Sunday song

Canada: Thousands successfully confront Carney’s capitalists

By Yves Engler 

“Capitalism can’t be fixed, billionaires shouldn’t exist” was among the chants taken up by more than 2,000 protesters who marched on Marc Carney’s CEO Summit on September 14. The Carnival Against Capitalism was undoubtedly the largest anti-capitalist protest in Canada in many years.

In dozens of articles, radio bits and video clips the dominant media covered opposition to the largest gathering of capitalists in Canadian history. And some of the coverage was quite sympathetic. International outlets like Reuters and the New York Times even reported on the protests with the latter publication noting, “many demonstrators carried signs denouncing billionaires and corporate executives. The group included Indigenous people opposed to natural resource development on their lands. Some signs called for greater taxation on wealth, while others denounced Mr. Carney’s military build-up and called for an end to investments in fossil fuels, a sector being actively promoted at the summit.”

Carney’s announcement Tuesday that the government would be seeking to effectively privatize Canada’s four largest airports confirms protesters’ signs that the Prime Minister was hosting a “privatization summit.” In another announcement demonstrating the pro-billionaire nature of the meeting, Carney also announced Tuesday that he would slash corporate taxes. The new “Productivity Mega Deduction” will cut the marginal effective tax rate on new business investment from 13% to 6.4%.

At Nathan Phillips Square Monday evening thousands listened to Indigenous activists Kanahus Manuel and Kakeká ThunderSky as well as Council of Canadians organizer Nik Barry Shaw and Ontario Public Service Employees Union organizer Elizabeth Ha. Capitalism Can’t Be Fixed coordinator Jasmine Peardon spoke against a wealth concentrating, ecocidal, economic system Carney’s CEO summit seeks to turbocharge. Activists Bianca Mugyenyi and Sara Rasikh MCed the boisterous protest.

The Carnival Against Capitalism march included contingents from the Revolutionary Communist Party, Acorn, Unifor, Socialist Action, 350 and others. An indigenous contingent led the march that chanted “Land Back”. Placards called for “water bombers, not F-35 fighters”, “abolish billionaires” and “Fuck CEOs. Hang all billionaires.”

Near the Art Gallery of Ontario heavily armed cops were deployed on foot and horseback to protect the capitalist get together. Still, the large crowd was able to get near the front of the building, ensuring the politicians and CEOs inside could hear. Protesters surrounded large parts of the Art Gallery for nearly two hours.

Two women were arrested by the police and have been charged for misdemeanours.

The idea of organizing a carnival against capitalism to protest Carney’s CEO Summit was first raised at Capitalism Can’t Be Fixed’s conference in May. In July the group released a public letter signed by David Suzuki, Yann Martel, Roger Waters, Ellen Gabriel and 1,000 other authors, artists, academics and activists calling to “Confront Carney’s CEO Summit”. Since then, CCBF has organized multiple webinars, memes and videos about the capitalist get together and put up over 10,000 “Confront Carney’s CEO Summit” stickers and nearly 2,000 posters across the city. Toronto activists also handed out several thousand leaflets promoting the demonstration.

Despite various obstacles put in its way, CCBF brought significant elements of the left onto the streets. Additionally, the campaign pushed the NDP, Canadian Labour Congress and many other mainstream left groups to release statements critical of the CEO summit.

If we want to challenge Mark Carney’s ecocidal, wealth concentrating agenda we need to build up a fighting socialist movement. 

the funnies

 

Latest updates from a wobbly Earth

• In an earthquake vote on Capitol Hill, the House just ordered the withdrawal of all American troops from Iran. Seven Republicans broke party lines to join every Democrat, dealing a STUNNING blow to military leadership. Washington is officially in CRISIS over this war. Is this a long-overdue EXIT or a dangerous retreat that invites chaos? 
• Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov: ‘Gulf states and Iran agree to meet in one of the cities of Oman, but it was delayed — someone doesn’t want the region to normalize, wants to provoke conflicts and differences between countries.’

• Iran’s IRGC has shot down its 52nd American MQ-9 drone above Qeshm Island, southern Iran.  

