News show “Democracy Now!” does exactly what it says on the tin for US VP debate

October 6, 2016October 6, 2016 ~ jlpagano

On Tuesday evening the Vice Presidential candidates in the US election, Senator Tim Kaine (D) and Governor Mike Pence (R) squared off in a debate at Longwood University in Virginia, which is curiously Kaine’s home state.

There are two other candidates running for President who are on the ballot in enough states to have a “realistic” chance of winning the election outright – Jill Stein of the Green Party and Gary Johnson of the Libertaians, but their VP choices were excluded from the debate.

For three election cycles up until 1984, the series of debates was organised by the totally non-partisan League of Women Voters but when they started to insist on “third-party candidates” being included in the process, the duopoly of Republicans and Democrats came together and forced them out, setting up instead their own organisation called the Commission for Presidential Debates that has rules which virtually guarantee just the two participants in each debate.

One of our top sources for “non-mainstream” media coverage of US affairs is Democracy Now!, hosted by Amy Goodman which has been running for around 20 years. As the two VP candidates slugged it out during the debate, Goodman had Green Party VP nominee Ajamu Baraka in studio to offer real time responses to the questions as though he were in fact part of the debate. Libertarian nominee William Weld was also invited but apparently they offered no response.

The show recently did something similar for the first Presidential debate between Donald Trump and Secretary Hillary Clinton, with the Green Party’s Jill Stein giving her responses, also in “real time” as the feed from the main debate was paused.

What Baraka proceeds to do is highlight the similarities between the two on-stage combatants, like on the subject of war where both Republicans and Democrats come from a position of war as an inevitable option – he presents the Greens as the party of peace. Whether or not you agree with this stance, true believers in democracy have to appreciate the opportunity to know the option is there on their ballot paper.

Here at FPP we would love to see this method employed during the course of an Irish election campaign given our ever-expanding selection of parties and platforms. We too have a duopoly that very much needs breaking…only in our case they are pretty much indistinguishable from each other in terms of political outlook.

MLK quote gets perfectly applied to #blacklivesmatter but also can be used for other struggles against injustice

September 30, 2016 ~ jlpagano

In the latest Best of the Left podcast there is a segment taken from Dave Zirin’s “The Edge of Sports” where he deals with the reaction to American football player Colin Kaepernick’s refusal to stand for the US national anthem in support of the #BlackLivesMatter movement.

Zirin uses a quote from Martin Luther King to describe the reaction of several influential people from the sport’s community to the protest, whereby they essentially say “I support the ends but not the means”.

I have almost reached the regrettable conclusion that the negro’s great stumbling block in his stride toward freedom is not the white citizen’s Councillor or Ku Klux Klan-er, but the “white moderate”, who is more devoted to order than to justice, who prefers a negative peace which is the absence of tension to a positive peace which is the presence of justice.

Who constantly says “I agree with you in the goal you seek but I cannot agree with your methods of direct action”.

Who paternalistically believes they can set the timetable for another man’s freedom, who lives by a mythical concept of time. And who constantly advises the negro to wait for a more convenient season.

Personally I have more respect for someone who bravely stands up for what he believes in than I do for someone who blindly stands up for a song and a waving piece of cloth.

But I also believe the quote is significant for wider issues around the world. Take what we have here in Ireland, like #RepealThe8th #Right2Water and #StopTTIP. Please understand that I appreciate the many differences between those struggles and those of the African American community in the US.

What I do mean is that such struggles should not be fought against the extremists at the far end of any ideological argument. It should instead be directed at those in between who stand with their backs to the resistance because while they do appreciate the injustice, they don’t see the point in resisting…at least not right now. “Maybe that day will come, but it is not today”, is essentially their argument.

They should be shown that not only can it be today, but it can also be done peacefully. If enough people believe, it can be so.

The First Presidential Debate – what the candidates weren’t asked #IssuesNotEgos

September 28, 2016 ~ jlpagano

So we’ve finally seen the two candidates on the same stage at the same time – how did they get on?

It’s quite simple…Trump got in some shots and had his opponent under pressure in the early stages but Hillary came storming back, easily got under his skin and forced him into some ramblings which I doubt even he could translate into understandable English now.

But amid all the rhetoric and back-and-forth on tax returns, emails, calling women Miss Piggy and bringing up Bill’s affairs by saying you won’t bring them up, was there much actual talk about, oh I don’t know, what they’d do as President?

Sure, there was a bit about jobs, a bit about trade and a bit about secret plans to beat ISIS, but even then it was more about how bad the opponent was rather than what each candidate would do themselves.

Yet the American mainstream media lapped up the verbal mud wrestling and proceeded to make the focus of the post-game all about “who won”.

Thankfully we have the good folks at FAIR.org to give an alternative take in their piece “Lester Holt Asks Zero Questions About Poverty, Abortion, Climate Change” by Adam Johnson.

