This is a bad year for the politics of expedience & lesser evilism if you’re a supporter of BDS & Palestinian justice. There isn’t a single candidate to vote for that doesn’t wholeheartedly support Israel. Yet you see progressives all over the place, including those who think they’re honchos on the left, endorsing Bernie Sanders & Jill Stein. And now Hillary Clinton has come out with a full-fledged promissory note that she will stand with Israel, oppose BDS, & go to the mat denying Israel is an apartheid regime in return for big bucks from billionaire Zionists.

Peddling influence is the least of her problems. For anyone who did their homework, that’s how Obama operated also. And all the jamokes before him. That’s the way US politics work. It’s a rigged system favoring millionaires & corporations. This should be where that “fool me once, shame on you; fool me twice, shame on me” stuff kicks in but it takes some longer to wean from desperate hope springing eternal that a rigged system can be gamed.

The problem isn’t taking money from Zionists; the problem is Clinton’s support for Israeli apartheid & ethnic cleansing. The role Israel plays as a US military fortress is so fundamental to US control of the Middle East that she doesn’t stand a snowball’s chance in hell of getting the Democratic nomination unless she tows the line. She doesn’t give a rat’s ass about the welfare of Jews; not a whit more than she cares about defending Palestinians against dispossession & carpet bombing.

Let’s be frank: if you want to separate the wheat from the chaff among political candidates, Israel & Palestine are the touchstone because of the role Israel plays in enforcing neoliberal predation & the role Palestinians play in the historic struggle against it. All else is blither. Because if Clinton, Sanders, & Stein (& lord knows who else) won’t draw the line at apartheid in Israel, they will acknowledge no barriers to injustice anywhere.

The Greek economic crisis is a classic elaboration of how neoliberal capitalism works–or rather how it doesn’t work, even on paper. What kind of system is it where banks lend billions to pay the interest on old debts? That’s “robbing Peter to pay Paul” writ large & hardly sound economics. You don’t have to be a sophisticated economist to see the folly of that because it operates exactly like every usurious title & payday loan chop shop.

Capitalism may be irrational but it is complex & operates differently in different countries, under different circumstances. Some capitalist countries are run by feudal monarchs; some by military juntas; others by flatulent parliaments. Some have strong labor & civil liberties traditions; under many regimes these are violently repressed. Rebellion against austerity policies in Europe is breaking out in southern Europe, in Greece, Spain, Portugal, Italy which are considered weaker economies relative to northern Europe.

Greece doesn’t seem the strongest country to resist neoliberalism except for its strong political & radical traditions, including in the fight against fascism. The importance of Greek working people in Cold War politics was not missed by the CIA which collaborated with Greek generals. The weakness of the labor movement in Greece today is a result of the military coup in 1967 which ruled until 1974 & repressed labor organization & civil liberties but did not destroy working class defiance.

We can really get a window into how capitalism operates by looking at Greece. SYRIZA is negotiating with the Troika but they are not in full control of Greece. Not by a long shot. That’s why they advisedly called a referendum to strengthen their position in negotiations, thereby gaining the authority of a popular mandate. There are contending political figures & parties in Greece; there are bankers & corporations. There is a capitalist class who will not lose their shirts & their gravy train to upstart politicians & dissident workers without a fight. That’s why they have a military which can intervene to save Greek oligarchy. Not unlike the military in Egypt.

Greece isn’t the first country to experience the trauma of debt bondage.The hundreds of thousands of refugees & immigrants traveling north from south Asia, the Middle East, Africa, from the Americas are driven by the whip of neoliberal austerity & dispossession going back to the 1980s & only become more ruthless with time. Healthcare, education, social security, housing, employment have been decimated for millions of people.

