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This evening's music features blues singer Georgia White. Enjoy!

"Fake news executives are nicer than real news executives, though real news executives are funnier than fake news executives. They dont know theyre being funny."

-- Stephen Colbert

News and Opinion

An interesting interview, worth reading in full:

“I Don’t Think We’re Free in America” – An Interview with Bryan Stevenson

Although the United States has just elected a new president whose promise to make America great “again” evoked an unspecified, presumably more glorious past, Americans’ appreciation of their own history, and particularly its most damning chapters, is limited at best. ...

Aiming to confront and reclaim that history, the Equal Justice Initiative, led by civil rights attorney and author Bryan Stevenson, launched its “Lynching in America” initiative, a years-long effort to compile the most comprehensive record of racial terror lynchings between 1877 and 1950. The project includes a detailed report of more than 4,000 lynchings in 12 states in the South, including 800 that were previously unreported, as well as plans for a museum in Montgomery, and an effort to erect markers in the places where lynchings took place. ...

The Intercept spoke with Stevenson about America’s failure to come to terms with its racist past — and therefore its present.

[Following is an excerpt from the interview. - js]

"There’s no question that there’s a consciousness and an awareness about our history of slavery, and terrorism, and segregation. But that doesn’t mean there’s an appreciation of the significance of that history, and people will invoke elements of that history in a way that is oppressive and bigoted and problematic because there is no appreciation of the significance of that history. Part of our work is aimed at trying to re-engage this country with an awareness and understanding of how our history of racial inequality continues to haunt us. I don’t think we’re free in America — I think we’re all burdened by this history of racial injustice, which has created a narrative of racial difference, which has infected us, corrupted us, and allowed us to see the world through this lens. So it becomes necessary to talk about that history if we want to get free.

Our project is trying to do that. We want there to be some acknowledgement that we’re a post-genocide society, that when white settlers came to this continent, there were millions of native people here whom we’ve killed through famine and war and disease, and that we forced off their land sometimes in cruel and barbaric ways. And instead of acknowledging that genocide we said, “No, those people are different, they’re not really people, they’re savages,” and we used this narrative of racial difference to justify this horrific behavior. That same narrative of racial difference was employed to justify centuries of slavery."

Fake News flows from the open, running sewer of the Washington Post.

Washington Post latest blunder proves fake news is fine... if it involves Russia

Russia Hysteria Infects WashPost Again: False Story About Hacking U.S. Electric Grid

The Washington Post on Friday reported a genuinely alarming event: Russian hackers have penetrated the U.S. power system through an electrical grid in Vermont. The Post headline conveyed the seriousness of the threat:

Russian hackers penetrated U.S. electricity grid through a utility in Vermont, officials say

The first sentence of the article directly linked this cyberattack to alleged Russian hacking of the email accounts of the DNC and John Podesta — what is now routinely referred to as “Russian hacking of our election” — by referencing the code name revealed on Wednesday by the Obama administration when it announced sanctions on Russian officials: “A code associated with the Russian hacking operation dubbed Grizzly Steppe by the Obama administration has been detected within the system of a Vermont utility, according to U.S. officials.” ...

It did not happen.

There was no “penetration of the U.S. electricity grid.” The truth was undramatic and banal. Burlington Electric, after receiving a Homeland Security notice sent to all U.S. utility companies about the malware code found in the DNC system, searched all its computers and found the code in a single laptop that was not connected to the electric grid.

Apparently, the Post did not even bother to contact the company before running its wildly sensationalistic claims, so Burlington Electric had to issue its own statement to the Burlington Free Press, which debunked the Post’s central claim (emphasis in original): “We detected the malware in a single Burlington Electric Department laptop not connected to our organization’s grid systems.” ...

Even worse, there is zero evidence that Russian hackers were even responsible for the implanting of this malware on this single laptop. The fact that malware is “Russian-made” does not mean that only Russians can use it; indeed, like a lot of malware, it can be purchased (as Jeffrey Carr has pointed out in the DNC hacking context, assuming that Russian-made malware must have been used by Russians is as irrational as finding a Russian-made Kalishnikov AKM rifle at a crime scene and assuming the killer must be Russian).

Watch “fake news” become a meaningless phrase

Trump questions claims of Russian hacking: 'I know things others don't'

Donald Trump has expressed continued skepticism over whether Russia was responsible for computer hacks of Democratic party officials.

In remarks to reporters upon entering a New Year’s Eve celebration at his Mar-a-Lago estate on Saturday night, Trump warned against being quick to pin the blame on Russia for the hacking of US emails.

“I just want them to be sure, because it’s a pretty serious charge,” he said.

