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This evening's music features Chicago blues guitarist Jimmy Rogers. Enjoy!

"Among those who dislike oppression are many who like to oppress."

-- Napoleon Bonaparte

News and Opinion

People in Gaza sifting through rubbish for food, UN head says

People in Gaza are searching through rubbish to find food as Palestinians battle unprecedented levels of poverty, the head of the UN agency for Palestinian refugees has said. Across Lebanon, Syria, Jordan, Gaza and elsewhere, Palestinian refugees are suffering at new depths because of the pandemic, according to the United Nations Relief and Works Agency chief, Philippe Lazzarini. “There is despair and hopelessness,” he said in an interview.

“In Gaza, people are going through the garbage,” Lazzarini said, referring to reports from UNRWA staff in the enclave. “More people are fighting to provide one or two meals a day to their families.” Lazzarini, an experienced humanitarian, was appointed commissioner general of UNRWA in April, and leads it at a time of deep crisis for the agency.

First is the seemingly permanent threat of financial ruin. Then there is the breakdown in the relationship with its former largest donor, the US, which claims – in line with long-running Israeli attacks on the agency – that it is “irredeemably flawed”. Add to that the threat of coronavirus ripping through refugee camps across the Middle East, home to many of the 5.6 million Palestinians supported by UNRWA. Meanwhile, Israel’s possible annexation of the occupied West Bank looms, threatening to stifle UNRWA’s work there.

Worth a full read:

Proposed Reform to US Espionage Act Would Create Public Interest Defense

Legislation proposed in Congress would amend the United States Espionage Act and create a public interest defense for those prosecuted under the law. “A defendant charged with an offense under section 793 or 798 [in the U.S. legal code] shall be permitted to testify about their purpose for engaging in the prohibited conduct,” according to a draft of the bill Hawaii Representative Tulsi Gabbard introduced.

Such a reform would make it possible for whistleblowers like Edward Snowden, Reality Winner, Terry Albury and Daniel Hale to inform the public why they disclosed information without authorization to the press.

The legislation called the Protect Brave Whistleblowers Act is supported by Pentagon Papers whistleblower Daniel Ellsberg. “If this long-overdue revision of the 1917 Espionage Act had been law half a century ago, I myself could have had a fair trial for releasing the Pentagon Papers in 1971: justice under law unavailable to me and to every other national security whistleblower indicted and prosecuted since then,” Ellsberg declared. ...

The Protect Brave Whistleblowers Act would change the law so prosecutors had to prove someone had a “specific intent” to injure or help an “enemy” or foreign nation through their disclosures. Currently, the Justice Department only has to show someone had “reason to believe” they would injure the country or help a foreign power. When material is classified, prosecutors invoke a government employee or contractor’s training and the non-disclosure agreement they sign when obtaining their security clearance. This is typically enough in a U.S. federal court for prosecutors to win a conviction.

One additional change would remove the vagueness of “national defense” information, and it make it so prosecutors must prove material was properly classified if copied, taken, or obtained and disclosed without authorization.

Far-Right Twitter Trolls Won’t Admit They Were Wrong About Killing of a “Patriot” in Denver

Here’s what happened in Denver on Saturday: Lee Keltner, a right-wing demonstrator, was shot and killed after he assaulted Matthew Dolloff, a reporter’s bodyguard, who retaliated for a blow to the head and a spray of Mace by firing a single gunshot from point-blank range. The skirmish, which escalated to deadly violence in less than 10 seconds, unfolded in broad daylight, directly in front of witnesses outside the Denver Art Museum. One was a conservative demonstrator who caught the sound of the gunshot and the sight of the victim collapsing to the ground in distressing video. A second was a livestreamer who rushed to the scene with the police, capturing the gunman’s arrest. A third was a staff photographer for the Denver Post, whose startling, close-up images of the whole incident were online by the end of the day.

But far-right Twitter personalities, who thrive by providing their followers with fresh reasons to be outraged around the clock, do not wait all day to leap to conclusions about unfolding events. Within minutes of the shooting — which took place after a sparsely attended rally described as a “patriot muster” against “BLM, Antifa, and related Marxist associations” by the organizer, a former military contractor who survived the Benghazi attack — influential conservatives with hundreds of thousands of followers began to speculate that the gunman must have been an antifascist activist.

