Fazal Rahman - Academia.edu (original) (raw)
Independent interdisciplinary researcher and writer.
Web site: http://imperialismandthethirdworld.wordpress.com.
I am an interdisciplinary researcher and writer, with background in many areas of biological and social sciences. I have lived and worked in many countries, as a scientist and head of research and development programs and centers. I have done in-depth and extensive studies on Marxism, Leninism, phenomenology, existentialism, political economy of capitalism and socialism, technocracy, psychology, mass psychology, genetics, epigenetics, etc., and formulated and published a new and original macro-level theory on the biosocial regulation of human nature by the powerful, combined, and intertwined social forces of social systems (capitalism, imperialism, socialism, various mixtures in the Third World etc.), technocracy, and cultures. One of the most important and disturbing conclusions of my theoretical research in this area is that the inner ecology of human nature itself is being disrupted and eroded by the politico-economic and cultural forces of advanced capitalism and advanced technocracy, self-evident on the empirical level. And that is happening on the biosocial levels, involving selection as well as epigenetic processes. My original theory was published in 1980, long before epigenetics became accepted in the scientific community and started getting applied in various areas of life and social sciences. I had already expanded and refined the theory in 1982. However, that version was not published. This is the only theory ever written or published on these complex interdisciplinary matters. It can be read through the following link. It needs further development. I am aware that in the current academic and intellectual environment of worldwide subservience to capitalist materialism, dehumanization, and inhumanization, such an original and critical macro-level interdisciplinary theory faces extreme institutionalized biases and hostility. Therefore I have never looked for any institutional support for this project.
Overwhelming majority of scientists in the areas of natural and life sciences are what the Spanish philosopher Ortega y Gasset had called Learned Ignoramuses, that is, they know a lot about a tiny little area of natural or biological reality, but nothing about other areas of that reality or social and human reality. Social and human sciences, and even philosophy, have become mutilated in similar ways. Typical scientists now not only do not see the forest for the trees, but do not even see the tree for the leaves.
While the natural and life scientists are, by and large, devoid of any knowledge of social and politico-economic reality, the knowledge and consciousness of social scientists in these areas, besides being extremely fragmented, are conditioned and regulated by the powers that be of the capitalist and imperialist systems of the Advanced Capitalist-Imperialist Technocratic Civilization and its imitators in the Third World.
Such scientists and technicians are the darlings of the governments and corporations in the capitalist and imperialist countries, as they provide them with the knowledge, information, and technical means for achieving their goals of domination, profits, and power. They are rewarded very well for these services and most of them are objective and subjective pillars of these unjust, evil, and nature-and-human nature-eroding-and-polluting systems.
Overwhelming majority of teachers, professors, and academics in the schools, colleges, and universities are like that too and play similar roles in the system. The few, who are not like that, seldom survive in these establishments. They are brainwashing countless millions of students-creating new generations of tokens and coins for the civilian, military, and corporate slot machines- who, by and large, do not know what is being done to them and are paying exorbitant tuition and other fees-to be brainwashed and fit into those slots- from which all the whores of the system are paid high salaries and other benefits. The relatively very few, who know what is happening, are powerless to bring about the necessary changes. Such is the unmatchable power of money-the bond of all bonds (Marx)-in the contemporary Advanced Capitalist-Imperialist Technocratic Civilization and its imitators in the Third World.
This is a large and very important topic and requires the writing of a separate article.
Address: Phoenix, Arizona, United States
less
Uploads
Videos by Fazal Rahman
Note by Fazal Rahman This audio contains important information and interviews on the Ukraine C... more Note by Fazal Rahman
This audio contains important information and interviews on the Ukraine Crisis and its fascists, Brazilian fascists, Russia, USA,, and Europe, etc. The US and Western mainstream media continue to deny the existence of neo-Nazis in Ukraine, against all the factual evidence. They are confident of the efficacy of their lies and coverups in their populations, overwhelming majorities of which are not only ignorant, gullible, and receptive, but are unconsciously conditioned to demand and require such deceptions. The mass unconscious and mass consciousness in these societies have become very dangerous, because, among other things, these have become the mass psychological and cultural basis of fascism in much of the West, and especially in the US. These have been effectively immunized against all real facts, truth, logic, history, ethics and morality, justice, and goodness, which are replaced by their opposites in the mass consciousness.
