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The day's news roundup + tonight's musical feature: Casey Bill Weldon

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Hey! Good Evening!

This evening's music features delta slide guitarist Casey Bill Weldon. Enjoy!

^{Casey Bill Weldon - I Believe I'll Make A Change}

"Everything bad that happens under the Trump administration will have happened because the Democratic Party was too corrupt and evil to run a good campaign with a good platform and a good candidate."

-- Caitlin Johnstone

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News and Opinion

Everybody duck! The neocon death cult is at it again:

Biden lifts ban on Ukraine using US weapons to strike deeper into Russia

Joe Biden has lifted the ban on Ukraine using long-range missiles to fire into Russian territory by permitting them to be used against Russian and North Korean forces in the Kursk region. The US president will allow Ukraine to use US-made Atacms rockets, which have a range of 190 miles (300km) – a decision being justified by the presence of North Korean troops fighting alongside Russia against Ukraine.

Though there was no public comment from the White House, the story first appeared in coordinated briefings to the New York Times, the Washington Post and the news agencies Reuters and Associated Press. Ukraine’s president, Volodymyr Zelenskyy, appeared to confirm the news, though he said any proof about the change in policy would emerge on the battlefield, if and when the missiles are used.

“Today, there’s a lot of talk in the media about us receiving permission for respective actions. But strikes are not carried out with words. Such things are not announced. Missiles will speak for themselves. They certainly will,” Zelenskyy said.

Poland’s foreign minister welcomed the news. “With the entry into the war of North Korea troops and the massive airstrike of Russian missiles, President Biden responded in a language that Putin understands,” Radosław Sikorski wrote on X.

But Vladimir Dzhabarov, the first deputy head of the Russian upper house’s international affairs committee, warned Moscow’s response would be immediate. “This is a very big step towards the start of world war three,” the Tass state news agency quoted Dzhabarov as saying.

Alastair Crooke : The West Lusts for War

Biden Ramps Up Nuclear Brinkmanship On His Way Out The Door

The New York Times reports that the Biden administration has authorized Ukraine to use US-supplied long-range missiles to strike Russian and North Korean military targets inside Russia — yet another dangerous escalation of nuclear brinkmanship in this horrific proxy war.

The Times correctly notes that authorizing Ukraine to use ATACMS, which have a range of about 190 miles, has long been a contentious issue in the Biden administration for fear of provoking military retaliations against the US from Russia. This reckless escalation has been authorized despite an acknowledgement from the anonymous US officials who spoke to The New York Times that they “do not expect the shift to fundamentally alter the course of the war.”

As Antiwar’s Dave DeCamp notes, Vladimir Putin said back in September that if NATO allows Ukraine to use western-supplied weapons for long-range strikes inside Russian territory, it would mean NATO countries “are at war with Russia.” This is about as unambiguous a threat as you’ll ever see.

Report: Biden Allows Ukraine To Strike Russia With Long-Range US Missiles
Putin has made clear that US-supported long-range strikes in Russia would risk nuclear war
by Dave DeCamp@DecampDave #Ukraine #Russia #NATO https://t.co/UlPCCHoZJT pic.twitter.com/jObYUzXVf1

— Antiwar.com (@Antiwarcom) November 17, 2024

NYT reports that Biden’s policy shift “comes two months before President-elect Donald J. Trump takes office, having vowed to limit further support for Ukraine.” And it is here worth noting that last week it was reported by The Telegraph that British PM Keir Starmer and French President Emmanuel Macron had been scheming to thwart any attempt by Trump to scale back US support for Ukraine by pushing Biden to authorize long-range missile strikes in Russian territory.

But it is also true that the day before the US election Mike Waltz, Trump’s next national security advisor, had himself endorsed the idea of authorizing long-range missile strikes into Russia with the goal of pressuring Moscow to end the war. His plan for disentangling the US from the conflict entails ramping up sanctions on Russia and “taking the handcuffs off the long-range weapons we provide Ukraine” in order to pressure Putin into eagerly accepting a peace deal.

So while this is being framed as an administration that’s more hawkish on Russia executing a maneuver that’s designed to hamstring the peacemongering of an incoming administration that’s less favorable to assisting Ukraine, in reality it may just be goal-assisting the next administration in a policy change it had planned on implementing anyway.

