Trump calls for $1.7 trillion in social cuts - World Socialist Web Site
▻http://www.wsws.org/en/articles/2017/05/23/pers-m23.html
Meurtres à petit feu...
The Trump administration will unveil a fiscal year 2018 budget today that includes $1.7 trillion in cuts to major social programs. The plan marks a new stage in a bipartisan social counterrevolution aimed at eviscerating what remains of programs to fight poverty and hunger and provide health care for millions of workers.
Macron prepares enabling act to slash contracts, labor rights in France - World Socialist Web Site
▻http://www.wsws.org/en/articles/2017/05/23/macr-m23.html
The Macron administration has no mandate whatsoever to carry out the program it is proposing. The labor law was deeply unpopular even without its most controversial provisions; former PS President François Hollande’s economic policy, which Macron helped formulate, had a 4 percent approval rating. Now Macron is advancing such a program after an election that he won largely by default, because he was facing deeply unpopular neo-fascist candidate Marine Le Pen.
Macron, a former investment banker at the Rothschild bank, aims to impose the arrogant diktat of the banks. Under Hollande’s presidency, as workers’ living standards fell, the wealth of top French multi-billionaires like Liliane Bettencourt and Philippe Arnault nearly doubled. With the world economy still mired in crisis, however, and France’s economic position and its weight in world trade continuing to fall, the ruling class is determined to squeeze even more money out of workers and place it in the hands of the super-rich.
The working class is faced with a political struggle against an absolutely ruthless government that is willing to resort to forms of repression unseen in France since the 1940s in order to ram through the diktat of the banks. The new administration is aware that it faces massive popular opposition and is making detailed plans to crush strikes and protests.
Last week, the media revealed that the PS had made plans for a coup d’état after the presidential elections, to be implemented had Marine Le Pen won. Its purpose would not have been to topple Le Pen, however, but to crush anti-fascist protests and suspend normal parliamentary procedure by imposing a PS government on Le Pen.
La classe ouvrière est confrontée à une lutte politique contre un gouvernement absolument impitoyable qui est disposé à recourir à des formes de répression inaperçues en France depuis les années 1940 afin de traverser le diktat des banques. La nouvelle administration est consciente qu’elle fait face à une opposition populaire massive et fait des plans détaillés pour écraser les grèves et les manifestations.
La semaine dernière, les médias ont révélé que le PS avait pris des plans pour un coup d’état après les élections présidentielles, à mettre en place si Marine Le Pen a gagné. Son but n’aurait pas été de renverser Le Pen, cependant, mais d’écraser les manifestations antifascistes et de suspendre la procédure parlementaire normale en imposant un gouvernement PS sur Le Pen.
French government prepared coup if Le Pen won presidential election
By Alex Lantier
▻http://www.wsws.org/en/articles/2017/05/19/fran-m19.html
Vous y croyez, vous ?
19 May 2017
According to an extraordinary report published yesterday in L’Obs magazine, top members of France’s Socialist Party (PS) government prepared to launch a coup d’état if Marine Le Pen of the neo-fascist National Front (FN) won the May 7 presidential run-off.
The purpose of the coup was not to keep Le Pen from taking office. Rather, it was designed to crush left-wing protests against Le Pen’s victory, impose martial law, and install Le Pen in power in an enforced alliance with a PS-led government.
French President Macron names right-wing PM, meets Merkel to plan austerity and war - World Socialist Web Site
▻http://www.wsws.org/en/articles/2017/05/16/macr-m16.html
Le lendemain de son investiture au palais de l’Elysée, le président français, Emmanuel Macron, a choisi un diplômé de droite de l’école nationale d’administration élite (ENA) en tant que premier ministre, avant de se rendre à Berlin pour rencontrer la chancelière allemande Angela Merkel.
Le rendez-vous amical entre Macron et Merkel à Berlin souligne que son installation dans l’Elysée fait partie d’une #contre-révolution sociale et d’une multiplication du #militarisme qui se propage dans toute l’Europe. Berlin, le champion de l’#austérité qui, en 2014, a battu avec sept décennies de contrainte militaire suite à la défaite du régime nazi et a lancé la remilitarisation de sa politique étrangère, a salué Macron, un partisan de l’austérité profonde et un retour du projet.
Macron envisage d’utiliser la loi du #travail de son prédécesseur, François Hollande, à travers l’Assemblée nationale sans vote face aux manifestations de masse et à l’opposition de 70 pour cent des Français, pour détruire les contrats et les prestations sociales par décret.
Il a commencé sa conférence de presse conjointe avec Merkel en insistant sur le fait que l’Union européenne ou l’Allemagne ne lui dictaient pas de l’austérité, mais était la politique de son gouvernement. « L’agenda français sera un programme de réforme dans les mois à venir, pas parce que l’Europe nous demande, mais parce que c’est ce dont la France a besoin », a-t-il déclaré.
