The first of the 388 workers arrested in the immigration raid on the Agriprocessors meatpacking plant in Postville, Iowa, were deported in mid-October, having spent five months in federal prison. Their crime? Giving a bad Social Security number to the company to get hired. The Postville raid was one of the many recent immigration operations…
Category: International
Nader’s Stubborn Idealism
“The working class, most of whom do not vote, watch Democratic candidate after Democratic candidate run for office promising to support labor and protect jobs and then, once elected, trot off to Washington to pass the corporate-friendly legislation drawn up by the 35,000 lobbyists who work for our shadow government.” BY WILLIAM GREIDER INTERNATIONAL Posted…
Greenspan Concedes Error on Regulation
In his prepared remarks, Alan Greenspan, considered as the infallible maestro of the financial system, said he was in “a state of shocked disbelief” about the breakdown in the ability of banks to regulate themselves. He also warned about the economic consequences of the crisis, saying that he “cannot see how we will avoid a…
Halloween 2008 – The Horror of Foreclosures
As Halloween neared in 2006, the looming mortgage crisis was already apparent and now two years later the horror of it all hasn’t gone away. It keeps getting worse. We’ve spent the last few months talking about the possibility that two million people might lose their homes by early next year. Now it turns out…
Why Soldiers Rape: Culture of Misogyny, Illegal Occupation Fuel Sexual Violence in Military
The view of women as sexual prey has always been present in military culture. Indeed, civilian women have been seen as sexual booty for conquering soldiers since the beginning of human history. So, it should come as no surprise that the sexual persecution of female soldiers has been going on in the armed forces for…
Anti-Democratic Nature of US Capitalism is Being Exposed
“Politics is the shadow cast on society by big business,” concluded America’s leading 20th century social philosopher John Dewey, and will remain so as long as power resides in “business for private profit through private control of banking, land, industry, reinforced by command of the press, press agents and other means of publicity and propaganda”.…
Profits uber Alles! American Corporations and Hitler
Hitler’s Third Reich was a monstrous system made possible by Germany’s top business leaders, and while it proved a catastrophe for millions of people, it functioned as a Nirvana for Corporate Germany. Foreign-owned enterprises were also allowed to enjoy the wonderful services Hitler’s regime rendered to das Kapital, such as the elimination of all workers’…
‘America’s Outrageous War Economy!’:Pentagon can’t find $2.3 trillion, wasting trillions on ‘national defense’
Yes, America’s economy is a war economy. Not a ‘manufacturing’ economy. Not an ‘agricultural’ economy. Nor a ‘service’ economy. Not even a ‘consumer’ economy. BY PAUL B. FARRELL, MarketWatch INTERNATIONAL Posted by Bulatlat ARROYO GRANDE, Calif. (MarketWatch) — Yes, America’s economy is a war economy. Not a ‘manufacturing’ economy. Not an ‘agricultural’ economy. Nor a…
Swimming Lessons for Washington and Wall Street?The Predators’ Bailout
If I recall correctly, the very same US Congress that is considering bailing out the big financial corporations that got the economy into its current mess because of their greed and the government’s willingness to forgo any regulation of their doings (and the doings of their sister companies in the energy sector) made it almost…
Seven Years in Afghanistan: From “War on Terror” to “War of Terror”
What began as a “War on Terror” with waves of bombing attacks on Kandahar and Kabul October 7, 2001 has long since become a War of Terror, inflicted on the peoples of Southwest Asia, generating and strengthening resistance movements (“insurgencies”), enraging local allies and even alienating regimes of Washington’s own creation. The Canadians and Europeans…
Big Trouble in Detroit:How the U.S. Auto Industry Wrecked Itself
This corporate Congress cannot be expected to issue serious demands, set tough conditions, or impose strict rules on the auto companies to ensure their workers receive fair pay and benefits, and prevent their fat-cat executives from making off big while leaving their companies in shambles. BY RALPH NADER Counterpunch INTERNATIONAL Posted by Bulatlat The Big…