• Portugal’s Foreign Minister Paulo Rangel stated that Jewish settlement expansion and economic pressure in the occupied West Bank and East Jerusalem were weakening prospects for establishing a viable Palestinian state. Rangel said Israel’s E1 settlement plan was "extremely pernicious" because it would split the occupied West Bank, separate East Jerusalem and undermine the possibility of a 'two-state solution.' He also described Israel’s withholding of Palestinian tax revenues as a "brutal strangulation" of the Palestinian Authority’s finances, saying the measures were preventing the Palestinian economy from operating. 

• Israeli reconnaissance drone activity surging across Lebanon, observed extensively over south Lebanon and Beirut's southern suburb. Israeli attacks on Lebanon have killed almost 9,000 people since the initial aggression began in October 2023.
• Palestinians mobilize to defend Majd al-Krum as Smotrich vows to expand Jewish settlements in occupied Galilee. Israeli Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich escalated tensions by declaring that the settlement "revolution" in the occupied West Bank would be extended to the Galilee and the Naqab (Negev), after his Religious Zionism party attacked what it called a "loss of control" in the Galilee over pro-Palestine chants during protests. Medical Aid for Palestinians says ‘no aid’ is entering the strip, causing severe shortages at the Al-Shifa Hospital that faced numerous Israeli raid and strikes throughout the genocide. 

• The Cradle: Israeli military Chief of Staff Eyal Zamir seeks 'legal action' against filmmakers behind NAZA documentary. The film “adopts narratives of Israel’s haters, defames our soldiers and commanders, and seeks to portray the IDF as deliberately acting unlawfully,” he said.  The film includes testimonies from Israeli soldiers describing the Gaza genocide as ‘insanely fun’. Israel’s Culture Minister Miki Zohar said he would work to revoke the citizenship of Oscar-winning filmmakers Yuval Abraham and Rachel Szor after their documentary NAZA won the Special Jury Prize at the Venice Film Festival. 

• So we are supposed to believe an American pilot flying bombing missions over Iran had his plane shot down and 'hit the ground at 70–100 mph, broke his back, arm, and shoulder, then somehow climbed a 7,000-foot ridgeline to evade capture?' [Expect the Hollywood movie next. This is the kind of story you put out when you are losing a war.]

• Columbia University paid hundreds of thousands of dollars to pro-Israel organizations during a period of intensified repression of pro-Palestine student activism, reports The Intercept. Financial filings show the university paid $100,000 to the Israel on Campus Coalition and $75,000 to the American Israel Education Foundation, AIPAC’s charitable arm, during 2024. The university also paid $450,000 to the United Jewish Appeal Federation of New York that year. Over the past decade, Columbia paid $250,000 to AIPAC’s charitable arm, while it paid $7,200 to the Anti-Defamation League in 2025 for what it described as “program services.” The payments coincided with Columbia suspending Jewish Voice for Peace and Students for Justice in Palestine, calling police to arrest pro-Palestine protesters, and dismantling solidarity encampments. 

• Nat'l Call for Safe Tech: Congress is fast-tracking two bills (HR 8255 and S.3639) to launch of hundreds of thousands of satellites. These bills would accelerate satellite deployments in already crowded orbits.  Applications for a million orbital data centers have already been submitted to the FCC. The FCC has NEVER assessed the health or environmental impacts of satellites, and the GAO has already found that this outdated approach needs to be reexamined.  These bills would further incentivize the FCC to continue to ignore otherwise legally required analysis and public involvement on environmental and human health impacts.

• Antiwar.com: US Africa Command announced that its forces launched another airstrike in Somalia as the Trump administration continues a record-breaking bombing campaign in the country, which receives virtually no coverage in US media. AFRICOM said they targeted al-Shabaab in the vicinity of Quumbi, a village about 50 miles northeast of the southern port city of Kismayo. As usual, AFRICOM offered no other details about the strike, and there were no statements from US-backed forces about military operations in the area that day.  According to AFRICOM’s numbers, the attack brings the total number of US airstrikes in Somalia this year to 81.

