Sadly, I do not know the specific year that this was true, but it doesn't really matter because it has been like this for a long time
/jd
re: Impeachment
Liberals have the law, Conservatives have the guns.
/jd
2018.09.17 LinkBlog
#ListeningTo
/jd
The Anarchists Who Ignited Occupy Wall Street Seven Years Ago Are Now Calling For
#OCCUPYSILICONVALLEY
‘…On Monday, September 17th, millions of people around the world, in millions of different ways, will unleash a one-day flood of memes, posts, pranks, tweets, and statuses—each of them overflowing with everything Silicon Valley wants to keep offline…’
http://abillionpeople.org/osv-press-release.html
What is Orientalism? Here's one pervasive but unobvious example...
/jd
Forging Islamic science
‘…These contemporary images are in fact not ‘reproductions’ but ‘productions’ and even fakes – made to appeal to a contemporary audience by claiming to depict the science of a distant Islamic past.
From Istanbul’s tourist shops, these works have ventured far afield. They have have found their way into conference posters, education websites, and museum and library collections. The problem goes beyond gullible tourists and the occasional academic being duped: many of those who study and publicly present the history of Islamic science have committed themselves to a similar sort of fakery. There now exist entire museums filled with reimagined objects, fashioned in the past 20 years but intended to represent the venerable scientific traditions of the Islamic world…’
https://aeon.co/essays/why-fake-miniatures-depicting-islamic-science-are-everywhere
Capital will be capital
/jd
‘…Ten days after Nike announced that Colin Kaepernick would be the face of its “Just Do It” 30th anniversary ad campaign, the sports apparel behemoth’s stock price closed at an all-time high on Thursday at $83.47, according to a report from Bloomberg…’
https://www.dailykos.com/stories/2018/9/15/1795753/-What-Was-Nike-Thinking
Historical nonsense underpins UK’s Brexit floundering
From Hastings to Dunkirk a past that blinds Britain to reality has been peddled
By Christopher Kissane
‘…In the British mind, that history remains centred on the second World War, the ‘darkest’ and ‘finest’ hour in which Britain imagines it stood alone in defiance of Nazism, not as a global imperialist allied to emerging superpowers.
[….] From the beginning of the European project, British opposition has rested on Powell’s assertion that the defining feature of Britain – “and above all of England” – is its “separateness from the history of continental Europe”.
[….] Superiority, antagonism and a fear of betrayal are not healthy historical lessons; instead they encourage Britain’s worst tendencies…’
https://www.irishtimes.com/opinion/historical-nonsense-underpins-uk-s-brexit-floundering-1.3630936
War is a racket, and the endless war means endless cash – but not for the Afghans.
/jd
Pentagon says war in Afghanistan costs taxpayers $45 billion per year
‘…the $45 billion total for the year includes $5 billion for Afghan forces and $13 billion for U.S. forces inside Afghanistan. Much of the rest is for logistical support. Some $780 million goes toward economic aid.
The costs now are still significantly lower than during the high point of the war in Afghanistan. From 2010 to 2012, when the U.S. had as many as 100,000 soldiers in the country, the price for American taxpayers surpassed $100 billion each year. There are currently around 16,000 U.S. troops in Afghanistan.
[….] “Why do the Taliban want a political settlement? They now control more territory than they did since 2001,” Democratic Sen. Jeff Merkley of Oregon said…’
https://www.pbs.org/newshour/politics/pentagon-says-afghan-war-costs-taxpayers-45-billion-per-year
Alternative museum tours explore colonial loot, biased narratives
‘…”It is no longer possible for Britain to present itself as a world power, and people aren’t willing to pretend any more,” says Procter. “They are interested in the stories that aren’t being told.”
Admiral Nelson’s lifelong opposition to the abolition movement, the English Crown’s financial involvement with slavery and the lack of evidence to support lurid tales of cannibalism all come as a bit of a shock.
“Museums provide almost a Trojan horse type of space to confront the official narratives we’re told,” says Procter, who started the tours in 2013.
“I started them out of a sense of frustration over the lack of self-awareness that white British people have over their pasts and history – and that lack of attention is part of the shadow of white supremacy and racism that’s hanging over our heads right now.”…’
The Corporate Media finally gets it – post-Obama.
/jd
https://www.facebook.com/time/photos/a.470156966490/10156010810521491
White People.
Slaves taken from regions of Africa
Source: https://www.reddit.com/r/MapPorn/comments/9g5how/slaves_taken_from_regions_of_africa_1229_x_869/
Michael Bloomberg for President?
Whether it be Hillary, Trump or Bloomberg, or even Sanders, certainly what #Murica wants most is someone from NYC to fight the elites.
/jd
#FYI, sometimes the NYT prints the truth.
/jd
‘…The United States controls roughly 800 military bases in dozens of countries around the world. This is far more than any other power. The United States also spends more on its military than China, Russia, Saudi Arabia, India, France, Britain and Japan combined. American Special Operations forces were deployed to 149 countries as of last year…’
https://www.nytimes.com/2018/09/17/opinion/democratic-party-cortez-foreign-policy.html
Where in the World Is the U.S. Military? (2015)
‘…By my calculation, maintaining bases and troops overseas cost $85 to $100 billion in fiscal year 2014; the total with bases and troops in warzones is $160 to $200 billion.
These costs have heightened debate over whether the United States needs so many bases abroad: What effect do they have around the world, and are they really making us safer?
