The Evening Blues - 9-16-20
Hey! Good Evening!
This evening's music features r&b singers Bob & Earl. Enjoy!
Bob & Earl - Dancin' Everywhere
“The petty thief is imprisoned but the big thief becomes a feudal lord.”
-- Zhuangzi
News and Opinion
'$2.5 Trillion Theft': Study Shows Richest 1% of Americans Have Taken $50 Trillion From Bottom 90% in Recent Decades
New research published Monday found that the top 1% of U.S. income earners have taken $50 trillion from the bottom 90% over the past several decades, and that the median worker salary would be around twice as high today as it was in 1945 if pay had kept pace with economic output over that period.
The study's authors, Carter C. Price and Kathryn Edwards of the RAND Corporation, examined income distribution and economic growth in the United States from 1945 to the present. The researchers found stark differences between income distribution from 1945 to 1974 and 1975 to 2018.
According to the study—which was funded by the Seattle-based Fair Work Center—the median salary of a full-time U.S. worker is currently about $50,000. Adjusted for inflation using the consumer price index, workers at or below the current median income now earn less than half of what they would have if incomes had kept pace with economic growth. This means that if salaries had kept pace with economic output, the median worker pay would be between $92,000 and $102,000 today, depending on how inflation is calculated.
Had the more equitable distribution of the roughly 30-year postwar period continued apace, the total annual income of the bottom 90% of American workers would have been $2.5 trillion higher in 2018, or an amount equal to about 12% of GDP. In other words, the upward redistribution of income has enriched the 1% by some $47 trillion—which would now be more than $50 trillion—at the expense of American workers.
David Rolf, a Seattle labor organizer, president of the Fair Work Center, and founder of Service Employees International Union (SEIU) Local 775, is more blunt. He calls this "the $2.5 trillion theft."
Every year, $2.5 trillion—that's trillion, with a “t”—is redistributed from the bottom 90 percent of Americans to the wealthiest 1 percent. That $50 trillion used to go to working Americans. It’s instead been rerouted to the pockets of the top 1 percent. https://t.co/d4hNjlIKhS
— Nick Hanauer (@NickHanauer) September 15, 2020
"From the standpoint of people who have worked hard and played by the rules and yet are participating far less in economic growth than Americans did a generation ago, whether you call it 'reverse distribution' or 'theft,' it demands to be called something," Rolf, who helped lead the fight for a $15 hourly minimum wage in Seattle and beyond, told Fast Company.
Remarkably, the study found that workers at all income levels would be better off today if income kept pace with output. Full-time, prime-age workers in the 25th percentile, for example, would be earning $61,000 instead of $33,000. Workers in the 75th percentile, who in 2018 earned $81,000, would be making $126,000. Even 90th-percentile workers, who earn $133,000, would be making $168,000 under the more equitable distribution.
On the other hand, had the economic pie been divided more equitably, the income of the top 1% would fall from around $1.2 million to a still-affluent $549,000. ...
According to Americans for Tax Fairness, the total wealth of U.S. billionaires increased by $792 billion, or 27%, during the first five months of the Covid-19 pandemic. During this period, Amazon CEO Jeff Bezos, the world's wealthiest person, has become the world's first multi-centibillionaire, with a net worth now surpassing $200 billion. Meanwhile, his employees struggle to make ends meet, and Amazon workers who speak out against poor pay and hazardous working conditions during the pandemic have been fired and derided by company executives. ...
The U.S. has the highest poverty rate among the world's most-developed nations, and the fourth-highest poverty rate among OECD nations after South Africa, Costa Rica, and Romania. According to UNICEF, the U.S. also has the second-highest rate of childhood poverty in the developed world behind Romania, with more than one in five U.S. children—and over one in four Latinx children, and nearly one in three Black and Native American children—living in poverty.
This year, more than 54 million Americans, or roughly one in every six people—including 18 million children—may experience food insecurity, according to the nonprofit group Feeding America.
Noura Erakat: Trump’s Bahrain-UAE-Israel Deal Won’t Advance Palestinian Peace & Will Up Repression
UAE, Bahrain and Israel sign historic accords at White House event
Israel, the United Arab Emirates and Bahrain have signed agreements to establish formal relations, ending a decades-old taboo in Arab diplomacy as power and priorities shift in the Middle East. ...
Long shunned because of its occupation of the Palestinian territories, Israel has always been considered a regional pariah. Yet as mostly autocratic Arab governments grow apathetic towards the Palestinian cause, and with Israel and the Gulf states sharing a common enemy in Iran, some relations have flourished discreetly in recent years.
After welcoming the Israeli prime minister, Benjamin Netanyahu, earlier on Tuesday, Trump said “five or six” other countries were close to making similar deals with Israel, but did not name them. “I think Israel is not isolated anymore,” he said. ...
In reference to the three monotheistic religions, Trump’s “Abraham accords” will establish open business, direct flights and diplomatic relations. However, they fall short of full peace deals as the three countries already maintain significant informal ties and have not been at war.
Trita Parsi: How Trump’s ‘Peace Deal’ Is Really A Gulf Arab Arms Sale
Mexico’s Amlo proposes referendum on prosecuting country’s ex-presidents
Mexico’s president has announced plans for a referendum on whether to prosecute his unpopular predecessors, saying he wants “the people” to give the green light to any legal proceedings against the country’s former presidents.
Andrés Manuel López Obrador, commonly called Amlo, delivered a document to the senate on Tuesday, asking for a plebiscite on prosecuting former presidents to be held along midterm elections on 6 June 2021.
The document outlines a litany of grievances during the three decades before López Obrador took office in December 2018, including privatisations rife with cronyism, spiralling violence and an increasing concentration of wealth.
López Obrador has previously said that he opposes putting past presidents on trial, saying: “We must not be anchored to the past.” But he has a track record of putting controversial ideas to “the people”.
USDA and Meatpacking Industry Collaborated to Undermine Covid-19 Response, Documents Show
The U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) and the meatpacking industry worked together to downplay and disregard risks to worker health during the Covid-19 pandemic, as shown in documents published Monday by Public Citizen and American Oversight.
The documents (pdf), which the groups obtained through Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) requests, reveal that a week before President Donald Trump issued his controversial executive order in April to keep meatpacking plants open—overriding closure orders from local health officials—a leading meat industry lobby group drafted a proposed executive order that was strikingly similar to Trump's directive.
North American Meat Institute president Julie Anna Potts drafted the document, which invoked the Korean War-era Defense Production Act in proposing a presidential proclamation that orders "critical infrastructure food companies continue their operations to the fullest extent possible."
The documents also show that the North American Meat Institute repeatedly requested that USDA Secretary Sonny Perdue discourage workers who were afraid to return to work from staying home, that meatpacking plants asked the USDA to intervene on multiple occasions when state and local governments either shut them down over health and safety concerns or sought to impose worker health and safety standards, and that pork producer and food processing giant Smithfield Foods repeatedly requested that the USDA "order" it to reopen its meat processing plant in Sioux Falls, South Dakota—even though the agency lacks the legal authority for such a move.
