Pfizer/ISID 2020 Africa & Middle East Grant Challenge

Application Deadline: 4th August 2020

About the Award: We are seeking innovative quality improvement health services and/or educational research applications that identify and evaluate practices for successfully implementing key elements of antimicrobial stewardship programs. Programs designed for healthcare organizations, hospitals, tertiary care clinics, and educational settings are all applicable. Through this $1-million USD grant challenge, projects can request up to $100,000 USD of funds to support two-year initiatives.

Type: Grants

Eligibility:

• The following may apply: medical, dental, nursing, allied health, and/or pharmacy professional schools; healthcare institutions (both large and small); professional associations; public health organizations, environmental health organizations, government agencies; Research facilities and other entities with a mission related to healthcare improvement.
• More information on organizations eligible to apply directly for a grant can be found at http://www.pfizer.com/files/IGLC_OrganizationEligibility_effJuly2015.pdf.
• Collaborations within institutions (e.g., between departments and/or interprofessional), as well as between different institutions / organizations / associations, are strongly encouraged. Antimicrobial resistance challenges require input from multiple stakeholders where limited resources can be judiciously allocated through collaborative approaches.
  Please note all partners must have a relevant role and the requesting
  organization must have a key role in the project. Projects with direct
  organizing effort and health outcomes focusing on patient populations in
  Africa and the Middle East will be prioritized for funding consideration.

Selection Criteria: Proposals will be reviewed according to the following critieria:

• Innovation – Does the work address a knowledge gap not yet answered in the proposed country or region?.
• Data/knowledge transfer – How can other hospitals/clinics/institutions benefit from the data, methodology and/or results?
• Probability – Is there a high likelihood of generating actionable data within the project period?
• Sustainability – Does the support go primarily to researchers living within the region and the proposed project benefits the regional patient population?
• Patient Safety – Do proposals take into account potential impacts on patient safety and present ways to mitigate potential adverse effects?

Eligible Countries: Africa and the Middle East

To be Taken at (Country): Africa and the Middle East

Number of Awards: Not specified

Value & Duration of Award: Projects can request up to $100,000 USD of funds to support two-year initiatives.

How to Apply: SUBMIT YOUR PROPOSAL THROUGH PFIZER’S CYBER GRANTS PLATFORM

• It is important to go through all application requirements in the Award Webpage (see Link below) before applying.

Visit Award Webpage for Details

Penalty pay rates slashed for Australian retail workers

Martin Scott

The Fair Work Commission (FWC) ruled early last week against a token bid by the Shop, Distributive and Allied Employees Association (SDA) to block cuts to Sunday penalty wage rates for retail and pharmacy workers.

The 15 percent loading reduction is the latest in a series of cuts that began in 2017. In three years, full- and part-time workers in the two industries have had their Sunday rates reduced from double time to time-and-a-half.

From July 1, casual shiftworkers employed on Sundays will be paid 1.6 times their normal hourly rate, down from 1.75 prior to November 2018. This will reduce the pay of more than 240,000 workers.

The minimum wage for adult retail workers is $21.41 per hour, so full-time Monday to Friday workers earn just $813.60 per week, less than half the national average.

Around half of Australian retail workers are employed part-time, and more than one third are casuals, meaning the vast majority earn far less.

In circumstances where median weekly rent is $582 per week in Sydney, and $454 per week in Melbourne, many retail employees depend on penalty rates to live.

The penalty rate cut will be felt especially by the most vulnerable layers in society, including single parents, full-time students, those caring for elderly relatives, and others who are unable to work more hours, even if a full-time job is available.

International students, who are prohibited from working more than 20 hours per week during semester, will be hit hard.

The SDA claims it was “deeply disappointed” by the FWC decision, but the union made no serious effort to prevent the cuts. And the SDA only asked the FWC to delay the reduction to coincide with a 1.75 percent minimum wage increase scheduled for February.

The lower-than-inflation minimum wage hike was to be introduced on July 1, but, bowing to big business, the FWC postponed it for all workers except for some deemed “essential.”

While the union referred to the crucial and frequently dangerous role of retail workers during the coronavirus pandemic, the SDA itself has been on the frontline of a broad assault on the working class.

In May, the union collaborated with McDonald’s and other major fast-food outlets to reduce guaranteed hours, eliminate overtime penalties, and effectively abolish casual loading for around 214,000 workers.

The SDA is not alone in facilitating such attacks on vulnerable workers.

“JobKeeper enabling directions,” rammed through parliament by the Liberal-National government with the full support of the opposition Labor Party and the Australian Council of Trade Unions (ACTU), granted employers the power to reduce workers’ hours and change their duties and location of work. This allowed employers to maximise productivity while reducing workers’ pay to the level of the $1,500 per fortnight JobKeeper wage subsidy.

The coronavirus pandemic has hit sections of the retail industry—more than 60,000 workers in the sector were stood down or sacked in March—but the largest employers, major supermarket chains, have seen surges in revenue.

Sales in Woolworths supermarkets rose by more than 40 percent in the week ending March 22, contributing to 11.3 percent revenue growth for the March quarter. Rival supermarket chain Coles increased its sales revenue 12.9 percent during the same three months.

Other major retailers have projected substantial growth for the 2019–20 financial year, partly as a result of the JobKeeper wage subsidy. The Harvey Norman retail chain anticipates a 20 percent year-over-year profit increase, while footwear retailer Accent Group, which sacked thousands of workers in March before signing on to the JobKeeper scheme, has told shareholders to expect a 10 percent earnings boost.

Rather than reward the workers who have endured life-threatening conditions to facilitate massive profits during the pandemic, these corporations have continued to call for reductions to workers’ pay and conditions.

Gordon Cairns, chairman of Woolworths, Australia’s largest retail employer, praised the collaboration between government and the unions. “It’s been adversarial up until now, and now it’s, I think, constructive,” he declared.

Cairns claimed that penalty rates have prevented the $47.7 billion company from employing more staff on weekends. In fact, a 2019 report by Macquarie University and University of Wollongong researchers found no evidence that the two previous rounds of penalty rate cuts had led to increased Sunday and public holiday employment.

An earlier study, released before the FWC approval of the penalty pay cuts in 2017, found that an increase in Sunday rates in the state of New South Wales between 2010 and 2014 had a “statistically insignificant” impact on retail employment.

Ignoring this data, the FWC instead relied on employer intentions surveys and the conclusions of an economist based on 50-year-old data.

