The Evening Blues - 1-15-20



eb1pt12


The day's news roundup + tonight's musical feature: Johnny B. Moore

Hey! Good Evening!

This evening's music features Chicago blues guitarist Johnny B. Moore. Enjoy!

Johnny B. Moore - I'm a King Bee

"Justice is incidental to law and order."

-- J Edgar Hoover


News and Opinion

Julian Assange attends procedural hearing at Westminster Magistrates Court

WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange appeared in person in central London at Westminster Magistrates Court yesterday, at a hearing scheduled to process the submission of defence evidence. The hearing was the latest procedural step in the extradition request from the US for Assange, which will be subject of a scheduled four-week trial beginning next month. It was revealed that, since his last hearing on December 19, Assange had been granted just two hours total to review that evidence with his legal team. What is being conducted in the British courts is not a trial but a legal farce, designed to cover up the lawless rendition of a political prisoner to a country that brazenly assassinates political opponents. ...

Assange's lawyer Gareth Peirce began the hearing with reference to the continuing and deliberate isolation of Assange from his lawyers and the impossibility of conducting a defence on this basis. According to Peirce, evidence that is yet to be submitted includes a volume on prison conditions that she has only begun to discuss with her client. There are three further “substantial volumes” of exhibited material that Assange had not yet had a chance to see at all. The legal team had hoped, Peirce noted, to have time to go through this material while Assange was held in the cells at Westminster Magistrates Court, after a “difficult journey” in a police van from the maximum security Belmarsh prison where he is being incarcerated. However, court security insisted that an interview could not be guaranteed, and that any session would be limited to just one hour. Peirce explained “this has set us back on our timetable enormously.”

District Judge Vanessa Baraitser was unmoved. She stated that there were 47 people held in the court’s cells and eight available interview rooms, and that therefore the decision to limit Assange’s time was “not an unreasonable position for them to take.” Baraitser has repeatedly refused to direct Belmarsh prison to make more visiting time available to Assange’s lawyers, despite the availability of interview rooms. In a previous hearing, she brazenly questioned how important it actually was for Peirce to go over this information in detail with her client. ...

In the coming days, Assange will have just one hour-long Thursday afternoon session at Belmarsh to review the remaining evidence before the deadline for submission at the end of the week. ... Assange’s next procedural hearing is scheduled for Thursday, January 23.

Worth a full read:

Will alleged CIA misbehavior set Julian Assange free?

A few days before Christmas, Julian Assange testified to a Spanish court that a Spanish security company, UC Global S.L., acting in coordination with the CIA, illegally recorded all his actions and conversations, including with his lawyers, and streamed them back in real time to the CIA. He will, at the end of February, make a similar complaint to a British extradition court about the CIA’s alleged misbehavior.

Will such misbehavior, if proven, set Assange free?

The Daniel Ellsberg case may be instructive. You may recall that after the U.S. Supreme Court’s decision in the “Pentagon Papers” case, Ellsberg was indicted under the Espionage Act for leaking Pentagon documents to The New York Times and The Washington Post. After the trial commenced in San Francisco, it was brought to the judge’s attention that the “White House plumbers” broke into the office of Ellsberg’s psychiatrist. Based on that information and other complaints of government misbehavior, including the FBI’s interception of Ellsberg’s telephone conversations with a government official, Judge William Matthew Byrne decided that the case should be dismissed with prejudice because the government acted outrageously.

For similar reasons, the case against Assange should be dismissed, if it reaches the U.S. courts. ...

The Spanish newspaper El Pais broke the story that UC Global invaded Assange’s privacy at the Ecuadorian embassy and shared its surveillance with the CIA. It demonstrated step-by-step, document-by-document, UC Global’s actions and its contacts with the CIA. UC Global reportedly installed cameras throughout Assange’s space in the embassy — including his bathroom — and captured Assange’s every word and apparently livestreamed it, giving the CIA a free TV show of Assange’s daily life. ...

The behavior of UC Global and the CIA seems indistinguishable from the government’s behavior in the Ellsberg case, which a federal judge found to have “offended a sense of justice” and “incurably infected the prosecution” of the case. Accordingly, he concluded that the only remedy to ensure due process and the fair administration of justice was to dismiss Ellsberg’s case “with prejudice,” meaning that Ellsberg could not be retried.