"While we knew that the meatpacking industry was lobbying the Trump administration to take steps to protect its profits regardless of the cost to workers' lives, the degree of collaboration these documents show is astounding," said Adam Pulver, attorney for Public Citizen.
"As outbreaks continue to emerge in meatpacking plants, it is stunning to see the cavalier attitude officials took to the health and safety of workers in the early part of the pandemic," Pulver added. "To the extent that the USDA impeded the efforts of state and local governments to contain the virus, the blood of meatpacking workers is on their hands."
According to July data from the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), 23 states reported Covid-19 outbreaks in meat and poultry processing facilities, with 16,233 cases and 86 deaths reported in 239 facilities. Fully 87% of those cases occurred among racial or ethnic minorities. The problem is global, with other countries from Britain to Brazil reporting widespread Covid-19 infection among their meatpackers.
A common theme connects all of these outbreaks around the world, critics said Tuesday—the prioritization of profit over people.
Pelosi Faces Dem REVOLT Over Lack Of Economic Relief
Senator Demands HHS Official Michael Caputo Be Fired for Deranged 'Sedition' Rant Against CDC Scientists
Sen. Patty Murray late Monday night demanded the immediate firing of Michael Caputo, the top communications official at the Health and Human Services Department, after the former Trump campaign aide over the weekend launched into an unhinged tirade accusing CDC scientists of "sedition" against the president and urging White House supporters to "buy ammunition" in preparation for a post-election conflict.
During a Facebook live session Sunday that has since been removed from the social media platform along with his entire personal account, Caputo baselessly claimed that "there are hit squads being trained all over this country" to prevent President Donald Trump's reelection. Without a shred of evidence, Caputo also accused the CDC of forming a "resistance unit" to harm the president even at the cost of worsening the Covid-19 pandemic.
CDC scientists "haven't gotten out of their sweatpants except for meetings at coffee shops" to decide "how they're going to attack Donald Trump next," Caputo said, according to the New York Times. "There are scientists who work for this government who do not want America to get well, not until after Joe Biden is president."
"When Donald Trump refuses to stand down at the inauguration, the shooting will begin," said Caputo. "The drills that you've seen are nothing."
Following Caputo's rant, Murray—the top Democrat on the Senate Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions Committee—called on HHS Secretary Alex Azar to fire the communications official, who has also reportedly been attempting to alter the CDC's weekly coronavirus reports behind the scenes despite his complete lack of medical experience.
"As the leader of our nation's health department during a pandemic that has claimed more than 190,000 American lives, Secretary Azar has a basic responsibility to ensure our public health experts are able to do their jobs, our Covid-19 response is not undermined by misinformation or conspiracy theories, and the data used to inform our efforts is free of political interference," the Washington Democrat said in a statement late Monday.
"It is clear Secretary Azar cannot meet his basic responsibilities while allowing Michael A. Caputo, a yes-man for President Trump with no scientific expertise who publicly attacked CDC scientists and privately interfered with key CDC reports, to continue serving in such an influential role," Murray continued. "If Secretary Azar believes his responsibility is to the American public and not to President Trump, he should demand Mr. Caputo's resignation today."
As Caputo's rant drew national news coverage and condemnation from Democratic lawmakers and other critics, HHS issued a statement to CBS News backing Caputo, calling him "a critical, integral part of the president's coronavirus response, leading on public messaging as Americans need public health information to defeat the Covid-19 pandemic."
Black churches say Donald Trump election ad incites 'white terrorism'
Black American church leaders have accused Donald Trump of inciting “white terrorism” against people of colour and depicting churchgoers as “thugs” in a presidential election campaign ad. They are calling for the advertisement’s removal from display and federal protection from any bias or threats it could provoke.
The video, named Meet Joe Biden’s Supporters, is online and includes violent scenes of burning buildings and police cars followed by footage of the Democratic presidential nominee kneeling in front of the altar at Bethel African Methodist Episcopal (AME) church alongside Black clergy members and community leaders in his hometown of Wilmington, Delaware.
The apparent voice of Vice-President Mike Pence is heard saying, “You won’t be safe in Joe Biden’s America.” It then cuts to text that reads: “Stop Joe Biden and his rioters.”
The AME church on Monday denounced the ad, which they said links the church to violence and implies “that those who gathered there are ‘thugs’”. Meanwhile, the Bethel pastor Silvester Beaman told Religion News Service (RNS): “The ad is overtly racist and offensive on numerous levels.” ...
They demanded an “immediate apology” to Bethel AME church and to Beaman, for the ad to be removed from all networks and “federal protection” for the church, its staff and community. They also called on the federal Departments of Justice and Homeland Security to launch an investigation into the “legality of the Trump campaign’s misrepresentation and Photoshopping images” and the “rhetoric as the language that might incite violence, and encourage racial tensions that lead to placing people of colour in harm’s way”.
Continue to Say Her Name: Breonna Taylor’s Family Wants Cops Arrested After Historic $12M Settlement
Breonna Taylor: Louisville officials agree to pay family $12m
The city of Louisville, Kentucky, has reached a $12m settlement with the family of Breonna Taylor in a civil suit stemming from the fatal shooting by police of the 26-year-old inside her apartment in March, the city’s mayor, Greg Fischer, announced on Tuesday. The agreement would be one of the highest such payments in a police killing in years. ...
A lawsuit filed in April by [Taylor’s mother, Tamika] Palmer alleged the police used flawed information when they obtained a “no-knock” warrant to enter the 26-year-old woman’s apartment late at night in March during a drug investigation. ...
Separately, a grand jury could soon be asked to weigh charges in a potential criminal case against three officers involved in the shooting. Local prosecutors have come in for heavy criticism for the long delay. Sunday marked six months since Taylor’s death at the hands of police on 13 March, prompting months of demonstrations in Louisville and nationally, against the backdrop of widespread Black Lives Matter protests.
One of the officers involved in the raid, which was connected to a drug investigation, was fired in June. That month, the city banned the use of no-knock search warrants. Brett Hankinson was terminated for “wantonly and blindly” firing 10 rounds into the apartment, according to his termination letter. Police said none of the three officers who took part in the raid were wearing body cameras. ...
In addition to a monetary settlement, the agreement between the city and the Taylor family includes multiple policing reforms, according to reports, including a requirement that commanders approve all search warrants before they go to a judge.
