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“Once a government is committed to the principle of silencing the voice of opposition, it has only one way to go, and that is down the path of increasingly repressive measures, until it becomes a source of terror to all its citizens and creates a country where everyone lives in fear."

-- Harry S. Truman

News and Opinion

“Victory for Julian”: U.K. Blocks WikiLeaks Founder Assange Extradition to U.S. on Espionage Charges

The US DOJ has already said it intends to appeal. The question -- and I'm hearing different things on this -- is whether the courts will keep Assange imprisoned while that appeal is pending. The court ordered him released, but it's unclear if the DOJ appeal will keep him in jail.

— Glenn Greenwald (@ggreenwald) January 4, 2021

Ultimately, though, from a humanitarian *and* a political perspective, what matters most is that Assange be freed as soon as possible. The US Govt doesn't care what prison he's in, or why: they just want him silenced and in a cage.

He should be freed immediately.

— Glenn Greenwald (@ggreenwald) January 4, 2021

Just confirmed: Assange's lawyers will request he be released on bail pending US Govt's appeal. The judge will decide that today. Ordinarily, defendants in these cases remain in jail pending appeal, and this judge emphasized how "humane" his conditions are in the UK. We'll see.

— Glenn Greenwald (@ggreenwald) January 4, 2021

At the request of Assange's lawyers - who want to build their best case for why his current prison conditions are oppressive and why they can offer guarantees that he won't abscond - the judge set the bail hearing for Wednesday to determine if Assange will be free pending appeal.

— Glenn Greenwald (@ggreenwald) January 4, 2021

Caitlin Johnstone: Let’s Be Absolutely Clear What’s At Stake In The Assange Case

We see this struggle playing out in many ways in our world right now. Between propaganda and those trying to learn and share the truth. Between the push for internet censorship and the fight against it. Between government secrecy and freedom of information. Between the campaign to imprison WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange for exposing US war crimes, and the campaign to free him.

On Monday January 4th a UK judge will be ruling on whether or not to allow the process of Assange’s extradition to the United States to move forward. It’s important for opponents of this extradition to be aware that the fight will not end at this time; there’s still a gruelling appeals process to go through which could take 18 to 24 months or longer in the likely event that the incredibly biased judge overseeing the case rules against Assange.

So as we prepare for the next stage in this fight, it’s important for us to be perfectly clear what’s at stake here.

It is absolutely true that this case will have far-reaching implications for press freedoms around the world. The imperial narrative managers have been toiling for years to frame the persecution of Julian Assange as something other than what it is, but in reality this case is about whether the most powerful government in the world is allowed to extradite journalists anywhere on earth who expose its malfeasance. Whether or not the United States should be allowed to imprison journalists for exposing its war crimes.

If the US succeeds in normalizing the legality of extraditing any journalist anywhere in the world who exposes its wrongdoing, there will be a worldwide cooling effect on national security journalism which will greatly impede humanity’s ability to form a lucid and unobstructed understanding of what’s going on in the world. The largest power structure on earth will have succeeded in not just turning the lights off in the room, but in uninstalling the light switch.

There is no legal case in the world right now where the struggle for lucid and unobstructed seeing has so much on the line. For this reason, this isn’t just about journalism: we really are collectively deciding the fate of our species with our response to the prospect of Assange’s extradition.

Are we going to allow the most powerful government on the planet to set a legal precedent which allows it to obstruct truth around the entire world? Or are we going to oppose this tooth and claw?

Are we going to allow power to remain corrupt and unaccountable? Or are we going to insist on our right to know what’s going on?

Are we going to let them keep the lights off? Or are we going to turn them on?

Are we going to let the bastards lock us into an omnicidal, ecocidal status quo while they drive us at a rapidly accelerating pace toward extinction and dystopia? Or are we going to move toward the kind of lucid and unobstructed perception of our situation which will allow us to progress into a healthy world?

