Archive for the ‘USA’ Category
Trump Is Toast? Comeback Kid Biden Staggering Into Evil of Two Lessers Saloon?
The Coronavirus crisis will destroy any chance Donald Trump has of retaining the US presidency this November, for one very simple reason. Driven by …
Trump Is Toast
Ed Moloney thinks he has spotted a silver lining in the CoronaVirus Cloud Haunting the USA.
Trump’s USA Rejects WHO Covid-19 Test Kit – Increases Likely Death and Infection Rate
Not a great deal wrong with that on first view except the Trump-dominated bureaucracy proved incapable of putting that wish into action and so there are not enough US-made test kits to meet the predicted demand. Elsewhere in the world, by sharp contrast, there is no shortage of WHO testing kits, a tribute to the power of international co-operation.
Driven by Trump’s ultra nationalist political world view, the US rejected an international plan for a COVID test kit proposed by the World Health Organisation (WHO) and decided to plough its own furrow.
The consequence of that will be a huge spike in undiagnosed Coronavirus victims in the USA who will not be treated or even put into quarantine and the numbers of those stricken with the virus, and the deaths that will follow will be proportionately higher. The US, thanks to Trump, will not come out of the Covid crisis unscarred.
A Climbing American Death Rate in the Summer Months?
Read the rest of this entry »COVID-19: The monster is finally at the door
Hurricane Katrina was a climatic disaster for the great city of New Orleans, USA in 2005.
https://www.nationalgeographic.com/environment/natural-disasters/reference/hurricane-katrina/
Mike Davis argues that Covid-19 could in 2020 provoke a social and medical collapse of the privately-owned nursing home industry -A Medical Katrina – in the land of Donald Trump.
We are in the early stages of a medical Katrina. Despite years of warnings about avian flu and other pandemics, inventories of basic emergency equipment such as respirators aren’t sufficient to deal with the expected flood of critical cases. Militant nurses unions in California and other states are making sure that we all understand the grave dangers created by inadequate stockpiles of essential protective supplies like N95 face masks. Even more vulnerable because invisible are the hundreds of thousands of low-wage and overworked homecare workers and nursing home staff.
The nursing home and assisted care industry, which warehouses 2.5 million elderly Americans—most of them on Medicare—has long been a national scandal. According to The New York Times, an incredible 380,000 nursing home patients die every year from facilities’ neglect of basic infection control procedures. Many homes—particularly in Southern states—find it cheaper to pay fines for sanitary violations than to hire additional staff and provide them with proper training. Now, as the Seattle example warns, dozens, perhaps hundreds more nursing homes will become coronavirus hotspots and their minimum-wage employees will rationally choose to protect their own families by staying home. In such a case the system could collapse, and we shouldn’t expect the National Guard to empty bedpans.
The outbreak has instantly exposed the stark class divide in healthcare: those with good health plans who can also work or teach from home are comfortably isolated provided they follow prudent safeguards. Public employees and other groups of unionized workers with decent coverage will have to make difficult choices between income and protection. Meanwhil, millions of low wage service workers, farm employees, uncovered contingent workers, the unemployed and the homeless will be thrown to the wolves. Even if Washington ultimately resolves the testing fiasco and provides adequate numbers of kits, the uninsured will still have to pay doctors or hospitals for administrating the tests. Overall family medical bills will soar at the same time that millions of workers are losing their jobs and their employer-provided insurance. Could there possibly be a stronger, more urgent case in favor of Medicare for All?
— Read on socialistresurgence.org/2020/03/12/covid-19-the-monster-is-finally-at-the-door/
Bernie Sanders Chooses Lesser-Evil Politics in the USA – Joe Biden Versus Donald Trump is The Evil of Two Lessers
A dimwitted comeback kid staggers into a saloon called “The Evil of Two Lessers”
The Twilight of the Political Revolution
The Twilight of the Political Revolution
— Read on louisproyect.org/2020/03/09/the-twilight-of-the-political-revolution/
Lesser-Evil Politics from a defeated Democratic Party Candidate Bernie Sanders :
Just as was the case in 2016, Sanders will stump for Biden like he did for Clinton. Yesterday, he told Meet the Press’s Chuck Todd, “Look, Joe Biden is a friend of mine. He has indicated that if he wins the nomination I will be there for him. Together, we are going to beat Donald Trump, the most dangerous president in the modern history of this country, but you can’t — we live in a democracy, and we have to contrast his — our records and our ideas, our vision for the future.”
The dogged investigative journalist Ed Moloney adds extra toxicity :
Now that Joe Biden is the favourite to win the Democratic presidential nomination, expect to see his failing mental powers – his increasingly hard-to-ignore senility to be blunt – assume centre stage.
