https://pressprogress.ca/corporate-canadas-pile-of-cash-in-offshore-tax-havens-has-hit-353-billion-for-the-first-time-in-history/?fbclid=IwAR2HX4jHXNy6qNDQ99hlMJqnVMoPFawJk9-eAZbZtL-6AcF6sSSySanUddU
353 billion dollars. That's our money. It's the money we should have have to finance education, poverty programmes, health care..... If most of us refused to pay our income tax, the government would take action against us. But the wealthy can refuse to pay hundreds of billions. And not a word is whispered.
I am reminded of Irving, the billionaire of the province of New Brunswick. Some years ago, this man who does not pay income tax on his fortune, made a relatively small donation for the poor. The newspapers got hold of the story. (Mr. Irving owns all the newspapers in the province.) And they slobbered the story all over their pages.
That threw the Chamber of Commerce into an ecstasy of praise for this man who gave thousands to the poor (while avoiding taxes in the many, many millions) So the business community wet its pants to hold a worshipful dinner for Mr. Irving. And he, of course, agreed to speak and be praised at it. (But not by the poor. They couldn't afford a Chamber dinner.)
And, again, Mr. Irving's newspapers carried the story, slobbering over their owner.
Our billionaires create jobs? Yes, lots of them, at minimum wage. And then they hide their massive profits. In effect, they create poverty by stealing what should be our money.
But cheer up, Canadians, the bill in the U.S. must be way over a trillion.
_______________________________________________________________
https://www.cbc.ca/news/world/venezuela-guaido-final-phase-maduro-1.5116327
This story is not as informative as it should be. In the first place, and despite American propaganda reports, Guaido was never elected to the Venezuela legislature - so he has no claim whatever to being president. Then there's the problem of the Russian and Chinese troops...
...I presume they're still there. This could turn into one hell of a confrontation with the possibility of sparking a world war. And, obviously, the U.S. in backing Guaido is prepared to risk that. Good luck to all of us.
The idea that the U.S. wants to restore democracy to Venezuela is pure rubbish. The American record in Latin America for over a century has been to create and support dictatorships - and, frequently, to mass murder helpless thousands as it did to the Maya people in Guatemala, as it did when Chile became a dictatorship, as it did during the Castro revolution in Cuba.
_________________________________________________________________
https://www.cbc.ca/news/technology/climate-change-floods-1.5115447
Pay no attention to scientific claims our current flooding is a result of climate change. If that were true, our billionaires would have told us, and would start paying taxes so we could deal with it. (But they don't want their billions to get all wet.)
_________________________________________________________________
https://www.cbc.ca/news/world/trump-sues-banks-block-house-subpoenas-1.5116320
Is it possible that Donald Trump is one of those people who hides his money from taxation? Hey! Do you think it's possible that he's not?
_______________________________________________________________
https://www.theguardian.com/world/2019/apr/26/hurricane-maria-puerto-rico-youth-mental-health-study-report
When Puerto Rico suffered a murderous hurricane that killed thousands, Trump gave minimal help - though Puerto Rico is an American territory. (He needed the money to give tax breaks to billionaires - seriously.)
________________________________________________________________
https://www.commondreams.org/news/2019/04/29/call-it-crisis-new-report-details-failure-cable-and-network-outlets-accurately
Too true. And it's always been that way. Our news media, quite accurately portrayed Hitler as evil. And that was true. But the British Empire of the time was a lot more evil. (and so was Churchill.) But you will rarely, if ever, find a newspaper that mentioned that. Muslim warrior groups of our time are often referred to as terrorists. Okay. Ever read a story calling Americans terrorists for their mass murder of civilians and children (as in Yemen, Iraq, Guatemala...?)
Most of our news media are extremely biased - and lying.