These are the questions that we are in the process of answering together. I hope we can get everyone to very seriously consider what they want their own answer to be.

Tucker Carlson interview with Julian Assange's fiancee Stella Moris

The Deep State Isn’t a Partisan Issue | Guests: Rep. Tulsi Gabbard and Rep. Thomas Massie

Julian Assange partner: extradition would be ‘unthinkable travesty’

Julian Assange’s partner has said a decision to extradite the WikiLeaks co-founder to the US would be “politically and legally disastrous for the UK”, on the eve of the judge’s ruling. Assange, 49, faces an 18-count indictment, alleging a plot to hack computers and a conspiracy to obtain and disclose national defence information in a case critics have decried as a dangerous attack on press freedom.

At the Old Bailey on Monday, the district judge Vanessa Baraitser will deliver her decision on whether he should be extradited to face the charges in the US, where his lawyers say he faces up to 175 years in jail if convicted. The US government says the sentence is likely to be between four and six years.

Before Baraitser’s ruling, Stella Moris, who has two children with Assange, said a decision to allow extradition would not only be an “unthinkable travesty” for her partner but would damage cherished British freedoms. “It would rewrite the rules of what it is permissible to publish here,” Moris wrote in the Mail on Sunday. “Overnight, it would chill free and open debate about abuses by our own government and by many foreign ones, too.

“In effect, foreign countries could simply issue an extradition request saying that UK journalists, or Facebook users for that matter, have violated their censorship laws. The press freedoms we cherish in Britain are meaningless if they can be criminalised and suppressed by regimes in Russia or Ankara or by prosecutors in Alexandria, Virginia.”

'I just want 11,780 votes': Trump pressed Georgia to overturn Biden victory

In an hour-long phone call on Saturday, Donald Trump pressed Georgia secretary of state Brad Raffensperger to overturn Joe Biden’s victory there in the election the president refuses to concede. The Washington Post obtained a tape of the “extraordinary” conversation, which Trump acknowledged on Twitter.

Amid widespread outrage including calls for a second impeachment, Bob Bauer, a senior Biden adviser, said: “We now have irrefutable proof of a president pressuring and threatening an official of his own party to get him to rescind a state’s lawful, certified vote count and fabricate another in its place.” The Post published the full call.

“The people of Georgia are angry, the people in the country are angry,” Trump said. “And there’s nothing wrong with saying, you know, um, that you’ve recalculated.” Raffensperger is a Republican who has become a bête noire among Trump supporters for repeatedly saying Biden’s win in his state was fair. In one of a number of parries, he said: “Well, Mr President, the challenge that you have is, the data you have is wrong.” Trump said: “So look. All I want to do is this. I just want to find 11,780 votes, which is one more than we have. Because we won the state.”

Trump presses top Georgia election official to ‘find’ votes for him in recorded phone call

'Traitors and patriots': Republican push to keep Trump in power seems doomed

All 12 Republican senators who have pledged not to ratify the electoral college results on Wednesday, and thereby refuse to confirm Joe Biden’s resounding victory over Donald Trump in the presidential election, declined to defend their move on television, a CNN host said on Sunday.

“It all recalls what Ulysses S Grant once wrote in 1861,” Jake Tapper said on State of the Union, before quoting a letter the union general wrote at the outset of a civil war he won before becoming president himself: ‘There are [but] two parties now: traitors and patriots.’ ...

The attempt to overturn Trump’s defeat seems doomed, a piece of political theatre mounted by party grandees eager to court supporters loyal to the president before, in some cases, mounting their own runs for the White House.

Nonetheless on Saturday Ted Cruz of Texas and Ron Johnson of Wisconsin led 11 senators and senators-elect in calling for “an emergency 10-day audit” of results in states where the president claims electoral fraud, despite failing to provide evidence and repeatedly losing in court.

