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"Afghanistan has been captured by a tyrannical violent extremist group and I hear the group that’s replacing them when they complete their withdrawal is pretty bad too."

-- Caitlin Johnstone

News and Opinion

Warmongers Keep Raging About The Phrase ‘Ending The Forever Wars’ And We Should Laugh At Them

In the wake of the Afghanistan withdrawal influential promoters of western militarism have been absolutely fuming about the popular idea of ending the forever wars, and their tantrums are not even trying to disguise it as something else. They’re literally using that phrase, “ending the forever wars”, and then saying it’s a bad thing.

I mean, what a bizarre hill to die on. War is the very worst thing in the world, and forever is the very worst amount of time they could go on for, yet they’re openly condemning the “doctrine of ending the forever wars”. How warped does your sense of reality have to be to even think this is a view anyone who isn’t paid by defense contractors could possibly be sympathetic to?

Yet they are indeed trying. Citing the chaos of the Afghanistan withdrawal as though every single day of the twenty-year occupation has not been far worse, career-long warmongers are trying to spin “ending the forever wars” as a disdainful slogan that everyone should reject.

Tony Blair, the former prime minister of Britain who led the UK into Afghanistan, criticized Biden's withdrawal, calling it a hasty move made “in obedience to an imbecilic political slogan about ending ‘the forever wars.’” https://t.co/jJbWliMJc9

— The New York Times (@nytimes) August 22, 2021

As we discussed previously, The Hague fugitive Tony Blair recently made headlines with a lengthy statement bloviating about the concept of ending forever wars with the revulsion you’d normally reserve for people advocating the elimination of age of consent laws or legalizing recreational panda punching.

“We didn’t need to do it. We chose to do it,” Blair wrote of the withdrawal. “We did it in obedience to an imbecilic political slogan about ending ‘the forever wars’, as if our engagement in 2021 was remotely comparable to our commitment 20 or even ten years ago, and in circumstances in which troop numbers had declined to a minimum and no allied soldier had lost their life in combat for 18 months.”

As Blair well knows, the only reason no allied soldier had lost their life in combat for 18 months was because the Trump administration had cut a deal with the Taliban in February 2020 on condition of withdrawal from Afghanistan. Pretending the lack of deaths among occupying forces was due to the occupation being easy and that it was in any way sustainable minus a credible promise of withdrawal is disgusting. And not that Blair cares but it’s not like the occupation hasn’t been slaughtering mountains of civilians during those eighteen months.

Then there’s Iraq war architect Paul Wolfowitz, who’s been on a media tour throughout the withdrawal because obviously everyone wants to hear the opinions of Bush administration war criminals about whether it’s okay to end the Bush administration’s criminal wars. His latest contribution is a Wall Street Journal op-ed titled “The ‘Forever War’ Hasn’t Ended” in which he argues the concept of ending forever wars is both stupid and fallacious.

“President Biden, like his two immediate predecessors, seems to think you can end ‘forever wars’ simply by leaving them,” Wolfowitz writes. “But Thursday’s unprovoked attack, on people who were fleeing and those who were helping them, demonstrates the truth of the soldier’s adage that ‘the enemy always gets a vote.’”

“Choosing to avoid ‘forever war’ by abandoning our Afghan allies was both costly and dishonorable,” says Wolfowitz. “Exactly as Churchill said to Neville Chamberlain after the betrayal of Czechoslovakia at Munich: ‘You were given the choice between war and dishonor. You chose dishonor, and you will have war.'”

God what a wanker.

Then there’s UAE-funded war propagandist Charles Lister hilariously arguing that the withdrawal shows a failure of the “ending forever wars doctrine” on the basis that it caused the “crumbling of a democratic government” and made “Al Qaeda ecstatic”. Hilarious because only by the most determined mental gymnastics was the corrupt US puppet regime in Afghanistan “democratic”, and because Lister has been an outspoken advocate of Al Qaeda in Syria.

There’s also the insufferably hawkish Congressman Adam Kinzinger, who has received campaign donations from Boeing, Raytheon, Lockheed Martin and Northrop Grumman, appearing on MSNBC and writing a Foreign Policy op-ed explicitly in opposition to the notion of ending endless wars.

