A Different TIME, a Different TONE

A Time and Tone that Recognized World Nations and Cultures, Understood and Embraced Multilateralism, Respectfully Engaged all Peoples of the world 

One world leader and 

head of state 

comes to mind:

Dr. Angela Merkel.

“… We want to collaborate in peace and friendship with all the other countries of the world.”

“In all our interests, we will gear our policy to human rights, to more prosperity, and to advancement—FOR US ALL” (emphasis in caps added) said the former Federal Chancellor of Germany Angela Merkel addressing ambassadors from every corner of the world.

TO Eurasia 
(approx. 36 percent of the Earth’s land area)—situated in the Northern and Eastern Hemispheres and comprising (a) the two most populous countries in the world (China and India); and (b) several of the world’s largest economies (e.g., China, Japan, Germany, Russia, and India): 

“We traditionally enjoy close relations with our neighbours—an obvious example is Ukraine” and, of course, “Russia …also stands out most prominently. … I can tell you that collaboration with Russia, on the part of the EU, as well as Germany in particular” — “will remain a major priority.” 

TO East Asia
Looking toward an approaching trip to the People’s Republic of China, she said,

“We will discuss German-Chinese cooperation.” With India “We have also launched intergovernmental consultations …. As you can see, we keep putting one foot in front of the other.…” 

TO Western Asia: 

“(We are) … saddened … that little to no progress seems possible—or at least has been possible—on the Middle East conflict. Germany will be continuing to campaign for a two-state solution with Israel as a Jewish state and another state for the Palestinians. We will keep working hard on that.” 

“… [T]here are sure to be complicated processes ahead. … No matter which country you should care to name, we will do our bit to advance its development.

“It is our hope that human rights will be respected…, and we are right behind the Arab League in everything it is doing in that regard.”

TO South Asia
(Afghanistan): Addressing the “Government of Afghanistan,” she said,

“It is our intention to complete the transfer of responsibility for security in the near future. We stand by that plan. … I believe that Afghanistan (desires) to stand on its own two feet. We will also support the reconciliation process wherever we can.”

TO Africa: 

“We are glad to see that there have been various favourable developments in Africa, our neighbouring continent.… The partnership between the EU and the African Union is very important to us. I can promise the AU that we will carry on at its side this coming year. … People in Europe often think that it is only here that there’s always an election on – but it is just the same in Africa.”

January 26, 2012, in Berlin, a Speech by Federal Chancellor Angela Merkel at the New Year reception for the Diplomatic Corps https://www.bundeskanzler.de/bk-en/speech-by-federal-chancellor-angela-merkel-at-the-new-year-reception-for-the-diplomatic-corps-807494

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[Text Excerpted] 

Prolific Southern-Born American Writer Dr. Carolyn LaDelle Bennett focuses on People, Press, Politics USA; Domestic and Foreign Affairs (no copyright claimed in direct quotes and individual image)

Latest book: Are There No Champions? Yes and No

Links: https://www.facebook.com/carolynladelle.bennett

https://insightbeyondtodaysnews.blogspot.com/

(live limited) https://www.bennettsareherenochampions.com/

https://www.xlibris.com/en/bookstore/bookdetails/859250-are-there-no-champions-yes-and-no

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Email: Nolandanisland@hotmail.com or Authorswork@gmail.com

TRAGIC IRONY Consumers Passion for Preborn(s) while Poisoning the World’s Children

DIRER Days on Horizon

Astonishing Findings in 2020s UNICEF reports

If everybody in the world consumed resources at the rate at which people in OECD and EU countries consumed — “the equivalent of 3.3 earths would be needed to keep up with consumption levels.”

If everyone in the world “consumed resources at the rate at which people the three countries (“Canada, Luxembourg and the United States of America”) consumed — “…at least five earths would be needed.”

The OECD

The history of the OECD extends to 1948 when its name was “Organization for European Economic Cooperation” or OEEC. The name was changed in 1961 to “Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development” or OECD.

Strikingly, after almost 80 years of existence, the OECD (or principal states thereof), while including some Member States of the Global South (Chile and Colombia)—has excluded the entire Continent of Africa and major Persian and Arab countries, the Subcontinent, and major Eastern European, Eurasian, and Far Eastern Asian countries.

World's Key Populations

ASIA East Asia 1.62 billion West Asia: 296.39 million	AFRICA: 1.48 billion
INDIA 1.42 billion	CHINA 1.41 billion
EURASIA: 1.12 billion / Eastern Europe 281.00 million (Russia 143.56 million)	EUROPE (Western Europe):  201.08 million Northern Europe: 107.71 million
AMERICAS North America:  613.15 million (USA 333.29 million; Central America: 52.7 million ) South America:  442,860,822 million

Founding Member States of the Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) are listed as Austria, Belgium, Canada, Denmark, France, (West) Germany, Greece, Iceland, Ireland, Italy, Luxembourg, the Netherlands, Norway, Portugal, Spain, Sweden, Switzerland, Turkey, the United Kingdom, and the United States of America. 