“Find 11,780 Votes”: Trump Pushes Georgia to Overturn Election in Move to Disenfranchise Millions

New Congress sworn in as Georgia runoffs loom and Trump runs amok

Congress convened for its 117th session on Sunday, swearing in lawmakers amid extraordinary political turmoil as Republicans worked to overturn Joe Biden’s victory over Donald Trump, crucial Senate runoffs in Georgia loomed and the coronavirus surge imposed severe limits on familiar Capitol ceremonies.

The Democrat Nancy Pelosi was re-elected as House speaker. But most attention was focused on the Senate, where Mitch McConnell could be carrying out his final acts as Republican majority leader.

If Democrats John Ossoff and Raphael Warnock unseat Republicans Kelly Loeffler and David Perdue in Georgia on Tuesday, the chamber will split 50-50. As vice-president, Kamala Harris would then hold a deciding vote, boosting Biden’s hopes of legislative success.

In an extraordinarily acrimonious campaign, early voting has shattered runoff records, with 3m ballots cast. African American turnout, critical to the Democrats’ chances, has been robust: about a third of ballots have come from self-identified Black voters, up from around 27% in the November contests which did not produce conclusive winners.

Paygo Exemptions in House Rules Will Help Pave Way for Green New Deal and Medicare for All, Progressives Say

Progressives on Saturday applauded House Democrats for including in the chamber's rules package for the incoming Congress two key exemptions from the "pay as you go" rule, also known as Paygo, which could cut down on roadblocks keeping lawmakers from passing far-reaching healthcare and climate action legislation.

House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) and House Rules Committee Chairman Jim McGovern (D-Mass.) unveiled an updated rules package which would exempt legislation "to prevent, prepare for, or respond to economic or public health consequences" of the Covid-19 pandemic or of the climate crisis, from being subjected to Paygo.

Paygo requires that any increase in spending by the federal government be matched by offsetting tax increases or budget cuts, and progressives including Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-N.Y.) have called for the rule to be revoked in recent years while Pelosi and other Democrats have defended it.

Ocasio-Cortez and her legislative goals were derided by critics after taking office in January 2019, as Pelosi adopted the Paygo rule for the 116th Congress. The New York congresswoman voted against the 2019 rules package.

On Saturday, Ocasio-Cortez added the "demotion" of Paygo to the list of achievements by progressives in Congress in recent years.

Breaking the federal government and corporate political press's "austerity mindset and rules, especially on climate, is a major tenet of the Green New Deal," Ocasio-Cortez tweeted.

The Intercept journalist Ryan Grim noted that the elimination of Paygo as a consideration for measures involving public health could eventually help Congress to pass Medicare for All as well as other measures to help Americans struggling with the effects of the coronavirus pandemic.

Lawmakers "could quite easily cite [the pandemic and the climate crisis] as the need for expanded public healthcare, which is specified in both subsections," Grim tweeted, adding that the rules change "easily covers a very sweeping set of policies."

After decades of powerful House Democrats being "fervently committed" to Paygo, tweeted Claire Sandberg, former national organizing director for Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.), "it's welcome news that exemptions have now been created for two extremely broad policy areas."

Other progressives praised the proposed rules change, which must still be voted on in the Democrat-controlled House, on social media.

Vaccine Rollout Is TOTAL DISASTER Nationwide, Falling Millions Of Doses Short

Hundreds of thousands more US Covid deaths possible amid vaccine chaos

America had no trouble hitting the appalling milestone of 20m coronavirus cases, but reaching the federal government’s own target of vaccinating 20 million people by the end of 2020 proved a huge problem. Just under 3 million Americans were vaccinated by the time the crystal-encrusted ball dropped in New York’s almost-deserted Times Square at midnight on New Year’s Eve to mark the end of a hellish year.

Now US distribution of the vaccine is being routinely described as “chaos”, with criticism that inept officials are “botching” efforts. More than 10,000 people died in the US in the last three days of 2020 alone, to bring the national death toll close to 350,000 so far, including the worst 24-hour toll of the whole pandemic when more than 3,700 people died last Wednesday, according to Johns Hopkins University data.

