FEINSTEIN

FEINSTEIN

 

 

Friends, Romans, countrymen, lend me your ears.

I have come to bury Caesar, not to praise her.

The evil that women & men do lives after them;

The good occurs when society is relieved of them & oft interrèd with their bones.

 

-      With full apologies to William Shakespeare 

 

 

By Gregg Wall (9-30-2023)

 

Senator Feinstein is gone now.  

 

At age 90, she was longest serving woman Senator and was groundbreaking only to the extent that she best exemplified what identity politics has come to mean in the United States, a dead end.  That is, women and minority officeholders who only serve donors, power, and themselves … rather than serve their disenfranchised women and minority constituents and advance their cause. 

 

Feinstein was not a tireless advocate for women, and hopefully, not even an aspirational symbol for American women.  But rather, was another icon of greed, worshipping power for power’s sake, using her office to enrich herself (being vested in stock trading, based upon her privileged perch), and a full-time supporter of America’s bankrupting war machine and deadly colonial empire.

 

Her thirty-year career in the Senate spanned the fall of the Soviet Union to, arguably, the fall of the United States, today (America’s national debt was just over $4 trillion in ’92, today it’s in excess of $36 trillion).  Like the Soviet Union, America has a gerontocracy problem.  And perhaps, due to her tenure, nobody stood for the collegial corruption in the Senate, the dry rot and decay of arcane rules & Senate norms that only serve the privileged & powerful (and are used to crush labor & the poor), quite like Senator Feinstein.  Even Republicans praise Feinstein, for she was one of them.

 

The canonization and hagiography have already begun, from the establishment, the transnational crime syndicate in the Senate, and the hacks and losers in America’s corporate MSM.  Absolutely deplorable.  And the more elites heap praise on a day trader, a warmonger, a queen of the surveillance state & the destruction of civil liberties, a senator that voted for Wall St bailouts…  that greedily snapped up campaign contributions from cartels, monopolies, Silicon Valley and Wall St… the more the establishment fully discredits & smears themselves. 

 

Their praise, the establishment’s praise, for a Senator so corrupt defines them, does it not?  Praise on Senators.  Praise on donors, multinationals, and their mouthpiece, the MSM. 

 

 

 

 

 

 

In the end, Feinstein, indeed, the Senate… have come to exemplify the very thing American revolutionaries and patriots fought against: the insolence and tyranny of an unresponsive government, despotic economic & government power in the hands of a very few, taxation (private & public) without representation, and the greatest evil under the sun, monopoly & untrammeled corporate power. 

 

Thomas Paine, American patriot, said it best: 

 

Every age and generation must be free to act for itself in all cases as the age and generations which preceded it.  The vanity and presumption of governing beyond the grave is the most ridiculous and insolent of all tyrannies.  Man has no property in man; neither has any generation a property in the generations which are to follow.  

 

Every generation is, and must be, competent to all the purposes which its occasions require.  It is the living, and not the dead, that are to be accommodated. 

 

And just as the dead should not rule over the living, neither should the ancient zombies in the Senate… several generations removed from America’s youngest voters… be allowed to rule indefinitely and to the complete detriment of the generations that follow.  The individuals in today’s Senate, the privileged & the powerful, have absolutely no clue as to what today’s younger generations of Americans face and will face.  And the majority of today’s Senators will not be around to see the outcome of their cancerous & malign rule. 

 

In parting, nothing quite defines Senator Feinstein like the arrogance, hubris, and insolence with which she told off a younger generation of women & girls, who merely asked the Senator to support a Green New Deal.  At the moment, these children, these young women are chained to the decision making of the senator from California, that now, rules from beyond the grave.  These young ladies & women are governed by a U.S. Senate that rule from the vantage point of greed & complete contempt for younger generations of Americans.  It is the Senate’s myopic vision, their support for monopolies, and dedication to the accumulation of wealth that has destroyed the nation. 

 

Nobody personifies that failure better than Feinstein.

 

 

Copyright JM Hamilton Publishing 2023

 

A License to Steal

A License to Steal

 

The state of California sued several of the world’s biggest oil companies on Friday, claiming their actions have caused tens of billions of dollars in damage and that they deceived the public by downplaying the risks posed by fossil fuels.

The civil case, filed in superior court in San Francisco, is the latest and most significant lawsuit to target oil, gas and coal companies over their role in causing climate change. It seeks creation of an abatement fund to pay for the future damages caused by climate related disasters in the state.

The lawsuit targets five companies: Exxon Mobil, Shell, BP, ConocoPhillips, and Chevron, which is headquartered in San Ramon, Calif. The American Petroleum Institute, an industry trade group based in Washington, is also listed as a defendant.

Seven other states and dozens of municipalities have filed similar lawsuits in recent years. But the California lawsuit immediately becomes one of the most significant legal challenges facing the fossil fuel industry.

