Memorandum 2022 and Memorandum 2023 (tags)
The Bremen study group on Alternative Economic Policy has been publishing analyses since 1975. Sustainable infrastructure Investments, de-carbonization, environmental safeguards, work protections and welfare regulations are primary as well as resisting profit maximization and environmental destruction.
There is broad agreement that freedom should not only be measured in terms of one's own well-being, but also in terms of others, especially the socially disadvantaged, and in solidarity with those who lack recognition. The strong welfare state is widely accepted, even by those who pay more than they receive.
The military will not solve a single problem (tags)
Solidarity could also be understood and implemented differently: as a concept that reduces violence and aims at protecting human lives in concrete terms. This includes not only refugee aid, humanitarian aid & all conceivable diplomacy. It is also important to examine whether social resistance measures planned for the short term make sense in this highly escalated situation.
Housing is a human right (tags)
To guarantee the human right to housing, a fundamental change in policy would be required at all levels. At all levels - federal, state and local - the social housing provision should be enforced against private profit interests. The non-profit status of housing must be revived. Housing must not be a commodity, it must not be the object of speculation and profit interests.
Is our system capable of solving the big problems of the future? (tags)
How high rents for residential and business premises are, how much biodiversity there is in our cultural landscape isl determined by the rulers. Energy prices, construction prices, food prices are the results of politics. Desolate inner cities are made by politicians.
January 30, 1933 and Media makes politics (tags)
Edward Bernays, an important developer of modern propaganda, wrote almost a hundred years ago: "The manipulation of the opinions of the masses is an important element in democratic society. Those who manipulate form an invisible government..."
The coup from above and The Decline of Civilization (tags)
Ignazio Silone (14), an important theorist of Italian fascism is reported to have said: When fascism returns, it will not say: 'I am fascism' No, it will say: 'I am anti-fascism'." And I say: we are on the threshold of an internationalized super-fascism.
Negotiated Solution - No Alternative! (tags)
NATO intervention seems unlikely so far, after U.S. President Biden ruled out direct military intervention even in the run-up to the war...Nevertheless, a further escalation of the war cannot be ruled out. At present, the powerless left has only the option of fighting for peace. (TKonicz)
Rethinking the State and Rent Madness (tags)
The right to housing for everyone must be understood as a public challenge and presupposes the de-commodification of the housing supply, a democratization of urban policy, and breach with the real estate exploitation coalition.
Misjudgments and Biden's foreign policy (tags)
Russia is to blame for our gas shortage, rising prices and high inflation. That's what the newspapers say, that's what you hear on the news and that's what presenters claim. Of course, this is not true. But the constant repetition shapes the public consciousness.
The property question and A new age of censorship is dawning (tags)
There is another good news, if not two good news, which are directly connected. A majority of people reject capitalism and want a different system. It is not difficult to link the global crises that threaten our very existence to our prevailing economic and social order.
Negotiated solution - No Alternative! (tags)
Does anyone really believe that more and more state-of-the-art weapons, no matter how tough sanctions and huge financial injections could produce peace? ...The survival of humanity depends in part on this business of death no longer having a future.
Happy Anti-War Day! The weapons must be silent! (tags)
The DGB (the German alliance of unions) and its member unions, an important voice in the German peace movement, commemorate the barbaric consequences of war and fascism on September 1. Trade unionists fight for peace, democracy and freedom.
The New NATO Strategic Concept: 6 Articles (tags)
Collective pressure in a broad societal dimension is necessary for a cease-fire - in a viable European security architecture... At the core of a sustainable compromise between Russia, Ukraine and the US could be a guarantee of Ukraine's full sovereignty and military neutrality.
Negotiating at last and The Russian-American Friendship (tags)
Russia's war is a response to NATO's eastward expansion, long criticized by the peace movement,and to Western policies of rearmament and confrontation, by which Russia feels existentially threatened. It began as early as the 1990s with the expansion of NATO.
