The Evening Blues - 7-8-21
Hey! Good Evening!
This evening's music features Chicago blues piano player Little Johnny Jones. Enjoy!
Little Johnny Jones - Chicago Blues
"They still don't want to admit to the world that this isn't the best and the fairest and most equal justice system. And that they are guilty of railroading people into jail. They don't want to, or never will, admit these things."
-- Leonard Peltier
News and Opinion
Biden Admin's Latest PLOY To Extradite Julian Assange
UK High Court grants US government right to appeal on Assange extradition
Stella Moris, the partner of imprisoned WikiLeaks publisher Julian Assange, spoke outside Britain’s High Court yesterday warning he is “still at risk of extradition” after a judge decided the US government can appeal an earlier court ruling that blocked his extradition on health grounds. The judge also ruled that Assange must remain in prison until the appeal is heard, effectively extending his incarceration for at least many more months.
The ruling underscores the Biden administration’s determination to ensure Assange’s removal to the US. According to a report in the Wall Street Journal, based on excerpts of the judge’s ruling supplied by the UK Crown Prosecution Service, the US government offered “assurances” that Assange would not be imprisoned in oppressive conditions and could be permitted to serve any sentence in Australia. Such assurances are meaningless. Once Assange is in US custody, those pledges will be cast aside. The Wall Street Journal reported: “The US said it reserved the right to impose special measures on Mr. Assange, or hold him in a Supermax jail, if ‘he were to do something subsequent to the offering of these assurances’ that meets the test for applying them.”
Britain’s High Court has reportedly granted a right of appeal to the US on three grounds. The court will decide whether Baraitser applied the Extradition Act correctly; whether sufficient advance notice was given of the court’s decision, and whether “assurances” by the US over mitigating the risk of suicide were properly considered. A date for the appeal hearing has not been announced, but it will likely take place after the courts’ summer recess. ...
In a letter sent yesterday to Biden and US Attorney General Merrick Garland by Doctors for Assange, 250 doctors from 35 countries demanded the dropping of all charges against the WikiLeaks publisher. They denounced his ongoing imprisonment due to the US appeal as “amounting to cruel, inhuman and degrading treatment in the UK.” They noted: “Today, the UK High Court granted the US limited permission to appeal the earlier UK ruling against the U.S. extradition request. Crucially, the High Court did not permit the US to appeal findings based on Assange’s medical and psychological status, and affirmed the previous judge’s findings regarding his clinical condition… Meanwhile, Mr. Assange continues to suffer serious, life threatening effects of the psychological torture he has been subjected to for more than a decade.”
Assange UPDATE: Appeal Granted After NO TORTURE Vow (For Now) Katie Halper Calls Out RESISTANCE LIBS
As U.S. Troops Withdraw from Afghanistan, Gov’t Turns to Armed Volunteers to Fight Taliban
Sources: U.S. troop withdrawal from Afghanistan complete 'for all intents and purposes'
The U.S. military's withdrawal from Afghanistan is essentially complete, despite President Joe Biden's comments last week that American troops will leave by late August, according to two U.S. officials. "The withdrawal is over, for all intents and purposes," said one of the officials with direct knowledge of the situation, who requested anonymity to discuss sensitive planning. "It's done."
The U.S. currently has roughly 600 troops in Afghanistan, most of whom are Marine Corps and Army personnel providing security at the U.S. Embassy in Kabul, the person said. The rest of the 600 will be based at the Kabul's Hamid Karzai International Airport, said another U.S. official with direct knowledge of the discussions. All of those troops are expected to remain after the pullout is officially complete, The Associated Press first reported last month.
In addition, the U.S. military must also pull out the remaining security and logistical forces sent in temporarily this spring to enable the drawdown, Pentagon spokesperson John Kirby said in a statement to POLITICO.
U.S. Navy Defends 'Essential' Black Sea Drills as Russia Threatens Violent Response
Tensions in the Black Sea have been high in recent weeks, which saw confrontations between Russian forces and British and Dutch ships in the strategically important region. The encounters came shortly before the annual Sea Breeze drills kicked off. This year's installment is led by the U.S. and Ukraine, involving forces from more than 30 nations.
Russian Deputy Foreign Minister Sergey Ryabkov told Russia's International Affairs on Tuesday that Western "provocateurs" risk an escalation, referring specifically to the passage of the British ship close to Crimean waters last month. "They would be better off leaving their provocations aside next time and staying away from that area because they will get clocked in the nose," Ryabkov said.
