CIA vetoes Chelsea Manning’s Harvard fellowship

Eric London

Harvard University’s decision to revoke whistleblower Chelsea Manning’s visiting fellowship at the Kennedy School of Government under pressure from the Central Intelligence Agency is a contemptible act of political cowardice.

Just four months ago, Manning was released from Ft. Leavenworth prison after serving seven years for the “crime” of revealing a government cover-up of US war crimes, including the murder and torture of Iraqi civilians.

For uncovering facts the world would have otherwise never learned about, the Obama administration tried Manning under the Espionage Act and subjected her to what the UN called “cruel and unusual punishment” in violation of international law and the US constitution. Since her release, Manning has given several interviews with the press and spoken at public forums, shedding crucial light on her time in captivity, her political motivations for blowing the whistle on the crimes of US imperialism, and her fight on behalf of equal rights for transgender people.

On Wednesday, Harvard announced several additional fellows for its 2017–18 program, including Manning, Clinton campaign manager Robert Mook and former Trump administration Press Secretary Sean Spicer.

Within 48 hours, Manning’s fellowship was vetoed by the Central Intelligence Agency and revoked by Harvard.

On Thursday morning, barely a day after Harvard’s initial announcement, former CIA Director Mike Morell resigned from his Kennedy School fellowship in protest, writing to Kennedy School Dean Douglas Elmendorf, “I cannot be part of an organization” that “honors a convicted felon,” adding: “I have an obligation to my conscience.”

At 6:00 p.m. Thursday, current CIA Director Michael Pompeo refused to show-up for a talk he was scheduled to give at the Kennedy School. He then published a letter to Elmendorf that reads: “After much deliberation in the wake of Harvard’s announcement of American traitor Chelsea Manning as a Visiting Fellow at the Institute of Politics, my conscience and duty to the men and women of the Central Intelligence Agency will not permit me to betray their trust by appearing to support Harvard’s decision with my appearance at tonight’s event.”

Both men refer to their wounded consciences, but neither should blush.

Morrell is a vocal defender of the CIA’s torture tactics and attacked the 2014 Senate report detailing the agency’s methods as “deeply flawed” in his memoir. He later refused to answer whether “rectal rehydration” tactics used by the CIA constitute torture. He is also an advocate for escalating CIA drone strikes.

Pompeo, a former Congressman, was referred to as “the congressman from Koch” for his subservience to the billionaire Koch brothers in his home district of Wichita, Kansas, where Koch Industries is based. Pompeo called for whistleblower Edward Snowden to “be given a death sentence” and said Muslim religious leaders were “complicit” for terrorist attacks like the 2013 Boston Marathon bombing.

Under what legal or political authority are the current and former CIA directors intervening? Why should Harvard University care what Morell and Pompeo have to say about what takes place on campus? An honest college dean would have replied by telling them they have no business interfering in the affairs of a major American university.

But hours after Pompeo’s letter, Elmendorf revoked Manning’s fellowship. Without referencing Morell’s or Pompeo’s comments and without acknowledging any outside pressure, Elmendorf published a statement just after midnight explaining that Manning’s conduct does not “fulfill the values of public service to which we aspire.”

It would take a multi-volume tome to list the assassinations, murders, death squads, drug deals, coups, and other crimes committed by the CIA Murder, Inc. in its 69-year history. Now, the agency exercises such influence that its leadership apparently dictates the policies of the US’s most prestigious universities and makes their deans shake in their boots. The power of the military-intelligence agencies is reflected in the groveling and nervous tone of Elmendorf’s letter:

“We did not intend to honor [Manning] in any way or to endorse any of her words or deeds… I see more clearly now that many people view a Visiting Fellow title as an honorific… In retrospect, though, I think my assessment…for Chelsea Manning was wrong.”

The degree to which universities have grown dependent on funding and institutional support from the military-intelligence apparatus is among the more sordid effects of the “war on terror.” Concerned over the prospect of losing part of their $36 billion endowment, Harvard’s administrators no doubt panicked over threats from donors from the military, finance, and political establishment for whom recognition of Manning is dangerous and unacceptable.

In an earlier period, the relationship between the CIA and domestic institutions would not have been so shameless. It was a major national scandal when New York Times reporter Neil Sheehan revealed on February 14, 1967 that the CIA was secretly financing the National Student Association, a liberal organization with chapters at campuses across the country.

The Guardian reports that Manning hung up the phone when Elmendorf called to justify his decision. According to a source present with Manning at the time of the conversation, Elmendorf “sounded audibly nervous.” When Manning’s team asked him to explain why the university would continue to honor Spicer and former Trump campaign chairman Corey Lewandowski (also a 2017–18 Harvard visiting fellow), Elmendorf replied that in contrast to Manning, Spicer and Lewandowski “brought something to the table.” Manning justifiably hung up.

Manning publicly denounced Harvard’s decision, tweeting: “This is what a military/police/intelligence state looks like, the CIA determines what is and is not taught at Harvard.”

This is not a mere figure of speech. The Kennedy School in particular is a platform for the training and development of senior military and intelligence personnel.

On program, the “National Security Fellows,” for example, serves to train “US military officers who are eligible for senior development education and equivalent civilian officials from the broader Intelligence Community,” according to Harvard’s website.

The military, not the university, determines enrollment: “Selection for this program is handled internally by the respective military services and federal government agencies.”

The “Intelligence and Defense” project “links defense and intelligence agencies with Belfer [a division of the Kennedy School] researchers, faculty, and Kennedy School students, to facilitate better policy-making in the field and enrich the education of fellows and students about defense and intelligence.” Classes for these programs and others like them are taught by a host of current and former generals, spies, prosecutors, and diplomats. Some course listings include the warning: “The seminar is off the record and nothing said can be published or recorded without the speaker’s consent.”

Harvard receives roughly $53 million per year in funding from the Defense Department. In 2015, VICE News ranked it the “most militarized” school among the elite group of schools referred to as the “Ivy League.” It is currently running an art and history exhibit titled “To Serve Better Thy Country: Four Centuries of Harvard and the Military.”

