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This evening's music features the r&b group The Valentinos the Womack family band notably including Bobby Womack. Enjoy!

"I have ever considered the constitutional mode of election…as the most dangerous blot on our constitution, and one which some unlucky chance will some day hit."

-- Thomas Jefferson

News and Opinion

'Faithless electors' explain their last-ditch attempt to stop Donald Trump

On Monday, the 538 members of the electoral college will gather in state capitols across the country to cast their votes for the next president of the United States. With 306 electoral college votes under his belt to Hillary Clinton’s 232, that person will almost certainly be Donald Trump. ...

This year, at least eight of the 538 have indicated that they intend to break ranks with modern tradition and vote against their party in a protest directed squarely against Trump.

All but one of those rebels are Democratic, which is not coincidental. Many of these Democrats see the electoral college as the last-ditch hope of stopping Trump – the idea being that if their example can encourage their Republican fellow electors to follow suit and rally around a compromise alternative candidate, the Trump presidency can yet be abated.

The chances of that are exceptionally slim. The only Republican rebel to come out so far is Christopher Suprun, an elector from Texas. On the Republican side, nobody knows the extent, if any, of a potential uprising by electors beyond him. A survey by Associated Press found little enthusiasm among Republican electors for joining the rebellion. ...

All that we do know is that 2016 will go down in the history books as a seismic year for the electoral college.

This, I kid you not, is the Electoral College tally w/ 42 states in:

256 TRUMP
143 CLINTON
3 COLIN POWELL
1 FAITH SPOTTED EAGLE#DEC19

— Kyle Cheney (@kyledcheney) December 19, 2016

Heh, perhaps this is the "Blue Revolution."

#Dec19 Protests Target Electoral College to Block Trump

Protesters are expected at state capitols across the country on Monday where the 538 members of the Electoral College are gathering to ultimately decide who will take up residence at the White House.

The organizers' website describes this as "the day to defend democracy," and urges "the Electors of the Electoral College to listen to the voice of the people and refuse to cast their ballots for Donald Trump." ...

Warning that ballots cast for Trump would "put our nation in danger," filmmaker Michael Moore has made a plea to Republican members of the Electoral College, asking that they "let history record your moment of true courage and patriotism."

In the post on his Facebook page, he writes that if they are in the five states that would target such "faithlessness" with it a fine, he'll pay it:

But some states have made it "illegal" for you to vote any other way than for Trump. If you don't vote for him, your state will fine you $1,000. So here's my offer to you: I obviously can't and won't give you money to vote tomorrow, but if you do vote your conscience and you are punished for it, I will personally step up pay your fine which is my legal right to do.

Elector: Our Duty in Electoral College is to Prevent Unqualified Demagogues from Presidency

Obama blames the success of Russia’s election hacks on America

The Russian hack of the 2016 election worked because America let it work. That was the message from President Obama at the final pre-holiday press conference of his presidency. ...

Russia’s gonna Russia, Obama said. Its actions, which seemingly amounted to hacking and leaking info from Democrats in an effort to swing the election to Trump, had an impact only because America’s divisions allowed them to have an impact.

“Mr. Putin can weaken us just like he’s trying to weaken Europe if we start buying into notions that it’s OK to intimidate the press, or lock up dissidents, or discriminate against people because of their faith or what they look like,” Obama said.

He was particularly critical of President-elect Trump’s allies who seem to have warmed to Putin.

“Over a third of Republican voters approve of Vladimir Putin, the former head of the KGB. Ronald Reagan would roll over in his grave,” Obama said. “And how did that happen? It happened in part because for too long, everything that happens in this town, everything that’s said, is seen through the lens of, Does this help or hurt us relative to Democrats or relative to President Obama.”

