Why the Trans-Pacific Partnership Is Bad for Animal Rights

This would make a great article, but I haven’t written it yet.

 




Communist crucifix for Pope Francis who lashes out at capitalism on Bolivia tour

RT.COM  DISPATCH  |  IN THE MIDST OF AN ALMOST TOTAL AMERICAN MEDIA BLACKOUT, A HISTORICAL VISIT MARKED BY radical and unprecedented PRONOUNCEMENTS.


“This system is by now intolerable. So let’s not be afraid to say it: we need change; we want change…it must be done, and it can be done. ” ——Pope Francis

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Bolivia’s President Evo Morales (L) presents a wooden hammer and sickle, with a figure of a crucified Christ resting on the hammer, as a gift to Pope Francis at the presidential palace in La Paz, July 8, 2015. (Reuters/Bolivian Presidency)


[dropcap]P[/dropcap]ope Francis has urged the people of Latin America to stand up to the world’s capitalist system and change the world economic order by creating a “truly communitarian economy” based on distribution of goods among all.

Pope Francis walks with Bolivian President Evo Morales and a children in traditional dress as he arrives at El Alto International Airport in La Paz, Bolivia, July 8. The airport is at 13,325 feet above sea level. (CNS photo/Paul Haring)

Pope Francis walks with Bolivian President Evo Morales and a children in traditional dress as he arrives at El Alto International Airport in La Paz, Bolivia, July 8. The airport is at 13,325 feet above sea level. (CNS photo/Paul Haring)

Starting his speech with the need to instigate change, he called on the faithful to fight to protect human dignity in a “system” where farm workers end up without land or home and laborers without rights.

“Do we realize that that system has imposed the mentality of profit at any price, with no concern for social exclusion or the destruction of nature?” he asked at a powerful speech before a gathering of social movements in Bolivia.

Pope Francis, wearing a helmet, blesses a woman as Bolivian President Evo Morales (R) looks on, during a World Meeting of Popular Movements in Santa Cruz, Bolivia, July 9, 2015. Pope Francis on Thursday urged the downtrodden to change the world economic order, denouncing a "new colonialism" by agencies that impose austerity programs and calling for the poor to have the "sacred rights" of labor, lodging and land. REUTERS/Alessandro Bianchi  - RTX1JSW8

Pope Francis, wearing a helmet, blesses a woman as Bolivian President Evo Morales (R) looks on, during a World Meeting of Popular Movements in Santa Cruz, Bolivia, July 9, 2015. Pope Francis on Thursday urged the downtrodden to change the world economic order, denouncing a “new colonialism” by agencies that impose austerity programs and calling for the poor to have the “sacred rights” of labor, lodging and land. REUTERS/Alessandro Bianchi

Once “capital” becomes an “idol” and guides individuals and once “greed for money presides over the entire socioeconomic system,” it ruins society, Francis said. It enslaves individuals and destroys “ fraternity,” a system which “excludes, debases and kills.”

“This system is by now intolerable. So let’s not be afraid to say it: we need change; we want change,” Pope Francis said.

The Pope called on his followers to create a “truly communitarian economy,” a system that would guarantee the three “L’s” of land, lodging and labor.

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“It is no utopia or chimera. It is an extremely realistic prospect. We can achieve it. Working for a just distribution of the fruits of the earth and human labor is not mere philanthropy. It is a moral obligation,” the Pope said in the city of Santa Cruz to participants of the second world meeting of popular movements, an international body that brings together organizations of people on the margins of society.

The Argentinian-native Pope urged the crowd to tackle “three great tasks”.

The first task is to create an economy at the ”service of peoples” not at the “service of money” Such an approach, the Pope believes, will focus on service rather than profits which in return will protect “Mother Earth.”


The second task is to unite our peoples on the “path of peace and justice” to defend their sovereignty against “colonialism.”

“The new colonialism takes on different faces. At times it appears as the anonymous influence of mammon: corporations, loan agencies, certain free trade treaties, and the imposition of measures of austerity which always tighten the belt of workers and the poor.”

Pope Francis receives a typical sombrero from Bolivian President Evo Morales during a World Meeting of Popular Movements in Santa Cruz, Bolivia, July 9, 2015. The word "Tahuichi" is from the Tupi-Guarani and means "Big Bird". REUTERS/Alessandro Bianchi - RTX1JSSB

Pope Francis receives a typical sombrero from Bolivian President Evo Morales during a World Meeting of Popular Movements in Santa Cruz, Bolivia, July 9, 2015. The word “Tahuichi” is from the Tupi-Guarani and means “Big Bird”. REUTERS/Alessandro Bianchi – RTX1JSSB

“Monopolizing communications” is yet another example of consumerism and “new colonialism” for the Pope that ultimately denies countries the right to development.