Can anything be more offensive to a “sense of justice” than an unlimited surveillance, particularly of lawyer-client conversations, livestreamed to the opposing party in a criminal case? The alleged streaming unmasked the strategy of Assange’s lawyers, giving the government an advantage that is impossible to remove. Short of dismissing Assange’s indictment with prejudice, the government will always have an advantage that can never be matched by the defense. The usual remedy for warrantless surveillance is to exclude any illegally obtained information from the trial, but that remedy is inapplicable here. The government’s advantage in surveilling Assange is not the acquisition of tangible evidence but, rather, intangible insights into Assange’s legal strategy. There is no way, therefore, to give Assange a fair trial, since his opponents will know every move he will make.

2020 candidates promise to withdraw U.S. combat troops, but stay silent on drone strikes

Justin Trudeau: US escalation partly to blame for Iran plane deaths

Victims of an Iran-downed jetliner would still be alive were it not for a recent escalation of tensions partly triggered by the US, Justin Trudeau has said. “I think if there were no tensions, if there was no escalation recently in the region, those Canadians would be right now home with their families,” the Canadian prime minister said in an interview with Global television.

He added that the international community had been “very, very clear about needing to have a non-nuclear Iran”, but also in “managing the tensions in the region that are brought about by US actions as well”. ...

The accident came as a deep blow to the Iranian community in Canada, which is home to North America’s largest Iranian diaspora. According to the last census, there were 210,000 Canadians of Iranian origin living in this country in 2016.

“I am, of course, outraged and furious that families across this country are grieving the loss of their loved ones, that the Iranian-Canadian community is suffering so greatly, that all Canadians are shocked and appalled at the senseless loss of life,” Trudeau said on Saturday.

“It’s a huge tragedy for the entire country and not just for the Iranian community.”

Canadians feel like collateral damage of Trump's scattershot foreign policy

When a Canadian business magnate sent off a flurry of tweets blaming Donald Trump for provoking the crisis which eventually led to the accidental shooting-down of a Ukrainian passenger jet, the posts quickly went viral. Michael McCain, the billionaire CEO of Maple Leaf Foods, used the company’s branded Twitter account to describe the US president as a “narcissist” and described the 176 passengers and crew as “collateral damage” from Trump’s “irresponsible, dangerous, ill-conceived behaviour”. ...

McCain’s tweets highlight one strand of Canada’s response to the disaster – the latest in a string of events in which the country has found itself caught up in feuds between the Trump administration and other countries. Justin Trudeau seemed to acknowledge such frustrations on Monday, when he said that the victims of the disaster would still be alive were it not for a recent crisis partly triggered by Trump’s decision to kill Iran’s top general, Qassem Suleimani. ...

As a close ally of the US – and its largest trading partner – Canada has always been especially vulnerable to the ebbs and flows of policy decisions made in Washington DC. Such sensitivity has only heightened under the current administration.

“Canadians might not be holding Donald Trump directly responsible for this attack, but I believe there is increasing concern among Canadians that we are the collateral damage in erratic decisions made by the Trump administration,” said Stephanie Carvin, a professor of international relations at Carleton University. “There’s no real forethought from this administration in how policy might affect allies. And really there’s no afterthought to how they might ameliorate the damage that comes from these situations.”

Trumps Stooges Comically Lie About Iran

Europe Is Calling Out Iran Over Its Nuclear Program

Britain, Germany, and France said Tuesday they had “been left with no choice” but to finally challenge Iran over its breaches of the 2015 nuclear accord, after Tehran announced it was abandoning limits on the enrichment of uranium altogether.

The European countries announced they had triggered the “dispute resolution mechanism” outlined in the landmark deal, which will bring their grievances before the other signatories — Iran, Russia, China, and the European Union — to try to find a resolution. If they can’t reach an agreement, Iran, whose economy is already suffering under U.S. sanctions, could face the return of crippling international measures.

Under the deal, which was intended to stop Iran developing a nuclear weapon, Tehran agreed to limits on its nuclear program in return for the lifting of international sanctions.