Mychal Denzel Smith on Breonna Taylor, Defunding Police, Systemic Racism & His Trump-Era Depression
Canada Post Printed Stamps With Former Prime Minister's Decapitated Head
Canada Post has apologized after the severed bronze head of the country’s first Prime Minister was immortalized in stamp form. James Bone, a federal government employee who handles stamp collections at Library and Archives Canada, had a sheet of official Canada Post stamps made bearing the detached head of a John A. Macdonald statue that was recently toppled in Montreal.
james bone deserves a heritage minute for designing these https://t.co/NGd2ieW9JK
— negro frolics (@DesmondCole) September 11, 2020
Bone posted a photo of a sheet of 50 domestic stamps on Twitter Tuesday, tweeting “Please RT if fuck colonialism” and promising to send them to people free of charge “if you or your ancestors were fucked over by Macdonald.” He had them printed through Canada Post’s Picture Postage program, which allows people to put their own photos on usable domestic or international stamps for a fee ($68 for a sheet of domestic stamps), a service that’s typically used to innocently celebrate birthdays and anniversaries. ...
Macdonald served as Canada’s prime minister in 1867-1873 and 1878-1891. While he was known for overseeing the creation of Canada and its national railway system, those accomplishments came at the expense of the Indigenous peoples who had lived on the land for thousands of years. Macdonald’s policies facilitated mass starvation of Indigenous peoples, whom he regularly referred to as “savages.” His conservative government also orchestrated the forcible removal of Indigenous children from their homes to be placed in residential schools, where they were often abused. ...
Canada Post was not amused by the stamp or the attention Bone’s tweet received. In an email to VICE News, a spokesperson said Canada Post was investigating how the image cleared the approval process for submissions to the Picture Postage program.
Journalists Need to Be Clear About a Clear Threat to Democracy
When the president of the United States has:
- explicitly declared his intentions to withhold federal election funding from states that are trying to make it easier to vote during a pandemic;
- appointed a major donor to his campaign with conflicts of interest to sabotage the US Postal Service—while stating that he opposes additional funding for the post office in order to prevent the opposition party from having universal mail-in voting;
- claimed that the defeat of lawsuits aimed at disenfranchising voters is the “biggest risk” to his reelection bid;
- deputized 50,000 “poll watchers” to intimidate people from voting across the country;
- advised his supporters to commit the felony of double voting;
- proposed postponing the 2020 elections;
- preemptively cast election results into doubt by suggesting the results may not be legitimate; and
- repeatedly refused to state whether he would concede the election in the event of a loss;
…then the evidence threshold has been more than satisfied for journalists to declare that he is trying to steal the 2020 election. Journalists and newsrooms have an obligation to report that the most powerful person in the country is trying to subvert the election and retain power illegitimately, and a failure to blow the whistle on a clear threat to democracy is journalistic malpractice.
Yet, while one can find several op-eds (e.g., The Week, 8/11/20; USA Today, 8/16/20) pointing out the obvious fact of President Donald Trump trying to steal the 2020 election, it appears to be taboo for journalists at the biggest newsrooms in the country to straightforwardly report the fact that Trump is trying to do so.
The ACLU’s Dale Ho (Vanity Fair, 6/14/20), an attorney fighting against GOP voter suppression lawsuits, has argued that, ultimately, lawyers cannot litigate their way out of Trump’s election theft efforts, and that a “news media fight” has to be waged to prepare US voters’ expectations. However, it’s hard for US citizens to prepare if the US media aren’t reporting that Trump is trying to steal the election.
FAIR conducted a Nexis search for “Trump” + “election” + “steal” of the New York Times, Washington Post, Wall Street Journal, Houston Chronicle, Chicago Tribune, Star Tribune, Los Angeles Times and USA Today—most of the biggest newspapers in the country by circulation—from July 7 to September 7. Out of all the results pertaining to the election, there wasn’t a single article reporting that Trump is trying to steal the 2020 election.
The closest things one can find to corporate media plainly stating that Trump is attempting to commit election theft are various scenarios of how Trump could steal the election, columns asking what would happen if Trump refused to concede the election if he lost, or reports on Democratic Party politicians asserting that Trump is trying to steal the election.
Slate (8/3/20) and the Washington Post (8/16/20) ran articles describing how Trump could potentially steal the election by “blocking the counting of mail-in ballots,” because more Democrats are in favor of mail-in ballots—which take longer to be counted—and the potential for Trump to prematurely “declare himself the victor” should initial results based on in-person voting show him winning. That’s in addition to preventing the Postal Service from delivering mail-in ballots to voters and to elected officials promptly.
Investigative journalist Greg Palast (Salon, 8/25/20) argues that “the real theft of the 2020 presidential election is not the lack of mailboxes,” but the “lack of commitment to counting ballots by both parties.” Mail-in voting and absentee ballots are already rejected at a much higher rate than in-person voting, especially from younger and minority voters, and some projections are estimating that absentee ballot rejections could be tripled in battleground states for November (AP, 9/7/20).
There have been reports of Democratic Party politicians like Beto O’Rourke (Houston Chronicle, 5/13/20) and Joe Biden (Washington Post, 7/23/20) warning that they believe Trump will “do everything within his power” to steal the election, and that “this president is going to try to indirectly steal the election by arguing that mail-in ballots don’t work.” However, corporate media also give space for Trump to air his accusations that it’s Democrats who are trying to commit election theft (Politico, 7/31/20; Fox News, 8/20/20; The Hill, 8/24/20), making this more “he said, she said” reporting, rather than an independent assessment of Trump’s plans and actions.
Other outlets ran articles (New Yorker, 7/21/20; Washington Post, 7/22/20; Politico, 9/4/20) and op-eds (CNN, 8/17/20) considering different scenarios of what could happen if Trump refused to leave office if he loses the election. Other op-eds (Washington Post, 7/9/20, 8/18/20) essentially advised Americans to trust the “bureaucracy and legal procedure,” even if it might “sound naive,” because “there are laws that stop others from using the authorities of the Executive Branch on behalf of anyone other than the legitimate president.” There are also laws forbidding officials from using government property for political purposes, but that didn’t stop the Trump campaign from turning the White House into a stage set for the Republican National Convention.
While contemplating different scenarios is valuable, these articles presume that American citizens are supposed to be passive spectators, rather than active political participants, since they include no calls to action, as a few other op-eds have (Intercept, 8/11/20; New York Times, 9/3/20). Neither do such articles point out why Americans need to contemplate these scenarios in the first place: President Donald Trump is trying to steal the election.
[More at the link. -js]
Krystal Ball: Can America SURVIVE Election Day?
Bernie Sanders offers left gloss to Biden’s right-wing campaign
With polls indicating a tightening of the presidential race, Vermont Senator Bernie Sanders gave an interview Friday in which he hinted at concerns that Democrat Joe Biden was conducting such a right-wing campaign he was in danger of losing to President Donald Trump. In the interview on the PBS Television program “Firing Line,” hosted by Margaret Hoover, Sanders made a feckless appeal for his “good friend” Biden to do a better job of packaging his right-wing program in more populist rhetoric about jobs, wages and health care. ...