“On both sides of the political spectrum, we’ve heard the ‘endless wars’ rallying cry used to argue against America’s presence in the Middle East,” Kinzinger writes for Foreign Policy. “We’ve heard the many fatigued Americans who complain about ‘forever wars.’ Some are upset by the money spent, and others want our troops home, or both. Those who have lamented for years that our mission in Afghanistan was a disaster from the start are stepping up in droves to say they were right and that we should have left years ago—or never engaged at all. I respectfully and vehemently disagree with all of it.”

Kinzinger told MSNBC’s Andrea Mitchell that “the kind of Rand Paul ‘endless war’ crowd that have been stoking this fire of endless war and man we’re all tired” is like “when your grandma tells you how tired you are and you eventually feel tired.” He then advocated for re-invading Afghanistan to take back the abandoned Bagram airfield.

In a recent National Review article titled “The ‘Forever War’ Fallacy“, MSNBC contributor Noah Rothman rages against the notion of ending perpetual military slaughter.

“In Afghanistan, the demagogues who wanted to see an end to America’s ‘forever wars,’ regardless of the consequences, got their wish. It has been a disaster arguably without parallel,” writes Rothman, who has apparently never heard of the disaster that was the entire Afghanistan occupation.

“The U.S. maintains deployments in and around the Middle East that fluctuate between 45,000 and 65,000 troops. Would advocates of retrenchment sacrifice that mission — and the Middle Eastern governments that rely on it to prevent non-state actors and Iranian proxies from destabilizing those regimes?” Rothman asks. “What about Africa, where between 6,000 and 7,000 American troops are advising local forces fighting Islamist militant groups?”

Uh, yeah actually, getting rid of those would also be great. The less expansive you can make the most destructive institution on earth, the better.

Perhaps the funniest case was Richard Haass, president of the wildly influential war propaganda firm Council on Foreign Relations, arguing on Twitter for a rebranding of “endless occupation” to “open-ended presence”.

“The alternative to withdrawal from Afghanistan was not ‘endless occupation’ but open-ended presence,” Haass said. “Occupation is imposed, presence invited. Unless you think we are occupying Japan, Germany, and South Korea. And yes, withdrawal was the problem.”

I mean, where to even start with that one? The hilarious notion that simply rebranding an endless occupation which has killed hundreds of thousands of people with a different label makes it better? The idea that the consent of a puppet government installed by regime change invasion means the military presence was “invited”? The claim that an occupation of nonstop bombing and killing is comparable to US military presence in Japan, Germany and South Korea? The claim that there’s any legitimate reason for the US military to be in Japan, Germany and South Korea either? The suggestion that everyone in Japan, Germany and South Korea wants the US military there?

Moron.

The fact that these people are thought leaders of policy-shaping influence and not fringe pariahs of society shows that our world is being steered by idiots and sociopaths. They’re standing there right in front of us and wagging their fingers at us for opposing something as straightforwardly and self-evidently bad as endless war. ENDLESS WAR.

They should be mocked and laughed at for this. We will know our world is becoming sane when such creatures are regarded with scorn and ridicule instead of being taken seriously by the largest platforms in our society. Never stop making fun of these freaks.

Media USES Dead American Troops To Push FOREVER WAR Lies

Multiple rockets fired at Kabul airport, intercepted by defense system -U.S. official

As many as five rockets were fired at Kabul's international airport but were intercepted by a missile defense system, a U.S. official told Reuters, as the United States' nears the complete withdrawal of its troops from the city.

The official, speaking on the condition of anonymity, said the rockets were fired early Monday morning Kabul time, though it was unclear if all were brought down by the defense system. Initial reports did not indicate any U.S. casualties, but that information could change, the official said.

Earlier on Sunday, American forces launched a drone strike in Kabul targeting a suicide bomber in a vehicle who was aiming to attack the airport.

There is increasing concern that Islamic State militants will launch further attacks on the airport as U.S. troops hurry to evacuate remaining American citizens and at-risk Afghans, before competing their own withdrawal by Aug. 31.

U.S. Winds Down Afghanistan Occupation Like It Began, with Drone Strikes & Civilian Casualties

US forces strike against ISKP suicide bombers in Kabul, officials say

US forces have launched a “defensive” military strike in Kabul against a vehicle carrying “multiple suicide bombers” from the Islamic State’s local affiliate in Afghanistan who were aiming to attack the airport, American officials have said. There was no immediate word on casualties and few other details about the incident, which may have triggered a second blast in a nearby house.

