Open Thread - The Weekly Watch

Hope you all had a good week. There was better, if not good, news from Standing Rock last Sunday. Time will tell. I'm proud of and glad for the protectors who are staying in the cold. The recount seems to have almost ground to a halt as T-rumps lawyers play to partisan courts that are ruling against Jill. Do you find it odd that the democrats gave in to election fraud in 2000 (FL), 2004 (OH), and this year in multiple states without a fight or even an objection? As T-rump assembles his cabinet, I think it can't get worse...and then it does. Wow folks, it looks like we're in for quite the struggle.

All that and more. Please join in the comments with any interesting news, insights, or thoughts!

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Standing Rock
The noDAPL fight isn't over! (3 min)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5x1DvtaL0T8

Tara Houska, national campaigns director for Honor the Earth, speaks about the Army Corp decision. She is Ojibwe from Couchiching First Nation. (9 min)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1b9pMB1ez7Y

Divesting from the banks that support DAPL. A conversation with Clark Williams-Derry, director of energy finance at the Sightline Institute, and Michael Vendiola, member of the Swinomish Indian tribal community who helped organize a protest at Wells Fargo (8 min)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GQP0dccD9wQ

Despite reports to the contrary, work continues on the pipeline (2 min)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=H29qvq4FB50
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rTEHjXbQIPs and a 30 min report

Jordan of TYT reports on U.S. District Judge's decision to deny a permit to Energy Transfer Partners to drill under Lake Oahe at least until the hearing in February. The Army Corp announced they will add water to Lake Oahe thus preventing the drilling (and perhaps flooding the main camp) (16 min)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FvzQUYZNkjY
What it's like in camp after the blizzard (7 min)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Z149Y0aPxCk
the technology challenges (5 min)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Dyu8JqpfgDk

Iron Eyes of the Lakota Law Project speaks about the camps and the movement (12 min)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kkHcVV889C0

Wes Clark ask for forgiveness for past military crimes to the first nations (3 min)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=j28i9JXrjj4
and reactions from a native americans (6 min)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YtvZXvDN03w

Lee Camp interviews “Veterans Stand for Standing Rock’s” Ashleigh Jennifer Parker. (8 min)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Qb0KTeVMnZI

Standing rock finally in the lame stream – with pictures and (mostly) positive interviews. "I think it's going to be hard to get people out of here," he said. "People have committed themselves to this."
http://www.usatoday.com/story/news/nation-now/2016/12/10/standing-rock-p...

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blazinAZ has a series of essays you can review (and is the source of the go solar graphic)
http://caucus99percent.com/user/4109/my_content

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The Election – will it ever be over?

How about the old (electoral) college try?
A Republican member of the Electoral College has come out saying he will not vote for President-elect Donald Trump when the Electoral College convenes December 19. (10 min)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3btqp-vvlj0
Should we have an electoral college? The Nation’s John Nichols says no. (15 min)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Jzfu6wPhbVY
Correspondent Naomi Karavani gives her comedic report on the electoral college (4 min)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=S-gsL-PUzvw

And the sad bottom line, you can't believe the election results.

Jill speaks about the recount (7 min)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DIcpF9D593s

Democracy now talks with a constitutional lawyer about the recount – (10 min)
https://www.democracynow.org/2016/12/8/constitutional_lawyer_its_an_outr...

Lee Camp on the recount (9 min0
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=n0h2teeI71A

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T-rump

T-rump -Time magazine's person of the year (30 sec)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JbI3CECnvkc
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hSR9oZTx8BQ (4 min)

Give the press credit for President T-rump
https://washingtonspectator.org/press-trump-perlstein/

The cabinet grows and just when you think it can't get worse....it does!

