Sputnik's Global Retransmissions (Volume One)
A New Feature To Go With Paid Subscriptions
Photo by Matthijs van Heerikhuize on Unsplash
Hello Folks.
Some months have passed since I started this newsletter, so I’m going to ask a favor: Your monetary support.
I’m going to humbly throw a lifeline out there and turn on paid subscriptions after months of writing for free.
Times, I know, are tough for everyone out there, and as fellow writers on Substack are aware, it takes a great amount of effort and hours just to put together one newsletter. Add in some amount of courage to throw your thoughts and feelings out on the internet for public consumption.
Hopefully, this doesn’t come across as selfish or melodramatic, but I have to eat and pay rent in these precarious times as well. Every little bit helps.
Whether I deserve that reward, I suppose, is up to you who read, share, or are presently subscribed.
I suppose we’ll see how it goes.
It’s very hard to build a wider audience with the written word and my perspective alone, even with interactive media, so I’m going to start offering a bonus to encourage paid subscriptions: Sputnik’s Global Retransmissions.
The idea is to peruse the internet for unique, outlier perspectives on the news and the state of reality in the domestic and global society, which will include people who have more of a “man or woman on the street” level of pedestrian wisdom, something I am finding more and more of on YouTube. People who genuinely care about humanity and improving our condition in life.
What this won’t be is a duplication of Chuck Todd’s or Dan Rather’s Twitter feed. There are plenty of corporate stenographers out there manufacturing consent in a mass echo chamber available for public consumption.
Independence and freedom of thought are key.
So, I will try to hunt, gather collate, and summarize perspectives that may or may not include interactive media and the written word. Hopefully, messages resonate.
We really need to come together in these very turbulent times to survive the assault on our senses and most importantly, encourage our sense of decency.
Worker at meeting of Rail Workers Rank-and-File Committee: We must bring power back to the rank and file
Despite what corporate media, in concert with social media posts from the government rushed to tell us, the majority of rail workers are definitively NOT on board with the “negotiated” contract. The strike is not permanently “averted”. The potential has just been pushed a little farther down the road.
For one thing, there is no concession to the rail workers’ very reasonable demands for better pay and paid sick leave and time off, a humane work-life balance. Many rail workers get as little as 12 hours a week with their families! This is the result of “pro-Union” President Joe Biden’s PEB negotiations: complete capitulation and corporate compromise.
The workers speak out here:
“Emails were sent to Congress telling them how this recommendation was a subpar contract that doesn’t come close to inflation or a fair share of profits. No sick days, no shift differentials. It didn’t even bother to recommend anything on the draconian attendance policies. And to top it all off, an increase in the cost of healthcare premiums.”
“What did we get? Nothing. The union reps accepted it anyway without our approval. After being deemed “essential” when convenient during a global pandemic, I lost workmates and friends. Workers lost loved ones. We were put into a situation where we were exposing each other and our families to this deadly virus. People were denied using vacation days if they had to quarantine, a quarantine which was demanded by the companies. All while record profits were being made by the fat cat CEOs. We were never compensated with a bonus or hazard pay, like so many workers in other industries.”
The link is constantly updated, so check back in.
Microcosm Of America’s Hellscape of Housing Problem
As a resident of Florida, turning 65 this month, taking Social Security, and living alone as a tenant in a home owned by someone else, I can say unequivocally that the levels of stress in the day-to-day and month-to-month living are real. More so NOW than ever, due to the fact that since the ban on evictions expired as we “moved on” from COVID, rental rates soared by hundreds and thousands of dollars. All without a commensurate rise in wages. This has generated an eviction crisis but is largely verboten to speak about in the mainstream media.
What was difficult is now impossible, as wages remain low and rentals inflate to sky-high levels.
This article by Substack writer Joe Duncan, reveals Florida as a “Microcosm Of Americas Hellscape Of Housing Problem”:
“For many Americans, stories of people living in motels are shocking. In Florida, it’s commonplace.
Being a vacation spot, Florida has an abundance of motels, large corporations that pay people peanuts for their labor, and a Republican-led state legislature that continually passes business-friendly bills at the expense of hardworking American individuals.
The Florida homeless battle for the right to stay at a motel. It's a competitive market to find a place to sleep for the night. They'll land a spot in an operational hotel if they're lucky.