The FWC, established in 2009 by the Rudd Labor government, and hailed by the unions as an “independent arbiter,” has consistently served as an arm of big business and the state.

In addition to imposing harsh cuts to workers’ pay and conditions, the FWC has repeatedly used its power to ban strikes and shut down industrial action. This has helped the unions suppress working class struggles and force workers to accept sell-out deals with management.

The FWC’s decision to slash penalty rates while delaying the promised minimum wage increase comes amid mass unemployment and underemployment.

Between March and April, around 2.7 million workers—one fifth of the workforce—lost their jobs or had their hours reduced. The job losses have disproportionately affected younger workers and those earning the least.

With less than three months remaining before JobKeeper and the JobSeeker coronavirus welfare supplement end, workers’ financial stress and anger are going to increase.

The slashing of retail penalty rates is a blatant move to maximise corporate profits. The complicity of the SDA and other unions underscores the need for workers to form their own workplace committees and other independent organisations of struggle.

New Zealand boosts preparations to join US war against China

Tom Peters

New Zealand’s Labour Party-led government, like its neighbour in Australia, is ramping up military spending and recruitment as part of the US-led preparations for war against China, which have accelerated in response to the global economic crisis triggered by the COVID-19 pandemic.

The US ruling class is determined that the war drive will be the means to reverse its economic decline and to divert working class opposition to unprecedented levels of social inequality. The Trump administration, backed by the Democrats, views China as the main obstacle to US hegemony, and has enlisted its allies’ support in the growing military build-up.

Ministers from the Five Eyes countries—the top-level intelligence-sharing network that includes New Zealand, Australia, the US, Britain and Canada—issued a joint statement on June 24 promising to “advance defence and security cooperation” to defend the “global order that is increasingly being challenged.”

Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern’s government, a coalition between Labour, the Greens and the right-wing nationalist NZ First Party, is committed to spending $20 billion on military upgrades.

This money is being diverted to the military during the worst economic and social crisis since the Great Depression and at the expense of the working class. Unemployment is expected to exceed 10 percent and nothing is being done to stop hundreds of thousands of people being plunged into poverty. The healthcare system is starved of resources, leaving the country highly vulnerable in the event of another outbreak of COVID-19.

On June 26, the NZ Navy received its new fleet tanker, the Aotearoa, purpose-built for $500 million by South Korea’s Hyundai Heavy Industries. The Aotearoa is the biggest ship ever to serve in the Navy and can operate in the Pacific and the Antarctic.

On July 8, Defence Minister Ron Mark, a member of NZ First, announced the purchase of 43 new Australian-designed armoured vehicles for the army. Stuff noted that the Bushmaster vehicles are already used by the elite NZ Special Air Service (SAS) and other members of the Five Eyes.

The number of regular soldiers in the NZ army is to increase from 4,500 to 6,000 by 2030. The Defence Force has already reported a 21 percent increase in applications to enlist between March and May, compared with the same period last year, fuelled by heavy job losses among young people.

Significantly, Mark praised the $270 billion military spending program announced by Australia’s government this month that includes new long-range missiles. Prime Minister Scott Morrison has made clear it is aimed at preparing for war against China.

Morrison told the media tensions between the US and China meant the world was in a dangerous period comparable to the 1930s and 1940s, i.e. the Second World War. He emphasised that “all of our defence force and defence strategy is built on the alliance… with the United States.”

Defence Minister Mark solidarised New Zealand with this strategy, telling Stuff: “What is good for Australia and the defence of Australia is ultimately good for New Zealand.” Canberra, he said, had shown “a clear commitment… to the defence of not just its own interests, but also to our Pacific partners, and a full realisation of the range of challenges that we’re all facing.”

Mark added that he was “very pleased that the door is wide open to New Zealand defence industry players to tender” for Australian military contracts.

The statements by Mark and Morrison expose the NZ government’s fraudulent “humanitarian” pretexts for military spending, including claims by the Green Party that new warships, planes and other military hardware are needed to provide relief in climate change-related disasters.

In reality, New Zealand’s ruling elite is preparing to join what would be a catastrophic war involving nuclear-armed powers. It has strengthened the alliance with US imperialism, including by joining the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, in exchange for Washington supporting New Zealand’s neo-colonial activities in the South Pacific.

In 2018, the Ardern government backed the US in labelling China and Russia the biggest “threats” to global stability. It has also called on Washington to send more military forces to the Pacific, to push back against China’s economic and diplomatic presence.

Sections of the media and academia, including supporters of Labour and NZ First, have for years sought to create a climate for war by stoking anti-Chinese sentiment.

These efforts have been ramped up in recent weeks, with renewed attacks on Chinese-born opposition National Party MP Jian Yang. Under intense pressure, Yang announced on Friday that he will retire from politics after the September election, after previously saying he would stand.

Jamil Anderlini, Financial Times Asia editor, asserted to TVNZ on June 28 that Yang was part of “the extension of Chinese power into New Zealand.” This echoes claims made by pro-US academic Anne-Marie Brady, without any evidence, that Yang is a Chinese Communist Party (CCP) agent. The fascist group Action Zealandia has similarly attacked Yang and accused the National Party of treason.

A key role in this campaign was played by the Daily Blog, which is supported by Unite and other trade unions. The blog organised a petition calling for Yang to be removed from parliament because, decades ago, he taught English at a Chinese military intelligence training academy.

Editor Martyn Bradbury wrote on July 7 that the National Party was “a front for Chinese business interests” and a danger to “national security.” Referring to party leader Todd Muller as “Beijing Muller,” Bradbury dismissed his statements that Yang left the CCP 26 years ago and is a loyal NZ citizen.

The Daily Blog, reflecting the nationalism of the trade union bureaucracy, advocates turning New Zealand into a “fortress” with a large military and a ban on immigration.

The National Party represents sections of the bourgeoisie that support the alliance with Washington but remain nervous about the economic impact of alienating China, New Zealand’s largest trading partner. On the other hand, Deputy Prime Minister Winston Peters, leader of NZ First and also foreign minister, has called for New Zealand to reduce its “reliance” on trade with China.

Peters announced on July 9 that New Zealand will join the other Five Eyes countries in “reviewing” its engagement with Hong Kong following Beijing’s imposition of a repressive “national security” law.

The bloc of NZ First, which has a long history of promoting anti-Asian xenophobia, with the Labour Party, the Greens and the trade unions, is based on the support of all these organisations for New Zealand imperialism. The wealth of the bourgeois and upper middle class layers they represent depends, in the final analysis, on the military alliance and financial ties with the US and Australia.

