https://znetwork.org/author/petedolack/ Independent Left News, Analysis, Vision and Strategy Thu, 18 Dec 2025 12:11:15 +0000 en-US hourly 1 https://znetwork.org/wp-content/uploads/2022/08/cropped-Z_logo_512-32x32.png https://znetwork.org/author/petedolack/ 32 32 https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/we-cant-understand-capitalism-without-understanding-slavery/ https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/we-cant-understand-capitalism-without-understanding-slavery/#respond Thu, 18 Dec 2025 16:50:00 +0000 Ever since Eric Williams published his book Capitalism and Slavery, which demonstrated to those more inclined to weigh evidence rather than ideology that slavery was a crucial prop to the Industrial Revolution, there has been a continual pushback. There is no surprise in that. The fiction that capitalism is a “natural” manifestation of “human nature” that [...]]]> https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/we-cant-understand-capitalism-without-understanding-slavery/feed/ 0 https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/cop30-self-congratulations-and-promises-to-talk-more-are-no-substitute-for-action/ https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/cop30-self-congratulations-and-promises-to-talk-more-are-no-substitute-for-action/#respond Wed, 26 Nov 2025 16:00:00 +0000 https://znetwork.org/?post_type=znetarticle&p=1291680 Another climate summit has mercifully ended. As with past summits, nothing of substance happened. The United States did not participate, meaning that the Trump administration technically could not thwart any attempt to block meaningful decision-making, but that was no problem for the Trump gang as Saudi Arabia was there to pick up the ball. Any [...]]]> https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/cop30-self-congratulations-and-promises-to-talk-more-are-no-substitute-for-action/feed/ 0 https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/sanctions-are-not-only-not-an-alternative-to-war-they-are-more-deadly/ https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/sanctions-are-not-only-not-an-alternative-to-war-they-are-more-deadly/#respond Thu, 18 Sep 2025 15:54:00 +0000 https://znetwork.org/?post_type=znetarticle&p=1288721 Increasingly, the United States and the European Union leverage their dominance in the world capitalist system to impose sanctions on other countries. Political leaders who impose these sanctions sometimes argue that sanctions are a “more humane” alternative to war. But that is not necessarily so. Sanctions are war by another name. How deadly are sanctions? [...]]]> https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/sanctions-are-not-only-not-an-alternative-to-war-they-are-more-deadly/feed/ 0 https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/the-u-s-supreme-court-declares-the-constitution-is-unconstitutional/ https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/the-u-s-supreme-court-declares-the-constitution-is-unconstitutional/#comments Thu, 28 Aug 2025 15:54:00 +0000 https://znetwork.org/?post_type=znetarticle&p=1287879 Although the article below is a fictional satire (at least for now), the U.S. Supreme Court’s far right majority consistently makes political rulings based on their personal preferences rather than quaint concepts like law, precedent, or constitutional language, never mind how a decision might affect actual human beings. The U.S. Constitution, even when read reasonably, [...]]]> https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/the-u-s-supreme-court-declares-the-constitution-is-unconstitutional/feed/ 3 https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/one-in-four-need-work-if-we-calculate-a-true-unemployment-rate/ https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/one-in-four-need-work-if-we-calculate-a-true-unemployment-rate/#respond Wed, 16 Jul 2025 18:54:03 +0000 https://znetwork.org/?post_type=znetarticle&p=1286238 How many people are out of work? What is the real unemployment rate? We don’t know. What we do know is that the true number is far higher than the unemployment rate at any given time. There are some measures that purport to give a better answer than the standard unemployment rate, such as the [...]]]> https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/one-in-four-need-work-if-we-calculate-a-true-unemployment-rate/feed/ 0 https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/oil-and-capitalism-perfect-together-but-not-for-us/ https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/oil-and-capitalism-perfect-together-but-not-for-us/#respond Thu, 29 May 2025 15:52:00 +0000 https://znetwork.org/?post_type=znetarticle&p=1284332 Just as we can’t imagine Britain’s rise to dominance in the capitalist system without coal, it is impossible to imagine the rise of the United States as the 20th century successor of Britain without oil. Nor can fossil fuels be disassociated from capitalism. Fossil fuels and capitalism are completely intertwined and that embrace, as tight [...]]]> https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/oil-and-capitalism-perfect-together-but-not-for-us/feed/ 0 https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/precarious-workers-are-employees-without-stability-not-entrepreneurs/ https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/precarious-workers-are-employees-without-stability-not-entrepreneurs/#comments Wed, 30 Apr 2025 17:46:24 +0000 https://znetwork.org/?post_type=znetarticle&p=1283160 A belief that the rise of so-called “platform capitalism” and the classification of working people in those sectors as “independent contractors” mean that the concepts of employer and employee are out of date appears to be on the rise. But a working person is still a working person, no matter the legal arrangement. The basic [...]]]