Several recent studies have punctured the conception, assiduously fostered by the media and political defenders of the profit system, that American capitalism makes possible the rapid acquisition of wealth for anyone motivated to work for it.

The truth is very different. A study by economist Tom Hertz of American University, ‘Understanding Mobility in America’, finds that a child born into a poor family, defined as the bottom 20 percent of the income distribution, has an infinitesimal one-in-a-hundred chance of making it into the top five percent income level.

Hertz’s report, issued by the liberal think tank the Center for American Progress (CAP), studied both ‘intergenerational mobility’ and ‘short-term mobility.’ Intergenerational mobility, comparing an individual’s economic status with that of his or her parents, is taken as a measure of equality of opportunity, since economic success independent of the status of one’s family would seem to indicate that merit and work are the principal sources of material rewards.

As far as intergenerational mobility is concerned, it is not only the children of the poor in the US who have little chance of becoming wealthy. Children born in the middle quintile (the 40-60th percentile of incomes in the country, $42,000 to $54,300) also have only a 1.8 percent chance of reaching the top five percent, a likelihood not much higher than in poor families. These findings were based on a study of over 4,000 children whose parents’ income was determined in 1968 and whose own income was then reviewed as adults in 1995, 1996, 1997 and 1999.

Breaking the data down by race showed that, within the framework of increasing pressure on the working class as a whole, black families continue to face higher burdens. While 47 percent of poor families remain poor in subsequent generations, this figure is 32 percent for whites and 63 percent for blacks. Only 3 percent of African-Americans jump from the bottom quarter of the income distribution to the top 25 percent, while for whites this number, still small, is 14 percent.
axisoflogic.com

…I think what happens is that — well, I don’t come to, you know, the U.S. that often, and like, for instance, this time I came to do an event with Eduardo Galeano, but I really wasn’t — I didn’t want to do any — except for this, I made it clear that I didn’t want to be working on this trip, because I want to think about some things. But I think it’s the opposite problem that I have. I think that there are many ways of shutting people down, and one is to increase the burners on this celebrity thing until you become so celebrity that all you are is celebrity.

For example, I’ll give you a wonderful example of how it works, say, in India. I was at a meeting in Delhi a few months ago, the Association of Parents for Disappeared People. Now, women had come down from Kashmir. There are 10,000 or so disappeared people in Kashmir, which nobody talks about in the mainstream media at all. Here were these women whose mothers or brothers or sons or husbands had — I’m sorry, not mothers, but whatever — all these people who were speaking of their personal experiences, and there were other speakers, and there was me. And the next day in this more-or-less rightwing paper called Indian Express, there was a big picture of me, really close so that you couldn’t see the context. You couldn’t see who had organized the meeting or what it was about, nothing. And underneath it said, “Arundhati Roy at the International Day of the Disappeared.” So, you have the news, but it says nothing, you know? That’s the kind of thing that can happen.

Actually, I’m somebody who is invited to mainstream forums, and I’m not shunned out. You know, I can say what I have to say. But the point is, Amy, that there is a delicate line between just being so far — you know, just being so isolated that you become the spokesperson for everything, and this kind of person that it suits them to have one person who’s saying something and listen to it and ignore what is being said, and I don’t want to move so far away from everybody else, that if you want to listen to me, then why don’t you listen to so and so? Why don’t you speak to so and so? Why don’t you get some other voices, because otherwise it sounds like you’re this lone brave, amazing person, which is unpolitical.
democracynow.org

Our early brush with climate change shows what an unequivocal scandal the privatisation of water represents.

…So what should forever stay in the public realm? No absolute rule seems to fit every service and circumstance. Few deny the privatisation of British Airways or British Telecom was a good idea, but as the NHS struggles to discover which of its functions are core and which can usefully be contracted out, a coherent dividing line eludes most observers.

