Subjects Archives: Inequality

  • Falling Behind: Life Expectancy in US Counties from 2000 to 2007 in an International Context

      Excerpt: Across US counties, life expectancy in 2007 ranged from 65.9 to 81.1 years for men and 73.5 to 86.0 years for women.  When compared against a time series of life expectancy in the 10 nations with the lowest mortality, US counties range from being 15 calendar years ahead to over 50 calendar years […]

  • All These People

      “Where did all these people come from?” “Who cares!  Don’t stop.  They don’t belong to our circles.” Juan Ramón Mora is a cartoonist in Barcelona.  This cartoon was first published in his blog on 19 June 2011 under a Creative Commons license.  Translation by Yoshie Furuhashi (@yoshiefuruhashi | yoshie.furuhashi [at] gmail.com).  Cf. Victor Mallet, […]

  • Syrian Opposition’s “Day of the Clans”

      Today, with the declaration of “Day of the Clans,” it becomes obligatory for one to distance oneself from the dominant reactionary forces within the Syrian opposition.  It is clear that the same reactionary forces that have been at the heart of the Iraqi opposition under occupation are there in the Syrian opposition.  What about […]

  • Louisiana Civil Rights Activist Sentenced to Fifteen Years in Prison

    On June 1, a week past her 31st birthday, civil rights activist Catrina Wallace was sentenced to fifteen years in prison.  This was a first arrest for Wallace, a single mother who became politically active when her brother was arrested in the case that later became known as the “Jena Six.”  Wallace was part of […]

  • Alabama’s HB 56: The Harshest State-level, Anti-immigrant Measure to Date

    Alabama Governor Bentley today signed into law what may be the harshest state-level, anti-immigrant measure to date.  Inspired by Arizona’s notorious racial profiling law, SB 1070, the new Alabama law imposes a draconian immigration enforcement scheme that will subject immigrants and people of color to scrutiny in every aspect of their lives, including when renting […]

  • Statement of Solidarity with the Queer Palestinian Call for Action “IGLYO Out of Israel”

      Statement by the Coalition for Sexual and Bodily Rights in Muslim Society Palestinian queer activists from Al Qaws for Sexual & Gender Diversity in Palestinian Society, Aswat — Palestinian Gay Women, and PQBDS (Palestinian Queers for Boycott Divestment and Sanctions) have issued a joint statement on June 1st 2011 calling on organizations, groups and […]

  • Why Is the United States Waging Perpetual War against the Cuban People’s Health System?

    In January the government of the United States of America saw fit to seize $4.207 million in funds allocated to Cuba by the United Nations Global Fund to Fight AIDS, Tuberculosis and Malaria for the first quarter of 2011, Cuba has charged.  The UN Fund is a $22 billion a year program that works to […]

  • Palestinians in America: An Intelligent Socialist’s Guide to Tony Kushner, with a Key to the UN Declaration of Human Rights

    (Scene: an elevator, downstage right.  Stuck inside are ROY COHN and ETHEL ROSENBERG, characters in Tony Kushner’s landmark play, Angels in America.  McCarthyite lawyer, ROY prosecuted Julius and Ethel Rosenberg, who were accused of spying for the USSR and executed in 1953.  ETHEL now paces impatiently, pushing elevator buttons.  Above the stage, captions from recent […]

  • Former President Manuel Zelaya Signs Cartagena Accord with Porfirio Lobo

      Tegucigalpa, 22 May 2011 This afternoon in the city of Cartagena, Colombia, former Honduran President Manuel Zelaya Rosales and incumbent regime leader Porfirio Lobo met to sign the Cartagena Accord. Colombian President Juan Manuel Santos, his foreign minister María Angela Holguín, and Venezuelan Foreign Minister Nicolás Maduro added their signatures to this Accord as […]

