St. Kitts & Nevis: Citizenship For Sale
St. Kitts & Nevis
The recent discussions of birth certificates and citizenship have rekindled my interest in living and working abroad, and, consequently, my frustration at just very how hard this is for the average person to accomplish. Each government jealousy guards its citizenship and work permits, even from friendly countries with whom it shares close cultural and economic ties. “I want to immerse myself in Europe’s culture and history,” I reflected, “not pop its cherry. Is there any country in the world which is even a little, you know…easy?” That’s how I learned about St. Kitts and Nevis.
If my coveted United Kingdom is an ice princess that does not deign to look down upon me from her ivory tower, St. Kitts and Nevis is her busty niece who is a sucker for men with flashy cars. St. Kitts and Nevis is a tiny English-speaking island state in the Caribbean; an independent Commonwealth realm…
Should America Expand the Size of Congress?
Dalton Conley and Jacqueline Stevens make a pretty compelling argument in a recent NY Times op-ed:
With the Senate preparing to debate filibuster reform, now is a good time to consider a similarly daunting challenge to democratic representation in the House: its size. It’s been far too long since the House expanded to keep up with population growth and, as a result, it has lost touch with the public and been overtaken by special interests.
Indeed, the lower chamber of Congress has had the same number of members for so long that many Americans assume that its 435 seats are constitutionally mandated.
But that’s wrong: while the founders wanted to limit the size of the Senate, they intended the House to expand based on population growth. Instead of setting an absolute number, the Constitution merely limits the ratio of members to population. “The number of representatives shall not exceed one for every 30,000,” the…
Two Minutes Hate
From Nick Pell at Red Star Times
Four things happened recently that I think require attention. They speak to not just the world that we live in as it is, but the direction where we are headed. It’s a cliche to repeat, but that won’t stop me–the Chinese curse “may you live in interesting times” applies now more than ever.
We do, indeed live in “interesting” times. Times as interesting as 1914, 1929 or 1939. We will live to see days like 1905, 1936 and 1968. Only time will tell if they blossom into 1789, 1871 or 1917, but the alternative is too terrifying to even contemplate.
“The Left” vs. The Working Class
From Nick Pell at Red Star Times
“The Communist Party cannot fulfill its mission except by preserving, completely and unconditionally, its political and organizational independence apart from all other parties and organizations within and without the working class.” – L. Trotsky
I am frequently maligned and attacked for not supporting “the left.” Slings and arrows thrown my way include admonishments to “get behind the real movement” and appeals for a “united front” from people who clearly don’t understand what the term means. However, it’s worth pointing out (once again) that I don’t consider building “the left” to be the task of a socialist. The task of a socialist is to help the working class organize to take power. Rather than building block along the road towards this end, the left is perhaps the largest impediment to working class politics both domestically and internationally. Whether you think of the left as being the…
Countdown
From Nick Pell at Red Star Times
My friend Bill is wont to say that humanity hasn’t quite figured out that it could do something so bad that it couldn’t be fixed. From a certain point of view, I agree. Our ability to fix the messes we create is finite. Never before the last 50 years has humanity been in a position to utterly and totally destroy itself and drag a large amount of other life forms down with it.
Chernobyl was bad, to be sure. However, the damage was largely regional. The BP disaster is creating an Exxon Valdez crash every four days, with no end in sight.
Forget about the very real possibility of a third world war, one that could irreparably render the planet uninhabitable for humans. The fact that multinational oil cartels are building things capable of creating disasters without solutions should be of concern to everyone who likes…
The End of Democracy for Non-Dummies
Following is an essay outlining some current problems with today’s form of globalized capitalism.
The message being conveyed is that there is something kind of off about the existence of hundreds of millions of people (the first world/outer party) who assume that they are democrtic citizens when the power to literally topple governments and start world wars is handed down dynastically into the hands of very few people. I’m aware that I am largely preaching to the converted, but if you’re interested, please read on.
The whole of human history may be considered as a broad narrative detailing the aggregation and evolution of small human communities into city-states, nation-states, super-national states and perhaps ultimately – a global state. It is perhaps the case that the current rate of social aggregation has exceeded the rate at which societies are willing to adjust economic and regulatory conditions within the emerging global community. The discrepancy…
An Anarchist Defense of Karl Marx
From Chris M. at Black Sun Gazette:
Karl Marx has received a bum rap. Some see him as the godfather of the modern revolutionary movement while others see him as the architect of Stalin’s gulags. I’m in the former camp rather than the latter. This is not to say his he is infallible, his texts are sacred, or his supporters haven’t committed any errors. In fact I think that last point is the cause of most of the controversy.
