Russia Accuses Obama Of Supporting Al Qaeda In Syria

Eric Zuesse

On May 4th, Russia’s Sputnik news agency headlined "Lavrov: US Tried to Include Al-Nusra Front Positions in 'Silent’ Period”, and reported that Russia’s Foreign Minister, Sergei Lavrov, speaking in Moscow about the lengthy negotiations between himself and U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry to agree on conditions for a Syrian ceasefire and peace talks to take place between Syria’s government and Syria’s rebels, said, "During the negotiations, our US partners actually tried to draw the borders of this ‘zone of silence’ to include a significant number of positions occupied by al-Nusra [Front]. We managed to exclude this as it is absolutely unacceptable.”

Al Qaeda in Syria calls itself “Al Nusra."

The “zone of silence” or “silent period” (and there are other phrases for it) refers to the areas in Syria that would be excluded from the ceasefire.

In other words: Lavrov was saying that whereas Russia’s President Putin refuses to stop military action in Syria to kill Syria’s Al Qaeda, America’s President Obama has been continuing, ever since the U.S.-Russian negotiations for a ceasefire in Syria started in January of this year, to insist that Russia must stop bombing those jihadists. Russia’s Foreign Minister was saying that Obama has been trying to protect Al Nusra.

Here is a chronological presentation of the reporting in the Western press, about U.S. President Obama’s efforts on behalf of Syria’s Al Qaeda (Al Nusra):

On 7 January 2016, Seymour Hersh reported in the London Review of Books,

Barack Obama’s repeated insistence that Bashar al-Assad must leave office – and that there are ‘moderate’ rebel groups in Syria capable of defeating him – has in recent years provoked quiet dissent, and even overt opposition, among some of the most senior officers on the Pentagon’s Joint Staff. Their criticism has focused on what they see as the administration’s fixation on Assad’s primary ally, Vladimir Putin. In their view, Obama is captive to Cold War thinking about Russia and China. ...

The military’s resistance dates back to the summer of 2013, when a highly classified assessment, put together by the Defense Intelligence Agency (DIA) and the Joint Chiefs of Staff, then led by General Martin Dempsey, forecast that the fall of the Assad regime would lead to chaos and, potentially, to Syria’s takeover by jihadi extremists, much as was then happening in Libya. …

Lieutenant General Michael Flynn, director of the DIA between 2012 and 2014, confirmed that his agency had sent a constant stream of classified warnings to the civilian leadership about the dire consequences of toppling Assad. The jihadists, he said, were in control of the opposition. ...

On 20 January 2016, the AP headlined "Kerry, Lavrov try to settle differences over Syrian talks”, and reported,

Differences over which Syrian opposition groups should be labeled terrorists and barred from the negotiations and the ceasefire have led to concerns that the talks may have to be postponed. Russia and Iran, which back Assad, have immense differences with Saudi Arabia, other Arab states, the United States and Europe over which opposition groups should be considered terrorists and therefore excluded.

On 12 February 2016, the New York Times bannered, "In Syria, Skepticism That Cease-Fire Will Stop Fighting”, and reported that,

With the proviso that the Nusra Front, Al Qaeda’s branch in Syria, can still be bombed, Russia puts the United States in a difficult position; the insurgent groups it [i.e., the U.S.] supports cooperate in some places with the well-armed, well-financed Nusra in what they [i.e., the U.S. government] say is a tactical alliance of necessity [with Nusra] against [Syrian] government forces. So Russia can argue that many of them [by which the NYT journalist refers to anti-Assad fighters] are, in effect, Nusra affiliates.

On 16 February 2016, independent journalist Gareth Porter headlined "Obama’s ‘Moderate’ Syrian Deception”, and reported that,

Information from a wide range of sources, including some of those the United States has been explicitly supporting, makes it clear that every armed anti-Assad organization unit in those provinces is engaged in a military structure controlled by Nusra militants. All of these rebel groups fight alongside the Nusra Front and coordinate their military activities with it.

That reporter, unlike some others, assumes that Obama’s support of Syria’s Al Qaeda is due to Obama’s weakness in adhering to the desires of haters of Russia, both in the U.S. and among America’s allies abroad:

President Obama is under pressure from these domestic critics as well as from Turkey, Saudi Arabia and other GCC allies to oppose any gains by the Russians and the Assad regime as a loss for the United States.

Mr. Porter presents no evidence backing up his assumption that President Obama is reluctant to adhere to this obsession against Russia. Seymour Hersh had reported, in his 7 January 2016 LRB report, facts that contradict Mr. Porter’s assumption:

General Dempsey and his colleagues on the Joint Chiefs of Staff kept their dissent out of bureaucratic channels, and survived in office. General Michael Flynn did not. ‘Flynn incurred the wrath of the White House by insisting on telling the truth about Syria,’ said Patrick Lang, a retired army colonel who served for nearly a decade as the chief Middle East civilian intelligence officer for the DIA. ‘He thought truth was the best thing and they shoved him out.’

In other words: Despite the opposition by the Joint Chiefs of Staff, Obama was determined to help Nusra replace the Assad government. Despite what Mr. Porter assumed, Barack Obama was not a weak President, but instead a very determined President, a President who fired people in his Administration who advised him against continuing his attempt to replace al-Assad by al-Nusra. Russia insisted on bombing them, and reluctantly — and in fits and starts — U.S. President Obama accepted Russia’s condition.

—

On 19 February 2016, the Washington Post bannered "U.S., Russia hold Syria cease-fire talks as deadline passes without action”, and reported that,

Russia was said to have rejected a U.S. proposal to leave Jabhat al-Nusra off-limits to bombing as part of a cease-fire.

That report even included an indication that President Obama’s current Secretary of Defense, Ashton Carter, who started his job on 17 February 2015, after the war against Syria was already well under way and Obama had replaced the people on his team who were opposed to it, is, if anything, even more obsessive against Russia than Obama himself is:

Defense Secretary Ashton B. Carter was said to have opposed the high-level contact with the Russians, at least initially.

In other words: when Obama replaced Chuck Hagel by Ashton Carter, he was replacing someone whom he held to be insufficiently anti-Russian, by a person, Carter, who is so extremely hostile toward Russians, as to have since been restrained by Obama from pursuing this hostility as forcefully as he wishes to. The only Cabinet member mentioned there as having persuaded Obama not to follow Carter’s more aggressive stance against Russia was Obama’s second-term Secretary of State, John Kerry.

On 20 February 2016, Reuters headlined "Syrian opposition says temporary truce possible, but deal seems far off”, and, under the sub-head “Nusra Front in Spotlight," reported that,

A source close to peace talks earlier told Reuters Syria's opposition had agreed to the idea of a two- to three-week truce.
The truce would be renewable and supported by all parties except Islamic State, the source said.
It would be conditional on the al Qaeda-linked Nusra Front no longer being attacked by Syrian government forces and their allies.

