Month: June 2011

Source: Tom Dispatch

Jesus answered, “It is written, ‘Man shall not live on bread alone, but on every word that comes from the mouth of God.’”

— The Gospel According to Matthew

It is a hard matter, my fellow citizens, to argue with the belly, since it has no ears.

— Cato the Elder

In both the periodical and tabloid press these days, the discussion tends to dwell on the bread alone — its scarcity or abundance, its price, provenance, authenticity, presentation, calorie count, social status, political agenda, and carbon footprint. The celebrity guest on camera with Rachael Ray or an Iron Chef, the missing ingredient in the recipes for five-star environmental collapse. read more

Source: In These Times

Less fanatical reactionaries than Gov. Scott Walker and his crew in the Wisconsin legislature would have given up by now.

Protests against Walker and his budget proposals are again rapidly gathering pace, with protesters erecting a “Walkerville” to remind public of the “Hoovervilles” that sprung up among the poor during the Great Depression. Budget hearings have been continually disrupted by nonviolent civil disobedience.

But the Republicans remain undeterred, having found another instrument to institutionalize their pro-corporate agenda. Still hanging on to majorities in both houses and with the state budget intended for passage within the next week or so, GOP politicians are still working to include a few particularly retrograde provisions. read more

Source: Al Jazeera

“The Earth upon which the sea, and the rivers and waters, upon which food and the tribes of man have arisen, upon which this breathing, moving life exists, shall afford us precedence in drinking.”
– Prithvi Sukta, Atharva Veda

Land is life. It is the basis of livelihoods for peasants and indigenous people across the Third World and is also becoming the most vital asset in the global economy. As the resource demands of globalisation increase, land has emerged as a key source of conflict. In India, 65 per cent of people are dependent on land. At the same time a global economy, driven by speculative finance and limitless consumerism, wants the land for mining and for industry, for towns, highways, and biofuel plantations. The speculative economy of global finance is hundreds of times larger than the value of real goods and services produced in the world. read more