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The day's news roundup + tonight's musical feature: Lightnin' Slim

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Hey! Good Evening!

This evening's music features Louisiana blues musician Lightnin' Slim. Enjoy!

^{Whispering Smith & Lightnin' Slim - Texas Flood & Take Me Back Baby}

"War is the greatest of all crimes; and yet there is no aggressor who does not color his crime with the pretext of justice."

-- Voltaire

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News and Opinion

Biden’s claims of “genocide” in Ukraine: A pretext for war against Russia

On Tuesday, US President Joe Biden claimed that Russia was committing genocide in Ukraine. In a subsequent statement to reporters in Iowa, he added, “I called it genocide because it’s become clearer and clearer that Putin is just trying to wipe out even the idea of being Ukrainian.” Biden’s accusation that Russia is engaging in genocide is aimed at poisoning public opinion and galvanizing popular hatred of Russia. It was a transparent pretext for the White House’s announcement, just one day later, that the United States would send attack helicopters and hundreds of armored vehicles to Ukraine in the largest escalation of US military involvement in the war to date. ...

On Wednesday, White House press spokesperson Jen Psaki was asked, “Is it the US policy that genocide has been committed in Ukraine, or was that the president’s personal beliefs?” To this Psaki replied, “Our objective now is evidenced by the enormous package of military assistance that we put out today.” This exchange is revealing precisely because it stands reality so neatly on its head. In the statements of the White House, the unprecedented funneling of arms to Ukraine is a testament to how strongly the US believes Russia is committing “genocide.”

The reality is the exact opposite: The accusations against Russia are the lying justification for a policy of military escalation. First, the war plans were laid down; then the accusations were made to justify them. The message being sent to the Russian government is that, as with similar “genocide” allegations made against Yugoslavia, Iraq and Libya, the United States is targeting it for war and regime change. ...

As of April 3, the United Nations had reported 1,842 civilians killed in Ukraine during the war. By contrast, during the Holocaust in Ukraine, between 1.2 and 1.6 million Jews were murdered by the Nazi regime.

Even if all of the allegations by the US against Russia were true, they would pale in comparison with the massive death toll of the US invasion of Iraq, which was estimated to have led to the deaths of over 1 million people and where US troops were photographed committing torture, murder and countless other atrocities.

The United States is seeking to use the emotionally laden term of “genocide” to create popular support for a catastrophic escalation of the war.

The latest from The Guardian's propaganda mill:

Macron declines to follow Biden and call Russian acts in Ukraine ‘genocide’

Emmanuel Macron has declined to follow Joe Biden’s example in labelling Russia’s actions in Ukraine as genocide, arguing that an “escalation of words” would not help bring peace.

The French president’s remarks drew an angry response from Kyiv, particularly his apparent argument that the term “genocide” did not apply because Ukrainians and Russians were “brotherly people”.

The spokesman for Ukraine’s foreign ministry, Oleh Nikolenko, called Macron’s remarks disappointing. ...

The US ambassador to the Organisation for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE), Michael Carpenter, made clear on Wednesday that the president’s comments did not represent an official US legal position. Carpenter said Biden had made a “clear moral determination” but added that a legal review was under way and that it is “going to take some time to be completed”.

Kremlin issues final warning to Kiev 'decision-making centers'

Biden Answers Zelenskyy's Plea to 'Arm Ukraine Now' With $800 Million in Weapons

U.S. President Joe Biden on Wednesday announced an even-larger-than-expected $800 million military aid package for Ukraine, which has been under attack by Russian forces since late February.

The package—which comes despite fears from anti-war voices that such weapons transfers will just further fuel the conflict—expands the type of weaponry the United States is sending to Ukraine.

"I am....not serene about this escalation," Esquire senior staff writer Jack Holmes tweeted about the U.S. assistance.

"The Biden administration's decision to send $800 million more in weapons and artillery to Ukraine is not in the interest of peace. It's in the interest of weapons manufacturers and war profiteers," said the anti-war group CodePink. "Negotiation is the only path forward."