Of course, “Syria’s opposition” there included the United States; and so the U.S. President was, at that time, still insisting upon rejecting the Russian President’s demand that Nusra be included in the “zone of silence,” the locations where the war would continue uninterrupted during the otherwise-ceasefire.

That report went on:

The spokesman for Russian President Vladimir Putin, Dmitry Peskov, said on Saturday: "Russia is sticking to its consistent policy of rendering assistance and aid to the armed forces of Syria in their offensive actions against terrorists and against terrorist organisations."
The source close to peace talks described the opposition's insistence on the Nusra Front no longer being targeted as "the elephant in the room".

Obama, like King Saud, Emir Thani, Tayyip Erdogan, and the other enemies of Russia, still stood firm that Nusra not be destroyed.

Therefore, the issue of whether Putin would be allowed to continue bombing Nusra was a heavy topic of disagreement between Obama's pro-al-Qaeda-in-Syria alliance, versus Putin’s anti-al-Qaeda-in-Syria alliance.

Seymour Hersh’s 7 January 2016 LRB article concluded:

Obama now has a more compliant Pentagon. There will be no more indirect challenges from the military leadership to his policy of disdain for Assad and support for Erdoğan. Dempsey and his associates remain mystified by Obama’s continued public defence of Erdoğan, given the American intelligence community’s strong case against him – and the evidence that Obama, in private, accepts that case.

Even though Obama accepts the case that Turkey’s leader, Erdoğan, is a dangerous man to be allied with, Obama moves forward with what is perhaps the most rabidly hostile toward Russia U.S. Administration ever. And this is after the USSR, and its NATO-mirror organization, the Warsaw Pact, were terminated by Russia in 1991, and after Al Qaeda perpetrated not only 9/11 but many other terrorist attacks, not only in the U.S., but in many of America’s allied countries — not to mention in Russia itself.

Furthermore, Seymour Hersh, in his 4 April 2014 article in LRB, “The Red Line and the Rat Line”, said that,

The full extent of US co-operation with Turkey, Saudi Arabia and Qatar in assisting the rebel opposition in Syria has yet to come to light. The Obama administration has never publicly admitted to its role in creating what the CIA calls a ‘rat line’, a back channel highway [of weapons from Gaddafi’s stockpiles in Libya] into Syria. The rat line, authorised in early 2012, was used to funnel weapons and ammunition from Libya via southern Turkey and across the Syrian border to the opposition. Many of those in Syria who ultimately received the weapons were jihadists, some of them affiliated with al-Qaida.

And, even prior to that, on 7 October 2013, Christof Lehmann at his site nsnbc.me, headlined “Top US and Saudi Officials responsible for Chemical Weapons in Syria”, and opened by summarizing:

Evidence leads directly to the White House, the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff Martin Dempsey, CIA Director John Brennan, Saudi Intelligence Chief Prince Bandar, and Saudi Arabia´s Interior Ministry.

He said that, regarding the 21 August 2013 sarin gas attack, which Obama claims crossed his “red line” to launch an invasion of Syria to overthrow Assad, and which Hersh and others report to have been based actually on Obama’s and his allies’ “Rat Line” of weapons from Libya into Syria, the initial decision was made by the Saudi agent in Syria, Zahran Alloush:

The final decision, made by Zahran Alloush may in fact have been predetermined together with his U.S. – Saudi liaison officers.
Launching a chemical weapons attack would allow the USA, UK and France, to call for military strikes against Syria and to turn the tide.

Zahran Alloush was killed by a Russian missile on Christmas Day 2015, and his nephew and close associate Mohammed Alloush was chosen by King Salman al-Saud (actually by his son Prince Salman al-Saud) to lead the Syrian opposition in the peace talks on the Syrian war. Zahran Alloush, like the Saud family, favored extermination of Shiites (including Assad), and so does Mohammed Alloush, which (besides the Alloushes’ support of foreign jihad generally) is perhaps the main reason why the Sauds had selected him to lead the U.S.-Saudi-Qatari-Turkish side in these peace negotiations against Syria. However, the Alloushes also greatly admire Osama bin Laden, who founded Al Qaeda; and, so, in total, there can be little if any doubt that what Lavrov was reported on May 4th to have said about Obama’s support for Syria’s Al Qaeda makes sense, even though Obama himself had arranged for bin Laden to be killed.

It seems that, at least after Obama’s success at killing off many of Al Qaeda’s leaders, he is determined to support Al Qaeda’s original jihad, which had been against the Soviet Union, and which continues now against Russia and its ally Assad. Obama therefore protects, and helps to arm, Al Qaeda in Syria, so as to eliminate, if possible, yet another ally of Russia (after Saddam Hussein, Muammar Gaddafi, and Viktor Yanukovych): this time Bashar al-Assad.

Whereas the U.S. and its allies will not likely affirm what Lavrov said, the facts do — even some that have been reported in the Western press — not only in non-Western media.

The Danger Of Fascism In The United States

John Scales Avery

The Indiana primary election, which took place on the 3rd of May, 2016, produced two results, one of which was hopeful, and the other, profoundly worrying. Bernie Saunders wakened hopes for restoration of democracy in the US with a resounding win over the political oligarchy's candidate, Hillary Clinton. The other result gave rise to fears of fascism. Donald Trump won the Republican primary by a large majority. Ted Cruz dropped out of the race, and the Republican leadership declared Trump to be their party's presidential candidate.

There is a real danger that Donald Trump, who is not only xenophobic. racist and hatemongering, but also misogynistic, wildly erratic and manifestly unqualified for the post, could be elected to the US Presidency in November. It could happen in the following way. If the Democratic Party's establishment succeeds in making Hillary Clinton their candidate, young voters and independents could become disillusioned. Without their support Hillary could lose to Trump.

By contrast, every recent public opinion poll shows that Bernie Sanders, the idealist and reformer, would win massively in a presidential race with Trump.

http://sourceplanet.net/politics/trump-vs-sanders-sanders-wins-in-every-poll/

It is impossible to listen to Donald Trump's speeches without being reminded of the fascist dictators who took control of Europe in the 1930's. His rhetoric is especially similar to that of Mussolini, who promised to “make Italy great again”, just as it was under the Roman Empire. In my opinion, it is correct to call Trump a fascist.

One wonders, however, whether Hillary Clinton might not also be called a fascist. She is in favor of the attempted US domination of the world through military force, and she is in favor of the US corporate oligarchy. Perhaps choosing between Hillary and Donald is like choosing which form of cancer is better for you.