The transformation of the university into a think-tank for American imperialism is taking place in the face of the opposition from the bulk of the school’s student body, the overwhelming majority of whom will be disgusted with Harvard’s acquiescence to CIA bullying. Anti-war sentiment is traditionally so firmly rooted in the student body that the administration was only able to re-open a Reserve Officers Training Corps (ROTC) recruitment office in 2012, forty years after students banned the military from the campus during the Vietnam War.

After a quarter century of war, there is hardly a decision made in any of the official institutions of bourgeois power—the political parties, the corporate television channels, the trade unions, corporations like Google and Amazon, the universities—where the military and intelligence agencies do not have the final say.

In Context: NA-120 Lahore By-election

Sarral Sharma

The by-election for Lahore's National Assembly constituency (NA)-120 - previously NA-95 - seat will take place on 17 September. The seat fell vacant after the disqualification of Pakistan's Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif's on 28 July following the Supreme Court verdict in the Panama Papers case. Through an assessment of the contesting candidates and their political agendas for the election, this article seeks to determine who stands the likeliest chance of winning, and why.

There are 44 candidates contesting for this seat; but the two key contenders are Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz's (PML-N) candidate, Begum Kulsoom Nawaz Sharif, and Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf's (PTI) candidate, Dr Yasmin Rashid. Other notable candidates include Pakistan People's Party's (PPP) Faisal Mir, Jamaat-e-Islami’s (JeI) Ziauddin Ansari, and independent candidate, Qari Yaqoob Sheikh, and they may have a limited role to play in the upcoming election.

The PML-N might not find it difficult to win the NA-120 constituency given how Nawaz Sharif won from the NA-120 seat five consecutive times, in 1985, 1988, 1990, 1993 and 1997. The constituency is regarded as Sharif's stronghold. The party has fielded Kulsoom Nawaz despite her serious illness, and Maryam Nawaz is tasked with leading the political campaign. Incidentally, Kulsoom and Maryam are Nawaz's spouse and daughter respectively. Amid reports of a possible political feud in the Sharif family with Hamza Sharif - son of Punjab Chief Minister Shahbaz Sharif - withdrew from electioneering. This would be viewed as Maryam's political anointment as Nawaz's potential political heir.

The PML-N appears to be focusing on consolidating its electoral base in both Province of Punjab (PP) constituencies, PP-139 and PP-140, which fall under NA-120. In the 2013 election, Sharif won a 10,000-vote lead in PP-140 compared to the lead of over 30,000 votes in PP-139 against PTI's Rashid. Therefore, the party's agenda is also to improve the overall tally in both the provincial constituencies in order to create a strong political base before the 2018 general election. More importantly, a win with a comfortable margin will prove critical for the PML-N's future in Punjab, and to an extent, might also address the doubts some have raised regarding Maryam's leadership. Still, factors such as a possible anti-incumbency sentiment, party infighting and the impact of the Panama papers trial on local electorate might limit their victory margin.

The PTI has again fielded Yasmin Rashid, who lost to Nawaz in the 2013 election. Rashid views Nawaz's disqualification as an opportunity to avenge her defeat in the previous election. Despite being the PML-N's home turf, representatives of the NA-120 constituency and the Punjab government have been accused of indifference due to the sorry state of infrastructure including poor roads, regular power outages, dismal sanitation facilities and unavailability of clean drinking water. Rashid has chosen door-to-door campaigning as well as addressing Mohalla (local area) meetings and erecting party flexes and banners highlighting local issues related to lack of basic amenities in the constituency.

Former PPP supporters as well as some PML-N supporters now disenchanted with the Party, and the youth constitute the PTI's core electoral base. PTI Chief Imran Khan, who had previously participated in electioneering, is not active this time, possibly because the Election Commission of Pakistan enforced a code of conduct barring campaigning by parliamentarians. Yet, he held a rally in Lahore on 8 September, outside the NA-120 constituency, to seek support for Rashid and to boost the party cadres' morale. PTI's win in the by-election may prove to be a referendum against the PML-N government ahead of the 2018 general elections. More importantly, Khan will stand vindicated in his anti-corruption campaign.

PPP’s Faisal Mir too is in the fray with the Party's old guard trying to re-enter Punjab politics after an embarrassing defeat in 2013. Although the PPP may not make a big impact in this election, the party is putting its best foot forward to prepare for the 2018 polls. Some PPP loyalists who supported PTI's Rashid in 2013 have reportedly returned to the former party's fold since Mir's nomination. However, the weak central leadership and limited political outreach outside Sindh province may dampen the party's future in Punjab. Still, it is possible that the PPP could improve its overall electoral standing and may make a dent in the opposition parties' vote share. 

Other smaller contenders such as the Jamaat-e-Islami (JeI), and the new entrant Qari Yaqoob Sheikh, an independent nominee supported by Hafiz Saeed's Jamaat ud Dawa (JuD), might garner some support from right wing voters in the constituency. However, the main contest will be between the two main opposition parties. If the PTI wins the upcoming by-election, it may signal a possible shift in Pakistan's political setup which might be more visible as the country goes for polls in 2018. Conclusively, Nawaz's political (and personal) image and Maryam's future as a potential leader of the PML-N are at stake in this election.

Stop the London Death Fair!

Michael Dickinson

Roll up!  Roll up!  Ballistic missiles and hand grenades!  Drones, helicopters and warships!  Rocket launchers, tanks and assault rifles!  Welcome to the biennial London Arms Fair!  Showing now until 15th September at the Excel Centre in Docklands, the Defence Systems and Equipment International (DSEI)  – “a world-leading event that brings together the defence and security sector to innovate and share knowledge” – presents one of the world’s biggest arms bazaars, displaying the latest high-tech arms and surveillance technology, crowd control and weaponry.  This year the exhibition is split into five key zones: air, land, security and joint, all showcasing the latest equipment and systems. DSEI is organised by Clarion Events, with extensive cooperation from the British government.

Military personnel, politicians, private defence contractors and consultants mingle as they shop. Countries accused of war crimes and human rights abuses, Algeria, Angola, Colombia, Iraq, Oman, Qatar, Pakistan, Turkey, the UAE, and Ukraine are among the invited.  Although not an official guest, the Israeli arms industry has special pavilions at the venue, where over 34,000 visitors are expected to view the latest in killing weaponry for sale, exhibited by more than 1,600 arms companies, including the US and UK giants Lockheed Martin, Boeing, Raytheon and BAE Systems.

