Archive | Commentary

Tony Karon has another sharp piece this week, entitled “Israel Pressed for a Tougher U.S. Line on Iran.”  For some time now, we have been forecasting an intensification of pressure on the Obama Administration, by Israel and pro-Israel constituencies in the United States, for U.S. military strikes against Iran’s nuclear infrastructure. It appears that the […]

November 9, 2010 The Honorable Michael Bennet 702 Hart Senate Office Building Washington, DC 20510 Dear Senator Bennet: I heard you say during your interview on National Public Radio this morning that if nothing is done, there will be no Social Security for people your age.  This is badly mistaken.  You should know, both for […]

Last month, the New America Foundation and the University of Chicago’s Project on Security and Terrorism (CPOST) sponsored a conference in Washington, entitled “Cutting the Fuse: Moving beyond the War on Terror.”  The conference was sparked by the publication of a new book by CPOST’s director, Robert Pape, and James Feldman, entitled Cutting the Fuse: […]

Introduction Many policymakers and analysts are arguing that there is an urgent need to make changes to Social Security.  They point out that the projections from the Congressional Budget Office and the Social Security Trustees show the program to be out of balance in the long-term, therefore we would be best advised to make changes […]

  November 8, 2010 — Young Jews challenged leadership at the Jewish Federation General Assembly in New Orleans.  They disrupted PM Netanyahu’s speech to say: “Israel’s actions delegitimize it, not those working to put an end to its violations of international law.” YoungJewishProud.org is a project of young leaders of Jewish Voice for Peace. | […]

Using ropes, some young people descended halfway from railroad bridges to force the train to stop.  Others hastily grabbed stones out from under the tracks and in this way prevent their use.  Far more, young and old from all over Germany, simply sat down on the tracks until police carried them away.  Banners and witty, […]

This one should not be all that hard but the papers have numbers all over the place.  Let’s turn to our old friend, arithmetic, to shed some light on the topic.  The Congressional Budget Office tells us that the labor force is growing at the rate of 0.7 percent a year.  The current size of […]

In the shadow cast by mass media coverage of elections in which under 40% of eligible citizens voted, the Federal Reserve recognized what the candidates could or would not.  The capitalist crisis is still upon us, shows few signs of fading soon, and provides strong hints that it might get worse.  So despite record cash […]

Somalia in particular and the Horn of Africa in general are at such a volatile stage that any misstep — domestic or foreign — could only further exacerbate their perilous condition.  One such potential misstep is the recently proposed US foreign policy toward Somalia known as the Dual-Track approach. First, a brief background: In 2006 […]

I ran as an independent candidate for Congress in Massachusetts against a visibly tired and increasingly unpopular but entrenched liberal Democratic incumbent, and a Tea Party Republican.  My message was, “The old system is broken — let’s start building a new one!”  I stated that I wanted to fight what I described as the trend […]

  The European Union to the United States: “Yes, my love, I know you like my position, but everyone is saying that you are the only one who has it in common with me.” Pedro Méndez Suárez is a Cuban cartoonist.  This cartoon was published in Rebelión on 7 November 2010.  Translation by Yoshie Furuhashi […]

Santiago Sierra (Madrid, 1966), an internationally recognized Spanish artist, has just rejected the “Spanish National Prize for Visual Arts,” writing a letter to Culture Minister Ángeles González-Sinde, who, in the Rodríguez Zapatero administration, represents the interests of media magnates.  See below Sierra’s original letter to the minister, dated “Madrid, Brumaire 2010” (the month straddling October […]

Nominal wages have risen at a 2.2 percent annual rate over the last quarter. The establishment survey showed the economy adding 151,000 jobs in October, the biggest rise since May.  The 159,000 increase in private sector employment was the second-largest monthly rise of the recovery.  Although the rate of job growth is about 50,000 more […]

In the early years of the past decade, two hard-line Cold Warriors, closely associated with radical right-wing Cuban exile groups in Florida, occupied strategic positions in the U.S. foreign policy machine.  Otto Reich, former head of the Reagan administration’s “black propaganda” operations in Central America, and Roger Noriega, co-author of the 1996 Helms-Burton Act, took […]

It is now abundantly clear that each and every response by the eurozone (EZ) to the galloping sovereign debt crisis has been consistently underwhelming.  This includes the joint EZ-IMF operation, back in May, to “rescue” Greece and, in short order, the quite remarkable overnight formation of a so-called “special vehicle” (officially the European Financial Stability […]

The Tea Party: The Atavistic Wing of the Republican Party Eneko Las Heras, born in Caracas in 1963, is a cartoonist based in Spain.  This cartoon was first published on his blog . . . Y sin embargo se mueve on 5 November 2010. | Print

Last night I attended a fundraiser for the US to Gaza mission that intends to bring humanitarian aid to the people of Gaza.  It was an incredible success.  About 350 mostly young people had crowded the hall, most of whom stayed on past 10 pm to listen to the invited speakers. The presence of so […]

Directed by João Fazenda; Script by Spam Cartoon; Animation by Ana Nunes; Sound Design by José Condeixa; Produced by João Paulo Cotrim and André Carrilho. | Print

The San Jose Mine incident in Chile has brought back old questions about labor and capital.  About those questions, raised by the 33 miners’ struggle to survive, I interviewed Michael D. Yates, Associate Editor of Monthly Review.  Yates was for many years professor of economics at the University of Pittsburgh at Johnstown, USA.  He is […]

I gave this talk at a very good conference, New Deal/No Deal, at Berkeley’s Institute for Research on Labor and Employment, on October 29.  The panel chair was Michael Reich, who was the main organizer of the conference along with Richard Walker of the geography department.  The dual themes were reflecting on the New Deal […]