In the 1930's, when Hitler, Mussolini and Franco came to power in Europe, they did so against the background of serious economic stress which made voters desperate to find leaders who promised salvation. Today too, economic stress forms the background for a drift towards fascism. This is not only true in the United States, but also in Europe, where an influx of refugees from war and climate change has produced xenophobia and racism.

Just as the rise of fascism in Europe in the 1930's led to an all-destroying world war, so too today the threat of fascism is also a threat that all that we love will perish in a catastrophic global war, which today would be a thermonuclear inferno. We all have a responsibility to work with dedication to avoid this threat. One of the most important things that we can do is to support the campaign of Bernie Sanders in every way possible, by financial contributions, social media posts, articles in the alternative media, telephone calls, conversations with friends, lobbying of superdeligates, and every other way that we can think of.

The threat of fascism is real. We must join hands and work with courage and dedication to avoid it.

Fiasco In Lebanon: 60 Minutes, Privilege And Exploitation

Binoy Kampmark

“The actions of a desperate mother are one thing; the extraordinary lapse in judgment and ethics of a crew of seasoned journalists getting involved in an international kidnapping scheme is another entirely.”
Ruby Hamad, The Age, Apr 17, 2016

Spittle-flecked journalism is something of a curse, an enterprise that muddies the fine lines between chasing a story and creating it. And the Nine Network of Australia, with its own variant of 60 Minutes, is certainly of such inspiration, drawing its strength from the margins of investigative journalism and assuming a role in influencing events.

Ambulance chasing newscasters are the true parasites of the media scene, incapable of describing events they would rather invent, if not influence. They feed on the flesh of vulnerable causes and bolster the confidence of those they effectively groom. The instance of an Australian mother, Sally Faulkner, desperate to recover her children who were taken to Lebanon by their father, Ali Elamine, provided a spectacular instance of this principle at play. It involved another travesty of the international relationship scene. Boy meets girl; children issue; children are taken by one parent after a ruse and made inaccessible.

In this case, a virtual counter-abduction was being suggested, with the spear carrier being former Australian soldier Adam Whittington from Child Abduction Recovery International. A desperate mother had sought other avenues to attain her goal, having made a public plea in November to the Australian foreign minister Julie Bishop to assist in recovering her children. A media outlet volunteered the financial ammunition and some logistical backing. The result was a bag of deception, stupidity and farce.

Faulkner, in her effort to broader the appeal of the operation, suggested that it was far more than a child abduction case. Her plight was an international one, a global problem of injustice. “It’s not just about me and my children, there are hundreds and hundreds of families this has happened to.” Faulkner was certainly right about one thing: states not signatory to the Hague Convention stipulating that children be returned to their “country of habitual residence” make that nigh impossible.

The hawks, in their desperation to grab the scoop, botched the operation. Footage of the event shows a vain effort by what was subsequently reported by Lebanese media as three gunmen who snatched the two children off a Beirut street in the area of al-Hadath south of the city. The children seem to be in the company of their paternal grandmother. As she subsequently noted, “The man came down and hit me on the head with something and I was a little dizzy.”

Police immediately pounced. The mother and the entire “news” crew, including Tara Brown, producer Stephen Rice and a cameraman, ended up being detained. They spent some richly deserved time in custody, with some suggestion that they might spend an even longer time for their errors of judgment. Unfortunately for the world of genuine and credible journalism, Brown and her crew were permitted to return to Australia.

Brown’s initial justification was that the crew had been engaged in a humanitarian mission. Even on her return, an unrepentant Brown could insist with a deluded determination that, “We’re journalists, we’re doing our jobs.” Both observations must be seriously contested.

Critics saw another ploy at work, one of selfishness, self-assumption and privilege. Ruby Hamad, writing in The Age (Apr 17), summed it up best: “While it seems incredible that a major news organisation could be so irresponsible as to film a serious crime taking place, that they allegedly agreed to participate in a kidnapping to be later spun as a heroic deed simultaneously shows the heights – and limits – of white, Western privilege.”

The consequences of this failure have been incalculable, though Elamine, the Lebanese father, is certainly making a good fist of it, asking for a further $US500,000 in addition to what already offered. Elamine felt emboldened, making his estranged wife sign away custodial rights. He has also taken to the propaganda front himself, posting images of his daughter, Lahela, 5, and son Noah, 3, on Facebook in response to Faulkner’s own pictorial efforts to win sympathy.

As for Whittington, abandonment has ensued. Having portrayed himself as a dedicated saint for the cause of family, he has also found himself the refuse of a journalistic stunt gone wrong. “I’m shocked (Nine) treated me in a selfish way, they didn’t care about me, they know I have a family to take care of.”

It would seem the producers of the program cannot help themselves, taking sides in a family dispute that has been opportunistically moralised. On April 27, it surfaced that another “child recovery” story produced but not yet aired was in the assembly line, dealing with a mother who successfully took her child out of Turkey. “It’s a completely different situation,” claimed a spokeswoman from the network. “There’s nothing similar.” As such a program shows, journalism can itself become the hideous story, inadvertently justifying the supposed monstrosities it is attempting to avert.

NATO on Trade, in Europe and Asia, is Doomed

Pepe Escobar

The President of the United States (POTUS) is desperate. Exhibit A: His Op-Ed defending the Asian face – the Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP) – of a wide-ranging, twin-headed NATO-on-trade “pivoting”.

The European face is of course the Transatlantic Trade and Investment Partnership (TTIP).

POTUS frames TPP – as well as TTIP – in terms of a benign expansion of US exports, and private (US) firms having “a fair shot at competing against state-owned enterprises.” “Fair”? Not really. Let’s see how the mechanism works, focusing on TPP’s European twin.

With impeccable timing, almost simultaneously to Obama’s Op-Ed, Greenpeace Netherlands leaked 248 pages of classified TTIP documents that were to be re-discussed last week by negotiators in New York. There have been no less than 13 rounds of TTIP negotiations so far, over nearly three years.

The documents – negotiated in total secrecy since 2013 – represent roughly two-thirds of the latest negotiating text. An array of detailed studies, like this one, had been warning about the state of play. The veil of secrecy ended up being the ultimate giveaway to TTIP’s toxicity. Before the Greenpeace Netherlands leak, EU elected representatives could only examine these documents under a police watch, in a secure room, without access to experts, and on top of it they could not discuss the content with anyone else.

I will crush you with my GMOs

Everything civil society across Europe – for at least three years – has been debating, and fearing, is confirmed; this is a sophisticated, toxic US-led corporate racket, a concerted assault across the spectrum, from the environment and animal welfare to labor rights and internet privacy. In a nutshell; it’s all about the US corporate galaxy pushing the EU to lower – or abase – a range of consumer protections.

