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The day's news roundup + tonight's musical feature: Andrew "Smokey" Hogg

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Hey! Good Evening!

This evening's music features Texas blues guitarist Andrew "Smokey" Hogg. Enjoy!

^{Smokey Hogg – Little Car Blues}

“Every war when it comes, or before it comes, is represented not as a war but as an act of self-defense against a homicidal maniac.”

-- George Orwell

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News and Opinion

Ah, Good Old War Propaganda

Just as the news breaks that Trump has issued Maduro an ultimatum to leave Venezuela immediately if he wants to escape with his life, the Murdoch-owned Wall Street Journal has published an amazingly brazen war propaganda piece titled “How Venezuelan Gangs and African Jihadists Are Flooding Europe With Cocaine.”

“Venezuela has become a major launchpad for huge volumes of cocaine shipped to West Africa, where jihadists are helping traffic it to Europe in record quantities,” the article begins, going out of its way to note that “the Trump administration’s pressure campaign against Venezuelan leader Nicolás Maduro — who it asserts is heavily involved in drug smuggling — has brought global attention to the country’s role in the drug trade.”

The propaganda piece is plainly aimed at Europeans as well as Americans, emphasizing Secretary of State Marco Rubio’s quip last month that the Europeans “should be thanking us” for blowing up alleged drug boats coming from Venezuela because he says some of those drugs are winding up in Europe.

It’s got everything. Whipping up international support for a regime change war. Fearmongering about “jihadists”. The evil, scary dictator. The whole war propaganda sales package.

Venezuela has become a major launchpad for huge volumes of cocaine shipped to West Africa, where jihadists are helping traffic it to Europe in record quantities. https://t.co/Oz1U9wtWVI

— The Wall Street Journal (@WSJ) December 1, 2025

The mass media do this every time the US empire gets war-horny. And the Murdoch press are always the most egregious offenders.

Reminds me of an old tweet by a man named Malcolm Price:

“I remember in the run-up to the Iraq War a friend I had known all my life suddenly said to me, ‘We must do something about this monster in Iraq.’ I said, ‘When did you first think that?’ He answered honestly, ‘A month ago’.”

Price’s friend had been swept up in the imperial war propaganda campaign that had recently begun, just like countless millions of others. Month after month after month western consciousness was hammered with false narratives about weapons of mass destruction, forced associations of Saddam Hussein with 9/11, and stories about how much better things will be for the people of Iraq once that evil tyrant is gone.

Normally it never would have occurred to the average westerner that a country on the other side of the planet should be invaded and its leader replaced with a puppet regime. That’s not the sort of thing that would have organically entered someone’s mind. It needed to be placed there.

The most common misconception about the free press of the western world is that it exists. All the west’s most influential and far-reaching news media publications are here not to report factual stories about current events, but to manufacture consent for the pre-existing agendas of the US-centralized western empire.

They report many true things, to be sure, and if you acquire some media literacy you can actually learn how to glean a lot of useful information from the imperial press without losing your mind to the spin machine. But reporting true things is not their purpose. Their purpose is to manipulate public psychology at mass scale for the benefit of the empire they serve.

This doesn’t happen through some kind of centralized Ministry of Truth where sinister social engineers secretly conspire to deceive people. It happens because all mainstream press institutions are controlled either by plutocrats or by western governments in the form of state broadcasters like the BBC, both of which have a vested interest in maintaining the imperial status quo. They control who the executives and lead editors of these outlets are, and those leaders shape the hiring and editing processes of the publication or broadcaster. Reporters come to understand that there are certain lines they need to color within if they want to get articles published and continue advancing their careers, so they either learn to toe the imperial line or they disappear from the mass media industry.

If people had a clear understanding of everything that’s really going on in our world, they would tear the empire apart brick by brick. If they could truly see how much evil is being done in their name and really wrap their minds around it, and if they could understand how much wealth the plutocrats are getting out of the imperial status quo compared to how little they themselves benefit from it, there would be immediate revolution. So the oligarchs and empire managers shore up narrative control in the form of media ownership, think tanks, Silicon Valley algorithm manipulation, imperial information ops like Wikipedia, and now increasingly through billionaire-owned AI chatbots to ensure that this never happens.

