The Evening Blues - 9-17-24



eb1pt12


The day's news roundup + tonight's musical feature: Little Willie Anderson

Hey! Good Evening!

This evening's music features Chicago blues harmonica player Little Willie Anderson. Enjoy!

Little Willie Anderson - Come Here Mama

"Certainly the game is rigged. Don't let that stop you; if you don't bet you can't win."

-- Robert A. Heinlein


News and Opinion

The Real Election Meddling Will Happen Right Out In The Open

The election in November will be rigged.

This election rigging will not be done by Russia, or by China, or by Iran, or by far right coup plotters, or by some shadowy cabal tampering with voting machines. It will happen right out in the open, and will be perfectly legal.

In fact, it’s already happening.

This election is being rigged by the donor class. It’s being rigged by lobby groups. It’s being rigged by the plutocrat-owned mass media, and by plutocrat-controlled Silicon Valley algorithm manipulation. It’s being rigged by obscenely wealthy people who can afford to extract political favors in exchange for massive campaign donations in ways normal members of the public never could. It’s being rigged by people who’ve bought up so much narrative control in the form of media ownership that they can set agendas for the entire country in ways the average voter has no chance of ever doing.

These election meddlers dictate the political framework and information environment in which elections take place. They decide what positions will be considered normal and acceptable, and which will be considered radical and extreme. They predetermine the location and range on the political spectrum at which the election will be contested, and they restrict the Overton window of acceptable political opinion within which debates and discourse will occur.

They do this without any regard for the interests of ordinary members of the public, but solely for their own interests. That’s why you see candidates arguing not about WHETHER wars should happen, but WHICH wars should happen, and HOW they should occur. It’s why you see them accusing one another of being too weak and dovish on foreign policy instead of attacking each other as reckless warmongers. It’s why you see them arguing over who loves Israel the most and who will send it the most weapons, rather than who will do the most to end Israel’s genocidal atrocities. It’s why you see them debating who supports the most fracking and oil-drilling instead of promising to end ecocidal policies and stop the corporate destruction of our environment. It’s why you see them arguing over the minute details of what capitalism and imperialism should look like, rather than if capitalism and imperialism should exist at all.

It’s also why, when you see a candidate show up with a platform of ending war and militarism, stopping ecocide, and curbing the injustices and abuses of capitalism, they are treated as outlandish extremists. Not just by the rich and powerful, but also by ordinary members of the public who’ve been indoctrinated by all this manipulation into accepting status quo politics as the norm.

This rigged, controlled political environment is what we were all born into, so we’re conditioned to think it’s normal. It’s very easy to miss how freakish and abominable the whole thing is. How destructive it is. How much needless death and misery and devastation it causes. If we came from a healthy world into this one we would scream in horror, but because we’ve never lived in a healthy world, we can be manipulated into mistaking the sickness of this civilization for health.

Elections are rigged in this way by a fairly small group of plutocrats and empire managers, not just in the United States but throughout the western world. They rig our entire political system in their favor, and then have the gall to tell us we all need to freak out because some Russians made some Facebook memes near an election season.

This is not democracy. This is plutocracy. This is oligarchy. We’re just indoctrinated into calling it democracy, by the very same mass-scale psychological manipulations they use to keep it from being a democracy.

All US elections these days come with allegations of election interference, especially from the losing side. But it’s important to keep in mind that even in the unlikely event that those allegations were 100 percent true, they’d still be a tiny drop in the ocean compared to the election interference that’s already happening right out in the open.

Iran has shown restraint after Israeli killing of Hamas leader, president says

The Iranian president, Masoud Pezeshkian, has said Tehran has shown restraint so far in its response to the Israeli assassination of the Hamas leader Ismail Haniyeh because it believes Israel has been trying to lure it into a regional war. ... “What Israel has done in the region and what Israel tried with the assassination of Ismail Haniyeh in Iran was to drag us into a regional war,” he told reporters. “We have exercised restraint so far but we reserve the right to defend ourselves at a specific time and place with specific methods.”

It remains a matter of debate whether Pezeshkian, who has a frank, consensual style, has access to the real levers of power or the political will to transform Iran’s relations with the west. But his use of a large international platform and often unpretentious direct manner suggests he is a new and unpredictable element in Iranian politics.

He did not rule out the possibility that Iran may have sold short-range ballistic missiles to Russia, saying no sale had occurred during his presidency but he could not speak for whatever had been agreed by his predecessor, Ebrahim Raisi. “This has not happened in our time. I won’t go into what happened in the past. It is a possibility. There is no prohibition,” he said.

Under questioning he denied that Iran had sent any missiles to Houthi rebels in Yemen, after the claimed firing of a hypersonic missile at Israel on Sunday. Pezeshkian said it was hard enough for people to get to Yemen from Iran and asked how a missile could go to Yemen unseen. He conceded that Iran had hypersonic missiles, but he said not of the kind fired by the Houthis on Sunday. “We don’t have this missile in Iran at all,” he said.

U.N. Experts Accuse Israel of "Starvation Campaign" in Gaza & Demand End to Western Complicity

At least 16 killed in Israeli airstrikes on Gaza

At least 16 people have been killed in Israeli airstrikes across central Gaza on Sunday night and Monday morning, including five women and four children, Palestinian health officials have said.

Rescuers said an airstrike early on Monday destroyed a residential building in the densely populated Nuseirat refugee camp in the heart of central Gaza, killing at least 10 people, including four women and two children.

The al-Awda hospital, which received the bodies, confirmed the deaths and said another 13 people were wounded. Hospital records quoted by local media show that the dead included a mother, her child and her five siblings.