Both British and Dutch officials maintain that their ships were sailing in international waters when confronted by Russian forces. Neither side is backing down over the Black Sea, which is a vital conduit for Russian trade and military power projection. The Sea is also another front in the ongoing Ukraine crisis. Russia's critics have accused Moscow of seeking to expand its influence in the Sea to choke Ukrainian ports, isolate Kyiv, and cement its 2014 annexation of Crimea.
Commander Daniel Marzluff, the U.S. Sixth Fleet's Black Sea Region Engagement Lead, told Newsweek Tuesday that the Sea Breeze drills as "essential" in deterring Russian aggression and asserting U.S. and NATO backing for Ukraine, which remains at war with Moscow-backed separatists in the east of the country. "This is clearly the most effective way to bring a unified front to this kind of rogue action," Marzluff told Newsweek from the Ukrainian port city of Odessa, referring to the ongoing exercises.
Haiti in Chaos After President’s Assassination as Activists in U.S. Urge Biden to Stop Deportations
‘No one’s in charge’: Haiti faces violent new era after killing of president
The assassination of Haiti’s president early on Wednesday marks the explosive climax of a spiralling political and security crisis – and threatens to open a violent new chapter in the Caribbean nation’s volatile history. ...
Whoever was behind the raid, experts say Moïse’s killing bodes badly for the future of a profoundly impoverished nation already grappling with a battery of interlinked crises involving Covid-19, politics, the economy and organised crime.
Robert Fatton, a Haitian politics professor from the University of Virginia said: “According to the Haitian constitution, the [interim] president should be the chief justice. But the chief justice died of Covid [last month] – so there is no one obviously in charge.”
The identity of Haiti’s prime minister was also unclear. Moïse had been due to install Ariel Henry as prime minister on Wednesday after dismissing his predecessor Claude Joseph. It was Joseph who in the event announced Moïse’s killing on Wednesday morning.
Fatton said: “We don’t have a parliament. We have a prime minister who is no longer prime minister. A chief justice who is dead. The police, which is falling apart. Gangs roaming the streets of Port-au-Prince. So there is no one really in charge … I think it’s going to lead to more chaos.”
South Africa’s former president Jacob Zuma hands himself over to police
South Africa’s former president Jacob Zuma is in police custody after handing himself in to serve 15 months in jail for contempt of court. Police ministry spokesperson Lirandzu Themba confirmed Zuma, 79, was in the care of the police service, in compliance with a constitutional court judgment, on Wednesday night. Earlier Zuma’s foundation said he would hand himself in.
The constitutional court sentenced Zuma last week for defying an instruction earlier this year to give evidence at an inquiry into corruption during his nine years in power until 2018.
Police had been instructed to arrest him by the end of Wednesday if he failed to turn himself in. ...
Zuma was sentenced to 15 months in prison for contempt because he defied a court order for him to testify before a judicial commission investigating widespread allegations of corruption during his time as the country’s president, from 2009 to 2018.
BOMBSHELL Report Supports Tucker Carlson Claim Of NSA Spying
Trump says he will sue social media giants over ‘censorship’
Donald Trump, the former US president, held a rambling press conference on Wednesday to announce legal action against Facebook, Twitter and Google, accusing the tech giants of censoring conservative voices. ...
“We’re asking the US district court for the southern district of Florida to order an immediate halt to social media companies’ illegal, shameful censorship of the American people,” Trump said in the faux-presidential setting of blue lectern, white columns and a dozen US flags at his golf club in Bedminster, New Jersey.
“We’re demanding an end to the shadow banning, a stop to the silencing, a stop to the blacklisting, banishing and canceling that you know so well. Our case will prove this censorship is unlawful. It’s unconstitutional, and it’s completely un-American. We all know that. We know that very, very well,” he added.
Complaints of Silicon Valley censorship have become a familiar talking point on the political right but many of the most popular personalities on sites such as Facebook are conservatives, such as Dan Bongino and Ben Shapiro. Even so, Trump said that, in conjunction with the new America First Policy Institute (AFPI) thinktank, he was filing a class action lawsuit against big tech giants including Facebook, Google and Twitter as well as their chief executives, Mark Zuckerberg, Sundar Pichai and Jack Dorsey. ...
The lawsuit faces tough odds. Under a law known as Section 230, internet companies are generally allowed to moderate their content by removing posts that, for instance, are obscene or violate the services’ own standards, so long as they are acting in “good faith”.