The first step is looking at where U.S. bases are, and where they’re most prevalent. For my forthcoming book, Base Nation, I compiled a near-comprehensive list of overseas U.S. bases, including smaller cooperative security locations (“lily pads”) and suspected but unconfirmed sites (“unconfirmed lily pads”).
Mapped all together, this data, which comes from the Pentagon’s annual Base Structure Report and additional government, news or academic sources, helps to show just how far America’s reach is…’
https://www.politico.com/magazine/story/2015/06/us-military-bases-around-the-world-119321
2018.09.16 LinkBlog
Massachusetts police tweet lets slip scale of leftwing surveillance
Massachusetts state police posted to Twitter a map of responses to fires and explosions.
[….] It was an image of a computer monitor, showing locations of 39 incidents as confirmed “by MSP Watch Center”, and it included a vital message: “Reminder: all residents of Lawrence/Andover/N[orth] Andover who have Columbia Gas must evacuate, as should anyone else who smells gas.”
But the image also showed something else: a bookmarks bar at the top of the browser window which listed several leftwing groups.
The bookmarks included a Facebook group for Mass Action Against Police Brutality (MAAPB); the Coalition to Organize and Mobilize Boston Against Trump (Combat); Facebook 413; Facebook MA Activism; and Resistance Calendar, which notes timings for canvassing for Democratic or progressive candidates and anti-Trump rallies.
Tom Arabia, a co-founder of Combat, said: “No one can deny the Massachusetts state police are surveilling leftwing organizations.”
He added that the image on the state police tweet “was both unsurprising and also a bit scary, because of how intimate it is in a sense to see your own organization listed in a police browser’s bookmarks”…’
Why Fascists Never Think They’re Fascists — but Victims and Heroes
– The Psychology of Neo Fascism
by umair haque
‘…Fascists never think they are fascists. A fascist never thinks of himself or herself as a “fascist”, anything at all carrying a negative or malicious connotation. They think of themselves, first, as victims. Victims of great and grand conspiracies — the Jews, the Muslims, the Mexicans. Those behind these conspiracies are not regular people — they are especially cunning and vicious especially greedy and unscrupulous, especially seditious and slothful, especially bad. They are especially powerful, in other words. They have the power to completely destroy the way of the life, the whole existence, of the person being victimized…’
https://eand.co/the-psychology-of-american-fascism-eff731c53f61
Afghan father who sought refuge in UK ‘shot dead by Taliban’ after being deported by Home Office
Exclusive: Zainadin Fazlie, father of four British-born children, forced to return to Afghanistan after 16 years in UK despite threats to his life – and killed two years later
‘…Mr Fazlie arrived to the UK in 2000 after the Taliban gained control of his home town in Maidan Wardak province. He was granted indefinite leave to remain and had four children now aged 16, 13, six and three.
He was issued a deportation notice in 2015 after recieving an eight-week suspended sentence for a violent offence. Due to a recent change in the law, he was unable to exercise his right to appeal in the UK and was removed to Afghanistan in April 2016…’
the key word here is systematic.
/jd
France admits systematic torture during Algeria war for first time
‘…Macron’s office said he would detail a system of arrest and detention legally put in place by parliament and decree in the late 1950s that allowed forces to hold and interrogate suspects, leading to “acts that were sometimes terrible, including torture.”
Macron will announce that archives will be fully opened up to historians, families and organisations seeking the truth about the large number of disappeared civilians and soldiers, both French and Algerian, whose bodies have never been found.
During the 1954-62 war, which claimed 1.5 million Algerian lives, French forces brutally cracked down on independence fighters in the then colony, which was ruled by Paris for 130 years…’
VIDEO: Poland is pushing the EU into crisis
‘Poland’s far-right party is subverting democracy, and setting the country on a collision course with the EU.
Poland is changing. In 2015, the far-right Law and Justice party, or PiS, won both the presidential election and a slim parliamentary majority. Since then, they’ve been working to cement their power by firing judges, purging the military and civil service, and cracking down on protesters and the media. All of this has put the country on a collision course with the European Union that could threaten Europe’s hard-won peace and prosperity following centuries of conflict.
To truly understand the international conflicts and trends shaping our world you need a big-picture view. Video journalists Sam Ellis and Liz Scheltens use maps to tell the story and chart their effects on foreign policy.’
Does this explain John Bolton's crazy attack on the ICC? Probably.
/jd
An International Court Is Investigating the U.S. and U.K’s Mass Expulsion of Indigenous Islanders
– Long ignored by the media, the people of Chagos struggle relentlessly to reclaim islands that the U.S. and U.K. stole for a military base.
‘For the first time, this month, the International Court of Justice (ICJ) is examining the deportation of the Chagossians and Britain’s 1965 decision to separate the people’s Chagos Archipelago from colonial Mauritius in preparation for the expulsion. The case could have significant implications for the U.S. military, for Mauritius, which is challenging U.K. sovereignty over the British Empire’s last-created colony, as well as for this long-ignored group of refugees.
[….] The price tag of this secret negotiation cost the U.S. government $14 million to relocate the Chagossians to Mauritius and the Seychelles. The two governments withheld the Chagossians’ expulsion from Congress, Parliament, the U.N., and the media.
[….] After 50 years of protests, strikes, and legal battles, some Chagossians have only received: negligible and inadequate compensation, short trips to restore the cemetery where their loved ones rest, and repeated dismissals in court proceedings….’