Current OECD Member States (alphabetically)

Commonwealth of Australia	Czech Republic (aka Czechia)	Dominion of Canada	Dominion of New Zealand	Federal Republic of Germany
French Republic	Grand Duchy of Luxembourg	Hellenic Republic (Greece)	Italian Republic	Kingdom of Belgium
Kingdom of Denmark	Kingdom of Norway	Kingdom of Spain	Kingdom of Sweden	Magyar Koztarsasag (Republic of Hungary)
Portuguese Republic	Republic of Austria	Republic of Chile	Republic of Colombia	Republic of Costa Rica
Republic of Estonia	Republic of Finland	Republic of Iceland	Republic of Ireland	Republic of Korea
Republic of Latvia	Republic of Lithuania	Republic of Poland	Republic of Slovenia	Republic of Türkiye
Slovak Republic	State of Japan	Swiss Confederation	The Netherlands (Holland)	United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland
United Mexican States	United States of America

(General references and the organization’s official website
https://www.oecd.org/en/about/members-partners.html)

The OECD-ers' Gifts to the world

• The greatest “exposure to harmful pollutants (toxic air, pesticides, damp and lead)”

• The biggest “contributions to the climate crisis, consumption of resources, and e-waste dumping

“Not only are the majority of rich countries failing to provide healthy environments for children within their borders,” the 2022 UNICEF finds, these countries “are also contributing to the destruction of children’s environments in other parts of the world.” (Gunilla Olsson, Director of UNICEF Office of Research – Innocenti).

The American Mentality Incorporated is filled with Ironies. Yet Americans seem never to blink or sense either the meaning or the implications of their contradictions.

People in contemporary USA—at least judging by the raging content and characters pervading traditional and modern media —are obsessed with wedge and other distractions including what they term “pre-born(s)” and “may-be-about-to-be born(s)” Yet they are unconcerned about relentless super-powered violence, human trafficking, child labor, and human slavery, and all manner of assault on clearly-living, viable  women and children.

The Children are Caught in the crossfire of Man’s Impunity, a Criminal and Morally Reprehensible Onslaught.

In addition to being made to suffer the terror of super-powered weaponry, unmanned drones, brutes and assassins—young people caught in conflict are also suffering “deadly diseases.” They are suffering diseases, says UNICEF Executive Director Catherine Russell, “that should no longer exist.”

Many countries are experiencing “the collapse of healthcare systems, destruction of water and sanitation infrastructure, and the displacement of families, triggering a resurgence of diseases like polio.”

Twenty-one countries are currently battling polio; fifteen of these countries are fragile or caught in conflict. Among the affected countries are “Afghanistan, the Democratic Republic of Congo, Somalia, South Sudan, and Yemen.” And for the first time in twenty-five years, polio has returned to the Gaza Strip.

UNICEF's View from the Ground and Sage Advice

“The world stands at a pivotal juncture.”

In this moment of “global crisis and rising uncertainty”—poor conditions in nature and populations, unwinding democratic expansion, and an unsteady multilateralism— children of the world are experiencing neglect and great suffering, portending an even direr future.

“Mounting waste, harmful pollutants and exhausted natural resources are taking a toll on our children’s physical and mental health and threatening our planet’s sustainability.”  

The current state of affairs “threatens to overshadow two decades of historic progress that had shaped the lives of children for the better. The advancement of poorer countries is being reversed. Living standards raised are now lowered or stilled.

We can continue on a backward path of plunder, division, denial and desert, leaving individual countries to grapple with inadequacies in essential infrastructures and resources, vast environmental changes, and a variety of sectarian, regional, international and domestic conflicts. 

Or “we can choose a path marked by increased global collaboration—a path that embraces innovation, knowledge sharing, policy transfer, and equitable growth.”

“We owe it to ourselves and to future generations to create better places and spaces for children to thrive.”  Therefore, “we must pursue policies and practices that safeguard the natural environment upon which children and young people (most of all) depend.” (Research Director Gunilla Olsson) 

Peoples of the world “… must recognize our shared destiny.”

