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	<title>World Socialist Party (US) &#187; Stefan</title>
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		<title>World Socialist Party (US)</title>
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	<itunes:author>World Socialist Party (US)</itunes:author>
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		<title>Immunity of the Rich and Powerful</title>
		<link>http://wspus.org/2012/02/immunity-of-the-rich-and-powerful/</link>
		<comments>http://wspus.org/2012/02/immunity-of-the-rich-and-powerful/#comments</comments>
		<pubDate>Wed, 22 Feb 2012 00:38:46 +0000</pubDate>
		<dc:creator>Stefan</dc:creator>
				<category><![CDATA[News]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[abuse]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[fraud]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[immunity]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[rape]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[rule of law]]></category>

		<guid isPermaLink="false">http://wspus.org/?p=2369</guid>
		<description><![CDATA[Money and power bring privileges of many kinds. Not just command over goods and services, labor and other resources, but also social deference and very often immunity to legal penalties. As they say, there is one law for the rich and another for the poor. Let’s look at a few examples. Fraud is a good place to start. Rewarding business acumen Before going into politics in 2010, Rick Scott was CEO of the Hospital Corporation of America. In this capacity, he masterminded schemes to defraud Medicare of an estimated $7 billion. Without admitting guilt, he settled all claims against him by coughing up $1.7 billion, leaving him completely in the clear with over $5 billion in loot stashed safely away. The voters of Florida rewarded Scott for his business acumen by electing him governor. He now has the power to decide whether to pardon any of the relatively small-time thieves languishing in the state’s jails. Under Florida’s Grand Theft Statute, unarmed robbery of just $301 (under one 20-millionth part of what Scott stole) is a felony punishable by five years in prison. For years the big U.S. banks have expedited, with full cooperation from the courts, innumerable fraudulent home foreclosures [...]


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		<item>
		<title>No, no, Keshagesh!</title>
		<link>http://wspus.org/2012/02/no-no-keshagesh/</link>
		<comments>http://wspus.org/2012/02/no-no-keshagesh/#comments</comments>
		<pubDate>Tue, 21 Feb 2012 22:19:19 +0000</pubDate>
		<dc:creator>Stefan</dc:creator>
				<category><![CDATA[Culture]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Poems]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[capital]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[greed]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[land]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[resources]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[war]]></category>

		<guid isPermaLink="false">http://wspus.org/?p=2531</guid>
		<description><![CDATA[Note. You can listen to this brilliant song by Buffy Sainte Marie at http://www.buffysaintemarie.co.uk or on YouTube. “Keshagesh” is a Cree word roughly equivalent to “greedy guts.” Socialists will identify “Keshagesh” or “Mr. Greed” with the world’s capitalist class, or with capital as the endlessly expanding and all-devouring force of production for profit. I never saw so many business suits. Never knew a dollar sign that looked so cute. Never knew a junkie with a money Jones: He&#8217;s singing, &#8220;Who&#8217;s selling Park Place? Who&#8217;s buying Boardwalk?” These old men they make their dirty deals. Go in the back room and see what they can steal. Talk about your beautiful and spacious skies. It&#8217;s about uranium; it&#8217;s about the water rights. Put Mother Nature on a luncheon plate. They cut her up and call it real estate. Want all the resources and all of the land. They make a war over it Blow things up for it. The reservation now is poverty row. There&#8217;s something cooking and the lights are low. Somebody&#8217;s trying to save our mother earth. I&#8217;m gonna help them to save it, To sing it and bring it No no Keshagesh: You can&#8217;t do that no more! No, no, [...]