Biden's move followed Russian President Vladimir Putin's declaration on Tuesday that diplomacy to end the war is at a "dead end."

Just hours before the U.S. announcement, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy posted a video on Twitter calling for heavy artillery, armored vehicles, air defense systems, and combat aircraft—as he put it: "Anything to repel Russian forces and stop their war crimes."

"Freedom must be armed better than tyranny. Western countries have everything to make it happen," said Zelenskyy, who suggested the war could spread to other European nations if Ukraine falls to the Russian invaders. "Arm Ukraine now to defend freedom!"

Biden said in a statement released after a call with Zelenskyy that "this new package of assistance will contain many of the highly effective weapons systems we have already provided and new capabilities tailored to the wider assault we expect Russia to launch in eastern Ukraine."

"These new capabilities include artillery systems, artillery rounds, and armored personnel carriers," Biden continued. "I have also approved the transfer of additional helicopters. In addition, we continue to facilitate the transfer of significant capabilities from our allies and partners around the world."

As Breaking Defense reports, "For the first time, the U.S. will provide 18 155mm Howitzers and 40,000 artillery rounds to fulfill Ukrainian requirements for fire support, Pentagon Press Secretary John Kirby said during a briefing following the White House's announcement."

The White House's decision also came after the Pentagon earlier on Wednesday convened a classified meeting of some of the largest arms-makers in the United States to discuss ramping up weapons shipments.

Longtime critics of U.S. foreign policy have warned how weapons transfers from the NATO governments to Ukraine could enrich these companies while exacerbating the bloodshed in the besieged country.

Really interesting discussion:

Mass protests in Pakistan as ousted PM accuses US of regime change

Janet Yellen Calls on China to Push Russia to End Ukraine War

Treasury Secretary Janet L. Yellen on Wednesday urged China to persuade Russia to end its war in Ukraine and warned that staying on the sidelines could jeopardize China’s standing in the global economy.

The comments came amid growing frustration from the United States and its allies in Europe and Asia that China has refused to condemn Russia’s actions in Ukraine and instead the two countries have solidified a “special relationship.” The United States has been watching with concern to see if China will help Russia evade sanctions and stabilize its economy.

“Going forward, it will be increasingly difficult to separate economic issues from broader considerations of national interest, including national security,” Ms. Yellen said in a speech to the Atlantic Council. “The world’s attitude towards China and its willingness to embrace further economic integration may well be affected by China’s reaction to our call for resolute action on Russia.” ...

“The war between Russia and Ukraine has redrawn the contours of the world economic outlook,” Ms. Yellen said. She is speaking ahead of the spring meetings of the World Bank and the International Monetary Fund next week, when finance ministers from around the world will gather in Washington. After two years of lockdowns and supply chain disruptions, those officials are now consumed with coordinating sanctions in an effort to cripple the Russian economy while helping their own countries cope with soaring inflation.

In the speech, Ms. Yellen singled out countries such as China and India that have continued to engage with Russia despite the global backlash against the atrocities it has committed in Ukraine. “Let me now say a few words to those countries who are currently sitting on the fence, perhaps seeing an opportunity to gain by preserving their relationship with Russia and backfilling the void left by others,” Ms. Yellen said. “Such motivations are shortsighted.” The speech continues, “And let’s be clear: The unified coalition of sanctioning countries will not be indifferent to actions that undermine the sanctions we’ve put in place.”

Swedish Peace Activist: Sweden and Finland Joining NATO Would Make the World Less Safe

Finland and Sweden take major step towards joining Nato

Finland and Sweden took a major step towards joining Nato on Wednesday, after their prime ministers said Russia’s invasion of Ukraine had changed Europe’s “whole security landscape” and “dramatically shaped mindsets” in the Nordic countries.

The Finnish prime minister, Sanna Marin, said on Wednesday that her country, which shares a 1,300km (810-mile) border with Russia, would decide whether to apply to join the alliance “quite fast, in weeks not months”, despite the risk of infuriating Moscow.