Hardball, predictably, is the name of the game. Washington no less than threatened to block EU car exports to force the EU to buy genetically engineered fruits and vegetables. In my travels in France, Italy and Spain over the past two years, I confirmed this to be the ultimate nightmare expressed by practitioners of top-end artisanal agriculture.

Predictably, the lobbyist-infested European Commission (EC) fiercely defends TTIP, stressing it could benefit the EU’s economy by $150 billion a year, and raise car exports by 149 percent. Obviously don’t expect the EC to connect these “car exports” to a US-led GMO invasion of Europe.

At least some nations have finally woken up from their (corporate lobbyist-induced) slumber. The French Minister for Foreign Trade, Matthias Fekl, said negotiations over a “bad deal” should stop. He went straight to the point, blaming Washington’s intransigence; “There cannot be an agreement without France and much less against France.”

Perennially ineffectual President Francois Hollande, for his part, has threatened to block the deal altogether. Three years ago Paris had already secured an exemption for the French film industry not to be gobbled up by Hollywood. Now it’s also about the crucial agriculture front. Hollande said he would never accept “the undermining of the essential principles of our agriculture, our culture, of mutual access to public markets.”

And what is the EC – leading the negotiations on behalf of the EU – doing? Pulling its predictable Trojan horse act; these are all “alarmist headlines” and “a storm in a teacup”. Puzzled EU citizens, en masse, may question if this is really the way for the EC – a bureaucratic Brussels behemoth – to supposedly defend the rights of EU consumers. Yet, infiltrated as it is by corporate lobbyism, the EC simply can’t protect the EU’s environmental and health standards, much more sophisticated than the US’s, from a corporate America bent on meddling with the content of EU laws all along the regulatory line.

I got an offer you can’t refuse

POTUS was heavily campaigning for TTIP last month in Germany. POTUS still hopes he may have a deal in the bag before he leaves office in January 2017. White House spokesman Josh Earnest has tried to put on a brave face, saying the leaks will not have a “material impact” on the negotiations. Wrong; they will – as they are mobilizing public opinion all across the EU.

David Cameron, in the UK, is also in a bind. He’s fiercely pro-TTIP. But Obama has already warned; this means Brexit is a no-no. Club Med nations, for their part, are leaning against. All 28 EU member nations – plus the European Parliament – would have to ratify TTIP if a deal is eventually reached.

TPP, for its part, has been negotiated. But it has not been approved by the US Congress (nor by Pacific nations). The approval process has gone nowhere. In fact it will be up to either Hillary Clinton or Donald Trump. Trump arguably is oblivious to TPP’s details; but considering the deal is being heavily championed by Obama, Trump may go against it.

A case can be made that both TPP and TTIP vow to distort markets, in Europe and Asia; prop up (US) monopolies; transfer jobs to slave labor markets (in the case of parts of Asia); trample on intellectual property rights (in the case of the EU); facilitate tax evasion; and ultimately transfer more wealth from the many to the 0.00001 percent.

And this leads us to how Hillary Clinton – the Wall Street/US establishment candidate – views both TPP and TTIP. Well, she supported both NAFTA and CAFTA, approved under Bill Clinton in the 1990s. As Secretary of State, she lobbied for the Panama trade deal. And, crucially, she has always treated the TPP as the “gold standard”. No wonder; this is the trade arm of the “pivoting to Asia” she’s been so fond of – a Pacific trade deal that excludes China, which happens to be the top trade partner of most Asian nations.

Moreover, those by now famous Goldman Sachs speeches are increasingly being seen as payments for services rendered (and promised) by Hillary Clinton to the 0,0001 percent, who are, of course, in favor of global corporate America expansion.

Yet it ain’t over till the November ballot sings. Hillary now faces serious scrutiny by working class voters in the US. So no wonder, in another flip-flopping masterpiece, she’s now leaning towards describing herself as opposing both TPP and TTIP.

Still, TPP at least may be approved during the post-election ‘lame-duck’ session of the US Congress. As for TTIP, it’s now mired in Walking Dead zone. Talk about what it takes for the Obama administration to imprint its trade “legacy” in the history books; to keep blackmailing Europeans and Asians alike as if it was just a lowly Mob extortion racket.

Poverty in America: the Deepening Crisis

David Rosen

Bernie Sanders has put inequality at the center of the 2016 presidential elections.  However much the corporate media attempt to turn the election into a personality contest between Clinton and Trump, inequality will not go away as the defining domestic election issue.  Whoever are the two major party presidential candidates, they will have to address the deepening problem of inequality.

The Occupy insurgency of 2011 put inequality onto the American political agenda, redefining class struggle in terms everyone could understand – the 1% versus the rest of us.  Sadly, only one major political campaign has followed — the push for a $15 minimum wage – and it has been fought by grassroots campaigns at the local and state levels by labor unions, NGOs, community groups and ordinary workers.

The concept of inequality, of the 1% vs the 99%, is a powerful metaphor that makes clear the structure of wealth and power defining American life today.  Sadly, while framing the problem confronting the nation, the concept of inequality doesn’t delineate the forms of economic, political and moral tyranny impacting the lives of an increasing number of Americans.  To illuminate the deepening crisis the U.S. is undergoing as capitalism restructures its useful to reframe the notion of inequality in terms of poverty.

Often forgotten, a half-century ago Michael Harrington published The Other America: Poverty in the United States (1962) that helped put poverty at the center of the national political agenda.  In his first State of the Union address following Pres. John Kennedy’s assassination, in January 1964, Pres. Lyndon Johnson called for an “unconditional war on poverty.”  He appointed Sargent Shriver, JFK’s brother-in-law and director of the Peace Corps, to lead the campaign.

Harrington called for a campaign to fight the systemic “culture of poverty,” the underlying racism and inequality, that institutionalized poverty.  Unfortunately, the Johnson administration adopted a more band-aid policy, targeting direct aid to those it identified as the most needy.  Nevertheless, over the following two decades, these efforts helped reduced by half the official level of poverty in America.  However, those days are long gone.

Poverty is a form of social powerlessness.  The poorer you are, the weaker you are, the harder your life; everything is about survival.  Poverty can be analyzed in two complementary ways – who and where.  By “who,” poverty refers to people based on their gender, race and age; by “where,” poverty refers to the location it is experienced, whether in cities, suburbs or rural areas as well as different parts of the country.  Both who and where are relative concepts reflecting the social structure of inequality.