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		<title>The Changing Configuration of World Power</title>
		<link>http://wspus.org/2012/02/the-changing-configuration-of-world-power/</link>
		<comments>http://wspus.org/2012/02/the-changing-configuration-of-world-power/#comments</comments>
		<pubDate>Fri, 17 Feb 2012 20:56:26 +0000</pubDate>
		<dc:creator>Stefan</dc:creator>
				<category><![CDATA[China]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[News]]></category>

		<guid isPermaLink="false">http://wspus.org/?p=2354</guid>
		<description><![CDATA[American global hegemony continues its steady decline. The most striking recent case in point is the overt shift of Pakistan, long a U.S. client state, into China’s sphere of influence. The U.S., no longer able to supply its forces in Afghanistan through Pakistan, has no choice but to withdraw rapidly from that country. (The old Soviet supply route through Uzbekistan is inadequate on its own, and we know from Wikileaks that the U.S. asked China to allow a new route through Chinese territory but was refused.) Afghanistan will revert to its traditional status as a dependency of Pakistan, whose tool the Taliban was from the start. Eventually Afghanistan too, with its rich unexploited mineral resources, may be integrated into the Chinese sphere. Or there may be renewed Russian and Uzbek intervention (advocated by some Russian strategists), with north-south partition the probable result. Illusions of grandeur America’s vast military spending and far-flung network of bases are now hugely disproportionate to its diminished economic strength and real influence over events. Multiple wars have left its troops overextended and exhausted. Yet the idea of deep reductions in military forces remains taboo in mainstream American politics, while the U.S. and Israel again gear up [...]


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		<item>
		<title>Russia: Report of a meeting of the anti-Putin opposition</title>
		<link>http://wspus.org/2012/01/russia-report-of-a-meeting-of-the-anti-putin-opposition/</link>
		<comments>http://wspus.org/2012/01/russia-report-of-a-meeting-of-the-anti-putin-opposition/#comments</comments>
		<pubDate>Sat, 07 Jan 2012 01:07:51 +0000</pubDate>
		<dc:creator>Stefan</dc:creator>
				<category><![CDATA[News]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[democracy]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[fascism]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[human rights]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[opposition]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Russia]]></category>

		<guid isPermaLink="false">http://wspus.org/?p=2319</guid>
		<description><![CDATA[From Vladimir Sirotin (Moscow), translated with explanatory notes by Stefan Yesterday [January 5, 2012] I was at a sickening meeting of the Organizing Committee for Honest Elections and Against the Putin Regime (or something like that). It was attended by a very ill-assorted bunch of people. Sitting on the platform were Udaltsov, Geidar Jemal, Lev Ponomarev, Ilya Ponomarev, Vladimir Tor, Ivan Mironov, Mr. Krylov and a number of others. (1) The picture looked surreal. The main theme of the overwhelming majority of speakers was that everyone must unite in the fight against Putinism and for honest elections – leftists, liberals and nationalists! This was said quite openly and publicly. “We have here four caucuses: leftists, liberals, Russian nationalists and cultural figures.” Buzgalin spoke briefly. (2) He said that supporters of democracy with social guarantees should unite with supporters of socialism, but it will hardly be possible to cooperate with nationalists. This immediately provoked catcalls from the nationalists present. Very soon he left the meeting. It was constantly said that no part of the anti-Putin coalition should be more opposed to any other part of the coalition than to the Putin regime. Although it was admitted in passing that were it [...]


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		<slash:comments>0</slash:comments>
		</item>
		<item>
		<title>The porn business</title>
		<link>http://wspus.org/2011/12/the-porn-business/</link>
		<comments>http://wspus.org/2011/12/the-porn-business/#comments</comments>
		<pubDate>Fri, 23 Dec 2011 21:43:29 +0000</pubDate>
		<dc:creator>Stefan</dc:creator>
				<category><![CDATA[News]]></category>

		<guid isPermaLink="false">http://wspus.org/?p=2311</guid>
		<description><![CDATA[Chatsworth is a district of Los Angeles in the San Fernando Valley, well endowed with parkland and sports facilities. It is home to a number of Hollywood film stars. Many famous films and TV series were shot in the area. Chatsworth is also the world center of the porn business, with 200 production companies employing 1,200 – 1,500 performers (and a few thousand other workers). Here too are the offices of the industry’s trade magazine Adult Video News, which sponsors an annual convention in Las Vegas and an award show modelled after the Oscars. Most performers are poorly educated young women aged 18 – 21. They are attracted by the pay, which seems good compared to other jobs open to them. Rates for a scene range from $200 for a blowjob up to $2,000 for a double anal or gang bang. But a lot of the money goes on supporting drug habits. Former porn star Shelley Lubben, who established the Pink Cross Foundation to help performers trying to get out of the business, explains that they need drugs because without them they would be unable to bear the abuse that the work entails: “Guys are punching you in the face. [...]


