Part 4 of Democracy V. Oligarchy and Stupidity
A Little American History
Joshua Lawrence Chamberlain- awarded the Congressional Medal of Honor for his "daring heroism and great tenacity" at the Little Round Top, Battle of Gettysburg.
Moving On:?
Continuing Chapter 3, Stiglitz wrote this about the Middle-Income Trap and American Justice:
"The United States can only push for advanced manufacturing, which requires higher skill sets and employs fewer people. Rising inequality, meanwhile, will continue ..." In addition, in late 2017, Stiglitz wrote that the drop in wages in the United States was 'due to the actions of multinational companies rather than globalization and wrote of the trade account imbalances between countries, that they were caused by free trade, as an agenda written by and for large multinational companies, at the expense of workers'?
In 2016, he (Stiglitz) said he believes that the economic situation of the United States is critical: "As the economists Anne Case and Angus Deaton showed in their study published in December 2015, life expectancy among middle-age white Americans was declining, as rates of suicides, drug use, and alcoholism increase. A year later, the National Center for Health Statistics reported that life expectancy for the country as a whole had declined for the first time in more than 20 years."With the incomes of the bottom 90% having stagnated for close to a third of a century (and declining for a significant proportion), the health data simply confirmed that things were not going well for swaths of the country". As late as 2017, he believed the challenges of globalization on the American economy as not insurmountable: "Yes, America faces a variety of problems—it always has, and what nation doesn't?".
Stiglitz on Justice?
Return to ICIJ:
What have ICIJ’s investigations into hidden Russian wealth revealed?
Offshore Leaks?(2013): ICIJ’s first investigation of leaked offshore records?cracked the lid?on the heavy use of tax havens by Russian elites, including prominent political figures and the heads of giant? state-controlled enterprises. At that time, Putin was a vocal proponent of curbing mRussians’ offshore investments, complaining that Russia’s economy was hurt because so much of it operated through tax havens.
The reporting also identified?companies involved in the Magnitsky Affair, a massive tax-fraud case investigated by Russian lawyer and whistleblower Sergei Magnitsky. He died in police custody in 2009, inflaming a scandal that soured U.S.-Russian relations.
Swiss Leaks?(2015): Leaked HSBC documents found that the global banking giant held a total of about $1.8 billion for hundreds of Russian clients, including sanctioned oligarch Gennady Timchenko and banker?Vladimir Antonov.
Panama Papers?(2016): The landmark investigation revealed key behind-the-scenes players in a?clandestine network operated by Putin’s inner circle?that shuffled at least $2 billion through banks and offshore companies. The documents shed light on about 100 financial deals tied to this network, which includes some of the Russian president’s childhood friends, like the cellist?Roldugin?and the billionaire?Rotenberg brothers, and showed how offshore entities were used to benefit Putin’s allies.
Paradise Papers?(2017): Leaked documents showed business ties between President?Donald Trump’s network?and?Putin’s inner circle.?
My Comment: Speaking of Sheldon Adelson (pictured):
CNN: Former President Donald Trump on Thursday said the Presidential Medal of Freedom, which honors civilians, “is actually much better” than the Medal of Honor, because service members who receive the nation’s highest military decoration are often wounded or awarded it posthumously.
Trump was praising Republican megadonor Miriam Adelson, to whom he awarded the Presidential Medal of Freedom while in office, during remarks at his golf club in Bedminster, New Jersey.
“Miriam, I watched Sheldon (Sheldon Adelson, her late husband) sitting so proud in the White House when we gave Miriam the Presidential Medal of Freedom. That’s the highest award you can get as a civilian, it’s the equivalent of the Congressional Medal of Honor, but civilian version. It’s actually much better, because everyone gets the Congressional Medal of Honor – that’s soldiers. They’re either in very bad shape because they’ve been hit so many times by bullets, or they’re dead,” Trump said.
“She gets it and she’s a healthy, beautiful woman, and they’re rated equal,” Trump said.
My insert, my experience: Anthony Casamento, Medal of Honor winner. - I, as a Marine Officer, escorted Anthony and his wife to the Naval Ball. He had 32 bullet fragments stitched across his chest- from Guadalcanal. They set off magnetometers at airports when he traveled:
CNN: It’s the latest in Trump’s?history of making disparaging comments?about military service. Early in his first presidential campaign, Trump?attracted controversy?by claiming then-Sen. John McCain — (of Arizona) a political rival who served as a naval aviator during the Vietnam War and was imprisoned for more than five years by the North Vietnamese, during which he suffered injuries that?would affect him for the rest of his life?—?was “not a war hero.”
“I like people that weren’t captured,” Trump said at the time.
Then, in 2020, The Atlantic?reported?that Trump said privately during a 2018 trip to France that he did not want to visit the graves of American service members and proceeded to refer to the fallen soldiers as “losers” and “suckers.” Trump has repeatedly denied making the remark - despite the remark being corroborated by John Kelly, a fellow Marine officer.
