(2021-01-26). Loud explosion shakes Riyadh days after Saudi Arabia intercepts projectile. middleeasteye.net 
Loud explosion shakes Riyadh days after Saudi Arabia intercepts projectile | Residents said the explosion rattled windows in the Saudi capital and saw air defences intercept a missile | Tue, 01/26/2021 – 14: 08 | It is rare for drones or missiles launched by Yemen's Houthi rebels to reach the Saudi capital, which is 700 km away from the border (AFP) | A loud explosion rocked Riyadh on Tues…
(2021-01-26). Unemployment rate soars to highest level for more than four years. thecanary.co Britain's jobless rate has soared to its highest level for more than four years as official figures showed nearly 830,000 workers have been dropped from UK payrolls since the start of the pandemic. | The Office for National Statistics (ONS) revealed the unemployment rate reached 5% for the first time since early 2016 in the three months to November after another 202,000 people lost their jobs. | Figures for December also showed there were 828,000 fewer Britons on company payrolls since before the crisis struck last February as the pandemic has hammered the jobs market. | Our latest labour market statistics have b…
(2021-01-26). The Economics Lesson Taught By The Pandemic. popularresistance.org On this week's show, Professor Wolff explains that in countries where the government is respected and empowered, such as New Zealand, Taiwan and Cuba, among others, the COVID-19 pandemic has been effectively contained. Alternately, where the government is demonized, disrespected and distrusted, such as in the UK and the US, the pandemic has been devastating. | Prof. Wolff argues that a rational economy includes both private businesses (regulated by the government to different degrees) and state-owned and operated enterprises, depending on which performs best to meet the needs of society. Moreover, besides the que…
(2021-01-26). Corporate Media Become Deficit Hawks When It Comes to Progressive Legislation. scheerpost.com By Alan MacLeod / FAIR A Democrat has assumed office, and so, like clockwork, corporate media are here to play their favorite game of pretending to suddenly be deeply concerned with the deficit and the national debt. Debt has risen sharply after a Covid-induced economic crash and rounds of enormous Trump tax cuts (the last of which gave 82% of the benefits to the richest 43,000 Americans… |
(2021-01-26). Why we can't give up on the idea of a world free from nuclear weapons. peoplesdispatch.org The Treaty on the Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons came into effect on January 22 but none of the nuclear weapons states are signatories. In fact, the US, in October, asked those governments who signed the treaty to withdraw from it…
(2021-01-26). How The Nuclear Ban Treaty Impacts The United States. popularresistance.org On January 20, Joseph Biden [became] the U.S. President. Two days later, on January 22nd, the Treaty on the Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons (TPNW) [has] become binding international law. The Biden administration should seize the opportunity to sign this landmark treaty and work toward its ratification, while productively engaging with the new legal regime created by the treaty. | With the TPNW, nuclear weapons will be subject to a global ban treaty for the first time, at last aligning nuclear weapons with other weapons of mass destruction, all already the subject of treaty-based prohibitions. The TPNW provides a f…
(2021-01-26). The rise of financial parasitism and the emergence of fascism. wsws.org Any assertion that the ruling classes as a whole and the dominant financial oligarchy have no need for fascist bands, let alone a coup, because they are continuing to make money, ignores both the lessons of history and the explosive contradictions within the very heart of American capitalism and its financial system.
(2021-01-26). Feeding two birds with one hand. nationofchange.org "Nuclear weapons are always in the wrong hands."