The Bad Losers

Members of the U.S. Congress, the mainstream media, the CIA and even President Obama have made fools of themselves and the nation by claiming that the Clintonite cabal lost because of Vladimir Putin. Insofar as the rest of the world takes this whining seriously, it should further increase Putin’s already considerable prestige. If true, the notion that Moscovite hacking could defeat the favorite candidate of the entire U.S. power establishment can only mean that the United States’ political structure is so fragile that a few disclosed emails can cause its collapse. A government notorious for snooping into everybody’s private communication, as well as for overthrowing one government after another by less subtle means, and whose agents boasted of scaring the Russians into re-electing the abysmally unpopular Boris Yeltsin in 1996, now seems to be crying pathetically, “Mommy, Vlady is playing with my hacking toys!” ...

This whole miserable spectacle is nothing but a continuation of the Russophobia exploited by Hillary Clinton to distract from her own multiple scandals. As the worst loser in American electoral history, she must blame Russia, rather than recognize that there were multiple reasons to vote against her.

The propaganda machine has found a response to unwelcome news: it must be fake. The Washington conspiracy theorists are outdoing themselves this time. The Russian geeks supposedly knew that by revealing a few Democratic National Committee internal messages, they could ensure the election of Donald Trump. What tremendous prescience!

Obama promises retaliation against Russia for treating the United States the way the United States treats, well, Honduras (and even Russia itself until blocked by Putin). Putin retorted that so far as he knew, the United States was not a banana republic, but a great power able to protect its elections. Washington is loudly denying that. The same mainstream media who brought you Saddam’s “weapons of mass destruction” are now bringing you this preposterous conspiracy theory with straight faces. ...

The hysterical anti-Trump reaction is unable to grasp the implications of the campaign to blame Hillary’s defeat on Putin. Do the kids in the street really want war with Russia? I doubt it. But they do not perceive that for all its glaring faults, the Trump presidency provides an opportunity to avoid war with Russia. This is a window of opportunity than will be slammed shut if the Clintonite establishment and the War Party get their way. Whether they realize it or not, the street protesters are helping that establishment delegitimatize Trump and sabotage the one positive element in his program: peace with Russia.

"Unnamed officals" are at it again. My goodness they're a bunch of chatty Cathys.

The CIA and FBI agree Russia hacked the election to help Trump, report says

The Federal Bureau of Investigation and the Central Intelligence Agency agree: Russian cyberattacks during the 2016 presidential campaign were intended to help Donald Trump defeat Hillary Clinton, according to a Friday report in the Washington Post, citing unnamed U.S. officials.

The CIA shared its assessment — that Russia was behind the hacks of the Democratic National Committee and Hillary Clinton’s campaign chair John Podesta’s email — with key senators on Capitol Hill two weeks ago. The FBI, which publicly focused on its investigation of Clinton’s use of a private email server as secretary of state, had been relatively silent on Russian hacks of the U.S. electoral process.

CIA Director John Brennan told the agency’s employees in a message that U.S. intelligence agencies are on the same page.

I guess "Unnamed officials" don't like it when people see them doing the dirty work of undermining democracy.

US Spy Leaders Won't Brief Electors

Amid a nationwide protest effort aimed at convincing members of the Electoral College to reject Donald Trump and serious concerns about alleged interference in the U.S. election by Russia's government, a new poll out Sunday reveals majority support for delaying Monday's scheduled vote until electors are given an official intelligence briefing on the matter. ...

Demands for Electors to receive such a briefing have been growing steadily since several high-profile news stories said U.S. intelligence officials have determined with a "high level of confidence" that the Kremlin was involved with obtaining emails from the Democratic National Committee's computer systems as well as emails from John Podesta, the powerful D.C. lobbyist who served as Hillary Clinton's campaign chair. ...

But despite lingering and serious questions about the actual "evidence" which might support those claims, the Office of the Director of National Intelligence (ODNI) on Friday said it would not brief Electors prior to Monday's vote due to an ongoing review of the alleged Russian interference ordered by President Obama. "This effort is ongoing and involves sensitive classified information," the ODNI said in a statement. "Once the review is complete in the coming weeks, the Intelligence Community stands ready to brief Congress and will make those findings available to the public consistent with protecting intelligence sources and methods."