German multinational BMW to slash 16,000 jobs

Dietmar Gaisenkersting

Germany’s big corporations and companies are using the coronavirus crisis to implement cuts in jobs, wages and working conditions planned long in advance. The German auto industry, which has been able to rely for decades on the services of the IG Metall union, is at the forefront of this offensive.

In the wake of the recent announcement by many of Germany’s largest manufacturers that they would destroy tens of thousands of jobs, BMW disclosed its own concrete plans and figures. In mid-June, the works council and BMW company management reported the decision to cut 6,000 jobs. In addition, about 10,000 temporary and contract workers will lose their jobs.

BMW plant in Leipzig [Credit: BMW Werk Leipzig]

On June 19, works council chairman Manfred Schoch and head of human resources Ilka Horstmeier made public the plan under which the job cuts specified by BMW finance chief Nicolas Peter are to be implemented.

The first to lose their jobs will be BMW’s temporary and contract workers. The slashing of 6,000 jobs in the core workforce is to take place “without compulsory redundancies” so that the IG Metall works council can present the cuts as a “success.”

Vacant posts will not be filled. Around 2,500 BMW employees retire annually while the same number quit the company seeking other work. This number is likely to be significantly lower in the current situation with mass unemployment. In order to cut 6,000 full-time jobs, so-called “nearing old age retirements” are to be implemented, along with severance payments. Forty-hour contracts will be reduced to 38 and some employees will be encouraged to waive a collectively agreed additional allowance in favour of eight extra days of vacation.

The cost and job cuts are repeatedly justified as being key to the company’s accelerated transition to electro-mobility. BMW intends to bring a total of 25 electric models onto the market by 2023.

Only recently, Schoch, the chairman of the works council, suggested an offensive against BMW’s international competitors by developing a technological platform dedicated solely to electric cars. Currently, autos are being built on platforms compatible with both electric and combustion engines.

According to Schoch, the e-platform he proposed is necessary if BMW is not to be overtaken by its competitors from California, i.e., Tesla, or China. Reuters reported that Schoch is not alone in making this proposal. Internally, some BMW executives have been discussing such a strategy for some time.

The real driving force behind the cuts is not simply the coronavirus-related slump in sales or the conversion of factories to produce electric cars, as the works councils, trade unions and board of directors claim. The main driving force behind the attacks on workers are the profit drive and demands of company shareholders. From the shareholders’ point of view, the decline in sales must not lead to a reduction in their dividends and BMW workers must pay the price for the insatiable lust for profits on the part of the company’s owners.

At BMW, the main shareholders are the siblings Susanne Klatten and Stephan Quandt. They are heirs of the Quandt family, which acquired its enormous wealth through close cooperation with the Nazis. Stephan Quandt is the tenth richest person in Germany. Forbes magazine estimates his fortune at $12.3 billion this year, compared to $17.5 billion last year. His sister is the richest woman in Germany, “but her assets have shrunk in recent years,” writes Capital magazine, “from 25 billion dollars (2018) to 16.8 billion dollars (2020).

When BMW shareholders decided at their annual general meeting in mid-May to award themselves over €1.6 billion [US$1.8 billion] in dividends, 34,000 BMW workers were forced to accept short-time working with corresponding wage losses. The two Quandt siblings, as main shareholders, took home an extra €800 million.

The money the two heirs have collected in dividends this year is sufficient to employ the 16,000 about to lose their jobs, calculating pay for temporary and contract workers on an equal basis with their full-time colleagues.

The main instruments for the enforcing of this policy of richly rewarding shareholders are the works council and the IG Metall union, which runs the council. Schoch is the longest-serving chair of a works council in the German auto industry, having served as chairman of the council at BMW since 1987. In this position he has also sat on the company’s board of directors for decades, raking in hundreds of thousands of euros annually.

Schoch and his fellow bureaucrats have dedicated themselves to ruthlessly defending the competitiveness of “their” company. When increasing profits and thus dividends is on the agenda, they respond by arguing for unavoidable adjustment measures. They are currently justifying company reorganisation by pointing to the economic crisis caused by the pandemic and the resulting decline in sales.

However, the works council and company executives announced cuts at BMW at the end of November last year, which were mainly to affect temporary workers and supply-industry employees. BMW CEO Oliver Zipse declared in September 2019 that he would reduce the number of temporary workers at BMW to almost zero, shortly after he took over as CEO. At that time, of course, there was no talk of a coronavirus crisis and decline in sales.

Since then, there have been successive reductions in administrative staff, either through not renewing contracts or not filling vacant positions. This is now to be extended to the production lines.

Announcing the cuts last November, Schoch’s deputy Stefan Schmid, chairman of the works council for the BMW plant in Dingolfing, Bavaria, said cuts were unavoidable. “BMW may sell a lot of cars, but profit margins are falling,” he told the Landauer Neue Presse. “This means: We may have an increase in sales, but we are currently not earning as much money. Company employees must also experience and understand this fact.”

Schmid, like Schoch, is a deputy chairman on the BMW supervisory board. The two of them receive €430,000 annually for their supervisory board activities alone—in addition to the hundreds of thousands they receive each year for their participation on the works council.

The two works council millionaires are socially and politically firmly on the side of management and shareholders. They are the key players when it comes to elevating profit margins from the current 5 percent to the targeted 8 percent return on sales.

In a July 2 ceremony, Schoch, Schmid and Zipse opened a new production line for electric motors in Dingolfing. “By 2022, we will be producing electric motors for over half a million electric vehicles per year in Dingolfing alone,” Zipse declared enthusiastically.

A total of 18,000 workers are employed in Dingolfing. In the medium term, the number of workers employed in the electric drive unit is to be increased from the current 600 to up to 2,000. At the same time a far greater number of employees will lose their jobs in the production of combustion engines.

The agreements reached on factories and job security, so highly praised by Schoch, Schmid and co., are not worth the paper they are written on. The current contract at BMW, which supposedly guarantees the jobs of every employee, is only valid as long as the BMW group makes an annual profit. In other words: employment is secured if BMW makes sufficient profit and the return on investment satisfies investors. However, as soon as economic problems arise and workers require job security, the contract no longer applies.

It is urgent to confront the management lackeys in the works council and break free from the stranglehold of the IG Metall. BMW workers can only defend their jobs, wages and living conditions by breaking with the unions and rejecting their divisive nationalist orientation and by building independent action committees, joining forces internationally and fighting for a socialist programme.