But since the U.S. withdrew in 2018 and reimposed its own sanctions, the Islamic Republic has gradually announced that it is walking away from various restrictions imposed by the agreement. Until now, European nations have tried to hold the weakened agreement together, but their latest statement signals that they have had enough of Iran’s breaches — and that Tehran could be hit with more devastating sanctions if it fails to get back in line.

Trump’s Team Can’t Defend His Shifting Iran Lies: A Closer Look

Up to 10 GOP senators consider bucking Trump on war powers

As many as 10 Republican senators are considering bucking President Trump on a resolution that would limit his ability to take military action against Iran.

The increasing number is the latest sign of growing GOP frustration over the Trump administration’s justification for the drone strike that killed Iranian Gen. Qassem Soleimani.

Sen. Tim Kaine (D-Va.) is circulating a bipartisan resolution that would direct Trump to remove U.S. forces from any hostilities against Iran within 30 days of its enactment.

GOP Sens. Mike Lee (Utah) and Rand Paul (Ky.) have already voiced their support for the measure, and Kaine says about eight more Republicans, including Sens. Susan Collins (Maine), Lisa Murkowski (Alaska), Todd Young (Ind.) and Mitt Romney (Utah), are reviewing it. ...

Democrats can force a vote on the measure at any time, but Senate Minority Leader Charles Schumer (D-N.Y.) on Monday said a vote will happen later in the week.

Russian government resigns

'Staggering number' of human rights activists killed in Colombia, UN reports

The United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights has expressed alarm at the “staggering number” of social activists killed in Colombia despite a peace accord aimed at improving conditions in poor, rural areas. According to the UN, 107 human rights defenders were killed in 2019, a worrying number that could grow to 120 as investigations are completed. At least 10 activists have been reported killed in the first two weeks of 2020.

“This vicious and endemic cycle of violence and impunity must stop,” said Marta Hurtado, spokeswoman for the high commissioner.

The vast majority of the deaths happened in rural areas with higher-than-average rates of poverty and where illegal armed groups operate. Some of these areas were previously controlled by the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia, the rebel group that signed a historic peace accord in 2016.

The UN pointed to challenges in implementing the accord, the presence of illegal armed groups in territory once controlled by the leftist rebels, and the government’s military-focused response as all being partly to blame.

The landmark agreement ending over five decades of conflict includes lengthy chapters outlining ways for the government to establish a presence in remote regions where the illicit drug trade flourishes. While some advances including the building of new roads and efforts at crop substitution have taken place, those parts of the accord are proving to be the most difficult to put into effect.

Nancy babbles on and on.

Trump impeachment: Nancy Pelosi announces impeachment managers


Democrats release Ukraine files including handwritten note on 'the Biden case'

House Democrats have released a trove of documents obtained from Lev Parnas, a close associate of Donald Trump’s personal lawyer Rudy Giuliani, including a handwritten note that mentions asking Ukraine’s president to investigate “the Biden case.” The documents made public Tuesday come as Democrats prepare to send articles of impeachment to the Senate for Trump’s trial. They add new context to their charges that Trump pressured Ukraine to investigate Democrats as he withheld military aid to the country.

The documents show Parnas was in constant communication with Giuliani and in contact with Ukrainian officials as he worked as an intermediary.

Among the documents is a screenshot of a previously undisclosed letter from Giuliani to Ukrainian president Volodymir Zelenskiy dated 10 May 2019, which was before Zelenskiy took office. In the letter, Giuliani announces himself as Trump’s personal lawyer and requests a meeting with Zelenskiy “as personal counsel to President Trump and with his knowledge and consent”.

Also among the documents is a handwritten note on stationery from the Ritz-Carlton Hotel in Vienna that says “get Zalensky to Annonce that the Biden case will be Investigated.“ Trump asked Zelenskiy in a July call to investigate his political rival, Democrat Joe Biden, and his son Hunter. Hunter Biden served on the board of a gas company based in Ukraine. In a letter outlining the evidence, Democrats said that Parnas’s attorney confirmed that Parnas wrote the notes.