Obama didn't retaliate against Russia because he thought Clinton would win

The Obama administration decided not to retaliate against Russia for interfering in the presidential election because they did not want to start a cyber war and they expected Hillary Clinton to win, NBC News reported Thursday.

"They thought she was going to win, so they were willing to kick the can down the road," an official told the outlet.

Podesta cranks up the speculator to 10 for an evidence-free ramble.

Podesta suggests Trump associates may have colluded with Russian hackers

Former Clinton campaign Chairman John Podesta said Sunday he believes that Donald Trump's associates may have colluded with Russian hackers to win the election.

In his first TV interview since Hillary Clinton's loss, Podesta said he doesn't believe that the president-elect himself was part of the plan but suggested some of his associates may have gone off the reservation. The Electoral College electors, he said, have the right to know the extent of the Trump campaign's involvement before they cast their votes Monday.

"It's very much unknown whether there was collusion," Podesta said on NBC's "Meet the Press."

"What did Trump Inc. know? When did they know it? Were they in touch with the Russians?" Podesta asked. "I think the electors have the right to know what the answers are."

Donna Brazile enters the evidence-free assertion sweepstakes:

DNC chair says Russian hackers did not stop after Vladamir Putin met Barack Obama at G20 meeting

The chair of the Democratic National Committee said Russian hackers continued interfering in the election until 8 November, despite the president’s claim that they stopped in September when he told Vladamir Putin to "cut it out".

Donna Brazile, who is calling for a bipartisan inquiry into the alleged hack, told ABC News that donors and other individuals associated with the campaign were personally harassed and the committee’s computer systems were hacked every day on an "hourly" basis.

"No, they did not stop [in September]," she said.

"They came after us absolutely every day until the end of the election. They tried to hack into our system repeatedly. We put up the very best cyber security – but they constantly [attacked]." ...

Ms Brazile also suggested the DNC had insufficient protection from intelligence agencies, despite both the CIA and the FBI concluding that Russians hacked the election to boost Donald Trump.

The FBI was accused of sitting on top of “explosive” information regarding the hack.

[Contrary to Brazile's claims that the hacking continued after Obama told Putin to "cut it out," Obama said:]

"In fact we did not see further tampering of the election process. But the leaks through WikiLeaks had already occurred."

In NDAA, Congress Mandates Report on How Much Wars Have Cost

How much has the US spent on war since 9/11? That’s been a matter of major debate, with no real official figures on the matter, and estimates varying wildly from low-end reports on the cost of the literal deployments to much larger all-in figures covering the war and aftermath.

We’re going to finally get an official figure at some point soon, however, as the 2017 National Defense Authorization Act (NDAA) has been revealed to include a provision requiring the Pentagon and the IRS to both figure out the overall cost of the wars and make that figure publicly available.

Saudi Arabia admits it used UK-made cluster bombs in Yemen

Saudi Arabia has finally admitted that it used UK-manufactured cluster bombs against Houthi rebels in Yemen, increasing pressure on the British government which has repeatedly refused to curb arms sales to Riyadh.

Saudi Arabia said it would cease to use UK-manufactured cluster bombs and that it had informed the UK government of this decision.

A "people swap" is underway in Aleppo, even after evacuation buses were torched

Buses evacuated ill and wounded residents, as well as orphaned children, from the besieged Syrian towns of al-Foua and Kefraya on Sunday after experiencing a setback in the morning when some vehicles came under attack and were set alight.

Syrian state media reported that “armed terrorists” from rebel groups Ahrar al-Sham and Jabhat al-Nusra launched the attack on five buses, burning and destroying them, as they were on their way to collect evacuees. “It is not clear which rebel faction attacked the buses, but the area is a stronghold of al-Qaeda-linked forces,” NPR’s Alison Meuse reported. ...