Just over an hour later, those same trolls flooded social networks with misinformation, amplifying a mistaken report from the Denver Post that the gunman was “a left-wing demonstrator.” That report, which was corrected later in the day, was apparently based on the account of Helen Richardson, the newspaper photographer who watched the shooting unfold through her viewfinder and had no idea that Dolloff was, in fact, a bodyguard for the reporter standing behind him. Before the Post corrected its report, popular far-right Twitter commentators with a combined audience in the millions told their readers that it was definitive proof that the killing was the work of an anti-fascist activist.

The viral spread of those false claims apparently alarmed the Denver Police Department, which had taken Dolloff into custody along with the journalist he was guarding and quickly determined that they were not left-wing protesters. Less than four hours after the shooting, the department tried to stem the tide of misinformation by tweeting an update on its investigation, in which it reported that detectives had determined that “the suspect is a private security guard with no affiliation with Antifa.” The police also released the journalist Dolloff had been guarding, a reporter for Denver’s NBC affiliate, 9 News, who had been recording right-wing rallygoers and left-wing counter-protesters all afternoon. ...

On Sunday, a leader of the pro-Trump youth movement Turning Point, Charlie Kirk, continued to make the false claim. “A conservative was just gunned down in the streets by ANTIFA and not a single ‘mainstream’ news outlet has asked Joe Biden to condemn the organization he called ‘just an idea,'” Kirk tweeted to his 1.8 million followers. “We don’t have a media in this country anymore,” Kirk added. “We have activists posing as journalists.” Kirk’s comment on the difference between journalism and activism is unintentionally ironic, given that so many right-wing activists posing as journalists on Twitter refused to retract their false claims that Dolloff was an antifascist gunman. The Denver Post, by contrast, corrected and explained the error in its report as soon as it was contradicted by the police investigation.

Trump's new Iran sanctions hurt civilians and threaten war

Iran short of 'significant quantity' of potential bomb material: IAEA boss

Iran does not at this stage have enough enriched uranium to make one nuclear bomb under the U.N. atomic watchdog’s official definition, the agency’s head told an Austrian paper. “The Iranians continue to enrich uranium, and to a much higher degree than they have committed themselves to. And this amount is growing by the month,” International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) head Rafael Grossi told Die Presse in an interview published on its website on Saturday.

“In the IAEA we do not talk about breakout time. We look at the significant quantity, the minimum amount of enriched uranium or plutonium needed to make an atomic bomb. Iran does not have this significant quantity at the moment.”

Iran denies ever having had a nuclear weapons programme, saying its nuclear programme is purely for energy purposes.

The IAEA defines “significant quantity” as the approximate amount of nuclear material for which the possibility of manufacturing a nuclear explosive device cannot be excluded.

Trump hoping to strike last-minute nuclear arms deal with Putin before election

President Trump is hoping to strike a last-minute nuclear arms deal with Russian President Vladimir Putin before the Nov. 3 election, Axios reported on Sunday.

The two leaders have talked about arms control in a series of phone calls over the past six months. But representatives for both countries were unable to make progress in talks in Vienna until recently.

U.S. national security adviser Robert O’Brien and Russia’s Nikolai Patrushev met in Geneva on Oct. 2, and the success of the meeting prompted Marshall Billingslea, Trump’s arms control envoy, to make a last-minute trip to Helsinki and to adjust another trip in Asia.

A source familiar with the discussions told Axios that the Trump administration thinks it has an agreement in principle that has earned the approval of Putin and Patrushev. Officials told the news outlet that they think the agreement could be completed within a week once talks resume.

But Sergei Ryabkov, Russia’s deputy foreign minister, disagreed, saying that “there are still huge differences in approaches, including to the central elements of such an agreement.”

Billionaires Are A Symbol Of A Failed Society

'People in Need Can't Wait': To Put Onus on Senate GOP, Progressives Urge Pelosi to Take $1.8 Trillion Covid Relief Package

With tens of millions still out of work and struggling to afford basic necessities as the coronavirus-induced economic collapse shows no sign of relenting, some progressives are urging House Speaker Nancy Pelosi to accept a far-from-perfect $1.8 trillion compromise relief package offered by the Trump White House, warning that failure to pass any additional aid before the November election would be both morally and politically disastrous.

Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin presented the $1.8 trillion counteroffer to Pelosi last Friday in an effort to revive talks that President Donald Trump threw into chaos, and nearly killed entirely, just days earlier.