Witnesses reported an explosion near Kabul airport and television footage showed black smoke rising into the sky. Taliban officials confirmed the US account. According to reports there were multiple fatalities, including children.

The US has said it was “assessing the possibilities” of having killed or injured civilians in the airstrike, which came three days after a suicide attack at the airport that killed more than 180 people, including 13 US Marines.

The Islamic State in Khorasan Province (ISKP) claimed responsibility for the bombing at the airport, one of the most lethal in Afghanistan’s history. ... The Taliban have condemned the US drone strike against suspected suicide bombers in Kabul, saying it had violated Afghanistan’s sovereignty.

The Taliban and US forces have increased security around the airport since Thursday’s attack. The Pentagon spokesman John Kirby said on Saturday that Washington believed there were still “specific and credible” threats against the airport.

Trita Parsi: Dismantling NEOCON Lies About Afghan Withdrawal

Taliban assure world leaders they will let eligible people leave Afghanistan

Boris Johnson and other world leaders have received assurances from the Taliban that foreign nationals and those with authorisation to exit Afghanistan will be free to leave, as tensions and bloodshed escalate on the streets of Kabul. ...

A significant number of British citizens told the Guardian they continued to wait at the airport in the hope of being rescued despite the terror threats and the departure of all UK troops at the weekend. They sent video footage of several people clasping UK passports and pleading for help. Desperate Afghans have been told to cross the border into neighbouring countries to escape the Taliban takeover.

On Monday, the UN security council is expected to discuss the Taliban’s reassurances – revealed in a statement on Sunday evening – after deepening concerns over the plight of thousands of Afghans with western links who are at their mercy.

France and Britain were expected to table an emergency UN security council resolution calling for any new Afghan government to back a safe zone at Kabul airport to allow evacuation efforts to continue, Emmanuel Macron said, though a Whitehall source claimed the French president’s comments were “premature”.

Palestinian boy shot by Israeli soldiers during clashes on Gaza border dies

A 12-year-old Palestinian boy shot last week by Israeli soldiers during clashes along the border with Gaza has died of his injuries, the territory’s health ministry said on Saturday.

Omar Hassan Abu al-Nile was hit last Saturday on the sidelines of a demonstration near the border fence separating the Gaza Strip from Israel, the official Palestinian news agency Wafa said. He “succumbed to his injuries”, Gaza’s health ministry said in a statement. About 100 mourners attended his funeral in the afternoon.

The 21 August unrest left about 40 people wounded, according to Gaza’s Hamas rulers, including a 32-year-old Palestinian man who died on Wednesday. An Israeli police officer was also shot, and remains in a critical condition.

The Israeli army said it had responded with live fire and other measures to Palestinian “rioters” who were hurling explosives over the border fence and attempting to scale it.

After the clashes, Israel carried out airstrikes it said were targeting weapons manufacturing and storage sites belonging to Hamas.

UK government: 50,000 annual COVID-19 deaths are “acceptable”

Britain’s i newspaper has revealed that Prime Minister Boris Johnson has conducted “a cost-benefit analysis” to determine whether “saving lives” through further lockdowns can be justified based on the “effect of deaths on the UK economy.” Two government advisors told the i that closed-door discussion had established an “acceptable level of Covid-19 deaths” at around 1,000 deaths a week.

According to one adviser, Johnson had privately accepted that there would be at least a further 30,000 deaths in the UK over the next year, and that he would “only consider imposing further [COVID-19 safety] restrictions if that figure looked like it could rise above 50,000.” Johnson, who has the social conscience of a Heinrich Himmler, put the acceptable cost of saving the life of a COVID-19 patient at £30,000. However, this proposed upper limit for treating a patient was then combined with a calculation of “how much each life lost costs the UK economy.”

According to the two sources, “the analysis shows that the cost of keeping the annual death rate below 50,000 would outweigh the cost to the UK economy of allowing it to rise above this level.” This translates to “deaths from Covid of 137 a day, or just under 1,000 a week.”

Professor Graham Medley, chair of the Government’s pandemic modelling group Spi-m and member of the Scientific Advisory Group for Emergencies (SAGE), told the i by way of justification, “Measures such as vaccinating children against meningitis or imposing speed limits on roads reduce death and disease, but also cost money and limit freedoms.”