Ellis Island´s immigrant statistics by ethnicity 1899-1931
https://www.facebook.com/photo.php?fbid=1758837204229152&set=a.112063842239838&type=3&theater
Where are the congressional hearings on Puerto Rico?
watch the Video… https://www.msnbc.com/all-in/watch/where-are-the-congressional-hearings-on-puerto-rico-1320087619657
Reading Trump's twitter is increasingly like reading the paranoid rantings of a holocaust denier :-/
/jd
https://twitter.com/realDonaldTrump/status/1040217897703026689
2018.09.13 LinkBlog
Earliest known drawing found on rock in South African cave
Researchers believe the pattern on the fragment of rock is 73,000 years old, but are perplexed as to what it might represent
‘…It lacks the grace of Da Vinci and has none of the warmth of Rubens, but the criss-crossed pattern on the chunk of rock is remarkable all the same. According to researchers who unearthed the piece, it is the earliest known drawing in the world.
Archaeologists found the marked stone fragment as they sifted through spear points and other material excavated at Blombos cave in South Africa. It has taken seven years of tests to conclude that a human made the lines with an ochre crayon 73,000 years ago.
The simple red marks adorn a flake the size of two thumbnails which appears to have broken off a grindstone cobble used to turn lumps of ochre into paint powder. The lines end so abruptly at the fragment’s edges that researchers believe the cross-hatches were originally part of a larger design drawn on the cobble.
“This is first known drawing in human history,” said Francesco d’Errico, a researcher on the team at the University of Bordeaux. “What does it mean? I don’t know. What I do know is that what can look very abstract to us could mean something to the people in the traditional society who produced it.”…’
How Viktor Orban Bends Hungarian Society to His Will (March 27, 2018)
‘…Even school textbooks.
On Page 155 of the latest eighth-grade history textbook, students are told that Mr. Orban thinks refugees are a threat to Hungary — and then encouraged to believe he is right. “It can be problematic,” the book concludes, “for different cultures to coexist.”
It is a testament to the scope of Mr. Orban’s program for remaking Hungary that part of the far-right leader’s message is now woven into the school curriculum…’
https://www.nytimes.com/2018/03/27/world/europe/viktor-orban-hungary.html
The refugee Dalai Lama who escaped to India from Chinese troops says refugees in Europe should go home (eventually)
– this is actually consistent with what he and his movement has said for a long time. But do not expect any kind of advocacy of multiculturalism or universalist humanist principled from him. I wonder if he is even aware how this statement will be interpreted by Euro-Nazis who regularly threaten and attack refugees in Europe?
/jd
‘…The Tibetan spiritual leader, the Dalai Lama, said Wednesday that “Europe belongs to the Europeans” and that refugees should return to their native countries to rebuild them.
Speaking at a conference in Sweden’s third-largest city of Malmo, home to a large immigrant population, the Dalai Lama — who won the Nobel Peace Prize in 1989 — said Europe was “morally responsible” for helping “a refugee really facing danger against their life”.
“Receive them, help them, educate them… but ultimately they should develop their own country,” said the 83-year-old Tibetan who fled the capital Lhasa in fear of his life after China poured troops into the region to crush an uprising.
“I think Europe belongs to the Europeans,” he said, adding they should make clear to refugees that “they ultimately should rebuild their own country”…’
https://www.france24.com/en/20180912-dalai-lama-says-europe-belongs-europeans
Trump’s National Security Advisor Michael Flynn to Speak Along Side Far-Right Parties Linked to Current Neo-Nazi Rallies In Germany
‘…While the [USA] Centrist and DNC aligned media has by and large pronounced the various neo-Nazi and white nationalist factions within the Alt-Right to be dead in the water, at the same time, in just the past month a member of DHS, a writer at the Daily Caller, and a Trump speech writer were all fired for their connections to white nationalists and the Alt-Right…’
The Big Hole in Germany’s Nazi Reckoning? Its Colonial History
‘…Running from 1884 to 1918, that colonial history was relatively short, compared with that of other European countries, but still scarring. German colonizers killed tens of thousands during their reign over all or part of modern-day Ghana, Togo, Cameroon, Rwanda, Burundi, Tanzania and Namibia.
Street signs and other memorials honoring German colonizers still remain scattered throughout the country. Only a smattering of colonial history is taught in German schools. The government has not apologized for the nation’s colonial crimes, and it only recently started referring to the killings as genocide.
[….] Berlin officials agreed a couple of months ago to rename Petersallee and two other streets honoring German colonizers, much to the delight of activists who have spent years lobbying for the changes. The streets will be named after African resistance fighters…’
https://www.nytimes.com/2018/09/11/world/europe/germany-colonial-history-africa-nazi.html
Are your memes Article 13 compliant?
Never forget that he was a born-again christian conservative Dem when he ran in 1976 – it was right wing media that morphed him into a liberal in the propagandized American mind.
/jd
Jimmy Carter warns Democrats: Don’t veer too far left, scare off moderates
‘…”Independents need to know they can invest their vote in the Democratic Party,” Carter said Tuesday during his annual report at his post-presidential center and library in Atlanta, where he offered caution about the political consequences should Democrats “move to a very liberal program, like universal health care.”
That’s delicate — and, Carter acknowledged, even contradictory — advice coming from the 93-year-old former president, and it underscores the complicated political calculations for Democrats as they prepare for the November midterms and look ahead to the 2020 presidential election.