In a separate strike targeting a building in Gaza City, six people died. A woman and two children were among the dead, according to the civil defence, a team of emergency responders working under the governance of Hamas.

Israel says its military operations exclusively target combatants and claims Hamas and other armed factions place civilians at risk by operating within residential areas.

Houthis THREATEN Tel Aviv With New Missile

Matt Hoh: Can Israel Legally Own Gaza?

UN Experts Warn Israel Risks 'Pariah' Status Over Gaza Genocide

United Nations human rights experts warned Monday that Israel risks becoming an international "pariah" over its ongoing assault on Gaza—for which it is on trial for genocide at the world body's International Court of Justice.

The special rapporteurs—who are appointed by the U.N. but do not speak on its behalf—condemned Israel's human rights violations against Palestinians, as well as its blatant disregard for international law and multiple rulings from the ICJ.

These include an advisory opinion that the 57-year Israeli occupation of Palestine is an illegal form of apartheid that must immediately end, and orders for Israeli forces to avoid genocidal actions in Gaza and to immediately halt the Rafah offensive.

George Katrougalos, the U.N. special rapporteur on the promotion of democratic and equitable international order and a former Greek foreign minister, said during a press conference that the "first obligation" for harmonious relations between nations "is for everybody to respect the United Nations rules."

"This is not happening in the case of Israel," Katrougalos noted. ...

Comparing the international community's reaction to Russia's ongoing invasion of Ukraine and Israel's war on Gaza, Katrougalos stressed that "we cannot anymore stand this kind of double standards and hypocrisy."

"I trust that the progressive and democratic citizens of Israel would not let their country become a pariah like South Africa [had] become during the times of apartheid," he added. South Africa is leading the genocide case against Israel at the ICJ.

Francesca Albanese, the U.N. special rapporteur on the rights situation in the occupied Palestinian territory, said that "I think it's unavoidable for Israel to become a pariah in the face of its continuous, relentless, vilifying assault of the United Nations, on top of millions of Palestinians."

"Shockingly, in the face of the abyss reached in the OPT... most member states remained inactive at best, or [are] actively aiding and assisting Israel's criminal conduct," she continued.

"Should there be a consideration of its membership as part of this organization, which Israel seems to have zero respect for?" Albanese added.

Pedro Arrojo-Agudo, the U.N. special rapporteur on the rights to safe drinking water and sanitation, warned that "we are blowing up the United Nations if we don't react" to Israel's human rights violations.

Arrojo-Agudo added that, as with starvation, Israel is using deprivation of water as a "weapon" and disavowed Israel's claim that Hamas—which led the October 7 attack on Israel—has "completely mismanaged water in Gaza."

The special rapporteurs' remarks came as representatives of U.N. member states gathered in New York for this year's annual General Assembly. General debate sessions are set for next week.

Former British ambassador Craig Murray: 'The West is deeply complicit in genocide of Palestine'

Can the World Save Palestinians From US-Israeli Genocide?

On September 18th, the UN General Assembly is scheduled to debate and vote on a resolution calling on Israel to end “its unlawful presence in the Occupied Palestinian Territory" within six months. Given that the General Assembly, unlike the exclusive 15-member UN Security Council, allows all UN members to vote and there is no veto in the General Assembly, this is an opportunity for the world community to clearly express its opposition to Israel’s brutal occupation of Palestine.

If Israel predictably fails to heed a General Assembly resolution calling on it to withdraw its occupation forces and settlers from Gaza, the West Bank and East Jerusalem, and the United States then vetoes or threatens to veto a Security Council resolution to enforce the ICJ ruling, then the General Assembly could go a step further.

It could convene an Emergency Session to take up what is called a Uniting For Peace resolution, which could call for an arms embargo, an economic boycott or other UN sanctions against Israel - or even call for actions against the United States. Uniting for Peace resolutions have only been passed by the General Assembly five times since the procedure was first adopted in 1950.

The September 18 resolution comes in response to an historic ruling by the International Court of Justice (ICJ) on July 19, which found that “Israeli settlements in the West Bank and East Jerusalem, and the regime associated with them, have been established and are being maintained in violation of international law.”

The court ruled that Israel’s obligations under international law include “the evacuation of all settlers from existing settlements" and the payment of restitution to all who have been harmed by its illegal occupation. The passage of the General Assembly resolution by a large majority of members would demonstrate that countries all over the world support the ICJ ruling, and would be a small but important first step toward ensuring that Israel must live up to those obligations.

Israel’s President Netanyahu cavalierly dismissed the court ruling with a claim that, “The Jewish nation cannot be an occupier in its own land.” This is exactly the position that the court had rejected, ruling that Israel’s 1967 military invasion and occupation of the Occupied Palestinian Territories did not give it the right to settle its own people there, annex those territories, or make them part of Israel.

While Israel used its hotly disputed account of the October 7th events as a pretext to declare open season for the mass murder of Palestinians in Gaza, Israeli forces in the West Bank and East Jerusalem used it as a pretext to distribute assault rifles and other military-grade weapons to illegal Israeli settlers and unleash a new wave of violence there, too.

Armed settlers immediately started seizing more Palestinian land and shooting Palestinians. Israeli occupation forces either stood by and watched or joined in the violence, but did not intervene to defend Palestinians or hold their Israeli attackers accountable.

Since last October, occupation forces and armed settlers in the West Bank and East Jerusalem have now killed at least 700 people, including 159 children.

The escalation of violence and land seizures has been so flagrant that even the U.S. and European governments have felt obligated to impose sanctions on a small number of violent settlers and their organizations.