360 views
This audio contains commentary on the newly established Disinformation Board by the US government... more This audio contains commentary on the newly established Disinformation Board by the US government and Biden's plan to send $33 billion more to Ukraine, in the midst of economic crisis in the US, which is going to get worse. It contains interviews with Scott Ritter, David Tawil, and Peter Coffin, critical political, military, and economic analysts.
46 views
Papers by Fazal Rahman
Comment by Fazal Rahman These articles by Ralph Nader were posted in the Counterpunch. In my 198... more Comment by Fazal Rahman
These articles by Ralph Nader were posted in the Counterpunch. In my 1986 article, posted on my web site in 2013, “TRANSFORMATION OF FASCISM IN THE TWENTIETH CENTURY: A COMPREHENSIVE THEORY”, with the following link, I had predicted the establishment of fascism in the USA, on the basis of concrete national and international politico-economic, theoretical, and historical analyses. The Trumpian fascistic coup that Nader has discussed in his article is not an anamoly. It is part of the developmental dynamics of American international imperialism, capitalist-imperialist democracy, and fascism. As such, it is immensely more complex and dangerous than an anomaly. It is of utmost importance to understand this historical structural dynamics in order to effectively resist and combat it. History informs us that under such conditions, opposition political parties and people must develop a untied front, in spite of their ideological and other differences, to stop and reverse the development of fascism.
End of comment
The infamous US agency funneled nearly half a billion dollars to Internews Network, a non-profit ... more The infamous US agency funneled nearly half a billion dollars to Internews Network, a non-profit deeply involved in media operations all over the world, WikiLeaks has revealed.
In 2023 alone, IN collaborated with 4,291 media outlets, produced 4,799 hours of broadcasts reaching 778 million people, and trained over 9,000 journalists. Operating in 30+ countries, it has key offices in the US, London, Paris, and regional HQs in Kiev, Bangkok, and Nairobi. But there's more to the story:
Note by Fazal Rahman It is true that mankind is closer to self-extinction as well as extinction ... more Note by Fazal Rahman
It is true that mankind is closer to self-extinction as well as extinction of most other forms of life than ever. However, these atomic scientists have excluded the historical role of USA in this development, which created the nuclear and most other weapons of mass destruction and their delivery systems, is the only country which used the nuclear weapons, spends incomparably more resources on these and other weapons and on wars and invasions of other countries, constantly initiates arms races, exports more weapons internationally than any other country, has been the biggest polluter of environment, funds and arms its allies to start proxy and genocidal wars, like the current war in Ukraine and genocidal war of Israel in Gaza, and trains their armies, unleashes constant threats against other countries as well as economic and other sanctions, hence creating constant conflicts, etc. They only mention threats posed by Russia, China, and North Korea in this scenario, without explaining the historical causes of arms races forced upon them by US and Europe, US efforts to continue its global hegemony, colonial and neo-colonial history of wars and exploitations, funding, arming, and training of their adversaries, etc. Even though the conclusion of these atomic scientists of the mankind being closer to extinction than ever is correct, their explanation of the role of various countries in this development is totally biased and flawed, and omits the most important historical events and facts.
End of note
Note by Fazal Rahman Pakistan has been suffering natural disasters due to climate change and gl... more Note by Fazal Rahman
Pakistan has been suffering natural disasters due to climate change and global warming as well as to economic, financial, political, state terrorist and non-state terrorist disasters, created by its capitalist-feudal-tribal politico-economic ruling class and its vast administrative, intelligence, law enforcement and military bureaucracies, which have turned it into one of the most unequal societies and mad houses in the world, which is being kept afloat through constant borrowing from the International Monetary Fund (IMF), Asian Development Bank (ADB), and World Bank, as well as bilateral loans from China, Saudi Arabia, and United Arab Emirates (UAE). Every time a new loan is procured, it is advertised as a triumph by successive Pakistani governments, concealing the enormous costs of repayments and interests. Under the current conditions, even the so-called middle classes are unable to satisfy their basic needs, much less the working classes and the poor. No wonder that such high percentages of children are suffering stunting causing malnutritions. No rosy pictures can hide these realities.
