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This week on CounterSpin: Nestle CEO Mark Schneider told investors in February that “2020 was a year of hardship for so many,” yet he was “inspired by the way it has brought all of us closer together.” And also by an “improvement” in Nestle’s “profitability and return on invested capital.” “The global pandemic,” Schneider said, “did not slow us down.”
You know what else didn’t slow them down? Ample evidence that their profitability relies on a supply chain that includes literal slave labor in the Ivory Coast. The US Supreme Court recently heard Nestle USA v. Doe, a long-running case that seemed to get at how much responsibility corporations have for international human rights violations, but in the end may have taught us more about what legal tools are useful in getting to that accountability. We got some clarity on the case from William Dodge, professor at University of California/Davis School of Law.
Transcript: ‘US Companies Can Be Sued for Involvement in Child Slavery’
AP (6/30/21)
Also on the show: Donald Rumsfeld launched wars of aggression in Afghanistan and Iraq that killed hundreds of thousands of people, and approved torture at Guantánamo Bay and Abu Ghraib. But to hear elite media tell it, the former Defense secretary should be remembered as “complex and paradoxical.” The New York Times described his arrival in Washington as “like an All-American who had stepped off the Wheaties box,” and AP suggested that all those dead Iraqis were mainly a thorn in Rumsfeld’s side, with the headline, “Donald Rumsfeld, a Cunning Leader Undermined by the Iraq War.” Obituaries noted that Rumsfeld expressed no regrets about his decisions; media appear to have none of their own.
CounterSpin talked about Rumsfeld’s media treatment back in 2008 with the Center for Constitutional Rights’ Michael Ratner, whose book The Trial of Donald Rumsfeld had just come out from the New Press. We’ll hear that conversation on today’s show.
Transcript: ‘The Techniques Rumsfeld Was Using Were Designed to Get False Information’
Plus Janine Jackson takes a quick look at recent press coverage of the New Cold War.
Did Nestle send men over to the Ivory Coast with guns and enslave people? Why is Janine not upset with the government of the Ivory Coast? She’s upset with our government’s actions allowing slavery 150 years ago. She should be VERY upset with the Ivory Coast’s government. Instead, she’s upset with a US company. Again, US bad, others countries good. To be consistent, she should be upset with the British companies who bought the cotton from the south 150+ years ago. She’s not. She’s upset with US companies now and US government then. Intellectual integrity Janine.
Yes, Janine should send messages to the US Military and NATO demanding that The Ivory Coast be bombed back into the stone age immediately. It’s time to make America Great again, no pissing about slapping around these shitty little countries and throwing them against the wall just to show off, we need to make it clear America: GOOD, the Rest of the World: BAD. Put some intellectual integrity back into military violence and show the world who’s boss. Good God man, whatever happened to CLASS? We gotta do this! Dump all these shitty little treaties, militarise space, implement FULL SPECTRUM DOMINANCE it’s the only way. We need to be able to manage conflicts on multiple fronts; there are so many of these shitty arsed upstart countries trying to make America look bad, it’s time to get mad!!
LOL. Where did that come from? I was talking about consistency.
You tell me. Is it consistent to be mad at slavery in the US 150 years ago, but not be mad at the Ivory Coast’s government now?
If she’s going to be mad at US companies now, that’s fine, she needs to be writing articles on the European companies 150 years ago who were buying all of the cotton then. Why does the anger only go one way (toward the US)? Nearly every country on the planet has had slavery. Why is the anger only focused on the US?
We can be very thankful for voices in the wilderness such as Fair and Counterspin, but oh what a challenge they face. The Law: antiquated, cumbersome, ambivalent and at best incapable of delivering justice. The Media: psychopathic, corrupt, corporate owned and not the least interested in justice or democracy, Having the public mind on a string is just an asset. The Senate: Full of sound and fury, influencing nothing.