Either way, it’s insane. Putin ordered changes to Russia’s nuclear doctrine in September in order to ward off these sorts of escalations by lowering the threshold at which nuclear weapons could be used to defend the Russian Federation, and they’re just barreling right past that bright red line like they barreled over the red lines which led to the invasion of Ukraine. And the fact that they’re adding yet another nuclear-armed state into the mix with North Korea is just more gravy for the nuclear brinkmanship pot roast.

At one point in 2022, US intelligence agencies reportedly assessed that the odds of Russia using a nuclear weapon in Ukraine was as high as fifty percent, but the Biden administration kept pushing forward with this proxy war anyway. These freaks are taking insane risks to advance agendas that stand to yield the slimmest of benefits even by their own assessments.

We are living in dark and dangerous times.

Biden greenlights ATACMS to hit Russia, spiting Trump. Russia missile strike targets Ukraine energy

Ray McGovern : Will Kiev Use US Missiles On Moscow?

Israeli strike on Beirut kills Hezbollah media chief Mohammed Afif

Hezbollah’s chief spokesman has been killed by an Israeli airstrike on Beirut, as Israel intensifies its air offensive in Lebanon despite ongoing indirect negotiations for a ceasefire.

Mohammed Afif, who has been the public face of Hezbollah for months, was killed in a strike on offices of the Ba’ath party in Ras al-Nabaa, central Beirut. The attack in the busy residential area came without warning, and appeared to damage to neighbouring buildings.

The son of a prominent Shia cleric, Afif managed the Hezbollah-run TV network Al Manar before taking over as head of the militant Islamist group’s media relations. Since the killing of Hassan Nasrallah, the longtime leader of Hezbollah, on 28 September, Afif became one of the group’s most prominent officials, holding several press conferences in Beirut.

Analysts said Asif was the first official with such a role to be killed by Israel, as all previous targets had military or senior leadership posts. Until Sunday, there had been no Israeli airstrikes on central Beirut since mid-October.

Witnesses saw four bodies at the scene of the strike, which took place a day before Lebanon was expected to deliver its response to a US-delivered ceasefire proposal. There was no official word on the exact death toll.

Rightwing settlers in Israel welcome ‘dream team’ of Trump and his hardline appointments

Rightwing settlers and extremist nationalist Zionists in Israel have described top officials in Donald Trump’s new administration as a “dream team” which will offer a “unique and special opportunity” to expand Israel’s hold on occupied territory and permanently end any prospect of a Palestinian state.

Palestinian groups and leftwing NGOs in Israel have been shocked by Trump’s appointment of outspoken supporters of the projects of far-right Israeli activists and say the government of Benjamin Netanyahu has been emboldened by Trump’s victory.

“The series of appointments announced by US president-elect Donald Trump should worry everyone who cares about Israel’s future,” an editorial in the leftwing newspaper Haaretz warned. ...

Trump’s picks have surprised even hardliners. The nominee for secretary of state, Republican senator Marco Rubio, has said he opposes a ceasefire in Gaza and believes Israel should destroy “every element” of Hamas, whom he described as “vicious animals”, while Elise Stefanik, proposed as ambassador to the United Nations, has called the UN a “cesspool of antisemitism” for its condemnation of deaths in Gaza.

The new US ambassador to Israel is set to be Mike Huckabee, an evangelical Christian who backs the Israeli occupation of the West Bank and has called a two-state solution in Palestine “unworkable”. During a visit to Israel in 2017, Huckabee said: “There is no such thing as a West Bank. There’s no such thing as a settlement – they are communities, they’re neighbourhoods, they’re cities. There’s no such thing as an occupation.”

Pope Francis Urges Genocide Probe of Israel's War on Gaza

In a new book set to be released this week, Pope Francis I endorsed a genocide investigation into Israel's war on Gaza—which has killed or maimed more than 150,000 Palestinians and forcibly displaced, starved, or sickened millions more over the past 13 months.

"In the Middle East, where the open doors of nations like Jordan or Lebanon continue to be a salvation for millions of people fleeing conflicts in the region: I am thinking above all of those who leave Gaza in the midst of the famine that has struck their Palestinian brothers and sisters given the difficulty of getting food and aid into their territory," the pontiff wrote in his latest book, which goes on sale in some countries on November 19.

"According to some experts, what is happening in Gaza has the characteristics of a genocide," the Pope added. "It should be carefully investigated to determine whether it fits into the technical definition formulated by jurists and international bodies."

The Pope's words echo last week's finding by a United Nations expert panel that Israel's annihilation of Gaza is "consistent with the characteristics of genocide."