WHO warns of ‘epidemiological stupidity’ of early Covid reopening
As England moves towards an anticipated “big bang” lifting of coronavirus restrictions on 19 July, a senior World Health Organization official has warned countries to lift their Covid-19 restrictions slowly so as “not to lose the gains that [they] have made”
The comments from the UN global health body’s head of emergencies, Mike Ryan, were not aimed directly at Boris Johnson’s much-trumpeted reopening. However, they will be interpreted as grist to the mill of those health experts who have been arguing that England is moving too fast at a time when infections are surging. ...
Ryan said the idea of letting people get infected with Covid-19 earlier rather than later was “epidemiological stupidity”.
His comments came at a briefing where the WHO once again urged countries to share Covid-19 vaccines to protect health and care workers and elderly and vulnerable people in low-income countries before expanding vaccination programmes to children. Addressing the speed of countries’ plans to reopen, Ryan added that in particular countries with low Covid-19 vaccination rates, combined with the lifting of restrictions, threatened a “toxic mixture”.
Sirota, worth a full read:
Workers Are Funding The War On Themselves
As the private equity industry launches ads to protect its lucrative tax preferences, we should remember that this industry is the unseen man behind the curtain driving many social ills — from high hospital prices to surprise medical bills to nursing home deaths to media layoffs to a housing crisis that has become a human rights emergency. A Businessweek cover put it best: You live in private equity’s world, even if you don’t know it. But a series of new reports remind us that there is another person behind the monocled, mustache-twirling oligarch running the Emerald City’s secret control panel — and that person isn’t a billionaire. It is the faceless pension official in a state capital or city hall who is using workers’ retirement savings to finance the Wall Street takeover of Oz.
In the process, teachers, firefighters, sanitation workers, and other government employees are being fleeced. Their retirement savings are being skimmed by finance industry executives, who are using the cash to lobby for self-enriching tax breaks while waging a class war on everyone else. All that money could end up bankrolling a new round of housing profiteering and infrastructure privatization, using workers’ money to wage a war on workers themselves. The relationship between the finance industry and public pensions has become one of this gilded era’s biggest schemes to redistribute wealth from workers to Wall Street - but the theft barely gets any attention outside the business press. ...
Here’s the thing you need to know: Public pensions are a huge business and quite exciting to the world’s richest people in the here and now. That’s because while fewer and fewer workers today get pension benefits, there is now $5 trillion in public pension systems that have accrued government workers’ retirement savings over decades. That giant pool of capital, overseen by appointees tied to Wall Street-bankrolled politicians, is the fuel behind the finance industry’s conquest of America.
Pension money is deferred compensation: Millions of public-sector workers — who are often paid less than their private-sector counterparts — have accepted lower up-front wages in exchange for pension contributions to fund their future retirement benefits. Two decades after pension officials began funneling more of that money into private equity, hedge funds, and real estate, roughly one fifth, or about $1 trillion, of the cash is now in these opaque “alternative” investments. These investments generate outsized fees for financial firms, bankroll the Wall Street’s political machine, and capitalize the corporations that are pillaging the middle class. This is a wildly lucrative business - and money managers are now trying to rake in even more from public pensions and also break into the even larger 401(k) market. You can see investment firms’ desperation in Wall Street’s cynical ad campaign trying to convince Americans that private equity firms are consistently delivering outsized investment gains for pensioners (they’re not).
PROOF Undercover Cops Present On January 6th
Texas governor revives Republicans’ thwarted efforts to pass voting laws
Texas governor Greg Abbott on Wednesday revived Republicans’ thwarted efforts to pass new voting laws in America’s biggest red state after Democrats temporarily derailed a restrictive bill with a late-night walkout in the state capitol in May.
As expected, Abbott made new election laws one of nearly a dozen items – including border security and other Republican lightning-rod issues – that he is instructing lawmakers to revisit over the next 30 days in a special session that begins Thursday. ...
Republicans are backing away from the two most contentious issues that fueled Democrats’ dramatic quorum break just before a midnight deadline over the Memorial Day weekend. He also ordered lawmakers to restore funding for Texas’ legislative branch after vetoing paychecks for roughly 2,000 capitol employees following the walkout.
The climate crisis will create two classes: those who can flee, and those who cannot
A few years ago, after I gave a talk on water and climate change, I had an Arizona rancher come up and ask me if there would be enough water in the future for their livestock or if they should sell out and move north. This week, I received an email from a retiring doctor, who, acknowledging both their privileged economic situation and the personal nature of the decision, nevertheless asked if it “would it be more advantageous/safe to consider moving to coastal Oregon or Washington, rather than staying in southern California” because of rising seas, extreme heat and the growing threat of wildfires. At an Independence Day party this weekend, a couple asked me if they should move from Colorado to Michigan because of growing drought and water shortages in the western US.