The evacuation of those two majority-Shia towns in the Idlib province, which sits west of Aleppo, was agreed upon as part of a people-swap deal between pro-Syrian government forces and the rebels. Pro-government forces demanded that residents be evacuated in exchange for the resumed evacuation of rebels and civilians from eastern Aleppo, of which forces loyal to Syrian president Bashar Assad seized control earlier this month after weeks of heavy fighting.

Turkey: Russian ambassador dies of gunshot wound, gunman neutralised

Russian ambassador to Turkey shot dead in Ankara art gallery

The Russian ambassador to Ankara has been killed in a gun attack at an art gallery in the Turkish capital, Russia’s foreign ministry confirmed. Reports suggested the gunman was a Turkish riot police officer.

Andrei Karlov was attending the opening of an exhibit at a contemporary arts centre when he was attacked on Monday evening. He was several minutes into a speech at the exhibit when a man shouted “Allahu Akbar” and fired at least eight shots, video of the attack showed.

After firing at the ambassador, the man, dressed in a suit and tie, shouted in Turkish: “Don’t forget Aleppo. Don’t forget Syria. Unless our towns are secure, you won’t enjoy security. Only death can take me from here. Everyone who is involved in this suffering will pay a price.”

He also shouted in Arabic: “We are the one who pledged allegiance to Muhammad, to wage jihad.” ...

Karlov had been part of discussions between Russia and Turkey that led to an evacuation of east Aleppo getting under way late last week. He had also been a central conduit to the Turkish government’s rapprochement with Moscow in April.

Trump has no idea how to run a superpower, say Chinese media

Donald Trump appears to have not a clue how to lead a superpower.

That was the conclusion of China’s Global Times newspaper on Monday morning as the country’s media weighed in on the president-elect’s latest social media assaults on Beijing.

“Trump is not behaving as a president who will become master of the White House in a month,” the Communist party controlled newspaper wrote in an editorial. “He bears no sense of how to lead a superpower.” ...

The article came after the US president-elect again used Twitter, which has been blocked in China since 2009, to berate the leaders of the world’s second largest economy.

“China steals United States Navy research drone in international waters – rips it out of water and takes it to China in unpresidented [sic] act,” Trump tweeted early on Saturday morning after it emerged the Chinese navy had seized a US naval drone that had been operating in the South China Sea.

China Says US ‘Hyping Up’ Underwater Drone, It Will Be Returned

Following up on Friday’s Pentagon report China “stole” an underwater surveillance drone in the South China Sea, the Chinese government today accused the US of “hyping up” what was actually a fairly minor matter, saying that the drone would be returned.

The drone, estimated to cost about $150,000 and be made of purely civilian components, was carrying out military surveying of the South China Sea. The exact location was not clear, but Pentagon indications may put it near the China-controlled Spratly Islands.

Two drones were in the water, about 500 meters from a US Navy ship, and one was scooped out of the water by China, while the other returned to its ship. Chinese officials claimed the boat crew didn’t know what the drone was, and scooped it out to ensure it wouldn’t pose a danger to passing ships in the region.

Ambassador for Apartheid: Trump's Pick for Israel Post Slammed as Threat to Peace & Two-State Talks

Billionaire businessman Vincent Viola picked as Trump's army secretary

President-elect Donald Trump announced on Monday that he has picked the New York billionaire businessman Vincent Viola to be his secretary of the army.

Trump has appointed a number of billionaires to his cabinet, along with leading figures from the world of banking, prompting criticism from some quarters, given the success of a presidential campaign built around an appeal to working-class voters. ...

Viola, known as Vinnie, is the founder of several businesses including Virtu Financial, an electronic trading firm. He also owns the NHL’s Florida Panthers and is a past chairman of the New York Mercantile Exchange (NYMEX). ...

