By Patrick Martin.
Air cargo shipments across the Atlantic and along the US East Coast were brought to a standstill Friday in a terrorism scare that included searches of cargo planes and hangars in New York, Newark and Philadelphia.
Fighter jets escorted a passenger jet from the United Arab Emirates to New York’s JFK airport, allegedly because of a single package from Yemen in the aircraft’s cargo. Canadian Air Force jets first intercepted Emirates Airways Flight 201 as it entered North American airspace, and F-16s picked up the plane at the US …

By Barry Grey.
The element of manipulation in US elections is immense. Under conditions of a political monopoly of two right-wing big business parties, legally enforced by ballot access restrictions and a host of other barriers to third party campaigns, torrents of corporate campaign cash, and the exclusion of anti-capitalist views by the corporate-owned media, elections in America have far more to do with the ruling class’s recalibration of policy and changes in its governing personnel than with the democratic will of the people. The sentiments and desires of the people …

By Ann Talbot.
The Conservative-Liberal Democrat government’s autumn spending review has introduced the most savage package of public spending cuts ever seen in Britain. Half a million public-sector jobs will be lost as £83 billion, or $128 billion, is cut from the budget. Another half million private-sector jobs will go as a result.
Spending for welfare benefits will be slashed by a total of £18 billion between the cuts contained in the spending review and those already made in the emergency budget earlier this year.
The military faces an 8 percent average cut …

By Patrick O’Connor.
Labor Prime Minister Julia Gillard yesterday declared that Australian forces, working with their US and NATO allies, would maintain operations in Afghanistan for at least the next decade. The government’s commitment to the indefinite occupation of the Central Asian state marked the opening of what is to be a two-week parliamentary debate on the neo-colonial war.

Some context for less-informed readers

Mining in Australia is a significant primary industry and contributor to the Australian economy.
Afghan mineral wealth could top $1 trillion: Pentagon | Reuters.

~ empirestrikesblack | Follow @nit2am on Twitter
Gillard …

By Paul Craig Roberts.
Does anyone remember the “cakewalk war” that would last six weeks, cost $50-$60 billion, and be paid for out of Iraqi oil revenues?
Does anyone remember that White House economist Lawrence Lindsey was fired by Dubya because Lindsey estimated that the Iraq war could cost as much as $200 billion?
Lindsey was fired for over-estimating the cost of a war that, according to Joseph Stiglitz and Linda Bilmes, has cost 15 times more than Lindsey estimated. And the US still has 50,000 troops in Iraq.
Does anyone remember that …

By Chris Hedges.
Nemesis was the Greek goddess of retribution. She exacted divine punishment on arrogant mortals who believed they could defy the gods, turn themselves into objects of worship and build ruthless systems of power to control the world around them. The price of such hubris was almost always death.
Nemesis, related to the Greek word némein, means “to give what is due.” Our nemesis fast approaches. We will get what we are due. The staggering myopia of our corrupt political and economic elite, which plunder the nation’s wealth for financial …

By Paul Krugman.
I live in a very sheltered world, yet I know young people just out of college who can’t find employment; men in their late 50s who have lost their jobs and think they will never find another; and families barely scraping by, terrified by what might happen if anyone were to get sick. These days, there are terrible stories everywhere you look.
Yet some Americans who have secure jobs and rather high incomes are feeling very sorry for themselves because it’s possible …

By Chris Hedges.
The ancient Greek playwright Aristophanes spent his life battling the assault on democracy by tyrants. It is disheartening to be reminded that he lost. But he understood that the hardest struggle for humankind is often stating and understanding the obvious. Aristophanes, who had the temerity to portray the ruling Greek tyrant, Cleon, as a dog, is the perfect playwright to turn to in trying to grasp the danger posed to us by movements from the tea party to militias to the …

By Scott Creighton.
The worm has turned; it’s time to demonize China’s human rights and labor policies for the good of the global economy.  China is moving toward protectionist policies and that can’t be allowed, so bring in The Simpsons.
UK street artist, Banksy, has been given credit for having directed the opening sequence for the latest episode of The Simpsons and it’s receiving a great deal of “progressive” support… which it doesn’t deserve. Whether or not “Banksy” actually submitted the script for this sequence …

By Barry Grey, 6 October 2010.
US corporate profits are soaring in the midst of the deepest economic slump since the Great Depression, on the basis of a ruthless policy of using mass unemployment to slash wages and heighten the exploitation of American workers. In order to make the impoverishment of the working class a permanent feature of American life, companies are hoarding vast amounts of cash rather than hiring workers and expanding output.
These are the conclusions that flow from a Wall Street Journal analysis of second-quarter 2010 corporate profits, reported …