Ladies and gentlemen, "the only democracy in the middle east," demonstrates its democratic principles:

Israeli Settlement Minister Wants West Bank Annexation, No Voting or Land Rights for Palestinians

Israeli Minister of Settlements and National Missions Orit Strock has said she’s working to ensure Israel can annex as much land in the West Bank as possible during the incoming Trump administration but said the Palestinians that live there don’t have rights to the land and shouldn’t have the right to vote.

“My office is working at full throttle to ensure that if sovereignty [annexation] is applied, it will cover the maximum area possible,” Strook told the Israeli media, according to Middle East Eye.

When asked what will happen to the Palestinians who live in the occupied territory, Strock said, “All people have human rights, though the national right over the land belongs solely to the people of Israel. They can stay here, as human beings, of course, and to be a Jewish state, we should grant them full human rights, in my view.”

When asked to clarify what rights the Palestinians would have, she said, “national rights over this land belong only to the Jewish people. I think a model needs to be found, but they shouldn’t be able to vote for the Knesset [Israeli parliament], right?”

UN Special Rapporteur Francesca Albanese calls David Lammy a 'genocide denier'

The United Nations special rapporteur for the occupied Palestinian territories has accused British Foreign Secretary David Lammy of being a "genocide denier" and said the UK has done "nothing" to prevent atrocities in Gaza. In an interview with Middle East Eye in London on Wednesday, Francesca Albanese took aim at Lammy in response to comments he made in late October denying that Israel is committing genocide.

"I hadn't realised that Mr Lammy was a lawyer," she said, referring to Lammy's legal background. "As a politician, you might say that for political convenience," she suggested, adding that would still make someone "a genocide denier". However, she saw such remarks from someone familiar with law surprising. "Because excuse me? What are you saying?"

On 29 October, Lammy suggested that Israel is not committing genocide in Gaza because millions of people have not been killed. Terms like genocide, Lammy told parliament, "were largely used when millions of people lost their lives in crises like Rwanda, the Second World War, the Holocaust, and the way that they are used now undermines the seriousness of that term". ...

"But it's not the numbers of those killed that determines whether or not there is genocide, and any lawyer would know that." Albanese noted that "certain jurisprudence might have inclined Mr Lammy to conclude what he said".

"But by doing so, he's denying that genocide occurred in the case of Australia or Canada or the United States, where the genocide was carried out primarily not through mass killing but through cutting the bloodline of the Aboriginals so that they could disappear in the white European coloniser's society."

Trump Pledges to CRACK DOWN On Pro-Palestinian Speech!

Haitian immigrants flee Springfield, Ohio, in droves after Trump election win

From a tiny office behind a Haitian grocery store on Springfield’s South Limestone Street, Margery Koveleski has spent years helping local Haitians overcome bureaucratic red tape to make their lives in the Ohio city a little bit easier. But Koveleski – whose family is Haitian – has noticed a major change recently. Haitians are now coming to her to figure out how to leave.

“Some folks don’t have credit cards or access to the internet, and they want to buy a bus ticket or a plane ticket, so we help them book a flight,” she told the Guardian recently. “People are leaving.” Koveleski, leaders in Springfield’s Haitian community, and others have relayed reports of Haitians fleeing the city of 60,000 people in recent days for fear of being rounded up and deported after Donald Trump’s victory in the 5 November presidential election.

“The owner of one store is wondering if he should move back to New York or to Chicago – he says his business is way down,” Koveleski remarked. Trump has repeatedly said he would end immigrants’ temporary protected status (TPS) – the provision through which many Haitians are legally allowed to live and work in the US – and deport Haitians from Springfield once in office.

As Jacob Payen, a co-founder of the Haitian Community Alliance who runs a business that includes helping Haitians in Springfield to file tax returns, said: “People are fully aware of the election result, and that is why they are leaving; they are afraid of a mass deportation. ...

Springfield’s Haitian community has been in the spotlight since Trump falsely accused immigrants here of eating pets during a presidential debate in September. Since then, the city has seen false bomb threats and marches by neo-Nazi groups after having experienced a revival in recent years in large part because of Haitians who took jobs in local produce packaging and machining factories that many previously there found undesirable.

Louisiana court amends ruling that bars school displays of Ten Commandments

A federal appeals court in New Orleans on Friday temporarily limited the scope of a ruling that Louisiana’s law requiring public schools to post the Ten Commandments in all classrooms next year is unconstitutional.