Prof Richard Wolff: Should small towns ban dollar stores?

FedEx mounts big-money push to head off unionization by US workers

FedEx workers hoping to unionize and get better pay and benefits have met with a well-financed barrage of opposition from the company, according to recordings obtained by the Guardian. Workers who charge that their benefits are less than at rival UPS said the company has bombarded them with anti-union messages and forced them to attend anti-union meetings.

The Guardian obtained recordings of meetings that were mandatory and required workers to sign in, according to a FedEx employee, held at FedEx facilities in 2015 and 2016, where managers and union avoidance consultants lectured workers on unions as the Teamsters was attempting to organize FedEx drivers at several locations around the United States.

“It’s time to campaign. If you don’t want this third party coming in putting a wall between us, it’s time. Because when you campaign and tell them you don’t want them here, eventually it becomes loud and clear to them. You can do that,” said a FedEx human resources manager in a July 2016 captive audience meeting. ...

FedEx, the second largest logistics company in the US, spent $837,000 between 2014 and 2018 on union avoidance consultants, according to a recent report published by the Economic Policy Institute. The report found by examining publicly available forms filed by consultants with the Department of Labor, US employers spend around $340m annually on union avoidance consultants, with FedEx as one of the top spenders.

FedEx’s anti-union campaign between 2014 to 2018 was largely a success. In April 2019, the only FedEx Freight workers unionized in the US voted against an effort to decertify the Teamsters union at a warehouse in Stockton, California, but prior decertification efforts were successful in 2017 in Pennsylvania and North Carolina. The only other unionized FedEx employees are their pilots, who voted to form a union in 1993.

Cops in Riot Gear Showed Up to Evict the Homeless Moms Occupying a Vacant Oakland House

Just before 6 a.m. Tuesday, the four homeless mothers occupying an investor-owned home in Oakland texted the supporters who’d been faithfully guarding them since a court ordered their eviction last week. They were about to be kicked out. “Sheriff is banging on the door right now please come to 2928 Magnolia Street right now to witness and film,” they wrote.

Video later showed sheriff’s deputies with the Alameda County Sheriff’s Office — who were ordered to carry out the eviction within five days after a judge ruled in the property owner’s favor Friday — trying to break down the door and return the property to vacancy. Advocates, who had been summoned to the home several hours earlier, appeared to surround the house on short notice. Marisa Kendall, a reporter for the Mercury News, said cops showed up in riot gear in turn to ward them off.

Dominique Walker, a 34-year-old mother to two young girls and member of the coalition that calls itself Moms 4 Housing, promised after Alameda County Superior Court Judge Patrick McKinney’s ruling that her cadre of moms and kids wasn’t leaving without a fight. They’d been there since November and celebrated the holidays there. The sheriff’s deputies came when she was out of the home for a media interview, according to April Thomas, a spokesperson for Moms 4 Housing. Four people were arrested during the eviction — two mothers and two of their supporters, according to Thomas — but it wasn’t clear on what charges. ...

The moms had been illegally occupying the modest three-bedroom home since November, arguing that the property’s corporate owner should consider selling them the home at a fair price since housing has become so unaffordable in the Bay Area. The mothers said they had a willing financier in the Oakland Community Land Trust, but that the homeowner wouldn’t come to the table to broker a deal. The home is owned by Wedgewood Properties, a California-based company that buys and flips distressed homes. The company, which has called the mothers’ occupation “violent, dangerous, and unsuccessful,” urged the women to leave voluntarily.



the horse race



2020 Democrats Spar on Foreign Policy, Electability, Free College & More at 7th Democratic Debate


Krystal Ball: Warren's identity politics smear backfired spectacularly

Don’t Take the Bait, Progressive Leaders Warn, After Sanders-Warren Spat Overtakes the News Cycle

So much for unity. Just a week after progressive leaders called for further cooperation between the presidential campaigns of Sens. Bernie Sanders and Elizabeth Warren, a series of media leaks has led to an escalation of hostilities between the candidates and their supporters. For some diehards, the weekend fireworks were vindication of their belief that unity was always a pipe dream; in an election, they say, there can only be one winner, and that zero-sum calculus necessarily leads to conflict. “Perhaps this new level of hostility between the campaigns can be put back in the bag,” said Nathan Robinson, editor of Current Affairs and a vociferous Sanders backer, who last week argued for harsher criticism of Warren. “But it shouldn’t be. We need to be critical and blunt. There is every reason to be hostile toward a candidate who has just tried to destroy your campaign with a damaging allegation.”