With authoritarian regimes such as Saudi Arabia, Egypt, Bahrain and Azerbaijan among the official UK government guests in attendance, this year’s keynote speakers at the opening day conference included British Defence Secretary Sir Michael Fallon, International Trade Secretary Liam Fox and many of the top brass in the UK military establishment.  Fox said that overseas governments had an inaliable right to defend themselves  and that if they could not buy the equipment they required from developed countries with effective controls, like the UK, they would look elsewhere.  Last year Britain’s arms export  industry turned over 3 billion pounds.

Andrew Smith, a spokesman from the activist group Campaign Against the Arms Trade (CAAT) said:  “DSEI is one of the biggest arms fairs in the world. It exists purely to maximise arms sales. Prime Minister Theresa May and her colleagues may talk about promoting human rights but DSEI could not happen without the full support of government.  A lot of the regimes in attendance have been linked to terrible human rights abuses, and events like DSEI only make them more likely in future. It is vitally important to spread as much awareness as possible of this terrible arms fair taking place. ”

Mayor of London Sadiq Khan’s has said that he was opposed to London being used as a market place for countries that contribute to human rights abuses, but that he had no powers to stop it.  A group called  Stop the Arms Fair https://www.stopthearmsfair.org.uk/ had other ideas.  They organised a week of action to halt the fair before it started, and to draw attention to an event that prefers to keep a low public profile.

Growing numbers of protesters gathered and set up camp with tents on the grass outside the Excel exhibition centre’s entrance last Monday, and in an attempt to disrupt and delay the lorries arriving with equipment to set up the show, began to blockade the way by dancing, singing, theatre, clowning, playing football, sitting or lying in the road, while surrounded by large numbers of police in bright yellow jackets, some on horses.  Over 100 protestors were arrested during the week, mostly charged with obstruction.

Banksy, the elusive street artist, has donated a new simple but powerful work to ‘Arts the Arms Fair’, an exhibition running along with the protest. ‘Civilian Drone Attack’, shows the horrified stick figure of a child next to a burning building.  Three drones circle above.  The piece will be auctioned off on Friday and proceeds donated to CAAT.  Ahmed Jahaf, a Yemeni artist who has submitted 10 works to the exhibition, said:  “British, American and people of other countries who sell their bombs to Saudi Arabia and UAE must know that we in Yemen regard their governments as partners in the massacres taking place.”  (The UK has sold 3.6 million pounds of arms to Saudia Arabia since the conflict with Yemen began.)

Organiser Sam Walton said “Less than 10 per cent of Londoners even know the arms fair  exists.  They [DSEI] want to stay in the shadows and what Art the Arms Fair is about is making this the most talked-about arms fair, so people can make their own judgements. One way to do that is through art.”

(Incidentally, this year the biennial London Arms Fair coincides with three important anniversaries in the history of weapons and warfare.  150 years ago in 1867 dynamite was invented by Swedish chemist Alfred Nobel.  60 years ago in 1957 the Russians launched the first intercontinental ballistic missile.  And 40 years ago today in 1977 the neutron bomb, which kills people but leaves buildings intact, was developed in the USA.  Now there’s a bargain!)

The Afghan Quagmire

Cesar Chelala

It is impossible to win a war that you cannot define. That seems to be the main lesson to be drawn from Afghanistan, where a so-called victory seems ever more unreachable. It is also the conclusion of several experts on the region, who fear U.S. forces would be mired forever in that unjustly punished country.

Civilians can sometimes offer insights into a war situation that professional warriors cannot do. In 2001, American writer Philip Caputo offered a unique insight into the Afghan psychology. He had spent a month in Afghanistan with the mujahedeen as a reporter, during the Afghans’ decade-long war with the Soviets.

At some point in the 1980s, he was accompanying a platoon of mujahedeen who were escorting 1,000 refugees into Pakistan. They had to cross a mountain torrent on a very primitive bridge, consisting essentially of two logs laid side by side. In front of him was a 10-year-old boy, separated from his family, his feet swollen from several days of barefoot marching.

When Caputo realized that the boy was terrified fearing that he could fall into the rapids below and almost certain death, he carried him to the other side. With the help of his interpreter he found the father and handed the boy to him. The father, rather than thanking him slapped the boy in the face and poked Caputo in the chest, shouting angrily at him. Caputo was obviously shocked.

He asked his interpreter about the boy father’s reaction and the interpreter explained to him, “He is angry at the boy for not crossing on his own, and angry with you for helping him. Now, he says, his son will expect somebody to help him whenever he runs into difficulties.”

Caputo concludes, “Well, that little boy probably learned. I don’t know what became of him, but in my imagination, I see our troops encountering him: now 31, inured to hardship and accustomed to combat, unafraid of death, with an army of men like him at his side.”

In a few words, Caputo magisterially captured the strength of the Afghan soldier, able to fight with the most primitive weapons against the greatest empires on earth. When these soldiers feel their land usurped by foreign forces, their strength is multiplied. And this is just one of the obstacles confronting U.S. and NATO forces in Afghanistan.

There are increasing doubts that a plain increase in the number of soldiers fighting in Afghanistan can lead to a victory progressively more difficult to define. Matthew Hoh, a former Foreign Service officer and former Marine Corps captain who became the first U.S. official to resign in protest over the Afghan war, declared to the Washington Post, “Upon arriving in Afghanistan and serving in both the East and South (and particularly speaking with local Afghans) I found that the majority of those who were fighting us and the Afghan central government were fighting us because they felt occupied.”

In the meantime, the costs of the occupation keep mounting. According to some estimates the total spending in Afghanistan is now more than $2 trillion, not even counting the future costs of interest for the money borrowed to finance the war. Those additional costs could add trillions of dollars to the total tab.

To those costs should be added veterans’ medical and disability payments over the next 40 years, which could be over $1 trillion. Linda Bilmes, a senior lecturer in public finance at Harvard’s Kennedy School of Government, says, “The cost of caring for war veterans typically peaks 30 to 40 years or more after a conflict.”

Since the start of the war, more than 2,350 US troops have been killed, in addition to thousands of allied forces. The toll on Afghans has been even greater, with tens of thousands Afghan civilian and military who died in the conflict. Afghanistan has been called the graveyard of empires. It should more properly be called the graveyard of illusions.