The only potential solutions to address such devastating problems consist of putting such societies on socialist paths. This is becoming clearer more than ever throughout the world, much of which is entangled in the ever deepening multidimensional quagmires of capitalist and imperialist political economies. Even in the richest of such countries, like the USA, millions of adults and children go hungry.
End of note
Note by Fazal Rahman Numbers of homeless and poor in the US are greatly undercounted by the US g... more Note by Fazal Rahman
Numbers of homeless and poor in the US are greatly undercounted by the US government agencies, which report these, because these agencies are allocated very limited resources in the budgets to deal with these immense problems. On the other hand, immense amounts are allocated to the military for wars and invasions of other countries, around $1 Trillion annually. For example, in 2022 HUD (Department of Housing and Urban Development) reported around 582,500 individuals experiencing homelessness in the United States, whereas the Department of Education reported 1.2 million homeless students in the school year of 2021-2022.
https://thephiladelphiacitizen.org/guest-commentary-is-philly-undercounting-our-homeless-population/
End of note
To Elon Musk, the word “homeless” is a “lie” and “a propaganda word.” “Homeless is a misnomer. I... more To Elon Musk, the word “homeless” is a “lie” and “a propaganda word.”
“Homeless is a misnomer. It implies that someone got a little bit behind on their mortgage, and if you just gave them a job, they’d be back on their feet,” he told former Fox News personality Tucker Carlson in October. “What you actually have are violent, drug zombies with dead eyes and needles and human feces on the street.”
The more money spent combating homelessness, “the worse it gets,” according to Musk.
Musk — who has funneled more than $250 million into Donald Trump’s presidential campaign — is now directing lawmakers and the White House to make drastic, potentially devastating cuts to federal agencies that support millions of vulnerable Americans, including thousands of people experiencing homelessness.
Note by Fazal Rahman Having been a military, economic, and political superpower, US imperialism ... more Note by Fazal Rahman
Having been a military, economic, and political superpower, US imperialism has become addicted to unleashing numerous direct and proxy wars against and invasions of incomparably weaker countries, especially since the Second World War, in which its Military-Industrial-Media-Academic-Complex (MIMAC) played the leading role. Arms manufacturers were the dominant part of that complex and harvested fabulous profits from those wars and invasions. Even though they have done the same in the proxy war of US and NATO against Russia in Ukraine, Russia is a superpower too and is unlike any of the previous victims of US imperialism. This proxy war has already failed miserably, after investments of hundreds of billions of dollars in military and financial aid to Ukraine, and Russia now has accelerated its advances into Ukraine, the leaders of which have been desperately pushing for involving NATO and US directly into this war, which will inevitably start the Third World War, which will destroy human and most other forms of life on this planet. Under the influence of MIMAC, American political leadership made one of the worst blunders in the history of this country. However, the arms manufacturers have and continue to make fabulous profits, some of which they share with their partners in MIMAC.
Note by Fazal Rahman In the extremist capitalist-imperialist system and society of USA, there a... more Note by Fazal Rahman
In the extremist capitalist-imperialist system and society of USA, there are thousands of herbicides, pesticides, and other chemical products that are extremely damaging to health of humans and other forms of life, but are sources of enormous profits for the corporations and businesses. The herbicides, Atrazine and Paraquat, have various scientifically proven debilitating effects on human health and have been banned in numerous countries for that reason, but not in the US, where, for all practical purposes, profits and money have been elevated to the status of God. Under the incoming Donald Trump administration, these and innumerable other problems are going to get much worse.
End of note
Last Week Tonight host John Oliver ridiculed President-elect Donald Trump’s potential cabinet pic... more Last Week Tonight host John Oliver ridiculed President-elect Donald Trump’s potential cabinet picks as “a deep bench of idiots, freaks and wannabe tough guys.”
Speaking about a CNN chart outlining possible Trump picks, the HBO host said, “It looks like a ‘choose your fighter’ screen where the only thing they’re fighting is the arc of the moral universe. It looks like an advent calendar where every circle opens up to a tiny piece of literal s***. It looks like a game board for Guess Who? Oops! All a**holes.”
This year is on track to be the world’s hottest on record, with UN boss Antonio Guterres warning ... more This year is on track to be the world’s hottest on record, with UN boss Antonio Guterres warning humanity was paying the price for “torching the planet”.