Several progressive leaders and groups — some who’ve endorsed Warren, some who back Sanders, and some who’ve yet to endorse either candidate — strongly disagreed. In conversations with The Intercept, they called for a truce, insisting that a slugfest between Warren and Sanders, less than a month before the Iowa caucuses, only helps the corporate wing of the Democratic Party. Leaders from MoveOn, the Working Families Party, Justice Democrats, Democracy for America, the Center for Popular Democracy Action, Sunrise Movement, and Indivisible all called on the two candidates to cease attacking each other and focus on the issues. And the Warren campaign today told BuzzFeed it wants to “de-escalate.” Neither the Warren nor the Sanders campaign responded to The Intercept’s request for comment.

Saagar Enjeti calls out CNN's outrageous conduct during debate


Sanders' Senior Advisor Chuck Rocha reacts to Iowa debate, reveals campaign impeachment strategy

Surging Ten Points, Sanders Takes Lead Over Biden, Warren in California Tracking Poll

With a ten-point jump since November, Sen. Bernie Sanders has surged to the lead in a California tracking poll less than two months before the state's Democratic primary on Super Tuesday—March 3.

The tracking poll Public Policy Institute of California, which was last conducted in November, shows Sanders leading with  support of 27 percent of likely Democratic primary voters, followed by former Vice President Joe Biden with 24 percent and Sen. Elizabeth Warren at 23 percent.

With a margin of error of 6.5 percent, the poll revealed a statistically tight race among the top three candidates—though fourth place was occupied by former South Bend, Indiana mayor Pete Buttigieg who garnered just 6 percent. The most striking feature in the trends was that while support for Warren and Biden has plateaued since Sen. Kamala Harrris, who represents California, dropped out in early December, Sanders experienced a significant surge.


"Sanders appears to have gained almost all of Kamala's former supporters in California," tweeted The Hill's Krystal Ball in response.

As other polls in California and nationwide have also shown, the California survey points to a massive advantage for Sanders among the youth vote while Biden—and to a lesser extent Warren—do better with older voters.

EXCLUSIVE POLL: Just as Many African-Americans Say They’d Consider Voting for Bernie Sanders as Joe Biden

Just as many African-Americans say they’d consider voting for Bernie Sanders as Joe Biden, according to new a VICE News-Ipsos Poll, suggesting Sanders might not have as much of a problem wooing black voters if he’s the Democratic nominee as some have assumed.

Fully 56% of African-Americans said they’d “consider voting for” Sanders in 2020 — a statistical tie with the 54% who said the same about former Vice President Joe Biden and significantly higher than any other candidate.

Only 23% of African-Americans said they wouldn’t consider voting for Sanders, about the same number as the 24% who said they wouldn’t consider voting for Biden.

Sanders does even better relative to Biden and the rest of the field among Hispanics: 47% say they’d consider voting for Sanders, while 37% said they’d consider voting for Biden. More Hispanics say they wouldn’t consider voting for Biden (37%) than wouldn't vote for Sanders (31%).

“Despite frequently being described as a ‘socialist’ or ‘too liberal’, Bernie Sanders has as many, if not more, minority Americans considering voting for him as any other candidate,” said Ipsos Public Affairs Vice President Chris Jackson.

Largest Teachers Union in Nevada Endorses Bernie Sanders

Sen. Bernie Sanders continued to rack up major labor endorsements in key early states as the largest teachers union in Nevada on Tuesday announced its endorsement of the 2020 Democratic candidate.

After Sanders received the most support among its approximately 19,000 members, the Clark County Education Association (CCEA) announced Sanders would have their support leading up to the state's Democratic caucus on Feb. 22.