“And if you look at the weapons of mass destruction, that was a disaster, and they were wrong.” ...

“And so I want them to be sure. I think it’s unfair if they don’t know. And I know a lot about hacking. And hacking is a very hard thing to prove."

“So it could be somebody else. And I also know things that other people don’t know, and so they cannot be sure of the situation.”

Asked what that information included, the president-elect said: “You will find out on Tuesday or Wednesday.” He did not elaborate, although in a statement released on Thursday in response to Obama’s sanctions, he said he would meet intelligence officials.

The American Public Should Be Thankful For Russian “Interference”

It would be one thing if Russian saboteurs infected election systems and tampered with the actual tabulation of votes, but there’s no evidence at all for this and no one seriously alleges it. (Even so, half of all Democrats now believe that the vote really was “rigged” by Russia.)

Half of Clinton voters believe, without evidence, that Russia tampered with vote tallies. Fake news at work. https://t.co/blVahJqlI6 pic.twitter.com/KSiSJyeYZJ

— Alex Emmons (@AlexanderEmmons) December 29, 2016

If the state-sponsored Russian hackers did something truly malignant, like messing with election results, then yes — that’d be a severe breach and warrant substantial retaliation. But as it stands, the sinister Russians are accused of illuminating American voters as to the activities of the country’s most powerful political actors. The revelations made via WikiLeaks shined a light on all manner of fraud, deceit, and malfeasance. Would it have been better had voters not received access to this information? Who did it harm, other than a small group of political functionaries like Podesta and Wasserman-Schultz? Didn’t the American polity actually profit as a result of these hacks, given that they were provided important information about a presidential candidate that would have been otherwise suppressed?

When people use the word “interfered” to characterize what the Russian government is supposed to have done here, they give whole matter a needlessly nefarious gloss. “Russian interference in the election” connotes some kind of elaborate, intensive subversion plot. But that’s not what happened at all — voters weren’t harmed as a result of this “interference.” They were benefitted.

Donald Trump warns 'no computer is safe'

Donald Trump warned guests at his New Year’s Eve party that “no computer is safe” and suggested people should send letters instead of emails for highly sensitive communications.

The US President-elect made his comments to reporters and celebrity guests, including actor Sylvester Stallone, who were gathered at his annual party at the Mar-a-Lago club in Palm Beach, Florida.

Mr Trump, who claims to rarely use emails or computers in spite of his fondness for tweeting, said: “You know, if you have something really important, write it out and have it delivered by courier, the old-fashioned way.

“Because I’ll tell you what: No computer is safe. I don’t care what they say.”

Iraq: Fighting IS group in the country prevents terror at home, Hollande tells troops

52,369 Killed in Iraq during 2016; 3,174 Killed During December

At least 52,369 people were killed in Iraq during 2017. Another 21,795 were wounded.

According to figures compiled by Antiwar.com, at least 9,148 civilians, 6,430 security personnel, and 36,661 militants were killed. Also, three U.S. servicemen were killed in combat in Iraq. (A fourth one was killed fighting the Islamic State militants in Syria.) A British bomb disposal expert and 125 members of the Kurdistan Workers Party were killed as well. Two French soldiers, a British bomb disposal expert, and an Australian N.G.O. worker were wounded. These figures are similar to 2015’s, which were 52,045 killed and 19,651 wounded.

In December, at least 3,174 people were killed and 1,939 were wounded. Of these, 798 were civilians killed. Another 1,658 civilians were injured. Security forces lost 154 personnel, while another 177 were wounded. At least 2,181 militants were killed, and 104 were injured. Also, at least 41 Kurdistan Workers Party (P.K.K.) members were killed in Turkish airstrikes within Iraqi territory. These figures are likely to be low estimates.

Due to the nature of the conflict and the Iraqi government restricting the release of actual numbers, true counts are impossible to derive.

Hundreds of Syrians flee as Assad's forces bomb Barada valley rebels

Army and militia units supporting the Syrian president, Bashar al-Assad, advanced further on Monday on a rebel region that is key to the capital’s water supply, launching strikes and artillery fire threatening a fragile nationwide truce.

Hundreds of civilians have fled the Barada valley region outside Damascus since Saturday, where government forces were battling several insurgent groups.

The region has been the target of days of airstrikes and shelling despite the recent nationwide ceasefire, which was brokered by Russia and Turkey and appears to be holding in other parts of the country, despite some reports of fighting. ...

The military said those fleeing Barada valley were relocated to safer areas and their names were registered by the Syrian Arab Red Crescent. Rami Abdurrahman, who heads the opposition’s Britain-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, said there were buses in the region ready to evacuate civilians but could not confirm how many people had left. Reports suggested more than a thousand had left in the last three days.