While the top-line figure is a far cry from the $3.4 trillion HEROES Act the House passed in May and significantly less than the $2.2 trillion revised version approved earlier this month, the proposed legislation—which has drawn criticism from both Pelosi and Senate Republicans—would provide substantial relief to the unemployed, an additional round of stimulus checks, and $300 billion in desperately needed funding for state and local governments.

"People in need can't wait until February," tweeted Rep. Ro Khanna (D-Calif.), alluding to the likelihood that failure to pass relief legislation before next month's election would likely delay any future stimulus talks until after the next president's inauguration.

"$1.8 trillion is significant and more than twice [the size of the] Obama stimulus," Khanna added. "Make a deal and put the ball in [Senate Majority Leader Mitch] McConnell's court."

As far as I can tell, correct me if I’m wrong, there’s been at least no public urgency or pressure from the progressive Dems — from @Aoc to @repmarkpocan to @RepJayapal — to take the deal on offer

— Jeff Stein (@JStein_WaPo) October 10, 2020

Though Khanna appears to be alone among progressive members of Congress in publicly calling on Pelosi to take the White House up on its $1.8 trillion offer, several left-leaning commentators have made similar arguments in favor of a compromise relief deal in recent days as the coronavirus pandemic continues to take lives and the nation's economic situation remains dire.

Andrew Yang SMEARED As Sexist For Telling Pelosi To Take Stimulus Deal

Pompeo: "There Will Be More To See" Of Hillary Clinton's Emails Before 2020 Election, "Doing It As Fast As We Can"

Secretary of State Mike Pompeo said in an interview with FOX News host Dana Perino on Friday that he has the Hillary Clinton emails and will release them publicly before the election.

"We've got the e-mails," Pompeo told Perino. "We're getting them out. We're going to get all this information out, so the American people can see it. You will remember, there was classified information on a private server. It should have never been there. Hillary Clinton should never have done that."

"I certainly think there will be more to see before the election," Pompeo said of the emails.

Packing the Courts: How Republicans Spent Decades Installing Judges to Cement Minority Rule

What Else Is Barrett Hiding? Dems Demand Answers After Trump Supreme Court Pick Caught Concealing Talks to Anti-Abortion Groups

On the eve of Judge Amy Coney Barrett's first confirmation hearing before the Senate Judiciary Committee, the panel's Democrats on Sunday demanded the right-wing Supreme Court nominee release any additional information she has withheld from lawmakers after new reporting revealed that she failed to disclose a pair of talks to anti-abortion groups and other materials.

After CNN reported Friday that Barrett omitted from her initial Senate questionnaire two talks she gave to student anti-abortion organizations at Notre Dame University in 2013, the judge submitted to the Judiciary Committee a supplement (pdf) disclosing both a lecture and a seminar. Barrett also informed the committee that while serving as a law professor at the University of Notre Dame, she signed onto a 2013 paid advertisement criticizing Roe v. Wade.

Following Barrett's belated disclosures—which did not include the content of the talks—all ten Democrats on the Senate Judiciary Committee sent a letter (pdf) demanding to know what else the corporate-friendly judge is withholding as Republicans rush ahead with her confirmation process despite a coronavirus outbreak on Capitol Hill and widespread opposition to the nominee among legal experts and civil rights groups.

"It is troubling that Judge Barrett supplemented her [Senate Judiciary Questionnaire] to include these talks only after they were identified by the press," the lawmakers wrote. "These new omissions raise more questions about the reliability of Judge Barrett's SJQ and her candor before the Committee. These new omissions also raise serious concerns about Judge Barrett's rushed confirmation process and the hasty process of collecting materials responsive to the SJQ."

In a statement on Sunday, Christopher Kang, chief counsel at advocacy group Demand Justice, said that Barrett's nomination—which is backed by tens of millions of dollars in spending from dark-money organizations—"should not move forward without a full accounting of her past speeches and links to these groups that she has clearly sought to downplay or hide."

"Amy Coney Barrett needs to come clean about her ties to far-right organizations and produce more information on the speeches she gave about Roe v. Wade," said Kang. "By repeatedly failing to disclose relevant information to the Senate, she has forfeited the benefit of the doubt."

Ryan Grim: What Democrats NEED To Know About Amy Coney Barrett

"Are You BETTER Off?" Surprising Poll Results!