“Rosie and I voted for Bernie Sanders in the past,” Carter noted…’
Taking away American passports and citizenship is a precursor to genocide.
‘…It’s what happened to Jews in Germany in 1938 when their passports were declared invalid. That is what is beginning to happen here, now, to Hispanic citizens along the U.S.-Mexico border. [….]
Hispanic U.S. citizens, some of whom were in the U.S. military, are not being allowed to renew their passports. This is reportedly happening to “hundreds, even thousands” of Latinos, according to a report in the Washington Post. They’re getting letters from the State Department saying it does not believe they are citizens. The government claims their citizenships are fraudulent. “I’ve had probably 20 people who have been sent to the detention center—U.S. citizens,” Jaime Diez, an attorney in Brownsville, told The Washington Post.
The Washington Post also reports on ICE officials coming to citizens’ homes and taking their passports away. This is an escalation from a few months ago, when Americans were detained by ICE officials just for speaking Spanish to one another…’
America doesn’t know how to escalate itself – and then thinks the solution is more guns and more cops, which then leads to more guns and more cops…
/jd
‘…According to the ACLU, schools nationally reported 27,000 sworn law enforcement officers, but only 23,000 social workers…’
https://gritpost.com/schools-guards-social-workers/
Oh FFS #Murica, WTF
/jd
‘North Carolina is bracing for the climate change-supercharged storm six years after passing legislation prohibiting state and local agencies from making planning decisions based on the latest climate science about sea level rise. Now the state is facing the threat of a life-threatening storm surge, which could cause billions of dollars in damage.’
‘The European Court of Human Rights (ECtHR) today ruled that the UK’s mass interception programmes have breached the European Convention on Human Rights.
The Court found that the UK’s mass surveillance programmes, revealed by NSA whistleblower Edward Snowden, did ‘not meet the “quality of law” requirement’ and were ‘incapable of keeping the “interference” to what is “necessary in a democratic society”’…’
2018.09.11 LinkBlog
#WTF is it really true that 70% of people in USA prisons have NOT been convicted of a crime but can’t pay the bail?
/jd
Innocent until proven guilty? 70% of people in prison have NOT been convicted of a crime but can’t pay the bail. Why did #KaliefBrowder spend 3 years in jail for a crime he didn't commit? Why does freedom have a price tag? #EndCashBail & follow @playercoalition pic.twitter.com/9rUccNMlDg
— Malcolm Jenkins (@MalcolmJenkins) September 11, 2018
Endless wars are good for someone, but who?
/jd
The US has spent $1.5 trillion on war since Sept 11 attacks
‘…The collective wars in Afghanistan, Iraq and Syria have cost U.S. taxpayers more than $1.5 trillion since Sept. 11, 2001, according to a Defense Department report [….] Currently there are approximately 14,000 Americans in Afghanistan…’
This is the kind of insanity that only John Bolton could conjure up
/jd
US threatens to arrest ICC judges if they pursue Americans for Afghan war crimes
‘…The United States threatened Monday to arrest and sanction judges and other officials of the International Criminal Court if it moves to charge any American who served in Afghanistan with war crimes.
White House National Security Advisor John Bolton called the Hague-based rights body “unaccountable” and “outright dangerous” to the United States, Israel and other allies, and said any probe of US service members would be “an utterly unfounded, unjustifiable investigation.”“If the court comes after us, Israel or other US allies, we will not sit quietly,” Bolton said.
He said the US was prepared to slap financial sanctions and criminal charges on officials of the court if they proceed against any Americans.
“We will ban its judges and prosecutors from entering the United States. We will sanction their funds in the US financial system, and we will prosecute them in the US criminal system,” he said.
“We will do the same for any company or state that assists an ICC investigation of Americans,” he said…’
EU, founded as project of peace, plans military future
‘…After decades of the EU viewing itself as a peace initiative and seeing defense as a matter of national sovereignty (made all the less urgent thanks to the EU’s existence) there is still no consensus on how to create, organize or wield joint military power. Few are eager to turn over authority to Brussels.
In Germany, under fire from U.S. President Donald Trump over military spending, there is renewed debate about becoming a nuclear power. In France, President Emmanuel Macron, citing a worrisome lack of joint EU military planning, has called for “a common intervention force, a common defense budget and a common doctrine for action.”
In the U.K., security cooperation is a cornerstone of Prime Minister Theresa May’s proposed post-Brexit relationship with the EU — one of few British demands that has won unvarnished praise in the rest of the EU.
[….] Some EU countries have shown a willingness to go their own way. Poland, for instance, asked the Trump administration to establish a new military base on its territory — a unilateral request that was not discussed in advance either among EU partners or NATO allies — and that some other European countries fear could unnecessarily provoke Russia…’
Trump $10 million from FEMA’s budget kidnap children and jail parents
‘….The Trump administration took nearly $10 million from the Federal Emergency Management Agency’s budget this summer to help boost U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement, according to budget documents [….] The nearly $10 million was taken from various places within FEMA, including training, preparedness and protection, and response and recovery operations…’
Today is Leonard Peltier’s 74th Birthday Today❤????
Sadly, he still in prison after 43 years????
GET INVOLVED ????❤????????