The entire empire is built on a foundation of lies. The whole power structure is held together by nonstop manipulation of the way westerners think, speak, act, shop, work, and vote. If truth ever finds a way to get a word in edgewise, the entire thing would collapse.

We know this is true because the oligarchs and empire managers pour so much wealth and energy into manipulating our minds. They’re not doing this for fun, they’re doing it because they need to. If they didn’t need to, it wouldn’t be happening.

So what they are doing is intensely creepy and destructive, but it’s also empowering, because it shows us right where their weak spot is. They’re pouring all this energy into controlling the dominant narrative because that’s the weakest point in the armor of the imperial machine.

What we need, then, is a grassroots effort to help truth get a word in. Help people understand that they’ve been propagandized and deceived about the world by western media and by their power-serving education systems every day of their lives, because propaganda only works if you don’t know it’s happening to you. Sow distrust in the imperial media and institutions. Open people’s eyes to the fact that they’re being lied to, and help them learn to see the truth. Anywhere the empire is sowing lies and distortions — whether that’s in Venezuela or Gaza or somewhere else — use that opportunity to help more people unplug their minds from the propaganda matrix.

A better world is possible. The first step in moving toward it is snapping people out of the propaganda-induced coma which dupes them into settling for this dystopian nightmare instead.

Mohammad Marandi: Middle East Shifts as Two More Wars ERUPT

Israeli settlers attack and rob Italian and Canadian volunteers in West Bank

Italy and Canada have raised concerns about the treatment of their citizens who were beaten and robbed by Israeli settlers in the occupied West Bank. Three Italians and a Canadian were attacked early on Sunday morning in the village of Ein al-Duyuk, near Jericho, where they had volunteered to help protect the Palestinian population from intensifying settler violence.

All four were hospitalised and one, an Italian man, was still receiving care in Ramallah on Monday for more substantial injuries. In a written account, the Canadian said: “At 4.30am on 30 November, 10 masked settlers, two carrying army-issued rifles, burst into the home where we were sleeping after night-watch.

“They beat us for about 15 minutes. I was repeatedly kicked in the head, ribs, hips and thighs. They shouted insults at us in Arabic and told us we had no right to be there. They smashed the interior of the house and destroyed the solar batteries before leaving.” The woman, who did not want her name published for safety reasons, added: “This is not about us. We were beaten for 15 minutes. Palestinians here endure this violence every day, every hour, a thousand-fold.”

The pace and intensity of attacks in Ein al-Duyuk have increased substantially over the past two months since the establishment of a settler outpost nearby and the arrival of young and aggressive settlers. Activists say that violent incidents have become an almost daily occurrence. Attacks have included settler mobs breaking into homes and beating villagers, stealing 200 sheep, two cars and destroying solar panels.

While all settlements on occupied territory are illegal under international law, irregular outposts are illegal under Israeli law. Ein al-Duyuk is in Area A of the West Bank, which means it is meant to be administered by the Palestinian Authority and illegal for Israelis to enter.

Greta CALLS OUT Italy's "FASCIST F**KING GOVT" as Activists Join Labor Strike For Gaza

How the US and Israel Are in Lockstep on Middle East Goals

It’s not just Gaza. From the West Bank to Syria and Lebanon, Israel’s onslaught continues

It is clear now that the ceasefire in Gaza is only a “reducefire”. The onslaught continues. There are near-daily attacks on the territory. On a single day at the end of October, almost 100 Palestinians were killed. On 19 November, 32 were killed. On 23 November, 21. And on it goes. Since the ceasefire, more than 300 have been killed and almost 1,000 injured. Those numbers will rise. The real shift is that the ceasefire has reduced global attention and scrutiny. Meanwhile, Israel’s emerging blueprint becomes clearer: bloody domination not only in Gaza, but across Palestine and the wider region. ...