I get these questions regularly and am both encouraged and dismayed by them. Encouraged because it suggests that the message about climate risks is finally getting out and people are beginning to reflect on the personal implications of those risks. Dismayed by the realization that the climate crisis is going to produce two classes of refugees: those with the freedom and financial resources to try, for a while at least, to flee from growing threats in advance, and those who will be left behind to suffer the consequences in the form of illness, death and destruction. ...
Worldwide, nearly 700 million people now live in low-lying coastal zones vulnerable to sea-level rise and coastal storms. That number could reach a billion by 2050. Island nations like the Maldives, Seychelles, Kiribati and others could be completely wiped out by rising seas and storms. Even a rise of only a meter (39in), almost certainly unavoidable now, will displace millions of people in Florida and along the Gulf coast, causing trillions of dollars in damages and property loss. ...
Every one of these changes shows the fingerprints of human-caused climate change. In response, humans that can move will move. Just as millions migrated over the past half-century from the colder north to sunny, warm communities in Florida, Arizona, New Mexico and southern California, we will certainly see a massive reverse migration in the coming half century away from the coasts, extreme heat and water shortages to places thought to be more favorable. We’re already seeing refugees on the southern border of the US fleeing countries suffering from drought and disasters. If greenhouse gas emissions continue unabated, some models suggest that more than a million climate refugees may move from Central America and Mexico to the United States. In April, the UN high commissioner for refugees released a report showing that climate- and weather-related disasters already displace more than 20 million people a year, and a report from the Australian Institute for Economics and Peace suggests that more than a billion people could be displaced by climate and weather disasters by 2050.
How bad will it get? I don’t know because I don’t know how long our politicians will dither before finally dealing with the climate crisis.
War on Science Persists Within Biden EPA as Staffers Allege Chemical Reports Altered
Four scientists at the Environmental Protection Agency are alleging that the "war on science" is continuing under the Biden administration, with managers at the agency altering reports about the risks posed by chemicals and retaliating against employees who report the misconduct.
The government watchdog Public Employees for Environmental Responsibility (PEER) filed a formal complaint Friday on behalf of the scientists with the EPA's Office of the Inspector General, calling for an investigation into reports that high-level employees routinely delete crucial information from chemical risk assessments or change the documents' conclusions to give the impression that the chemicals in question are not toxic.
The group also wrote to the House Committee on Oversight and Reform's Subcommittee on Environment, calling on lawmakers to work with the inspector general to investigate the allegations.
The report follows outrage about officials in the Trump administration covering up scientific facts by deleting the EPA's climate change website, but PEER emphasized that the problem is persisting at the agency six months into President Joe Biden's term.
"These alterations of risk assessments are not just artifacts of the Trump administration; they are continuing on a weekly basis," said Kyla Bennett, science policy director at PEER who formerly worked at the EPA.
Under the Toxic Substances Control Act, the agency is responsible for evaluating the risks of existing chemicals as well as those slated to be manufactured in or imported to the United States.
The four employees said in the complaint that they've observed "numerous instances" in which significant changes were made to their own assessments, including:
- The removal of language identifying possible adverse effects of chemicals, including developmental toxicity, neurotoxicity, mutagenicity, and/or carcinogenicity;
- Changes to report conclusions to indicate that there are no signs of toxicity "despite significant data to the contrary"; and
- Risk assessments being reassigned to inexperienced employees "to secure their agreement to remove issues whose inclusion would be protective of human health."
"The resulting Material Safety Data Sheets lack information vital to prevent harmful exposures, such as proper handling procedures, personal protection needed, accidental release measures, first aid, and firefighting measures," said PEER.
In one case, managers increased the dose considered safe for consumption for a certain chemical by nearly 10,000-fold, according to The Hill.
“All of these altered assessments need to be pulled back and corrected in order to protect both workers handling chemicals and the American public," said Bennett.
According to PEER, staff scientists at EPA have spent months raising concerns internally and filing a formal complaint on their own—only to face "harassment from managers named in the complaints."
Hours after PEER filed the complaint on Friday, the organization said, the four whistleblowers' names were released internally at the EPA in "a troubling move" by someone at the agency.
"Whistleblowers help protect us all—we must protect them," PEER said.
The organization called on the inspector general to "identify all the alterations and restore the correct risk information," and to dismiss the civil service managers found responsible for the misconduct in the investigation.