Australia’s national cabinet steps up “reopening” despite COVID-19 surge

Mike Head

A “national cabinet” meeting yesterday decided to ramp up its reopening of the economy even though its policies have triggered a major COVID-19 resurgence in Melbourne and signs of spread to other parts of Australia.

Like governments around the world—from Trump in the US to Bolsonaro in Brazil and Modi in India—their Australian counterparts are intent on pushing all workers back into workplaces, regardless of the worsening global pandemic, in order to restore corporate profits.

So far, the toll in Australia remains substantially lower than on other continents, but the same pattern has emerged. Since the national cabinet started lifting restrictions at breakneck speed in late May, the number of new confirmed infections has begun to soar.

Workers attempting to practice social distancing while waiting to enter Leichhardt Centrelink office [Credit: World Socialist Web Site]

There have been 1,870 in the past two weeks, taking the total since March to near 10,000. This week, the state of Victoria has registered higher totals than during the initial phase in March, before partial lockdowns were belatedly implemented.

Today, Victorian Labor Premier Daniel Andrews announced another 216 cases were confirmed in the state over the previous 24 hours, taking the two-day total to 504, with an additional death, the 107th nationally. Several new cases have been reported also in Sydney and Canberra in the past two days.

This outbreak is worse than the first phase because the cases come mainly from unknown sources of domestic transmission, rather than identified returned travellers. As is happening globally, workplaces such as meat plants, warehouses and fast food outlets have become hotspots of infection, along with schools, hospitals and aged care homes.

Yet, yesterday’s national cabinet—a de facto national unity government of federal, state and territory leaders—declared that it met to discuss “easing restrictions, helping Australians prepare to go back to work in a COVID-safe environment and getting the economy moving again.”

Despite describing the news from Victoria as “very concerning,” the leaders declared that their “Three-Step Framework for easing restrictions” must proceed.

They “recommitted” to “the strategy of suppression of COVID-19,” again ruling out any effort to eradicate the disease, because that would mean shutting down industries that have been kept operating throughout the crisis, including mining and construction sites.

The leaders went further, welcoming the Queensland Labor government’s decision to reopen its borders to all states and territories, except Victoria, sparking a flood of people into Queensland’s coastal tourism centres. They also adopted a Productivity Commission report laying out “deregulation opportunities.” That means exploiting the pandemic to further restructure the economy to boost profits at the expense of safety, the environment and workers’ conditions.

The only modification to the reopening plan was a cap on the number of overseas arrivals. Some states have temporarily delayed border relaxations and go-aheads for huge crowds at football games, but not the return of school students and teachers to classrooms, even though the largest single outbreak, of more than 100 infections, is at a Melbourne school.

Having issued its instructions, the national cabinet adjourned for two weeks, until July 24, with Prime Minister Scott Morrison announcing he was taking a holiday break.

At the post-cabinet press conference, Morrison again emphasised the bipartisan unity between his National-Liberal government and the state and territory leaders, the majority of whom are from the opposition Labor Party.

Morrison said the leaders had agreed to “stick to the plan, to stick to the strategy, and to ensure that is well resourced and well implemented.” He said: “That was the focus of the briefing that Premier Andrews gave to National Cabinet today and he received strong support from all of his colleagues.”

This united front is driven by concern that the deteriorating public health situation and accompanying economic crash could intensify discontent with the entire political establishment.

Morrison and his colleagues are continuing to blame individuals, particularly young and working-class people, for the COVID-19 surge, accusing them of ignoring social distancing. This is a diversion from the responsibility of the governments themselves.

New virus clusters began emerging in late May, starting in the Melbourne suburb of Keilor Downs, pointing to underlying community transmission. But on June 1 restrictions were eased in Victoria. Exactly two weeks later, daily infection numbers climbed back into the double digits, and continue to grow.

The national cabinet statement claimed: “Victoria is responding well, including expanding testing and tracing, with the support of Commonwealth and other states and territories.”

In reality, evidence is mounting of serious contact tracing and other public health failures in Victoria. Alarmed parents in Melbourne have told the media of dangerous delays in being informed by the health authorities of infections at their children’s schools. Shelley Turner said she waited 12 days for an official notice that her child had been in close contact with another student who had tested positive for COVID-19 at Flemington Primary School.

Victorian healthcare, aged care and disability workers are reporting shortages of personal protective equipment (PPE). Nurses and other hospital workers told the media of PPE being rationed. One disability worker said she and her colleagues had bought their own clear plastic folders for homemade face shields.

For four months, health workers have asked the state government for supplies of masks, gloves, eye masks and coveralls for hospital, pathology, disability and aged care staff.

Since Monday, at least 20 infections have been found among healthcare workers and their patients at eight Melbourne hospitals, including the Northern Hospital, Broadmeadows Hospital, Austin Health, Royal Melbourne Hospital, Brunswick Private Hospital, St Vincent’s Hospital, the Alfred Hospital and the Royal Women’s Hospital

There have been at least 13 cases in aged care, including 11 among nursing home staff.

PPE shortages are not confined to Victoria. A survey of 500 healthcare workers across Australia found half were experiencing shortages. In some circumstances, only low-quality masks were available to aged care and disability workers.

Further revelations are coming from furious residents of the nine Melbourne public housing towers that the Labor government suddenly surrounded with 500 police last Saturday to impose a “hard lockdown” that trapped them inside their cramped apartments.

They are not just angry over being treated like criminals, without any welfare or counselling and no access to essential foods and other supplies for days. Ever since the coronavirus crisis began, residents had sent emails and made phone calls unsuccessfully asking the health department for hand sanitiser on every floor, regular deep cleaning of lifts and shared spaces, and public health information posted in multiple languages.

Brushing aside the danger to lives and livelihoods resulting from the coronavirus resurgence, the Australian Financial Review editorial today insisted that the overriding “task” is to “move ahead with opening up the rest of the country.” Such is the voice of the corporate elite and its governments.

As a Socialist Equality Party statement “Oppose the premature lifting of COVID-19 safety restrictions!” warned on June 3: “Every aspect of the response of governments—their cuts to public healthcare and medical research, lack of pandemic preparation and indifference to the lives of working people—flows from the subordination of human needs to corporate profits and the accumulation of personal wealth.”

Netanyahu acquires dictatorial powers citing Israel’s upsurge in COVID-19 cases

Jean Shaoul

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu is responding to the collapse of Israel’s economy and a resurgence of the COVID-19 pandemic with a turn to dictatorial measures against the Israeli and Palestinian working class.