Russia has repeatedly warned both countries against joining Nato and would see any such move as a provocation. The Kremlin spokesperson, Dmitry Peskov, has said that if Finland and Sweden entered Nato, Russia would have to “rebalance the situation” with its own measures.

Speaking alongside her Swedish counterpart, Magdalena Andersson, at a joint press conference in Stockholm, Marin said Finland had to be “prepared for all kinds of actions from Russia” and that “everything had changed” when Moscow attacked Ukraine.

“The difference between being a partner and a member is very clear, and will remain so. There is no other way to have security guarantees than under Nato’s deterrence and common defence as guaranteed by the alliance’s article 5,” she said.

WHO chief blames racism for greater focus on Ukraine than Ethiopia

The head of the World Health Organization (WHO) has criticised the global community’s focus on the war in Ukraine, arguing that crises elsewhere, including in his home country of Ethiopia, are not being given equal consideration, possibly because the people affected are not white.

Dr Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus questioned whether “the world really gives equal attention to Black and white lives” given that ongoing emergencies in Ethiopia, Yemen, Afghanistan and Syria had garnered only a “fraction” of the concern for Ukraine. Last month Tedros said there was “nowhere on Earth where the health of millions of people is more under threat” than Ethiopia’s Tigray region.

Since a truce was declared in Tigray three weeks ago, about 2,000 trucks should have been able to bring food, medicines and other essentials to the conflict-ridden area, he said during a virtual press briefing from Geneva on Wednesday. Instead, only about 20 trucks had arrived, he said.

“As we speak, people are dying of starvation,” said Tedros, a former health minister in Ethiopia and an ethnic Tigrayan. “This is one of the longest and worst sieges by both Eritrean and Ethiopian forces in modern history.”

He acknowledged that the war in Ukraine was globally significant, but asked whether other crises were being accorded enough attention. “I need to be blunt and honest that the world is not treating the human race the same way,” he said. “Some are more equal than others.”

‘Burnt out and tired’: nurses at leading California hospitals prepare to strike

Five thousand nurses at Stanford and Lucile Packard children’s hospital in Stanford, California, are preparing to strike in demand of wage increases, mental health and wellness support, better healthcare benefits, and a focus on hiring and retaining nurse staff. The union has set a strike date for 25 April.

Stanford hospital at Stanford University in California has been consistently ranked among the top hospitals in the US by US News, but nurses say high turnover rates, understaffing, and inadequate proposed wage increases and benefits have contributed to high burnout rates. In a survey of union members, 45% of nurses reporting said they intend to leave their job within the next five years.

Kathy Stormberg, a nurse in the radiology department at Stanford hospital for 19 years and vice-president of the Committee for Recognition of Nursing Achievement (Crona), blamed the strike on the hospitals’ continued reliance on contractors and its policy of pushing nurses to work overtime amid staff shortages, unfilled vacancies, and difficulties retaining enough nursing staff.

“That is not sustainable,” said Stormberg. “Nurses have an overwhelming sense of guilt to work overtime when they are getting texts requesting nurses to come in every four hours on their days off.” She also cited inflation, the high cost of living in the Bay area, student debt and other area hospitals providing better wages and benefits as obstacles for nurses to sustain careers at Stanford.

Nurses represented by the union voted by 93% in favor of a strike authorization as the union’s contract expired on 31 March and 30 bargaining sessions over the past three months have yet to yield a tentative agreement.

Wealthiest Americans pay just 3.4% of income in taxes, investigation reveals

Between 2014 and 2018, the 25 wealthiest Americans collectively earned $401bn, but paid just $13.6bn – about 3.4% of that – in taxes, according to a bombshell ProPublica investigation into the finances of the wealthiest Americans released on Wednesday.

The investigation is the latest in a series ProPublica started in June 2021 that looks at the tax records of the top 0.001% wealthiest Americans. This installment uses a trove of tax filings from 2013 to 2018 to dive into the wealth of the 400 richest Americans, all of whom earn more than $110m a year. It found that the wealthy benefit from lower tax rates on financial assets and deductions from charitable contributions to keep their taxes low. ...