With a superpower spending a thousand times what all of its alleged (and necessary) enemies spend on war tools, surrounded by compliant, sycophantic vassal states and psychotically obsessed with violent domination with zero respect for human life it would suggest that Climate Change, perilous as it is, may be the least of humanity’s problems.
Climate change has always been a small problem. It is only worth our time if all of the following are true:
1) Primarily man made.
2) Can man affect any positive change.
3) Is the cost worth the “damage.”
Number 1 is in doubt, but absolutely possible. Numbers 2 and 3 are not known by anyone. Even if Numbers 2 and 3 were absolutely true, the next question is can you get all 7B people to sign on. Not likely. It then puts number 2 in question again.
Tim, you’re a fucking idiot.
Now that’s a well thought out argument. Eloquent and succinct. It takes real discipline to create something that good.
Hello Tim, are you being a devil’s advocate or trolling? Climate change is not a “small problem”, it’s an existential threat to life on this planet. Going through your numbers. Number one is not in doubt. For example,the recent heatwave in Canada was described as virtually impossibility without human action by scientists in a recent BBC news report. Exxon has know for over 35 years that burning fossil fuels would contribute to climate change. James Lovelock who promulgated the Gaia theory now believes that without a major change in human behaviour the bio-sphere will be totally destroyed (10 years ago he did not).
If human action is the primary cause of climate change it follows that human action can alter the outcome and posts such as yours are part of the problem. The longer we prevaricate the less we will be able to create positive outcomes and the more the effects will become irreversible. Finally, it’s not necessary that 7 billion people change their behaviour as the effects of people’s behaviour is not equal. Would that is was. Power is not evenly distributed. Access to capital is not equal. CEO’s and policy makers have disproportionate influence. It is beholden on the rich in rich countries to shoulder any costs to mitigate the adverse effects of climate change.
Climate change is not existential. The existence of humans on earth is NOT at stake.
How do you propose we change human behavior? How are you going to get the Chinese to change? How about the Indians? You’ll never get them to change. You’re on-line. You’re consuming electricity. You’re buying food that is being shipped. You ride a bike, drive a car, or take a bus. You go to the hospital. You use electricity. Each one of those things takes products that are mined. You haven’t a clue how to change human behavior. You live in a fantasy world.
Always the rich’s problem with you leftists. I thought you leftists wanted to make the rich pay for the debt? Now you want them to pay for some magical climate change? You haven’t a clue as to your real power and resource consumption. Things just magically provide you an amazing lifestyle from which you think you can tell others in 3rd world countries to stay that way. You’re standing on the shoulders of giants and think you’re tall. You recycle, ride a bike most of the time, drive an electric car, and have solar panels so you think you’re a “good” person. You haven’t a clue about the energy requirements to provide those to you. You haven’t a clue as to how to provide that to ALL 7B people (you are a socialist after all and want equality).
You go buy a farm. Use a shovel, grow your food and cotton (you can’t have any animals due to flatulence). Weave your own clothes. Live fully off the grid. Don’t buy anything (that will involve a truck to ship or mining equipment to mine).
You do all that for a year and then you lecture us on practical ways to achieve what you only dream of now.
Thanks for answering my question, Tim. How about enlightening us with some numbers and facts, then? Since you mentioned socialists perhaps you could define what you think socialism is. Do you think such socialists are alone in wanting equality or could it be important to humankind in general? Oh, and what about justice? Is that a universal human belief or just a construct? Your posts here remind me of Bertolt Brecht’s poem “The Buddha’s parable of the burning house”, but despite that, I’d be interested in your answers (for anyone who doesn’t know the poem I’ve posted a link to a page containing a translation of the poem in full).
Most conservatives couldn’t care less about equality. We’re interested in liberty. Just the little people are concerned with other peoples’ wealth
No facts in your last post, Tim. This liberty you refer to, how is it different from anarchy? If you are not willing to define your terms there is no real basis for a discussion to be had.
(Note to readers: in my previous post I mentioned a link. It can be found by clicking on my name in that post.)