In Gaza, the Israeli military has been murdering Palestinians day after day for the past 11 months. The Palestinian Health Ministry has counted over 41,000 Palestinians killed in Gaza, but with the destruction of the hospitals that it relies on to identify and count the dead, this is now only a partial death toll. Medical researchers estimate that the total number of deaths in Gaza from the direct and indirect results of Israeli actions will be in the hundreds of thousands, even if the massacre were to end soon.

Israel and the United States are undoubtedly more and more isolated as a result of their roles in this genocide. Whether the United States can still coerce or browbeat a few of its traditional allies into rejecting or abstaining from the General Assembly resolution on September 18 will be a test of its residual “soft power.”

President Biden can claim to be exercising a certain kind of international leadership, but it is not the kind of leadership that any American can be proud of. The United States has muscled its way into a pivotal role in the ceasefire negotiations begun by Qatar and Egypt, and it has used that position to skillfully and repeatedly undermine any chance of a ceasefire, the release of hostages or an end to the genocide.

By failing to use any of its substantial leverage to pressure Israel, and disingenuously blaming Hamas for every failure in the negotiations, U.S. officials are ensuring that the genocide will continue for as long as they and and their Israeli allies want, while many Americans remain confused about their own government’s responsibility for the continuing bloodshed.

This is a continuation of the strategy by which the United States has stymied and prevented peace since 1967, falsely posing as an honest broker, while in fact remaining Israel’s staunchest ally and the critical diplomatic obstacle to a free Palestine.

In addition to cynically undermining any chance of a ceasefire, the United States has injected itself into debates over the future of Gaza, promoting the idea that a post-war government could be led by the Fatah-led Palestinian Authority, which many Palestinians view as hopelessly corrupt and compromised by subservience to Israel and the United States.

China has taken a more constructive approach to resolving differences between Palestinian political groupings. It invited Hamas, Fatah and 12 other Palestinian groups to a three-day meeting in Beijing in July, where they all agreed to a “national unity” plan to form a post-war “interim national reconciliation government,” which would oversee relief and rebuilding in Gaza and organize a national Palestinian election to seat a new elected government.

Mustafa Barghouti, the secretary-general of the political movement called the Palestinian National Initiative, hailed the Beijing Declaration as going “much further” than previous reconciliation efforts, and said that the plan for a unity government “blocks Israeli efforts to create some kind of collaborative structure against Palestinian interests.” China has also called for an international peace conference to try to end the war.

As the world comes together in the General Assembly on September 18, it faces both a serious challenge and an unprecedented opportunity. Each time the General Assembly has met in recent years, a succession of leaders from the Global South has risen to lament the breakdown of the peaceful and just international order that the UN is supposed to represent, from the failure to end the war in Ukraine to inaction against the climate crisis to the persistence of neocolonialism in Africa.

Perhaps no crisis more clearly embodies the failure of the UN and the international system than the 57-year-old Israeli occupation of the Palestinian territories it invaded in 1967. At the same time that the United States has armed Israel to the teeth, it has vetoed 46 UN Security Council resolutions that either required Israel to comply with international law, called for an end to the occupation or for Palestinian statehood, or held Israel accountable for war crimes or illegal settlement building.

The ability of one Permanent Member of the Security Council to use its veto to block the rule of international law and the will of the rest of the world has always been widely recognized as the fatal flaw in the existing structure of the UN system.

When this structure was first announced in 1945, French writer Albert Camus wrote in Combat, the French Resistance newspaper he edited, that the veto would “effectively put an end to any idea of international democracy… The Five would thus retain forever the freedom of maneuver that would be forever denied the others.”

The General Assembly and the Security Council have debated a series of resolutions calling for a ceasefire in Gaza, and each debate has pitted the United States, Israel, and occasionally the United Kingdom or another U.S. ally, against the voices of the rest of the world calling in unison for peace in Gaza.

Of the UN’s 193 nations, 145 have now recognized Palestine as a sovereign nation comprising Gaza, the West Bank and East Jerusalem, and even more countries have voted for resolutions to end the occupation, prohibit Israeli settlements and support Palestinian self-determination and human rights.

For many decades, the United States’ unique position of unconditional support for Israel has been a critical factor in enabling Israeli war crimes and prolonging the intolerable plight of the Palestinian people.

In the crisis in Gaza, the U.S. military alliance with Israel involves the U.S. directly in the crime of genocide, as the United States provides the warplanes and bombs that are killing the largest numbers of Palestinians and literally destroying Gaza. The United States also deploys military liaison officers to assist Israel in planning its operations, special operations forces to provide intelligence and satellite communications, and trainers and technicians to teach Israeli forces to use and maintain new American weapons, such as F-35 warplanes.

The supply chain for the U.S. arsenal of genocide criss-crosses America, from weapons factories to military bases to procurement offices at the Pentagon and Central Command in Tampa. It feeds plane loads of weapons flying to military bases in Israel, from where these endless tons of steel and high explosives rain down on Gaza to shatter buildings, flesh and bones.

The U.S. role is greater than complicity - it is essential, active participation, without which the Israelis could not conduct this genocide in its present form, any more than the Germans could have run Auschwitz without gas chambers and poison gas.

And it is precisely because of the essential U.S. role in this genocide that the United States has the power to end it, not by pretending to plead with the Israelis to be more “careful” about civilian casualties, but by ending its own instrumental role in the genocide.

Every American of conscience should keep applying all kinds of pressure on our own government, but as long as it keeps ignoring the will of its own people, sending more weapons, vetoing Security Council resolutions and undermining peace negotiations, it is by default up to our neighbors around the world to muster the unity and political will to end the genocide.