* * *

Poverty is an endemic feature of American capitalism.  As tracked by the Census Bureau in a September 2015 study, “Income and Poverty in the United States: 2014,” the U.S. has witnessed 11 periods of “recession” over the last half-century, including: 1948-1949, 1953-1954, 1957-1958, 1960-1961, 1969-1979, 1973-1975, 1980, 1981-1982, 1990-1991, 2001 and 2007-2009.  One consequence of the capitalist boom-bust cycle is repeated upswings in the poverty rate.  According to researchers at the University of Michigan, the poverty rate hit 22 percent in the late-1950s, involving nearly 40 million Americans. The rate peaked in 1959, hiting 22.4 percent, the highest in the post-WW-II era.

The same year that Pres. Nixon took the U.S. off the gold standard, 1973, the poverty rate hit its lowest level over the last half-century – 11.1 percent, involving 23 million people.  Like a rollercoaster, the poverty rate increased to 15.2 percent in 1983, then fell to 11.3 percent in 2000, jumped to 15.1 percent in 2010 and has now flattened out at 14.8 percent.  In 1964, when Pres. Johnson called for a “war on poverty,” the rate was 19 percent.  Has the 15 percent poverty rate become the new normal?  Does this mean that a 0 percent poverty rate is no longer conceivable?

In 2014 median household income was 6.5 percent lower than in 2007, the year before the Great Recession hit.  In ‘14, the median household income was $53,657, unchanged from 2013; median household income peaked in 1999 at $57,843.  The U.S. economy has stagnated in the wake of the Great Recession of 2007-2009 and income for a majority of Americas (57.1%) was flat during the period of 2009-2012.

In ’14, the poverty threshold was $24,000 and between 2009 and 2012, more than one third of the population (34.5%) suffered, in the Census Bureau’s word, “at least one spell of poverty lasting at least 2 or more months.”

So, which Americans suffer poverty the most and where do they reside?  According to the Census Bureau, in 2014 Asian households had the highest median income of $74,297; non-Hispanic white households was $60,256; African-American household income was $35,398; and Hispanic household median income was $42,491.

In terms of geographic location, households in the Northeast had the highest median household at $59,210 and the West at the $57,688; those with the lowest were in the Midwest at $54,267 and the South at $49,655.  Households within metropolitan areas but outside principal cities had the highest median income at $61,600, while households outside metropolitan areas had the lowest income at $45,482.

Sadly, full-time workingwomen earn about four-fifths (79%) of wages earned by male workers and nearly one third (30.6%) of female-headed households were in poverty; male workers are earning 2.2 percent less in 2014 than in 2007.  Most disturbing, in 2014 the poverty rate for children under 18 was 21.1 percent, while the rate for those aged 18 to 64 was 13.5 percent and the rate for people aged 65 and older was 10.0 percent.

The Census Bureau notes as an aside, “The official poverty thresholds developed more than 50 years ago do not take into account rising standards of living or such things as childcare expenses, other work-related expenses, variations in medical costs across population groups, or geographic differences in the cost of living.”  If such factors were included, poverty in the U.S. would be far worse.

* * *

Capitalism is a system of plunder and those who suffer most are the poorest, the weakest, those least capable of defending themselves.  The few safeguards against domestic plunder that have emerged over the last century of reformism, be it government safety nets, union organizing or nonprofit programs, never fully protect those most vulnerable from the tyranny of wealth and power that determines American life.

The poor pay dearly for their poverty.  Most troubling, their lives are insecure, a constant struggle not simply to make ends meet but to live day-to-day.  Little can be taken for granted, whether a job, a home or one’s health.  Education is a luxury; obesity a common condition; drug use – and overdoses – a way to blunt the pain; suicide increasingly is a way out; and mortality rate for the poor are on the rise.

Poverty in America continues to be a hidden crisis, at once widespread, deepening and evermore painful.  In 1964, Pres. Johnson called for a “war on poverty” and now, a half-century later, one can only hope that Mrs. Clinton — if she wins in the November beauty contest — will champion a 21^st century “war on poverty,” but one that addresses what Harrington identified as the systemic “culture of poverty,” the underlying racism and inequality that institutionalizes poverty.

Somnolent Europe, Russia, and China

Paul Craig Roberts

In September 19, 2000, going on 16 years ago, Ambrose Evans-Pritchard of the London Telegraph reported:

“Declassified American government documents show that the US intelligence community ran a campaign in the Fifties and Sixties to build momentum for a united Europe. It funded and directed the European federalist movement.

“The documents confirm suspicions voiced at the time that America was working aggressively behind the scenes to push Britain into a European state. One memorandum, dated July 26, 1950, gives instructions for a campaign to promote a fully fledged European parliament. It is signed by Gen. William J. Donovan, head of the American wartime Office of Strategic Services, precursor of the CIA.”

The documents show that the European Union was a creature of the CIA.

As I have previously written, Washington believes that it is easier to control one government, the EU, than to control many separate European governments.  As Washington has a long term investment in orchestrating the European Union, Washington is totally opposed to any country exiting the arrangement.  That is why President Obama recently went to London to tell his lapdog, the British Prime Minister, that there could be no British exit.

Like other European nations, the British people were never allowed to vote on whether they were in favor of their country ceasing to exist and them becoming Europeans. British history would become the history of a bygone people like the Romans and Babylonians.

The oppressive nature of unaccountable EU laws and regulations and the EU requirement to accept massive numbers of third world immigrants have created a popular demand for a British vote on whether to remain a sovereign country or to dissolve and submit to Brussels and its dictatorial edicts.  The vote is scheduled for June 23.

Washington’s position is that the British people must not be permitted to decide against the EU, because such a decision is not in Washington’s interest.

The prime minister’s job is to scare the British people with alleged dire consequences of “going it alone.”  The claim is that “little England” cannot stand alone.  The British people are being told that isolation will spell their end, and their country will become a backwater bypassed by progress.  Everything great will happen elsewhere, and they will be left out.

If the fear campaign does not succeed and the British vote to exit the EU, the open question is whether Washington will permit the British government to accept the democratic outcome.

Alternatively, the British government will deceive the British people, as it routinely does, and declare that Britain has negotiated concessions from Brussels that dispose of the problems that concern the British people.

Washington’s position shows that Washington is a firm believer that only Washington’s interests are important.  If other peoples wish to retain national sovereignty, they are simply being selfish.

Moreover, they are out of compliance with Washington, which means they can be declared a “threat to American national security.” The British people are not to be permitted to make decisions that do not comply with Washington’s interest. My prediction is that the British people will either be deceived or overridden.

It is Washington’s self-centeredness, the self-absorption, the extraordinary hubris and arrogance, that explains the orchestrated “Russian threat.” Russia has not presented herself to the West as a military threat.  Yet, Washington is confronting Russia with a US/NATO naval buildup in the Black Sea, a naval, troop and tank buildup in the Baltics and Poland, missile bases on Russia’s borders, and plans to incorporate the former Russian provinces of Georgia and Ukraine in US defense pacts against Russia.

