But Support for Renewable Energy Policies Remains Key to Reaching Goals Renewable energy is likely to become the world’s dominant climate change solution by the middle of the century, according to a new study by the United Nations’ Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC). It has the potential to be more competitive than nuclear power, […]
Geography Archives: United States
Intervention in the Name of Stability
Intervention in the Name of Stability Professor Noam Chomsky recently delivered an important address in Amsterdam entitled “Contours of the World Order.”1 A large part of the speech was devoted to the role of the United States in defending its area of absolute hegemony. According to Chomsky’s excellent analysis, the US relates to all countries […]
The Left’s Failure to Supersede the Democratic Party’s Hegemony over Social Movements
What Michael T. Heaney and Fabio Rojas’ “The Partisan Dynamics of Contention: Demobilization of the Antiwar Movement in the United States, 2007-2009” (Mobilization 16.1; now linked to MRZine) shows is that, in the United States, the anti-war/peace movement is much narrower and more shallow than many believe. Whereas there remains an enduring core of genuinely […]
Nuclear Power: Not the Solution to Climate Change
If carbon emissions from energy production are the problem, is nuclear power the solution? After all, nuclear reactors split uranium atoms to generate heat; no fossil fuels are used on site, and no CO2 is released into the air from the power plant itself. Plenty of voices can be now heard advocating construction of nuclear […]
The Tea Party Creams Labor
To Tea Partiers and supporters of the Far Right, Madison, Wisconsin has become the latest “Shining City Upon a Hill,” where one of their courageous leaders, Wisconsin Governor Scott Walker, is waging a heroic battle to tame big government and balance the state’s budget. American Exceptionalism has always defined liberty as keeping government off […]
The Ecological Rift: A Radical Response to Capitalism’s War on the Planet
John Bellamy Foster, Brett Clark, and Richard York. The Ecological Rift: Capitalism’s War on the Earth. Monthly Review Press, 2010. 544 pages. Climate change is often called the greatest environment threat facing humanity. The threat is very real. Unless we cut carbon pollution fast, runaway climate change will worsen existing environmental and social problems, and […]
Cuba Opposes Any Foreign Interference in Syria
Statement of Cuban Ambassador Rodolfo Reyes, at the Special Session of the Human Rights Council, on the human rights situation in Syria, Geneva, 29 April 2011 Mr. President: Cuba condemns the hypocrisy and double standards on which the convocation of this special session is based. Human rights are not its genuine motive. The motive is […]
Why Are Americans Celebrating Osama’s Death?
It shouldn’t surprise us that many American liberals, including Muslims, are now joining the celebrations of Osama bin Laden’s death. They may not agree with how the War on Terror has been conducted, but they have at least tolerated it and have no reason to view Bin Laden with sympathy in any case. Let us […]
Syria and the United States
Robert Rabil. Syria, the United States, and the War on Terror in the Middle East. Westport: Praeger, 2006. xxvi + 289 pp. $49.95 (cloth), ISBN 978-0-275-99015-2. Robert Rabil’s book examines the ups and downs in Syrian-U.S. relations. The final portion of its title, the War on Terror in the Middle East is, in reality, […]
May Day Toast to the Workers of the World
“Let’s drink a toast to all those farmers, workers, artists and intellectuals of the last 100 years who without thought of fame and profit . . . worked tirelessly in their dream of a worldwide socialist revolution, who believed and hoped that a new world was dawning and that their work would contribute to […]
Invitation to URPE Summer School: “Topics in Radical Political Economy: Marxist Theory”
We invite graduate students and young researchers to participate in the URPE (Union for Radical Political Economics) Summer School entitled “Topics in Radical Political Economy: Marxist Theory,” which will take place in Amherst, Massachusetts on the UMass campus on May 24-27, 2011 (right before the World Association for Political Economy conference on May 27-29). […]
Death on the Job: The Toll of Neglect
This 2011 edition of “Death on the Job: The Toll of Neglect” marks the 20th year the AFL-CIO has produced a report on the state of safety and health protections for America’s workers. This year is historic for workers’ safety and health. It is the 100th anniversary of the Triangle Shirtwaist Factory fire, where 146 […]
Free Bahrain! Chicago Rally, 29 April 2011
Hundreds of protesters gathered in Chicago’s Daley Plaza on April 29, 2011 to demand an end to the oppression of the people of Bahrain “at the hands of the Bahraini military and the security forces provided by other states of the Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC).” The action was heavily attended by representatives from Chicago area […]
When China Overtakes the United States
Various observers have noted this week that China’s economy will be bigger than that of the United States in 2016. This comes from the International Monetary Fund’s (IMF’s) latest projections, which were made in its semi-annual April World Economic Outlook database. Since 2016 is just a few years away, and it will be the first […]
State and Municipal Debt: The Coming Crisis?
Testimony to the House Oversight and Government Reform Subcommittee on TARP and Financial Resources, 15 March 2011 Thank you, Chairman McHenry and Ranking Member Quigley, for inviting me to testify before the subcommittee and to share my views on the debt problem facing state and local governments. I will make three main points in my […]
Further House Price Declines in the United States
The price decline since July has eliminated more than $1 trillion in housing wealth. The Case-Shiller 20-City index fell by 1.1 percent in February, the fifth consecutive month where it has fallen by at least 1.0 percent. It is now down by 6.5 percent from its peak in July. Eighteen of the twenty cities had […]
Vik Arrigoni, Remembered for His Dreams
On April 9, Vittorio Arrigoni — Vik to us — wrote to me in an e-mail that “I will go out immediately after this shame” ends. The “shame” was Israel’s latest flurry of F-16-delivered explosives that landed on the inhabitants of the Gaza Strip. On April 14 at noon I learned of Vik’s abduction at […]
Chávez Condemns Plot against Syria
Caracas, 25 April (PL) — Venezuelan President Hugo Chávez said today that the government of Syria is a victim of a plot to justify future actions — including military ones — against it. “They are infiltrating terrorists into Syria and causing violence and deaths, and all of a sudden the president is pronounced guilty, immediately, […]
Only in America: Former U.S. Official Sued Haiti Contractors for Kickbacks
Corruption takes many forms, and if the United States seems like it has less of it than many developing countries, this is partly because we have legalized so much of it. Election campaign contributions are only the most costly and debilitating form, a legalized bribery that, for example, gives the pharmaceutical and insurance companies a […]
Free Ebrahim Sharif, a Political Prisoner in Bahrain
Ebrahim Sharif is a 53-year-old Bahraini politician, businessman, husband, father — and now, a political prisoner. He serves as the secretary general of the National Democratic Action Society (also known as Waad), a secular, moderate, and peaceful political opposition group in Bahrain. Ebrahim Sharif Speaks At around 2 AM, on Thursday, March 17, 2011 […]