The i ’s sources stressed that “it won’t be an immediate reaction” and that only a “sustained rate of death of around a 1,000 a week for two or three weeks” would “lead to discussion on restrictions being reimposed.” Not even a “discussion” on lockdowns will take place. The proposed trigger for such a possible reconsideration was meant solely to legitimise the ending of lockdown and the removal of all measures of mitigation on July 19. It was never intended to be implemented.

Sympathising with Johnson’s supposed dilemma, the i ’s source states, “Unfortunately, prime ministers have to weigh up the cost of saving lives to the impact on the economy. No one wants to talk about that’s how it works.” But Johnson has previously made clear exactly “how it works.” His embittered former adviser Dominic Cummings revealed WhatsApp messages sent by Johnson to his advisers last October, declaring of COVID fatalities, “The median age is 82–81 for men 85 for women… There are max 3m [million] in this country aged over 80. It shows we don’t go for nationwide lockdown.”

Kim Iversen: BOMBSHELL Report Suggests Natural Immunity Triggers Better Response Against COVID

Fauci: 100,000 new Covid deaths in US ‘predictable but preventable’

As many as 100,000 new Covid-19 deaths in the US by December is “predictable but preventable”, the leading US infectious diseases expert said on Sunday, as dozens of states reported rapidly increasing fatalities.

Amid resistance in some states to public health measures and mandates, the Delta variant of the virus has pushed up deaths in 14 states by more than 50% in a week, and by at least 10% in 28 more, according to Johns Hopkins University. Those figures follow a dire warning from the University of Washington that tens of thousands more could die, with a daily peak of 1,400 by mid-September.

On Sunday, Johns Hopkins put the US death toll from Covid-19 at almost 637,000.

“What is going on now is both entirely predictable and entirely preventable,” Dr Anthony Fauci, head of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases and chief medical adviser to President Joe Biden, told CNN’s State of the Union. “We know we have the wherewithal with vaccines to turn this around, and the reason the numbers are so alarming is that we have about 80 million people in this country who are eligible to be vaccinated who are not yet vaccinated. ...

Vaccine hesitancy is decreasing, figures show, with an average of about 900,000 shots being administered each day in the US, up 80% in a month. This week, Biden hailed full Federal Drug Administration (FDA) approval of the Pfizer vaccine for those 16 and older as “a key milestone” in the coronavirus fight. But experts say that the rate must increase further, and the public needs to continue social distancing and mask wearing, if the situation is to improve.

Unvaccinated teacher infected half her students with Covid, CDC finds

An unvaccinated teacher in a California elementary school infected half her students and 26 people in total when she contracted the Covid-19 Delta variant, researchers for the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) found.

The researchers said the teacher attended school for two days despite displaying symptoms of Covid-19, and read aloud to her class without a mask during that time. Infections corresponded to the classroom’s seating chart, with the students sitting closest to the teacher the most likely to be infected.

Authorities said the report showed why vaccinations, masks and other prevention measures remain critical to prevent Covid-19 infections as US schools reopen. They also warned that anyone with symptoms of Covid-19 should stay home, to avoid infecting others.

“Evidence has repeatedly demonstrated that multi-layer prevention strategies – such as vaccination for all children and adults who are eligible; masks for all students, teachers, staff, and visitors; ventilation; cohorting; physical distancing; and screening testing – work to prevent the spread of Covid in schools,” said Dr Rochelle Walensky, the CDC director, at a press briefing on Friday.

The report is likely to increase calls for vaccine mandates in schools, which some districts such as New York City have already implemented. Children in the California investigation, in Marin county, were too young to be vaccinated.

Judge Strikes Down DeSantis Ban on Mask Mandates

A Florida judge delivered a blow to Republican Gov. Ron DeSantis' effort to stop public schools from mandating mask-wearing amid the state's latest surge in Covid-19 cases, ruling that the governor violated the Florida Constitution with his executive order last month.

Second Judicial Circuit Judge John Cooper sided with several parents who sued DeSantis and his Department of Education over the state's directive which barred school districts from requiring face coverings and threatened to withhold state education funding if school boards disobeyed.

Cooper granted the parents an injunction against the Department of Education and noted in his ruling that the state's "parent's bill of rights," which lawmakers passed earlier this year and which DeSantis claimed allowed him to keep schools from following public health guidance, "doesn't ban mask mandates."