Pope Francis called on social movements to protect their culture, their language, their social processes and their religious traditions.

The third task is environmental: to “defend Mother Earth,” by breaking down the current “system” which ravishes the planet’s ecology.

The pontiff issued a fierce condemnation of the world’s governments for what he calls “cowardice” in defending the Earth, calling it “a grave sin.”

“We cannot allow certain interests – interests which are global but not universal – to take over, to dominate states and international organizations, and to continue destroying creation,” Pope Francis concluded.


horizontalBlack2addendum | By RT.COM

‘Not to share wealth  with poor is to steal’: Pope slams capitalism as ‘new tyranny’

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Pope Francis (Reuters/Giampiero Sposito)

[dropcap]P[/dropcap]ope Francis has taken aim at capitalism as “a new tyranny” and is urging world leaders to step up their efforts against poverty and inequality, saying “thou shall not kill” the economy. Francis calls on rich people to share their wealth.

The existing financial system that fuels the unequal distribution of wealth and violence must be changed, the Pope warned.

“How can it be that it is not a news item when an elderly homeless person dies of exposure, but it is news when the stock market loses two points?” Pope Francis asked an audience at the Vatican.

The global economic crisis, which has gripped much of Europe and America, has the Pope asking how countries can function, or realize their full economic potential, if they are weighed down by the debts of capitalism.

“A new tyranny is thus born, invisible and often virtual, which unilaterally and relentlessly imposes its own laws and rules,” the 84-page document, known as an apostolic exhortation, said.

“To all this we can add widespread corruption and self-serving tax evasion, which has taken on worldwide dimensions. The thirst for power and possessions knows no limits”,the pope’s document says.

He goes on to explain that in this system, which tends to devour everything which stands in the way of increased profits, whatever is fragile, like the environment, is defenseless before the interests of a deified market, which has become the only rule we live by.

Shameful wealth

Inequality between the rich and the poor has reached a new threshold, and in his apostolic exhortation to mark the end of the “Year of Faith”, Pope Francis asks for better politicians to heal the scars capitalism made on society.

“Just as the commandment ‘Thou shalt not kill’ sets a clear limit in order to safeguard the value of human life, today we also have to say ‘thou shalt not’ to an economy of exclusion and inequality. Such an economy kills,” Francis wrote in the document issued Tuesday.

His calls to service go beyond general good Samaritan deeds, as he asks his followers for action “beyond a simple welfare mentality”.

“I beg the Lord to grant us more politicians who are genuinely disturbed by the state of society, the people, the lives of the poor,” Francis wrote.

A recent IRS report shows that the wealth of the US’s richest 1 percent has grown by 31 percent, while the rest of the population experienced an income rise of only 1 percent.

The most recent Oxfam data shows that up to 146 million Europeans are at risk of falling into poverty by 2025 and 50 million Americans are currently suffering from severe financial hardship.

“As long as the problems of the poor are not radically resolved by rejecting the absolute autonomy of markets and financial speculation, and by attacking the structural causes of inequality, no solution will be found for the world’s problems or, for that matter, to any problems,” he wrote.

Named after the medieval saint who chose a life of poverty, Pope Francis has gone beyond general calls for fair work, education, and healthcare.

Newly-elected Pope Francis has stepped up the fight against corrupt capitalism that has hit close to home – he was the first Pope to go after the Vatican bank and openly accused it of fraud and shady offshore tax haven deals.

In October, Pope Francis removed Vatican bank head Cardinal Tarcisio Bertone, after revelations of alleged mafia money laundering and financial impropriety.

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‘Nuclear train’ returns: Russia to deploy rail-based missiles to counter US ‘Prompt Global Strike’

A DISPATCH FROM RT.COM


Constant sabre-rattling by the US and a very serious attempt to develop a first-strike capability has convinced the Russians that they should quickly rebuild their nuclear countermeasures if world peace is to be preserved, and to guarantee that Russia won’t be annihilated in a sneak attack. Washington can’t be trusted.


railroad-based-missile-system.si

(Image from ens.mil.ru)

[dropcap]R[/dropcap]ussia’s Strategic Missile Forces are preparing to revive railroad-based missiles and counter the US’s Conventional Prompt Global Strike concept. A blueprint of the modernized “nuclear train” was presented in the first half of 2014.