There is no alternative to ceasefire negotiations and The rebel withn us (tags)
There is no alternative to negotiations on ceasefires and ceasefires, is there? That is where all the power should be concentrated. If that succeeds, the bombing will also stop.
Address at the Easter march in Berlin (tags)
1), we need to end the war in Ukraine as quickly as possible. The German government should stop adding fuel to the fire. 2): We must prevent "dark eagles" in Europe.3) We must become a broad movement that prevents the rearmament mania in this country.
Preserving Democracy and the Welfare State (tags)
We are confronted with war and endless suffering, with flight, with poverty and social insecurity, with a global pandemic... The arms buildup planned for decades will not end the deaths in Ukraine, will not make our world more peaceful and will not make it safer.
The UN vote against the Ukraine war (tags)
For many abstaining states in the UN vote, Russia's belligerent incursion into Ukraine should be rejected, but the U.S. should be denied its prosecutorial status as a champion of a just and peaceful international order, and Russia should be accorded legitimate security interests.
"The US is lying to itself" (tags)
The U.S. government, he said, should recognize the "brutal fact" of spheres of influence. Washington cannot continue to claim that "only brutal tyrants like Putin want to influence neighboring countries." Because the U.S. would be "lying to itself" by doing so.
The instrument of using half-truths is found in Nato propaganda where it cherry-picks Russian law-breaking in the Crimea crisis to portray Russia as a threat, forgetting the Western-blamed law-breaking in the weeks before: the pro-Western Yatsenyuk "interim government."
Children suffer strongly from homeschooling in Lockdown (tags)
The situation, which UNICEF described as a "catastrophic education crisis" at the beginning of March, continues. In addition, errors, stereotypes, misjudgements and trivialization prevail in the discussion about children, Corona and digital distance learning.
30 Arguments against Compulsory Vaccination (tags)
When it comes to protecting people from severe and fatal disease courses in covid-19, today, as a year ago, it is primarily about protecting the so-called risk groups. The median age of those who died from or with Covid 19 is still 83 years. Of the deaths in the last three reporting weeks, 93 percent were older than 60 years.
Liberty restrictions such as lockdowns, contact restrictions, or mandatory masks are authoritarian by their very nature. Authoritarian action, however, does not correspond to a liberal state, but to a state of authority, as it was realized in the GDR (East Germany).
Toward a new economic policy paradigm (tags)
Over the years, the institutionally enshrined budget discipline has created a considerable investment backlog. Important investments in infrastructure, education and climate protection have not taken place.
A Declaration of Independence (tags)
Utopia resolutely in sight But all those pillars of a free democratic basic order must have stood on feet of clay anyway, must have been more dummies than real basic pillars, otherwise they could not have been washed away so quickly, easily and thoroughly. We are now called upon to tread truly new paths.
For a democratic polarization (tags)
The new world economic crisis has shown yet again that one can't leave it to the market to provide for a strong economy. In any case, it is a truism that a community with a certain quality of life depends to a great extent on resources that the market does not produce.
Because man is a human being (tags)
People don't have to remain victims. Rebellion and resistance against a disease-causing system serve to stabilize psychological existence and social coexistence. The basis for resistance is sensitization: perceiving that society is deprived and disenfranchised by privatization, for example, that people are violated.
The Viral Death of School (tags)
A real improvement in the school system could only come from a change in the underlying conception of man. Children must be treated as human beings with their own dignity and rights - not as stuffed geese that can be filled with knowledge of the state at will.
Time to end the panic mode (tags)
Tyrannies reverse the rule of law. They turn law into an instrument of injustice. They cloak their crimes in false legality. They use the outward decorum of courts and trials to disguise their criminality.
Lockdowns Do Not Control the Coronavirus (tags)
The political reaction is disproportionate, it is authoritarian, dogmatic and it is excessive. There is no question about that. And we as citizens expect to be informed and treated in a science-based, rational and measured way. Why is the hospital system overloaded?
Stolen childhood and The language of violence (tags)
To make the hospitals fit for the "pandemic of the century", the government did nothing... The population will suffer in every respect - with one lockdown after another, inadequate health care, increasing impoverishment and lack of prospects, and presumably with endless depression.