Florida Agriculture Commissioner Nikki Fried, a Democrat who is running to replace DeSantis a governor, called the ruling "a win for common sense, for children's safety, and for all the families and school officials who have been fighting to protect their loved ones, students, and staff."

The governor indicated earlier this week that he planned to appeal Cooper's decision to a more conservative appeals court if the ruling was not in his favor.

Several school districts have defied DeSantis' order in recent weeks despite his threat to pull funding, and as of Thursday, more than half of Florida's 2.8 million public school children were going to schools which have adopted mask mandates. ...

Amid DeSantis' attacks on public health measures, Florida is now seeing more children hospitalized with Covid-19 than at any other point in the pandemic. The state currently has the fifth highest number of new infections per capita.

MILLIONS On Brink Of Homelessness As Media Ignores Eviction Moratorium

SCOTUS Overturns Eviction Moratorium, Ro Khanna DEMANDS Congressional Action Amid Pandemic

Dental, Insurance Lobbyists Quietly Target Democrats' Medicare Expansion Plan

Underscoring the for-profit healthcare industry's tireless efforts to avoid any reduction in its bottom line—no matter the cost to the American public—lobbyists for health insurers and dentists are ramping up pressure on lawmakers to leave comprehensive Medicare coverage out of the $3.5 trillion spending plan now making its way through Congress.

Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.), who has led negotiations on the package as chairman of the Senate Budget Committee, has long called for Medicare to include dental, vision, and hearing care and has demanded those provisions, in addition to lowering the eligibility age, be included in the bill.

According to Politico, groups including the American Dental Association (ADA)—threatened by the possibility that patients will switch to traditional Medicare plans instead of higher-paying, private Medicare Advantage plans—are pushing Congress to apply means-testing to the provisions.

"Let's focus on those who currently can't afford to see a dentist, people who are most likely to end up in the emergency room," Michael Graham, senior vice president for government and public affairs for the ADA, which wants Congress to limit dental benefits to people earning less than 300% of the federal poverty line.

Polls show millions of Americans—not just those living in poverty—have significant trouble affording dental care, and frequently go without to save money. Last year, one in five older adults told the National Poll on Healthy Aging that they had delayed taking care of their oral health in the previous two years, with a majority saying cost had played a role in their decision.

In 2018, nearly half of Americans polled by NORC said they went without a routine cleaning or dental checkup that year, and 39% said they avoided getting treatment for a dental problem.

Ninety-three percent of older adults told the National Poll on Healthy Aging that they favored including dental coverage in traditional Medicare.

Considering the popularity of including more comprehensive benefits in the program, Politico reported, "the industry is mindful of the optics of publicly opposing coverage of eyeglasses, dental care, and hearing aids, and is largely lobbying behind the scenes."

Larry Levitt, executive vice president for health policy at the Kaiser Family Foundation, said the ADA's current pressure campaign is reminiscent of healthcare lobbyists' efforts in the 1960s to prevent the creation of the Medicare program, when the American Medical Association told the public Medicare would "put the government smack into your hospital" and warned against socialized medical care.

In addition to means-testing, at behest of healthcare lobbyists, lawmakers are currently debating a longer phase-in for dental care or more cost-sharing for patients to protect the profits of insurers that sell additional coverage for hearing, vision, and dental care.

Insurance companies, Rep. Lloyd Doggett (D-Texas), who chairs the House Ways and Means health subcommittee, told Politico, "don't have an interest in having traditional Medicare provide comprehensive coverage."

"That's all the more reason, in my opinion, that we need to do it," Doggett said.

Forget the Alamo review: dark truths of the US south and its ‘secular Mecca’

Bryan Burrough, Chris Tomlinson and Jason Stanford assert: “If there’s ever been a moment for a spirited discussion about what the Alamo really symbolizes, we’d suggest it’s now.” ... Almost 200 years after the battle which killed 200 Americans at an old Spanish church outside San Antonio, the essential argument remains the same: were these settlers fighting for their “freedom” against the oppression of a Mexican tyrant, Antonio López de Santa Anna, or were they mostly interested in preserving the slavery a recently independent Mexico opposed but they considered essential for the success of their burgeoning cotton farms?

Burrough, Tomlinson and Stanford leave no doubt about the correct answer. Slavery.