“A Defense Ministry report has been submitted to the president and the order has been given to develop a preliminary design of a rail-mounted missile system,” the commander of the Strategic Missile Force, Lt. Gen. Sergey Karakayev, said Wednesday, RIA Novosti news agency reported.

General Karakayev compared a potential power of a “nuclear train” with several missiles to a division of stationery silo-based intercontinental ballistic missiles.

“Our missile officers are frustrated that we don’t possess such a system today,” Karakayev said Wednesday. “When the Supreme Commander-in-Chief [President Vladimir Putin] asked me about it, I expressed full support in the railroad-based missile systems.”

Russia used to possess ICBM Molodets railroad-based missile system (NATO designation: SS-24 Scalpel) disguised as an ordinary freight train, inherited from the Soviet Union. With Russia’s extremely vast railroad system, detection and preemptive destruction of that system was extremely difficult.

“We see the future missile as solid-fueled, with multiple warheads – with RT-24 Yars as a prototype. We are talking of modifying missiles that are to weigh 47 tons. To compare, a missile in the old nuclear train weighed 110 tons,” Karakayev said.

Russia_to_deploy_new_train-mounted_raildroad-based_nuclear_ballistic_missile_in_the_coming_year_640_001-2

Within the framework of the START-II nuclear arms reduction treaty with the US, signed by President Boris Yeltsin and his US counterpart, George H. W. Bush in 1993, the SS-24 Scalpel system was decommissioned and all launching platforms were destroyed by 2007.


The ‘New START’ treaty signed by presidents Dmitry Medvedev and Barack Obama in 2011 does not limit the use of railway-based systems, so in 2012 Russia reconsidered development of a new version of a railway-based strategic missile system.

One year later, Russia’s Defense Ministry announced the new railroad missile system would be developed by the Moscow Institute of Thermal Technology – the same institute that developed the sea-based Bulava nuclear missile for the latest generation of Borey-class submarine strategic nuclear missile carriers.

The Institute is expected to present a blueprint of the system within the next six months.

The project is aimed at countering the threat posed by the US Conventional Prompt Global Strike concept. This concept implies destroying stationary targets with hypersonic missiles armed with conventional warheads in any part of the planet within an hour of receiving an order.


Russia has also invested in the mobile nukes YARS defence system.

Russia has also invested in the mobile nukes YARS defence system.

A constantly moving “nuclear train” is viewed as a hard target for that still-being-developed system.

Last week, Russia’s Deputy PM Dmitry Rogozin, who oversees the Russian military and defense industry, called America’s Conventional Prompt Global Strike concept “the most important new strategy being developed by the United States today.” Rogozin warned that in case Russia becomes a target of such a strike, “in certain circumstances we will of course respond with nuclear weapons.”

Recently, Rogozin also announced that Russia was developing strike hypersonic missiles itself.


*First edited: December 24, 2013

 

 

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Resist before you enlist

Before You Enlist! (2006; 2011)
a (must-see) compilation by our fraternal site, Dandelion Salad

resistDontEnlist


BeforeYouEnlist
September 18, 2006

Straight talk from soldiers, veterans and their family members tells what is missing from the sales pitches presented by recruiters and the military’s marketing efforts.

***

Updated: Nov. 11, 2013

Before You Enlist! (2011 revision)

BeforeYouEnlist
Jan 13, 2011

see also:

What if they gave a War? By Charles Sullivan (2006) 

Stopping the War Machine: Military Recruiters Must Be Confronted

Wars Begin in High School Cafeterias by David Swanson

Don’t Enlist by Laurence M. Vance

Should Anyone Join the Military? by Laurence M. Vance

Recruiters

GI Resistance

***

Remember: All captions and pullquotes are furnished by the editors, NOT the author(s). 


What is $5 a month to support one of the greatest publications on the Left?









‘No big deal’: Senior Iranian commander says Tehran ready for war with US

RT.COM DISPATCH


brigHosseini

Lieutenant Commander of the Islamic Revolution Guards Corps (IRGC) Brigadier General Hossein Salami (Reuters/Morteza Nikoubazl)

[dropcap]A[/dropcap] top commander warned that Iran is ready for an all-out war with US, alleging that aggression against Tehran “will mobilize the Muslim world” against it. The remarks follow Secretary of State John Kerry’s claims that military force was still an option.

Brigadier General Hossein Salami, lieutenant commander of the Islamic Revolution Guards Corps (IRGC), spoke Wednesday to a state-run TV channel as Western powers readied for a new round of talks on getting the Islamic Republic to curb its nuclear ambitions ahead of a June 30 deadline.