Few people have bothered to read his works and instead point to the horrors committed by his followers mainly Lenin and the Bolsheviks. After Karl died three main voices appeared in the socialist movement of the 20th century all claiming the mantle of Marx — Bernstein, Lenin, and Luxemburg.
Bernstein who lead the democratic socialists, said revolution was unnecessary and pursed reforms within a democracy (this is the model of a number of European…
Your Corporate Masters Are In Control
Nick P. at Black Sun Gazette writes:
A new poll reveals what you already knew: the economy is fucking depressing. You can’t help but wonder how many people have committed suicide over losing a job or a house, or how many relationships have been strained to the breaking point by a lack of money.
It’s proof that we live in Bizarro world that we even take such things for granted. Much like the tenets of organized religion, if you simply lay out the reality in simple terms — you and I are subject to the whims and vagaries of a tiny group of social parasites who produce nothing while taking everything, and when their investments tank our lives go in the shitter — it’s patently ludicrous.
To those suckling at the teat of corporate control, however, it seems as natural as sunshine.
This Day in History: Al Gore Gives Up … So The Stock Market Could Keep Going Up
Interested in hearing your ideas about what we haven’t heard yet about the 2000 election. I have my ideas, but looking forward to hearing what you have to say, nine years later:
Almost a century and a half ago, Senator Stephen Douglas told Abraham Lincoln, who had just defeated him for the presidency, “Partisan feeling must yield to patriotism. I’m with you, Mr. President, and God bless you.” Well, in that same spirit, I say to President-Elect Bush that what remains of partisan rancor must now be put aside, and may God bless his stewardship of this country.
— Vice President Al Gore’s concession speech on December 13, 2000, after the Supreme Court decision Bush v. Gore, effectively ending his hopes of becoming the 43rd president of the U.S.
Full text of Vice President Al Gore’s concession speech here.
Facebook: Where Souls Go To Die
On 
The First Church of Mutterhals:
I recently saw graffiti written on a train that said “80% of the internet is pornography.” While I don’t normally give much credence to random statistics scrawled on the sides of fast moving freight trains, I have to say this one struck me as fairly accurate. I would even go as far as characterizing the remaining 20% as being comprised of cat pictures, celebrity gossip and social networking sites appealing to the emotional retard in all of us.
Yeah, I said it. Retard.
Facebook is a place for puerile rumor mongering and passive-aggressive pronouncements made from the safety of your profile page. For all the talk about connecting to people around the world, social utilities really only serve to foster the increasing sense of isolation and narcissism already rampant among humanity.
Am I the only person who thinks every update is a provocation aimed directly at me? And…
Let’s Kick Some Pricks
From Buelahman at Black Sun Gazette
I love to watch the lunatic fringe squirm as they realize that their little kingdom is falling apart. Its not that I get jollies knowing the demoRAT party will probably increase the next election round overall, even if the ObamaMeister will force the reTHUGlicans back into the Whitehouse. It is all crazy shit and I blame Americans for being too partisan, stupid, scared or gullible to clearly back away from those “parties” and the devastation the participation brings to our way of life.
Why Vote for the Lesser Evil?
Chris M. at Black Sun Gazette
I think in the year 2000 we actually entered through the looking glass. It’s almost absurd — left is right, up is down, fight terrorism by going shopping and Afghans are “Enduring Freedom” is an incredible Orwellian mind fuck. A sizable minority live in Fox News World and swallow up conservative dribble, because Bush “kept us safe for eight years” except for the day between 9-10 and 9-12 (snap).
Another sizable liberal minority live in Futurama and believe all would have been fine had Al Gore been elected (no terrorism, no war, no hurricanes, no government corruption) unlike the rest of American history. The fact that the two men were both from old political families that served the interests of the elite didn’t phase most people. One was the son and great grandson of presidents; the other a vice president and son of a powerful senator.…
Show Me the Money
By Robert Singer
We have been conditioned from birth to believe that everything wrong in our society is about Greed: The inordinate desire to acquire or possess more than one needs or deserves, especially with respect to material wealth.
However, my research concludes the earth’s environmental damage and pollution was not the result of greed and the unintended consequences of our capitalistic consumer society, but was the goal.