He said the Barada valley region was not part of the ceasefire because of the presence of Fatah al-Sham Front, formerly known as the Nusra Front, and government forces and allied fighters were engaged in fierce clashes with rebels.

“Regime forces and fighters from Lebanon’s Hezbollah group are advancing in the region and are now on the outskirts of Ain al-Fijeh, the primary water source in the area,” he said.

Syrian Rebels Threaten to Withdraw From Ceasefire

Syria’s ceasefire has mostly held through the weekend, and managed to get an endorsement from the UN Security Council on Saturday. At the same time, however, rebels are threatening to withdraw from the pact soon, accusing the government of widespread violations.

At issue, as ever, is the status of al-Qaeda’s Nusra Front, which the rebels insisted are included in the truce, and the government insists are not. Syrian forces have continued to target Nusra and their allies throughout the ceasefire, and that is leading the rebels to demand Russia stop Syria from all strikes anywhere in the country or risk seeing the truce collapse.

The source of this confusion appears to be the language of the ceasefire excluding “UN-designated terrorist organizations.” While the Nusra Front is indeed such a group, they changed their official name over the summer, and the rebels are arguing that means they’re not technically terrorists anymore.

Israel: Police to question PM Benjamin Netanyahu over alleged gifts

Israeli Prime Minister Netanyahu faces questions about gifts from an American billionaire

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu is to face questioning by police Monday about gifts he received from an American billionaire and other foreign businessmen, Israeli media is reporting.

The questions will focus on allegations that Netanyahu and his family took gifts and other favors from business figures in Israel and abroad, in breach of his position as a public official.

Netanyahu, who has strenuously denied the allegations, reasserted his innocence Monday, advising his critics in the media to hold off their celebrations, the Jerusalem Post reported.

Police arrived for the interview at the prime minister’s official residence on Monday night, where a black veil had been put up to block the view of reporters, according to reports.

Majority of Americans Unconvinced Trump Can Handle Nation's Top Job

According to results released by Gallup on Monday, "less than half of Americans are confident in [Trump's] ability to handle an international crisis (46%), to use military force wisely (47%) or to prevent major scandals in his administration (44%)."

Those numbers are far lower than measures taken on Trump's most recent predecessors—Barack Obama, George W. Bush, and Bill Clinton—all of whom had percentages close to 70% in each of those categories prior to their taking office.

Democrats Aim to Slam Brakes on Key Members of Trump's "Rigged Cabinet"

Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) has been warned that Senate Democrats are planning to "aggressively target" eight of President-elect Donald Trump's Cabinet nominees, aiming to delay as long as possible the confirmation hearings slated to start next week. 

"President-elect Trump is attempting to fill his rigged cabinet with nominees that would break key campaign promises and have made billions off the industries they’d be tasked with regulating," Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-N.Y.) said in a statement Sunday reported by the Washington Post.

"Any attempt by Republicans to have a series of rushed, truncated hearings before Inauguration Day and before the Congress and public have adequate information on all of them is something Democrats will vehemently resist," Schumer said. "If Republicans think they can quickly jam through a whole slate of nominees without a fair hearing process, they're sorely mistaken."

The nominees in the Democrats' crosshairs are:

• Secretary of State nominee and ExxonMobil CEO Rex Tillerson;
• Sen. Jeff Sessions (R-Ala.), Trump's pick for attorney general;
• Heiress Betsy DeVos, nominated for Education secretary;
• Rep. Tom Price (R-Ga.), Trump's choice to lead the Department of Health and Human Services;
• Fast-food CEO and Labor secretary nominee Andrew Puzder;
• Treasury nominee Steve Mnuchin, a former Goldman Sachs partner;
• Oklahoma Attorney General Scott Pruitt, Trump's pick to head the Environmental Protection Agency; and
• Rep. Mick Mulvaney (R-S.C.), tapped to lead the Office of Management and Budget.

Confirmation hearings for Tillerson and Sessions are expected to begin next week. 

Seasteading: tech leaders' plans for floating city trouble French Polynesians

A futuristic plan to build a floating techno-libertarian city in a French Polynesian lagoon has left some local residents worried they could be the next unsuspecting inhabitants of a peaceful planet in a science-fiction movie. ...

The proposal for a seastead – an autonomous oceanic colony; think homesteading, but wetter - took a significant step on Christmas Day, when a Silicon Valley group announced it had reached an agreement with the French Polynesian government, with officials poised to explore serving as the group’s host.