However, one privatisation will always stand out as an unequivocal scandal: the privatisation of water. It is used all over the world as a classic example of what not to do. Making millions out of an element that falls freely from the skies – profiteering from rivers, rain and clouds – affronted most citizens. It gifted shareholders an absolute monopoly over a necessity no one could do without. There was no chance to choose from another supplier (unless perhaps bathing in Perrier). The price of water doubled, great profits were made and the public got nothing.
guardian.co.uk

“Do you care more about the pigs around you or God?” BattleCry leader Ron Luce asked the crowd of more than 17,000 youth gathered at Wachovia Spectrum Stadium in Philadelphia on Friday, May 12. No, this wasn’t a metaphor. After reading a passage from Luke 15 that mentions pigs, he actually had a bunch of those big, oinking, pink, farm animals on stage with him! Get it, you either get with Luce’s hateful, hyperpatriotic, woman-bashing, racist god, or you’re a … pig?

And it became clear during the BattleCry rally, all the talk of battles, warriors and war is not metaphor either.

White Man’s Burden

Early on the second day, a tribal drumbeat filled the stadium and a voice boomed out “the most violent people in human history.”

Grainy images appeared on the stadium screens of indigenous Ecuadorians running and throwing spears. Proof of their “barbarism”? Never mind that their land was destroyed by oil development and their way of life undermined, these “savages” had killed five missionaries who came to destroy their belief systems decades ago. One of the supposed killers is brought on stage. He’s been “civilized” by the Bible and calls on the youth to sign up for mission trips to go and convert others like him.

News flash to Luce’s audience: These indigenous people, whose very existence is hanging by a thread-threatened by the encroachment of the “modern world” of exploitation, racism, environmental destruction and cultural genocide-are at least a hundred million people short of being “the most violent people in human history,” even if they did what he accused them of.

The reality is that over a hundred million indigenous people were killed by the Europeans who followed Columbus to the “new world.” And let’s not forget that the genocide against Native Peoples was blessed by people carrying Ron Luce’s Bible.

Finally, after being programmed with these racist lies, Luce’s flock flooded down to the floor of the stadium to sign up for missions this summer-to Africa, Latin America, the urban U.S., Australia, the Mideast and beyond. As they went, Ron Luce offered odd encouragement, “You guys are freaks of a whole different breed … You guys are a bunch of wild animals. Man!”
counterpunch.org

Hugo Chāvez has announced that director Oliver Stone is planning to make a film of the attempt to oust the Venezuelan president in 2002. US officials deny Mr Chāvez’s claim that American officials were behind the botched coup.
guardian.co.uk

Bush decries ‘erosion of democracy’ in Venezuela, Bolivia
Asked here about the two Latin American countries’ seemingly adverse policies towards Washington, Bush did not directly answer the question, but vowed to continue to foster positive policies in Latin America.

“I am going to continue to remind our hemisphere that respect for property rights and human rights is essential for all countries in order for there to be prosperity and peace,” the US president said at a national meeting of restaurateurs, where he spoke about developments in Iraq.

“I’m going to remind our allies and friends in the neighborhood that the United States of America stands for justice; that when we see poverty, we care about it, and we do something about it,” Bush said.

And in what appeared to be an oblique reference to reports that Venezuela played a supporting role in presidential elections last December in Bolivia, Bush cautioned against “meddling.”

“I’m going to remind our people that meddling in other elections to achieve a short-term objective is not in the interests of the neighborhood,” Bush said.

‘The neighborhood.’

The young accomplice of a sniper who spread panic and fear around the US capital during a three-week killing spree told a court today how his former partner vowed to “terrorise the nation”.

Lee Boyd Malvo testified that his father figure, John Allen Muhammad, outlined a plan for six sniper shootings a day for 30 days. That would have been followed by a bombing campaign targeting schools, school buses and children’s hospitals, the court heard.

….Malvo’s lawyers contended Muhammad brainwashed the teenager and turned him into a killer. They also said that well after the arrest, Malvo never fully detached himself from Muhammad despite deep anger toward him. The case continues.
guardian.co.uk

Who (or what) is this guy? A military weapon?

LONDON (AFX) – The OECD has warned that the eventual rebalancing of the US current account gap ‘looks increasingly unavoidable’ and will send shock waves across the globe, starting with a slump in the dollar’s exchange rate.

The OECD said in its world economic outlook that the depreciation faced by the dollar could be ‘of the order of one-third to one-half.’
forbes.com

VIENNA (Reuters) – The U.N. nuclear watchdog chief headed on Monday for talks in Washington where he is likely to nudge U.S. officials to consider security assurances for Iran to defuse a crisis over Tehran’s nuclear program, diplomats said.