> https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/precarious-workers-are-employees-without-stability-not-entrepreneurs/feed/ 1 https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/columbia-universitys-profile-in-cowardice-is-nothing-new/ https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/columbia-universitys-profile-in-cowardice-is-nothing-new/#respond Wed, 26 Mar 2025 17:53:40 +0000 https://znetwork.org/?post_type=znetarticle&p=1281580 A crucial requirement for a dictatorship to take hold is widespread acquiescence. That is being put to test as the United States slides toward right-wing dictatorship with a real possibility of going beyond ordinary dictatorship to outright fascism. With grassroots activists still gaining their bearings after two months of relentless, unprecedented attacks by the Trump régime [...]]]> https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/columbia-universitys-profile-in-cowardice-is-nothing-new/feed/ 0 https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/you-cant-keep-imposing-austerity-and-expect-the-corporate-party-to-last-forever/ https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/you-cant-keep-imposing-austerity-and-expect-the-corporate-party-to-last-forever/#respond Fri, 28 Feb 2025 15:49:22 +0000 https://znetwork.org/?post_type=znetarticle&p=1280379 The failures of the neoliberal brand of capitalism — and capitalism as a system itself — were once again on display in the February 23 German elections. In a political vacuum, with mainstream parties unable to offer anything other than the austerity that has been imposed for decades, the extreme right gains adherents. The 21 percent [...]]]> https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/you-cant-keep-imposing-austerity-and-expect-the-corporate-party-to-last-forever/feed/ 0 https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/its-the-end-of-the-world-and-i-dont-feel-fine/ https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/its-the-end-of-the-world-and-i-dont-feel-fine/#respond Mon, 09 Dec 2024 18:00:50 +0000 https://znetwork.org/?post_type=znetarticle&p=1276863 Fredric Jameson is no longer here to remind us that imagining the end of the world is easier than imagining the end of capitalism, but the just concluded COP29 climate summit has refreshed our memory. Although securing profits is the primary goal of fossil fuel corporations along with the governments that love them, and the [...]]]> https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/its-the-end-of-the-world-and-i-dont-feel-fine/feed/ 0 https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/the-cost-of-corporate-profit-in-u-s-health-care-reaches-2-trillion/ https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/the-cost-of-corporate-profit-in-u-s-health-care-reaches-2-trillion/#respond Wed, 30 Oct 2024 15:49:00 +0000 https://znetwork.org/?post_type=znetarticle&p=1274516 As has long been the case, the U.S. health care system is by far the world’s most expensive while providing the worst results among the world’s advanced capitalist countries. And that expense continues to get larger and more unaffordable. Just how large is the cost of private profit in health care? Almost two trillion dollars! [...]]]> https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/the-cost-of-corporate-profit-in-u-s-health-care-reaches-2-trillion/feed/ 0 https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/there-are-minimum-wages-why-not-a-maximum-wage/ https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/there-are-minimum-wages-why-not-a-maximum-wage/#respond Thu, 17 Oct 2024 15:46:00 +0000 https://znetwork.org/?post_type=znetarticle&p=1273830 Why don’t we have a maximum wage? Asking that question is another way of asking why some people can rake in millions while others struggle to earn enough to eat. A maximum wage might be one way to tamp down some of the massive inequality that exists around the world. The political conditions for a [...]]]> https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/there-are-minimum-wages-why-not-a-maximum-wage/feed/ 0 https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/you-are-not-alone-if-you-are-out-of-work/ https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/you-are-not-alone-if-you-are-out-of-work/#respond Thu, 27 Jun 2024 15:50:00 +0000 https://znetwork.org/?post_type=znetarticle&p=1268494 We are endlessly and repetitively treated to sermons on the wonders of capitalism. Everybody will be taken care of, with the proviso that you are willing to work. As I have had frequent cause to note, that a line has to be furiously propagated across every channel speaks to a lack of concrete reality. And [...]]]> https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/you-are-not-alone-if-you-are-out-of-work/feed/ 0 https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/capitalism-cant-overcome-the-laws-of-physics/ https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/capitalism-cant-overcome-the-laws-of-physics/#comments Thu, 30 May 2024 15:48:00 +0000 https://znetwork.org/?post_type=znetarticle&p=1267129 You can’t have infinite growth on a finite planet. That should be a commonplace idea. And that inevitably means facing up to the necessity of putting an end to capitalism in favor of an economic system of rationality, sustainability and equity for all the world’s peoples. It can’t be said too many times that the [...]]]