This and that for your Thursday reading. – David A. Green, J. Rhys Kesselman, Lindsay Tedds discuss some of the complications involved in designing a basic income system. And David Roberts makes the case for a universal basic services model to ensure people have access to the necessities of life
Continue readingTag: neoliberalism
Accidental Deliberations: Wednesday Morning Links
Miscellaneous material for your mid-week reading. – Linda McQuaig warns us not to tolerate yet another around of austerian demagoguery when investment in people’s well-being is a positive step toward every end other than the goal of pushing people into additional precarity. And Marilyn Watkins examines how Washington state was
Continue readingAccidental Deliberations: Saturday Afternoon Links
Assorted content for your weekend reading. – Bryan Borzykowski recognizes that many Canadian families are weathering the COVID-19 crisis only by taking on more debt – though it’s worth questioning whether the burden should fall on individuals to dig their way out from under it, rather than receiving systemic relief.
Continue readingAccidental Deliberations: Friday Morning Links
Assorted content to end your week. – Annie Lowrey discusses how essential workers have been consistently undervalued due to political choices. And Patty Coates, Jan Simpson and Pablo Godoy discuss the need to ensure legal protections for workers’ rights in the wake of Foodora fleeing the country after its attempt
Continue readingAlberta Politics: That rumble you hear is the sound of the Shock Doctrine artillery softening up Alberta for austerity on steroids
In trench warfare, before the shock troops go over the top, the artillery softens up the defenders with a barrage at the point of the attack. In the midst of a great struggle with a mysterious coronavirus that threatens all mankind, we are being subjected to such a barrage by
Continue readingPolitics and its Discontents: A Glitch In The Machine
Watch the following, and you will understand. The Government™ has made an ad about the global response to the pandemic, and it's surprisingly honest and informative 🌏📺 👉 We're on Patreon: https://t.co/gHLr8lwdS2 pic.twitter.com/tD3lEeZL0L — theJuice (@thejuicemedia) May 1, 2020 Recommend this Post
Continue readingAccidental Deliberations: Monday Morning Links
Miscellaneous material to start your week. – Rochelle Baker interviews David Suzuki about the lessons from the coronavirus pandemic which we should apply equally to the threat of a climate breakdown. And Mike Layton writes that we need a Green New Deal as our recovery program once the pause on
Continue readingWritings of J. Todd Ring: Neoliberalism & The Death Of The Middle Class
The death of the middle class is due to a very conscious, four decade class war, known as neoliberalism. (See Chomsky, Profits Over People, and, Requiem For The American Dream. See also, The Crisis of Democracy, the very first publication of the Trilateral Commission.) Offshoring of production, or corporate globalization,
Continue readingWritings of J. Todd Ring: Nostalgia For Simpler Times
I generally am not one for nostalgia, having a strong preference for living in the present, and looking to the future. Further, I rarely write in conversational colloquialisms. But I must say this, as a short note: Holy shit do I miss the ’70’s! Things were fucked up and crazy
Continue readingAccidental Deliberations: Monday Afternoon Links
Miscellaneous material to start your week. – Bruce Campbell writes that we have a needed opportunity to reimagine how our economy and society are organized, while Gregory Beatty rightly argues that we need to push for better than merely getting back to the previous normal. Alfredo Saad-Filho points out how
Continue readingWritings of J. Todd Ring: The Death of Modern World – Or the Death of the Planet & the Human Species
“The causality of the One was frequently explained in antiquity as an answer to the question, ‘How do we derive a many from the One?’ Although the answer provided by Plotinus and by other Neoplatonists is sometimes expressed in the language of ‘emanation’, it is very easy to
Continue readingAlberta Politics: Canada’s universal single-payer health care system is our best vaccination against the neoliberal virus
Who would have thought a decade ago, or even six months back, that Canada’s chances of surviving as a unified country would be better than those of the United States? The thought the mighty United States of America — e pluribus unum, and all that — could be on the
Continue readingAccidental Deliberations: Saturday Morning Links
Assorted content for your Saturday reading. – Henry Giroux discusses how the greatest risks arising out of the coronavirus pandemic can be traced back to neoliberal political assumptions. And Patrick Sharkey notes that the effect of the pandemic has been to reveal the U.S.’ glaring inability to address collective action
Continue readingWritings of J. Todd Ring: The Decline, Decay, Death and Rebirth of Democracy and Freedom
The two greatest threats to democracy and freedom in the West, or to peace, justice, equality, or even a viable future for humanity, are without question, the currently reigning de facto world government of neofeudal corporate oligarchy, also known as neoliberalism, and the fascist order which it is rapidly
Continue readingWritings of J. Todd Ring: The Myth Of Progress – Pricking The Bubble
Again and again, I am reminded of the need for humility, as well as dignity and confidence. I am reminded not only by my own faults and errors, which are numerous enough, but also by many of the people I respect the most. Again, and again, I read an exceptionally
Continue readingWritings of J. Todd Ring: Waiting For The Crazed Clown Show To End – Or, Welcome To The Brave New World
I don’t know when I will be able to go to the gym or library again, or a park, or my favourite local bookstore or record store – or whether they will still be in business when this is over, if it does indeed end; or when I will be
Continue readingWritings of J. Todd Ring: The Faux Left, and, The Urgent Need To Unite The People
What’s called “the left” is really a few camps, very narrow in range: There are neoliberals such as Hilary Clinton, Obama, Biden, and the Democratic party establishment, who are (like Tony Blair and new Labour in B, and the Liberal party of Canada) in reality extreme right – they are
Continue readingWritings of J. Todd Ring: Sanders & The Terror Of Socialism, vs The Real Dangers
A note to those on the right: Universal public health care is considered a basic human right in Canada, the UK, Europe, and every civilized country. It aslo happens to cost less than the private profit-driven US system – a lot less. So let’s not be too dogmatic. The
Continue readingWritings of J. Todd Ring: Global Geopolitics Analysis 2020: Sinking All Ships (But Our Own): Elite Aim To Sink Global Economy, In Order To Consolidate Global Neo-Feudal Corporate Rule
The currently reigning political-economic orthodoxy, philosophy or ideology, both East and West, and in virtually every nation, with only a few exceptions, has rightly been called neoliberalism. What that means, is the merger of business and the state, which as Mussolini himself defined it, is properly called corporatism – which,
Continue readingDead Wild Roses: Austerity Is The Enforcement Mechanism designed to keep the Rich in Control of the American Political Economy – Rob Urie
Counterpunch columnist Rob Urie tackles some of the political consequences of the neoliberal choices we have made as a society. “The question of bailouts is fundamentally different from that of taking care of people. An adequate response to the pandemic will require years of dedicated effort, not tossing a
Continue reading