Gaza is at the sharp end of an expansion of Israeli imperialism, one that stretches to the West Bank and beyond. In the occupied territories of the West Bank, a crackdown that has intensified since 7 October 2023 continues to escalate into a full military siege. Tens of thousands of Palestinians have been forced out of their homes this year in a pattern that Human Rights Watch said amounted to “war crimes, crimes against humanity, and ethnic cleansing … that should be investigated and prosecuted”. Last week, footage emerged of two Palestinian men in Jenin being executed by Israeli soldiers after it appeared that they had surrendered. Itamar Ben-Gvir, the far-right national security minister, said that the forces involved in the killings have his “full backing”. They “acted exactly as expected of them – terrorists must die”. ...

And still, the parameters of Israel’s mandate to assault, kill and land grab continue to widen. Last week, Israeli forces launched a ground incursion in southern Syria, killing 13 Syrians, among them children. The Israeli military refused to provide information on the group it claimed to be targeting in the raid. It was simply reserving its right to reach into Syrian territory, as it has several times since it invaded and occupied the buffer zone between the two countries, and other parts of southern Syria. Since it has done so, Israeli forces have been accused by Human Rights Watch of applying the colonial playbook seen in Palestinian territories: forced displacements, home seizures, demolitions, cutting of livelihoods and unlawful transfer of Syrian detainees to Israel. Israel intends to maintain its presence indefinitely.

To Lebanon, where 64,000 people still remain displaced from their homes after last year’s war, and where Israeli attacks have been intensifying. Despite a peace deal negotiation last November, Israel has launched almost daily bombings in Lebanese territory. The latest was only last week. It continues to occupy five vantage points from which it launches attacks on targets it claims are linked to Hezbollah. According to a UN peacekeeping force in Lebanon, Israel is guilty of more than 10,000 air and ground violations of the ceasefire, during which hundreds of people have been killed. In the melee, civilians are, once again, ejected from their lands, vulnerable to Israeli military assaults and essentially subjects of a sort of Israeli super-sovereignty. According to a recent New York Times report, “the situation in Lebanon offers a compelling example of a new Middle East where Israel’s reach is near ubiquitous”.

What sort of ceasefires are these? What sort of status quo is this? A volatile and unsustainable one, is the answer, one during which no reasonable mind can expect any sort of peace to materialise, either in Palestine or in the wider Middle East. Brokers and stakeholders and diplomats may repeat the language of phased ceasefires and reconstruction schemes, but the reality is that these are plans for a future that is never going to emerge unless Israel’s unlawful acts across territories that it has no legal rights over come to an end. The dangerous illusion that life is returning to normal applies not only in Gaza, but across Palestine and the wider region. It will soon shatter.

Kiev's Catastrophe Day; Pokrovsk Volchansk Fall; ECB NO To EU's Russian Asset Loan Kiev Coup Rumours

Mark Sleboda | Pokrovsk Falls: NATO Mull First Strike On Russia

NATO’s Top Military Officer Floats Idea of ‘Pre-Emptive Strike’ on Russia

NATO’s top military officer has floated the idea of the Western alliance conducting a “pre-emptive” strike on Russia, a comment that drew a sharp rebuke from Moscow.

Adm. Giuseppe Cavo Dragone, the chair of NATO’s Military Committee, made the provocative comment in the context of discussing alleged “Russian hybrid attacks” in Europe. He told the Financial Times that a “pre-emptive strike” could be considered a “defensive action,” but added that “it is further away from our normal way of thinking and behavior.”

The Russian Foreign Ministry called Dragone’s comments “extremely irresponsible” and said it could be an effort to undermine peace talks around Ukraine. “People who make such statements should be aware of the risks and potential consequences, including for the alliance members themselves,” said Russian spokeswoman Maria Zakharova.

While NATO officials are constantly claiming, without providing evidence, that Russia is involved in sabotage attacks in Europe, the US and NATO are openly supporting drone and missile attacks inside Russian territory. The US recently restarted its support for Ukrainian strikes inside Russia using US and British-provided missiles.

Prof. Jeffrey Sachs : Is Trump Planning More Wars?

