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"The nation no longer stands for the enlightenment tradition, but rather for military-political hegemony and the total commodification of life."

-- Morris Berman

News and Opinion

Inside Nicaragua’s 2021 elections – and the latest US/OAS coup attempt

An excerpt from the transcript:

One of the most absurd myths about Nicaragua’s 2021 elections was that the anti-Sandinista opposition was not allowed to participate. This is blatantly false.

Across Nicaragua, there were 6 options on the ballot, 5 of which were anti-Sandinista opposition parties, all right-wing.

On Nicaragua’s Caribbean Coast, which has political autonomy and thus a slightly different system, there were 7 options on the ballot, only 1 of which was the Sandinista Front-led leftist alliance.

Another falsehood repeated by the foreign media was that the Sandinista government had arrested candidates. This is extremely misleading too.

There were some right-wing opposition leaders who were detained, but they were not candidates. And they were apprehended for violating numerous laws, after they took millions of dollars from the US government to lead a brutally violent coup attempt in 2018, in which hundreds of Nicaraguans were killed and the country was destabilized, and in which extremists hunted down, tortured, and murdered Sandinista activists and state security forces, even setting some on fire.

The coup leaders who were detained were never officially registered candidates. This is why the press has consistently referred to them as so-called “precandidates” or “presidential hopefuls,” which doesn’t mean anything.

Anyone can say they’re a presidential hopeful. If you laundered money in order to get millions of dollars from a foreign government to carry out a failed violent coup attempt in the United States and were arrested, you couldn’t just say you’re a US “presidential hopeful” to try to get out of the legal consequences. That’s what Nicaragua’s wealthy oligarchs are trying to do.

The United States was particularly furious about Nicaragua arresting the coup leaders it had cultivated because Washington had seemingly made plans to repeat the strategy it used in Venezuela when it appointed opposition politician Juan Guaidó as the so-called “interim president.”

Class Warfare and Socialist Resistance: Nicaragua, Cuba, Venezuela as Existential Threats to the US

One of the extreme ironies of the latest attack by the settler-colonial regime of the United States against the national democratic project of Nicaragua is that in Nicaragua, the second poorest nation in the Americas, universal healthcare and education are guaranteed to the population as a human right, while in the U.S. those kinds of basic human rights are distant dreams.

The day after the so-called progressive block of legislators in the U.S. House of Representatives surrendered to President Joe Biden and the right-wing corporate wing of the party on the Build Back Better legislation that offered some minor and temporary relief for workers and the poor, many of those same “progressives” voted for the RENACER Act. The RENACER Act is a vicious piece of legislation meant to undermine the ability of the Nicaragua government to protect the human rights of its people and to punish the people for having the temerity to support their government and their anti-colonial project.

Why do Nicaragua, Cuba and Venezuela pose such an existential threat to the U.S.? Why are they able to unite all the wings of the democrat party and the republican party against them? It boils down to two factors. First, the power of their example in attempting to build independent, self-determining projects that center the material needs and interests of the people over those of capital. Second, the class warfare politics of the U.S. state. ...

The reassertion of the racist Monroe Doctrine by the former US National Security Advisor John Bolton was not repudiated by the Biden administration because it is also the guiding framework for its policies. The reference to the Monroe Doctrine was nothing more than connecting that doctrine to its contemporary policy expression reflected in the doctrine of “Full Spectrum” dominance that has been bipartisan U.S. foreign policy for twenty years. The thrust of this policy is that any nation that attempts to defy the U.S. and build an independent project that threatens U.S. hegemony in any region of the world will be destroyed. ...

But there is also a domestic ideological component to this as well. The very existence of these nations at this historical moment, a moment characterized by the deepening and irreversible contradictions and current crisis of the capitalist order poses a potentially serious ideological threat. If these relatively poor nations can build public housing and eliminate homelessness, offer free education and universal healthcare, guarantee that no one will be allowed to go hungry, can build democratic structures with the protected right of popular participation, the question as to why these kinds of human rights are unrealizable for the people of the U.S. is a destabilizing one that must be avoided at all costs.

Historian Alfred McCoy Predicts the U.S. Empire is Collapsing as China’s Power Grows

Yemen: UN calls for talks on Houthi takeover of Hodeidah port

The UN has called for talks about the implications of the Houthis’ complete takeover of the long-contested strategic port of Hodeidah in Yemen, amid reports that the withdrawal of the government forces had led to as many as 6,000 people being displaced. ...

