Where the $1.3 Trillion Per Year U.S. Military Budget Goes

Eric Zuesse

The Greanville Post | March 24, 2023

Nobody can give a precise dollar number to U.S. ‘Defense’ spending because the U.S. ‘Defense’ Department has never been able to pass an audit, and is by far the most corrupt of all federal Departments (and is the ONLY Department that has never passed an audit), and also because much of America’s military spending is being paid out from other federal Departments in order to keep down the published annual U.S. Government ‘Defense’ expenditure numbers (which come from ONLY the “U.S. ‘Defense’ Department). Those are expenditures for America’s privatized and overwhelmingly profit-driven Military-Industrial Complex. (By contrast: Russia and China require, by law, that their armaments firms be majority-owned by the Government itself.)

Conservative anti-tax zealot Grover Norquist. His brand of “anti-government” agitation cannot save the world from US militarism, but it benefits the oligarchy that controls the government.

Nordstream 2 Revelations & US Reaction Expose Arrogance of Empire

The Hegemon has only enemies and non-sovereign vassals.

Caleb Maupin

EDITED BY PATRICE GREANVILLE

The destruction of the Nordstream 2 pipeline on September 26th, 2022 was no small incident. It resulted in the largest release of methane in history, with estimates that roughly 500,000 tons of gas were released over the course of 17 days. The incident caused natural gas prices to jump by 12% across Europe.

Prior to the incident, the White House had threatened that if Russia intervened in Ukraine, the Nordstream pipeline would be destroyed. US Under Secretary of State Victoria Nuland made similar statements. In response to the destruction of the pipeline, anti-Russian voices across social media thanked the United States for making good on its threat. Russia went to the United Nations Security Council saying that it appeared the USA had been involved as US helicopters had been close by.

Labor in market, and the mainstream economics

Farooque Chowdhury

Countercurrents | March 26, 2023

Market and labor in market are crucial questions both to capital and labor. The questions have been discussed and answered by economists, from the mainstream, and also from the camp of labor.

“Markets”, writes Michael D. Yates in his Work Work Work: Labor, Alienation, and Class Struggle (Monthly Review Press, New York, USA, 2022), “act as a veil, hiding the face of the system. They are imper­sonal mechanisms, which allow us to use them without knowing what is underneath.”

Yates elaborates the issue: “We buy goods and services and are thereby dependent on those who produce our food, clothing, shelter, and services of every kind. However, we simply exchange money for them. And as the Romans said, Pecunia non olet. Money has no smell.”

He shows the argument employers use to defend self-interest: “Employers say that they pay the market wage. If it is too low for survival, that is no fault of the boss.”

U.S.: What’s Fueling the Graduate Worker Union Upsurge?

Dave Kamper

Labor Notes | March 22, 2023

The University of Minnesota’s Graduate Labor Union gathered union authorization cards representing nearly half the bargaining unit in the first 24 hours of the drive. Photo: Nolan Ferlic.

The Twin Cities saw one of its biggest-ever snowstorms the week of Presidents Day. But for labor activists the snow was overshadowed by the launch of the University of Minnesota Graduate Labor Union.

In its first 24 hours, the new union—affiliated with the United Electrical Workers (UE)—gathered more than 1,700 authorization cards representing nearly half the entire bargaining unit. Eight days in, they had a strong majority. And this week they filed for election with 65 percent support.

Such a first day bodes well for the success of the campaign, despite five—count ’em, five—previous election losses in graduate union drives at the University of Minnesota.

Nord Stream sabotage was to undercut Germany, says Seymour Hersh

Countercurrents | March 25, 2023

Journalist Seymour Hersh

U.S. President Joe Biden ordered the sabotage of the Nord Stream pipelines because he was unhappy with the level of support provided by German Chancellor Olaf Scholz to Ukraine in its conflict with Russia, veteran investigative journalist Seymour Hersh has claimed.

Hersh first accused Washington of destroying the key European energy route in an article released in February, and made more allegations in an interview with the China Daily newspaper published on Friday.

