Every once and a while, mainstream newspapers like The New York Times offer actually useful insight into the socioeconomic fabric of American capitalism - but, of course, they do it quite unintentionally.
On February 8, the Times posted an article on their website (and presumably also in print, but who reads those old things anymore??) by David Kirpatrick called "Irked, Wall St. Hedges Its Bets on Democrats."
It's intentional thesis: Financial institutions (known colloquially as "Wall Street" - which i always thought was kind of funny as a distinct category) who once heartily backed Obama with campaign contributions are now turning to the Republicans in protest of Obama's populist rhetoric.
Framed as "buyer's remorse." We didn't get what we paid for.
Since the Executive branch is clearly in control of the U.S. military prowess, it's no wonder that the current NYS tax requirements are reinforcing the illegal perception that the President can "declare war".... considering the economic/military interests in New York.
Constitutionally, only Congress can declare war as scribed in Article One, Section 8:
"To declare war, grant letters of marque and reprisal, and make rules concerning captures on land and water;"
Ratified by the Conventions of nine States
September 17, 1787
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Article_One_of_the_United_States_Constituti...
Somehow our legal/constitutional words have been co-opted in the name of Empire.
Congress does have the 'power' to declare war, but now we have Executive Orders too.
They're called Combat Zones.
http://www.tax.state.ny.us/pdf/publications/income/pub361.pdf
Published on Thursday, January 21, 2010 by CommonDreams.org
Corporate Personhood Should Be Banned, Once and For All
Outrageous SCOTUS Decision Should Reignite Most Necessary of Debates
by Ralph Nader
January 21, 2010 statement from Doris “Granny D” Haddock in response to the Supreme Court’s decision today to kill campaign finance reform.
In response to the recent Supreme court ruling, whereby corporations have the "right" to spend an unlimited amount of money to influence and manipulate federal elections, Congressman Alan Grayson introduced a series of bills designed to protect our political process from undue corporate influence.
http://grayson.house.gov/2010/01/save-our-democracy-gains-momentum.shtml
1) The Business Should Mind Its Own Business Act (H.R. 4431): Implements a 500% excise tax on corporate contributions to political committees, and on corporate expenditures on political advocacy campaigns.
2) The Public Company Responsibility Act (H.R. 4435): Prevents companies making political contributions and expenditures from trading their stock on national exchanges.
3) The End Political Kickbacks Act (H.R. 4434): Prevents for-profit corporations that receive money from the government from making political contributions, and limits the amount that employees of those companies can contribute.
4) The Corporate Propaganda Sunshine Act (H.R. 4432): Requires publicly-traded companies to disclose in SEC filings money used for the purpose of influencing public opinion, rather than to promoting their products and services.
5) The Ending Corporate Collusion Act (H.R. 4433): Applies antitrust law to industry political action committees.
6) End the Hijacking of Shareholder Funds Act (H.R. 4487): This bill requires the approval of a majority of a public company’s shareholders for any expenditure by that company to influence public opinion on matters not related to the company’s products or services.
by Chris Hedges, republished from Common Dreams
Martin Luther King Day has become a yearly ritual to turn a black radical into a red-white-and-blue icon. It has become a day to celebrate ourselves for "overcoming" racism and "fulfilling" King's dream. It is a day filled with old sound bites about little black children and little white children that, given the state of America, would enrage King. Most of our great social reformers, once they are dead, are kidnapped by the power elite and turned into harmless props of American glory. King, after all, was not only a socialist but fiercely opposed to American militarism and acutely aware, especially at the end of his life, that racial justice without economic justice was a farce
Photo-Poetry Workshop Explores Two Art Forms
What meaning does a photo convey? Often the viewer has one idea and the photographer has a different idea. The Photo–Poetry Workshop explores artistic meaning of photography through the lens of poetry, a critical form called ekphrastic, a classical Greek practice of illuminating one art form through another.
Photo- Poetry Workshop
Andrei Guruianu, Broome County’s poet laureate, Peg Johnston, photographer and one of the founders of the Cooperative Gallery, and Gregory Bain, a theatre arts and designer are teaching a series of three workshops to look at photography through the art of poetry. The workshops are free and will be held January 17th, January 24th, and February 7th from 1- 4 pm at the Cooperative Gallery 213 State St. Binghamton. The project is supported by a Decentralization grant from the NYS Council on the Arts/ Chenango County Council of the Arts.
Participants can attend one workshop or all three and should bring 3-5 photos taken locally of the Southern Tier. (If possible, digital images should be sent to glb4ada@aol.com or nmegglaser@gmail.com prior to the workshop. If not, we will scan them at the workshop for display and manipulation.)
At the end of the workshop series participants will illuminate a photograph with a poem and the resulting posters will become street art during a first Friday in the Spring and will be uploaded to the binghamtonbridge.org news site.
For more information, call Peg 785-3429 X11 or email glb4ada@aol.com or nmegglaser@gmail.com. There is no formal registration or fee but we would appreciate knowing of your interest.
Lowering the Bar: Kindergarten Recruitment
Tuesday 17 November 2009
by: Jon Letman, t r u t h o u t | Op-Ed
(Image: Jon Letman)
How old is old enough for students to be approached by military recruiters?
High school? Junior high? Fourth grade? How about ten weeks into kindergarten?
Last week at the dinner table, my five-year-old son announced blithely, "Soldiers came to school today." He then added, "They only kill bad people. They don't kill good people."
He made the announcement with the same levity he uses in recalling the plot line of Frog and Toad or a Nemo video.
More...
http://www.truthout.org/1117091
Helena Norberg-Hodge is a native of Sweden, a leading critic of conventional
notions of growth and development, and the recipient of the Right Livelihood
Award, also known as the Alternative Nobel Prize. She is also the founder and
director of the International Society for Ecology and Culture and the author
of Ancient Futures: Learning from Ladakh.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Helena_Norberg-Hodge
Thinking Outside the Box
An interview with Helena Norberg-Hodge
http://www.zmag.org/zmag/viewArticle/23524
BARSAMIAN: The existing economic model of globalized capitalism is reeling,
but there is really no alternative that we can turn to and say, "Okay, tried
that, didn't work. Let's try this."
NORBERG-HODGE: I disagree. I think there is a systemic alternative that is being discovered and actually developed at the grassroots. But this alternative, which is a systemic shift toward localizing economic activity instead of globalizing it, has received almost no air time. It's a sort of invisible growth, but it's happening nevertheless. Fundamentally, what that shift is about is recognizing that this global economic system has its roots from 500 years ago, when elites in the UK and Europe started sending people across the world to gather wealth for themselves.