"CCEA is proud to have endorsed Senator Bernie Sanders for President," the union's president Vikki Courtney said in a statement. "Senator Sanders has a stellar record of supporting educators. His position on public education issues is second to none. He has always been a champion for educators and working class people. He has our support. He has spent time with our members and has made a firm commitment to advance public education in our country."

Not only is it the largest educator union in Nevada—representing teachers and other professionals across the southern part of the state, including the Las Vegas area—CCEA is also the largest independent educator union in the entire country.


Victory for Democrats as Wisconsin appeals court puts hold on voter purge

A Wisconsin appeals court on Tuesday put on hold an order to immediately remove up to 209,000 names from the state’s voter registration rolls, handing Democrats who had fought the move a victory in the battleground state.

The appeals court sided with the bipartisan state elections commission in putting the brakes on removing any voters while the court fight continues. It also put on hold a ruling from Monday in which a judge found the commission and its three Democratic members in contempt for not proceeding with removing the voters.

The orders came as the commission was meeting in a closed session with attorneys from the state justice department to discuss the case.

A conservative law firm that brought the case, the Wisconsin Institute for Law and Liberty, had wanted the purge to happen immediately, even though the elections commission raised concerns about the accuracy of data used to identify voters who would have their registrations deactivated. ...

The case is being closely watched, as Wisconsin is among a group of swing states being targeted by both Democrats and Donald Trump this year. Trump narrowly won Wisconsin in 2016 by fewer than 23,000 votes, putting even more of a focus on every voter in the state.



the evening greens


Ex-lobbyist used Trump agriculture job to boost industry allies, emails reveal

In 2017, Dow Chemical scored a long-sought-after victory: after a push from the US government, China approved the import of the company’s genetically modified herbicide-resistant corn seeds. A grateful Dow lobbyist emailed a senior agriculture department official whose support had been critical: “Thank you for your efforts in support of U.S. agriculture.”

That official, Rebeckah Adcock, was no stranger to Dow. Before joining the Trump administration, Adcock was the chief lobbyist for the herbicide industry’s trade group, of which Dow was a prominent member. Adcock had helped her former industry colleagues in a variety of ways. At Dow’s request, for example, she had arranged a meeting between a top company official and the secretary of agriculture, Sonny Perdue, about the seed issue.

Before the May 2017 meeting, a Dow lobbyist emailed Adcock: “Do you know who will staff the secretary?” Adcock wrote back playfully: “Yes and u do too.”

“Roger”, the lobbyist, Hunt Shipman, replied. Then he joked about the potential conflict of a public servant helping former colleagues: “Maybe you can have a chair on both sides of the table… maybe you can staff them both? :).” It’s unclear if Adcock sat in on the meeting, but her government ethics agreement allowed her to communicate extensively and offer her assistance to the association’s members, including Dow.

Adcock isn’t the only lobbyist who has made her way to the federal government. Roughly one of every 14 appointments in the Trump administration has been a lobbyist. But previously unreported emails show Adcock repeatedly trading notes with industry players to craft policy. “It’s highly inappropriate conduct,” said Virginia Canter, chief ethics counsel for the not-for-profit Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington. Canter worked as an ethics attorney in the administrations of Bill Clinton, George W Bush and Barack Obama.

The emails were recently obtained by the Sierra Club and the liberal freedom of information group American Oversight. The groups requested the communications in response to a ProPublica and New York Times investigation that revealed the industry ties of Adcock and other administration officials.

BlackRock CEO Promises to Center Climate Change in Investment Strategy

In a letter to investors Tuesday, Larry Fink, CEO of money management firm BlackRock, announced the company would prioritize the climate crisis in deciding on investments and strategies going forward—a major victory for the environmental movement.

The new direction for BlackRock, the largest investment firm in the world which manages assets of around $6.96 trillion, is the result of a hard-fought effort by a group of dedicated activists, tweeted 350 Action co-founder Bill McKibben. ...


As Common Dreams reported last week, a new campaign called "Stop the Money Pipeline" is aimed at stopping financial support for the fossil fuel industry and has BlackRock as one of its primary targets.

Fink says in his letter to investors that he believes "we are on the edge of a fundamental reshaping of finance."