 

-      California Sues Giant Oil Companies, Citing Decades of Deception, NY Times

 

By Gregg Wall (9-16-2023)

 

Vulgarian Peter Thiel once famously quipped, ‘Competition is for losers.’  However, what has become increasingly clear to the majority of North Americans is that cartels and monopolies are for thieves.  Per a recent Bloomberg piece, some 82% of Canadians believe greed is behind sky-high food prices.  The food industry in Canada is dominated by three major retailers, who are raking in record profits.  Canadians are also savvy enough to figure out that a suppressed Canadian dollar, held down by the Bank of Canada, maybe good for exporters and for multinationals repatriating foreign earnings (from say, fossil fuels); but a weakened CAD (Canadian dollar) does serious damage to Canadians’ purchasing power (particularly on food imports). 

 

And that isn’t the half of it.  The prices of essentials are through the roof throughout North America: food, fuel, housing, rents, and in the United States medicine and doctor visits.  Monopolies & Cartels not only damage consumers, they crush & squeeze labor, and do irreparable harm to ‘democratic’ governments (by buying out our elected officials and often unelected judges).  Some industries are so repugnant they commit serious loss of life, significant property damage, and egregious harm to the economy … here, I’m pointing directly at you, fossil fuels industry.  

 

This summer has been replete with an endless stream of news stories about record temperatures, burning forests, flood after flood, waves of human migration, and tremendous loss of life.  The link to all these events has come down to fossil fuels, the OPEC cartel, and the oil majors.  This nefarious cartel, Big Oil & Gas, with unprecedented pricing power, backed by Wall St banks (yet another nasty cartel with unprecedented power) & shadow banking… these cartels are directly responsible for trillions in damages to property, life, the economy, and the steady erosion of faith in democratic government.  And don’t forget wars.  The O&G industry’s link to rising gas & fuel prices, during wars sponsored & curated by the United States government, is indisputable.  

 

That’s why it was completely refreshing to read about the State of California’s lawsuit against the Oil & Gas majors in this morning’s news flow.  The stated aim of the litigation is to recover billions and billions in property losses and damages to the environment.  But why stop there?  What about litigation over the significant loss of life, damages to the economy, damages to democracy and sound government, as the JM Hamilton blog called for.  Politicians are now allegedly scrambling (or is it more foot dragging), in some instances, to tighten up competition language and antitrust wording.  

 

But why not use the laws already in place?  Where’s the criminal charges?  If we consider that one in five dies early, due to fossil fuels, why not arrest and prosecute entire boardrooms, C-suites, and politicians that accepted bribe money (ahem, campaign donations) from this industry?  (The WSJ just did another piece about how the industry has been lying since the 1950s, on the lethality of its products and the catastrophic damage its products cause to the environment.)  Does anybody, allegedly, in charge know what a lift that would give to democracy and the public to see the high and mighty brought low and cooling their heels in a prison cell?   All this is to say, sure tighten up antitrust and competition laws, if you must… but there are far simpler laws already in place, concerning murder and theft, that will do just fine.  The fact that politicians and prosecutors have done so very little, in this regard, speaks to the power the Oil & Gas industry holds over Western government, politicians, and judges.  It gives credence to the belief, increasingly prevalent, that so-called Western democracy is merely a front for oligarchy & multinationals, entirely captured, and politicians and heads of state merely run interference and stall on desperately needed reforms & justice (reforms & justice necessary to rein in cartels and monopolies). 

 

Remember, cartels & monopolies, concentrated economic power is a license to steal, from children, consumers, families, government, and labor.  And stealing, last I checked, is illegal. 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

And that was the other good news this week.  The UAW is taking on the auto majors, the auto cartel that has been stealing from labor for years.  The auto workers gave concession after concession to keep the big three automakers afloat, during the 2008 financial crisis.  Now, the UAW and union workers are just looking for long, long overdue payback.  

 

Which begs the question, why didn’t management preemptively step up to the plate and offer increased pay, benefits, and retirement pay?   Why is the solution, from billionaires, multimillionaires, and C-suite crime lords always antagonistic?  What’s with the layoffs, the plant closings, the threats to offshore yet more jobs?  Why hasn’t congress - or parliament - stepped up and created a floating tariff that immediately offsets any labor, regulatory, or tax arbitrage play executed upon by shipping yet more jobs & plants offshore?  That is to say, a tariff that immediately eliminates any and all incentives to crush North American workers.  To wit: Management & ownership can send another plant offshore, but any savings by exploiting foreign labor will be directly offset - dollar for dollar - by an increase in taxes. Why are such tariffs not already in place?  Why does it take a crisis to get governments to act?  Why is the presumption or government favoritism always in capital’s and management’s favor?   In favor of the failed neoliberal paradigm? 

 

Why? 

 

The verdict is in: CEOs are worthless (their exclusive value appears to be to manipulate stock prices), management is worthless… Wall St execs add no value, and as is increasingly apparent, the same can be said of the Congress of the United States.  They add no value.  They are overhead. 