Democrat bosses would not be human if they were not concerned about how he will fare against Trump in the back and forth of debates. Biden’s mental confusion is now so obvious and embarrassing, even if much of the US media don’t want to go there, that it is enough to make you wonder whether the Ukrainian scandal was really staged to make it appear that Trump was scared of Biden when in fact he wanted him to be his opponent.
This piece in Commonweal magazine mercilessly examines Biden’s mental problem.
The question for the radical left in the USA becomes : is there a credible third-Party campaign which can be supported?
This is one option :
https://solidarity-us.org/every-state-is-a-battleground/
https://howiehawkins.us/whats-wrong-with-capitalism-and-why-we-need-ecosocialism/
Coronavirus has sparked a perfect storm of nationalism and financial speculation – Yanis Varoufakis, Former SYRIZA Finance Minister in Greece – THE GUARDIAN
Here is a fresh warning about the toxic combination of two different phenomenons – the CoVid-19 Health Crisis and a Financial Money Markets Storm, similar to the 2008 Crash.
The author is Yanis Varoufakis, the Greek Finance Minister sacked from a SYRIZA Government before it surrendered to the Austerians.
When the air is replete with inflammable materials, any given spark can cause a financial explosion, at any time.
Éric Toussaint of CADTM examines a worldwide stock market collapse.
Eric Toussaint is a historian and political scientist who completed his Ph.D. at the universities of Paris VIII and Liège, is the international spokesperson of the CADTM (Committee for the Abolition of Illegitimate Debt) , and sits on the Scientific Council of ATTAC France.
He is the author of Debt System (2019), Bankocracy (2015); Glance in the Rear View Mirror. Neoliberal Ideology From its Origins to the Present, Haymarket books, Chicago; “Debt, the IMF, and the World Bank, Sixty Questions, Sixty Answers”, Monthly Review Press, New York, 2010. He has published extensively in this field. He is a member of the Fourth International leadership.
Nationalism and speculation have seldom had a better opportunity to combine forces as the one riding today on the coattails of Covid-19, known as the coronavirus. When Covid-19 leapfrogged from China to Italy, even ardent Europeanists normally appreciative of open borders joined the deafening calls to end freedom of movement across Europe’s national borders – a longstanding demand of nationalists. Meanwhile, the money men speculating on government debt are performing a classic flight from Italian to German government bonds, seeking the financial safety that only the continent’s hegemon can offer during any crisis. As if in a bid to remind us of the great contradiction of our times, Covid-19 is illuminating gloriously the freedom of money to transcend a borderless financial universe while humans remain as fenced in as ever.
Coronavirus has sparked a perfect storm of nationalism and financial speculation – THE GUARDIAN
https://www.yanisvaroufakis.eu/2020/03/09/coronavirus-has-sparked-a-perfect-storm-of-nationalism-and-financial-speculation-the-guardian/
— Read on www.yanisvaroufakis.eu/2020/03/09/coronavirus-has-sparked-a-perfect-storm-of-nationalism-and-financial-speculation-the-guardian/
My Dad’s Jewish so I grabbed Nazi flag at Sanders rally – The Forward
An American Hero – thanks to Dave Schubert for the link.
Editor’s note: A teenaged boy and a friend tore down the Nazi flag a protestor unfurled at Thursday’s Bernie Sanders rally in Phoenix. This is the teenager’s account of the event, lightly edited for clarity. He spoke on the condition of anonymity out of concerns for his personal safety.
I decided to go to the rally because Bernie is a politician who interests me. His family’s background is similar to my family’s background. My dad’s side of the family, they moved to America because of anti-Semitism in Europe. They came here from Romania and moved here just like Bernie’s dad. They didn’t have much English, and they worked hard. I wouldn’t say I’m Jewish, but a large part of my identity is Jewish.
Bernie came on, and we’re all cheering, and then two or three minutes after he started speaking, we heard shouting. I heard someone yell “Fuck you, Bernie!” I turned around, and I saw him trying to unravel this flag, and even though I’m not very religious, it kind of hurt, seeing that. And the moment I saw it I just felt sick to my stomach. He said, “Fuck you Bernie, you stupid Jew,” and then he kept yelling.
USA Conservative Political Action Conference attendee tested positive for coronavirus – CNNPolitics – President Donald Trump Was There!
A correspondent suggests :
Could President Trump get coronavirus from having shaken hands or made selfies or inappropriately groped someone at CPAC?
The White House said earlier Saturday in a statement that it was aware of an individual testing positive for coronavirus after attending the CPAC conference.
“At this time there is no indication that either President Trump or Vice President Pence met with or were in close proximity to the attendee. The President’s physician and United States Secret Service have been working closely with White House Staff and various agencies to ensure every precaution is taken to keep the First Family and the entire White House Complex safe and healthy,” according to the White House.
