repeated across the globe, capitalism and the financial Mafia have no borders, borders are for us, to keep us in our place and to live according to their rules.

        The following extract is from World Socialist Web Site 

 

Bank of America (Image credit: Mike Mozart/Flickr)

          Hefty profits for top US banks as millions face social disaster
Shannon Jones, 13 October 2020
          Big US banks reported much stronger than expected profits in the third quarter while wide layers of the population face misery and hardship.
         Buoyed by government cash poured into the financial markets, JPMorgan Chase reported third-quarter profits of $9.44 billion, or $2.92 per share, well above the forecasts of economic experts. That figure compared with $4.76 billion last quarter and $9.08 billion one year ago.
        JP Morgan’s bond and stock trading operations accounted for a 20 percent year-over-year increase in revenues, offsetting declines in consumer loans and credit cards. The bank’s earnings rose despite a charge for $524 million for legal fees related to its criminal manipulation of global markets in commodities and US treasury notes.
       Citigroup reported $3.2 billion for the third quarter, despite a 13 percent drop in revenue from consumer banking as its trading and investment revenue rose 5 percent.
       BlackRock, the world’s largest asset manager, also reported strong third quarter profits, which rose to $1.36 billion. Fueled by US Treasury cash, its assets under management increased to $7.8 trillion, which is an increase of 12 percent from the third quarter of last year.
       Other large US banks, including Bank of America, Goldman Sachs and Morgan Stanley, are expected to show healthy third quarter profits when their reports come out later this month.
        The strong results for the banks come in the midst of the worst economic collapse since the Great Depression and mounting hardship across the US. The situation facing the unemployed is increasingly dire as the limited and inadequate support for the unemployed contained in the CARES Act long ago expired and funds released by the Trump administration for a $300 supplement are largely exhausted.
       Meanwhile, the US Treasury continues to pump cash into the financial markets, money that will have to be repaid at devastating cost to the working class in terms of social benefits, wages, working conditions and lives. The necessity of restarting production in order to repay the trillions handed over to the banks and corporations is the driving force behind the homicidal back-to-work policy of the US ruling class and governments around the world. This has led to a sharp increase in COVID-19 cases and deaths, with the number of fatalities surpassing one million internationally and 221,000 in the US.

Read the full article HERE: 

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Domestic Violence.

      Domestic violence is no new phenomena it has been part and parcel of our society for many a generation. It is born out of patriarchy and festers away in what is often thought of as a "normal" home. It is another symptom of our unjust, unequal, sick society, so often people will turn away when they see or hear it manifest itself, it is somehow seen as a private affair. We always seek to eradicate aggressive and unprovoked violence in our society, we should remember, the home is a unit of our society. This pandemic lockdown has made the life of those at the receiving end of domestic violence all the more precarious, sometimes escape seems impossible, and that is when friends and neighbours should come in.

      This is an appeal for solidarity with those subject to domestic violence, with some helpful advice from Greece.

The following from Act For Freedom Now:

DOMESTIC VIOLENCE IS A COLLECTIVE ISSUE

       In this time of Covid-19, during the State-imposed lockdown and transport ban, the cases of domestic violence in Greece have increased. It was to be expected -now it’s even harder to escape. The myth of the “holy nuclear family” takes for granted that staying at home is always the safest, but for many of us being with our families or partners is just as threatening as being out there. In the odd silence of the city, the screams we can hear from the neighbouring houses aren’t getting any quieter. Domestic violence is not just a “couple’s problem”, an “issue for the family to resolve” or a “private affair”. All forms of violence against children, partners, family members or housemates are never justified, except when it’s for self-defence against the aggressor.
Every year, patriarchy kills more than any other virus.
     If you are experiencing violence, physical or otherwise, and you are quarantined with your aggressor/s, we tried to put together some suggestions:
• Practice how to get safely out of the house.
• Create a sign to use for emergencies with your neighbours.
• Find people who understand and support you and a safe space, to take refuge in.
•Try to resist! If you can’t do anything, it’s totally ok too, it’s not your fault, you’re not alone.
       If you witness domestic violence which doesn’t target or threaten you and you don’t intervene or speak out, you support the aggressor.
        What you could do:
•Try to create a connection with the person targeted by the violence.
• Offer your space as shelter
• If the person agrees, call out or confront the aggressor.

Anti Covid19 – Network for Mutual Aid and Struggle
FB:@AntiCovidAidNetwork
patriarchyisthevirus.tem.li

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Little Sparks!

 

     It is only a matter of time. The cracks are beginning to appear, how much longer will compliance be the accepted norm? You can rest assured as more and more people stretch the rules, the police, in their usual arrogant heavy handed over reaction, will do their best to intimidate and subdue any infringement. Don't expect the state to rebuke the police, their mouthpieces will always loudly acclaim that it was the public that was at fault, and the villains are being dealt with severely. Fear is their weapon.

   We can rest assured that this incident reported from Turin in Italy, is not the only one on this planet of lockdown, but don't expect the mainstream media to inform you of these "infringements", they would much prefer to push the scenario of all happy happy, clappy clappy, we're all in this together, to conceal their total ineptitude and stupidity and their complete inability or desire, to create a system that would protect the public from such a situation in which we now find ourselves.

The following from Enough is Enough:

#Turin #Italy – Giulio Cesare street is just the beginning.
           Turin. Italy. April 19. 2020. The now unbridled power of the police has manifested itself today in a catch that tasted like an assault. Shortly after lunch, under the occupation of 45, Giulio Cesare street, a dozen policemen stopped two men with an exaggerated exercise of force and without paying attention to the precautionary anti-infection measures. The violence of the action was such that it aroused the attention of the people in the area who, although locked in their homes, did not remain silent and many took to the streets.
        Originally published by Macerie. Translated by insuscettibile di ravvedimento.
        Among them also some comrades who began to rage against that brutality aggravated by the total and contemptuous disregard for the possible contagion. It is precisely those who effectively impose the lockdown and have the complete management of what happens in the streets of the cities that represent a further danger to health, beyond what their role normally grants them. Numerous police and army vehicles arrived as reinforcements and, in the face of a neighbourhood that was clearly hostile to them, began to put pressure on comrades who were thrown to the ground, dragged and taken away.
       Dozens and dozens of individuals remained in the street and together with a few sympathizers who arrived later and hundreds of residents at the windows created a real protest.
       With incredible speed came the first statements by the city citizen politicians from the right and left who, compete in a disjointed manner for the title of who, over the years, have invoked the repression of anarchists most tenaciously. It seems clear that they are frightened by scenarios that they cannot even imagine because in Aurora neighbourhood the measure seems to be full and after weeks of forced domicile in narrow apartments, a life now literally reduced to starvation, towards the State and its representatives in uniform are beginning to see unequivocal signs of not forbearance.
      In the popular neighbourhoods of the cities this could be just the beginning. In fact, there is news of a group of comrades who, in Milan, in the late afternoon, went from courtyard to courtyard, in the neighborhood of Ticinese, to tell about the events in Turin with a megaphone and that the response from the houses was of heartfelt and noisy solidarity with the arrested comrades.
     There is still no certain news of them, we will soon report some updates. In the meantime, the newspapers say that they are under arrest and that forty people have been denounced for violation of the rules envisaged for the current coronavirus pandemic.
      What happened today, as we said, seems to be only the beginning and it is no coincidence that it happened on the poorest streets of the city.

Freedom for Giordana, Marifra, Samu and Daniele!

Freedom for everyone!

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