In a brief statement, the United Nations Mission to Support the Hudaydah Agreement (UNMHA) said: “The withdrawal of the Joint Forces from Hudaydah City, Al Durayhimi, Bayt al Faqih and parts of At Tuhayta districts and the subsequent takeover by Ansar Allah (Houthi) forces represents a major shift of the frontlines in the Hodeidah governorate. These events warrant discussions between the parties of the agreement first signed in 2018.” ...

The 2018 Hodeidah agreement, negotiated in Stockholm, was at the time seen as the first step to a wider peace in Yemen, but no detailed agreement was ever made on the mutual withdrawal of Houthi and UN backed Yemen government troops in the port leading to an impasse. ...

The Emirati-backed commander of Yemeni National Resistance forces, Tareq Saleh, had initiated the withdrawal in the middle of last week, saying it had been a mistake to expend troops on maintaining a defensive frontline with no ability to fight due to previously signed peace agreements. ... The withdrawal means the road is now open between the port and the Houthi held Yemen capital Sana’a, potentially facilitating the flow of aid. It is not clear if the withdrawal is a precursor to a wider Saudi withdrawal designed to bring about a wider ceasefire and peace talks.

Millions of Afghans Face Starvation as U.S. & West Freeze Billions in Gov’t Funds

Fast spreading bird flu puts Europe and Asia on alert

Several outbreaks of severe bird flu in Europe and Asia have been reported in recent days to the World Organisation for Animal Health (OIE), in a sign the virus is spreading quickly again. The spread of highly pathogenic avian influenza, commonly called bird flu, has put the poultry industry on alert after previous outbreaks led to the culling of tens of millions of birds.

It is attracting the attention too of epidemiologists as the virus can be transmitted to humans. China has reported 21 human infections with the H5N6 subtype of avian influenza so far this year, more than in the whole of 2020. ...

Bird flu can affect humans in rare cases if people touch infected birds, their droppings or bedding, or while preparing infected poultry for cooking.

CONFIRMED: Dem Plan Includes HUGE Tax Cut For Millionaires

Manchin Leads Charge Against Biden's Pro-Union Electric Vehicle Tax Credit

Advocates for both workers' rights and climate policy are condemning Sen. Joe Manchin's latest statements opposing provisions in the Build Back Better Act, the $1.75 trillion social spending and climate action package that has already been substantially weakened due largely to the right-wing Democrat's objections to numerous anti-poverty and environmental measures.

Manchin's most recent opposition is to tax incentives for electric vehicles made by American workers who are represented by unions.

At an event last week with officials from Toyota, whose plant workers have no union representation, the senator told Automotive News that incentivizing the purchase of electric vehicles from the only three auto companies with unions—the U.S.-based Ford, General Motors, and Chrysler—would be "un-American" and "wrong."

"We shouldn't use everyone's tax dollars to pick winners and losers," Manchin told the outlet at the event, where Toyota announced it would be investing $240 million in a non-union West Virginia plant to produce hybrid vehicles.

Toyota and other foreign-run auto companies have been lobbying against the provision, while United Auto Workers (UAW) has expressed support. If passed as it's written now, the Build Back Better Act would provide purchasers of electric vehicles with a maximum tax credit of $7,500, and would add a $4,500 credit on top of that starting if the vehicle is manufactured by unionized workers.

As Earther reported Monday, the tax incentive could have a major impact on Americans' ability to purchase vehicles not solely reliant on fossil fuels, as "price still remains the number one barrier in preventing new [electric vehicle] adoption."

A 2020 survey by Ipsos Global showed that consumers would be willing to pay only 10% more for electric vehicles. The tax credit would bring down the cost of some electric vehicles by $12,000 to around $20,000, far below the current average cost of about $42,000.

President Joe Biden said last month that he wants workers and companies that benefit from the tax incentive to be "here in Michigan, not halfway around the globe."

Ray Curry, president of the UAW, said last month the tax incentive "would be a win for auto manufacturing workers" while also encouraging "nonunion manufacturers to let their workers freely organize."

Evidently, writer and attorney David Lurie said, "Manchin thinks being pro-labor is un-American."

Progressives Revealed As FOOLS As Biden Agenda Tanks

Researchers identify 102 students who died at Native American school in Nebraska

Researchers say they have identified more than 100 students who died at a harsh residential school for Native Americans in Genoa, Nebraska. The search for the cemetery where many are believed to be buried continues.

The Genoa US Indian School was operated by the federal government between 1884 and 1934. Brutal punishments and hard labour were commonplace for students, large numbers of whom were removed from their families and homelands against their will, prohibited from speaking tribal languages and forced to convert to Christianity in an effort to subdue or eliminate Indian culture.