> https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/capitalism-cant-overcome-the-laws-of-physics/feed/ 1 https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/capitalism-attacks-argentine-workers-and-you-may-be-next/ https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/capitalism-attacks-argentine-workers-and-you-may-be-next/#respond Thu, 16 May 2024 17:27:33 +0000 https://znetwork.org/?post_type=znetarticle&p=1266478 As always when a representative of the right wing tells you he or she is campaigning to bring “freedom,” be afraid. Very afraid. For “freedom” in these cases means freedom for the richest financiers and industrialists to do whatever they want. For them, “Freedom” is for capital, not for human beings without capital to invest. Today’s exhibit [...]]]> https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/capitalism-attacks-argentine-workers-and-you-may-be-next/feed/ 0 https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/the-sad-spectacle-of-lesser-evil-elections/ https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/the-sad-spectacle-of-lesser-evil-elections/#respond Wed, 17 Apr 2024 17:50:54 +0000 https://znetwork.org/?post_type=znetarticle&p=1265164 One of the two major-party candidates for the presidency of the United States has allowed an decades-long ethnic cleansing to morph into a genocide, a horror that could be stopped with one phone call; has escalated the drilling of oil and gas despite the existential threat of global warming; forced railroad workers to swallow a [...]]]> https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/the-sad-spectacle-of-lesser-evil-elections/feed/ 0 https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/why-should-we-give-all-our-money-to-landlords/ https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/why-should-we-give-all-our-money-to-landlords/#respond Thu, 07 Mar 2024 16:56:00 +0000 https://znetwork.org/?post_type=znetarticle&p=1263279 Who decided we should give all our money to landlords? Did you vote for that? I didn’t. You didn’t, either. And if you have thoughts of leaving renting behind to buy, the costs of mortgages are, not surprisingly, rising dramatically as well. As far as I know, no landlord has been recorded as holding a [...]]]> https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/why-should-we-give-all-our-money-to-landlords/feed/ 0 https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/so-long-and-thanks-for-all-the-hamburgers/ https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/so-long-and-thanks-for-all-the-hamburgers/#respond Thu, 21 Dec 2023 16:52:00 +0000 https://znetwork.org/?post_type=znetarticle&p=1259587 It’s not true that humanity is committing suicide, as exemplified by the COP28 farce of a climate summit. The world’s industrialists and financiers are committing humanity to ecocide. More than ever, it’s easier to imagine the end of the world than the end of capitalism. Death by capitalism. That phrase has a certain catchy feeling [...]]]> https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/so-long-and-thanks-for-all-the-hamburgers/feed/ 0 https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/the-prioritization-of-human-health-development-and-self-activity-in-chavez-era-venezuela/ https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/the-prioritization-of-human-health-development-and-self-activity-in-chavez-era-venezuela/#respond Thu, 05 Oct 2023 15:54:00 +0000 https://znetwork.org/?post_type=znetarticle&p=1255314 The Bolivarian Revolution, led by Hugo Chávez until his death in 2013, has undergone multiple phases since President Chávez’s first election in 1999. Twenty years ago, a new form of social services, the mission, was created to bypass recalcitrant bureaucrats and to enable the participation of those receiving social services. Another initiative, the commune, was [...]]]> https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/the-prioritization-of-human-health-development-and-self-activity-in-chavez-era-venezuela/feed/ 0 https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/its-a-capitalist-world-no-country-on-earth-respects-labor-rights/ https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/its-a-capitalist-world-no-country-on-earth-respects-labor-rights/#respond Thu, 21 Sep 2023 15:55:00 +0000 https://znetwork.org/?post_type=znetarticle&p=1254483 Conditions for working people continue to get worse. The right to strike, or to join a union, is denied by increasing numbers of the world’s governments. The 2023 Global Rights Index report issued by the International Trade Union Confederation makes for grim reading, as has consistently been the case for the decade that the ITUC [...]]]> https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/its-a-capitalist-world-no-country-on-earth-respects-labor-rights/feed/ 0 https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/the-tragedy-of-allende-era-chile-a-strong-start-countered-by-imperialist-assault/ https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/the-tragedy-of-allende-era-chile-a-strong-start-countered-by-imperialist-assault/#respond Wed, 06 Sep 2023 16:00:00 +0000 https://znetwork.org/?post_type=znetarticle&p=1253425 The 50th anniversary of the first 9/11 — the military coup that overthrew the democratically elected government government headed by Socialist Party leader Salvador Allende — is this month. Chilean working people made enormous advances during the first year of the Allende government, formally a multiparty coalition known as Popular Unity, before Chilean capitalists, U.S. [...]]]> https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/the-tragedy-of-allende-era-chile-a-strong-start-countered-by-imperialist-assault/feed/ 0 https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/the-worlds-food-system-brings-us-inflation-hunger-and-waste/ https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/the-worlds-food-system-brings-us-inflation-hunger-and-waste/#respond Mon, 14 Aug 2023 15:34:35 +0000 https://znetwork.org/?post_type=znetarticle&p=1251966 Market fundamentalists would have us believe that if only we left the provisioning of all human needs to the tender mercies of unregulated markets, a cornucopia of fabulous wealth would trickle down to all. A powerful fire hose of propaganda ceaselessly proclaims this, amply funded by those whose interest lie in accumulating unlimited wealth without [...]]]