alanjjohnstone
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Meanwhile, today's story by Robert Fisk is one you yourself, ALB, highlighted some days previous on message #13 – The Saudi flogging.Fisk adds some historic details to it, not to justify it but to condemn it. http://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/middle-east/saudi-arabias-history-of-hypocrisy-we-choose-to-ignore-9978493.html
http://www.bbc.com/news/world-us-canada-30824375The headline reads "FBI foils IS-inspired plot to attack US Capitol"…only to discover that the plot consisted of one person and a FBI informant and no connection whatsoever with ISIS. Another conveniently timed "breaking news" fed to the media. I am sure FOX TV will be highlighting it. Reading between the lines, this is another of those infamous and many sting operations where the authorities know of and actively encourage and foster a terrorist act. No wonder conspiracies about false flag ops are so prevalent.
The Assassination of Trotsky starring Richard Burton as Trotskyhttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AeKHthb-YMM&index=115&list=PLD5054093669285D5
The backlash – over a 50 attacks against muslim targets across France in last weekhttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cz72nsMqoGM#t=93I'm not a fan of RT but i don't think they are over-exaggerating
Duncan, I need a lot of convincing that somehow the average Scottish worker is more radical than a typical English worker. Just how is a person in Blackburn, West Lothian or Blackburn Aberdeenshire any more left-wing than the person in Blackburn, Lancs.I would not be as racist as to ascribe Scottish people as homogeneous, and think alike, nor would i dare declare that all born in England too were all the same, as you have in your post. Not ALL in England voted for Thatcher and you know this only too well so why slander and slur those miners who stood against her. Many millions of English voters did not vote for her. In the October 1974 election the Tories won 25% of the vote in Scotland. That rose to 31% in 1979 before falling to 28% in 1983 and 24% in 1987. In 1992 the Tory vote was 25%. In other words, Scots voted for Thatcher in rather greater numbers than is sometimes assumed. Only recently, after Thatcher was gone , 1997 and onwards, has the Tory vote dropped to the current 15% or whatever. ALB counselled you to use facts, good advice if you want to really understand politics.Try also researching a bit history such as of the Sheffield or Furness workers committees which were just as popular as the CWC. Union and left-wing militaancy is something that took place south of the border, too. Didn't Keir Hardie have to leave Scotland to get elected for a West Ham seat? You simply blinker yourself to what you want to see. Yes, you are right that many of us are cynical and sceptical about Syriza. We do have accurate memories and we do study our history.If you wish i could easily list those radical reformist political parties that promised change within capitalism and their resulting failures and the disillusionments. Even now, Syriza are showing they will be following policies that are no more subversive than any run-of-the-mill social democratic parties of the past. Surely you understand our misgivings in offering workers false solutions and unrealisable promises. They end up with the reformers being eventually rejected and a subsequent swing to the right, even the far-right. You seem to think a drowning man should clutch at straws. The only alternative that is plausible and realistic is to try and explain capitalism and educate our fellow workers to build a new society rather than patch up the old one…temporary fixes guaranteed never to hold. 2nd Warning: 1. The general topic of each forum is given by the posted forum description. Do not start a thread in a forum unless it matches the given topic, and do not derail existing threads with off-topic posts.
Pope calls for a regulated capitalism.The world cannot wait for an economic system that will cause poverty to fix itself, Pope Francis said. "Markets and financial speculation cannot enjoy absolute autonomy," he said. There must be "programs, mechanisms and procedures aimed at a better distribution of resources, job creation and the integral advancement of those who are excluded," he said in a recently published interview. "We cannot wait any longer to fix the structural causes of poverty, to cure our society from a disease that can only bring on new crises," he said.http://www.catholicnews.com/data/stories/cns/1500140.htm"Liberals say popes don't know anything about sex, conservatives say they don't know anything about economics." Some Catholic business leaders have complained about Francis's emphasis on income inequality and the defects of capitalism. Ken Langone, the billionaire founder of the Home Depot and a major Republican donor, warned Cardinal Timothy Dolan of New York that if the pope kept up the drumbeat, some wealthy Catholics might stop giving to church causes.American church leaders have long been advocates for the poor and immigrants. But these are edicts many conservatives felt could be ignored. The pope will visit the U.S. in September. Privately, some right-wing Republicans have grumbled about this invitation, but they can't block it.Read more here: http://www.fresnobee.com/2015/01/13/4327978/albert-hunt-pope-francis-rattles.html#storylink=cpyFrancis has rattled the U.S. church hierarchy, notably the bishops. Francis has condemned careerism, which will make the bishops pay more attention to Catholic lives. Cardinal Raymond Burke, the former archbishop of St. Louis, who refused communion to any Catholic politicians who weren't on the right side of the abortion issue. Burke recently asserted that a "feminized" church, which permits altar girls, is responsible for a shortage of priests and some of the pedophilia crimes. a Francis critic, he was removed as head of the Vatican's high court. Equally important, the pope chose Blase Cupich, the progressive bishop of Spokane, Washington, to be the archbishop of Chicago, the third-largest American diocese. He succeeds Cardinal Francis George, a conservativeFrancis now is determined to make addressing climate change a moral imperative for the world's 1.2 billion Catholics.http://www.fresnobee.com/2015/01/13/4327978/albert-hunt-pope-francis-rattles.html
A bio of one of their leaders, already in a position of powerhttp://www.theguardian.com/world/2015/jan/13/syriza-rena-dourou-greece-fresh-airEither the journalist's reporting style is boring or she is….
