Getting Fat On Other People's Sweat.

       Some crazy figures in this capitalist world that show the inequality created by this insane, unjust, exploitative system. Despite the screams of disaster and crisis in 2008, and not forgetting the Eurozone problems, according to a recent report from Credit Suisse, global wealth has more than doubled since 2000, reaching over £150 trillion, During this period have you personally felt the benefits of this remarkable growth? On the contrary, for you and I, this period has been one long spell of “austerity”, falling incomes, shrinking social services and deteriorating living standards. 

     Crisis or no crisis, we still create wealth at an enormous rate, where is it going? Well, there are approximately 5 billion adults in the world today, but just 8.4% of whom own 83.4% of all household wealth. At the other end, approximately two-thirds of adults in the world have less than $10,000 of net wealth, while approximately 3.2 billion adults have nil, nothing. 

     So at one end we have billions of people with no wealth what so ever, nothing. While we have 32 million people who own $98 trillion of the world's wealth, that's 41% of the total. At the top of this heap of parasites, wallowing in unbelievable unearned wealth, we have just over 98,000 individuals who have more than $50 million each, with almost 34,000 of those owning more than $100 million each. It works out that 1% of the population own 41% of the world's wealth, 10% own 86%, and the bottom half, the you and me's, own just 1%. 

    It doesn't take a mathematical expert to work out that we have enough material wealth to see to the needs of all our people, but this man made, crazy, greedy driven system, is not built to do that, it is doing what it was meant to do, make rich people richer, and to hell with the rest of you. However, never forget that the parasites are getting fat on our poverty and sweat, every penny of that wealth was created by the you and me's of this world, it is ours, we just have to take it all back, but when? 

Visit ann arky's home at www.radicalglasgow.me.uk

An Open Letter.

      Willie McDougall was one of Glasgow's life long anarchists and a bitter anti-war campaigner. As a conscientious objector he was sent to Dartmoor prison. Somehow he managed to get his hands on a bicycle and proceeded to cycle off, making his way back to Glasgow, where he continued his anti-war campaigning. 

 Photo courtesy of Bob Jones and Gina Bridgeland.

       This is an extract from an open letter he wrote to Mr Callaghan, leader of the Labour Party. Though some what dated, it still makes for interesting reading.

        The entire letter can be read at Spirit of Revolt, "Read of the Month"

RENT, INTEREST AND PROFIT.

      The old Fabians, although reformist, carried out a vigorous propaganda against Rent, Interest and Profit, all legalised forms of robbery of the common people. This view was also held by such famous socialists as Upton Sinclair and Robert Blatchford.

      In order to buy off counter-revolutionary violence the latter were prepared to pay modest compensation to these robbers, but only for their own life time. In the case of landowners they quoted John Ball, the Kentish Priest, whose text was: "When Adam delved and Eve span who was then the Gentleman?" He was hanged for demanding the land for the people.

      Somewhere along the line in all countries the land was stolen by force, or deceit from the common people. The Red Indians in America, the Zulus in Africa, the Aborigines in Australia were massacred, while in Europe and in Scotland there were Sutherland-type Clearances.

     Jack Jones has quipped that two-thirds of the members of the House of Lords are descendants of cattle thieves, land thieves or Court prostitutes. This applies also to our landlords. Whoever got the original titles had no moral or ethical right to acquire, sell or bequeath them.

     Blatchford cleverly shows the unfair parallel with the useful writer or inventor.... The latter's copyright lasts only 50 years whereas land rights, like interest are in perpetuity. The burden of interest which lies like an Albatross round the necks of all our big cities, causes rents to be at least three times higher than necessary. As our great Scottish revolutionary, John Maclean, pointed out, the perpetual burden of interest on the nationalised industries makes it difficult for them to be viable.---- 

Visit ann arky's home at www.radicalglasgow.me.uk

Don't You Know That There's A War Going On.

From The Progressive Populist:

      "For days, images of the Philadelphia public school system have haunted me. More than 30 children in one class share 11 math books. Bathrooms locked because there aren’t enough hall monitors. What’s most heartbreaking is to know that just a few miles away other school students attend some of the highest rated public and private schools in the nation, where they are lavished with cutting edge technology and enrichment opportunities.
        Then there are the images of elected officials turning a deaf ear to the protests of the students, teachers and parents angered at the extreme cuts. And the image of the Philadelphia Board of Education voting to cancel the contract with the teachers’ union. Shame on the board and shame on everyone else who blames Pennsylvania’s and American’s crisis in public education on teachers or believe the solutions to the problem all involve taking money out of the pockets of these highly skilled professionals." Read the full article HERE:

       Does the above sound familiar?

        If there is anybody out there who still can't see that we are in a brutal global class war, they must be blind. In country after country the  flag at the masthead of the powers that be is, "AUSTERITY". An ideology being directed by the financial Mafia, which is made up of individuals and institutions of unimaginable wealth. Their wealth is increasing by means of plundering all public assets, if it belongs to the public, it has to be transferred to private hands at a bargain price. All public spending must be curtailed and where possible eliminated. Incomes have to be squeezed, cheap labour is a wonderful wealth creator for the leeches that feed off our backs.

       The world is awash with wealth, but more and more of it is being syphoned into the coffers of that small band of parasites that make all the rules, to guarantee such an outcome. It is no accident, it is a well thought out policy driven by greed, at our expense.

        Here in this country, official figures showed that disposable income available to households fell by 1.7 per cent between the end of last year and the first three months of this year, the biggest fall since early 1987. A recent report by the Joseph Rowntree Foundation stated that a typical couple, both of whom work full-time, who have two children, would now need an annual income of just under £39,000 to maintain a “minimum” standard of living. Another result of this global class war being waged against the ordinary people, is the fact that the amount of money needed to afford ordinary, not luxury, food, clothes and leisure activities, has risen by 25 per cent since the so called "crisis" in 2008,

        As this global class war goes on unabated, this country has seen an explosion of food banks, hardly a sign of an economic recovery for us the ordinary people. In the year 2008/09 the number of people receiving food parcels from these food banks numbered, 25,899. The latest figures for 2013/14 puts that number at 913,138, almost one million people seeking free food to survive. The increase in the number of food banks is continuing, averaging two more a week opening. Where will it end, will it be when we all depend on food banks? 

           Do we just get on with it and accept that the multi-billionaires who are engineering this plundering of our wealth, after all we create all of it, will one day be compassionate and start to reverse the process? Or do we accept that it is a global class war, act accordingly and start to take back all that we created, creating a society that sees to the needs of all our people and gets the parasitic leeches off our backs, once and for all.

Visit ann arky's home at www.radicalglasgow.me.uk