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Showing posts from September 11, 2016
" On Wednesday a foreign affairs committee chaired by the Conservative MP Crispin Blunt delivered its excoriating verdict on   David Cameron’s Libyan adventure . Few people will rush to Cameron’s defence. Yet the former prime minister might be forgiven for feeling a pang of irritation at the committee’s uncompromising verdict. In March 2011, when Cameron went to the Commons to propose bombing Libya, no fewer than 557 MPs voted with him. Just 13 voted against. Those 13, just in case anyone is interested? They did not include Crispin Blunt. They did not include Theresa May. They did not include Owen Smith, Corbyn’s rival for the Labour leadership or Angela Eagle, who kicked off the leadership challenge (she abstained). But they did include Jeremy Corbyn and John McDonnell. That’s what many of us call leadership. A parliament full of criminals and they call it democracy
" The best of all possible worlds " (G. Leibniz) All what matters is the income of the lower middle class. "Neo-liberalism" has survived thus no wonder the liberals, or most of them, find a reason for defending globalisation and capitalism in general. Putting the blame on local institutions is pervasive. Before that the defenders of the status quo had used "the cultural backwardness" of Africa and the Middle East, for example, as the cause of underdevelopment. For them local institutions are isolated from the global institutions and the main powers control of finance, trade, terms and conditions, military power, etc as well as their interests in tacitly supporting local regimes. For "the masters of the universe" the law of combined and uneven development is non-existent. The authors of this article ignore that the country which elevated more poor people out of poverty than any other (see UN reports on China) has done and that because the s...
نبيل الملحم: ما أن يلتقي جون كيري وسيرغي لافروف، حتى يتهامسان، لا ندري إذا ماكان همسهما، لعبة من تبادل الأطباق: - خذ طبقاً من الهوت دوغ، وهات طبقاً من الـ بلوف. ثم تكون المائدة. ولا ندري أية همسات مابين الأتراك والإيرانيين: - خذ الشاورما، وهات الـ "ديزي". والاثنان يُقسمان أنه اللحم الحلال.. ثم تكون المائدة. هي السياسة هكذا، نعم، وبهذا التبسيط، وكل من يعتقد بغير ذلك فهو أبله، أو مثقف (ما يعني أبلهاً أنيقاً). - أين الغرابة في كل ذلك حين نكون نحن هي الأطباق؟ الأطباق البشرية؟ ستقولون لي:"هي استحقاقات الجيوسياسة"، نعم، ومن قال بأنها غير أطباق من نوع ما؟ أطباق خطوط الغاز، مكامن النفط، صناديق المال، تبادل الزوجات، المعادن الثمينة، ولكل مائدة فقهاؤها، ولمزيد من العلم، فقد لعبت الكوكاكولا ماعجزت عنه ساحات القتال، وها نحن نضرم النيران والبخور من أجلها.. أعني من أجل الأطباق، ونتهامس كما يتهامسون: - طبقاً ديموقراطياً من الأمريكان، ثم نستشهد بما قدموه لنا في كابول، بغداد، القدس، وها نحن نأكله طازجاً في دمشق، نأكله لنأكل بعضنا بعضاً في مأدبة هي عسر هضم ا...
I love the English and their way of life The other day someone, an English, was telling how marvellous the American soldiers were in treating dogs in Afghanistan. One Syrian Photographer's Last Letter to the World
Keynes’ 1930s optimism gained credence with the boom during a major world war and the subsequent post-war Golden Age that restored the profitability of capital for a generation.  Let’s hope it does not take another world war to confirm the  optimism of the modern Keynesians like DeLong . The end of globalisation and the future of capitalism
Capitalism " batters down all  Chinese walls ... In one word, it creates a world after its own image." " All that is  solid  melts into  air , all that is holy is profaned, and man is at last compelled to face with sober senses his real conditions of life..." A prayer for Mecca — the city that many pilgrims don't see Also Mecca for the rich: Islam's holiest site 'turning into Vegas'