Covid protests and Weimar Family Court (tags)
Democracy lives from criticism and protest. The Weimar Family Court has banned two schools from requiring students to wear masks and take Corona tests - because the children would be harmed "physically, psychologically, pedagogically and in their psychosocial development."
The language of violence and The clinic lie (tags)
"Newspeak" is what George Orwell called a language invented specifically by the Party to control the masses. Today, we are further along. The new language, invented specifically to enforce the Corona measures, seems harmless. Almost unobtrusively, the untruth creeps into our brains through frequent repetition.
There is currently no alternative to national debt (tags)
A private economy left to its own devices is completely incapable of immanently combating the crisis. This is especially true for future-oriented investments for ecological modernization that serve climate protection. The vaccine against Covid-19, which will apparently be available shortly, would not exist without govt funding.
Crisis rent instead of debt trap (tags)
Store closings, event cancellations, slumping orders, short-time work and job losses, especially in precarious employment, have left many unable to afford their apartments or rented commercial space. Despite initial easing, there is no end in sight.
Strengthening the welfare state (tags)
Trump's smear campaigns, scapegoating, fear mongering, $8-trillion tax heists, corporate welfare, attacking the poor, minorities, seniors, disabled, children and students have left democracy in intensive care. Helicopter money, a Marshall Plan for journalism and ending wars could revive the debate culture.
For a borderless pragmatism. Outline of a Progressive Migration Policy (tags)
Immigration leads to stronger economic growth, which in turn creates jobs, Without migration, we would all be sitting in Olduvia in East Africa, as we were 100,000 years ago. About 3% of the world's population, about 215 million people, live in a state other than the one in which they were born. Migration has always existed.
The long struggle for a post-capitalist society (tags)
The (Corona) crisis has relentlessly exposed the inability of neoliberal capitalism and its political personnel to meet the elementary needs of the people. Even if it is not felt to the same extent in Germany due to the depressing political conditions: the neoliberal offensive is in a deep existential crisis.
The new normality is characterized by fear, social distancing and increasing state control. Many fear that the current situation could become permanent and that our liberal democratic legal system could be transformed into a dictatorial system of injustice.
The future of humanity and the earth require a break from the rule of capital and the security state.... The political public is now at least beginning to discuss again how to deal with the constitution and fundamental rights. It remains to be seen what will become of them.
On the prohibition of the war of aggression (tags)
Happy Anti-War Day Sept 1, 2020! Peace is not everything but without peace, everything is nothing (Willy Brandt). The German Basic Law mentioned in this article is equivalent to our constitution.
The turn to less: Corona and the consumption dilemma (tags)
The Corona crisis could be the beginning of a better normality. Corona could make a turning point in history. The global North has benefited from unequal trade relations. Global employment has lost its role as the center of life. We must get out of the old path dependencies.
Economics in the times of the coronavirus (tags)
Most people’s thinking is determined by the development of the Covid-19 crisis, the return of “the hour of executive power” (Gerhard A. Ritter), i.e. state of exception legislation, and the fears which it evokes as well as the economic measures in response to the health crisis.
Democracy - a Plea toStrengthen It and Fight for It (tags)
We as democrats must take care of democracy as a learning system. If we do not do so, democracy will wither away.
Chaos.Thbe New Age of Revolutions (tags)
The End of the Megamachine brings to light the roots of the destructive forces threatening the future of humankind today. Dismantling Western progress mythologies, Scheidler shows how the logics of endless capital accumulation have devastated both human societies & ecosystems
Good Housing for All and Rent Madness (tags)
Apartment rents have increased faster thant he incomes of wage earners. Real estate decays to an object of speculation. Capital seeks lucrative investments. Hectic activity and bustle replaces inactivity and idleness since the protests of renters cannot be ignored any more.
A Social Change is Overdue (tags)
Social rental housing construction which has been increasingly restricted since the 1980s must be resumed on a grand scale and rapidly promoted to offer low-income earners, single parents and large families a place to stay.
