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The day's news roundup + tonight's musical feature: Meade "Lux" Lewis

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Hey! Good Evening!

This evening's music features one of the great boogie-woogie piano players Meade "Lux" Lewis. Enjoy!

^{Meade "Lux" Lewis - Roll Em (Pete)}

"Shadow is the obstruction of light. Shadows appear to me to be of supreme importance in perspective, because, without them opaque and solid bodies will be ill defined; that which is contained within their outlines and their boundaries themselves will be ill-understood unless they are shown against a background of a different tone from themselves."

-- Leonardo da Vinci

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News and Opinion

The Gaza Ceasefire Is Being Sabotaged By Israel, By Trump, And By The Media

The Gaza ceasefire (if you can even call it that) is already in grave peril.

Hamas has announced that it will be postponing the release of any more Israeli hostages in response to repeated ceasefire violations from Israel and consistent failure to meet its terms of the agreement. The IDF has been routinely killing Palestinians in Gaza ever since the so-called “ceasefire” went into effect, with 110 killed in less than three weeks according to the Euro-Mediterranean Human Rights Monitor.

The first obstacle to the ceasefire holding was always that it depends on good behavior from individual IDF troops, many of whom (A) quite like murdering Palestinians and (B) hope the ceasefire ends so they can murder more. These troops could also be reasonably confident that they would incur no consequences from their superiors for those killings.

In response to the Hamas announcement, President Donald Trump told the press that if “all” hostages are not returned by Saturday at 12 PM, the truce should end and Israel should “let hell break out.”

It’s likely that Hamas was made more willing to risk the collapse of the ceasefire by Trump’s comments regarding the ethnic cleansing of the Gaza Strip over the last two weeks. The president said on Monday that he may cut off aid to Jordan and Egypt if they do not agree to take in Palestinians in what would amount to a forced evacuation of the enclave. Trump has also begun clarifying to the press that his plan to purge Gaza of Palestinians would indeed be a permanent removal and that its inhabitants would not be permitted to return after reconstruction, contradicting earlier statements from the White House that this would be intended as a temporary relocation.

If Hamas believes the US and Israel are going to permanently end the existence of Palestinians in Palestine, then they are naturally going to be less invested in extending this ceasefire.

Then you’ve got reports from Israeli media saying that Benjamin Netanyahu has returned from his weeklong tour of Washington determined to obstruct the ceasefire from moving on to its second phase, with one source telling Haaretz that “Once Hamas realizes there won’t be a second stage, they may not complete the first.”

We have seen photos of body parts belonging to Palestinian children being carried in plastic bags by their siblings. We have seen photos of Palestinian men, forced to strip to their underwear and chained together. We have seen photos of Palestinians flattened by tanks https://t.co/2HBtO1EziK

— Charlotte(@charlottor) February 9, 2025

And the mass media aren’t helping.

Imperial news outlets were already beginning to pound the drums of war before all this started in response to the emaciated appearance of three Israeli hostages released by Hamas this past Saturday, expressing outrage at the idea that the captives would have lost weight under a starvation blockade imposed by the IDF, without ever mentioning the evidence of starvation and torture in Palestinian hostages being released by Israel at the same time.

“What will anger at sight of gaunt hostages mean for a fragile ceasefire?” asks a headline by the BBC, who spent the last year and a half performing gold medal Olympian verbal gymnastics to minimize Israel’s daily massacres in Gaza.

“Israel decries ‘shocking’ images of gaunt, pale hostages freed by Hamas,” reads a headline from The Washington Post.

“Emaciated hostages show we need a ‘bomb the rails to Auschwitz’ plan,” reads the New York Post headline to an op-ed by the odious Bethany Mandel.

“I’ve got to be honest. My sympathy for ‘ordinary Palestinians’ is pretty low this morning,” tweeted the Mail on Sunday’s Dan Hodges regarding the hostages.

The idea the public is meant to ingest from this type of messaging, of course, is that it would be good and right for the ceasefire to end and the Gaza holocaust to resume as before.

