They see us as a threat because we’re having an impact
The Guardian – July 21, 2019 – Ali Smith and others interview Greta Thunberg
https://www.theguardian.com/culture/2019/jul/21/great-thunberg-you-ask-the-questions-see-us-as-a-threat
Pretty much from nowhere, there she was: small and slight, a girl just turned 16, the way-too-young odd person out on a panel of adults sitting in front of the world’s economic powers at Davos last January. Unshowy and serious, careful, firm, she said it. “Our house is on fire”… You’re in the presence of the opposite of cynicism – of a spirit, in fact, that rebuffs cynicism and knows that the way we act, every single one of us, has transformatory impact and consequence. “The real power belongs to the people.”… “We must remember that this is above all an emergency – not primarily an opportunity to create new green economic growth. We need a whole new way of thinking.”
The Weaponization of National Belonging, From Nazi Germany to Trump
The New Yorker – July 21, 2019 – Masha Gessen
https://www.newyorker.com/news/our-columnists/the-weaponization-of-national-belonging-from-nazi-germany-to-trump
By turning unspoken assumptions about outsiders into hateful rally chants, Donald Trump has initiated a radical renegotiation of what it means to belong in this country…. The Trump Administration presents its war on immigrants as a war on certain groups of immigrants only—only the asylum seekers who cross between points of entry, for example, or those who lied on their citizenship application. It’s the legalistic veneer of fascism… This is what happens first: a political force seizes the power to define its members as insiders and certain others as intruders. This is done in the name of protection of the motherland, which the newly marginalized are said to hate. Everything else follows.
The Dangers of American Fascism
Truth Out – February 28, 2011 – Henry A Wallace, an article in the New York Times, April 9, 1944
https://truthout.org/articles/the-dangers-of-american-fascism/
A fascist is one whose lust for money or power is combined with such an intensity of intolerance toward those of other races, parties, classes, religions, cultures, regions or nations as to make him ruthless in his use of deceit or violence to attain his ends. The supreme god of a fascist, to which his ends are directed, may be money or power; may be a race or a class; may be a military, clique or an economic group; or may be a culture, religion, or a political party… It is an infectious disease, and we must all be on our guard against intolerance, bigotry and the pretension of invidious distinction. But if we put our trust in the common sense of common men and “with malice toward none and charity for all” go forward on the great adventure of making political, economic and social democracy a practical reality, we shall not fail.
Americans Are Absolutely Terrified of Trump
Rolling Stone – July 22, 2019 – Peter Wade
https://www.rollingstone.com/politics/politics-news/americans-are-absolutely-terrified-of-trump-861686/
“They say, ‘I’m scared.’ And I have not—I’ve never in my total of 37 years in public service ever heard a constituent say that they were scared of their leader,” said Rep. Elijah Cummings… America is reliving and reviving the darkest moments of our history. And it’s not just Americans who are terrified. It’s the world. As a 2019 Pew poll revealed, a growing number of people around the world see America as a major threat.
A Step Backwards or Leap of Faith Against the US Dollar
OpEdNews – July 19, 2019 – Ramin Mazaheri
https://www.opednews.com/articles/A-Step-Backwards-or-Leap-o-by-Ramin-Mazaheri-Dollar-190717-516.html
The dollar’s dominance is what allows Washington to impose murderous, illegal sanctions on countries like Iran, Cuba, Korea and elsewhere, which is why many are so keen to end it.
New Report: State Supreme Court Diversity
The Brennan Center – July 23, 2019 – Laila Robbins and Alicia Bannon
https://www.brennancenter.org/publication/state-supreme-court-diversity
Amid growing recognition of disparities in America’s justice system, this report highlights a critical but under-scrutinized problem: the lack of racial, ethnic, and gender diversity on state supreme court benches across the United States. State supreme courts, which sit atop state judiciaries, do not typically garner the same attention as the U.S. Supreme Court, but they hold substantial power. As a whole, state courts hear 95 percent of all cases filed in the United States. State supreme courts generally provide the final word in interpreting state law and set precedents that bind more than 23,000 lower state court judges… Building a more inclusive judiciary should be a priority — not just for our elected officials and law schools, but for all of us.
It’s Just Good Business: Even Red States Are Dumping Coal for Solar
Common Dreams – July 22, 2019 – Juan Cole
https://www.commondreams.org/views/2019/07/22/its-just-good-business-even-red-states-are-dumping-coal-solar
Republican decision-makers increasingly see solar as just a good business investment that produces electricity more cost-effectively than coal. One important consideration is that the fuel is free.