“Texas as we know it exists only because of slave labor,” they assert, and most Texans who came from the the south “wouldn’t immigrate to Texas without it … for Mexicans, newly freed from Spanish oppression, abolishing slavery was a moral issue. For the American colonists it was an issue of wealth creation.”

Or as the Texas pioneer Stephen Austin wrote in different letters, “Nothing is wanted but money” and “negroes are necessary to make it”.

What the authors call a “historiography” or “a history of histories” does a fine job of separating the few actual facts about the Alamo from the legend which comprises “the beating heart of Texas exceptionalism”.

Jacob Blake Jr, paralysed in Kenosha police shooting, expects to walk again

Jacob Blake Jr, the Wisconsin man who was left paralyzed from the waist down after he was shot by a white police officer last year, expects to be walking soon – an accomplishment he says is tempered by fears of it happening again.

Blake was shot seven times by a Kenosha police officer in August 2020. Three months after George Floyd was killed by police in Minnesota, Blake’s shooting set off days of violent protests in the city of about 100,000 midway between Chicago and Milwaukee.

Blake told CNN he was able to take a few steps during a birthday party for his son this week, which he compared to sliding his legs through a woodchipper. Although he was “so geeked” by the moment following months of physical rehabilitation, he said he was not claiming victory.

“Yeah, I’m here, and yeah I’m about to be walking, but I really don’t feel like I have survived because it could happen to me again,” Blake said. “I have not survived until something has changed.” Blake said he continues to relive not only his own shooting but other gun violence in Black communities. Last month, during Fourth of July fireworks when Blake was in Chicago with family, he called 911 over what he later realized was an anxiety attack.

Lindsey Graham repeats impeachment call for former friend Joe Biden

Lindsey Graham has repeated his call for Joe Biden to be impeached over the US withdrawal from Afghanistan, saying the president “ignored sound advice” and has “been this way for 40 years”. Some observers may harbour doubts about Graham’s sincerity.

The Republican senator from South Carolina was close to Biden when Biden was a senator, a relationship which remained strong when the man from Delaware became vice-president to Barack Obama. Only six years ago, in 2015, Graham told the Huffington Post: “If you can’t admire Joe Biden as a person, then you got a problem. You need to do some self-evaluation. ’Cause what’s not to like?” ...

On Sunday, amid a cacophony of comment and invective over Afghanistan from Biden’s advisers and opponents, Graham gave a short interview to CBS’s Face the Nation. Calling for US forces to remain in the country, to tackle terrorists who killed 13 US troops and as many as 170 Afghans this week, he said: “You cannot break [Islamic State’s] will through drone attacks. You’ve got to have people on the ground hitting these people day in and day out. You can’t do it over the horizon.

“[Biden] deserves a lot of accountability for this. And I’m sure it will be coming.”

Republican election audits have led to voting system breaches, experts say

Republican efforts to question Donald Trump’s defeat in 2020 have led to voting system breaches experts say pose a risk to future elections. Copies of Dominion Voting Systems softwares used for designing ballots, configuring voting machines and tallying results were distributed at an event this month in South Dakota organized by the MyPillow chief executive, Mike Lindell, a Trump ally who has made unsubstantiated claims about last year’s election.

Matt Masterson, a former top election security official in the Trump administration, said: “We told election officials, essentially, that you should assume this information is already out there. Now we know it is, and we don’t know what [hackers] are going to do with it.”

The software copies came from voting equipment in Mesa county, Colorado, and Antrim county, Michigan, where Trump allies challenged results last fall. Dominion software is used in some 30 states, including California, Georgia and Michigan.

Harri Hursti, an election security pioneer, was at the South Dakota event and said he and other researchers were given three separate copies of election management systems that run on the Dominion software. Data indicated they were from Antrim and Mesa counties. While it’s not clear how the copies came to be released, they were also posted online and made available for public download.

The release gives hackers a “practice environment” to probe for vulnerabilities and a road map to avoid defenses, Hursti said. All hackers would need is physical access to the systems because they are not supposed to be connected to the internet. US election technology is dominated by three vendors, meaning election officials cannot easily swap out existing technology. A Dominion representative declined comment, citing an investigation. Hackers could sabotage the system, alter ballot design or even try to change results, said Kevin Skoglund, an election technology expert.