A week before the debate,Comcast-owned NBC announced the topics, and one could already tell we weren’t going to be in for a substantive evening: “Achieving prosperity,” “America’s direction” and “securing America.” This generic approach lead to a generic debate that focused mostly on horserace disputes and vague, open-ended questions about taxes and jobs.

What I find amusing is how Americans can be so bent out of shape about their media making it all about personalities when they have over 300 millions people, just two main parties (well actually there’s four but they keep the Greens and Libertarians away from these debates), and election campaigns that last well over a year.

Here in Ireland, with a humble 5 million people, we have an ever-growing amount of political parties and campaigns squeezed into just under a month, so while the “Yanks” have plenty of time to talk about issues and seem to choose not to, here our media has so little time all they get to focus on is what would the inevitable coalition look like after the unnecessarily over-complicated voting process is done.

Democratically held elections for government should be about issues not egos, but as a general public we seem content to have them portrayed like “reality” TV shows.

Protecting not protesting & Crushing the Black Snake #NoDAPL

September 20, 2016 ~ jlpagano

It may be happening thousands of miles away but there is much about the Dakota Access pipeline controversy that is of interest to Irish readers.

Two things I’d like to focus on here…first, the coverage by The Guardian. It may be a British paper but there is so much mistrust towards national media in the US that now many are turning to them for some semblance of truth in their reporting, and they are certainly working hard to provide it.

I listen to several US progressive podcasts like Best of the Left, The Young Turks, Democracy Now etc and all have quoted the publication often affectionately known as “The Guarniad” because if its supposed reputation for frequent typos.

Back in August a piece by Iyuskin American Horse in Canyon Ball, North Dakota was published titled “‘We are protectors, not protesters’: why I’m fighting the North Dakota pipeline“. It offers the native Americans’ side of the story.

The fact that Energy Transfer Partners, the company behind the pipeline, would use the word “Dakota”, which means “friend” or “ally”, in the name of its project is disrespectful. This pipeline is a direct threat to all Dakota, Lakota and Nakota people, especially our future generations. And we are not the only ones. We know that burning this oil is changing our climate and Indigenous people all over the world are bearing the brunt of the catastrophes that causes.

The other interesting aspect of this story is that of the black snake.

Our elders have told us that if the zuzeca sape, the black snake, comes across our land, our world will end. Zuzeca has come – in the form of the Dakota Access pipeline – and so I must fight.

I have absolutely no reason not to believe that American Indians have a legend of a black snake that was going to cross their land. But it would certainly not surprise me if the oil barons and their sympathisers who would be keen to push this pipeline through raised doubts as to the validity of the folklore.

Well all I can say is that even if they did make it up, it’s nothing compared to the amount of shite big oil corporations fabricate to get past environmental studies and judicial processes in order to get the profits flowing in their direction as quickly as possible.

Best of luck to Iyuskin American Horse and his people. May the Black Snake be driven away from their sacred land for all eternity.

Meanwhile, we could probably do with an external journalists source focusing on Irish affairs in a similar fashion to that of the Guardian.

A must-read perspective on #AppleTax

September 10, 2016 ~ jlpagano

An article by an Irish Economics expert that fully lays out the #AppleTax situation without towing the government line or simply spelling out what public services can be bought with a sum like €13billion is our kind of article.

Terrence McDonough is a retired professor of economics at the National University of Ireland, Galway and co-editor of Contemporary Capitalism and Its Crises: Social Structure of Accumulation Theory for the Twenty-First Century.

His article appears in the American left-wing quarterly Jacobin and is titled “Ireland’s Bad Apples” and puts a very interesting spin on the reaction of our government to the European Commission’s ruling, particularly that of the “Churchillian” Michael Noonan.

It often seemed like Irish politicians believed they should represent Europe to the Irish people rather than represent the Irish people in Europe. But it turns out their cozy relationship with Europe was weaker than their romance with a major American multinational corporation.

Well worth a read. Many thanks to Joan Collins TD for sharing.

Claire Byrne skewers Richard Bruton with question tying #AppleTax to #Right2Water

September 8, 2016September 8, 2016 ~ jlpagano

Earlier today we commented on the general mainstream media and how they fail to provide proper balance and ask the right questions. It is only fair that we also highlight the times we feel they actually DO it.

Many thanks to “FunnyOldWorld” on SoundCloud for posting this snippet from the Claire Byrne Live show this week as she interviewed FIne Gael’s Scapegoat In Chief Richard Bruton…

“Europe is messing with our sovereignty is what you’re saying…”

“Europe is totally messing with our sovereignty…”

” So why didn’t you say that when they asked us to bring in water charges?”

Brilliant. We love you Claire.

