financial crisis

John Rees on the reasons for the Tory debacle and what comes next

An operation that began as a seemingly obscure academic discussion three years ago is now becoming a full-blown propaganda campaign by some of the most powerful institutions in the industrialized world. This is what rightly should be termed the War on Cash. Like the War on Terror, the War on Cancer or the War on Drugs, its true agenda is sinister and opaque. If we are foolish enough to swallow the propaganda for complete elimination of cash in favor of pure digital bank money, we can pretty much kiss our remaining autonomy and privacy goodbye.

In the eyes of profiteers, there’s money to be made from debt, especially from the poor. Privatisation of the court bailiff system is like privatising parking enforcement – and look where that led – scandal after scandal. The civilianisation of law enforcement has always proved to be much worse than when managed by government with civilian scrutiny. This, like so many other privatisation projects this will end in failure with the over-stretched citizenry shouldering the burden of government incompetence and the poor exploited even further.

Corporate executives have been selling their stocks at an unprecedented rate for several months. Meanwhile, ordinary people are still placing their faith and their bets on a stock market that most experts agree is completely unsustainable.
The post The Elites Are Jumping Ship As The Financial Collapse Draws Near appeared first on BSNEWS.

A woman uses her fan to cool down outside the Bank of Greece headquarters in Athens, July 24, 2017. (AP/Thanassis Stavrakis)
ATHENS (Analysis)– Oscar López Rivera, the Puerto Rican activist, and advocate for independence whose 70-year prison sentence was commuted earlier this year, resulting in his release after serving 35 years, once had this to say about patriotism and colonialism:

The United States’ ability to maintain its influence over the rest of the world has been slowly diminishing. Since the petrodollar was established in 1971, U.S. currency has monopolized international trade through oil deals with the Organization of the Petroleum Exporting Countries (OPEC) and continuous military interventions. There is, however, growing opposition to the American standard, and it gained more support recently when several […]

This article is dedicated to all those who search for a full understanding of the tragedy at Grenfell Tower, both official and unofficial investigators. Most of all, it is for the survivors of the inferno, and the friends and relatives of those who were lost. It is offered in the hope that it will help you find the right questions to ask.
The post Grenfell Tower and the Search for Truth appeared first on BSNEWS.

(ANTIMEDIA)– The divide between wealthy and working class has grown wider each year since the last financial crisis, but this disconnect is about much more than just money or politics. The super-rich, in particular, have become completely detached from the everyday problems facing millions of their fellow citizens.

A victory, against the current odds, for a Jeremy Corbyn-led Labour will, if it adheres to positions he promoted when he won the party leadership by a margin even greater than Blair’s when the latter became leader, ensue in the promise of an overturning of neoliberalism.
The post The UK’s Epochal Election appeared first on BSNEWS.

An earlier version of this essay was published in Outlook magazine “The young students are not interested in establishing that neoliberalism works – they’re trying to understand where markets fail and what to do about it, with an understanding that the failures are pervasive. That’s true of both micro and macroeconomics. I wouldn’t say it’s … Continue reading New Politics of Our Times and Post-Capitalist Futures