NYT truly remains in a league of its own - almost every headline from a major news org has mentioned the reason why Hamas is postponing the release. Then, there’s the Times. pic.twitter.com/7SIVRVMxkf

— Sana Saeed (@SanaSaeed) February 10, 2025

Such manipulations are ramping up as the ceasefire becomes more tenuous. The New York Times just ran a piece titled “Hamas Postpones Release of Hostages ‘Until Further Notice’” and subtitled “Stalling the next release of hostages from the Gaza Strip, scheduled for the coming weekend, raises new challenges for the already tenuous six-week truce and chances for a lasting end to the war.”

If you noticed the complete absence of any mention of Israel’s ceasefire violations as Hamas’ reason for the move, you get an A in media literacy for today. Anyone skimming the news headlines on their social media feed would assume that Hamas is the provocateur in this standoff instead of Israel.

So the governments of the US and Israel appear to be ramping up to resume the incineration of Gaza, and the media outlets which administer propaganda for both of these tyrannical states are grooming the public into accepting this.

Here’s hoping sanity somehow finds a way to prevail.

LtCOL. Karen Kwiatkowski : Can the US Expel Palestinians from Gaza?

Hamas suspends release of Israeli hostages over ‘violations’ of ceasefire

Hamas has said it is delaying the release of Israeli hostages indefinitely over “violations” of the ceasefire deal, prompting Israel’s defence minister to put the country’s military on alert with orders to prepare for “any scenario in Gaza”.

Mediators fear a breakdown of the three-week-old ceasefire, Egyptian security sources told Reuters, and have postponed talks until they receive a clear indication of Washington’s intent to continue with the phased deal.

Israel’s security cabinet has moved forward a meeting to discuss negotiations on the second phase, which had been set for Tuesday evening. The army has cancelled all leave for soldiers in the Gaza division, the Kan news outlet reported, in another sign that Israeli authorities are preparing for the resumption of war.

Late on Monday, Hamas said the “door remains open” for the next hostage-prisoner exchange, due to take place on Saturday. In a statement, the militant group said it had “intentionally made this announcement five days before the scheduled prisoner handover, allowing mediators ample time to pressure [Israel] towards fulfilling its obligations”. It added: “The door remains open for the prisoner exchange batch to proceed as planned, once the occupation complies.”

Trump says Gaza ceasefire should be cancelled if Israeli hostages not freed

Donald Trump has warned that if all the Israeli hostages held in Gaza are not returned by Saturday at noon he would propose canceling the Israel-Hamas ceasefire and letting “all hell break loose”. Speaking to reporters in the Oval Office late on Monday, the US president also said he might withhold aid to Jordan and Egypt if those countries do not take Palestinian refugees being relocated from Gaza.

Trump’s comments came after Hamas said it was delaying the release of hostages indefinitely over “violations” of the ceasefire deal, prompting Israel’s defence minister to put the country’s military on alert with orders to prepare for “any scenario in Gaza”.

Trump called the statement by Hamas “terrible” and said he would “let that be Israel’s decision” on what should ultimately happen to the ceasefire. “But as far as I’m concerned, if all of the hostages aren’t returned by Saturday 12 o’clock – I think it’s an appropriate time – I would say cancel it and all bets are off and let hell break out,” Trump said.

The ultimatum could end a three-week-old ceasefire which dictates a strict schedule for the release of the Israeli hostages in exchange for hundreds of Palestinian prisoners being held in Israeli jails.

Prof. Jeffrey Sachs : Is Trump Any Better Than Biden?

Hamas official Basem Naim tells Al Jazeera that Israel's PM Benjamin Netanyahu is “intentionally sabotaging” the ceasefire deal, continuing to block aid, kill Palestinians, and delay negotiations on phase two. pic.twitter.com/QLyCzdbCKw

— Al Jazeera English (@AJEnglish) February 10, 2025

Trump says Palestinians will have no right of return to Gaza under his plan

Donald Trump has said that his plan to “take over Gaza” would not include a right of return for the more than 2 million Palestinians that he has said have “no alternative” but to leave because of the destruction left by Israel’s military campaign.