Texting While the Planet Burns: Smartphones and Climate Change

TODD LARSEN

Smartphones are a huge part of our lives.

We use them constantly for texts, social media, calls, directions, and finding information online. Even when we’re sleeping, they’re still active, receiving data all night.

But those little notifications we get on our phones have a surprisingly big environmental footprint. Keeping millions of people connected uses enormous amounts of energy, and most of that energy comes from fossil fuels.

AT&T and Verizon, the two largest telecommunication companies in the United States, use an incredible 26 million megawatts of energy per year, as much as 2.6 million households. And they get less than 2 percent of that energy from wind or solar power.

For their millions of customers, that means every call, text, or search we make is fueling climate change.

It doesn’t have to be that way. In the tech industry, leaders like Google and Apple are already at or near 100 percent power from renewable energy sources. Even Amazon, which isn’t known for its social responsibility, has a goal of reaching 100 percent renewable energy for its servers.

Sprint, a direct competitor to AT&T and Verizon, has a goal of reaching 10 percent renewable power this year.

It’s not a question of AT&T or Verizon denying climate change or its impacts. Both companies state that they take climate change seriously. Both have worked to reduce the amount of energy it takes to process data on their massive servers. As a result, even as data usage has grown tremendously, their overall energy usage has increased more slowly.

They’ve slowed the growth of the problem, and saved themselves money in the process. But they’re still using millions of megawatts of energy that directly fuel climate change.

Now is the ideal time for both companies to embrace a commitment to 100 percent clean energy. Clean energy is on the rise in the United States. There are 75,000 megawatts of wind power installed in the country, making up 5.4 percent of the power grid, with the projection to double by 2020 and reach 20 percent by 2030.

Last year, a record of 14,000 megawatts of new solar were installed, and 2018 will bring total U.S. solar installations up to 2 million units.

As clean energy sources grow, they’re getting much cheaper. If major companies like Apple can achieve 100 percent renewable energy across all data centers, we know that AT&T and Verizon can do the same.

It’s not a lack of money that’s holding them back. Both AT&T and Verizon are taking in over $120 billion in revenues per year. They spend millions upon millions of dollars on advertising to lure in new customers.

What’s missing is pressure from their customers to purchase greener energy options. Companies care about what their customers think. Consumers have pushed food companies to offer organic options. They’ve pushed toy manufacturers to remove unsafe chemicals like phthalates.

And they’ve gotten many tech companies to commit to 100 percent clean energy.

AT&T and Verizon need to hear from customers that a commitment to clean energy matters. And if enough of us take action and tell them to hang up on fossil fuels, they will. If they don’t, more and more customers might find themselves turning to Sprint.

Destructive Stock Buybacks–That You Pay For

Ralph Nader

The monster of economic waste—over $7 trillion of dictated stock buybacks since 2003 by the self-enriching CEOs of large corporations—started with a little noticed change in 1982 by the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) under President Ronald Reagan. That was when SEC Chairman John Shad, a former Wall Street CEO, redefined unlawful ‘stock manipulation’ to exclude stock buybacks.

Then after Clinton pushed through congress a $1 million cap on CEO pay that could be deductible, CEO compensation consultants wanted much of CEO pay to reflect the price of the company’s stock. The stock buyback mania was unleashed. Its core was not to benefit shareholders (other than perhaps hedge fund speculators) by improving the earnings per share ratio. Its real motivation was to increase CEO pay no matter how badly such burning out of shareholder dollars hurt the company, its workers and the overall pace of economic growth. In a massive conflict of interest between greedy top corporate executives and their own company, CEO-driven stock buybacks extract capital from corporations instead of contributing capital for corporate needs, as the capitalist theory would dictate.

Yes, due to the malicious, toady SEC “business judgement” rule, CEOs can take trillions of dollars away from productive pursuits without even having to ask the companies’ owners—the shareholders—for approval.

What could competent management have done with this treasure trove of shareholder money which came originally from consumer purchases? They could have invested more in research and development, in productive plant and equipment, in raising worker pay (and thereby consumer demand), in shoring up shaky pension fund reserves, or increasing dividends to shareholders.

The leading expert on this subject—economics professor William Lazonick of the University of Massachusetts—wrote a widely read article in 2013 in the Harvard Business Review titled “Profits Without Prosperity” documenting the intricate ways CEOs use buybacks to escalate their pay up to 300 to 500 times (averaging over $10,000 an hour plus lavish benefits) the average pay of their workers. This compared to only 30 times the average pay gap in 1978. This has led to increasing inequality and stagnant middle class wages.

To make matters worse, companies with excessive stock buybacks experience a declining market value. A study by Professor Robert Ayres and Executive Fellow Michael Olenick at INSEAD (September 2017) provided data about IBM, which since 2005 has spent $125 billion on buybacks while laying off large numbers of workers and investing only $69.9 billion in R&D. IBM is widely viewed as a declining company that has lost out to more nimble competitors in Silicon Valley.

The authors also cite General Electric, which in the same period spent $114.6 billion on its own stock only to see its stock price steadily decline in a bull market. In a review of 64 companies, including major retailers such as JC Penny and Macy’s, these firms spent more dollars in stock buybacks “than their businesses are currently worth in market value”!

On the other hand, Ayes and Olenick analyzed 269 companies that “repurchased stock valued at 2 percent or less of their current market value (including Facebook, Xcel Energy, Berkshire Hathaway and Amazon). They were strong market performers. The scholars concluded that “Buybacks are a way of disinvesting – we call it ‘committing corporate suicide’—in a way that rewards the “activists” (e.g. Hedge Funds) and executives, but hurts employees and pensioners.”

Presently, hordes of corporate lobbyists are descending on Washington to demand deregulation and tax cuts. Why, you ask them? In order to conserve corporate money for investing in economic growth, they assert. Really?! Why, then, are they turning around and wasting far more money on stock buybacks, which produce no tangible value? The answer is clear: uncontrolled executive greed!

By now you may be asking, why don’t the corporate bosses simply give more dividends to shareholders instead of buybacks, since a steady high dividend yield usually protects the price of the shares? Because these executives have far more of their compensation package in manipulated stock options and incentive payments than they own in stock.