________________________________________________________________
https://countercurrents.org/2019/04/27/inescapable-200-250-trillion-global-carbon-debt-increasing-by-16-trillion-annually-gideon-polya/
________________________________________________________________
https://thetyee.ca/Mediacheck/2019/04/30/Way-Canadian-Journalism-Used-To-Be/
It's even worse than it used to be, though not all have fallen as low as The Post of Toronto. CBC has the best journalists. But even it is under constant pressure to be less than honest.
A site I refer to commonly is rabble.ca. It was founded by an excellent CBC journalist. And it is honest.
The lying came early. When Baden-Powell (later founder of the Boy Scouts), the news media went wild with joy when he was relieved after his long defence of Mafeking. Britain and its news media went wild with joy. The army command did not.
The fact is that Baden-Powell was not supposed to be defending Mafeking. And the British army had a terrible time getting him out of it.
______________________________________________________________
Like I said, most of our news media lie.
https://mail.google.com/mail/u/0/?tab=rm#inbox/FMfcgxwCgVRJbNGBSdzZrSGJXJXSnCpr
_______________________________________________________________
http://www.informationclearinghouse.info/51514.htm
This is not similar to an act of war. To attack a ship at sea IS an act of war. The U.S. has effectively declared war on Iran (perhaps with the help of its democracy loving friends in Saudi Arabia.) And this is a war with the potential to draw in many more nations - among them Israel, Turkey, Saudi Arabia and, indeed, the whole region.
_____________________________________________________________
http://www.informationclearinghouse.info/51511.htm
________________________________________________________________
http://www.informationclearinghouse.info/51516.htm
_______________________________________________________________
https://www.nationalobserver.com/2019/04/30/features/province-wide-tuition-waiver-gives-former-foster-kids-fighting-chance
A rare, good news story.
I grew up in a very poor district. We were all kids from families that had always been poor. I still remember how, in my first year class, only one of us - a girl - would go to university. (I would, too, but it never looked that way and I never finished high school.) My parents weren't at all upset when I announced I had been kicked out. The understood that people like us were, at best, working class - and we were forever going to stay there. Schools do that to you. They would later get very angry when I quit my awful job to sneak into university. I was trying to rise 'above my station'.
That doesn't happen with kids of a higher income family. They grow with friends who are raised to know that Kindergarten is the first year of university studies. We need schools that teach children they have a right to be ambitious. But they can't because schools don't have the money. Our billionaires don't pay the taxes to make that possible.
The bright lights (in high school) were the Jewish kids in my high school. There is a strong tradition of learning in Judaism. And that produced children who were as poor as I was but who didn't allow that to bog them down.
_________________________________________________________________
https://www.globalcitizen.org/en/content/indonesia-jakarta-climate-change/
________________________________________________________________
https://off-guardian.org/2019/04/29/tipping-point-the-gilets-jaunes-are-winning-whats-next/
_______________________________________________________________
https://truthout.org/articles/making-us-schools-less-great-again/
In Canada and the U.S. education systems are mostly a mess. Of course. You can't allow billionaires to avoid taxes - and that means you can't afford a decent education system. Anyway, any money that governments have left over has to be saved to give back-door deals to billionaires, and to help pay bills for the schools their children go to.
________________________________________________________________
This has been a frightening day. Trump is without doubt the most juvenile president in the history of the U.S. If he is moving in on Venezuela as seems to be the case, we could be in one hell of a world war. Remember, both China and Russia are there. And both, like the U.S. are nuclear armed.
I never thought I'd say this, but we're lucky Putin is in charge of Russia. Putin, whatever his faults might be, is probably far the most intelligent of the world's leading politicians.
And Trump is just a spoiled brat.
This is a VERY dangerous situation. Anything could trigger a foolish action that would trigger the massive firing of American nuclear missiles that the U.S. has lined along the Russian border. (And damn fools in the European states allowed the U.S. to do that.)
And while we are pondering supidity and ignorance, how can Americans believe the story that the U.S. is doing this to restore democracy to Venezuela? Pu-leeze. The U.S. has spent over a century destroying any attempts at democracy in Latin America. John Bolton doesn't give a damn about democracy. He wants to capture Venezuelan oil to benefit his billionaire friends.
