President Obama standing with U.S. Trade Representive Michael Froman outside the White House in June of 2013. Froman was nominated by the president for the top position and is now among the key targets of protests and critics who are decrying the administration’s trade policy. (Photo: Larry Downing/Reuters) The pro-big business President Barack Obama and his corporate allies are starting …
Move Over Shale, Solar Is Shining Brighter With Each Passing Day – Jon Queally
Move over dirty fossil fuels, the solar revolution is coming. That, at least, is the buried headline contained in new reporting from Reuters on Sunday which looks at the ability of the solar industry to upend the world’s energy system in ways similar to recent innovations which allowed oil and gas companies to squeeze previously unattainable deposits from underground shale formations. With a focus …
US Lawmakers Quietly Advance Legislation to Penalize Boycott of Israel – Sarah Lazare
U.S. lawmakers are quietly advancing legislation that would penalize international participation in the growing movement to boycott, divest from, and sanction (BDS) Israel for human rights abuses against Palestinians. With little notice, anti-BDS directives were injected into the “Fast Track” legislation that passed the Senate Finance Committee Wednesday night, despite broad opposition to the bill, which gives the administration of President Barack …
US economic decline overshadows IMF-World Bank meeting – Nick Beams
The annual spring meetings of the International Monetary Fund and World Bank held in Washington over the weekend comprised the treasurers and central bankers, together with financial experts and analysts, from all the major capitalist economies. However not a single proposal was advanced from this high-level meeting to alleviate, let alone resolve, the mounting problems besetting global capitalism. The reason …
China’s struggle for water security – Giles HEWITT
Way back in 1999, before he became China’s prime minister, Wen Jiabao warned that water scarcity posed one of the greatest threats to the “survival of the nation”. Sixteen years later, that threat looms ever larger, casting a forbidding shadow over China’s energy and food security and demanding urgent solutions with significant regional, and even global, consequences. The mounting pressure …
The Decline and Fall of the United States – David Swanson
Some say the world will end in fire, Some say in ice. From what I’ve tasted of desire I hold with those who favor fire. But if it had to perish twice, I think I know enough of hate To say that for destruction ice Is also great And would suffice. –Robert Frost After a speech I gave this past …
China is a “major driver” of environmental degradation in Latin America – Robert Soutar
China’s increased trade and investment in Latin America over the past decade has resulted in powerful social and environmental impacts such as job losses and pollution, although the growing relationship has also brought some benefits, says new research published today. The high concentration of Chinese activity in Latin America’s agriculture and extractive sectors has placed a heavy strain on water …
Mandarin for the Warlords: The Harvard School of Empire Building – Prof. James Petras
Harvard professor Joseph Nye, a former senior Pentagon functionary, is one of the longest serving and most influential advisers to US empire building officials. Nye has recently re-affirmed the primacy of the US as a world power in his latest book, Is the American Century Over? And his article, ‘The American Century will survive the Rise of China’ (Financial Times, 3/26/15, p. …
Economic Update – Honest Economics – 04.19.15
Updates on Bernanke’s new big-bucks finance job, GM avoids billions in victims’ claims for faulty ignitions, Seattle capitalist raises all workers to minimum $70k/yr, Americans’ self-delusion on inequality, private profit trumps public policy, and anti-student-debt activism. Responses to listeners: impact on China if capitalism’s relocation stopped. Major discussions of economics of wages and prices, narrowness of economics education, and basic global economic development issue.
The “Fight for $15″ and the Return of the Vanishing Worker – Richard Eskow
On April 15, perhaps as you’re reading these words, working people in 200 American cities will rally for a $15 base wage and the right to form a union. Solidarity demonstrations are planned in more than 30 cities on six continents, and have already taken place in Switzerland, the Philippines, South Korea, New Zealand, and Japan. The “fight for $15” matters …