Rekindle the cooperative spirit that once was, in an earlier era when leading figures seemed to place the “interests” and the “voices” of children and developing youth “at the centre of decisions” about the world’s “common future.” UNICEF Report “Prospects for Children in 2024: Cooperation in a Fragmented World: A Global Outlook” https://www.unicef.org/innocenti/reports/prospects-children-2024-global-outlook

UNICEF Reports Referenced

• “Prospects for Children in 2021–2025: A Global Outlook: At a time of global crisis and rising uncertainty, does the vision of the SDGs remain a possibility?” https://www.unicef.org/innocenti/reports/prospects-children-2021-2025-global-outlook

• United Nations News May 24, 2022, “World’s richest countries damaging child health worldwide: UNICEF” “Over-consumption in the world’s richest countries is creating unhealthy, dangerous, and toxic conditions for children globally, according to a new report published on Tuesday by the UN Children’s Fund (UNICEF).” (Gunilla Olsson, Director of UNICEF Office of Research) https://news.un.org/en/story/2022/05/1118902

• UNICEF Press release May 23, 2022 “Over-consumption in the world’s richest countries is destroying children’s environments globally, new report says”; “The world’s richest countries – including Finland, Iceland, the Netherlands and Norway – are providing healthier environments for children within their borders, yet are disproportionately contributing to the destruction of the global environment”

• “Prospects for Children in the Polycrisis: A 2023 Global Outlook: As the world is forced to confront the interconnectivity of risks, trends and events, will we finally prioritize holistic solutions to improve prospects for children?” https://www.unicef.org/innocenti/reports/prospects-children-polycrisis-2023-global-outlook

• “Prospects for Children in 2024: Cooperation in a Fragmented World: A Global Outlook” https://www.unicef.org/innocenti/reports/prospects-children-2024-global-outlook

• UN NEWS October 23, 2024, Health “UNICEF: 85 per cent of children affected by polio in 2023 lived in fragile, conflict-affected areas… Countries facing conflict, natural disasters and humanitarian crises are struggling to provide routine childhood immunizations leaving many children vulnerable to the resurgence of polio, the UN Children’s Fund (UNICEF) warned in new report.” https://news.un.org/en/story/2024/10/1156041

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PROLIFIC SOUTHERN-BORN AMERICAN WRITER DR. CAROLYN LADELLE BENNETT focuses on People, Press, Politics USA; Domestic and Foreign Affairs (no copyright claimed in direct quotes and individual image)

Latest book: Are There No Champions? Yes and No

Links: https://www.facebook.com/carolynladelle.bennett

https://insightbeyondtodaysnews.blogspot.com/

(live limited) https://www.bennettsareherenochampions.com/

https://www.xlibris.com/en/bookstore/bookdetails/859250-are-there-no-champions-yes-and-no

https://www.xlibris.com

Email: Nolandanisland@hotmail.com or Authorswork@gmail.com

Unspeakable Acts must be detected and corrected; without delay, fear or favor, Wrongdoers Held Accountable

Make no mistake about it, barbarism and the acquiescence to barbarism is never forgotten by moral men and women and by the victims and communities on whom barbarous behavior is inflicted.

No magnanimous jury or payoffs, no hearts and flowers, no thoughts and prayers can erase men’s (or women’s) unspeakable acts, their demonstrable contempt for life, and their willful denial—not only of justice, but of humanity itself.

Torture— what does it mean?

Torture is “any act by which severe pain or suffering, whether physical or mental, is intentionally inflicted on a person for such purposes as obtaining from him or a third person information or a confession, punishing him for an act he or a third person has committed or is suspected of having committed, or intimidating or coercing him or a third person, or for any reason based on discrimination of any kind, when such pain or suffering is inflicted by or at the instigation of or with the consent or acquiescence of a public official or other person acting in an official capacity … (excerpted from Part I Article 1). December 10, 1984, by the United Nations General Assembly resolution 39/46 Source Human Rights Instruments CORE INSTRUMENT United Nations Human Rights Office of the High Commissioner https://www.ohchr.org/en/instruments-mechanisms/instruments/convention-against-torture-and-other-cruel-inhuman-or-degrading

“Other Cruel, Inhuman or Degrading Treatment or Punishment” adopted, entry into force June 26, 1987, in accordance with article 27 (1) The States Parties to this Convention… 

“Considering that, in accordance with the principles proclaimed in the Charter of the United Nations, recognition of the equal and inalienable rights of all members of the human family is the foundation of freedom, justice and peace in the world.... 

“Desiring to make more effective the struggle against torture and other cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment or punishment throughout the world… 

“Have agreed as follows (excerpt):

“Each State Party shall ensure that all acts of torture are offences under its criminal law. The same shall apply to an attempt to commit torture and to an act by any person which constitutes complicity or participation in torture.

“Each State Party shall make these offences punishable by appropriate penalties which take into account their grave nature” (Article 4)

“Each State Party shall ensure that any individual who alleges he has been subjected to torture in any territory under its jurisdiction has the right to complain to, and to have his case promptly and impartially examined by, its competent authorities.

“Steps shall be taken to ensure that the complainant and witnesses are protected against all ill-treatment or intimidation as a consequence of his complaint or any evidence given.” (Article 13) https://www.ohchr.org/en/instruments-mechanisms/instruments/convention-against-torture-and-other-cruel-inhuman-or-degrading; https://www.ohchr.org/en/ohchr_homepage

Seventeen years later

How then does this happen?

An Iraqi Testimony 

“The Americans came to destroy us….” “Hundreds of thousands of Iraqis” have gone through US prisons…” and suffered unspeakable acts.