The World Meteorological Organisation (WMO) said data from six global datasets from January to September show 2024 is on track to be the warmest year on record, with the global average near surface temperature even higher than 2023’s record heat.
Note by Fazal Rahman Actual numbers of multidimensionally poor in the world are very likely to be... more Note by Fazal Rahman
Actual numbers of multidimensionally poor in the world are very likely to be even higher than the reported 1.1 billion in this article. Poverty, malnutrition, famines, inequality, wars between and within nations, climate change disasters, dangers of nuclear war, pollution of food, water, air, and soil, and multidimensional sufferings of billions of victims of capitalism and imperialism in the world are greatly increasing, after the grand betrayals and destruction of socialism in the Soviet Union and Peoples Republic of China. In many countries, right-wing and far right political parties are getting elected to form the governments, which will further aggravate these problems. In their essence, all these macro-level problems are caused by the political economies of capitalism and imperialism, which have also created capitalist and imperialist human natures. And yet, in overwhelming majority of the media, academic and other journals, and brain-washed and conditioned societies of capitalism and imperialism, it is a Grand Taboo to even mention the real causes and bases of these problems, some of which are the greatest problems in the history of mankind and the planet, that is, political economies of capitalism and imperialism. Anyone and any organization that imagines that these can be reduced or solved within these systems is engaging in delusional fantasies.
End of note
The percentage of Americans able to access quality healthcare hit a new low of 55% in 2024, accor... more The percentage of Americans able to access quality healthcare hit a new low of 55% in 2024, according to the West Health-Gallup Healthcare Affordability Index. Affordability of healthcare has become one of the top issues ahead of the 2024 US presidential election.
The US healthcare system continues to lag far behind other high-income countries, an analysis by the Commonwealth Fund shows.
As documented by numerous experts and analysts, the annual determinations of Federal Poverty Leve... more As documented by numerous experts and analysts, the annual determinations of Federal Poverty Level (FPL) by the Federal Health and Human Services (HHS) and related agencies are extremely flawed and logically and factually erroneous. The main way poverty is measured in the U.S. hasn't been updated since 1963, when the federal government created the poverty line. The official poverty line as currently defined by the Census Bureau is "three times the cost of a minimum diet in 1963" – meaning it's measured by how much families spent on food more than six decades ago. It is adjusted annually to include the inflations of goods and services, which are measured in a way that greatly underestimate the effects on the low-income and disadvantaged tens of millions, as these lump the essentials, like food, energy, housing, healthcare, transportation, etc.- the inflation rates of which are much higher than the generalized official figures - with numerous other categories that are almost exclusively used by the wealthy. Other important and elementary costs of living, like exorbitant housing rents, utilities, transportation, healthcare, etc., are totally excluded from FPL determinations. For example, the annual inflation rate of 3.29 percent has been applied to 2024 FPL, while the prices of various food items have gone up by 50 and even 100 percent or more. During 2023 HHS applied lower inflation rates for FPL adjustment than the SSA COLA, which caused those close to the Qualified Medical Beneficiary (QMB) limits to be dropped from it.
A new regional military alliance in the Middle East may be in the offing if Israel's prime minist... more A new regional military alliance in the Middle East may be in the offing if Israel's prime minister gets his way. But what other alliances, pacts and blocs are already out there? Sputnik explores.
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu proposed the creation of a new NATO-style military bloc in the Middle East dubbed the ‘Abraham Alliance’ during his trip to Washington this week, saying the coalition, arrayed explicitly against Iran, would include Israel, the United States, and any Israel-friendly Arab country wishing to join.
There is already more than a dozen alliances out there, with their purpose ranging from collective defense and intelligence sharing to attempting to enforce a certain "indispensable nation's" hegemony on the rest of the world. Here's what to know about them.
Brief conclusion: Capitalism and imperialism inevitably produce dehumanization, inhumanization, ... more Brief conclusion: Capitalism and imperialism inevitably produce dehumanization, inhumanization, alienation, and reification in the vast majority of their populations, while socialism produces rehumanization, de-alienation, and de-reification in the vast majority of its population.
