EIR Daily Alert Service
EIR DAILY ALERT SERVICE P.O. BOX 17390, WASHINGTON, DC 20041-0390
- The Planet as a Whole: A Race between the BRICS and the World War Party
- Boston Death Sentence of Marathon Bomber Sparks Debate
- Elizabeth Warren Lands First Punch in Round Three of TPP Fight, Releases ‘Broken Promises’ Report on Free Trade.
- Macedonia ‘Maidan’ Is Attempted London Attack on the Whole BRICS
- Greece’s ‘Big Red Line’ Is Not Paying the Debt
- Nazification of Ukraine Advances; Obama’s Crowd Loves It
- Kerry Threatens War in Korea, as Modi Offers Development
- Smart Ibero-Americans Eager for Silk Road Alternative to Wall Street
- South Korea Commits $10 Billion for India’s Infrastructure Development
- Jerry Brown: ‘Conserve’ Is the Only Water Policy; Cripple Desalination
EDITORIAL
The Planet as a Whole: A Race between the BRICS and the World War Party
May 18 (EIRNS)—The past weeks have seen an extraordinary consolidation of the economic partnership and mutual support among China, India, and Russia—the core of the BRICS impulse of scientific progress and economic growth, which is now reaching many nations. A “brotherhood,” as EIR Founding Editor Lyndon LaRouche recently called it, rather than an alliance of nations, some of which are driving the highest rates of productivity and growth in the world; others of which, desperately need that. systems, are driving the world toward war—and not only the spreading, genocidal wars in the Mideast and Northern Africa which Bush and Obama, Blair and Cameron, and their Saudi allies have started. Modi and U.S. Secretary of State Kerry were visiting at the same time. credits for Indian infrastructure development, along with a commitment to bring to But the relatively bankrupt trans-Atlantic countries, with very bankrupt banking Today the battle was in full view in South Korea, where Indian Prime Minister India and Korea formed a strategic partnership; Korea extended $10 billion in credits for Indian infrastructure development, along with a commitment to bring to India, South Korea’s famously successful model for rural development. Modi presented the benefits of his “Make in India” campaign, for Korea.
Kerry, on the same day, dismayed his Korean hosts by blustering attacks on North Korea—virtual demands for war on the peninsula—and pushed the U.S. ballistic missile defense system Korea does not want, down their throats. Kerry’s deputy, Victoria Nuland, spent three days in Ukraine, then that country’s President signed laws which effectively glorify the country’s Nazi collaboration during World War II and outlaw dissent against it; while the Obama Administration again emphasized that heavy weapons for Ukraine to fight Russia were “on the table.”
And London moved against Macedonia, with anti-government demonstrations led by European diplomats and promising “a war here like in Ukraine.” Macedonia is an important link on China’s “Maritime Silk Road” port-and-rail development corridor, and an opponent of anti-Russia sanctions. The attack against Macedonia is against the BRICS as a whole, which alliance is clearly giving Greece a live option to escape the murderous austerity and economic depression imposed on it by EU agencies.
The BRICS dynamic must prevail. The current U.S.-NATO policy of destroying the BRICS combination, encircling and confronting both Russia and China, is not only a bankrupt policy; it is leading toward thermonuclear war and potential human extinction.
Remove Obama—whose own party is in revolt against him over his pro-Wall Street and pro-London policies—and a new orientation for America toward the BRICS dynamic is possible.
Remove Obama—who today proclaimed Camden, New Jersey with its 15%-plus unemployment rate “a symbol of promise for the nation”—and Wall Street could be defeated, beginning with a new Glass-Steagall Act to throw the casino speculation out of banking.
Remove Obama and create a surge of credit for productivity and employment, using Alexander Hamilton’s credit policies—and the United States can join the BRICS in rebuilding the economies and broken-down labor forces of nations, including its own.
U.S. POLITICAL AND ECONOMIC
Boston Death Sentence of Marathon Bomber Sparks Debate
May 18 (EIRNS)—Last week’s sentencing of convicted Boston Marathon bomber Dzhokhar Tsarnaev to death, done in Federal court in Massachusetts, has thrown the spotlight on the dangerous impetus at large in the United States, to condone death and killing as the “solution” for economic and social crises—the Cheney, Obama approach. There are many points raised in the debate which has ensued on the Boston case. One, in particular, concerns the use of the Federal death penalty in a state where it is not used.