Trump Holds Talks With Top Advisers on Venezuela Amid Push Toward Regime Change War

President Trump held talks with his top advisers on Monday to discuss Venezuela amid a major US military buildup in the Caribbean and signs that he’s planning to launch attacks on the country, which would be illegal under the Constitution without congressional authorization.

At this point, it’s unclear exactly what was discussed during the talks or whether any decisions were made. The meeting came after Trump confirmed a report that he held a phone call with Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro, a call that Secretary of State Marco Rubio, who has been leading the push toward war, also joined.

According to a report from the Miami Herald, Trump gave Maduro an ultimatum during the call, telling the Venezuelan leader that the only way he could save himself and his family was if he fled the country, and Maduro rejected his terms. ...

According to recent media reports, options that Trump has been presented with for attacking Venezuela include bombing military sites, sending in a special operations force to kill or capture Maduro, or invading with a much larger force to seize airfields and oil fields.

Col. Larry Wilkerson: Red Alerts Everywhere: The U.S. Just Hit a Point of No Return

Trump reportedly gave Maduro ultimatum to relinquish power in Venezuela

Donald Trump reportedly gave Nicolás Maduro an ultimatum to relinquish power immediately during their recent call – but Venezuela’s authoritarian leader declined, demanding a “global amnesty” for himself and allies. On Sunday, the US president confirmed the call had taken place, telling reporters: “I wouldn’t say it went well or badly, it was a phone call.”

Neither the US nor Venezuelan government have offered further details of the topics discussed during the highly unusual conversation, which is thought to have happened on 21 November. But sources told the Miami Herald the US president had sent a “blunt message” to his South American counterpart, who is the focus of a four-month pressure campaign in which Trump has ordered a massive naval deployment off Venezuela’s northern coast.

“You can save yourself and those closest to you, but you must leave the country now,” Trump reportedly said, offering safe passage for Maduro, his wife and his son “only if he agreed to resign right away”. However, Venezuela’s president reportedly refused to step down immediately and allegedly made a series of counter-demands, including worldwide immunity from prosecution and being allowed to cede political control but keep control of the armed forces.

The newspaper said there had been no further direct contact between Trump and Maduro, although Maduro reportedly requested a second call last weekend after Trump declared Venezuela’s airspace “closed in its entirety”. “The Maduro government … received no response,” the Miami Herald claimed, saying the first discussion had been brokered by Brazil, Qatar and Turkey. On Monday Maduro told thousands of supporters that Venezuela did not want “a slave’s peace”.

AMB. Chas Freeman : US Killing Non-Violent Civilians

White House Claims Trump ‘Has the Authority to Kill’ Survivors of Boat Strikes

While continuing to deny that the Pentagon chief ordered those carrying out the first known US military strike on an alleged drug-running boat to "kill everybody" on board, the top White House spokesperson on Monday reiterated the administration's position that President Donald Trump has the authority to take out anyone he deems a "narco-terrorist."

Rights advocates, legal scholars, American lawmakers, and leaders from other countries have condemned the boat bombings in the Caribbean and Pacific Ocean, which began on September 2, as murders, and rejected the Trump administration's argument to Congress that the strikes are justified because the United States is in an "armed conflict" with drug cartels.

A week after the first bombing, the Intercept reported that people on board survived but were killed in a follow-up attack. The Washington Post provided more details on Friday, including that Adm. Frank M. "Mitch" Bradley ordered a second strike on two survivors to fulfill US Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth's alleged directive to kill everyone.

CNN also spoke with an unnamed source who confirmed Hegseth's supposed edict—which the White House press secretary, Karoline Leavitt, denied on Monday.

During Monday's press briefing, NBC News White House correspondent Gabe Gutierrez noted Trump's "confidence" in Hegseth's claim that he did not give an explicit order to kill everyone on the first vessel, and asked Leavitt, "Does the administration deny that that second strike happened, or did it happen and the administration denies that Secretary Hegseth gave the order?"