  • NATO’s Humanitarian Response

    NATO: “Bah!  It’s just African immigrants dying of hunger.” Victor Nieto is a cartoonist in Venezuela.  His cartoons frequently appear in Aporrea and Rebelión among other sites.  Translation by Yoshie Furuhashi (@yoshiefuruhashi | yoshie.furuhashi [at] gmail.com).  Cf. Barbara Lewis, “U.N. Says 10 Percent Fatality for Libya Sea Migrants” (Reuters, 13 May 2011).  var idcomments_acct = […]

  • Immigrants for Sale

    The detention of migrants is a multi-billion dollar industry, one in which immigrants are traded like products.  They are for sale to the highest bidder.  Who benefits and who profits?  Corrections Corporation of America, or CCA, the GEO Group, and Management and Training Corporation combined own over 200 facilities in the nation, with over 150,000 […]

  • Obama Declares Manning Guilty Before Trial

      President Barack Obama said on April 21 that PFC Bradley Manning “broke the law.” Obama: “So people can have philosophical views [about Bradley Manning] but I can’t conduct diplomacy on an open source [basis]. . . .  That’s not how the world works.  And if you’re in the military. . . .  And I […]

  • Maseerat al ‘Awda, the Return to Palestine March

      Following a general meeting that brought together representatives from various Palestinian and Lebanese civil society organizations as well as individual activists, the Organizing Committee of Maseerat al ‘Awda, the Return to Palestine March, has announced the launch of its preparatory activities. The “Return to Palestine March” will take participants to the border with Occupied […]

  • 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 […]

  • Bahrain, Free the Docs!  Bahraini Government Continues to Abduct Physicians

      According to reports from Bahrain, doctors are disappearing as part of a systematic attack on medical staff.  Many physicians are missing following interrogations by unknown security forces at Salmaniya Medical Complex, Manama.  Although families have tried to contact administration officials, the administration denies any knowledge of their whereabouts.  According to family members, the physicians […]

  • Arrested in Bahrain

      Among the arrested are human rights activist Abdulhadi Al-Khawaja, Wa’ad Secretary General Ebrahim Sharif, Haq Secretary General Hassan Mushaima. . . . Cf. Bahrain Center for Human Rights, <www.bahrainrights.org/en>; National Democratic Action Society (Wa’ad), <www.aldemokrati.org>; <en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hasan_Mushaima>. | Print  

  • Guy Hocquenghem on Homosexual Desire, Capitalism, and the Left

    Guy Hocquenghem.  The Screwball Asses.  Trans.  Noura Wedell.  Semiotext(e), 2010.  88 pp.  $12.95 “Speak to my ass.  My head is sick.” — Southern French proverb This little book was first published as an anonymous essay at the end of Félix Guattari’s Recherches no. 12, its March 1973 special issue titled Trois Milliards de Pervers [Three […]

  • The War in Libya: Race, “Humanitarianism,” and the Media

      Firing for Media Effect: Setting the “African” Agenda “We left behind our friends from Chad.  We left behind their bodies.  We had 70 or 80 people from Chad working for our company.  They cut them dead with pruning shears and axes, attacking them, saying you’re providing troops for Gadhafi.  The Sudanese, the Chadians were […]

  • Why the Bombing of Libya Cannot Herald a Return to the 1990s Era of Humanitarian Intervention

      On 4 April 2011, when David Chandler’s essay below was first published in e-IR, French and UN forces intervened in Ivory Coast on behalf of Alassane Ouattara and his forces, eventually deposing President Laurent Gbagbo on 11 April 2011.  Humanitarian pretexts were offered for that intervention, but rather perfunctorily, almost as an afterthought to […]

  • After Yugoslavia: Alternative Balkanization from Below, against the Belgrade Consensus

      Andrej Grubacic.  Don’t Mourn, Balkanize! Essays after Yugoslavia.  Introduction by Roxanne Dunbar-Ortiz.  PM Press, 2010. This is not a typical book review and I am not a detached reader.  The book’s author, Andrej Grubacic, is a friend and collaborator, a comrade in the truest sense of the word.  And as he makes clear throughout […]