"EPA's lack of accountability for scientific misconduct poses a direct danger to public health," said Bennett. "Inside EPA, scientific integrity has become an oxymoron and a cure will require a complete overhaul."
California braces for dangerously high temperatures in new heatwave
A new heatwave is predicted to bring dangerously hot weather to California’s inland regions this week, as relentlessly high temperatures continue to torment the west coast. Meteorologists are warning residents to prepare for “potentially record-breaking” temperatures as high as 115F (46C) in the Central Valley and 120F (49C) in desert areas like Palm Springs, with temperatures in Death Valley set to approach an all-time high. The heat is predicted to start to build on Wednesday and increase through the weekend.
“Temperatures are going to be about 10 degrees above normal for this time of year,” said Diana Crofts-Pelayo a spokesperson for the California office of emergency services. “This will be a record-setting heatwave.”
The state is already facing extreme drought and fires spawned by the dry conditions. The fire situation could be intensified by gusty winds near the Oregon border and predicted lightning storms in the Sierra Nevada mountains, the forecasters said. “The big story is the developing heat,” said Eric Schoening, a meteorologist for the National Weather Service (NWS). “This will be a long duration event, where it is not going to cool down much at night. So it is a dangerous time for the state.”
Also of Interest
Here are some articles of interest, some which defied fair-use abstraction.
Desperate to Get Assange, US Promises No SAMS & Prison Time in Australia
The Empire Depends On Psychological Compartmentalization
Biden's 'Deterrence' Bombing In Iraq Is An Obvious Failure
New York Times Pushing the Envelope on Russia
South Dakota to Send Additional Troops to Border Beyond Donor-Funded Mission
Corporate Counterinsurgency Against Line 3 Pipeline Resistance
Indigenous Water Protectors Face Off With an Oil Company and Police Over a Minnesota Pipeline
Age, sex, vaccine dose, chronic illness – insight into risk factors for severe Covid is growing
The Spread Of New Covid Variants
Why is a 108-year-old resorting to GoFundMe to pay for home care?
In Leaked Video, GOP Congressman Admits His Party Wants 'Chaos and Inability to Get Stuff Done'
As the World Burns, DC Slow-Walks on Climate
Leonardo Da Vinci project finds 14 living descendants
“Police State Without the State”: Palestinian Authority Face Protests over Critic’s Death in Custody
Tensions on the rise at Armenia-Azerbaijan border
Dedollarizing | Russian wealth fund gets rid of the US dollar over sanctions threat
Krystal Ball: Greatest Wealth Transfer IN HISTORY Happening Under Biden's Watch
Saagar Enjeti: Pelosi CAUGHT Making Millions On Stocks Involving Government Contracts
A Little Night Music
Little Johnny Jones - I May Be Wrong
Little Johnny Jones w Muddy Waters - Shelby County
Little Johnny Jones - Dirty By The Dozen
Little Johnny Jones - Big Town Playboy
Little Johnny Jones - She Wants To Sell My Monkey
Little Johnny Jones - Hoy Hoy
Little Johnny Jones - Doin' The Best I Can
Johnny Jones & Bily Boy Arnold - Sloppy Drunk Blues
Elmore James w/Johnny Jones - Early In The Morning
Little Johnnie Jones & The Toe Twisters - Prison Bound Blues
Little Johnny Jones - Wait Baby
Comments
Mama bear knows what is best for mama bear.
evening humphrey...
heh, pelosi the child of grifters has been grifting most of her life and doesn't know how to stop even when she has so much more than she could possibly use in the years remaining to her.
With regards to Julian Assange.
Thanks for the EB's Joe!
Welcome in the new norm folks, it looks as if the global warming morons were totally wrong, as it's already upon us decades earlier than what they said.
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...
yep, thank goodness that trump lost. (/s)
Does Keith actually believe this
or is he just being Keith Maddow for the money and being an ‘important' mouthpiece of the Biden bros?
I’d rather it be #2 instead of him believing the propaganda that he used to despise.
Good gawd that article on Haiti.
"The impoverished country will have a hard time getting back on its feet"
No you idiot. There is no reason why Haiti has to stay an impoverished country if the world leaders would condemn the USA and get in there and help them. The guy teaching Haitian politics should be behind something like that instead of just accepting that is how things are. As Caitlin said, people turn a blind eye to atrociously heinous crimes so that it doesn’t bother their ‘beautiful minds.' Gag me.
It’s a good thing all those militia groups are ready for when the government steps on their freedoms. How many centuries have they been training and then waiting for the event? How is it that they missed it every time government did just that?