Mohamed ElBaradei’s trip heightens a diplomatic swirl over Iran as European Union leaders craft incentives for Tehran to stop enriching uranium. Their package will be considered at a meeting of U.N. Security Council powers in London on Wednesday but has already run into U.S. and Iranian skepticism.

Some EU officials, ElBaradei’s International Atomic Energy Agency and many analysts believe Iran could be motivated to stop activity that could lead to nuclear bomb-making only with a U.S. pledge not to try to topple the Islamic Republic’s government.
news.yahoo.com

Fresh insurgent attacks across Afghanistan claimed nearly 20 more lives, officials said on Tuesday, adding to the death toll of around 300 killed in some of the heaviest fighting since the fall of the Taliban.

Three policemen and 12 Taliban were killed when a convoy carrying a deputy provincial governor and a police chief came under attack in the south while three health workers and their driver died in a roadside bombing near the capital Kabul.

In total more than 20 insurgency-linked attacks were reported in at least 12 provinces over the past two days.

Many were outside the insurgency-hit south and south-east, the traditional hotspots for Taliban-linked violence.

Villagers and human rights groups meanwhile insisted that the civilian death toll from an hours-long coalition air and ground assault in the southern province of Kandahar early Monday was higher than the 16 claimed by Afghan officials.
abc.net.au

Clashes in Southern Afghanistan Kill 3 Policemen, 11 Militants
…In Kabul, a roadside bomb killed four healthcare workers employed by the Afghan Health Development Service. Police and aid officials say a doctor, a male and a female nurse and their driver were killed Monday as they were traveling in Wardak province, about 50 kilometers west of the capital.

Insurgents linked to the ousted Taleban regime have been blamed for a series of attacks on schools as well as health and development workers.

Taleban insurgents intensified their attacks this past week and so did U.S.-led coalition forces who are trying to destroy Taleban hideouts. More than 250 militants, Afghan forces, coalition soldiers and civilians were killed as a result.

Afghan president to summon top US commander over civilian deaths
KABUL -President Hamid Karzai will summon the top commander of US forces in Afghanistan for an explanation of civilian deaths during a coalition air and ground attack in the south, his office said on Tuesday.

The president has also ordered Afghan authorities to investigate the incident, a palace statement said.

Kandahar’s provincial governor has said at least 16 civilians were killed in the operation that started late Sunday in Panjwayi district but villagers say the number of civilian dead is far higher.

Governor Asadullah Khalid said Taleban rebels had hidden in villagers’ homes. The coalition has said up to 80 Taleban may have been killed and it was investigating reports of civilian deaths.

Karzai, who is visiting the United Arab Emirates, was saddened by the incident but also condemned ‘the cowardly act of terrorists hidding in people’s homes,’ the statement said.

He would summon the commander of the coalition forces, Lieutenant General Karl Eikenberry, to explain how the casualties occurred, it said.

The statement noted that Karzai had ‘in past has also asked troops to be careful to avoid civilian casualties during combat operations.’

Nuri al-Maliki, the new Iraqi prime minister, had a surprise for Tony Blair and his entourage in Baghdad yesterday. At a joint press conference, Mr Maliki said British troops would hand over responsibility in two provinces to Iraqi security forces by next month and that he expected US, British and other foreign troops out of 16 of the country’s 18 provinces by the end of the year, a much speedier and more ambitious schedule than the US and Britain have so far admitted to.

The announcement was news to Mr Blair and his team. Mr Maliki said there was an agreement with the British: but British officials said there was no agreement. And he said the withdrawals would be in June: officials say it will be July.

Mr Blair was more vague than the Iraqi prime minister. He insisted that there was no timetable and that the handover to Iraqi forces would depend on the prevailing conditions.

Both Mr Maliki and Mr Blair’s comments were telling. With the arrival at last of an Iraqi government, the US and British can at last begin to plan for specific withdrawals. The planes to carry troops home can be booked.
guardian.co.uk

sure

Ministers have one thing in common – Britain
IT MAY have taken five months of wrangling for Iraq’s competing sectarian and ethnic groups to form a working coalition, but many of the new ministers have at least one thing in common.

Five of the most prominent figures in the new Iraqi Government spent much of their long period in exile in Britain.