EDL disrupt book reading of Brand's Revolution thinking he was going to turn up …but alas…Worth watching the video.'This could have been so easily posted on the Charlie thread as a sign of the beginning of the reactionary back-lash…http://www.independent.co.uk/news/people/edl-members-crash-a-book-group-because-they-thought-russell-brand-would-be-there-9974257.html
The Pope defends himself agains the "Marxist" label.http://www.aleteia.org/en/religion/article/pope-again-defends-himself-against-marxism-critics-5871640722276352
Quote:..If I repeated some passages from the homilies of the Church Fathers, in the second or third century, about how we must treat the poor, some would accuse me of giving a Marxist homily. ‘You are not making a gift of what is yours to the poor man, but you are giving him back what is his. You have been appropriating things that are meant to be for the common use of everyone. The earth belongs to everyone, not to the rich.’ These were St. Ambrose’s words, which Pope Paul VI used to state, in Populorum Progressio, that private property does not constitute an absolute and unconditional right for anyone, and that no one is allowed to keep for their exclusive use things superfluous to their needs, when others lack basic necessities.”The Pope conceded that globalization has helped many people rise out of poverty, but it has also "damned many others to starve to death. It is true that global wealth is growing in absolute terms, but inequalities have also grown and new poverty arisen.”He clarified that the Gospel does not condemn the wealthy, but the idolatry of wealth, “the idolatry that makes people indifferent to the call of the poor.”
Quote:this system sustains itself through a culture of waste, which I have already discussed various times. There is the politics, the sociology and even the attitude of waste. When money, instead of man, is at the center of the system, when money becomes an idol, men and women are reduced to simple instruments of a social and economic system, which is characterized, better yet dominated, by profound inequalities. So we discard whatever is not useful to this logic; it is this attitude that discards children and older people, and is now affecting the young.But being the Pope of Roman Catholocism, Frankie went on
Quote:the culture of waste; that which leads people to discard babies through abortion. I am shocked by the low birth rates here in Italy; this is how we lose our link to the future. The culture of waste also leads to a hidden euthanasia of older people, who are abandoned.But who can disagree with his overall conclusion "Papa Francesco. Questa economia uccide" trans."Pope Francis: this economy kills”
US government wants to reduce meat eating http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/wonkblog/wp/2015/01/07/why-the-governments-new-dietary-guidelines-could-be-a-nightmare-for-the-meat-industry/?tid=sm_fbI hold out no hope that there will be a dramatic change. After all the food industry succeeded in getting tomato ketchup included in the 5-a-day veg guidelines but it is a sign of change in attitude. Interesting graph on the carbon footprint of foods, though.
A story asking a question i asked earlier on this thread back at #19…about the Nigerian slaughterSo what makes one atrocity more important…well, starts with who were killed and where they were killed rather than why they were killed …sometimes the how is more important…a swift beheading is classed as more horrific than being raped to death…http://www.theguardian.com/world/2015/jan/12/-sp-boko-haram-attacks-nigeria-baga-ignored-mediaBut now i fear i am dwelling too much on this subject and won't add anything more unless its really really relevant or bring something new to the table.
Was i being paranoid?Troops on the French streets and now the internet crackdownhttp://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2015/jan/12/david-cameron-pledges-anti-terror-law-internet-paris-attacks-nick-cleggNot only new surveillance laws but the possible re-introduction of border and passport controls in the Schengen area…something UKIP couldn't achieve.I keep wondering why this atrocity outweighs the 2005 tube attacks in London or the Madrid train bombing a year previous and can we now call it a reaction of hysteria, this time around.
I,of course, withdraw my intemperate accusation. But was sparked from your earlier depiction of Fisk's article as "pro-muslim".I also apologise to Redstar.I know both of you have a much more sophisticated analysis than my simplistic and mistaken labelling.
