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Recent US elections confirmed that progressives will have to fight two monsters at once: Donald Trump and corporate Democrats

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How neoliberalism manufactured consent to secure its unlimited power

From David Harvey's A Brief History of Neoliberalism
Part 2 - How neoliberalism penetrated ‘common-sense’ understandings
How, then, did neoliberalism negotiate the turn to so comprehensively displace embedded liberalism? In some instances, the answer largely lies in the use of force (either military, as in Chile, or financial, as through the operations of the IMF in Mozambique or the Philippines). Coercion can produce a fatalistic, even abject, acceptance of the idea that there was and is, as Margaret Thatcher kept insisting, ‘no alternative’. The active construction of consent has also varied from place to place.
Furthermore, as numerous oppositional movements attest, consent has often wilted or failed in different places. But we must look beyond these infinitely varied ideological and cultural mechanisms –– no matter how important they are –– to the qualities of everyday experience in order to better identify the material grounding for the construction of consent. And it is at tha…
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Η ιστορική τους απέχθεια για το Πολυτεχνείο

Πέτρος Κατσάκος
Η απέχθειά τους για τον εορτασμό της εξέγερσης του Πολυτεχνείου και ό,τι αυτή εξακολουθεί να συμβολίζει είναι ιστορικά γνωστή και δεν κρύβεται. Όχι ότι το προσπάθησαν και ιδιαίτερα, αλλά τουλάχιστον για τα μάτια του κόσμου και της δημοκρατίας ήταν και μερικές δεκαετίες που πήγαιναν πάσο.
Τα τελευταία χρόνια, όμως, αυτά που ξέραμε μας λένε ότι πρέπει να τα ξεχάσουμε και να προσαρμοστούμε στις επιταγές της δικής τους πραγματικότητας στην οποία δεν χωρούν οι ιδεολογικές αγκυλώσεις της Αριστεράς. “Αγκυλώσεις” οι οποίες τεχνηέντως και συστηματικά αρχικά συγχέονταν και πλέον ταυτίζονται με την περιβόητη ανομία και τίποτε παραπάνω.
Εορτασμοί, πορείες, φοιτητικές παρατάξεις, πανεπιστημιακό άσυλο, εκλογές, φοιτητική εκπροσώπηση, άρθρο 16, όλα μαζί στο μίξερ των ταλιμπάν του νεοφιλελευθερισμού, που επισημοποιούν όλο και πιο εμφατικά την επιχειρούμενη ακύρωση ενός πλαισίου κεκτημένων που αφορούν ένα σημαντικό κομμάτι της νεολαίας το οποίο και θα πρέπει να υποταχθεί στο αγοραίο αφήγη…
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Trump is running scared of Socialism

Donald Trump’s economic advisers released a bizarre report attacking socialism yesterday. Socialists can only take one lesson from it: we’re winning.
by Miles Kampf-Lassin
Part 5 - A Flawed Critique
Accidental arguments for single-payer aside, the entire premise of the CEA critique of socialism misses the mark. After pointing to the failures of farming and food production under Stalin and Mao — models which, as far as I’m aware, no socialist politicians or Democratic Socialists of America organizers are advocating for — the authors claim that “the lessons from socialized agriculture carry over to government takeovers of oil, health insurance, and other modern industries: They produce less rather than more.”
The implication is that socialist policies would result in scarcity — bread lines, famine, and rationed care. For socialists, however, the goal is not to eliminate production, but to shift it from boosting corporate profits to serving human needs. As Meagan Day explains, “Our goal is …
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The oligarchs behind the “humanitarian” regime change network now exploiting Jo Cox’s death to push for UK Labour split

Only by masking their otherwise unpopular policies in the cloak of Jo Cox’s tragedy, and humanity’s natural empathy for good samaritans and the downtrodden, has this small group of powerful individuals been able to launder disastrous wars and military adventurism as “the right thing to do.”
by Vanessa Beeley and Whitney Webb
Part 8 - Ted Turner and Calvin’s connections to Clinton
Ted Turner endorsed Hillary Clinton’s election campaign in 2016. Time Warner was among the myriad of media moguls who financed the failed Clinton campaign to the tune of $50,000 – $100,000, according to statistics published by Politico.
CNN reporter Larry King was once caught on open-mic in the early 1990s telling Bill Clinton that “Ted Turner would serve” him. A report in the Washington Times cited Turner as saying “Hillary Clinton is one of the smartest and most powerful people in the world.” Turner praises Clinton uncritically, ignoring her record as one of the most malevolent war-hawks of our generation.
It…
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US senators seek to stop weapons sales to Saudi Arabia over Yemen war, Khashoggi murder

A newly proposed bill in the US Senate would suspend the sale of weapons to Saudi Arabia and block refueling of Saudi warplanes bombing Yemen, as punishment for the death of a Washington Post columnist.
A group of senators on the Foreign Relations Committee, led by Bob Menendez (R-New Jersey) and Lindsey Graham (R-South Carolina) introduced the “Saudi Arabia Accountability and Yemen Act of 2018.” It was sponsored by three Democrats and two Republicans.
https://www.rt.com/usa/444128-saudi-arms-ban-bill/

