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The Saker
A bird's eye view of the vineyard

offsite link Alternative Copy of thesaker.is site is available Thu May 25, 2023 14:38 | Ice-Saker-V6bKu3nz
Alternative site: https://thesaker.si/saker-a... Site was created using the downloads provided Regards Herb

offsite link The Saker blog is now frozen Tue Feb 28, 2023 23:55 | The Saker
Dear friends As I have previously announced, we are now “freezing” the blog.  We are also making archives of the blog available for free download in various formats (see below). 

offsite link What do you make of the Russia and China Partnership? Tue Feb 28, 2023 16:26 | The Saker
by Mr. Allen for the Saker blog Over the last few years, we hear leaders from both Russia and China pronouncing that they have formed a relationship where there are

offsite link Moveable Feast Cafe 2023/02/27 ? Open Thread Mon Feb 27, 2023 19:00 | cafe-uploader
2023/02/27 19:00:02Welcome to the ‘Moveable Feast Cafe’. The ‘Moveable Feast’ is an open thread where readers can post wide ranging observations, articles, rants, off topic and have animate discussions of

offsite link The stage is set for Hybrid World War III Mon Feb 27, 2023 15:50 | The Saker
Pepe Escobar for the Saker blog A powerful feeling rhythms your skin and drums up your soul as you?re immersed in a long walk under persistent snow flurries, pinpointed by

The Saker >>

Public Inquiry
Interested in maladministration. Estd. 2005

offsite link Joe Duffy is dishonest and untrustworthy Anthony

offsite link Robert Watt complaint: Time for decision by SIPO Anthony

offsite link RTE in breach of its own editorial principles Anthony

offsite link Waiting for SIPO Anthony

offsite link Formal complaint against Robert Watt Anthony

Public Inquiry >>

Human Rights in Ireland
A Blog About Human Rights

offsite link UN human rights chief calls for priority action ahead of climate summit Sat Oct 30, 2021 17:18 | Human Rights

offsite link 5 Year Anniversary Of Kem Ley?s Death Sun Jul 11, 2021 12:34 | Human Rights

offsite link Poor Living Conditions for Migrants in Southern Italy Mon Jan 18, 2021 10:14 | Human Rights

offsite link Right to Water Mon Aug 03, 2020 19:13 | Human Rights

offsite link Human Rights Fri Mar 20, 2020 16:33 | Human Rights

Human Rights in Ireland >>

Lockdown Skeptics

The Daily Sceptic

offsite link Bristol University Axes the National Anthem from Graduation Ceremonies Amid Students? Claims it is ?... Fri Dec 08, 2023 11:01 | Will Jones
Bristol University has axed the National Anthem from its graduation ceremonies with some students claiming it is "old-fashioned" and "offensive to some".
The post Bristol University Axes the National Anthem from Graduation Ceremonies Amid Students’ Claims it is “Old-Fashioned” and “Offensive to Some” appeared first on The Daily Sceptic.

offsite link The Covid Inquiry is Insulting the Victims of Lockdown Fri Dec 08, 2023 09:00 | Will Jones
What gives the relatives of Covid victims the sole right to the moral high ground, asks Allison Pearson. Lockdowns were devastating, and their victims were often far younger than those of Covid.
The post The Covid Inquiry is Insulting the Victims of Lockdown appeared first on The Daily Sceptic.

offsite link German Media Realise Their Health Minister is an International Laughingstock Fri Dec 08, 2023 07:00 | Eugyppius
The German media are waking up to the fact that their mask-loving Health Minister Karl Lauterbach is an international laughingstock thanks to a devastating intervention by Stanford's Professor Jay Bhattacharya.
The post German Media Realise Their Health Minister is an International Laughingstock appeared first on The Daily Sceptic.

offsite link News Round-Up Fri Dec 08, 2023 00:57 | Richard Eldred
A summary of the most interesting stories in the past 24 hours that challenge the prevailing orthodoxy about the virus and the vaccines, the ?climate emergency? and the supposed moral defects of Western civilisation.
The post News Round-Up appeared first on The Daily Sceptic.

offsite link ?Mr. Trump Says He is Very Proud of Operation Warp Speed. Should He Be?? Thu Dec 07, 2023 19:00 | Will Jones
Last night, Megyn Kelly asked the Republican presidential hopefuls whether Donald Trump was right to be proud of Operation Warp Speed, which approved the mRNA Covid vaccines in record time. Here's what they said.
The post “Mr. Trump Says He is Very Proud of Operation Warp Speed. Should He Be?” appeared first on The Daily Sceptic.

