Playing Chicken with Public Health: The Horrors of Poultry Production

Tyson poultry workers in Tennessee speak out on terrible health and safety conditions

by Zac Thornton - WSWS

24 April 2020

Two Tyson meatpacking plants in Tennessee have seen large numbers of workers infected with COVID-19. At the Tyson Shelbyville poultry plant in south-central Tennessee there have been 79 reported cases out of a workforce of 1,000. One hundred twenty cases are reported at the Goodlettsville beef plant north of Nashville that employs 1,600.

Both plants are still in operation, although the Shelbyville plant is set to close over the weekend for cleaning.

Brainless in Canberra: Malcolm Turnbull's Misremembered Adventures in Siberia

Malcolm Turnbull's Russia Story: Ex-Prime Minister of Australia Tries New Comeback with Old Brain

by John Helmer, Moscow

@bears_with

April 21, 2020

Malcolm Turnbull is the most intelligent man ever to become Australian prime minister, and to have left office more stupid than he began. Among the governments south of the Equator, this is without precedent. Since Turnbull served as head of government for only three years, 2015 to 2018, when he was 61 to 64 years of age, he has set the medical record for non-traumatic early-onset senescence in the cerebrum; that’s the part of the brain responsible for learning. He didn’t; he can’t. 

This week Turnbull has published a book of selections from his life aimed at refreshing his credentials to retake the political power he lost to rivals. His display of the symptoms that caused him to lose it is undiminished.

Now We're Talking About Money: Financial Benefits of a Global Ceasefire

The Economic Benefits of a Global Ceasefire

by David Swanson - Let's Try Democracy

April 14, 2020

There doesn’t seem to be any dispute with the findings of various studies, that investing public dollars in most other things (education, green energy, infrastructure, healthcare, etc.), or not taxing the money from working people in the first place, produces more jobs than military spending. 

In a generally wonderful new book by Clifford Conner called The Tragedy of American Science, the author claims that if a government produces more jobs through non-military spending, private capital will produce fewer jobs, more than eliminating the benefit. Only military spending, he claims, produces jobs nobody else would produce, because military spending – like Great Depression-era jobs digging and then re-filling ditches – produces nothing useful.

Crisis? Which Crisis! No Returning to Normalcy of the Abnormal

COVID-19 and the Wasting Disease of Normalcy

by Brian Terrell - Voices for Creative Nonviolence

April 17, 2020

The pandemic has brought home what the threats of global destruction by climate change and nuclear war should have long ago—that the promises of normalcy will never deliver in the end. 

Daniel Berrigan, Cornell University circa 1970 Ithaca, New York

(Photo: PL Gould/IMAGES/Getty Images)

“But what of the price of peace?” asked Jesuit priest and war resister Daniel Berrigan, writing from federal prison in 1969, doing time for his part in the destruction of draft records. 

After Year Zero: Dutch Manifesto on the Post-Covid World Order

Dutch manifesto: Five proposals for a better world after the pandemic 

via Climate & Capitalism

April 20, 2020

170 Dutch academics sign manifesto for sustainable, equal and diverse societies based on international solidarity  

The following statement, signed by 170 academics from eight universities in the Netherlands, has been widely reported in the Dutch press, becoming a focus for discussion on how to avoid repeating past mistakes when in planning for the future.

Happy B.Day Willie!

Horrible Histories William Shakespeare Song

Into the Breach: Canada Lifts Arms Embargo on Saudi Arabia

Canada Resumes Selling Arms To Saudi Warmongers

by TRNN

April 22, 2020

Now in the midst of a crisis, Canada will lift its embargo and sell armored vehicles to the Saudi military, which is engaged in brutal repression inside the country and the ongoing war in Yemen.