He made no substantive suggestions on policy questions, and when Hoover pointed out that the platform adopted at last month’s Democratic Party Convention omitted the key planks in his so-called “political revolution,” Sanders readily acknowledged the fact. “It’s not a great secret that Joe Biden is far more conservative than I am,” he said. “Joe Biden does not believe in Medicare for all. I do. I believe in the Green New Deal. Joe does not.” If anything, Sanders seemed eager to establish Biden’s conservative credentials in order to counter Trump’s efforts to cast the Democratic Party and Biden as puppets of “far-left” and “socialist” forces.
In reality, the nomination of the pro-war corporate shill Biden and the right-wing character of his campaign constitute a devastating refutation of the central claim of Sanders and the various pseudo-left organizations that support him: That the Democratic Party can be pushed to the left and transformed into an instrument of progressive change through pressure from below.
Sanders’ acknowledgment of Biden’s refusal to support even his mild reform proposals did not prevent him from affirming his full backing for the Democratic campaign. Since pulling out of the race for the Democratic nomination last April and endorsing Biden soon after—reprising his endorsement of Hillary Clinton in 2016—Sanders has demanded that his supporters line up behind Biden and attacked those who criticize the Democratic ticket. He merely pleaded with Biden to “do a better job in getting out” his economic agenda.
'A savagely broken food system': Cory Booker wants radical reform ... now
From a viral pandemic to the movement for racial justice to the worsening climate crisis, Senator Cory Booker says the massive challenges facing the US right now are all tied to a “savagely broken food system”. And last week, his most recent challenge to that system gained new momentum, when a coalition of 300 farm, food, and environmental advocacy organizations sent a letter to Congress urging legislators to pass a bill that would eventually eliminate the country’s largest concentrated animal feeding operations (Cafos).
Speaking exclusively to the Guardian, Booker, a New Jersey senator who ran for the democratic presidential nomination earlier this year, says: “Nobody seems to be calling out how multinational, vertically integrated industrial agricultural companies are threatening American wellbeing, and I just think that the more people learn about these practices, the more shocked they are. “I don’t think most Americans realize that the way we raise animals is such a betrayal of the heritage of our grandparents. I don’t think they realize that … these big companies like Smithfield and Cargill and others have our American farmers now living like sharecroppers in constant debt, forced to follow their rules. I’ve watched the suffering in North Carolina of minority communities who live around Cafos and can no longer breathe their air … and I’ve seen workers in the meatpacking plants and how dangerous those plants are.
“Everybody is losing in this system – except for the massive corporations that have taken over the American food system.” ...
The issue of the US food system has picked up steam amid the Covid-19 pandemic, which shed light on the potential of Cafos to spread disease and contribute to antibiotic resistance, as well as the fragility of the US’s heavily consolidated food chain. There have been large coronavirus outbreaks at plants: hundreds of workers have died, thousands have been ill, and farmers have been forced to euthanize and dispose of millions of animals.
Booker, unlike most politicians, is willing to call out the behaviour of powerful meatpacking companies and introduce legislation to directly disrupt and regulate their businesses. In June, Booker and Senator Elizabeth Warren launched an investigation into meatpacking companies’ actions during the pandemic, looking at the coronavirus outbreaks and the companies’ claims that keeping plants running was necessary to feed the country, at the same time as a record amount of meat was being exported to China and other countries. In July, Booker introduced a bill that would prevent the US Department of Agriculture from allowing plants to speed up their lines, but it has so far not moved forward. Booker has also introduced bills to prevent further consolidation in agribusiness, incentivize climate-friendly farming practices via the Climate Stewardship Act, and increase support for small farms selling into local markets, with specific attention to historically underserved producers like black farmers.
'Yet Another Alarm Bell': Ice Chunk Twice Size of Manhattan Breaks Off Greenland Glacier Amid Record Arctic Warming
A chunk of ice nearly twice the size of Manhattan has broken off from Greenland's largest remaining glacier and fallen into the ocean, a frightening phenomenon that researchers and environmentalists attributed to record-breaking Arctic warming driven by the human-caused climate crisis.
"This is yet another alarm bell being rung by the climate crisis in a rapidly heating Arctic," Greenpeace spokesperson Laura Meller told the Associated Press.
In a statement announcing the development on Monday, the Geological Survey of Denmark and Greenland (GEUS) said the Nioghalvfjerdsfjorden ice shelf has lost 160 square kilometers since 1999.
"We should be very concerned about what appears to be progressive disintegration at the Arctic's largest remaining ice shelf," said Jason Box, a glaciology professor at GEUS.
Jenny Turton, a researcher at Germany's Friedrich Alexander University, noted that "the last few years have been incredibly warm in northeast Greenland."
"We had very early melt onset in 2019 linked to the heatwave across Europe and Greenland," said Turton. "The atmosphere in this region has warmed by approximately three degrees Celsius since 1980 and record-breaking temperatures have been observed in 2019 and 2020."
Firefighters make progress in west coast blazes as smoke spreads across US
Firefighters on the US west coast reported more progress in the battle against wildfires that have killed more than 30 people and destroyed entire communities. But much of the region is enveloped in a thick layer of smoke that has now affected large swaths of the country.
Aided by better weather, fire crews in Oregon on Tuesday gained more ground against the massive blazes that have scorched 1m acres and destroyed hundreds of homes in the state. Thousands of residents remain evacuated in congregate shelters and hotel rooms, and 22 people are still confirmed missing, according to the Oregon Office of Emergency Management.
Meanwhile, debilitating smoke continues to choke the region, with air quality in the city of Portland ranking among the worst in the world. Smoke clouds have grown so large that they are “obscuring the sun” and cooling temperatures as far away as the east coast, according to the National Weather Service in Baltimore-Washington.
Have you noticed the sky looking milky? What you are seeing is smoke from the wildfires in the western U.S. which is being carried to New England by the jet stream. No impacts expected in our area other than a hazy sky. A model animation of the smoke plume is below. #MEwx #NHwx pic.twitter.com/U6QSg7q3Fp
— NWS Gray (@NWSGray) September 15, 2020
In California, 16,600 firefighters were battling 25 fires on Tuesday after being able to largely put out two blazes on Monday. More than 20 people have died in wildfires in the state since mid-August, when fire season kicked off early with a freak barrage of dry lightning. ...
Donald Trump on Monday visited California, ignoring the scientific consensus that climate change is playing a central role in the catastrophe and revived his claim that poor forest management is mostly to blame.
The Atlantic basin remains extremely active. In addition to #Paulette #Sally #Teddy #Vicky, several areas are being monitored for potential development. Low pressure S-SE of the Cabo Verde Islands has a high formation chance during the next 5 days. https://t.co/Xhmye8a8VH pic.twitter.com/nrXlp5l10K
— National Hurricane Center (@NHC_Atlantic) September 15, 2020
Also of Interest
Here are some articles of interest, some which defied fair-use abstraction.