The remarks are the latest effective endorsement of ethnic cleansing by the US president, who announced his plan last week during a summit with the Israeli prime minister, Benjamin Netanyahu, to the outrage of the Arab world and the surprise of even his closest aides.

In the interview with Fox’s Bret Baier, Trump said that he would “own” the Gaza Strip and declared it would be a “real estate development for the future”. At the same time, he continued to endorse a plan for the Palestinians to be resettled in Egypt and Jordan, a plan that both countries have rejected and the region’s largest Arab states have declared is a non-starter.

Trump said he would build up to six new sites for Palestinians to live outside Gaza, in effect permanent refugee camps underwritten by the US president. Asked if Palestinians would have the right to return to Gaza, Trump told Baier: “No, they wouldn’t, because they’re going to have much better housing.

Trump foreign policy, chaos or realpolitik w/ Aaron Maté

Israel Expands ‘Open Fire Order’ in West Bank, Resulting in Surge of Civilian Killings

The Israeli military command overseeing operations in the occupied West Bank has expanded its “open fire orders,” leading to a surge in the killing of Palestinian civilians by IDF troops, Haaretz reported on Monday.

One of the orders allows Israeli troops to fire on unarmed Palestinians if they are “messing with the ground.” The claim is that this order is necessary to prevent explosives from being planted, but sources told Haaretz it has made soldiers “trigger happy.”

The other order allows Israeli troops to open fire on any vehicles approaching Israeli military checkpoints that are leaving combat zones to force them to stop. Since the combat zones are residential areas, this means the IDF can open fire on civilians trying to flee.

The Haaretz report also revealed the Israeli military has been using Palestinian civilians as human shields to check for explosives inside buildings, a practice that became common in Gaza.

Russia Says Outlook Not Good for Extending Last Nuclear Arms Control Treaty With US

A senior Russian official said Monday that the outlook of extending or replacing the last nuclear arms control treaty between the US and Russia does not look good.

The New START treaty limits the number of nuclear warheads and delivery systems the two powers can deploy, and it is due to expire on February 5, 2026. There’s no sign that the two sides are working on a replacement treaty.

“As for our dialogue with the US in the area of strategic stability, including the situation concerning the post-New START period, it does not look promising,” said Russian Deputy Foreign Minister Sergey Ryabkov, according to the Russian news agency TASS. “On February 5, 2026, the pact expires and after this it will not exist.”

In 2023, Russia said it was suspending participation in New START, citing US support for Ukrainian attacks on Russian facilities housing nuclear weapons. While the inspection aspect of the treaty hasn’t been implemented, both sides said they would continue to abide by the limits set by the treaty. However, once New START expires, there will be no constraints on the number of nukes the US and Russia can deploy.

Waste or abuse?

Nearly $500m of food aid at risk of spoilage after Trump USAid cuts

Nearly half a billion dollars of food aid is at risk of spoilage following the decision of Donald Trump and Elon Musk’s “Doge” agency to make cuts to USAid, according to an inspector general (IG) report released on Monday. Following staff reductions and funding freezes, the US agency responsible for providing humanitarian assistance across the world – including food, water, shelter and emergency healthcare – is struggling to function.

“Recent widespread staffing reductions across the agency … coupled with uncertainty about the scope of foreign assistance waivers and permissible communications with implementers, has degraded USAid’s ability to distribute and safeguard taxpayer-funded humanitarian assistance,” the report said.

According to USAid staff, this uncertainty put more than $489m of food assistance at ports, in transit, and in warehouses at risk of spoilage, unanticipated storage needs, and diversion. USAid employs about 10,000 staff, with approximately two-thirds posted at the agency’s more than 60 missions overseas across multiple countries. The entire staff was put on administrative leave on Saturday, with limited exceptions. ...

The sweeping freeze on foreign assistance has also made it more difficult to track potential misuse of US taxpayer-funded humanitarian assistance, according to the report.