When the Ottoman rule of the Levant ended, Jewish people owned about 3 percent of the land in Pal... more When the Ottoman rule of the Levant ended, Jewish people owned about 3 percent of the land in Palestine.
During World War I, Britain made agreements to gain the support of various groups in the Middle East. Most notable was the 1917 Balfour Declaration, which promised the “establishment in Palestine of a national home for the Jewish people”.
The mandate facilitated Jewish immigration from Europe to Palestine from the 1910s to the 1940s, bringing the Jewish population of Palestine to 33 percent by 1947.
Historical Palestine was 26,790sq km, about the size of Haiti (27,750sq km).
Note by Fazal Rahman This article was published in Lancet, a world-leading general medical jour... more Note by Fazal Rahman
This article was published in Lancet, a world-leading general medical journal. According to its estimates, up to 186 000 or even more deaths could be attributable to the current conflict in Gaza, which include both direct and indirect deaths, resulting from the Israeli genocidal war against the Palestinians . Using the 2022 Gaza Strip population estimate of 2 375 259, this would translate to 7•9% of the total population in the Gaza Strip. This is what the US and much of the West have been supporting, funding, and arming. Why I am not surprised or shocked? Because they themselves have done even much worse in their past and recent history.
End of note
Note by Fazal Rahman This audio contains important information and interviews on the Ukraine C... more Note by Fazal Rahman
This audio contains important information and interviews on the Ukraine Crisis and its fascists, Brazilian fascists, Russia, USA,, and Europe, etc. The US and Western mainstream media continue to deny the existence of neo-Nazis in Ukraine, against all the factual evidence. They are confident of the efficacy of their lies and coverups in their populations, overwhelming majorities of which are not only ignorant, gullible, and receptive, but are unconsciously conditioned to demand and require such deceptions. The mass unconscious and mass consciousness in these societies have become very dangerous, because, among other things, these have become the mass psychological and cultural basis of fascism in much of the West, and especially in the US. These have been effectively immunized against all real facts, truth, logic, history, ethics and morality, justice, and goodness, which are replaced by their opposites in the mass consciousness.
360 views
This audio contains commentary on the newly established Disinformation Board by the US government... more This audio contains commentary on the newly established Disinformation Board by the US government and Biden's plan to send $33 billion more to Ukraine, in the midst of economic crisis in the US, which is going to get worse. It contains interviews with Scott Ritter, David Tawil, and Peter Coffin, critical political, military, and economic analysts.
46 views
Comment by Fazal Rahman These articles by Ralph Nader were posted in the Counterpunch. In my 198... more Comment by Fazal Rahman
These articles by Ralph Nader were posted in the Counterpunch. In my 1986 article, posted on my web site in 2013, “TRANSFORMATION OF FASCISM IN THE TWENTIETH CENTURY: A COMPREHENSIVE THEORY”, with the following link, I had predicted the establishment of fascism in the USA, on the basis of concrete national and international politico-economic, theoretical, and historical analyses. The Trumpian fascistic coup that Nader has discussed in his article is not an anamoly. It is part of the developmental dynamics of American international imperialism, capitalist-imperialist democracy, and fascism. As such, it is immensely more complex and dangerous than an anomaly. It is of utmost importance to understand this historical structural dynamics in order to effectively resist and combat it. History informs us that under such conditions, opposition political parties and people must develop a untied front, in spite of their ideological and other differences, to stop and reverse the development of fascism.
End of comment
The infamous US agency funneled nearly half a billion dollars to Internews Network, a non-profit ... more The infamous US agency funneled nearly half a billion dollars to Internews Network, a non-profit deeply involved in media operations all over the world, WikiLeaks has revealed.