Neoliberal capitalism is spiraling into a global crisis; the system is out of control & ‘all the king’s horses & all the king’s men’ can’t put this monstrosity back together again. It’s an irrational system held together by periodic bloodletting in war & by outright theft legitimized in law. You can formulate laws to make plunder legal but you can’t formulate laws to make the system work. Immense wealth for an itsy-bitsy number of people is maintained at the expense of millions of working people; those who come out on the short end are called excess population. Social hatred, eugenics, & ethnic conflict are essential to this system.

Well Greek working people have put their foot down & this is good news around the globe because they have more organized power to resist than workers in many other countries. Those further north (including in the US) who think they’re sitting pretty today fortified against all that impoverishment can think again. There’s a tsunami moving north because neoliberalism, the barbaric phase of capitalism, just can’t help itself. The oligarchs are not moving backwards in history through feudalism to slavery–they’re going straight to slavery. Until we draw the line & stop them.

This photo is Greek pensioners being shut out by the banks which claim the till is empty without bail out money. Our fullest respect & solidarity with Greek working people–because the Greek people can’t stand their ground alone.

(Photo by Emilio Morenatti/AP)

It’s all over but the crying for the Troika!

According to the Greek interior ministry, the “no” side is officially projected to win by 61 percent.

Hats off to our Greek brothers & sisters.

Homeless in Athens: this elderly man sleeping rough is the European Union-IMF bail out plan for Greece. Pensions are directly targeted along with other social services.

Greeks are voting in a public referendum today whether to accept or reject EU-IMF extortion. There have been massive protests demanding a “no” vote. Which ever option they choose, life will be hell for awhile. But a “no” vote giving the bum’s rush to plunder will be the most emancipating choice in the long run. They can rebuild an economy without doing it on the backs of working people & strengthen their forces to bounce capitalist predation once & for all.

Revolution don’t come easy but it never comes by groveling before tyranny.

Our fullest solidarity with our Greek brothers & sisters.

(Photo by Andreas Solaro/AFP/Getty Images)

This refugee woman & her infant are leaving a train in a border town between Macedonia & Serbia. Likes thousands of others, she’s trying to get north to other countries in Europe.

While the US & European Union militarize their borders & whip up right-wing nationalists against refugees, photojournalism documents that tens of thousands of them are women with infants & small children. Just as often, it is unaccompanied children. That’s as true on the US border as it is in the Mediterranean Sea & the borders of Europe.

It takes a special kind of barbarism to build barrier walls & take your navies after women & children. It’s neoliberal barbarism, a scorched earth economics that sees human life as dispensable in service to private wealth & oligarchy.

Immigration is a human right for all men, women, & children. Open the damn borders! If that means the end of neoliberalism, all the better for building a humane world.

(Photo by Dimitar Dilkoff/AFP/Getty Images)

Everybody likes a holiday, especially the ones with picnics, parades, & firework displays. The 4th of July celebrations in the US are always an extravaganza par excellence. Fireworks don’t get bigger–even in cities where parks & libraries are closed down for lack of funds.

No one wants to cast a pall over celebrations of the American revolution against British tyranny because, believe it or not, it was one of the first revolutions against colonialism. But while the new Americans were fighting the British they were also exterminating the indigenous peoples in the most savage ways. So savage, that the US wars against the original Americans became a model, a matrix for other barbarisms, for other genocides, including Hitler & the colonial state of Israel.

We could try to put colonialism of the Indians aside for just one day & celebrate a victory over British colonialism–since after all, they had at that time a good share of the human race in shackles. But the US government has turned the day into a celebration of militarism, of triumphalism over millions of people. Just like the British in 1776.
July 4th doesn’t signify emancipation in Afghanistan or Iraq or any of the countries where the US military is stationed or bombing. It doesn’t signify the end of occupation or of war–or for that matter, the extermination of Native Americans. If you stand in solidarity with the victims of US militarism it’s really hard to join the parades here which are a spectacle of flag-waving patriotism & nationalism.

So those in the US who see people around the world as brothers & sisters, not as enemies, have a real hard time on the 4th of July. It’s not our day. It’s not our festival anymore. We prefer solidarity to militarism. Call us old-fashioned.