Redress denied Upfront

People whom they abducted, imprisoned and tortured, the Americans also “stripped of their rights” and in perpetuity (after release, if released) prohibited the abducted, imprisoned and tortured from fighting for their rights. On the testimony or a prisoner “US authorities made him sign a paper barring him from filing any complaints or making public statements about the inner workings of the jail he was in.”

(The man reported also that of his two brothers who had been arrested and ended up in Camp Bucca … one of them died, and another was left crippled.”)

Camp Bucca was a facility in Southern Iraq constructed in 2003 and operated through the decade by US military branches and America’s highly paid partnering killers for hire (soldiers of fortune). For many years, it was the site of well-documented chronic abuse of prisoners. When the 1950s-1970s-through 2010s notorious prison, Abu Ghraib—operated, interchangeably, by US-favored-then-disfavored strongman Saddam Hussein and US military / CIA—hit world headlines for operators’ unspeakable treatment of prisoners, the Americans switched some of their prisoners from Abu Gbraib in western Iraq to the newly renamed “Ronald Bucca” (instead of Camp Bucca) prison in southern Iraq. And kept up their usually crimes against human beings.

Unspeakable Crimes

Reported 

The Americans accused people they had abducted of being a “terrorist” when, the man said…: Before the Americans arrived “We did not even know what terror was.”

The Americans arbitrarily manufactured charges, accusations against “thousands of people” that were totally divorced from reality: “had nothing to do with, reality.”

Personnel, captors or keepers of the prison committed unspeakable acts (no actual investigation but rabid mistreatment). The former reported.

• “Prison guards set police dogs on him.
• “Forced him to ‘talk’ to them while placing his head against their muzzles (open end of firearms, or discharging weapons)
• “Poured water on him
• “Beat him with sticks (some assaults causing broken ribs)”

Contempt for and abuse of Cultural traditions, Breach of Relations

Reported
Prison personnel and their partners “tortured inmates and brainwashed them by talking about religious ‘factions.’ …” It was the “first step towards organizing religious schools in the prison.” Before the Americans came, Sunni and Shi Muslims in Iraq had good relations and had lived in peace.

In their rigid segregation and mind-managing of prisoners at Camp Bucca, the Americans manufactured enemies where there were none.

Former Abu Ghraib prisoner Duraid Nael spoke with RT World News “US prisons were ‘recruiting points’ for terrorists – ex-Abu Ghraib inmate to RT: The US promised democracy to Iraq but instead destroyed it through mass killings and religious strife, Nael Kamel has said”
April 23, 2023, https://www.rt.com/news/575280-us-prisons-iraq-recruiting-terrorists/

2004 - 2024 Injury Compounded

Americans’ unspeakable acts at Abu Ghraib that came to light in 2004 were well documented and “came to epitomize human rights violations by the US military and CIA” following the highly publicized aerial and incendiary weapons incidents that occurred in the Northern Virginia and New York City areas of the United States on September 11, 2001.

“Media reports (in 2004) showed graphic images of torture and humiliation of detainees, often held without any legal basis.”

In June 2004, in a Washington, DC area United States federal court on the matter of multinational contractor CACI’s “alleged involvement in the Abu Ghraib torture and prisoner abuse, … 256 Iraqis sued CACI International”— aka California Analysis Center Inc aka Consolidated Analysis Center Inc, an American multinational professional services and information technology company headquartered in Northern Virginia” and engaged in servicing (being contracted by) “many branches of the US Federal Government including defense, homeland security, intelligence, and healthcare”—and Titan Corporation (now L-3 Services, part of L-3 Communications) (gen ref).

Twenty years later

As thousands of US abductees and prisoners having suffered torture and still suffer consequences of torture (some having been killed) without redress—a jury in Northern Virginia (Washington, DC area) finds “a US defense contractor (CACI) liable for its role in the torture of three Iraqi civilians at Abu Ghraib prison.”

• Middle school principal Suhail Al Shimari
• Fruit vendor Asaad Zubae
• Journalist Salah Al-Ejaili

The magnanimous US court following a callous US pattern found “CACI Premier Technology Inc—whose estimated revenue is $4.35 billion (and rising) — “liable’” in the amount of “$42 million for having conspired to torture, and having committed cruel, inhuman, and degrading treatment” against three of Iraq’s people. RT World News November 14, 2024 “US military contractor fined millions over torture: CACI Premier Technology is responsible for the inhumane treatment of three men held at the notorious Abu Ghraib prison in Iraq, a jury has found.” https://www.rt.com/news/607628-us-contractor-liable-torture-iraq/

Life is further cheapened.

Blatant denial of justice is celebrated.

