“Post WWII planning recognized that control of the incomparable energy reserves of the Middle East would yield “substantial control of the world,” in the words of the influential Roosevelt advisor A.A. Berle. Correspondingly, that loss of control would threaten the project of global dominance that was clearly articulated during World War II and has been sustained in the face of major changes in world order ever since.” — Noam Chomsky https://chomsky.info/20110824/“

This quote sets the stage to the work Peace House addresses in advocating for economic justice.
We maintain that for peace to prevail, justice must be present to uphold it.

Consider U.S. government endeavors to control the world, both here and abroad include the following:

• War and regime change
  • The overthrow of nations/regions (covert actions ¹, direct bombing, human rights violations – loss of life and suffering of horrendous magnitude)
  • The taking of resources, most notably, oil². (We need to be reducing fossil fuels and converting to sustainable energy to reduce global warming which is past critical levels of 350 ppm³).
• Outsourcing ⁴ to other countries
  • The economic exploitation and human rights violations of workers, here⁵ and abroad⁶, including pennies for labor and forced labor.
  • The severe unemployment⁷ created with entire industries being transferred from the U.S.
  • The continued support of destructive trade deals. (NAFTA accelerated labor exploitation while eliminating thousands of factories and millions of jobs in the U.S.  We oppose these trade deals, including the most recent one.  The Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP), known as “NAFTA on steroids”) involves 11 counties and extends global control by multinational corporations. suing process against any country that interferes with its profits (superseding U.S. law and our national sovereignty). It will do this via “Investor State Dispute Settlement” (ISDS) tribunal courts which decide on suits brought by multination corporations against countries, superseding a nations’ laws and sovereignty. Read more about TPP and the billion dollar lawsuits presently brought against the U.S. under NAFTA.

Meanwhile in the U.S., we see the effects of the economic mismanagement of our tax dollars:

• Inordinate military spending
• The subsidization of corporations along with low to zero taxation and/or offshoring of assets
• The cuts in vital services to the truly needy (our elderly, disabled, disadvantaged families, working poor)
• The absence of viable works program to transition from fossil fuels to sustainable clean energy, or to build our infrastructure that would provide jobs even as FDR provided such to bring our nation out of The Great Depression
• The lack of a living wage (to provide adequate food, shelter)
• A broken health care system that still siphons money to insurance and pharmaceutical/biotech companies while increasing premiums and deductibles to where many citizens cannot afford access to care and necessary medicines. We support a single payer universal health care in Oregon (expanded Medicare) serving all equally.

Ultimately in looking for a major causal root of these things, in simplest terms, power is either shared or decided by economics (money buys inordinate power if unregulated).  When we see the bulk of money (and, therefore, power) being held by a fractional few (see The U.S. Wealth Pie and How It Slices Up), we also see that the majority of people are in a steady downward decline into becoming ‘Have Nots” both in terms of money and power.

Peace House feeds those in need including many seniors having to choose between paying their rent, utilities, and medicines, or buying food. Too many of our elders are suffering under this deplorable and unacceptable fact of economic injustice. It is equally unacceptable that our society and government is turning a blind eye to the families we help feed whose parents cannot find work – the jobs are simply not there. Also ignored are the working poor (managing multiple part time jobs without benefits and still not able to make ends meet), and veterans who are living on the street.

As Peace House educates the public on the state of affairs that causes economic injustice, we seek to address any issue that destabilizes peace, such as gun violence (see Vision Quilt, sponsored by Peace House), concerns regarding human dignity, rights, or social injustice.  We hope to inspire your interest in becoming more involved in direct volunteering at Uncle Food’s Diner, donating, signing letters of petition (see our right side column on any page), and other actions you can take.  Sign up to receive our quarterly newsletter and biweekly email send of Peace House Calendar of Events (covers peace and justice oriented activities by diverse organizations in the Rogue Valley). Please visit our Facebook page as well as review the legislative work that Peace House actively supports.

Thank you for caring about injustice and being willing to ‘do one small thing’ against it – it adds up to make the change we are all seeking when we together share in the responsibility of making peace possible by eradicating injustice of any form.

Sources:

1. Covert United States foreign Regime change actions – Republished from Wikipedia

2. Why the war in Iraq was fought for Big Oil – By Antonia Juhasz, Special to CNN

3. “If humanity wishes to preserve a planet similar to that on which civilization developed and to which life on Earth is adapted, paleoclimate evidence and ongoing climate change suggest that CO₂ will need to be reduced from its current 385 ppm to at most 350 ppm.” – Dr. James Hansen

4. “The Offshore Outsourcing of American Jobs: A Greater Threat Than Terrorism” – Dr. Paul Craig  Roberts was Assistant Secretary of the Treasury in the Reagan administration. His latest book, “How The Economy Was Lost,” has just been published by CounterPunch/AK Press.

5. Human Rights and Workers’ Rights in the United States – Lance A. Compa, Cornell University, lac24@cornell.edu

6. “Human rights violations in labor outsourcing” – published by Politifact
7. “Outsourcing also increases U.S. unemployment. The 14 million outsourced jobs are nearly double the 7.9 million unemployed in the United States. If all those jobs returned, it would be enough to also hire the 8 million who are working part-time but would become full-time positions. That assumes the jobs could, in fact, return to the United States. Many foreign employees are hired to help with local marketing, contacts, and language. It also assumes the unemployed here have the skills needed for those positions” – How Outsourcing Jobs Affects the U.S. Economy: 7 Things You Should Know About Outsourcing