Nearly 70 People Arrested for Resisting Line 3 at Rally Outside Minnesota Governor's Mansion

Environmental justice campaigners expressed solidarity over the weekend with nearly 70 people who were arrested Saturday by Minnesota law enforcement as they assembled outside Democratic Gov. Tim Walz's home, demanding the governor take action to stop the construction of the Enbridge Line 3 tar sands pipeline.

Protesters were loaded into buses after police threatened dozens with pepper spray, rubber bullets, and a Long Range Acoustic Device (LRAD) for peacefully protesting the pipeline, which violates the treaty rights of the Anishinaabe people as well as threatening water safety in northern Minnesota.

RootsAction urged supporters to donate to bail funds for the campaigners, many of whom have been arrested multiple times for standing up for Indigenous rights, public health, and the future of the planet.

On Saturday, more than 100 people marched to Walz's mansion from the Minnesota State Capitol in St. Paul, demanding the governor live up to campaign statements he made opposing the pipeline and intervene in the permitting process for Line 3.

Walz has expressed support for moving "away from fossil fuels," but since taking office he has declined to stop construction, which is now on the verge of completion.

"If we’re gonna transport oil, we need to do it as safely as we possibly can with the most modern equipment," said Walz on Friday as thousands of demonstrators camped out on the grounds of the state Capitol.

At the rally in front of the governor's home on Saturday, Indigenous water protectors read a statement demanding action from Walz and President Joe Biden, who advocates say should suspend the permit allowing construction of the Line 3 pipeline under the Clean Water Act and "undertake a thorough review" of the federal permitting process and the project.

"Line 3 violates treaties by threatening water, manoomin, and our climate, leading to the loss of usufructuary and cultural rights," said the organizers. "President Biden, as well, has failed to uphold treaties and the principle of free, prior, and informed consent by allowing the project to proceed without nation to nation consultation with sovereign tribes opposed to the project."

Organizers including Taysha Martineau, one of the Anishinaabe women leading the resistance to the pipeline, chained themselves to the gates in front of Walz's mansion before the arrests.

"I'm here locked to the fence demanding that Governor Tim Walz speak to us," Martineau said. "We’re calling on Governor Walz to pull the permits for Line 3 and demanding a federal Environmental Impact Statement for the project. Water protectors marched 256 miles from the headwaters of the Mississippi River to speak with this gentleman. He has not come to listen to their voices and so we came here. We’re here demanding that they hear us.”

Exxon's Oil Drilling Gamble Off Guyana Coast Could Turn Country from Carbon Sink to "Carbon Bomb"

Floating wind turbines could open up vast ocean tracts for renewable power

In the stormy waters of the North Sea, 15 miles off the coast of Aberdeenshire, in Scotland, five floating offshore wind turbines stretch 574 feet (175 metres) above the water. The world’s first floating windfarm, a 30 megawatt facility run by the Norwegian company Equinor, has only been in operation since 2017 but has already broken UK records for energy output.

While most offshore wind turbines are anchored to the ocean floor on fixed foundations, limiting them to depths of about 165ft, floating turbines are tethered to the seabed by mooring lines. These enormous structures are assembled on land and pulled out to sea by boats.

The ability to install turbines in deeper waters, where winds tend to be stronger, opens up huge amounts of the ocean to generate renewable wind power: close to 80% of potential offshore wind power is found in deeper waters. In addition, positioning floating turbines much further off the coast helps avoid conflicts with those who object to their impact on coastal views.

Floating offshore wind is still in its early stages: only about 80 megawatts of a total of about 32 gigawatts (0.25%) of installed offshore wind capacity is floating. But some experts say the relatively new technology could become an important part of the renewables mix, if it can overcome hurdles including cost, design and opposition from the fishing industry.

The US has traditionally lagged behind Europe when it comes to offshore wind power, but that may be changing. Joe Biden has pledged to build more than 30GW of offshore wind by 2030. The Department of Energy says it has invested more than $100m in researching and developing floating offshore wind technology in an attempt to establish itself as a leader in the sector.

Worth a full read. Another way for profit-seeking "saviors" of the earth to destroy things.

Is deep-sea mining a cure for the climate crisis or a curse?