In 2023 alone, IN collaborated with 4,291 media outlets, produced 4,799 hours of broadcasts reaching 778 million people, and trained over 9,000 journalists. Operating in 30+ countries, it has key offices in the US, London, Paris, and regional HQs in Kiev, Bangkok, and Nairobi. But there's more to the story:
Note by Fazal Rahman It is true that mankind is closer to self-extinction as well as extinction ... more Note by Fazal Rahman
It is true that mankind is closer to self-extinction as well as extinction of most other forms of life than ever. However, these atomic scientists have excluded the historical role of USA in this development, which created the nuclear and most other weapons of mass destruction and their delivery systems, is the only country which used the nuclear weapons, spends incomparably more resources on these and other weapons and on wars and invasions of other countries, constantly initiates arms races, exports more weapons internationally than any other country, has been the biggest polluter of environment, funds and arms its allies to start proxy and genocidal wars, like the current war in Ukraine and genocidal war of Israel in Gaza, and trains their armies, unleashes constant threats against other countries as well as economic and other sanctions, hence creating constant conflicts, etc. They only mention threats posed by Russia, China, and North Korea in this scenario, without explaining the historical causes of arms races forced upon them by US and Europe, US efforts to continue its global hegemony, colonial and neo-colonial history of wars and exploitations, funding, arming, and training of their adversaries, etc. Even though the conclusion of these atomic scientists of the mankind being closer to extinction than ever is correct, their explanation of the role of various countries in this development is totally biased and flawed, and omits the most important historical events and facts.
End of note
Note by Fazal Rahman Pakistan has been suffering natural disasters due to climate change and gl... more Note by Fazal Rahman
Pakistan has been suffering natural disasters due to climate change and global warming as well as to economic, financial, political, state terrorist and non-state terrorist disasters, created by its capitalist-feudal-tribal politico-economic ruling class and its vast administrative, intelligence, law enforcement and military bureaucracies, which have turned it into one of the most unequal societies and mad houses in the world, which is being kept afloat through constant borrowing from the International Monetary Fund (IMF), Asian Development Bank (ADB), and World Bank, as well as bilateral loans from China, Saudi Arabia, and United Arab Emirates (UAE). Every time a new loan is procured, it is advertised as a triumph by successive Pakistani governments, concealing the enormous costs of repayments and interests. Under the current conditions, even the so-called middle classes are unable to satisfy their basic needs, much less the working classes and the poor. No wonder that such high percentages of children are suffering stunting causing malnutritions. No rosy pictures can hide these realities.
The only potential solutions to address such devastating problems consist of putting such societies on socialist paths. This is becoming clearer more than ever throughout the world, much of which is entangled in the ever deepening multidimensional quagmires of capitalist and imperialist political economies. Even in the richest of such countries, like the USA, millions of adults and children go hungry.
End of note
Note by Fazal Rahman Numbers of homeless and poor in the US are greatly undercounted by the US g... more Note by Fazal Rahman
Numbers of homeless and poor in the US are greatly undercounted by the US government agencies, which report these, because these agencies are allocated very limited resources in the budgets to deal with these immense problems. On the other hand, immense amounts are allocated to the military for wars and invasions of other countries, around $1 Trillion annually. For example, in 2022 HUD (Department of Housing and Urban Development) reported around 582,500 individuals experiencing homelessness in the United States, whereas the Department of Education reported 1.2 million homeless students in the school year of 2021-2022.
https://thephiladelphiacitizen.org/guest-commentary-is-philly-undercounting-our-homeless-population/
End of note
To Elon Musk, the word “homeless” is a “lie” and “a propaganda word.” “Homeless is a misnomer. I... more To Elon Musk, the word “homeless” is a “lie” and “a propaganda word.”
“Homeless is a misnomer. It implies that someone got a little bit behind on their mortgage, and if you just gave them a job, they’d be back on their feet,” he told former Fox News personality Tucker Carlson in October. “What you actually have are violent, drug zombies with dead eyes and needles and human feces on the street.”
The more money spent combating homelessness, “the worse it gets,” according to Musk.
Musk — who has funneled more than $250 million into Donald Trump’s presidential campaign — is now directing lawmakers and the White House to make drastic, potentially devastating cuts to federal agencies that support millions of vulnerable Americans, including thousands of people experiencing homelessness.
Note by Fazal Rahman Having been a military, economic, and political superpower, US imperialism ... more Note by Fazal Rahman
Having been a military, economic, and political superpower, US imperialism has become addicted to unleashing numerous direct and proxy wars against and invasions of incomparably weaker countries, especially since the Second World War, in which its Military-Industrial-Media-Academic-Complex (MIMAC) played the leading role. Arms manufacturers were the dominant part of that complex and harvested fabulous profits from those wars and invasions. Even though they have done the same in the proxy war of US and NATO against Russia in Ukraine, Russia is a superpower too and is unlike any of the previous victims of US imperialism. This proxy war has already failed miserably, after investments of hundreds of billions of dollars in military and financial aid to Ukraine, and Russia now has accelerated its advances into Ukraine, the leaders of which have been desperately pushing for involving NATO and US directly into this war, which will inevitably start the Third World War, which will destroy human and most other forms of life on this planet. Under the influence of MIMAC, American political leadership made one of the worst blunders in the history of this country. However, the arms manufacturers have and continue to make fabulous profits, some of which they share with their partners in MIMAC.