California investigates unauthorized ballot boxes installed by Republicans

California authorities have launched a criminal investigation into unauthorized ballot boxes that the Republican party has placed in several counties, with authorities warning that these set-ups are illegal. The boxes have appeared in Fresno, Los Angeles and Orange counties at locations including political party offices, campaign headquarters and churches, according to the California secretary of state. The GOP admitted Monday that it owned the boxes and defended the practice.

The secretary of state issued a memo to county registrars this weekend clarifying that unofficial drop boxes are illegal and ballots must be returned by mail or to official polling places, vote centers or ballot drop-off locations. ...

The state has sent cease-and-desist orders to the GOP in all three counties. California’s attorney general, Xavier Becerra, said late Monday he had received “disturbing reports” that some GOP officials “may not be prepared or willing to remove those boxes”. If the boxes aren’t removed, the Republican leaders could face prosecution, he added.

Massive Lines in Georgia on First Day of In-Person Voting Exemplify Ongoing 'Voter Suppression,' Say Critics

Georgia's first day of in-person early voting Monday was marred by excessive wait times, as the combination of high turnout and technical difficulties resulted in long lines and possible health risks—a situation that voting rights advocates described as an example of intense voter engagement and excitement being undermined by a troubling system of voter suppression. 

According to the Atlanta Journal-Constitution (AJC), "voters wrapped around buildings... even before polling places opened."

All registered voters in the state are eligible to vote prior to November 3, and early voters may cast a ballot at any polling station located in their county.

The AJC noted that "in-person early voters will join the 439,000 Georgia voters who have already returned their absentee ballots," adding that "by the time Election Day finally arrives, over two-thirds of the state's 5 million projected turnout will have already voted."

While this year's added flexibility is meant to encourage participation amid the coronavirus pandemic, election officials explained that "their goal is to keep lines moving and avoid problems" that occurred during Georgia's primary election on June 9, when voters in some areas experienced wait times of several hours. 

Early evidence indicates that officials are not meeting their stated objective.

The Washington Post reported that "voters waited in line for up to five hours across the metro Atlanta region and surrounding suburbs."

"This is a picture of voter suppression," tweeted Claire McCaskill, a former senator from Missouri and current NBC News and MSNBC analyst. "Why do Americans have to wait in lines this long?"

Noam Chomsky CHALLENGED On Vote Blue No Matter Who, Twitter Erupts

Locked in Tight Race, GOP Sen. Dan Sullivan Caught in Environmental Scandal

In the final month of his reelection campaign, Alaska’s one-term Republican Sen. Dan Sullivan is fighting to recover from a scandal that ties him more closely to a controversial mining project opposed by the majority of voters in his state. Sullivan’s political crisis centers around Pebble Mine — a yearslong contested project that would bring large-scale mining to the Bristol Bay watershed, a mineral-rich region that supports the largest sockeye salmon fishery in the world, and home to more than two dozen federally recognized tribal governments. The senator has received tens of thousands of dollars in campaign contributions from lobbyists, executives, and employees involved with the project, according to a recent investigation by journalists Judd Legum and Tesnim Zekeria.

Those contributions could prove to be a political liability in a Senate race being prioritized by national Democrats as they seek to retake the upper chamber. Democratic challenger Al Gross has been funding new radio, TV, and digital ads blasting Sullivan for his ties to Pebble Mine, prompted by a recent investigation that showed how mining executives envision the reach of the project growing larger than had been publicly stated. Sullivan and Gross are locked in a tight race, according to a late September poll, conducted by a Super PAC aligned with Gross. If elected, Gross — who is registered as nonpartisan — would caucus with Democrats, like Sens. Bernie Sanders of Vermont and Angus King of Maine. Gross is backed by national groups including Indivisible, the DSCC, and anti-Trump conservative group the Lincoln Project.

In September, the Environmental Investigation Agency — an advocacy group focused on exposing environmental crimes — published secretly recorded conversations between undercover actors, who had pretended to be potential Pebble Mine investors, and Pebble Limited Partnership CEO Tom Collier and the head of its parent company, Northern Dynasty Minerals CEO Ronald Thiessen. In those tapes, Thiessen made clear to the fake investors that the company would aim to expand Pebble farther than it has already applied to build, contradicting Collier’s written 2019 testimony submitted to the House Water Resources and Environment subcommittee, where he stated Pebble has “no current plans, in this application or in any other way, for expansion.” 

