… rating due to the nation’s rising healthcare and social security spending. The change would be the first since 1917.
Of course, FT goes on to contend that the triple-A rating doesn’t mean much these days. Nonetheless, I think the credit rating threat due to increased social spending indicates that something is amiss, to put it lightly, in the world economic system. And there have long …

Comment by Matthew Lymburner: … rating agencies are engaged in. You …

Tags: credit, economy, social spending, United States, welfare

… States Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit has ruled that the Religious Freedom Restoration Act does not apply to detainees at the Guantanamo Bay Naval Base, “ effectively ruling that the detainees are not persons at all for purposes of U.S. law.” The Court also ruled that torture is a “foreseeable consequence” of military detention. You can read the entire ruling …

Tags: Guantanamo Bay, human rights, law, torture, United States, war on terror

… some 40 years ago, died on Monday Jan. 7th in Havana at the age of 72. Phil gave wonderful insight into just what the agency was involved in throughout his time there, and carefully documented U.S-sponsored terrorism against Latin America. His courage in denouncing the brutal atrocities perpetrated by the CIA will be remembered.

…

… Graffiti make the world go round.
Graffito is a little scratch, a groove on urban skin.
A record without a scratch, is simply called a mandolin.
Graffiti can be found in Tikal on a Mayan tomb,
In Hagia Sophia, like stretch marks on a womb.
A prolific graffito artist was sent to jail.
Was he a bastard for pinning the donkey on a tail?
When French soldiers carved their names,
During …

Comment by Eliot Che: … agree with Geoff that graffiti is a …

… on its editorial page a commentary by Joseph Stiglitz. The former chief economist of the World Bank is vaguely predicting stagflation - stagnation plus inflation - and expressing his concern about how this will affect workers and consumers. He also worries that government and central bank policies will exacerbate the pain experienced by these people. Stiglitz has frequently been lauded by …

Comment by D. T. Cochrane: … deny that stagflation is a real …

Author: D. T. Cochrane

Comment author: D. T. Cochrane

… computerized techniques in image manipulation, Philippe Halsman shot this photograph of Salvador Dali suspended in mid-air. While today this image could easily be replicated in Photoshop, it wasn’t possible in 1948. Taking 28 attempts, it was over four hours before Halsman was satisfied with the photo. According to Brandon Luhring :
Halsman set up his New York studio and using the 4 …

Comment by Mike Gifford: … about a pre-photoshop photo that …

Comment author: Mike Gifford

… the image handling portion of the site.
Changes for site visitors :

See an example of the new way visitors will view multiple images here.
Use the left/right arrows on the keyboard to move between images.
Open multiple images at once and move them around on the page.

Changes for site contributors and authors :

Images are no longer automatically pushed to the top of …

…

Comment by Archie: … of way - he’s happy selling …

… Liberation of Niggy Tardust, has been released online in a high-bitrate mp3 format, giving consumers the choice of downloading the album for free, or paying 5$ for it. Which would you choose? The album’s producer, Trent Reznor, says that out of the 154 449 people that downloaded the album, 28 322 paid the five dollars. That’s 18.3% of downloaders paying up front. Since that works out …

… to activist circles. The possibility of oil’s disappearance as a viable energy source was a cause for both dread - what horrible things might happen within a society deprived of its energy gluttonous toys? - and celebration - what desirable changes might occur? However, talk of the theory is increasingly finding its way into the mainstream. Most recently, the Toronto Star featured the …

Comment by Matthew Lymburner: … that implied that I am an expert on …

Author: D. T. Cochrane

Tags: capital, corporations, differential accumulation, economy, energy, liberalization, Middle East, peak oil, power theory, war on terror

… the pleasure of reading Rudolf Rocker’s “masterpiece”, outlining the theory and contextually specific practical application of Anarcho-Syndicalism. Having an avid interest in anarchist theory, this text has long-awaited my attention. And while I generally enjoyed it, reading Rocker’s dated text, I noticed some sharp division between his thought and my own.

First, Rocker employs …

Tags: anarchism, books, critical theory, ideology, syndicalism

… The Universe. Apart from the horrible dramatisation of ’sinister’ stars and ‘evil’ planets, something about the series has been really bothering me. It’s the arrogance with which the scientists who appear on it present their theories. In particular, one episode titled ‘Alien Galaxies’ included a lengthy discussion of ‘dark matter’ and ‘dark energy.’ The existence of …

Comment by Matthew Lymburner: … point. I would add that some recent …

Author: D. T. Cochrane

… Marx? or Marxian Anti-Economics and the Study of Political Economy
From the ruins of the Berlin Wall and the decline of the Soviet empire emerged declarations about the end of Marxism and the triumph of Western capitalist democracy. And yet, these misguided assertions failed to address two key points - that Soviet-style top-down communism was not what Karl Marx envisioned in his …

Tags: academics, critical theory, economy, labour, Marxism, political economy, politics

… By Peru
I was invited to a group show in Vienna. My idea was against the theme, “Canada VS Spain”, by having a map of Pangea when they were both (and all others) the same place. There is too much fighting in the world already, its time to start helping each other, and create some unity.

Tags: art, Canada, community, geography, politics, Spain, Vienna