Is this worth the lives of the victims of Saudi security forces which will use these weapons in the war in Yemen and in repression within Saudi Arabia itself? Well, joining us today we have Yves Engler. Yves is a Canadian commentator, also an author. His most recent book is The Ugly Canadian: Stephen Harper’s Foreign Policy, and previously he published The Black Book of Canadian Foreign Policy, and Canada in Haiti: Waging War on a Poor Majority.

Did You Forget? Covid-19 Less Novel Than Presented

Is Amnesia a Symptom of Covid-19?

by Gilad Atzmon

April 20, 2020

I ask because just three years ago the USA experienced one of its most severe influenza outbreaks in recent memory. I am talking about the 2017-18 influenza that according to The American Centers of Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) was associated with “45 million illnesses, 21 million medical visits, 810,000 hospitalizations.” By September 2018 CNN announced that as many as 80.000 were dead for reasons associated with the outbreak.

The number of flu cases that year in the USA alone was about 18 times higher than the current number of Novel Coronavirus cases worldwide (2.5 million so far). The number of hospitalized American patients was more than 4 times higher than those who have been hospitalised in the USA with Coronavirus symptoms (200.000 to date). 

Gorilla Radio with Chris Cook, Stephen Corry, Dimitri Lascaris, Janine Bandcroft April 23, 2020

This Week on GR

by C. L. Cook - Gorilla-Radio.com

April 23, 2020

Welcome to Gorilla Radio’s continuing Post-Covid broadcast. We are NOT for now broadcasting live from the basement of the SUB building at the University of Victoria, but instead have moved production to my (ahem) home studio. This interview is recorded April 7th, 2020.

Triage is the current reality in hospitals struggling to handle the influx of patients sickened by the Covid-19 influenza+ pandemic. Already, guests of this show have reported pseudo-euthanasia policies in France and Spain. It’s clear, in times of emergency our medical systems accepts, when resources are short, some must perish that others be saved. But, what happens when the philosophy and practice of winnowing the wounded into essential and expendable categories extends further than the battlefield, or surgical theatre?

Listen. Hear.

Stephen Corry is CEO of Survival International, an organization dedicated to “A world where tribal peoples are respected as contemporary societies and their human rights protected.” He’s written numerous articles on the subjects of “scientific racism” and ideology of “fortress conservation”, and is the author of the book, ‘Tribal Peoples for Tomorrow’s World’.

Corry and SI have interceded on behalf of the rights of tribal peoples in South America, Asia, and Africa where their efforts standing up for the Kalahari Bushmen in Botswana earned Stephen the honorific of “liar, devil and loose cannon” from its government. Stephen Corry’s articles too appear online at, among other places, CounterPunch where I found his recent article, ‘It’s Time to Clean Ecofascism Out of Environmentalism’.

Stephen Corry in the first half.

And; the race to replace the long-time Green Party of Canada leader, Elizabeth May is on. Dimitri Lascaris is a Canadian lawyer, human rights activist, and reporter for the Real News Network. He's the past Justice Critic in the Shadow Cabinet of the Green Party of Quebec, and has put himself forward to fill May’s considerable boot print on the national stage.

Dimitri Lascaris and moving the Green agenda forward in Canada in the second half.

And; long-time Gorilla Radio contributor, Janine Bandcroft will be here at the bottom of the hour with the Left Coast Events Bulletin of some of the good things to be gotten up to in and around our town in the coming week. But first, Stephen Corry and taking the Eco from ecofascism.

Chris Cook hosts Gorilla Radio, airing live every Thursday between 11-Noon Pacific Time. In Victoria at 101.9FM, and on the internet at: http://cfuv.ca. He also serves as a contributing editor to the web news site, http://www.pacificfreepress.com. Check out the GR blog at: http://gorillaradioblog.blogspot.ca/

Proof of Life Required: Skripal 'Prisoners' Remain Incommunicado

SERGEI AND YULIA SKRIPAL – IN PRISON TOGETHER OR IN SOLITARY?

by John Helmer, Moscow

@bears_with

The last people to say they saw Sergei and Yulia Skripal together were two medical staff members at Salisbury District Hospital. The first was Senior Sister Sarah Clark, who was in charge of the evening shift at the Salisbury hospital’s Intensive Care Unit; the second was Dr Stephen Davies, a consultant in the Emergency Department of the hospital. 

