Sarah van Gelder at Yes! magazine writes—More Confessions of an Economic Hit Man: This Time, They’re Coming for Your Democracy. In a preface to her interview with John Perkins, she notes:
Twelve years ago, John Perkins published his book, Confessions of an Economic Hit Man, and it rapidly rose up The New York Times’ best-seller list. In it, Perkins describes his career convincing heads of state to adopt economic policies that impoverished their countries and undermined democratic institutions. These policies helped to enrich tiny, local elite groups while padding the pockets of U.S.-based transnational corporations.
I couldn’t help but think about Flint, Michigan, under emergency management as I read The New Confessions of an Economic Hit Man.
Perkins was recruited, he says, by the National Security Agency (NSA), but he worked for a private consulting company. His job as an undertrained, overpaid economist was to generate reports that justified lucrative contracts for U.S. corporations, while plunging vulnerable nations into debt. Countries that didn’t cooperate saw the screws tightened on their economies. In Chile, for example, President Richard Nixon famously called on the CIA to “make the economy scream” to undermine the prospects of the democratically elected president, Salvador Allende.
If economic pressure and threats didn’t work, Perkins says, the jackals were called to either overthrow or assassinate the noncompliant heads of state. That is, indeed, what happened to Allende, with the backing of the CIA.
Perkins’ book has been controversial, and some have disputed some of his claims, including, for example, that the NSA was involved in activities beyond code making and breaking.
Perkins has just reissued his book with major updates. The basic premise of the book remains the same, but the update shows how the economic hit man approach has evolved in the last 12 years. Among other things, U.S. cities are now on the target list. The combination of debt, enforced austerity, underinvestment, privatization, and the undermining of democratically elected governments is now happening here.
I couldn’t help but think about Flint, Michigan, under emergency management as I read The New Confessions of an Economic Hit Man. [...]
HIGH IMPACT STORIES • THIS WEEK’S HIGH IMPACT STORIES
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FFS DU JOUR
The Republican-dominated House Budget Committee has approved a budget plan that would include draconian cuts in the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP, formerly known as the Food Stamp Program). The cuts would amount fo more than $150 billion—more than a 20 percent chopping—over the next decade (2017-2026).
This means cutting off food assistance to millions of low-income famIlies or reducing their benefits under the 52-year-old program. This year’s budget has two categories of SNAP cuts:
- It includes three major benefit cuts that Congress ultimately rejected from House-passed versions of the 2014 farm bill. They would terminate benefits to about 3 million low-income people — including many working families, senior citizens, and people with disabilities, and some of the poorest Americans — and cut SNAP spending by more than $25 billion over ten years (2017-2026).
- It would convert SNAP into a block grant beginning in 2021 and cut funding steeply — by $125 billion (or almost 30 percent) over 2021 to 2026. States would be left to decide whose benefits to reduce or terminate. They would have no good choices, since SNAP benefits average only $1.41 per person per meal and go primarily to poor children, working parents, seniors, people with disabilities, and others struggling to make ends meet.
This would be on top of the 500,000 to 1 million Americans who will be cut from SNAP benefits this year as a three-month limit on SNAP benefits for unemployed adults aged 18-49 who aren’t disabled or raising minor children returns in many states. Such individuals, with an average income that is just 17 percent of the poverty level, will lose their SNAP benefits after three months no matter how dutifully they are looking for a job.
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BLAST FROM THE PAST
At Daily Kos on this date in 2011—Scott Walker's administration gave a state job and a 26% raise to the son of a major supporter:
Wisconsin Republicans claim that their state is broke, and have used that claim to justify stripping state workers of their collective bargaining rights. And yet, even though they claim to be broke, Scott Walker's administration just gave a state job, and a 26% raise, to the son of a major supporter who has no college degree, no relevant experience, and two drunk driving convictions. JS Online:
Just in his mid-20s, Brian Deschane has no college degree, very little management experience and two drunken-driving convictions.
Yet he has landed an $81,500-per-year job in Gov. Scott Walker's administration overseeing environmental and regulatory matters and dozens of employees at the Department of Commerce. Even though Walker says the state is broke and public employees are overpaid, Deschane already has earned a promotion and a 26% pay raise in just two months with the state.
Ah, a state job with a big salary and a huge raise. You don't need a degree, relevant experience, a clean criminal record, or even a formal application:
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