Others seek refuge in abandoned motels with no power or running water.
From GoFundMe to begging hotel owners, Florida families are desperate to find something that resembles stability.
These aren't just single guys with drug problems. Like the families in D.C., these are families with several children, married people who fell on hard times, lost their jobs, or were laid off when the pandemic halted economic activity.
Florida is a microcosm of America's hellscape of a housing problem.
It has all the ingredients necessary to concoct a perfect storm that exemplifies America's ongoing housing crisis.”
Corollary link that dramatically illustrates this shocking fact:
“Building affordable housing is extremely expensive. Building luxury housing for the ultra-rich is dirt cheap. It’s here in Florida everywhere we turn. We constantly see a new luxury condo complex being built with all the bells and whistles.”
Well worth a read, no one, literally, beyond occasional “human interest stories” on local news is talking about this.
Monday Mourning With Katie Halper and Aaron Mate
Every “Monday Mourning” the incredibly talented journalists and commentators Aaron Mate and Katie Halpern do the heavy lifting and sit through the drudgery of a worn-out corporate television news tradition: The Sunday “Talk Show”.
The vibe on their Channel, “Useful Idiots” is casual and the air is definitively sarcastic.
Personally, until I saw my first “Monday Mourning” I didn’t get the level of dull, meaningless bloviation in these shows across the board. The sets change, and the letters in the networks vary, but you could close your eyes and simply substitute one show or guest for another and never know the difference. Sometimes a guest on one show will be featured on another show broadcasting across the street in the DC media bubble.
There is no one out there, IMHO, that has the encyclopedic knowledge of International Politics that Aaron Mate brings to the table, and Katie Halpern as well.
They are both incisive and witty, pulling no punches as they dissect the bloviation and peel back the layers of pure bullshit. I have laughed out loud more times than I can count. As Frank Zappa once said, “Politics is the entertainment division of the Military Industrial Complex.” If that is true “Monday Mourning” is keeping that tradition alive and well.
I Allegedly: The Vital Perspective Of The Everyday Person
The “wisdom of the common man” is completely underrated in a world where power and authority are valued above all.
While perusing YouTube I have found, surprisingly, a chorus of voices of like-minded people that seem to be more in touch with the actual day-to-day reality than the manufactured propaganda pumped out by corporate networks and Cable News.
Dan Golka has such a refreshing and completely unique approach to engaging with his audience that I would venture to say it’s totally unprecedented. While walking around in some of the most beautiful scenic spots in Southern California, Dan delivers, in a calm reassuring tone, personal commentary on the realities of the economy. He is experienced as a businessman working in the movie industry and is surrounded by economic and real estate professionals. I find that I have become addicted to his daily meditations. Highly recommended.
Patrick Humphrey is a young family man who exudes rare qualities of empathy, wisdom, kindness, awareness of global happenings, and a level of direct honesty in engaging with his audience which is rare. If there is such a thing as a collective consciousness of like-minded individuals that simply want a better world for the common man and woman, it’s encapsulated here.
I like to call Patrick the “gentle prepper” because his calm even tone in discussing dire warnings belies the YouTube algorithm that favors melodrama for clicks. He never screams or rants to make a point. The art of the soft sell. Patrick seems wise beyond his years, and like Dan Golka, he is someone I visit on a regular basis.
Zelensky To Appeal Directly To US Defense Companies
If you feel marginalized as a proponent of peace and feel there is no hope, you wouldn’t be alone. It appears there is no stopping the outflow of wealth to weapons manufacturers tapped from the US and NATO allied populations of the EU. It’s a beast that devours billions of dollars to support destruction, while economic collapse, both here and abroad, is eminent. Zelensky seems to be a leader with unlimited access to power and money, fueling what wiser military experts like Scott Ritter say is an unwinnable situation. No better example than being allowed a direct appeal to weapons manufacturers, an event that, to my knowledge, has no precedence in modern times. Where does the US taxpayer get a say?
“Zelensky was set to speak by video link before a conference hosted by the National Defense Industrial Association in Austin, Texas, in his first-ever speech to the U.S. defense industry. The association's members include Raytheon Technologies Corp (RTX.N) and Lockheed Martin Corp (LMT.N), which jointly produce Javelin antitank weapons that have been used by Ukraine.”
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