"The evidence on climate risk is compelling investors to reassess core assumptions about modern finance," Fink wrote.

According to the New York Times:

The firm, he wrote, would also introduce new funds that shun fossil fuel-oriented stocks, move more aggressively to vote against management teams that are not making progress on sustainability, and press companies to disclose plans "for operating under a scenario where the Paris Agreement’s goal of limiting global warming to less than two degrees is fully realized."

...

In a statement, the Sierra Club's campaign representative Ben Cushing said BlackRock's decision was a watershed moment while warning the letter needs to be backed up by immediate and concrete action to divest from dirty investments.

"As the biggest financial institution in the world, BlackRock's announcement today is a major step in the right direction and a testament to the power of public pressure calling for climate action," said Cushing. "But BlackRock will continue to be the world's largest investor in coal, oil, and gas."

"It is time to turn off the money pipeline to dirty fossil fuels for good," Cushing added.

Warming oceans force leatherback turtles on longer journeys to feed

Leatherback turtles are making exhausting journeys, in some cases nearly twice as long as usual, from nesting to feeding grounds, because of rising ocean temperatures and changing sea currents.

After nesting, turtles must move to cooler waters to feed, but higher temperatures mean some are having to swim further to reach suitable areas, according to research from Greenpeace and the French Institut Pluridisciplinaire Hubert Curien, part of the Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique.

The researchers tagged 10 nesting female leatherback turtles last year on the Yalimapo and Remire-Montjoly beaches of French Guiana, and then tracked their migration through the north Atlantic. Some of the turtles were found to have swum as far as Nova Scotia in north-east Canada and to France to find new feeding grounds for the jellyfish which form their main diet.

Though small in scale, the research provides an insight into how some marine species are being forced to adapt to the warming oceans. This week scientists warned that ocean temperatures had reached record levels with the last five years, which were the five hottest on record.


Also of Interest

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

Intercepted with Jeremy Scahill - Iran: What Next?

Bernie Sanders’s Lonely 2017 Battle to Stop Iran Sanctions and Save the Nuclear Deal

The Evangelicals Who Pray for War With Iran

CNN Moderators, Alarmed by Cost of Medicare for All, Ignore Price Tag of Endless War

St. Louis’ Top Prosecutor Is Using the Ku Klux Klan Act Against the City’s Police Union

Has President Trump Become the Pied Piper of Wall Street Along with the New York Fed?

Actually, Congress is Overdoing It

Man requests sword fight with ex-wife and lawyer to settle legal dispute

Cenk Uygur: Mark my words, Bernie will go up after Warren spat

Rising: Trump campaign agrees CNN mods out to get Bernie Sanders

Rising: Panel agrees Warren's attack won't stick with voters

Rising: Did Billionaires keep Yang, Gabbard off the stage?

Krystal and Saagar: How impeachment will affect 2020


A Little Night Music

Johnny B Moore - All Night Long

Johnny B. Moore - Broke Man

Johnny B. Moore - In the Closet

Johnny B. Moore - Crazy over You

Johnny B. Moore - Sittin' Here Thinkin'

Johnny B. Moore - Straight From The Shoulder

Johnny B. Moore - Rockin' In The Same Old Boat

Johnny B. Moore - Whiskey Drinkin' Woman

Johnny B Moore - Troubled World

Johnny B Moore - Boogie Chillen'

Karen Caroll & Johnny B Moore - Shakey Ground


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mimi's picture

this. From:
Following Amazon $1.5 Million Campaign to Try to Remake the Seattle City Council, Lawmakers Ban Foreign-Influenced Corporations from Spending in City Elections

The Seattle City Council voted today to pass a landmark campaign finance law that combats the influence of foreign corporate spending in city elections.

The legislation, introduced by Councilmember M. Lorena González, prohibits corporations from spending money in Seattle elections if they are foreign-influenced, defined as more than 1 percent ownership by a single foreign national or more than five percent ownership by multiple foreign nationals.
...
While this legislation was pending, local election spending in Seattle garnered national attention ahead of the 2019 city council elections, where online retail giant Amazon contributed an unprecedented $1.5 million to the Seattle Chamber of Commerce’s super PAC. In addition to being one of the country’s largest companies, more than five percent of Amazon is owned by foreign investors in Europe and Asia; in fact, two of Amazon’s top ten investors are foreign banks. Political spending by Amazon and other companies that meet the legislation’s thresholds of foreign ownership would be prohibited under the proposed legislation.