According to the British Government, the two Skripals were attacked by a chemical nerve agent in the centre of Salisbury at about 4:15 on the afternoon of Sunday, March 4, 2018, then rushed by ambulance to the Salisbury hospital. The nerve agent was reported later – at least thirty-six hours later, perhaps longer – to have been identified by the Defence Science and Technology Laboratory at Porton Down as an organophosphate chemical warfare agent called Novichok produced in Russia. 

Labour Storm Revealed: Wading Through Leaked Party Anti-Corbyn Conspiracy

That Leaked Labour Party Report

by Craig Murray

April 20, 2020

I have now read my way through all 851 pages of the suppressed and leaked Labour Party report on its handling of anti-semitism complaints. It is an important document, that is fundamental to understanding a major turning point in UK history, where Northern European social democracy failed to re-establish itself in the UK.

If whoever leaked the document still has access to the vast amount of original source material on which it is based, this is documentation of immense historical value. I would strongly urge them to send the original thousands of emails, texts and messages to Wikileaks to ensure that this is preserved for the public record.

This Is London... Coronavirus' Hidden Suffering

The Coronavirus Lockdown, Hidden Suffering, and Delusions of a Rosy Future

by Andy Worthington

April 15, 2020

Nearly a month since the coronavirus lockdown began in the UK, it seems clear that the intentions behind shutting most retail outlets and workplaces, and encouraging everyone to stay at home as much as possible — to keep the death toll to manageable levels, preventing the NHS and the burial industry from being overwhelmed — are working, although no one should be under any illusions that Boris Johnson’s government has managed the crisis well. Nearly 13,000 people have died so far in hospitals in the UK, a figure that seriously underestimates the true death toll, because it cynically ignores those dying in care homes.

London under the coronavirus lockdown, March 30, 2020 

(Photo Andy Worthington from his photo-journalism project The State of London).

However, frontline NHS staff are also dying, and this is because they are still deprived of necessary personal protective equipment (PPE), which is an absolute and unmitigated disgrace, showing how far our current elected officials are from the wartime spirit of the plucky British that they are so intent on selling to the public to cover up their failings.

Medical Despotism and the New Antisocialism

Led by "the Science" to Medical Despotism

by Rob Slane - The Blogmire

April 14, 2020

Having packed my TV in a box some 20 years ago (did I miss anything good?), I feel I have developed a certain immunity to some of the more blatant propaganda techniques waged upon the populace by the media and Government. On the occasions I do get to see them, I often find myself at a loss to know whether to laugh out loud at the absurdities, or weep that many will swallow them without question.

My favourite recent example of this in the media is this piece here on the BBC (the Babylon Bee Corporation?), where they examine the sinister measures being taken by some of Europe’s more authoritarian leaders, asking whether they are using Covid-19 as an excuse to oppress their populations and increase their power. 

Covid Bono? Remembering the Ghost of Pandemic Past

Covid-19: Have "Real Journalists" Forgotten the H1N1 Scandal They Reported On? 

by Tony Cartalucci - LandDestroyer

April 4, 2020

Overreaction and big-pharma profiteering from Covid-19 is a repeat of the 2009 H1N1 "Swine Flu" scandal. Why has the corporate media that would eventually expose the 2009 scandal failed to inform readers today that the same corrupt interests are leading the Covid-19 response?

Amid Covid-19 hysteria - "real journalists" across the Western corporate media are shamelessly and eagerly fanning the flames of hysteria, panicking the public and ensuring both the government and corporate special interests that influence their policy remain firmly in control.