Walmart in recent years has bought back over $50 billion of its shares – a move benefitting the Walton family’s wealth – while saying it could not afford to increase the meagre pay for over one million of their workers in the US. Last year the company bought back $8.3 billion of their stock which could have given their hard-pressed employees, many of whom are on welfare, a several thousand dollar raise.

The corporate giants are also demanding that Congress allow the repatriation of about $2.5 trillion stashed abroad without paying more than 5% tax. They say the money would be used to grow the economy and create jobs. Last time CEOs promised this result in 2004, Congress approved, and then was double-crossed. The companies spent the bulk on stock buybacks, their own pay raises and some dividend increases.

There are more shenanigans. With low interest rates that are deductible, companies actually borrow money to finance their stock buybacks. If the stock market tanks, these companies will have a self-created debt load to handle. A former Citigroup executive, Richard Parsons, has expressed worry about a “massively manipulated” stock market which “scares the crap” out of him.

Banks that pay you near zero interest on your savings announced on June 28, 2017 the biggest single buyback in history – a $92.8 billion extraction. Drug companies who say their sky-high drug prices are needed to fund R&D. But between 2006 and 2017, 18 drug company CEOs spent a combined staggering $516 billion on buybacks and dividends – more than their inflated claims of spending for R&D.

Mr. Olenick says “When managers can’t create value in the business other than buying their own stock, it seems like it’s time for a management change.”

Who’s going to do that? Shareholders stripped of inside power to control the company they own? No way. It will take Congressional hearings, a robust media focus, and the political clout of large pension and mutual funds to get the reforms under way.

When I asked Robert Monks, an author and longtime expert on corporate governance, about his reaction to CEOs heavy with stock buybacks, he replied that the management was either unimaginative, incompetent or avaricious – or all of these.

Essentially burning trillions of dollars for the hyper enrichment of a handful of radical corporate state supremacists wasn’t what classical capitalism was supposed to be about.

Ethiopia’s Economic Growth Hides Fear and Oppression in the One-Party State

Graham Peebles

Scan the mainstream media for news about Ethiopia and discover headline after headline describing the country’s economic successes: double-digit economic growth, foreign investment and aspirations to become a middle-income country by 2030. Ethiopia, we are told, is a functioning democracy, an African tiger economy and an important ally of Western governments.

According to such eminent sources as the BBC, CNN, the World Bank and the US State Department, Ethiopia is an African success story; a beacon of stability and growing prosperity in a region of dysfunctional states. Dig a little deeper, speak to Ethiopians inside the country or within the diaspora and a different, darker image surfaces: A violent picture of brutal state suppression, state corruption, widespread human rights violations and increasing levels of hardship as the cost of living escalates.

For a country to be regarded as broadly democratic a series of foundational pillars and interconnected principles are required to exist and be in operation: the observation of human rights, political pluralism, a flourishing independent media, an autonomous judiciary and police force, a vibrant civil society and a pervasive atmosphere of tolerance, inclusion and freedom. Where these are found to be absent so too is democracy.

The Ethiopian government – the Ethiopian People’s Revolutionary Democratic Front (EPRDF) maintains that it governs in accordance with democratic ideals: a brief overview of their methods however makes clear this is far from the truth. The EPRDF rules in a highly suppressive manner and has created an atmosphere of fear and suspicion throughout the country, employing a largely uneducated security apparatus to keep the increasingly mobilized populace in order, and a state-run judiciary to lock troublemakers away.

Political dissent is all but outlawed, and should protestors take to the streets they are shot at, beaten and/or arbitrarily arrested; opposition leaders are imprisoned, branded terrorists, intimidated and persecuted; all major media outlets as well as the sole telecommunications company are state owned or controlled — outspoken journalists are routinely jailed, trade unions are controlled by the government, and humanitarian aid, including food and fertilizer, is distributed on a partisan basis, as are employment opportunities and university places. Refuse to pledge allegiance to the EPRDF and see that job offer withdrawn, the seeds, fertilizer and humanitarian support withheld.

In justification of this tyrannical rule, the government states that Ethiopia is an evolving democracy, that change takes time and that economic growth is their primary concern and not the annoying niceties of universal human rights law, much of which is written into the liberally worded, systematically ignored constitution. And whilst the EPRDF commits wide-ranging human rights violations, and acts of state terrorism, the country’s major donors, America, Britain and the European Union, remain virtually silent. Indeed their irresponsible actions go beyond mere silence — they promote the fictitious image of democracy and stability in Ethiopia, and in some cases conspire with the regime against opposition party activists, as many believe the UK has done in the case of Tadesse Kersmo, a British citizen and leading member of the opposition party Ginbot 7 – Movement for Unity and Democracy in Ethiopia. He was recently arrested at Heathrow on vague terrorism charges, as well as Andargachew Tsege another British citizen. Tsege was kidnapped while transiting through Sanaan airport in Yemen, and rendered to Ethiopia as part of a brutal crackdown on political opponents and civil rights activists. He has been imprisoned inside Ethiopia ever since, and the British government, to their utter shame, has said little and done nothing.

Development aid from these and other benefactors, including the World Bank, flows through and supports “a virtual one-party state with a deplorable human rights record,” Human Rights Watch (HRW) states in its aptly named report, Development without Freedom. The Ethiopian government’s “practices include jailing and silencing critics and media, enacting laws to undermine human rights activity, and hobbling the political opposition.”

Who benefits?

In 1995 the then Prime Minister Meles Zenawi stated that the plan was for Ethiopia to “sustain current double-digit rates of growth for the next 15 years so that by 2025 we become a middle-income country.” And they would achieve this in a manner that would “allow us to have zero net carbon emissions by 2030.” Economic reforms and growth controlled by a highly centralized political system, mirroring, many have suggested, the methodology of China, is the EPRDF’s approach. It is largely Chinese money and organization that has built the new dams, roads and railways. Industrial parks have sprung up offering new jobs at increased wages, and the government plans to build another nine such facilities. But manufacturing is a tiny part of the country’s economy: almost 85% of the workforce is employed in agriculture, which accounts for 41% of GDP, coffee being the main export.

