Just Stop Oil protesting in London 6 December 2022. Roger Hallam was instrumental is founding Just Stop Oil.
I am very pleased to announce an audio podcast featuring renowned climate activist Roger Hallam and myself on 1 May 2024 at 7pm BST (GMT +1).
The podcast is titled ‘Talking about a Revolution’ and to include addressing the following themes: What is a revolution – historically and in the 21st century?, that revolution means exiting the system and being in resistance to it, why that is necessary as we face social/eco collapse and concrete pathways to action at the present moment.
I have research to do as preparation. Roger has many videos on youtube, I’m finding many of them long and long-winded. The podcast is likely to last at least 30 minutes. Roger has a reputation for sometimes being abrasive and I have been known to call a cnut a cnut so it is probably wise to accept that there may be some profanities. Further audio podcasts may follow.
AS BELEAGUERED customers faced further price hikes today, the scale of Britain’s energy rip-off was revealed.
The energy firms have collectively reaped profits of £420 billion since 2020, according to research by the End Fuel Poverty Coalition.
For comparison, the annual budget of the Department of Health & Social Care, which includes the NHS, was £181.7bn in 2022-3.
Though the Ofgem-imposed price cap, limiting what customers pay for each unit of gas and electricity that we use, fell today to £1,690 a year for a typical household, the average standing charge rose from £303 a year to £334.
These charges, which have to be paid even if no gas or electricity is used, have risen by 147 per cent since the 2022 outbreak of war in Ukraine.
Those cashing in on the profits dividend include not only the energy providers but also the firms that own the wires and pipes through which electricity and gas supplies travel, all publicly owned prior to privatisation in 1990.
This is yet to be finalised but looks as though it’s likely to happen. I’m hoping to bring you an audio podcast on 1 May – Mayday – at 7pm BST (GMT +1). It will be me and a prominent climate activist discussing the climate crisis and talking about a revolution. I expect to do a test run a week earlier to see that I have the podcast tech working properly.
3/4/24 9.05am. This intended podcast is now looking unlikely. I’m getting no response to emails after an initial encouraging response. I’m disappointed too.
4/4/24 8.15am. I am very pleased to announce an audio podcast featuring renowned climate activist Roger Hallam and myself on 1 May 2024 at 7pm BST (GMT +1).
The podcast is titled ‘Talking about a Revolution’ and to include addressing the following themes: What is a revolution – historically and in the 21st century?, that revolution means exiting the system and being in resistance to it, why that is necessary as we face social/eco collapse and concrete pathways to action at the present moment.
The podcast is likely to last at least 30 minutes. Roger has a reputation for sometimes being abrasive and I have been known to call a cnut a cnut so it is probably wise to accept that there may be some profanities. Further audio podcasts may follow.
Argentine President Javier Milei with US Ambassador in Argentina Marc Stanley
In an interview with CNN, the Argentine president called Petro a “terrorist assassin”, Mexican President López Obrador “ignorant”, and declared that Israel was not committing “any excesses” in Gaza
Argentina’s libertarian president Javier Milei is under fire from his counterparts in the region for comments made during an interview with CNN Español. In response to his explosive comments, wherein he called Colombia’s president a “terrorist assassin”, Colombia’s Foreign Ministry announced the expulsion of Argentina’s diplomats from its embassy in Bogotá, Colombia.
The Foreign Ministry wrote in a statement, “This is not the first time that Mr. Milei offends the Colombian head of state, affecting the historical relationship of brotherhood between Colombia and Argentina.”
Indeed, Milei made similar comments about the leftist president back in January. When asked what he thought about the Colombian president, Milei told right-wing Colombian-American journalist Patricia Janiot that he is a “communist assassin that is sinking Colombia”.
In the statement released by the Colombian government, they highlighted: “The expressions of the Argentine president have deteriorated the confidence of our nation, in addition to offending the dignity of President Petro, who was democratically elected.”
Meanwhile, former Argentine president Alberto Fernández also condemned the statement by his successor. “I regret and categorically reject the statements of President Javier Milei, who has mistreated the President of Colombia, Gustavo Petro. My solidarity with the president of the Colombian people. The derogatory and disqualifying way in which the Argentine president expresses himself about presidents legitimately elected by their people and who are recognized leaders throughout Latin America is absolutely inadmissible.”
Gustavo Petro himself responded to Milei’s comments on Thursday and stated, “I believe that Milei seeks to destroy, or at least postpone, the project of Latin American integration. Today the Argentine people suffer and poverty increases. Milei’s promise to repeat the neoliberal system of 30 years ago may be a failure foretold; His thesis in the world that he has seen today as neoliberalism led to worsening the climate crisis, and putting us on the brink of extinction, as a species, is not accurate. The Argentine people are the ones who must discuss these issues and decide.”
He added, “Despite the insults, we must preserve the project of unity, in diversity, of Latin America and the Caribbean.”
Since winning the elections, Milei has rejected the pro-Global South integration position of his predecessors, instead pledging his priority and allegiance to the United States. Weeks after he was sworn in, Milei announced that Argentina would not join the BRICS economic bloc. The body had offered Argentina membership after its Johannesburg summit in August 2023, but Milei stated in December that it would rather do business with the US and Israel. So far Argentina has remained in the Latin American integration platforms but has threatened to withdraw from some.
Milei’s explosive comments were not reserved only for Colombia’s president. The CNN interviewer mentioned that Mexican President Andrés Manuel López Obrador had said some “tough words” about Milei, to which the Argentine president said “That an ignorant person like López Obrador speaks ill of me exalts me”.
The Mexican head of state responded to the comments on Thursday saying, “Milei stated that I am ‘ignorant’ because I called him a ‘conservative fascist.’ You are right: I still do not understand how the Argentines, being so intelligent, voted for someone who is not accurate, who despises the people and who dared to accuse his countryman [Pope] Francisco of being a ‘communist’ and ‘representative of the Evil One in the earth’, when it comes to the most Christian Pope and defender of the poor that I have ever known or heard of. PS Hugs to Gustavo Petro.”
Another segment of the not-yet aired interview that was shared was regarding Milei’s views on Israel’s genocidal war on Gaza. The staunch zionist declared: “Israel is not committing any excesses.”
The full interview is set to air this Sunday March 31.
A rowing boat on the River Thames Putney, London, March 27, 2024
THE crisis of capitalism is running out of your taps and pouring into our rivers. Britain’s water industry is lurching towards calamity, poisoned by the priorities of profit and abetted by politicians in the pocket of the privateers.
The largest water company in the country, Thames Water, appears to be on the edge of insolvency after its investors refused to pump in cash essential to the company’s survival — apparently because the reluctance of regulator Ofwat to authorise even steeper increases in bills to households made it an unattractive bet.
And alarm was spread about the annual Oxford-Cambridge boat race on Saturday having to row through the sewage-ridden Thames, with doubts being cast on maintaining the tradition of throwing the cox of the winning crew in the river on health and safety grounds.
Now there are calls for the government to declare a national emergency as discharges of raw sewage into rivers and seas across Britain reach a record high.
These are the fruits of the handing over of the most basic resource to the tender mercies of monopoly capital. The sewage in the rivers is one side of the coin, the riches sitting in shareholders’ bank accounts is the other.
…
Nationalisation may be forced on the government in the case of Thames Water. But state control can only work in a context of planning, investment and a role for both workers’ and consumer interests.
That was Labour Party policy until Keir Starmer abandoned it. It is time the labour movement demanded its reinstatement.