The Leechable Moment: Blood-Suckers Quick to Leap on Wounded

Never Let a Good Waste Go to Crisis 

by Rob Urie - CounterPunch

April 17, 2020
 

It has been an article of faith during recent crises that temporary measures must be taken to bring about a return to normalcy, at which point a longer view can prevail. Following 9/11, the national security state that had been waning with the end of the Cold War was revived and given new prominence. Later, the Obama administration ‘held its nose’ as it bailed out the large banks, with the result being that the institutions that caused the crisis were fully restored and the balance of power and nature of ‘the economy’ were permanently altered.

Photograph by Nathaniel St. Clair 

In the absence of real crises, there have been contrived emergencies like Iraqi Weapons of Mass Destruction and ‘foreign interference’ in U.S. elections that served more targeted purposes and constituencies. 

Surveilled Society: Covid "Totals" Up

Covid-19 Is Bringing Us Into A Hyper-Surveilled, Highly Policed Fascist Dystopia

by Rainer Shea, SeeYouIn2020 

via Popular Resistance

April 16, 2020

Look out my window, what do I see
A crack in the sky and a hand reaching down to me
All the nightmares came today
And it looks as though they’re here to stay

- David Bowie                            

                             

We must understand that the crisis we’ve entered into will never end, at least not for as long as our neoliberal capitalist system isn’t replaced with a socialist model. In the U.S., as well as the other countries where austerity has wrecked healthcare systems, Covid-19 is going to cause societal disruptions for years as the virus partially subsides and then regrows.

Failing British Columbia: NDP's Skewed Priorities

Canada: British Columbia’s New Democrat government defends corporate interests as coronavirus runs rampant

by Penny Smith  - WSWS

17 April 2020

British Columbia’s ostensibly progressive John Horgan-led New Democratic Party (NDP) government is proving incapable of protecting the population from the devastating medical and economic effects of the COVID-19 pandemic.

Canada’s third most populous province has reported over 1,500 coronavirus cases to date and at least 75 deaths.

De Facto Death Penalty: Covid in Canada's Prisons

Rights Groups React to Prisoner Death in Custody; Call for Public Inquest and Immediate Release of Prisoners to Stop Dangerous Spread of COVID-19

by Joint Effort

April 17, 2020

Prisoner rights, human rights, Indigenous and civil liberties groups are reacting to the horrific news of a death in Correctional Service of Canada’s custody of a person incarcerated at Mission Institution in BC. Mission Institution is the site of the largest COVID-19 outbreak at a federal institution in the country.

This death is the first reported COVID-related death of a federal inmate. A prisoner transferred from Mission Institution now serving time in Atlantic Canada knew the prisoner who died in custody. 

In his words, “We were good friends and I knew he was in the hospital. That could be me next.” 

Trudeau Comes Out for Big Oil & Gas

Feds could still be hiding billions for oil companies

by wildernesscommittee.org

April 17, 2020

Wilderness Committee is calling for full transparency in how government agencies are supporting the fossil fuel industry after Prime Minister Trudeau announced money for Canada’s struggling oil and gas sector.

“The only thing clear about today’s announcement was that Canadians have made public money for oil companies so politically toxic that the federal government wants to hide it,” said Climate Campaigner Peter McCartney. 

From Wheeze to Eternity: The End Comes

From Here to Dystopia: Not With a Bang But a Cough

by John Feffer - TomDispatch

April 16, 2020

In retrospect, it’s no surprise that, after the election of Donald Trump in 2016, dystopian fiction enjoyed a spike in popularity. However, novels like George Orwell’s 1984 and Margaret Atwood’s The Handmaid’s Tale, which soared on Amazon, would prove more horror stories than roadmaps. Like so many ominous sounds from a dark basement, they provided good scares but didn’t foreshadow the actual Trumpian future.

Of course, it didn’t take an Orwell or an Atwood to extrapolate from the statements of candidate Trump to the policies of President Trump -- and such projections bore little resemblance to the worlds of Big Brother or an all-powerful patriarchy.