Lies.

          We are facing the worst crush on our standard of living in many a year, a throw back to Victorian times, with all the repercussions that this entails, drastic effects on the health and well being of our children and ourselves, increase in stress and anxiety, an increase in mental health problems also leading to an increase in poverty, destitution and homelessness. We live in one of the richest counties on the planet and our lives are controlled by a rich group of privileged parasites.

                                             Image courtesy of World Socialist Web Site

      We have a Chancellor of the Exchequer who spouts that he understands the hardship the ordinary people are facing, he is lying, he doesn't, he can't possibly know how to juggle with decisions of whether to skip a meal to buy your kid a pair of shoes for the winter, making the decision of whether to turn the heating on or go cold so that you can put food on the table. He lives in a bubble that insulates him from the reality of the ordinary people. This man who states he understands our problems is a multi-millionaire, he and his wife have a personal fortune of around £730 million between them. Last year, his wife, daughter of a billionaire, received approximately £11 million in dividends from her 9% share in her fathers multi-billion pound company. How they can have the audacity to say, they understand our problems, when they don't even know anything about our lives and daily struggles. Two different worlds, one of opulence and excess the other of daily struggle to have a half decent life, with the ever present risk of not making it even to that level.

Image courtesy of The Journal.

       Why do we tolerate this subservience to this bunch of rich, selfish parasites? They need us to make their fortunes for them, we don't need them. We the ordinary people have made everything, distributed everything, but always do it to the dictate of the rich and powerful, all to the advantage of the rich and powerful, why?  

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Infants.

 

          If there was any doubt that capitalism kills, perhaps the following will convince you that it does, and we must kill capitalism before it kills us. What sort of society would tolerate companies that attempt to thwart legislation that could help prevent babies from infection. After all selling products to families that are intended to be fed to infant babies, must surely have the most stringent safety regulations and any producer of these products should welcome all safety regulations that can protect their customers. However, that is not how capitalism works. First and foremost, profit is paramount, shareholders bonuses are sacred and the governing policy will always be to increase those bonuses. Not the basis for an ethical system and a dangerous one when it comes to food for children and infants.  

The following extract from The Intercept: 

    

The Abbott Nutrition facility in Sturgis, Michigan, which produces much of the U.S. supply of baby formula, shut down in February, bringing production lines to a grinding halt. Following a voluntary recall and investigation by the Food and Drug Administration and the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, the stoppage stemmed from a bacterial outbreak whose effects would be felt months later. Starting last September, five babies who had consumed the plant’s formula contracted bacterial infections. Two of them died.

           The production pause is now contributing to a national shortage of formula, a crisis that experts believe will continue for months. Abbott, however, disputes that there is any link between its formula and the infant illnesses.

         Questions are now swirling about alleged problems at the Abbott-owned factory, which produces popular brands such as Similac, Alimentum, and EleCare. A recently disclosed whistleblower document claims that managers at the Sturgis plant falsified reports, released untested infant formula, and concealed crucial safety information from federal inspectors.

           But eight years earlier, the formula industry rejected an opportunity to take a more proactive approach — not only for increasing supply capacity, but also for preventing a potential outbreak. Records show that the industry successfully mobilized against a 2014 proposal from the FDA to increase regular safety inspections of plants used to manufacture baby formula.

           At the time, the FDA had proposed rules to prevent the adulteration of baby formula in any step of the process in order to prevent contamination from salmonella and Cronobacter sakazakii, which led to this year’s Sturgis plant shutdown.

          The largest infant formula manufacturers quickly stepped up to delay the safety proposals. The International Formula Council, now known as the Infant Nutrition Council of America, is the lobby group that represents Abbott Nutrition (owned by Abbott Laboratories), Gerber (owned by Nestlé), Perrigo Co., and Reckitt Benckiser Group, the companies that control 89 percent of the baby formula market in the U.S.

Read the full article HERE:

 Visit ann arky's home at https://spiritofrevolt.info  

Anger.

 

            Back from a wee break in the wilderness I thought I would re-start my rantings with a video from Sub Media. Here they bring together a series of May Day happenings across the world. It is impossible today to find a country where the people are not on the streets in anger at the system that shackles millions to poverty, destitution and war, and where the public's opinion of politicians has sunk somewhere low in the sewage system, from Sudan to Sri Lanka, from Paris to Montreal, from Berlin to Chile. The people are angry, the privileged parasites are nervous, expect the unexpected.

A note from SubMedia regarding this video:

         During the production of this episode we were working with the most up to date information at the time when we had said nobody had died at the May Day protests in Chile. Unfortunately we have since learned that Francisca Sandoval, a journalist age 29 died several days later in the hospital. Our condolences go out to her family and loved ones.