Until the common man became “civilized” he had almost no environmental impact on the earth. Hunters, foragers and gatherers are unable to upset the ecological structures of the planet. [1]
The first civilized societies and their agrarian economies had an environmental impact but the damage was negligible because only 3% of the population, Kings and Lords were consumers.
The earth wasn’t in trouble until the House of Rothschild unleashed the middle class on the planet when they financed and fomented the American and French Revolutions. [2]
Now the…
Two Important Articles: The Collapse of Communism / “Unions”
From Black Sun Gazette
I wanted to recommend two articles to my readership from my most favorite news source, the World Socialist Web Site. I consider this website to be nothing short of the New York Times or The Economist for working class socialists. The two articles I am about to refer people to here express quite succinctly why I consider their analysis to be head and shoulders above anything else on the phony left. In addition, I believe that these two articles really cut to the heart of two problems that plague the fake left. Namely, anti-communism and toadying for the “union” bureaucracy.
Marty Beckerman Hates Fat People … And Tells Them
Marty Beckerman’s really going to make some big enemies with his latest blog rant, Kill Fatty: A Modestly Sized Proposal. Here at disinformation we published his book (mostly) about politics, Dumbocracy: Adventures with the Loony Left, the Rabid Right, and Other American Idiots, but I’m not sure we would have had he included his latest assault on the weight-challenged. Here’s a sample, and don’t hold back on your comments, Marty likes to feature hate mail on his blog:
Overweight people are fucking abhorrent, which seems like an obvious and uncontroversial statement, but you cannot turn your head these days without gawking at the vile cascades of shapeless distended flesh that ubiquitously engulf your grotesque countrymen.
Look at these nauseating statistics:
1. 33 percent of Americans are overweight, according to the federal government.
2. Another 34 percent are obese, which is even worse.
3. Six percent are “extremely obese,” which is code for “must be airlifted…
Why I Hate The ISO
From Black Sun Gazette
This is an article I’ve wanted to write for a long time. I considered the subject to obscure until my special lady friend assured me that it was not. If you’ve ever been within 50 miles of a college campus you probably know who the International Socialist Organization are. They’re the obviously middle-class kids shilling a banal newspaper in really large type font who curl into a ball and start crying if you ask them a question harder than “but is socialism really possible / aren’t people naturally selfish / didn’t socialism fail in the Soviet Union?” If the ISO weren’t running around claiming to be socialists, I can honestly say that I wouldn’t have any problem with them. If they just fessed up to the fact that they’re garden variety radical liberals who want good people to do good things in the world, I wouldn’t have the…
Nobel Price Farce
From Nick P at Black Sun Gazette
I don’t really need to get into why this is insane, Orwellian, and farcical. But I’m going to anyway. The refusal to dawn down troops in Afghanistan, the continued threads against Iran, the expansion of the War on Terror Truth into Pakistan (using tactics at home in Pinochet’s Chile) and Somalia (while simultaneously cutting food aid), continuing Bush-era police state operations, defending Bush-era torturers while leaving the framework of their policies in place, attacking health care for working class Americans, offering no relief to unemployed workers while giving the bankers who caused the crisis whatever they want at the expense of you and me, and generally fiddling while Rome burns.
Yeah. Dude is really doing his bit to increase the peace.
Final Word: Democrats Are WORSE Than Republicans
Nick P at Black Sun Gazette
I know. You’re totally flabbergasted and think that I’ve gone off the deep end. Well, I haven’t. You’ve just stomached so much blue covered propaganda throughout your life that the title of this entry sounds insane. But I assure you that it is not. Once again, this isn’t a question of “playing radical” and trying to be the most arch. It is an important political question. I’m not advocating that people start voting Republican, nor am I endorsing their politics. What I am advocating is that people make a clear break with both corporate parties and stop pretending that one is the nicer face. It isn’t. Keeping progressive, radical, and working class forces chained to the Democrats is the main impediment to social progress in America.
Great power conflicts overhang G20 summit in Pittsburgh
As political leaders and central bankers gather for the Group of 20 summit of major economies, to be held today and Friday in Pittsburgh, they face the task of papering over increasingly open and embittered conflicts over policies to revive the world economy and prevent another financial disaster.
One year after the near-collapse of the global financial system, mutual pledges of multi-lateral coordination and rejection of protectionist policies proclaimed at last November’s G20 summit in Washington and the April summit in London are being overshadowed by divisions over economic policy. These differences correspond to the national interests of the ruling elites of the US, Europe and rising economic powers in Asia and Latin America—above all, China.