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		<slash:comments>0</slash:comments>
		</item>
		<item>
		<title>The &#8220;Troubled Teens&#8221; Business</title>
		<link>http://wspus.org/2011/11/the-troubled-teens-business/</link>
		<comments>http://wspus.org/2011/11/the-troubled-teens-business/#comments</comments>
		<pubDate>Wed, 30 Nov 2011 17:55:15 +0000</pubDate>
		<dc:creator>Stefan</dc:creator>
				<category><![CDATA[News]]></category>

		<guid isPermaLink="false">http://wspus.org/?p=2314</guid>
		<description><![CDATA[On the internet I keep running across the same image – the scowling face of a teenage boy, accompanied by the words: Fix Defiant ODD Children. It is an ad for a “Total Transformation Program” that will “empower” you to “stop defiance, backtalk and lying” and “regain control of your child, your family and your life”. ODD, in case you’re wondering, is the “diagnosis” that psychiatrists now pin on disobedient youngsters: Oppositional Defiant Disorder. Until recently no one had ever heard of it. Numerous programs to “fix” disobedient kids are on offer to American parents. Many are residential programs run by private entrepreneurs in “boot camps” and other locked facilities located both inside and outside the US (in Mexico, Jamaica, Costa Rica, etc.). Or you can send your child off on a gruelling “wilderness expedition” in the harsh desert landscape of the Southwest. Force and deception are routinely used to trap children in these programs, which usually entail physical and/or emotional cruelty, inflicted in the name of “tough love”. Abuse and deprivation sometimes result in death – in particular, when complaints of pain and exhaustion are not believed (see, for instance, nospank.net/boot.htm: Torturing Teens for Fun and Profit). In many [...]


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		<item>
		<title>The Waste of Luxury</title>
		<link>http://wspus.org/2011/05/the-waste-of-luxury/</link>
		<comments>http://wspus.org/2011/05/the-waste-of-luxury/#comments</comments>
		<pubDate>Tue, 24 May 2011 18:50:18 +0000</pubDate>
		<dc:creator>Stefan</dc:creator>
				<category><![CDATA[News]]></category>

		<guid isPermaLink="false">http://wspus.org/?p=2260</guid>
		<description><![CDATA[Like hunger and homelessness, the global trade in luxury goods is booming. Turnover fell from $254 billion in 2007 to $228 billion in 2009 – a decline that observers attributed to “luxury shame”. Rich people could still afford all the luxuries they wanted, but apparently they felt a trifle uneasy about flaunting their wealth at a time of crisis. They soon got over their unease. Sales recovered to $257 billion in 2010 and are expected to surge to $276 billion in 2011. “Luxury shame is now over,” declared marketing consultant Claudia d’Arpizio in March. So the long-term trend still points sharply upward. This reflects the continuing polarisation of the distribution of wealth – that is, the process by which the rich get richer and the poor poorer. It also reflects the rapidly growing number of rich people in fast-growing economies like Brazil and China (already the second largest market after the United States). The figures are misleading, in that they refer only to goods purchased over the counter – liqueurs, fashionable apparel, cosmetics, perfumes, jewelry, gold watches, handbags, luggage, etc. They do not include fancy cars, yachts and jets, for instance. Or mansions and penthouse apartments. Estimates based on a [...]