When Washington, its generals and European vassals declare Russia to be a threat, they mean that Russia has an independent foreign policy and acts in her own interest rather than in Washington’s interest.  Russia is a threat, because Russia demonstrated the capability of blocking Washington’s intended invasion of Syria and bombing of Iran.  Russia blunted one purpose of Washington’s coup in the Ukraine by peacefully and democratically reuniting with Crimera, the site of Russia’s Black Sea naval base and a Russian province for several centuries.

Perhaps you have wondered how it was possible for small countries such as Iraq, Libya, Syria, Yeman, and Venezuela to be threats to the US superpower.  On its face Washington’s claim is absurd.  Do US presidents, Pentagon officials, national security advisors, and chairmen of the Joint Chiefs of Staff really regard countries of so little capability as military threats to the United States and NATO countries?

No, they do not.  The countries were declared threats, because they have, or had prior to their destruction, independent foreign and economic policies.  Their policy independence means that they do not or did not accept US hegemony. They were attacked in order to bring them under US hegemony.

In Washington’s view, any country with an independent policy is outside Washington’s umbrella and, therefore, is a threat.

Venezuela became, in the words of US President Obama, an “unusual and extraordinary threat to the national security and foreign policy of the United States,” necessitating a “national emergency” to contain the “Venezuelan threat” when the Venezuelan government put the interests of the Venezuelan people above those of American corporations.

Russia became a threat when the Russian government demonstrated the ability to block Washington’s intended military attacks on Syria and Iran and when Washington’s coup in the Ukraine failed to deliver to Washington the Russian Black Sea naval base.

Clearly Venezuela cannot possibly pose a military threat to the US, so Venezuela cannot possibly pose an “unusual and extraordinary threat to the national security of the US.”  Venezuela is a “threat” because the Venezuelan government does not comply with Washington’s orders.

It is absolutely certain that Russia has made no threats whatsoever against the Baltics, Poland, Romania, Europe, or the United States.  It is absolutely certain that Russia has not invaded the Ukraine.  How do we know?  If Russia had invaded Ukraine, the Ukraine would no longer be there. It would again be a Russian province where until 20 years ago Ukraine resided for centuries, for longer than the US has existed. Indeed, the Ukraine belongs in Russia more than Hawaii and the deracinated southern states belong in the US.

Yet, these fantastic lies from the highest ranks of the US government, from NATO, from Washington’s British lackeys, from the bought-and-paid-for Western media, and from the bought-and-paid-for EU are repeated endlessly as if they are God’s revealed truth.

Syria still exists because it is under Russian protection.  That is the only reason Syria still exists, and it is also another reason that Washington wants Russia out of the way.

Do Russia and China realize their extreme danger?  I don’t think even Iran realizes its ongoing danger despite its close call.

If Russia and China realize their danger, would the Russian government permite one-fifth of its media to be foreign owned?  Does Russia understand that “foreign owned” means CIA owned?

If not, why not?  If so, why does the Russian government permit its own destabilization at the hands of Washington’s intelligence service?

China is even more careless.  There are 7,000 US-funded NGOs.  Only last month did the Chinese government finally move, very belatedly, to put some restrictions on these foreign agents who are working to destabilize China.  The members of these treasonous organizations have not been arrested.  They have merely been put under police watch, an almost useless restriction as Washington can provide endless money with which to bribe the Chinese police.

Why do Russia and China think that their police are less susceptible to bribes than Mexico’s or American police?  Despite the multi-decade “war on drugs,” the drug flow from Mexico to the US is unimpeded.  Indeed, the police forces of both countries have a huge interest in the “war on drugs” as the war brings them riches in the form of bribes. Indeed, as the crucified reporter for the San Jose Mercury News newspaper proved many years ago, the CIA itself is in the drug-running business. (See Whiteout: the CIA, Drugs and the Press by Alexander Cockburn and Jeffrey St. Clair)

In the United States truth-tellers are persecuted and imprisoned, or they are dismissed as “conspiracy theorists,” “anti-semites,” and “domestic extremists.”  The entire Western World consists of a dystopia far worse than the one described by George Orwell in his famous book, 1984.

That Russia and China permit Washington to operate in their media, in their universities, in their financial system, and in “do-good” NGOs that infiltrate every aspect of their societies demonstrates that both governments have no interest in their survival as independent states. They are too scared of being called “authoritarian” by the Western presstitute media to protect their own independence.

My prediction is that Russia and China will soon be confronted with an unwelcome decision: accept American hegemony or go to war.

Hillary Clinton and the End of the Democratic Party

Rob Urie

Friends with Benefits

Liberal incredulity at Charles Koch’s (Koch Bros.) recent (soft)endorsement of Hillary Clinton — assertions that is was either a non-sequitur or a ploy to discredit her, was to dismiss the endorsement without answering the question: what about Mrs. Clinton’s policies, or those of any other establishment Democrat for that matter, could inheritance babies, oil and gas industry magnates and long-term supporters of the radical Right like Mr. Koch possibly object to? Mr. Koch was simply saying out loud what anyone paying attention to American politics in recent decades already knows: the Democratic Party is the Party of Wall Street and of corporate America.

To the political inconvenience of said establishment Democrats, including Mrs. Clinton, Mr. Koch’s endorsement has content behind it. His charge (link above) is that establishment Democrats have the softer touch needed in present circumstance to sell Conservative policies like deregulation of industry and fiscal austerity. As Bill Clinton, whose policies Mr. Koch preferred to those of George W. Bush, and Barack Obama have demonstrated— it is socially liberal Democrats who have been the better proponents of Wall Street’s neo-capitalist takeover precisely because they accomplish with stealth economic policies what Republicans attempt more straightforwardly through politics.

In support of Mr. Koch’s assertions are secret documents leaked last week by Greenpeace on the TTIP (Trans-Atlantic Trade and Investment Partnership) ‘trade’ agreement that illustrate the Democrat’s strategy of publicly supporting environmental and labor regulations while undermining them through ‘trade’ deals that give the power to regulate to multi-national corporations. The mechanisms for doing so, ISDS (Investor State Dispute Settlement) provisions and their variants in these ‘trade’ agreements, limit state regulations in the public interest by forcing states to pay corporations for phantom ‘lost profits’ due to regulation. That Charles Koch personally benefits from these policies while Democratic Party loyalists pay for them illustrates who Democrats really answer to.