We're sorry for any confusion this may have caused

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Away.

 

           Hi friends, associates, comrades, my rants will be silenced for a week or so as I off to a cottage on the shore of Loch Goil at the back of beyond, for some nice family time. Believe it or not it seems we will have nice weather as a bonus. In the mean time, keep stirring the shit.

Loch Goil

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Ref & Black.

            Glasgow's Red and Black Bookfair on Saturday May 7th. was a great success. A good variety of interesting and colourful stalls and was well attended with lots of young folk, which is also very encouraging. So a bit of a pat on the back for those who organised and took party. Let's hope it can become a welcome annual affair in the city. So if you attended, or missed it, and would like to see it a repeat annual get together, get in touch with any of the groups involved and make your voice heard. It's up to you. 

Some photos from the event.

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Illusions?

           As is usual in this world of illusions, we in the West are always on the side of good, freedom and democracy. So any conflict the West indulges in must be for the good and those who oppose this are obviously on the side of evil. So in the Ukrainian situation we are expected to take the side of the righteous good West and stand against the evil that is Russia. If only it was that simple. The West lead by the self righteous U$A, has achieved the decimation of more countries than Russia can ever hope to achieve. The Western nation states, like Russia, are power mongers, all vying for control of the world's resources, all attempting to seize the largest market share, and all ready to spill the blood of their respective populations to defend or expand their dominance in the field of resources and market share. They will gladly go to war and shed the blood of millions if they feel their dominance is threatened or they believe they can gain an advantage over the other. They consider that your blood is a price worth paying for their advantage. I don't recall a war ever starting because bus drivers of one country wanted to kill plumbers in an other country, or shop workers from one country wanting to kill teachers from another country. It is always the rich and powerful that call for war when they think that their wealth and power might be threatened, full well aware that they will not be on the killing fields, that's up to the bus drivers, teachers, plumbers and shop workers, who will gain nothing from this insanity.

The following from Act for Freedom Now:

SABOTAGE
          The way in which events in Ukraine are presented can deceive us. They call it a war of democracy and freedom on the one hand, with dictatorship and oppression on the other. It is supposed to be the time to stand as one, on the ‘right’ side of the barricade, in this battle between good and evil. But if we look behind the lines of spectacle, we see propaganda from all sides to enlist our bodies and minds for another round of geopolitical chess. The presented juxtaposition between freedom and oppression is false. Every country is at war in one way or another.
        Through military operations outside its borders. By driving refugees to their borders to their death. By manufacturing weapons systems or technologies for military use and selling them to anyone who buys them. Every State oppresses. By imposing its dominant system on its population and punishing its dissenters in an exemplary manner. We can fight the war. Not by being soldiers, but by being saboteurs. Directly, by attacking the war industry that makes war possible.
More broadly, by breaking the social peace on which every State depends for its continued existence.

 

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Profit War!

         To the corporate world every crisis has a silver lining. The Ukraine affair might be a disaster for the people caught up in the bloodshed, as is usual in war situations, the ordinary people pay in blood and trauma. However, to the corporate world it is seen as a bonus. The corporate/financial world of parasites has been creaking near breaking point since 2008 when the "Market" gambling bubble burst. They have been searching for ways to recapitalise the system and have used austerity on the people as the main source of that recapitalising, but the system was still struggling. Along comes the pandemic, and states throw money at the corporate word, money that the people will be tasked with paying back through lower standard of living. 

 

 

However the corporate economics was still in a bit of a mess despite all that tax payers money, suddenly we have a war, yippee shouts the corporate bosses, the arms industry moves into top gear with taxpayers money flooding in as the West throws billions of £s of weaponry into Ukraine. The oil and gas markets seize the moment and shoot the price of energy somewhere beyond the moon. Another golden opportunity to recapitaise the system with our money. Energy giant Shell has reported its highest ever quarterly profit, a staggering £7.3 billion in the first three months of this year. Other energy giants, BP and Total have also reported a sharp rise in profits. There is a cash waterfall rushing into the share holders bank accounts while you and I face eating or heating, cutting down on life's necessities, seeing kids go hungry. This is the moment the Bank of England decides to raise the interest rate for the second time in months. This will hit mortgages, payments on loans, credit cards, etc.. In the meeting rooms of the bankers, financial Mafia and corporate robbers, they no doubt will raise a glass to Russia, with the toast, "long may the war last, because of it, we are doing wonderfully, thank you".

 

        Why do we tolerate such an insane, greedy parasite driven system, why do 

we just suffer and watch the shareholders laugh all the way to their new luxury yacht? 

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