“Secrets of a Global Super Court” : essential reading to understand why we need to #StopTTIP

September 3, 2016 ~ jlpagano

In the ongoing #AppleTax debacle one of the most common themes used by both Apple and the Irish government is that the ruling of the European Commission is essentially an “attack on our sovereignty”. If they truly believe that, they must also surely be unified against the ISDS courts due to be used by the TTIP and other such proposed treaties should they come into effect.

According to reports, resistance from both France and Germany could ensure the TTIP doesn’t go ahead, but still I reckon it’s vitally important that the wider public appreciates just exactly what the proposed treaty entailed because I very much doubt the multinationals corporations are going to give up and not try to force something similar through down the line.

Thanks to the latest episode of the excellent Democracy@Work podcast featuring Richard Wolff, we have discovered a series of articles by Chris Hamby on Buzzfeed which expose exactly what these so-called super-courts are all about, who comprises them, and what kind of rulings they have made in the past.

The series kicks off like this :

Imagine a private, global super court that empowers corporations to bend countries to their will.

Say a nation tries to prosecute a corrupt CEO or ban dangerous pollution. Imagine that a company could turn to this super court and sue the whole country for daring to interfere with its profits, demanding hundreds of millions or even billions of dollars as retribution.

I urge you to read on. There are four articles in total. The third one is about Sri Lanka but should still be of particular interest to Irish readers.

Inside The Global “Club” That Helps Executives Escape Their Crimes

The Secret Threat That Makes Corporations More Powerful Than Countries

How Big Banks Bled A Tiny Island Nation

How America’s Gift To Trade Treaties Can Come Back To Hammer It

Has an Irish media outlet conducted a similar investigation? A Google search of “ISDS” under the “Country : Ireland” setting produces nothing from national newspapers, if that means anything.

How RTÉ reported #AppleTax on Nine O’Clock News

August 31, 2016August 31, 2016 ~ jlpagano

Here at FPP we’re not just concerned with what happens, but also how it is reported by mainstream media. So here is the first of our “report on reports”.

Overall, our analysis of their coverage of the story seems to be one leaning more heavily toward #TeamAppeal. While there was a fair amount in favour of the #TeamKeep argument it was presented as more of an afterthought.

The lead report was filed by Tony Connelly. Basically he laid out the facts surrounding made by the European Commissioner for Competition Margrethe Vestager.

Next it was on to the reactions from the Irish Government and Apple itself, as if you could tell the two opinions apart. Minister for Finance Michael Noonan said the ruling was on “tenuous grounds” and that the Irish govt had done “nothing illegal”. They read a statement from Apple saying the Commission was “rewriting history” and that they had “complied with tax laws”.

The text of the RTE report went on to speak of the “fundamental differences” between the Irish govt and the EU and using words like “sovereignty” and “taxpayers”.

Next up we had “Economic correspondent” Sean Whelan who laid out the amount of tax paid by Apple and how they diverted it into a “Head Office” that didn’t actually exist. This is precisely what Vestager did in her announcement by the way, only Whelan had some fancy graphics on display behind him as aids.

Now it was time to go to “outside experts”. First, speaking for #TeamAppeal was Brian Keegan from Chartered Accountants Ireland, who basically said there was no way we should keep the money. Then arguing for #TeamKeep was Dr Jim Stewart – the graphic just had “Trinity College” by his name but it wouldn’t have hurt to add that he is Associate Professor in Finance (Business & Administrative Studies) there.

Eventually we get to the reaction of the other Irish parties. Fianna Fail (who had a soundbite from spokeperson Michael McGrath TD) and Labour (no soundbite) came out on #TeamAppeal. The other “left-wing” parties are firmly on #TeamKeep and there were soundbites from Pearse Doherty of SF, Richard Boyd Barrett of PBP and Catherine Murphy of the Social Democrats.

The most important reaction will be that of the so-called “Independent Alliance” that is currently propping up the Minority Government along with the “silent partners” Fianna Fáil. We had a brief soundbite from John Halligan but apparently their opinion would be made known to a Cabinet meeting the following day.

Finally the report went to two more RTE correspondents – David Murphy, who laid out the “morality issue” of the notion of the Irish government denying its own Exchequer and award of such size, and Martina Fitzgerald, who repeated the importance of the Cabinet meeting today. Not sure if that reportage was a two-person job, but there you go.

Like I said earlier, I got the sense that this report was presented with a leaning more toward the #TeamAppeal side of things, much like Joe Duffy had done on his Liveline show earlier that afternoon on RTE radio.

To provide a bit more balance, perhaps they could have actually spoken to the Commissioner herself, as did American public broadcaster PBS NewsHour :

Any member state can have their own legislation we would never question that – but the thing is you cannot give a specific company a benefit or advantage.which is not open to other companies.

Sounds to me like a reasonable statement from someone with the job title European Commissioner for Competition?

Now to wait and see what happens next. Paschal Donohoe was on today’s Morning Ireland and said the Dáil would not be brought back early from its recess so we’ll see how this morning’s Cabinet meeting pans out.