353 billion dollars. That's our money. It's the money we should have have to finance education, poverty programmes, health care..... If most of us refused to pay our income tax, the government would take action against us. But the wealthy can refuse to pay hundreds of billions. And not a word is whispered.
I am reminded of Irving, the billionaire of the province of New Brunswick. Some years ago, this man who does not pay income tax on his fortune, made a relatively small donation for the poor. The newspapers got hold of the story. (Mr. Irving owns all the newspapers in the province.) And they slobbered the story all over their pages.
That threw the Chamber of Commerce into an ecstasy of praise for this man who gave thousands to the poor (while avoiding taxes in the many, many millions) So the business community wet its pants to hold a worshipful dinner for Mr. Irving. And he, of course, agreed to speak and be praised at it. (But not by the poor. They couldn't afford a Chamber dinner.)
And, again, Mr. Irving's newspapers carried the story, slobbering over their owner.
Our billionaires create jobs? Yes, lots of them, at minimum wage. And then they hide their massive profits. In effect, they create poverty by stealing what should be our money.
But cheer up, Canadians, the bill in the U.S. must be way over a trillion.
_______________________________________________________________
https://www.cbc.ca/news/world/venezuela-guaido-final-phase-maduro-1.5116327
This story is not as informative as it should be. In the first place, and despite American propaganda reports, Guaido was never elected to the Venezuela legislature - so he has no claim whatever to being president. Then there's the problem of the Russian and Chinese troops...
...I presume they're still there. This could turn into one hell of a confrontation with the possibility of sparking a world war. And, obviously, the U.S. in backing Guaido is prepared to risk that. Good luck to all of us.
The idea that the U.S. wants to restore democracy to Venezuela is pure rubbish. The American record in Latin America for over a century has been to create and support dictatorships - and, frequently, to mass murder helpless thousands as it did to the Maya people in Guatemala, as it did when Chile became a dictatorship, as it did during the Castro revolution in Cuba.
_________________________________________________________________
https://www.cbc.ca/news/technology/climate-change-floods-1.5115447
Pay no attention to scientific claims our current flooding is a result of climate change. If that were true, our billionaires would have told us, and would start paying taxes so we could deal with it. (But they don't want their billions to get all wet.)
_________________________________________________________________
https://www.cbc.ca/news/world/trump-sues-banks-block-house-subpoenas-1.5116320
Is it possible that Donald Trump is one of those people who hides his money from taxation? Hey! Do you think it's possible that he's not?
_______________________________________________________________
https://www.theguardian.com/world/2019/apr/26/hurricane-maria-puerto-rico-youth-mental-health-study-report
When Puerto Rico suffered a murderous hurricane that killed thousands, Trump gave minimal help - though Puerto Rico is an American territory. (He needed the money to give tax breaks to billionaires - seriously.)
________________________________________________________________
https://www.commondreams.org/news/2019/04/29/call-it-crisis-new-report-details-failure-cable-and-network-outlets-accurately
Too true. And it's always been that way. Our news media, quite accurately portrayed Hitler as evil. And that was true. But the British Empire of the time was a lot more evil. (and so was Churchill.) But you will rarely, if ever, find a newspaper that mentioned that. Muslim warrior groups of our time are often referred to as terrorists. Okay. Ever read a story calling Americans terrorists for their mass murder of civilians and children (as in Yemen, Iraq, Guatemala...?)
Most of our news media are extremely biased - and lying.
________________________________________________________________
https://countercurrents.org/2019/04/27/inescapable-200-250-trillion-global-carbon-debt-increasing-by-16-trillion-annually-gideon-polya/
________________________________________________________________
https://thetyee.ca/Mediacheck/2019/04/30/Way-Canadian-Journalism-Used-To-Be/
It's even worse than it used to be, though not all have fallen as low as The Post of Toronto. CBC has the best journalists. But even it is under constant pressure to be less than honest.