“Unconstitutional” since the 1980s; the last execution in Massachusetts took place in 1947. Turning the trial of Dzhokhar Tsarnaev into a “capital” case then, was the imposition of the Federal government on the state, on this point of principle. government in 1988—is declining, down from 80% in the 1970s, to only 55% today.
In Massachusetts, and Boston in particular, however, public support for the death penalty runs as low as 15%, according to a recent poll done by the New York Times. Actually granted a trial by a jury of his “peers,” since all potential jurors were pre screened as to their views on the death penalty, and only “favorable” jurors were allowed to be seated. Small wonder then at the sentencing. UCLA law professor Adam Winkler says the jury was “rigged” in this method, telling the Business Insider website that “a true representative jury in Massachusetts might well have imposed a different sentence.” an “easy way out,” telling his native Brisbane Times that “putting him to death, in any case, is not justice. It’s not going to bring back those three people who died or do anything for the people who lost their limbs.” Others, particularly local victims, see the death sentence as the beginning of a long line of appeals, stretching out their anguish for years, possibly even decades.
Daughter maimed in the bombing, sent a plea, headlined, “To End the Anguish, Drop
The Death Penalty,” to the Boston Globe. “We know that the government has its reasons for seeking the death penalty,” they said, “but the continued pursuit of that punishment could bring years of appeals and prolong reliving the most painful day of our lives.”
Under Massachusetts state law, the death penalty was declared Nationally, citizen support for the death penalty—reinstated by the Federal This contradiction has drawn several people to ask whether Tsarnaev was Bobby O’Donnell, who ran in that Boston Marathon, called the death sentence Bill and Denise Richards, who saw their 8-year-old son killed and 7-year-old daughter maimed in the bombing, sent a plea, headlined, “To End the Anguish, Drop the Death Penalty,” to the Boston Globe. “We know that the government has its reasons for seeking the death penalty,” they said, “but the continued pursuit of that punishment could bring years of appeals and prolong reliving the most painful day of our lives.”
As noted by Bloomberg Business, “If the penalty is carried out, Tsarnaev will be the fourth person put to death in a Federal case since the death penalty was reinstated in the U.S. in 1988. He would follow Oklahoma City bomber Timothy McVeigh, a murderous drug dealer, and a man who killed a female U.S. soldier, all of whom were executed by lethal injection at the Federal death chamber in Terre Haute, Indiana.” is no longer made in the United States, and European suppliers are now refusing to sell it to the U.S., prompting several states to stop the imposition of death sentences in their states entirely.
Elizabeth Warren Lands First Punch in Round Three of TPP Fight, Releases ‘Broken Promises’ Report on Free Trade
May 18 (EIRNS)—Far from conceding defeat in the wake of Obama’s arm-twisting “win” in last week’s Senate vote approving the chamber to proceed to debate fast-track and the TPP, Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-MA) has struck a new blow at the Administration. She has issued a new report entitled, “Broken Promises: Decades of Failure To Enforce Labor Standards in Free Trade Agreements.” Presidents’ comments before trade agreements were passed: Clinton before NAFTA, G.W. Bush before CAFTA (Central America), and Obama before the South Korea Free Trade deal, and now before the TPP. Each man’s statement on his proposal, promised superior “protections for workers and the environment,” exceeding those of previous deals. deliver, or to be enforced. “The history of these agreements betrays a harsh truth,” says the opening summary, “that the actual enforcement of labor provisions of past U.S. FTAs lags far behind the promises. This analysis by the staff of Senator Warren reveals that despite decades of nearly identical promises, the United States repeatedly fails to enforce, or adopts unenforceable, labor standards in free trade agreements.” “persistent challenges to labor rights, such as limited enforcement capacity, the use of subcontracting to avoid direct employment, and, in Colombia and Guatemala, violence against union leaders.” Prior to 2008, the U.S. Department of Labor “had not accepted a single complaint,” dealing with “key labor provisions” in international treaties, and has since “resolved” a measly “one of five” complaints, dealing with “key labor provisions” in international treaties, and has since “resolved” a measly “one of five” complaints, and those at a snail’s pace. Similarly for issues dealing with “child labor, trafficked persons, and human rights.”