Certainly there have been some economic achievements over the past 25 years and the country’s carbon emissions during the period 1999 to 2012, have, according to the World Bank, remained static. This is indeed positive, as is the commitment to hydro, geothermal, wind and solar power. Overall unemployment has fallen slightly to 19.8% (from 2009 when it was 20.4%), but 50% of young people remain unemployed, and Gross Domestic Product (GDP), the famous ‘double-digit growth rates’, has been consistently high, averaging 11.35% in the years since 2010, according to Trading Economic, although this dropped to 8% in 2015/16. The UN relates that there has also been substantial progress in the achievement of Millennium Development Goals, particularly relating to those living in extreme poverty. This figure has fallen from 45% in 1995/6 to 30%.

Whilst these figures and the commitment of sustained investment are encouraging, no level of economic growth, green or otherwise, can justify violent, suppressive governance, as is being perpetrated in Ethiopia, and a nation’s GDP is only one measure of a country’s health, and a narrow one at that. It reveals nothing of the political landscape, the human rights conditions under which people are forced to live, the dire levels of poverty or where any new wealth has settled. Many claim ‘crony capitalism’ abounds in Ethiopia, that the principle beneficiaries of economic growth have been government members and close supporters and people from Tigray, the regional home of the majority of the government and senior members of the armed forces.

Desperate for change

With a population of almost 100 million, Ethiopia is the second most populous country in Africa after Nigeria. And with a population growth rate at a tad under 3% it’s growing apace (in the EU e.g. its 0.23%, the US 0.81%), meaning over the coming five years the country will have 25 million more people to feed.

The median age is a mere 17 years of age (44% are under 14), life expectancy is just 67 years of age (158th out of 198 countries) and the country (according to the US State Department) is still regarded as one of the 10 poorest nations in the world, with some of the lowest per capita income figures on the planet – just $590 (World Bank): it’s hard to live on $49 a month anywhere. The combination of low income, low life expectancy and poor education levels – only 39% of adults are literate and 85% of rural youth don’t complete primary school – means that Ethiopia is ranked 174th (of 198 countries) on the United Nations Human Development Index.

None of this, plus other stark details of daily life, the inflated cost of living for example, increased taxes, or the lowest level of Internet access in Africa – just 3.7%, is featured in the country’s routinely championed GDP figures. Headline numbers which mean nothing to the majority of people: most can barely feed themselves and their families, are increasingly angry at the level of state suppression and live in fear of government retribution should they dare to express dissent. As HRW correctly states, “visitors and diplomats alike are impressed with the double-digit economic growth, the progress on development indicators, and the apparent political stability. But in many ways, this is a smokescreen: many Ethiopians live in fear.”

Fear that has kept the people silent and cowering for years, but, encouraged by movements elsewhere, long-held frustration and anger spilled over in 2015 and 2016, when large-scale demonstrations erupted. Unprecedented demonstrations that followed hard on the heel of elections in May 2015, which, despite widespread discontent with the ruling party saw the EPRDF miraculously win 100% of the seats in both the federal and regional parliaments.

Thousands marched; firstly in the Oromia region than in parts of Amhara (areas that constitute the two largest ethnic groups in the country), until in October, after scores of people were killed in a stampede at Bishoftu in Oromia, a State of Emergency was announced by the ruling regime. Extreme measures of control were contained in the clampdown that lasted for 10 months. Draconian rules, which undermined the rights of free expression and peaceful assembly, and prohibited any association with groups labeled terrorist organizations, such as independent media stations, ESAT TV and Radio and the Oromia Media Network. Break the rules and face up to five years in jail, where torture is commonplace.

HRW made clear that the Directive, which was lifted in August, went “far beyond what is permissible under international human rights law,” and “signaled a continuation of the militarized response” that characterized the government’s reaction to people’s legitimate grievances, peacefully expressed. Tens of thousands of protestors, including opposition party leaders, were arrested and detained without due process. Hundreds of people killed, many more beaten by security forces that act with total impunity. None of this is contained in the World Bank data, the IMF forecasts or the BBC news headlines, nor is the state terrorism taking place in the Ogaden region and elsewhere, where murder and false imprisonment of pastoralists is routine and women tell of multiple rapes at the hands of soldiers and the quasi Para-military group the Liyu Police.

Ethiopia desperately needs a renaissance, true development built on a firm foundation of human rights, inclusion and political pluralism. Human development that caters to the needs of all its citizens, not economic growth based on a prescribed outdated, unjust economic model, which inevitably benefits a few, strengthens inequality and fosters corruption.

Far from building a democratic society in which freedoms are observed and valued, an atmosphere of fear, suspicion, and inhibition has been cultivated by the EPRDF government, a brutal regime that is determined to maintain power, no matter the cost to the people of Ethiopia, the vast majority of whom are desperate for democratic change.

How Big Pharma and Big Food Have Made Us Fat and Sick

Martha Rosenberg

How do you launch a “disease” created for no other purpose than to sell drugs that are supposed to treat it?

* Issue a press release about how it is an “under-recognized” disease with many “barriers” and “stigmas” to treatment.

* Launch a TV campaign to “raise awareness” about the disease’s symptoms and risks factors to help “sufferers” in the general public self-diagnose

* Create a website with a quiz for people to determine if they have the disease and a script for them to take to the doctor to be prescribed the intended drug

* Hire doctors to warn people that the disease is progressive and silent and will only get worse if they ignore it and don’t seek treatment.

* Create patient front groups to lobby the FDA to approve expensive drugs for the disease and to lobby insurers to not substitute a lower cost drug

* Plant articles in respectable medical journals about the hidden costs of the under-recognized disease in hospitalizations and quality of life of sufferers which total more than the cost of insurers buying the drug itself.

* Develop a second drug that sufferers need to add to the first drug to boost its performance, either because the first drug doesn’t work or the people never had the disease in the first place.

How Do You Produce Food That Fattens and Sickens Instead of Nourishes?

* Use taxpayer money. to market unhealthy food directly to consumers to help Agribiz, ignoring the government’s duty to protect public health.

* Dump unhealthy food into the School Lunch and other government programs where food consumers have little choice, also to help Agribiz.

* Pay dietitians to concoct protein, milk or nutrient “deficiencies” in children and the general public to unload the unhealthy food.

* Protect the identity of farms producing contaminated products and abusing workers, animals, and the environment (usually the same farms).

* Refuse to prosecute perpetrator farms, except for slaps on the wrist, and never shut them down which would be anti-industry.