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PROLIFIC SOUTHERN-BORN AMERICAN WRITER DR. CAROLYN LADELLE BENNETT focuses on People, Press, Politics USA; Domestic and Foreign Affairs (no copyright claimed in direct quotes and individual image)

Latest book: Are There No Champions? Yes and No

Links: https://www.facebook.com/carolynladelle.bennett

https://insightbeyondtodaysnews.blogspot.com/

(live limited) https://www.bennettsareherenochampions.com/

https://www.xlibris.com/en/bookstore/bookdetails/859250-are-there-no-champions-yes-and-no

https://www.xlibris.com

Email: Nolandanisland@hotmail.com or Authorswork@gmail.com

WE MOURN THE BREACH of Promised Nonviolence, Diplomacy, Neighborliness, Peace.

Before the wholesale return and magnification, the celebration and multiplication of armchair commanders, mercenaries, rabid war profiteers, blood-sport bettors, and barbarians—we called this eleventh day of the eleventh month (beginning in 1921)—not another consumers’ holiday, but a day of solemn remembrance: “ARMISTICE Day.”

MOURNING

• More than forty thousand people SLAUGHTERED
• More than one hundred thousand WOUNDED
• More than two million DISPLACED under brutal blockades.

Human beings are suffering starvation and loss of healthcare and medicines; hygiene deficits; and the rise and spread of what would be curable diseases (Palestine, West Asia).

REMEMBERING

Sad forgetfulness or Flagrant Disavowal of Moral and Human Principles: The avowed “Faith (of) … Representatives of Governments of the United Nations …, signatories to the Charter of the United Nations at San Francisco, California, on June 26, 1945

Chapter II: “Membership”

“Membership in the United Nations is open to all other peace-loving states which accept the obligations contained in the present Charter and, in the judgment of the Organization, are able and willing to carry out these obligations” (Excerpt from Article 4)

“A Member of the United Nations which has persistently violated the Principles contained in the present Charter may be expelled from the Organization by the General Assembly upon the recommendation of the Security Council” (Article 6)

Chapter I: “Purposes and Principles”

“All Members shall refrain in their international relations from the threat or use of force against the territorial integrity or political independence of any state, or in any other manner inconsistent with the Purposes of the United Nations” (Excerpt from Article 2).

Bold Declaration of United Nations

“WE THE PEOPLES OF THE UNITED NATIONS … HAVE RESOLVED TO COMBINE OUR EFFORTS TO ACCOMPLISH THESE AIMS… (and so) DETERMINED …

• to save succeeding generations from the scourge of war, which twice in our lifetime has brought untold sorrow to mankind, and

• to reaffirm faith in fundamental human rights, in the dignity and worth of the human person, in the equal rights of men and women and of nations large and small, and

• to establish conditions under which justice and respect for the obligations arising from treaties and other sources of international law can be maintained, and

• to promote social progress and better standards of life in larger freedom

AND TOWARD THESE ENDS

• to practice tolerance and live together in peace with one another as good neighbors, and

• to unite our strength to maintain international peace and security, and

• to ensure, by the acceptance of principles and the institution of methods, that armed force shall not be used, save in the common interest, and

• to employ international machinery for the promotion of the economic and social advancement of all peoples…. https://www.un.org/en/about-us/un-charter/full-text

Some of today's holders of inordinate power may carelessly forget. 

Multitudes cannot and will NEVER forget

Armistice 

An Afterthought, in My Mind’s Eye …

ARMISTICE means we lay down our arms (chemical, biological, nuclear and nonnuclear, manned and non-manned) 

Henceforth we no longer present ourselves as bullies or enemies. Nor do we cavalierly or conveniently cast (scandalize or propagandize) others as our enemies. 

Armistice means we stand on the principle and practice of peace. In our actions henceforth we are men and women (a nation) of discussants, communicators in words, reasoned argument, civil debate, and nonviolence in domestic and international affairs. 

We commit to abolishing “our” foundations, structures, infrastructures, deployments, occupations and operations whose aims and intended or unintended consequences—well-documented in highly credible sources and history books—including: 

• The breach of sovereignties, systems, quests for self-determination 
• The interference with (including assassinations of) other nations, their leaders and ways of being 
• The upending of foreign governments and the destruction of economies (including the US economy and the neglect of America’s people)
• The creation of “terror” cells
• The arming and division (routinely by militarist force) of cultures, peoples, regions, and relations 

ARMISTICE means no longer abusive or capricious use of language but deliberately clear, clean, correct, caring and considerate use of language. 

ARMISTICE means a change of heart. We become a changed people—morally and psychologically. We no longer define strength in anachronistic terms: mercenary, belligerent, barbarous terms.

ARMISTICE means we lay down our arms. 

ARMISTICE means NO MORE VIOLENCE.

