The Ascendancy of a Criminal Financial Elite: The Two Faces of a Police State “The rotten heart of finance” The Economist “There is a degree of cynicism and greed which is really quite shocking” Lord Turner Bank of England , Financial Service Authority Introduction Never in the history of the United States have we witnessed crimes committed on the scale and scope of the present day by both private and state elites. An economist of impeccable credentials, James Henry, former chief economist at the prestigious consulting firm McKinsey & Company, has researched and documented tax evasion. He found that the super-wealthy and their families have as much as $32 trillion (USD) of hidden assets in offshore tax havens, representing up to $280 billion in lost income tax revenue! This study excluded such non-financial assets as real estate, precious metals, jewels, yachts, race horses, luxury vehicles and so on. Of the $32 trillion in hidden assets, $23 trillion is held by the super-rich of North America and Europe.
Category: James Petras
James Petras, a retired Bartle Professor (Emeritus) of Sociology at Binghamton University, SUNY, New York, U.S., and adjunct professor at Saint Mary’s University, Halifax, Nova Scotia, Canada. He describes himself as a “revolutionary and anti-imperialist” activist and writer. He has worked with the Brazilian landless workers’ movement and the unemployed workers’ movement in Argentina. He is currently a member of the editorial collective of Canadian Dimension. Petras is the author of numerous books and articles and contributes to Counterpunch.
China: Rise, Fall and Re-Emergence as a Global Power: Some Lessons from the Past* Introduction The study of world power has been blighted by Eurocentric historians who have distorted and ignored the dominant role…
Introduction One of the most significant political developments in recent US history has been the virtually unchallenged rise of the police state. Despite the vast expansion of the police powers of the Executive Branch of…
Introduction: The mounting threat of a US-Israeli military attack against Iran is based on several factors including: (1) the recent military history of both countries in the region, (2) public pronouncements by US and Israeli political leaders, (3) recent and on-going attacks on Lebanon and Syria, prominent allies of Iran, (4) armed attacks and assassinations of Iranian scientists and security officials by proxy and/or terrorist groups under US or Mossad control, (5) the failure of economic sanctions and diplomatic coercion, (6) escalatinghysteria and extreme demands for Iran to end legal, civilian use-related uranium enrichment, (7) provocative military ‘exercises’ on Iran’s borders and war games designed for intimidation and a dress rehearsal for a preemptive attack, (8) powerful pro-war pressure groups in both Washington and Tel Aviv including the major Israeli political parties and the powerful AIPAC in the US, (9) and lastly the 2012 National Defense Authorization Act (Obama’s Orwellian Emergency Decree, March 16, 2012). The US propaganda war operates along two tracks: (1) the dominant message emphasizes the proximity of war and the willingness of the US to use force and violence. This message is directed at Iran and coincides with Israeli announcements of war preparations. (2) The second track targets the ‘liberal public’ with a handful of marginal ‘knowledgeable academics’ (or State Department progressives) playing down the war threat and arguing that reasonable policy makers in Tel Aviv and Washington are aware that Iran does not possess nuclear weapons or any capacity to produce them now or in the near future. The purpose of this liberal backpedaling is to confuse and undermine the majority public opinion, which is clearly opposed to more war preparations, and to derail the burgeoning anti-war movement. Needless to say the pronouncements of the ‘rational’ warmongers use a ‘double discourse’ based on the facile dismissal of all the historical and empirical evidence to the contrary. When the US and Israel talk of war, prepare for war and engage in pre-war provocations – they intend to go to war – just as they did against Iraq in 2003. Under present international political and military conditions an attack on Iran , initially by Israel with US support, is extremely likely, even as world economic conditions should dictate otherwise and even as the negative strategic consequences will most likely reverberate throughout the world for decades to come.
Introduction Between April 21 -23, the National Patriotic Council will convoke thousands of activists from most of the major urban and rural social movements and trade unions, human rights groups and indigenous , afro-colombian movements,…
Introduction From the Financial Times to the far left, tons of ink has been spilt writing about some variant of the “Crises of Global Capitalism”. While writers differ in the causes, consequences and cures, according…
One of the great paradoxes of history are the claims of imperialist politicians to be engaged in a great humanitarian crusade, a historic “civilizing mission” designed to liberate nations and peoples, while practicing the most…
The deepening economic crises in Europe and the United States are provoking contrasting socio-political responses from the working and middle classes. In Europe, especially among the Mediterranean countries ( Greece , Spain , Portugal and…
Pillage, Promise and Peace Invited paper to be presented to the “Encuentro Nacional de comunidades Campesinas, Afrodescendientes e Indigenas por la Tierra y la Paz de Colombia ”, “El dialogo es la Ruta” 12 al…
This author retraces Greece’s parliamentary path, under the corrupt leadership of its so-called Socialist Government, from independence to its current unconditional subservience to the de facto colonial rule of the IMF and European central bankers….