António Castelo

YouTube video by Institute of David Graeber David Graeber on Modern Capitalism

When David Graeber explained why Corporations behave the way they do in modern Capitalism!

youtu.be/QOVnb3y8hm4

We need better words. Who is working on that?

US says Sudan's RSF rebels committing 'genocide' – DW – 01/07/2025 US Secretary of State Blinken announced sanctions on the leaders of the rebel group. The RSF has been at war with Sudan's military since April 2023, in a conflict that has further devastated the Afric...

"The United Nations says over 30 million people in Sudan are in need of aid. More than half this number are children."

The Structural Adjustment Programs inflicted by the World Bank and IMF have irreparable consequences for African peoples.

Washington Post cartoonist resigns over paper’s refusal to publish cartoon critical of Jeff Bezos Pulitzer prize winner Ann Telnaes had drawn a cartoon of the paper’s owner kneeling before Donald Trump

Peak corporate media

Apple to pay £76m over claims Siri eavesdropped on iPhone users Millions could receive payouts after tech giant settles claims that conversations triggered adverts for certain products

This headline is a perfect example on how to protect corporations. Siri doesn't eavesdrop, it is programmed to record and store intelligence on customers for commercial and potentially political purposes.

If we are headed nowhere in particular we will be steered by corporate power influencing political leadership. Is this the best we can do in the West? Corporate media dictating narrative and smoke-filled boardrooms dictating policy? Where are our ideas?

The so-called Green Transition creates high demand for new natural raw resources for which supply routes and locations are being implemented hastily. We are repeating some of the worst mistakes of the first scramble for the riches of the global South from the 1400s to the late 1900s.

Macron, Trudeau, Obama, Sunak, etc. All democratically elected. All put forward liberal agendas benefiting corporations and the wealthiest. All of them corroded democracy. The Left needs to come forward with a new ideological horizon. It has to learn to engage. Without utopias we are directionless.

Trump and Musk in the White House is a landmark in the European colonial project started in the 1400s. Descendents of white settlers from two different continents are living proof that capitalism and imperialism have managed to surpass every other social and moral frame of economic organization.

UBI isn't supposed to be a magic bullet that cures everything, but its big advantage is it destroys conditionality which justifies enormous judgmental bureaucracies that alienate poor people and encourage them to hate each other and vote for the right

The idea that the market is somehow opposed to and independent of government has been used at least since the nineteenth century to justify laissez-faire economic policies, but such policies never actually have the effect of lessening the role of government. . In late 19th century England, for instance, an increasingly liberal society did not lead to a reduction of state bureaucracy but the opposite: an endlessly mushrooming array of legal clerks, registrars, inspectors, notaries, and police officials — the very people who made possible the liberal dream of a world of free contract between autonomous individuals. . It turned out that maintaining a free-market economy required considerably more paperwork than a Louis XIV–style absolutist monarchy. The same effect could be seen in America during Ronald Reagan’s presidency, or in Russia after the fall of the Soviet Union, where, from 1994 to 2002, the number of civil servants jumped by some quarter million. . - David Graeber

As David Graeber explains, the Neo-Liberal myth that Free-Market policies will end bureaucracy, is well a Myth!

Spoken in Portuguese. Carlos Lopes remains one of the brightest minds in macroeconomic analysis of North-South relations.

Most loans were captured by the IMF through deals signed by autocrats after coup d'etats, most of which had foreign support. These have mostly benefitted multinational corporations based in the North - who are hired for project implementation - and local elites, who pocket large sums immediately.

"How does it become a man to behave toward the American Government today? I answer, that he cannot without disgrace be associated with it."

"Resistance to Civil Government"
Henry David Thoreau, 1849

The great global conflicts are rising not from grievances between different national or religious groups but between the global elites and the people. We need new models, parliamentary procedure alone doesn't spell democracy.

Liberal democracies are nationalist and capitalist. How does this not descend to oligarchy and right wing populism? Do we have any models to escape this pitfall?

Over 3,100 children died at schools built to crush Native American cultures.

A year-long investigation by The Post reveals more than 3,100 students died at Indian boarding schools between 1828 and 1970 — and more than 800 of those students are buried in cemeteries at or near the schools they attended.

Read the full findings: wapo.st/408M3VV

It’s easy to get under that thin orange skin.

Champagne’s sordid secret: the homeless and hungry migrants picking grapes for France’s luxury winemakers A Guardian investigation finds an underpaid, underfed workforce, some of whom are forced to sleep on the streets, exploited by a system of labour providers

Immigration without rights stems directly from slavery and forced labour. The state aims for just enough through the border, and then denies citizenship and social security, effectively condemning people to the exploitation from predatory bosses and migration-lenders, a.k.a. traffickers.

Journalists who were unlawfully spied on have ‘no doubt’ UK reporters are still targeted Belfast-based Trevor Birney and Barry McCaffrey won landmark victory that PSNI’s surveillance was unlawful

We criticize so-called developing countries for failing to demonstrate respect for democratic processes, free press and fair governance. How cynical can we be?

Le militant écologiste Paul Watson de retour en France après cinq mois de détention Connu pour ses actions-chocs, le militant a suscité un élan de sympathie en France où les autorités avaient demandé au Danemark de ne pas l’extrader vers le Japon.

Le militant écologiste Paul Watson de retour en France après cinq mois de détention

Elon Musk praises far-right German AfD party The far-right Alternative for Germany party is classified by German intelligence as a ‘suspected extremist’ organization.

Elon Musk voiced his support for Alternative for Germany, a far-right German political party that has been classified by German intelligence as a suspected extremist organization.

The billionaire Tesla founder wrote in a post on X, the social media platform he owns: “Only the AfD can save Germany.”

The capitalists who lean left have to bring change within their circles. We would gain by shifting to a more coop ecosystem of industry, trade and business ownership. This ultra-accumulation is perverting the little that is left of the democratic process beyond recognition.

Limit foreign political donations, says UK government’s ethical adviser Call comes after reports that Elon Musk could make large gift to Nigel Farage’s Reform UK

Important story from @annasophiegross.bsky.social:

Elon Musk apporte son soutien à l’extrême droite allemande « Seule l’AfD peut sauver l’Allemagne », a posté le milliardaire américain, vendredi, sur son réseau social X, alors que le parti d’extrême droite allemand est crédité de près de 20 % des intentions de vote aux élections législatives du 23 février 2025.

Elon Musk apporte son soutien à l’extrême droite allemande

Africa and South east Asia have produced some of the best leaders and ideologues the Left has seen, most definitely in the 20th century. With the North failing so spectacularly, we may gain insight from looking South. Oppression and want foster political innovation, and community is the way.

Surely not...

Bamboo bonanza: how a village in India used its forest to go from poverty to prosperity Restoring age-old land rights has enabled 300 villagers to build a prosperous business and halt the exodus to the city

www.theguardian.com/global-devel...