Please Share Everywhere????
http://Whoisleonardpeltier.info
Susan Sontag in the New Yorker writes just after after 9/11 2001
/jd
click to read more comments on Twitter…
from the Sept 24 2001 issue of the New Yorker: https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2001/09/24/tuesday-and-after-talk-of-the-town
The Obamas are the 1%
‘…On April 15, 2016, Obama released his 2015 tax returns, which showed that he and his wife filed jointly and reported an adjusted gross income of $436,065. They paid $81,472 in taxes according to their 18.7 percent tax rate. They also donated a total of $64,066 to more than 30 charities.
[….] The power couple’s storytelling has already proven lucrative as their most recent book deal with Penguin Random House, for example, is worth up to $65 million, according to NBC News…’
https://www.gobankingrates.com/net-worth/politicians/barack-obama-net-worth/
via R. Crumb facebook group: https://www.facebook.com/groups/rcrumb
John Feffer asks WHY?...
/jd
Anonymous And Trumpism Without Trump
‘..I’ll support Anonymous just like I support the Colin Kaepernick ads despite Nike’s failure to pay livable wages to its workers. Sometimes you have to praise the action and ignore the actor.
But the question remains: why did Anonymous do it?
[….] I think it’s part of an effort within the Republican Party that will gain strength over the next two years: to build a movement of Trumpism without Trump.
[….] So, I’ll certainly join hands with Anonymous to rid America of its present danger. But let’s not kid ourselves about the future danger that Anonymous wants instead.’
https://lobelog.com/anonymous-and-trumpism-without-trump/
2018.09.11 LinkBlog #911
911 day. the day american foreign policy went off the rails.
/jd
my photos from my photoblog
/jd
Sept 11th 1973
‘…Suppose that on 9-11 the planes had bombed the White House. Suppose they’d killed the president, established a military dictatorship, quickly killed thousands, tortured ten of thousands more, set up a major international terror center that was carrying out assassinations, overthrowing goverments all over the place, installing other dictatorships, and drove the country into one of the worst depressions in its history and had to call on the state to bail them out. Suppose that had happened? It did happen. On the first 9-11 in 1973. Except we were responsible for it so it didn’t happen. That´s Allende’s Chile. You can’t imagine the media talking about this…’
– Noam Chomsky on the Pinochet coup. .
17 years today people started believing in a lot of bullshit on teh internets.
/jd
And continuing on the topic of conspiracy theories, why do not people dwell obsessively on this real issue?? I have never even read of ChemTrails being blamed for this. Why is it that people are entranced by 911 bullshit, but do not see much worse things on the immediate horizon?
/jd
‘…A strange thing has happened to men over the past few decades: We’ve become increasingly infertile, so much so that within a generation we may lose the ability to reproduce entirely. What’s causing this mysterious drop in sperm counts—and is there any way to reverse it before it’s too late?
[….] The results, when they came in, were clear. Not only were sperm counts per milliliter of semen down by more than 50 percent since 1973, but total sperm counts were down by almost 60 percent: We are producing less semen, and that semen has fewer sperm cells in it. This time around, even scientists who had been skeptical of past analyses had to admit that the study was all but unassailable. Jørgensen, in Copenhagen, told me that when he saw the results, he’d said aloud, “No, it cannot be true.” He had expected to see a past decline and then a leveling off. But he couldn’t argue when the team ran the numbers again and again. The downward slope was unwavering…’
https://www.gq.com/story/sperm-count-zero
Conjuring Up the Next Depression
Chris Hedges writes..
‘During the financial crisis of 2008, the world’s central banks, including the Federal Reserve, injected trillions of dollars of fabricated money into the global financial system. This fabricated money has created a worldwide debt of $325 trillion, more than three times global GDP. The fabricated money was hoarded by banks and corporations, loaned by banks at predatory interest rates, used to service interest on unpayable debt or spent buying back stock, providing millions in compensation for elites.
The fabricated money was not invested in the real economy. Products were not manufactured and sold. Workers were not reinstated into the middle class with sustainable incomes, benefits and pensions. Infrastructure projects were not undertaken. The fabricated money reinflated massive financial bubbles built on debt and papered over a fatally diseased financial system destined for collapse.
What will trigger the next crash? The $13.2 trillion in unsustainable U.S. household debt? The $1.5 trillion in unsustainable student debt? The billions Wall Street has invested in a fracking industry that has spent $280 billion more than it generated from its operations? Who knows. What is certain is that a global financial crash, one that will dwarf the meltdown of 2008, is inevitable. And this time, with interest rates near zero, the elites have no escape plan…’
https://www.truthdig.com/articles/conjuring-up-the-next-depression/
These Are the 3 Pernicious Forces Protecting Trump from Impeachment
Here’s why Trump continues to survive all the scandals and crises of his administration.
By J.M. Opal
• The tycoons
• The chosen people
• The real estate mogul unites the right[….] Individually, these groups cannot win elections…’
Bell Burnell: Physics star gives away £2.3m prize
‘One of the UK’s leading female astronomers is to donate her £2.3m winnings from a major science prize she was awarded.
The sum will go to fund women, under-represented ethnic minority and refugee students to become physics researchers.
Prof Dame Jocelyn Bell Burnell has been awarded a Breakthrough Prize for the discovery of radio pulsars…’
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/science-environment-45425872
11th Sep 1973: the Chilean coup d'etat was carried out. Thatcher went on to thank Pinochet for bringing "democracy to Chile". pic.twitter.com/OWzgrXkgT6
— Crimes of Britain (@crimesofbrits) September 10, 2018
and Cas Mudde adds to this map…
Useful map, but forgets:
1) Fidesz ???????? (49.3%)
2) SNS ???????? (8.4%)
3) VB ???????? (3.7%)Some would argue, it also forgets
4) PiS ???????? (37.6%)
5) FrP ???????? (15.2%)
2018.09.08 LinkBlog
African migrants reel as Israeli law cuts their salaries
‘African migrants in have been detained, threatened with deportation and faced hostility from lawmakers and residents. Since last year, they face another burden: a de facto 20 percent salary cut that has driven them further into poverty.