* Strip federal food inspectors of power to enforce laws, stop assembly lines and report violations, making them pathetic figureheads who are openly ridiculed by plant managers.

* Remind the public to wash its hands after handling raw food because food safety is their responsibility and federal food inspectors can’t catch everything.

* Outlaw food labels that reveal production methods, dangerous ingredients or genetic engineering associated with a product so consumers can’t make informed purchasing choices.

Despite the wonder of Western medicine, the United States has some of the sickest people in the world, thanks to direct-to-consumer advertising—and most of it is self-diagnosed.

We “suffer” from seasonal allergies, asthma, seasonal affective disorder, social anxiety, depression, bipolar disorder, attention deficit hyperactivity disorder, erectile dysfunction, irritable bowel syndrome, dry eye, fibromyalgia, insomnia, migraines, mood disorders, obsessive-compulsive disorders, spectrum disorders, chronic fatigue, restless legs, excessive daytime sleepiness, osteopenia, perimenopause, and lactose intolerance. Many of the new diseases are “imbalances” from a “deficiency” of a drug that Big Pharma makes and we will need them for the rest of our lives, says the marketing.

In addition to taking drugs for diseases (and deficiencies) that barely existed before drug ads, we take drugs to prevent diseases we don’t even have, like thinning bones and cardiovascular diseases.

And despite the wonders of the Western diet, the United States has the least fit people in the world. We develop high cholesterol, high blood pressure, high blood sugar, obesity, diabetes, heartburn, gastroesophageal and reflux disease from junk food–and aching backs, painful joints, poor circulation and sleep apnea from the extra weight it causes. Drugs we’re already taking for “deficiency” diseases add to the obesity and we treat with more drugs for metabolism like statins, “purple pills,” and blood sugar–lowering pills. The food leads us to drugs and the drugs lead us to food, in a vicious cycle.

The TV “teleprompter” telling us to eat junk food is not the only cause of our national obesity. Super sizing, free refills and all-you-can-eat buffets encourage people to get their money’s worth at the price of their waistlines. The family meal, where we learned portion control and restraint, is a dying cultural icon. Size inflation, in which women who were size sevens are now size zeros through no effort of their own, furthers adipose denial. And baggy and low rider urban fashions seldom “don’t” fit.

And there is the ubiquity of snacks themselves. Once upon a time snacks weren’t available in banks, bookstores, body shops, hardware stores and hospitals. When some Europeans visiting a US mall saw people in the “food court,” eating cheese fries at 10:30 in the morning, they asked, “What meal is that?” Good question.

When you consider the toll that cheap food and drugs take on the public health, it is obvious that there is nothing “cheap” about them. The billions that Big Food and Big Pharma make are simply transferred to the cost of treating a nation with chronic, expensive-to-treat and often preventable diseases.

In fact, the junk food and drugs “deficiencies” we’re said to suffer from bring to mind the 1953 song, sung by Burl Ives, “There Was an Old Lady Who Swallowed a Fly.”After swallowing a fly, the old lady swallows increasingly larger animals to catch the previously swallowed animal. She swallows a spider to catch the fly, a bird to catch the spider, a cat to catch the bird, a dog to catch the cat, and so on. Every time she swallows a larger animal, the absurdity of her first act is repeated in the chorus: “I don’t know why she swallowed the fly, perhaps she’ll die.” And, in the end, she does. It sounds a lot like US consumers in the age of aggressive junk food and drug advertising.

Torture, the London Police and the Middle East

Robert Fisk

The Metropolitan Police in London will in a few hours’ time find themselves involved in the Gulf crisis when UK lawyers for three prominent Qataris submit their evidence of alleged torture and illegal imprisonment for which they blame up to 10 senior officials of the United Arab Emirates – including a cabinet minister and a high-ranking security adviser.

Human Rights lawyer Rodney Dixon QC will hand the Met details of alleged beatings, torture and illegal imprisonment of the three Qataris, one of them close to the head of Qatar’s own State Security Service, under the terms of the 1988 Criminal Justice Act – which allows British police to investigate and arrest foreign nationals entering the UK if they are suspected of war crimes, torture or hostage-taking anywhere in the world.

Prime Minister Theresa May, who only a few weeks ago decided to keep secret a British police report on “terrorist funding” for fear it would upset Saudi Arabia, will no doubt be infuriated to discover that the Metropolitan Police are now being asked to investigate the alleged “crimes” of senior officials in the Emirates – one of Saudi Arabia’s closest allies in the dispute with Qatar.

One of the three Qataris was repeatedly accused of being a member of the Muslim Brotherhood, the very Islamist group that the Saudis have accused Qatar of supporting. According to the same man – the one associated with the Qatar secret police – he was beaten and electrocuted and held in solitary confinement for almost a year.

Section 134 of the Criminal Justice Act – which cannot be May’s favourite piece of legislation – effectively allows the police or UK border agencies to question anyone, including wealthy Arab dignitaries visiting Britain on holiday, about torture and war crimes committed abroad. Cynics might suggest that the Qataris wish to embarrass their Emirati brothers during the expensive political crisis which principally involves Saudi Arabia and Qatar. And such cynics may be right. The Saudis have demanded that Qatar end its “funding” of “terrorism”, close down the international Al Jazeera television station and break off relations with Iran. As almost all Arabs will tell you, this crisis – which is somewhat contrived since Donald Trump, in his wisdom, is selling billions of dollars of weapons to both Saudi Arabia and Qatar – is about Iran and about the Sunni Arab world’s desire to crush Iranian Shiite power in Iraq, Syria and Lebanon.

The US President has – during moments of both clarity and insanity – supported the Saudi policy against Iran, one which is also enthusiastically endorsed by Israel. This week’s attempt to bring the Met into the politics of the Middle East may thus be seen in this highly toxic context. But stripped of its legal, and supposedly criminal aspects, however, the whole affair also says as much about the brazen relationships between Arab Gulf states as it does about the humane standards of secret police interrogation boasted by those who protect the emirs and potentates of the region.