(2021-01-25). Italian PM Conte to resign in bid to form new coalition government — cabinet office. rt.com 
Italy's Prime Minister Giuseppe Conte will tender his resignation to the president on Tuesday after first informing ministers, the government's cabinet office has said. Conte is expected to then try and form a new government. | The PM faces calls from within his own government to resign and assemble a new administration after losing his Senate majority last week when ex-PM Matteo Renzi withdrew his party from the coalition. | Renzi's Italia Viva party resigned in response to the government's handling of the Covid-19 pandemic and the country's economic recession — a move that has thrown Italian politics in…
(2021-01-25). With COVID controlled and economy growing, Vietnam's Communists plan for future. peoplesworld.org 
HANOI—With only 35 recorded deaths, Vietnam has managed the coronavirus pandemic better than almost any other country on earth. And, unlike other nations, where mass unemployment and recession are the norm, Vietnam's economy is actually growing. That's the context in which the 13th National Congress of the Communist Party of Vietnam (CPV) is set to …
(2021-01-25). Sanders Wants to "Act Now" on COVID Relief But McConnell Is Holding Up Senate. truthout.org 
Incoming Senate Budget Committee Chairman Bernie Sanders (D-Vermont) has said that he wants a new coronavirus relief bill to be one of the first priorities for the new Senate. He hopes to pass a new relief bill using budget reconciliation, which would allow for a simple majority vote, before the Senate begins their impeachment trial on February 8. | "Working families are living today in more economic desperation than since the Great Depression and if Republicans are willing to work with us to…
(2021-01-25). Saudi sovereign wealth fund to invest billions to tackle soaring unemployment in kingdom. middleeasteye.net 
Saudi sovereign wealth fund to invest billions to tackle soaring unemployment in kingdom | Joblessness in Saudi Arabia touched 14.9 percent in the third quarter of 2020 as Covid-19 continues to sink the economy | Mon, 01/25/2021 – 08: 01 | The board at the Stock Exchange Market (Tadawul) bourse in Riyadh (AFP) | Saudi Arabia is moving to tackle soaring unemployment and a Covid-19-triggered…
(2021-01-25). Saudi sovereign wealth fund to invest billions to tackle soaring joblessness. middleeasteye.net Saudi sovereign wealth fund to invest billions to tackle soaring joblessness | Unemployment in Saudi Arabia touched 14.9 percent in the third quarter of 2020 as Covid-19 continues to sink the economy | Mon, 01/25/2021 – 08: 01 | The board at the Stock Exchange Market (Tadawul) bourse in Riyadh (AFP) | Saudi Arabia is moving to tackle soaring unemployment and a Covid-19-triggered economic d…
(2021-01-25). Capitalism, romanticism, and nature. mronline.org 
Robert Sayre and Michael Là∂wy's Romantic Anti-capitalism and Nature is an extremely interesting book—enjoyable, informative, and intellectually stimulating.
(2021-01-25). Why Anti-Racism Must Be Anti-Capitalist. popularresistance.org Last summer we saw one of the largest anti-racist mobilisations in decades. In over sixty countries, protesters took to the streets in their thousands to demand transformative, lasting change. | The Black Lives Matter movement calls for a fundamental shift in how our societies are organised: defunding police forces, ending the prison-industrial complex, opposing imperialist projects abroad, and destroying neo-colonial power relations between the Global North and the Global South. Racism and its brutal history are being discussed in a way that is unparalleled in my lifetime. | As happens with every radical movemen…
(2021-01-25). Sri Lankan IYSSE holds well-attended online lecture on 200th anniversary of Friedrich Engels' birth. wsws.org Students, young workers and others participated in an enthusiastic discussion on the contemporary significance of Engels' fight for scientific socialism.
(2021-01-25). The UN Prohibits Nuclear Weapons and What Does Italy Do? globalresearch.ca Today, January 22, 2021, is the day that can go down in history as the turning point to free humanity from those weapons that, for the first time, have the ability to erase the human species and almost every other …
(2021-01-25). Syria: 18 children killed since the start of the year, UNICEF reports. news.un.org The brutal fighting in Syria continues to exact a terrible toll on children, with at least 18, including a one-year-old killed in incidents involving explosive weapons and unexploded ordnance, since 1 January, UN Children's Fund (UNICEF) said on Sunday. At least 15 others were wounded.