So vaccines are the big hope for fighting the outbreak. But experts are warning that hundreds of thousands more deaths are possible if the inoculation process doesn’t get quickly and solidly on track. “Basically, the federal government is botching the vaccine rollout,” said Ashish Jha, dean of Brown University’s school of public health. “They thought their job ends when the vaccine arrives in the states, and there’s really no well-delineated plan.”

He added: “What America is suffering through is the consequence of incompetence in federal leadership – the entire pandemic has been marred by a group of people, not just Donald Trump – who don’t understand how things work and can’t get something to work effectively.”

World Faces Covid-19 “Vaccine Apartheid”

Pfizer CEO Albert Bourla recently heaped praise on “the almost 44,000 people who selflessly raised their hands to participate in our trial.”

“Each of you has helped to bring the world one step closer to our shared goal of a potential vaccine to fight this devastating pandemic,” Bourla wrote in an open letter to volunteers who took part in Pfizer’s Covid-19 vaccine research, which was conducted in Argentina, South Africa, Brazil, Germany, and Turkey as well as the U.S. His letter was published on November 9, the same day Pfizer announced that the vaccine was more than 90 percent effective at preventing the disease, and Bourla laid this considerable accomplishment at the feet of the medical volunteers: “You are the true heroes, and the whole world owes you a tremendous debt of gratitude.”

But Argentina, South Africa, Brazil, and Turkey will have to be satisfied with Pfizer’s gratitude, because (like most countries in the world) they won’t be receiving enough of the vaccine to inoculate their populations, at least not anytime soon. ...

The deadly consequences of delayed access to the Covid-19 vaccine will be on display in the coming year. The number of people vaccinated worldwide in 2021 will depend partly on whether other potential vaccines candidates are successful and whether they’re delivered as one dose or two. But it’s already clear that the majority of countries will not have enough, while rich countries are hoarding vaccine supplies.

#ForceTheVote Pressuring Power & Strategizing.

ZERO Progressives Vote Against Pelosi Speakership

Mitch McConnell and Nancy Pelosi homes vandalised in Covid protests

The Senate Republican leader, Mitch McConnell, decried what he called a “radical tantrum” on Saturday after his home in Kentucky was vandalised with messages apparently protesting against his refusal to increase Covid aid payments from $600 to $2,000.

The attack followed a similar one on the home of Nancy Pelosi, the Democratic House speaker, in San Francisco. ...

According to local media reports, on Saturday morning the majority leader’s home in Louisville was spray-painted with slogans including “Weres [sic] my money?” and “Mitch kills the poor”. Police reported minor damage. It was not immediately known if McConnell and his wife, the transportation secretary, Elaine Chao, were home at the time.

In California, Pelosi’s home was graced by a pig’s head, red paint and messages including “cancel rent” and “We want everything”.

Saagar Enjeti: How To BEAT Ghouls Like McConnell And Win 2k Checks For All

As New Jobless Figures Show 'Massive Pain on the Eve of the New Year,' Dems Rip McConnell for Stonewalling $2,000 Relief Checks

As new figures showed 1.1 million new Americans filed for federal unemployment aid last week, Democratic lawmakers on Thursday took Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell to task for his refusal to swiftly pass a House-approved measure to issue $2,000 stimulus checks to struggling workers.

According to the latest U.S. Labor Department statistics (pdf), 787,000 Americans filed first-time jobless assistance claims during the week ending December 26, including seasonal adjustments. An additional 308,262 people applied for aid under the Pandemic Unemployment Assistance program, which provides assistance for people including so-called gig economy workers who don't qualify for government benefits. 

In stark contrast, 220,000 people filed (pdf) first-time unemployment claims during the same period last year. Ten months into the coronavirus pandemic, more than 19.5 million Americans are claiming some form of unemployment assistance in a year in which "for 41 weeks in a row the country has seen more new jobless claims than in any week before 2020," according to Rep. Don Beyer (D-Va.).