• Israeli 'defense' technology company Capture Systems Ltd. plans to establish its US headquarters in Sterling Heights, Michigan, with nearly $1 million in state incentives and an expected 125 new jobs. The Michigan Economic Development Corporation approved the incentives for the company’s US expansion. The new facility is expected to manufacture counter-drone platforms, optical surveillance equipment and mobile defense systems, while also testing advanced counter-drone technology and remotely operated weapons systems. The expansion comes as Michigan seeks to strengthen its role in drone and defense technology, with Camp Grayling in northern Michigan also designated by the US government as a testing site for drone research.
• Sovereignista: Economics Prof. Michael Hudson holds the idea that the ‘pesky middle countries’ must repudiate or default or suspend payments on IMF debt. He explains that incoming world depression from soaring oil prices will strain the balance of payments and they simply cannot afford to pay BOTH the higher oil prices and food import prices AND pay their dollarized debts.
• CBS has obtained new images of the damages to US facilities at Prince Sultan Air Base, Camp Arifjan & Camp Buehring due to Iranian missile attacks. 

• Space News: Air Force Secretary Troy Meink revealed that the US has deployed space-control weapons in orbit, while also disclosing new milestones for military satellite programs tied to missile defense and long-range targeting. Meink says Space Force will begin launching air-target tracking satellites this month and has reached flight-ready hardware on a Golden Dome interceptor effort. “This is why the Space Force now has on-orbit space control weapons capable of defending the joint force against hostile adversary action,” he said. “It is critically important that we maintain our dominance, not only in the air but in space,” he said. [Trump's Space Force knows that the Golden Dome costs in the trillions is problematic for the nation, already strapped with $40 trillion debt. So they are rushing some kind of 'space weapons deployment' in order to make it harder to stop the program.]

• The Yemeni Armed Forces show they shot down a Saudi F-15 fighter jet during their current offensive. 

• Pepe Escobar, The Global South Is Building a World Beyond US Control: Yemen’s advance and the shutdown of Saudi Arabia’s East–West pipeline have raised the stakes around the Red Sea and Hormuz. Meanwhile, BRICS has issued its strongest condemnation yet of secondary sanctions and is expanding trade in national currencies. Russia and Iran are coordinating more closely, BRICS Pay is moving forward, and China is pressing for deeper financial, industrial and digital ties across the bloc. Each new route and payment mechanism leaves the Global South less exposed to US sanctions and financial pressure.
• Russian strikes targeting the De Novo data center in Kiev will create “an information vacuum and eliminate databases used to target our facilities – including those deep inside Russian territory,” Col. (ret.) Anatoliy Matviychuk told Sputnik. Besides being used to store “vast amounts of intelligence data to support the operations of Ukraine’s military” and drawn upon by Palantir, the massive data center served several other functions, including waging “information-psychological warfare on the Russian population” using local platforms.
• K. J. Noh: President Lee Jae Myung has announced he will not be sending South Korean (ROK) troops to Iran.  He is the first Korean president to refuse to send ROK troops to an illegal US war (they are all illegal). Prior to this, ROK sent troops to every US major war since 1950. It has had secret deployments with almost every US operation, and it has had Special Warfare forces in UAE since 2011. This refusal is a historic first. However, by taking this stand, he has put himself in US crosshairs.  The US is unlikely to give up its pressure. In fact, it could retaliate, including staging a coup. There is already a coup US Ambassador in place, Michelle Steele.

• Exxon Mobil has shut down one of the largest diesel refineries in the US. The refinery produced 11 million gallons of gasoline and diesel fuel per day.
• Northern Siberia’s oil reserves, which Russia is developing and shipping via the Arctic Ocean, could give Moscow a major geopolitical advantage.  By linking Siberian production to Arctic sea routes, Russia is building a new energy corridor aimed at Asian markets, thereby expanding its export options beyond traditional routes. The first crude shipments have already departed. Situated on the Taymyr Peninsula, Vostok Oil combines the existing Vankor fields with new deposits in the northern Krasnoyarsk Krai, drawing on a resource base estimated at around 7 billion tons of liquid hydrocarbons.

Report from Finland: Impacts since joining NATO in 2023

 

From September the 'Defence Cooperation Agreement' (DCA)  with USA is valid. Here in the North of Finland, the USA has got two places for restoring of weapons and materials (Kemi and Tervola), one airport (Rovaniemi) one garnizone (Sodankylä) and one frontier guard in Ivalo – right in the North-East of Lapland near the Russian Border. The distance between Murmansk and Ivalo is less than 300 kms.