Viola bought the Panthers for about $250m in 2013. Reported to be worth $1.8bn himself, he ranks No 374 on Forbes’ list of the 400 wealthiest people in the US.

Leak reveals Rex Tillerson was director of Bahamas-based US-Russian oil firm

Rex Tillerson, the businessman nominated by Donald Trump to be the next US secretary of state, was the long-time director of a US-Russian oil firm based in the tax haven of the Bahamas, leaked documents show.

Tillerson – the chief executive of ExxonMobil – became a director of the oil company’s Russian subsidiary, Exxon Neftegas, in 1998. His name – RW Tillerson – appears next to other officers who are based at Houston, Texas; Moscow; and Sakhalin, in Russia’s far east.

The leaked 2001 document comes from the corporate registry in the Bahamas. It was one of 1.3m files given to the Germany newspaper Süddeutsche Zeitung by an anonymous source. The registry is public but details of individual directors are typically incomplete or missing entirely.

Though there is nothing untoward about this directorship, it has not been reported before and is likely to raise fresh questions over Tillerson’s relationship with Russia ahead of a potentially stormy confirmation hearing by the US senate foreign relations committee. Exxon said on Sunday that Tillerson was no longer a director after becoming the company’s CEO in 2006.

IMF Credibility Takes Hit After Managing Director Found Guilty of Criminal Negligence

Shocking news! An elite politician/banker was found to be corrupt by a court. Oh, nevermind it was not a US court where that sort of business will never get in front of a judge. However, much like the US, there won't be any jail time.

IMF Chief Convicted, But Spared Jail Time, for Corruption

Christine Lagarde, head of the International Monetary Fund (IMF), on Monday was found guilty of "negligence" for approving a massive government payout to business tycoon Bernard Tapie during her tenure as French finance minister. ...

Though Judge Martine Ract Madoux did not hand down a sentence for the managing director, the court said Largarde "should have done more" to prevent the €405m ($422m) payout, Bloomberg reports.

Tapie, a close associate and financial backer of former French president Nicolas Sarkozy, was awarded the payout in in 2008. ...

The trial and surprise conviction will likely "reviv[e] concerns in France about high-level corruption," the New York Times notes, "shining a spotlight on intimate ties between politicians and businesspeople, and on the large sums that are sometimes used to grease the country's political wheels."

Michigan unemployment agency made 20,000 false fraud accusations – report

A Michigan government agency wrongly accused individuals in at least 20,000 cases of fraudulently seeking unemployment payments, according to a review by the state.

The review released this week found that an automated system had erroneously accused claimants in 93% of cases – a rate that stunned even lawyers suing the state over the computer system and faulty fraud claims.

“It’s literally balancing the books on the backs of Michigan’s poorest and jobless,” attorney David Blanchard, who is pursuing a class action in federal court on behalf of several claimants, told the Guardian on Friday. ...

The findings come as Michigan’s Republican-led legislature passed a bill this week to use $10m from the unemployment agency’s contingent fund – which is composed mostly of fines generated by fraud claims – to balance the state’s budget. Since 2011, the balance of the contingent fund has jumped from $3.1m to $155m, according to a report from a Michigan house agency.

The system, known as the Michigan Integrated Data Automated System (Midas), caused an immediate spike in claims of fraud when it was implemented in October 2013 under the state’s Republican governor, Rick Snyder, at a cost of $47m.

Shameless, despicable corporate assholes.

Apple and Ireland team up to fight $14 billion EU tax bill

Apple on Monday outlined its appeal of a $14 billion tax bill imposed by the European Commission in August, claiming it’s been unfairly targeted by the EU competition chief. And the Irish government hit out strongly at the Commission, saying it overstepped its authority by ordering Ireland to collect the tax from Apple.

Apple and Ireland both issued strongly worded statements on the same day the Commission published a 130-page report that sets out the corporate structures Apple has put in place in Ireland to minimize its tax bill. According to the report, one of Apple’s two Irish subsidiaries — both of which have no employees and no physical presence — had profits of $25 billion in 2014, but paid less than $10 million in tax. ...