 

That’s why it’s extremely important for all Americans to support labor during this strike because it’s abundantly clear that Western governments are entirely captured and operated solely for the benefit of cartels, monopolies, utilities, and the oligarchy that owns all. 

 

And what is concentrated economic power and monopolies, but a license to steal. 

 

Copyright JM Hamilton Publishing 2023

 

Alberta Oil & Gas’ Coup Against Renewable Energy

Alberta Oil & Gas’ Coup Against Renewable Energy

 

A clean energy think tank says Alberta's pause on approvals for new renewable energy projects is affecting 118 projects worth $33 billion of investment.

In a new report, the Pembina Institute says those projects would create enough jobs to keep 24,000 people working for a year.

It says those projects represent what could be $263 million in local taxes and leases for landowners in 27 municipalities.

-       Renewables pause in Alberta affecting 118 projects worth $33B, think tank says, CBC News

 

By Gregg Wall (9-2-2023)

 

It’s odd, downright strange.  

 

Alberta just held a provincial election, and the United Conservative Party (UCP) made no mention of their desire to harm investments, jobs, innovation, and the economy.  And yet, arguably, that’s exactly what Premier Smith & UCP did in early August when they announced the halting of renewable energy approvals for six months.  The natural reaction from investors, with billions on the line, was: we may look elsewhere (and take our jobs, boost to the economy, and tax revenue with us).

 

You might expect government intervention into the economy like this, perhaps from a progressive government, that sees the writing on the wall for fossil fuels.  Indeed, your humble author has called for the American & Canadian governments, on any number of occasions, to nationalize fossil fuels, wind down the industry, with the proceeds going to fund a green grid, reparations, remediation, and clean up.  With North America, indeed, the Northern hemisphere, presently in flames and suffering suffocating blast furnace heat, due to fossil fuels, such a proposal & government intervention makes perfect sense. 

 

And yet, this is, here in Alberta, a libertarian government.  UCP, so I’ve read, is all about free markets, the invisible hand, price discovery, and allowing innovation & jobs creation.  Supposedly, UCP is the party of limited government.  But apparently, there’s a clear departure between campaign rhetoric, libertarian theory, and reality.  And this is something we’ve see throughout Western governments, and particularly from centrists, corporatists, and neoliberals (aka libertarians) … the desire to protect donors & entrenched interests, the desire to crush opportunity & innovation (in the furtherance of a failed status quo).  And if consumers and labor suffer w/ sky high gas and utility prices, and fewer jobs, detrimental to the Alberta economy, that’s simply too damn bad.  If humanity suffers from a burning planet, toxic air, deadly heat, and diminished crop production, that too, is too bad. 

 

Alberta has a deadly fossil fuels industry to protect.  This coup, this hypocrisy, to be sure, is nothing short of catastrophic for Alberta & Canada.  It also tells us something about the fossil fuels industry, an industry that now takes in $7 trillion in direct & indirect subsidies, globally.  Namely, that the industry cannot compete against renewables, and so endless lobbying to shut renewables down.  (No few in number were recently patting themselves on the back that renewable energy received a trillion in investments.  Now, compare the trillion in investments to the seven trillion in welfare the fossil fuels industry receives.) 

 

At one time democracy was said to offer experimentation, innovation, and opportunity.  Governments might try greater social spending or a pivot back to free market principles, and these experiments were something other nations could look towards and learn from.  But Western governments, now controlled by multinationals & oligarchy, seem to have shut that down.  After all, what interest do centrist and corporatist politicians… reporting into bankers, billionaires, monopolies, & utilities… have in a departure from the status quo.  Particularly, when the failed status quo prints out billion and billions in quarterly returns.

 

It appears that libertarians and neoliberals have abandoned all the very principles that made capitalism worthwhile, in favor of greed, monopoly, and profit maximization.  Innovation, competition, price discovery (completely necessary for a free market economy), increased jobs and rising wages have all been abandoned for boardroom & C-suite dictators & despots…  setting captured gov policy, prices, and wages (w/ maniacal control).  And given these same boardrooms' & C-suites' quest for unlimited corporate socialism… including but not limited to, corporate welfare, bailouts, privatized profits – socialized costs and R&D, captured regulatory bodies, control & ownership of political duopolies & due process, free money welfare from central banks, etc, etc… what we are seeing throughout the West is the merger of corporate interests and the state.  

 

What many recognize as nothing less than fascism.  As for the people of Alberta, they’ll pay and pay for this type of crony capitalism & ultra-corrupt libertarian government.  Albertans will pay with lower wages, fewer jobs, grossly elevated prices at the pump & utility bills, a lower standard of living, and an economy that has lost out on investment, innovation, and opportunity.  The resulting drag on the economy will, of course, damage social cohesion and stress families.  

 

And democracy & society will further rend in two… which has, historically, been a key strategy of the highly corrupt, powerful, and wealthy.  Best to keep on eye on libertarians, best to watch both what they say and what they do.  

 

They are not to be trusted.

 

Copyright JM Hamilton Publishing 2023