A Short Response To Mordechai Kedar’s No More Safe Haven (tags)
Global Judeopathy, Mass Jewish Migration To Israel, Make English An Official Language in Israel!
The Judicial Dictatorship in Israel, is not Democracy (tags)
Judicial Dictatorship Distorts Democracy in Israel. Israel Needs Judicial Reform Now!
Housing is not just another commodity (tags)
Like food, clothing, health, and education, housing is an elementary need. On'e apartment is a place of retreat of the private person, a protective- and creative space of inviolable identity, Long-term low-interest housing tax credits & SROs, are alternatives to indifference.
Elections are being organized in the Iraqi town of Kirkuk. The Iraqi Government opposes this but a significant Kurdish minority is supporting affiliation with the Kurdish Autonomous Region.Hurricane Harvey has threatened Houson refineries for 4 or 5 reasons
Europe's Conquest by the US (tags)
The US and NATO have troops at the Russian border. Russia has no troops at the US borders with Canada and Mexico. Who staged the 2014 coup in the Ukraine? Who promised Gorbatchev there would be no NATO expansion to the East? Who is the stabilizer and who is the destabilizer?
Competition Ideology and Power Reality (tags)
Competition cannot be an end-in-itself. Uncontrolled private power leads to misuse. Uncontrolled competition increasingly destroys itself through concentration and centralization processes. Bastard Keynesianism helps the banks. People diverted from real cause of crises
Democracy and the Social State (tags)
Finance capitalism and Citizens United turn life, language and democracy upside down as the $150 million given by Wall Street to Hillary Clinton fall under the rubric "social engagement." With these theses, Franz Segbers emphasizes the social state as the foundation of democracy.
We Must Choose: Capitalism or Democracy (tags)
Middle-class democracy only knows formal political equality. Rule over public opinion grows out of the dominance of capital. The alternative is authoritarian capitalism or solidarity democracy. Resistance is the command of the hour.
How Much State Does the Social Market Economy Need? (tags)
The use of property is only legitimate within the limits of the public interest. Whoever takes a risk must bear it and be liable for the losses. The state has the political task of laying down effective rules for risk assessment, liability and providing transparency. Distributive battles intensify.
Casino Capitalism and Profit Maximization (tags)
In the 1960s the average holding time for stocks was 10 years. Now the holding time is not 9 months but 22 seconds. Like shareholder value, profit maximization leads to exploding inequality and the waste of resources. States are weakened by tax cuts.
Netanyahu Vows Harsher Police State Viciousness on Palestinians (tags)
Israel
Israel Declares War on Palestinian Hunger Strikers (tags)
Israel
Victory of the Economy over Democracy and the Constitutional State (tags)
The person exists as an end-in-him/herself and not merely as a means... On the other hand, the principle of the worldwide market economy is based on treating persons and their needs as means to the end of profit realization.
Challenging Israel's House Demolition Policy (tags)
Israel
Netanyahu's "Jewish State" Bill - Full text (tags)
Netanyahu's "Jewish State" Bill - Full text
Israel: Racist Pariah State Writ Large (tags)
Israel
Israeli Settlements Prevent Peace (tags)
Israel
Casino Capitalism and Profit Maximization (tags)
“The state is consciously weakened to speed up the redistribution from bottom to top because that corresponds to the dogmas of the neoliberal ideology.” Our state was systematically weakened in the last 15 years by extensive tax cuts. I remember the lowering of the top income tax rate.