My Comment: I wanted to write sooner, but I wanted to keep it short - Blaise Pascal
As I write of cartoon characters:?
Climate Deniers Diving Club
Trump, who?received five military draft deferments during the Vietnam War,?also once referred to his efforts to avoid contracting sexually transmitted diseases as “my personal Vietnam:?
I know, right!
My Additional Comment:?A comparison of the civilian Medal of Freedom with the Congressional Medal of Honor is an insult to all those who, unlike Trump, serve or have served the United States of America.?
To compare the heroism of Joshua Lawrence Chamberlain:
the hero of the Little Round Top, at Gettysburg, for example,?and all those who have merited the Medal of Honor?
with a donor, especially a Jewish donor, whose husband, Sheldon, refused to contribute to Trump’s campaign after the antisemitism displayed at Charlottesville, is a disgrace and the height of hypocrisy. It justifies Tillerson’s comment about Trump being an f’n moron and Mattis and Miley’s consternation at Trump wanting to use our troops as his private praetorian guard in Lafayette Park and on 6 January. 2021:
Among many analysts sought for their assessment of the?January 6, 2021 assault on the capitol, [Fiona] Hill stated to?The Daily Beast, "The president was trying to stage a coup. There was little chance of it happening, but there was enough chance that the former defense secretaries had to put out that letter,[22] which was the final nail through that effort. They prevented the military from being involved in any coup attempt. But instead, Trump tried to incite it himself, [t]his could have turned into a full-blown coup had he had any of those key institutions following him. Just because it failed or didn't succeed doesn't mean it wasn't real."[23] On January 11, 2021, an opinion authored by Hill explicated the basis for her assessment of the attempted coup that precipitated the?second impeachment of Donald Trump.[24]
My Comment:?Trump has no knowledge of American history, does not read books (like many of his acolytes) and is hopelessly ineloquent and ignorant.?
When it comes to trade and job creation, he is indeed an incompetent- as I will explain about WTO in chapter 5.?
ICIJ Continued:?The investigation discovered that then-U.S.?Commerce Secretary Wilbur Ross?maintained a stake in a company that did business with a major oligarch-controlled energy company. The probe also revealed that a major investor in Twitter and Facebook?had financial ties?to two Russian government-owned firms known as vehicles for politically sensitive Kremlin dealings. And it identified Russian billionaires who had registered private jets in tax havens and showed how the offshore world helped oligarch Arkady Rotenberg?skirt sanctions?related to Russian aggression in Ukraine.
FinCEN Files?(2020): A global ICIJ- and BuzzFeed News-led investigation on the role of banks in dirty money flows, FinCEN Files uncovered more massive financial maneuvers by Russian oligarchs, including?Roman Abramovich?(and his $100 million donation to?controversial Israeli settlers),?Oleg Deripaska?(and the?billions he reportedly moved through a tiny Latvian bank), and the Rotenbergs, who were found to have transferred substantial assets to their sons?after being sanctioned?over the Russian invasion of Crimea.
Leaked files also showed that JPMorgan shuttled millions for Paul Manafort before and after he resigned from the Trump campaign because of allegations about his work with a pro-Russian political party in
Pandora Papers?(2021): ICIJ identified more beneficial owners from Russia in the Pandora Papers than from any other country. Prominent figures included?propaganda chief Konstantin Ernst, oil tycoon?Gennady Timchenko, Putin’s childhood friend?Peter Kolbin, a reported?romantic partner of Putin’s, Svetlana Krivonogikh:
My insert
and more than 45 oligarchs in all. The documents also show?how Russian elites responded to U.S. sanctions punishing?Russia for its “worldwide malign activity.” The widest-spanning offshore leak ICIJ has ever investigated also shed light on more key international enablers of Russian elites, including?American law firm Baker McKenzie, British lawyer?Alastair Tulloch, financial services firms?DADLAW?in Cyprus,?Asiaciti Trust?in Singapore and?Moores Rowland in Monaco.
New?Pandora Papers Russia?reporting identifies more professional enablers and details the offshore dealings, before and after targeted sanctions, of?top Russian bankers,?Burger King’s Russian operations,?gold magnate Suleiman Kerimov, the family of?Russian arms tycoon Sergei Chemezov, and one of the country’s richest businessmen,?Alexei Mordashov?(and the?help he got from elite accounting firm PwC).
Disclaimer:?I have intercalated images, titles, subtitles, comments and highlights in order to more effectively deliver this story. Attribution is made for the Art, literature, film, lyrics, photography, cartoons, music of others, and footnotes are provided for the ideas of others - whenever possible and appropriate.?Otherwise, the intuitions and disciplined inspirations - are mine.
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Continued with Chapter 5?
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