Looming Recession Threatens US Political and Economic System

Capitalism’s Long, Hot Inflationary Summer, Korean Truckers End Strike After Deal With Govt., Heatwave Highlights Climate Change Impacts

In this episode of By Any Means Necessary, hosts Sean Blackmon and Jacquie Luqman are joined by Dr. Jack Rasmus, economist, radio show host, & author of 'The Scourge of Neoliberalism' to discuss the Federal Reserve’s unprecedented interest rate hike by 0.75% and what effects this will have on inflation, why outside economic factors like sanctions imposed by the US and the EU on Russia and corporations keeping energy supplies low cast doubt on the Fed’s ability to address the root of the inflation crisis, the prospect of a global recession as a result of the Fed’s focus on lowering consumer demand and the danger of stagflation, and the inaction from the Biden administration and the Democrats that will ultimately spell doom for their electoral aspirations in the upcoming midterm elections.

In the second segment, Sean and Jacquie are joined by Erica Jung, member of Nodutdol for Korean Community Development to discuss a recent strike by unionized truckers in South Korea over minimum payment and fuel subsidies and whether the promises made by the government in negotiated end to the strike will be honored, how recently inaugurated south Korean President Yoon Seok-Youl’s administration responded to the strike and what his administration’s relationship with labor might look like, and the history of neoliberalism in south Korea and the US support for right-wing policies in the country, and what the future looks like for the growing labor movement after this strike and a general strike led by the Korean Confederation of Trade Unions in October.

In the third segment, Sean and Jacquie are joined by Brianna Griffith, journalist with Liberation News to discuss a brutal heat wave causing record electricity demand in the state of Texas and crumbling infrastructure that left over 100,000 people without water in Odessa, Texas, how renewable energy is stepping up to save Texas from a repeat from the blackouts during winter storm Uri that killed Texans, how environmental racism exacerbates the dangerous effects of this heat wave for working class Black and Brown communities, and the need for a full spectrum struggle to fight for public ownership of utilities and real efforts at mitigation of the already locked-in impacts of climate change.

Later in the show, Sean and Jacquie are joined by Jon Jeter, award-winning journalist and foreign correspondent, radio and television producer, Bluesologist and Decolonizer, and author of the book “Flat Broke in the Free Market: How Globalization Fleeced Working People” to discuss the growing fears of another stagflationary crisis and what such a crisis will mean for poor and working people and the future of the US political and economic system, why the Democrats don’t present a viable solution to what increasingly looks like a collapse in the US political system, and the death cult that grips the US through indoctrination and how it delegitimizes resistance to US imperialism.

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