Despite the staggering scope of the pandemic-driven unemployment crisis, McConnell (R-Ky.) on Thursday continued to reject the $2,000 stimulus checks—which the House approved in a stand-alone bill on Monday—as "socialism for the rich." This followed remarks on Wednesday in which McConnell asserted that "the Senate is not going to be bullied into rushing out more borrowed money into the hands of Democrats' rich friends that don't need the help."

Iran steps up nuclear plans as tensions rise on anniversary of Suleimani’s killing

Iran has announced plans to enrich uranium up to 20% purity, just a step away from weapons-grade levels, as tensions with the US ratchet up during the final days of Donald Trump’s presidency.

The International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) confirmed it had been notified of Iran’s decision to increase enrichment at the Fordow facility, buried in a mountainside to protect it from military strikes, although Tehran did not say when the process would begin.

The weekend also marks the first anniversary of a US drone strike that killed top general Qassem Suleimani, with Washington apparently bracing for possible retaliation.

After the US stepped up military deployments and threatening language, Iran’s foreign minister, Javad Zarif, accused it on New Year’s Eve of trying to set up a “pretext for war”. In an apparent attempt at de-escalation the Pentagon has abruptly withdrawn the aircraft carrier Nimitz from the region, the New York Times reported.

Hedge Fund Alden, Accused of 'Bloodless Strip-Mining of American Newspapers,' Moves to Buy Tribune Publishing

Defenders of local newspapers expressed grave concern Thursday after Alden Global Capital—a hedge fund once dubbed "the face of bloodless strip-mining of American newspapers and their communities"—signaled it wants to have full ownership of Tribune Publishing.

"It's hard to imagine how this wouldn't be an apocalypse for local news," tweeted Wired editor Megan Greenwell.

News of the $520 million offer was first reported by the Wall Street Journal.

Chicago-based Tribune owns nine major newspapers including The Baltimore Sun, New York Daily News, and Chicago Tribune. Alden is already Tribune's largest shareholder, currently holding 31.6% of shares having acquired additional stakes in November—much to the outrage of newspaper unions.

Alden has "a media empire of roughly 200 newspapers nationwide," the New York Times noted, and is known, along with other hedge funds, for "wring[ing] profits from newspaper chains through austere management practices" including massive layoffs when taking over media entities.

The Save Maryland Newspapers website, an effort of the NewsGuild-CWA, is less muted in its criticism, describing Alden as "an unscrupulous hedge fund aimed at lining the pockets of a handful of investors at the expense of news, accountability, and the people of our community."

According to the Tribune:

Alden... made a nonbinding proposal on Dec. 14 to buy out other shareholders for $14.25 per share, according to a filing Thursday with the Securities and Exchange Commission. [...]

Launched in 2007, the hedge fund turned its focus to newspapers during the Great Recession, buying stakes in companies that had declared bankruptcy such as MediaNews, Philadelphia Media Network, and Journal Register.

"In June," CNN further noted, "Alden acquired a third seat on Tribune Publishing's board in exchange for a standstill agreement with the newspaper chain. The agreement prevents Alden from increasing its stake for the company until June 2021."

Alden's bid, the Tribune added, requires approval from the two-thirds of Tribune Publishing's shareholders, and that's something the Chicago Tribune Guild is hoping doesn't come.

"If you're a shareholder and you have any concern for the future of this institution or the common good," the union tweeted, "please don't sell to Alden Global Capital."

Krystal Ball: Can This Democratic Socialist BEAT The Clinton Machine In Virginia?

Youth Activists Ring In 2021 With Renewed Demand That World 'Wake Up to the Climate Crisis'

Youth activists around the world kicked off the new year Friday with a fresh round of #ClimateStrike actions and demands that 2021 be the year policymakers take sufficiently bold action to address the climate emergency.