It would certainly be unprecedented for the world to unite, in opposition to Israel and the United States, to save Palestine and enforce the ICJ ruling that Israel must withdraw from Gaza, the West Bank, and East Jerusalem. The world has rarely come together so unanimously since the founding of the United Nations in the aftermath of the Second World War in 1945. Even the catastrophic U.S.-British invasion and destruction of Iraq failed to provoke such united action.

But the lesson of that crisis, indeed the lesson of our time, is that this kind of unity is essential if we are ever to bring sanity, humanity and peace to our world. That can start with a decisive vote in the UN General Assembly on Wednesday, September 18, 2024.

US/EU $50B Rus Asset Ukr Loan Plan Fails; Ukr Officers Flee Vuhledar; Rus Encircles Ukr Troops Kursk

No Word on Long-Range Strikes in Russia After Biden-Starmer Meeting

Ukraine is still pushing for the US to support long-range strikes inside Russian territory after a meeting between President Biden and British Prime Minister Keir Starmer ended with no announcements about the issue.

Biden and Starmer held talks at the White House on Friday, a day after Russian President Vladimir Putin warned that if the US allowed and supported long-range strikes inside Russia, it would mean NATO is at war with Russia.

Ahead of the meeting, the White House said the US hasn’t changed its policy regarding long-range strikes. “There is no change to our view on the provision of long-range strike capabilities for Ukraine to use inside of Russia,” said National Security Council spokesman John Kirby. “I would not expect any major announcement in that regard.”

The UK wants the US to sign off on Ukraine’s use of British-provided Storm Shadow missiles, which have a range of about 155 miles, inside Russian territory. But there’s no sign that Biden gave that permission during the meeting with Starmer, and according to The New York Times, the US is more concerned about the risk of escalation than the UK.

Prof. Jeffrey Sachs: Ukraine, Israel, and Diplomatic Failures

Barnier fights to form French government amid no-confidence threats

The new French prime minister, Michel Barnier, has continued negotiations with potential ministers as he struggles to form a government to end the country’s political deadlock.

The veteran politician and former EU Brexit negotiator, appointed by the president, Emmanuel Macron, earlier this month, had promised to form a new administration this week after “listening to everybody”.

However, with threats from the far right and hard left to call a vote of no confidence in any ministerial team that fails to meet their approval, sources close to Barnier say he is unlikely to put names to posts until the end of next weekend.

Vincent Jeanbrun, a spokesperson for the centre-right Republicans party (LR), which Barnier represents, said the PM had “a complex equation to solve” and he did not expect an announcement before then.

Barnier has promised to seek ministers from across the political spectrum, but leftwing candidates have been reluctant, while the far-right National Rally (RN) is seen as a behind-the-scenes arbiter.



the horse race



Kamala's INSANE Israel Rhetoric and "Lethal" Militarism (w/ Kshama Sawant)

Suspect charged as Trump accuses Biden and Harris of incitement

The suspect in the second apparent assassination attempt of Donald Trump in as many months was charged in federal court on Monday morning with two gun-related crimes, as urgent investigations began into how he was able to get so close to the former US president.

As the US continued to react in shock to the latest apparent attempt on Trump’s life, the Republican presidential nominee added to the already tense atmosphere around the US election campaign by making highly inflammatory remarks, explicitly blaming Joe Biden and Kamala Harris for inciting the attack and calling them “the enemy within”. ...

“Their rhetoric is causing me to be shot at, when I am the one who is going to save the country and they are the ones that are destroying the country – both from the inside and out,” Trump told Fox News Digital. “These are people that want to destroy our country,” he added. “It is called the enemy from within. They are the real threat.”

JD Vance, Trump’s vice-presidential pick, echoed his sentiments in a tweet, urging his followers to “reject censorship” amid what he considers a lack of coverage from media and discouragement from expressing “an opinion on the public affairs of your nation”.

“The logic of censorship leads directly to one place, for there is only one way to permanently silence a human being: put a bullet in his brain,” reads his 1,200-word post.

Chief justice Roberts pushed for quick immunity ruling in Trump’s favor

John Roberts Jr used his position as the US supreme court’s chief justice to urge his colleagues to rule quickly – and in favor – of Donald Trump ahead of the decision that granted him and other presidents immunity for official acts, according to a New York Times investigation published on Sunday. The new report provides details about what was happening behind the scenes in the country’s highest court during the three recent supreme court decisions centering on – and generally favoring – the Republican former president.

Based on leaked memos, documentation of the proceedings, and interviews with court insiders, the Times report suggests that Roberts – who was appointed to the supreme court during Republican George W Bush’s presidency – took an unusually active role in the three cases in question. And he wrote the majority opinions on all three. In addition to the presidential immunity ruling, the decisions collectively barred states from removing any official – including Trump – from a federal ballot as well as declaring the government had overstepped with respect to obstruction of justice charges filed against participants of the 6 January 2021 attack that the former president’s supporters aimed at Congress.

The Times reported that last February, Roberts sent a memo to his fellow supreme court justices regarding the criminal charges against Trump for attempting to overturn the result of the 2020 election that he lost to Joe Biden. In the leaked memo, the Times reported that he criticized a lower court decision that allowed the case to move forward – and he argued to the other justices that Trump was protected by presidential immunity. He reportedly said that the supreme court ought to hear the case and grant Trump greater protection from prosecution.

“I think it likely that we will view the separation of powers analysis differently,” the Times said that Roberts wrote to the other supreme court justices in the private memo. According to the Times, some of the conservative justices wanted to delay the decision on the presidential immunity case until after Trump finished running for a second term in the White House in November. But Roberts advocated for an early hearing and decision – and ultimately wrote the majority opinion himself.