Carson as HUD secretary? I guess urban = black (5 min)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=T7yB5FjiOEM
More about Carson from Jumaane Williams, New York city councilmember for District 45 and chair of the city’s Housing and Buildings Committee. (12 min)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OQUfNw4U62w

The Prospect's Justin Miller says Andrew Puzder, labor secretary nominee, opposes raising the minimum wage even though he makes in a day what his workers make in a year (8 min)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Gb4l8xG_DuA
Democracy Now looks at fast food CEO Puzder (15 min)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=T5R5AY_wcTg

President-elect Donald Trump will nominate Oklahoma Attorney General Scott Pruitt to head the Environmental Protection Agency. Pruitt is seen as a close ally of the fossil fuel industry. (21 min)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5qToO_Oby_A
Journalist Dahr Jamail talks about Scott Pruitt, future head of EPA (14 min)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=k9R7URLS1_E

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Climate
Noam Chomsky speaks about the climate conference and Trump's climate change denialism—and what it means for the future of the human species. (8 min)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=08WNclaSI4o

Dr. Kevin Trenbreth is among the many who signed an open letter calling on President-elect Trump not to cut funding for research or censor scientists (14 min)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PrHp59egmR0

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Richard Wolffe offers his advice after the election (4 min)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0XaiP5rTKL0&list=PLPJpiw1WYdTPhmzRFXzKdY...

Create worker owned coops – democratic work places (2 min)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yxGiehkgFXs

More from Richard Wolff. How class works (12.5 min)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=euH3pAuLuko

Australia's approach to hourly wage from Jimmy Dore (12 min)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Vr2gWIsijdI

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Education
High poverty schools are often staffed by substitute teachers
https://www.washingtonpost.com/local/education/how-can-students-learn-wi...

What NC schools suggest about the future of US education.
http://www.alternet.org/education/north-carolinas-charter-school-industr...

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War

The 75th anniversary of Pearl Harbor – historic background to the conflict from historian Peter Kuznick (19 min)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pjyYtmclNQk

Medea Benjamon describes Code Pinks effort to stop the Iraq war (8 min)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rqgSa5mwn7c
Part of a larger tribunal on the Iraq War (5.5 hours)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LxNcalgTsYY

Greed and waste at the pentagon...what's new? (1.5 min)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sdaDty6vZd8

This week was the anniversary of the declaration of human rights. The Commission of Human Rights, guided by Eleanor Roosevelt’s forceful leadership, captured the world’s attention. On December 10, 1948, the Universal Declaration of Human Rights (UDHR) was adopted by the 56 members of the United Nations.
http://www.ohchr.org/Documents/Publications/Compilation1.1en.pdf

Pardon me Obama, but please pardon Don (and Manning and Snowden, and Assange, and Peltier, and....)
https://washingtonspectator.org/pardon-siegelman-obama/

Around the world

Syria
Interesting conversation with Tariq Ali and journalist and author, Jonathan Steele about events in Syria and the possible recalibration of US foreign policy under Trump. (30 min)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cz31FtcsSZ0

Battles continue between pro-government forces and rebels in Aleppo’s Old City, with Damascus slowly winning back territory. (4 min)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1tuRVwO86KA

1000's leave Aleppo (2 min)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cHf3H28Dy2A

Honduras
In Honduras, there are over 100,000 domestic workers who are earning less than $150 a month that are now organizing and finding ways to fend for themselves (2 min)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HMIU8JRYfBE

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The Planet

Paris suffers severe air pollution (1.5 min)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_FK6OMoT3eY

Beyond Standing Rock - other environmental challenges from Lee Camp (6 min)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oM3sdg4xsf4

"Where to draw the line" – a new documentary about an Ecuadorian indigenous community fighting enforced oil extraction in their Amazon home. (3 min trailer) entire film available
https://vimeo.com/191981440

Rescue workers and locals are searching for survivors in Pidie Jaya after a 6.5 magnitude undersea earthquake struck the Aceh province on the island of Sumatra (30 sec)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=za1UPEVLSA0

Despite our best efforts it is still a beautiful planet. Enjoy these images from space (4 min)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6OQ1hSE6_Ow

Have a good Sunday, and I look forward to your comments and stories....

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nicely organized.

Trump will become president with less than a 50% approval rating(42% or so now) and will not have the good will most new presidents start with. How much of a difference this will make, Who knows? but I think it's a factor.

The corporate press did as much as any institution to put him in the White House and can turn on a dime if Big Finance says so.

Trump's appointments don't have the veneer of credibility, like Whitman did at EPA for example - it was a sham but most of Trump's appointees don't begin with the benefit of the doubt.

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"The justness of individual land right is not justifiable to those to whom the land by right of first claim collectively belonged"

Lookout's picture

I keep getting emails about a big march and protest at the inauguration. That ought to be interesting.