Netanyahu admitted Friday that the country was once again in the grip of a “major outbreak.” He introduced a controversial law—passed shortly after midnight on Tuesday by a 29 to 24 majority—giving himself and the cabinet emergency powers to impose pandemic restrictions for up to a week before lawmakers can discuss, amend or cancel them.

He justified this blatant erosion of the Knesset’s control over the government saying that debating proposed laws delays the implementation of governmental decisions. He declared, “The legal rules restrict us, it’s simply unbelievable to pass everything through legislation.”

Netanyahu’s deputy and Minister of Defence Benny Gantz approved the call-up of an additional 2,000 reservists for the rest of the month, in addition to the 750 reservists previously approved, to help the government’s response to the pandemic.

Another new law enables the Health Ministry to work with Israel’s domestic spy agency Shin Bet to use its tracking system, employed against Palestinians suspected of “terrorism,” to identify people who had contact with those infected with the coronavirus and order them to quarantine. So flawed is the system that gives Shin Bet legal access to the cell phones of all its citizens that hundreds of the tens of thousands of people contacted and told to quarantine said they were at home at the time and had no contact with anyone. People have taken to going out without their cell phones to avoid being caught by the tracking system.

Netanyahu also gave the green light to his far-right supporters to initiate a vote in the Knesset to set up a commission to investigate Supreme Court judges he has long accused of carrying out a vendetta against him, encouraging his own Likud Party to support it. Gantz’s Blue and White Party had called the move “a declaration of war on democracy.” In the event, Netanyahu absented himself from the vote, which failed to win a majority.

These measures follow on from Netanyahu’s efforts to neuter the media and social media to maintain his grip on government. He has filed numerous complaints with the police about alleged threats and incitement to violence against him and his family, some of which he claims are “are clearly affiliated with the radical left.”

Netanyahu has been indicted on serious charges of bribery, fraud and breach of trust in three separate cases that all involve attempts to secure a suitably pliant and obsequious media. The second hearing takes place on July 19. It is expected that his lawyers will ask for a delay after the State Comptroller’s Office rejected Netanyahu’s requests for permission to accept donations from wealthy benefactors for his legal expenses and instructed him to return funds already received, prompting his lawyer Micha Fettman to quit his defence team.

The health authorities announced that the number of active coronavirus cases had exceeded 15,000 for the first time since the start of the pandemic—standing at 17,302 on Friday. There were 1,335 new cases reported on Wednesday, 1,268 on Thursday and 1,441 on Friday in contrast to the numbers during most of May, when new cases dropped to the low double digits. Some 46,000 people are in quarantine, 130 people are in a serious condition, up from 45 two weeks ago, and 39 people are on ventilators. The number of deaths has risen to 351.

The ban on visitors imposed in March remains in place, while any residents returning from abroad must quarantine for two weeks on their return, so this surge is the result of local transmission.

In the West Bank, there are 5,829 active cases, while 25 people have died. In the Gaza Strip, 72 people have been diagnosed with the virus and one person has died. President Mahmoud Abbas’s Palestinian Authority has extended the lockdown of the entire West Bank.

Gantz is in quarantine after coming into contact with a confirmed coronavirus carrier, as is Rafi Peretz, the Minister for Jerusalem Affairs and Heritage, Public Security Minister Amir Ohana, one of Netanyahu’s key cronies in his war on the judiciary, and Aviv Kohavi, Israel’s military chief, and other senior officers.

Netanyahu had announced a return to work at the end of April, as the cost of the closures reached $285 million a day, in a bid to ensure a continuing flow of profits to Israel’s corporate and financial elite. He declared “victory” over the pandemic and encouraged people to go out and “enjoy yourselves.” Having guaranteed a resurgence of the disease, he now blames the public for the surge, saying they should have worn masks in public.

His remarks have led to a massive increase in police enforcement of mask wearing, including fines, arrests and detention, prompting a spike in violent conflicts between police and the public and complaints against the police for using unnecessary force. The police are also enforcing the quarantining of tens of thousands of people.

Professor Siegal Sadetzki, the leading epidemiologist heading the coronavirus response and director of the Health Ministry’s Public Health Services, resigned Tuesday. She said the government ignored her warnings, reopening the country too quickly, and refused to listen to advice to address the rising number of infections already apparent more than a month ago.

Sadetzki posted a nine-page critique on Facebook, describing the government’s chaotic and ineffective approach and saying it had “lost its bearings.” Sadetzki wrote, “The achievements in dealing with the first wave [of infections] were cancelled out by the broad and swift opening of the economy.” She blamed the recent surge on the reopening of schools in May and wedding venues in June, allowed to host up to 250 guests.

Professor Eli Waxman, who heads the panel of experts advising Israel’s National Security Council on the pandemic, said Israel faced the most dramatic crisis in its history. This is not just a health care crisis, but an economic, social and political crisis.

More than five weeks after the infection rate clearly began to rise again, the cabinet has reluctantly approved new restrictions. These include closing bars, clubs, banquet halls, gyms, public swimming pools, banning cultural events, limiting the number of people allowed on buses, in restaurants and synagogues and hiking fines for people not wearing masks in public. It is discussing whether to impose lockdowns in neighbourhoods or towns with a high infection rate and the measures schools must take when they reopen in September after the summer break.

Under conditions where Netanyahu’s government has gutted public services and the social safety net and put in place few measures to protect the health, safety and economic well-being of Israeli and Palestinian workers—including 150,000 families who are short of food, people unable to pay their rent and facing eviction, and the tens of thousands of people isolated and alone—this is tantamount to premeditated murder as he allows the pandemic to spin out of control.

Netanyahu is facing growing anger and criticism over his handling of the economic fallout of the pandemic, with polls indicating only 38 percent of Israelis trusted the government’s handling of the crisis. More than 800,000 workers are still unemployed, 21 percent of the workforce. In the West Bank, unemployment has risen from 25 percent to 40 percent.

A mass demonstration has been called for Saturday night in Tel Aviv’s Rabin Square against the lack of a social safety net for workers and delays in receiving the limited funds promised. It follows last Saturday’s rallies by thousands across the country, organised by the Black Flag movement, demanding Netanyahu’s resignation in the wake of the surge in coronavirus cases, the government’s response and its plans to annex parts of the West Bank.

US takes punitive measures against China over Hong Kong

Peter Symonds

The Trump administration has seized on China’s passage of a national security law covering Hong Kong to ramp up its condemnations of Beijing, impose sanctions against Chinese officials and begin to dismantle US legislation granting special status to Hong Kong after its transfer to China in 1997.