Trump announces 25% tariffs on foreign steel and aluminum

Donald Trump announced 25% tariffs on foreign steel and aluminum on Monday, ramping up his controversial bid to boost the US economy by hiking taxes on imports from overseas.

The modified US duties will be enforced “without exceptions or exemptions”, the president declared, dashing the hopes of countries that hoped to avoid them.

Trump first imposed steep tariffs on foreign steel and aluminum during his first presidency. The action announced on Monday night ends exemptions granted to certain countries, and increases the duty rate on aluminum.

The changes are not due to come into effect until 4 March, however, according to a White House official – raising the prospect of the Trump administration brokering deals with governments seeking reprieve. Countries including Australia have already been making their case. ...

“The steel and aluminum tariffs 2.0 will put an end to foreign dumping, boost domestic production and secure our steel and aluminum industries as the backbone and pillar industries of America’s economic and national security,” Peter Navarro, Trump’s top trade adviser, told reporters. “This isn’t just about trade. It’s about ensuring that America never has to rely on foreign nations for critical industries like steel and aluminum.”

Is MAGA Abandoning Economic Populism by Gutting CFPB? With Matt Stoller

Trump halts enforcement of US law banning bribery of foreign officials

Donald Trump signed an executive order on Monday directing the US justice department to halt prosecuting Americans accused of bribing foreign government officials to win business.

The order instructs the US attorney general, Pam Bondi, to pause prosecutions under the Foreign Corrupt Practices Act of 1977 until she issues revised enforcement guidance that promotes American competitiveness.

“Future FCPA investigations and enforcement actions will be governed by this new guidance and must be approved by the attorney general,” the document said.

According to the White House, the law puts US firms at a disadvantage to foreign competitors because they cannot engage in practices that are “common among international competitors, creating an uneven playing field”.

“American national security depends on America and its companies gaining strategic commercial advantages around the world, and President Trump is stopping excessive, unpredictable FCPA enforcement that makes American companies less competitive,” according to a copy of a White House factsheet seen by Reuters.

More Sinister USAID-Funded Propaganda Programs REVEALED

Elon Musk-led group makes surprise bid of nearly $100bn for OpenAI

Elon Musk escalated his feud with OpenAI and its CEO Sam Altman on Monday. The billionaire is leading a consortium of investors that announced it had submitted a bid of $97.4bn for “all assets” of the artificial intelligence company to OpenAI’s board of directors. The startup, which operates ChatGPT, has been working to restructure itself away from its original non-profit status. OpenAI also operates a for-profit subsidiary, and Musk’s unsolicited offer could complicate the company’s plans. The Wall Street Journal first reported the proposed bid. ...

Altman posted his reaction on X shortly after the news broke, saying, “no thank you but we will buy twitter for $9.74 billion if you want.” Musk famously bought Twitter in 2022 for $44bn and renamed it X. Musk responded to that post, saying, “Swindler.” Musk was a co-founder of OpenAI but left the company in 2019 and started his own AI company called xAI. Over the past several years, he’s tussled with Altman over the direction of the company. ...

Although Musk is a close Donald Trump ally, Altman has also met with the president and attended his inauguration. Trump tapped OpenAI to be part of a group of AI companies to work on a $500bn deal called Stargate to invest in the burgeoning technology. Musk’s xAI is not part of this deal.

Americans RALLY Around Luigi Mangione and Kick in Funds to Pay for His DEFENSE

Democrats demand conflict-of-interest answers over Elon Musk ‘Doge’ role

The California senator Adam Schiff has demanded answers about Elon Musk’s potential conflicts of interest in his role leading the “department of government efficiency” (Doge), as evidence grows of his complex business relationship with agencies now facing cuts. ...

The controversy centers on Musk’s dual role as a government official and CEO of companies under federal scrutiny, including Starlink, a satellite internet service operated by Musk’s SpaceX. Most notably, USAid was investigating Starlink’s operations in Ukraine just months before Musk, as Doge chief, moved to dismantle the agency. USAid inspector general Paul K Martin confirmed to Congress in September that the agency was looking into its oversight of Starlink terminals provided to Ukraine. The investigation focused on a 2022 collaboration where USAid helped deliver 5,000 Starlink terminals to the war-torn nation.

