Hot Air
The horrific explosion of COVID-19 cases and deaths that has crossed the United States is in significant ways a product of an economic system, capitalism, that was unprepared for it as it should have been, and was unable to contain it as it should have been. I say prepared and I say should have been and I say contained because many other countries, advanced industrial countries like the U. S., but not as wealthy as the U. S. were able to be prepared and were able to contain it far far better than the United States. Did Mr. Trump have a lot to do with it? Yes. But it goes a lot deeper and further than that. … What this means is that the horrific damage of the virus is compounded by the damage and waste of an economic crisis that has tens of millions of people either out of work or unable to live.
“As tens of millions of Americans suffer from the health and economic ravages of this pandemic, a few hundred billionaires add to their massive fortunes,” ATF executive director Frank Clemente said in a statement. “Their pandemic profits are so immense that America’s billionaires could pay for a major Covid relief bill and still not lose a dime of their pre-virus riches.”
“Their wealth growth is so great,” Clemente added, “that they alone could provide a $3,000 stimulus payment to every man, woman, and child in the country, and still be richer than they were nine months ago.”
Kerry is a founding member of the Washington think tank, the American Security Project (ASP), whose board is a who’s who of retired generals, admirals and senators. The ASP also hailed the appointment of their man, explaining, in a little-read report, exactly what treating the climate as a national security threat entails. And it is nothing like what Sanders advocates.
For the ASP, climate change constitutes an “accelerant of instability” and a “threat multiplier” that will “affect the operating environment,” and notes that Kerry will have three priorities in his role as President Biden’s right-hand man. What were those three priorities? Making sure people in the Global South could eat and have access to safe drinking water? Reparations? Disaster relief or response teams? Cutting back on fossil fuel use? Indeed not. For the ASP, the primary objectives were:
A huge rebuilding of the United States’ military bases,
Countering China in the Pacific,
Preparing for a war with Russia in the newly-melted Arctic.
It's your open thread, now...
Comments
Caribou
‘A huge win’: B.C. government suspends logging in endangered caribou habitat near Revelstoke
Stop Climate Change Silence - Start the Conversation
Hot Air Website, Twitter, Facebook
NYS Pension Fund to Divest from Fossil Fuels
A link to some good news from New York State
Hi jbob
Thanks. Here are the details. Let’s hope this is just the beginning.
Hoping all is well with you and yours. Take good care.
Stop Climate Change Silence - Start the Conversation
Hot Air Website, Twitter, Facebook
a failed state
My hope is for a rapid collapse of this evil empire.
We're on our own. Hang on it is going to be a rough ride.
Everyone take care and be well.
“Until justice rolls down like water and righteousness like a mighty stream.”
good afternoon lo
This day has escaped. Flown the coop. And still just getting started.
Make it so. (Though I think there is little that we can do to actually stop it from happening at this point.)
Thanks for all you do. Take good care.
Stop Climate Change Silence - Start the Conversation
Hot Air Website, Twitter, Facebook
Biden just confirmed it. On your own.
Will not use executive actions.
No handouts to you people. But biden will understand.
Good morning, magi ~~
Thanks for posting the Richard Wolf video. He is always worth listening to no matter if it's his show or someone else's. We all need to be financially smarter. Buy land. So important. I need to purchase some.
Hope you are well!
Enjoy the day!
"The “jumpers” reminded us that one day we will all face only one choice and that is how we will die, not how we will live." Chris Hedges on 9/11
howdy ra
Yes to that. Be smarter and buy land. Good luck and may your land find you. I am well and continue to spend as much time outside as I can. The fall here is gently, dry and beautiful. No rain in sight. Though maybe Sunday. We are late again this year.
Take good care!
Stop Climate Change Silence - Start the Conversation
Hot Air Website, Twitter, Facebook
Morning magi.
Well here we are, watching all this unfold in a way that many had predicted. Catastrophe upon catastrophe. Climate change we know is a sticky problem, but the problems with the economy and the pandemic could be mitigated. In comparison with other ways we spend our money, it would cost a "trivial amount".
https://www.ianwelsh.net
Earlier in the summer things were looking bad. We all saw it. Predictable.
https://www.ianwelsh.net/the-coming-homelessness-and-hunger-apocalypse-i...
(edited to fix link)
Young talented people doing what young talented people should do:
hola rantntx
God I love those women. And that song. The first time I heard them I went searching for all their songs.
[video:https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=doi7qFWZtNA]
Thanks for the Ian Welsh link:
My heart aches for them and our planet. Thanks randtntx. Be well and take good care.
Stop Climate Change Silence - Start the Conversation
Hot Air Website, Twitter, Facebook
I meant to add this
to my previous comment.
Every person who is, or will be homeless, has a story. The increasing numbers of the unhoused is staggering.
No one deserves this: https://www.wsws.org/en/articles/2020/12/10/port-d10.html
This seems appropriate
[video:https://youtu.be/yR-1v-Si7bs?t=67]
Stop Climate Change Silence - Start the Conversation
Hot Air Website, Twitter, Facebook
It does seem appropriate
. Thanks for the sweet tunes, that group makes me smile.
Best to you.
Oy folks
planning to hang out in my hammocka
come sundown and dream of stinky fish
a multicultural mixed blessing
if the zillionaires won't share
to ease our plight
a great-big enforced evening
may be in the pipeline
thanks magi
afternoon q
smile
[video:https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=o5zb0WTSLsY]
Take it easy, but take it. Take good care...
