They O U

Bernie Mad-off-with-the-loot Ponzi Schemer was the Whole Thing in micro; We’ve been being ripped off for centuries, becoming even more enslaved, getting bled dry by these schemers –

as always, personal greed allows people to commit acts they know in their hearts to be evil, to be against niceness to others, to be screwing someone else over;

just look at their cruel faces,  coldhearted eyes,

–

of course you can’t always tell by externals,

but actions will steer you the way,

sooner or later.

and if they’re acting like heartless assholes,

they probably are

heartless assholes.

Riots in England

Calling these riots and potential riots a “crisis in European Democracy” is such a smoke screen to avoid admitting that it’s a crisis in Capitalism, which is not necessarily Democracy!

It also creates a gateway for something that isn’t Democracy to be brought through – something that perhaps doesn’t involve as much freedom as Democracy without control by the few wealthy might.

Bastards

Today’s headline:

Drug Makers Raise Prices in Face of Health Care Reform –

November 2009

see: http://www.nytimes.com/2009/11/16/business/16drugprices.html?th&emc=th

And remember this, from Jan. 2009?:

Pfizer to buy Wyeth for $68B; cut 8,000 jobs

Associated Press / January 27, 2009 Published January 26, 2009

LINDA A. JOHNSON

“Pfizer Inc., the world’s largest drugmaker, said Monday it is buying rival Wyeth for $68 billion in a deal that will quickly boost Pfizer’s revenue and diversification –…”

“The deal is being financed by five banks: Bank of America Merrill Lynch, Barclays, Citigroup, Goldman Sachs and J.P. Morgan Chase.”

“By buying Wyeth, Pfizer will mutate from a maker of blockbuster pills to a one-stop shop for vaccines, biotech drugs, traditional pills and nonprescription products for both people and animals.”

for more gory details, see:

http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2009/01/26/business/main4752726.shtml

or my own post:

https://victorials.wordpress.com/2008/12/30/beginnings/

and don’t miss this, just 2 months ago (9 months after that acquisition):

Pfizer to Pay $2.3 Billion for Fraudulent Marketing

Justice Department Announces Largest Health Care Fraud Settlement in Its History

“…Pfizer has agreed to pay $1 billion [table scraps] to resolve allegations under the civil False Claims Act that the company illegally promoted four drugs—Bextra; Geodon, an anti-psychotic drug; Zyvox, an antibiotic; and Lyrica, an anti-epileptic drug—and caused false claims to be submitted to government health care programs for uses that were not medically accepted indications and therefore not covered by those programs. The civil settlement also resolves allegations that Pfizer paid kickbacks to health care providers to induce them to prescribe these, as well as other, drugs. The federal share of the civil settlement is $668,514,830 and the state Medicaid share of the civil settlement is $331,485,170. This is the largest civil fraud settlement in history against a pharmaceutical company.”

– quoted from U.S. Department of Justice
September 2, 2009:

http://www.fbi.gov/pressrel/pressrel09/justice_090209.htm

What’s the War costing US?

“The U.S. Employment Effects of Military and Domestic
Spending Priorities: An Updated Analysis:”

“We show that investments in clean energy, health care,
and education create a much larger number of jobs across
all pay ranges, including mid-range jobs (paying between
$32,000 and $64,000) and high-paying jobs (paying over
$64,000). Channeling funds into clean energy, health
care and education in an effective way will therefore
create significantly greater opportunities for decent
employment throughout the U.S. economy than spending the
same amount of funds with the military. a project of the
Institute for Policy Studies The U.S. government spent
an estimated $624 billion on the military in 2008. This
amounts to about $2,000 for every resident of the
country.”

“Amid the debates on the political and strategic merits
of the Iraq war, one aspect of military spending that
has been largely neglected is its effects on the U.S.
economy. Six hundred twenty-four billion dollars is a
vast sum of money-greater than the combined GDP of
Sweden and Thailand, and eight times the amount of U.S.
federal spending on education.”

from:

The U.S. Employment Effects of Military and Domestic
Spending Priorities: An Updated Analysis
By Robert Pollin and Heidi Garrett-Peltier
Foreign Policy in Focus
October 9, 2009
http://www.fpif.org/pdf/0910Jobs_report1.pdf

The Rape Continues:

The Heart of India is Under Attack

By Arundhati Roy
The Guardian (UK)
October 30, 2009

click on the link to read on,

to read an old story that is repeating itself in India –

long live Capitalism,

that is until it has nothing left to exploit.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2009/oct/30/mining-india-maoists-green-hunt

“The low, flat-topped hills of south Orissa have been
home to the Dongria Kondh long before there was a
country called India or a state called Orissa. The
hills watched over the Kondh. The Kondh watched over
the hills and worshipped them as living deities. Now
these hills have been sold for the bauxite they
contain. For the Kondh it’s as though god had been
sold. They ask how much god would go for if the god
were Ram or Allah or Jesus Christ….

If the flat-topped hills are destroyed, the forests
that clothe them will be destroyed, too. So will the
rivers and streams that flow out of them and irrigate
the plains below. So will the Dongria Kondh. So will
the hundreds of thousands of tribal people who live in
the forested heart of India, and whose homeland is
similarly under attack.

In our smoky, crowded cities, some people say, “So
what? Someone has to pay the price of progress.” Some
even say, “Let’s face it, these are people whose time
has come. Look at any developed country – Europe, the
US, Australia – they all have a ‘past’.” Indeed they
do. So why shouldn’t “we”?”

Of particular interest above is the paragraph with what people say in it.  I’m always wondering what people are thinking when decisions like hacking up an entire mountain range are made.  Now I know.  Humans are a shortsighted lot.  With mounds of mounting evidence, we plunge ahead.  It’s like a madness, a sickness.

Yes, we do seem to need forms of energy and building materials, but hacking our planet out from underneath us to get it, and allowing corporate businesses run by rich greedy predators to swoop into communities with the help of the military to accomplish their ends seems to me a soul emptying enterprise.

But what else is new?

Round and round we go…maybe it’s because the planet is round; maybe it’s because our heads are round; maybe it’s because we have no new original ideas…?