I understand, for example, that after the original arrest of the three Qataris – one of them at Dubai airport, two others while crossing the Saudi land border into the Emirates – their imprisonment and alleged torture between 2013 and 2015 was well known to the Qatari authorities who preferred to try and resolve the matter without publicity. The senior Qatari security agent, I gather, was accused of bringing espionage equipment into the Emirates. Two of the three men made “confessions” on police videotape long before their release in May 2015 after being told they would be freed if they did so. These “confessions” were made after the men say they were subjected to prolonged torture, including the use of electricity and being hung upside down by their interrogators.

And there the matter might have ended – if the inter-Arab squabble between Saudi Arabia and Qatar had not broken out this summer and if the Emirati authorities had not then broadcast the police “confessions” of two of the three Qataris. If they now seek to clear their names and expose the ordeal of their alleged imprisonment and torture – as, I gather, they will in London this week – it would be interesting to know why they did not take this step when they were released more than two years ago. They claim that the “confessions” were tortured out of them.

As for the poor old Met, no one would dispute that when constabulary duty’s to be done – even under Section 134 – a policeman’s lot is not a happy one. And there are indeed times when inter-Arab politics – even without Trump’s appearance – might be better illustrated in the form of a Gilbert and Sullivan operetta. And this would be true if torture and solitary confinement was not the bedrock of every Arab state in the entire Middle East.

The Russia-China Plan for North Korea: Stability, Connectivity

Pepe Escobar

The United Nations Security Council’s 15-0 vote to impose a new set of sanctions on North Korea somewhat disguises the critical role played by the Russia-China strategic partnership, the “RC” at the core of the BRICS group.

The new sanctions are pretty harsh. They include a 30% reduction on crude and refined oil exports to the DPRK; a ban on exports of natural gas; a ban on all North Korean textile exports (which have brought in US$760 million on average over the past three years); and a worldwide ban on new work permits for DPRK citizens (there are over 90,000 currently working abroad.)

But this is far from what US President Donald Trump’s administration was aiming at, according to the draft Security Council resolution leaked last week. That included an asset freeze and travel ban on Kim Jong-un and other designated DPRK officials, and covered additional “WMD-related items,” Iraqi sanctions-style. It also authorized UN member states to interdict and inspect North Korean vessels in international waters (which amounts to a declaration of war); and, last but not least, a total oil embargo.

“RC” made it clear it would veto the resolution under these terms. Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov told the US’ diminishing Secretary of State Rex Tillerson Moscow would only accept language related to “political and diplomatic tools to seek peaceful ways of resolution.” On the oil embargo, President Vladimir Putin said, “cutting off the oil supply to North Korea may harm people in hospitals or other ordinary citizens.”

“RC” priorities are clear: “stability” in Pyongyang; no regime change; no drastic alteration of the geopolitical chessboard; no massive refugee crisis.

That does not preclude Beijing from applying pressure on Pyongyang. Branch offices of the Bank of China, China Construction Bank and Agricultural Bank of China in the northeastern border city of Yanji have banned DPRK citizens from opening new accounts. Current accounts are not frozen yet, but deposits and remittances have been suspended.

To get to the heart of the matter, though, we need to examine what happened last week at the Eastern Economic Forum in Vladivostok – which happens to be only a little over 300 km away from the DPRK’s Punggye-ri missile test site.

It’s all about the Trans-Korean Railway

In sharp contrast to the Trump administration and the Beltway’s bellicose rhetoric, what “RC” proposes are essentially 5+1 talks (North Korea, China, Russia, Japan and South Korea, plus the US) on neutral territory, as confirmed by Russian diplomats. In Vladivostok, Putin went out of his way to defuse military hysteria and warn that stepping beyond sanctions would be an “invitation to the graveyard.” Instead, he proposed business deals.

Largely unreported by Western corporate media, what happened in Vladivostok is really ground-breaking. Moscow and Seoul agreed on a trilateral trade platform, crucially involving Pyongyang, to ultimately invest in connectivity between the whole Korean peninsula and the Russian Far East.

South Korean Prime Minister Moon Jae-in proposed to Moscow to build no less than “nine bridges” of cooperation: “Nine bridges mean the bridges of gas, railways, the Northern Sea Route, shipbuilding, the creation of working groups, agriculture and other types of cooperation.”

Crucially, Moon added that the trilateral cooperation would aim at joint projects in the Russian Far East. He knows that “the development of that area will promote the prosperity of our two countries and will also help change North Korea and create the basis for the implementation of the trilateral agreements.”

Adding to the entente, Japanese Foreign Minister Taro Kono and South Korean Foreign Minister Kang Kyung-wha both stressed “strategic cooperation” with “RC”.

Geo-economics complements geo-politics. Moscow has also approached Tokyo with the idea of building a bridge between the nations. That would physically link Japan to Eurasia – and the vast trade and investment carousel offered by the New Silk Roads, aka, the Belt and Road Initiative (BRI) and the Eurasia Economic Union (EAEU). It would also complement the daring plan to link a
Trans-Korean Railway to the Trans-Siberian one.

Seoul wants a rail network that will physically connect it with the vast Eurasian land bridge, which makes perfect business sense for the fifth largest export economy in the world. Handicapped by North Korea’s isolation, South Korea is in effect cut off from Eurasia by land. The answer is the Trans-Korean Railway.

Moscow is very much for it, with Putin noting how “we could
deliver Russian pipeline gas to Korea and integrate the power lines and railway systems of Russia, the Republic of Korea and North Korea. The implementation of these initiatives will be not only economically beneficial, but will also help build up trust and stability on the Korean Peninsula.”

Moscow’s strategy, like Beijing’s, is connectivity: the only way to integrate Pyongyang is to keep it involved in economic cooperation via the Trans-Korean-Trans-Siberian connection, pipelines and the development of North Korean ports.

The DPRK’s delegation in Vladivostok seemed to agree. But not yet. According to North Korea’s Minister for External Economic Affairs, Kim Yong Jae: “We are not opposed to the trilateral cooperation [with Russia and South Korea], but this is not an appropriate situation for this to be implemented.” That implies that for the DPRK the priority is the 5+1 negotiation table.

Still, the crucial point is that both Seoul and Pyongyang went to Vladivostok, and talked to Moscow. Arguably the key question – the armistice that did not end the Korean War – has to be broached by Putin and the Koreans, without the Americans.

While the sanctions game ebb and flows, the larger strategy of “RC” is clear – a drive aimed at Eurasian connectivity. The question is how to convince the DPRK to play along.