This is the 4th of July “Baby Parade” in Port Carbon, PA. The small boy is being indoctrinated into American triumphalism, not the spirit of 1776, by his parents who are pulling the cardboard tank.

(Photo by Jacqueline Dormer/The Republican-Herald/AP)

One wishes the UN commission that reported on Israel’s Operation Ethnic Cleansing (Protective Edge) last summer was just inept & politically stupid instead of dishonest & malignant. Then the members could walk away from the report with some of their dignity still intact. Apparently they don’t realize that photojournalism combined with social media to alter the quotient of propaganda to truth & you can no longer fool all the people all the time. The boycott of Israel called by Palestinians & the massive international solidarity movement have entered history on the side of Palestinians & the truth is out.

Palestinians are expected to be grateful for the empty gesture–like Pope Francis saying a Hail Mary at the apartheid wall & the UN & European parliaments passing resolutions endorsing Palestinian bantustates–called “Palestinian statehood.” So when the UN acknowledges in the report what the entire world witnessed, that which is irrefutable, Palestinians & their supporters are supposed to herald it as a step forward, a partial victory, a big deal for justice. How about calling a spade a spade & telling the UN to stick their report where the sun don’t shine?

Let’s just take a look at methodology: the commission admits Israel denied them access to Gaza for inspection or to personally interview Palestinians who endured 51 days of carpet bombing. Interviewing of selected people was done by Skype. There were a lot of charges made by Israel to justify bombing schools, refugee centers, hospitals, mosques, entire residential areas. So wouldn’t on-site inspection be essential? If they don’t want to take the word of Palestinians, did they at least interview the Israeli soldier & veteran group named Breaking the Silence who published extensive testimony about the Israeli military’s indifference to human life & property in Gaza?

Operation Ethnic Cleansing was not addressed within the context of the Israeli blockade of Gaza or occupation of the West Bank & East Jerusalem. Any commission with an ounce of integrity would consider the blockade to be of the very essence of the Israeli siege & not just an irrelevant by the by. But integrity is the very thing this report lacks.

The fatal flaw of this piece of rubbish/propaganda however is the sleazy attempt to efface distinctions between Israeli ethnic cleansing & superior military power & that of paramilitary outfits in Gaza, like Hamas. Under the heading of “Rocket & mortar attacks” from Gaza, the report states “Between 7 July & 26 August 2014, Palestinian armed groups fired 4,881 rockets & 1,753 mortars towards Israel, killing six civilians & injuring as many as 1,600 people, including 270 children.” How does the commission explain the discrepancy between those figures & other UN reports that 66 Israeli soldiers were killed & three civilians, including one child, with no mention of injuries? And how many of those rockets & mortars actually got past the Israeli Iron Dome system & landed in Israel? Because if the Iron Dome isn’t working, then the Pentagon ought to stop bankrolling it.

In the heading “Tunnels,” the report says the Israeli military found 32 tunnels, 14 of which extended beyond the apartheid barrier around Gaza into Israel. This caused “great anxiety” among Israelis, the commission said, for fear Palestinian commandoes meant them harm. Can the UN suggest other means for Palestinians to defend themselves against the blockade & after repeated aerial bombardments by Israel? Can the UN even confirm the existence of all those tunnels–or are they taking Israel’s word on it? Presumably those tunnels didn’t extend into the hills of Sderot, Israel where residents exhibited no anxiety at all but gathered in easy chairs to wave Israeli flags & cheer on ethnic cleansing in Gaza.

Enough with the half-measures & empty gestures when it comes to Palestinian justice. Enough with the rubbish/propaganda that passes for investigation. It’s of interest that five countries abstained on the vote (India, Kenya, Ethiopia, Paraguay, Macedonia) & only the US voted no. So many questions are raised by that vote. How can anyone who supports Palestinians also support Obama? How can anyone who supports justice support Modi?