A “Persistent Eye in the Sky” Coming to a City Near You?
ASSANGE HEARING DAY SIX—Prosecutor Says Government Can Prosecute Journalist for Publishing
Fake News About Iran, Russia, China Is U.S. Journalism's Daily Bread
Ahead of Senate Antitrust Hearing, Groups Demand AGs Sue Google to End Monopoly Abuses
'Where Will Everyone Go?' New Report Documents How Climate Migration Could Reshape US
‘We’ve always known ours was contaminated’: the trouble with America’s water
Alarm over inbreeding after California cougars spotted with crooked tails
Archaeologists in Mexico identify first Mayan slave ship
Krystal and Saagar: MSNBC blames BERNIE for Biden's flagging Latino support as Biden plays Despacito
A Little Night Music
Bob & Earl - Harlem Shuffle
Bob & Earl - Sweet Pea
Bob & Earl - Baby, Your Time Is My Time
Bob & Earl - Baby, it's over
Bob And Earl - You Made A Boo Boo
Bob & Earl - Deep Down Inside
Bob & Earl - Oh Baby Doll
Bob & Earl - Fancy Free
Bob & Earl - Puppet On A String
Bob & Earl - Everybody Jerk
Bob & Earl - Land of 1000 Dances
Bob & Earl - Harlem Shuffle (fast version)
Comments
A Hard Won Victory For Firefighters and for Mt. Wilson
I'm verklempt...
There is always Music amongst the trees in the Garden, but our hearts must be very quiet to hear it. ~ Minnie Aumonier
and this...
There is always Music amongst the trees in the Garden, but our hearts must be very quiet to hear it. ~ Minnie Aumonier
evening anja...
i'm glad to hear that everything went well and mount wilson is safe. i hope that everything continues to go well, the winds cooperate and the bobcat fire gets tamed quickly.
have a great evening!
Me too, Joe
Btw, Nick Hanauer has done some great lectures on what he calls "Pitchfork Economics". I remember a TED Talk he did when the debate about minimum wage being raised to $15 an hour first hit the political narrative back in 2014. Addressing the rhetorical talking point the opposing side was making, asking if a fast food worker should make as much as and educated or skilled worker, Hanauer pointed out that the objective was not to raise the minimum wage so that "unskilled" workers can make more, the goal was to raise the bar so that EVERYONE can make more. An idea that was pioneered a long time ago when Henry Ford paid his workers double the going wage at the time, Hanauer describes Ford's decision as an experiment in capitalism in it's purest form because not only did his workers become consumers for his cars, they became consumers for other businesses as well. Illustrating the point even further, Hanauer commented that if plutocrats had NOT been born in the U.S., they would probably be selling fruit on the side of the road. Not because other countries don't have entrepreneurs, but because fruit was the only thing their customers could afford. A persuasive argument I thought at the time.
There is always Music amongst the trees in the Garden, but our hearts must be very quiet to hear it. ~ Minnie Aumonier
Wondering why our evening skies turned orange last two
nights:
Jet Stream carries smoke to Europe
Thanks Joe for the News and Blues. So many days (evenings) it's the bright spot in our day (at least the music).
Anja thanks for the shout out about Mt. Wilson, which is such an historic place. And a major congratulations to you on the Bobcat fire situation. Hoping you can relax, and that fresh air is on its way.
Our Oregon family and friends came very close to the Riverside fire three days ago, but the marine push has stopped it and in some cases pushed it back on itself. Everyone is waiting for fresh air.
A society grows great when old men plant trees in whose shade they know they shall never sit. Allegedly Greek, but more possibly fairly modern quote.
Consider helping by donating using the button in the upper left hand corner. Thank you.
Can you ask your friends in Oregon
To send California that marine push we so desperately need?
There is always Music amongst the trees in the Garden, but our hearts must be very quiet to hear it. ~ Minnie Aumonier
Anja, will do our best. Our Seattle family and friends are
waiting too. No daily walks. Dogs are wired. Nephew saw haze inside the big suburban mall near his home.
When the orange sunsets started we looked for the fires in France and saw none. Here's a map someone put up the other day. It uses satellite heat imaging rather than ground report for data mapping. You can check the planet from what I've seen so far.
Fire heat maps
Bonne chance, bonne courage Anja.
A society grows great when old men plant trees in whose shade they know they shall never sit. Allegedly Greek, but more possibly fairly modern quote.
Consider helping by donating using the button in the upper left hand corner. Thank you.
The Arcadia situation is good news
for firefighters and for the City of Arcadia for sure. But the fire is still moving west, where I am. That said, the rate it's going now, we should be ok. But if the winds kick up it changes the game entirely.
There is always Music amongst the trees in the Garden, but our hearts must be very quiet to hear it. ~ Minnie Aumonier
evening dm...
that smoke is really getting around. it showed up here yesterday and it's been more hazy than usual for the past couple of days. the sunset was colorful, though.
The U.S. has the highest poverty rate
among stanguled nations. Didn't need a study for that. Does help explain why I can't retire, tho.
Thanks for the news and dance, Joe.
question everything
evening qms...
heh, the u.s. government is great at creating scarcity. its elite class is hot to follow malthus' ideas about the necessity of keeping the serfs poor to make them work to enrich the worthies of society.
Country climate country climate it's country by a nose
Both ways we lose, so sad as it didn't need to happen
https://jessescrossroadscafe.blogspot.com/
I never knew that the term "Never Again" only pertained to
those born Jewish
"Antisemite used to be someone who didn't like Jews
now it's someone who Jews don't like"
Heard from Margaret Kimberley
evening ggersh...
heh, one of these days, the word "unsustainable" will be understood by the elite class.
Evening all ...
Here's some stuff from my morning paper, and joe's.
This is more alarming than the heat: Lakes Mead, Powell at risk again from drought despite major conservation efforts
What price absolution ? How I am claiming my racism
[video:https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YNSbW7-dtcs width:500 height:300]
We wanted decent healthcare, a living wage and free college.
The Democrats gave us Biden and war instead.
evening azazello...
the last time i was in phoenix, more than 50 years ago, i remember driving through it in the back seat of our station wagon, seeing green golf courses and suburban homes with grassy yards as vibrant as any that you would find in my relatively water-privileged area.
i remember thinking, "this is a desert?"
is that still common out there?
i'll have to think about that article from the sun writer for a while. there is something about it that just doesn't get it for me.
heh, pretty funny, the germans are going to bribe trump. they certainly know whom they are dealing with, though i would expect trump to try to chisel a bigger bribe out of them.
Gimme' a number.
As a white man, racist and thief, it seems like I'm being offered an out; money. Would that be a lump sum or maybe a percentage of my meager Social Security ? Will I get some kind of certificate ? Can I really buy my way out of these unpleasant truths ? Gimme' a number.