US district judge John deGravelles’ ruling that the law is unconstitutional remains in effect under the order from the fifth US circuit court of appeals. However, the appellate court temporarily blocked a part of the ruling that requires state education officials to notify public schools statewide that the law has been struck down.

State attorneys said in an emergency stay motion filed on Wednesday that deGravelles’ finding that the commandments posting requirement is unconstitutional only affects five local school systems that are defendants in the case. They said deGravelles overstepped his authority when he ordered that schools in all 72 districts be notified of his finding. They asked that the notification requirement be paused immediately while they appeal all of deGravelles’ order. That broader appeal was filed later on Friday night.

Friday’s fifth circuit order was a temporary “administrative stay” granted in response to the state’s emergency request. The order may be altered or lifted as the appeal progresses. Judges Jerry Smith, nominated to the court by Ronald Reagan, and Kurt Engelhardt, nominated by Donald Trump, voted to grant the stay in a one-sentence order. A footnote said Judge James Graves, nominated by Barack Obama, would have denied the stay.

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Experts sound alarm as Trump mulls pardons for January 6 attackers

lf Donald Trump follows through on his promise to pardon people who participated in the January 6 riot at the US Capitol, attorneys and lawmakers who oppose such moves would not be able to stop him, according to legal experts.

If Trump does issue the pardons, it could indicate to many of his supporters that there was nothing illegal about the riot to prevent the peaceful transfer of power, and would undermine the US constitution, the experts said.

“It gives the message that Trump decides what is and is not actionable under the criminal laws of the United States,” said Kimberly Wehle, a professor at the University of Baltimore School of Law who has studied constitutional law and the separation of powers. ...

The federal government has filed criminal charges against more than 1,500 people. More than 1,000 people have pleaded guilty or been found guilty. The FBI is also still searching for people who allegedly participated in the attack. During his campaign, Trump said that issuing “full pardons with an apology to many” would be a top priority.

Presidents issuing pardons is nothing new, and they are allowed to do so under the constitution. The long list includes President George Washington, who issued a presidential pardon in 1795 to people engaged in Pennsylvania’s Whiskey Rebellion; President Gerald Ford, who gave his predecessor, Richard Nixon, “a full, free, and absolute pardon” for crimes he committed as president; and President Bill Clinton, who pardoned Marc Rich, a fugitive financier who fled the United States after his indictment.

Anya Parampil on why Kamala lost

Trump converts voters in deep-blue California – was it all about the economy?

Donald Trump on 5 November expanded his coalition across the United States, and he did so even in deep-blue California. While Kamala Harris unsurprisingly beat out Trump in the Golden State – receiving about 60% of the vote – the former president nonetheless pulled off a victory, winning eight counties that supported Joe Biden in 2020.

It may take years to fully understand the dynamics that contributed to the shift, but experts and political observers have so far pointed to the economy and diminished voter enthusiasm as key elements.

Notorious for taking weeks to fully tally the election results, California is still finishing up its count. With more than 1m ballots left to sort through, the results could change, but as of Friday evening, Trump appears to have flipped eight counties from voting Democrat to Republican in the presidential race: Butte, Merced, Stanislaus, Fresno, San Joaquin, Inyo, San Bernardino and Riverside.

The counties are concentrated in the state’s interior, from the Inland Empire east of Los Angeles to the agricultural heartland in the Central Valley. They’re generally more rural and not as progressive as population centers on the coast, and several are closely split between the parties while others are predominantly Democratic. Half of the counties backed a mix of Democrats and Republicans in US House races while one – Merced – supported a Democrat in its sole House contest. More than 1 million people voted for Trump in those areas, which are home to almost 7 million people.

Polling by the Associated Press and Norc at the University of Chicago suggest that California voters saw the economy as the most important issue facing the country, ahead of immigration, the climate and abortion access. It’s a trend seen across the country, said Mark Baldassare, the survey director at the Public Policy Institute of California, with voters feeling negatively about the economy and angry and dissatisfied at those currently in power.

Progressives Roundly Reject Idea of Rahm Emanuel as DNC Chair

Progressives were left fuming and flummoxed over reporting Friday that Rahm Emanuel is considering running for chair of the Democratic National Committee, with many leftists wondering whether the party has learned anything from its loss of the White House, Senate, and, arguably, the country's working-class voters.

Axios first reported that Emanuel—President Joe Biden's ambassador to Japan and a former congressman, Chicago mayor, and chief of staff to former President Barack Obama—is mulling whether to seek the top DNC post. Current DNC chair Jamie Harrison, who was elected to the post in 2021, is unlikely to seek a new term, which would begin in March.