Gawd what a hideous thought. Did they rig the housing market so that poorer climate refugees can’t afford to relocate? The timing of everything going on right now seems a tad too convenient for fate. And just like they sacrificed half million people and counting during Covid I imagine that they will turn their eyes away from the refugees. I thought of that when I questioned whether I should relocate soon.
When congress stops drilling and fracking and letting Nestles et all steal state’s water and growing alfalfa for other countries and what not then we will know that they are doing something. Since 2018 drilling and fracking has used 18 million or billion gallons of water. Might have been a tweet from a few days ago.
lol on the EPA's rewriting reports. The FDA has been doing it for how long as well as other agencies. Crack parties with DEA agents? During Bush?
From common dream alpha null:
Gina is working for Biden these days.
Oh goody more ongoing war on us
Stephen Don…'s judge is from the federalist society which chevron donates to. She just ruled that he is a flight risk and extended his house arrest. He has been there for more than 700 days. The punishment for fleeing is 90 days. For jumping bail it’s 6 months but Assange has started his 3rd year in Belmarsh. Wonder what summers are like there?
Horrible new roundup, Joe. Thanks?
Edited.
Which AIPAC/MIC/pharma/bank bought politician are you going to vote for? Don’t be surprised when nothing changes.
Voting is like driving with a toy steering wheel.
evening snoopy...
it's all number 2 - keith olberman is a cesspool with a fountain on top.
haiti is today what bill clinton and the neocons wanted it to be. they worked assiduously to destroy haiti and, well, here we are.
reminds me of this: Dig a Hole: Reagan Administration and Civil Defense
in fact today, almost everything in the news reminds me of that piece. i have to go check and see if my shovels are in good order, now.
Swell…
Ehh?
It just made it so the odd numbered people leave first so what does that solve? lol…
Starkly irrational? How about fantasy land?
HUD has been so defunded there are 10 year waiting lists in some states. Nothing is available for years in others.
Barbaric and starvation rations.
(Edited out of order.)
Thanks Joe! That cheered me right up.
Dig a hole is right. Because that won’t do crap for surviving a nuclear strike. I don’t want to be around in that future. I’m either getting evacuated or obliviated (sp apparently) because of the air base 20 miles from my house.
Which AIPAC/MIC/pharma/bank bought politician are you going to vote for? Don’t be surprised when nothing changes.
Voting is like driving with a toy steering wheel.
heh...
yeah, sorry, i have a pretty dark sense of humor.
if you remember the brewhaha at the time, the reagan administration was pretty transparently telling people to bury themselves, presumably to save the government the trouble after they had the war they really wanted.
heh, i am just north of d.c. and surrounded on all sides by military installations.
Olbermann, Maddow, TYT, and
many others got their creds during the Bush/Cheney years. Their criticisms and critiques of the Bush admin were solid, but that wasn't a difficult task. The tough nut was getting a platform where one could be heard and seen. Particularly during those years when the MSM had been in Bush's pocket since 1998 and there was hunger for a different voice. Unfortunately, far too many people were too quick to embrace those voices totally before figuring out who and what these people are. Too quick to forget that MSNBC ditched Phil Donahue and kept Chris, Tweety, Matthews. And way too slow to recognize when those voices revealed important factors about themselves.
As I only intermittently and not too often tuned into these people, perhaps I had an advantage in seeing their spots early on. Tuned out and never tuned back into Maddow in 2007 when it was unmistakable to me that she was first a Clinton polemicist. Had their criticisms/critiques of Bush/Cheney been authentic, they wouldn't have given Obama a pass as he doubled down on most Clinton/Bush policies. A solid majority didn't want that in 2008. Nor in 2010, 2014, and 2016. They still don't.
As entertainment, politics is very low level. Thus, I don't get the why people bother tuning into any of these shows; they're one trick ponies: My team rocks and the other team sucks, cheer or boo accordingly.
Tucker Carlson, or any other one of these overpaid hucksters, having intermittent moments of sanity doesn't impress me either. He's still and forevermore will remain a rightwing dickhead, but might be slightly smarter than his rightwing associates because he can see opening for himself when there's virtual silence in the MSM on certain matters that aren't in accordance with the American psyche.
Excellent points
I agree wholeheartedly. Sad it took me so long to see it.
I met Booker and his dad tonight and while the kids played we talked politics. He might have been an Obama supporter at one time, but he has seen through the BS of Obama, democrats, republicans and Biden. We had a lovely chat and it’s so good to see someone else here thinking along the same lines. After I said that Obama was a white president and is responsible for slavery in Libya he told me he was half black. But then he agreed with me. lol..foot/mouth.