We wanted decent healthcare, a living wage and free college.
The Democrats gave us Biden and war instead.
We must stop helping each other now!
evening gj...
i've always thought that a rigorously applied program of barter and mutual aid with broad participation could destroy capitalism as we know it.
Barter?
I just traded ten hours of honest work for one hundred pounds of grass fed, hormone and antibiotic free beefburger.
My customer and I both won.
Barter is my best friend.
Regardless of the path in life I chose, I realize it's always forward, never straight.
heh...
barter is a great alternative to using the man's brand of currency. when demand for the currency falls off, the man weakens.
Edit - Hola, Joe! We're in hand-wringing mode because of Sally
since we have property in the path of the storm in FL and AL. Fingers crossed!
Gonna post a link to the HHS website, although I haven't had a chance to read a single font of their distribution plan. (sounds to me like seniors may be told to "go to the back of the bus"--I'll check that out, before I drop back by) The link below, should have a link to the Administration's plan, if anyone wants to check it out.
Heh--just found a PDF copy of the 'plan' released today. Yeah! Unlike Biden's 'experts'--including Doctor Death Emanuel--SENIORS are not deprioritzed.
The top two categories are:
Actually, haven't gotten any vaccinations (except for Tetanus after a cut about a decade ago) for quite a number of years. So, regardless of the election outcome, plan to wait 12-18 months, at the least, before we look to get one. Having said that--don't want a hassle in the event that our physicians should recommend getting it, earlier. For now, the risk might outweigh the positive (for us).
FWIW, during "Hidey-Hole" Joe's remarks (live) today, he didn't even mention seniors regarding his priorities. Par for the course! Waiting to see if I can get a speech and Q&Q transcript in order to screenshot it, and Tweet it out, so that people realize where his priorities lie. Between that, and his efforts to create a 'managed care' public option which he plans to allow to compete directly with Traditional Medicare and Medicare Advantage, we're hoping like heck that travel bans will be lifted, and we can get out of here. Phew!
BTW, Joe--thanks for article about Japanese (or, Vietnamese?) study. Have two epidemiologists in our working group of health/mental health providers/professionals, now--they basically recommend Level 2 (minimally) or Level 3 surgical masks--if a person can't get a N-95 respirator. Exception might be cloth masks with medical grade filter pockets, which could include actually using surgical masks as filters. They (cloth masks) are dicey, unless they are constantly washed, and thoroughly dried, though. Studies have shown that.
Note: Got a Face The Nation transcript where Dr Scott Gottlieb also says that all seniors should be outfitted with a N95--when I get more time, going to screenshot it, and Tweet it out, too. Will post here, then.
Here's link to HHS Distribution Plan.
Feeling rather puny today, probably because of a mini-crises been handling for almost 48 hours. Thank goodness, think it's resolved now. Haven't forgotten about posting link to Doctor Death's White Paper--just waiting until I can Tweet it, so I can post it in Tweet form.
Almost forgot--Biden's campaign team has created a 'legal war room'--also called a 'Special Litigation' Unit to contest Election Results.
Carville's been talking about these efforts since early summer (on Brian Williams 11th Hour program). Several Dems have even written a White Paper to detail how to foment so-called color revolution-type of protests if it looks like Joe doesn't win. Sorta figure that's one reason that Dems are encouraging rioting, along with protests--unlike when 'O' was President. At that time, when Ferguson was under siege, the 'O' Administration sent Sharpton and Company to quell the riots, not stir the pot. Remember--they even created a "Commission" headed by the former DC and Philadelphia Police Chief with a record amount of awards granted/upheld against his department (DC) for police brutality (Charles Ramsey). Convenient, eh? So, not sure where Fair author Cho is coming from. Maybe he's forgotten that it was Dems who recently attempted a soft coup in the ol' US of A. From all that I'm reading, the concern with Republicans might be related to voter suppression. Actually, rigging the election, will probably be what we see from Dems--if they can do it. Pretty sure they'll pull out all the stops, since they failed to circumvent it in 2016, even with their fabricated Russia Ruse plan. Gonna be a very interesting several months, for sure.
Hope Everyone is safe from wildfires, and, from 'Sally.'
Have a nice evening. Stay safe. Be well.
Mollie
[Edited: 'pull' not 'put']
"The leaders of this new movement are replacing traditional liberal beliefs about tolerance, free inquiry, and even racial harmony with ideas so toxic and unattractive that they eschew debate, moving straight to shaming, threats, and intimidation."
~~Matt Taibbi, The American Press Is Destroying Itself, June 12, 2020
"I know, I know. All passion; no street smarts."
~~Captain West, 1992 Rob Reiner/Aaron Sorkin Movie, A Few Good Men
“If there are no dogs in Heaven, then when I die, I want to go where they went.”
~~Will Rogers, Actor & Social Commentator (1856-1950)
Everyone thinks they have the best dog, and none of them are wrong.
evening mollie...
good luck with the storm. from what i've been reading, it's going to do a great deal of damage because it's so slow moving and dumping so much rain.
i guess you aren't currently in its path, which is good. it looks like it is going to track south of tennessee according to the maps i've seen.
it's hard to know what to expect of a biden administration regarding the distribution of a vaccine that could well be vaporware at this point. with any luck, "dr. death" will be something of an outlier among biden's advisors. i expect that since biden has little support among young people, he's going to need to court the senior vote to have any hope at all of winning.
heh, i would imagine that there are plenty of clintonite dead-enders ready to step up and steal the election for biden.
it should be an amusing show.
have a great evening!
Thank you for well wishes, Joe. We're lucky
that 'Sally' is tracking east, and, as you said, we'll be fine here in TN. (just concerned about South AL and Florida Panhandle, since there'll possibly be a fair amount of downtime before we know if we've sustained any damage down there)
BTW, in Pensacola, a main thoroughfare was damaged due to 'Sally,' and will be "out of commission" for quite a while due to repairs. For sure, that'll be a major hassle for the folks in Escambia County.
Hurricane Sally: Pensacola Bay Bridge may be out of commission a month or more
Kevin Robinson - Pensacola News Journal
Heh, hope you're right about Emanuel being sidelined. Sounds like he's pretty influential with Establishment Dems and Biden, since he's not only Biden's healthcare advisor, but, he's on his so-called "Public Health Advisory Committee." Guess time will tell.
Hope you Guys in MD aren't in Sally's path. (Truthfully, haven't had a time to check it out--leaving all that to Mr M. I've got my hands full with other stuff.
)
Mollie
"The leaders of this new movement are replacing traditional liberal beliefs about tolerance, free inquiry, and even racial harmony with ideas so toxic and unattractive that they eschew debate, moving straight to shaming, threats, and intimidation."