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Prolific Southern-Born American Writer Dr. Carolyn LaDelle Bennett focuses on People, Press, Politics USA; Domestic and Foreign Affairs (no copyright claimed in direct quotes and individual image)

Latest book: Are There No Champions? Yes and No

Links: https://www.facebook.com/carolynladelle.bennett

https://insightbeyondtodaysnews.blogspot.com/

(live limited) https://www.bennettsareherenochampions.com/

https://www.xlibris.com/en/bookstore/bookdetails/859250-are-there-no-champions-yes-and-no

https://www.xlibris.com

Email: Nolandanisland@hotmail.com or Authorswork@gmail.com

A Nation and People Caught in Torrent of Loss and Costs

Rabid Wastefulness of Life and Treasure, Entrenched Power Turned against America

US Officials and Partners Reject 

America’s People

Duty of Governance

Loss: Shutout, Shutdown

SUMITOMO closes shop, dumps Americans
Why would those Over There care if those OVER HERE do not care

Evidence of Intertwined Public-Private Sector Betrayal

Sumitomo Rubber USA, LLC, on November 7, 2024, announces immediate shutdown and cease of all production at its “Tonawanda, New York-based facility (manufacturing automotive tires for passenger cars, trucks, buses and motorcycles). However, the announcement said, the conglomerate would by use “a larger percentage” of subsidiary Sumitomo Rubber Industries Ltd’s “global production capacity” so as not to interrupt “service to existing customers.” Contact: media@sumitomorubber-usa.com; https://srusa-tonawanda-update.com/Media%20Release%20Landing%20Page%20Nov%202024%20Final%201.pdf]

The history of the Tonawanda plant extends to the early twentieth century, long before 2015 Sumitomo takeover.

TONAWANDA is situated in Western New York 5.8 miles from Amherst, NY, 7.5 miles from Buffalo, NY; 284.2 miles from Philadelphia, PA. Its population estimate around 15,000, among them some 1,200 foreign born residents; and more than 10 percent of Tonawanda’s total population (more than 90 percent secondary school graduates) living in poverty. https://www.city-data.com/city/Tonawanda-New-York.html

SUMITOMO CORPORATION is a Japanese Conglomerate (owned by Sumitomo Group, headquartered in Tokyo; subsidiaries: SCSK; TBC Corporation; constituent company: The Nikkei 225 or Nikkei Stock Average); estimated revenue and net income latest update $32.16 billion, $ 2.16 billion respectively. Sumitomo is described as a general trading industry its commodities metal, construction, transportation, infrastructure, chemicals, energy, mineral resources, food, other goods.

MULTINATIONALS
Now you see them - Now you don’t

DUNLOP or GOODRICH or GOODYEAR or SUMITOMO
Who Knows?

• 1985 Dunlop Rubber Company is acquired by British multinational industrial conglomerate company originally founded in 1924 as the British Goodrich Rubber Co. Ltd a subsidiary of US rubber specialist B.F. Goodrich Company (BTR headquartered in London, England, now nonexistent). Sumitomo, without acquiring Dunlop company, acquires rights to manufacture and market Dunlop branded road tyres. Dunlop Ltd then becomes a brand operated by different companies worldwide.

• 1997 Sumitomo completes agreement to use the Dunlop name in its corporate name, changes name of its UK subsidiary to “Dunlop Tyres Ltd”

• 1998 BTR sells … Dunlop Aviation and Dunlop Precision Rubber (among others) to Doughty Hanson & Co to form Dunlop Standard.

• 1999 Sumitomo Rubber Industries and Goodyear Tire and Rubber Company form joint venture (Sumitomo continuing to manufacture all Japanese-made tyres under the Dunlop name and Goodyear Tire and Rubber Company buying three quarters of Sumitomo’s European and North American tyre businesses. (Since 1999, the Dunlop brand has been part of Goodyear’s North American and European portfolio) Goodyear obtains Dunlop tire assets in Europe; US and Sumitomo Rubber Industries continue selling Dunlop tires in other countries

• 2004 Dunlop Standard is sold to London based Meggitt plc (or Ltd)

• 2006 India’s multinational Apollo Tyres Limited (tyre manufacturing company) acquires Dunlop Tyres International

• 2008 Goodyear Dunlop Tires North America Inc (Tonawanda plant) reduces production and cuts 150 jobs

• 2013 Sumitomo Rubber Industries acquire Dunlop Tyre trademark rights in Africa from Apollo Tyres; and Sumitomo Rubber Industries in 2014 changes its name to Sumitomo Rubber South Africa (Pty) Ltd.

• 2014 Goodyear accuses Sumitomo of “anticompetitive conduct in violation of applicable antitrust law”

• 2015 Sumitomo reclaims ownership of Tonawanda Dunlop plant

• 2024 Sumitomo Rubber in Tonawanda, New York eliminates “all 1,550 union and salaried jobs” and shuts down plant operations.

USA 

CONDITIONS, OUTLOOK

BLEAK

• Recession Probability by December 2025: 45 percent

DISCARDED: Poverty in the United States of America

• Thirty-eight million (more than 11 percent of) Americans live in poverty.