The Cheapest Way to Save the Planet Grows Like a Weed
TruthDig – July 25, 2019 – Ellen Brown
https://www.truthdig.com/articles/the-cheapest-way-to-save-the-planet-grows-like-a-weed/
Hemp grows to 13 feet in 100 days, making it one of the fastest carbon dioxide-to-biomass conversion tools available. Industrial hemp has been proved to absorb more CO2 per hectare than any forest or commercial crop, making it the ideal carbon sink. It can be grown on a wide scale on nutrient-poor soils with very small amounts of water and no fertilizers… We can use plastic made from hemp, which is biodegradable and nontoxic… Hemp can break our dependency on petrochemicals, not only for fuel but for plastics, textiles, construction materials and much more. It has actually been grown for industrial and medicinal purposes for millennia, and today it is legally grown for industrial use in hundreds of countries outside the U.S.
‘No doubt left’ about scientific consensus on global warming, say experts
The Guardian – July 24, 2019 – Jonathan Watts
https://www.theguardian.com/science/2019/jul/24/scientific-consensus-on-humans-causing-global-warming-passes-99
“This paper should finally stop climate change deniers claiming that the recent observed coherent global warming is part of a natural climate cycle. This paper shows the truly stark difference between regional and localised changes in climate of the past and the truly global effect of anthropogenic greenhouse emissions,” said Mark Maslin, professor of climatology at University College London… The good news is public understanding of the scientific consensus is increasing. The bad news is there is still a lot of work to do yet as climate deniers continue to persistently attack the scientific consensus.
Forget the Theater Criticism—Mueller’s Conclusions Are the Real News
Atlantic Magazine – July 25, 2019 – David A. Graham
https://www.theatlantic.com/ideas/archive/2019/07/substance-muellers-testimony-matters-more-theater/594796/
Mueller softly but staunchly rejected several oft-repeated lies that President Donald Trump has told about the investigation into him, including that it exonerated him and that he cooperated fully; and he outlined the ways his report, while not explicitly accusing Trump of any crime, lays out in detail how Trump almost certainly obstructed justice.
Death Penalty Opponents Say Resuming Federal Executions Is a Bad Move
Time Magazine – July 26, 2019 – Melissa Chan
https://time.com/5635787/executions-death-penalty-reaction-opponents/
The Justice Department on Thursday said it would go back to executing federal death-row inmates for the first time in nearly two decades—a move capital punishment opponents quickly denounced as a step backward for criminal justice reform in the country.
We Are Here Because You Were There
Portside – Berkshire Eagle – July 20, 2019 – H Patricia Hynes
https://portside.org/2019-07-20/we-are-here-because-you-were-there-0
Why would so many Guatemalans make the arduous journey to the US-Mexican border seeking refuge, knowing the hatred heaped on them by the Trump Administration? A short list of our long history of corporate exploitation and military aggression in that country might explain… Drug traffickers infiltrate the Honduran government “from top to bottom,”… The brother of the current president, whom we back and support with US aid, was recently charged with trafficking… He was assisted by national police (also funded by the US)… Over the last eight decades, US military support for right-wing coups and authoritarian candidates has strangled social movements for self-determination, worker rights and economic development in El Salvador… What follows is a short list of our interventions in this country that have driven the displaced, impoverished and endangered to travel a trail of tears to our border.
The Trump Administration Plans to Kick Three Million Off Food Stamps
The American Prospect – July 25, 2019 – Kalena Thomhave
https://prospect.org/article/trump-administration-plans-kick-three-million-food-stamps
Increasing obstacles to public assistance and pushing people off of it entirely seems to be a major priority of this administration: After all, if there are fewer people receiving public assistance, then one may think there are fewer people in poverty, and then the economy is working for everybody—right?
Americans Must Do More Than Simply Reject Trump’s Racism
Common Dreams – July 25, 2019 – Eoin Higgins
https://www.commondreams.org/news/2019/07/25/americans-must-do-more-simply-reject-trumps-racism-ilhan-omar-argues-absolute-must
An opinion piece by Rep. Ilhan Omar for The New York Times Thursday [https://www.nytimes.com/2019/07/25/opinion/ilhan-omar-trump-racism.html] calls on Americans to do more than just condemn President Donald Trump’s racism—the country, says Omar, needs to “protect and expand basic democratic rights” while pressing for the kind of bold progressive agenda that represents the best of its values… It is not enough to condemn Mr. Trump’s racism. We must affirmatively confront racist policies — whether the caging of immigrant children at the border or the banning of Muslim immigrants or the allowing of segregation in public housing. It is not enough to condemn the corruption and self-dealing of this administration. We must support policies that unmistakably improve working people’s lives, including by strengthening collective bargaining, raising the minimum wage and pursuing a universal jobs guarantee.