Instead of the standard paycheck that most American workers get, which includes deductions for social security and Medicare taxes, the wealthiest Americans get their income through financial assets, like stocks, that are generally taxed at a lower rate. The long-term capital gains rate has been 20% since 2013.

Billionaires in tech pay the lowest tax rate, an average of 17% of their income, largely because their wealth comes from such investment income. Bill Gates, whose income from 2013 to 2018 was an average of $2.85bn a year, paid an average effective federal income tax rate of 18.4%. Lauren Powell Jobs, the widow of Apple co-founder Steve Jobs, earned an average of $1.57bn and paid an average tax rate of 14.8%. Ten of the top 15 earners on the list are billionaires who made their money in tech.

In comparison, the average single worker earning $45,000 paid an average tax rate of 21%. A married couple with one child who earns $200,000 paid a rate of 26%. In 2018, the highest top rate on ordinary income, which excludes investments, was 37%, yet the average tax rate for the 400 wealthiest Americans was 22% from 2013 to 2018.

Video shows police officer kneeling on Black man before fatally shooting him

A Black man face-down on the ground was fatally shot in the back of the head by a Michigan police officer, the violent climax of a traffic stop, foot chase and fight over a stun gun, according to videos of the 4 April incident released Wednesday. Patrick Lyoya, 26, was killed outside a house in Grand Rapids, Michigan. The white officer repeatedly ordered Lyoya to “let go” of his Taser, at one point demanding: “Drop the Taser!”

Citing a need for transparency, the city’s new police chief, Eric Winstrom, released four videos, including critical footage of the shooting recorded by a passenger in Lyoya’s car on that rainy morning. “I view it as a tragedy. … It was a progression of sadness for me,” said Winstrom, a former high-ranking Chicago police commander who became Grand Rapids chief in March. The city of roughly 200,000 people is about 150 miles (240 km) north-west of Detroit.

Video shows Lyoya running from the officer who stopped him for driving with a license plate that didn’t belong to the vehicle. They struggled in front of several homes while Lyoya’s passenger got out and watched. Winstrom said the fight over the Taser lasted about 90 seconds. In the final moments, the officer was on top of Lyoya, kneeling on his back at times to subdue him. “From my view of the video, Taser was deployed twice. Taser did not make contact,” Winstrom told reporters. “And Mr Lyoya was shot in the head. However, that’s the only information that I have.”

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Pramila Jayapal ABANDONS Nina Turner, Progressives With Shontel Brown Endorsement: Briahna Joy Gray

Sanders Endorses Turner for Congress

Sen. Bernie Sanders on Tuesday endorsed progressive firebrand Nina Turner's campaign for the U.S. House seat in Ohio's 11th Congressional District, calling her a "real leader who fights for higher wages, Medicare for All, and affordable prescription drugs." ...

Sanders' endorsement comes less than a month out from the May 3 Democratic primary in Ohio's 11th, where Turner is rematching Rep. Shontel Brown less than a year after the two faced off in a heated race for the House seat vacated by Marcia Fudge, the secretary of Housing and Urban Development.

Turner, a former Ohio state senator, has argued that the circumstances are different this time around, noting that the 2021 contest was an off-year special election—a likely contributor to lower voter turnout.

Turner has also pointed to the torrent of corporate money that poured into last year's race in an attempt to undermine her campaign and bolster her opponent, who was backed by such establishment figures as House Majority Whip Jim Clyburn (D-S.C.) and former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton.

"There was an anybody-but-Nina campaign ran in 2021," Turner told NBC News earlier this year. "Some of those forces may still decide to get into this race, but what they will not be able to do is totally concentrate [on the Ohio 11th District] because this will not be the only race."