Which AIPAC/MIC/pharma/bank bought politician are you going to vote for? Don’t be surprised when nothing changes.
Voting is like driving with a toy steering wheel.
Hard way to learn a valuable lesson.
or maybe that's lessons. Critical thinking/reasoning and at least spot checking presented facts seems invaluable. Assess the source as much as possible and be willing to adjust the assessment in light of additional information. A good nose for bs is also helpful. Of course knowing one's self and where one stands on basic issues, principles, and orientation and why necessary.
Idealizing or idolizing anyone, particularly people I don't know personally, isn't possible for me. My assessment of others is always conditional. When I was young and in a male dominated business, in general I found it much easier to get along professionally with the older men because there was nothing covert about their sexism and that oddly freed them to evaluate me based on the work. (A long and mostly boring story.)
Once worked for a small company in a growth mode. (an IPO about a year after I started.) Co-workers, particularly in the home office, treated the CEO as if he walked on water. I was under no such illusion and the CEO knew that I wasn't; he was a sleazebag. The company crashed and burned and suddenly the CEO was the devil incarnate for the all sycophants. Far too late he recognized that I was the only steady and clean employee that he could ask to help him.
It's surprising and fascinating when a person deviates from his/her apparent core values and trustworthiness. I'm thinking of Amy Goodwin. And Bernie Sanders for espousing the Russiagate nonsense. Even if it was only a political tactic for him, it still meant that he was either willing to lie and not half as intelligent as he needed to be.
Good evening Joe. Thanks for the Evening Blues.
So we and our NATO allies, will continue to provoke and pressure Russia in order to support our buddies of the Ukraine junta and we pronounce this theory from Odessa, no less. Part of me thinks "perhaps from the steps of Odessa?" War on Russia might not go as well as our war on Assange.
Not news or surprising, the MSM is silent on the Assange outrage, Also too, the NSA has been gathering info on Tucker Carlson and also too there were feebs at the Capitol insurrection, not just informants, but provocateurs, though, somehow only one informant has been outed. And the EPA is owned, cue Frank saying "whooooooooooo could imagine?"
But Trump will sue selected media powers about censorship! Really? That's good news. He loves to sue, sure, but if anything comes of this it will be a fabulous clown show, possibly worthy of the SF Mime Troop of yore.
Little Johnnie, good stuff.
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 e.l.
[video:https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1sEPFd-1Dm8 width:500 height:300]
We wanted decent healthcare, a living wage and free college.
The Democrats gave us Biden and war instead.
Ayup. For those not familiar with the movie, the
crew of the Potemkin joins the revolution, the people love the idea, the troops are the Tsar's Kossacs who are slaughtering the people. Of course, then the Potemkin takes out the opera house where all the Tsar's military and political leaders are having a confab.
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...
my guess is that the u.s. and its allies will not stop hectoring russia on its doorstep until russia gives them what they desperately want - an excuse for a larger war.
who indeed could imagine?
personally, i am looking forward to trump's suit and i hope that he hires the best litigators on the planet to represent him/his class, not a bunch of ghouliani caliber morons.
have a great evening!
I doubt they'll hear it. Assuming that it is some sort of
Trumped up tort claim (but how were any of the wannabee plaintiffs harmed?), how in the hell do they plan on computing damages? Specific performance? On what theory? It should be a giggle all of the way around.
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 --
yeah...
all of the conventional wisdom says that it will get laughed out of court. but i would like to see a case taken up that addresses the issue of whether private companies have free rein to box individuals and groups out of the marketplace of ideas. i would like to see some of these monopolies like facebook, google/youtube and twitter to at the very least be determined to be public accommodations.
I would love to see such a determination, but, assuming
one was handed down, there is still no award for the plaintiffs, the situation is vaguely parallel to ex post facto law or secret law. I can't go and paint the curb you are parked aat red and then fine you for parking there, any rule on public accomodation of utility would be prospective.
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 --
heh...
frankly, i don't care if the plaintiffs get a dollar. but i would guess that an enterprising lawyer could note that the biparties are actually corporations and as such require goodwill to operate and that goodwill is generated by their politicians and platforms. by blocking politicians and ideas from the public square they have denied plaintiffs a means of generating goodwill. as such businesses have found a way to value goodwill as an asset, so perhaps that could be a way to get around the problem of finding a tangible loss. but, hell, what do i know. shrugs.