"The latter is true," Leavitt said. She then read a statement that she often referred back to throughout the briefing:

President Trump and Secretary Hegseth have made it clear that presidentially designated narco-terrorist groups are subject to lethal targeting in accordance with the laws of war. With respect to the strikes in question on September 2, Secretary Hegseth authorized Adm. Bradley to conduct these kinetic strikes. Adm. Bradley worked well within his authority and the law, directing the engagement to ensure the boat was destroyed and the threat to the United States of America was eliminated.

"And I would just add one more point," Leavitt continued, "to remind the American public why these lethal strikes are taking place: Because this administration has designated these narco-terrorists as a foreign terrorist organizations, the president has a right to take them out if they are threatening the United States of America, and if they are bringing illegal narcotics that are killing our citizens at a record rate—which is what they are doing."

Asked by Gutierrez to confirm Bradley ordered the second strike, Leavitt did so, saying that "he was well within his right to do so."

Multiple other reporters also inquired about the recent reporting, including Fox News senior White House correspondent Jacqui Heinrich, who said: "You said that the follow-up strike was lawful. What law is it that allows no survivors?"

Leavitt responded: "The strike conducted on September 2 was conducted in self-defense to protect Americans and vital United States interests. The strike was conducted in international waters and in accordance with the law of armed conflict."

Noting that exchange on social media, former Congressman Justin Amash, a Michigan Republican, said: "This is not how self-defense works. Everyone understands that self-defense requires an immediate physical threat and proportionality. Repelling a missile attack with a missile is self-defense. Blowing up boats hundreds of miles from US shores is not. This isn't complicated."

Ryan Goodman, a former Pentagon special counsel who's now a New York University law professor and Just Security coeditor-in-chief, also weighed in. "This has got to be one of [the] most painful responses to watch," he said, also pointing out that "the 'law' Leavitt cites is utterly irrelevant (self-defense is non sequitur, it's not armed conflict, and 'no survivors' is a crime)."

"Part of the pain in watching that response is knowing how the reported patently illegal orders will affect US service members," Goodman added, referring to a new Just Security essay by Mark P. Nevitt, a retired judge advocate general who is now an associate law professor at Emory University.

Notably, Trump suggested last month that Democratic members of Congress who previously served in the US military and intelligence service and recently warned service members of their duty not to comply with illegal orders should be hanged. The Pentagon has since threatened to court-martial one of them: Sen. Mark Kelly (D-Ariz.), a retired US Navy captain.

According to a CNN timeline, from September 2 to November 15, at least 22 US boat strikes killed 83 people and left two survivors who were initially taken onto a warship but ultimately returned to their home countries of Colombia and Ecuador.

So far, Congress has failed to advance war powers resolutions intended to stop Trump's boat-bombing spree. However, since the Post reporting, top Democrats on both the US House and Senate Armed Services Committees have promised vigorous oversight.

Following Leavitt's remarks on Monday, the New Republic's Greg Sargent said that "it's doubly relevant that Adm. Bradley is in talks about briefing the House Armed Services Committee," and pointed to his new interview with Congressman Adam Smith (D-Wash.), the panel's ranking member.

The congressman told Sargent he will pressure GOP members of the committee, including Chair Mike Rogers (R-Ala.), to "use whatever leverage is available to us to try to get answers," including subpoenaing top civilian and military officials.

Smith also discussed the reporting during a weekend appearance on MS NOW. Posting a clip of it on social media Monday, he declared that "Americans want to live in a constitutional republic, not an authoritarian dictatorship."

Meanwhile, Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-NY) said on the chamber's floor Monday that "I don’t think we have ever seen someone so unserious, so childish, so obviously insecure serving as secretary of defense as Pete Hegseth—and that should alarm every single one of us."

Schumer called on Hegseth to release the tapes "that would show exactly what happened during these military strikes," and to "come before the Congress to testify under oath about the nature of his order, the evidence supporting the strikes, and an explanation for what the goals are in Venezuela."

Trump’s former lawyer Alina Habba serving unlawfully as US attorney, says appeals court

Donald Trump’s former personal lawyer Alina Habba, whom his administration has maneuvered to keep in place as New Jersey’s top federal prosecutor, is disqualified from serving in the role, an appeals court said on Monday.