Seasteaders said it was a breakthrough that could change the world, but Tahitian TV host Alexandre Taliercio worried that rich Americans simply wanted to use his home to dodge taxes.

“These millionaires,” he said, “lulled by an illusory desire to free themselves from the existing states, seem to have much more to gain than we do.”

The idea of seasteading – escaping the laws, regulations, and taxes of life on terra firma by establishing an outpost in international waters – has long enchanted libertarians.

This Proposed Pipeline Would Cut Right Through The Appalachian Trail

Environmental groups are voicing opposition to a proposed natural gas pipeline that would cut across the Appalachian Trail in Virginia and require clearing a previously protected corridor of forest.

The Mountain Valley Pipeline would transport natural gas from northwest West Virginia to southern Virginia, according to The Wilderness Society, which published an editorial this week saying the pipeline would set a “dangerous precedent.” That’s because construction would involve clearing a 125-foot-wide section that would cross 3.4 miles of forest protected under the Forest Service’s “roadless rule ― litigation meant to protect lands from road construction and logging.

“Some of the most iconic viewpoints, like Angels Rest, along the Appalachian Trail in Virginia will look out upon an ugly swath of destruction that dissects habitat and threatens waterways,” the Wilderness Society writes.

Specifically, the pipeline would cross Jefferson National Forest in West Virginia and Virginia, pass through the Appalachian National Scenic Trail Corridor and cross the Appalachian Trail near Virginia’s Peters Mountain Wilderness Area, according to the conservation group Wild Virginia. ...

Pipeline supporters include Virginia Gov. Terry McAuliffe (D) and local business leaders, who say the project would create jobs, lower energy costs and potentially attract new business.

Mountain Valley Pipeline Project #Virginia & #westvirginia https://t.co/CylgPi6Wv4 @piedmontenviron @NWFMidAtlantic @Nature_DCMDVA #Loudoun pic.twitter.com/BR6XMSvtHy

— EarthDay@Loudoun (@LoudounEarthDay) November 23, 2016

Planet Earth II 'a disaster for world's wildlife' says rival nature producer

David Attenborough’s blockbuster nature series Planet Earth II is “a disaster for the world’s wildlife” and a significant contributor to planet-wide extinctions, a rival natural history producer has claimed.

The BBC programme concluded in December and drew audiences of more than 12 million viewers but presents “an escapist wildlife fantasy” that ignores the damage humans are doing to species everywhere, according to Martin Hughes-Games, a presenter of the BBC’s Springwatch. ... Hughes-Games said the makers had ignored evidence of mass extinction, most recently from the World Wide Fund for Nature and the Zoological Society of London, which reported last year that between 1970 and 2012 there had been a 58% decline in the abundance of vertebrates worldwide.

“These programmes are still made as if this worldwide mass extinction is simply not happening,” he said. “The producers continue to go to the rapidly shrinking parks and reserves to make their films – creating a beautiful, beguiling, fantasy world, a utopia where tigers still roam free and untroubled, where the natural world exists as if man had never been.”

The result is that Attenborough and others “are lulling the huge worldwide audience into a false sense of security,” he said. “No hint of the continuing disaster is allowed to shatter the illusion.”

Standing Rock protesters unfurl banner over field at Minneapolis NFL game

In Minneapolis on Sunday protesters unfurled a banner protesting the Dakota Access oil pipeline, high above the field during an NFL game between the Minnesota Vikings and the Chicago Bears.

The protest continued through the game, though play was unaffected.

The banner, which read “Divest #NoDAPL” and carried the US Bank logo, was hung in the US Bank Stadium by two people. One of the protesters, wearing a No4 Brett Favre Vikings uniform, rappelled down the banner.

Members of the media were reportedly sent a message that said the stunt was designed to urge US Bank to divest from the pipeline project, which is run by Energy Transfer Partners, a Dallas-based company.

Also of Interest

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

Trump and Brexit left progressives aghast – they should be emboldened

The day violent thugs were driven out by hippies with glowsticks

U.S. Special Operations Numbers Surge in Africa’s Shadow Wars

Barack Obama Wasn’t Nearly As Tough on Israel as Republican Presidents

On Loving Another Country

A Little Night Music

Georgia White - Alley Boogie

Georgia White - New Dupree Blues

Georgia White - The Blues Ain't Nothing But

Georgia White - I Just Want Your Stingaree

Georgia White - Hydrant Love

Georgia White - Your Worries Ain't Like Mine

Georgia White - No Second Hand Woman

Georgia White - Fire In The Mountain

Georgia White - The Stuff Is Here

Georgia White - Late Hour Blues