> https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/the-worlds-food-system-brings-us-inflation-hunger-and-waste/feed/ 0 https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/grasping-dependency-and-under-development-as-structural-not-simply-a-product-of-force/ https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/grasping-dependency-and-under-development-as-structural-not-simply-a-product-of-force/#respond Thu, 04 May 2023 15:50:00 +0000 https://znetwork.org/?post_type=znetarticle&p=1245559 That some regions have to remain undeveloped so that others can develop has long been one of the obvious realities of capitalism. This is another way of pointing out that massive poverty across the Global South is not the result of some local insufficiency but rather due to the functioning of imperialism, the ongoing effects [...]]]> https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/grasping-dependency-and-under-development-as-structural-not-simply-a-product-of-force/feed/ 0 https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/call-it-whitewashing-or-greenwashing-world-bank-subterfuge-doesnt-fool-us/ https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/call-it-whitewashing-or-greenwashing-world-bank-subterfuge-doesnt-fool-us/#respond Thu, 02 Feb 2023 13:28:00 +0000 https://znetwork.org/?post_type=znetarticle&p=1238487 Every so often, the World Bank puts out a paper that calls for better social protection or at least a somewhat better deal for working people. The public relations people there evidently believe we have very short memories. No, dear reader, the World Bank has not changed its function, nor have elephants begun to fly. [...]]]> https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/call-it-whitewashing-or-greenwashing-world-bank-subterfuge-doesnt-fool-us/feed/ 0 https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/central-banks-are-a-symptom-capitalism-is-the-cause/ https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/central-banks-are-a-symptom-capitalism-is-the-cause/#respond Thu, 05 Jan 2023 16:33:58 +0000 https://znetwork.org/?post_type=znetarticle&p=1236303 Wishing for central banks to act in the interest of working people rather than the financial industry is about as fruitful as hoping a starving wolf won’t eat the chicken that was just placed next to it. Pigs will fly, the Amazon will freeze over and Wall Street will give all its money away before [...]]]> https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/central-banks-are-a-symptom-capitalism-is-the-cause/feed/ 0 https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/its-a-clean-sweep-not-one-country-guarantees-workers-rights/ https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/its-a-clean-sweep-not-one-country-guarantees-workers-rights/#respond Thu, 13 Oct 2022 13:42:35 +0000 https://znetwork.org/?post_type=znetarticle&p=1222782 There is no respite from class warfare. Past annual Global Rights Index reports issued by the International Trade Union Confederation have invariably shown that there is no country on Earth that fully protects workers’ rights and the 2022 edition is not only not an exception but finds that repression of labor organizing is increasing. The [...]]]> https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/its-a-clean-sweep-not-one-country-guarantees-workers-rights/feed/ 0 https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/we-have-no-cheering-interests-when-two-oligarchic-right-wing-governments-fight/ https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/we-have-no-cheering-interests-when-two-oligarchic-right-wing-governments-fight/#respond Wed, 27 Jul 2022 20:47:00 +0000 https://znetwork.org/?post_type=znetarticle&p=1199745 It is bewildering to see the Russia/Ukraine war be reduced to a cheering contest, as if a football game were being watched. For those along much of the political spectrum, this cheering for “our side” is not a surprise given the well-oiled propaganda apparatus that constitutes most of the corporate media. But many on the [...]]]> https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/we-have-no-cheering-interests-when-two-oligarchic-right-wing-governments-fight/feed/ 0 https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/banks-fueling-global-warming-is-business-as-usual/ https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/banks-fueling-global-warming-is-business-as-usual/#respond Thu, 28 Apr 2022 11:00:06 +0000 https://zcomm.org/?post_type=znetarticle&p=1057644 https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/banks-fueling-global-warming-is-business-as-usual/feed/ 0 https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/corporate-greed-keeps-the-pandemic-alive/ https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/corporate-greed-keeps-the-pandemic-alive/#respond Wed, 13 Apr 2022 11:40:34 +0000 https://zcomm.org/?post_type=znetarticle&p=1057137 https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/corporate-greed-keeps-the-pandemic-alive/feed/ 0 https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/theres-no-money-then-how-can-there-be-10-trillion-for-financiers-in-two-years/ https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/theres-no-money-then-how-can-there-be-10-trillion-for-financiers-in-two-years/#respond Wed, 16 Feb 2022 12:39:44 +0000 https://zcomm.org/?post_type=znetarticle&p=1055045 https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/theres-no-money-then-how-can-there-be-10-trillion-for-financiers-in-two-years/feed/ 0