A panel of judges from the third US circuit court of appeals sitting in Philadelphia sided with a lower court judge’s ruling after hearing oral arguments at which Habba herself was present on 20 October.

“It is apparent that the current administration has been frustrated by some of the legal and political barriers to getting its appointees in place. Its efforts to elevate its preferred candidate for US attorney for the district of New Jersey, Alina Habba, to the role of acting US attorney demonstrate the difficulties it has faced – yet the citizens of New Jersey and the loyal employees in the US attorney’s office deserve some clarity and stability,” the court wrote in a 32-page opinion.

It concluded: “We will affirm the district court’s disqualification order.”

The ruling comes amid the push by Trump’s Republican administration to keep Habba as the acting US attorney for New Jersey, a powerful post charged with enforcing federal criminal and civil law. It also comes after the judges questioned the government’s moves to keep Habba in place after her interim appointment expired and without her getting Senate confirmation

Several protesters arrested after ICE raid thwarted in New York City

A raid by federal immigration authorities on Saturday in New York City was thwarted by about 200 protesters, several of whom were arrested after scuffles with police officers. The episode was the latest in which citizen activists have stood up to agents enforcing Donald Trump’s aggressive immigration agenda through targeted raids in various cities across the country after his second presidency began in January. ...

According to the New York Times, Saturday’s confrontation took place on the edge of Manhattan’s Chinatown neighborhood, where US Customs and Border Protection (CBP) agents were assembling with counterparts from the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) and Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE). The newspaper reported that scuffles with police took place at a parking garage in lower Manhattan beginning in the late morning, with some protesters blocking the government vehicles from leaving with makeshift barricades including garbage bags and metal barriers.

By early afternoon, the Times said, about 200 protesters had gathered, chanting and shouting at the agents, and the confrontation turned violent when some of the vehicles emerged from the garage and were chased along Canal Street. A number of the protesters were “hurling planters and trash cans after them”, the newspaper said, and a masked occupant in one of the vehicles sprayed several people with what appeared to be a chemical irritant.

Time magazine reported government agents abandoned their raid, which would have been their second large-scale operation in six weeks in lower Manhattan. In October, dozens of federal agents swarmed through Chinatown and arrested nine people DHS said were in the US illegally. That raid attracted another spontaneous protest by residents and sparked criticism by leading New York Democrats, including Zohran Mamdani, who was elected mayor of the city in November. ...

Mamdani announced after his election that he would retain Jennifer Tisch as NYPD commissioner a year after she was appointed by outgoing mayor Eric Adams. The Times said Tisch had a phone conversation Saturday with Ricky Patel, the special agent in charge of Homeland Security Investigations, the law enforcement arm of DHS. During the call, a source said, Tisch called Saturday’s government action “unacceptable” and said it put New Yorkers, federal agents and NYPD officers in harm’s way.

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Aipac over affordability: Democratic candidates come under fire for support of Israel

At a campaign event in the Bronx last month, a congressional candidate quizzed a cheering crowd: “What do you think would happen if the US ended all aid to Israel?” At a Thanksgiving gathering with voters, another candidate in the same race fielded questions about affordability – but also about “moral leadership” when it came to Israel’s war in Gaza. A third candidate vying for the same seat devoted much of his campaign’s launch video to lambasting the current member of Congress representing the district over the funding he’s received from the pro-Israel lobby.

The incumbent in question – congressman Ritchie Torres – is one of the most staunchly pro-Israel advocates in Congress. Dalourny Nemorin, one of his challengers for the Democratic nomination to represent the district calls him the “poster boy” for the American Israel Public Affairs Committee, or Aipac. “Ritchie Torres cares more about Bibi than he does about the Bronx,” Michael Blake, another challenger, said in the launch video. Torres’s seat is not likely to be in danger – he is widely popular in his district, which spans a vast swath of the Bronx. But the messaging of his several challengers for the Democratic nomination to represent the district – five candidates have entered the race so far – underscore how major shifts in Americans’ views of Israel are beginning to seep into political campaigns. ...