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Polish president marches with nazis in Warsaw

Anya Parampil reports on a 200,000-strong far-right rally held in Poland over the weekend to mark 100 years of the country’s independence. Polish President Andrej Duda spoke at the event, which included self-described Nazis and fascists chanting slogans such as “Refugees, get out!”. News Analyst for Sputnik Radio, Dmitry Babich, joins Anya to discuss the roots of Nazi sentiment in Poland and whether or not the mainstream international press has sufficiently covered the disturbing news.
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Pentagon launched new classified operation to support Saudi coalition in Yemen

Even as the humanitarian crisis precipitated by Saudi Arabia’s more-than-three-year war in Yemen has deepened, the Pentagon earlier this year launched a new classified operation to support the kingdom’s military operations there, according to a Defense Department document that appears to have been posted online inadvertently.
The existence of the new classified operation, code-named Yukon Journey, was partially revealed in a Defense Department inspector general report posted online earlier this month, which noted that “the Secretary of Defense designated three new named contingency operations: Operation Yukon Journey, and operations in Northwest Africa and East Africa.”
The three operations, which focus on al-Qaida and ISIS, are classified, the report notes, and the Pentagon has not publicly disclosed their location beyond saying they are in the Middle East and Africa.
But another document posted earlier this year on a Pentagon-affiliated website identifies Yukon Journey as a Central Com…
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Η Ιταλική αντίσταση ενάντια στη νεοφιλελεύθερη χούντα έρχεται πάνω στην ώρα για τον Τσίπρα

globinfo freexchange
Και ξαφνικά, όλα φαίνεται να "πηγαίνουν δεξιά" για τον Τσίπρα και την κυβέρνηση ΣΥΡΙΖΑΝΕΛ. Κατά ... "διαβολική σύμπτωση", πήρε και πάλι μπρος η μηχανή σκαλίσματος σκανδάλων εν όψει των επικείμενων εκλογικών αναμετρήσεων μέσα στο 2019.
"Όλως τυχαίως", μπήκε στο στόχαστρο ως και ο ίδιος ο πρώην πρωθυπουργός, Κώστας Σημίτης, μετά τη δίωξη Παπαντωνίου και την πρόσφατη αναθέρμανση των μεγάλων υποθέσεων διαφθοράς στο χώρο της υγείας, στις οποίες φαίνεται ότι εμπλέκονται και ορισμένα κορυφαία στελέχη της ΝΔ.
Ξαφνικά, ξεθάφτηκε πάλι η μη νομιμότητα της μείωσης των συντάξεων και η κυβέρνηση έδωσε ένα προεκλογικό δωράκι στους συνταξιούχους, επιτρέποντάς τους να διεκδικήσουν τα χαμένα λεφτά, χωρίς βέβαια να τους εγγυάται κανείς ότι θα το πετύχουν.
Ήρθαν όμως δειλά-δειλά και άλλα προεκλογικά δωράκια στην επιφάνεια, όπως, για παράδειγμα, η ανακοίνωση για περαιτέρω μείωση των ασφαλιστικών εισφορών για ορισμένους επαγγελματικούς κλάδους, από την αρχή…
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AOC shows the way to Bernie and the progressives: a third, fully independent party and a solid alliance with the Greens

Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez finally scores against the establishment
globinfo freexchange
It seems as if the new star of the progressive movement, Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, heard the alarm that we activated about two months ago.
As we wrote, Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez is a critical factor for the outcome of the civil war inside the Democratic party. But if you consider this as a 90-minute football game that has started with her astonishing victory and will end at the day of the 2020 presidential election, we are only about nine minutes from the start of the game. And the establishment already scored three goals. With that rate of retreat, the progressives will be literally vanished by 2020.
Indeed, Cortez counterattacked decisively. It was her turn to score big against the establishment, inside the court of the corporate Democrats.
As the Intercept reported:
           Protesters with the environmental group Sunrise marched on Democratic leader Nancy Pelosi’s office on Tuesday. The group, made …
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How the Bush administration used the 2001 anthrax attacks to manufacture consent for the Iraq war

17 years ago, less than one month after the horrific attacks on September 11, 2001, weaponized anthrax was sent through the mail in a biological attack that stunned an already traumatized nation. The first American died from anthrax infection on October 5th. During the weeks that followed, letters sent through the US postal system containing anthrax were targeted at US media organizations and sitting US senators. In the end, five people were left dead–two US postal workers, a Florida photojournalist, a New York city hospital worker and a 95 year old widow in Connecticut. Over 22 people were hospitalized from exposure. Many dozens more tested positive for anthrax in the months that followed.
It was a one-two punch of guttural horror. Americans were already glued to their television sets, watching 24/7 coverage of planes exploding and iconic skyscrapers crumbling. Over and over, we watched thousands perish. But terrorism was still abstract to those removed from the tragedy. The anthrax a…
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