Note by Fazal Rahman In the extremist capitalist-imperialist system and society of USA, there a... more Note by Fazal Rahman
In the extremist capitalist-imperialist system and society of USA, there are thousands of herbicides, pesticides, and other chemical products that are extremely damaging to health of humans and other forms of life, but are sources of enormous profits for the corporations and businesses. The herbicides, Atrazine and Paraquat, have various scientifically proven debilitating effects on human health and have been banned in numerous countries for that reason, but not in the US, where, for all practical purposes, profits and money have been elevated to the status of God. Under the incoming Donald Trump administration, these and innumerable other problems are going to get much worse.
End of note
Last Week Tonight host John Oliver ridiculed President-elect Donald Trump’s potential cabinet pic... more Last Week Tonight host John Oliver ridiculed President-elect Donald Trump’s potential cabinet picks as “a deep bench of idiots, freaks and wannabe tough guys.”
Speaking about a CNN chart outlining possible Trump picks, the HBO host said, “It looks like a ‘choose your fighter’ screen where the only thing they’re fighting is the arc of the moral universe. It looks like an advent calendar where every circle opens up to a tiny piece of literal s***. It looks like a game board for Guess Who? Oops! All a**holes.”
This year is on track to be the world’s hottest on record, with UN boss Antonio Guterres warning ... more This year is on track to be the world’s hottest on record, with UN boss Antonio Guterres warning humanity was paying the price for “torching the planet”.
The World Meteorological Organisation (WMO) said data from six global datasets from January to September show 2024 is on track to be the warmest year on record, with the global average near surface temperature even higher than 2023’s record heat.
Note by Fazal Rahman Actual numbers of multidimensionally poor in the world are very likely to be... more Note by Fazal Rahman
Actual numbers of multidimensionally poor in the world are very likely to be even higher than the reported 1.1 billion in this article. Poverty, malnutrition, famines, inequality, wars between and within nations, climate change disasters, dangers of nuclear war, pollution of food, water, air, and soil, and multidimensional sufferings of billions of victims of capitalism and imperialism in the world are greatly increasing, after the grand betrayals and destruction of socialism in the Soviet Union and Peoples Republic of China. In many countries, right-wing and far right political parties are getting elected to form the governments, which will further aggravate these problems. In their essence, all these macro-level problems are caused by the political economies of capitalism and imperialism, which have also created capitalist and imperialist human natures. And yet, in overwhelming majority of the media, academic and other journals, and brain-washed and conditioned societies of capitalism and imperialism, it is a Grand Taboo to even mention the real causes and bases of these problems, some of which are the greatest problems in the history of mankind and the planet, that is, political economies of capitalism and imperialism. Anyone and any organization that imagines that these can be reduced or solved within these systems is engaging in delusional fantasies.
End of note
The percentage of Americans able to access quality healthcare hit a new low of 55% in 2024, accor... more The percentage of Americans able to access quality healthcare hit a new low of 55% in 2024, according to the West Health-Gallup Healthcare Affordability Index. Affordability of healthcare has become one of the top issues ahead of the 2024 US presidential election.
The US healthcare system continues to lag far behind other high-income countries, an analysis by the Commonwealth Fund shows.