Washington’s increasingly shrill campaign is part of a US confrontation across the full range of issues—diplomatic, economic and military—that are leading to war. Amid the worsening global crisis triggered by the COVID-19 pandemic, US imperialism regards China as the chief threat to its world dominance.

China’s National People’s Congress passed the national security legislation on June 30, making major inroads into basic democratic rights in Hong Kong. The offences of subversion, terrorism, promoting secession from China and collusion with foreign forces, all defined in sweeping terms, are now punishable by up to life in prison.

Chinese authorities established a new national security office in Hong Kong on Wednesday, allowing Chinese security agents to openly operate in the city for the first time and investigate anyone suspected breaching the laws. The first most obvious targets will be protest leaders and opposition politicians critical of Beijing’s intrusion into Hong Kong and opposed to the new security law.

Even before the office was opened, a 23-year-old man, Tong Ying-kit, on Monday became the first person to be charged under the legislation—with terrorism and inciting secession. Flying a banner emblazoned with “Liberate Hong Kong,” he allegedly rode a motorbike into a group of police officers last week, injuring three. The decision to charge him under the law, rather than existing laws, was clearly designed to intimidate other protesters. Tong was remanded without bail.

A purge of literature from libraries and schools appears to be underway. Books written by prominent protest leaders and opposition politicians were removed from public libraries last weekend. Hong Kong’s cultural services department said the books had been withdrawn while it determined whether they violate the national security law. The education bureau announced a similar “review” of books used in schools.

Britain’s transfer of Hong Kong to China in 1997 took place under the “one country, two systems” formula whereby Hong Kong would largely retain the legal and political systems established under British colonial rule. This principle was enshrined in the Basic Law governing the territory for 50 years. The national security law makes inroads into Hong Kong’s legal system by allowing its chief executive—appointed by a handpicked pro-Beijing committee—to appoint judges to hear national security cases and allows serious cases to be heard in Chinese mainland courts.

Beijing’s imposition of these anti-democratic laws reflects deep fears in Chinese ruling circles that waves of mass protest in Hong Kong—the latest against the security law itself—have the potential to trigger opposition on the Chinese mainland over the lack of democratic and social rights. Those concerns have grown as the pandemic has hit China’s already slowing economy, raising the spectre of widespread unemployment and social unrest.

At the same time, Beijing fears that demands for the independence of Hong Kong will fuel separatist movements in other parts of China, including Tibet, and among the Muslim Uyghurs in the western province of Xinjiang. It is concerned that the US and its allies will exploit such movements to break up China. Protest leaders in Hong Kong have played into the hands of the Chinese regime by appealing for the US and Britain to intervene against Beijing.

US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo declared: “The United States will not stand idly by while China swallows Hong Kong into its authoritarian maw.” The US, he said, will “respond to Beijing’s attacks on freedoms of speech, the press, and assembly, as well as the rule of law, all of which have, until now, allowed the territory to flourish.”

These remarks are utterly cynical. The lack of democratic rights in Hong Kong derives from the long period of British rule, during which a colonial governor had extensive, autocratic powers. Once again, the US is selectively exploiting “human rights” to advance its own imperialist interests, as it has done for wars of aggression in the Middle East.

Even before China’s national security law was passed, the Trump administration announced that it intended to overturn Hong Kong’s special status with the US, covering trade, investment and legal matters such as extradition. The White House has begun by halting defence exports and restricting Hong Kong’s access to high-technology products. The Department of State also announced it will bar Chinese officials allegedly responsible for rights abuses in Hong Kong from entering the US.

Late last week, the US Senate passed a bill aimed at blocking US banks from doing business with Chinese officials responsible for the Hong Kong security legislation. The bill was passed unanimously, demonstrating the bipartisan nature of the US anti-China campaign. Leading Democrats, such as Joseph Biden, are criticising Trump for not being tough enough and demanding even more aggressive action.

On Thursday, Pompeo also announced sanctions against Chinese officials over the widespread detention of Uyghurs and other ethnic minorities in Xinjiang in so-called re-education centres. At the top of the list is Chen Quanguo, who is a member of the Chinese Communist Party’s Politburo and party secretary for the Xinjiang region. The sanctions come amid an increasingly hysterical campaign in the US media and political establishment, typified by a Washington Post editorial alleging that China is carrying out “genocide” against the Uyghurs.

Just a day earlier, on Wednesday, the Trump administration imposed visa restrictions on Chinese officials involved in policy on Tibet, supposedly in protest at the Beijing’s refusal to allow American tourists, journalists and diplomats to visit the strategically-sensitive area. The US has for decades established close relations with Tibetan, as well as Uyghur, exile organisations, campaigning for secession from China or greater autonomy.

The Trump administration’s ramping up of measures against Beijing over Hong Kong, Tibet and Xinjiang is aimed at undermining China by fostering its break-up and also vilifying Beijing as the US prepares to take further steps toward open economic war and military conflict.

COVID-19 disrupts reopening of US professional sports

Alan Gilman

US professional soccer, baseball and basketball are beginning to resume play against the backdrop of a pandemic that is surging throughout the country as daily new infections are exceeding 60,000 and deaths are nearing 135,000.

By mid-March all professional sports leagues in the US had suspended play in response to the COVID-19 outbreak. At that time two National Basketball Association (NBA) players had tested positive, and nationally approximately 1,500 people had been diagnosed with the virus and 40 had died.

The suspension of play had been considered to be a temporary measure until the virus could be brought under control. With tens of billions of dollars at stake, the various leagues began designing plans on when and how to “safely” reopen, eventually all of which centered on resuming in the summer with the expectation that the severity of the pandemic would have been greatly reduced by then.

On June 27 the National Women’s Soccer League (NWSL) was the first league to open, with a month-long tournament being held in Utah in which all players are being confined to a “player village” with mask coverings mandatory and no visitors allowed.

Before the league’s nine teams left for Utah, however, it was announced that the Orlando Pride, considered the league’s premiere team, had to withdraw because six players and staff had tested positive for COVID-19.

As the league scrambled to announce a schedule for what is now be an eight-team tournament, some of the league’s stars announced they were also staying home due to coronavirus concerns including US national team players Megan Rapinoe, Tobin Heath and Christen Press.

“Although I want to be on the field with my teammates doing what I love, because of the uncertainty and risks created by COVID-19, I have chosen not to participate in the NWSL Challenge Cup,” said Heath.