Weakened at Bernie’s

The Democratic Party’s efforts to install Mrs. Clinton as its nominee would be premature, bordering on pathological, had Bernie Sanders not signaled his willingness to bow out based on Mrs. Clinton’s demonstrated ability to garner less than 9% of the eligible votes (read on). Registered Democrats represent 31% of registered voters and 17% of eligible voters. Bernie Sanders has the support of approximately 50% of registered Democrats which leaves support for Hillary Clinton at 16% of registered voters and less than 9% of eligible voters (54% of eligible voters voted in the 2012 election). Contrary to the assertions of Democratic Party functionaries, it isn’t at all clear at this stage that Mrs. Clinton could be elected dog catcher, let alone President.

Source: Gallup.

The tactic of posing Mrs. Clinton’s candidacy as fait accompli via a rigged delegate count is to claim impermeability for the Democratic political establishment. In those historical moments when elections settle political matters this strategy ‘works’ to the extent that it de-legitimizes resistance. But with only a bit more than half of eligible voters voting in recent elections and well over half of those that do voting for ‘outsider’ candidates, claims of impermeability look a lot like the delusion of class privilege seen through a filter of self-sequestration. In terms of basic self-preservation for the ruling class, Bernie Sanders’ election would be the pressure-relief valve that might save the Washington establishment from itself.

This written, the electoral system in the U.S. works from the premise of political legitimacy to offer a choice between candidate A or B. Popular support for Bernie Sanders and Donald Trump doesn’t reduce to this ‘consumer choice’ theory of politics. Electing Mr. Sanders to better ‘manage’ the system of state-capitalism would quickly make visible a degree of systemic ossification that is unlikely to be resolved through electoral politics. The choice between the ‘incremental change’ of Democratic establishment fantasy and system change is of type, not degree. As Charles Koch’s endorsement of Hillary Clinton suggests, Mrs. Clinton’s role is to keep the unwashed masses in their place, not to affect substantive political ‘change.’

A Peasant Day in the Neighborhood

Viewed through the Liberal silos of ‘politics’ and ‘economics’ the Democratic establishment’s support for (and from) Wall Street is pragmatic, if distasteful from a public relations perspective, economic policy. Wall Street is a part of the economy (goes the logic), the economy benefits us all, and therefore ‘helping’ Wall Street benefits us all. The received ‘political’ wisdom is that Wall Street’s money ‘influences’ politics through funding political campaigns like Hillary Clinton’s. What hasn’t yet filtered into public understanding is that Wall Street’s existence is political— it is the premiere state-capitalist institution through its ability to exert political influence by its control over the financial economy. This was well-covered territory in Lenin’s The State and Revolution a century ago.

The ‘Washington Consensus’ that supports Wall Street, a/k/a the Democratic Party’s real platform, sees it as necessary imperial appendage, as the financial ‘carrot’ always held a few inches in front of the ‘stick’ of American militarism that supports corporate plunder. It is this neo-imperialist frame that unites neo-liberalism with neo-conservativism, the Western tendency toward muscular militarism, in the Democratic establishment ethos. Seen through this lens, Democrat Barack Obama’s decision to fully restore Wall Street from its near self-immolation in 2009 was a political act. It ties directly to his support for ISDS provisions in the ‘free-trade’ agreements he is pushing (link above).

When Hillary Clinton promises to ‘get tough on Wall Street’ her working premise is that Wall Street is necessary to this imperial project— most likely a different role than many of her supporters imagine for it. What was made evident in the housing boom and bust of the early-mid-2000s is that ‘we,’ the 99% on the outside of Washington’s imperial divide, are easy prey for Wall Street. Left unsaid is that the Democratic establishment’s ‘free-trade’ deals that Mrs. Clinton will ‘reluctantly’ support should she be elected are intended to hand regulatory powers over to the very same Wall Street that Mrs. Clinton is promising to ‘get tough’ on.

History Gets an Enema

Historical turning points are notoriously difficult to see as they unfold, partly because outcomes aren’t yet determined and partly because their significance is specific to the social forces that create them. To venture a view, the developed West, and particularly the U.S., is at a moment of historical inflection the direction of which will determine the broad social context in which people live their lives (or not) for decades to come. As was the case with the social possibilities unleashed and notable political failures of the late 1960s, an entrenched and now deeply dysfunctional political and economic establishment will fill any turn toward reflection and accommodation with more of the same.

Another term for universal health care coverage, high-quality public education, guaranteed jobs that pay a living wage and income security in old age is ‘civilization.’ The contortions of the (Charles) Kochian ‘maker / taker’ shit-logic that Hillary Clinton and her Liberaleconomists put themselves through to conclude that ‘we can’t afford civilization for the rest of you’ well-illustrates whose interests they serve. Insipid nonsense like economic ‘models’ that demonstrate that the universal healthcare, public education and living wages offered by other developed nations are Left-wing fantasies are declarations of class war launched by the Liberal class against the working classes and the poor.

Terms like ‘income inequality’ apply the illusion of natural distribution to the wholly predictable consequences of the class war launched in the 1970s by the well-funded radical Right (Charles Koch) in collusion with Liberal economists as the memory of the last domestic capitalist catastrophe— the Great Depression, faded from memory. In capitalist theory inequality of outcomes is the entire point because in that theory people earn in proportion to their economic contribution. That capitalism is more precisely a system of welfare for the rich was well understood by the New Deal Democrats of the 1940s and 1950s. And to be clear, with the bailouts and trade deals they support as evidence, it is well understood by plutocrat-loving establishment Democrats in the present. Assuring that this welfare for the rich continues is why Charles Koch hearts Hillary Clinton.

Looking Past the Bern

Bernie Sanders’ willingness to play by rules determined by ‘the graveyard of social movements,’ the Democratic Party, is more of the same anti-politics that has spelled defeat for the American Left since the 1960s. Hillary Clinton isn’t a centrist variant on the program that Mr. Sanders’ supporters find compelling, she is its antithesis. The sad irony is that Mr. Sanders’ capitulation is apparently based on the rigged delegate count, not on the popular will. Fear of being the ‘spoiler’ who elected Donald Trump requires ignoring that everything that comes from the Washington political establishment is bullshit anyway— it was Jimmy Carter’s turn hard-Right (see Paul Volcker and the ‘monetarist experiment’) that lost him re-election against Ronald Reagan in 1980, not a move to the Left as Democrat lore has it.

Part of Donald Trump’s appeal, for those to whom he has appeal, is that he is willing to take the Republican establishment down in flames rather than accede to its dictates. Were this inclination used to promote the political program of his supporters, rather than the prerogative of privilege applied to Mr. Trump’s personal ambition, it might be admirable. From the Washington political establishment’s perspective it is most certainly irresponsible. The question back for both Democrats and Republicans is: how responsible is it to put forward an ossified political order as the only choice in the face of its four decades of conspicuous political and economic failures? Hillary Clinton is the candidate of this failure— just ask Charles Koch.