The announcement from the Genoa Indian School Digital Reconciliation Project, a collaboration between the University of Nebraska-Lincoln (UNL), the Genoa US Indian School Foundation and descendants and representatives from five Nebraska tribes, is among the most significant developments since the project began in 2017.

The names of 102 deceased students were gathered from sources including newspaper archives and school newsletters, according to the researchers, who say official records were destroyed or scattered when the school closed.

While some names are likely to be duplicates, the death toll from the school – which enrolled thousands from more than 40 tribal nations in its 50-year history – is probably far higher, said Margaret Jacobs, professor of history at UNL and project co-director. She said the names would be released after consultation with tribal leaders and after efforts to trace living relatives of the deceased were exhausted.

Ahmaud Arbery killing: judge rejects mistrial requests as Jesse Jackson attends

A judge has denied mistrial requests at the trial of three white men charged with murdering Ahmaud Arbery after defense attorneys claimed jurors were tainted by weeping from the gallery where Arbery’s parents sat with the Rev Jesse Jackson.

Monday morning’s testimony was interrupted by arguments in the jury’s absence over Jackson’s appearance. The judge said he found one defense lawyer’s complaints last week about Black pastors to be “reprehensible” and no group would be excluded from his courtroom.

Tensions flared in the courtroom on Monday morning soon after Jackson sat in the back row of the courtroom between Arbery’s parents. The defense attorney Kevin Gough asked the judge to make the civil rights leader leave to avoid unfairly influencing the jury.

Gough, an attorney for Bryan, also complained last week when the Rev Al Sharpton joined Arbery’s mother, Wanda Cooper-Jones, and father, Marcus Arbery Sr, inside the Glynn county courtroom. Gough told the judge on Thursday: “We don’t want any more Black pastors coming in here.”

“There is no reason for these prominent icons in the civil rights movement to be here,” Gough said Monday. “With all due respect, I would suggest, whether intended or not, that inevitably a juror is going to be influenced by their presence in the courtroom.”

The superior court judge, Timothy Walmsley, declined the request. Courtrooms are generally open to the public, although the judge has limited seating in the public gallery because of the coronavirus pandemic.

Kyle Rittenhouse trial: jury prepares to deliberate after closing arguments

Prosecutors and defense attorneys delivered closing statements in the murder trial of Kyle Rittenhouse, the 18-year old who has been charged with homicide after fatally shooting two men during racial justice protests last August in Kenosha, Wisconsin. ... He faces charges that include intentional homicide – punishable by life in prison. Rittenhouse has pleaded not guilty to all charges. Judge Bruce Schroeder dismissed a weapons charge before closing arguments on Tuesday morning.

In closing arguments, the prosecutor Thomas Binger said Rittenhouse was a “wannabe soldier” and had been “looking for trouble that night”. Binger repeatedly showed the jury drone video that he said depicted Rittenhouse pointing the rifle at demonstrators. He told the jury: “You lose the right to self-defense when you’re the one who brought the gun, when you are the one creating the danger, when you’re the one provoking other people.”

The jury was expected to begin deliberations on Tuesday. The judge will use a raffle system to narrow the 18 jurors who have heard the two-week trial down to the final 12 who will decide Rittenhouse’s fate, with six alternates.

The defense attorney Mark Richards contested Binger’s closing arguments, saying there had been “a rush to judgment” in his client’s case while accusing prosecutors of “lying” or “misrepresenting” the video footage in which they argued Rittenhouse was the one who provoked the fatal encounter.

Wyoming Republican party stops recognizing Liz Cheney as member

The Wyoming Republican party will no longer recognize Liz Cheney as a member of the GOP in a rebuke over her vote to impeach Donald Trump over his role in the 6 January insurrection.

The vote by the state party central committee followed votes by local GOP officials in about one-third of Wyoming’s 23 counties to no longer recognize Cheney as a Republican.

The vote is the group’s second formal rebuke for her criticism of Trump. In February, the Wyoming GOP central committee voted overwhelmingly to censure Cheney, Wyoming’s lone US representative. ...

Cheney is now facing at least four Republican opponents in the 2022 primary, including the Cheyenne attorney Harriet Hageman, whom Trump has endorsed. Hageman in a statement called the latest state GOP central committee vote “fitting”, the Casper Star-Tribune reported. ...

In May, Republicans in Washington DC removed Cheney from a top congressional GOP leadership position after she continued to criticize Trump’s false claims that voter fraud cost him re-election.

BETO Running For Texas Gov, Stands By Taking ALL AR-15s

Beto O’Rourke to run for governor of Texas in 2022 election

Beto O’Rourke, a former congressman, Senate candidate and contender for the Democratic presidential nomination, will run for governor in Texas next year.