Since the signing of NAFTA in 1993, the U.S. has signed 14 trade agreements involving 20 other nations. There have been reported problems involving 11 of those 20 countries, not to mention the damage to the domestic workforce through this outsourcing.
COLLAPSING WESTERN FINANCIAL SYSTEM
Macedonia ‘Maidan’ Is Attempted London Attack on the Whole BRICS
May 18 (EIRNS)—The crucial role of a BRICS Bank offer of membership to Greece, contributing to a toughening of the Greek government’s commitment to its population against the bankrupt EU “creditors,” has been met with a counterattack by London and NATO—in neighboring Macedonia. This is an explicit attempt to repeat the “Maidan” uprising and coup in Macedonia, which dragged Ukraine into the bankrupt arms of the EU and NATO a year ago.
A week ago Greece was defaulting on the IMF, which “blinked” and essentially proposed a trick by which it would pay itself the $750 million payment “due” from Greece. Greece’s determination to restore employment, wages, and pensions—and not to pay, or contract any further debts which compromise this—was thus sufficiently shown. Greece is very close to giving China’s COSCO the contract to develop the Port of Piraeus and the surrounding rail system.
The City of London’s first counterattack is to collapse the Greek banking system, using the European Central Bank to force a formal split from the euro, where it cannot force more austerity. Greek 2- and 3-year bond interest rates are spiking upward today as a result—but, so are those of other so-called “peripheral” EU economies, showing contagion which was not supposed to occur. The second weapon, against the BRICS-allied nations as a whole, is being deployed in Macedonia. At an anti-government rally of 10-20,000 yesterday in the capital, Skopje, opposition leader Zoran Zaev proclaimed that if Prime Minister Nikola Gruevski did not resign, “there will be war here like in Ukraine.” EU diplomats flagrantly marched at the head of the demonstration—the mark of the Maidan. Zaev, whose party has received George Soros funds for years, told the Soros-owned NOVA-TV that the opposition had brought “2,000 young people who know karate and kick-box.”
Macedonia is on China’s Maritime Silk Road, on the route of the gas pipeline agreed by Russia and Turkey into Europe, and is opposed to the sanctions against Russia. And, its economy is growing at a near 5% annual rate, according to the IMF.
Greece’s ‘Big Red Line’ Is Not Paying the Debt
May 18 (EIRNS)—The big “red line” Greece will not cross is that it will not pay back the bailout debt. Greece does not want a third “aid” package to pay off old debt and pile on new debt. In an interview reported on oikonomia.gr, Greek Defense Minister Panos Kammenos made this point: “It is not possible that the Greek statecan pay its creditors, and not receive what it is entitled to,” stressing that “the country’s priority is not to pay the creditors, but to pay the necessary money in order for the state to run smoothly. Salaries and pensions, education, health, defense. That is what we will do from now on.” solution within the framework of the mandate and the red lines set so as not to surrender the sovereignty of the country and not to accept alteration of the Constitution and democracy.”
Central Committee and the Political Secretariat Including Yiannis Milios, Antonis Ntavanelos, Sophie Papadogianni, Panos Lambrou, and George Sapounas announced that they will convene an open meeting tomorrow to discuss the need for Greece to prepare for a rupture with the lenders rather than capitulate to their demands. arrived. The lenders are pushing the government to sign an agreement that is arepeat of the neo-liberal memorandum of privatizations, destruction of insurance, pension and labor rights, and an increase in the Value Added Tax. Their assessment is that a radical anti-austerity program of the Greek government cannot co-exist with the intolerance of neo-liberal-steered Eurozone. Greece must decide whether to sign the looming austerity agreement or have a rupture with lenders, and therefore conclude that Syriza cannot be turned into an austerity party to implement a memorandum. Thus, the only way out is a rupture with lenders, even if it means a possible break with the European Monetary Union.”
