Daily Archives: November 29, 2020

2020-11-29: News Headlines

Jonathan Cook (2020-11-29). The Planet Cannot Begin to Heal Until We Rip the Mask off the West's War Machine. dissidentvoice.org Making political sense of the world can be tricky unless one understands the role of the state in capitalist societies. The state is not primarily there to represent voters or uphold democratic rights and values; it is a vehicle for facilitating and legitimating the concentration of wealth and power into fewer and fewer hands. In …

_____ (2020-11-29). Indigenous Women Lead Land Struggle Against Wealthiest People In The US. popularresistance.org While the United States shudders in the shambles of another election year, whether from a collective sigh of relief or fear of what's to come, a different system of governance blooms in a swath of woodlands jutting into the Atlantic Ocean. This sandy shoreline now part of what is called Long Island has always been home to the Shinnecock people. A group of Shinnecock women, organized as the Warriors of the Sunrise, are called to rise up in the face of invasive settlement. This is not their first battle. | Members of the Shinnecock Nation know of a time before there was a Southampton…

Commonwealth Club (2020-11-29). Wednesday 12/9: Impact of COVID-19 on Refugees & Aid Workers in the Middle East. indybay.org Online via livestream (FREE)…

National Welfare Rights Union, NUH, partners (2020-11-29). Thursday 12/10: We Charge Genocide: Systemic Poverty in All Its Forms is Violence! indybay.org Online event…

_____ (2020-11-29). The Actual Effects Of Enhanced Unemployment Benefits. popularresistance.org No matter how hard they search, unemployed workers can't find jobs that don't exist. The major cause of today's high unemployment is the lack of jobs, not workers who have stopped searching for work and have left jobs unfilled. By the end of July, there were still 11.1 million fewer jobs in the U.S. economy than there had been prior to the pandemic in January 2020. | Renewing the FPUC supplemental unemployment benefits would boost spending and create jobs. Economist Mark Zandi from Moody's Analytics estimates that $1 of renewed unemployment benefits would increase economic output by $1.64…

RT (2020-11-28). Covid-19-driven recession may see Russian economy contract by 4.5% & a million plunged into poverty, says finance guru Kudrin. rt.com The economic consequences of Covid-19 are becoming clearer, and they aren't good. The number of Russians in poverty is projected to grow by about a million by the end of 2020, with the overall economy due to fall as much as 4.5%.

RT (2020-11-28). Navalny uses meeting between EU officials & pro-West Russian opposition to call for sanctions on Kremlin-linked 'oligarchs'. rt.com Alexey Navalny has called on the EU to impose sanctions on Russian "oligarchs," rich businessmen he says are connected to the Kremlin. The opposition figure wants them to be prevented from keeping assets inside the 27-member bloc. | Navalny explicitly named Uzbek-Russian tycoon Alisher Usmanov and Israeli-Russian billionaire Roman Abramovich. Both men laid the foundations for their immense wealth during the Boris Yeltsin-era, when Western governments were encouraging privatization in Russia, and the country's integration into the global capitalist system. Finnish-Russian magnate Boris Rotenberg, who came to pr…

Fight Back (2020-11-28). Engels at 200: He transformed dreams of better world into a science for liberation. fightbacknews.org November 28 marks the 200th anniversary of the birth of one of the greatest revolutionaries of all times, Fredrick Engels. Born the son of a factory owner in Barmen, Germany, Engels, along with his comrade and friend Karl Marx, made immense contributions to the struggle for emancipation of the working class. In the U.S. today, monopoly capitalism has revealed itself a corrupt and criminal system that is unable to meet the needs of the vast majority of people. It rewards the wealthy with fabulous profits and unimaginable riches. As a result, there is renewed interest in socialism. | What has made scientific social…

Commonwealth Club (2020-11-28). Tuesday 12/1: Alicia Garza: BLM Co-Founder & Activist on New Book, "The Purpose of Power" indybay.org Online via livestream…