Tesla, valued at $1.25tn – more than all other American automakers combined – faces multiple federal investigations that could be affected by Doge’s restructuring and government regulation. The National Highway Traffic Safety Administration’s investigation into Tesla’s autopilot system identified design flaws that “led to foreseeable misuse and avoidable crashes” in an April report linking the technology to 13 fatalities.

Further entanglements arise from Neuralink, Musk’s brain computer chip company. The firm received FDA clearance for human trials in May 2023 after initially being denied permission, but remains under investigation by the FDA and the Department of Agriculture over its animal testing practices. Reuters reported that approximately 1,500 animals died in four years of testing at Neuralink facilities.

“Mr Musk’s companies have been the subject of at least 20 recent investigations or reviews by federal agencies, which heightens the risk that Mr Musk may seek to use his new position to shield his companies from federal scrutiny,” Schiff wrote.

STAND OFF: Trump DARES Courts In Spending Fight

Trump ordered by judge to immediately restore frozen funding

A federal judge said on Monday that the Trump administration had defied his order to unfreeze billions in federal funding and issued a directive demanding that the government “immediately restore frozen funding”. In the order, US district judge John J McConnell Jr in Rhode Island instructed Donald Trump’s administration to restore and resume federal funding in accordance with the temporary restraining order he issued in January, which halted the administration’s freeze of congressionally approved federal funds.

The ruling appeared to be the first instance of a judge finding the Trump administration had violated a court order pausing a new policy rollout. The Trump administration on Monday said it is appealing.

Last month, the Trump administration’s office of management and budget issued a memo halting federal grants and loans while it evaluated spending to ensure it was in alignment with Trump’s agenda and policies. The administration later withdrew the memo, which caused widespread confusion. Nearly two dozen states filed a lawsuit against the Trump administration. On 31 January, McConnell issued a temporary restraining order, blocking the freeze of federal funding, and described the rescission of the memo as “in name only”.

McConnell’s new order on Monday comes as Democratic attorneys general that challenged the freeze, in the 22 states and Washington DC, said the government had not been complying with the order and had yet to restore some funding for several programs.

“The states have presented evidence in this motion that the defendants in some cases have continued to improperly freeze federal funds and refused to resume disbursement of appropriated federal funds,” McConnell wrote in his decision, adding that the pauses in funding “violate the plain text” of the temporary restraining order.

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Farmers ‘very worried’ as US pesticide firms push to bar cancer diagnoses lawsuits

Pesticide company efforts to push through laws that could block litigation against them is igniting battles in several US farm states and pitting some farm groups against each other. Laws have been introduced in at least eight states so far and drafts are circulating in more than 20 states, backed by a deluge of advertising supporting the measures.

The fight is particularly fierce now in Iowa, where opponents call the pesticide-backed proposed law the “Cancer Gag Act”, due to high levels of cancer in Iowa that many fear are linked to the state’s large agricultural use of pesticides. Iowa has the second-highest rate of new cancer cases in the United States and the fastest growing rate.

The bill would bar people from suing pesticide manufacturers for failing to warn them of health risks, as long as the product labels are approved by the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA). Organizers against the Iowa bill are planning a rally at the state capitol today after the state senate voted last week to advance the measure.

Opponents say the legislation will rob farmers and others who use pesticides from holding companies accountable in court if their pesticide products cause disease or injury. ...

The actions in the states come alongside a simultaneous push for changes in federal law that would in effect shield companies from lawsuits brought by people claiming they developed cancers or other diseases due to their use of pesticides. Bayer, the Germany-based owner of the former Monsanto Co, is the chief architect of the strategy, designed as a means to beat back thousands of lawsuits filed by farmers and others who blame their use of Monsanto’s Roundup herbicides for causing them to develop cancer.