Across the country, candidates who are openly critical of Israel – including a record number who are of Palestinian descent – are entering local, state and federal races, donning keffiyehs and denouncing “genocide” in campaign materials. ... In New York City, which holds primaries in June, voters said they preferred Mamdani’s approach to Gaza over that of his challengers. Several incumbent Democrats – including Daniel Goldman and Adriano Espaillat – are on the defensive over their pro-Israel stances.

Israel’s war in Gaza played an outsized role in the New York City mayoral election. While he did not back down on his pro-Palestinian stance even as it offered a frequent attack line against him, Mamdani ran a campaign that focused primarily on affordability. Candidates looking to tap into his momentum are trying to emulate that focus while also connecting cost of living issues with the US government’s massive funding of Israel. ... The more than $21bn the US sent to Israel since October 2023 alone offer a way to link the issue to voters’ material interests.

Trump Approval In FREE FALL As WH Answers MRI Questions

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Zillow deletes climate risk data from listings after complaints it harms sales

Zillow, the US’s largest real estate listing site, has removed a feature that allowed people to view a property’s exposure to the climate crisis, following complaints from the industry and some homeowners that it was hurting sales. In September last year, the online real estate marketplace introduced a tool showing the individual risk of wildfire, flood, extreme heat, wind and poor air quality for one million properties it lists, explaining that “climate risks are now a critical factor in home-buying decisions” for many Americans.

But Zillow has now deleted this climate index in the wake of complaints from real estate agents and some homeowners that the rankings appeared arbitrary, could not be challenged and harmed house sales. The complaints included those from the California Regional Multiple Listing Service, which oversees a database of property data that Zillow relies upon.

Zillow said it remains committed to help Americans make informed decisions about properties, with listings now containing outbound links to the website of First Street, the nonprofit climate risk quantifier that had provided the on-site tool to Zillow. Matthew Eby, founder and chief executive of First Street, said that removing the climate risk information means that many buyers will be “flying blind” in an era when worsening impacts of extreme weather are warping the real estate market in the US.

“The risk doesn’t go away; it just moves from a pre-purchase decision into a post-purchase liability,” Eby said. “Families discover after a flood that they should have purchased flood insurance, or discover after the sale that wildfire insurance is unaffordable or unavailable in their area. Access to accurate risk information before a purchase isn’t just helpful; it’s essential to protecting consumers and preventing lifelong financial consequences.” ...

Eby defended First Street’s methods and accuracy, pointing out that the models used are built on peer-reviewed science and validated against real-world outcomes. “So when claims are made that our models are inaccurate, we ask for evidence,” he said. “To date, all the empirical validation shows our science is working as designed and providing better risk insight than the tools the industry has relied on historically.”

‘Fighting for Our Lives’: Youth Sue to Block Utah Fossil Fuel Permits

Following the Utah Supreme Court's dismissal of a youth-led constitutional climate lawsuit earlier this year, 10 young Utahns on Monday launched a new case intended to block state permits for coal, gas, and oil development.

Backed by Our Children's Trust—a legal group behind various youth climate suits, including Juliana v. United States and Held v. State of Montana—the plaintiffs are suing he Utah Board of Oil, Gas, and Mining; the Division of Oil, Gas, and Mining; and the director of the latter, Mick Thomas, in state court.

"Plaintiffs bring this action to protect their fundamental rights to life, health, and safety that defendants are violating by permitting fossil fuel development, when doing so is harmful, unnecessary, and more expensive than clean, renewable forms of energy," says the complaint.

"Due to localized air and climate pollution caused by defendants' permitting activities, plaintiffs live in some of the worst air quality of any state in the nation and face climate disruptions, including elevated temperatures and deadly heatwaves, frequent and severe wildfires and smoke, exceptional drought, exacerbated medical conditions, and increased health risks," the filing continues.

"Defendants' fossil fuel permitting challenged here is unconstitutional because it harms the health and safety of plaintiffs, interferes with their healthy development, and takes years off of their lives," the document adds.