~~Matt Taibbi, The American Press Is Destroying Itself, June 12, 2020
"I know, I know. All passion; no street smarts."
~~Captain West, 1992 Rob Reiner/Aaron Sorkin Movie, A Few Good Men
“If there are no dogs in Heaven, then when I die, I want to go where they went.”
~~Will Rogers, Actor & Social Commentator (1856-1950)
Everyone thinks they have the best dog, and none of them are wrong.
Nord Stream 2 coming to an end?
construction
payoff
yep...
it looks to me like the u.s. has been overplaying its hand on the nord stream project. i expect that it will have long-term repercussions if the next administration doesn't make a sharp policy turnabout.
Good golly, Joe
This is the worst one I’ve seen.
When he reads from a TelePrompTer he sounds so flat and nothing like that arrogant ass he’s been. Read some of the replies to this tweet.
ETA
This. I love this:
Saw a few more tweets of people saying that they blocked Bernie because they can’t stand the lies. It’d be one thing if Bernie had lost fair and square, but when he was so blatantly cheated it’s another that he’s lying his buttocks off.
The meat plant article is something else. I knew a bit about how bad it was in those places, but not that extent. I hope some of the current congress members live long enough to stand trial for crimes against humanity and the theft of the US economy. A dawg can dream right?
Scientists are concerned that conspiracy theories may die out if they keep coming true at the current alarming rate.
evening snoopy...
wow, that was quite a word salad that biden served up, there. completely unintelligible. i guess he forgot to take his meds.
it seems to me that sanders is in no position to make demands of voters. if he talked to me that way i'd politely tell him to go piss up a rope, joe biden hasn't earned my vote.
Bernie signaling retirement in 2024
He's burned up all his credibility, all his public standing, all his historical record, everything he ever stood for, and for what? To try to get a corporate stooge elected who is maybe (but very doubtfully) a teensy sliver of an eensy bit better than the corporate stooge currently occupying the Oval Office - and who will certainly be nothing more than a puppet for the Big Corporations.
Say goodnight, Bernie. Don't bother running again - for anything. Enjoy your hard-earned retirement.
There is no justice. There can be no peace.
I have no idea what Biden was responding to
or attempting to address, but even so, there are some serious glitches in his neural synapses. Does the DOD even operate any stores on bases anymore or have not all been outsourced? (We now know they own and operate the Edelweiss Lodge and Resort in Bavaria which has vacation cabins and 258 rooms and suites. Restricted to military personnel, their families, and veterans.)
From "department store" to "second floor of the ladies department" adds details to whatever he was attempting to say, but those are completely irrelevant details.
A tweet mentioned that Biden got a list of questions
with which journalists would be asking them and he still messed it up. But one person said that the words had been edited to make him sound like that. Nice try. He said them that way.
Any tiny bit of criticism of Biden on his policies or anything and people say that you are behaving badly and just want Trump to win. It’s worse than during Obama’s tenure when criticism meant you are racist.
Scientists are concerned that conspiracy theories may die out if they keep coming true at the current alarming rate.
I got 'you're a racist' once
for criticizing Obama, but mostly I got 'you're a Putin puppet/stooge,' and I seem to recall that it began before Russiagate emerged in the 2016 election. If my recollection is correct, it means that some bloggers were being primed for Russiagate before it was rolled out.
What can you say about joe?
[video:https://youtu.be/C9Pw0xX4DXI]
Regardless of the path in life I chose, I realize it's always forward, never straight.
evening pricknick...
yep, it certainly appears that he might not be the best politician to insert into the white house.
Assange trial
https://dissenter.substack.com/p/good-ellsberg-bad-assange-at-extradition
Scientists are concerned that conspiracy theories may die out if they keep coming true at the current alarming rate.
thanks...
glad to see that ellsberg gave the prosecutor a hard time.
Good evening Joe. So we have our own miniature
genocidal sterilization program under ICE, whooooooo could imagine. Mothing will comeof this beyond the whistle blower getting sacked and a lot ofdeetainees mistreated even worse.
I really don't get why they bother to write stuff like this:
So how big is that and what % of the US population has any idea, let alone the world. Is it as big as DisneyLand, Death Valley, Paris? Hiw many football fields?
be well and have a good one.
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 --
evening el...
yep, we used to save those programs for indian reservations and institutionalized populations. who knew that the u.s. government would start taking such an interest in immigrants?
heh, i guess roughly 45 and a half square miles would be too hard for people to imagine.
have a great evening!
Hola, EL! Wanted to catch up with you,
and wish you and yours Godspeed.
For sure, Mr M and I send you beau coup positive thoughts and karma, hoping that you and your home manages to stay safe and secure.
And while I'm at it--thanks for all you do for our Community. You and Joe are obviously bedrocks--even though I rarely mention it, your hard work is very much appreciated.
Take good care, Guy. Be well, too.
Mollie
Everyone thinks they have the best dog, and none of them are wrong.
Thanks Mollie, appreciate it.
be well and have a good one
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 --
Thanks for the "Hidey Hole" Joe Tweet, SD! Will Retweet.
Can't wait until the CNN townhall with Joe. Since Cooper has his head up you-know-where, sure that it'll be laughable. IOW, there will probably be no attempt at a 'serious' policy discussion.
Generally-speaking, the CNN hosts must know that he's not cognizant of what's going on, since they've attempted on several occasions to interview him within the past several weeks. But, who knows? Perhaps he'll be 'dosed up' with enough drugs that he'll be able to come across as coherent. If not, should be a wild ride.
What was particularly amusing to me--since "quartermaster" is usually considered a military term, I have to wonder how many people made any sense of his botched comment.
BTW, read last evening that ABC (with George S) offered him a townhall, like the one held with Orange Man, yesterday. But, there were "scheduling" conflicts. Rich, eh? Especially, since it's well-known that Biden's mostly hiding out in his basement.
Hope Charlie's doing well.
Mollie
"The leaders of this new movement are replacing traditional liberal beliefs about tolerance, free inquiry, and even racial harmony with ideas so toxic and unattractive that they eschew debate, moving straight to shaming, threats, and intimidation."
~~Matt Taibbi, The American Press Is Destroying Itself, June 12, 2020
"I know, I know. All passion; no street smarts."
~~Captain West, 1992 Rob Reiner/Aaron Sorkin Movie, A Few Good Men
“If there are no dogs in Heaven, then when I die, I want to go where they went.”
~~Will Rogers, Actor & Social Commentator (1856-1950)
Everyone thinks they have the best dog, and none of them are wrong.
I don’t see how Biden can debate Trump
Not live anyhow. He can’t control when his mind is going to be okay. I thought the debate with Bernie had been taped and edited because he did so well. And why not? Everything else about this election has been fake.
The VP debate is at the university of Utah. I might watch just for prosperity sake. I’m betting on Pence.