Global Protests Against Bedouin Ethnic Cleansing (tags)
Israel
New Israeli Discriminatory Laws Tabled (tags)
Israel
Dispossessing East Jerusalem Palestinian Residents (tags)
police state
Israeli Referendum Measure Blocks Land for Peace (tags)
Israel
More Evidence of Fake Israeli/Palestinian Peace Talks (tags)
Israel
Israel's Fascist Government: Part II (tags)
Israel
Israel's One of the World's Biggest Land-Grabbers (tags)
Israel
Israel
Israeli Election Results (tags)
Israel
Israel
Hardening Israeli Fascism (tags)
Israel
Privatizing Israel's Legal System (tags)
Israel
Separate and Unequal in Israel (tags)
Israel
Israel: Profile of a Police State (tags)
Israel
Israel's Gulag Prison Hell (tags)
Israels
Mass Palestinian Prisoner Hunger Strike (tags)
Israel
State of Human Rights in Israel (tags)
Israel
Anti-Democratic Knesset Bills (tags)
Israel
No Peace or Justice in Our Time with Netanyahu (tags)
Palestine
Israel's Proposed Counterterrorism Law (tags)
police state
Brutally Isolating Detainees in Israeli Prisons (tags)
lawlessness
Netanyahu's Government: Israel's Worst Ever (tags)
Israeli repression
Unrecognized Palestinians: Illegally Demolishing Their Homes and Villages (tags)
actions against Israeli citizens
Shin Bet Mistreatment of Palestinian Detainees (tags)
detainees are tortured and abused
Palestinian Detainee Abuse During Operation Cast Lead (tags)
clear evidence of Israeli war crimes
Occupied Palestine: Home Demolitions, Dispossessions and Residency Rights Revoked (tags)
More evidence of Israeli lawlessness
Deteriorating Conditions for Israeli Arab Citizens (tags)
Israel wants the city exclusively Jewish
Deteriorating Conditions for Israeli Arab Citizens (tags)
20% of the population affected
Freedom of Association Restrictions and Discrimination in Israel and Occupied Palestine (tags)
destructive Israeli policies
Palestinian Dispossession in East Jerusalem (tags)
Israeli ethnic cleansing to make E. Jerusalem exclusively Jewish
Israeli Unaccountability and Denial: Suppressing the Practice of Torture (tags)
Torture is official Israeli policy
Israeli Theft of Palestinian Property (tags)
Israeli ethnic cleansing
Israel's Ofra Settlement on Unauthorized Palestinian Land (tags)
more Israeli land theft
Israel's Discriminatory Land Policies (tags)
Israeli laws sanction Palestinian land theft
Human Rights in Israel and Occupied Palestine (tags)
serious human rights violations
Israel lurches to the right.
Global Human Rights Groups Protest Slaughter in Gaza (tags)
Israeli genocide
Jeff Halper's "An Israeli in Palestine" - Part I (tags)
Halper's excellent book.
Sixty Years of Palestinian Displacement, Occupation and Suffering (tags)
On May 14, remember the Nakba.
Jonathan Cook's "Blood and Religion" (tags)
Israel's imperial plan.
"Unrecognized" Palestinians (tags)
How Israel discriminates against its non-Jewish citizens.
New island found in Mediterranean (tags)
with Arabic speaking people
"Demonstration" Government in Palestine (tags)
IS-Israeli led coup against the democratically elected Hamas government
Beijing's Errant Children (tags)
Now that Hong Kong is anxious for self-rule and Taiwan is serious about nationhood, China is awakening from a dream of a peaceful reunification with its democratic territories -- another round of terror is likely.
Israel & Occupied Territories: US Country Reports on Human Rights Practice (tags)
We can assume this is why Israel did not wish to make an appearance at the Hague but sent instead a bus. All of these offenses needed to be discussed but Israel refused to show up and be present. The US continues to reward such behavior with American Tax Dollar$.
Focus On Jerusalem ~ (Michael Tarazi's Bad Fences Part IV) (tags)
International And Humanitarian Law IS Non-Negotiable. US tax dollars should NOT be funding any kind of terrorism, including this!
Anti-Democratic developments on the Israeli parliamentary scene (tags)
Dear friends, It is our sad duty to bring to your attention a set of very serious and dangerous developments on the Israeli parliamentary scene. The ruling coalition, headed by the Likud and the Labor Party, has given its support to a set of recently adopted draconic measures. These new laws are cynically aimed at canceling the representation our faction, the Democratic Front for Peace and Equality and that of the Arab lists, which together hold ten seats in the 120 member Israeli Knesset.