Glenn just posted this
I peeked at DK recently and saw someone had written about Assange and how the story fell because of the lies and I needed a shower after. Plus it’s okay for Biden to spy on Carlson because Putin. It’s also okay Trump supporters are in isolation before trial because Trump. Democrats got people to turn their back on everything they once stood for. You can see it on Twitter too. Interesting to watch this experiment in real time huh? Wonder what Im swallowing that is propaganda?
Which AIPAC/MIC/pharma/bank bought politician are you going to vote for? Don’t be surprised when nothing changes.
Voting is like driving with a toy steering wheel.
heh...
good for glenn, and i never expected fox news to stand up for any sort of principle, but good for them, too.
My, my, my, heat wave, they say, so maybe go to a Lake?
5.9 in Tahoe + 28 aftershocks, so far they say, so maybe don't go in the water.
Think I'll just wander out into the heat wave (just starting) and throw some left over homemade pizza on the grill and work on my tan.
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 --
People are tweeting about the ones in California
have you felt any? One in Sacramento and possibly Stockton and elsewhere around there.
Why don’t go in the water with after shocks? Geology was never my strong suit.
Which AIPAC/MIC/pharma/bank bought politician are you going to vote for? Don’t be surprised when nothing changes.
Voting is like driving with a toy steering wheel.
There was alleged to be one in Stockton today, but that was
actually just Tahoe, dunno about Sacamenna. We had one a couple of miles from my house earlier, 4.x, no biggie. Didn't feel the Tahoe one, you'd have to be aligned with whatever fault it was on to do so, the Sierras are a whole shitload of Granite to shake too much for too far.
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 --
This could happen.
heh...
more likely we'll all become mole people, because 3-5 feet below the surface it's 55 degrees pretty much year round.
That's what I call
a well insulated basement.
When we built our forever home we went with a prefab modular basement wall system. With added insulation we have R-35. Typical poured concrete basement walls only achieve a 1.5 R value. On the hottest days it never gets above 65f and is used as a cold sink to cool other areas.
Too many waste too much on aesthetics instead of practicality.
Regardless of the path in life I chose, I realize it's always forward, never straight.
yep...
i live in a very old house with a 2 foot-thick stone foundation. it's almost always cool in the basement.
I think the official name is Morlocks.
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 --
Stay out of the water?
FYI
Which AIPAC/MIC/pharma/bank bought politician are you going to vote for? Don’t be surprised when nothing changes.
Voting is like driving with a toy steering wheel.
Was with reference specifically to Lake Tahoe -
was prefaced by
... idea was water sloshing around, bad humor.
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 --
Be all well, read this EB and was knocked out
I wonder how I always fall asleep when the shit hits the fan. Sometimes I pray for all of you and I do now. Blessed are those with cool basements with a stone foundation.
The shit has hit the fan
More shit hits the Haitian people
Haiti police say 26 Colombians, two US-Haitians took part in Jovenel Moïse assassination
Of course we, the Americans, have to save the Haitian
people from the dangers of an 'Unraveling Democracy'.
Who else could do it better than US ?
Done for today. I am going to pray some more. Bye.
Thank you for your prayers mimi
Sometimes it is all that we have, and all that we can contribute. The tragedy of life for Haitians is heartbreaking. If only life was fair, what a better world we would have.
For you, because I know you like this song ...
[video:https://youtu.be/fndZpGGuN9c]
thank you, dear friend,
I hope you and yours are coping sufficiently well with this wonderful world. Love and peace to you.
And some tickling and this
I hope she will be your joy for a long time to come.
Stay with us. You are a healing force.
I just had a thought
Remember that class-action fraud lawsuit against the DNC, where the verdict was "it's fucking immoral, but it's legal so no Justice for you"?
I was wondering if there's any legal distinction between "fraud" and "false advertising" - especially since the plaintiff in that case didn't go in calling the defendant a "private corporation", but the defendant's claim that they are was a key to their victory (so now THAT precedent's been set)? I figure the laws that can still be expected to function as they ought to (and hence the ones you'd appeal to if you want to get anything done) would be the ones the corporations themselves need to be able to use against each other - and "false advertising" would be one of them.
I was not personally party to that lawsuit (nor am I a lawyer, so I'm not 100% clear on how it all works), I would CERTAINLY have been one of the people the suit was speaking on behalf of - I determined after the fact that with the money I spent on political charity in the 2015-2016 season ALONE, I could've bought a car (and frankly could use a new one right now - what is this "public transportation system" of which you speak, O Mysterious Oriental???)!
In the Land of the Blind, the One-Eyed Man is declared mentally ill for describing colors.
Yes Virginia, there is a Global Banking Conspiracy!