Burmese government rejects international inquiry into anti-Rohingya pogrom - World Socialist Web Site
▻http://www.wsws.org/en/articles/2017/05/15/burm-m15.html
Burmese government rejects international inquiry into anti-Rohingya pogrom
By John Roberts
15 May 2017
A European tour by the Burmese (Myanmar) head of government Aung San Suu Kyi this month has been marked by shameless hypocrisy, outright lies and cover-up of the campaign by the military and nationalist thugs to terrorise the country’s Rohingya Muslim minority.
On May 2 in Brussels, the European Union headquarters, Suu Kyi, flatly rejected a fact-finding investigation mission proposed on March 24 at the annual meeting of the 47-member UN Human Rights Council (UNHRC) in Geneva.
British ruling elite celebrates falling life expectancy as boon for pension fund deficits - World Socialist Web Site
▻http://www.wsws.org/en/articles/2017/05/13/life-m13.html
Donc, au Royaume-uni, on se réjouit de la baisse de l’espérance de vie parce que ça va rudement bien aider à la réduction du déficit des caisses de retraites (et des fonds de pensions ?)
#brrr... Quel monde.
British ruling elite celebrates falling life expectancy as boon for pension fund deficits
By Jean Shaoul
13 May 2017
A recent article in the Financial Times, noting that life expectancy had begun to fall, particularly among the elderly, was remarkable for its utter indifference to the possible causes and the adverse implications of what is an unprecedented phenomenon in peacetime, in the absence of epidemics or particularly harsh winters.
It is quite extraordinary. For decades after World War II, it was taken as an article of faith that better health care and improved living conditions would mean a continuing fall in mortality. Now people are dying younger and all the newspaper of the financial elite can do is note the likely benefits to the corporations: a reduction in the pensions deficit!
Risk: Laura Poitras’ confused, superficial documentary about Julian Assange and WikiLeaks - World Socialist Web Site
▻http://www.wsws.org/en/articles/2017/05/11/risk-m11.html
Risk: Laura Poitras’ confused, superficial documentary about Julian Assange and WikiLeaks
By David Walsh and Joanne Laurier
11 May 2017
Laura Poitras’ new documentary, Risk, about WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange, opened in the US May 5. Shot over six years, beginning in 2011, the film treats events during the period in which Assange was under house arrest (December 2010-June 2012) in England and, subsequently, forced to take refuge in the Ecuadorian embassy in London (June 2012 to the present).
Sri Lankan prime minister strengthens ties with US allies - World Socialist Web Site
▻http://www.wsws.org/en/articles/2017/05/11/wick-m11.html
Sri Lankan prime minister strengthens ties with US allies
By Vijith Samarasinghe
11 May 2017
Sri Lankan Prime Minister Ranil Wickremesinghe made official visits last month to Japan, Vietnam and India. In each country, Wickremesinghe pledged deeper economic ties and military cooperation on the pretext of ensuring the “security of the Indian Ocean region.”
India, Japan and Vietnam all have strategic ties with the US as part of its war preparations against China. The trips took place amid concerns in New Delhi, Tokyo and Washington about Sri Lanka’s economic dependence on China.
US children’s suicide-related hospital admissions double in last decade - World Socialist Web Site
▻http://www.wsws.org/en/articles/2017/05/11/suic-m11.html
US children’s suicide-related hospital admissions double in last decade
By George Gallanis
11 May 2017
New research indicates a devastating development amongst the most vulnerable section of society. The number of children and teens ages 5 to 17 hospitalized for suicidal thoughts or self-harm in the United States has doubled since 2008.
The finding are based on a study abstract titled, “Trends in Suicidality and Serious Self-Harm for Children 5-17 Years at 32 U.S. Children’s Hospitals, 2008-2015” prepared for presentation at the 2017 Pediatric Academic Societies Meeting in San Francisco May 7.
#états-unis #santé #enfants #suicide #enfance
Three years after the lead poisoning of Flint, residents face water shutoffs, home foreclosures - World Socialist Web Site
▻http://www.wsws.org/en/articles/2017/05/10/pers-m10.html
Three years after the lead poisoning of Flint, residents face water shutoffs, home foreclosures
10 May 2017
More than three years after the decision to switch the water supply of Flint, Michigan to the polluted Flint River, virtually nothing has been done to address the catastrophic health consequences of the lead poisoning of tens of thousands of working-class residents. Instead, city officials have resumed water shutoffs and are threatening to foreclose on the homes of workers who fail to pay for water tainted by lead and other toxins.
Hundreds of migrants drown in Mediterranean - World Socialist Web Site
▻http://www.wsws.org/en/articles/2017/05/09/medi-m09.html
Hundreds of migrants drown in Mediterranean
By Bill Van Auken
9 May 2017
More than 200 migrants are believed to have died trying to cross the Mediterranean last weekend, according to the UNHCR, the United Nations refugee organization. They are feared to have drowned when the rubber boats into which they were packed by smugglers deflated and sank.
A group of seven survivors picked up by the Libyan coastguard reported that they were the only ones left from a boat crowded with 170 people. Another 60 are believed to have drowned after a second boat carrying at least 120 migrants sunk on Saturday.
