Turning the Corner

It's Halloween, Day of the Dead, and All Saints Day rolled into one this week. After all we are midway into fall, halfway between the equinox and the solstice...one of the four corners of the year. The US election looms, and Brazil's election is today...both seem rigged to me. Central American refugees migrate north toward probable conflict and violence. Stronger and more frequent storms have become the norm. The market is falling and the dollar's international supremacy slips more every day. I jokingly suggested several months ago TPTB planned to reduce global warming with a nuclear winter...I hope I wasn't prescient...as the US withdraws from nuclear treaties and continues to increase our stockpile of destruction.

Are you scared yet? We might already be...

There are plenty of scary stories to go with the holiday...
Climate chaos proceeds at an ever greater pace...the speed of which is consistently underestimated. Check out the Thursday column "Hot Air" for the latest studies and reports. My friends in Florida got the power back last weekend. They are still cleaning up from Hurricane Micheal. It has been the most powerful hurricane season on record. There was all sorts of loss, personal and financial, that you don't realize. They lost several jets on the Gulf Coast bases...about 6 billion USD worth...more expensive that the base itself. (video or text)

So our approach is to double down on extraction opening federal lands in the Arctic to off shore drilling https://www.commondreams.org/newswire/2018/10/25/trump-administration-ap...

Hilcorp, the company that is proposing to build this Liberty Project, has a horrendous track record of pipeline spills in the southeast of Alaska, in the Cook Inlet, as well as in Gulf of Mexico. And right now—this was not reported in The Washington Post—they are asking for a waiver of the corrosion protection on that pipeline

https://www.democracynow.org/2018/10/26/trump_admin_opens_up_alaska_for (video or text)

Meanwhile we've had a massive leak in the Gulf of Mexico spewing out barrels for over a decade.
https://www.washingtonpost.com/national/health-science/a-14-year-long-oi...
5 min audio interview with the author of the article
http://www.wbur.org/hereandnow/2018/10/23/oil-spill-gulf-of-mexico-taylo...

It’s as if many people who are supposed to represent our interests either lack the imagination, foresight and long-term thinking needed to deal with a crisis as massive as human-caused climate disruption, or they’ve given up and decided short-term economic gain and positive election prospects are more important than ensuring that we and our children and grandchildren will have a viable future.

https://davidsuzuki.org/story/are-governments-giving-up-on-global-warming/

There are some signs of progress...baby steps, but in the right direction. The EU is banning single use plastic. (video or text)
https://therealnews.com/stories/european-parliament-bans-single-use-plas...


So are we at the day of the dead, doomsday, or the eve of destruction?

The Intermediate-Range Nuclear Forces agreement is one of the most important international treaties and its cancellation will mean a full return to the nuclear arms race and closer to nuclear disaster, says Peter Kuznick of the Nuclear Studies Institute at American University (video or text)
https://therealnews.com/stories/withdrawal-from-inf-nuclear-treaty-bring...

More from Daryl Kimball, director of the Arms Control Association. He previously led the Coalition to Reduce Nuclear Dangers. He has been advocating for the U.S. and Russia to preserve the INF Treaty. (video or text)
https://www.democracynow.org/2018/10/22/counterproductive_and_dangerous_...

There are many reasons we can't seem to escape from the war machine. William J. Astore discusses several. https://www.truthdig.com/articles/the-sinister-reason-the-u-s-persists-i...

Peace is breaking out in Korea..will US war hawks prevent it? (video or text)
https://therealnews.com/stories/can-washingtons-hawks-sabotage-koreas-peace

Foreign wars and violence at home woven in a web of confusion by corporate media.

The murder of 11 people and wounding of six, allegedly by Robert Bowers, 46, came a day after the arrest of Cesar Sayoc, 56, for a mail bombing campaign that targeted liberals including George Soros. A prominent Jewish billionaire, Soros has in recent weeks been the target of heightened conspiracy-minded rhetoric from prominent Republicans including Donald Trump.

https://www.theguardian.com/world/2018/oct/27/pittsburgh-synagogue-shoot...

Elections

I don't know about you, but I'm not sensing a blue wave in my neck of the woods. I keep hearing the talking heads speak as though a dim take over of the house is a certainty. I think they are counting their turkeys before Thanksgiving. We'll see...

I live on the Georgia line, and their governors race is pretty interesting. Greg Palast is bringing suit against candidate Kemp (who is regulating the election as Sec. of State). It's not how the people vote, but how their votes are counted.
https://www.democracynow.org/2018/10/24/greg_palast_sues_georgias_brian_...

Georgia “is one of five U.S. states whose voting machines have no paper trail, making them the most vulnerable to hacking, according to cybersecurity experts.”
https://www.truthdig.com/articles/theres-something-suspicious-going-on-w...

https://therealnews.com/stories/republican-kemps-desperate-moves-to-stop...

Brazil's election is today...
Brazilians face a momentous decision between ‘neo-fascist’ frontrunner Jair Bolsonaro and the Workers Party’s Fernando Haddad. How did Brazil get to this point? We discuss the situation with Alex Hochuli (video or text)
https://therealnews.com/stories/calling-brazils-presidential-frontrunner...
According to opinion polls, far right candidate Jair Bolsonaro is poised for victory in Brazil’s presidential elections this Sunday. But with his candidacy and rising support has come a wave a political violence rarely seen in Brazil’s presidential elections.
https://therealnews.com/third_party_content/brazil-at-the-crossroads-ris... (2 min video)

Honduras

Smedley Bulter reminds us of our legacy in Central America...