Major League Soccer (MLS) began play on July 8 with its “MLS is Back Tournament,” which is to run through August 11. The tournament is being held at Disney’s Wide World of Sports Complex near Orlando, Florida, in which all players and staff, totaling over 1,200 people, will be confined in two hotels. They will continue to be isolated from outsiders, including their families, in what has been characterized as a protective “bubble.”

Florida is currently one of the epicenters of the pandemic, averaging close to 10,000 new cases a day, and Orlando has nearly a 20 percent positivity testing rate, indicating that the virus is particularly rampant in that community.

FC Dallas, one of the league’s 26 teams, had to withdraw from the tournament after 10 players had tested positive, and Nashville SC had to postpone its initial appearance when five of its players tested positive.

Vancouver left three starters home for COVID-related reasons and LAFC is without Carlos Vela, the league’s best player and biggest draw, because he chose to stay home with his pregnant wife. At least five teams had their travel delayed by testing concerns, forcing the postponement of their opening-round matches.

Dr. Abraar Karan, a physician at Harvard Medical School and Brigham and Women’s Hospital who is working on COVID-19 response in Massachusetts, said that outdoor soccer might be inherently less dangerous than indoor basketball, but it was still a high-risk contact sport, adding that the league’s stance of not considering a Plan B or canceling the tournament was “reckless.”

“If you’re heading into a tournament knowing [about Dallas], you’re in denial if you’re saying that the tournament may somehow magically be safe,” he told ESPN. “You’re actually moving people in and interacting with even more people. You’re basically saying ‘we know that this is dangerous. We know our players are testing positive. We know we’re putting them in high-risk situations where they’re in close contact with one another. And yet we’re hoping for a different outcome.’ There’s no science there. There’s no logic there.”

MLS Commissioner Don Garber, in announcing the tournament last month, estimated the league could lose as much as $1 billion to the COVID-19 shutdown, and emphasized how important it was to their corporate partners to get the teams back in front of fans as soon as possible, even if they can watch only on TV.

The National Basketball Association (NBA) is planning to resume its nearly completed season on July 31 with an abbreviated schedule before the playoffs begin. The top 22 of the league’s 30 teams reported to Orlando, Florida, on July 7 at the same Disney complex and its players and staff will live in a similar “bubble.” Players will not be able to have contact with their families until the playoffs end in late August.

The NBA, which was facing a $1 billion loss if the rest of the season was canceled, decided, like the MSL, that it would utilize Orlando as its venue. This was because Florida was one of the first states to reopen, it claimed to have had a low infection rate and its governor, Republican Ron DeSantis, had publicly appealed for professional sports teams that were being restricted in their home states to come to Florida to play.

In the initial testing period from June 24 to June 29, 25 of 351 NBA players have tested positive, approximately 7 percent, as well as 10 of 884 team staff members.

Despite the high number of players and staff who have tested positive, and the high incidence of the virus in Orlando, NBA Commissioner Adam Silver said July 7 that even if there were new positives, it would not likely cause the season to be canceled. When asked what would be the threshold for having to shut down, Silver acknowledged, “It’s the right question, and I’m not sure yet.”

Ten NBA players have opted out of playing and will be forfeiting the remainder of their salaries, approximately 10 to 30 percent, depending upon how many playoff games they would have potentially played. Most cited health concerns for themselves or their families.

Major League Baseball (MLB), which had halted spring training in mid-March, resumed it on July 1 in each team’s home city and will begin a compressed 60-game season on July 23–24, with the playoffs and World Series to be completed by early October.

Baseball team owners claim about 40 percent of their total annual revenue, about $10.7 billion, is derived from ticket sales. Without fans in the stands, they are attempting to salvage the enormous revenues from their broadcast rights.

MLB’s safety and health protocols called for all players to be tested beginning last Friday and then begin a rhythm of being tested every other day until the end of the season. The results of this first batch of tests were not delivered within the prescribed 48 hours, forcing eight teams to cancel Monday’s practice.

With such a widespread testing breakdown occurring at the beginning of this effort, many are questioning how MLB will be able to conduct and process roughly 14,000 tests a week taken at dozens of sites across the country. Once swabs are taken, they have to be sent to a lab in Utah for analysis and the results returned to each team within the 48-hour window

According to ESPN’s Marly Rivera, there were 66 positive tests (58 players and eight staff) among 3,470 initial tests.

“I think there’s still some doubt that we’re going to have a season now,’’ St. Louis Cardinals reliever Andrew Miller, a member of Major League Baseball Players Association’s executive subcommittee, said Sunday. “By no means is this a slam dunk. We’re trying, we’re going to give it our best effort, but for me to sit here and say 100 percent would be a lie.’’

High-risk players can decide to opt out and would receive both their full salary and service time for the season. Players who have high-risk family members may also decide to opt-out, but MLB would leave it up to teams to make the decision of whether or not they would receive salary or service time. High-risk would include people who have heart disease, lung disease, cancer, high blood pressure or diabetes.

Sean Doolittle of the Washington Nationals said that to many players, the opt-out provisions are not great. “There’s a lot of players right now trying to make decisions that aren’t 100 percent comfortable where things are at right now,” he told the press. “That’s kind of where I am. I think I’m planning on playing, but at any point I can start to feel unsafe. If it starts to take a toll on my mental health with all of these things we have to worry about this cloud of uncertainty hanging over everything, then I’ll opt out.’’

In the National Football League (NFL), several players and coaching staff have recently tested positive for COVID-19 as training facilities have begun to reopen. There is no plan for an NFL “bubble” even though Dr. Anthony Fauci raised the possibility in a CNN interview two weeks ago.

“Unless players are essentially in a bubble—insulated from the community and they are tested nearly every day—it would be very hard to see how football is able to be played this fall,” he said. President Trump quickly attacked that idea in a tweet, saying, “Tony Fauci has nothing to do with NFL Football. They are planning a very safe and controlled opening.”

As always, when it is a conflict between profits for the super-rich and the health and welfare of those who actually do the work—in this case, a conflict between the owners and the athletes—Trump comes down 100 percent on the side of the bosses.

Biden promotes economic nationalism and anti-China militarism

Barry Grey

On Thursday, former Vice President Joe Biden, the presumptive Democratic presidential candidate, gave what was billed as a major speech on economic policy. Biden’s remarks, delivered at McGregor Industries near Scranton, Pennsylvania, were dominated by economic nationalism, with a focus on attacks against China.