The report published Monday says Apple could reduce its tax bill to Dublin if it increased payments to its U.S. parent company or paid back taxes to other EU countries. Apple has indicated it may be willing to repatriate some of its cash to the U.S. if President-elect Donald Trump follows through on a promise to reduce the corporate income tax rate from 35 percent to 10 percent.

Factory Near Carrier Sends Jobs to Mexico, But Trump Just Tweets

Just a few miles away from the Carrier plant in Indianapolis where President-elect Donald Trump celebrated his role in stopping 730 jobs from moving to Mexico earlier this month, another corporation is shutting its factory and moving it to Mexico. ...

Rexnord Corporation first announced in October that it would close the plant, which produces industrial mechanical goods, such as bearings. Local news outlets reported that the company was looking to save $15 million annually by relocating, although the company was hardly hurting; “it generated $24.6 million in profit during its fiscal second quarter, up from $22.6 million a year earlier.” ...

Rexnord of Indiana is moving to Mexico and rather viciously firing all of its 300 workers. This is happening all over our country. No more!

— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) December 3, 2016

Was the Carrier deal a one-off by Trump to boost his popularity as he prepares to move into the Oval Office, or was it a sign that the president-elect was committed to stopping the offshoring of Americans jobs?

Rexnord quickly became a test case, with Trump’s tweet. So far, however, there is no sign that Trump has contacted the company.

Wells Fargo Is on a Losing Streak, But Still Has Some Trump Cards

The embattled Wells Fargo Bank, famously accused of signing up its customers to multiple accounts without their knowledge, was discovered last week to be doing the same thing with a life insurance product sold in their branches by Prudential. ... Then on Tuesday, the bank was suspended from doing any work for the city of San Francisco, its home town. Plus, Wells was the only U.S. bank to have their “living will” — a government-mandated roadmap for how to dismantle the firm in the event of a failure — rejected by federal regulators. ... The company has until March 31 to re-submit a credible living will. If that doesn’t pass muster, the bank could be forced to sell off business lines, essentially breaking itself up. ...

According to a report from the New York Times in August, Trump owes Wells Fargo a total of $410 million, a figure that includes other Trump-owned properties that have debt attached. Wells Fargo is also an underwriter to Ladder Capital, another major lender to Trump. ...

The company’s main federal antagonist, the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau, is in line to be neutered in a Trump administration; Republicans are planning to put CFPB’s budget under Congressional appropriations control, which could limit their resources. ... Trump will have the opportunity to add at least two board members to the Federal Reserve, one of the two agencies governing the process. So Trump could remake the two agencies currently sanctioning Wells Fargo, leading them to reverse the sanctions and allow the company’s living wills to move forward. And he could cripple the agency that looks out for consumers at a time when Wells Fargo has been ripping them off.

Arctic ice melt 'already affecting weather patterns where you live right now'

The dramatic melting of Arctic ice is already driving extreme weather that affects hundreds of millions of people across North America, Europe and Asia, leading climate scientists have told the Guardian.

Severe “snowmageddon” winters are now strongly linked to soaring polar temperatures, say researchers, with deadly summer heatwaves and torrential floods also probably linked. The scientists now fear the Arctic meltdown has kickstarted abrupt changes in the planet’s swirling atmosphere, bringing extreme weather in heavily populated areas to the boil. ...

In November, ice levels hit a record low, and we are now in “uncharted territory”, said Prof Jennifer Francis, an Arctic climate expert at Rutgers University in the US, who first became interested in the region when she sailed through it on a round-the-world trip in the 1980s.

“These rapid changes in the Arctic are affecting weather patterns where you live right now,” she said. “In the past you have had natural variations like El Niño, but they have never happened before in combination with this very warm Arctic, so it is a whole new ball game.