I was a racketeer, a gangster for capitalism. I helped make Mexico and especially Tampico safe for American oil interests in 1914. I helped make Haiti and Cuba a decent place for the National City Bank boys to collect revenues in. I helped in the raping of half a dozen Central American republics for the benefit of Wall Street. I helped purify Nicaragua for the International Banking House of Brown Brothers in 1902-1912. I brought light to the Dominican Republic for the American sugar interests in 1916. I helped make Honduras right for the American fruit companies in 1903.

...it’s important to understand what has been happening in Honduras, and the role of the U.S. in the crisis that Honduras has been facing for a very long time. There are two particular moments in history in the past 10 years, like the coup d’état that took place in 2009 and, of course, the unconstitutional re-election of Juan Orlando Hernández. These two moments in history increased the political and economic instability in Honduras, and now we’re seeing the results.

U.S. foreign aid is not what most Americans like to think it is. Very often, U.S. foreign aid is sort of like a boomerang. I mean, you put money nominally abroad, but what they have to do with the money is essentially purchase either merchandise or services from the U.S. And in the case of Central America, in specific, the last four or five years, which indeed show an increase in the nominal amount of U.S. foreign aid, has been primarily earmarked for essentially security and defense purposes

https://www.democracynow.org/2018/10/23/the_us_helped_destabilize_hondur...

This doesn't look good to me...
The Trump administration is planning to dispatch at least 800 active-duty troops to the southern border at the direction of a president who has sought to transform fears about immigration into electoral gains in the midterms as a caravan of thousands of migrants makes its way through Mexico. https://www.usnews.com/news/world/articles/2018-10-25/trump-says-hes-bri...

The Economy
Richard Wolff discusses the weeks economic news and in the last 15 minutes interviews Chris Hedges https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1wUX84SnSv0 (30 min total)

The weakened estate tax is strengthening the aristocratic class (duh).
https://therealnews.com/stories/millionaires-group-says-unfair-tax-syste... (video or text)

The Swiss bank UBS’s fifth annual billionaires report published on Friday, billionaires across the globe increased their wealth by $1.4 trillion last year—an astonishing 20 percent—bringing their combined wealth to an astonishing $8.9 trillion.
https://www.truthdig.com/articles/billionaires-made-history-in-2017-for-...

Chris Hedges explains the psyche of the uber-rich
https://www.truthdig.com/articles/the-rule-of-the-uber-rich-means-tyrann...

Max and Stacy explain Sear's bankruptcy and how the CEOs profited from it. The last half is a general analysis of the economic cycle.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UoSAnu2SQvA (26 min)

Interesting conversation with Luke Rudkowski and Ron Paul about an anarchist town in Mexico. Can the small Mexican town of Cheran serve as a model? They banned politicians and found nearly everything improved. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_i00F-AazMA (23 min)

There exists in the US not just one economy, but many, as well as many kinds of economic actors. From platform cooperatives to cryptocurrency, people are continuously building economic alternatives. So says Nathan Schneider, crusader for collective ownership and author of “Everything for Everyone: the Radical Tradition That Is Shaping The Next Economy.” (video only - 20 min followed by Virgina Eubanks -10 min - on the automation of inequality)
https://therealnews.com/stories/laura-flanders-show-the-next-economy

Our foreign policy isn't helping our economy. As the US tries to keep countries such as India from dealing with Iran and Russia, it is driving more and more countries to seek alternatives to the US dollar, threatening the dollar’s hegemony, says Vijay Prashad.
https://therealnews.com/stories/unintended-consequences-us-sanctions-on-... (video or text)

Media

Abby Martin discusses the fate of her show "Empire Files" and her documentary on Israel / Palestine to illustrate the difficulty of independent journalism. (19 min)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2ZMw43NyRqU

Ben Norton, Max Blumenthal and Jeb Sprague discuss how scaremongering over Russia and China is being exploited to silence dissents on social media. (two parts video and text)
https://therealnews.com/series/facebook-purge-of-alternative-media
https://www.truthdig.com/articles/facebook-is-systematically-censoring-a...

Max is back with RJ Eskow discussing the situation in Saudi and the ME in a fascinating conversation. "The Saudis got away with their 911 involvement. Chances are they will get away with this murder too." (35 min)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=H_YDxt6yGuA

Bob Scheer discusses the way corporations are using you and your data for marketing, manipulation, and censorship. (video or text)
https://therealnews.com/stories/is-orwells-big-brother-here-bezos-amazon...

We can thank Julian Assange for much of our understanding of the surveillance state.
gjohn's piece this week describes his current situation
https://caucus99percent.com/content/assange-situation-about-come-end
Jimmy discusses Julian's TED talk interview from 2010 when attitudes about Wikileaks were much different https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gJ8RoTq9U1o (22.5 min)

This picture should scare (or is it disgust) you if nothing else in this column did...

Another week that has flown by. Winter and the end of the year are in sight. We're turning a corner of the calendar year, but can we turn the corner toward a more productive future? There are glimmers...plastics bans, anarchist Mexican villages, cooperative economics...we have to be the change. I look forward to your stories and comments below and I wish you all....