STRATEGIC WAR DANGER
Nazification of Ukraine Advances; Obama’s Crowd Loves It
May 18 (EIRNS)—Last Friday, May 15, Ukrainian President Petro Poroshenko signed the package of laws adopted by the Supreme Rada on April 9, mandating “de-communization” and glorification of Hitler’s Banderite collaborators in the country. This was done while Obama’s Nazi-loving Assistant Secretary of State Victoria Nuland was in Kiev, meeting with everyone in that government, Poroshenko included. metroplus.com.ua, reported, and smashed up memorial plaques, starting with one to Marshal Zhukov. Zhukov was the Soviet general key to the defeat of Hitler, and to whom General Eisenhower awarded the Chief Commander grade of the U.S. Legion of Merit, for Zhukov’s contributions against the German forces. Battalion currently serving in parliament with the Radical Party, celebrated the vandalism, writing on Facebook: “Kiev youth dismantled (smashed) a memorial plaque to the Ukrainophobe Marshal of the U.S.S.R. Georgi Zhukov. The police detained the activists, who then had to lecture the cops about de-communization. Looks like they were all let go.” report on her “terrific and extremely busy two days” she had spent in Kiev, meeting with “President Poroshenko, Prime Minister Yatsenyuk, Foreign Minister Klimkin, Minister of Finance Jaresko, Speaker Groysman, SBU Chairman Nalyvaichenko, Minister Avakov, a collection of young Rada deputies, the leader of the Opposition Bloc, the mayor of Kiev, OSCE’s leadership, Heidi Tagliavini and the head of the political working group, Ambassador Morel … [and] some Ukrainian business leaders.” democratic police force that Ukraine is building first in Kiev and that you’re now going to start expanding across the country.” That is to say, for the “clean, democratic police force” receiving U.S. training, which is being created under the direction of, and with the active participation of openly Banderite Nazis. Secretary for Defense Evelyn Farkas gave an interview to Voice of America/Ukraine, reiterating that “all options to provide weapons to Ukraine are being considered.”
“Hooligans” got into the spirit over the weekend, a news brief from “Right Sector” figure Ihor Mosiychuk, a commander of the Banderite Azov That same weekend, on May 16, Nuland held a press conference in Kiev, to She specifically expressed enthusiasm over “the new institutions, the new, clean, The same day Nuland was hailing this “new, clean, democracy,” U.S. Assistant Secretary for Defense Evelyn Farkas gave an interview to Voice of America/Ukraine, reiterating that “all options to provide weapons to Ukraine are being considered.”
Kerry Threatens War in Korea, as Modi Offers Development
May 18 (EIRNS)—There could not be a more extreme contrast than that between the proposals of the two leading statesmen who are visiting South Korea today. strategic alliance for peace in Asia, U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry is in Seoul ranting about North Korea, threatening new sanctions, and to take Pyongyang to theInternational Criminal Court (ICC), while lying that there is “not an inch, not a centimeter, not a microscope (sic)” of difference between the United States and South Korea in the approach to the North. Regime in the North, is deeply involved in ongoing development projects involving South Korea, North Korea and Russia. President Park Geun-hye is intent on building rail and pipeline connections through North Korea to Russia and China within this year, as part of a “peace through development” approach.
“The world is hearing increasingly more and more stories of grotesque, grisly, horrendous, public displays of executions,” referring to press reports last week that the South Korea intelligence agency had reported that one of North Korea’s top military officials had been executed with anti-aircraft weapons in public. Even the South’s spy agency has now retracted its report of the execution, but that did not restrain Kerry’s hysteria. saying that the threat from the North means “we need to deploy ships, forces, and we are talking about THAAD.” This is Kerry’s first reference to the Terminal High Altitude Area Defense (THAAD) missiles, South Korea recognizes THAAD is useless against North Korea, 30 miles away, and is only intended as part of the encirclement of China and Russia—which South Korea refuses to be part of. belligerence: “Under the current complex and sensitive situation on the Korean Peninsula, we hope that the relevant parties can do more to ease the situation and do things conducive to the resumption of the six-party talks.” As Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi offers development cooperation and a As documented in depth in EIR, Seoul, despite serious concerns over the erratic Kerry’s threats are clearly aimed at the South as well as the North. He raved:
The purpose was made clear when Kerry met with U.S. military forces in Seoul, China’s Foreign Ministry spokesman Hong Lei responded to Kerry’s.
Park Geun-hye is planning to visit Washington in June.
Posted By: Rhea Razon