O’Rourke, 49, is seeking to take on Greg Abbott, the Republican governor who is pursuing a third term. Abbott is seen as more vulnerable than previously, given demographic changes and events including the failure of much of the Texas power grid in very cold weather in February this year, which led to numerous deaths.

“I’m running for governor,” O’Rourke announced on Monday. “Together, we can push past the small and divisive politics that we see in Texas today – and get back to the big, bold vision that used to define Texas. A Texas big enough for all of us.”

Possible rivals include Matthew McConaughey, a Hollywood star who has flirted with a switch to politics.

A recent poll by the University of Texas and the Austin American-Statesman gave Abbott 46% of the vote to 37% for O’Rourke but also put Abbott’s job disapproval rating at 48%. In September, Quinnipiac University found that 50% of Texas voters did not think O’Rourke would do a good job as governor; 49% said the same for McConaughey.

Dems Losing 'Normal' Voters Of ALL Races

Despite Outcry Over Lead Poisoning, New Asphalt Plant Approved in Flint, Michigan

Less than a week after a federal judge approved a $626 million settlement for thousands of lead poisoning victims in Flint, Michigan, state officials on Monday rubber-stamped an air permit for a new asphalt plant in the city despite strong opposition from residents and advocates, who denounced the decision as another manifestation of environmental injustice.

According to Earthjustice, "The Ajax asphalt plant will be located in Genesee Township, less than 1,600 feet from public housing in a low-income Black neighborhood in Flint that is already overwhelmed by high levels of air toxics, particulate matter from the concentration of industrial activity. Nearby facilities include Genesee Power Station, Universal Coating, Inc., Ace-Saginaw Paving Company, Buckeye Terminals, Superior Metals, RJ Industrial Recycling, and many others."

"A coalition of many Flint-based groups have been fighting the issuance of this permit" by the Michigan Department of Environment, Great Lakes, and Energy (EGLE), Earthjustice said in a statement. "In response to the comments of this coalition and other advocates, EGLE changed the draft permit."

Mona Munroe-Younis, executive director of the Environmental Transformation Movement of Flint, told MLive on Monday that "I haven't seen the permit yet and am interested to know if EGLE made any changes based on the public outcry against the permit."

"I'm frustrated and disappointed that EGLE would issue the permit before having all the information they need to do so, namely the cumulative impact analysis," Munroe-Younis added. "The state of Michigan should know that their civil rights obligations require them to consider the health impacts on already environmentally burdened, predominantly Black communities. We'll have more to say once we see the permit."

MLive reported that EGLE "said the green light for the project comes with 'a host of site-specific conditions and restrictions [that] provide safeguards to ensure compliance with the law and to better protect the community.'"

Opponents of the asphalt plant, however, remain unconvinced.

"It is unconscionable that EGLE allowed another source of pollution, including lead and other air toxics, in our community," Deborah Hawley, director of the St. Francis Prayer Center, said in a statement. "Our community, our families, our children, cannot and should not take more chemical pollution."

Big Ag Furious After EPA Determines Top Herbicides Driving Vulnerable Species Toward Extinction

As Big Ag fumed Monday over a U.S. Environmental Protection Agency determination that herbicides including the endocrine-disrupting atrazine and carcinogenic glyphosate are likely to harm more than 1,600 protected plant and animal species, environmentalists pointed to the agency's findings as proof of the need for stricter limits on the use of the dangerous poisons.

After decades of refusing to comply with its obligations under the Endangered Species Act, the EPA on Friday released its final biological evaluations for atrazine, glyphosate, and simazine in order to comply with a 2016 legal agreement with the advocacy groups Center for Biological Diversity and Pesticide Action Network. The EPA evaluations concluded that the chemicals are likely to adversely affect 1,676 animals and plants on the federal threatened or endangered species lists.

"It's no surprise that these chemical poisons are causing severe harm to imperiled wildlife since U.S. use exceeds 70 million pounds of atrazine and 300 million pounds of glyphosate every year," Nathan Donley, environmental health science director at the Center for Biological Diversity, said in a statement. 

Both atrazine and glyphosate have been re-approved for use in the past two years. Earlier this year, the EPA was denounced by environmental and consumer advocacy groups after the agency argued that Bayer's glyphosate-based Roundup—the world's most widely used herbicide—should remain on the market despite acknowledging that a Trump-era review of the chemical was flawed and required reevaluation.

Bayer announced in July that it would end U.S. sales of Roundup for residential use by 2023.

In 2019, the administration of former President Donald Trump moved to increase the allowable levels of atrazine, which has been linked to hermaphroditic amphibians, and birth defects, cancer, and other ailments in humans.