Israel’s roughly 35,000 African migrants and the groups that support them say the recent law — in which Israel withholds the money from their paychecks every month and returns it only if they leave the country — is yet another attempt by an anti-migrant government to force them out.
“I feel that they started the ‘deposit law’ to make our life miserable,” said Salamwit Willedo, a migrant from Eritrea who came to Israel in 2010. “We suffer for eight years here. If I had a country, why am I living here?”
The Africans, mainly from war-torn Sudan and dictatorial Eritrea, began arriving in Israel in 2005…’
https://apnews.com/c36a59ae85e34854bbd9aca1aae010eb
Israel bans Ahed Tamimi from travelling abroad
‘Israeli authorities banned Ahed Tamimi, a Palestinian activist and campaigner who became a resistance icon, and her family from travelling abroad, her father said on Friday.
Basim Tamimi told Anadolu Agency that he and his family had planned to travel to Europe via Jordan. But they were informed by Palestinian authorities that Israel had banned them from travelling abroad.
They had planned to leave Friday morning, he said, adding the authorities did not provide a reason for the ban.
They were due to participate in some events in which they would discuss the Palestinian resistance movement and the experience of being detained in Israel, Basim said…’
https://www.middleeasteye.net/Israel-travel-ban-Palestinian-campaigner-Ahed-Tamimi
Hilel Garmi, Israeli Conscientious objector
‘…Hilel Garmi is in prison for the third time, for refusing to serve in the Israeli military. His decision was partly inspired by one of the lead organizers of the Great Return March in Gaza.
Conscientious objector Hilel Garmi was sentenced to 10 days in prison on Monday, after he again refused to serve in the Israel Defense Forces, in protest of Israel’s policies in the occupied territories. This is Garmi’s third detention, at the end of which he would have served 37 days in military prison.
Garmi, 18, from Kibbutz Yodfat in northern Israel, was first imprisoned in late July, after military police forces arrived at his home to arrest him. “I know I will be proud of this decision for the rest of my life, knowing that in the moment of truth, I was loyal to my beliefs, and did the only thing that seems moral to me. The way I see it, I chose to be on the right side of history,” said Garmi, upon his entry to prison…’
2018.09.07 LinkBlog
‘…In Melbourne’s outer south-east, Amazon had opened its first local “fulfilment centre”. This massive shed is where thousands of products wait to be plucked off shelves, packed into boxes and mailed to customers by workers.
They are almost all casual employees engaged not by Amazon, but through a third-party labour hire firm Adecco.
[….] “It’s a hellscape,” said one of the workers, who spoke directly to Fairfax Media but declined to be identified for fear of losing their current jobs or damaging future work opportunities with labour hire firms. “I’ve never worked anywhere as harsh, and it’s frustrating because the head of Amazon is the richest man on the planet.”
[….] As soon as one item is scanned, a solid bar on the bottom of the screen immediately starts to count down, showing how much time they have to reach their next item, which could be anywhere in the 24,000-square-metre warehouse.
If an item is not scanned within the required time, the worker’s “pick rate” is marked down…’
2018.07.16: Amazon workers strike in Germany, joining action in Spain and Poland
‘…Thousands of workers will walk off the job on Tuesday at Amazon warehouses in Germany to demand better working conditions, joining colleagues in Spain and Poland in taking action that coincides with a major sales promotion…’
‘Filmed and transmitted shortly before the fall of Communism in Hungrary.
Nick Thorpe – the BBC’s Central Europe correspondent – reports for Scene on the lives and thoughts of young Hungarians, living in the capital of Budapest and the village of Martonfa, on the cusp of dramatic political change.
First broadcast on BBC2 at 12.55pm on Friday 13th January 1989. Produced in association with Magyar Televízió (MTV Hungrary).’
Trump admin wants ability to hold migrant kids indefinitely, upending decades-old ban
‘The Trump administration announced a new rule Thursday that would allow immigrant children with their parents to be held in detention indefinitely, upending a ban on indefinite detention that has been in place for 20 years.
The rule, proposed by the departments of Homeland Security and Health and Human Services, goes into effect in 60 days and will allow Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) to keep children with their mothers in detention facilities while their cases for asylum play out in court.
A DHS official said the average length of stay for adults with pending court cases is currently 39 days. However, court backlogs can drag out the time an immigrant must wait in detention for a court hearing.
Until now, children have been released with their parents after 20 days. Earlier this year, the Trump administration sought to get around that rule by separating parents from their children and holding parents in detention while children were placed in the care of HHS…’
USA: Pro-Women Groups Keep Independent, Third Party Female Candidates Off Websites
‘One example is Center for American Women and Politics that was established in July 1971 at Rutgers University’s Eagleton Institute of Politics. For decades, CAWP has claimed to be “a nonpartisan voice that is central to creating awareness and understanding of women’s political participation.”
However, while combing through CAWP’s information on 2018 female candidates running for U.S. Congress and statewide executive offices, there was no mention of any women running under a third party or independent…’
Benefit for Food Not Bombs in Budapest Hungary
Going to this gig tonight, should be some good bands.