Lockdown Skeptics >>

Right2Change: The Theft of the Commons

category national | bin tax / household tax / water tax | opinion/analysis author Wednesday February 17, 2016 23:17author by right2water - Right2Change Report this post to the editors

We declare the right of the people of Ireland to the ownership of Ireland and to the unfettered control of Irish destinies, to be sovereign and indefeasible.’ An affirmation that should, by now, be familiar to most of us.

Given Connolly’s input into what became the Proclamation of the Republic, argues the labour historian John Callow, this passage ‘could be taken as legally enshrining the nationalisation, and common ownership, of industry and the land’. Democratic control of the island’s resources and indeed all aspects of the economy was a central tenet of Connolly’s political thought, and has featured prominently in the efforts of his followers to transform society for the benefit of the majority.

Other political forces, such as the Fianna Fáil governments of the early 1930s or indeed the contemporary proponents of populist nationalism, have not been above using the principle of Irish ownership as a rhetorical tool to appeal to all sections of the population. But as the abhorrent treatment of Dunnes Stores workers starkly demonstrates, this limited objective does not in itself constitute the making of a more democratic and equal society. Connolly made this point repeatedly, not least in the weeks leading up to the Easter Rising: ‘We are out for Ireland for the Irish. But who are the Irish? Not the rack-renting, slum-owning landlord; not the sweating, profit-grinding capitalist; not the sleek and oily lawyer; not the prostitute pressman – the hired liars of the enemy. Not these are the Irish upon whom the future depends. Not these, but the Irish working class, the only secure foundation upon which a free nation can be reared.’

For the greater part of its existence, the economy of the southern Irish state has been designed to benefit the class of people so despised by Connolly. At various points in Irish history, native policy makers have privileged ranchers, commercial banking interests, multinational corporations and those engaged in FIRE (finance, insurance and real estate) activities over the needs of the broader population. As early as the 1950s, with the opening up of the economy to free trade and FDI, government ministers had begun to establish Ireland’s ‘open for business’ credentials with a giveaway of oil and gas exploration rights worth £ millions. Henceforth, the two civil war parties would create between them the architecture of an economy based on speculation, while the middle-men continued receiving huge fees for services rendered to multinationals.

Neoliberalism – as those living in Thatcher’s Britain or Reagan’s US understood and experienced it – took longer to reach Ireland, but by the time it did it was pushing at an open door. From the late 1980s onwards, the Irish economy began to replicate the features of global neoliberalism – low taxes, a weakened labour movement, financialisation, and commercial property speculation – while somehow retaining the structures that benefited its strong middleman class. Indeed, it was in 1989 that the Fianna Fáil Minister for Energy Ray Burke reduced the reduced the state’s 50% share in its offshore oil and gas to zero and abolished royalties completely.

The characteristics of the neoliberal turn are well known to us, but it is privatisation that best encapsulates its grasping nature. Privatisation is not efficient, it’s not clever and it doesn’t deliver. It’s simply a massive wealth grab, a project increasing in scope and intensity across the globe with annual revenues reaching the hundreds of billions. As we have reduced progressive and wealth taxes, and as public finances have collapsed, new infrastructural investment has increasingly taken the form of installing private tollbooths over the economy’s most critical access points such as roads, public transportation, communications, energy, healthcare, education and, of course, clean water. It represents the final theft of the commons and allows private interests to control our most important public assets. Privatisation is the backbone of the neoliberal project and shows the true nature of the free market, monopolies owned by the few. That’s not democracy, it’s an economic tyranny.

Having formed a key component of the project that led to the biggest capitalist crisis in living memory, privatisation is now proposed as part of the solution. Embedded in TTIP, EU treaties and the programmes of national governments are a set of policies that lead inexorably to the privatisation of everything that remains in common ownership. In the twenty-six counties, this involves the sale of profitable state assets, the defunding and creeping privatisation of a two-tier healthcare system, and the transformation of Irish Water into a commercial entity.

Contained within the Right2Change Policy Principles for a Progressive Irish Government is a rejection of privatisation, wholesale opposition to TTIP and a number of measures aimed at (re-)establishing democratic control over ‘surrendered natural resources’ and crucial parts of the economy. Realisation of these proposals would go some way towards reversing the drift to a market society, deepening economic democracy both in places where it can already be found and where it has not existed. Achieving and sustaining this kind of radical change will require victory on the political front and a fundamental transformation in the balance of class power.

Written by Stevie Nolan and Sean Byers, Trademark Belfast

Related Link: http://www.right2change.ie/blog/theft-commons
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