Peoples Dispatch (2020-11-28). This holiday season, hunger and poverty stalk the US. peoplesdispatch.org It's holiday season in the United States but the country faces an unprecedented crisis as poverty and hunger are soaring and millions face the risk of evictions…

MEE and agencies (2020-11-27). Attack on protest camp leaves six dead, dozens wounded in Iraq's south. middleeasteye.net Attack on protest camp leaves six dead, dozens wounded in Iraq's south | Followers of cleric Muqtada al-Sadr attack tent camp of anti-government protesters in Nasiriyah's Haboubi Square | Fri, 11/27/2020 – 17: 45 | Tens of thousands of Sadr supporters hit the streets of Baghdad and southern city of Nasiriyah (AFP/File photo) | Six people have died and dozens of others wounded in southern I…

_____ (2020-11-27). International Coalition Of Activists Launches Protest Against Amazon. popularresistance.org An international group of climate activists and Amazon warehouse workers have launched an online campaign called "Make Amazon Pay," calling on the tech giant to provide better working conditions for its employees and to reduce its expanding carbon footprint. The protests come just as the New York Times reports that the Seattle-based company has been on a hiring spree this year, expanding its global workforce. | "During the Covid-19 pandemic, Amazon became a trillion dollar corporation, with CEO Jeff Bezos becoming the first person in history to amass $200 billion in personal wealth," the campaign states on its we…

John Pilger (2020-11-27). Britain's Class War on Children. counterpunch.org When I first reported on child poverty in Britain, I was struck by the faces of children I spoke to, especially the eyes. They were different: watchful, fearful. In Hackney, in 1975, I filmed Irene Brunsden's family. Irene told me she gave her two-year-old a plate of cornflakes. "She doesn't tell me she's hungry, she

Stephen Lendman (2020-11-27). No Thanks on Thanksgiving During US-Engineered Economic Collapse. globalresearch.ca On Thanksgiving day, throughout the year, with likely worsening times ahead, ordinary Americans are suffering through the hardest of hard times in US history. | For 36 straight weeks since March, over one million Americans sought unemployment insurance (UI) benefits. | It's …

Ella Hopkins (2020-11-27). Why the G20's Failure on Debt Cancellation Is Bad News for Women. commondreams.org World leaders have put wealthy creditor interests before debt justice, further jeopardising women's rights. | www.commondreams.org/sites/default/files/styles/cd_special_coverage/public/views-article/thumbs/gettyimages-1229708368.jpg

The Canary (2020-11-27). Celebrities demand airlines stop mass deportation flight to Jamaica. thecanary.co Supermodel Naomi Campbell and actress Thandie Newton are among a host of prominent figures calling on airlines not to operate a mass deportation flight to Jamaica next week. | "Unlawful and wrongful": | The open letter is addressed to the bosses of multiple airlines including Hi Fly, Titan Airways, and TUI UK and Ireland. In it more than 90 high-profile figures, campaigners, and activists have urged the companies to decline to operate the planned 2 December flight. | They are also calling for a pause on the operation of future deportation flights to Commonwealth countries. | The letter, which also include…

The Canary (2020-11-27). Charity issues warning that fuel poverty will kill terminally ill people quicker this winter. thecanary.co Fuel poverty will kill people quicker this winter as terminally ill people struggle to afford to heat their homes, a charity has warned. | At risk: | High energy bills, delays in accessing benefits, and the other costs associated with their illness are leaving terminally ill people struggling to afford their heating costs, said end of life charity Marie Curie. It warned the consequences of living in cold, damp housing could lead to new infections, make existing symptoms worse, affect mental wellbeing and in the worst cases even hasten death. | In a report on 27 November, it said between 2014-2019 in Engla…