The Real Reason for Impeachment
Robert Reich’s Blog – July 27, 2019
https://robertreich.org/post/186554561680
The core purpose of the Constitution is to prevent tyranny. That’s why its Framers distributed power between the president, Congress and the judiciary. That’s why each of the three branches was designed to limit the powers of the other two. In other words, the Framers anticipated the possibility of a Donald Trump… Trump surely appears to be usurping the powers of the other branches. Under these circumstances, the Constitution mandates that the House undertake an impeachment inquiry and present evidence to the Senate. This may not be the political thing to do. But in order to safeguard our democracy, it is the right thing to do.
Israel Demolishes 70 More Palestinian Apartments in East Jerusale
The Real News – July 24, 2019 – interview of Jeff Halper, a leader of the anti-demolitions movement
https://therealnews.com/stories/israel-demolishes-70-more-palestinian-apartments-in-east-jerusalem
Discussion of the destruction of Palestinian homes, along with the history and politics that allows this violation of international law to continue… Writ large, this is all within a policy since 1967 of what the Israeli government calls “Judaizing Jerusalem,” turning an Arab city into a Jewish city. And the way you do that of course is by displacing Palestinians… In other words, this decision by the military not to allow Palestinian building within 250 meters for the whole length of the wall has now been affirmed by the Supreme Court… So there’s tens of thousands of people— not just the five or six-hundred of yesterday— who are today worried that at any moment the Israeli Army can come and demolish their homes.
How Science Got Trampled in the Rush to Drill in the Arctic
Politico – July 28, 2019 – Adam Federman and Nathaniel Wilder
https://www.politico.com/interactives/2019/trump-science-alaska-drilling-rush/
Tucked into the Tax Cuts and Jobs Act, a bill signed by President Donald Trump five months earlier, was a brief two-page section that had little to do with tax reform. Drafted by Alaska Senator Lisa Murkowski, the provision opened up approximately 1.6 million acres of the vast Arctic National Wildlife Refuge to oil and gas leasing, a reversal of the federal policy that has long protected one of the most ecologically important landscapes in the Arctic.
Iowa Crops Look Like Food — But No One’s Eating
Portside – July 22, 2019 – Mark Bittman
https://portside.org/2019-07-22/iowa-crops-look-food-no-ones-eating
The highly romanticized past has fallen apart, as it did in coal country and the Rust Belt, and anywhere else where extraction has reached its limits. (Industrial farming, like mining, is extraction: The removal of something precious from the earth.)… The system itself must change, and that change can’t be brought about by individual farmers… To address the climate, environment, animal welfare, and public health crises, we need decisive and radically different government action… The current system obviously enriches a few at the expense of most. That is not how you define “equality,” and it’s certainly not a way to approach sustainability.
Reclaiming the Commons
Portside – Boston Review – July 27, 2019 – David Bollier
https://portside.org/2019-07-27/reclaiming-commons
The significance of the commons is not only moral but also pragmatic. Any sort of creative endeavor requires space for experimentation and new construction—for the freedom to try new things. Market enclosure typically serves to regiment and control such freedom. While we need markets, we also need room for the visionary ideas, accidental discoveries, and embryonic notions that germinate into real breakthroughs, if only they have the space to grow. The challenge that recurs is how to retain the surplus value generated within a commons. How can members of a commons prevent the appropriation of community-generated value by proprietary interests?… The silent theft of our shared assets and civic inheritance need not continue. But first we must recognize the commons as such, name it, and understand the rich possibilities for reclaiming our common wealth.
The Economist Who Would Fix the American Dream
Atlantic Magazine – August 2019 issue – Gareth Cook
https://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2019/08/raj-chettys-american-dream/592804/
No one has done more to dispel the myth of social mobility than Raj Chetty. But he has a plan to make equality of opportunity a reality… He has pioneered an approach that uses newly available sources of government data to show how American families fare across generations, revealing striking patterns of upward mobility and stagnation… Chetty has established Big Data as a moral force in the American debate… If a phenomenon like upward mobility can be measured with enough precision, then it can be understood; if it can be understood, then it can be manipulated. “The big-picture goal,” Chetty told me, “is to revive the American dream.”