• Half a Million-plus People are Homeless, i.e., living temporary shelter or transitional housing or sleeping in places not meant for human habitation (under bridges or viaducts, along sidewalks, in doorways or abandoned buildings).

Homelessness numbers by State
At or Above 10,000 Homeless
(13 States)

California 171,521	New York 74,178	Florida 25,959	Washington 25,211
Texas 24,432	Oregon 17,959	Massachusetts 15,507	Arizona 13,553
Pennsylvania 12,691	Georgia 10,689	Ohio 10,654	Tennessee 10,567	Colorado 10,397

Homelessness Percentages

District of Columbia 65.8	California 43.7	Vermont 43.1	Oregon      42.3	Hawaii 41.4
New York 37.7	Washington 32.6	Maine 32.1	Alaska 31.7	Nevada 24.2

https://worldpopulationreview.com/state-rankings/homeless-population-by-state

2024 US elections PAID out or Wasted

Projections by OpenSecrets

Congressional Races $10,286,346,287

Presidential Race $5,514,721,998

Total Cost of Election $15,901,068, 285 BILLION

2024 Presidential Election Cycle
https://www.opensecrets.org/elections-overview/cost-of-election

Waste Fraud Abuse - US Monetary Costs of War (estimates) 2024

October 7, 2023-September 30, 2024
United States Spending on Israel’s Military Operations and
Related U.S. Operations in the West Asia Region

• Includes “approved security assistance funding since October 7, 2023, supplemental funding for regional operations, and an estimated additional cost of operations”

• Excludes “any other economic costs” https://watson.brown.edu/costsofwar/papers/2024/USspendingIsrael

$22.76 BILLION

And RISING

October 7, 2023 – October 7, 2024 U.S. spending on aid for Israeli military operations in Gaza and elsewhere exceeds $17.9 billion. Spending on related U.S. operations in the region exceeds $4.86 billion. https://watson.brown.edu/costsofwar/papers/2024/USspendingIsrael

 

United States War Spending September 11, 2001-September 11, 2022

$8 Trillion

Veteran Care over 30-year period going forward: $2.2 Trillion

https://watson.brown.edu/costsofwar/papers/summary

DEBT

Federal Debt as of September 30, 2024
$35.5 trillion
UP $2.3 trillion from FY 2023

FY 2024 Interest on the debt $1,126.5 billion
INCREASE from FY 2023: $251.0 billion

FY 2024 budget deficit $1.8 trillion

US Government Accountability Office Financial Audit: Bureau of the Fiscal Service’s FY 2024 and FY 2023 Schedules of Federal Debt GAO-25-107138 Published: November 7, 2024; Publicly Released: November 7, 2024. (NOTED: “GAO has previously recommended that Congress consider developing a plan to place the government on a sustainable fiscal path and that the plan should include considering alternative approaches to the debt limit.”) https://www.gao.gov/products/gao-25-107138

Accelerated Business and Industry Failures affecting Workers and Income

2024

2,000+ stores closing across United States of America

13 retail brands = 2,055 locations

UBS (formerly known as the Union Bank of Switzerland) UBS Group AG/UBS Group SA/UBS Group Inc analysts project over five-year period (- 2029) 

45000 US retail closures

Business Insider (Yahoo) by Dominick Reuter, Alex Bitter, October 24, 2024
https://www.pennlive.com/news/2024/10/more-than-2000-stores-are-closing-in-the-us-this-year-is-your-favorite-on-the-list.html

ABANDONMENT!

Betrayal of America

Never Ends

Shutdowns 
UK Independent, Graig Graziosi reporting June 10, 2024

“Store closures are rocking the US market. … Thousands of brick-and-mortar retail and dining storefronts are sitting empty in the wake of a tsunami of business closures across the US in recent months.

“Inflation has beaten down consumers, forcing Americans, whose salaries have largely not kept pace, to rethink how and when they shop. This has pushed some already-struggling retailers and restaurants to the brink, sparking a rash of bankruptcies and the closures of nearly 3,200 store locations in 2024.” https://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/americas/store-closures-us-inflation-chains-b2559894.html

Commercial and Employment Sectors
Two Exclusivist Political Parties
Nearly Half Century 1980/1993 Through 2024

• Sell Offs
• Off Shoring
• Sellouts
• Downsizing
• Discouraging transferrable skills development
• Promoting causal-slippery-nonpermanent-easily disposal American work and workers
• Fielding and support of mercenaries and incompetents, malleable (bought and sold) panderers (patriots for hire masquerading as public officials)

US deciders have shown, repeatedly, their general contempt for life—though in disingenuousness, they profess otherwise. Up and down the spectrum of public office and endeavor (federal to local, and with their “partners”), people in US public office and positions of influence have demonstrated a cavalier dismissal and disavowal of the sacred duty of governance—governance which means, at its most fundamental:

• To Provide for America’s common defense (not command, commit, enable or arm aggression on American streets or against world nations and peoples) and

• To Promote Americans’ general welfare.