Sen. Dianne Feinstein's RAPID Mental Decline ALARMS Whistleblower Lawmakers: Report

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Brazil's Lula Vows to End Illegal Mining on Indigenous Lands

Indigenous activists on Tuesday welcomed a promise from leftist Brazilian presidential candidate Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva to immediately revoke far-right President Jair Bolsonaro's policies, including laws that opponents say facilitate the destruction and exploitation of native lands.

"Nobody is going to tamper with Indigenous land without your agreement," da Silva—a member of the leftist Workers' Party (PT) who previously served two terms as Brazil's president—told thousands of people gathered at the site of a 10-day protest by over 170 ethnic groups, the Free Land Camp, in the capital Brasília. "Everything this government has decreed against Indigenous peoples must be repealed immediately."

Da Silva drew loud applause when he pledged to create a Ministry of Indigenous Peoples, telling protesters that "someone will have to take over the ministry and it won't be a white man like me, it will have to be an Indian."

A series of Bolsonaro-backed bills that critics have dubbed the "package of destruction" are currently advancing in the National Congress. If passed and signed into law by the president—a climate skeptic who has called himself "Captain Chainsaw"—they would allow mining on Indigenous lands, relax restrictions on the use of pesticides, and, according to opponents, greenlight illegal logging and land seizures.

More than 8,000 square miles of Amazon rainforest were destroyed between August 2020 and July 2021, a 15-year high. According to Brazil's National Institute for Space Research, Amazon deforestation in February 2022 increased 62% from the previous year.

Native leaders announced at the camp that they would form an Indigenous Bench in the federal and state legislatures. To date, only two Indigenous people have ever been elected to the Chamber of Deputies, the lower house of the National Congress, and none have served in the Senate.

"The idea is not just to launch candidacies to gain visibility, it is to launch candidacies to win," Sônia Guajajara, a member of the Guajajara people and leftist Socialism and Liberty Party (PSOL) who recently announced her pre-candidacy for the Chamber of Deputies, told Agência Pública.

Aruã Pataxó, president of the Indigenous Federation of Pataxó and Tupinambá Nations and a Communist Party of Brazil pre-candidate for state deputy in Bahia, told the outlet that "only we, as Indigenous people, can defend our rights."

Addressing the camp on Tuesday, Guajajara said that "we want to participate in the construction of the project for a new Brazil."

"That's why we decided to launch an Indigenous group that will remove the ruralist group once and for all," she said, referring to the large landowners and their elected representatives.

Referencing a highly controversial dam and a Canadian mining operation, Guajajara said the Indigenous Bench seeks to ensure "that there is no more Belo Monte in your government, so that there is no Belo Sun, no hydroelectric plants. They are our territories. We can no longer remain on the sidelines of building and running this country." ...

Brazil's presidential election will take place on October 22. According to the most recent survey by the Brazilian public polling institute Datafolha, 43% of respondents said they would vote for da Silva "if the election for president was today," while 26% said they would choose Bolsonaro.

South Africa floods: deadliest storm on record kills over 300 people

The death toll from devastating floods in and around the South African port city of Durban has risen to 306, the government said Wednesday, after roads and hillsides were washed away as homes collapsed. The heaviest rains in 60 years pummelled Durban’s municipality, eThekwini in Zulu. According to an AFP tally, the storm is the deadliest on record in South Africa. ...

The South African president, Cyril Ramaphosa, has described the floods as a “catastrophe” and a “calamity”.

“Bridges have collapsed. Roads have collapsed. People have died … This is a catastrophe of enormous proportions,” he said, addressing a local community after inspecting the damage from the floods. The search for missing persons is still going on, said Ramaphosa, promising to “spare nothing” in dealing with the disaster.

“This disaster is part of climate change. We no longer can postpone what we need to do … to deal with climate change. It is here, and our disaster management capability needs to be at a higher level.”

These rains were not tropical, but rather caused by a weather system called a cutoff low that had brought rain and cold weather to much of the country. When storms reached the warmer and more humid climate in Durban’s KZN province, even more rain poured down. “Some parts of KZN have received more than 450mm (18in) in the last 48 hours,” said Dipuo Tawana, a forecaster at the national weather service – nearly half of Durban’s annual rainfall of 1,009mm.