US corporate profits up 13.9 percent on cost-cutting and low wages - World Socialist Web Site
▻http://www.wsws.org/en/articles/2017/05/09/econ-m09.html
US corporate profits up 13.9 percent on cost-cutting and low wages
By Barry Grey
9 May 2017
Former Obama administration officials joined the Trump administration and the media in hailing the April employment figures released Friday as proof that the US economy has reached “full employment” and essentially completed its “recovery” from the Great Recession.
According to the Bureau of Labor Statistics, the US economy added 211,000 private-sector non-farm jobs in April and the official jobless rate dropped to 4.4 percent, the lowest level in more than a decade.
#états-unis #richesse #pauvreté #spéculation #pouvoir #argent
Hunger affecting millions of children in UK - World Socialist Web Site
▻http://www.wsws.org/en/articles/2017/05/09/maln-m09.html
Hunger affecting millions of children in UK
By Joe Mount
9 May 2017
Hunger affects an increasing number of children in Britain. Up to three million children in Britain are threatened with malnutrition outside term time, when they are not provided with school meals, according to new research.
A third of these children qualify for free meals provided by schools during term time and often go hungry during school holidays. Two million are from working households that earn poverty wages, but do not qualify for free school meals.
8,000 Flint residents face foreclosure for failing to pay for poisoned water - World Socialist Web Site
▻http://www.wsws.org/en/articles/2017/05/05/flin-m05.html
8,000 Flint residents face foreclosure for failing to pay for poisoned water
By Jerry White
5 May 2017
More than 8,000 residents in Flint have received letters from the city threatening them with home foreclosures if they do not pay outstanding bills for water, which is still tainted with lead and other toxins. Seeking to squeeze $5.8 million out of city residents, the letters said outstanding bills would have to be paid by May 19 or property tax liens would be issued that could result in residents losing their homes by March 2018.
The action is the latest offense against the largely working-class population in the former manufacturing center for General Motors, 60 miles north of Detroit. Residents in the city of 100,000 have fought a three-year battle against the lead poisoning of their water and the official cover-up of this criminal act by local, state and federal authorities.
The human cost of the US-Mexico border: More than 6,000 bodies found since 2000 - World Socialist Web Site
▻http://www.wsws.org/en/articles/2017/05/05/pers-m05.html
The human cost of the US-Mexico border: More than 6,000 bodies found since 2000
5 May 2017
Between 2000 and 2016, the US Customs and Border Patrol (CBP) has discovered the remains of 6,023 undocumented people who died crossing from Mexico into the United States.
This shocking figure, cited in a May 4 article in the New York Times, underreports the total death toll. According to one Texas sheriff, “I would say for every one [body] we find, we’re probably missing five.” That is, the number of undiscovered bodies could be in the tens of thousands.
Bodies turn up along the US-Mexico border “with stunning regularity,” the Times report notes. In one border area, Brooks County, Texas, 550 bodies have been discovered since January 2009, the month of Barack Obama’s inauguration. At a single ranch in Texas, 31 bodies have been discovered since 2014. CBP unceremoniously throws some of the bodies together in “cluster graves,” often without removing them from biohazard bags.
#frontières #murs #mexique #états-unis #mourir_aux_frontières
French warship joins US-UK-Japanese fleet threatening North Korea - World Socialist Web Site
▻http://www.wsws.org/en/articles/2017/05/04/frko-m04.html
Vous étiez au courant ?
Amid the US military escalation and growing nuclear war tensions in the Korean peninsula, the French Socialist Party (PS) government has sent a Mistral-class warship to join exercises led by the US military alongside the Japanese Navy. The Mistrals are amphibious assault helicopter carriers that participated in the Libyan War in 2011.
On Saturday, the ship reached the Sasebo naval base in Japan’s western island of Kyushu to join with US armada threatening North Korea and China. It will participate in joint military exercise from the second to the third week of this month, alongside the US, Japanese and British navies near islands including Guam and Tinian in the western Pacific, around 2.400 km from Japan.
Why Emmanuel Macron is no lesser evil compared to Marine Le Pen - World Socialist Web Site
▻http://www.wsws.org/en/articles/2017/05/04/fran-m04.html
C’est possible mais dans ce cas, il ne nous reste plus qu’à se flinguer, non ?
Why Emmanuel Macron is no lesser evil compared to Marine Le Pen
By Johannes Stern
4 May 2017
These remarks were delivered by Johannes Stern, a leading member of the Sozial istische Gleichheitspartei , the German section of the ICFI, at the first public meeting of the Parti de l ’ égalité socialiste on May Day in Paris.
As today’s international speaker I first of all want to extend the warmest international greetings to you from the Sozialistische Gleichheitspartei (SGP), the German section of the International Committee of the Fourth International (ICFI) and from the entire IC. I am proud to participate and speak at this first public meeting of the Parti de l’égalité socialiste (PES) in Paris, at such a critical political juncture.
The PES is clearly the only party intervening in the elections with a revolutionary perspective for the working class. As comrade Alex Lantier has explained, our call for an active boycott is made, not from the standpoint of parliamentary calculations, but from the dynamic of the class struggle.