• To Embrace fully and put into practice the promise and principles inherent in the oath, ethic, and work ethic of public office: to serve and protect the United States of America and its people

• To Work toward a more perfect union.

Long time coming Crisis of Legitimacy
From the late Twentieth Century to the Present day

In 1973, the United States of America is “mired in a series of … economic, political, military crises… eroding US domestic confidence in government and thwarting US geopolitical ambitions US powers and influencers response to which is to expand US hegemony “through

• Conventional and hybrid warfare, often outsourced to non-state actors
• Financialization of the economy and
• Weaponization of the dollar…”

The middle twentieth century saw “the industrial corporation displace the banking system as the prime economic symbol of success”; and “late twentieth-century saw the “growth of derivatives and a novel banking model ushering “a new period of finance capitalism.”

What the powers that be termed “‘solutions’”— Financialization of the U.S. economy PLUS movement of American capital abroad PLUS relentless de-industrialization in the United States—created even “more intractable problems” culminating in today’s “crisis of legitimacy” pervading the United States of America.

Financialization, Rentiers Rule
Government is Held Hostage

Finance is “‘liberated’ from any functional connection to the real economy, becoming a source of great wealth from speculation (and) the grand destabilizer of both the domestic and global economy.”

“Export of capital … isolates the rentiers”—those living on income from property or securities—from production and sets the seal of parasitism on the whole country that lives by exploiting the labor of several overseas countries.”

“Shareholder capitalism” is king, “deregulation and privatization its handmaidens.”

“… Large multinational companies and financial capital organized a takeover of political power, and labor and middle-class interests were pushed to the side-lines.”

“… Production of profit from the manipulation and global expansion of financial capital … (becomes) the biggest and most profitable sector of the economy; … (and holds) government hostage to its interests.

For the parasitic financier “crises are just an opportunity to increase their power and line their pockets. Hedge funds profit from geopolitical instability and stock market volatility. Political chaos, boom and bust cycles are their bread and butter because when investors are worried, they want to be hedged.”

Despite the appearance of wealth (fueled by money-printing and unsustainable debt) the United States of America, as a nation and a people, “is actually teetering on the edge.”

“Under the cover of ‘boom and bust’, rot and decay have set in.” The “parasitic rentier class has weakened its host….” “The global balance of power has already shifted.”

Loss of Legitimacy
Self-inflicted Crisis, Chaos, National Weakness

The Executive Branch of US government, from the early second-half of the twentieth century, “encouraged the outsourcing of non-inherently governmental functions” to private entities. And, as if deliberately shirking duty and proper governmental responsibilities, elected officials increased and accelerated outsourcing practices through the 1990s into the present day.

Powerful US and US-allied entities and individuals within and outside the United States of America succeed in “blurring the lines” between public and private sectors and interests. They move in and out of the official US government, operating “in the gray zone between Hard and Soft Power” — a calculated arrangement “no longer juxtaposed but conceptualized as a continuum integrated into a single framework” wherein nongovernmental entities are permitted to receive “tax-deductible donations from corporate-financier groups (often indirectly through the think-tanks they control”) and receive “state funding”— and empowered “to shape domestic and foreign policy.”

This surrender and disestablishment of standards, official duty and responsibility of Government and Governance of the United States not only have threatened the sovereignty of other nations of the world; but this manufactured, exclusivist, self-interested arrangement has destroyed the essential interior fabric and operations (work, labor, earning, human rights, multi-level physical, health, education, welfare, banking services, structures and infrastructures) together with the citizenry’s presumed “democratic” (of-by-for-the-people) Constitutional institution of Government of the United States of America.

America’s crisis of legitimacy, in 2024, far exceeds the economic, political, military crises of the previous century. “The impact will be acutely felt” by the nation and people of these United States.

Excerpted and adapted from Laura Ruggeri’s “Unleashing Chaos: The responses to the first crisis of U.S. hegemony unleashed forces that ultimately eroded its power.” November 4, 2024, https://strategic-culture.su/news/2024/11/04/unleashing-chaos/

Researcher and geopolitical analyst, former academic Laura RUGGERI investigates “colour revolutions and hybrid warfare.” Her work appears in at least four languages English, Chinese, Italian and Russian

Those who would pen their hopes or hitch their wagons 

to the prevailing, intermingled narcissists and swindlers spread throughout public and private sectors are partners in crime. Americans who would embrace or acquiesce to the current breed, the prevailing characters and manifestations, arrayed against the public good, become partners—whether intentionally or not—in America’s downfall: the aiding and abetting in the great loss and enormous costs being suffered by the United States of America and its people.

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Prolific Southern-Born American Writer Dr. Carolyn LaDelle Bennett focuses on People, Press, Politics USA; Domestic and Foreign Affairs (no copyright claimed in direct quotes and individual image)

Latest book: Are There No Champions? Yes and No

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