In a display cabinet in the recently opened Our Broken Planet exhibition in London’s Natural History Museum, curators have placed a small nugget of dark material covered with faint indentations. The blackened lump could easily be mistaken for coal. Its true nature is much more intriguing, however. The nugget is a polymetallic nodule and oceanographers have discovered trillions of them litter Earth’s ocean floors. Each is rich in manganese, nickel, cobalt and copper, some of the most important ingredients for making the electric cars, wind turbines and solar panels that we need to replace the carbon-emitting lorries, power plants and factories now wrecking our climate.

These metallic morsels could therefore help humanity save itself from the ravages of global warming, argue mining companies who say their extraction should be rated an international priority. By dredging up nodules from the deep we can slow the scorching of our planet’s ravaged surface. “We desperately need substantial amounts of manganese, nickel, cobalt and copper to build electric cars and power plants,” says Hans Smit, chief executive of Florida’s Oceans Minerals, which has announced plans to mine for nodules. “We cannot increase land supplies of these metals without having a significant environmental impact. The only alternative lies in the ocean.”

Other researchers disagree – vehemently. They say mining deep-sea nodules would be catastrophic for our already stressed, plastic-ridden, overheated oceans. Delicate, long-living denizens of the deep – polychaete worms, sea cucumbers, corals and squid – would be obliterated by dredging. At the same time, plumes of sediments, laced with toxic metals, would be sent spiralling upwards to poison marine food-chains. “It is hard to imagine how seabed mines could feasibly operate without devastating species and ecosystems,” says UK marine biologist Helen Scales – a view shared by David Attenborough, who has called for a moratorium on all deep-sea mining plans. “Mining means destruction and in this case it means the destruction of an ecosystem about which we know pathetically little,” he says.

It is a highly polarised dispute. On one side, proponents of nodule extraction claim it could save the world, while opponents warn it could unleash fresh ecological mayhem. For better or worse, these mineral spheres are going to play a critical role in determining our future – either by extricating us from our current ecological woes or by triggering even more calamitous outcomes.

Hurricane Ida Slams Native Communities in Louisiana as New Orleans Loses Electricity & COVID Rages

Caldor fire: crews battling California blaze face rising temperatures

Spiking temperatures and increasing winds on Sunday added to the challenges faced by firefighters battling blazes across northern California, including the huge Caldor fire, which continued its march toward the Lake Tahoe resort region. “It is going to be the hottest day so far since the fire began and unfortunately probably the driest,” said Isaac Lake, a spokesperson for efforts to stop the two-week-old blaze. Flames churned through mountains just a few miles south-west of the Tahoe Basin, where thick smoke sent tourists packing at a time when summer vacations would usually be in full swing.

Triple-digit temperatures were possible and the heat was expected to last several days, Lake said. A weather watch for critical fire conditions was issued for Monday and Tuesday at higher elevations across the Northern Sierra. Crews working in rugged terrain scrambled to douse spot fires caused by erratic winds. “It’s so dry out there that when embers blow out into the unburned fuel beds, the probability of ignition is 90%,” Lake said.

More than a dozen large fires are being fought by more than 15,200 firefighters across California. Flames have destroyed around 2,000 structures and forced thousands to evacuate while blanketing large swaths of the west in unhealthy smoke. The California fires are among nearly 90 large blazes in the US. Many are in the west, burning trees and brush desiccated by drought. Climate change has made the region warmer and drier and will continue to make the weather more extreme and wildfires more destructive, according to scientists.

The Caldor fire, which broke out on 14 August, was 19% contained after burning nearly 245 sq miles (635 sq km), an area larger than Chicago. More than 600 structures have been destroyed and at least 18,000 were under threat. ... The Dixie fire, the second-largest in state history at 1,193 sq miles, was 48% contained in the Sierra-Cascades region about 65 miles north of the Caldor fire. Nearly 700 homes are among almost 1,300 buildings destroyed in the fire since early July.

Also of Interest

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

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A Little Night Music

Ike & Tina Turner - Take you higher

Ike and Tina Turner - I Can't Believe What You Say

Ike and Tina Turner - Shake Your Tail Feather

Ike & Tina Turner - I`ve Been Loving You Too Long

Ike & Tina Turner - So Blue Over You

Ike and Tina Turner - River Deep - Mountain High

Ike & Tina Turner - Wake Up

Ike and Tina Turner - Whole Lotta Love

Ike & Tina Turner Revue - Proud Mary