While green groups welcomed the delayed evaluations, commercial agricultural interests expressed anger over the EPA's findings. Several Big Ag lobby groups including the American Farm Bureau Association and American Soybean Association claimed the agency failed to use the "best available science and data" when formulating its decision.

The EPA's findings will now be reviewed by the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service and National Marine Fisheries Service, which will determine what steps to take to protect affected species and ensure that the herbicides do not further harm animals and plants at risk of extinction.

"It's long past time for atrazine to be banned, and the EPA needs to crack down on the reckless overuse of glyphosate," Donley added. "Without real conservation action, these pesticides will continue to push our most endangered wildlife closer to extinction."

China urges developed countries to take the lead in cutting out coal

As Cop26 drew to a close over the weekend, Chinese media highlighted Beijing’s contribution over the last fortnight in Glasgow. “The Chinese delegation took a constructive attitude, actively communicated and negotiated with all parties,” said CCTV’s main evening news bulletin on Sunday. “[It] provided China’s wisdom and China’s solution …”

But when China and India chose the last few hours of negotiations to push for the language on coal to be diluted from “phase out” to “phase down”, both countries came under nearly immediate fire from commentators. Cop president Alok Sharma later urged both countries to “explain themselves and what they did to the most climate-vulnerable countries in the world”.

On Monday Beijing kicked the ball back to developed nations. Zhao Lijian, a spokesperson at China’s foreign ministry, said that before asking all countries to stop using coal, developed countries should remember how far many developing countries need to travel in order to find sustainable ways to provide electricity for their citizens. “We encourage developed countries to take the lead in stopping using coal while providing ample funding, technological and capacity-building support for developing countries’ energy transition. We need concrete actions more than slogans.”

Climate leaders call for pressure on stubborn nations before Cop27

Bringing countries back to the negotiating table with updated national plans on greenhouse gas emissions will now be the hardest task for the UK and the UN for the next year, say developing countries and climate experts. ... Current national plans, called nationally determined contributions (NDCs), would result in a disastrous 2.4C of heating, according to analysis published during the Glasgow talks, which would be far above the 1.5C nations agreed to aim for.

However, the Paris agreement and the Glasgow pact contain no “policing mechanisms” for ensuring that countries make pledges that are commensurate with the scale of the climate crisis. Already, Australia has said it will not update its NDC. The country is widely regarded as a laggard on climate action, though its officials in Glasgow did not publicly oppose the resolutions reached there, which included a “phase-out” of coal until it was downgraded by China and India to a “phase-down”. ...

The Paris agreement is built on “an honour system”, the official said, which makes any enforcement mechanism impossible. However, countries must publish their NDCs for scrutiny, and under the deal reached in Glasgow the UN will publish regular “synthesis reports” assessing countries’ plans against the Paris temperature goals.

This will help to ensure pressure can be applied based on what countries have committed to, said the official. “We now know precisely where the onus to lead is, and countries will be called out routinely. The G20 will be in the spotlight – and a few in particular – the US, India, Brazil, China, Australia, Japan and Mexico. Civil society’s role has never been more important in the process,” they said.

Also of Interest

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

The settlers whom many Americans mythologize at Thanksgiving as peace-loving Pilgrims issued government orders offering cash for dead Native American children

Julian Assange & the Crisis of British Public Service

Australian War Propaganda Keeps Getting Crazier

How Trump reshaped the fifth circuit to become the ‘most extreme’ US court

Employers Still in Denial About the New Normal of Fed-Up Low Wage Workers

Argentina’s far right and far left make big gains in congressional elections

A Second Female Lawyer Who Worked at JPMorgan Chase Says Fraud Is Condoned at the Bank

How Workers Are Inadvertently Propping Up Fossil Fuels

Unstuck in Time: the Kurt Vonnegut documentary 40 years in the making

China Dissident's DIRE WARNING About Political Correctness

EU to aim for rapid deployment force without US help by 2025

Batya Ungar-Sargon: Cable News’ FLUBBED Steele Dossier Coverage Confirms Their MASSIVE Class Bias

A Little Night Music

Frank Stokes & Dan Sane - Mr. Crump Don't Like It

Frank Stokes - Tain't Nobody Business If I Do

Frank Stokes - I'm Going Away Blues

Frank Stokes - Chicken You Can Roost Behind the Moon

Frank Stokes - Right Now Blues

Frank Stokes - You Shall

Frank Stokes - Stomp That Thing

Frank Stokes - Frank Stokes' Dream

Frank Stokes - I Got Mine

Ry Cooder - I Got Mine