Bernie Sander’s CRINGE Reaction To Kamala Harris Endorsement

RFK Jr’s name will remain on ballot in swing state Wisconsin, judge rules

Robert F Kennedy Jr’s name will remain on the ballot in the swing state of Wisconsin, a judge ruled on Monday.

Dane county circuit judge Stephen Ehlke ruled that Wisconsin law clearly states presidential candidates who have submitted nomination papers can’t be removed from the ballot unless they die. Kennedy’s campaign submitted nomination papers before the state’s 6 August deadline.

“The statute is plain on its face,” Ehlke said, adding later: “Mr Kennedy has no one to blame but himself if he didn’t want to be on the ballot.” ...

Kennedy asked a state appellate court to consider the case last week, days before Ehlke issued his ruling. The second district court of appeals has been waiting for Ehlke’s decision before deciding whether to take the case.

The Wisconsin elections commission voted 5-1 earlier this month to approve Kennedy’s name for the ballot after an attempt by Republican commissioners to remove him failed. The commission noted the statute that prevents candidates from removing themselves from the ballot short of death.

Kamala FUMBLES Basic Questions In New Interview



the evening greens


Three US states call on environmental agency to regulate PFAS air emissions

Three US states are formally demanding that the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) begin regulating PFAS “forever chemical” air emissions, as the toxic threat that the pollution poses to the environment and human health comes into sharper focus.

So far, federal regulators have focused on water pollution, but state environmental agencies in North Carolina, New Mexico and New Jersey last week filed a petition calling for the EPA to categorize four types of PFAS compounds as hazardous air pollutants and to begin regulating them under the Clean Air Act.

The petition comes after a Guardian investigation earlier this year found a Fayetteville, North Carolina, Chemours PFAS production plant is likely emitting much higher levels of the chemicals into the air than regulators and the company claimed. The air pollution is thought to be a driver of PFAS contamination in soil, water and food supplies across hundreds of square miles in the region.

However, a lack of federal rules makes it difficult for states to rein in air pollution, which is a “tremendous concern in our states and across the US”, the states wrote in their petition to Michael Regan, the EPA administrator. “Adding these forever chemicals to the list of regulated pollutants addresses a gap in our regulatory authority and makes it possible to tackle a critical part of the PFAS life cycle: air emissions,” Elizabeth Biser, the secretary of the North Carolina department of environmental quality, added in a press release.

Superbugs ‘could kill 39m people by 2050’ amid rising drug resistance

Superbugs will kill more than 39 million people before 2050 with older people particularly at risk, according to a new global analysis. While deaths linked to drug resistance are declining among very young children, driven by improvements in vaccination and hygiene, the study found the opposite trend for their grandparents.

By the middle of the century, 1.91 million people a year are forecast to die worldwide directly because of antimicrobial resistance (AMR) – in which bacteria evolve so that the drugs usually used to fight them no longer work – up from 1.14 million in 2021. AMR will play some role in 8.2 million deaths annually, up from 4.71 million.

The study, published in the Lancet was conducted by the Global Research on Antimicrobial Resistance (Gram) Project and is the first global analysis of AMR trends over time. Researchers used data from 204 countries and territories to produce estimates of deaths from 1990 to 2021, and forecasts running through to 2050.


Also of Interest

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

If You Vote For Harris Or Trump You Should At Least Have The Decency To Feel Gross About It

22,500 Palestinians Now Have Life-Changing Injuries Due to Israel’s Genocide

West Experiences Blowback From Fostering Fascists In Ukraine

Ukraine War Turns Into Russian Roulette

Alleged Would-Be Trump Assassin Said in Book That He Looks Forward to World War III

‘Putin, here I am’: man accused of targeting Trump had ‘delusional ideas’ about helping Ukraine

Harris, Trump & the Race to Oblivion

Drone Awards 2024 – in pictures


A Little Night Music

Little Willie Anderson - Big Fat Mama

Little Willie Anderson - Late Night

Barrelhouse Chuck & Willie Anderson - Westside Baby

Little Willie Anderson - Willie's Women Blues

Little Willie Anderson - 69th Street Bounce

Little Willie Anderson - Don't Put That Thing On Me

Willie Anderson - Had A Dream

Little Willie Anderson - Been Around

Little Willie Anderson - Looking For You Baby


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Comments

Tonight is the harvest moon, you know what that means:

Bluebird skies here, it ought to be spectacular.

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6 users have voted.
snoopydawg's picture

@JtC

on top of it being a super moon. It starts just after 10 EST. Lucky for you to have clear skies. It’s hit and miss here after we got the thunderstorm from hail this afternoon. Good thing I checked the weather just before I was going to leave for our walk. The cemetery is littered with big tree branches everywhere.

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10 users have voted.

Was Humpty Dumpty pushed?

joe shikspack's picture

@JtC

thanks for the neil young!

heh, it may be a harvest moon here, but nobody in my neighborhood will see it. we're on the edge of the tropical storm working its way up from the carolinas tonight. it's been drizzling since late afternoon and the cloud cover is extra thick.

have a good one!

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5 users have voted.
snoopydawg's picture

.

No President should fear public scrutiny of his program. For from that scrutiny comes understanding; and from that understanding comes support or opposition. And both are necessary. I am not asking your newspapers to support the Administration, but I am asking your help in the tremendous task of informing and alerting the American people. For I have complete confidence in the response and dedication of our citizens whenever they are fully informed.

