The Open Village» Economy

Discard & Destroy: Walmart, H&M etc.

Daniel Ihonvbere — Fri, 08 Jan 2010 19:40:02 +0000

This week, it was revealed that retail giant Walmart and H&M took capitalist greed to a new level by slashing and burning what they could not sell. For these pillars of capitalism, instead of taking unsold items to sample sales or donating them to people in need (and there are many, especially in these very tough economic times where one-third of New York City’s population is poor), H&M and Wal-Mart have been throwing them out in giant trash bags. For good measure and to ensure that people who stumble on these bags of unsold items do not try to keep or re-sell them, these companies have gone ahead and slashed up garments, cut off the sleeves of coats, and sliced holes in shoes so they are unwearable. Hundreds of Wal-Mart tagged items with holes made in them have been found dumped: “gloves with the fingers cut off, warm socks, cute patent leather Mary Jane school shoes, maybe for fourth graders, with the instep cut up with a scissor, men’s jackets, slashed across the body and the arms. The puffy fiber fill was coming out in big white cotton balls.”

Foreign Aid and The Mirage Of Poverty Eradication

Daniel Ihonvbere — Sun, 24 May 2009 12:37:45 +0000

The reality of aid… is that it continues to fail to promote human development for the eradication of poverty based on the core values of human rights, democracy, gender equality and environmental sustainability. This is despite the appearance of progress in the form of high-profile debt cancellations, new aid pledges, and the signing of the Paris Declaration on aid effectiveness – Caterina Amicucci Globalization has [...]

The Spectacle called Lindsey Graham

admin — Mon, 09 Feb 2009 13:34:56 +0000

Some people have absolutely no shame. Take the senator from South Carolina, Lindsey Graham, for example. I could not help but double up in raucus laughter the other day when I saw him on television yelling “look at this bill!, look at this bill!” while brandishing what I suppose was the current stimulus package that is going through the senate at the moment. Do these folks ever stop to think about the reaction of the public to their silly showmanship for a minute? Was this the same senator Graham who supported every bill George W. sent to the senate and even went on national television to support some of the most odious ones? Where was his outrage when billions of dollars were being wasted on a useless war? Where was he when billions of dollars were dolled out to billionaire farmers while many Americans were losing their jobs? Was he in this country when millions of dollars were allocated to stupid projects like the so-called bridge to nowhere? Oh, I know, a Republican president was in the White House then, so stupid and wasteful bills for stupid and wasteful expenditures were okay.

Obama’s Security Team

Daniel Ihonvbere — Mon, 01 Dec 2008 17:54:08 +0000

As was widely rumored, President-Elect Barack Obama unveiled his National Security Team today. Here’s the announcement as released: Good morning. Last week, we announced our economic team, which is working as we speak to craft an Economic Recovery Program to create jobs and grow our struggling economy. Today, Vice President-elect Biden and I are pleased to [...]

Pimping D.L. Hughley

Daniel Ihonvbere — Wed, 29 Oct 2008 01:38:03 +0000

A little over a week before the U.S. presidential elections, CNN, the cable new network, decided to start airing a “comedy show” hosted by the Black comedian D.L. Hughley. On the face of it, it does not look like much, but the bottom line is that in a very sensitive election cycle where a Black candidate is on the verge of becoming the first non-white to be the president of the United States of America, CNN is using Hughley to give voice to its concerns about the Obama candidacy. To avoid being labeled racist, who better to make jokes about a black candidate without the attendant backlash than a black fool? It is a shame that D.L. Hughley is allowing himself to be pimped in such a fashion. One expects him to know that he is just feeding into the stereotype of an idiot (albeit a rich one) making a fool of himself in the village square. The dry jokes are not resonating. It would have been more respectable for him to delay his show until after the election. Perhaps, he could have avoided the unnecessary scrutiny this new gig will attract. Deep down, Hughley knows it’s not going to work. Comedians like him are not used to working in a very scripted environment where the jokes are forced and the language is plastic. There is nothing wrong in making fun of a black presidential candidate or any person of color running for higher office, but it should be done on the terms of the comedian, not as an outlet for a wimpy news organization trying to find a shortcut to asking difficult questions or raising and discussing difficult issues involving ethnicity, race and achievement. D.L. Hughley, you are better than this.

John McCain’s Fantasy World

Daniel Ihonvbere — Sat, 25 Oct 2008 16:33:00 +0000

“I know how to win wars” “I am a maverick” “I have been tested” “I know how to get Osama Bin Laden” Hearing senator John McCain make these claims, the totally uninformed is wont to take the word of the 72-year old at face value. After all, he has been celebrated as a war hero; he is a long-serving [...]

Lou Dobbs: Intellectual Bully or Ignorant Fool?

Daniel Ihonvbere — Tue, 14 Oct 2008 00:15:48 +0000

For quite a while, I actually enjoyed listening to Lou Dobbs on CNN. I religiously followed what I assumed were intelligent discussions of pressing issues, especially when it had to do with capital flight and the so-called war on the middle class, outsourcing and disappearing jobs in America. But the more I listen to this [...]

Change We Can Believe In

Daniel Ihonvbere — Fri, 10 Oct 2008 15:27:33 +0000

Remarks of Senator Barack Obama–as prepared for delivery Chillicothe, Ohio Friday, October 10, 2008 We meet at a moment of great uncertainty for America. In recent weeks, we’ve seen a growing financial crisis that’s threatening not only banks and businesses, but your economic security, as well. It’s getting harder and harder to get a loan for that new [...]

George Will’s Stunted Philosophy

Daniel Ihonvbere — Mon, 06 Oct 2008 18:49:56 +0000

Like most of America’s bankrupt and horribly myopic intelligentsia which has contributed in no small measure in pushing the foreign and domestic policies of the Unites States to the extreme right, George Will is not happy that the tried and true tactics of diversion, obfuscation and irrelevant pontification by the Republican party is bouncing off [...]

Yes, We Can!

Daniel Ihonvbere — Sun, 05 Oct 2008 04:40:30 +0000

Barack Obama’s emotional speech in Virginia, October 4, 2008: “In the end, none of this will be easy. We’re up against a powerful, entrenched status quo in Washington that will say anything and do anything and fight with everything they’ve got to keep things the way they are. But I know that if we come together, and [...]