Graphic: The Guillotine! A device capitalists should love, an ‘efficient’ machine for dispatching the Ancien Regime in the French Revolution. Hillary Clinton should love it also— it was sold as the ‘humanitarian’ method of separating former heads of state from their heads. It was a crucial part of the ‘Change You Can Believe In’ political campaign of 1789. Source: http://europeanhistory.about.com.

The Democratic Party will no doubt stumble on regardless of the outcome of the coming election. What Hillary Clinton’s candidacy helps clarify is its true nature as a reactionary force that poses itself as the Party of the powerless to better promote the interests of the powerful. By running as a Democrat Bernie Sanders consciously joined forces with those determined to crush any real Left political movement. For those democratic socialists who aren’t ready to roll over, Philadelphia can be hot and humid in the summer. Wear loose clothing and drink plenty of water. Should the Philadelphia Police Department decide to distribute free tear gas, be generous and ask yourselves: what would Hillary do?

Forty million Russians in debt

Clara Weiss

Western sanctions and the collapse of the price of oil have thrown Russia into a social and economic crisis, which finds stark expression in the indebtedness of 40 million private individuals.

The Russian economy has been in recession for two years. In its latest report on April 6, the World Bank projected an economic decline of 1.9 percent in 2016. The economy is only predicted to grow again in 2017, by a miserly 1.1 percent. The Moscow-based Higher School of Economics predicts a total decline in GDP between 2015 and 2019 of 8.1 percent.

The World Bank projection is based on an increase in oil prices in 2017 to $50 per barrel. The Russian economy and the state budget are heavily dependent on oil exports. Experts estimate that only with an oil price of $119 per barrel can the budget be balanced.

The sustained recession has led to a social crisis, which is made very clear in the figures of indebtedness for private households. Forty million Russians, almost a third of the population of 140 million, are currently indebted. Large sections of the working-age population are affected.

According to the national bureau of credit history, private debt has more than doubled since 2008. It currently stands at 10.2 billion roubles (roughly $159 billion). According to the New York Times, the percentage of unpaid debts increased by 50 percent in 2015, to reach $15 billion. In the same year, real wages decreased by 10 percent. The number of debtors in default, who have paid nothing in three months, rose from 6 million in March 2015 to 7.5 million in March 2016.

According to the New York Times, a large proportion of the debt is made up of short-term small loans amounting on average to just $125. The average interest rate on these loans is 2 percent per day. Those who have taken out loans are mostly workers whose families are forced to live on a few hundred dollars per month. Under such conditions, a layoff or illness quickly results in their entire economic existence being called into question.

Another important reason for growing impoverishment is the withholding of wages by employers. According to official statistics from Rosstat, the total amount of withheld wages rose in March by 1,186 million roubles to 4,471 million roubles.

On April 1, 78,000 people received no wages, according to official statistics. Of these, nearly half were in production industries, 23 percent in construction and 25 percent employed in transport.

In March, for the first time since 2008, more than half of all income was spent on foodstuffs and cigarettes. Under these conditions, a growing number of workers are compelled to take on short-term loans in spite of the horrendous interest rates.

Michail Karpenko, a lawyer in the Urals, where several impoverished industrial towns are located, told the Guardian, “In our region, the Tshelyabinsk oblast, the population is deeply indebted. The people simply fall into a black hole of debt and never come out again.”

Increasing numbers of indebted families are falling victim to the terror of debt collectors hired by small financial institutions. The victims rarely have anyone to turn to. Hardly anyone in Russia trusts the police, because their connections to criminal networks are widely known. Conditions are increasingly similar to those in the 1990s, which remain a traumatic experience for Russian workers. At that time, gangsters and mafia bands rampaged through the streets and did as they pleased, either being directly backed by the state or allowed to operate with impunity.

In December, a kindergarten in southern Russia had to be evacuated because debt collectors threatened to blow it sky high. The husband of one of the workers had not paid his debts.

A couple from Novosibirsk reported that debt collectors sent a false message to friends about the death of their daughter in January and uploaded the personal details of the woman on a site for prostitutes.

On January 27, a small child was severely injured in Ulyanovsk after debt collectors set light to a house with a Molotov cocktail. The reason for the arson attack was a loan of just $51 taken on by the child’s grandfather.

The terror employed by debt collectors against workers and their families is not new. In 2012, a 47-year-old woman in Podmoskovye committed suicide after collectors threatened to throw her out of her apartment due to an unpaid loan.

In October, the Russian government passed a law enabling individuals to declare bankruptcy. But this law will hardly help anyone. Declaring bankruptcy is only possible when total debt has reached 500,000 roubles, an amount that hardly anyone takes on.

The anger over the brutality of debt collectors compelled state television to report some incidents in detail. The first Russian television channel invited Natalia Gorbunova to a talk show on April 11. She was the victim of a campaign of severe telephone threats, before the collectors broke into her home, assaulted her son and raped her. The loan in question amounted to 5,000 roubles, around €60, which she had borrowed in September 2014. The daily interest rate was 2 percent, and her wage, which an entire family of five lived on, was 25,000 roubles, around €335.

Most of the other guests on the talk show—actors, lawyers and duma deputies—attacked the woman and humiliated her. They accused her of taking out the loan and not paying back her debts in time because she did not work enough. Several studio guests, including the well-known actress Ljudmilla Zvitkova, attacked the woman for lying about being raped. A Duma deputy criticised her 17-year-old son for not working to help his mother.

A YouTube video of the broadcast was commented on by hundreds of people. One user wrote, “The gangsters are protected by the law,” to which another responded, “I would not say by the law, but by the wealthy people in the country. Just look at the clothes worn by these walking moneybags in the studio.”

Another user was angered by the humiliating treatment of Gorbunova, writing, “The studio guests went too far. Not everyone can earn as much as Duma deputies or actors. With 25,000 roubles, a family cannot pay to feed the children, for education and for the husband’s medical care. Anyone can end up in such a situation if they have no money.”

Another comment read, “Our ‘elite’ live in a parallel universe, they don’t understand a thing about the problems of normal people.”

Several Duma deputies are now demanding, not for the first time, the banning of debt collecting firms. Duma elections are due in Russia in September and the Putin regime is increasingly nervous given the deepening social crisis. The terror practiced by debt collectors is currently one of the most widely discussed issues in Russia.

One victim of the debt collectors commented to the Guardian on the legal reforms proposed, “Laws that help the oligarchs are adopted within a week, but laws for [normal] people take years to pass. These draft laws are probably just PR.”