I not only could not stifle controversy among your readers--I welcome it. This Administration intends to be candid about its errors; for as a wise man once said: ‘An error does not become a mistake until you refuse to correct it.’ We intend to accept full responsibility for our errors; and we expect you to point them out when we miss them.

Without debate, without criticism, no Administration and no country can succeed--and no republic can survive. That is why the Athenian lawmaker Solon decreed it a crime for any citizen to shrink from controversy. And that is why our press was protected by the First Amendment—the only business in America specifically protected by the Constitution—not primarily to amuse and entertain, not to emphasize the trivial and the sentimental, not to simply ‘give the public what it wants’—but to inform, to arouse, to reflect, to state our dangers and our opportunities, to indicate our crises and our choices, to lead, mold, educate and sometimes even anger public opinion.

This means greater coverage and analysis of international news—for it is no longer far away and foreign but close at hand and local. It means greater attention to improved understanding of the news as well as improved transmission. And it means, finally, that government at all levels, must meet its obligation to provide you with the fullest possible information outside the narrowest limits of national security—and we intend to do it.

Scott suggests that Biden, Blinken, Garland, Wray and others read what he said and take it to heart.

Russia says that the reason America is censoring RT is because it’s losing the propaganda war and it can’t keep rT from spreading the truth. Those dweebs should read those speeches too.

Lol…I read an article about Larry Johnson by someone from Voice of America the other day and laughed all through it. I’ll see if I can find it again.

Russian state media amplify ex-CIA analyst’s false claims to promote pro-Kremlin narratives

Since Russia's full-scale invasion of Ukraine on February 24, 2022, Russian state media have cited Larry C. Johnson in hundreds of news articles and TV reports. They frequently present his views on the Russian-Ukrainian war and the West's role, referring to him as a former CIA analyst, despite his short tenure with the agency more than 35 years ago. The Kremlin uses Johnson's often false and misleading claims to promote pro-Russian narratives and improve its image.
….
In January 2024, Johnson gave an interview to Channel One, a Russian state-owned TV channel, in which he promoted narratives indistinguishable from Kremlin propaganda: Ukraine has no chance in a war with Russia, Ukraine's air force and air defenses are destroyed, Russia is an industrial giant, and the West cannot compete with it.

He just let that hang there without debunking it like he did other things Larry said.

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9 users have voted.

Was Humpty Dumpty pushed?

snoopydawg's picture

@snoopydawg

Click play. Rumble quit updating who he’s talking to for some reason.

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7 users have voted.

Was Humpty Dumpty pushed?

joe shikspack's picture

@snoopydawg

that kennedy guy had a way with words. no wonder he was so hated by the establishment.

heh, i guess you know that you've made it as a truth-teller when voice of america sends out the attack dogs after you. good for larry!

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9 users have voted.
The Liberal Moonbat's picture

...Can anyone tell me how long it'll take for Achenar's campaign-fundraising spammers to get the memo???

I keep getting spam from candidates in states I've never even lived in, and spam-texts from Rho and Rheich - and sometimes, I even still get begging E-mails from Kos!
My inbox has become enough of a boondoggle without them (at least when I wound up on mailing-lists like "Catholics United" and "MomsRising.org", it was a little amusing).

I DO recall being told that the shift would take a while to be recognized/processed, but I've forgotten just when they said it would be.

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6 users have voted.

In the Land of the Blind, the One-Eyed Man is declared mentally ill for describing colors.

Yes Virginia, there is a Global Banking Conspiracy!

joe shikspack's picture

@The Liberal Moonbat

i think that spam from politicians just goes with opening up a mailbox on the internet. i've never found a way of stopping it, the best i've been able to do is divert some of it into folders other than my inbox.

good luck!

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6 users have voted.
snoopydawg's picture

.

Hillary too wants to censor speech and that includes Americans who don’t spout the party line. This starts with Hillary spewing her bull shyte.

Maddow might have had a lobotomy. It’s the only explanation I can think of for her to have changed her views about war from peaceful to full on warmonger. I wonder what she thought of the Cheney endorsements?

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7 users have voted.

Was Humpty Dumpty pushed?

joe shikspack's picture

@snoopydawg

of course hillary wants to silence inconvenient people. all elites do.

maddow is and always has been a partisan. it just wasn't as obvious when her party was more aligned with the average american.

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6 users have voted.
snoopydawg's picture

@joe shikspack

She is writing about free speech I read 5 essays and subscribed because I like what she is saying.

She covered the veteran who wrote something on Facebook about 911. The feds arrested him and tried to keep him locked up in a mental ward, but the mother got mad and the Rutherford lawyers got him released.

She links to the Jefferson speech on watering the tree of liberty. He thought that people should hold their government accountable…hell we can’t even get people to object when it crosses the line.

Dammit…I can’t find it.

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5 users have voted.

Was Humpty Dumpty pushed?

soryang's picture

...(or before Yoon gets impeached).

Washington and Seoul discussing new deal on cost sharing for US troops in South Korea ahead of a potential Trump election victory

Washington and Seoul may strike a cost-sharing agreement for US forces based in South Korea before the end of the year — even though the current agreement does not expire until the end of 2025 — as both sides feel a sense of urgency to get a new deal solidified before the possibility of a second Trump administration, according to two US officials and two former US officials familiar with the discussions.

The negotiations over the Special Measures Agreement, known as the SMA, strained the US-South Korea alliance during the Trump administration. Former President Donald Trump demanded Seoul pay up to 400% more for the presence of the 28,500 US troops in the country during negotiations over the current agreement.