(Photo of Gaza which is proof of war crimes was taken August 27, 2014 by Suhaib Salem/Reuters)

There is probably no living figure in world politics more loathsome, contemptible, ruthless, amoral, criminal than this lowlife. He’s ugly all the way to the bone & comparisons to repugnant animals are only unfair to the animals. His political history is nothing but killing fields on every continent.

Those who associate with him & pay homage to his leadership, including Obama & Hillary Clinton, tell you everything you need to know about their real view of politics: realpolitik in the coercive, amoral, Machiavellian sense. Now Dilma Rousseff, the president of Brazil, just met with Kissinger in NYC & called him a “fantastic person, with a grand global vision.” She also met with Rupert Murdoch & a number of bankers & CEOs, likely shilling for more neoliberal investment in Brazil.

When millions of people protested in 2013 against austerity in Brazil, including thousands of Indigenous peoples fighting back against multinational land grabs, when riot police brutally occupied favelas, leftist activists of the Stalinist tradition circulated slanderous accusations that the movement was led by fascists. And when protests erupted again recently, publications like NACLA published articles claiming protestors were the well-heeled rebelling against her reforms. Many activists who don’t follow politics in Brazil, even around the World Cup & Olympics games, bought that crap; & more were confused.

Perhaps the next time they vilify popular movements of rebellion against neoliberal austerity, land grabs, environmental disaster, usurpations of Indigenous rights, people will ask more probing questions & not be taken in by political piss-heads with an agenda of conforming to the status quo & groveling for every double-talking politician that comes down the pike.

This isn’t the first time social movements have been slandered in that way. A similar thing happened during the Hong Kong democracy movement last year & the Syrian revolution against Assad’s tyranny was vilified.

Rousseff has exposed her hand in a way that cannot be denied. But be certain, there are those that will try.

(Photo of the creep by Pascal Lauener/Reuters)

Media is really working that ISIS thing–especially with the 4th of July coming up. Police departments have sophisticated equipment to distinguish between firecrackers & bombs when any teenager could tell them. Network news brought on terrorism experts to declare the world on high security alert. They expect “ISIS-inspired gunmen” to show up at US embassies, on beaches, in 4th of July parades & picnics. And of course as we know from TV, they’ll be wearing hijabs or carrying a Quran or saying something in Arabic. Be afraid. Be very afraid. And then turn the damn TV off.

There are a few explanations offered for why Saudi Arabia is bombing Yemen. One says it’s so the Sunni Saudi regime can stop Shia Iran’s regional influence. That narrative claims Iran is backing Yemen’s Houthi rebels in their conflict with Saudi-supported president Hadi. Others claim Iran’s connections to the Houthi are marginal & that the Saudi feudal monarch has domestic reasons for waging war–including placating rivalries within the ruling family in a power & succession struggle favoring one of his sons. Other explanations bring in al-Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula (the Pentagon’s favorite boogiemen), ISIS, & even tribal secessionists in Yemen. Too much of this kind of analysis rots the brain.

Saudi Arabia is a bastion of reaction in the Middle East, playing a collaborating role in neoliberal domination of the region. It was vital to the US in the two Iraq Wars & it remains vital to US & European economic, political, & military control–along with the Bahraini monarchy, Egyptian military junta, & Israeli colonial regime in reversing & destroying the massive Arab movements for democracy. Those reactionary regimes are US-European allies because neoliberal interests accord with their own: feudalism, sweatshop capitalism, & denial of all democracy.

The US & its allies in the Middle East are turning the region into a killing field–from Syria to Gaza to Yemen to the streets of Egypt. This man is searching for survivors in the rubble of a home destroyed by Saudi bombing in Sanaa, Yemen. We have witnessed this same carnage over & over again because war & bombing is the only way barbarism can impose its control.

Rebuilding the international antiwar movement & demanding the end of bombing, occupation, tyranny is the only way forward for humanity. It’s not a mission we can afford to blunder.

(Photo by Hani Mohammed/AP)