As documented by numerous experts and analysts, the annual determinations of Federal Poverty Leve... more As documented by numerous experts and analysts, the annual determinations of Federal Poverty Level (FPL) by the Federal Health and Human Services (HHS) and related agencies are extremely flawed and logically and factually erroneous. The main way poverty is measured in the U.S. hasn't been updated since 1963, when the federal government created the poverty line. The official poverty line as currently defined by the Census Bureau is "three times the cost of a minimum diet in 1963" – meaning it's measured by how much families spent on food more than six decades ago. It is adjusted annually to include the inflations of goods and services, which are measured in a way that greatly underestimate the effects on the low-income and disadvantaged tens of millions, as these lump the essentials, like food, energy, housing, healthcare, transportation, etc.- the inflation rates of which are much higher than the generalized official figures - with numerous other categories that are almost exclusively used by the wealthy. Other important and elementary costs of living, like exorbitant housing rents, utilities, transportation, healthcare, etc., are totally excluded from FPL determinations. For example, the annual inflation rate of 3.29 percent has been applied to 2024 FPL, while the prices of various food items have gone up by 50 and even 100 percent or more. During 2023 HHS applied lower inflation rates for FPL adjustment than the SSA COLA, which caused those close to the Qualified Medical Beneficiary (QMB) limits to be dropped from it.
A new regional military alliance in the Middle East may be in the offing if Israel's prime minist... more A new regional military alliance in the Middle East may be in the offing if Israel's prime minister gets his way. But what other alliances, pacts and blocs are already out there? Sputnik explores.
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu proposed the creation of a new NATO-style military bloc in the Middle East dubbed the ‘Abraham Alliance’ during his trip to Washington this week, saying the coalition, arrayed explicitly against Iran, would include Israel, the United States, and any Israel-friendly Arab country wishing to join.
There is already more than a dozen alliances out there, with their purpose ranging from collective defense and intelligence sharing to attempting to enforce a certain "indispensable nation's" hegemony on the rest of the world. Here's what to know about them.
Brief conclusion: Capitalism and imperialism inevitably produce dehumanization, inhumanization, ... more Brief conclusion: Capitalism and imperialism inevitably produce dehumanization, inhumanization, alienation, and reification in the vast majority of their populations, while socialism produces rehumanization, de-alienation, and de-reification in the vast majority of its population.
When the Ottoman rule of the Levant ended, Jewish people owned about 3 percent of the land in Pal... more When the Ottoman rule of the Levant ended, Jewish people owned about 3 percent of the land in Palestine.
During World War I, Britain made agreements to gain the support of various groups in the Middle East. Most notable was the 1917 Balfour Declaration, which promised the “establishment in Palestine of a national home for the Jewish people”.
The mandate facilitated Jewish immigration from Europe to Palestine from the 1910s to the 1940s, bringing the Jewish population of Palestine to 33 percent by 1947.
Historical Palestine was 26,790sq km, about the size of Haiti (27,750sq km).
Note by Fazal Rahman This article was published in Lancet, a world-leading general medical jour... more Note by Fazal Rahman
This article was published in Lancet, a world-leading general medical journal. According to its estimates, up to 186 000 or even more deaths could be attributable to the current conflict in Gaza, which include both direct and indirect deaths, resulting from the Israeli genocidal war against the Palestinians . Using the 2022 Gaza Strip population estimate of 2 375 259, this would translate to 7•9% of the total population in the Gaza Strip. This is what the US and much of the West have been supporting, funding, and arming. Why I am not surprised or shocked? Because they themselves have done even much worse in their past and recent history.
End of note
On Friday, Russia’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs hosted a seminal meeting headed by the head of st... more On Friday, Russia’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs hosted a seminal meeting headed by the head of state, where the Russian president outlined the historical background for the country’s foreign policy vectors in a conversation with senior Russian diplomats. Read the full text below.
Note by Fazal Rahman This 2024 article presents some facts which reveal the historical role of US... more Note by Fazal Rahman This 2024 article presents some facts which reveal the historical role of US imperialism in creating and supporting fascism in numerous countries. I had written and posted an article with the following link in 2013, which contained an original theory on the transformation of fascism in the Twentieth Century. Focus of that article was on the transformation of US imperialism into fascism in numerous countries and its return to the US imperialist center itself, replacing its capitalist-imperialist democracy. As expected, that article got very little attention or publicity. The processes described in that article have been happening for decades and have now reached the stage in which American capitalist-imperialist democracy is being rapidly eroded and being replaced with American forms of fascism. A full fledged American fascism will be incomparably more dangerous and destructive than that of Germany, Italy, Spain, and their allies before and during the Second World War. It will inevitably lead to the Third World War, which will result in the extinction of human and most other forms of life. End of note