_____ (2020-11-27). COVID-19 Economy: A Deliberate Disaster. popularresistance.org With nearly 12 million cases and a quarter million deaths in the US so far (over 55 million cases and 1.3 million deaths world-wide), the COVID 19 pandemic is ravaging civilization. The disease is on track to be the deadliest epidemic since 1918. | The economic fallout for the working class has been severe. In the US, unemployment has skyrocketed, with 45.4 million new unemployment claims since March 14. At least 1/6 of those with jobs before the pandemic are now out of work. According to The New York Times, "The economic downturn is shaping up to be particularly devastating for renters, who are more likely to be…

Fight Back (2020-11-27). Millions face a financial cliff as grim economic news keeps on coming. fightbacknews.org San José, CA – On Wednesday, November 25, the U.S. Department of Labor reported that new claims for regular state unemployment benefits increased for the second week in a row, up 30,000 to 778,000. This is the highest level in five weeks and the first time since July with back-to-back increases. Adding in the weekly new claims for the federal Pandemic Unemployment Assistance or PUA for the self-employed and gig workers, almost 1.1 million people sought government aid in the recession. | For the first time in almost two months, the total number of people receiving government unemployment benefits across all progra…

MEE and agencies (2020-11-26). Gaza blockade has pushed more than one million people below poverty line. middleeasteye.net Gaza blockade has pushed more than one million people below poverty line | UN report says that 11-year blockade of the coastal enclave cost Palestinians $16.7bn | Thu, 11/26/2020 – 12: 03 | Vehicles transporting Palestinians about to cross onto the Egyptian side wait at the Rafah border crossing between the Gaza Strip and Egypt (AFP) | Israel's blockade of the Gaza Strip has pushed more th…

Chuck Collins (2020-11-26). Facing Holiday Rush, Frontlines Retail Workers Urge Billionaire Bosses to Share the Wealth. counterpunch.org This Black Friday and Cyber Monday, frontline essential workers will be hustling to help holiday shoppers — while also fighting for dignity, hazard pay, and other protections as Covid-19 infection rates spike again in many regions. Rina Cummings, who works at the JFK8 Amazon Warehouse on Staten Island, feels like the billionaire owners are sending

Amanda Mills (2020-11-26). "It's going to be a billionaire Thanksgiving." Wealth of US richest just hit $1 trillion since the start of the pandemic. nationofchange.org "The increases in billionaire wealth continue to defy gravity in the real economy where millions have lost their jobs, health, and livelihoods."

WSWS (2020-11-26). What the rich are thankful for. wsws.org Amid mass unemployment, hunger and death, America's financial oligarchy is celebrating a bumper year.

Jessica Corbett, staff writer (2020-11-26). Amid Public Health and Employment Crises, New Survey Shows Poor Americans Agree on Policy Solutions. commondreams.org With over 262,000 Americans killed by Covid-19, millions jobless and at risk of soon losing unemployment aid, and families and friends warned against spending Thanksgiving together because of the dangers of the ongoing coronavirus pandemic, new polling results revealed Thursday that people with low incomes agree upon a range of policy solutions to poverty and hunger. | www.commondreams.org/sites/default/files/styles/cd_special_coverage/public/headline/thumbs/gettyimages-12770002851.jpg

Chuck Collins (2020-11-26). It's a Billionaire's Thanksgiving: Wealth of Richest Surges Past $1 Trillion Since Pandemic Hit. commondreams.org The combined wealth of U.S. billionaires has grown 34 percent since March 2020. | www.commondreams.org/sites/default/files/styles/cd_special_coverage/public/views-article/thumbs/elon_musk_thanksgiving_billionaires.jpg

Heidi Shierholz (2020-11-25). Millions Will Lose Unemployment Benefits in December Unless GOP Senators Act. commondreams.org www.commondreams.org/sites/default/files/styles/cd_special_coverage/public/views-article/thumbs/un.jpg

Alison Stine (2020-11-25). Don't just laugh at "Hillbilly Elegy" — its damaging myths still need to be countered. salon.com J.D. Vance's memoir and the movie perpetuate dangerous stereotypes about Appalachia, poverty, women and addiction…