The spirit in Finland is depressive, since we joined NATO and since our parliament approved the DCA. The people was never asked – joining the NATO was made on false polls. For many reasons we are told lies all the time. Russia has repeatedly said that they do not plan to attack Finland, but still we are fed up with stories of 'the Russian threats'. The private discussions get more and more important to keep us in the reality.

These decisions become very expensive for the population. The social and health care are cut and diminished. The roads which have been neglected for years are now suddenly prepared for NATO´s needs. The railway infrastructure is planned to be changed in order to fit the width of the West-European rails, which is a little more narrow than the Finnish railway, which was built from 1862 on, during the Russian era (1809 – 1917). 

This is a shame because we have a population getting old, needing care, and our children need education and support as well. The regime talks like our security is depending on violence and weapons – even nuclear – instead of human understanding, diplomacy and cooperation.

This map is before Finland joined NATO in 2023

If we are sincere, we cannot say that this change of strategy is due to Russian aggression. Russia did make diplomatic efforts to try to get negotiations about European security before the war in Ukraine. Ever since the coup in Kiev 2014, Russia tried eagerly to get diplomatic solutions to the situation, that was very dangerous for Russian speakers [in the Donbass of eastern Ukraine], other minorities for some political parties and so on.

I live in Lapland about 100 kms north from the Arctic circle. I enjoy the life here with friendly neighbors, with the nature round the corner and rather cool weather as well. Sometimes it is hard when the cold and darkness is strong. Last winter we had for a couple of weeks of 40 degrees Celsius and a long time -30 degrees. But because it is hard, people help each other despite of differences in political or other opinions.

The reindeers are around and need good surroundings. When they are making the infrastructure for NATO – they neglect the needs of the reindeer herders. For instance they plan to build new roads for strategic reasons right through the areas where the reindeers need space and peace for living.

Before, when our politicians had diplomatic relations as the key for our security, we could cooperate with all our neighbors in a peaceful way with the benefits of all. If the NATO occupies Lapland like Hitler´s Germany did 1941, the living here is getting restricted and difficult.

The nature needs peace and so do we human beings also.

Greetings to all our friends around the world!

Kerstin Tuomala, Finland 

War machine is an Earth killer

Watch Abby Martin's much needed and amazing new film "Earth's Greatest Enemy" at:

http://www.earthsgreatestenemy.com

Dear Ed Sheeran...from Candace Owens

Candace Owens likes Ed Sheeran — but says this is the moment that will test him. 

After Macklemore was removed from the tour following his pro-Palestine remarks, Candace calls on Ed to stop hiding behind the stadiums, cancel the remaining shows, and prove that money and industry pressure don’t get the final say.

Importance of 'Keep Space for Peace Week'

Keep Space for Peace Week is organized each year by the Global Network Against Weapons and Nuclear Power in Space.

This year space week will be held October 3-10. During that time we ask groups and concerned citizens of the global community to organize events and share information about the growing dangers of the US program to 'control and dominate space and to deny others the use of space'. This was all spelled out in the US Space Command document called Vision for 2020.

Various activities could be held during the week. Educational forums, protest events outside military bases, military weapons production sites, various government installations and along busy streets.

The public must be informed about the growing costs of preparation for war in space that would result in the theft of taxpayer monies (trillions of dollars) that could otherwise be used for health care, education, environmental care, public transportation, infrastructure repair and more.

Many nations are now falling into the trap of investing in this 'pie in the sky' dream of mining the sky for precious resource extraction on the planetary bodies. Elon Musk wants to mine Mars for magnesium, cobalt, uranium and other minerals. On the Moon there is helium-3 and water that attracts many greedy 'investors'. Gold is promised on the asteroids.

With each polluting rocket launch a larger hole is punched in the Earth's ozone layer that keeps life on our fragile planet from burning up. Also Lower Earth Orbit (LEO) is now getting so crowded with satellites that scientists fear cascading collisions (called the Kessler Syndrome) will occur making it virtually impossible to get a rocket off our planet thru that space mine field.

There are many reasons to oppose the nuclearization and weaponization of space. Please go to our two video libraries here and here and help spread these various space-related videos during space week.

Thanks for your interest and concern. Please contact us with any questions or suggestions at globalnet@mindspring.com

Bruce