‘Backsliding’: most countries to miss vital climate deadline as Cop30 nears

The vast majority of governments are likely to miss a looming deadline to file vital plans that will determine whether or not the world has a chance of avoiding the worst ravages of climate breakdown.

Despite the urgency of the crisis, the UN is relatively relaxed at the prospect of the missed date. Officials are urging countries instead to take time to work harder on their targets to cut greenhouse gas emissions and divest from fossil fuels.

Simon Stiell, the UN’s top climate official, said in a speech in Brazil on Thursday: “Because these national plans are among the most important policy documents governments will produce this century, their quality should be the paramount consideration … Taking a bit more time to ensure these plans are first-rate makes sense, properly outlining how they will contribute to this effort [to tackle the climate crisis] and therefore what rewards they will reap.”

New national plans on emissions cuts are urgently needed because current targets are dangerously inadequate. The world must cut carbon by about half this decade, relative to 1990 levels, to have a chance of limiting temperature rises to 1.5C above preindustrial levels, the important threshold that scientists fear is already out of reach. Governments are working to blueprints set out four years ago that would result in temperature rises of 2.6C to 2.8C by the end of the century, according to the UN’s environment programme.

Trump administration suspends $5bn electric vehicle charging program

The Trump administration has ordered US states to suspend a $5bn electric vehicle charging station program in a further blow to the environmental movement since the president’s return to the White House. In a memo issued on Thursday to state transportation directors, the transportation department’s Federal Highway Administration (FHWA) ordered states not to spend any funds allocated to them under the Biden administration as part of the national electric vehicle infrastructure (NEVI) program.

“The new leadership of the Department of Transportation … has decided to review the policies underlying the implementation of the NEVI Formula Program,” Emily Biondi, the FHWA’s associate administrator for planning, environment and realty, wrote in the memo. “Accordingly, the current NEVI Formula Program Guidance dated June 11, 2024, and all prior versions of this guidance are rescinded,” Biondi added.

“As result of the rescission of the NEVI Formula Program Guidance, FHWA is also immediately suspending the approval of all State Electric Vehicle Infrastructure Deployment plans for all fiscal years. Therefore, effective immediately, no new obligations may occur under the NEVI Formula Program until the updated final NEVI Formula Program Guidance is issued and new State plans are submitted and approved,” she wrote.

Biondi added that until new guidance is issued, reimbursements of existing obligations for designing and building charging stations will be allowed in order to prevent the disruption of current financial commitments.

According to an existing page on the energy department’s website, the NEVI program provides funding to states to strategically deploy EV chargers. Funding is available for up to 80% of eligible project costs including the acquisition, installation and network connection of EV chargers, proper operation and maintenance of EV chargers, and long-term EV charger data sharing.

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Also of Interest

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

It’s Gross And Cringey To Love A State Like Israel Or The USA

White House Says Israel Pullout From Lebanon ‘On Track,’ But Netanyahu Seeks Extension

Walking the Walk on Iran Nuclear Talks

US History of Duplicity Means Impossibility of Negotiated Settlements, Including Ukraine; Could a Government in Exile Be Coming?

It’s The End of the American Era. Period.

China Urged To End Successful Policies

Trump revokes security clearance for Antony Blinken, calling him a ‘bad guy’

Revelations of Israeli spyware abuse raise fears over possible use by Trump

FBI finds secret JFK assassination records after Trump order

The Government-Funded, Landlord Trump

With Fresh Tariffs Looming, One Economist Warns They're Just a Way to Fund Tax Cuts for the Rich

Euclid telescope captures Einstein ring revealing warping of space

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A Little Night Music

Meade "Lux" Lewis - Honky Tonk Train Blues

Meade "Lux" Lewis - Low Down Dog

Meade "Lux" Lewis - Whistlin' Blues

Meade "Lux" Lewis - Six Wheel Chaser

Meade Lux Lewis - Bear Cat Crawl

Meade "Lux" Lewis - Yancey Special

Meade Lux Lewis - Mr. Freddie Blues

Meade Lux Lewis - The Blues (Complete, Parts 1-5)

Meade Lux Lewis - Chicago Flyer

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