/jd
• https://www.facebook.com/events/222126945038325/
• https://www.facebook.com/FoodNotBombsBudapest/
2018.09.06 Link Blog
ROBERT WEISSMAN
‘…And a couple of those cases had to do with a lawsuit you all have covered extensively, which had to do with ExxonMobil’s operation in Indonesia and villagers in Aceh suing for really horrible human rights abuses conducted by the Indonesian military on behalf of Exxon. Judge Kavanaugh ruled in two separate cases regarding that, first saying, “Look, if the government says—the U.S. government says there’s a foreign policy consideration here, case closed. We’re not even going to look at it.” Secondly, getting actually to the legal question presented by a different set of villagers about the same matter, he said they should have no right to sue in U.S. courts, first, because the abuses occurred overseas, but, secondly and crucially, he said that the relevant statute, which is known as the Alien Tort Statute, doesn’t apply to corporations, that you can sue human beings under the Alien Tort Statute, but you can’t sue corporations.
So, corporations, it turns out, aren’t always people. They’re not people for Judge Kavanaugh when they might be held liable. And if you look across his record, you see, time and time again, this theme that comes through: There is one standard that applies to corporations, and it is very favorable, and there’s a different standard that applies to human beings as they’re trying to get their rights recognized, either as consumers, workers, breathers of clean air or victims of human rights abuses…’
Full interview and transcript: https://www.democracynow.org/2018/9/5/report_finds_judge_kavanaugh_ruled_against
Brett Kavanaugh's record on human rights
Opinions from Judge Brett Kavanaugh's time on the U.S. Court of Appeals suggests he side human rights and police abuse cases on the U.S. Court of Appeals suggests h http://ow.ly/ZSD530lHmrC
Publiée par Democracy Now! sur Mercredi 5 septembre 2018
Nike’s NFL Deal – Nike makes money from all sides
While Colin Kaepernick was 'taking the knee', Nike negotiated an 8 year contract withe NFL, then turned around months later to negotiate another contract with him using his political stance against the NFL. Amazing.
/jd
‘….The two brands announced on Tuesday that they would be extending their partnership for another eight years. The new deal will take place when the current one expires in 2020 and will run through 2028.
As part of the deal, Nike will set up all 32 teams with game-day uniforms and sideline apparel that bears the swoosh logo [….] Financial details of the NFL deal weren’t released…’
https://money.cnn.com/2018/03/27/news/companies/nike-nfl-gear-contract/index.html
check out Ray Serrato's data analysis of how searching for #Chemnitz on Youtube results in a feedback loop of bias-confirmation that drives people to Alt-Right racist/fascist videos. Quite disturbing, I think. /jd
3. When I sorted these videos by view count, an unsettling trend emerged: most of the highly-viewed videos were from the perspective of the Alt-Right and its subgroups of conspirators, white nationalists, media like RT Deutsch, and other fringe right figures. pic.twitter.com/ET4qfJh4vz
— Ray Serrato (@raymserrato) September 2, 2018
Read the entire twitter thread: https://twitter.com/raymserrato/status/1036349167394795527
Free speech determined by AI? I feel safer, already
/jd
‘…Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg told U.S. Congress that artificial intelligence would solve the problem of accurately tracking hate speech in 5 to 10 years…’
by Ray Serrato and Michael Meyer-Resende work for Democracy Reporting International
Oh those colonial laws...
'...157-year-old colonial-era law which criminalises certain sexual acts as "unnatural offences"...'
‘In a historic decision, India’s Supreme Court has ruled that gay sex is no longer a criminal offence.
The ruling overturns a 2013 judgement that upheld a colonial-era law, known as section 377, under which gay sex is categorised as an “unnatural offence”.
The court has now ruled discrimination on the basis of sexual orientation is a fundamental violation of rights.
[….] What is section 377?
It is a 157-year-old colonial-era law which criminalises certain sexual acts as “unnatural offences” that are punishable by a 10-year jail term…’
more at: https://www.bbc.com/news/world-asia-india-45429664
India decriminalises gay sex in landmark verdict
‘…Neighbouring China decriminalised homosexuality in 1997 and with this landmark ruling in India, a majority of Asians now will not face criminal charges for their sexual identities. [….] “LGBTI communities in Sri Lanka, Pakistan and Bangladesh are also working to repeal similar remnants of British colonisation in their own country and the ruling from India will feed into more dialogues, at least among LGBTI civil society across these countries,” she added. Homosexual acts are still illegal in most of India’s neighbouring countries, including Sri Lanka, Pakistan and Bangladesh…’
re: Kaepernick & Democrats in 2018
Book Review by Danny Haiphong:
The Einstein File Exposes the FBI as an Enemy of All the People
‘…The book The Einstein File’ further shows that the world’s most famous scientist was a social democrat whose specific experience with anti-Semitism in Germany and anti-communism in the US greatly influenced his political strivings. Einstein vocally rejected communism but that didn’t matter to the FBI. Einstein never leaked nuclear secrets to the Soviets not only because he disagreed with Soviet policy but also because it was the US intelligence apparatus itself that prevented Einstein from participating in the Manhattan Project (and he certainly opposed the use of the atomic bomb after witnessing the horrors inflicted on Japan). Einstein declined an invitation to the Soviet Union when many other leftists in the US visited the country. Yet by the end of his life, Einstein was the target of charges of espionage and efforts on the part of the INS to deport him from the country for his alleged ties to communism.