The ACU noted that it has been in contact with the state of Maryland’s health department and would follow guidance from health experts.
“The exposure occurred previous to the conference. A New Jersey hospital tested the person, and CDC confirmed the positive result,” the ACU said in a statement. “The individual is under the care of medical professionals in the state of New Jersey, and has been quarantined.”
“Our children, spouses, extended family, and friends attended CPAC. During this time, we need to remain calm, listen to our health care professionals, and support each other. We send this message in that spirit,” the group said.
— Read on edition.cnn.com/2020/03/07/politics/cpac-coronavirus-tested-positive/index.html
Every state is a battleground – Howie Hawkins, Green Party USA Presidential Candidate in 2020 – Standing on the Ecosocialist Left Against the Democrats and Republicans
Every state is a battleground
— Read on solidarity-us.org/every-state-is-a-battleground/
Howie Hawkins is the Green Party Candidate in the USA 2020 Presidential Election.
He eloquently presents the case against making a “lesser evil” choice between the two wings of one American Capitalist Party – the Republicans and the Democrats. 
How should Marxists react to Bernie Sanders becoming the front-runner?
How should Marxists react to Bernie Sanders becoming the front-runner?
How should Marxists react to Bernie Sanders becoming the front-runner?
— Read on louisproyect.org/2020/02/24/how-should-marxists-react-to-bernie-sanders-becoming-the-front-runner/
Louis Proyect looks at the Bernie Sanders phenomenon in the USA, and offers large doses of reality countering a lot of socialist hype. Putting it in local terms, the USA Democratic Party is no better than Fianna Fáil or Fine Gael – it is certainly worse.
I get email from Bernie Sanders every so often. Naturally it is soliciting a donation, which I naturally ignore. What if instead the Sanders apparatus used their database to invite people living in my neighborhood to attend a meeting to discuss how to protect undocumented workers on the Upper East Side from ICE?
Better yet, what if Sanders gets screwed by the DP bosses in a brokered convention and Joe Biden or some other piece of shit gets nominated? Wouldn’t it be about time for him to run as an independent and begin to use his money to create a staff in every major city in the USA that is committed to his democratic socialist principles? I would jump in with both feet even if I, like other leftists, have problems with his willingness to base F-35s in Vermont. As it happens, I also had big problems with Ralph Nader in 2000 but was glad to vote for him as a Green Party candidate since I believe that CLEAN BREAK with the Democratic Party is the key task facing the left.
Instead, it is likely that Sanders will endorse another Democrat if he is cheated out of the nomination. To some extent, this is just a function of an old man not having the psychological and physical reserves to face up to the brutal opposition from the liberal wing of the ruling class that Nader faced in 2004. Probably, the one thing that is not factored into the Jacobin/DSA thinking is the degree to which Sanders is an outlier. Shaped by the same political sea change that turned me into a revolutionary socialist, he decided instead to become an evolutionary socialist in the Eduard Bernstein mold.
I would even be happy to back a party based on Bernstein’s evolutionary socialism in 2020 as long as it had the same kind of class independence that the German social democracy had. Within that party, I would fight for a revolutionary perspective like Luxemburg and even Kautsky did. But within the Democratic Party, I would say “Abandon all hope ye who enter here”, the words Dante written on the walls of Hell before entering it.
Mr Paisley Meets the Trumps – A fabulous gift 🎁 from the Irish Peace Process
Another fabulous gift 
🎁 from the Irish Peace Process : Far-right reactionaries Ian Paisley and Donald Trump schmooze at the Washington DC Patrick’s Day Parties and get away with it – corruption, hate, misogyny, warmongers, eyes wide shut :
“It is understood no DUP figures are set to attend St Patrick’s parades on Saturday.
Accompanying Mr Dodds on the American trip is his wife Diane, one of the Province’s three MEPs.
Also with them are Paul Givan and Edwin Poots, MLAs for Lagan Valley, and Jonathan Buckley, MLA for Upper Bann.
Mr Paisley and Mr Givan were pictured meeting Donald Trump himself during a lunch on Thursday.
Mr Dodds’ trip is funded by Parliament, and his wife’s trip by the European Parliament; the other DUP delegates are there as guests of pro-life group “Family and Life”.
It is understood the fact that Ian Paisley was personally invited to a St Patrick’s lunch at the White House is because of a family connection to the Trumps.
A party spokesman suggested this may date back to a meeting Mr Trump had with Rev Ian Paisley concerning golf courses in Northern Ireland.
The Scotsman newspaper reported in January 2008 that Mr Trump and Rev Paisley had met the previous month in New York.
It also said that a meeting between Ian Paisley Junior and a key Trump business aide was thought to be scheduled in January 2008, at which the future of Runkerry golf course on the north Antrim coast was thought to have been up for discussion.”
Tomás Ó Flatharta 