And yes the cabinet seems like a fictional story - the owner of Hardee's for labor, A fossil fuel minion for EPA, public school hater for education, war hawks for foreign policy, and on and on. I don't believe I could have written a more unbelievable script, but here it is. Amazin' really.

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“Until justice rolls down like water and righteousness like a mighty stream.”

Sun, 12/11/2016 - 7:35am — Lookout

Good morning duckpin

I keep getting emails about a big march and protest at the inauguration. That ought to be interesting.

And yes the cabinet seems like a fictional story - the owner of Hardee's for labor, A fossil fuel minion for EPA, public school hater for education, war hawks for foreign policy, and on and on. I don't believe I could have written a more unbelievable script, but here it is. Amazin' really.

I keep thinking of the Dune books, where the Baron speaks of sending down Beast Raban to run Arrakis and to terrorize and abuse the population into accepting his monstrous ?nephew? (haven't read it for years) as a saviour after a bit of this... and I keep waiting for Hillary to be appointed/voted in as President, this presented as a 'miracle save' for her probably slightly less obviously disastrous cabinet picks and other appointments, expecting the population to be relieved after this well-corporate-media-covered horror show and to never again try for a 'populist' candidate, something the abusive and self-serving billionaire Trump clearly never was. And I hope there are riots either way, demanding a real election not involving any corporate candidates and resulting in a real democratic government.

And I'm also waiting for another major False Flag event, something worse than 9/11, to 'justify' nuking Russia, China and a bunch of other people's countries on the official Psychopath To Do List... only any evidence/indications of the facts will, of course, be 'foreign propaganda' whether or not reveled via the perps own communications. In that case, nice knowing ya'll and may we all have a good death, rather than a slower one of radiation poisoning/starvation and thirst through the ensuing nuclear global dimming polishing off life and oxygen production on the planet.

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Psychopathy is not a political position, whether labeled 'conservatism', 'centrism' or 'left'.

A tin labeled 'coffee' may be a can of worms or pathology identified by a lack of empathy/willingness to harm others to achieve personal desires.

Raggedy Ann's picture

Thanks for the roundup - very comprehensive this morning, and all Sunday mornings. Smile

DAPL is my focus, these days - I believe it is setting the tone for what is to come in terms of America being a real democracy, where the people supposedly have voice in our "citizen government" and whether or not our actual freedoms exist.

A thought - was the election placed in November so that we would soon be consumed by November gatherings with turkeys (actual ones) and December with the Consumermas holiday? Can't pay attention to how our politicians are screwing us if we're occupied with eating and shopping! Just a thought..... Diablo

Perhaps the reason her heinous is not involved in a recount is because her own election cheating would be discovered. Scratch one-s head

There was a good video posted yesterday, here on c99p, on a UN press conference on Syria. Truth-tellers daring to be heard.

Well, have a beautiful Sunday! Pleasantry

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"The “jumpers” reminded us that one day we will all face only one choice and that is how we will die, not how we will live." Chris Hedges on 9/11

Lookout's picture

Here's what I found on why we vote in Nov.

The reason was simple: under an early federal law, the electors for the electoral college were to meet in the individual states on the first Wednesday of December. And according to a 1792 federal law, the elections in the states (which would choose the electors) had to be held within a 34-day period before that day. Beyond meeting legal requirements, holding elections in November made good sense in an agrarian society, as the harvest would have been concluded.

However, your hypothesis about distraction may be the reason we continue Nov. voting.

I hope you have a great day. It is chilly here, but will get up to about 50 degrees F this pm. Rain expected tomorrow - we still need some.

Edit - to add the video you mentioned -
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ebE3GJfGhfA
about 50 min (best part is at about 17 min)
UN Syrian press conference

All the best!

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“Until justice rolls down like water and righteousness like a mighty stream.”

Raggedy Ann's picture

It is well worth watching.

Very windy here today. Smile

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"The “jumpers” reminded us that one day we will all face only one choice and that is how we will die, not how we will live." Chris Hedges on 9/11

Citizen Of Earth's picture

4,000 is a full Brigade. But hey, when you are fighting a Terrorist Organization Of US Police State Fascists, you gotta go big.

Nice news roundup Lookout. Thanks.

