schalom libertad

Like many other municipalities around the world, Berlin was having problems financing its public transport system during the 1990s. The increasingly neoliberal central government was reluctant to provide support. Financial advisors came up with a neat way to help out. Lease the transport equipment long term to investors in the United States and then lease it back. The investors in the United States got a tax credit on depreciation of foreign investment. The investors shared their tax break with the Berlin transit authority (who received around $90 in the late 1990s). In effect US tax-payers were subsidizing German municipal governments many of which struck similar deals on everything from water supply and sewage systems to convention centers. When the US tax authorities figured out the scam they moved to close the loophole after 2004. But the contracts, complicated and written in English, stayed in force. The contract specified that the value of the leased assets had to be insured with a highly rated insurer. Berlin was eventually persuaded by the US investment bank JP Morgan to insure through a collateralized debt obligation backed by many financial institutions deemed highly credit-worthy including Lehman, AIG and the Icelandic banks. When all of these crashed in September 2008, and the CDO went toxic, Berlin either had to find another highly rated insurer (by then impossible) or deposit its own moneys as collateral. It was liable for $200 million or more. Many other German municipalities found themselves in the same predicament (Leipzig was particularly hard hit because they had leased almost everything they had). But it was very difficult, as one German municipal official noted, not to be lured into such a scheme when so many other municipalities were gloating at their good fortune back in the 1990s.
The fiasco of cross-border leasing in Germany then added fuel to an all-too plausible but erroneous European interpretation, articulated by both German and French leaders, that the crisis was a distinctively Anglo-American production rather than a systematic failure of capitalism. (From an upcoming book.)

A few weeks ago Redok reported about a group of „internationalists“ who forcefully prevented the showing of a film about Israel in Hamburg. During the blockade of the cinema insults such as “Jewish swine” were to be heard, and people hoping to see the film were violently attacked. The radical Left newspaper, Jungle World, published this in-depth analysis of the events.

On WW4Report, Iraqi Labor Leaders Speak: Their Fight for Workers and Against Occupation

An interview with four Iraqi labor leaders who were on the East Coast on a tour sponsored by US Labor Against the War: Hassan Jumaa, president of the Iraqi Federation of Oil Unions; Rasim Awadi, president of the General Federation of Iraqi Workers; Sardar Mohammed, president of the Iraqi Kurdish Workers Syndicates & Unions; and Falah Alwan, president of the Federation of Workers Councils & Unions in Iraq. They spoke about the struggle for workers rights under occupation and the prospects for rebuilding Iraq’s industrial sector—and expressed sometimes divergent views on how and when the US should withdraw.

And the magazine Wildcat analyzes the demonstrations and riots sparked during the Iranian elections of 2009 with their article: Iran 2009: A new attempt?

Globally the left is engaged in a controversial debate about the mobilisations in Iran which took place before and after the elections. Only rarely are these mobilisations related to the global crisis and the severe economic and governmental crisis in Iran itself – although their inter-relatedness is blatant.

Der U-Bahn war voll. Ich hatte aber ein Platz gefunden. In der Nähe von mir saß eine Deutschetouristengruppe. Sie quatscht untereinander. Ein Mann mitteln Alters steigt ein, guckt skeptisch rum, und endlich nehmt er einen Platz zwischen mir und der Gruppe. Er ist größ und rund und etwas fröhlich und lustig. Er hat wilde, blonde, lockige Haare unter einer Baseballkappe und sieht sich wie ein größ Kind an. Er sieht ein bisschen wie Michael Moore aus, aber ohne Selbstbewusstsein.
Er fangt mit der Gruppe zu quatschen an, ein bisschen wie ein Clown. Ich höre nicht zu aber zufällig beachte ich das laute Lachen einem Mädel der Gruppe. Ich interessiere mich nicht dafür, aber ich merke dann dass er von „dem gefährlichen Kreuzberg“ und „den Türken“ redet.
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Amos Oz was here in Berlin last week. A few notes on some of his comments.

As he thoroughly explained in his „The Tale of Love and Darkness“, he told of the conflicted relationship towards Europe that his parents‘ generation of Jewish emigrants had in 1930s Jerusalem.

To paraphrase, he explained how Jews were the only real europeans in 1930s Europe. Everyone else was a Polish, German, or other kind of nationalist. The Jews were the „cosmopolitans.“ And for this, they couldn‘t remain in Europe. His parents tried to recreate European culture, with their literature and political circles, in the city of their refuge, Jerusalem. Today everyone wants to be a European, and are now criticizing the Jews for not being so.
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