“It is inconceivable that this ridiculously warm Arctic would not have an impact on weather patterns in the middle latitudes further south, where so many people live.

“It’s safe to say [the hot Arctic] is going to have a big impact, but it’s hard to say exactly how big right now. But we are going to have a lot of very interesting weather – we’re not going to get around that one.”

Statoil wins U.S. government bid to build offshore windfarm on the East Coast

Norwegian company Statoil will lease from the U.S. government nearly 80,000 acres off the coast of New York for an offshore wind farm, the company announced in a news release on Friday. ...

Power from the wind farm will go to New York City and Long Island. The area of the lease is between 14 and 30 miles off the coast of New York. ... In the U.S. there is currently only one operational wind farm, which started generating power last week off the coast of Rhode Island.

Poll Shows Canadian Majority Wants Water for People, Not for Profit

An overwhelming majority of Ontarians want their government to prioritize community drinking water needs over those of commercial water-bottling companies, according to a new poll which also supports the call for Nestlé Waters Canada to sell a well it purchased this summer to the local municipality as its residents have demanded.

The poll (pdf), conducted by Oraclepoll Research on behalf of the Council of Canadians, surveyed 1,200 respondents between December 8-13, 2016. Its findings overall clearly demonstrate that "[p]eople do not want companies like Nestlé to profit from water," as Maude Barlow, the group's national chairperson, declared. ...

The Elora, Ontario, well is quickly becoming a flash point in the fight over water rights in Canada, Mark Calzavara, the Ontario-Quebec regional organizer for the Council of Canadians, told CBC News. "It is the most important, or clearest contest, between a municipality and a bottled water company," he said.

Nestlé purchased the well earlier this year, as Common Dreams reported, outbidding the Township of Centre Wellington and helping to spark a growing Boycott Nestlé effort. Just last week, news outlets reported that Nestlé was in fact seeking to develop a "partnership" between the company and the Township of Centre Wellington—causing local water protectors to bristle. 

"Mayor [Kelly] Linton needs to make an immediate public statement that he does not support any 'partnership' agreement with Nestlé," said Arlene Slocombe, executive director of Wellington Water Watchers, which claims such a deal would merely be an attempt by Nestlé to get around an existing moratorium. "If he is engaged in discussions with Nestlé he needs to end those discussions immediately, and respect the wishes of the community and say 'No to Nestlé.' Water is for life, not for profit."

Also of Interest

Here are some articles of interest, some which defied fair-use abstraction.

US 'got it so wrong' on Saddam Hussein, says CIA interrogator of the Iraq dictator

School choice gutted Detroit’s public schools. The rest of the country is next.

Out Of Prison, Barrett Brown Recommits Himself To Agitating Against Existing Order

How Many Children Were Shot Dead Today? An Interview with Gary Younge

Trump and the Pain of Blue-Collar Whites

The Vampire Squid Occupies Trump's White House

What the US economy doesn't need from Donald Trump

Moscow Attacks!

A Spy Coup in America?

Donald Trump will violate the US constitution on inauguration day

Has America Fallen? Krugman and Europeans Raise the Question.

If You Want to See How Donald Trump Will Destroy the Environment, Read This Legislative Roadmap

'Unpresidented': Donald Trump invents the Guardian's word of the year

A Little Night Music

The Valentinos - Lookin' For A Love

The Womack Brothers - Couldn't Hear Nobody Pray

The Valentinos - She's So Good To Me

The Valentinos - Everybody Wants To fall In Love

The Valentinos - What about Me

The Valentinos - I'm Gonna Forget About You

The Valentinos - Bitter Dreams

The Valentinos - Baby, Lots Of Luck

The Valentinos - I'll Make It Alright

Bobby Womack Of The Valentinos - I Found A True Love

The Valentinos - Darling, Come Back Home

The Valentinos - Two lovers history

The Valentinos - Let's Get Together