Daily Babel » Editorials

The Word on the Street: Germany’s lofty, tragic heritage

MassimoCalderazzi — Mon, 26 Jul 2010 14:21:44 +0000

In July, Italy’s foremost daily, Corriere della Sera, published a short Op-Ed by the distinguished contributor, Sergio Romano, whose reputation comes from his historical essays rather than from having been an ambassador. The title was strong: “The rebirth of a great country. Ethical values of the Germans”. Romano emphasized that in 1870 the immense victory of Prussia in just two great battles of a war with France that Berlin exploited but did not start, launched a well-deserved primacy of Germany in Europe. The Reich which was born in the German space out of many kingdoms and principalities soon asserted itself as the Continent’s most important country, also its moral leader.

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The Word on the Street: Let’s Renege the Idolatry of Growth

MassimoCalderazzi — Thu, 22 Jul 2010 13:07:09 +0000

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Like many pro-market economists, Prof. Paul Krugman has inveighed against the present attitude of the German political-economic school, which advocates austerity and fiscal sanity as the right way to confront the international crisis. Krugman too believes that budget cuts are dangerous, that they can suffocate the infant recovery. In the United States, President Obama should do the opposite of what President Hoover did: when, at the beginnings of the Thirties, the Great Depression appeared on the verge of recovery, the White House and the leaders of the financial and banking community thought it wise to stop supporting the economy through federal incentives. The disastrous result, according to Krugman, was that in the U.S. the Depression went on for the whole of the Thirties. Only the Second World War, calling to arms 10 million Americans and requiring weapons on a giant scale, solved the problem of American unemployment. Facts went that way indeed. Pearl Harbor rather than F.D.Roosevelt’s New Deal ended the Great Depression.

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HotTopics: None But the Good Find Peace

LenSive — Mon, 19 Jul 2010 13:17:27 +0000

Those who produce should have, but we know that those who produce the most—that is, those who work hardest, and at the most difficult and menial tasks, have the least. Eugene V. Debs

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HotTopics: LET US NOW PRAISE FAMOUS MEN

LenSive — Sat, 03 Jul 2010 23:32:07 +0000

Corporations are today the dominant institution in life, both at home and abroad. Their reach and influence and power are unexcelled, and perhaps unexampled in history. They enjoy the kind of omnipresence and omnipotence that made the Christian Church the dominant institution of the Middle Ages—only more so. In the Middle Ages there were two realms: the earthly and the spiritual. The Church was exalted above the earthly realm, which by and large went its way content with this hierarchical ordering of life that put a premium on spiritual things, and made the princes of this realm subject to the princes of the next. But for the corporation there is one, and only one, realm and rule: the Kingdom of Profit here and now.

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HotTopics: ONLY KING MIDAS NEED APPLY

LenSive — Fri, 25 Jun 2010 16:39:13 +0000

“The only thing necessary for the triumph of evil is for good men to do nothing.” Edmund Burke

It should come as no surprise that America’s Republican Supreme Court, which through its pro-business and pro-plutocracy decisions, should once again lay bare their “everything for the rich, nothing for the poor” philosophy. Recently the Supreme Court cut off matching public funds for three candidates in the Arizona gubernatorial race, leaving them to face a far richer opponent with meager resources of their own now that public financing has been struck down. The Roberts Court continues its plutocratic ways, and in the process our very model of democracy is not just threatened, it is now an endangered species.

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The Word on the Street: Japan Rightly Indignant Yet not ‘Scandalmaniac’

MassimoCalderazzi — Tue, 22 Jun 2010 14:26:52 +0000

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In the decade before Pearl Harbor the political process of the Rising Sun was dominated both by the competition for influence of the great ‘zaibatsu’, the giant business conglomerates, and by the infighting among activist military groups. Most men in the armed forces were demanding wars, especially against China, so that Japan, Asia’s most dynamic player, would acquire territories and resources. In 1931, the high command of the Japanese divisions in Manchuria acted on his own and conquered most of the Manchu region, belonging to China.

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HotTopics: ROTTEN TO THE CORE

LenSive — Sun, 20 Jun 2010 19:59:20 +0000

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June 16th was a great day for Apple: orders for iPhone 4 topped 600,000, and that figure, according to a NY Times article, excluded orders which, because of a technical glitch, didn’t go through. “The company, “ said the Times, “ apologized to its customers who were frustrated by the computer hiccups…which affected the ordering system…,” and customers were urged to try to order their iPhone again. Apple said that “it was the largest number of preorders” in its history. Everyone seemed pleased (and none more so than Steve Jobs, presumably), including Wall Street, which saw Apple’s shares rise 3% to $267.25. AT&T was also pleased, since now they can extend their client’s new iPhone contracts for another year or more. Total iPhone sales estimates for this quarter have risen from 8.5 to 9.5 million. Hey, what’s not to like?

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The Word on the Street: An Undisputed Wrong of the Free Market

MassimoCalderazzi — Thu, 17 Jun 2010 15:57:08 +0000

We lack information on what happened to a certain Mr. Andrew J.Hall, who a year ago was the head of the Phibro energy-trading unit of Citigroup. Considering the importance of his compensation, we certainly hope for him that he keeps the job for an n number of decades. Last August, his contract entitled Mr. Hall to net $100 million for his 2009 exertions. The problem was that Citigroup, the banking colossus his Phibro company belonged to, was losing so much money that the federal government was forced to rescue it with taxpayer’s dollars.

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HotTopics: CORPORATE CAPITALISM: THE PLANET’S GREAT EVIL

LenSive — Tue, 15 Jun 2010 12:44:58 +0000

Now that the oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico has been occurring for weeks, with greater and greater devastation to ocean flora and fauna both out in the Gulf as well as closer to shore, we can see how a typical, large corporation is dealing with this unprecedented environmental catastrophe. And it should come as no surprise that British Petroleum (BP) is trying its hardest to escape from both present and future liability, civil and criminal. Its lawyers and lobbyists, as well as the politicians they have bought and paid for, are hard at work trying to contain the present damage, and especially to limit future regulatory action against BP in particular and oil companies in general.

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The Word on the Street: Indonesia- From Turmoil to Tranquility?

MassimoCalderazzi — Thu, 10 Jun 2010 14:31:01 +0000

Judging by some appearances (also from some data), Asia’s third largest nation and Islam’s most populated country has settled down to an almost calm, improving reality. Just twenty years ago such a prospect looked impossible. Indonesia was wrestling with overpopulation, poverty, corruption, political turbulence, a too far-flung national geography (from Malacca to Australia) and an excessive ethnic diversity.

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