Speaking in a battle-ground state that was narrowly won by Donald Trump in 2016, Biden attempted to present himself as a “blue-collar” partisan of the “hard-working middle class.” The 77-year-old political windbag has been a fixture in American politics for nearly 50 years, having been first elected in 1972, at the age of 30, to the US Senate, where he served for 40 years before spending eight years as vice president under Barack Obama.

The man who presents himself as “middle-class Joe from hard-scrabble Scranton, Pennsylvania” is implicated in virtually every crime and atrocity committed by US imperialism against the people of the world over that period, as well as the social counterrevolution of the past four decades, which has produced unprecedented levels of social inequality and financial parasitism. That includes the Obama-Biden administration’s role in the bailout of Wall Street in 2008-2009 and the biggest transfer of wealth from the bottom to the top to that point in US history.

In his speech, Biden offered no opposition to the administration’s brutal “back-to-work” drive, which is being implemented by Democratic and Republican governors and mayors alike, and which has already resulted in an explosion of COVID-19 infections and hospitalizations, along with a new surge in deaths.

Nor did he propose measures to restore the millions of jobs permanently lost during the pandemic. He was silent on the multi-trillion-dollar bailout of Wall Street and big business enacted in March with the near-unanimous votes of the Democrats in Congress. He did not even address the looming cutoff of the $600 weekly federal unemployment benefit, which threatens to plunge tens of millions of workers into homelessness and destitution.

Instead, he pledged that a Biden administration would continue the economic nationalist, trade war policies enacted by Trump. Calling for an expanded “Buy American” program, he sought to attack the incumbent president from the right, claiming that Trump was insufficiently aggressive in cracking down on Chinese imports and bringing global supply chains back to the US.

The speech was laced with the standard pseudo-populist pablum of American capitalist politics, such as the promise to build “an economy where every American has a chance to get a fair return for the work they put in, an equal chance to get ahead.” At one point, Biden called for an end to “shareholder capitalism,” meaning a return to a mythical capitalist past when corporations recognized that “they have responsibility to their workers, their community, to their country.”

He got to the main point when he called for a future that is “made in America, all in America.” He proposed to double the tax on foreign profits and said he would allocate $400 billion in his first year to buy American products. This would constitute a $400 billion taxpayer handout to major US corporations.

Biden’s plan also calls for eliminating loopholes and waivers to “Buy American” requirements and affixing “Buy American “labels on products produced by US-owned corporations.

The Wall Street Journal cited a Biden campaign adviser, who said in advance of the speech that it would “serve notice to American trading partners that, even if Mr. Trump loses in November, allies shouldn’t expect Washington to return to the embrace of economic globalization that had defined the policies of the Obama-Biden administration and two decades of Republican and Democratic presidents who preceded it.”

After proclaiming his own “America First” credentials, Biden launched into attacks on China, as well as denunciations of Trump for being “soft” on Beijing. “The Chinese are spending multiple billions of dollars trying to own the technology of the future while we sit with our thumb in our ear,” he declared. “This means fighting unfair trade practices, curbing the theft of intellectual property by countries like China.”

Of Trump, he complained, “He promised to buy American, then let federal contractors double the rate of offshoring jobs in his first 18 months… He praised the Chinese government, even as the virus was coming to our shores because he was so afraid that they’d walk away from his trade deal…”

At another point he denounced “the way [Trump] coddles up to Putin and others.”

This was combined with praise for the trade unions, bastions of national chauvinism and protectionism and key instruments for suppressing working class opposition to the homicidal back-to-work drive. “The unions built the middle class,” he proclaimed.

Other proposals announced by Biden include a research and investment program of $300 billion over four years “to sharpen America’s competitive edge in new industries where global leadership is up for grabs, like battery technology, artificial intelligence, biotechnology and clean energy”—that is, another subsidy for corporate America.

He pledged to raise the corporate tax rate from the 21 percent established in the Trump tax overhaul to 28 percent, which is still a substantial reduction from the 35 percent that prevailed prior to the December 2017 measure.

He listed the most minimal of social reforms, including a $15 dollar minimum wage, a raise in Title One teacher pay to $60,000 a year and financial incentives for “black, brown and Native American entrepreneurs.”

The Democratic Party’s embrace of the extreme economic nationalism promoted by Trump is in large part motivated by fear of the emergence of a united mass movement of the American and international working class against capitalism. The US corporate oligarchy is well aware of the growth of socialist sentiment among workers and rising struggles by workers internationally against the brutal and incompetent response of capitalist governments to the pandemic. In recent weeks, for example, Mexican workers at auto parts sweat shops along the US border have refused to return to work and appealed for support from American autoworkers, disrupting supply chains and plans to reopen US assembly plants.

Economic nationalism and trade war go hand in hand with militarism and shooting wars. Biden and the Democrats are no less committed to preparing for war against Washington’s “great power” rivals, first and foremost China and Russia, than Trump and the Republicans.

Earlier this month, Defense One published an article titled “How Biden Would Wage Great Power Competition,” which asserted that, regardless which party wins in November, the National Defense Strategy published in the beginning of 2018 will remain the basic national security doctrine. That document declared that US military strategy had shifted from the “war on terror” to great power “competition” against China and Russia, two nuclear-armed powers.

The article, which reflects the thinking of significant sections of the military-intelligence establishment, compared Biden’s ability to execute and manage this strategy favorably to that of Trump. “Trump’s commitment to great power competition is a matter of debate, the author wrote, adding that “the president’s actions contrast starkly with the president’s words, particularly on Russia and President Vladimir Putin.”

The article continued: “The United States is in the process of updating its Cold War-era arsenal of nuclear bombs and delivery vehicles. Biden has boasted about the money that the Obama administration put toward modernization… Biden might spend less on nuclear weapons than another Trump administration, but not by much…

“No matter who is president, the money will continue pouring into things like hypersonic missiles and next-generation aircraft like the F-35, which Biden has described favorably. Biden has also signaled a willingness to spend more on key areas of defense he has described as overlooked, including ‘cyber, space, unmanned system, and artificial intelligence.’”

As for Biden’s “blue-collar” credentials, through 2018, Biden and his wife, Jill, had cashed in on Biden’s years as second-in-command to the president to the tune of $15 million after leaving office two years earlier. Between multi-million-dollar book deals, business ventures and $100,000-a-pop speaking engagements, the Bidens are estimated to be worth at least $9 million.

Little wonder that in a speech to large donors in New York in June of last year, Biden said: “What I’ve found is rich people are just as patriotic as poor people. Not a joke. I mean, we may not want to demonize anybody who has made money.”