“The [U.S.] president was afraid of Chancellor Scholz not wanting to put more guns and more arms [to Ukraine]. That is all. I do not know whether that it was anger or punishment, but the net effect is that it cut off a major power source through Western Europe,” Hersh claimed.

US bank collapse: How and why the 1% was saved again

Newsclick | March 24, 2023

The collapse of several banking institutions in the United States over the past fortnight has started sending shockwaves through the international banking system. NewsClick spoke with tech expert Bappaditya Sinha on what the data says about systemic problems within the US banking system, which have contributed to these collapses.

‘He Did It’: Seymour Hersh Slams Biden As Nord Stream Bomber

Countercurrents | March 16, 2023

Pulitzer-prize winning investigative journalist Seymour Hersh made waves again Tuesday night as he excoriated the Biden administration and lambasted mainstream media coverage of the Nord Stream bombing, the Russiagate story, and the Democrat Party’s love of war at the National Press Club in Washington, D.C.

Media reports said:

In a wide-ranging discussion, journalist Seymour Hersh doubled down on his explosive findings that U.S. President Joe Biden ordered the Nord Stream pipelines to be blown up last year using C-4 charges previously planted by U.S. Navy divers, took his former employers at the New York Times to task for their uncritical reporting on the issue, and slammed top Biden officials as “lunatics.”

“We’ve got to cut; we’ve got these lunatics,” Hersh told audiences at the storied press center.

The betrayers of Julian Assange

John Pilger

People’s Dispatch | March 17, 2023

I have known Julian Assange since I first interviewed him in London in 2010. I immediately liked his dry, dark sense of humor, often dispensed with an infectious giggle. He is a proud outsider: sharp and thoughtful. We have become friends, and I have sat in many courtrooms listening to the tribunes of the state try to silence him and his moral revolution in journalism.

My own high point was when a judge in the Royal Courts of Justice leaned across his bench and growled at me: ‘You are just a peripatetic Australian like Assange.’ My name was on a list of volunteers to stand bail for Julian, and this judge spotted me as the one who had reported his role in the notorious case of the expelled Chagos Islanders. Unintentionally, he delivered me a compliment.

I saw Julian in Belmarsh not long ago. We talked about books and the oppressive idiocy of the prison: the happy-clappy slogans on the walls, the petty punishments; they still won’t let him use the gym. He must exercise alone in a cage-like area where there is a sign that warns about keeping off the grass. But there is no grass. We laughed; for a brief moment, some things didn’t seem too bad.

Nord Stream Sabotage: German Newspaper Debunks Other Media Stories

Countercurrents | March 13, 2023

A German newspaper has debunked the Nord Stream sabotage stories by other Anglo-U.S. media.

German center-right newspaper Bild has insisted that the mainstream media story that the Nord Stream pipelines were destroyed by a team of six operating from the Andromeda, a 15-meter chartered yacht, is becoming increasingly dubious.

Earlier this week, The New York Times and Die Zeit claimed that “new intelligence” had traced the Nord Stream sabotage attack to a “pro-Ukrainian group” consisting of five men and one woman who used a yacht rented in Poland. The vessel was later found by German investigators and turned out to be the Andromeda, a Bavaria C50 sailing boat. The group reportedly embarked on their mission from Rostock on September 6, 2022. The equipment for the secret operation was allegedly transported to the port in a truck.

Iran-Saudi Rapprochement: Signs of Waning Influence of USA in the Region

Countercurrents | March 12, 2023

The Iran-Saudi Arabia rapprochement has wide reactions.

An NBC report — What does the Iran-Saudi Arabia truce mean for Washington’s standing on the global stage? (March 11, 2023, NBCNews.com) — said:

As some world leaders hailed the restoration of ties between long-standing enemies Iran and Saudi Arabia, there were growing fears in Washington that the deal could help spell the end of the United States’ pre-eminence in the region and beyond.

U.N. Secretary-General António Guterres celebrated the announcement, expressing his appreciation to China for brokering the deal.