Emanuel has some powerful backers among the war-and-Wall Street wing that has dominated the Democratic party for decades.

"If they said, 'Well, what should we do? Who should lead the party?' I would take Ambassador Rahm Emanuel, and I would bring him back from Japan, and I would appoint him chairman of the Democratic National Committee," prominent political consultant David Axelrod, who ran both of Obama's successful presidential campaigns, said Wednesday on his podcast.

Axelrod followed up the next day with a post on X, the social platform formerly known as Twitter, in which he wrote of Emanuel, "Dude knows how to fight and win."

Reaction came fast and furious, with Jonathan Cohn, policy director at the group Progressive Massachusetts, asking on the social network Bluesky, "How is this not a sick joke?"

Center for International Policy executive vice president Matt Duss, a former foreign policy adviser to Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.) writing on X that "if you assembled a team of top scientists and told them to come up with a plan to ensure that the Democratic Party continues to lose working-class voters, I doubt they could do better than 'Make Rahm Emanuel head of the DNC.'"

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Fossil fuel bosses get ‘red carpet’ at Cop29 despite concerns over influence

The host country of this year’s UN climate summit, Azerbaijan, has rolled out “red carpet” treatment to fossil fuel bosses and lobbyists, the Guardian can reveal. At least 132 oil and gas company senior executives and staff were invited to the Cop29 summit, and had special badges denoting they were guests of the presidency.

That was equivalent to red-carpet treatment at a UN climate summit, Cop experts told the Guardian. Holders of the special host country badges include the head of Saudi oil company Aramco and the chief executive of BP.

The revelations came as some of the world’s most senior voices on the climate raised concerns over the influence of the global fossil fuel industry and petrostates at the UN talks, which reached their midway point on Friday night. Countries are gathered in Baku, Azerbaijan’s capital, to establish ways of raising the cash that developing countries need to cut their greenhouse gas emissions and cope with the impacts of the climate crisis.

Trump Picks Climate-Denying Oil & Gas Magnate as Energy Sec. He Once Drank Fracking Fluid on Live TV

Trump Taps Fracking CEO Chris Wright for Energy Secretary

In a move that alarmed green groups, Republican President-elect Donald Trump on Saturday tapped Chris Wright—the CEO of a fracking company who denies the climate emergency—as his energy secretary.

Wright, who leads the Denver-based oil services company Liberty Energy, is a Republican donor whose nomination to head the Department of Energy is backed by powerful fossil fuel boosters including oil and gas tycoon and Trump adviser Harold Hamm.

"Chris has been a leading technologist and entrepreneur in Energy. He has worked in Nuclear, Solar, Geothermal, and Oil and Gas," Trump said in a statement announcing his choice. "Most significantly, Chris was one of the pioneers who helped launch the American Shale Revolution that fueled American Energy Independence, and transformed the Global Energy Markets and Geopolitics."

Trump—who has promised to increase fossil fuel production beyond the record-setting levels of the Biden administration—also said Wright would serve on a new Council of National Energy led by Doug Burgum, his pick to run the Interior Department.

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Also of Interest

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

On Way Out, Reckless Biden Allows Deep Russia Strikes

English Outsider On Trump's Cabinet Of Curiosities And How Little It Matters

Leaks expose secret British military cell plotting to ‘keep Ukraine fighting’

Craig Murray: Two Weeks in Beirut

“America First” Means Stomping Out Free Speech In The US In Order To Help Israel

Deliberate Lies About Amsterdam Violence

Patrick Lawrence: Donald Trump’s Middle Finger

Trump SHOWDOWN With Senate GOP Over Matt Gaetz Nomination

BIDEN lame duck, approves ATACMS strikes into Russia

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A Little Night Music

Casey Bill (William Weldon) - We Gonna Move (To The Outskirts Of Town)

Casey Bill Weldon - You Shouldn't Do That

Casey Bill Weldon - Guitar Swing

Casey Bill Weldon - Give Me Another Shot

Casey Bill Weldon - Somebody Changed The Lock On My Door

Casey Bill Weldon - I'm a Stranger In Your Town

Casey Bill Weldon - The Big Boat

Casey Bill Weldon - Go Ahead, Buddy

Casey Bill Weldon - Has My Gal Been Here?

Casey Bill Weldon - You Just as Well Let Her Go

Casey Bill Weldon - Guitar Swing (take 3)

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