A site I refer to commonly is rabble.ca. It was founded by an excellent CBC journalist. And it is honest.
The lying came early. When Baden-Powell (later founder of the Boy Scouts), the news media went wild with joy when he was relieved after his long defence of Mafeking. Britain and its news media went wild with joy. The army command did not.
The fact is that Baden-Powell was not supposed to be defending Mafeking. And the British army had a terrible time getting him out of it.
______________________________________________________________
Like I said, most of our news media lie.
https://mail.google.com/mail/u/0/?tab=rm#inbox/FMfcgxwCgVRJbNGBSdzZrSGJXJXSnCpr
_______________________________________________________________
http://www.informationclearinghouse.info/51514.htm
This is not similar to an act of war. To attack a ship at sea IS an act of war. The U.S. has effectively declared war on Iran (perhaps with the help of its democracy loving friends in Saudi Arabia.) And this is a war with the potential to draw in many more nations - among them Israel, Turkey, Saudi Arabia and, indeed, the whole region.
_____________________________________________________________
http://www.informationclearinghouse.info/51511.htm
________________________________________________________________
http://www.informationclearinghouse.info/51516.htm
_______________________________________________________________
https://www.nationalobserver.com/2019/04/30/features/province-wide-tuition-waiver-gives-former-foster-kids-fighting-chance
A rare, good news story.
I grew up in a very poor district. We were all kids from families that had always been poor. I still remember how, in my first year class, only one of us - a girl - would go to university. (I would, too, but it never looked that way and I never finished high school.) My parents weren't at all upset when I announced I had been kicked out. The understood that people like us were, at best, working class - and we were forever going to stay there. Schools do that to you. They would later get very angry when I quit my awful job to sneak into university. I was trying to rise 'above my station'.
That doesn't happen with kids of a higher income family. They grow with friends who are raised to know that Kindergarten is the first year of university studies. We need schools that teach children they have a right to be ambitious. But they can't because schools don't have the money. Our billionaires don't pay the taxes to make that possible.
The bright lights (in high school) were the Jewish kids in my high school. There is a strong tradition of learning in Judaism. And that produced children who were as poor as I was but who didn't allow that to bog them down.
_________________________________________________________________
https://www.globalcitizen.org/en/content/indonesia-jakarta-climate-change/
________________________________________________________________
https://off-guardian.org/2019/04/29/tipping-point-the-gilets-jaunes-are-winning-whats-next/
_______________________________________________________________
https://truthout.org/articles/making-us-schools-less-great-again/
In Canada and the U.S. education systems are mostly a mess. Of course. You can't allow billionaires to avoid taxes - and that means you can't afford a decent education system. Anyway, any money that governments have left over has to be saved to give back-door deals to billionaires, and to help pay bills for the schools their children go to.
________________________________________________________________
This has been a frightening day. Trump is without doubt the most juvenile president in the history of the U.S. If he is moving in on Venezuela as seems to be the case, we could be in one hell of a world war. Remember, both China and Russia are there. And both, like the U.S. are nuclear armed.
I never thought I'd say this, but we're lucky Putin is in charge of Russia. Putin, whatever his faults might be, is probably far the most intelligent of the world's leading politicians.
And Trump is just a spoiled brat.
This is a VERY dangerous situation. Anything could trigger a foolish action that would trigger the massive firing of American nuclear missiles that the U.S. has lined along the Russian border. (And damn fools in the European states allowed the U.S. to do that.)
And while we are pondering supidity and ignorance, how can Americans believe the story that the U.S. is doing this to restore democracy to Venezuela? Pu-leeze. The U.S. has spent over a century destroying any attempts at democracy in Latin America. John Bolton doesn't give a damn about democracy. He wants to capture Venezuelan oil to benefit his billionaire friends.