Polls show that majorities of Alaskans have consistently opposed the mining project since at least 2012, when Bristol Bay Native Corporation began conducting statewide annual surveys. One fear is that the proposed Pebble Mine is only the beginning of even more harmful extraction; more than 60 percent of Alaskans believe that if a smaller mine project moves forward, then plans for a larger mine will be later pursued and approved. Another poll released this past summer by the Bristol Bay Defense Fund, a coalition of business, tribal, nonprofit, and community groups, found likely Alaska voters opposed construction of the mine by a 2-1 margin.

A three-year, peer-reviewed EPA assessment released in 2014 found that Pebble Mine — which would be one of the largest open pit copper mines in the world — could have devastating impacts on fish populations and surrounding streams. When the EPA vetoed the Pebble proposal that year, Sullivan blasted the move, claiming the EPA “short-circuited the permitting process” and the project should have gone to the Army Corps of Engineers for review. The veto was reversed under the Trump administration, which fast-tracked the Army Corps of Engineers assessment. This past summer, the Corps determined that “as currently proposed, the project could have substantial environmental impacts within the unique Bristol Bay watershed and lacks adequate compensatory mitigation.” Mining executives are hoping to get a modified plan approved by the end of the year.

Democrats Subsidize DRILLING While Americans Suffer

Fifth of countries at risk of ecosystem collapse, analysis finds

One-fifth of the world’s countries are at risk of their ecosystems collapsing because of the destruction of wildlife and their habitats, according to an analysis by the insurance firm Swiss Re. Natural “services” such as food, clean water and air, and flood protection have already been damaged by human activity. More than half of global GDP – $42tn (£32tn) – depends on high-functioning biodiversity, according to the report, but the risk of tipping points is growing.

Countries including Australia, Israel and South Africa rank near the top of Swiss Re’s index of risk to biodiversity and ecosystem services, with India, Spain and Belgium also highlighted. Countries with fragile ecosystems and large farming sectors, such as Pakistan and Nigeria, are also flagged up.

Countries including Brazil and Indonesia had large areas of intact ecosystems but had a strong economic dependence on natural resources, which showed the importance of protecting their wild places, Swiss Re said.

“A staggering fifth of countries globally are at risk of their ecosystems collapsing due to a decline in biodiversity and related beneficial services,” said Swiss Re, one of the world’s biggest reinsurers and a linchpin of the global insurance industry. “If the ecosystem service decline goes on [in countries at risk], you would see then scarcities unfolding even more strongly, up to tipping points,” said Oliver Schelske, lead author of the research. ...

The Swiss Re index is built on 10 key ecosystem services identified by the world’s scientists and uses scientific data to map the state of these services at a resolution of one square kilometre across the world’s land. The services include provision of clean water and air, food, timber, pollination, fertile soil, erosion control, and coastal protection, as well as a measure of habitat intactness. Those countries with more than 30% of their area found to have fragile ecosystems were deemed to be at risk of those ecosystems collapsing. Just one in seven countries had intact ecosystems covering more than 30% of their country area.

Kenya's fight against poaching pays off as elephant population doubles

Also of Interest

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

Two Massive New Leaks Show Dirty Underbelly of Empire

Why did Amnesty UK, Bellingcat and White Helmets sabotage Roger Waters webinar on corporate pollution?

Nagorno-Karabakh Ceasefire in Tatters With Heavy Overnight Shelling

US Plan: Weapons Anywhere on Earth in One Hour

Portland group topples Roosevelt and Lincoln statues in protest of Columbus day

Black man led on rope by Texas police on horseback sues for $1m

Not News But A Juicy Collection Of Narratives - How The New York Times Failed Its Readers

If You’re Baffled as to Why JPMorgan Chase’s Board Hasn’t Sacked Jamie Dimon as the Bank Racked Up 5 Felony Counts – Here’s Your Answer

'Heads in the sand': conservationists condemn US failure to protect wolverines

Keiser Report | The 25th Amendment for Central Banks

Krystal Ball: New Poll Is DEATH KNELL For Talking Point About Trump's Base

A Little Night Music

Jimmy Rogers - Sloppy Drunk

Jimmy Rogers - That's all right

Jimmy Rogers with Ronnie Earl & The Broadcasters - Left Me With A Broken Heart

Jimmy Rogers - What Have I Done

Jimmy Rogers - One Kiss

Jimmy Rogers - Blues All Day Long

Jimmy Rogers - Chicago Bound

Jimmy Rogers - Walking By Myself live on the Late Night Show

Jimmy Rogers - You're The One