Extreme Atlantic hurricane seasons now twice as likely as in 1980s

Extremely active Atlantic hurricane seasons are now twice as likely as they were in the 1980s due to global heating, according to new research that warns the climate crisis is supersizing storms that threaten life and property in coastal areas.

Climate breakdown has contributed to a “decisive increase” in intense hurricane activity since 1982, the study states. Researchers in Germany and Switzerland who undertook the analysis wrote that the growing hyperactivity of storms could be “robustly ascribed” to the rising temperature of the oceans. The warming of the sea surface has “contributed significantly to more extreme tropical cyclone seasons and thereby to the fatalities, destruction and trillion-dollar losses that these cyclones have caused over the last four decades”, the research added.

Previous research has shown that while the number of hurricanes – often called cyclones when they happen in the Pacific – may not increase drastically due to climate change, the events themselves appear to be getting stronger and more destructive. A storm is considered a hurricane when it reaches sustained winds of 74mph or more and is measured between category 1 and 5 on the Saffir-Simpson hurricane wind scale for severity.

This intensification of storms, in which the energy and moisture held by a swirling hurricane is boosted by elevated heat from the ocean and atmosphere, has manifested itself in numerous recent disasters, including Hurricane Maria, a category 5 hurricane that reached 174mph and devastated Puerto Rico in 2017, and Hurricane Florence, a powerful category 4 storm that smashed into the US east coast a year later.

“While the attribution of individual tropical cyclone events remains difficult, there can be no doubt that climate change is creating more intense storms,” said Peter Pfleiderer, a scientist at the Berlin-based Climate Analytics, who led the study. “Our results do not imply that increasing sea-surface temperatures lead to more tropical cyclones – but point towards a trend of more intense storms and therefore more extreme outcomes for seasons with many tropical cyclones.”

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Also of Interest

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

Glenn Greenwald: The Censorship Campaign Against Western Criticism of NATO’s Ukraine Policy Is Extreme

SCOTT RITTER: Twitter Wars—My Personal Experience in Twitter’s Ongoing Assault on Free Speech

Biden Approves Additional $800 Million in Military Aid for Ukraine, Includes Howitzers for the First Time

U.S. Military Intelligence Official Refutes 'Russian Atrocities' Claims

Russia Views US/NATO Vehicles Transporting Weapons in Ukraine are ‘Legitimate Military Targets’

Robert Kagan’s Selective Memory

CIA, UK Officials Discussed Fidel Castro Assassination

A Love Letter To All Draft Dodgers

Accountability #2: Sweden’s Decision To Let Old People Die Who Could be Saved

Wave of union victories suggests union-busting consultants may have lost their sway

'Dehumanizing and Cynical Stunt': Texas Bus Drops Off Migrants Outside Fox News HQ in DC

Matt Taibbi: The Great Billionaire Space Caper

Back from the dead? Elusive ivory-billed woodpecker not extinct, researchers say

Benjamin Norton on Sanctions: Ethics and Geopolitics

NEW LOWS: Biden Approval SINKS Over Inflation, 'Recession Shock' Coming

Elon Musk Makes $43B CASH Offer To Buy Twitter

Moskva warship mystery. Pentagon reveals $800 million Ukraine weapons list.

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A Little Night Music

Lightnin- Slim - Winter Time Blues

Lightnin' Slim - Bad Feeling Blues

Lightnin' Slim - Hoodoo Blues

Lightnin' Slim - Mean Ole Lonesome Train

Lightnin Slim, Schoolboy Cleve - Strange Letter Blues

Lightnin' Slim - Rooster Blues

Lightnin' Slim - You Know You're So Fine

Lightnin' Slim - I'm a Rollin' Stone

Lightnin' Slim - It's Mighty Crazy

Lightnin Slim, Schoolboy Cleve - She's Gone

Lightnin' Slim - Don't Start Me Talking

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