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Donnie The #ShitHole Douchebag. Fake Friend to the Working Class. Real Asshole.

Lookout's picture

Hope everything is going your way. Jimmy Dore had a routine - that based on his cabinet picks, T-rump will build brigades not bridges. Want to understand how we can provide everyone with health care, college, and a clean environment? Just imagine shifting where we spend our money.

It kills me that when talking about wasted money, they harp on health care, education, social security with no mention of the military. It is pretty easy to see where the fat is!

discretionary_spending_pie,_2015_enacted.png

It is really absurd when you look internationally at military spending

us military spending.jpg

We could change directions - we just need the will to do so!

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“Until justice rolls down like water and righteousness like a mighty stream.”

as wasteful.

Advertising: What does this produce? The desire to buy what you didn't know you wanted?

Planned obsolescence: We should build things to last and are also built to be repaired. We could displace a lot of highly paid engineers and have higher quality things we actually need.

Insurance: In many areas, like the delivery of health services, a middleman layer is obviously a waste. Medicare operates on a 3% administrative cost; private insurance, 15% to 18%.

Duplication of government functions: The USA has 16 intelligence agencies.

Lack of accountability in government and big corporations: If it costs $1Million/year to keep a soldier on active duty, how much does it cost to keep a general? I've read(don't know if it's true) that in WW2 the USA had over 10 million people in the armed services. Today, it's less than 2 million yet there are more admirals and generals now than in WW2. If true, and with the enormous waste built into the military, there are great savings without negatively impacting the mission.(I think the mission itself if a waste and is counterproductive.)
Does big business really need CEOs to make 300 times that of the average workers. Should the taxpayers continue to subsidize this waste as well as subsidizing platoons of lawyers, fleets of private jets, and pricey confabs at ritzy locales?

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"The justness of individual land right is not justifiable to those to whom the land by right of first claim collectively belonged"

Citizen Of Earth's picture

Then it buries its own study so it won't lose funding.

Jimmy Dore (Dec 9, 2016) - Pentagon Buried Its Own Study Exposing Billions In Waste
https://youtu.be/95Zxt3My0Y8

The US Military is the Biggest Welfare Queen of all.

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Donnie The #ShitHole Douchebag. Fake Friend to the Working Class. Real Asshole.

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"The justness of individual land right is not justifiable to those to whom the land by right of first claim collectively belonged"

Lookout's picture

they cannot account for...

http://www.reuters.com/investigates/pentagon/#article/part2

In its investigation, Reuters has found that the Pentagon is largely incapable of keeping track of its vast stores of weapons, ammunition and other supplies; thus it continues to spend money on new supplies it doesn’t need and on storing others long out of date. It has amassed a backlog of more than half a trillion dollars in unaudited contracts with outside vendors; how much of that money paid for actual goods and services delivered isn’t known. And it repeatedly falls prey to fraud and theft that can go undiscovered for years, often eventually detected by external law enforcement agencies.

Yesterday someone posted a picture of a billion dollars vs a trillion. Waste every where as CoE and duckpin remind us.

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“Until justice rolls down like water and righteousness like a mighty stream.”

Lookout's picture

Merkel's reaction to T-rump as Time's person of the year (4 min)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ahZAW0EY4eg

And what school is like at the university of Alabama - (5 min)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Yrrj0076E9U

May as well laugh...

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“Until justice rolls down like water and righteousness like a mighty stream.”

enhydra lutris's picture

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That, in its essence, is fascism--ownership of government by an individual, by a group, or by any other controlling private power. -- Franklin D. Roosevelt --

Lookout's picture

We are the 99% (4 min)
[video:https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=x56bXZTvrJA]

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“Until justice rolls down like water and righteousness like a mighty stream.”

blazinAZ's picture

and thx for the shout-out. I really appreciate you and others on this site who are scouring the sources for good info for us.

In peace,
blaze

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There is no justice in America, but it is the fight for justice that sustains you.
--Amiri Baraka

Creosote.'s picture

this bit about Mark Knopfler of Dire Straits, who "Has a dinosaur named after him (Masiakasaurus knopfleri) -- The researchers who discovered bones from six specimens in Madagascar reported that they found the fossils whilst listening to Dire Straits tapes."
With extra appreciation for the tremendous news roundup.
C99% is now my hearth and home.

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