Stop Climate Change Silence - Start the Conversation
Hot Air Website, Twitter, Facebook
Good morning magi. So expected of of the US that the
climate emergency is seen primarily from a military perspective and in particular as an "accelerant of instability", instability that we will try to manipulate and direct in such fashion as to help with our ongoing world domination project.
Kerry, the hawk in faux liberal clothing will be a front man for the war department, the sheep and the velvet glove, but the mission is still the same. Another quote from his think tank in this regard:
Note the wording and thinking. China is doing good things for these countries and their people and helping them to get green and resist the climate crisis, and thereby constitutes
a threat to U.S. dominance of the region. We don't give a shit for those nations or their people, their survival as individuals or as a nation state, only that we must control them, we must own them, and, as ever, exploit them, right up to the day they either drown or starve.
This is a very sick and very telling expose' of our national world view in one short paragraph; we are, in fact, "The Great Satan".
Good news out of BC, however, hooray for that.
Thanks for the column and the OT
be well and have a good one
That, in its essence, is fascism--ownership of government by an individual, by a group, or by any other controlling private power. -- Franklin D. Roosevelt --
hola el
Dunno. Wish I did. Gotta keep on.Right? Thanks bro for all you do. Take good care.
This is really long but worth checking out
[video:https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ClLbkEMaNvU]
Stop Climate Change Silence - Start the Conversation
Hot Air Website, Twitter, Facebook
This goes double for Hawaii, of course.
America’s political elite have never given a shit about the Hawaiian people — from the very beginning, it was only about the strategic location for control of the Pacific region through military bases.
good morning,
and thank you, magiama. interestingly enough, the RT.com version of the AFTF report had only mentioned bezos and elon musk.
clicking into the report does name billionaire bill gates (not his and mel's foundation), not so much in extra wealth, but oy and veh: will he/they profit mightily given investments in vaccine makers, robotic doctors, and 'the WEF's Great Covid Reset' and 4th Industrial revolution'.
i have more, including a Q or two, but RL chores are calling.
hi wendy
Hola chica. Thanks for dropping in. Your fave, Gates.
Be well and take good care.
Stop Climate Change Silence - Start the Conversation
Hot Air Website, Twitter, Facebook
Exactly the reason why Rep. Deb Haaland won't get picked
by Dementia Joe, the people want her
https://www.commondreams.org/news/2020/12/10/climate-action-indigenous-r...
I never knew that the term "Never Again" only pertained to
those born Jewish
"Antisemite used to be someone who didn't like Jews
now it's someone who Jews don't like"
Heard from Margaret Kimberley
hi gg
Don't you wish.
No, they want someone who worked in the obomba administration.
You do the math.
Thanks for the link. Take good care.
Stop Climate Change Silence - Start the Conversation
Hot Air Website, Twitter, Facebook
thnaks also for bringing alan macleod's
exposé on Kerry as militarized climate czar. his on fluornoy and rice was great (or was that raul diego?), later SOS 'nice guy' blinken. and caitlin johnstone's on SecDef 'easier to sell to progressives' curtis.
‘In bipartisan vote: US House approves record $741 billion military spending bill’, patrick martin, wsws.org, dec. 10 (longish, a few excerpts):
“The House vote for the National Defense Authorization Act (NDAA) [H. R. 6395] was by a massive margin, 335–78. Democrats supported passage by 195–37. Republicans supported passage by 140–40. Every leader of the House Democrats backed passage: Speaker Nancy Pelosi, Majority Leader Steny Hoyer, Majority Whip James Clyburn. They were joined by the top Republicans: Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy, Minority Whip Steve Scalise and the ranking Republican on the House Armed Services Committee, the co-sponsor of the massive bill, Mac Thornberry of Texas.”
The margin was far more than the two-thirds required to override a threatened Trump veto, although it is not clear that Trump will actually follow up on his tweets demanding two changes in the bill, neither relevant to its basic purposes. Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell has already said the Senate will pass the NDAA in the next few days. The margin is likely to be even more decisive than in the House.” [...]
“One of the largest single components of the Pentagon budget is Overseas Contingency Operations (OCO), funded to the tune of $69 billion. This is the spending for ongoing military operations where US forces are deployed: primarily Afghanistan, Iraq and Syria, as well as the Persian Gulf, where vast naval and air assets are arrayed against Iran. The OCO also covers active drone missile warfare operations across Central Asia, the Middle East and North Africa.
The bill puts billions into preparations to confront Russia and China, including fully funding the European Deterrence Initiative, the NATO build-up on Russia’s western borders, and the Pacific Deterrence Initiative, providing $2.2 billion for similar activity by US naval and air forces directed against China. The label “deterrence” is entirely deceptive: the Pentagon is not seeking to ward off Russian and Chinese aggression, but to prepare for US aggression against one or both countries, regarded as the main obstacles to maintaining US world domination. Another $250 million goes for the Ukraine Security Assistance Initiative, while $500 million (and likely much more) is earmarked for Israel.”
hmmmm...for what other purposes could those mega-billions have been allocated?
[video:https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=omEX35pbelI]
meh
Thanks for the article. Take good care.
[video:https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DLMlkjnYe0U]
Stop Climate Change Silence - Start the Conversation
Hot Air Website, Twitter, Facebook