(2021-01-25). Farmers' Protests Reflect Existential Crisis of Indian Agriculture. dissidentvoice.org With over 800 million people, rural India is arguably the most interesting and complex place on the planet but is plagued by farmer suicides, child malnourishment, growing unemployment, increased informalisation, indebtedness and an overall collapse of agriculture. Given that India is still an agrarian-based society, renowned journalist P Sainath says what is taking place can be described …
(2021-01-25). The beginning of the end for nuclear weapons. nationofchange.org Few antiwar activists ever thought they'd see nuclear weapons banned, but thanks to dedicated organizing, a historic UN treaty goes into effect today.
(2021-01-25). Growing warnings of a Wall Street bubble. wsws.org The rise and rise in the shares of the "barely profitable" electric car company Tesla "seemingly beyond all reason" is an expression of the "market craziness" resulting from the injection of trillions of dollars into the financial system by the Fed.
(2021-01-25). Missouri residents confront growing joblessness, hunger, evictions. wsws.org Mass unemployment and the miserable levels of state aid available are sowing increasing devastation throughout the region.
(2021-01-24). Chris Hedges: State Of American Empire. popularresistance.org On the show this week, Chris Hedges talks to Professor Noam Chomsky, the pioneering linguist and prolific author of numerous seminal political works, about the state of the American Empire. | Professor Chomsky is the author of over 100 books, including 'The Fateful Triangle', 'Manufacturing Consent', 'Failed States' and 'Requiem for the American Dream', and America's most important intellectual. His new book, with Marv Waterstone, professor emeritus at the University of Arizona, is 'Consequences of Capitalism: Manufacturing Discontent and Resistance'.
(2021-01-24). Intensification of Contradictions in the Empire: Election in the USA and Its Impacts. socialistproject.ca In his last interview (streamed live on November 6th, 2020), Leo Panitch spoke with the International Relations and Marxism Network (RIMA), in partnership with Chutando a Escada Podcast and PUC-Rio, about the escalation of contradictions in the empire, the US elections and their impact on global capitalism. The recent election in the USA has profound …
(2021-01-24). Matt Hancock's lies just crashed and burned live on TV. thecanary.co 
Matt Hancock's arrogance seems to know no bounds. Because on Sunday 24 January, he lied about the UK's vaccination programme, live on TV. But to make matters worse, a doctor immediately called out his untruth just moments later — on the same show. | It's "going so well"!: | Sky's Sophy Ridge on Sunday was being presented by
(2021-01-24). Venezuela Decries Another Terrorist Attack to Its Oil Industry. telesurenglish.net Venezuela's President Nicolas Maduro Saturday denounced a terrorist attack aimed at disrupting gas supplies in the northern department of Anzoategui. | RELATED: | Maduro informed that the sabotage was carried out by unknown individuals in a gas pipeline section of the Anaco-Jose Industrial Complex. | The terrorist attack caused a massive fire controlled by the pipeline's workers, who managed to close the valves…
(2021-01-24). Bare-Knuckle Capitalism has No Place in Nursing Homes. commondreams.org www.commondreams.org/sites/default/files/styles/cd_special_coverage/public/views-article/thumbs/gettyimages-ltc-toronto.jpg …
(2021-01-24). The 2020 Worldwide Corona Crisis: Destroying Civil Society, Engineered Economic Depression, Global Coup d'État and the "Great Reset" globalresearch.ca We are at the crossroads of one of the most serious crises in modern history. We are living history, yet our understanding of the flow of events since January 2020 has been blurred. Worldwide, people have been misled both by their governments and the media.
(2021-01-24). Why capitalism compels renunciation and we could work less. indybay.org The corona and climate crises demonstrate how 'our economy' is failing before the existential challenges of the time. Eternal growth, maximum profit and rising share prices are the lifeblood of the economy. Without them, it immediately begins to crumble. The climate crisis reveals that growth programmed for infinity will amount to the destruction of the planet in the medium rather than the long term.