Advocates argue that a significant US troop presence in the Korean Peninsula is crucial to strengthening the alliance between the two countries. The troops are important to both countries as a means to deter any potential attack from North Korea as Kim Jong Un’s regime continues to build its nuclear arsenal and as a way of bolstering the US presence in the region to counter China’s aggression.

There is more urgency to get the deal done before the end of the year on the Korean side, given the tumult of the previous round of negotiations, officials said. US officials are engaging with South Korean officials on the topic, but some officials fear that getting an agreement done now could trigger criticism from Trump, and they do not want the alliance to be in the former president’s line of fire if he wins the election in November.

[Editorial] Convictions in Deutsch Motors case mean it’s time to indict first lady

I'll just let that one go with the link. The picture at the link shows the First Lady, (or is she the real president of South Korea?), in one of her classic staged poses showing interest in the suicide phone on the Mapo Bridge. This is so transparently staged, hoping that people have largely forgotten several weeks back, the Civil Affairs and Human Rights Commission on a split vote gave the First Lady a pass on her acceptance of a Dior designer bag recorded on video. Later the director of the commission was found dead at home, an alleged suicide, overcome by remorse apparently that he had succumbed to outside pressure and let the First Lady off the hook. Note that this tactic is a known one for President Yoon. Earlier Yoon, when prosecutor general of South Korea, was accused of misconduct, he referred accusations against himself for corrupt behavior, to a special hearing of senior prosecutors (all of whom worked for him) to decide nothing to see here, Yoon Seok-yeol did nothing wrong.

So the First Lady is doing her Mother Teresa act, or is it Audrey Hepburn? She appears so innocent and well intentioned doesn't she?

It is fairly clear at this point that Yoon and family are headed to the slam. The question is can he be impeached, or will he finish out his term. Cho Guk, whose entire family was being destroyed by Yoon's prosecutors, has committed himself to getting a Yoon impeachment vote within 100 days. The opposition parties still need about ten defections from the conservative PPP party members. Will enough jump ship?

I like this old Teresa Teng song. Apparently there are two different versions. They are almost the same with just a few words in a couple of lines changed. I translated it the last couple of days with help from google translate, a couple of Chinese dictionaries, and a Korean Hanja dictionary. Apparently, there is a Japanese song with the same or similar title, but I think that's just a coincidence.

邓丽君 《北国之春》 + lyrics Teresa Teng

I posted the translation (Mandarin, pinyin, English) over here, if anyone is interested:

Spring in the North 北国之春

Thanks for the EBs Joe. I read or listened to almost all of it.

(edited again, lost it the first time around)

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8 users have voted.

語必忠信 行必正直

joe shikspack's picture

@soryang

heh, it looks like a lot of effort is being put into tying the hands of a potential trump presidency. i guess we'll see how that works out for them.

thanks for the update!

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6 users have voted.
enhydra lutris's picture

As you will recall, Niger told the US military to get out. So the US then set up a meeting to plan for its departure, a move we've all seen before. As it turns out, the US troops were supposed be be gone by the 15th of this month and, wonder of wonders, they were. I can't be completely sure, but I very strongly believe that this was a first.

Also news to me, META (faceplant) has banned RT.

be well and have a good one

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11 users have voted.

That, in its essence, is fascism--ownership of government by an individual, by a group, or by any other controlling private power. -- Franklin D. Roosevelt --

joe shikspack's picture

@enhydra lutris

heh, well, they did manage to drag their feet for quite a long time between being told to pack up and leave and the actuality of it. i'm sure that at some future date we'll find out more details that put the action into a different perspective.

have a good one!

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5 users have voted.
snoopydawg's picture

@enhydra lutris

Blinken further told reporters Friday, "Our most powerful antidote to Russia’s lies is the truth" and that the administration is "shining a bright light on what the Kremlin is trying to do under the cover of darkness."

First off we haven’t seen the evidence of Russian propaganda or how they are interfering in the election. We’re just supporting to take his word for it.

On Hillary wanting to criminally charge those who are spreading propaganda then she should be the first person charged for spreading the propaganda about Russia Russia Russia. And for driving the country nuts with it.

Blinken too must be charged for getting the ex officials that lied about the Hunter laptop. Then go down the list….

It’s like the government officials who love to send kids to war, but never their own kids.

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7 users have voted.

Was Humpty Dumpty pushed?

snoopydawg's picture

@enhydra lutris

Zuckerberg recently apologized for following the government’s orders to censor people and he realized that was wrong, but here he is again censoring RT. Not many people thought he was serious about his apology and now they have been proven right.

India said that they won’t remove RT. How many more countries will find the balls to stand up to Biden and tell him no?

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8 users have voted.

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snoopydawg's picture

It’s why Israel is emboldened to attack Palestinians in the West Bank too. And constantly bomb whomever they want.

Good coverage of the event.

https://www.zerohedge.com/geopolitical/hundreds-wounded-dead-beirut-afte...

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joe shikspack's picture

@snoopydawg

zh seems to be expecting what i'm expecting - this was israel's first wave of attack on lebanon, intended to disrupt enemy communication networks and kill militant leaders.

i am expecting that the lebensraum rangers will attack shortly.

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7 users have voted.
snoopydawg's picture

@joe shikspack

Hoschstein a pro Zionist Biden official warned Hezbollah that if it doesn’t stop attacking Israel we won’t be able to hold Israel back.

https://www.axios.com/2024/06/25/us-warned-hezbollah-israel-escalation

Once again after Israel attacks another country it and its allies pretend that Israel is just minding its own business and suddenly it’s attacked for no reason. I think the world is getting quite sick of this scam.

Israel bombed the Iran embassy in Syria and then bombed Iran’s guest in Tehran, but if Iran legally retaliates it’s the bad guy.