Einstein faced such an assault from the FBI precisely because of his strong adherence to the principle of solidarity…’
read more: https://blackagendareport.com/review-einstein-file-exposes-fbi-enemy-all-people
also see: http://www.theeinsteinfile.com/portal/alias__Einstein/lang__en-US/tabid__3339/default.aspx
2018.09.05 LinkBlog
3 fingers for W = White, the circle fingers and a finger = P for People or Power, and with the 'OK' gesture means 'White Power is OK' or 'White People are OK' – Trump has mainstreamed fascist white gang symbols.
/jd
White power sign at the Kavanaugh hearing
Zina Bash, a member of Brett Kavanaugh’s team, who previously worked at the White House on immigration policy, throws a white power sign during the Kavanaugh hearing.This is who they are.Source: https://twitter.com/rubin_kd/status/1037033721235263488
Publiée par The People For Bernie Sanders sur Mardi 4 septembre 2018
‘…Zina Bash [behond Trump Supreme Court nominee Brett Kavanaugh in Congress]…previously worked at the White House on immigration policy…’
Don't laugh
/jd
Saudi Arabia declares online satire punishable offence
‘…”Producing and distributing content that ridicules, mocks, provokes and disrupts public order, religious values and public morals through social media … will be considered a cybercrime punishable by a maximum of five years in prison and a fine of three million riyals ($800,000),” the public prosecution tweeted late Monday…’
https://www.france24.com/en/20180904-saudi-arabia-declares-online-satire-punishable-offence
Yes, it is a constitutional crisis, No the Democrats do not want to Impeach him, And the November elections will not solve this problem.
/jd
‘…Chief of staff John Kelly describes Trump as an “idiot” and “unhinged,” Woodward reports. Defense Secretary James Mattis describes Trump as having the understanding of “a fifth or sixth grader.” And Trump’s former personal lawyer John Dowd describes the President as “a fucking liar,” telling Trump he would end up in an “orange jump suit” if he testified to special counsel Robert Mueller.
“He’s an idiot. It’s pointless to try to convince him of anything. He’s gone off the rails. We’re in crazytown,” Kelly is quoted as saying at a staff meeting in his office. “I don’t even know why any of us are here. This is the worst job I’ve ever had.”
[….] In addition to literally stealing or hiding documents from Trump’s desk, they sought to stall and delay decisions or distract Trump from orders they thought would endanger national security.
“A third of my job was trying to react to some of the really dangerous ideas that he had and try to give him reasons to believe that maybe they weren’t such good ideas,” said Porter,[….] After Trump’s Charlottesville, Virginia, controversy, in which he failed to condemn white supremacists, Cohn tried to resign but was instead dressed down by Trump and accused of “treason.”
Kelly, who is Trump’s current chief of staff, told Cohn afterward, according to notes Cohn made of the exchange: “If that was me, I would have taken that resignation letter and shoved it up his ass six different times.”…’
https://edition.cnn.com/2018/09/04/politics/woodward-book-trump-charlottesville/index.html
Spain confirms it has halted sale of bombs to Saudi Arabia
‘…Spain has halted the sale of a shipment of bombs to Saudi Arabia amid concerns about their use in the conflict in Yemen, the Spanish Defence Ministry said on Tuesday.
Amnesty International and other human rights groups have denounced Western arms sales to Saudi Arabia and its allies in a war which the United Nations says has killed more than 10,000 people and left 8.4 million on the brink of famine.
Spanish broadcaster Cadena Ser reported the Defence Ministry had started a process to cancel a contract signed between Spain’s former government and the Gulf Arab state in 2015 to sell 400 laser-guided bombs.
The broadcaster said the bombs would have been used in Yemen, where U.N. human rights experts have said air strikes by the Saudi-led coalition have caused heavy civilian casualties and some may amount to war crimes.
“We confirm the news,” a Defence Ministry spokeswoman said, declining to give any further details. There was no immediate response from Saudi authorities.
[….] In April, Spain signed a framework agreement to sell warships to Saudi Arabia in a deal estimated to be worth around 1.8 billion euros…’
if they try to sell it, who has $1,000,000,000,000 to buy it?
/jd
Amazon’s Stock Value Has Crossed $1 Trillion
‘…Amazon’s stock value briefly topped $1 trillion on Tuesday, a little over a month after Apple crossed the same milestone. [….] Bezos, whose fortune comes from his Amazon stake, has been declared the richest person in modern history, with a net worth topping $150 billion…’
https://www.npr.org/2018/09/04/644545822/amazons-stock-value-has-crossed-1-trillion-joining-apple
re: Kaepernick and Nike...
Zina Bash's husband defends her...
/jd
The attacks today on my wife are repulsive. Everyone tweeting this vicious conspiracy theory should be ashamed of themselves. We weren’t even familiar with the hateful symbol being attributed to her for the random way she rested her hand during a long hearing. 1/3
— US Attorney John Bash (@USAttyBash) September 4, 2018
and a reply...
She works with Stephen Miller creating immigration policy targeting Mexicans and Muslims and stripping children away from parents to put them in cages.
You can be a white supremacist and be of Jewish/Mexican descent, @lachlan.
Just like you can be a misogynist and be a woman. https://t.co/pCC6Onoygd
— Leah McElrath (@leahmcelrath) September 4, 2018