He also stated, “War against Iran will mobilize the Muslim world against the US, an issue which is very well known by the enemy.”

Iran recently agreed on a framework deal concerning its nuclear interests with the P5+1 group in Switzerland, which would pave the way for it to be finalized. However, Israel was highly critical of the move. Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu stated that it “would not block Iran’s path to the bomb. It would pave it.”

mohamed-javad-zarif-y-john-kerry

US Secretary of State John Kerry (R), meets with Iran’s Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif. 


Kerry has recently appeared to try to ease tensions with the Jewish state by assuring it that war was still on the table. This and possible other similar remarks don’t sit well with Salami.

“We have prepared ourselves for the most dangerous scenarios and this is no big deal and is simple to digest for us; we welcome war with the US as we do believe that it will be the scene for our success to display the real potentials of our power,” Salami said, as cited by Iran’s FARS news agency.

The general’s rationale is that past US military victories owe themselves to their enemies’ “rotten”armies – not the case with Iran, he warned.

Addressing the officials currently at the negotiating table, Salami urged them to halt negotiations if any threat of force is issued again by a US official.

Salami echoed the words of Supreme Leader Ayatollah Seyed Ali Khamenei, who in a separate speech remarked that making simultaneous military threats while at the negotiating table will not fly.

READ MORE: Destroying Iran’s nuclear facilities would take ‘several days’ – US Senator Tom Cotton

“This is not acceptable that the opposite side continues making threats simultaneous with the talks,”he said at a public meeting with teachers in Tehran on Wednesday.

The Supreme Leader also referenced remarks from two US officials whom he did not name, but whom also said action wasn’t completely off the table, saying that: “Negotiation under the ghost of a threat is meaningless and the Iranian nation does not tolerate negotiation under the shadow of threat.”

As for any tangible possibility, Khamenei claimed: “First of all, you can’t do a damn thing.”

“Secondly, as I had already stated during the term of the former US president, the era of hit-and-run attacks is gone and the Iranian nation will not let go of anyone” with aggressive plans on it.

According to the religious leader, this is for the simple reason that the US needs the negotiations as much as Iran does, as it wishes to be seen as the country that put Iran in its place at the negotiating table.

But he added that while it would be best that the crippling economic sanctions by Western powers were lifted, it is “our own planning, will and ability, no matter the sanctions are in place or not,” that is crucial here.

He sent a message to the Iranian negotiators, asking that they “never allow the other side to impose its will, exercise force, humiliate or threaten you.”

A picture released by the office of Iran's supreme leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei on March 20, 2013, shows him addressing the nation on the occasion of Noruz, the Iranian New Year, in Tehran. AFP PHOTO/HO/IRANIAN SUPREME LEADER'S WEBSITE == RESTRICTED TO EDITORIAL USE - MANDATORY CREDIT "AFP PHOTO / IRANIAN SUPREME LEADER'S WEBSITE" - NO MARKETING NO ADVERTISING CAMPAIGNS - DISTRIBUTED AS A SERVICE TO CLIENTS ==Iran’s supreme leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei (Iran Gov. picture)


Kerry is not alone in appearing to keep the threat of force alive. Last month Republican Senator Tom Cotton (Arkansas) claimed that it would take Washington just several days to destroy Iran’s nuclear facilities.

Cotton was the author of the letter signed by 47 Republican senators and sent to the Iranian leaders, saying that a nuclear agreement made without congressional approval might not last beyond the Obama administration.

On Thursday, the US Senate passed a bipartisan bill that would give Congress review rights over the White House’s Iran nuclear deal.

A faction led by Tom Cotton and Marco Rubio (R-FL) attempted to insert a number of amendments into the bill during the floor debate, including a provision requiring Iran to recognize Israel as a Jewish state.

It echoes the demand of PM Benjamin Netanyahu who wants any final deal with Iran to include a“clear and unambiguous Iranian recognition of Israel’s right to exist.”  (This a red herring; Israel’s right to existence has never been the real issue. The problem is Israel’s criminal policies in the region, its role as the new imperial gendarme for the US, and its unrelenting expansionism, from its birth to this day.—Eds.)

READ MORE: Senate passes bill giving Congress right to review Iran nuke deal

Meanwhile, on Monday the Iranian foreign minister addressed Israel on behalf of the 120-nation Non-Aligned Movement, calling that it gives up the bomb, as well as renewing calls for a nuclear-free Middle East.

Israel has not signed up to the nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT), though it has sent an observer to the month long conference for the first time in 20 years.

 

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