Let’s hope something comes from the UN meeting tomorrow, but it shouldn’t have taken 11 months for it to happen.
Any bets on whether Turkey is still providing Israel with fuel?

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8 users have voted.

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joe shikspack's picture

@snoopydawg

apparently, turkey's supply of fuel to israel is more complicated than it appears on the surface:

Does Turkey have a duty to turn off the taps on oil supplies to Israel?

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3 users have voted.
snoopydawg's picture

@joe shikspack

Amid the protests, Turkey has been forced to face legal questions as to whether it has a duty to disrupt oil shipments to Israel through a pipeline it doesn't own and oil it doesn't produce.

Since Israel is breaking international law and has ignored every order issued by the UN, I think Turkey would be in the right to stop letting oil flow through its country that is going to Israel. After the UN makes a decision don’t countries have the responsibility to help uphold the law?

Turkey has leverage over America on this. If it sanctions Turkey for blocking the oil then Turkey can kick America out of its country. Black and white maybe, but if Israel doesn’t have to follow the law then why should any country?

I’d love to be gawd for 24 hours. Just give me some advance notice and I’d figure out all the things I’d want to fix.

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soryang's picture

@snoopydawg @snoopydawg

through a pipeline it doesn't own and oil it doesn't produce.

I had a brilliant property law professor years ago. Maybe others have heard of this, I didn't know the definition of property, particularly real estate. All estates inhere from the sovereign. This idea really isn't popular in the Anglo-saxon world but it is actually the law. What this law implies is that the "king" or "sovereign" or government as we know it, ie, the community always has a vested interest in its land or territory. If you want to operate in a sovereign territory, you need the state's permission, aka a license or permit of some kind. Whether you "own" something or don't "own" something the state interest, and the interest of the community is always present.

For a government to entertain the notion of property rights from a corporate perspective in a matter of urgent state necessity is absurd. Now the definition of property is in simple terms, the relation among people to a thing. No one has an exclusive right to exercise dominion and control of a thing, without regard to the requirements of the sovereign, or others in the community. Otherwise society would be in a condition of chaotic lawlessness. I'll let the Turks decide what is best and what is practicable. They are sovereign, they have their own system. But saying they don't have an adequate property interest is ridiculous. It sounds so corporate minded to say that. That's a transactional analysis not a legal analysis. imo

I'll probably get put on a list for saying that. I think I'm already there.
(edit: disclaimer- this is a matter of academic interest to me as a historian and observer of international affairs; I'm not a lawyer authorized to practice law nor do I give legal advice.)

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語必忠信 行必正直

snoopydawg's picture

@soryang

So you’re saying that because Turkey gave permission for the pipeline to go through its country then it has the right to revoke it? I think that would hold up in court if Turkey has signed the Geneva Convention?

The thing is that Erdogron (?) keeps threatening to cut off the oil going to Israel. So maybe he knows he legally can. But then he threatens a lot of things, but never follows through.

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3 users have voted.

Was Humpty Dumpty pushed?

QMS's picture

@snoopydawg
.
.
to his political advantage
NATO & BRICS
as an example

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4 users have voted.

question everything

soryang's picture

@snoopydawg

I knew a barmaid once who used the expression, "somebody stop me," when she was just clowning around. In other words, I think Erdogan is making up reasons why he can't do it. I think it's complicated for all the reasons given in the article. It would probably be best if it were done selectively rather than closing the valve entirely. In other words, inspect the papers, the corporate shells, the bills of lading and so on. that will be quite an effort. I don't know that he really wants to do that. Close the wrong valve, and there will be transactional consequences one way or another. Who knows? Someone could pull a north sea pipeline.

He has sovereign immunity, did he waive that? And if he did waive that, say by agreeing to indemnify the producers and shippers, does that trump (pardon the expression) humanitarian considerations? I don't know what courts will do. I think it was Pluto's Republic who made a statement about the lack of trustworthiness of judicial institutions among other institutions, especially under current circumstances.

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5 users have voted.

語必忠信 行必正直

QMS's picture

@soryang

seems appropriate

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4 users have voted.

question everything

enhydra lutris's picture

@joe shikspack @snoopydawg @soryang

starting here:

"Azeri crude is delivered via the Baku-Tbilisi-Ceyhan (BTC) pipeline, majority-owned and operated by BP," the group said. "The crude oil is loaded onto tankers at the Turkish port of Ceyhan for delivery to Israel."

Note that the pipeline is not wholly owned by BP, it was not originally their project or property, and such things are most often consortiums or joint ventures. "Azeri crude" should be interpreted as crude

delivered in Azerbaijan.

. It will include crude lifted in Azerbaijan territory, some of which the Azeri government may have an interest in and some of which it doesn't. Deliveries will also include oil lifted outside of Arzeri territory. Such oil may or may not be in part owned by other governments and will definitely be largely owned by producers, just like the Azeri sourced oil. Odds are that you're now looking at a pissing match concerning divvying up the costs and benefits between Turkey, Azerbaijan, Kazakhstan, BP, Chevron-Texaco, Exxon-Mobil, maybe Royal Dutch Shell and, possibly Total-Fina-Elf +/- somewhere around 6,000 lawyers. Good luck resolving that in the near future

be well and have a good one

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5 users have voted.

That, in its essence, is fascism--ownership of government by an individual, by a group, or by any other controlling private power. -- Franklin D. Roosevelt --

janis b's picture

I found the talk on Breaking Points with Krystal and Saagar as vacuous in meaning and content as anything else found on MSM.

On the other hand, the Drone Awards were spectacular.

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