Scientists are concerned that conspiracy theories may die out if they keep coming true at the current alarming rate.
Bernie is always polite
(lacks that killer gene) which made for a less stressful debate for Biden. The impact of stress on a person that is beginning to lose cognitive functioning tends to be more pronounced. If Biden can get through his debates with Trump without crumbling, then he is probably more mentally sound than he has been appearing.
Hi, Marie--while I'm not a betting person,
I'll be absolutely blown away if Biden manages to hold his own during all 3 debates. (Been wrong before, so, may wind up having to eat crow!
)
That is--unless, as I suspect, Biden insists on debating DT 'virtually.' That way, he can cheat with cue cards, teleprompters, or whatever. Otherwise, since I'm guessing that DT will be no less than withering in his ridicule--especially, regarding the young girls, and Joe's lack of mental acuity. Of course, no one in the MSM will acknowledge it, or, Heaven Forbid, 'air' any such media--so, could be that he'll crumble, and almost no one will even know it. (aside from Debate viewers)
Traditionally, Mr M and I have watched all rallies and debates. So far, we've watched--if we could stream them--a few minutes of most of Biden's and DT's rallies and/or events. (not including all the DT events featuring his family members and/or various surrogates--more than we can count) Just major stuff.
Most of Joe's are before several people or hosts, or, he reads remarks before an empty room, except for Jill and a handful of staffers/aids. So, he's not as practiced being before a live audience.
Definitely looking forward to watching the Debates. Disconnected teevee years ago, so, will depend upon satellite radio, or, online streaming. Getting ready to order the popcorn this Friday!
Hey, if you're in CA, Marie (as I recall), take good care of yourself. Sending all the karmas and positive vibes we can muster.
That goes for all C99'ers and readers, of course.
Mollie
Everyone thinks they have the best dog, and none of them are wrong.
Thanks for the well wishes --
fires are a feature of the California ecosystem. For the most part, more dangerous to those that live near open lands than for those in more urban areas, but a fire storm can quickly knock out almost any area that wouldn't seem to be so vulnerable. (ie the 1961 Bel Air fire and 1991 Oakland firestorm, but both areas were at the wildland-urban interface which also tends to be the more desirable residential communities.) That said, so many large fires in such a short period of time is unique and a major rethink may be in order.
wrt the presidential debates - from what we've seen so far, it's difficult to imagine a one-on-one live debate with Biden coming out in good shape. Democrats tend to overrate debate skills of their nominees and underrate the GOP opponents. The bar was low for Biden in '08 and '12 because he only had to 'hold his own' and in '08 he didn't face much of an opponent. That was better than Lieberman and Edwards in '00 and '04 when they didn't manage to 'hold their own' against Cheney. Nor did Kaine in '16 against Pence. Expectations play a huge role in the presidential debates. Generally, the bar is lower for the leading candidate; 'hold their own' is good enough. Unless, the opponent is skilled enough (and few are) to slice, dice, and filet. Had Gore brought his A game to the first two debates as he did the third one, GWB wouldn't have gotten close enough to steal the election. A question for me is if the polls are accurate enough and Biden is actually in the lead.
This is worrisome
People who tested positive but were asymptomatic still had heart issues just like people who had gotten sick. The more they learn about this virus the heinous Trump’s actions are as well as CEOs who don’t give a damn how many of their workers die.
https://www.wired.com/story/if-youve-just-had-covid-exercise-might-not-b...
Scientists are concerned that conspiracy theories may die out if they keep coming true at the current alarming rate.
well damn...
there's a good reason to stop exercising.
Bernie Sanders offers left gloss to Biden’s right-wing campaign
Caveat emptor, Bernie...caveat emptor.
Possibly time to retire and spend time with the family.
Gëzuar!!
from a reasonably stable genius.
evening bollox...
yep, it's probably time for somebody with the nerve to actually take on the establishment to take up a leadership position in the progressive movement.
Anybody
who considers sanders as a fighter of the 99% is delusional.
Actions speak much louder than words.
Regardless of the path in life I chose, I realize it's always forward, never straight.
Ran across this little article this evening
while I was looking for video of the event.
The America of Trump’s Father: an Aspirational Fascism Reigned in New York
I'm pretty sure I've posted a video of the rally before, but let's do it again. 7 minutes
[video:https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eq9yst4W-6c]
Heil, Washington! Note that this was before "under God" was added to the Pledge. That was a later wave of madness. Quite the round of applause when the guy who rushed the stage was dragged off by two dozen cops. I'm reminded of violence at Trump's 2016 rallies.
Or as Elvis Costello sang:
"The greatest shortcoming of the human race is our inability to understand the exponential function." -- Albert Bartlett
"A species that is hurtling toward extinction has no business promoting slow incremental change." -- Caitlin Johnstone
evening woodsdweller...
yep, trump is certainly not the only president with family ties to nazism, either. the bush (crime) family had significant business ties to hitler's regime. support for the nazis was not uncommon in the business and political elites.
I read about how many people supported the Nazis in NY
and elsewhere. And watched the movie. Plus we had the Rockefeller’s and Ford family supporting eugenics. Gawd the real history of this country has been well hidden.
Scientists are concerned that conspiracy theories may die out if they keep coming true at the current alarming rate.
Wine cave report mid September
Just like the national news headlines, the Stalin/Buttegeig plan here is to save the pigly plantation owners and grifters, in other words: "Get Back to Work You Savages. NOW!"
Sonoma County revamps calculation of key data tracking coronavirus outbreak
Bla bla bla, profits before people because of course. And so,
Mutual aid groups partner with Corazón help local farm workers amid wildfires
Mutual aid rescues the underpaid and overworked people, propping up this house of cards in collapse. Meanwhile, back at the ranch...
Montage Healdsburg builder seeks to renegotiate deal with city as resort nears opening
Ds and Rs will do anything except raise wages and lower rents. Anything and everything! Get out the duopoly vote, crank up the crony profits and save those good old boys and girls some headache. F-bomb the watershed who needs it.
Regulators raise water quality fine to $6.4 million for Montage Healdsburg resort
Six million dollars man, what a rip-off! I'd vote to deport every millionaire and county "planner" that ever thought their twisted maze of water thievery and corruption could see such "success".
Countywide food emergency is growing
My neighbor drives for UPS and there is a last mile meltdown currently happening, loaders and drivers out sick while the virus works its way through that essential workforce. He pays for his own PPE, even with a good Teamsters contract he still pays out of his own pocket, because of course. It took eleven working days to get supplements delivered here compared to the usual four. FedEx workers are hurting too. All of us are getting lung damage and god knows what else from the constantly shitty outdoor air.
Imagine being homeless outside all day for a month breathing "unhealthy" air, no escape except for the one that takes you off this mortal coil. This is the Biden Trump dystopian shit hole future right now, it is not very nice. Good luck.
Peace and Love