The thunderous events set in motion by Israel’s storming of the Mavi Marmara, the lead ship in the peace flotilla challenging the blockade of Gaza, have thrown important light on the overall situation in the Middle East. Turkey has emerged as the major protagonist among the forces that support the Palestinian cause. This is extremely […]
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Monthly Review Magazine
Erdoğan, Cut the Ties with Israel NOW!
Erdoğan! İsrail’le ilişkileri kesin HEMEN! Erdoğan! Cut the Ties with Israel NOW! Carlos Latuff is a Brazilian cartoonist. | Print
Don’t Let Deficit Demagogues Scare You into Accepting Austerity
The U.S. and European Union together make up about half of the global economy, and recovery is quite uncertain in both of these big economies. Contrary to a lot of folk wisdom and political posturing, the problem is not irresponsible government spending in either case, but a lack of commitment by the authorities in both […]
The Deficit, the Debt, and the Real World
The latest fad in business journalism is to sound the alarm about the United States having become the biggest debtor in the world. This is intended to bring visions of our country sliding into a third world-type debt trap. But even those who don’t draw such dire inferences nevertheless assume that a ballooning U.S. debt […]
Minnesota Nurses Association Provides Rx for Union Revival
The last thirty-five years have been disastrous for American unions. The percentage of the workforce represented by unions has declined from about 30% to barely 10%. As the unionized island in the center of the workforce has shrunk, every element of labor relations affected by unions — job security, promotions and lay-off, job descriptions, wages […]
The Fine Old English Gentleman
The Fine Old English Gentleman New Version (To be said or sung at all Conservative Dinners) I’ll sing you a new ballad, and I’ll warrant it first-rate, Of the days of that old gentleman who had that old estate; When they spent the public money at a bountiful old rate On ev’ry mistress, pimp, […]
Iran’s Authorities Say Greens Feared Low Turnout and Cancelled Demonstrations
. . . Mir Hossein Moussavi and Mehdi Karroubi, de facto leaders of the Green Movement, had issued a statement on June 10 asking their supporters to stay home. According to Fars, a semi-official news agency with intimate ties to the Islamic Revolutionary Guards Corps, Moussavi and Karroubi were afraid of low turnouts and […]
Iran: Good Old Times for Israeli Bombers in Clear Saudi Skies?
Ah, these lazy, hazy, crazy days of summer. Fish are jumping (except if they happen to be in the Gulf of Mexico) and the cotton is high. And Israel prepares to bomb-bomb-bomb Iran, under clear and sunny Saudi skies — at least according to the London Times. Hugh Tomlinson’s June 12 piece in the […]
Listen, Keynesians!
There is a remarkable consensus among economists of all ideological and political persuasions — conservative, liberal, and radical — that capitalist economies must grow to be healthy, and that the key to growth lies in the capital accumulation or savings-and-investment process. Accepting this view, we have long been arguing in effect that capitalism, like living […]
Spain at World Cup
General strike, benefit cuts, pension freezes, starvation, wars? Crisis, what crisis? Repeat after me: We Can Win the World Cup! We Can Win the World Cup! We Can Win the World Cup! We Can Win the World Cup! YES WE CAN! Juan Kalvellido, born in Cádiz, Andalucía, Spain in 1968, is a working-class cartoonist who […]
Debt Management in Latin America: How Safe Is the New Debt Composition?
. . . Public debt levels as a share of GDP declined substantially in the Latin American region during the five years preceding the great global crisis of 2008 and 2009. Data available for the largest seven countries in the region (LAC-7)1 show that the ratio of total public debt to GDP fell from […]
Sovereign Debt in the Americas: New Data and Stylized Facts
Excerpt: In contrast to the stable average stocks of debt, the composition of these debt stocks (by lender, currency and location) have changed visibly over the last 15 years. By lender: private lending shifted from bank- to bond-based (private lending), while official lending moved from bilateral to multilateral. On the other hand, in contrast with […]
A Threatened Blow
On Tuesday, June 8, I wrote the Reflection “On the Threshold of Tragedy” around midday; later I watched Randy Alonso’s “Roundtable” television program, broadcast at 6:30 p.m. as usual. That day, the eminent and distinguished Cuban intellectuals taking part in the Roundtable replied to the program director’s acute questions with eloquent words which greatly respected […]
Turkey: Media’s Latest Target for Terrorist-Baiting
The Israeli raid on the Gaza flotilla that resulted in the deaths of eight Turkish citizens and one Turkish-American has led Israel and its supporters to argue (see The Weekly Standard, 5/31/10) that the Turkish government and a prominent Turkish humanitarian organization are “terrorist” sympathizers with ill intentions toward Israel and the United States. […]
About Keynes and Keynesians
Did you ever accept Keynesian economics, or did you go beyond Keynesian economics and feel his approach had lost the essence of what the problem was? One thing you should understand is that Keynesian theory permits an enormous variation in political and ideological positions. Later on what Joan Robinson came to call Bastard Keynesianism […]
Persistent (and Game-Changing) Myths: Iran’s 2009 Presidential Elections, One Year Later
Since manufactured claims about Iraqi WMD led the United States to invade Iraq in 2003, no analytic line about developments in the Middle East has had a bigger impact on American foreign policy than the assertion that the outcome of Iran’s June 12, 2009 presidential election — held one year ago tomorrow — was a […]
Bolivia and Its Lithium: Can the “Gold of the 21st Century” Help Lift a Nation Out of Poverty?
Excerpt: . . . Finally, there are concerns about the chronic problems faced by the Bolivian government to manage such an ambitious program — problems that pre-date President Morales. To pull off its lithium ambitions, Bolivia will need highly trained and qualified experts, in the technical and scientific aspects of lithium, in business management […]
The Greenest Building in New York (and Maybe the World)
If it were set in, say, Manhattan, Kansas, it would be a spectacular sight: a twisting, shimmering 51-story tower of glass. As it is, though, it doesn’t stand out in Midtown Manhattan, New York — a stylized office tower, topped by a harpoonish spire. In short, another glass office building that screams “architecture” while exuding […]
A Jewish Ship to Gaza
We are a group of German Jews who want to send a ship with not only daily necessities but also musical instruments to Gaza. We are acquiring a ship, loading it up in Germany, and then picking up passengers (Jewish and non-Jewish, German and non-German) at a Mediterranean port. Among the goods to be […]
Brazil and Turkey Defy Washington on Iran Sanctions
The United Nations Security Council approved a resolution calling for new sanctions against Iran today. Wait, did you just yawn? Pay attention, there’s real news here. The man-bites-dog story is that two countries — Brazil and Turkey — voted no, while Lebanon abstained. That’s a record. There’s never been more than one no vote before; […]