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		</item>
		<item>
		<title>The Killing of Bin Laden: Understanding the American Reaction</title>
		<link>http://wspus.org/2011/05/the-killing-of-bin-laden-understanding-the-american-reaction/</link>
		<comments>http://wspus.org/2011/05/the-killing-of-bin-laden-understanding-the-american-reaction/#comments</comments>
		<pubDate>Sun, 22 May 2011 18:48:30 +0000</pubDate>
		<dc:creator>Stefan</dc:creator>
				<category><![CDATA[News]]></category>

		<guid isPermaLink="false">http://wspus.org/?p=2258</guid>
		<description><![CDATA[A large majority of Americans – 87 percent, according to one poll – approve of the killing of Bin Laden. Many were visibly overcome by joy when they heard the news, and the subsequent warning by CIA director Leon Panetta that the operation would actually increase the terrorist threat to the US only slightly damped their spirits. Within a few days of the operation, video games were on the market offering simulated experiences of killing Osama – or, in one case, his ghost! If you get killed by him first, never mind: you can just start over again. Sam Sommers, a sociology professor at Tufts University, explained the jubilant reaction as follows: “September 11 shook our belief [that] the world [is] a just and fair place where you get what you deserve. Innocent people died senselessly. Seeing this closing scene, for many people, provides a just ending.” Hence the “sense of relief” expressed by the widow of one 9/11 victim. What can account for this strange belief that the world is a just and fair place? How is it possible not to know that innocent people die senselessly every day? Perhaps it has something to do with religion, which has [...]


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		</item>
		<item>
		<title>Japan Meltdown: Another Man-Made Disaster</title>
		<link>http://wspus.org/2011/03/japan-meltdown-another-man-made-disaster/</link>
		<comments>http://wspus.org/2011/03/japan-meltdown-another-man-made-disaster/#comments</comments>
		<pubDate>Sun, 20 Mar 2011 17:29:16 +0000</pubDate>
		<dc:creator>Stefan</dc:creator>
				<category><![CDATA[News]]></category>

		<guid isPermaLink="false">http://wspus.org/?p=2198</guid>
		<description><![CDATA[No, of course earthquakes and tsunamis are natural phenomena. But it is known where – if not when – they are going to strike. So in principle society could take action to minimise the human impact. It was known that the seabed off the northeastern coast of Honshu (the main island of the Japanese archipelago) is prone to earthquakes. It was known that a sufficiently powerful offshore earthquake would generate a tsunami. So why not leave the endangered coastal area uninhabited? Crammed into the danger zone This earthquake and most of its aftershocks were offshore. However, the next major earthquake may well occur, as long predicted, on land. It is a matter of when, not whether. The area at greatest risk is the southern coastal strip of Honshu that stretches west from Tokyo – a city already devastated by earthquakes in 1891 and 1923. And yet the eastern half of this strip, up to Osaka, covering a mere 6% of Japan’s land area, is the country’s industrial powerhouse, with 45% of its population of 127.5 million. Tokyo and its outlying cities alone contain 30% of the country’s population. Would a rational society cram so many people and resources into the [...]


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		</item>
		<item>
		<title>Egypt: The hard road to political democracy</title>
		<link>http://wspus.org/2011/02/egypt-the-hard-road-to-political-democracy/</link>
		<comments>http://wspus.org/2011/02/egypt-the-hard-road-to-political-democracy/#comments</comments>
		<pubDate>Tue, 01 Mar 2011 04:25:13 +0000</pubDate>
		<dc:creator>Stefan</dc:creator>
				<category><![CDATA[Africa]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Mid-East]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[News]]></category>

		<guid isPermaLink="false">http://wspus.org/?p=2113</guid>
		<description><![CDATA[At the time of going to press, the “revolution of anger” in Egypt seems to be entering a new phase. Tahrir Square has been reopened to traffic and commerce. Massive political demonstrations are over, at least for the time being, but strikes and protests by various groups of workers continue. The employees of the National Bank of Egypt have forced the resignation of its chairman, a Mubarak ally. Ambulance drivers, public transport workers, and even the police are demonstrating for better wages and conditions. Many Egyptians are dissatisfied with what has been achieved so far, and with good reason. Mubarak has gone. But what sort of democrat is the man who took over from him on 31 January – Omar Suleiman, assassin and torturer-in-chief of the dreaded Mukhabarat (General Intelligence Service)? The demand to suspend the emergency law that permits detention without charge has not been met, nor have political prisoners been released. The ruling military council has set no firm timetable for elections and transition to civilian rule. They have made plenty of promises, but who is naïve enough to trust them? To understand what is happening in Egypt, we must first understand the nature of the ruling regime. [...]


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