When the Utah Supreme Court upheld the dismissal of the earlier lawsuit in March, Our Children's Trust called it a "partial win" because, as lead attorney Andrew Welle explained at the time, "the decision opens a clear path forward for continuing our challenge to the state's actions in promoting fossil fuel development."

The lead plaintiff for both cases is Natalie Roberts, an 18-year-old who lives in Salt Lake City. In April, the American Lung Association's annual State of the Air report gave the state capital's metro area an "F" grade for both ground-level ozone (smog) and particle (soot) pollution.

"Both ozone and particle pollution can cause premature death and other serious health effects such as asthma attacks, heart attacks and strokes, preterm births, and impaired cognitive functioning later in life. Particle pollution can also cause lung cancer," said Nick Torres, advocacy director for the American Lung Association, in a statement when the report was released.

"Unfortunately, too many people in the Salt Lake City metro area are living with unhealthy levels of ozone and particle pollution," Torres continued. "This air pollution is causing kids to have asthma attacks, making people who work outdoors sick and unable to work, and leading to low birth weight in babies. We urge Utah policymakers to take action to improve our air quality, and we are calling on everyone to support the incredibly important work of the US Environmental Protection Agency."

Hole in Antarctic ozone layer shrinks to smallest since 2019

The hole in the ozone layer over the Antarctic this year was the smallest and shortest-lived since 2019, according to European space scientists, who described the finding as a “reassuring sign” of the layer’s recovery.

The yearly gap in what scientists have called “planetary sunscreen” reached a maximum area of 21m sq km (8.1m sq miles) over the southern hemisphere in September – well below the maximum of 26m sq km reached in 2023 – and shrank in size until coming to an early close on Monday, data from the Copernicus Atmosphere Monitoring Service (Cams) shows.

It marks the second year in a row of smaller holes in the ozone layer, after a series of larger and longer-lasting holes that appeared between 2020 and 2023. “The earlier closure and relatively small size of this year’s ozone hole is a reassuring sign,” said Laurence Rouil, the director of Cams. “[It] reflects the steady year-on-year progress we are now observing in the recovery of the ozone layer thanks to the ODS [ozone-depleting substances] ban.”

The ozone layer, a stratospheric shield that protects life on Earth from ultraviolet (UV) rays, has been worn down by human pollution. However, since ozone-depleting chemicals were phased out by the 1987 Montreal protocol and a series of amendments that followed, it has begun to recover. A study in Nature Climate Change last year found the actions had successfully curbed emissions, and led to the heating effects of the gases peaking five years earlier than expected.

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Also of Interest

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

Europa Ante Novum Bellum (Europe Before the New War)

Soldiers Have ‘Duty To Refuse’ Hegseth’s Order To Commit War Crimes

Trump’s pardon of Honduras’s ex-president shows counter-drug effort is ‘based on lies and hypocrisy’

Mexican authorities kill one of country’s top fentanyl traffickers

Hundreds flee central Haiti after gangs launch large-scale attacks and burn homes

The Financialization Hoover Effect & The End Of The American Dream

The question isn’t whether the AI bubble will burst – but what the fallout will be

Why Do We Still Have Poverty?

Luigi Mangione under ‘constant watch’ in prison to prevent ‘Epstein-style situation’

‘We’re true guardians of the forest’: quilombola community near Belém demand land rights and recognition

Zohran Rises, Trump Flexes, Europe Falls — w/ Yanis Varoufakis

How Netanyahu’s war crimes probe at The Hague was derailed

Millions of full-time workers are struggling to afford a place to live. Here’s why

"A War Crime & Murder": David Cole on U.S. Killing of Survivors of Boat Strike in Caribbean

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A Little Night Music

Smokey Hogg w/ Frankie Lee Sims - Hard Times

Smokey Hogg – When The Sun Goes Down

Andrew "Smokey" Hogg-Kind Hearted Blues

Smokey Hogg – Worrying Mind

Smokey Hogg - Penitentiary Blues

Smokey Hogg w/ Frankie Lee Sims - Goin' Back Home

Smokey Hogg - I Want a Roller

Smokey Hogg - Crawdad

Smokey Hogg - I'm Gonna Find Your Trick

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