Many of the pleas included the hashtag #ClimateStrikeOnline, as the coronavirus crisis has forced many "school strike for climate" events to be virtual.

"2021 must be the year that we finally wake up to the climate crisis," tweeted Sydney-based activist Patsy Islam-Parsons, noting that it was her 69th week of Fridays for Future actions.

"It must be the year we take real action instead of continuing to repeat meaningless words and empty promises," she wrote.

Greta Thunberg, who catalyzed the worldwide Fridays for Future movement, shared her signature Skolstrejk för Klimatet placard in a Friday tweet and said, "New year, same crisis."

The Swedish teen's message was mirrored in a tweet from Leah Namugerwa of Uganda, who wrote: "This is week 99 #schoolstrike4climate in Uganda. The struggle continues..."

Dominique Palmer, a climate justice activist and member of the U.K. Student Climate Network, put the sweeping changes needed to address the climate emergency in the context of the global efforts that emerged to contain the spread of Covid-19.

"This year has shown that urgent action in times of a crisis is possible, and now more than ever is the time to push for a green recovery," Palmer tweeted, pointing to a need for a system that "fundamentally restructures the economy for a habitable future."

In an op-ed published Thursday at the Guardian, Greenpeace U.K. executive director John Sauven also addressed the simultaneous crises. He wrote, in part:

[W]hile the pandemic was raging, so was the climate emergency, like two horror films overlapping. We saw record-breaking wildfires engulf the West Coast of the U.S., a record number of powerful Atlantic storms, the Arctic ice failing to freeze in late October, and deadly floods hitting countries from Italy to Indonesia. We got a glimpse of a chaotic world battered by multiple crises, each making the other worse, and it was terrifying.

Exceptional as the calamities of 2020 may seem, they could be just a taste of what's to come unless we change direction.

"It's clear," wrote Sauven, "that nothing short of a complete transformation of our economy and society can save us from climate breakdown." He continued:

This is why sliding back to the old normal is not an option. Unless we stop oil firms drilling for more oil, food giants destroying rainforests, and destructive fishing depleting our seas, the worst isn't over—it's just begun. Ending the pandemic is only half the job—we must also start something new and better. We must create new green jobs, invest in communities, and tackle the hardship faced by many at the same time. And 2021 is the year to do it.

That call for change was also captured in a New Year's Eve tweet from Thunberg. 

"May 2021 be the year of awakening and real bold change," wrote Thunberg. "And let's all continue the never-ending fight for the living planet."

Also of Interest

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

UK Judge to Give Decision on Assange Extradition on Monday

The Kafkaesque Imprisonment of Julian Assange Exposes U.S. Myths About Freedom and Tyranny

ASSANGE EXTRADITION: Legal Teams Likely Informed Already of Judge’s Decision

Amid Warnings of Surging Worldwide Poverty, Planet's 500 Richest People Added $1.8 Trillion to Combined Wealth in 2020

'Raises From Coast to Coast in 2021': New Year, Higher Minimum Wages in 24 States and 50 Municipalities Thanks to Fight for $15

Biden Cabinet Picks Blinken and Yellen Each Made Over $1 Million From Corporate Clients and Speeches

The Top 10 Weather and Climate Events of a Record-Setting Year

Gerry Marsden, frontman of Gerry and the Pacemakers, dies aged 78

Nils Melzer on Assange

Jimmy Dore: DSA Deny Their Own Manifesto Of Advocating #ForceTheVote

A Little Night Music

William Brown - Mississippi Blues

Willie Brown - Ragged And Dirty

Willie Brown - Future Blues

Charlie Patton & Willie Brown - Dry Well Blues

Kid Bailey (Willie Brown?) - Mississippi Bottom Blues

Kid Bailey (Willie Brown?) - Rowdy Blues

William Brown, Willie Blackwell - Four O' Clock Flower Blues

Willie Brown - Make Me A Pallet On The Floor

Stefan Grossman - Mississippi Blues