I always thought that Amazon is an American corporation. I find it puzzling that it is considered as foreign influenced, but in this context, I like that it is a lot. Hope other state or city governments would do the same.

Thank You for your tireless production of the EB no matter what. Hope all is well in your corner of the world and the weather behaves. Over here it is grey, more grey and nothing but grey.

Good Night.

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joe shikspack's picture

@mimi

amazon is a multi-national corporation (with business in lots of countries) and with investors from lots of countries. its interests are not really aligned with those of the people of seattle. it is just another huge business that wants to use the labor pool and other resources of seattle without paying a penny more for them than it can get away with by purchasing elections and government officials.

i would guess that the foreign ownership criteria was the easiest way of identifying a behemoth company like amazon and differentiating it from a local mom and pop business legally.

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11 users have voted.
mimi's picture

@joe shikspack
You are right, I think they used Delaware for the same reasons in their early years, to not pay a penny more than necessary. I think the same is true for their presence in Germany. Too much for me to follow.

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Bollox Ref's picture

That running a strong fifth on a regular basis, means that you'll come in fifth, strongly.

Incrementalism that is past its sell-by-date. Time to return to the even more frigid north.

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10 users have voted.

Gëzuar!!
from a reasonably stable genius.

joe shikspack's picture

@Bollox Ref

heh, you have to give it to klobuchar for tenacity. i would guess that she knows that there's not a snowball's chance in hell for her candidacy, but the name recognition that she builds now might help out next time the party donor class needs a neoliberal woman candidate.

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7 users have voted.
snoopydawg's picture

his squirrelly pals for ripping the mask off what our government is and showing the world who America really stands for. This includes democrats who have gone along with everything he has done and of course the republicans can't be left out. How anyone can believe that there are two separate parties and democrats stand on the side of righteousness is really beyond me.

What gets me the most with pompous Pompeo is that he brags that he is catholic. He should thank Frank the pope who did away with purgatory so he can go straight to hell when he dies. I bet Pompeo believes that abortion is bad, but he has no problem blowing people to bits. And torture and rendition is almighty with gawd.

Did anyone see the notes that are said to have shown how Rudy and friends tried to get Zelensky to open an investigation into ByeDone and son? lol... there is nothing on them that proves when they were written or by whom. That people are taking them at face value is everything that is wrong with Russia Gate. "On they are guilty!"

But gee maybe if democrats hadn't rushed through their bogus impeachment they might be able to further investigate them and anything else that comes up.

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11 users have voted.

Which AIPAC/MIC/pharma/bank bought politician are you going to vote for? Don’t be surprised when nothing changes.

joe shikspack's picture

@snoopydawg

yep, trump is doing a great job of turning the u.s. into a global pariah without really changing u.s. policy a bit from his predecessors. give him another four years and he might put an end to u.s. imperialism by uniting the world against the u.s.

yep, i saw a couple of images of parnas' alleged notes from the ritz carlton vienna. the notes are as good as parnas' credibility. i guess we'll see how that works out.

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7 users have voted.
Raggedy Ann's picture

It's concerning that social media is deleting accounts of Iranians, Syrians, and Venezuelans. First it was.....

I feel the noose around America tightening. It's getting harder to breathe.

Hope you all have a fine evening! Pleasantry

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9 users have voted.

"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

joe shikspack's picture

@Raggedy Ann

yep, freedom of speech as we once knew it is pretty much a dead letter. because terror. we appear to be sliding downhill with greater rapidity.

32 feet/second2 it's the law.

have a great evening!

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10 users have voted.
travelerxxx's picture

Thank-you so much for the work you put in for the EB, js. If I read nothing else all day, I know I will be well informed by catching the EB.

Even though I seldom post here, I lurk bigly.

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10 users have voted.
joe shikspack's picture

@travelerxxx

thanks! have a great evening.

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6 users have voted.